Alphabet Soup Week 23: Artists Filed Under L
A 1960's "psychedelic cowboy" crooner; an amazing but underappreciated 1980s new wave duo; a pair of genre-juggling acts that straddled the turn of the 21st century. All that and more this week!
Welcome to Week 23 of Alphabet Soup, the weekly playlist series comprising tracks that used to be in my CD collection until about a decade ago when we ripped everything to mp3 and began the inexorable journey from physical media into the world of streaming. If you’re one of the new subscribers who signed up since last week, thanks for joining, and welcome! And thanks, as always, to those of you that have been here for a while, it’s great to have you along for the ride!
Over the last few weeks, I’ve found myself struggling to draft a meaningful intro for each week’s column. With the road to retirement rapidly unfurling before me, and with our downsizing efforts in full swing (we need to be out of the house and into the Airbnb a week from Saturday), there’s an awful lot going on in my life right now. In addition, my intermittent depression has also made an appearance just when I needed it most /end sarcasm/ which makes it that much harder to do anything, even (and sometimes especially) those things that I’d normally enjoy. As such, I’ve been finding myself a little short on both time and motivation. But I’m hanging in there. And this too shall pass!!
Over the next month I expect there to be slight changes to both the form and format of this series. From early July through mid-November, my wife and I will be out on a trail somewhere (on the UK’s South West Coast Path through September and on Italy’s Via Francigena through November). My hope is that being retired full time and spending my days immersed in the natural world will provide a fertile headspace for more inspirational intros and a change in emotional tone from recent weeks. We shall see. Additionally, in the interest of reducing the time I spend writing each week, I’ve decided to make a change to the back end of the column once we hit the trail on July 2. I’ll be retiring the “Life in the key of” closing section and replacing it with a series of photos from the prior week on the trail.
ALPHABET SOUP WEEK 23: Artists Filed Under L
This week’s selections:
ARTIST: Lee Hazlewood
TRACK: "My Autumn's Done Come" from These Boots Are Made For Walkin' (2002)
I first heard Lee Hazlewood’s My Autumn’s Done Come, from his third album, 1966’s The Very Special World of Lee Hazlewood, on Air’s 2006 installation of the compilation series Late Night Tales, my favorite disc in the series. As I did with Scott Walker, who also appeared on the same collection, I went on a voyage of discovery into Hazlewood’s back catalog and eventually acquired These Boots Are Made For Walkin’ (The Complete MGM Recordings) released by Ace Records in 2002.
While Hazlewood isn’t for everyone, I’m a fan of his deep baritone voice, his laconic delivery, and the enigmatic and often fantastical lyrics laid over the top of a very particular, of its era, orchestrally-anchored music branded as “cowboy psychedelia” by The Guardian.
ARTIST: The Lowest Of The Low
TRACK: "7th Birthday" from Hallucigenia (1994)
Trigger warning: the discussion of this song includes themes of molestation and incest.
This is a disturbing song.
I heard this track for the first time when it was included on a mixtape made by a friend of mine in the spring of 1994. I clearly wasn’t paying much attention the first few times I listened to the song. I remember appreciating the clarity of the guitar picking in the intro, the chorus of “happy birthday, happy birthday, happy birthday fun” and the swell of reverb-soaked guitar leading into the second half of the song following the vocal bridge in the form of the repeated “you are so beautiful, you are so beautiful . . .”
But it wasn’t long before the horror of the lyrics caught my ear, with the opening line “your eyes are like your mother’s but your body’s like your brother’s / and I can touch you there / don’t worry daddy’s here / and our blood is the same / and this is just a game / that only we can play / when everyone’s gone away”. Suddenly I heard the second half of the chorus: the “happy birthday, happy birthday, happy birthday fun” is followed by the directive “but don’t tell anyone”.
Despite the subject matter, I have to admit that I love this song as I find it an incredibly thought-provoking and challenging piece of art. The up-tempo music and the seemingly positive lyrical snippets (the “happy birthdays” and the repeated “you are so beautiful”) juxtaposed against the graphic and disturbing incest theme generates a sense of dissonance that demands my full presence while listening. This track could never possibly be consigned to the category of background music for me.
ARTIST: Limp Bizkit
TRACK: "Behind Blue Eyes" from Results May Vary (2003)
In what might be deemed an affront to fans of The Who, but quite simply represents my lack of knowledge of the band’s catalog, I’d never heard Behind Blue Eyes until hearing this cover by Limp Bizkit. The song appeared on the band’s fourth studio album, 2003’s Results May Vary, and was played during the closing credits of the film Gothika (although it didn’t appear on the soundtrack). To me, from a vocal perspective, at least for the first half of the song, the cover remains faithful to the original. Readers of Rolling Stone magazine in 2011 were not impressed however, naming it the second-worst cover song of all time (a little harsh, no?!?) behind Miley Cyrus’ rendition of Nirvana’s Smells Like Teen Spirit.
As you make your way through this week’s playlist, I’d love to hear your thoughts. Do any of these tracks really stand out for you? What do you like? What don’t you like?
Please click the button below to leave a comment.
ARTIST: Live
TRACK: "Lightning Crashes" from Throwing Copper (1994)
Live was one of the many exciting new-to-me bands I found myself exposed to in the mid-90s by the pay-per-play music video channel The Box. Although the band had been performing together under a variety of names since 1984, releasing The Death of a Dictionary as Public Affection in 1989 and Mental Jewelry as Live in 1991, it was their third album, 1994’s Throwing Copper, that delivered mainstream success.
I stuck with the band for their next album, 1997’s Secret Samadhi, but ultimately lost interest and stopped following their music. The band would go on to release a further four albums after Secret Samadhi before disbanding in 2009. A short-lived reunion, representing a reconstituted version of the band with a new lead singer, resulted in the band’s final album, The Turn in 2014. Original lead singer Ed Kowalczyk would later rejoin the band for their final release, the 2018 EP Local 717.
ARTIST: Love Spit Love
TRACK: "Well Well Well" from Trysome Eatone (1997)
Love Spit Love, formed by Richard Butler during The Psychedelic Furs’ extended hiatus in the early 90s, released two albums, the second of which found its way into my CD library after Fall On Tears from Trysome Eatone appeared on the November 1997 CMJ New Music Monthly CD sampler.
Reviewing the album for AllMusic, Stephen Thomas Erlewhine wrote that the album “update[s] the Furs sound with a sharp, clever production and the occasional electronic or alternative flourish. It evokes the '80s without slavishly recreating the sound, but Trysome Eatone manages to be more than a guilty pleasure for longtime Furs fans because of Butler's solid craftmanship. Many of the album's songs are well-written and memorable, resulting in a record that represents a return to form for one of the early '80s' most distinctive artists.”
While the album never made it into heavy rotation in our house, it was nonetheless an enjoyable listen with a handful of fantastic songs, my favorite of which is Well Well Well.
ARTIST: The Lover Speaks
TRACK: "This Can't Go On!" from The Lover Speaks (1986)
[NOT ON SPOTIFY]
This Can’t Go On! from The Lover Speaks 1986 self-titled debut is the second appearance from the band in Alphabet Soup after Face Me and Smile, from the same album, appeared in Week 12. The Lover Speaks, the album, is one of my Desert Island Discs from a band that unfortunately failed to meet the expectations of their record label A&M and sadly never achieved mainstream success. Despite being produced by Jimmy Iovine, and including contributions from Dave Stewart and Nils Lofgren, the album was a commercial failure.
A&M declined to release the follow up The Big Lie (with production by Iovine, Stewart, and Daniel Lanois) although it was later released as a limited promotional factory-pressed CD. One day I hope to get my hands on the album, which has a median price on Discogs of $97.50. Three of the tracks, all of which are fantastic, are currently available on YouTube (Thunder No One Else Can Hear, The Big Lie, Vespers).
ARTIST: Leslie Spit Treeo
TRACK: "UFO (Catch the Highway)" from Don't Cry Too Hard (1990)
The Ontario-based Canadian folk-rock band Leslie Spit Treeo made their first appearance in Alphabet Soup way back in the double feature installment that kicked the series off on January 12. While not released as a single, UFO (Catch the Highway) garnered significant airplay on Canada’s MuchMusic video channel and their debut album, 1990’s Don’t Cry Too Hard, was one of my favorite musical discoveries during my sophomore year in Halifax. The success of the album earned the band a 1991 Juno award for Most Promising Group. The band would release a further three albums before disbanding after 1996’s Chocolate Chip Cookies.
ARTIST: Louis XIV
TRACK: "Finding Out True Love Is Blind" from Illegal Tender (2005)
Louis XIV was a short-lived band that released a handful of EPs and albums between 2003 and 2008. I’d hardly call myself a fan of the band as I don’t like much of their music and only ever owned one EP, 2005’s Illegal Tender, but something about this track really tickles my musical fancy. Despite hailing from San Diego, they always sounded like a British group to me, possibly because that’s where they found the most success. In 2004 the band appeared on Jonathan Ross’s show a week after Oasis and later performed on BBC One Radio. They were named “the best band of the festival” following 2005’s T in the Park festival in Scotland. Favorable reviews in NME and Rolling Stone, and being regularly name checked by David Bowie as one of his favorite new bands, never translated into mainstream success and the band broke up in 2009.
ARTIST: Lo Fidelity Allstars
TRACK: "Battleflag (featuring Pigeonhed)" from How to Operate with a Blown Mind (1998)
Looking back now, the late 90s and early 2000s were such an incredible time in music for my tastes. So much of what was happening involved some sort of experimentation with the fusing of musical genres, both within the broad “electronica” church and in the expansive and ever-expanding “alternative rock” universe. While not the first example of this genre-juggling style, 1998’s How to Operate with a Blown Mind, the debut album of English electronic group Lo Fidelity Allstars, was an absolute banger of an album.
Reviewing the album for Entertainment Weekly (of all places!), David Browne opines that “the Lo-Fidelity Allstars answer the question: What would happen if a barking, beat-inspired Goth fronted a shambling electronica band that dabbled in everything from drum-and-bass to hectic break beats?” and goes on to say that the album “heralds a new wave of rock bands who aren’t rock bands, who envision a future in which forms old and new meld into each other. (It’s revealing that the Allstars include a DJ sampler but not a guitarist.)”
While the album as a whole hasn’t stood the test of time for me, this track remains one of my favorites of that Chemical Brothers, Prodigy, Fatboy Slim big beat era.
ARTIST: Linkin Park
TRACK: "In The End" from Hybrid Theory (2000)
From fusion in the electronic music world to the melding of heavy metal with elements of hip hop, funk, industrial and grunge that characterized the oft-maligned (unfairly in my opinion) genre of nu metal. While Korn, Limp Bizkit and Staind represented some of the early successes of the new genre, it was Linkin Park that cemented nu metal’s popularity with their 2000 debut album Hybrid Theory. The album sold 50,000 copies in its first week, was certified gold within five weeks, and would eventually achieve 12x platinum certification in the US and sell over 30 million albums globally.
In The End, the fourth and final single from the album, peaked at number 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and was a top 10 single in over a dozen countries.
Life in the key of L: Love
I won’t pretend to be any sort of Kahlil Gibran scholar but from what I know of his work, I find his writing to be powerful and affecting. The above passage, taken from The Prophet, provides important advice on individuality and interdependence within the context of love.
My early experiences of what I believed to be love (in hindsight, I never knew true love until meeting my wife), were very much akin to an unhealthy dependence, an addiction if you will. That “love as addiction” is, for many recovering addicts, a hallmark of early sobriety.
Between the ages of 15 and 23, my reliance on alcohol and drugs as crutches to navigate life progressed to a daily compulsion to numb myself to everything that life offered, to completely blot out the tedium of existence. I’d later come to learn that one of the consequences of my behavior during this period was a significant retardation of my emotional growth. Shortly after getting clean and sober in 1994, I entered therapy as a 23 year old man-child with the emotional maturity of a teenager.
Very early on, at one of my recovery meetings, one of the participants shared the following with a wry grin, “There’s good news and bad news when you get sober. The good news is that you start to feel. The bad news? You start to feel!” Just about everyone in the room laughed; I sat there, silent and trembling, filled with a growing horror at the truth of this statement. I had already begun finding myself overwhelmed by these alien emotions, characterized by a terrifying and disorienting inability to understand and process just about everything I was feeling.
I’d later see this feeling of sensory overload depicted in the classroom scene of the 2013 movie Man of Steel. In the scene, a young Clark Kent becomes overwhelmed by the world as experienced through his super powers, prior to him developing the ability to filter his heightened perceptions. After Clark locks himself in a utility closet his mother Martha is called to the school. Through the door she asks, “how can I help you if you won’t let me in?” to which Clark replies, “the world’s too big Mom!”. Her simple yet incredibly insightful response, “then make it small” was the very definition of my first couple years of sobriety.
Slowly but surely, through group and individual therapy, I began to learn how to identify and process feelings. Over time, I found myself less frequently going from zero to rage. I came to recognize some of the individual strands of the complex emotional tapestry that an authentically lived life is capable of producing. And my emotional maturity began to catch up with my intellectual maturity in many areas. One aspect of my life that displayed a dogged resistance to any sort of progression was in the realm of relationships and emotional attachment.
When I fell for someone, which happened far more frequently than was appropriate for a man in his mid-20s, it was an uncontrolled descent, one with little to no boundaries on my part. I felt everything. And I gave everything. I lost both myself and my sense of self in these early relationships. And I crashed and burned, only to pull myself from the smoldering wreckage with nary a lesson learned. But over time, and with some intensive love and relationship therapy from an absolute angel, I came to understand the importance of boundaries. The importance of establishing them. And the importance of sticking to them. I came to learn that I could bring all of myself to a relationship, fully and authentically, but that I didn’t need to gift wrap my heart and my soul and hand them over.
My desire to love, and to be loved, appropriately, born of pain and burnished by experience, was integral to the intentional development of my relationship with my wife. While our whirlwind romance was punctuated at times by a seemingly overwhelming passion, I maintained my boundaries and I refused to sacrifice myself to the relationship. We both gave and we both took, but we both held on to ourselves and we came into our love as equals.
After close to 25 years of marriage, we remain deeply in love, sustained and fulfilled by our commitment to each other. But we have not surrendered ourselves to each other. We are a couple, yet we are also individuals, retaining both independent and joint interests. We support each other and we participate in each other’s lives but we also live our own lives. To me, this balance between intimacy and independence in love is the essence of Gibran’s poem, the idea that we are not so bound to each other that we can’t grow in different directions while still growing together.
If you’re still here, thanks for sticking with me for another installment, I truly appreciate it, and I don’t take your time for granted. I hope something in the music or the writing, or perhaps even both, resonated with you. If so, please let me know in the comments.
Until next time, peace and love.
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Here’s the link to the running playlist which is updated on a weekly basis as each new installment is published:
ALPHABET SOUP RUNNING PLAYLIST
Tracks missing from the Spotify playlist:
Allegory by Murray Attaway (Week 02)
Face Me and Smile by The Lover Speaks (Week 12)
From Your Mouth by God Lives Underwater (Week 13)
This Can’t Go On! by The Lover Speaks (Week 23)
Thank you for reading Joy in the Journey, I appreciate you being here! If there’s someone in your life you think may enjoy this post, feel free to share it.
Very wise words about love. I celebrate the solid and healthy relationship your wife and you have built. My husband and I have built ours on a very similar foundation: we have a similar outlook on life, complement each other’s differences, share a common horizon, but respect each other’s individualities.
When I was 16 or 17, I found a copy of The Prophet in our bookcase and was intrigued by the ghostly face on the cover and opened it up. I was fascinated by the breadth & calmness of his words, their beauty, and power. When I moved out, I asked my mom if I could take it with me. It is a book I have returned to repeatedly, and its wise words always remind me of what is truly important.