I don't remember whether it was Megan or me who first latched on to this song, but whichever of us it was couldn't have been more right.* Kupek is Brian Lee O'Malley's musical alias, and if you've ever read Scott Pilgrim then you should have some idea of the awesomeness you're in for. The song's incredibly catchy, even in this ridiculously lo-fi form, and that's Point One in its favor. It borrows lyric snippets from Jets to Brazil and Jay-Z and a bunch of others without ever seeming even slightly derivative, and that's Point Two. It's clever, and that's Point Three - as O'Malley says, "She 'practically' rocks because she rocks other than the fact that she stopped liking me." Which, I dunno, maybe you don't think that's clever, but I do.
And it pulls a sort of switch on you, unexpectedly, which I totally love but have a hard time putting into words - it's just done that elegantly! Throughout a lot of the song, there's this chant (one of the 'swiped' bits): "Get your damn hands up," he says, talking to the girl who stopped liking him. It seems a little odd at first, I guess. But at the end, it clicks into place in a so-simple-it's-perfect bit of backwards logic: "Why don't you throw your hands in the air/ And wave them around like you just don't care." She just doesn't care, so she should get her damn hands up. It's a beautiful thing, that line, when it makes you realize that the weirdness of that chant has suddenly turned into something utterly poignant.
It's great! I've sucked all the magic and charm out of it, I realize, so you'll just have to trust me on this. But damn, is it great.
Download: Kupek - You Practically Rock
More stuff available at O'Malley's site. It's worth it, I promise: Kupek Music
So as some of you may know and some of you may not, I went to the Pitchfork Fest in Chicago. Yeah, I know, blah blah blah pfork sux, whatever. They had a great lineup, so shut yo mouth! I spent the two days hanging out with my now-girlfriend and her kid sister.** And it was hot as hell, but worth it, and the best performance there (Megan and I are in agreement on this) was by Jens Lekman. He did "You Are the Light" and "Black Cab" and "A Sweet Summer Night on Hammer Hill" and all, but there was one song - one song he did - that blew me away. It was fucking amazing, absolutely showstopping. And it had never been released. Brand new, only played a handful of times. I spent most of the rest of last summer looking for it, finally located a crappy, very muddy sounding live version, and figured that was the best I'd get.
Not so! Because just recently, I stumbled onto a much better quality version of the song. It's from a show Jens did in New York while he was in the US for the Pitchfork fest. When he played it for us there, it was half-spoken, half-sung; the spoken parts are a bit different and shorter than I remember, but they still work incredibly well. But enough background; here's why this song kills me every time.
The song starts with Jens explaining that he went to Berlin to visit his longtime penpal Nina, who takes him to her parents' apartment for dinner. On the doorstep, she tells him, "I'm so sorry I haven't told you this, but I've told my family that we're engaged."
And the singing starts: "Nina, I can't be your boyfriend/ So you can stay with your girlfriend/ Your father is a sweet old man/ But it's hard for him to understand/ That you want to love a woman."
If that hasn't sold you on the song, I'm unsure as to whether you have a soul, but I've got more to say (as usual). More, as in, why I love the song so much. Yeah, it's funny, it's clever, it's what you'd expect if you'd heard stuff by Jens before. But at the end, it turns on you. (This is why it's in a post with "You Practically Rock," incidentally.) All of a sudden, after making you giggle or laugh throughout the song, after detailing all the awkward moments and bizarre details of this (true) encounter with Nina's parents, Jens sings, "Nina I just want to check in/ Cause I think about you every second/ So I send you this postcard just to say/ Don’t let anyone stand in your way/ Yours truly, Jens Lekman.” And the song ends with a climactic buildup around the line, "Don't let anyone stand in your way." And you're suddenly pulled in, emotionally invested in the trouble Nina's been facing over coming out to her dad - after spending the song laughing at its ridiculousness. Bam! Jens gets you. It's a marvelous reversal of mood/tone, and I can't think of anyone else who's pulled off something so dramatic, so drastic.
This song haunted me for almost a year, it was so good. I'm not sure Megan was quite as impressed, but I've always known she couldn't be completely perfect, so I let it go. I'm sure you'll love it though: if you listen to no other music today, listen to this.
Download: Jens Lekman - A Postcard to Nina (Live at the Bugjar)
*Regardless, the fact that she likes the song perhaps even more than I do is just further proof of what a great girlfriend she is.
**She isn't really a kid, but I like that phrase too much to pass up an opportunity to use it.
Kupek - You Practically Rock &
Jens Lekman - A Postcard to Nina
The Replacements - The Ledge
So, I won't pretend this is anything new, it's just a little something that I put together.
While waiting for a phone call last night, i picked up 33 1/3's "Greatest Hits" book and started reading Colin Moloy's capsule sized essay on the Replacement's Let It Be. On their music video for "The Ledge" he says, "Shot in stark, uncompromising back-and-white, the video was comprised of one shot: the various shoed feet of each of the Replacements, while the band members to whom they belonged sat on a couch. For a song that was obviously about teenage suicide, it was a pretty bizarre approach to video making... 'Even though we've signed to a major label,' the Replacements' video said, 'we still don't give a shit.'"
Moloy has the details of the video wrong (although his memory of it is, perhaps, more interesting), still what actually comprises the video is just as disaffected and understated as he describes it.
The Decemberists themselves having recently released a somewhat compromised major label debut, I thought it fitting to remember a band that (for an, albeit brief period of time) refused to compromise their view of music and the various medias that accompanied it.
Shot in stark black-and-white, the video shows the various band members on or around a few couches in an otherwise empty room. Close ups of their faces reveal looks of near pain, but you can tell it's not the emotion that the song expresses, it's that they're bored. That seems to be the feeling that video puts across the most. It wasn't that The Replacements weren't willing to put forth a flashy video because it didn't mesh with their lo-fi outlook on music, it was that even the most minimal music video was a waste of their time.
It's somewhat disheartening to see a band so unenthused, but, I must say, I find that I prefer this approach to what comes out of the heavily compromised underground these days.
Back to business, then:
The Arcade Fire - Black Mirror &
2007's best video
So, here we are in a new year, and Knuckle Up is kicking things off for you all in grand old fashion - as usual, of course.
The Arcade Fire - maybe you've heard of 'em, right? - just announced the first single off their upcoming album, Neon Bible. It's called "Black Mirror," it's so fresh I've barely heard it myself, and it's right here.
And it wouldn't be 2007 without a reference to YouTube, which every newspaper/magazine/TV show in the world assures us conquered/altered everything in 2006. Former Pulp frontman Jarvis Cocker had a new album out in 2006, and one of the songs on it was one he wrote for Nancy Sinatra's album earlier in the year. The song's "Don't Let Him Waste Your Time," the version Jarvis sings is miles beyond Nancy's (not that she's untalented, necessarily), and the video has to be seen to be believed.
Download: The Arcade Fire - Black Mirror
Watch: Jarvis Cocker - Don't Let Him Waste Your Time
