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I’ve also excised portions from my original post to make amends.
Thanks for reading, Alex
In the past couple of months, I've had this weird, recurring thing with John Lurie. I think it started back in September, when I tracked down the Criterion Collection edition of "Stranger Than Paradise," the viewing of which rekindled my curiosity about the man's legacy in the pantheon of New York City musicians. I knew he'd formed the so-called "fake jazz" ensemble Lounge Lizards during the nuclear winter of No Wave in the late `70s/early 80's (featuring Anton Fier of the Feelies on drums, Arto Lindsay of DNA on guitar, his brother Evan on keyboards and a gent named Steve Piccolo on bass), but what I credibly know about jazz -- fake or otherwise -- isn't much. I did know that Lurie seemed like an incredibly cool cat, and I enjoyed the snippets of music I'd heard by him in various films. I'd always loved the lulling "Bob the Bob," although that particular piece, as it turned out, was recorded by a completely different line-up from the afore-cited incarnation of the band.
In any case, after that, I started searching again with half-an-eye for that debut Lounge Lizards disc. Again, while I'm normally not a big saxophone fan (maybe I'm just haunted by FEAR's scathing indictment of the instrument in its association with NYC), I felt it was music I should know about, given my fascination with all the fixtures around it.
In November, meanwhile, you may remember I sang the praises of the new photo blog I'd encountered called New York City 1990's: Photo Archives by Gregoire Allessandrini. If you've not checked it out, you really need to do so at once, as it's just an amazing trove of images from the era in question. But, while pouring over Gregoire's shots, I came across this excellent shot of posted flyers and bills on a wall in Hell's Kitchen, and sure enough -- there was Lurie's name once again. That's the shot in question at the top of this post, by the way. I hope Gregoire doesn't mind me using it.
Some time after that, I went down to Chinatown to check out the latest incarnation of Downtown Music Gallery. While there, I finally picked up a copy of the Lounge Lizards disc. I'm not entirely sure what I was expecting. Not being a big jazz guy, all I can say it that it has some great, compelling moments on it -- along with some moments that didn't really grab me. Suffice to say, there are a couple of numbers wherein the amount of dizzying noodlrey gets a bit out of hand, but ultimately that's just a rock-head talking about jazz. What do I know?
On a recent, aimless Christmas-shopping expedition, I dialed up on the album on my iPod as I was walking around SoHo and across Canal Street. I frequently do this -- call up certain music while walking around certain neighborhoods. I'll listen to Television or the Ramones when walking through the East Village. I'll fill my headphones with Murphy's Law or the Cro-Mags while walking by the site of the old Ritz. I'll blast Missing Foundation when traipsing through Tompkins Square Park. Invariably, while my subconscious intention may be to magically transport myself back in time, these endeavors rarely work. Too much has happened since those respective eras. As such, walking down Courtlandt Alley off Canal in the direction of 77 White Street (the former site of the Mudd Club) while listening to the Lounge Lizards might sound like a romantic notion, but it did nothing to magically conjure anything other than the confirmation that everything is different from how it once was ... a point that was already self-evident.
Anyway, while I enjoyed the chaotic elements of skronk n' honk on the debut Lounge Lizards disc (the combination of Lurie's horn with Lindsay's scratching, squealing guitar discord being an interesting dynamic), I think I was really hoping for something more along the more melodic lines of the afore-cited "Bob the Bob." I did a little research and learned that said track was originally released on the 1988 album, Voice of Chunk (a disc which featured Marc Ribot taking Arto Lindsay's place on guitar and bass duties handled by future Skeleton Key mainman Erik Sanko). Clearly, this was the album I needed to go fetch.
As I might've guessed, however, the album is long out of print. "No problem," I thought, "This is New York City! I'm sure I can find it here somewhere." Quite often, I can be a naive chump who believes his own bullshit. This was one of those times.
Unable to find it at any of the paltry few likely spots left on the map, I decided that a trek back down into the maze of Chinatown to Downtown Music Gallery on Monroe Street was in order. So yesterday, that's what I did. They were sure to have it, I thought.
I was wrong, of course.
Whatever. I still wanted to track down that album. At this point, my best options were all on the Internet, but as I've whined before, I don't really enjoy that so much. Yes, I can actually prize Voice of Chunk for a tidy sum on eBay or seamlessly acquire its mp3s on iTunes, but fuck that! I want to buy the disc from an actual shop. Apparently, that's a tall order.
So, anyway, as I was lamenting all this this morning, imagine my surprise when my friend Tim Broun of Stupefaction fame posts this amazing clip of John Lurie himself, filmed as recently as this past November, speaking lucidly and affably about his days filming "Fishing with John." In it, the man sounds completely normal and is frankly hilarious.
I'm lifting part one from Tim, but check on his site tomorrow for Part Two.
Weird, though, right?
It's a chilly Sunday morning, and my wife and kids return from Houston, Tx. this evening. I've got a plateful of errands I need to do prior to their arrival, like getting a haircut, cleaning up the apartment and procuring a Christmas tree bag for the inevitable disposal of our aromatic tannenbaum, but I'm slow to get motivated this AM. To further procrastinate, I've exhumed this end-of-year survey from a couple of years back, being that today is the penultimate day of 2012. Let's dive in, shall we?
1. What did you do in 2012 that you'd never done before? - Hmm. This is a toughie, actually. I can't honestly think of something I did this year that I'd legitimately never done before ... apart from maybe catch a fluke whilst ocean-fishing off Hampton Bays. Lame, I know.
2. Did you keep your New Year's resolutions, and will you make more for next year? - I honestly don't remember if I made any last year, so no. This year, I'm vowing to go on a "cleanse" after the mass consumption of food and drink during the holiday season. We'll see how that manifests itself. I've also been toying with the resolution of sharply curtailing my Facebook activities. Haven't quite decided on that one as yet, though. I suppose I have another day to make my mind up about it.
3. Did anyone close to you give birth? - This is a silly question, as people generally do follow the biological imperative to procreate. I can't imagine anyone not knowing someone who gave birth. No one in my immediate family gave birth this year, but a few friends of mine certainly acquired new additions to their respective broods in 2012. 2013 promises to be no different in that capacity.
4. Did anyone close to you die? - Sadly, yes. The venerable Al Patterson passed away this fall. As one of my step-father's dearest friends, Mr. Patterson has been like an uncle to me since I was a child, and I had the sincere pleasure of living under the man's roof for several happy summers (in a group house in Quogue when I was a petulant teen). He was a truly classy, wise, funny and inspirational gent, and he is deeply missed.
5. What countries did you visit? - Apart from this one? Zero. There was a fleeting moment when we were planning a visit to the Caribbean, but Superstorm Sandy took a giant, runny dump on that notion.
6. What would you like to have in 2013 that you lacked in 2012? - Hmmm. I'm not wanting of a lot of specific material items. I mean, a larger apartment would be great. A faster, more up-to-date computer would be swell. More money with which to pay the various bills and tuitions. But we've been doing alright thus far, knock on wood.
7. What date from 2012 will remain etched upon your memory? - Monday, October 29, which was the evening our lights first went out due to Sandy.
8. What was your biggest achievement of the year? - I hate these questions. Nothing too major. I remained employed and tenuously sane. Those are both pretty substantial for me. I took greater pride in the accomplishments of my children, who've both continued to excel in school and are steadily turning into exemplary little critters, god bless'em.
9. What was your biggest failure? - Sheesh. Well, there was a patch during the earlier part of the year wherein I was being overwhelmed with my workload at the office, and I don't believe I executed all of my duties as well as I should've. I received a less-than-sterling review as a result. Said wrongs have largely since been righted, and I'm back on the good foot, but that indelible experience still haunts and stings. On a completely different front, I had to forego my guitar lessons, as I simply wasn't finding the time to practice. I feel bad about that and consider it a personal failure.
10. Did you suffer illness or injury? Nothing major that I can remember, although I had a couple of pre-cancerous moles zapped, as I'm now of the age where I have to worry about such things,
11. What was the best thing you bought? - I pretty much hate the fucking thing, but I bought my wife an iPad, and she and the kids get an awful lot of use out it.
12. Whose behavior merited celebration? - As much as I'm prone to bitch about how annoying they can frequently be, when I see how poorly behaved most other children are compared to mine, I become grateful and awestruck at my own little offspring.
13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed? - My fellow Americans of the right-leaning, gun-toting variety.
14. Where did most of your money go? - School tuition and apartment maintenance.
15. What did you get really, really excited about? - Being that I was never athletically-inclined as a kid, I was surprised to find myself really getting into my son's foray into soccer, and genuinely enjoyed cheering him on every Sunday from the sidelines. That, and the news SWANS album.
16. What song will always remind you of 2012? - I don't think the year is summed up by a single song, but probably one of these.
17. Compared to this time last year, are you happier or sadder? Both this year and last year were pretty tough for different reasons, but I think I was sadder last year.
18. Thinner or fatter? Oh, entirely fatter.
19. Richer or poorer? About the same, I'd wager.
20. What do you wish you'd done more of? Laughing with my children and family.
21. What do you wish you'd done less of? Wasting time online, getting riled-up and testy by ultimately insignificant shit.
22. How did you spend Christmas? With my in-laws down in Texas.
23. Who did you spend the most time on the phone with? No idea. This is a dumb question.
24. Did you fall in love in 2012? I've been solidly in love with my wonderful wife since I first met her in 1998. No change there. Every day that I spend with her is an absolute gift.
25. How many one night stands in this last year? Well, see the last response. No one night stands for me.
26. What was your favorite TV program? We watched a lot more TV this year, I have to say. We got really into "Homeland," "Girls," "Sherlock Holmes" (with Benedict Cumberbatch), "Downton Abbey," "The Hour," "The Newsroom" and, of course, "Mad Men" (although my wife is kinda cooling on that one). And I continue to enjoy "That Metal Show." I'm sure I'm forgetting something.
27. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year? On a personal level? No, but several public figures earned my eternal scorn for their respective reactions to the Sandy Hook tragedy. Basically, anyone who still feverishly clings to the Second Amendment or blames that event on anything other than fucking guns.
28. What was the best book you read? I really, really enjoyed Dean Wareham's (Galaxie 500/Luna) memoir, "Black Postcards."
29. What was your greatest musical discovery? I can't say I discovered them, but my colleague Drew turned me onto this new band, Savages, who are fucking great.
30. What did you want and get? A really nice new leather jacket (yeah, I know -- Hello, Midlife Crisis!)
31. What did you want and not get? Like Sinead O'Connor used to say, I do not want what I have not got. I mean, there are always a couple of rare or out-of-print CD's and DVD's that I've, thus far, been unable to put my hand to -- stuff like Voice of Chunk by the Lounge Lizards -- but, frankly, it's kinda fun having those Holy Grail-like items to search for.
32. What were your favorite films of this year? I still don't get out to the movies that much, but I did see "West of Memphis," the updated documentary about the West Memphis Three, which was excellent and compelling.
33. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you? We had some friends over and had a nice dinner, and I turned an appalling 45 years old.
34. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying? Swift and decisive gun-control legislation in the wake of the Sandy Hook tragedy.
35. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2012? The valiant-if-futile struggle to sartorially fuse age, dignity and stubborn post-punk swagger into ensembles that are simultaneously flattering and slimming.
36. What kept you sane? Peggy, Charlotte and Oliver
37. What celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? She's invariably dumb as a bag of rocks, but Alec Baldwin's wife Hilaria is smokin' hot.
38. What political issue stirred you the most? Gun control. No private citizen needs an assault weapon, full stop.
39. Who did you miss? I don't get to see many of my friends as often as I'd like, so them.
40. Who was the best new person you met? Several cool, brilliant colleagues.
41. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2012 - Gadgets won't help you when the waters rise and the power goes out.
42. Song lyric that sums up 2012:
It's not my favorite track on the album, but from Killing Joke's MMXII, this rang especially true...
Cities on blackout
Satellites are knocked out
iPhone and laptops, one big belly flop
Servers, TV, alarms and security
-- everything's gone in seconds
I'd first heard about David Markey's "My Career as Jerk" via Facebook. If you're not familiar with the guy, Markey is the director responsible for such crucial flicks as the Black Flag documentary, "Reality 86'd" (restored to YouTube here) and "Desperate Teenage Lovedolls." He's also responsible for a little movie called "1991: The Year that Punk Broke" (the titular irony lost on many), which covered Sonic Youth's emergence from the underground with a fledgling Nirvana in tow. I must shockingly confess to never having seen that film (apologies, Mr. Markey, but it's only recently become available on DVD). By the same token, as much I have a lot of love for Sonic Youth, I'm kinda sick to death of the deification of Nirvana.
Anyway, when I heard he was working on a documentary about the Circle Jerks -- one of my former "favorite all-time bands" -- I practically started frothing at the mouth. At last, someone was finally paying attention to what I consider to be one of the greatest bands of the hardcore era. I realize that assertion doesn't put me out on too many limbs, but in the rapturous rush to praise (entirely worthy) bands like Black Flag, Minor Threat and Bad Brains, it strikes me that the Circle Jerks frequently get overlooked.
I've talked about my indoctrination into the faith of the Circle Jerks a couple of times here already, so I won't bore you with all that again, but suffice to say when my friend Brad O'Sullivan played me their amazingly fast, visceral music for the first time, it practically blew a new part in my hair and made the Generation X and Adam & the Antz records I was otherwise listening to at the time sound flaccid by comparison. Practically overnight, I was scrawling the Circle Jerks logo on school blackboards, textbooks and backpacks like a zealot (which didn't exactly endear me to the uninitiated, who were legion). Outside of a tiny gaggle of my friends, nobody seemed to know -- much less care -- about the Circle Jerks, whereas I thought they were practically *gods*.
In any case, Markey's film dives right in, tracing the backstory of the band via first person accounts by Keith Morris, Lucky Lehrer, Greg Hetson and a fistful of other SoCal hardcore scenesters of the era. As documentaries go, it's pretty straightforward, but in terms of subject matter, it's so refreshing to see the story of this band treated with respect, reverence and an observance to detail. Even the band's gradually less crucial years are covered with a thorough eye. If, like me, you too were a geeky teenage weirdo obsessed hardcore, you really owe it to yourself to see this movie.
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Not too long after I'd first discovered the Circle Jerks, I started reading the name of this Minnesota band called the Replacements who were vaguely trading in the same circles. But it wasn't until the 1984 release of Let It Be, their third proper LP (well, technically, fourth if you count Stink), that I seriously investigated them. Inspired by Let It Be's now-iconic cover (a simple photograph of the gents in the band -- all denim, Chuck Taylors and unwashed hair -- hanging out on a rooftop), I picked up the LP (records were still cheap enough to do that in 1984). That might sound like a crazy reason to buy a record, but it had worked before; that same year, I picked up Ride the Lightning by Metallica based solely on the fact that the on the back cover, guitarist Kirk Hammett was wearing a Discharge t-shirt. Both Ride the Lightning and Let It Be swiftly became (and remain) two of my favorite albums of all time, albeit for very different reasons.
Blah blah blah...like droves of other hardcore heads, rock dorks, record store geeks and indie hipsters-in-training, I too fell head over heels in love with Let It Be. It ended up being strikingly different (endearingly so) from the narrow, slovenly hardcore I'd been expecting (although "We're Comin' Out" covered that department in spades). The Replacements were entirely more versatile, adventurous, ambitious and, frankly, IMPORTANT than any hardcore band. They weren't making music for any particular scene. They made music for themselves. That fact that anyone else outside the band liked it or not was incidental, which is probably why all their records (even the weaker, later ones) still hold up today.
Fervor for the Replacements is significantly more widespread, so when I first heard that they were making a documentary about the band, I wasn't at all surprised in the manner I'd been upon hearing about the Circle Jerks movie. Gorman Bechard's "Color Me Obsessed," however, is an entirely different type of film than "My Career as a Jerk." For a start, the surviving members of the Replacements themselves do not appear in the film outside of a (surprisingly) few, fleeting photographs. There is no concert footage. Not a single song by the band is featured in the movie. Not one.
Instead, the film is more like a lengthy oral history as recounted by friends, fans, writers, hangers-on and more windy rock critics than you can shake a middle-finger at, each of them lovingly unspooling yarn upon yarn about the band's fabled exploits, their remarkable music, their stinging (under)achievements and their enduring legacy. I suppose I respect Bechard's strict adherence to the concept and structure of the film, but even halfway into it, I felt pangs of unsatisfaction (see what I did there?). My thirst for palpable nourishment went entirely unslaked. While I do harbor respect for cats like Robert Christgau, Jim Derogatis, the disarmingly frail looking Grant Hart and that beardy dude from Titus Adronicus, I was expecting something a little more than their rose-tinted ruminations. While I'm glad I saw it, I didn't really come away from "Color Me Obsessed" feeling like I'd learned anything new about the band. If I wanted to hear people wax rhapsodic about how great the Replacements were, I can call up any number of friends of mine.
Adding insult to injury, I probably should have saved my money and not bought "Color Me Obsessed," as the entire film is on YouTube. Watch it here:
Hey all. I hope everyone's holidays went swimmingly. I flew back into NYC on Thursday night, leaving my wife and kids back in Texas at my in-laws' place until they return on Sunday. But, I had to work on Friday, so that was that.
Last night, after getting home from work to discover an empty fridge, I stepped back out into the cold to try to russle up something to eat and maybe score a DVD to watch (yes, my fixation with the tactile artifact extends beyond music and into film appreciation as well). As such, I found myself strolling East toward Kim's on 1st Avenue, when I suddenly looked up and spied what looked like a perfectly full and piercingly brilliant moon over East 9th Street.
Glad to be back. More stuff to come.
As I've been keen to point out in the past, I grew up here in Manhattan. As such, I routinely biked around the island during eras when the mere notion of a bike lane was considered uproariously laughable. One had to respect one's place in the perilous food chain of the city street, where cars, cabs and buses confidently ruled.
Apart from once clumsily breaking my thumb in my teens, I was very lucky on my bicycle in NYC (and my thumb injury happened only about a half-a-yard away from my front door, and sadly did not involve any dazzling display of BMX ability). I continued riding my bike in the city into my adult years, albeit with decreasing frequency. I never used my bike as a practical means of transportation (like commuting to and from work). When I was on my bike, it was purely for the purposes of leisure and, as a secondary by-product, exercise. It was fun, pure and simple, and one of the best ways to explore the city.
Strangely enough, since the advent of the hotly-contest bike lanes, I've witnessed a striking uptick in bike accidents and bike-related agita. This year, after spying both a guy hit the deck head-fist (without a helmet) on West 23rd street after tussling with a cab and witnessing a disarming display of bicyclist-vs.-pedestrian fisticuffs on East 14th street, I decided it was time to throw in the towel. I packed my trusty sticker-covered Trek 820 into the storage compartment of a eastbound Hampton Jitney and relegated my riding of it to the leafy byways of the south shore of Long Island. I'm no longer willing to roll the dice on these busy streets for the sake of fun and exercise. I have two little children. It's not worth it. Of course, I could always get into a bike accident out on Long Island as well, but that's another story.
So, yeah, blah blah blah... why am I discussing any of this? Well, I recently stumbled upon a captivating photographic website called Downtown From Behind. In its own words: "DFB is a photographic series capturing subjects riding their bikes from behind on some 200+ streets, avenues and lanes below 14th stret in New York City."
The pictures are beautifully composed portraits of individuals on bicycles, cruising around Manhattan's myriad byways, side streets and avenues (like the lovely, seasonally appropriate shot above, snapped on Centre Street). It's an endearingly simple idea, and strikingly executed. It almost gives me second thoughts, making me want to go reclaim my bike from my mom's Long Island garage. Almost.
7" singles. Double LPs. Gatefold sleeves. Cassettes. Cassingles. Compact discs. 3" CDs. CD singles. Double packs. Box sets. My life was once ruled by these and other formats.
But, as time has gone on, both the hardware and the software have changed. My stubbornly all-consuming urge to scour New York City for records and compact discs is now considered by many a quaint, antiquated ritual of a vanished age.
More to the point, as I've gotten older and my time has become more consumed with my responsibilities as a parent, a husband, a professional, and, well, an adult, I've had less time to invest -- financially, intellectually or otherwise -- in my passion for music, regardless of its manifestation. I've become largely distracted with more important things and simultaneously disinterested in the overarching trajectory of modern music (or at least of the more mainstream variety). That isn't at all to say that I've given up on proceedings entirely, but the instances wherein my imagination is actively fired by new music seem to happen with discouragingly decreasing frequency. Moreover, so much of what is currently championed as this era's greatest music just leaves me cold, clammy and filled with palpable contempt. Hello, middle-age!
As such, while I'm still virulently passionate about the music I hold dear, perhaps I'm not the best person to be submitting yet another hackneyed, needless and strenuously unsolicited "end-of-the-year" roundup. But once a music geek, always a music geek. We can't stop ourselves.
So, if you were really fired up this year about PSY, Taylor Swift, Rihanna, Adele, Carly Rae Jepsen, Justin Bieber (fucking God have mercy on your soul, `cos I'll show you none), Mumford & Sons, Usher, One Direction, Dangermau5, Skrillex, and/ or Ke$ha, you should probably stop reading right now, as you probably won't dig the stuff below. By the same token, maybe you're more open-minded than I am these days and you will check some of it out. Either way, these were my favorite songs of the year. Like anyone cares.
In many instances, there were more than one song by a single band I wanted to cite, but in the interest of diversity, I've limited this list to a single track per artist.
1. "The Seer Returns" by SWANS
2. "Lord Knows" by Dum Dum Girls
3. "In Cythera" by Killing Joke
3. "Nowhere to Be Found" by Firewater
4. "The House that Heaven Built" by Japandroids
5. "I Am Here" by Savages
6. "Autobahn" by Call of the Wild
7. "Gravity is the Enemy" by Skeleton Key
8. "15 Steps" by The Stranglers
9. "King Dick II" by The Way We Live*
10. "Left Myself Behind" by TOY
*Technically, this song dates back to 1971, but it was released this year on the excellent compilation, Man Chest Hair: 10 Outbursts of Unreleased Testosterone from the 1970s Mancunian Rock Underground.
Favorite re-release of the year: It's tempting to cite both Loveless by My Bloody Valentine and Blue Lines by Massive Atack (both excellent, if not entirely necessary), but I gotta go with the luscious Japanese edition of It'll End in Tears by ye olde This Mortal Coil.
Best live show of the year: SWANS at the Bowery Ballroom 10/28/12 (the hurricane show)
Hey again, all.
Yeah, it's almost Christmas, so I'm going to be hopping in a cab and heading out of town shortly to ring in the holiday with my wife's side of the family. As such, things may slow down here for a few days ... or possibly not. I may feel inspired and post some stuff to publish later, so keep your eyes open. Either way, please have a happy, healthy, hearty, heady and hedonistic holiday. After the last few months -- from Sandy to Sandy Hook -- you've invariably earned it. Celebrate life. Listen to great music. Tell the people you love how much you care about them. Splurge. Laugh. Get drunk. Eat foods you'd normally avoid. Dance. Sing. Rejoice. Be thankful. Who knows what's going to happen next?
Talk to you again shortly. Merry Christmas.
I'm usually not one to get too bent out of shape about, for lack of a better term, "celebrity deaths," but I still remember being genuinely shocked and even a little choked up upon hearing of the death of the great Joe Strummer, so vividly that it's hard to fathom that it was already a decade ago.
For the past few years, I've devoted posts to his memory on the anniversary of his death, usually appended with a striking black n' white photo of the man. The picture above ... stumbled upon on Tumblr ... is another great example. Oh sure, there are thousands of amazing photographs of Strummer fronting the Clash and throwing any number of heroic poses, but there's something so simple and lovely about this shot (not least because it was taken here in New York City ... somewhere in the West Village -- Jones Street, maybe?) that makes it so ripe for inclusion here today. In it we see Joe strolling manfully down the middle of the street (Dylan-stylee) with his wife in 1994. I'd not spied this shot before, but according to the site from which I prized it, it was snapped by the great Bob Gruen.
Pour one out for Joe.
Generally speaking, I don’t like to repurpose old posts here, but given the time of year, I felt this one from 2007 was worth exhuming. As I mention below, there’s an indefinable quality about the holidays in New York that reminds me of my (now cripplingly distant) youth on the Upper East Side, specifically the early 80’s. As such…
I went back up to the Upper East Side recently. There's something about that part of town around the holidays that always gets me nostalgic, being that I spent most of my life up there. While strolling around in the East 70s, I was instantly reminded of this song, thinking back to my grade school days prior to the advent of MTV. I vividly remember a Friday afternoon when my friend Rich and I went back to his place on East 96th street after school and flipped on the radio (something almost unheard of, these days), spending the rest of the afternoon just listening and watching the speakers in anticipation of each new selection. Back then, the local rock stations still seemed to seamlessly venture beyond parameter. It wasn't at all unlikely to hear Traffic, Led Zeppelin and Foreigner followed in swift succession by the Talking Heads, B-52s and Adam & the Ants. It all seemed so new. It's probably idealistic and a little revisionist of me to suggest as much, but it seemed like a healthier option compared to today's rigidly compartmentalized playlists that cater exclusively to pre-market researched demographics. It just seemed more open.
Beyond those afore-mentioned artists, I also link Joe Jackson, Ian Dury & The Blockheads, Elvis Costello, Blondie, Graham Parker, Split Enz, The Pretenders, Robert Gordon, Marshall Crensaw, Nick Lowe, Rockpile, The Cars and, of course, Squeeze to that era. Too accessible for orthodox Punk Rock (which I was also just discovering) and too early for the New Romantic set, these and other artists all fell under the catch-all umbrella (and hotly-contested term), "New Wave."
One of the more conventional bands of this gaggle, Squeeze's inclusion in the New Wave roster itself is somewhat arguable. Their record sleeves may have bore all the trappings of the era (day-glo colors, xeroxed photographs, angular fonts), but the band itself traded in a brand of straight-ahead pop that came steeped in the same tradition that informed Lennon & McCartney (a writing duo Squeeze's Chris Difford and Glen Tillbrook were frequently compared to -- somewhat overwhelmingly -- at the time). In the parlance of a youthful Upper East Side brat at the precipice of adolescence, although you might've heard them playing on the speakers at Fiorucci, Squeeze were always more JG Melon than CBGB. Unlike the work of so many of their garishly-sunglassed peers, Squeeze's songs eschewed paeans to urban upheaval or the exploration of dance floor frontiers in favor of mature themes, adult situations and naturalistic romantic entanglement. It wasn't at all unlikely to hear Squeeze singing about infidelity, estrangement and divorce while the rest of the world was doing "The Safety Dance."
By the same token, Squeeze still had a quirky, immediately distinctive sound. Back on the radio, once you found yourself emerging from the lethargic malaise of some awful track by Bad Company or The Doors, the opening notes of "Another Nail In My Heart" from the Argybargy album sounded legitimately like the freshest, most urgent music imaginable and a palpable blow against the empire. Never mind waving your lighter around, those taut, jumpy guitars made you want to put on your skinniest tie and pogo around the room. They may not have had the feral aesthetic of the Buzzcocks or the Ramones, but Squeeze still had caught a whiff of the future, and it didn't include plodding, self-indulgent solos.
Similarly, "Pulling Mussels (From The Shell)" retained its sibling single's energy, but packed it with a gorgeous melody, Jools Holland's amazing boogie-woogie piano and the band's signature lyrical complexity (name-checking no less than Harold Robbins and William Tell in the process). Personally speaking, I cannot hear one of these tracks without pining for the other. On East Side Story, the album that followed Argybargy, Squeeze scored their biggest hit to date with "Tempted" (featuring the then-newly recruited Paul Carrack filling in for the absent Jools Holland) and even my dad bought that one (which, of course, meant I lost all interest -- once your parents appreciate your music, it's all over). The band's hits compilation, Singles - 45's & Under became a ubiquitous staple in the record collections of virtually every person I knew, and rightly so.
Twenty-seven years later, while Squeeze's name never springs to mind when I'm asked to cite my favorite bands, I still adore both "Another Nail In My Heart" and "Pulling Mussels (From The Shell)." They might lack the venom, lyrical spite and propulsive wallop of much of my favorite music, but I know timeless pop music when I hear it.
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