Buffalo Tom “Taillights Fade”

I mentioned Buffalo Tom in passing recently, and today wanted to fulfill the promise of reminding y’all that they were awesome.

Initially dissed as “Dinosaur Jr. Jr.” (J. Mascis produced their first disc, which I don’t have), these Boston alt rockers had really found their voice by their third platter, 1992’s Let Me Come Over.

The distortion was still there, but the songwriting suggested something a little more heartland, a distillation of Paul Westerberg’s tender moments that mostly ditched the boozy self-destructive streak for pure heatbreak restrained by some hint of stoicism. They became a great folk-rock band that knew how to deploy the weapons of their era.

“Taillights Fade” is my favorite Buf-Tom jam, and it might be everybody else’s. After all, it’s kinda their grand majestic power ballad moment. It’s a bit of a slow-burner, but gets some momentum out of the soft-verse-loud-chorus thing (like I said, weapons of their era).

They do make a nod toward aforementioned boozy self-destruction, the confession “lost my life in cheap wine,” and even wink at their critics to the tune of “I feel like a dinosaur.” “Taillights Fade” was prominent on my pity party soundtrack in college, but at this remove I’m feeling more comfort. Maybe it’s the well-structured, tuneful treatment of ragged emotion. Maybe it’s just that if you’ve still got the strength to sing, then yr not all the way gone.

Let Me Come Over at Newbury Comics. (and at iTunes.)

Freedom Cruise “Sensational Gravity Boy”
Cradle Robbers “Sotto Voce”

Call it nostalgia or I dunno what, but I’ve been going back lately to the pleasant sounds of the Red Hot + Bothered compilation, part of the Red Hot Organization’s series raising money for the fight against AIDS.

This 1995 release was subtitled “The Indie Rock Guide to Dating,” which implies awkwardness and maybe a total catastrophe; instead, we got a neat set of pop songs from various underground-ish luminaries highlighted by a bunch of team-ups.

The pole position went to Freedom Cruise, a one-off conjoining of lo-fi luminaries Guided by Voices and alternative rock stars the Breeders.

For “Sensational Gravity Boy,” Kim Deal somehow ended up behind the drum set in an all-but-buried performance, but it’s kind of wonderful to hear a Bob Pollard song, in all its shambling, classic rock derived, pyschedelic word-shuffling glory, augmented by the cool tones of the Deal sisters’ backing vocals.

I find it a bit weird, but my favorite thing about this song is that processed guitar burbling out of the left channel. Pretty sure I hear at least a phaser and chorus on there, but there’s probably more; I wouldn’t be surprised if the guitar had been modified to shoot bubbles or something. It’s a tone of whimsy and possibility to me so it’s kind of perfect for a nonsense song about a boy who could fly.

Elsewhere on the comp, Lois Maffeo of the band Lois and Spinane Rebecca Gates, leading lights of the Northwest-to-D.C. indie pop scene (if you will), joined forces as the Cradle Robbers. On “Sotto Voce,” a Maffeo composition, they actually nailed the disc’s minor goal of showing off the sexy sounds of underground music geek culture.

The song’s quiet and simple, two soft voices, some sawed wood, mellow keboards. Quite apropos, actually, for tackling the subject of whispers in the night. But the Robbers have stuffed it so full with a messy range of emotion and experience–togetherness, disillusion, antagonism, playfulness, lust, faith–that it comes on sort of epic. Then, just when you think it’s over, they slay you with a wordless refrain.

Red Hot + Bothered at Newbury Comics.

Sloan “Right Or Wrong” “Someone I Can Be True With”

Some folks have had their hands on it for a while–people north of the 49th parallel or so, those willing to pay those exorbitant Canadian import prices–but this Tuesday my fellow ‘Muricans and I can finally wrap our grimy hands around the new record from Canadian popsters Sloan, Never Hear the End of It.

The roomie hooked me up with a preview a couple months back, and I’m gonna use the term “return to form,” because I’ve been a little disappointed by the band’s last couple joints–the Sloan enterprise veered too much toward well-groomed schmaltz, and I thought we were losing the dudes with the B–tles on their brain, KISS stickers on their gear and a gleam in their eye.

Never Hear the End of It has been filtered through party shuffle listening, but really I like it so far about as much as any of their prime 90s output, holding aside masterpiece Navy Blues. So here’s a couple examples why, back-to-back tracks from the 30-song record’s first third(!).

“Right Or Wrong” is sort of a state of the Sloan address set to a maraca-shakin’ upbeat groove. It’s a pretty forthright statement from a band that’s been playing stadium-oriented rock to a cult following for creeping up on two decades.

There’s an appreciation for the bitter irony–”Ten years ahead of our time/or about one year behind” indeed–and maybe a tinge of bitterness–”sooner or later we’ll be singing for free.” Admittedly, the career complaint jam is a risky endeavor. I mean, these are lucky, talented guys, right? So what I dig is the statement of purpose, the sense that the dudes are weary but they’re gonna keep rolling that boulder up the hill and breaking our hearts in harmony.

In places, End of It feels like Sloan’s (old school) Guided by Voices record. In between yr typical three- or four-minute pop song, there are neat little miniatures like “Someone I Can Be True With.” It’s a peppy little love song that bows out just as it gets rambly and repetitive. I especially appreciate the grumpy/campy pop culture references. Since the song’s about that total love that thrives in the cocoon of comfort, it makes sense to fill it up with the stuff of everyday life.

Then again, the latter half of the song sounds like my typical weekend with the little lady, if you substitute “Road House“ or “CSI: Miami” for “Gremlins 2.” (But then it wouldn’t rhyme, I guess.)

Never Hear the End of It at Newbury Comics. (and at iTunes.)

The Modern Lovers “Girl Friend”

Last week I was on a bus from Springfield, Mass., to NYC, hand in hand with the little lady, both of us listening to her nano through a handy headphone splitter doohickey from Radio Shack. Somehow, to know we were sharing this, listening to the same songs, was a measure of comfort amidst the general misery that comes with Peter Panning it.

Y’all know how much I make out of little coincidences. Predicatbly, when the Modern Lovers’ “Girl Friend” shuffled into our ears shortly after the little lady nudged me and pointed out the Met, the opening namecheck of “the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston” fairly jumped out at me. Wrong town, but right for the moment.

There are many, many things I love about “Girl Friend” (off the band’s delayed self-titled debut, originally released in 1976). There’s the local color; the beautifully wrong, I mean so right, chorus spell-out of “G-I-R-L, F-R-E-N”; the heavy piano action and all its implied drama; the thrumming, lyrical bass; the moment around 1:20 when the dripping need of the song’s sentiment pushes through into an inarticulate yelp and warble that dies almost as soon as it’s breathed out; and that reverbed guitar solo that searches and swoons, outgrowing its conception as a hat tip to Lou Reed.

And, hey, you gotta hand it to lead Lover Jonathan Richman: by song’s end he leaves no doubt as to what it is he wants.

But I’m gonna talk for just another second about that opening assertion. Forlorn and sadly single young Jonathan is sure that if he found a special lady, at that museum “I could look through the paintings/I could look right through them.”

When I was younger, I thought of women as a mystery to solve. There was some sort of literalization of “carnal knowledge” stuck in my head–each object of interest admittedly a mystery I’d likely never solve; I’ve never been a Lothario, maybe a sometimes slut at best.

Now a girlfriend is something that I understand, and maybe I’m a little closer to a truth young Jonathan, his stuffed nose, his tender heart and his professed affinity for all those foxy college girls were all pointing toward.

It’s not really about the lust–lust is essential too, don’t get me wrong–and I’m gonna have young Jonathan back me up by blowing totally out of proportion a little nothing I only just noticed as I was preparing this post.

“Girlfriend” is a compound word, but the title of the song is “Girl Friend.” OK, we’ve established that Jonathan takes liberties with his spelling of the word. But, really, that space maybe adds some extra innocence, like the “space for the Holy Ghost” enforced between a slow-dancing couple at the Friday night Catholic school dances of my youth. (Is that right? Or am I conflating a joke and a genuine memory?)

We’re getting long-winded here, but basically I wanna believe, as young Jonathan did, in an earthly love that helps make things clear. When yr on a good team, it kinda gets to feel that way, and it’s really not that bad.

The Modern Lovers (2003 import reissue) at Amazon.

Elvis Costello & The Attractions “High Fidelity” (Live)

So this week PCR turned into High Fidelity (just in time for the Broadway musical!). I don’t know why, but you got a Spoon break-up song in between little remembrances of (the end of) summer love, an unrequited crush and recovery from the dissolution of my first really significant relationship.

Really, I’m gonna try to knock that shit off.

Anyway, I hope you’ll pardon yr cruise director, Capt. Obvious here, for posting today… well, you see it above. Elvis C. is a god of sorts to most of us music nerds and all of us geek rockers.

If you go back to the book that spawned the movie that spawned the musical that spawned a chorus of groans… It was, appropriately enough, basically a novelization of the Costello catalog, drawing out especially his “love is war” theme. (How did Pat Benatar get to sing the definitive song on the topic anyway?) And High Fidelity the book, for its flaws, nailed all the little details of music nerd life and worked its way into a sort of modern canon, as well as many of our hearts.

Which all, actually, is off-topic from what I wanted to discuss about this stripped-down live version of “High Fidelity,” taken from the 2003 reissue of 1980 E.C. masterwork Get Happy!! OK, I still like the studio version better. The concert take lacks the headlong drive and Motownisms of the fixed document–key charms of most of the tunes on that record–but vastly expands its moodiness.

So why post? What I’m finding fascinating about this take on the song is the interplay between Elvis’ vocal performance and Bruce Thomas’ bass playing. Maybe as a sometimes bassist m’self I tend to listen for this stuff, but really the bass fiddle is right there in yr face. This has been mixed like an early Attractions record so, in terms of prominence in the mix, it goes vocals, bass, drums, organ, guitar.

(A little funny that Elvis and Bruce T. have built up a lasting animosity, given the great musical service the bassman’s provided over the decades–but then again maybe not, since the Attractions started out as strangers, hired hands.)

Anyhow, before I ramble myself way way way past yr attention span, I want to point up the varied, almost improvised feel of Thomas’ playing on this song. I hear uptight funk, nods to classic pop bounce, dub cutouts, swooping, dramatic figures that suggest something epic and, starting around 2:12, call-and-response between Elvis’ chant and Thomas’ pluckings.

The drums set up a frame, the vocals communicate a text, the keys seep mood and peal out flourishes, the guitar growls a white noise wash… but here the bass is the meat and muscle tying it all together.

Get Happy!! at Newbury Comics.