The beat of the first few seconds of this song just kills me. It’s like a very Euro-flavored disco version of Dr. Who. Erlend Øye is a great pop artist from Norway who has been part of a number of other bands (remember Royksopp? Remember their song “Poor Leno?” Yep, that was Erlend. Ever hear of The Whitest Boy Alive? Erlend.). His voice is like soy milk – very smooth, pretty devoid of flavor, but surprisingly tasty.
Okay – first of all? I know the drummer. That drummer is a friend of mine. (And you, sir, are no drummer.) That drummer is a total badass and just about the nicest person you’ll ever meet. So, now you, by extension, know the drummer. You see once again why reading this blog is a good idea.
And second of all, this band is seriously incredible. How they manage to have a sound that’s tight and at the same time so gritty, I’ll never know. I’ve been a blues band myself it’s hard to sound…right. You don’t want to sound too polished because that’s inauthentic. The blues is earth-bound and cracked and held together with tape. But if you sound too sloppy, then you just sound like you suck. Bad Influence does not suck. Anyone who knows me knows that’s a pretty big compliment. Rock on, gentlemen. And all y’all who like these guys, go to http://www.badinfluenceband.com for tour dates and other stuff.
I’m about to head into three days of mostly day-long meetings and I am fully anticipating that they will be feel and sound like this, one of my favorite pieces by Argentine tango genius, Astor Piazzolla. Put a group of fun, smart, interesting people together in a room, give them a cool topic and a lot of coffee, and watch them go. Nothing better.
So, like everyone, I have a number of circles of friends. Some of them overlap, some of them don’t. Within each circle is a person or set of people that know me really well. And these people form their own special little subgroup – the sanctum sanctorum, if you will (or even if you won’t. This is my blog. Get you own, you crank). These are people I tell everything to, who let me be crass and laugh at my dumb jokes, and don’t wig out when it’s a Friday night and I all want to do is hang out with them in our PJ’s and enjoy some microwavable chicken pot stickers and crap $3 wine from Trader Joe’s and ask questions like, “how weird would it be if humans evolved to not need noses anymore?” People who would be down to join me if I said “I’d rather dance in ugly pants in the comfort of a lounge room in suburbia.” Parties are where your people are. So thank you, sanctum sanctorum. You know who you are, and man, “things don’t get no better – better like you and me.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FB-s-pMt-9U
A Western, a Tarantino film, a Dragnet episode, and a burlesque show walked into a bar. Cozy the bartender put them in a blender, added some rum, and poured the results into some instruments and called it “Big Noise From Winnetka.” This song makes me want to race out to the nearest store and get some leopard-print horn-rimmed sunglasses, cigarette pants, a pack of smokes, and a guy who calls me a “broad.” This song sounds so raunchy – I mean the whistle sounds like a cat-call, for one thing. But there’s a real disconnect between this song, written in 1962, and American culture at the time. For one thing, fashion.
Oh baby.
Does that woman look like this song sounds? Correct! Not even close. That’s a Doris Day woman. What does her family look like?
Oh stop – stop – you’re driving me crazy.
Yep, like that. What television shows do they watch? The Andy Griffith Show, Gunsmoke, Bonanza, Red Skelton, and Danny Thomas.
So there is some serious cognitive dissonance going on between saucy Cozy Cole’s jazz track and “normal” American life. This is another reason, Tuners, why music is my favorite art medium. It’s always ahead of the curve, carving out space for new ideas and feelings and emotions. Without Cozy Cole, there could be no Prince. Without Prince, there could be no Common. I would also argue, without Cozy Cole there could be no feminist movement, but that’s another argument for another day. People get so wrapped around the axle about time-travel when really, all you have to do is turn on your stereo.
Clearly my soul is wandering around the planet without permission because, while I started the week being homesick for New England, now I find myself longing to be back in Prague. Fortunately, the wonderful female group BraAgas has me covered. This saucy little minx of a song is from their 2009 album, “Tapas,” which won the Anděl Award, the Czech version of a Grammy. In addition to world music, BraAgas is also proficient in medieval music – one of their members plays the shawm, which, I mean, if there is a more direct way to my heart, I haven’t found it yet.
Lyrics (which I’m pretty sure are in Romani) below.
—
Adjatok egy szalmaszálat,
Égessem el a világot!
Adjatok egy szalmaszálat,
Hadd fújjam fel ezt a házat!
Lábam termett a táncra,
Szemem a kacsintásra.
Ha táncolok, szikrát szórok,
A világra fittyet hányok!
Aj Csiki-Csiki, aj ke te merav,
Aj Csiki-Csiki, aj ke te merav,
Aj Csiki-Csiki, aj ke te merav,
Me zhanav me ka zhivav
Vesz ő nékem selyemruhát,
Gyöngyöt, láncot, piros szoknyát,
Reám költi a vagyonát,
Lopja-lopja édesanyját,
Bolondítom, hevítem,
Kiáltozza a nevem,
Csiki-Csiki, így hív engem.
Megöllek én, szép szerelmem!
Aj Csiki-Csiki, aj ke te merav,
Aj Csiki-Csiki, aj ke te merav,
Aj Csiki-Csiki, aj ke te merav,
Me zhanav me ka zhivav
Lábam termett a táncra,
Szemem a kacsintásra.
Ha táncolok, szikrát szórok,
A világra fittyet hányok!
Bolondítom, hevítem,
Kiáltozza a nevem,
Csiki-Csiki, így hív engem,
Megöllek én szép szerelmem!
Aj Chiki-Chiki, aj ke te merav,
Aj Chiki-Chiki-Chiki, aj ke te merav,
Aj Chiki-Chiki, aj ke te merav,
Me zhanav me ka zhivav
Give me a piece of straw to set the world on fire
give me a piece of straw to blow up this house
My feet were made for dancing
my eyes were made for winking
when i dance I spread sparkles all around
and don’t give a damn about the world
Ai,Tchiki-Tchiki, i should die
Ai,Tchiki-Tchiki, i should die
Ai,Tchiki-Tchiki, i should die
I know I’m going to live
Ai,Tchiki-Tchiki, he dies for me
Ai,Tchiki-Tchiki, this is how he calls me
Ai,Tchiki-Tchiki, this is how he calls me,
With me, he go where I want
He will buy me a dress of silk, necklace of pearls, red skirt,
he’ll spend his fortune on me
he will steal his mother again and again
and I make him crazy, I set him on fire
He only shouts my name
tchiki tchiki – that’s what he calls me
I will kill you my beautiful love !
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7OX1uKE2jho
When I’m getting my head in the game for a big meeting, when I need to suit up, when I need to kick the tires and light the fires, I turn to this song. Hendrix’s version is very sexy – that naked, shimmering guitar riff, the thumb of the bass drum, the crash of the chord at the entrance. It has real swagger. But after I heard Kidjo’s version, it sounds…vaguely pompous. Like there wasn’t any doubt that the protagonist could make an island out of the pieces of the mountain. Like he could always just do that. Kidjo sings it like this comes from experience, from hard work, practice, and struggle. That’s why this version gives me that extra boost – it’s a song of strength learned from difficulty. It’s a “oh, you don’t even know what I can do” kind of song. A “you think this is difficult?” song. It’s a very human sort of voodoo.
Hendrix’s original version:
I. Cannot. Stop. Playing. This. Song. This is a remix of O.V. Wright’s Song “I Don’t Know Why,” which, as you’ll see is much slower. By speeding it up and adding a new drum track, Poldoore skews the track way more towards funk – and hip-hip – and away from soul. I love the very 60’s era chord progression and lead guitar riffs (vaguely Buffalo Springfield-esque), the tempo, the rhythm track layered on top, the horns, the way it builds – everything. It’s flawless. Check out more of his stuff on his Soundcloud website. Groove on, Tune-Up fans.
This song is so wacky. (Then again, it was 1999.) It’s gotta be the most mild-mannered rap song I’ve ever heard, layered over a tight rhythm and feel-it-in-your-bones baseline. I recommend starting any conversation with, “Yeah-yeah, yeah, yeah…oh yeah.” Also, this has got to be the only song written ever, in any genre, that uses the lyric “flowing like soy milk over sweetened cereal.” Quantum MC’s were a great group that included two favorite artists of mine – Cut Chemist and DJ Shadow. I find that I tend to start the song fairly soft and then crank it by the time it gets to 3:37. What-what! Happy Friday, Tune-Up Fans.
Happy Fear Day, Tune-Up fans! (Or, Valentine’s Day, if you’re committed to living a life of mindless literalism and social norms and having people actually understand what you’re talking about.)
Before you all inundate me with messages about the glories of love and life and birds and bees and whatnot, let me pause for a second. Love is great. Love is glorious. Love is also terrifying, difficult, and a royal pain in the ass. Think of all the hundreds of billions of inputs that endlessly feed into making you who you are – the person who takes their coffee black, who prefers staying up late to getting up early, who prefers big groups to small gatherings, and will never under any circumstances wear pleat-front pants. You and everyone you see every day are Olympic-sized swimming pools of memory-infused preferences and experience-born trigger points, some conscious and some so parked in your subconscious you don’t even know it. In a way, there are seven billion unique languages on the planet. And yet, in the midst of all of this, we meet people, we fall in love, and, sometimes, we find our languages have a common root. Amazing.
This is what I ponder every February 14th that rolls around, and it always makes me think of those people who are in the beginning stages of the whole love saga. No matter how much sang-froid one was born with, it’s impossible not to wonder about the future. And because, in my mind, V Day is also Fear Day, it does kind of put one on the offensive. Hit it, Patti Jo. “You’re gonna be downright in shame if I find that you’re playing any game. Make me believe in you.”
The Daily Tune-Up 