The Beatles’ “Revolution,” Take 20
The Beatles, as in “The White Album,” was the best way to sizzle a brain without chemicals. I still remember freaking myself out with my freshly purchased vinyl in 1981, going back to my room, putting on headphones and, after the 90 minutes were over, realizing that most of my record collection was utterly useless. I was also at an age where it was fun to scare yourself, which meant turning off all the lights, putting on those beastly Nova ‘phones from Radio Shack and listening to “Revolution 9.” Then, when I worked up the fortitude, I played it backward. My vinyl didn’t thank me, but The Beatles was simply a watershed purchase — few times in my life have $11.95 paid back such dividends.
This week, through a European bootleg called Revolution.. Take Your Knickers Off, a newly unearthed version of “Revolution” surfaced. This one is the 20th take of “Revolution,” which provides the missing link between “Revolution 1″ and “Revolution 9.” While “9″ is mostly a series of tape loops and found sounds, it had little actual connection to the content of “1,” unless you subscribe to the notion that “9″ is an aural depiction of the sound of an actual revolution, something of a “Guernica” for the ears.
According to Beatles experts, two copies were made of “Take 20,” and John Lennon took one of them home with him, where he sliced and diced it to create “Revolution 9.” This particular recording has been documented thoroughly by Beatles experts, but mostly as piece of lore. Now we get to actually hear it. Twelve Major Chords has it here.
Sugarland to Perform at Zoo, September 11
Jennifer Nettles and Kristian Bush of Sugarland.
During the Grammy Awards this month, Staticblog readers became an unlikely fandom bloc for Sugarland, the Athens, Ga. band featuring Jennifer Nettles and Kristian Bush. This morning the duo announced a new slate of tour stops, including one on Sept. 11, 2009 at the Zoo Amphitheatre.
This is serious advance notice, so there is no ticketing information at this time — the Zoo hasn’t even formally announced its summer season. But as soon as the information is available, we’ll post it.
Movie Review: “Waltz With Bashir”
Rating: 74
Whether “Waltz With Bashir” is a documentary in the purest sense is an open question: Ari Folman’s film about Israel’s 1982 war with Lebanon is a digitally animated battle memoir containing only a few minutes of unretouched footage at the end. But given Folman’s difficult premise — the painstaking recreation of memories lost in the fog of war — “Waltz With Bashir” accomplishes its goals and tells its story vividly and inventively.
Folman begins in a bar, where a former Army buddy tells him of a recurring dream in which he is chased by 26 wild dogs. The number is always the same. Folman is sure there is a connection between the nightmare and their service in Lebanon 25 years before, but soon realizes that he carries few personal memories of the war. He tracks down several former soldiers, piecing together their collective life during wartime, rediscovering the atrocity and otherworldly oddity of their time in uniform.
Given the need to illustrate these memories and visions, Folman literally illustrated them: “Waltz With Bashir” is rendered with Flash animation of current images and old battles. The look and feel is close to the rotoscoping used in Richard Linklater’s “Waking Life” and “A Scanner Darkly,” or the recent Charles Schwab ad campaign, but in terms of methodology, it’s closer to Brett Morgen’s “Chicago 10,” in which the gaps between archival footage of Abbie Hoffman’s trial were filled with animated recreations.
It’s all done to compelling and psychedelic effect — fantasy seamlessly melds with reality as ‘80s hits by Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark and Public Image Limited drone in the background. The film’s only serious flaw is the distance created by the animation: because these are computer-drawn images, much of the visceral quality of war gets lost in the pixels. But “Waltz With Bashir” is as much about memory and what time does to it as it is about the war being blocked from that memory.
Static, Episode 3: Matthew Alvin Brown
Interview
“Miles Around”
“Cupcake”
Derek Trucks Talks About “Already Free” and Touring With Slowhand
Sometimes the best music gets captured on record when the people involved are playing more than they’re working, feeling good more than feeling driven. When Derek Trucks invited friends and family into his new home studio in Florida, the result was “Already Free,” a disc with the loose, natural sound that matches its title.
“You know, I think the whole feel of the record is really relaxed and inclusive,” said Trucks, who performs with his band Sunday at the Coca-Cola Bricktown Events Center, 425 E California. “You know, it is such a family record: everyone was around the whole time, the kids were in and out of the studio and it was all close friends. It was my wife (Susan Tedeschi) and her band, Doyle Bramhall, Warren (Haynes), Oteil (Burbridge). So it felt like a real communal thing, and you get that real sense on the record, that everyone wants to be there.”
“Already Free” often recalls the loose blues-rock feel of Eric Clapton’s solo debut, when the English blues guitar master discovered Oklahoma singer-songwriter J.J. Cale and started setting his watch by Tulsa time. It was recorded following a tour in which Trucks played guitar alongside Clapton and Bramhall, and the setlist was made up largely of songs from Clapton’s Derek & the Dominos disc, “Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs.”
Trucks, who was named after Derek & the Dominos, was gratified to get the call to play with Clapton, who asked him to play on his collaboration with J.J. Cale, “The Road to Escondido,” which eventually led to the tour.
“I got a call from Eric to play on that J.J. Cale/Clapton record, and that was just out of the blue for me — I didn’t know him or have any connection with him,” Trucks said. “So it was pretty wild to get the phone call. About two or three songs into that session, he asked me if I would consider joining his band for the year. That’s not something you can really pass up.”
Besides working with Tedeschi on her solo albums, touring and recording with the Derek Trucks Band and a near constant slate of collaborations, Trucks also has his other day job — as a guitarist for the Allman Brothers Band. The nephew of Allmans drummer Butch Trucks, Derek Trucks now fills the shoes of the band’s most famous guitarist, the late Duane Allman.
The Allman Brothers Band traditionally does a multi-show stand at New York’s Beacon Theatre each year, but was forced to bow out in 2008 due to keyboardist-singer Gregg Allman’s bout with hepatitis C. Now recovered, Allman will lead the band during its “Beacon Run” next month in celebration of the band’s 40th anniversary.
“We did about a week of rehearsal, and there’s a ton of different guests that are coming out for a tribute to Duane Allman,” Trucks said. “We’re trying to get all his friends and people who recorded with him and were influenced by him. There’s going to be some pretty heavy hitters.”
IN CONCERT
The Derek Trucks Band
When: 7:30 p.m. Sunday.
Where: Coca-Cola Bricktown Events Center, 425 E California.
Tickets: www.okctickets.com
DVD Review: Beverly Hills Chihuahua
Rating: 11
Even viewers with low standards can only be expected to chuckle at the novelty of talking dogs a few times before wondering if there might be better use of their time. Still, “Beverly Hills Chihuahua” became a huge hit by stretching a computer trick into a feature-length endurance test. Sure, kids will love it, but kids will also eat marshmallows until forced to stop. In that sense, “Beverly Hills Chihuahua” is a dog dish overflowing with marshmallow cream.
Chloe (voiced by Drew Barrymore) is a pampered, pedigreed pooch who lives much better than 99 percent of humans, but when she gets lost in Mexico and is stripped of her Harry Winston collar and the comforts of her mansion, Chloe discovers just how out-of-touch she is with her canine roots. And there’s a wrong-side-of-the-tracks love interest for Chloe (Papi, a mixed-breed Chihuahua voiced by George Lopez), some barely written human characters played by Piper Perabo, Jamie Lee Curtis and Manolo Cardona, some mild peril subbing for an actual plot and a truckload of voice talent ranging from Placido Domingo to Michael Urie of “Ugly Betty.”
But beyond the low-rent music choices (George Thorogood must make a killing with soundtrack licenses) and 10-year-old Taco Bell commercial aesthetic, “Beverly Hills Chihuahua” trades in some noxious stereotypes about Mexico. It condescendingly makes nice with the nation toward the end, but what country wants to be half-heartedly enabled by a talking dog movie?
Video of the Day: Phil and the Osophers, “High Art”
Lasik surgery rocks! It doesn’t necessarily sing on key, but it rocks.
Video of the Day: Late of the Pier, “Heartbeat”
Samuel Eastgate takes his punishment and can’t stand up for falling down in this mind twister. Well, not so much a mind twister as a brain-blower. There’s proof at the end.
Turning the Page
It just won’t be the Barenaked Ladies without Steven Page. BNL’s lead vocalist and chief songwriter is calling it quits with the band.
The news isn’t altogether surprising, given the roundly crummy time it has been for the 38-year-old Page, who was busted last year in a late-night cocaine bender with his girlfriend and another woman in upstate New York.
“These guys are my brothers,” Page said in a statement on the group’s web site. We’ve grown up together over the past 20 years. I love them and wish them all the best in the future.”
The web site statement continues:
“The band also wish Steven well in all of his endeavors. Ed Robertson says: ‘It’s the start of a new chapter for all of us. Here’s to the future!’”
Um, good luck with that, Ed, but color me skeptical. Robertson is no slouch as a songwriter, but Page’s quasi-falsetto vocal chops and brilliant lyrics were the soul of Barenaked Ladies.
Page says he will try his hand at a solo career and perhaps some theatrical writing. I wish the guy well. BNL’s stock has dimmed considerably since its heyday of such gems as Gordon and Stunt, but the Canadian-based group was still managing at least two or three superb tracks per disc.
RIP, Barenaked Ladies.
“One Week”
“Brian Wilson”
“The Old Apartment”
– Chase
Music Review: Beastie Boys, “Paul’s Boutique: 20th Anniversary Edition”
Rating: 98
To understand the massive artistic leap and the attendant confusion caused by Beastie Boys’ 1989 disc “Paul’s Boutique,” imagine the response if the Beatles followed up “Love Me Do” with “I Am the Walrus.” Adam Horowitz, Mike Diamond and Adam Yauch rode a caricature to superstardom with “License to Ill,” but the millions of teenagers who shelled out for that hot slab of fraternity raunch seemed perplexed by the dense layers of samples and obscure references in “Boutique.” It sold only 500,000 copies in 1989 — a small fraction of the band’s previous reaping.
Now re-released in a remastered 20th anniversary edition, “Paul’s Boutique” is widely considered one of the best albums of the late 20th century. Produced by the Dust Brothers, who went on to sculpt Beck’s sonically similar “Odelay,” “Paul’s Boutique” included samples from 105 songs. “Shake Your Rump” alone had 12 elements pulled from sources ranging from the Average White Band to Led Zeppelin. These samples were stitched together so tightly that they rarely stood out, assuming roles in the Beasties’ funky b-boy tapestry.
But “Paul’s Boutique” is not just a production marvel: the Beasties absorbed metric tons of culture after “License” and it all got poured into their lyrical references — “High Plains Drifter” covers more subjects than the evening news and is built on the rhythm from Eagles’ “Those Shoes.” And now, thanks to the kind of remastering that is oh-so-necessary with ’80s releases, which often sounded horribly flat in their initial CD incarnation, this endlessly brash, boombastically funky song cycle now has enough bottom end and range to give full voice to the Beasties and DustBros ambition. To quote the 12-minute closer, “B-Boy Bouillabaisse,” “Paul’s Boutique” has “more flavor than Fruit Stripe Gum.”
