Friday Influences Thread 01.29.10

[Stackabones]

What has influenced you as a songwriter in the past ... or since the last FIT?

 

*

 

Aurora borealis. In my neverending quest to find songs without choruses, I had somehow forgotten about Neil Young's Pocohontas. Strange -- considering that I had played it just about every weekend during the first half of the 90s. While I've heard this song countless times, I have to admit that I'm not entirely sure what it's about (my personal interpretations have shifted throughout the years), which is cool. Mystery is important in songs.

 

I adore these lines ...

 

 

I wish a was a trapper

 

I would give thousand pelts

 

To sleep with Pocahontas

 

And find out how she felt

 

 

[YOUTUBE]gHPZuQTNoCo[/YOUTUBE]

[Lee Knight]

I've never heard that. That was just great. Marlon Brando, Pocahontas and me... Thank you Stack.

 

So, for me this week. I posted a tune Out of Range. It's fun to not be so serious all the time. I got some melancholy stuff going for a bit and I wanted a conscious change of mood. Humor! Or... some mild version of it at least. Not funny in a parody way, but more a... oh, I don't know.

 

So our very own Dingoist says it reminds him a bit of The Odds. The Odds? Never heard of the Odds. Fun power pop from the 90's? And I haven't heard of them? Uh, what are they from Canada or something?!??! Oh... they are? Sorry. Actually, I love Canada and hope to move to either Vancouver or Toronto some day as an old crusty.

 

So the Odds. Oh... and Kids in the Hall????!!!!! I'm in. I am a new fan. I love where their roots are from and that Canuck humor, well, my mom's a Torontoan and she's a hoot. Check it out:

 

[YOUTUBE]QiI0ydrw_QU[/YOUTUBE]

[MDR]

 

I love Canada and hope to move to either Vancouver or Toronto some day as an old crusty.

 

 

We'd love to have you. However, it's -11 C and windy here in Toronto today. And in Vancouver, it's rained so much lately that some Olympic venues are running out of snow.

[Lee Knight]

We'd love to have you. However, it's -11 C and windy here in Toronto today. And in Vancouver, it's rained so much lately that some Olympic venues are running out of snow.

 

I lived in Chicago. And Kenosha, WI. I can hang.

[rockinrobby]

Here's a good influence

 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20100129/sc_space/biggestandbrightestfullmoonof2010tonight

[eeglug]

 

ISo our very own Dingoist says it reminds him a bit of The Odds. The Odds? Never heard of the Odds. Fun power pop from the 90's? And I haven't heard of them? Uh, what are they from Canada or something?!??! Oh... they are? Sorry. Actually, I love Canada and hope to move to either Vancouver or Toronto some day as an old crusty.

 

 

I basically grew up in Toronto but now live in Chicago. So many great things that I miss about being in T.O., although much has changed.

 

Since we're on a Canuck thing here, there's another great little pop band from up there called Sloan. Four members, each sing and write songs and they trade off on being in the spotlight. This is a catchy little ditty which even ties into Lee's plan to retire:

 

[YOUTUBE]ygejqgBm9l0[/YOUTUBE]

[blue2blue]

The focus is on a new technology in this clip:

 

kH-krlgo2e8

 

I once met Kay Kayser vocalist Harry Babbitt when I was working in a self-serve station in a very tough part of town (three murders within 500 feet of the station in a single one week period while I was there). He pulled into the station in a dusty pickup, a middle aged woman and a younger woman in the cab with him. He saw me playing guitar and started chatting, asked if he could see the guitar, played a little simple walking blues (that was actually quite revelatory to me, I'd only been playing a couple of years) and said he used to be a big band singer. He mentioned Kay Kayser and I said, "Oh, yeah, I think I've heard of her," and he gently corrected, "Him." And I said, "Well, it's hazy," and we both laughed. (This was about '75.)

 

He talked about how he retired from the music biz in the late 40s or early 50s as the big band era was running down and the economic conditions that had supported 20 and 30 piece touring bands changed. He mentioned a lot of the guys getting into drugs (speed -- "pep pills" -- had become very popular with WWII vets because amphetamine had been handed out to GIs through the course of the war, along with free cigarettes. Of course, speed is still given to military personnel who have to put in long shifts, such as the guys (and gals?) who fly those 30 hour refueling missions.)

 

At the time, I assumed the dusty pickup meant he'd hit rough times, but when I looked up his bio a few years ago, it turned out he'd become a ranch owner and raised horses.

[Lee Knight]

 

 

 

 

Love it. So I have to buy a Sloan CD now too...

[grantsabbath]

Probably my favourite modern Canadian band and, like myself, Atlantic Canadian: Wintersleep.

 

I haven't seen much about them on the forums so I figured I'd post a song for you all to enjoy.

 

I REALLY apologize that this song is set to bloody OC clips but I couldn't find another version.

 

[YOUTUBE]KnU3Mc2WFI0[/YOUTUBE]

 

Some lyrics, as well, as we're all songwriters here!

 

Wrap those feathers like a blanket over me,

throw my bones into the belly of the deep.

Whisper through my walkie talkie: "I am ready."

 

But I was not prepared to die.

Wipe the shadows from my mind,

my mind, my mind, my mind, my mind,

my mind, my mind, my mind.

 

I was not prepared for flight.

[blue2blue]

Most of my bands were lousy with guys (and occasionally gals) who had to wear glasses.

 

But none of them sounded like that.

[MDR]

 

 

 

Gotta love a bass clarinet!

[blue2blue]

I know... I was doing something else when that part of the clip came up and and I just thought "WTF is that source instrument?" Before I had a chance to look at the screen (or even think about the field of probable instruments in a swing band that size) I was thinking contrabasson (formant shaped by Harry's vocal cavity, etc, it sounded thin).

 

The first time I saw the Sonovox in a movie (another Kay Kayser vehicle or maybe this one, it popped up in a few) I was pretty blown away. But then I thought back to a disk I found in a used record store in the 70s (on radio-station red vinyl) of station IDs that, working backwards, I now realize were done on the sonovox. At the time, though, they all sounded early 50s but, with vocoders and talkboxes then-current, I figured that the ID's must have been a retro-affectation... something you might have heard on a 'hip' oldies station trying to demonstrate that putative hipness.

[saveuplife]

This guy brought me back to songwriting...

 

He may look like a clown, but he's an incredible songwriter....

 

[YOUTUBE][/YOUTUBE]

 

Lyrics...

 

There aint no reason things are this way

Its how they always been and it tends to stay

I can't explain why we live this way, we do it everyday

Preachers on the podium speaking to saints

Prophets on the sidewalk begging for change

old ladies laughing from the fire escape cursing my name

I got a basket full of lemons and they all taste the same

A window and a pigeon with a broken wing

You can spend you whole life working for something,

Just to have it taken away

People walk around pushing back their debts

Wearing pay checks like necklaces and bracletes

Talking bout nothing, not thinking bout' death

Every little hearbeat, every little breath

People walk a tight rope

On a razors edge

Carrying their hurt and hatred and weapons

It could be a bomb or a bullet or a pen

Or a thought or a word or a sentence

 

There Ain't no reason

Things are this way

It's how they've always been

and its tends to stay

I dont know why I say

The things that I say

But I say them anyway

But love will come set me free

Love will come set me free, I do believe

Love will come set me free, I know it will

Love will come set my free yes.

 

Prison walls still standing tall

Some things never change at all

Keep on building prisons, gonna fill them all

Keep building bombs, gonna drop them all

Working young fingers bear to the bone

Breaking your back make you sell your soul

Like a lung its filled with cold, suffocating slow

The wind blows wild and I may move

The politicians lie and i am not fooled

you don't need no reason or a three piece suit

To argue the truth

The air on my skin and the world under my toes

Slavery is stitched into the fabric of my clothes

Chaos and commotion wherever I go

Love I try to follow

 

Love will come set me free

Love will come set me free, I do believe

Love will come set me free, I know it will

Love will come set my free yes.

 

There ain't no reason things are this way

Its how its always been and it tends to stay

I can't explain why we live this way,

We do it everyday.

[Lee Knight]

There Ain't no reason

Things are this way

It's how they've always been

and its tends to stay

I dont know why I say

The things that I say

But I say them anyway

 

Never heard of him... I loved it. You guys got good taste.

[blue2blue]

Definitely a good song. He sounds a little like Madeliene Peyroux.

 

 

Seriously, though, I like it. I'm going to keep my eye out for him, maybe track him down on Rhapsody next time I'm thinking about it.

 

EDIT: I did. I do wish his people had hired a better vocal editor to do his retuning. I hate those A-T artifacts. Ugh. That whole ham-fisted Nashville style retuning. I mean, come on. Let the dude have a couple extra takes and fire the tin-eared Auto-Tune jockey. "When She's Gone" is pretty much unlistenable because of it.

[saveuplife]

Since you like that, I'll toss out a couple of his other songs...

 

 

This is a new one (he also did a take of this song with Natalie Merchant)...

 

[YOUTUBE][/YOUTUBE]

 

 

Lyrics -

 

Beyond the rules of religion

The cloth of conviction

Above all the competition

Where fact and fiction meet

 

There's No color lines or casts or classes

There is no fooling the masses

Whatever faith you practice

Whatever you believe

 

Heaven. Heaven.

What the hell is Heaven?

Is there a home for the homeless?

Is there hope for the hopeless?

 

Throw away your myth misconceptions

There ain't no walls around heaven

There are no codes you gotta know to get in

No minutemen or border patrol

 

You must lose all earthly possession

Leave behind your weapon

You cannot buy your salvation

There is no pot of gold

 

(chorus)

 

Heaven ain't got no prisons

No government no business

No banks or politicians

No armies and No police

 

Castles and cathedrals crumble

Pyramids and pipelines tumble

The failure keeps you humble

Leads us closer to peace

 

 

Here's an older one (probably my favorite of all of them)... I love the line about "a flask filled with hope"

 

[YOUTUBE][/YOUTUBE]

 

 

Lyrics-

 

When I arrived in my old set of clothes

I was half a world away from my home

and I was hunted by the wolves

and I was heckled by the crows

Darlin' do not fear what you don't really know

 

Alongside my innocence I laid in bed awake

conflicted and estranged with the impetus of age

but like a phantom she crept across the floor and out the window

Darlin' do not fear what you don't really know

 

From its place on the mantel my heart was taken down

scattered in a thousand little pieces on the ground

and I below the streetlamp like an orphan with a halo

Darlin' do not fear what you don't really know

 

cuz it won't last

worries'll pass

all your troubles they don't stand a chance

and sometimes it takes more than a lifetime to know

Darlin' do not fear what you don't really know

 

Your confidences fall as your faith etched in stone

neither could comfort you from the wild unknown

so bury your burning hatred like a hatchet in the snow

Darlin' do not fear what you don't really know

 

If you have a broken heart or a battered soul

find something to hold onto until they go

to help you through the hard nights

like a flask filled with hope

Darlin' do not fear what you don't really know

 

cuz it won't last

your worries'll pass

all your troubles they don't stand a chance

and it always hurts the worst when it's the ones we love the most

Darlin' do not fear what you don't really know

 

sometimes your path is marked in the sky

sometimes it fails to fit in between the lines

sometimes all you can do is say no

Darlin' do not fear what you don't really know

 

I said when I arrived in my old set of clothes

I was half a world away from my home

and I was hunted by the wolves

and I was heckled by the crows

Darlin' do not fear what you don't really know

I said Darlin' do not fear what you don't really know

[blue2blue]

That A-T is just way too much for me, I'm afraid. It's a darn shame, as he seems like an interesting singer-songwriter. I know some of these artists get stuck in contracts and don't have much say over the final product -- so I don't blame him.

 

In fact, I understand one of the 'hot' producers retuned Neil Young, against Neil's protests, which were in vain, the retuned product was released... I can understand why some folks would want to retune Neil but, damn, that's them, not him. I'd say that's just clearly a case of not getting it.

 

(I try never to read the rock press so pardon if that's old news; I only recently heard about it in passing at Gearslutz.)

[blue2blue]

Here's a cool thing I just found... Andey Bey and the Bey Sisters in Paris in 1960. You sort of have to listen past the narrator -- but what he's saying is also pretty interesting. Tell me Paris in 1960 doesn't look and sound ridiculously cool...

 

j7unac-deU0

 

Here's a more recent track -- a cover of the languid Nick Drake tune, "Riverman." (Sorry it's just a 'slideshow' video. But the sound quality should be good, depending on your YT settings.)

 

GIwEiarttXc

 

 

And a jazz lion in late fall...

v1UVNn90d1s

[Etienne Rambert]

Great Pop Instrumentals & old TV themes always influence me the most.

 

Forget the Beatles. The 1960's was the golden age of Pop instrumentals.

 

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My favorite orchestration from the 60's. The strings & electric guitar slay me every time.

 

sZ_WgrAAsBI

 

a44Wbs8qAeQ

 

9HM8I2BU7-Y

 

I had a near death experience with this one.

 

oQrBxslfX-o

 

Motorcycle wreck north of Atlanta in 1982, I was on the operating table.

I drove my BMW into a ditch on a winding road in Cobb County. My clutch lever

cost me my spleen.

 

In the OR, I'd go in and out of consciousness. But every time I'd start to come out,

"A Walk In The Black Forest" seemed to be playing on the hospital Muzak system.

 

I loved the song when I was a kid. But after the motorcycle wreck,

it became something more, an intimation of immortality, a glimpse of the other side.

[blue2blue]

Geez... I think that was playing at my hospital in 1980... I'd forgotten what it was, though. I remember the name (and Jankowski's name, since there was a Yankowski at my jr and high scool) from the sixties. It wasn't one of my faves, although I could often be counted on to like a lot of that stuff, including "Midnight in Moscow" and "Music to Watch Girls By," both of which I had on record. I got seduced by spy music about that time, too, so I was a huge fan of many of the spy movie/TV themes, the usual, 007 themes, UNCLE, I Spy, Perry Mason (not a spy but a cool theme), Spy Who Came in from the Cold, Ipcress File, and such.

[Etienne Rambert]

Agree B2B. Fred Steiner's Perry Mason theme is an awe-inspiring piece of music.*

The strings are orgiastic, as are the piccolos & piano playing.

 

(*It's title was "Park Avenue Beat")

 

rCaCXXCM42Y

 

Have you noticed that theme's similarity to Gene Pitney's "Town Without Pity"?

 

****

I think "Music to Watch Girls By" is the perfect 1960's time-capsule.

 

It's got the Herb Alpert-style trumphet.

 

It's got the James Bond/spy-music electric guitar & string counterpoint.

 

It's got the electric sitar.

 

It's got the Bossa/Bahia beat & the Stan Getz-style sax solo.

 

It's even got a fuzz tone thrown in at points.

 

It's an amazing orchestration.

 

sZ_WgrAAsBI

 

Nostalgia is a terrible thing. It comes at the expense of the present & future.

[Dingoist]

Most of my bands were lousy with guys (and occasionally gals) who had to wear glasses. But none of them sounded like that.

 

I first saw Sloan in '92 shortly around their first release, Peppermint EP.

 

Funny thing, it was an outdoor festival and the crowd had no idea what to make of them. I went to the show just to see them 'cause I was hearing good things via the grapevine and wanted to check it out.

 

There was a couple of thousand people in the audience, mostly there to see Spinal Tap play as the headliner. Maybe about 20 people or so dancing. The rest were getting into drunken fights (was the first time I ever saw a guy get kicked in the head with a steel toe boot, lets just say the paramedics and police were quite busy).

 

This was their big track back then that got them all the airplay:

 

[YOUTUBE]3RHf07SA3vg[/YOUTUBE]

 

 

But going along the route of great Canadian bands and thinking 'bout "Heterosexual Man" brings me back to the Northern Pikes "She's so pretty"

 

[YOUTUBE]UG3ExHB133k[/YOUTUBE]

[Dingoist]

 

So our very own Dingoist says it reminds him a bit of The Odds. The Odds? Never heard of the Odds. Fun power pop from the 90's? And I haven't heard of them? Uh, what are they from Canada or something?!??! Oh... they are? Sorry. Actually, I love Canada and hope to move to either Vancouver or Toronto some day as an old crusty.

 

 

It's funny when you think of your own personal musical "era" for me it was in the Canadian music scene from the mid late 80s to the late 90s. So '90 Canadian Power Pop is one of my influences, though normally I skirted to the fringes which the band "Sloan" was considered back then, just starting to making to mainstream, they were getting over their sonic meltdowns on stage. 54-40 was still getting over the 80s (don't get me wrong, I love 54-40 but I still have trouble listening to the 80s stuff, and prefer their 90's material).

 

So not's not really a "F.I.T" of what influences you today, but this background influences a great deal of my approach to pop.

 

Then there were bands like Junkhouse (not sure where from, but loved the first album):

 

[YOUTUBE]0de2W97x_Yg[/YOUTUBE]

 

And the Gandharvas (out of London, Ontario where I lived for a few years):

 

[YOUTUBE]KalQfUBA1VM[/YOUTUBE]

 

I got drunk and ate fish'n'chips with Gord Downy of the "The Tragically Hip". I own and still have trouble listening to the first album (which touts such errr... great lyrics as "I'm a werewolf baby, watch me howl....").

 

[YOUTUBE]LAZUsCONjIQ[/YOUTUBE]

 

Bourbon blues on the street loose and complete

Under skies all smoky blue-green

I can Forksake the dixie dead shake

So we dance the sidewalk clean

My memory is muddy what's this river I'm in

New Orleans is sinking and I don't want to swim

[grantsabbath]

I think loving the Hip is a Canadian institution.

I've seen them more than any other band and I really haven't ever had a bad time.

[prolog]

 

 

 

I can't believe Sloan isn't more famous than they are. Easily one of the best bands to come out of Canada, ever.