max abelson's super groovy music video spectacular

astounding that i’d never heard let it be the way god...

Sat, 26 May 2012 15:30:47 -0400

astounding that i’d never heard let it be the way god intended it, with his highness phil spector’s original production intact, until today. it is like being bar mitzvahed a second time.

#940: the fugees - killing me softly (1995) four out of five...

Thu, 24 May 2012 21:53:00 -0400

#940: the fugees - killing me softly (1995)

four out of five scholars of gnostic soulquarian mysticism agree that the increasingly plausibility of d’angelo releasing some form of his more-than-a-decade-in-the-making james river means that the next mid-90s soulful genius to release her more-than-a-decade-in-the-making album will be lauryn hill.

#939: kate bush - babooshka (1980) i’ve written a major...

Wed, 23 May 2012 11:52:24 -0400

#939: kate bush - babooshka (1980)

i’ve written a major motion picture screenplay about the meeting kate bush took with emi music executives in 1980 where she demanded to spend the babooshka video wearing a vale and holding an over-sanded double bass against an all black background. in the film’s second act, the emi music executives counter that they’ll only fund a babooshka video if she wears a kind of stripper-set-loose-in-the-metropolitan-museum’s-arms-and-armor-wing get-up. but in the third act, when their lawyers fight, both teams threaten to leave the talks before agreeing to a babooshka video with half arms-and-armor and half vale and bass. in the fourth and fifth acts they film the video and it becomes a world-famous triumph.

#938: curtis mayfield - back to the world (1973, soul train) i...

Tue, 22 May 2012 20:45:00 -0400

#938: curtis mayfield - back to the world (1973, soul train)

i bet you i know what don cornelius and curtis mayfield are doing in heaven: they are soul-socking the ether together for all bright, shining eternity.

do you ever stop to think about how much more people would like...

Tue, 22 May 2012 20:15:00 -0400

do you ever stop to think about how much more people would like you if you were curtis mayfield?

#937: curtis mayfield - we gotta have peace (1974) it’s a...

Tue, 22 May 2012 20:09:00 -0400

#937: curtis mayfield - we gotta have peace (1974)

it’s a good thing curtis mayfield was a pacifist, because if he hit people he’d dislocate cheekbones into eye sockets and summon obscure but well-honed skills when angered. but curtis mayfield knew there is never any choice (“save the children, save the children, save the children”) except peace.

#936: jimmie rodgers - waiting for a train (1930) a bandana over...

Mon, 21 May 2012 22:07:00 -0400

#936: jimmie rodgers - waiting for a train (1930)

a bandana over the bottom of your face means you’re in n.w.a., a bandana in the back left pocket means you’re in a mine, a bandana in the back right means you’re on those blocks of christopher street west of bleecker that make tourists uncomfortable, a bandana around your arm means you’re bleeding profusely and don’t have a better tourniquet, a bandana around your special area means you’re a pop star in wheat fields, and a bandana around your neck while you play a special request for an old lady at a train station means you’re jimmie rodgers.

if it weren’t for joan didion, john starks, agnes martin...

Mon, 21 May 2012 22:00:00 -0400

if it weren’t for joan didion, john starks, agnes martin and hank williams, jimmie rodgers would have been the 20th century’s greatest american.

now that spring’s sprung, remember to listen to charlie...

Sat, 19 May 2012 23:28:00 -0400

now that spring’s sprung, remember to listen to charlie parker with strings really late at night and then again in the morning, every day, and don’t forget to study the album cover too. surely you’ve been told what happens to the nicest part of the year when you don’t.

#935: the wowz - sometimes i feel life (2008) the press page...

Fri, 18 May 2012 07:46:00 -0400

#935: the wowz - sometimes i feel life (2008)

the press page for the wowz doesn’t list any reviews since 2006, the year i graduated from college, even though live videos of their sad, lovely, bent, acidic (in both ways) love songs prove they’ve been around longer and have taken at least one trip to rural norway. and if that’s true, i don’t know why the dirty projectors, the other sad and bent band from the early century at yale, gets to make albums about mountains and grapefruits and orcas with bjork while sometimes i feel life stays off the million mix tapes it belongs on. if someone can get the harlem shakes together again i’ll ask the women’s center for a wowz-shakes double bill—brings a tear to the eye even thinking about it.

#934: tom waits - telephone call from istanbul (1987, big...

Wed, 16 May 2012 09:47:00 -0400

#934: tom waits - telephone call from istanbul (1987, big time)

narrowly the world’s finest song on the subject of telephonics, by the skin of a tooth on a hair hanging from a blue trenchcoat.

#933: little feat - long-distance love (1975, live on japanese...

Tue, 15 May 2012 22:38:00 -0400

#933: little feat - long-distance love (1975, live on japanese television)

the greatest phonecall-related love songs in pop music history:

3. chuck berry - memphis, tennessee

2. little feat - long-distance love

1. ??? - to be revealed tomorrow! tune in next time.

oftentimes, even if i’m not wearing my blue bathrobe and...

Tue, 15 May 2012 22:00:00 -0400

oftentimes, even if i’m not wearing my blue bathrobe and my hair down, people come up to me on the streets of new york to ask, “are you lowell george from the thanks i’ll eat it here cover?” and what do i do—i just smile and move my head diagonally, so it could be a nod or a shake. and i say, “friend: maybe so.”

#932: tina turner - ooh-poo-pah-do (1964, shindig!) if the twin...

Mon, 14 May 2012 16:38:00 -0400

#932: tina turner - ooh-poo-pah-do (1964, shindig!)

if the twin cancers of american racism and sexism could be cured with a music video, the tempest and melody and ecstasy and soul of a very young tina turner gliding across a mid-1960s television soundstage—in front of the dry-cleaned gentlemen in suits behind her—would do the trick very nicely.

tina turning.

Mon, 14 May 2012 16:20:00 -0400

tina turning.

quincy jones and norma jennings/peggy lipton, 1974 to 1990:...

Wed, 09 May 2012 21:41:00 -0400

quincy jones and norma jennings/peggy lipton, 1974 to 1990: never forget.

quincy jones week installment no. 7: thinking a lot about what quincy and peggy’s marriage was like at its peak to take the mind off the ny knicks.

#931: frank sinatra and quincy jones - until the real things...

Wed, 09 May 2012 21:30:00 -0400

#931: frank sinatra and quincy jones - until the real things comes along (1984)

almost certainly the best sweater-on-sweater action of 1984, quincy jones in red and sinatra in blue. it was probably filmed the same day as footage of quincy messing around with herbie hancock’s new synthesizers, just after taking off his sweater and switching spectacles.

music is quincy jones’ business. this is quincy jones week...

Tue, 08 May 2012 23:59:49 -0400

music is quincy jones’ business.

this is quincy jones week installment no. 5.

#930: michael jackson (prod. quincy jones) - rock with you...

Tue, 08 May 2012 21:24:00 -0400

#930: michael jackson (prod. quincy jones) - rock with you (1979)

one flugelhorn, a trombone, two flutes and two trumpets, three saxophones, electric piano, guitars, strings, synthesizers, bass, a repetitive disco melody released five months after chicago’s “disco demolition night” and monosyllabic lyrics about lengthy sexual relations were combined by michael jackson and quincy jones—the man we’re here to celebrate—into a song whose sheen is so pure and blinding that you probably should cover your eyes. and that’s not even taking into account the green lasers bouncing off the all-sequin outfit in its underrated video.

don’t smoke cigarettes unless you’re quincy jones in...

Mon, 07 May 2012 23:59:49 -0400

don’t smoke cigarettes unless you’re quincy jones in the background of a 1960s photograph, and even then you should make sure sammy davis jr. is in the frame holding sheet music.

quincy jones week: installment no. 3