The Sordid History of Sousa's Horrible Musical Tastes

[Sousa]

Really, the problem is that it's pretty much exactly Jerry Butler's version and Jerry Butler sings it like this...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHHoqBYgOIQ

...and it sounds so, so much better.

[Sousa]

So I've actually been listening to some albums that would likely come later on this list and I kinda want to get it going again. So let's pile up a couple more!

The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots (2002)

...yeah, you know what? This album was what stalled the list because I honestly can't think of anything interesting to say about it, so I'm just going to blow through it. A lot of you have probably heard at least one song from this album, and you know what? It's fine. The album, on the whole, is fine.

I don't really have a lot to say about how or why I got into this album--"Do You Realize??" was everywhere when it came out, and "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Pt. 1" got some airplay on 97X (BAAAAAAAAM, THE FUTURE OF ROCK AND ROLL)--but it did lead to the only instance ever of me turning in homework I don't remember writing. I'd just gotten my wisdom teeth out in I want to say 2003, and I was back in my apartment, still a little loopy from laughing gas. I took a Vicodin and a Codeine, put on Yoshimi, and... well, I don't remember what happened, but the next morning, I'd written this for my poetry writing class:

 

Every room is an elevator here
And everyone is descending
Flute tripping kayak on the River Styx
Forktailed and pumicetoothed I ride
Beneath Dante’s gates, I breakdance
Commas commanding me to spin
Spin
Spin

...yeah this is why my major was prose, not poetry.  Still, Yoshimi plus too much pain medication brought me to a weird place, and that's my enduring memory of this album.

I don't know what to say about it, really. It comes from that early 2000's period where The Flaming Lips started writing a bunch of songs to appear in things like yogurt commercials, so most of it is less noisy/weird and more melodic/poppish. How you feel about that is up to you. As for me? I dunno, I listened to this again and I'm kind of over them. But I said it was the next album on the list so I'm just going to give it a nice pat on the ass and say "if you liked the big single from this album you'll probably like the rest of it just fine too, even if the middle of it is pretty dull."

Song Highlights:

"Do You Realize??" - Yeah, this is that song, and real talk here, EWB: "Do You Realize??" is really good. It's a little wanky, but as we've seen given the fact that there's a fucking Live album on here, that's not a barrier for Ya Boy Sousa.

"One More Robot/Sympathy 3000-21" - Kind of a pretty song with an electronic influence. This one was one of my favorites from the first, and it still holds up pretty well.

"Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell" - The most chill possible song with the title "Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell." I'm pretty sure this is where that poem came from.

Song Lowlights:

"Fight Test" - This is the song Cat Stevens sued over--compare to "Father and Son." I dunno, a lot of songs on this album have this sort of sound, and for an album that sometimes tries to GET WACKY, a lot of it is kind of samey.

"Are You a Hypnotist??" - To wit, so named because it put me to sleep.

With the Benefit of Hindsight:

I dunno, I can't really form a strong opinion one way or the other. But the good songs on this one are so good that it's not really a surprise it was a hit. I'm already tired of writing about it, so I'll try to set one up next that I was actually excited to write about.

UP NEXT: It's so fuckin' beautiful.

Edited October 23, 2015 by Sousa but... more evil...
WHAT IS UP WITH QUOTES ON THIS BOARD

[MalaCloudy Black]

My friend was obsessed with that album for what feels like the last two years we were in high school. I could honestly never get into it the way he did, but I was also on a looot less drugs than he was at the time. Maybe if I go back and listen to it I'll be able to appreciate it, but hey. I don't really care.

Also, man, The Flaming Lips did an album with Miley Cyrus this year and I wanted to be optimistic about it - I was optimistic about it! - but holy shit is it ever the fucking pits. It has a few decent tunes on it, but they're mostly the songs that The Flaming Lips had nothing to do with, the ones produced by Mike Will Made It.

[Sousa]

Painkillers are like the only drugs I've ever done and apparently I really liked it on painkillers so maybe that's a thing you should try.

Gonna knock off another one of these because I'm not happy with that post. Luckily I just listened to the next one recently SO.

Rilo Kiley - The Execution of All Things (2002)

Okay, this motherfucker I can say things about.

This is probably the last "I heard it on 97X and really liked it a lot so here it is on this list" album that we're going to get to, and to be honest, it's probably my favorite one. In case you missed them at the time/are a kid/don't actually care, Rilo Kiley marked the first appearance outside of a boatload of kids' movies of noted Woman Sousa Had A Crush On For Most Of The Mid-2000's Jenny Lewis. The band was originally built around Lewis and second vocalist Blake Sennett, both of whom were child actors, but here's the thing: Blake Sennett is not a very interesting vocalist. By the time their major label debut (and last album as a band) Under the Blacklight hit, Rilo Kiley was basically Jenny Lewis as a solo artist before she actually became one.

Blacklight and its predecessor, More Adventurous, are the more famous Rilo Kiley albums, mostly because they solidify the band around Lewis, but Execution is the one I discovered on the radio thanks to its title track. At the time, Rilo Kiley were signed to Saddle Creek, the small Omaha-based record label that mostly existed to put out Bright Eyes records and country-twinged indie rock. Execution definitely comes from that place, wearing its folksiness on its sleeve and at times coming off a bit too cute for its own good, as in the three weird musical diversions about her parents scattered between several tracks.

But this is the album that started to get Rilo Kiley attention, and frankly, it should've because jesus christ is it good. Lewis goes from abrasive and harsh to earnest and crooning all throughout the album, and almost all of it works. The title track is really the album's thesis statement--bleak lyrically, but bouncy and pleasant to listen to, elevated largely by Lewis's wonderful vocals. The whole album feels really American, if that makes sense--country sensibility without delving into cliché. Even Blake Sennett's two songs are pretty good.

This is an album that ends with a blistering, over-the-top song about stars and birds and cliffs and has a melodramatic IT'S SO FUCKIN' BEAUTIFUL right near the end... and feels like it's earned it. It's aged delightfully even if I've kind of outgrown its early-20's sensibility.

Song Highlights:

"The Good That Won't Come Out" - To me, this is the defining Rilo Kiley song--not the best, but the one that's a pretty good barometer for what the band's all about. It's quiet and twangy (gotta get in that slide guitar) but lyrically it's the exact opposite of what you'd expect, dwelling on environmental concerns (a theme of the album), loneliness, fear of doctors (the second verse is so good), and featuring a great build in the bridge that builds and builds before ending in resignation--"You say I choose sadness, that it never once has chosen me... maybe you're right." So great.

"The Execution of All Things" - The first single and, honestly, probably the best song on the album. Lots of big building verses, a melodramatic string intro, and a goofy guitar solo--it all works really well.

"So Long" - I'm trying not to just go LISTEN TO THIS ALBUM IT'S LIT so I'm going to give a nod to one of the two Blake Sennett songs and, really, probably his best one. Honestly, he's not a bad vocalist--he's earnest, pleasant, and likable, and the band is so good that they can get away with a line like "I hope that you drive tonight into the last of the great sunrises" in his other song. It's just that Sennett is a good indie vocalist and Jenny Lewis was clearly on the path to becoming a superstar. So I'll give it to you here, Blake; this song is lovely.

"Hail to Whatever You Found in the Sunlight That Surrounds You" - Shimmering cowboy country with a lot of help from Jiha Lee in a lovely flute part (set to appear in a later album on this list as well!). It's got all of three lines in it, but it's a campfire song and that's all it needs.

Song Lowlights:

"My Slumbering Heart" - Honestly, I like most of this album, and this song's... not bad? I really like the first verse ("The kids keep on playing the driving game and they're singing the same goddamn refrain" is a great line coming out of Lewis), but the song as a whole is just too cute and twee. It's really the only thing on the album that doesn't work.

Also I'd Be Remiss If I Left Out:

"Portions for Foxes" - This song comes from More Adventurous, which isn't featured because, while it's very good, it's not Executions good and starts with the most thuddingly stupid anti-George W. Bush song possibly ever. But I can't talk about Rilo Kiley without talking about "Portions of Foxes" because it's a fucking masterpiece, a perfect bit of alt-rock that I think stacks up with the best of the genre. Really, if you listen to Executions and like it, you should immediately get More Adventurous as well because it's also pretty amazing so long as you skip the first two tracks and start with this one.

With the Benefit of Hindsight:

I'll occasionally pick up Execution to this day and rediscover it. I'd probably rank it in my four or five favorite albums ever. Grab it and give it a listen if you've missed it before now.

UP NEXT: I was originally going to do Guided by Voices' album Earthquake Glue here, but I worry I'm going to stall on it for want of something interesting to say. You should give it a listen, though. Instead, I'll probably do something involving tapdancing.

[GoGo Yubari]

Execution of All Things is definitely the best album. More Adventurous is definitely probably the second-best, even if Take-Offs and Landings has two songs that crush almost anything on that album ("Science vs. Romance" and "Pictures of Success").

Under the Blacklight is also an album that they recorded. "Breakin' Up" is fun?

[Schlitzbrille]

I would like to formally take credit for this topic's revival, mainly through incessant nagging. 

[Sousa]

SWERVE I AM GOING TO TALK ABOUT IT.

Guided by Voices - Earthquake Glue (2003)

Guided by Voices is great for the same reason that prewriting is great.

First off, "how I got here" doesn't require a whole lot of explanation, because before this album came out, I'd known about GBV for years, first getting into them from musically-inclined friends in the late-90's. It makes sense that I'd get there, as GBV is something of a local legend around here--my hometown of Dayton's enduring contribution to music. Essentially, local 4th grade teacher Robert Pollard self-financed a bunch of his basement recordings in the late-80's/early 90's, eventually finding something that got some notoriety with Propeller. GBV is probably best known for their album Bee Thousand and their minor hit "I Am a Scientist," which got a lot of airplay on independent and college radio, and they're pretty well-known in indie rock circles.

The thing about GBV is that my music-loving friends were absolutely adamant about them... and I didn't get it. The local fascination made sense--Dayton doesn't get much love despite giving you motherfuckers the Wright Brothers and Paul Laurence Dunbar and Shark Boy. But GBV's problem has always been that Robert Pollard has a ton of good ideas and records literally every one of them... and in that bunch, maybe five or six are really brilliant, four or five are pretty great, and fifteen are garbage. Pollard kept them all in. That's why I compare them with prewriting, with that stage in writing when all ideas sound great but only a couple of them are really worth a damn, and most of the early albums are as lo-fi as they come, which can sometimes make them hard to get into.

Don't get me wrong: GBV's individual songs, when they work, are incredible, Pollard's weird faux English accent notwithstanding (you're from like ten minutes from my house, dude). Every album has a few tracks that are stellar. Bee Thousand has "Goldheart Mountaintop Queen Directory" and "Echos Myron." Alien Lanes has "My Valuable Hunting Knife" and "Motor Away." Under the Bushes Under the Stars has "Cut-Out Witch" and "To Remake the Young Flyer." Mag Earwhig! has "I Am a Tree" and "Bulldog Skin" (this song is the fucking truth). Universal Truths and Cycles has "Cheyenne" and "Back to the Lake."  Do the Collapse had "Teenage FBI" and... well, Do the Collapse had "Teenage FBI." But the typical GBV listening pattern was "put in an album, listen to the four or five good songs, then put in another one"--which was exacerbated by the fact that most GBV songs clock in under two minutes. If ever there was a band that cried out for a greatest hits collection, it's this one (and they do have one, the excellent Human Amusements at Hourly Rates).

Earthquake Glue came after a run that's almost universally acknowledged as their worst (other than the early albums, which are almost unlistenable)--slicker and better produced but at the cost of creativity. They were a bit more consistent, but nothing stood out, and most of them erred on the side of mediocrity. I bought Earthquake Glue almost out of habit since I'd mostly hated the previous two albums.

This was, really, the album where I got GBV, where Pollard's big-arena ambitions and stream-of-consciousness writing style really came together. It felt like the album Pollard had been trying to make for years, full of beefy rock anthems, greasy blues, and shiny pop numbers. Like the most celebrated GBV albums, there's a lot of ideas at play, and I think they work better here. There aren't very many songs that hit the height of GBV's best individual songs, but almost everything is good, and the best songs are real classics.

That's why I decided to write this up anyway. Earthquake Glue was one of those times when a band I had liked suddenly came together and became a band I loved. That's rare and pretty wonderful.

Song Highlights:

"The Best of Jill Hives" - GBV has made a lot of plays for big-time success, like they did with the bullshit ode to sappy crying bullshit "Hold on Hope" (IT'S A SHIT SONG, SCRUBS FANS, DON'T @ ME, THERE HIDES THE COWBOY INDEED.), and this is probably the best of them--a pretty straightforward but lovely little pop song with a good hook and clever lyrics... and unlike some of GBV's other best songs, it sounds like it's about something. For a band that has an admittedly great song that for some reason is called "Tractor Rape Chain," that's something.

"Dirty Water" - Jill Hives is the best, but "Dirty Water" is my favorite--grimy and nasty like a steam locomotive, with a groovy bit of harmonica on top of it.

"I'll Replace You with Machines" - A great song and a great threat to offer EWR mod forum posters on top of it.  Just a fun noisy rocker.

"Dead Cloud" - The whole middle of this album--from "Useless Inventions" through about "Mix Up the Satellites"--is a really strong run of songs anyway, and "Dead Cloud" is a highlight with its quick guitar jolts leading into the soaring chorus.

Song Lowlights:

"My Son, My Secretary, My Country" - I remember someone saying that GBV sometimes uses short songs like these as glue to hold together better songs. This is sort of like that, a completely forgettable interlude and bit of weirdness that basically exists for its ending--"And we all will be warriors, RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"--before "I'll Replace You with Machines" starts up and immediately kicks your ass.

"Beat Your Wings" - Yeah, not every flirtation with longer songs works. This one would probably make a stronger three-minute song, which is a weird complaint to have about this band in particular.

And I'd Be Remiss If I Left Out:

Look, just listen to the songs I linked up there, it'll take you like ten minutes altogether. Seriously, GBV has some ridiculously good individual songs.

With the Benefit of Hindsight:

GBV came back recently, and honestly, I haven't had much interest in following them again--not because I hold some elitist opinion about their EARLY WORK or whatever (Earthquake Glue was their second-to-last album before hiatus), but because I feel like I've got a pretty good sense of what Robert Pollard is all about. He's an good songwriter and occasional genius who never managed to fly as high as his aspirations, but he carved a nice niche for himself and gave us some excellent music.

UP NEXT: Now I'll get to tapdancing, I promise.

[apsham]

The only thing I know about Guided By Voices was a throwaway line in The IT Crowd and I really figured that I would get around to at least hearing a song of theirs one day. And here I am.

[METALMAN]

The only Guided By Voices I've heard is Alien Lanes, which I think is also their most famous one. It's pretty good.

[Sousa]

The only Guided By Voices I've heard is Alien Lanes, which I think is also their most famous one. It's pretty good.

It's between that and Bee Thousand, both of which are pretty good.