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Blipiography

Each day in March I’m going to Blip a song. 31 days, 31 songs, ordered sequentially. I’ll update this post throughout the month, and you can also follow this little experiment on Blip.fm and Twitter. Each song will remain available online as long as Blip is able to find them. The blipiography is a fleeting gesture, I guess.

2008 Mix

If the Side A/Side B thing seems pretentious, there’s at least a little method to my (nostalgic) madness. See, ideally, one who listens to this mix will take a short break after Nina Simone’s “Mississippi Goddam.” Frankly, I don’t know how anyone could hear that song and not need to stand up, walk around, pour a stiff drink, smoke a cigarette, something.

Riff Raff

I bought Powerage rather than one of the other, more obvious choices because it includes “Riff Raff,” hands-down my favorite AC/DC song. There’s much to love about this song — the opening crescendo, Angus’s riffs, the driving 8th-note bassline, the unimpeachable beauty of a 3-chord song

Seven Songs

The Seven Songs “Boots of Spanish Leather” by Bob Dylan “Inside a Boy” by My Brightest Diamond “Spirits (Having Flown)” by Bee Gees “A Letter to Both Sides” by The Fixx “Elegie in C Minor,… Seven Songs

Magic and Loss

How’s this for a strange association? While marveling at Lou Reed’s performance Wednesday night, I kept thinking of Michel Subor.

Saturday Night at Church

I was sitting so close I could never get all four performers — Patty Griffin, Emmylou Harris, Buddy Miller, and Shawn Colvin — in a single shot. I was sitting so close, in fact, that the only two people in the theater sitting closer to Emmylou were Patty and Buddy (sorry Shawn).

In Rainbows

In Rainbows

Couldn’t find any official cover art, so I’m going with this.

David Byrne Does K-Town

“At the Holiday Inn in Knoxville, I saw a sign for the historic town center. Thinking it might contain some character and restaurants, we head there in search of dinner. There’s no one on the streets — not metaphorically, but literally not a single soul is out and it’s not even 8 o’clock.”

Mars Volta

Vermicide

“I think it’s Mars Volta. . . . Rush for the new millennium.”

Mix CD: It’s Beautiful Now

I made this mix for a group of friends, nearly all of whom are about a half-generation older than I am. We all grew up listening to the same music, though. They bought vinyl in the new releases bin; I saw the reunion tours.

Yo La Tengo

By the Time It Gets Dark

First great show of 2007: Lambchop and Yo La Tengo. Unfortunately, YLT’s last visit to Knoxville was memorable for reasons having little to do with the amazing music that was played that night. But they… By the Time It Gets Dark

Mirror (Tarkovsky)

Mix: Needle Drops

This mix began with a single iTunes download. My all-time favorite needle drop accompanies my favorite sequence in what also happens to be my favorite film, Andrei Tarkovsky’s Mirror.

Wiast Deep in the Big Muddy

Waist Deep in the Big Muddy

William Wyler’s The Big Country (1958) is one of those westerns about men proving themselves in the unforgiving and sublime conditions of the American southwest.

Dear John

Aimee Mann at the Bijou

I’d brought along Joanna’s bite-sized Sony Cyber-shot camera in hopes of getting some decent stills, but the light was too low (even from the third row) and, as a result, all of the photos were streaked by motion blurs. So, instead, I experimented with the video capture, and I’m really pleased with the results — especially with the sound.

Live Music

This post is about the years I spent as a broke-ass graduate student, unable to afford to see the shows that came through town.

Jonathan Richman

The Origin of Love

This is the second time “The Origin of Love” has been a Long Pauses Song of the Moment. Again, I was inspired by seeing a live performance of Hedwig and the Angry Inch — this… The Origin of Love

Sonic Youth

Drunken Butterfly

Or, Random Observations Provoked by Seeing Sonic Youth Live for the First Time

David Sancious

About three-and-a-half minutes into “Kitty’s Back,” just after Springsteen’s blaring, horn-backed solo, Sancious steps in with a squirrelly run on his Hammond organ, followed by a slew of percussive figures and arpeggios. Harmonically, it isn’t an especially interesting solo, but it’s exactly the kind of Booker T-inspired playing the song needs.

Electrif Lycanthrope

For years, I’ve heard and read about Electrif Lycanthrope, an unofficial live release from 1974. Original vinyl copies still show up on the market from time to time, though at prohibitively steep prices. But now, thanks to the wonders of the Internet Archive, it’s right there, just waiting to be downloaded for free.

Music Hall MMF 2.1

I have no will power. Barely two weeks after deciding that I’d like to pick up a turntable, I now own a Music Hall MMF 2.1.

The Tyranny of “Shuffle”

There’s no effort required to shuffle. And, even worse, no creativity. Listening becomes a wholly passive act, and the music suffers, dissolving into the atmosphere like so much Muzak.

What's Going On?

Inner City Blues

If I’m remembering theory notation correctly, the change for “Inner City Blues” is i-IV. Two chords. It opens with twenty-four straight measures of the minor root before finally changing to the major IV, where it stays for all of four measures before returning to the root. Would have bored me senseless a decade ago; now, I’ll be damned if that change ain’t transcendent. The song is a chant-like, soul-filled lamentation. An angry prayer.

A Session of Dance Music

One of my goals with this latest mix, “A Session of Dance Music,” was to gather some songs that wouldn’t inspire Joanna to take sarcastic jabs at my piss-poor taste. We just got back from a long drive, during which we listened to the entire disc, and her opinion seems to hover somewhere in the “Well, at least it doesn’t suck” range. So mission accomplished, I guess.