Music Notes
By 
Not going to be around to discuss much this week til later, as I am presently at Newport Folk Festival.
This week was devoted to music films. I saw three. The first is the big one–I finally saw A Complete Unknown, James Mangold’s Dylan biopic from last year. I was skeptical and my skepticism was only somewhat unwarranted after watching it. This film is better than average, so that’s good, but it’s a weird film in that the good things are really good and the bad things are quite problematic, so I was really torn. Here’s 3 things I thought were great and 3 I thought were really problematic. On the great side: 1) Mangold makes no effort to whitewash Dylan’s awful personality. He’s a huge asshole to everyone and the film is totally open to showing that. Dylan himself it seems to push for this. 2) He does a great job getting fantastic performances from the actors. I want to especially shout out Edward Norton here, who completely disappears into Pete Seeger. That was absolutely fantastic work. I’ve always thought Norton was great and this is one of his very finest performances in a great career. Kieran Culkin was very good in A Real Pain so I don’t have any problem with him winning Best Supporting Actor, but I would have voted for Norton. Dylan remains unknowable, so it’s hard for anyone to truly embody him, but Chalamet was good. And given that Mangold directed the quite problematic Johnny Cash biopic Walk the Line, the fact that Cash was more properly portrayed here by Boyd Holbrook (much better than he was in Narcos, that’s for sure) as a total rounder high and fucked up out of his mind and completely insane is quite interesting. Holbrook nailed that performance. The third thing I really liked here is that the film did a good job of demonstrating just how revolutionary those songs were as soon as he showed up in New York. He was just so far ahead of anyone else in the folk scene.
Three things I didn’t like: First, all the portrayals of women were awful and this is really frustrating. The Suze Rotolo (by Dylan’s request given a different name for some reason) and even the Joan Baez characters are massively underdeveloped. They basically exist to watch Dylan be amazing and then to suffer from him being a problematic man. Only at the very end do either take on any texture at all and that’s really frustrating. Baez obviously is a force of nature of her own, but Rotolo was absolutely crucial to Dylan developing as a songwriter through her politicizing him and none of this is shown at all. That’s really, really frustrating. They are just poorly written roles. Second, the film repeats the bullshit about the Newport Folk Festival in 1965 when Seeger supposedly tried to pull the cords on the sound, which DID NOT HAPPEN. Mangold has defended this by saying that he’s not filming a Wikipedia entry and while that’s fair enough, repeating lies is not exactly a better option. The whole set up is that Dylan has to overcome this hopeless corny square in Seeger, as well meaning as he is. That’s….not really accurate and it is a cheap shot at Seeger. Relatedly, and I totally understand from a movie perspective why this choice was made, but it was not Seeger at the hospital all the time with Woody Guthrie. It was Ramblin’ Jack Elliott and given that Dylan later just totally shit on Ramblin’ Jack, it would have reinforced what a little asshole he is had they introduced the Elliott character here and brought Seeger in a little later. Third, the film has more than a little fan fiction here. Mangold doesn’t even try to get at Dylan’s motives for anything and as such, it becomes a series of song after song after song, to the point that it sometimes feels like I’m listening to the two Dylan Greatest Hits packages.
A couple of other points here. First, Woody Guthrie–who it should be said was an extremely difficult human being at the best of times–was in much worse shape at the end of his life than is pointed out here and he wouldn’t have been able to communicate to this level. Well, whatever. Same with Dylan showing up and playing him “Song to Woody” is a complete fabrication–he didn’t write that song until later. Movie magic, OK I get it. Also, for the sake of veracity, none of these interactions between Cash and Dylan actually happened in the way that they are portrayed, but this is a fudging of the truth that actually works in the film.
Anyway, it’s a better film than most biopics at least.
I also watched Sini Anderson’s 2013 film The Punk Singer, about Kathleen Hanna. This is about as good as a music doc as you can get and it’s entirely because Hanna is one of the most charismatic performers to ever be on a rock and roll stage. She simply was made to be a rock star. That she is also a totally badass feminist who told the men in the horrifically misogynist punk/grunge scenes of the late 80s and early 90s to fuck off is of course also critically important to her legacy, but the film works because she is so damn good on film, whether in grainy footage of performances or the many interviews she has given over the years. The film does spend a long time on her late-stage Lyme Disease diagnosis, which is a comedown, but then that dominated her life for years, so it makes sense why the film would reflect this. Like any biography, there are downtimes and her’s happened to be an undiagnosed illness that really sucked. The film came together just as she was returning to live performances as part of her recovery, with The Julie Ruin. So that was a nice redemption narrative there. Good film. This is presently playing on Criterion.
Finally. I watched was Me and Stella, the 1976 Geri Ashur documentary about the great Elizabeth Cotten. This is streaming on Folkstreams, so check it out. I didn’t actually know that much about Cotten’s life, but I had no idea she wrote “Freight Train” when she was 12 years old and then later put her guitar away for years because her life was cleaning white people’s homes. Her story of returning to music is bonkers. She was in a department store and found a wandering child who had gotten lost named Peggy Seeger, Pete’s half-sister. Her mother Ruth Crawford Seeger then hired Cotten to work in their home. There was music all over the place there of course and Cotten was like, hey I know how to play the guitar and then she just had these old songs. Peggy’s brother Mike began recording her and a folk revival career was born with one of the best songs ever written in America.
I have absolutely nothing to say about Ozzy Osbourne. I’ve never heard a single one of his solo albums. My friends in school were not metal kids and no one I’ve known since really cared enough to play them for me. I have heard a Black Sabbath album or two, but not since college. But if you have more to say about Ozzy, please feel free to do so. You know who did have more to say about Ozzy? John Darnielle from The Mountain Goats and it’s really a fantastic piece of fan criticism from someone who wouldn’t obviously be a fan.
I also have little to say about Chuck Mangione, who I have always associated with the pure cheese of what happened to the fusion movement by the mid 70s. I am not going to begrudge any jazz musician actually making money, since so few do. But I have never heard anything by Mangione–at least in his solo career–that I thought was good. Convince me I’m wrong if you think I am!
Dean Wareham on writing music in these horrible times.
God is a ridiculous concept. Gospel music is not.
Excited for the new Wednesday album.
If you’d like Lucy Dacus to officiate your wedding at one of your shows, she’s offering her services.
This week’s playlist:
- Talking Heads, Speaking in Tongues
- Parquet Courts, Content Nausea
- Watchhouse, Tides of a Teardrop
- Anna Webber, simpletrio2000
- Jerry Joseph, Istanbul/Fog of War
- Sierra Ferrell, Trail of Flowers
- Neil Young, Zuma
- Richard and Linda Thompson, Shoot Out the Lights
- Natalie Hemby, Puxico
- Harriet Tubman, The Terror End of Beauty
- Mekons, Deserted
- Ray Wylie Hubbard, Tell the Devil I’m Getting There as Fast as I Can
- William Parker, I Plan to Stay a Believer: The Inside Songs of Curtis Mayfield
- U.S. Girls, Half Free
- Jason Isbell, Southeastern
- Smithsonian Collection Of Classic Jazz, Volume 1
- Jamie Saft/Joe Morris/Charles Downs, Mountaintops
- Dave Douglas, High Risk
- David S. Ware Trio, Live in New York, 2010
- Ambrose Akinmusire, Honey from a Winter Stone
- Kali Uchis, Orquedias
- Boldy James and Sterling Toles, Manger on McNichols
- Lambrini Girls, Who Let the Dogs Out
- Sniffany & the Nits, The Unscratchable Itch
- Fauxe, Ikhlas
- Feeble Little Horse, Girl with Fish
- Marika Hackman, Any Human Friend
- Algiers, Shook
- Tammy Wynette, 20 Greatest Hits
- Karl Shiflett & Big Country Show, self-titled
- Richard Thompson, Watching the Dark, disc 1
- Merle Haggard, A Portrait of Merle
- Hank Williams, The Unreleased Recordings, disc 1
- Don Rigsby, The Midnight Call
- Laura Veirs, Saltbreakers
- H.C. McEntire, Lionheart
- Bob Dylan, Desire
- Marty Robbins, Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs
- John Moreland, High on Tulsa Heat
- Toru Takemitsu, A Flock Descends into the Pentagonal Garden
- Medeski Martin and Wood, It’s a Jungle in Here
- Hurray for the Riff Raff, Life on Earth
- Sir Douglas Quintet, Live from Austin TX
- U2, War
- Robbie Fulks, Bluegrass Vacation
- Yo La Tengo, This Stupid World
- Charlie Haden, Liberation Music Orchestra
- Silver Jews, The Natural Bridge
- Wild Billy Childish & CTMF, Where the Wild Purple Iris Grows
- Iggy Pop & James Williamson, Kill City
- 2 Chainz, The Play Don’t Care Who Makes It
- Prince, Purple Rain
- Midnight Oil, Blue Sky Mining
- Jon Dee Graham, Full
- Margo Cliker, Valley of Heart’s Delight
- Buddy Tabor, Writing on Stone
- George Jones, The Essential, disc 2
- Sun Ra, Purple Night
- Peter Rowan and Tony Rice, You Were There For Me
- The Rolling Stones, Between the Buttons
Album Reviews, which this week cover six radically varied albums, all of which are fascinating in their own way without me really liking any of them so much that I’m likely to buy them, or at least none of them are at the top of my list of my weekly album purchases (I buy 2-3 every Friday, this week was Bobby Kapp and Matthew Shipp’s Cactus and Kahil El’Zabar’s America the Beautiful):
Los Thuthanaka, self-titled
This is a couple of Bolivian American brothers. I can’t say I’ve ever heard anything quite like this before. This is basically experimental electronic music with a strong nod to the traditional music of the Andes. But it’s not like sitting around a drum circle or something. There’s a ton of prog influences here, hip hop to some extent, and of course dance music on top of it all. It’s in fact not really danceable, or at least I wouldn’t think so, but the influences are clear. I’m also not entirely sure whether “good” is a way to describe it, though “bad” it is definitely not. Some of this is going to depend on how much you like the postmodern production-heavy chopping up of sounds into tiny bits and reconstituted into this unusual project. I can say this–you will think a lot about what is happening here. I don’t think I need to hear it again, but I am certainly glad I heard it once.
B
The War and Treaty, Plus One
Every white mainstream country fan’s favorite Black artist has a new answer out. I suppose this isn’t their fault, though this couple definitely panders to white conservatives and to significant financial payout. I mean, hell, the guy actually learned to play piano as part of the occupying force in 2003 whose job it was to guard Saddam Hussein’s palace and it was Saddam’s piano. So to say the least, this is a group that likes its traditional values. I generally don’t care to center the politics of bands but it’s kind of important when placing this band in the musical universe. The band itself is really completely fine in riding that soul/country line that is pretty common today and I’m glad for it. Yola does it better though. This tends to be a bit bombastic when it doesn’t need to be. They can sing though, not questioning that. It’s a completely solid album, though tuned up with too many over the top Nashville arrangements. Also, it does not need to be 18 songs. What album really does?
B
Alma Laprida, Pitch Dark and Trembling
Laprida is an avant-garde musician and composer from Buenos Aires who plays the tromba marina, a medieval instrument a little bit like a cello I guess. It’s very good for the droning that she wants to create. She takes the tromba marina and adds electronic processing to it and runs it through a subwoofer in order to create a bigger and deeper sound. So yeah, this is a low pitched album that has both the possibilities and limitations of a solo acoustic bass album that jazz guys sometimes do. It allows her to show off the what this instrument can do and her own vision and that’s super cool. It also is not exactly something you probably want to hear repeatedly. It’s a super fascinating recording though and at only about 30 minutes, the right amount of time. Album title is accurate.
B+
Deerhoof, Noble and Godlike in Ruin
Deerhoof has now been around for over 30 years. That’s kind of amazing and it also makes me feel old, though what doesn’t after you hit 50. This album starts with a song that I hope is ultimately about humanity, called “Overrated Species Anyhow.” It’s a pretty typical Deerhoof album, which means interesting avant garde rock. In fact, who makes better avant garde rock and who has ever better made better avant garde rock? The Velvet Underground in the past, OK, but that’s over 50 years and for about 5 minutes. Now, I am not the biggest avant garde rock guy and so I inevitably respect Deerhoof more than love them. That’s where I am at here too, enjoying all of this without a likelihood I will listen to it more than once a year or so. And that’s fine, some subgenres will inevitably have some limitations for all of us.
B+
JLin, Akoma
This minimalist electronic composer is someone who exists on the edges of a lot of worlds I reside in. I’ve actually seen her, for example, sitting in with Third Coast Percussion at Big Ears a couple of years ago, one of those shows you hit in a festival like that during the rare times when it is a down point in the schedule for you and you just decide to check something out. Here, she shows off her fans. The guests on this album include Bjork, Kronos Quartet, and Philip Glass. Oh is that all? All that said, it’s still a lot of beeps and boops with some weird other sounds to me, though quite melodic at times. It’s perfectly fine for me as some kind of background music, albeit an odd sort of background music, but in terms of loving JLin, it’s just not going to happen.
B-
Miss Li, Livet, Doden, Skiten, Daremellan
Swedish pop that’s actually in Swedish as opposed to the usual singing in English from European artists. Not that I blame them for the commercial necessity of making that choice. And you know, it ain’t bad. We aren’t talking a Beyonce or Ariana Grande level talent here, no. But is this entirely decent electropop that could get radio play was it in English? Sure. The album did have a couple of hits, and one song has over 54 million plays on Spotify, which for a song in Swedish ain’t bad. Several others are in the 20 million range. So for fans of pop music, this might well be for you. For me, it’s fine.
B-
As always, this is an open thread for all things music and art and absolutely no things politics.