BUT NOT TODAY!

Today, I’m featuring a song from Volume 6 that still gets me so riled up that I can’t discuss it rationally.  There are no ideas here.  Just total, unrelenting, nostalgic joy:

Song of the Week: Toadies, “Possum Kingdom”

If you were a kid in the 96X era and didn’t hear Toadies’ “Possum Kingdom,” I’ll have a hard time relating to you.  For me, this song is as much ingrained into anyone’s 90′s experience as their first kiss, or Bill Clinton, or the first time they kissed Bill Clinton.  “Possum Kingdom” is not the best song (but is it?).  Toadies are not the best band (but are they?).  There are more important songs from the 90′s, more quintessential songs of the 90′s, more popular songs from the 90′s, and (if “grunge” was the defining sound of the 90′s) grungier songs from the 90′s.

Simply: there are a million better songs than Toadies’ “Possum Kingdom.”  But there are only a handful of songs whose opening seconds bring me more joy.

Why is that?

Since I’m CLEARLY NOT TRYING THIS WEEK, my attempted answers will come in list-form:

1) It’s fucking awesome.  Sorry for the language, but I need to be precise.  This song just isn’t “awesome.”  It’s fucking awesome*.  I’ll outline this descriptor at the bottom of the post.  Warning: more bad language.

1A) Between “Possum Kingdom” and “Tyler,” their two biggest songs were fearlessly creepy.  Maybe more than any other 90′s band.  Wait, no–Live.  Live.  Always Live.

2) “This is 96X music.”  96X had its own little commercial tags coming in and out of breaks.  With faux-gravitas, The 96X Voice would say “THIS…is 96X music,” and then they’d splice together a few moments of a few recognizable songs to let you know their format.  This moment of “Possum Kingdom” was always “96X music.”  I don’t think they ever had a tag that didn’t include it.

2A) It was 96X music.  This single came out in the fall of 1994 and only gained strength through the spring and summer of 1995.  That was arguably the best nine months of the 96X-era: grunge had exploded, alt-rock had splintered in twenty different directions, and 96X’s format suddenly meant “everything we like.”

Think about it: the grunge torch-bearers were either in their prime (Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Alice In Chains) or already legends (Nirvana).  Second and third generation grunge bands (STP, Bush, Silverchair, Candlebox, Seven Mary Three, Toadies, Live, etc) had broken the mainstream and competed for airtime.  College radio demigods were now headlining festivals and selling out arenas (Jane’s Addiction, R.E.M.).  Countless iterations of “alt-rock weirdness” were popping up the charts (Green Day, Weezer, Better Than Ezra, Gin Blossoms, Cranberries, Everclear, Oasis).  The Horde & Lilith Fair crowds were picking up steam.  As disparate as these artists were, they all made sense under the tent of “96X music.”

So, not only did an average radio block put Dada’s “Dizz Knee Land” alongside Alice In Chains’ “Rooster” alongside Spacehog’s “In the Meantime,” nobody thought twice about it.  For a moment, anything went.  It was a thrilling time to listen to the radio.  And “Possum Kingdom” was one of the biggest hits during a golden era for popular music.  For me, “Possum Kingdom” isn’t a cool song or a fond memory: it represents the peak of the 96X era.

It wasn’t the best song on 96X, but it was 96X music.

Volume 7: Same time next week!

(*On my scale, a “fucking awesome” song rates higher than an “awesome” song.  It’s more specific than “awesome,” because awesome is vague.  A “fucking awesome” song rocks; it’s also usually “bitchin.”  While an “awesome” song’s merits are more subjective, a fucking awesome song is, in some way, objectively great.  Usually that way is “undeniable, incorruptible, irrepressibly lovable rocksauce.”  A fucking awesome song often gets better with age, as it feeds off nostalgia.  “Fucking awesome” songs resonate more if you’re wearing denim.  “Fucking awesome” songs sound better if you’re in a mall parking lot.  At its heart, a “fucking awesome” song is a “fuckin’ awesome” song.)

Then Doc Martens and Lucky jeans became popular and I was the kid in hand-me-down Gap khakis (Ghakis?).  It’s all been downhill since.

Anyway, that was the first CD I ever owned.  But the first CD I ever bought?  With my own money that I saved up myself?  Green Day’s Dookie.

Song of the Week: Green Day, “Basket Case“

When 96X was created, its format was “alt-rock,” but in the early 90′s, that mostly meant “Seattle grunge.”  My Brother began collecting those tapes and CDs, so I became a fan by association.  Pearl Jam’s Ten and R.E.M.’s Automatic For the People were staples in his room, but I loved them too.  There was no need buy my own music; I stole his.

Green Day’s Dookie was a dividing line.  It was the first time I liked a band that my brother didn’t; hence, it the first time I had to buy a CD myself.  But, bigger picture: 1994 was approximately when 96X’s “modern rock alternative” format expanded from “pretty much grunge and R.E.M.” to “anything that wouldn’t have been popular in the 80′s.”

Specifically, the “alternative rock” genre splintered in a dozen different directions, each focusing on their own flavor of Gen X idiosyncrasies and loserdom.  Beck and the Beastie Boys were blending rock and hip hop in exciting new ways.  The Cranberries and Hole were fresh female voices in the rock mainstream.  The jammy Horde contingent was starting to gain steam (Dave Matthews, Blues Traveler, etc).  Second-iteration grunge bands (STP, Smashing Pumpkins) were already huge, popularizing their own version of the “it” sound.

And then there was Green Day, carving out a place for California pop-punk that continued long into the 2000′s.

In so many (probably misguided) ways, I still think of Green Day as Nirvana’s deranged step-cousin.  Both were three-piece bands led by the singular vision of their singer and songwriter.  Both were essentially punk bands that wrote pop songs within that idiom.  Both focused on boredom, self-loathing, and alienation.  Both were funny.  Both touched on social commentary without being political.  Both were unpredictable live.

But while the aspect of punk Nirvana most adopted was its nihilistic freedom, the aspect Green Day cherished was its populism.  Specifically, smart songs that sound dumb.  Take “Basket Case” or “Longview.”  These aren’t just hits: they’re mission statements.  Billy Joe Armstrong has always been invested in talking “about nothing and everything all at once.”  It was true in 1993, and it’s true in 2013.

Being Green Day is tricky.  By straddling the line between self-deprecating goofballs and relevant band, they’ve always run the risk of being massively popular but not taken seriously.  For example, “Longview” is an immediately likable song about (among other things) masturbation.  The question is, can a goofy song about masturbation also be a smart song about loneliness?  Just because a song’s overtly funny, does that mean it’s not serious, too?

So, Green Day has always been taken with a grain of salt, a knowing chuckle, a roll of the eye.  Their ingrained silliness is the reason my brother didn’t like Dookie and the reason American Idiot and 21st Century Breakdown were met with mixed reviews.  But music’s alone in this respect.  We adore movies that realistically marry comedy and drama.  No serious critic would claim that Seinfeld was actually “a show about nothing.”  Like “Basket Case,” it was about nothing and everything.  All at once.

But with music, we need our smart artists to act like smart artists.  We associate “inaccessible” with “deep.”  If we don’t understand, we assume it’s over our heads.  Look: I write, sing, and think about songs all day.  I’ve done it, too.  I’ve used that crutch.

I admire Green Day.  It is a very real, very valuable gift to simply say what you’re trying to say.  Ever since Dookie went diamond in 1994, Green Day has done the hard, honest work of writing smart songs that anyone can relate to.  And if humor lets more people in, they’ll fearlessly make themselves the butt of the joke.

Quick postscript: In 2009, I went to see Green Day in Nashville for the 21st Century Breakdown tour.  Brother, now a long-time convert, sat next to me and loved every second.  And after the show, I stole his copy of American Idiot.

Every summer, Mom, Dad, Brother, and I would pile into the Oldsmobile and take a roadtrip.  Usually, we drove West Virginia to see our extended family.  Sometimes, we went Elsewhere.  Occasionally, we went to West Virginia and Elsewhere.  During these marathon drives, we took turns picking music (specifically, the next CASSETTE): Dad first, the person riding shotgun next, and around we went.  On a long drive, you could count on at least one George Jones selection from Dad.  Mom always worked Martha & The Vandellas into the rotation.  Brother’s pick was forever and always Use Your Illusion until, aged fourteen, he officially became too smart for everything that wasn’t Bob Dylan (if this sounds a little like confirmation, it was).

One summer, Brother’s friend made him a mixtape for our drive to West Virginia (or Elsewhere).  I can still see the tracklist scrawled on the insert.  The tape was full of soon-to-be 96X staples (10000 Maniacs, Crash Test Dummies, R.E.M., etc).  But listed #1 was a song I’d never heard by a band I’d never heard of, with an asterisk and “awesome!” written in the margin.*

And, in my memory, it was the first 96X song that all four of us openly liked.

Song of the Week: Counting Crows, “Round Here“

Adam Duritz has spent much of his life battling depression.  According to Duritz, his first battles with major depressive disorder began in his early twenties after a bad LSD trip.  Passionate about music (and clearly talented), he struggled to make music a consistent, full-time enterprise.  It’s hard to start a rock band if you can’t get out of bed.

Still, he dabbled with different sets of San Francisco musicians, and he slowly found his voice as a songwriter.  In the midst of an experimental, jammy incarnation The Himalayans, Duritz wrote a song called “Round Here.”  By the time the song we know reached completion, Duritz had focused on a new band with an all-star cast of Bay Area musicians.  His voice, combined with their musicianship and professionalism, became Counting Crows.  The rest we (kind of) know.

“Round Here” became a massive hit in the 96X-era for a lot of reasons: it’s catchy, the production and execution are great, it was wisely marketed to a moody early 90′s alt-rock crowd desperate for more “smart pop,” etc.  It’s a marriage of talent, inspiration, and great timing.  But I think its best attribute is urgency.

Some of the best songs simply had to come out.  This is more than talent, and this is more than inspiration (though it’s both of those, too).  These songs sound like the feverish tick-tock of a time bomb.  They sound like they arrived fully-formed out of sheer will and desperation.  They’re breathless, and they’re some kind of perfect.  They strain to say everything at once, and usually do. They’re hard to describe, but–a wonderful testament to the way audiences receive pop music–we know it when we hear it.

“Mr. Jones” is inspired; “Round Here” is urgent.  It sounds like what it is: an explosion of talent after years spent bottled up, hung up, and clinically depressed.

(More examples: Of the 96X era, “Losing My Religion” has this quality.  Pearl Jam’s “State of Love and Trust.”  A classic example is “Like a Rolling Stone.”  Outkast’s “B.O.B.”  The Clash’s “London Calling.”  In many cases, the artist had bigger hits, but this was the song that initially broke them to a new, wider audience.)

“Round Here” is the sound of a breaking point.  The song deftly builds to its climax–specifically, Maria’s ledge.  Duritz’s outcry that “she must be tired of something,” remains deeply affecting nearly twenty years later.  It’s a moment of silence finally voiced, inarticulateness deftly-articulated, helplessness trying to lend a hand.  Everything in the song has built to this point, and the line is both explicitly hollow and implicitly fulfilling.  Alongside “The Bends” (“I wish it was the sixties/I wish I could be happy/I wish…something would happen“) and “Smells Like Teen Spirit” (its entirety), this moment of “Round Here” stands as a definitive moment of 90′s rock.

It was catchy enough for Mom to love it, lyrical enough for Dad to like it, cool/relevant enough for Brother to sign onto it, and accessible enough for me to appreciate it.  In 1993, it was the perfect single for anyone smart, landlocked, and scared of mosh pits.  “Round Here” is a quintessential song of the 96X era, and Counting Crows’ finest hour.

Unfortunately, that hour was also their first.

But this series isn’t just about remembering the 90′s–it’s about connecting the dots to 2013.  And it’s a shame that New Counting Crows have been disappointing enough to actually compromise appreciation of Old Counting Crows**.

I’ll point the finger at myself.  I distrust and hate Saturday Nights, Sunday Mornings (2008) so much, so viscerally, it colors the way I’ve ever viewed the band.  I could go on speculating the reasons Counting Crows were once that good and are now this good***.  I could write circles about whether I should’ve seen this coming.  I could question what trust even exists between a band and their fanbase.  I could rhapsodize on burning out, fading away, etc.

But I won’t.  I’m wrong to retrospectively dislike Counting Crows, and I’m not going to.  I’ll let Rasheed Wallace and Robert Plant guide me: ball don’t lie, and the song remains the same. “Round Here” is a great record, even if it’s full of ghosts.

Same time next week: Volume 5!

*Might not have said “awesome!”  I can’t remember.  Maybe “tubular” or “cowabunga” or some other 90′s radness.

**Should be mentioned: I think Recovering the Satellites is a fantastic record, This Desert Life has great moments, and “Up All Night” (from Hard Candy) is one of their best songs.  We’re not talking about Maria jumping off a ledge here; more like slowly, methodically, falling down the stairs.

**OK, I’ll bite.  The short version: I think it’s hard on a band’s development when its most talented member is also its most volatile and least musical member.  This lends itself to early, inspired highs and later, misguided lows.  The Killers (of whom I’m also a fan) are another example.  A counterexample is R.E.M.  The difference is R.E.M. were a “band that mattered” long before (and long after) they were a “band that was hugely popular.”  Their hits were more incidental than integral.

Here’s the one:

So, build a desert tent (?) and camp out til next week.

Move and nobody gets hurt,

CM

The only song I ever heard come back from the dead twice was “Far Behind” by Candlebox.  The single itself came early in the alt-rock boon, but 96X simply would not let it die. As late as 1998, sandwiched between Matchbox 20 and (you guessed it) The Verve, there was “Far Behind” by Candlebox, steadily gluing non-stop rock sets together.

Song of the Week: Candlebox, “Far Behind“

Say you’re a record executive in 1993.  Your name is Bert Harb.  Your job is to find the next Nirvana.  But you’re 48, you live in Brentwood, you wear a suit, and you kind of dig the Eagles.  You don’t have a frame of reference for “grunge.”  How to know?  Where to begin?  Mostly, you will look at non-musical traits to gauge a band’s potential success.

This is paint-by-numbers A&R.  It’s been around as long as hit records and people-who-work-in-music-who-don’t-know-music.  And perhaps no band from the 90′s exemplifies it more than Candlebox.

Back to Bert in 1993.  What’s he’s looking for?  What are the numbers he’s painting by?

In no particular order*:

1) (Kind of) dumb names.  After Soundgarden, every band name needed to be two words–ideally pushed together–that sound cool but meant little.  Bonus points if these words describe inanimate objects.
96X Example: Superdrag. Lemonheads. Silverchair. Radiohead. Etc.
Candlebox? Check.

In 2013: Band names that include punctuation, missing letters, foreign characters, a bad joke, or the word “deer.”  The perfect band will be called “DeërJHN!”

2) Sad white guys. Bonus points if they all have long hair and look practically identical.
Example: Every band on 96X except Rage Against the Machine.
Candlebox? Check.

In 2013: Same.  Maybe less sad.  Maybe more white.

3) Vocal ticks.  The singer should have a good voice, but should also have a weird voice. Something memorable and gritty, but not too threatening.  Bonus points if it resembles Eddie Vedder.
Example: Can you pronounce “didn’t,” like “didahn’t,” and make “maybe” a nine-syllable word?  Yes, yes I can.
Candlebox? Check.

In 2013: Singing voice just can’t sound like speaking voice.  Sing with accent that isn’t yours, sing with affect, or sing with effect/autotune.  Fake human or real robot.

4) Vague song titles.  Most songs are named after the words repeated in the chorus.  Cool–most of mine are, too.  Bonus points if those words are short, vague, and suggest alienation.
Example: “I Alone.” “Cumbersome.” Every song from Pearl Jam’s Ten.
Candlebox, “Far Behind”? Check.

In 2013: Wildly specific song titles.  Ideally a place nobody goes, or an object nobody uses.  A meditation on a non-thing.

5) Muddy, heavy guitars. Heavy, distorted guitars were a grunge staple. Typically, they’re quiet during verses and loud during choruses (a Pixies trademark Nirvana mastered and popularized).  Bonus points if they sound like they’re underwater.
Example: “Come As You Are.” “Lightning Crashes.”
Candlebox? Check.

In 2013: Handclaps.  One banjo player who “just picked it up, man.”  Two drummers or zero drummers.

6) GenX cynicism and ambiguity.  An extension of #4.  Only in the 90′s would the word “maybe” be a chorus.  “Let’s build up into a climactic moment, then let’s scream the most anti-climactic word we can.”  Bonus points if a male singer sings from a female perspective.
Example: Nevermind.  Bush.
Candlebox? Check. May-ay-aybe.

In 2013: GenY optimism and spirited half-sense.

7) Overlong hits.  The five-minute single became standard in the mid-90′s.  Bonus points if it takes two minutes to reach a chorus.
Example: How is “Banditos” by the Refreshments 5 minutes long?
Candlebox, “Far Behind”?  Kind of. (Clocks in at a brief 4:54)

In 2013: What is a hit?

This factor, more than any other, illustrates the difference in paint-by-numbers A&R from 1993 to 2013 (bypassing the fact that A&R doesn’t really exist in 2013).  Hits–and hit potential–aren’t part of the selection process.

Here’s why Candlebox was perfect: in 1993, if you’re Bert Harb looking for the next Nirvana, you’re 1) too late and 2) missing the point.  There’s only one Nirvana.  Instead, you’re grabbing several bands that 1) meet your grunge criteria, and (crucially) 2) have at least one pop-leaning potential hit.  Build a stable, find the hits, and milk the cow til it can’t stand anymore.

You have to work in a model that values hit singles (radio play >> record sales >> profit).  THEN, you have to be able to recognize a hit when it’s in front of you.

The difference is obvious: in 2013, record sales are a fraction of an artist’s income.  So, most bands aren’t trying to make hits.  While the Candlebox Model (1993) used hit potential as an essential method of selection, the Candlebox Model (2013) contains everything but that.  Pop songs got cut out.  Where the 96X bands were mimicking Nirvana and other hugely lucrative juggernauts, current bands mimic an proven commodity.  They look the part of indie, but don’t sound the part of mainstream.

And because Candlebox were an A&R man’s dream, they were prototypical set-glue for 96X.  There’s a reason half my middle school friends thought “Far Behind” was by Seven Mary Three, and “Tomorrow” was by Candlebox, and “Cumbersome” was by Silverchair.  Execs in skyscrapers and kids in minivans understood the same thing: Candlebox didn’t matter.  Nirvana did, but Candlebox didn’t.  What mattered was that, between “In Bloom” and “Heart-Shaped Box,” we had “Far Behind” to keep us listening.  You didn’t have to like Candlebox to understand why they were being played on that station.

Candlebox was often resurrected by 96X because of how un-great they were. If the best bands create their own checklist, the Candleboxes of the world succeed by simply checking off a ton of boxes on Bert Harb’s list.

The difference is whether you’re a poor-man’s Pearl Jam or an original DeërJHN!.  Twenty years from now, a few music geeks (of which I’m one) will remember DeërJHN!.  But everyone remembers “Far Behind.”  Many still love it.  Bands come and go, but songs last.

Vive Candlebox.

(*I hope this list doesn’t come off as seriously critical or negative.  Please remember the reason I’m writing about Candlebox is because I genuinely enjoy this song, and think it tells us something important about music then and music now.  And one of the reasons I’m continually inspired as an artist is because there’s so much great music being made in 2013.  I’m just making some gross generalizations in the interest of fun.  Remember fun?)

1) Had I heard any of their songs and (if so) did they annoy me?
2) Did I like the kids who wore their t-shirts?

Nirvana and Pearl Jam Kids were generally okay. Soundgarden Kids were angrier, but also (subsequently) cooler. Red Hot Chili Peppers Kids were alright, but not my style.  For example, I might get invited to a Chili Pepper Kid birthday party, but might not feel comfortable attending. Alice in Chains Kids were not going to invite me to their birthday parties, and if they did, I wouldn’t attend, because I’d assume it would be in a windowless cell.  And obviously, Nine Inch Nails Kids were to be avoided at all costs.

Which is to say, I was aware of what was going on, and liked many of the contemporary bands, but not really for reasons related to music (that came a few years later). The lone exception to this rule?

The Gin Blossoms.

The 96X Anthology: Volume 2 (click for Volume 1 last week)

Song Of The Week: Gin Blossoms, “Til I Hear It From You“

The 90′s–and 96X–were full of bands who didn’t survive the decade.  So, we tend to lump them together under one tent of one-hit-wonders, sentimental favorites, and (meaningless yet inevitable) “guilty pleasures.”  In 2013, it’s hard to find someone who just likes the Gin Blossoms without doing so ironically or through a prism of nostalgia.  And while this whole series is deeply rooted in nostalgia, let me be very clear about something:

I love the Gin Blossoms.  Sans irony.  I think they were a great band.

My love of the Gin Blossoms–and this song–is a story in two parts: how I experienced them at the time, and how I experience them now.

Then, I thought that I liked them because they talked about driving around town (“Hey Jealousy”), bus-stop drama (“Found Out About You”) and a girl named Allison (“Allison Road”). My girlfriend’s name was Allison, I often waited at bus stops, and I spent a lot of time riding around town.  In a misguided way, 8 Year Old Chris thought the Gin Blossoms exclusively wrote songs about his 3rd grade experience.

Now, I realize that I was predisposed to liking them. They were the first contemporary (read: cool) band that sounded like my parents’ music. Their sound was jangly and rich with harmonies (the Byrds), relentlessly poppy (Rubber Soul Beatles) and specialized in sad songs that sound happy (Big Star). From birth, I had heard all their greatest influences. Now they had arrived and I loved them for different (but valid) reasons.

And while “Hey, Jealousy” was their greatest hit, “Til I Hear It From You” was my personal favorite.  Then, I loved it because (in the way music speaks this language and forges these associations) that opening guitar melody sounded like fall in Memphis.  Fall has always been my favorite time of year.  So, I loved the way this song sounded and what it connoted.  Also, the drums coming out of the guitar solo (that transitional section, around 2:00) sounded cool.  And I loved singing the background vocals (e.g. “outside looking in” at 2:10).  It was fun and memorable–my ear latched onto it.

Those are the reasons I loved the song.

But now?  Now I love those same elements, but realize I was predestined to.  Let’s break it down:

1) Sometimes, the sound of a record indescribably matches the sound of a specific place at a specific time.  It’s often been said that The Strokes popped in the fall of 2001 not only because they were good, but because they sounded like New York at a time when the world was rooting for NYC.  Well, the Gin Blossoms’ records (including “Til I Hear It From You”) were recorded in Memphis.  As a kid, I knew instinctively that they sounded familiar and resonant; I just didn’t realize that it was recorded months earlier, ten miles from my house.

But let’s push it further.  Why did a song by an Arizona band sound so much like home, regardless of where it was recorded?

2) The Gin Blossoms were Big Star super-fans.  Their own songwriting was so heavily influenced by Big Star that, to get their version of the Big Star sound, they recorded right at the source. They essentially traveled 2,000 miles, knocked on Ardent’s door, and said “we’ll have the Big Star, with everything, please.”

But can you actually hear Big Star’s influence in “Til I Hear It From You”?

3) My God, yes.  Check this out:

–Here is the guitar part from “Til I Hear It From You” (0:01).

–Now, here is Big Star’s “Way Out West” (0:59).

Not only did they take one piece of one bridge of one Big Star song and transform it into the lead guitar hook for a Top 10 hit, the Gin Blossoms didn’t even change the key.*

[Also: that drum part I loved so much as a kid (2:05)?  It's borrowed from Motown, Beach Boys, etc.  Again, stuff I'd been hearing in my parents' cars for five years before Gin Blossoms stole my heart on 96X.]

And what I’m trying to say is this: when people talk about “influence,” this is what they mean.  This is exactly how one artist influences another, how one musical device can become something new decades down the road, how the same idea can be transformed from 1970 to 1992 to 2013.  And how an eight year-old in his parents’ car heard a song for the first time but was predestined to love it.

I never had a chance.

(*Since moving back to Memphis in 2010, I’ve been lucky enough to chat with Jody Stephens–Big Star’s last surviving member–a handful of times.  Once, he mentioned how much he likes the Gin Blossoms.  I asked him about the “Til I Hear It From You”/”Way Out West” connection.  He took a long pause, laughed, and said, “Oh wow.  Wow.  Yeah.”  And then we talked about BBQ.)

Smells like pre-teen spirit.

Technically, I’m the same generation as my older brother; we’re siblings born of the same parents in roughly the same era.  Culturally, we’re of separate generations: he was born in the 70′s, I was born in the 80′s.  He’s in a nameless, transitional group; I’m squarely in the “Millennial/Gen Y” set.  I’d love to say these markers had no bearing on our development, but I’d be totally wrong.  In two of the most important ways, my brother and I are of different generations:

1) Technology.  The internet/email/instant messaging/piracy exploded when I was in high school.  It didn’t really snare his peers until college and after.  In other words, while I talked to my friends on AIM, I was also writing my brother letters.  Actual letters.  His friends (now, also my friends) are still internet novices.  I recently gave one a tutorial on how to “share” something on Facebook (full disclosure: it was my music).  Another doesn’t know what Reddit is.  Obviously, not everyone’s like me or my brother or our friends.  My point is, a handful of years is a technological generation and, in our case, an important one.

2) Music.  While my brother was a decade younger than Gen X, he was a teenager when grunge and alt-rock (read: “96X Music”) became popular.  It is one of my greatest  disappointments that I was always too young to appreciate that music as it happened.  I experienced it (in a way that this series will catalog), but I didn’t appreciate it until years later.  When I was in high school.  And LFO was popular.

This is me, trying to pick up the pieces.

Volume 1: Red Hot Chili Peppers, “Under the Bridge“
This single popped in the summer of 1992.  In the pre-Nevermind purgatory that was 1991–and in the promise of spring ’92–I wish I’d been a cool kid with a skateboard and a shelf full of RHCP cassettes.  I wish I’d been a teenager in a parking lot with long hair like Anthony Kiedis.  I wish I’d known, at least abstractly, what a junkie was, enough to pretend to “feel” this song.

Instead, I was a child at a summertime day-camp.  I was making fun of girls, running fast, distrusting authority figures (insert “were you six or twenty-six?” joke here).

Camp had periods, like school: music at 8AM, gym at 9AM, etc.  After swimming (2PM?), my tiny crew scurried to arts and crafts.  Every day we walked into A&C, the counselors (whom I remember as 30 but were probably 18) had a boombox playing in the corner of the room. And every day, “Under the Bridge” was on.  I didn’t know anything about music or the radio.  I just knew that this song was on that boombox at the exact same time every day and that the counselors dug it.  To this day, if I hear “Under The Bridge,” I smell play-doh.

There are probably better, more important, and more interesting songs on Volume 1 than “Under The Bridge” (e.g. “Smells Like Teen Spirit”).  But I wanted to start here, because even though I’m (at best) a casual RHCP fan, this song has been a musical touchstone for me ever since I walked into Lausanne summer camp.

At age 11, I picked up a bass because I knew no other bassists.  I thought, “if I learn bass, I will be in a dozen bands.”  “Under The Bridge” was the first song I learned.  “Under the Bridge” is to novice bassists what “Stairway to Heaven” is for novice guitarists–everyone learns it.  It’s famous, it’s fun to play, it sounds impressive, but it’s not difficult to learn.

Within a year, those bands never formed and I’d picked up my brother’s guitar.  One of the first songs I learned was “Under The Bridge.”  Again, John Frusciante’s guitar work in “Under the Bridge” isn’t complex, but it’s beautiful, vibrant, and distinct.  It was the first time I borrowed a friend’s amp and tried (and failed) to duplicate a guitar tone.  I watched the video and wanted to mimic Frusciante.  His guitar sounded cool, but watching him play it also looked cool.  Same with Flea.  “Under The Bridge” taught me that music is a visual medium, too (a lesson further learned every time I saw Stone Gossard*).

A few years after that, my interest in recording and producing picked up and (not coincidentally) I read a lot about Rick Rubin. I read about the making of Blood Sugar Sex Magik.  I read that Rubin didn’t like some of the older songs the band brought in and encouraged Kiedis to create something new, to actually write from a more immediate and honest place. How they put this poem to music in the studio, and that became their first and biggest hit. How he pushed the band outside their comfort zone, to do something newer, more urgent, and more immediate.  How to create lightning in a bottle.

It’s been over twenty years since “Under The Bridge” played on camp counselor boomboxes in the summer of 1992.  Throughout the 90′s, 96X spun more and more RHCP hits, and “Under the Bridge” became the breakthrough song that everyone appreciates but nobody ever plays (you know, “too obvious”).  They’ve remained popular, relevant, and (perhaps most importantly) together, and they’re still one of the biggest bands on earth. And I’m still a guy who only owns a few dozen songs and not one full record.

But “Under The Bridge” today doesn’t sound like a relic from an alt-rock era.  It doesn’t sound dated the way so many grunge hits do.  In 2013, it just sounds like a good song.  It sounds like a band flirting with this very moment for several years and finally breaking through.  It sounds inspired.  And every time I hear it, I think of the countless Rubin interviews I’ve read, and how much they’ve taught me about writing and recording new music.  And I remember how, ever since I picked up a guitar, I’ve wanted to play like John Frusciante: melodic, tight, song-serving.  And I remember the first song I learned on any guitar, playing along with Flea’s bass lines, making up my own fills during the “under the bridge downtown…” coda.  I listen to “Under The Bridge” and love it, not because it’s always been my favorite song by a favorite band, but because it grew up with me.

I can still smell the play-doh.

(*Notice my guitar heroes were never Jimmy Page, Eddie Van Halen, Slash, or any other paragons of shredding.  All I ever wanted was to be a great rhythm guitar player.  So my favorites were guys like Stone Gossard, John Frusciante, Mike Campbell, George Harrison, etc: overqualified rhythm players, understated/melodic/song-serving lead players.  I still get too much pleasure watching a virtuosic guitarist simply strum chords and pick a few fills.)

Eddie Vedder: still crazy after all these years.

UPDATE: I posted this at 10AM on April 11.  At 1PM, Twitter erupted with the local news that 96X is back!  DID I JUST WILL THIS TO HAPPEN???

This is one of the weirdest and best days of my life.  I am even more excited for this series now!

Original post below.

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Here are a few things you need to know about me:

1) I grew up in the 90′s in Memphis, Tennessee.

2) During that time, there was a “modern rock alternative” radio station that I listened to a lot.  It was called 96X.

3) I believe 96X was the greatest radio station in the history of radio and stations and a Top 5 all-time human achievement*.

4) I’m prone to hyperbole.

5) In an ongoing battle to understand my adolescence, I made an anthology of every song that would’ve been played on 96X during its existence.

6) It is fifteen volumes and 300 songs long.  It is called The 96X Anthology.

7) I have unimaginative titles.

Over several weeks, Song Of The Week will explore The 96X Anthology.  I’ll pick one song from each volume and plow through the hypercolor fog of my adolescence.

Can you get with this?

Starting Next Week: April 18

Volume 1: Red Hot Chili Peppers, “Under The Bridge”

I feel stupid and contagious,

CM

P.S. For those who didn’t have an equivalent station growing up, 96X was a “modern rock alternative.”  So, this station–and this anthology–covers anything under the nebulous “alt-rock” tent.  No rap/R&B/country/etc.  As much as I’d love to dedicate a post to, say, Blackstreet, that wasn’t on 96X.

(*Rest of that list: democracy, Gus’s fried chicken, collected works of William Shakespeare, collected works of Nick Saban.)

Several years, countless tours, five releases, and three homebases into my career, I still believe The Song’s the thing.  I believe it because I think that it’s true, but I also believe it because I have to.  I’m a guy who can write songs and sing pretty and work hard.  There is no Music Row Rolodex.  There is no trust fund.

Prompted by one (excellent) retrospective of the Strokes’ career, a dozen (bad) reviews of the new Strokes album, and one (uninspiring) listen of the new Strokes album, I’ve  become re-obsessed with old Strokes albums.

I’ve played Is This It and Room On Fire between ten and 600 times.  I’ve read old reviews, features, and interviews from 2001-2003.  I’ve fondly remembered where I was and what I thought when I first saw “Last Nite” on MTV2.  I’ve listened to them exclusively and thought about them a lot.  And mostly, I’ve fallen in love (again) with “Under Control.“

Song Of The Week: The Strokes, “Under Control“

“Under Control” is a non-single from The Strokes’ sophomore album, Room On Fire (2003).  It isn’t a hit.  It isn’t a rocker, and it isn’t really a ballad.  It’s not particularly fast or slow.  Musically, it sounds like The Strokes: telephone-booth vocals, doubled guitar noodling, punchy-but-straightforward drums.  Like “Someday” (Is This It, 2001), it is a melodic, mid-tempo meditation on a relationship.  Both begin with an introductory drum and a chimey, dual guitar melody.  In “Someday,” Casablancas’s vocal follows the guitars and rests in the pocket; in “Under Control,” he’s a step ahead.  That is, the guitar’s melody stays a beat behind the vocals; the band plays in one pocket, while Casablancas sings in an adjacent one.  Conceptually, it works: when Casablancas pre-empts the guitar to sing, “I don’t want to waste your time,” the song sounds appropriately rushed.

Lyrically, the song echoes Dylan’s “All I Really Wanna Do.”  Both are a litany of good intentions.  Dylan’s performance plays off his persona in 1964 (literary, clever, impish); Casablancas’s performance plays off his persona in 2003 (a cad).  So, t’s easy to hear the song’s expressed hope through a prism of inevitable failure (“we don’t have no control/we’re under control”).  It could be a 3-minute exercise in manipulation.  But I hear it as sung in earnest; an even-handed snapshot of a problematic relationship.  The Strokes’ rock side has always been slightly overrated, their sweet side underrated.  When I hear “Someday” and “Under Control,” I hear real regret, loneliness, and compassion.  I believe them.

As a companion piece to an earlier hit, “Under Control” is a musical step forward for a developing band.  As a sophomore album statement on their own success and public image, it’s a deeply satisfying time-capsule.  As a case study in trying–and likely failing–to make a relationship work, it’s deftly-executed.  And as a melodic, smart, self-aware, complicated, accessible, affecting, and simply gorgeous song, it’s perfect.

It’s a perfect Strokes song.

I’ve spent the last week listening to–and thinking about–The Strokes.  And when I think about The Strokes, I think about their breakout in 2001.  I think about all the cultural factors that lent themselves to that moment.  I think about The Strokes’ relationship with the press.  I wonder how they went from golden boys to whipping boys in little more than a decade.  I think about Steven Hyden’s quote that, upon arrival, their “sense of self was fully-formed.”  I start to think about what other bands, if any, have been so conceptually perfect so early in their career.

So then I think about Vampire Weekend’s marketing savvy, their gift for branding.  I wonder if it’s a New York thing.  I wonder if, to become big in New York you not only have to out-work everyone, but also out-think everyone.  Or maybe, pushing it further, if that simply means out-cooling everyone.  I wonder if you have to suddenly appear as the next cool thing before anyone else has ever conceived of it.

I think about all of these things, and I go down every rabbit hole and I read every column.  And then I think about it some more.

It’s clear that sometime between 2001 and 2013 most music critics went from loving The Strokes to not-loving The Strokes.  And it’s equally clear that The Strokes are one of the rare bands that matter even when they’re bad.  These columns work to define why, and how The Strokes mean what they mean.  They think about it and they go down every rabbit hole.  They talk about the band’s biography, their development, their side projects, their pop cultural context, haircuts, girlfriends, substance abuse, etc.  They try to do what good writing does: articulate an abstraction.

But only a few articles about music actually talk about the music.

And maybe it’s as simple as the music itself.  Maybe the difference between The Strokes in 2001 and 2013 is as obvious as this: the songs aren’t as good.  Is This It had a lot of great songs.  Room On Fire had several.  And, no matter where you stand on Comedown Machine, I don’t think anyone would claim its best song is better than “Under Control.”

We–and The Strokes–have changed a lot over the years.  All of the other things matter.  But maybe The Song is the thing.  Or maybe that’s just what I need to believe.