Listening #3

James Yorkston I was a Cat from a Book (2012)

Domino Records www.jamesyorkston.co.uk

James Yorkston is another one of those artists I’ve always intended to listen to but not got round to, well I’m glad I did at last. Yorkston, for the uninitiated is a singer-songwriter hailing from Fife in Scotland, as well as his own songs he also sings & records traditional folk songs. I was a Cat from a Book comprises all his own compositions, for the most part beautiful lilting ballads and simple charming folky songs with pretty harmonies, which are a delight to listen to. Which make the two more upbeat, driving songs ‘Just as Scared’ and ‘I Can Take All This’ stand out all the more, the latter of which provides a stirring conclusion to a fine album.

Highlights: Catch, Border Song, Just as Scared, I Can Take All This

Liars WIXIW (2012)

Mute www.liarsliarsliars.com

For some reason I missed Liars 5th album Sisterworld, so I’ve missed a step in this constantly evolving band’s development. Perhaps that explains why I haven’t managed to connect with or find a way into this album yet, because if you had told me "Liars experiment more with electronica" I’d have thought YES! this sounds like it’s going to be right up my alley. For once it feels like Liars sounding like other music that already exists. It’s when they create that otherworldly sound that the album really comes alive as on ‘Flood To Flood’ which sounds simultaneously new AND like Liars, ‘Brats’ is a totally unexpected off-kilter dancefloor filler that puts everything else on this album in the shade.

Highlights: A Ring On Every Finger, WIXIW, Flood To Flood, Brats

Dan Deacon America (2012)

Domino Records www.dandeacon.com

Dan Deacon’s America, as an idea doesn’t sound like it should work, an artist known for bonkers techno, creating a concept album. The first 5 tracks a reaction against the economic crisis, and polarisation of US politics, the 2nd half one long paen (split into 4 parts) to the landscapes of North America. But work it does, gloriously well, what you get is a far more joyful outcome than some of the more topographical electronica out there. Deacon takes you on an adrenaline fuelled tour of America with fizzes and crashes sitting perfectly on top of grandiose orchestral arrangements that create a feeling of wind in your hair whether you’re in a convertible flying down US-50, or not.

Highlights: True Thrush, Crash Jam, Is A Monster, Manifest

 

Animal Collective Centipede Hz (2012)

Domino Records www.myanimalhome.net

I’ve been a fan of Animal Collective’s awkward avant-garde noise-pop since 2007’s Strawberry Jam. Their throw everything at it and see what emerges approach can make for exciting listening as it balances on a tightrope with everything trying to make the songs fall off into unlistenable noise. Unfortunately all too often this album seems to fall off that tightrope, it’s so densely layered that it turns into a musical mush where nothing can come to the fore and drag the song forward. Infact my main problem with this record is that it all sounds too similar, too formulaic, just well, dull.

Highlights: Moonjock, Applesauce

 

Dinosaur Jr. I Bet On Sky (2012)

[PIAS] www.dinosaurjr.com

I’ve seen it mentioned somewhere else, but it’s true, there’s something very comforting about Dinosaur Jr. Not in a retro, nostalgic way, they haven’t changed - they don’t need too, in J Mascis hands a guitar solo is always necessary, never over wrought. Watch the Corners isn’t just one of the best rock songs of 2012, but would stand up as one of the best at the height of gr*nge, and Almost Fare just makes me happy. Hell this whole album makes me happy, Dinosaur Jr break all the rules - reformed bands aren’t supposed to be this good.

Highlights: Watch the Corners, Almost Fare, Rude, Pierce The Morning Rain

Get Off Jack's Back

In just a few weeks the film adaptation of Jack Kerouac’s ‘On The Road’ will be released in UK cinemas, I’m currently re-reading the book in anticipation. As you would expect there have been alot of articles & blogs written about Jack Kerouac as the film approaches, many looking to make a name for themselves by accusing Kerouac sexism, racism, homophobia, being anti-semitic & a reactionary conservative - that’s not to mention the legions of comments sections frequented by people who have read the book once in school & read a few ill-informed articles.

 UK Release 12th October 2012

One such example I saw used the following quote "Several times I went to San Francisco with my gun and when a queer approached me in a bar john I took out the gun and said ‘Eh? Eh? What’s that you say?". Which of course to anyone reading it would look homophobic, but is comletely out of context, missing the remorse that follows and what could even be considered a comment on the effect guns have on people - "I’ve never understood why I did that; I knew queers all over the country. It was just the loneliness of San Francisco and the fact that I had a gun. I had to show it to someone."

This also sums up the conflict at the heart of Kerouac for me, you can look at his writing through modern eyes and see words like ‘queer’ or ‘negro’ (or worse) and be offended or you can place yourself in the time. Writers like Keroauc were born in the 1920’s, and were young men in the 1940’s when sexism, racism & homophobia were not only the social norm but in the case of racial segregation, the law.

Virtually every one of our relations alive in the same era would have used similar expressions, held similar opinions that appear wrong to our modern viewpoint. Does that make everyone else bad people aswell? Or are we just picking on him because he wrote about things the way they were? How do we know that in 70 years time there will not be people looking at us judging our society as unenlightened?

Jack Kerouac & Allen Ginsberg

One article that I thought hit alot of nails on the head comes from a suprising source, theamericanconservative website. It doesn’t try to claim Kerouac as a conservative, but points out that as a young man all of his actions show him to be non-conservative, non-conformist, infact very unpolitical in any way. He is a young writer who wants to see, hear & experience all that he can, he does not write of his gay friends like Ginsburg, Orlovsky and others with disgust but with love, respect and affection. It is only after he becomes famous, and his inablity to cope with that, when he has sought refuge in drink that he returns to the familiar, conservative reactionary roots that surrounded him as he grew up. Read the article here.

I once heard Andy Warhol say something along the lines of "As a shy person you desperately want attention, but when you get it you don’t know what to do with it". This sums up Jack perfectly, he wanted to be a famous writer but when fame arrived he couldn’t cope with the attention, couldn’t cope with the criticism, couldn’t cope with the way people politicised his writing for their own ends, couldn’t cope with the constant stream of people who would turn up at his mothers house expecting him to party with them. So he retreated from the world into alcoholism, travelled less, prefering to stay in the safety of his mother’s home and reacted against what people wanted him to be by turning to the familiarity of his conservative catholic upbringing.

The 'On The Road' Scroll

Then of course there’s the did he, didn’t he write it in 3 weeks debate. To say either is far too simplistic. Jack made copious notes about his travels and tried to write the book a couple of times, binning them as he couldn’t realise what was in his head. Then he was inspired by one of Neal Cassady’s stream of concsiousness letters, and realised that if he combined this style with his own prose-poetry he might get what he was looking for. He then wrote the infamous scroll in 3 weeks as the legend tells us, before reworking this into the book that was finally published. Can we leave the discussion behind now?

I wasn’t really intending the first blog I wrote on my passion for Kerouac’s books to be a defense, I had thought I’d write about what I love about his work, but that’s not how things have worked out I guess. I am excited to see the On The Road film which is released in just a few weeks, and to see the original scroll which I learnt a few days ago will be on display at the British Library until Christmas. Hopefully I can combine a trip to see both in one day, and I’ll doubtless write a blog about that.