I must give Johann credit: At least he’s willing to listen.
He’s as devoted a swimmer in the musical mainstream as one can be and has long considered what he can’t hear on the radio to be weird and scary. He has, however, often expressed a desire to expand his horizons, something that came to a head a few weeks ago. And I, the aging former hipster who thinks his taste in music is the cat’s ass, am glad to oblige.*
*The bulk of my music collection is made up of alt-rock and hip-hop from the late 1980s and early ’90s. Back then, I made no effort to hide my disdain for the Baby Boomer fucktards who lionized their Cool 101.9 puke to the exclusion of everything else. These days, I am one of those fucktards, only of the snarky, irrelevant Gen-X variety.
Sifting through 55 GB of music is a daunting task, especially when trying to expand someone’s horizons within the bounds of their preferences. So no thrashing guitars, a la Ministry, Slayer or Suicidal Tendencies. And no overly hardcore hip-hop, a la Public Enemy, Cypress Hill or Ice Cube. And no truly wonky stuff like Mercury Rev, Wesley Willis or Mogwai. And more difficult was trying to cull just a few tracks by artists or groups that I really liked — Ween, De La Soul or Tortoise.*
*I know Tortoise is sort of wonky too, but they are too awesome not to include.
So after several hours of cogitating my entire iTunes library, I had to force myself to stop. I ended up burning 9 CDs of just rock music, two volumes of which are entirely made up of Ween. I haven’t even begun to tackle the hip-hop, funk and jazz tracks.
Following is the first volume in the Songs for Johann series. I hope he enjoys them as much as I enjoyed patting myself on the back doing this for him. If you’d like to download the Zip file, let me know in the comments; I’ll e-mail you a link.
Songs for Johann, Vol. 1
- Alice in Chains, “Rooster”
- Backwards Day, “Revolutionary” — Backwards Day were my second-favorite band of Springfield’s original music scene of the late 1980s and early ’90s. They were fronted by Scott Faingold, with whom Johann went to Southeast. *makes hand gesture*
- Blur, “There’s No Other Way” — I never understood the whole Blur vs. Oasis thing, because Blur >>>>>>>>>>>>> Oasis.
- Blur, “Song 2″ — Of course.
- The Breeders, “Cannonball”
- Camper Van Beethoven, “Take the Skinheads Bowling”
- Camper Van Beethoven, “When I Win the Lottery”
- The Charlatans, “The Only One I Know” — The bass line is totally ripped off of Deep Purple’s “Hush.” But that’s OK; this song rocks, too.
- Cody ChesnuTT, “Bitch, I’m Broke” — This guy is like a cross between Marvin Gaye and old-school Ween.
- Cody ChesnuTT, “Look Good in Leather”
- Cornershop, “Brimful of Asha” — Everybody needs a bosom for a pillow, indeed.
- Dead Kennedys, “Too Drunk to Fuck” — This is sort of an inside joke with my family. When I was younger, Johann and commenter Marjorie loved to give me a hard time about my taste in music. The circle is now complete.
- Descendents, “Enjoy” — There are better Descendents songs in my opinion, but if there’s anything Johann likes, it’s a good fart joke.
- Dub Narcotic Sound System, “Ridin’ Shotgun” — DNSS is a good funk band, but indie-rock legend Calvin Johnson is a horseshit singer: You either hate him or ignore him.
- Dub Narcotic Sound System, “Shake a Puddin’ “
- The Fall, “Mansion” — Mark E. Smith’s vocals also are an acquired taste. Fortunately, this is an instrumental track.
- The Farm, “Groovy Train”
- Fishbone, “Lyin’ Ass Bitch” — From their debut EP, back when they were more ska-oriented.
- Fishbone, “Bonin’ in the Boneyard” — Johann plays the bass guitar, and this track features John Norwood Fisher prominently on the funky ass bass.
- Foo Fighters, “I’ll Stick Around” — I always assumed that this song was about Courtney Love.
- Foo Fighters, “Everlong”
You know you’re really into Ween when you can differentiate an ‘old school’ and ‘new school’. All good stuff so far. Good to see you didn’t neglect the Fighters of Foo. Leaving Everlong off any list would be a travesty.
I agree with the quality of this list. I’m in the midst of quality-checking more than two-dozen cumulative mix CDs I’ve made for people this Christmas. It’s an annual (long) process, but one for which my friends and family (especially Tony, who claims I’m his only pipeline to new music) are usually appreciative.
Wow. I know I agreed to let you punk out your perception of my lack of musical tastes for the blog in exchange for all the work you did compiling the music, but daayyy-ummmm… your creative license is showing again.
Do allow me the courtesy of clarifying a few things.
I’m not 100% behind the “Cool 101.9 puke fucktard” thing, but I will give it to you that for a long time, I have been under the philosophy of “how good can ’so-and-so’’s music be if they don’t play it on the radio”. In my defense, that attitude was forged long before the era of digitized music technologies, and for the most part, the interwebs itselves- a time when radio was the only place TO hear new music (if you didn’t want to go to some heavy metal vomit party, which I never did). But thanks to the iTunes, I have very cautiously unchained my door and let a few “weird and scary” songs in on occasion.
My big thing with the not-played-on-the-radio genre, and I am not proud of it but am still admitting to it, is that I just don’t care for the whole counter-culture vibe that seems to permeate it. I know it sounds preachy and/or judgmental, but I’m not practiced in the art of self-medication, so I’m not into songs that glorify it, whether blatantly or more subtly. Hence why I never cared for most Pink Floyd, Moody Blues, or Jefferson Airplane music. I appreciate some of their musical compositions, but there’s not enough herb out there to make me want to be taken on THOSE psychedelic journeys. That’s also why I liked the Beatles’ music when they were more a [radio-friendly] pop band, before they really full-on discovered Lucy and whatever else. Much of their hippy dippy trippy music sucked.
I’m also not into lyrics at all, for the most part, so I tend not to go for songs that talk about how horrible the singer’s life is, about how life is so much better when you’re baked, drunk, coked out, etc., or about killing all the cops, whiteys, hos, and bitches- after fucking them all first, of course. I’m obviously no Puritan, but I tend to tune out (pardon the pun) from songs that seem to have the air of “hee hee hee… we just totally said ‘fuck’ in our song, dude!”
I “like” a song for its musicality. (And that is 100% subjective.) Vocals, for example… I don’t like screaming banshee vocals á la Cinderella (showing my age again) or some of the “angry” alternative bands out there now. Another question for another time: why does every new act have to fall into some mold- the angst-ridden alternative band, the death metal Satan worshipper band, etc. Anyway, I don’t like vocals that sound like Cookie Monster deep-throated a microphone. On the other side of that, I don’t like that overdone, fake-sounding vibrato either. I like a nice, melodic, natural singing voice.
I did my share of headbanging- when I was a kid, mind you- so I’m not totally against loud screeching guitars, but they still need to have some actual musical quality. As long as it’s not just total ear-bleeding, window-shattering, piercing noise, I’m fine with some speed thrash. To a point.
Basically, I’m really kind of a walking contradiction regarding music in that I’m actually not an all-or-none person. I like what I like. As I said before, I don’t like the fuck-whitey hardcore gangster rap, but I really liked most of “Doggystyle” and “The Chronic”, for example. And yes, AnonCom, I know how you feel about “The Chronic” and how it killed hip-hop as a genre. There are some other rap songs I really like, but it’s because the track appeals to me. I do like some of Ice Cube’s stuff. The thing with rap and hip-hop for me is that Run-D.M.C. is the diamond standard for all of that style of music, and I [unfairly] judge all others next to Run-D.M.C.’s first two or three albums.
THAT being said ref. the “all or none” philosophy, even Rush- easily one of my top three all time favorite bands, if not THE favorite- some of their songs, even a couple entire albums, suck very serious ass. But then, that’s my whole point. I don’t blindly like *everything* a band puts out simply based on a preconceived notion of their prior music, and I don’t blindly dislike *everything* an artist puts out based on a preconceived notion of their music- or their genre, for that matter. Again, I like what I like. That doesn’t mean I absolutely won’t slowly open up to the wonky, the hardcore, the screech metal…
Basically, your first line summed it up: I AM willing to listen.
Sorry to be so long-winded.
Johann: Thanks for the comment, Tolstoy.
A few things:
–Back in the day, you know that the radio wasn’t the only vehicle for new music… Night Tracks, fool!
–But just because something isn’t on the radio doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s “counterculture” and doesn’t automatically confer overtones of drug use.
–I also appreciate you following the Gangsta Rap Order of Operations: killing all the cops, whiteys, hos, and bitches- after fucking them all first, of course. Brilliant.
P.S. Ref. “The circle is now complete.”…
Something something Dark Side…
Oh, and if it’s easier for you- and if you haven’t already burned all 113 CDs- I can do the zip file thing, but you’re going to have to show me how. I’m not so teknolojikully advanced… for example, from where would I be actually downloading it, can I put the file into and use it with iTunes and my iPod/iPhone, can I go on to burn a CD with said files if I so choose…
When it comes to something I like, I basically have to listen to it for the first time on accident…in someone else’s car, house, etc. SeriusXM and Internet Jukeboxes at bars these days are also great for that. It’s pretty much how I largely ignored the Foo Fighters until a few years ago, but now I like them. It’s why I like the Black Keys, too. The thing about a lot of these bands though is that they were on the radio, just not on Spfld radio. And if AC hadn’t ended the volume with Foo Fighters and ended it with the Farm (Groovy Train may have been their one hippy-trippy, kinda neat song, but they basically had just one album that I’m not sure I could listen to today), he might have sent you running back to QLZ or something…AC has always had a more eclectic variety and appreciation of other things…Enjoy.
But wait! I didn’t see any Billy Joel, Barry Manilow or Kinky Friedman listed. Their songs have a good beat and you can dance to them. Hahahahahahaha.
KFOG.
–But just because something isn’t on the radio doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s “counterculture” and doesn’t automatically confer overtones of drug use.
I know, I know. But like I said, that’s how I classified much of it. If it wasn’t “fit” to be on the airwaves, then it *must* have some seedy lyrics. Not saying it’s right, simply stating how my mind worked.
It’s kind of like what I [personally] call “college music”. REM, Depeche Mode, shit like that that seems to be popular to 20-year-olds [that went to college, since I never did and never got into either band]. Maybe not a proper (or fair) generalization in either case, but that’s just how I classify certain artists. Hopefully the musical see-the-world-outside-Abe-FM tour upon which you’re sending me will help to change that, at least somewhat.
Oh- and Night Tracks only played videos of songs that were on the radio, fool.
And to Steve- I haven’t listened to QLZ since probably 1997. Just sayin’.