True Stories

"I'm 6'3", and maintain a very consistent panda bear shape." - Louis Fyne

True Stories, apart from being a splendid album, is also an even better film. Directed by David Byrne and released in 1986, it profiles a small Texas town called Virgil and the collection of oddballs who live there. It doesn't have a story as such, it just drifts along towards the town's Celebration of Special-ness, a pageant where the towns folk perform various acts of varying quality.

Byrne appears as the nameless narrator, introducing us to the characters, but never really intruding on their lives, apart from when he goes to dinner with the happily married couple who haven't spoken for 15 years. The closest we get to a narrative is through Louis Fyne (played by the always excellent John Goodman), and his quest for marriage. We also meet 'the cute woman', the preacher, the woman who doesn't leave her bed, the voodoo practicioner, and 'the lying woman'. These characters were inspired by stories that Byrne read in the National Enquirer, and other tabloids.

But despite, a fairly shallow level of characterisation, they don't feel like characatures or freaks, but rather they are likable misfits, with a story that needs telling. They are people too, godammit...

And of course, there are the songs, which are tremendous, and are, with the exception of Wild Wild Life, performed by the cast. Not all of the cast versions are available yet, but below you can find two of them.

Talking Heads - Papa Legba (Pops Staples Vocal Version)

Talking Heads - Radio Head (Tito Larriva Vocal Version)

Talking Heads - Wild Wild Life (Extended Mix)

Person Louis Fyne

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And according to Roger Ebert's review here, there are 50 sets of twins in this movie. If that's not a reason to watch the film, then I don't know what is.

Buy them the cd and dvd here.

July 18th is the the day of the troubadour.

Creationism

Ah, the quandry of Creation records.

I have only just noticed that Alan McGee had been blogging for the Guardian, and the thought that passed through my mind was something along the lines of "What's the rampant self-publicist on about nowadays?" His blogs are only marginally insightful, and for the most part, rather pointless. I would imagine that this impression I have of him (and I don't think I'm alone) comes from three things: his cocky demeanour, that to be fair seems to be part of the whole svengali role that he inhabits (see Malcolm McClaren, Tony Wilson, Simon Napier Bell, et al), the fact that he discovered of Oasis and him having been the manager of The Libertines (the most overrated British band since Oasis).

For me, it was Oasis that killed Creation Records, not the massive overspend on My Bloody Valentines Loveless. After signing them, he only signed one more decent band (admittedly the fantastic Super Furry Animals). The money from Oasis could have been used to grow the label by enriching it with a diverse roster of signings, as has happened with Domino and the money from the Franz / Monkeys windfall, and to a lesser extent by Rough Trade with Arcade Fire.

Maybe Oasis made him lazy. If you can sit around surrounded pots of cash, then swan off to Downing Street, you are less likely to be found the next night trawling dingy Camden nightspots looking for the next big thing. Maybe too much success made the arrogance that is in part necessary, spiral out of control. Its amazing how he lost his ability to spot a good band (Heavy Stereo?!), especially when you consider the quality of his earlier signings for Creation.

And that's why I don't like to think about McGee as mouthy Britpop entrepreneur (even if it's true), but instead as the man who brought me some of my favourite music of the late 80's and early 90's. The albums released in that era make Creation one of the greatest record labels in the story of popular music, and that's not hyperbole. They released Screamadelica, Bandwagonesque, Loveless, Copper Blue, Fuzzy Logic, and Giant Steps. That's got to put Creation up there in the pantheon, surely?

Primal Scream - Don't Fight It, Feel It (from the album Screamadelica)

Teenage Fanclub - The Concept (from the album Bandwagonesque)

My Bloody Valentine - Soon (from the album Loveless)

Sugar - Hoover Dam (from the album Copper Blue)

Super Furry Animals - If You Don't Want Me To Destroy You (from the album Fuzzy Logic)

Boo Radleys - Lazurus (from the album Giant Steps)

Solid Gold Popular Music Number Four

Every week I post a song, for no reason other than it's fabulous. It may be old or new, obscure or over-exposed. No explanation, no fancy spiel, just solid gold popular music. Oh, and it's a secret, so you'll just have to trust me.

Solid Gold Popular Music Number Four

Takes 'n' Takes

On our recent trip to London, Bruna and I were lucky enough to squeeze in Adem's concert at the lovely Union Chapel. It was a happy coincidence as he is a mutual favourite of ours. Suffice to say, he was excellent in his natural setting, acoustically that is, as were we, not as religious folks but as puritans, enjoying the smoke, alcohol and div free environment.

Adem's latest album, Takes, is composed of twelve covers of his favourite songs from 1991 to 2001. It is tremendous collection, with just the right balance of old favourites (Bjork's Unravel), forgotten gems (The Breeder's Invisible Man), the obscure (Pinback's Loro), the uncool (lisa Germano's Slide) and the surprising (Aphex Twin's To Cure A Weakling Child + Boy/Girl Song). This last song is the standout, a fantastic and catchy rendition. Singalong-a-Aphex, who'd of thought it, eh?

Adem - To Cure A Weakling Child + Boy/Girl Song

The album never feels forced, you can tell that he chose these songs because he loves them, not because he wants to show off his record collection. There is nothing remotely hipster about it, which makes it fun for the rest of us.

And here, as an accompaniment, are the originals:

01 Bedside Table - Bedhead - 7” single 1992 (+the end of the day (beheaded1996))

02 Oh My Lover - PJ Harvey - Dry 1992

03 Slide - Lisa Germano - Slide 1998

04 Loro - Pinback - Pinback 1998

05 Hotellounge - dEUS - Worst Case Scenario 1994

06 To Cure A Weakling Child
Boy/Girl Song - Aphex Twin - Richard D James 1996

07 Tears Are In Your Eyes - Yo La Tengo - And Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out 2000

08 Starla - Smashing Pumpkins - I am one 7” b-side 1992. (+Window Paine from Gish 1991)

09 Gamera - Tortoise - Gamera 12” 1995

10 Unravel - Björk - Homogenic 1997

11 Invisible Man - The Breeders - Last Splash 1993

12 Laser Beam - Low - Things We Lost In The Fire 2001

July 2nd is the day of firemen and hospitals

Solid Gold Popular Music Number Three

Every week I post a song, for no reason other than it's fabulous. It may be old or new, obscure or over-exposed. No explanation, no fancy spiel, just solid gold popular music. Oh, and it's a secret, so you'll just have to trust me.

Solid Gold Popular Music Number Three

June 29th is the day of fisherman and telephone operators

Jamesinbrasil's Underrated Albums Number Two: The Entire Recorded Output Of Rocket From The Crypt

I've never been a musician as I don't have the stones to stand in front of a room of strangers and entertain them. But my passion, and I hope my knowledge, of pop music is deep, profound and an essential part of my being. I trust my ears, they have never let me down, which leads to me believe I could be a great svengali, if you are prepared to ignore the admittedly rather central point that they often have more charisma than their charges.

So when I consider the kind of band I would construct, in order to destroy all other pop music through their sheer brilliance, I like to think of them in terms of other bands. A kind of hybrid recipe, if you will. I want power of James Brown and the Famous Flames, I want the catchiness of Abba, the soul of Otis Redding, the oddness of Screaming Jay Hawkins, the humour of Devo, the punk energy of Little Richard and the authority of Public Enemy. Oh, and the brass of Sly and The Family Stone, because I love brass in rock 'n roll.

There are problems with this plan of mine, mainly the fact that it is impossible to be that good, (and anyway, if it were achieved, surely all other artists in all genres would cease to create as it would become obvious that their endeavours were wasted in the face of this new phenomena.) Secondly, someone has already tried it, and they were called Rocket From The Crypt.


The band was formed in San Diego in 1990, and they recorded several fantastic albums of pure rock n roll music, filtered through decades of soul, funk, glam, punk and hardcore. They took all these influences and melded them to some of the most immaculate pop songs of the nineties. You may even remember them for their number twelve UK hit On A Rope, which gave them the opportunity to perform on Top of the Pops.



Of course in a fair and just world the song would have reached number one, and be played at weddings and funerals across the world ad infinitum. Why we don't live in this world has yet to be explained to me yet.

There were many other reasons to love RFTC, aside from the music (as if that's not enough):

1) They wore matching clothes. All the best bands wear uniform. See Devo, the Beach Boys, Talking Heads, Daft Punk, the White Stripes, Kraftwerk etc.

2) They had a roadie who used to come on stage and dance and sing backing vocals. He also wore the uniform.

3) If you tattooed yourself with their logo, you were allowed free entry to shows for life.

4) At Glastonbury, they parted the crowd and persuaded the schmucks to make a huge mud slide.

5) They breathed fire.

6) They had aliases (Speedo, Petey X, ND, Apollo 9, Atom, JC 2000), which is always cool.

But the main reasons, for me, to love RFTC were the incredible live shows and obviously the songs. I guess I was lucky to have been a teenager at a time when bands like this could get on the cover of the NME and been seen performing live on prime time BBC. But this shouldn't be about nostalgia, as even though they split up two years ago, their music is as fresh as it ever was. This is an important band, and should be valued as such. Spread the word and enjoy the punk heat blast.

Maybelline

Hippy Dippy Do

My Arrow's Aim

On A Rope

Lipstick

Ghost Shark

Too Many Balls


French Guy

Proper biography here.

Buy their albums, including R.I.P. the CD / DVD of the final show, here

Solid Gold Popular Music Number Two

Every week I post a song, for no reason other than it's fabulous. It may be old or new, obscure or over-exposed. No explanation, no fancy spiel, just solid gold popular music. Oh, and it's a secret, so you'll just have to trust me.

Solid Gold Popular Music Number Two

Nudity and a musical building

You know I feel duty bound to report the latest activities of David Byrne, because they are always interesting, whether it's singing on trance songs or writing pop - operas about Imelda Marcos. So here are the two sides of Mr. Byrne in two videos I saw this week.

Firstly, he does guest vocals on the new Fatboy Slim project, the Brighton Port Authority. You can say what you want about Norman Cook, but you can't deny he knows his way around a pop tune, so the combination of the two of them, with Dizzee Rascal, is pretty irresistable. Nice cheeky video too.



Secondly, he has turned a building in New York into a giant musical instrument. Well, musical is debatable, but it seems pretty cool to me.



The 20th June is the day of resellers

Little Creatures

How can any album with Road To Nowhere and And She Was on it be so underappreciated?

And She Was (Early Version)

Road To Nowhere (Early Version)

Television Man (Extended Mix)

June 18th is the day of the chemists and Japanese immigrants

Solid Gold Popular Music

Here's a new feature at jamesinbrasil. Every week I will post a song, for no reason other than it's fabulous. It may be old or new, obscure or over-exposed. No explanation, no fancy spiel, just solid gold popular music. Oh, and it's a secret, so you'll just have to trust me.

Solid Gold Popular Music Number One

June 14th is solstice

Your 16 year old daughter is dating a man of 38? Oh dear."

June 10th is the day of pastors, artillery, the Portuguese language

Head to head

Radiohead covering Portishead? Yes, please.

Radiohead - The Rip

Hey!

I haven't had many musical epiphanies in my life (who has?), but one I clearly remember happened about 8 years ago. I was channel hopping in bed, trying to wake up, when I turned onto VH1 classics. They were showing Bo Diddley's Bo Diddley, a grainy performance from sixties TV. Something about it made me sit bolt upright in my bed, utterly captivated by the video. The primal backbeat, the egotastic simplicity of the lyric, Bo's shuffling dance, the bee-hived female backing vocals (which I'm always a sucker for), the screaming, white teenagers and sheer force of the song all compressed into a two minute alarm clock. I can't help but be jealous of everyone involved, existing at a time when music felt truly revolutionary, not just sonically, but socially.

Thanks to the joys of the modern world, I can now share this video with you. I hope you feel ten percent of the joy that I feel when I watch it:

June 5th is environment day

Easily Fooled

Today, I can't help but think of London, my former home, and feel deeply worried...

Pavement - Easily Fooled (live; Wireless JJJ Radio, Australia, July 7, 1994)
Taken from Wowee Zowee: Sordid Sentinels Edition

Hearing Double & JCB Soundsystem - London, I Love You But You're Bringing Me Down
Taken from http://lcdremixed.com/

May 3rd is world freedom of the press day and day of the rural people.

The Brazilian Obsessions 3: The Lord

The other day I was waiting for the bus when one drove by with the message "Nos vamos com O Senhor" (We go with God) on the front. Now this isn't entirely surprising in this country (home of the world's largest Catholic community), but it was on the electronic display where you would expect to see the destination. And I understand that Catholicism requires a leap of faith, but surely even the most ardent god-botherer would flinch at this. Do you trust the Lord to take you home, or do you wait for the next one? Guess what I did.

Man alive, do Brazilians love to get their Jesus on. And when you come from a largely secular country as I do, it can be a little disorienting to see such obvious shows of faith. 90% of the people I see reading in public are reading the Bible. It is very common to see people wearing t-shirts proclaiming their faith and devotion to the almighty. I also find it a little embarrassing, in my own English way, to see such a public display of emotion. Surely this is a private thing, to be respected, but kept to yourself? They parade it in the same way that I used to show off my taste in US indie bands when I sixteen: put it on your chest.

I guess this says more about me then it does about them, after all, why should they be ashamed and hide it away all anglo-saxon style? It's not exactly the Brazilian way. But just so you get an idea of how I feel, see below:


Now do you know what I mean?


The Gutter Twins - God's Children (from the album Saturnalia)

The Flaming Lips - God Walks Among Us (from the album 1984 - 1990 (A Collection Of Songs Representing An Enthusiasm For Recording . . . By Amateurs))

The Future - Future Religion (from the album The Golden Hour of the Future)


April 13th is the day of the office boys and the young.