Anatomy of a Mix Tape: Part IV

Continued from part III.

Track 16: "King of Carrot Flowers, Pt. One" by Neutral Milk Hotel, track 1 from In the Aeroplane Over the Sea, February 1998

The last track on the CD I came to directly though Nick, "King of Carrot Flowers Part I" is the beginning to Neutral Milk Hotel's maybe-masterpiece. I say "maybe" because it's some of the densest, most obtuse music you'll ever listen to. The quote I like the best about this album is "In the Aeroplane Over the Sea is undoubtedly a major statement, but just what it's saying is anyone's guess." Even today, I still don't know what I think about this album. I'll listen to it, not know whether I'm sincerely enjoying it, or merely making fun of it. So I'll listen to it again to try and figure that out. I might listen again immediately, or wait a few days or weeks or months, but the outcome is always the same: I still don't know what I thought of it. And if someone chances to mention Neutral Milk Hotel, I can't help but grinning and proclaiming "yeah! I love Neutral Milk Hotel!" But whether I love them, or love knowing who they are, is, well... anyone's guess.

The fact remains that, no matter how tongue-in-cheek the admiration for this band may be, hearing (or hearing about) a track on In the Aeroplane Over the Sea always makes me smile. Andrew has a hypothesis that the entire album is about incest; I don't know about incest necessarily, but the sexual innuendos are rife throughout. And no track gives more smiles or innuendos than "King of Carrot Flowers, Pt. One". In case you're wondering, there is in fact a Pt. 2, and a Pt. 3, and for whatever reason, they're the same track. If that's not obtuse, I don't know what is.

Honorable mentions: open to pretty much anything here. This was pretty much a last-minute addition to fill a few minutes.


Track 17: "My Name is Jonas" by Weezer, track 1 from the Blue Album, May 1994.

My recent review of Weezer's Red Album was so thorough and comprehensive as to cover pretty much all of my sentiments toward and history with the band. So I'll keep this one short. The Blue Album just slightly edges out Green for "best Weezer album in my book", but that's probably out of a nod to its historical significance rather than it necessarily being better music.

And what better song than "My Name is Jonas" to represent the album, and the band as a whole? It has insistent guitar riffs and a singably simple structure that assures it'll remain a concert staple and fan favorite as long as the band continues to play. And that's not even to mention impromptu concerts in the form of Weezer Sing-Alongs that are undoubtedly going on in someone's car even as you read this.

Honorable mentions: "No One Else" and "In the Garage" from the Blue Album, "Photograph" from the Green Album, "Keep Fishin'" from Maladroit


Track 18: "Strawberry Swing" by Coldplay, track 9 from Viva la Vida, June 2008

I've also delved into Coldplay, and specifically Viva la Vida recently. It's tough to recall how I first came to Coldplay, but the first friend I can remember who actually vouched for their goodness was a guy named Chris. Chris and I were pretty good friends in late elementary and early middle school, eventually going our separate ways when we went to different high schools. But in that turn-of-the-century time, he was a pretty effective in his avocation of Parachutes and his anticipation of A Rush of Blood to the Head. Now that the band's taken on a different--and in my opinion much better--sound, I wonder if he still listens?

"Strawberry Swing" is one of the band's most relaxing, though managing not to be boring, songs they've ever written. "Strawberry" evokes a certain flavor right away, that sweet pinkish-red inexorably associated with relaxing during the summer. Plus, the song features an intriguing pentatonic countermelody that doesn't necessarily add anything to the song's meaning, but at least makes it really pleasant to listen to.

Honorable mentions: "Talk" from X&Y, "Cemeteries of London" and "Violet Hill" from Viva la Vida


Track 19: "Hands Open" by Snow Patrol, track 2 from Eyes Open, May 2006

Personal history with Snow Patrol dates back to an indeterminate time in high school, more likely than not senior year. And it was in one of my friend's cars, but exactly whose I can't honestly recall. The band is nominally indie, though certainly not in the Decemberists-Shins mode of the genre. I'd put them a lot closer to the "alternative" of Coldplay and Keane and the Fray. That is, the sort of music that can either be immensely entertaining, but has to face the constant danger of falling into lullaby-falsetto mode.

Fortunately, Snow Patrol avoids that trap more often than not. As has become sort of a trend in the Mix CD, "Hands Open" is by far the hardest, most energetic track off a CD that's not exactly known for its hard rock. The song contains a few surprisingly insightful aphorisms, like "it's hard to argue when/ you won't stop making sense." And it of course features what's possibly the most wonderful allusion to an indie song ever: "Put Sufjan Stevens on, and we'll sing your favorite song./ 'Chicago' bursts to life, and your sweet smile remembers you." If "Chicago" is Snow Patrol's favorite song, or Snow Patrol's girlfriend's favorite song, that's good enough for me.

Honorable mentions: Relationally, something from Dizzy Up the Girl by the Goo Goo Dolls, perhaps "Broadway". Granted, that's a stretch, but you can make it work.


Track 20: "Penny Lane" by the Beatles, track 3 from side 2 of Magical Mystery Tour, November 1967

Of course, "roll up" in the title track has nothing at all to do with marijuana. It's a tour bus. Honestly. If Revolver is recognized as the Beatles' most triumphant album stylistically and technically, then Magical Mystery Tour is the most salient example of their psychedelic influences. The Beatles on a whole need no introduction, except for me to reaffirm the mantra that anything good we seen in popular music today is in some way, directly or obliquely, thanks to the Beatles.

This is a startlingly impressive album. "I Am the Walrus", "Strawberry Fields Forever", "The Fool on the Hill", and of course "Penny Lane", plus several more very strong tracks, all in one release? Only the Beatles could pull that off. "Penny Lane itself" has anything you could want. Personal, expressive lyrics that don't necessarily need to be about anything or proving a point. A piccolo trumpet solo, which was an incredibly innovative touch for the time. Imagery to rich as to make us believe we're actually in an English suburb, and sound effects to help us get there too. A work of brilliance by the greatest band of the 20th century to close off the CD.

Honorable mentions: "Yellow Submarine" from Revolver, "Strawberry Fields Forever" from Magical Mystery Tour, "Let it Be" from Let it Be


Tomorrow, we take a look back at these twenty songs and see what interesting patterns emerge.


Currently listening: "In the Chess Court", soundtrack to Hero

Anatomy of a Mix Tape: Part III

Continued from part II...

Track 11: "Many Funerals" by Eisley, track 1 from Combinations, August 2007

If KT Tunstall was the radio's greatest success, then Eisley is certainly Last.fm's. If you're unfamiliar with the concept, here's a quick rundown. As you listen to music, a small and non-intrusive program collects data on what you're listening to. It sends this data ("scrobbles" it) to a server. Then, based on that information, you can get recommendations of what else you might like. Conveniently, there's even a recommendation radio station, where you can sit and listen to exactly what the server thinks you might be interested in.

Some of these recommendations are so obvious as to be frustrating: just because I'm listening to Miles Davis doesn't necessarily mean I want every jazz musician ever to show up in my recommendations. Some of them are so prescient as to be useless: after listening to Hot Fuss by the Killers, Last.fm got really excited in encouraging me to check out Franz Ferdinand. I already know of Franz Ferdinand and already have some of their music, but I hadn't listened to it in a while, so Last.fm naturally assumed that I had no idea who they were. And some are based more on common listenership than any stylistic similarity: I fail to see the resemblance between Bright Eyes and the Decemberists, no matter how much Last.fm insists they're connected.

But happily, some of the recommendations work beautifully. After listening to a bit of Rilo Kiley and some Beatles, I noticed this "Eisley" pop up more than once, both in the list and the radio station. So I listened to what the radio station had to offer (namely "Memories" and "Telescope Eyes" if I remember correctly), and I was pretty much blown away. Turns out Rilo Kiley and the Beatles described a perfect Venn diagram to generate Eisley, too. Eisley lists the Beatles as one of their influences (as should every band dating from 1970 or later, as far as I'm concerned). And Eisley and Rilo Kiley sound a lot alike, at least superficially. Both bands feature girl singers with incredible voices, both have an indie-ish sound despite being signed to Warner Brothers, and both are unafraid to take a page from unconventional genres like blues or country.

The similarity stops there, mostly. Rilo Kiley prefers to sing about any manner of situation gone horribly askew, from bitter rejoinders against ex-lovers in their earlier music to the more recent tales about dangerous sexual practices. Eisley has this tendency to sing about happy things, like love that actually does work out, and people that genuinely miss each other. Some critic might complain that this "isn't addressing the entire range of human emotion" or something similar, but Eisley departs from that when they feel the need. "Invasion", the first single off Combinations, is about aliens. And "Many Funerals" is about someone's parents who died at sea. The subject matter isn't as uplifting as in most of the rest of the songs I've put on the CD, but the music more than makes up for that: energetic, spirited, and lively. Plus, lead singer Sherri DuPree's incredible soprano is contrasted with sister and backup singer Stacy's alto to create the best form-fits-function for a sea tale since Vaughan Williams.

Honorable mentions: "Memories" and "Marvelous Things" from Room Noises; "Invasion", "Taking Control", and "Combinations" from Combinations

Track 12: "Someone Else's Arms" by Mae, track 3 from The Everglow, March 2005

This one comes as no surprise. I came to Mae through Nick, when he burned their first CD (Destination: Beautiful) for me. "This music is really happy," he told me. "It puts you in a good mood." And so it did, and still does. Independently, we purchased The Everglow, and agreed that it's one hell of an album. I'm not sure where it ranks on Nick's top ever, but I'd guess that it's at least somewhere. It sits at the top of mine, no questions about it. I even hold the possibly slightly presumptuous opinion that if you don't like The Everglow, you probably don't have a soul. Of course I don't mean that literally, but this is one of those albums that really should mean something when you listen to it.

Mae takes a cue from some of the later prep rock bands, like Motion City Soundtrack, but that doesn't define their sound. They definitely elicit an emotional response, but they're by no means an emo band. And the music is deeply spiritual in many places, but they don't resort to preachiness or becoming overtly a "Christian" band. A big criticism of Mae, and especially The Everglow, is that they use too perfect structure—I forget the exact quote, but it had something to do with resenting their inability to go beyond what a music theory class would tell them to do. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: all that music theory makes their music sound really, really good. It's not modern, it's not edgy—and it doesn't need to be, and they're not trying to be. It's sincere and genuine.

The Everglow is, on a high level, about a young man's journey to find out what's actually out there, and what it means to love. That sounds incredibly cheesy unless you've heard the music. But the progress of the story is almost Shakespearean, from the first act of "love makes you feel happy" through the climax of "love is needing someone" and finally to the resolution of "love overwhelms any selfish thought." And there's a story, and a reflection, and a good chance at finding something very personal at every turn. "Someone Else's Arms" is from the very beginning of the story, when out hero is still in the "I want to feel good" mode. It's very straightforward, about feeling sort of desperate and wanting to wake up lying next to someone. And by the end of the album, the definition of love has progressed far beyond that notion. But it remains one of the most fun songs to listen to, with the youthful exuberance appropriate to such subject matter.

Honorable mentions: "Embers and Envelopes", "All Deliberate Speed", and "Sun" from Destination: Beautiful, and literally any other song from The Everglow

Track 13: "Barrel of a Gun" by Guster, track 2 from Lost and Gone Forever, September 1999

One afternoon, back in late high school, a friend and I faced a long drive. So she grabbed a CD, telling me that it was "really good" and that I'd like it. It was something by Guster—I don't remember what album exactly, but it did turn out to be really good. And it provided quite the pleasant soundtrack to a trek out to Stone Mountain Village and Norcross, for various acquisitions. I'm thankful for that, because I don't know that I would have come across Guster any other way. Possibly Last.fm may have thrown a heroic effort my way, but it's doubtful, once it figured out that I like the Shins and Death Cab.

This band is less indie and more college band/garage band that just sort of took off. The sound is very acoustic and features lots of creative uses of percussion, including the trademark bongos. Vocally, Guster uses lots of harmonies; not just conventional harmonies, but interesting counterpoint too. Instead of just singing the same words at a specified interval apart, Guster is known for changing up those intervals on the fly, and even singing completely different lyrics from each other. The entire repertoire over Guster's almost fifteen years as a band is remarkably consistent, with excellent quality taking hold on the second release, Goldfly, and not letting go since. Choosing "Barrel of a Gun" was more or less random, except that it was probably influenced by its presence at the legendary Wasch Studios the same way "Jacksonville" was. It tracks a fanboy's obsession with a movie star whose love for him is so perfect, it's as if "she already knows me." That sort of tongue-in-cheek pastiche is yet another reason to love the band.

Honorable mention: "Red Oyster Cult" from Keep it Together; "Satellite" from Ganging Up on the Sun

Track 14: "Your Ex-Lover is Dead" by Stars, track 1 from Set Yourself on Fire, March 2005

Recall for a moment the legendary Graduation Night iTunes Gift Card Debacle, in which I managed to lose two graduation cards handed to me, containing $30 worth of iTunes gift cards. These gifts were generously replaced, leading me to purchase some Decemberists, plus Your Ex-Lover is Dead on Jenny's advice. She promised me they were sort of like the Postal Service, which is reasonably accurate, though I've refined my personal description of the band since then. Stars are generally lumped into what might be referred to as "indie pop", though where exactly the line is between that and indie rock is beyond me to try and pinpoint.

What I can say for sure is that they have a pleasantly peppy sound in most of their music, whether the subject of the song is indeed peppy or something far more sinister. Frontman Torquil Campbell is a talented multi-instrumentalist, and any doubts I may have had about the band (brought on mostly by their over-expressed political leanings) were more or less mollified when Campbell busted out a trumpet and played all the solos at the band's concert.

I went with Set Yourself on Fire because it's on a whole a better CD than its successor In Our Bedroom After the War. Now, I have my opinions on In Our Bedroom After the War, and succinctly, that opinion is it's not by any means a bad album. It just suffers from too much filler that can swing from "excellent" to "awful" depending on your perception of the rest of the album. And its songs aren't structured correctly to provide enough support to the less strong tracks. Set Yourself on Fire doesn't have that problem; it's solid throughout despite a bad song here and there. Like In Our Bedroom After the War, though, it starts off with one of its best; in this case, that's "Your Ex-Lover is Dead", filled with winds and strings and nostalgia.

Honorable mentions: "What I'm Trying to Say" from Set Yourself on Fire, "The Night Starts Here" and "Take Me to the Riot" from In Our Bedroom After the War

Track 15: "Feuer Frei!" by Rammstein, track 5 from Mutter, April 2001

Just as Leaving Through the Window became a soundtrack to sophomore year of high school, Mutter was every bit as much to freshman year. It was marching band camp in August 2001 when I was first acquainted with Rammstein, thanks entirely to my man Andrew van Devender. He played this curious CD for me called Live Aus Berlin, which featured German men singing angrily in baritone registers and the hardest rock music that I'd ever actually enjoyed. I went out and bought Live Aus Berlin myself, and Mutter not long after that.

To put it in a genre, Rammstein is most generally "industrial", though I sort of like the German appellation "tanz-metall" ("dance-metal") better. And what an odd dance party it would be, featuring songs about air base tragedies and hermaphrodites and gasoline. Mutter is maybe a little softer than the rest of their music—it's not the "music to invade Poland to" that I've heard the first album described as. But it's distinctly Rammstein, no doubt about it.

I decided to go with "Feuer Frei!" out of sentimentality as much as anything. It recalls the good old days of spending countless afternoons and evenings and weekends at Andrew's place, playing Perfect Dark on the Nintendo 64. (All you thirteen year old kids out there that think your precious Halo 3 is revolutionary? You'd have nothing if it weren't for Goldeneye and Perfect Dark.) Of course we needed music for our matches. More often than not, that was Rammstein; when it was Rammstein, it was usually Mutter; and every time we played Mutter, we were always sure to hit "Feuer Frei!". It's a perfect fit to a shooter, of course, translating as "fire freely!" or "fire at will!", and having the angry industrial metal to back it up.

Honorable mentions: "Links 2 3 4" from Mutter, "Moskau" from Reise, Reise

Tomorrow, the last five tracks, and the analysis and conclusion comes over the weekend.


Currently listening: "The Final Countdown", Europe

Anatomy of a Mix Tape: Part II

Continued from part I...

Track 6: "Cath..." by Death Cab for Cutie, track 4 from Narrow Stairs, May 2008

Death Cab needs no introduction to many people. They're probably the most successful and well-known exemplar of the contemporary "indie" tradition, even though they, like the Decemberists, have now made the lemming-jump to a major label. Or so the most hardcore fans thought would happen, and a few probably still insist did happen. Death Cab's style is emo first and foremost, but an honest and genuine emo, never turning to whining. Their instrumentation is especially solid, doing well to avoid the screaming and intentional, misplaced dissonance that some of their peers rely on.

Narrow Stairs promised some drastic changes from Death Cab's earlier music, and while it is a lot different, we still have the same band. Death Cab's songs have never been particularly optimistic on a whole. Perhaps they weren't as clearly melancholy as Narrow Stairs turned out to throw at us, maybe they didn't come right out and say there was "No Sunshine", but objectively it was more a refinement than a departure. "Cath...", like the review of the album mentioned is widely agreed to be the best song on it, and I agree with public opinion here. "Cath..." is absolutely classic Death Cab, a pleasant little story of a girl who unwisely ends up with a man who doesn't love her.

Honorable mentions: "The Sound of Settling" and "We Looked Like Giants", Transatlanticism, "Marching Bands of Manhattan" and "Soul Meets Body" from Plans


Track 7: "Get Off" by the Dandy Warhols, track 7 from Thirteen Tales form Urban Bohemia, August 2000

I proclaim myself to be a Dandy Warhols fan on the strength of this album alone--without having heard any of the band's other music. I've been assured that the rest of their music is way different from this one anyway, and honestly, if this album were the band's only one ever, that would be more than enough for me to consider them masters of the craft. I suppose you could call it "psychedelic" rock, if for no other reason than the multitude of drug references and the insistent dreaminess of many of their songs.

The lyrics on this album range from introspective to satirical, from self-satisfying to insightful, from boorish to sublime. And they do some remarkably creative things with structure and instrumentation, ranging from totally conventional 4/4 guitar-driven rock to ethereal, drifting experiments. "Get Off" is about exactly what it sounds like it's about. And it's wonderfully fun to listen to.

Honorable mentions: Practically anything from Thirteen Tales from Urban Bohemia, particularly "Godless", "Bohemian Like You", and "Big Indian"


Track 8: "Make Me Smile" by Chicago, track 2 from side 2 of Chicago II, January 1970

Along with the Beatles, Chicago is one of two bands on the CD that I first came to through my parents. Musical originality is a big thing with me, and Chicago exemplifies that brilliantly. I can't think of another band that so completely integrates a horn section into their music. Cake tries, and puts up a good show. But one trumpet, while it is the cornerstone of any good horn section, just doesn't compare to the Loughnane-Pankow-Parazaider triad that's given Chicago its unique sound for four decades. Perhaps not until Norah Jones did we have an artist that was so completely accepted in the pop scene but also gave jazz bands something interesting to play too.

I'm partial to Chicago's earlier stuff for just that reason: it features the horn section the best and the most creatively. Another reason is that I really like the city Chicago, an influence on the band and particularly the earliest few albums. The reason I like "Make Me Smile" in particular is that I have personal experience with it; a few weeks back in middle school jazz band. Even though it was sort of a hokey arrangement, that was the first song I ever played that I'd heard of before I played it.

"Make Me Smile" is actually the first part of a seven-song cycle, "Ballet for a Girl in Buchannon", that also includes the slow-dance staple "Color My World. The version I have actually includes the first three or four parts of the cycle on the same track, which is all the better. But "Make Me Smile", which showcases Chicago's mastery of dynamics and of course has a memorable trumpet solo, steals the show.

Honorable mentions: "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is" from Chicago Transit Authority, "25 Or 6 To 4" from Chicago II


Track 9: "Suddenly I See" by KT Tunstall, track 9 from Eye to the Telescope, February 2006 (US)

Where most of the artists featured on the CD are either products of direct recommendation or a bit of self-directed musical digging, KT Tunstall comes from the radio. The Atlanta radio station Dave.fm, which is usually pretty decent, provided it's not on a weird 80s kick, or a streak of several overly mellow songs in a row, in the vein of Jack Johnson. In fact, browsing their recent playlist, "Suddenly I See" was played not half an hour ago, along with "Sweet and Low" by Augustana, "Californication" by Red Hot Chili Peppers, and "Imagine" by John Lennon, all in the past few hours. (Though they do have a penchant for that irritating "Mercy" song that seems to be in vogue lately.)

I listened to the radio a lot in the summer of 2006, a time of teaching Koreans to speak English and staying at Andrew Hood's old house until the wee hours of the morning at least a few times a week. And whenever I turned on the radio, whether it be leaving for work at 8:30 am, or leaving work at 2 pm, or even coming home at 3 am, I had a better chance than not of hearing "Suddenly I See". And it really grew on me. I like the driving, energetic guitar, and Tunstall has a great voice (if maybe not as good as Jenny Lewis's). The song, of course, is a feminist one, but that doesn't make it any less musically sound. Plus, Tunstall looks really, really cute on the cover for the iTunes version of the single.

Honorable mentions: "Other Side of the World" and "Another Place to Fall" from Eye to the Telescope


Track 10: "Jacksonville" by Sufjan Stevens, track 5 from Illinoise, July 2005

Back in the grand old days of Folk Hall, quite the music community flourished on the local iTunes network. And an enterprising individual could take advantage of this with the OurTunes client to appropriate any sort of shared music onto his own computer, to the tune of possibly several gigabytes. I'd actually read about Illinoise in the Atlanta Fish Wrapper of all places, when it was first released, and thought "hey, that sounds cool." When I did appropriate it, it was more than cool. This album earned laudatory remarks like "best album of 2005" by many critics, and who am I to argue with that?

Those same critics will also probably say that "Chicago" is the album's standout track. It is good, no doubt. But the song that caught me when I first listened to it was "Jacksonville", which is actually quite a moving song about sympathy toward abolitionists. It, like many of Stevens' other songs, features folk melody and vocals against a symphonic background, and crams in allusions to the great Land of Lincoln. And even more than his other songs, there's something fundamentally uplifting, positive about it. Besides, I heard it at the legendary Kate Wasch Studios, which means it has to be of the highest quality.

Honorable mentions: "Come On! Feel the Illinoise!", "Decatur", and "Chicago" from Illinoise


Tune in tomorrow for part III.


Currently listening: "Lost Underworld" from Mother 2 - Giygas' Counterattack

Anatomy of a Mix Tape: Part I

To read the introduction to the Accidental Mix Tape project, click here.

I'll now delve into each of the tracks that made it onto the CD, giving possibly-relevant facts like album and date of release. I also aim to give a one-paragraph synopsis of the band—it might stretch into two—and a quick chat about why I chose the particular song that I did. I'll finish off with a few "honorable mention" tracks that also could have been good choices for the CD, and might well make it onto Mix Tape Part 2.

Track 1: "Close Call" by Rilo Kiley, track 2 from Under the Blacklight, August 2007

Rilo Kiley is one in a proud line of bands that I was first exposed to thanks to my friend Nick. For a while back in high school, it seemed that every time I saw Nick, he had a new CD packed to the brim with his latest favorite bands. Some of these bands I just couldn't get into, and sort of let fall by the wayside; some of them, I keep coming back to even now. Rilo Kiley is definitely in the second group, I want to say introduced to me in June 2005. Their lyrics are creative and clever, lead singer Jenny Lewis has a gorgeous voice, and the instrumentation takes cues not only from rock and pop, but also from folk and country.

I would put Under the Blacklight in my personal top five albums of 2007, ranking behind Wincing the Night Away (which is also represented on the CD), but maybe not much else. We’ve seen incredible development since the days of Take-Offs and Landings. The band's sound has progressed from lo-fi and indie to refined and produced, and Lewis's voice has transformed from girly and almost coquettish to mature and approaching sultry in places. The thing that's striking, though, is that both CDs are remarkably good. In the end, I went with the recency of Under the Blacklight over the primacy of Take-Offs and Landings. "Close Call" is one of three or four excellent tracks on the album; in the end, I thought it had a little more energy than "Silver Lining", and I wanted to give something besides the title track a try after it had been my ringtone for several months.

Honorable mentions: "Plane Crash in C" from Take-Offs and Landings, "Paint's Peeling" from The Execution of All Things, "Silver Lining" and "Under the Blacklight" from Under the Blacklight

Track 2: "Here I Dreamt I Was an Architect" by the Decemberists, track 2 from Castaways and Cutouts, May 2002

The Decemberists, even after their dreaded Migration to a Major Label, remain as indie-workhorse as ever. A massive vocabulary, songs about Japanese geishas and crooked French-Canadian bootleggers, and immensely entertaining live shows have given them a well-deserved place near the top of the indie heap. It's tough to remember the exact first time I heard of the Decemberists, but the references just kept piling up in April and May of 2005. By the time I finally broke down and listened to one of their songs, I had just eaten dinner at Dante's Down the Hatch, a wonderful Buckhead fondue place with an 18th century naval theme. And I had just finished reading Neal Stephenson's The System of the World, the final volume in the Baroque Cycle, a delightfully epic historical fiction trilogy. The first Decemberists song I heard was "The Infanta", which tied into both of those cultural experiences and made me instantly appreciate the band.

I first heard Picaresque in its entirety, then Castaways and Cutouts and Her Majesty at the same time, later acquiring The Crane Wife when it was released. I think I made a mistake in not "cleansing my palette" in between listening to the two earlier albums, because they're not immensely stylistically distinct, and even now I have a hard time telling them apart. Both albums have about half mediocre filler and half sheer brilliance, such that if you combined the best half from each, you'd probably have one of the greatest collections of music ever. Alas, even the Decemberists can't pull together utter genius every waking moment. But the thing that distinguishes the Decemberists despite a handful of less-than-exciting songs (not bad, per se, just uninteresting) per album is that the "good half" is incredible. I said "sheer brilliance" and I don’t think that's an overstatement. "Here I Dreamt I Was an Architect" is in this half.

I liked the song already, but I began to truly appreciate it last summer in Europe. There's something indescribably wonderful about seeing the Mediterranean coast for the first time ever, passing over the Spanish border at sunrise, and hearing the lyric "and here in Spain I am a Spaniard" not half an hour later. The song features three evocative, imagistic vignettes about attempts at getting love to work out in fantastic circumstances. And it showcases the Decemberists' lyrical brilliance possibly better than any of their songs.

Honorable mentions: "July, July!" and "California One" from Castaways and Cutouts, "Billy Liar" and "Song for Myla Goldberg" from Her Majesty, "The Infanta" from Picaresque, "The Island" from The Crane Wife (though its scope and length might not make it quite right for the "mix tape" environment)

Track 3: "I Want to Save You" by Something Corporate, track 1 from Leaving Through the Window, May 2002

Unlike Castaways and Cutouts, which I first heard three years after its release, I've been listening to Leaving Through the Window since the day it came out. That's more than six years now, which is nigh unfathomable. The album became a soundtrack to my sophomore year in high school, a time that turned out to be huge in terms of maturation, all that wonderful "coming out of puberty" business. Appropriately, Something Corporate belongs to that genre that I've talked about before as having defined my high school musical experience, sometimes called "pop-punk" or "post-punk" or a label that I've taken a liking to, "prep rock". You know the sorts of band. New Found Glory, Good Charlotte, number bands like Blink-182 and Sum 41.

I didn't realize it at the time, but for a type of music to dominate the high school popular scene, that wasn't necessarily a bad trend. It came on the heels of insipid pop along the lines of Christina Aguilera, N'Sync, and Ricky Martin. And it was followed by the ascendancy of mainstream hip-hop: Kanye West, Usher, Nelly, Jeezy, and all the rest. Something Corporate wasn't the best-known exemplar of that trend in music, but I think they're among the most distinctive. They knew when to cool off and play at slower than 180 beats per minute. And they also made the most of unconventional orchestration, adding strings and piano to enhance their sound nicely. "I Want to Save You" doesn’t have any particular significance over the rest of the album, but I like its pacing and tempo.

Honorable mentions: "I Woke Up in a Car" from Leaving Through the Window, "Bleed American" and "Splash, Turn, Twist" by Jimmy Eat World from Bleed American. Usually I'll try to preserve the same artist in an "honorable mention"... this is more of a "relational" connection.

Track 4: "Such Great Heights" by The Postal Service, track 2 from Give Up, February 2003

The Postal Service is another one of those bands that's tricky to nail down an exact time I first heard them, or heard of them. I'm pretty sure Nick had something to do with it, but whether that "something" was introducing me, or merely burning the music for me, I don't remember. The band is relatively well known by this point as a collaborative project between Death Cab for Cutie's lead singer Ben Gibbard and some dude who does electronica that nobody can really remember. It's emo, sure, but intelligent emo, and a darn catchy beat in the background. This band is one of the most universally accepted among my friends, colleagues, and acquaintances. Nearly everyone who's heard of the Postal Service likes them, views them favorably, and reacts well to their music being played in a long car ride. Of course, there are people who don’t know anything about them at all, and whose personal spheres of music appreciation probably don't come close to including indie pop. But you don't have to be a green amoeba shirt-wearing Shins fan to think good things about the Postal Service.

They have but one full album, sadly, and I've gone with what's undoubtedly the most well known song from it. You can hear "Such Great Heights" in UPS commercials, Target commercials, and M&Ms commercials. It was even covered by another indie staple, Iron & Wine, prompting a huge and still-raging debate over which version is the superior one. (Of course, by its inclusion on this CD, I come down on the side of the Postal Service). Apparently it's "the only positive song" Ben Gibbard has ever written about love, and positive it is, and happy too, which is why I've chosen it for the CD.

Honorable mention: "The District Sleeps Alone Tonight" and "Brand New Colony" from Give Up

Track 5: "Turn on Me" by the Shins, track 7 from Wincing the Night Away, January 2007

This is a direct Nick contribution, in the form of an actual CD, and it's his single greatest act of genius and philanthropy. What a fantastic collection of music. Perfectly paced and balanced, dramatically introductioned, gracefully concluded. No filler, except for the 54 seconds of "Pam Berry", which is just as easily overlooked—you want to listen to every song. Interesting instrumentation and outreaches to various genres. Witty and unconventional throughout, but nowhere near the point of becoming novelty—these guys are making music meant to be taken seriously but manage to have a lot a fun doing it. I got Wincing the Night Away for my birthday, February 2007, and almost instantly, it became one of my favorites. I was actually hesitant to listen to the band's earlier albums, because there wasn't any way they could be as good as Wincing the Night Away. Eventually I caved in. I was right, they weren't quite as good, but still excellent.

If I said that Rilo Kiley's sound has matured since their first album, then the Shins have accomplished a metamorphosis worthy of Ovid or Kafka. Oh, Inverted World, a darling of the indie community, was so lo-fi and poorly produced by comparison that lead singer James Mercer's vocals seem muffled and unintelligible. And Wincing the Night Away is so much more varied and original that after listening to it, all the songs on Oh, Inverted World sound the same—to a synesthete, it's almost like they take on the same weirdly drab blue of the album's cover. This isn't an indictment of Oh, Inverted World at all; merely an observation that next to Wincing the Night Away, even an earlier success pales in comparison. I don't know if I'm alone in the belief that Wincing the Night Away completely eclipsed Oh, Inverted World as the Shins' masterwork, but I'll stick by that belief as fervently as I need to. Picking a song was tougher, but "Turn on Me" has everything you'd want from the Shins: catchiness, imaginative similes, and the good old apathy that's become their trademark.

Honorable mentions: "So Says I" and "Saint Simon" from Chutes Too Narrow, "Australia" and "Phantom Limb" from Wincing the Night Away


Check back tomorrow for part II!


Currently listening: "Turkish March", Mozart

Anatomy of a Mix Tape: Introduction

It's a goal ever elusive in the world of music: the album with no filler. Where every song is equally enjoyable to listen to, yet different enough that you actually want to listen to all of them, one after another. Mae did it with The Everglow. The Shins followed suit with Wincing the Night Away. The Beatles came close a few times, and several bands have efforts that are almost there, but not quite. So, an idea dawned on me as I was listening to Coldplay's Viva la Vida again and really wanting to hurry up and get to "Violet Hill". What if I just made a CD like that for myself? Throw it in the drive, maybe randomize it so I wouldn't get tired of the same sequence of music, and never have a track I wanted to skip over.

Opening up iTunes, I made a new playlist then started dragging in good songs as I thought of them. I decided to add another restriction: not only did I not want two songs from the same album, I didn't want two songs from the same artist. I figure that I like enough different bands that that would be a feasible goal. I got to about fifteen songs, realized that CD-Rs can hold about twenty, and threw in a few more for good measure. Now, this is supposed to be a CD that contains exactly zero filler, but I did put in songs as I thought of them—that might lead to an unintentional bias toward wanting to listen to the first few songs. So for the sake of fairness, I hit shuffle a few times to randomize the order. Only after I hit burn, watched it for a few minutes, and saw it get halfway through "Jacksonville" by Sufjan Stevens did I realize what this project had turned into.

Holy Mother of God, I'd created a mix tape.

Granted, the intention was more "hall of fame" than "mix", and nobody's actually made tapes for the past decade. Between that and the attempt at guitar playing, Samantha's right—I'm getting too hipster for my own good. Tangential update on the guitar: I know eight chords now, and after learning a few more (notably B major and a minor), I'll be able to play the entire collective works of Neutral Milk Hotel. That prospect delights me to no end.

One definite omission from this CD is anything classical—it would just be too weird to come out of the Shins and into Vivaldi. I could do (and may well end up doing) something similar with classical, and it would probably involve lots of baroque, some Dvorak, something from Carmina Burana, and a bit of Copland and Gershwin to round it off. But that's a project for another day. Oh, classical music side note: the reason I mention Dvorak and Gershwin specifically (besides the fact that I like them) is that there's going to be an ASO show featuring those composers in November. The program is Gershwin's Cuban Overture and Dvorak's Ninth Symphony (one of my favorite classical pieces ever), and I'm definitely interested in going to that.

So in the end, how did my come-to-find-out-it's-a-mix-tape turn out? Actually pretty well, I think. I'm going to post a quick rundown of each of the songs in the coming days, and an analysis of a few interesting trends I noticed at the very end. If nothing else, it'll give a good insight into at least the popular side of my musical taste.


Currently listening: "Winning A Battle, Losing The War", Kings of Convenience

My favorite character from The Office

...is the topic of a fun new user experience! To all the dozen or so people who recommended the show to me, I've already commended you on your fine choice of program. Now, let's see how well you really know me. Having just watched the entirety of The Office in the last few weeks, who's my favorite character?

I'll once again express my opinion that this show is one of the best on television, and that I don't know how I got along this many years without watching it. The satire is dead-on--and it's something that you can truly appreciate once you've actually worked in an office setting. Another thing this show does well is the issue of the fourth wall. For me, breaking the fourth wall is a comedic disaster. The instant a character in a movie starts acting like he's in a movie is the instant the movie stops being funny.

"Wait, doesn't The Office do just that?" Well, yes and no. True, the characters do act like they're participating in a documentary. The Office creatively skirts this issue by having the characters acknowledge the fact that they're on a documentary from day one. The fact that people are watching this is accepted by all the characters; the layer of suspended disbelief inherent to the documentary process becomes a second layer of verisimilitude. That way, the fourth wall no longer separates the office from the "documentary".

But there is still a notion of fourth wall present, separating the production of the "documentary" from the viewers. The character Jim, for instance, always acts like Jim--as he would act in a documentary. It's a subtle distinction, but it's one that adds an incredible comedic element to the show. In essence, we get two levels to each character: the characters as they interact with each other as they passively acknowledge the cameras, and the interviews as each actively talks to the camera. And all the actors do it so well that they never break character--either level of character.

The deft handling of the fourth wall is only part of the brilliance of this show. Another part is that it portrays a love story that I actually find myself caring about. When you look at all the shows that I espouse as my "favorites", I rarely if ever buy into the love story elements. I don't care about Cameron and Chase, or Wilson and Cutthroat Bitch on House. (And honestly, I wasn't all that sad when Cutthroat Bitch kicked the bucket.) I've never cared about Jack Bauer and whatever floozy he was with at the moment. I sure as hell don't care about the Sawyer-Kate-Jack-Juliet quadrangle on Lost. I find it perplexing that, given all the intriguing things that a fan could dig into with this show, people are such diehard "Jaters" or "Skaters" (proponents of Jack-Kate and Sawyer-Kate, respectively).

Then the Desmond-Penny arc was introduced, and I became a believer. Prior to the season 4 finale, we kept hearing about a spectacular kiss that was going to "stop time". People naturally assumed this was going to be a Sawyer-Kate kiss. Perhaps the producers intended the time-stopper to be that Sawyer-Kate kiss we got. I respectfully disagree. Desmond and Penny's reunion aboard her boat was the single most poignant and emotionally rewarding moment of the show to date. And at that point, I realized that I actually could care about love stories in television shows.

Nothing is a better example of that than Jim and Pam on The Office. You're supposed to like Jim, because he's sort of the protagonist, and he's undergone a lot of character development in the four seasons we've seen so far. And there's something about him that you can't help but like: the easygoing, mischievous nature, the rapport that he naturally develops with most people he interacts with. The only thing missing from that is, of course, Getting the Girl. The end result? I honestly do care about this love story, and one of the points of interest in this show is seeing how it progresses.

On a completely unrelated note, I was wrong about the American version of Iron Chef. I used to denounce it as a less creative version of the Japanese original, where ludicrous ingredients like eel and shark fin gave way to... chicken? After watching a few episodes, yeah, it is rather less creative in its choices of secret ingredients. But after getting into the Food Network culture a bit, knowing who guys like Flay and Batale are, the show really is good. And it helps tremendously that Alton Brown does the commentary. The man is a genius, delicately balancing culinary intellect with eccentricity, and coming off as incredibly informed, throwing a generous helping of biochemistry along the way. My friend Samantha compared me favorably to Alton Brown a few times, and only recently have I begun to fully appreciate how big a compliment that is. He's awesome.


Currently listening: "Summersong", the Decemberists

Summer Reading Season, First Round

Here's a concept: reading books. I lament that it's not something I have a whole lot of time for during the school year. What better time, then, to go on a literary spree than summer? Last summer I hit such highlights as Ken Jennings' Brainiac, and the seventh Harry Potter book (many, many times over). And that's not even to mention the wonderful Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World among others.

This summer, exiled as I am to Alton, Illinois, I decided to continue that fine tradition a step further by packing a backpack full of books and busting them out whenever I had nothing to do. That turned out, and continues to turn out, to be quite frequently. I began actually a bit before the migration started, and now that I'm about halfway through, it's time to discuss the first batch.

John Sanford's Rules of Prey occupied some time in car rides out to Athens (two of them in one week! The horror!) for my cousin's wedding. Definitely an enjoyable book, and highly recommended to fans of the mystery/suspense genres. There wasn't anything hugely literarily significant about it. But like a good episode of CSI, the plot is so cleverly wrought, and the characters are at least interesting enough to string it along, that it's enjoyable the whole way through. Sanford is far from the first author to write about quirky detective-types, and he'll by no means be the last. That said, few if any authors writing today do it better, and I'll make an effort to read more of these books when college affords me the chance.


The Count of Monte Cristo is one of those books you hear an awful lot about, think "yeah, maybe I should read this" and never really work up the motivation. Or perhaps you're forcibly exposed to it through some Honors English teacher. The reason that you're forcibly exposed to it, or that people won't stop talking about it? This book is truly excellent. From the outset, what's not to love about a bunch of French guys getting revenge on each other? The degree of forethought and subtlety in all of the plots, as wrought by both Dumas and his characters, is spectacular.

Some of the side stories are less interesting than the main plot--this is both necessary to keep us wanting to come back to the main plot, and a sign that Dumas is indeed human--and some of the character relationships become a little confusing as the book snowballs on. I might have appreciated a few family trees, a la George R. R. Martin. that told me the given name, the title, and the family name of any given character. (As is common with nobility, at some point, people stop going by their given names and just take on their titular identities.) And I find Dumas' continuous restatement of his thesis, that you must experience sorrow to experience true happiness, toward the end of the book a little heavy-handed. Perhaps I find it heavy-handed because I disagree with it.

But that's not enough to prevent enjoyment of the book, by any means. This book literally "has it all"--intrigue, action, romance, and the religious commentary that's practically required of the Romantic era. Redemption, vindication, treachery, and of course vengeance. Dumas works wonders with character development, both in terms of perceived character development as plots come to light, and in the characters' real development in response to events in the story. The highest praise I can give, though is this: for its daunting volume, most of it clips by at a surprisingly quick speed. Definitely recommended.


Next up on the list was that book-club staple The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls, written as a memoir of her childhood. Plenty of peoples' gut reaction to this book is a negative one: "I smell a rat." Maybe it's naivety on my part, but I can't believe someone would make this all up. Why incriminate one's own family so harshly for the purposes of authorship? If she wanted to go through the trouble of writing fiction, then Walls merely could have written fiction. And because she's obviously a proficient storyteller, the resulting tale would have been just as good.

I don't know what reaction Walls was hoping to elicit to the characters in the book. It seems unlikely that she meant to vilify her own family as thoroughly as she does, but I walked away from this book with a sharp dislike for both of Jeannette's parents. Alcoholism is a beast I haven't had to deal with anyone close to me having had, so I'm the least qualified person imaginable to comment on it. But it's very difficult for me to believe that Rex couldn't at least scrape up an ounce of restraint so that he could buy food for his children rather than getting drunk. How Jeannette managed to hold out any respect for the man after that happened--not just once, but time and time again--is beyond me. Not to mention his constant disputes with viable sources of income for the family; getting shunned from jobs just because of an ideological conflict with the boss.

Her mother isn't free from blame either. If you're, say, 26 years old and living by yourself, do whatever you want. Go ahead and say "I know I have experience teaching, but screw it, I want to be an artist. I don't care if that means I only get one meal a day." More power to you. But again, if you're in a situation where people are depending on you for that food, don't condemn them to one meal a day just because you're too obstinate to teach school.

Take home message from this book? Where any number of allegories or propagandas try and convince you that you should appreciate what you have, this book actually succeeds. Reading about some of the absolute destitution that Walls and family end up in, whether it actually happened or not, truly helps you to value that roof over your head and that running water in the sink.


I also hit a book called None So Blind by Joe Haldeman, a collection of science fiction short stories. Most of them are quite good, not going full blown Star Wars level of sci-fi, just altering one aspect of a story to make it paranormal. Perhaps one character has advanced technology. Perhaps there's an alien. Maybe technology has advanced from where we are now, but only significantly in one area, and that's the area Haldeman explores. Most of the time, this turns into very, very good reading. Haldeman's biggest weakness is that he insists on tying his Vietnam experiences into each and every story. There were maybe two stories in the entire book that didn't mention Vietnam at all--there was almost always a character that makes an offhand mention of having been in Nam. Ignoring that, or just taking each story for itself individually, it's a fine collection, and a good choice for sci-fi fans. (Yes, Nick, this is your book that you lent me about four years ago. Yes, you will be getting it back in the fall.)


Finally, we come to a literary giant, The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck. Heretically, I really didn't like it much. That goes against everything I've heard from people who've read it, and everything I'm supposed to believe as an American reading American literature, but oh well. One of the biggest reasons is Steinbeck's dialog. He insists on so closely attempting to match the Oklahoma dialect that he puts an apostrophe in every time a character drops a consonant in every speech. Hell, any given person might say "you and I" and sort of slide off on the d in "and". Or the f in any given "of". Those are understood speech patterns. But every "and" that shows up in the dialog in that book, without fail, is "an' ".

The other huge problem is that Steinbeck loves to have his characters tell stories, and that's fine. But these characters that he's written are not intelligent enough to be able to respond in a coherent conversation to each other beyond a few lines. So you might get one character express some thought, have another character tell a paragraph long tale about some chicken, and then have the first character, who just listened to the story, express the same thought he did before the story started. That's another irritating thing, the characters repeat themselves incessantly. Not repeating thoughts. Repeating what they just said, word for word.

We also see the book turning from simple expose narrative, showcasing the plight of the migrant worker, to a paean to organized labor and socialism at the end of the book. Showing that conditions were really awful for these people is one thing. If Steinbeck were trying to accomplish a social change by affecting people's attitudes toward poor workers, fine by me. That's a good enough cause. I can support him wanting to elicit a reaction akin to "wow, I never realized it, but people really do starve in America. We as a culture ought to do something about that." And this would have had a tremendous impact.

Where I have to stop supporting Steinbeck is when he finally crosses the line and suggests that the government can provide for the citizens much better than the citizens themselves can. And after that point, he entirely denounces the ability of the individual to combat injustice, and throws that responsibility squarely on the shoulders of the collective. "If we are to get anywhere, we must abandon our individualism, and once we have done that, attempt to get the government to fix our problems for us."

Political leanings aside, I thought it left a lot to be desired as a narrative, too. Constantly, every chapter in fact, we go from following the actual plot, to some generalized account of the same thing the story is about. Steinbeck might spend an entire chapter talking vaguely about someone going to pick cotton, somewhere, and communicate a the point that there's really not enough work to go around. Then, the very next chapter, we see the actual story describe the exact same conditions--except in specifics this time, featuring the characters the reader actually cares about. Steinbeck could have omitted essentially every other chapter and told the same story. Between that and the fact that the characters are seemingly unable to talk to each other for longer than a few lines and insist on saying everything they say at least twice (if not three times), it would almost be a good choice of book for an ADD patient--except for the fact that it lasts nearly 600 pages.

Structurally, the story didn't really have a climax and lacked a cohesive resolution altogether. Towards the end, a girl who'd been pregnant the entire book miscarries her baby. Then at the very end, she breast-feeds some dying man she comes across in a barn. Seriously. We've been following this destitute Oklahoma family for going on six hundred pages, and we've finally reached the point where they literally have no money or job, and now a flood has destroyed most of their possessions. The very last scene is this girl breast-feeding some random dude. Then, fin. Infuriatingly unresolved, as if Steinbeck said "ah, to hell with it. Time to go write Cannery Row." I understand the symbolism behind this; that she represents rebirth in the face of adversity, and the fact that even in desperate times, there is some kernel of compassion in humanity. That doesn't make it an entertaining way to end a book. And anytime you let your narrative suffer for the purpose of making a statement, you reduce the quality of your writing.

One of the foremost standards I learned from my high school AP Literature teacher, Mr. Norton, was "keep it f'real". Jokey slang aside, his point is a valid one. Don't claim to like a book simply because it's attained the label of "classic". And The Grapes of Wrath is just one that I can't bring myself to like.


Coming up: Canterbury Tales, Catch-22, The Stranger by Albert Camus, my second go with Pope Benedict's book, and probably some Palahniuk and Koontz to round it out.


Currently listening: "London Bridges" from This is Ivy League's self-titled album

Life's Better With a Giant Turkey Leg

Among my hit parade of getting other people to cook/buy me food was home-cooked dinner courtesy of my mentor and his wife. (Pretty good pasta, too.) Now, before dinner, the afternoon's festivities were a trip out to the renaissance festival, that staple of elementary school field-trippers and counter-culture high schoolers.

There are lots of things at the renaissance festival that anyone can appreciate. For instance, when the falconer is so good that he can attract a bird of prey just by holding out his arm, and then doesn't get taloned in the process... that's impressive Various acts of juggling and swallowing fire. And of course no real day is complete without watching a joust, whether you happen to be nine or ninety.

Of course, a nine-year-old isn't going to have as developed a sense of subtext, observation, and historical relevance as an older viewer. That's why it took my second visit to a renaissance fair to notice something interesting about it. The fair is, necessarily, presented as an artifice. Nobody rides horses at each other with lances for honor anymore. (Well, perhaps that does exist; enthusiasts seem to exist for every conceivable hobby.) There are belly-dancer shows today, but long gone is the notion that a wealthy patron can go up to the show runner with a couple of silver pieces and take one of the dancers home for the night. In other words, though the performers try and maintain a respectable sense of verisimilitude, all the attendees know what a facade they're getting into.

And despite this, I don't think the experience for the average fairgoer is fundamentally different now as it was for a real fair six hundred years ago. In either time, it's not a common event to see a leatherworker or a blacksmith in action. Of course, the reason why is completely different: in the real renaissance, you were probably too poor to afford transportation to the industrial center where those things were being made, instead merely buying them when the traveling merchant decided to show up. Now, it's uncommon because of globalization and industrialization.

At both fairs, you're likely to see wondrous sights that only a few people in the world can perform. Maybe the methods of sword swallowing are more accessible now than they were, thanks to the internet, but that doesn't immediately imply that more people know how to do them. It's still a spectacle. And the entertainers now are no less eager to make a living than they ever were. Whichever ploy they use to try and gain the audience's favor, whether it be flattery, self-deprecation, or merely impressing us with their talent, they're not about to give a free show.

Two things I do wonder about. First, was the S&M pretext as strong at the fairs hundreds of years ago as it is now? Costumes. Leather as far as the eye can see. And more cats o' nine tails than at the "Johnny Vegas Adult Boutique" down the street from my apartment. That's sure as heck something that a nine year old isn't ever going to notice... hopefully.

Second, did it cost the equivalent in florins to eight dollars to get a turkey leg back then? No matter. I'm sure it was every bit as delicious. And no real man would come to a joust without one.


Currently listening: "Cemeteries of London", Coldplay

This makes the Ark of the Covenant killing Nazis look plausible

Review: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

And boy, that sure is a mouthful. I'll return again to one of my slogans: that I'm not really a movie person, but that I might appear to be one when I go on a movie-reviewing spree. That usually happens thanks to my legitimate movie person friends at two times of the year: the end of the year pre-Oscar season, and the summer blockbuster season. (Count this as the summer blockbuster installment of 2008.) Just to prove how much of a movie person I'm not, let's talk about the Indiana Jones movies. I've only seen the first one once, about five years ago, and I don't really remember what happened in it. I've never even seen the second or third ones. If that's not shirking my duty as a cinema-obsessed American, I don't know what is.

On the bright side, I've been told that if I'm only going to have seen two of the movies, the first and fourth aren't a bad two. And if I pretended to be a little apprehensive about having missed "some critical plot detail" in the second or third ones before I saw the fourth, the Indiana Jones series proves that it's on the other end of the "serial scale" from, say, Lost. I do have at least some modicum of education on the series; enough, for instance, to understand why Dr. Jones has a picture of Sean Connery on his desk.

And if I say that I don't really remember the first movie at all, I at least remember the iconic scene, perhaps one of the defining in American moviemaking, where Indiana shoots the scimitar-wielding Arabic fellow. That, and I remember lightning shooting out from the Arc of the Covenant and killing Nazis. And I remember thinking, up until this point in the movie, it almost seemed plausible. Maybe there really is some hidden Pharaonic staff buried in a tomb that, when placed in the right part of the model of the city, lights up with the rays of the sun, etc. etc. The lightning part was a jump into the idea of "yep, you're going to have some supernatural/paranormal events in this movie." Okay, fine.

The events of the fourth movie idea put that to shame, whether for better or worse. The ending of the movie is so awash in the paranormal that you can't decide whether to be confused or entertained, or merely to start lathering on the Mystery Science Theater. I mean, aliens, all right. The Mayan ruins are actually a spaceship, whatever. But not just a normal spaceship, no, an interdimensional one, that transports matter to other versions of space by sucking them through some hole in the ceiling?

I'm obviously not expecting the most subtly worked, nuanced plot from an action movie, but there's a massive hole in the plot that opens right when Dr. Jones and friends walk into the "bunch of aliens with crystal skeletons" room. So there's this legend that whoever returns the skull to the city gets control over its powers. Cool. Here's the difficulty with that: conquistador guy takes the skull from that chamber in, what, 1500-something? If all it took for the spaceship to get booted up again was for all the parts of all the aliens to be present, shouldn't the chamber already have been sucking stuff into another dimension? And how did that legend get started anyway?

So in terms of "movie that makes you think" you're in the wrong place--unless you want to try and puzzle through that plot hole. As an Indiana Jones movie, I'm not the best person to ask about that, given my relative lack of experience with the rest of the series. But as an action movie, and as an inspiration for adventure stories, it's a lot of fun.

One thing I really don't understand (aside from the entire backstory to the film) is Shia LaBeouf. My dad had seen that this person called Shia LaBeouf was hosting Saturday Night Live, and he asked me if I had any idea who that was. This was before I'd seen the movie, of course. "Nope," I responded. "In fact, I have no idea if that's a male or female." Turns out, of course, it's the guy who plays Jones' sidekick-slash-long lost son, an actor who's shown up in a handful of earlier movies, and someone who's apparently slated to become a huge movie star this year. Good to know.


Currently listening: "Either Way", Wilco

Weezer: A Retrospective

Review: The Red Album

I'm a bad Weezer fan, I admit it. I didn't even know that there was a new Weezer album until I saw some scrappy looking guys on an MTV commercial and thought, "hey, those guys sound sort of like Weezer." Turns out, I was right. They were hyping their third self-titled album in six tries with their oddly named single "Pork and Beans". The first two self-titleds were their greatest successes, spaced roughly seven years apart; why not try it again, seven years later?

My experience with Weezer is an extensive one ranging over that second seven-year period, dating back to when I first figured out what sorts of music I liked. My very first forays into musical taste were Weird Al and baroque. The Weird Al period was fun, and everybody should have one, but I think I sort of outgrew the shtick. And I still like baroque and prefer it to any other classical, but my musical tastes have expanded considerably. Besides, baroque isn't per se a band. Coming into 8th, 9th grade, the first three bands I could consider myself a fan of were Creed, Rammstein, and Weezer. These are entirely different bands—generic rock, bordering on Christian; German "dance-metal"; and geek-rock meets emo—a diversity of taste that I try and still maintain today.

I don’t listen to much Creed anymore, except for when my iPod decides I need to hear "My Sacrifice" or "Faceless Man" on shuffle (the former happened as recently as last week). Then again, with the band's demise a few years ago, it's not like there's terribly much Creed to listen to these days anyway. I still keep up with Rammstein—there's nothing like it if I want some ridiculous driving industrial. Over the years, though, I've found there's less and less keeping me coming back to Rammstein—where I'm usually content with a band doing the same thing over several albums (as long as it stays good), Rammstein has been doing the same thing for so long that they might benefit from a drastic change. Or maybe it's just that I listened to Mutter so many times in the year 2002 that I finally reached some sort of saturation years down the road.

I discovered Weezer in a Newsweek article that was about the band's resurgence in producing the Green Album, the second self-titled (the first was the Blue). The article described what sorts of things the band sang about: the X-Men, playing roleplaying games in their basement, going on vacation, wishing they could drop everything to go surfing, and most importantly what they'd love to, but can't, find in a girl. Clearly, these are all things that a somewhat geeky fifteen year old can relate to. So in 2001 I decided to buy both the Blue and Green albums. (The article also touched on Pinkerton, Weezer's second album, which vanished into obscurity between the Blue and Green. But it didn't have very nice things to say about either the album itself or fan reactions to it, so I decided to pass on that one.)

And they were really, really good. Blue was a bit grittier, a nice helping of angst along with distorted guitar riffs, and it was where Weezer first established its unabashed geek-rock base. Green was peppy, on the verge of pop, and it couldn't help but make you think of nice, warm things like summer and the beach (especially when they started talking about Islands in the Sun). Despite those distinctions, they very much sounded like the products of the same band, so much so that I began to associate the two in my mind into one aggregate idea of "what Weezer sounds like". And over the next several years, I couldn't get enough of it.

A couple years later, 2003 saw the release of Maladroit, a heavier, louder take on the concept established in the first couple CDs. I didn't like it at first. I had that idea of what the band was supposed to sound like, and Maladroit conflicted with it. However, sometime since then, maybe around 2005, that album grew on me. Though I don't hold it in as high esteem as the Blue or Green, I recognize it today as a good CD. I say "maybe 2005" because that's when we got Make Believe, undoubtedly the worst in the discography. Upon figuring out how bad it was, I think I decided to re-evaluate my stance on Maladroit. As for Make Believe, between the strained efforts of the radio-overplayed "Beverly Hills" and the proclamation that "We Are All on Drugs", I started to wonder if Weezer might be too.

Despite their stances on whether Blue or Green was better, or if Pinkerton was any good at all, a huge majority of listeners held the opinion that Make Believe wasn't worth the CD it was burned onto. After a couple-year hiatus, Weezer returned to the strategy that had already paid dividends seven years earlier: return to a colored self-titled album. And so in 2008 we get the Red Album.

A lot has changed for this band since their would-be Buddy Holly days. Sleeve-worn hearts, black-rimmed glasses, and four guys standing around against a monochromatic background have given way to lyrics about being old, weird trucker hats, and… four guys standing around against a monochromatic background. "We're a whole lot different now," the band seems to say, "but hey, we're still just four guys playing some rock music. And you like us for that."

The important question, though, is what sort of rock music? From the onset of the album, it's clear that Weezer isn't out to please anyone. It's obliquely hinted to when the first track is called "Troublemaker". It's thematically obvious when you hear the second, "The Greatest Man That Ever Lived". And it's finally explicitly stated in the third, "Pork and Beans", when Weezer says outright that they're not out to please us.

It's become a rock band cliché to release a "this is an album that we wrote for us" album after they've reached a certain veteran status. In fact, it's become such a cliché that I can't think of any examples of them. But you know what I'm talking about. A band is known for doing one thing, and doing it well. Suddenly, it takes a complete change of course on the latest album. When confronted with criticism from fans or the media, the band casually replies "we just decided to make this a project that we wanted to do, and we hoped our fans would like it too." This raises a question: has the band been doing something it didn't really want to do for all these years?

So whether us fans like it or not—literally—we're stuck with this album that Weezer clearly intended for Weezer. It might work for Weezer, but does it work for a fan or listener? As an album, not really. The songs are disjointed, and there's really no common stylistic theme that unites them all. I'm not asking for "Weezer does concept album" here, merely for "Weezer writes eleven songs that sound good together." They've done that before, several times. One of the oddest parts of the album is when other members of the band besides Rivers Cuomo insist on singing—I'd remind them only that the Beatles fell apart after Ringo started to sing.

Of course, no discussion of the Red Album is complete without more talk about "The Greatest Man Who Ever Lived". This is Weezer's shot at theme and variation, and it's a doozy. It starts with Rivers trying some white boy rap, features several generic-rock sections and a few overly-dramatic snare drum sections, and even includes a contrapuntal vocal thing about halfway through. When writing theme and variation, the most important consideration is "are out variations distinct and interesting enough that you want to listen to all of them?" In this song, the answer isn't always yes. But I at least have to give major points for creativity.

Elsewhere in the album, it seems like Weezer has chosen to do a retrospective of themselves. There's Blue Album grit, Green Album pop, and Maladroit distortion. They pay tribute to some of their favorite rock songs (and presumptive influences) in "Heart Songs", and with that comes an irony I can't help but pounce on. That Newsweek article I read, the one that introduced me to Weezer in the first place, praised the band for "looking like Buddy Holly when everyone else wanted to look like Kurt Cobain" and being okay with that conception of themselves. "Heart Songs" has a prominent section dedicated to none other than 1991's seminal grunge album In Utero. No way Weezer did that on purpose; doubtful that any of the band remembers that statement in the article anyway. I'll again give some credit to Weezer, this time for unabashedly acknowledging their influences, whether they be from seventeen or thirty-seven years ago.

The Red Album has songs that would have felt in place on any of Weezer's previous albums. It has some that are right at home on the Red Album. And it has a few that are simply out of place, no matter where you put them. That's especially true when the album gets way too dark and fatalistic in the last few tracks and starts talking about death. While it's definitely not an instant hit, a la the Blue and Green Albums, it's not an instant failure a la Make Believe either. I can see it growing on me like Maladroit or fading like Pinkerton. And it should be interesting to see how I remember the Red Album next time the occasion comes around to do a Weezer retrospective.


Currently listening: "Canzon A 12", Giovanni Gabrieli

2008: A fine year to go Experimental

Review: Viva la Vida

A few weeks ago, my mom asked me what I thought of Coldplay. Now, my mom is definitely a product of the 60s and 70s, but certainly a product who lived through those decades and has musical taste. At the very least, she completed the greatest musical task set forth to baby boomer parents: impress upon the youth the immense significance of the Beatles. It was through my mom that I first came across the thesis that everything good about any music after 1970 is in some way attributable to the Beatles. It sounds radical, but I'm more or less inclined to agree with it.

So when she asked me what I thought of Coldplay, I was naturally a bit surprised. "How come?" I asked. She had seen the iTunes commercial with the new Coldplay song, and she said she never knew she actually liked that band. "Coldplay's all right," I told her. "Some of their stuff is boring. But there's a lot of music that, given a choice between Coldplay and it, I'm picking Coldplay." Now, at this point, I had not seen the iTunes commercial in question—credit to my mom for picking up something technological and musical before I got there.

Several days later, I saw the iTunes commercial for myself. This is the one featuring the title track from Viva la Vida. Yes, I thought, mom's right, this is good. Perhaps I should check out the new Coldplay CD for myself. I did. If I thought the newest Death Cab CD was going in some strange directions… let's just say I wasn't prepared for Viva la Vida. This is some sort of odd "Coldplay does experimental rock". We're talking pentatonics, mixed meter, innovative orchestration. And the baffling thing is, on almost every level, it works.

I'll go farther than that, in fact. This album has done something remarkable. Something that Parachutes seemed dead-set against, that A Rush of Blood to the Head wanted nothing to do with either, and that X&Y flirted with and almost broke through to in a few spots. This album has made Coldplay interesting. And it's easily my favorite Coldplay CD.

Now, as a disclaimer, this is coming from the guy who liked X&Y, quite a bit. I wouldn't go so far as to call X&Y one of my favorite CDs, but it's definitely something that I listen to on purpose. I've been told from people who know far more than I do about songwriting and popular music appreciation that I'm really not supposed to like it that much. The lyrics are flat, they complain. There's almost no trace of creativity. Yeah, maybe that's true, I admit. But it's good to listen to.

All of this has made me realize something about my personal criteria for good music. Forced to make a choice, I'm going to pick the thing that sounds nice over the thing that has meaningful words behind it almost every time. If you can do both, a la the Shins, then you're (finally) golden (boy). Other bands can do it too, like the Decemberists, Eisley, Rilo Kiley, and Sufjan Stevens; these are artists I would legitimately call my "favorites". There are exceptions, like Neutral Milk Hotel, which has a certain indelible intellectual charm about it despite the fact that Neutral Milk Hotel wouldn't know "in tune" if it hit them in the proverbial jug. But this is precisely why I don't listen to Bright Eyes, Radiohead, and Modest Mouse—regardless of how good the words are, it just doesn't sound very pleasant.

Most of X&Y did. Again, not that Parachutes and A Rush of Blood to the Head didn't. They were just bland in their not-unpleasantness. Maybe they were a plate piled high with white rice. There's nothing wrong with rice, and given the choice between rice and starvation (or the Brussels sprouts of most modern popular music), I'm taking the rice. Maybe X&Y was rice subtly flavored with saffron. It doesn't change the fact that it's still rice, and plenty of people are going to criticize it for trying to pretty itself up and mask its shortcomings.

That makes Viva la Vida gumbo. There's still rice there, and it’s not that you even have to look very hard to find it. But this time there's much more going on: more flavors, more colors, and more to keep you coming back even after you've had a plate. Now, suppose you like your rice plain. Saffron would be a little off-putting, and chicken, sausage, and okra are going to turn you away completely. And suppose you were sort of expecting something drastically different, but you would have preferred a helping of cashew chicken mixed into that rice. Then Viva la Vida might be very disappointing indeed.

The fact remains that, for better or worse, it's different. I think it's good different. And I can see this experimental album being one of those that creates a schism in Coldplay's listener base: some fraction swearing off the band as sellouts and another fraction embracing the experiment. I'm very much in the latter.


Currently listening: "Harry Truman", Chicago

What Matt has been doing in suburban St. Louis

Among other things, getting taken out to dinner by co-workers trying to make a good impression on the Intern. Reading, a bit. Finally getting the internet! (Yesterday marked that momentous occasion.) Watching all sorts of trash on MTV--I'm so up to date on A Shot at Love that it pains me. I've also "acquired" the first two seasons of The Office, which everyone tells me that I'm supposed to love. I'm just scratching the second season now, and yeah, I see where the hype comes from. This is probably the driest comedy that the American market can tolerate, but that's entirely a good thing so far. That also means that it's downright slapstick compared to the British version that inspired the American one, which is also a good thing. Some Britcom is funny, but I get the idea that The Office was probably the driest thing to hit English television in some time. This means most American fans--myself included--are going to be turned off from it. Bottom line: if you're among the perhaps dozen or so people who have told me that I needed to watch this show, good call, and I'll update more as I get further into it.

This week also marked the return of The Mole, which is certainly my favorite reality/competition show of all time, and probably breaks into the top ten or fifteen overall. The premise, in case you're unfamiliar: a group of people is shipped off to an exotic locale and made to do ridiculous things in the name of money. Every time someone wins a challenge, money is added to the pot, and whoever wins the show gets the pot. Now, the catch: one of this group is trying to sabotage the rest of it. This can't be blatant abuse, like knocking down a tower if the challenge is to build a tower; then, people would catch on. It's subtleties, like "oh, goodness, I missed that clue buried in the sand. Oops." It's intelligent in a way that nearly no other reality show comes close to, and it's engaging to the viewer, as you yourself try and figure out who the Mole is.

Also, writing. I'm about to embark on a Super Secret Writing Mission at the request of a friend who shall remain nameless. As a warm-up exercise, I wrote the last half of a short story I'd had in the works for some time called "Ashlanders". I described this to my friend Samantha as "half trivial satirical social commentary and half weird Lost-inspired love story". The premise is based off a story one of my favorite high school teachers once told me about a game he and his college buddies used to play: go to the library on a Friday night, and find the white kid. This is really nowhere as racist as it sounds, I promise. You can read "Ashlanders" here.

Coming up next: reviews of the new Indiana Jones movie, the new Coldplay and Weezer CDs, and a discussion of the renaissance festival.


Currently listening: "Strawberry Swing," Coldplay

Ironically, my last post was number 108

The irony here is that this is yet another Lost-themed post. 108 is of course immediately significant to fans of the series as the sum of the numbers. At this point in the series, a mere two weeks before the season 4 finale, I feel the need once again to summarize some theories I've had about the show's intrigue and mysteries. As usual, I can't take credit for all these theories myself, but I've compiled existing theories and added my opinions.

About the Monster, aka Cerberus:

• The monster, as we know, is named Cerberus, an allusion to the three-headed dog that guarded Hades in Greek myth.


• The monster can, and regularly does, appear as a cloud of black smoke. This is one of Cerberus's "heads".


• The monster has also appeared to Mr. Eko as Yemi. (This was confirmed by the producers.) This suggests that the monster can appear as people. This is the second of Cerberus's "heads".


• In a podcast, the producers referred to both Yemi and Christian Shepherd as "undead".


• But they've also referred to Christian Shepherd as "dead".


• We know for a fact that on Lost, if you die, you're dead. The island can heal you miraculously, but even it can't resurrect.


• So the Christian Shepherd that we've seen is another Yemi-like manifestation of the second of Cerberus's heads


• Maybe this explains some of the mystery behind Richard Alpert, too. If the Richard we see is a manifestation of the monster, then there's no reason that it would ever get any older.

Questions raised and unanswered by this theory:

• We've seen Richard Alpert three separate times, as well as Christian once, off the island. This would suggest that the monster can escape the island, which we have no evidence of it being able to do.


• Can the monster only appear as dead people? As humans? As one thing at a time, or more than that?


• The producers also referred to Kate's horse as "undead"; is the horse another manifestation of Cerberus's second head?


• What is Cerberus's third head?


• Maybe this is what Locke saw when he "looked into the eye of the island" way back in season 1?


• We've seen that Ben has apparent control over at least the "smoke monster" manifestation; can he control either of the others?


• Does the sonic fence stop all three heads or just the smoke monster one?


• Maybe Mikhail's mysterious return at the end of season 3 was a smoke monster manifestation?


• How in the hell did this thing get on the island, and who put it there? Why?

Theories about Widmore and finding the island:

• We know that Widmore is looking for the island. Also, we know that Widmore and Hanso have collaborated in the past through the Widmore Corporation.


• Widmore may have had some connection with the DHARMA Initiative specifically; chances are good he at least had heard of it.


• Additionally, Ben tells us that Widmore wants the island for his own. He is currently looking for it by means of the freighter.


• Widmore has probably looked for the island before.


• The boat race around the world and whatever Widmore did with the Black Rock's ledger were almost certainly his prior attempts to find the island.


• Rousseau's science expedition and Henry Gale's balloon flight could be other efforts by Widmore to find the island in the past.


• According to the producers, Ben and the real Henry Gale "had words". If Ben knew Gale was from Widmore, he would react a lot more hostly toward him.


• And remember, Henry Gale's balloon had a Widmore logo on it.


• Why would Ben be so interested in raising Rousseau's daughter as his own? So he could have some leverage over Widmore.


• The only reason that this expedition, as opposed to any Widmore had sent over the last 25 years, was successful, is that the electromagnetic anomaly surrounding the island and controlled by the hatch is not in play anymore.

Questions raised and unanswered by this theory:

• What exactly does Widmore intend to do with the island?


• What prior history do Ben and Widmore have? And what are these mysterious "rules"? If the theory concerning Rousseau is anywhere close to correct, then the relationship has been hostile for at least sixteen years.

Theories about the freighter and the wreckage:

• There exist two similar, but non-identical and mutually exclusive, sets of orders for various teams on the freighter:


• Keamy's team of mercenaries is to apprehend Ben Linus and kill everyone else.


• Naomi's team is supposed to extract Ben Linus.


• Overwhelmingly, the evidence points to Widmore as sending Keamy's team.


• Matthew Abaddon sent Naomi's team; before the introduction of Keamy's men, it made sense to assume that Widmore was the man behind Abaddon's team also.


• But it doesn't make sense for Widmore to have sent both teams.


• So it appears Abaddon is working for someone else.


• It makes sense that that "someone else" is DHARMA.


• DHARMA knows about the Purge, and wants revenge on Ben Linus for orchestrating it.


• It's "metagaming", but we know that both the Initiative and the freighter people (Faraday, Charlotte, and Miles) are going to be increasingly important in Season 5.


• This explains Charlotte's excitement at finding the DHARMA polar bear in Tunisia.


• Perhaps Faraday, Charlotte, and Miles (possibly Naomi and Lapidus, too) are themselves former DHARMA as well:


• That explains why Abaddon would select a "ghostbuster" and a "headcase" for the mission: they know something about what's going on, if only a little.


• This also explains why all the freighter people are so dismayed to see that the wreckage of 815 had been found: it suggests proximity to the island, and DHARMA sure doesn't want knowledge of the island to be floating around.


• Alternately, Abaddon could be working for Oceanic Airlines:


• This could be off-base, but I seem to remember the guy Lapidus spoke to on the "Oceanic Hotline" as sounding a lot like Abaddon.


• Oceanic would have a lot to gain from being able to manage nicely exactly where the plane went and who survived.


• That's also a motivation for Oceanic to have staged the wreckage in the Sunda trench.


• Tom seems to think that Widmore placed the wreckage in the trench.


• That's plausible, but Widmore doesn't want knowledge of the island to get out any more than DHARMA would.

Questions raised and unanswered by this theory:

• How far is the Sunda trench from the island? The closer it actually is, the less likely Widmore was to have put it there.


• If Abaddon works for Oceanic, why does his team know about and care so much about Ben?


• Regardless of who Abaddon works for, how did he get his team onto the freighter that obviously had different orders?


• How does Abaddon know to speak to Locke about the Walkabout?

I won't bother trying to speculate on the Orchid, because all of that will be revealed in a couple of weeks anyway. Finally, if you want a ridiculously detailed and comprehensive conspiracy theory about time travel on the show, then check out the time loop theory. (I had no part in making this.) A lot of it is very convincing, and it does touch on a variety of the show's mysteries. My only criticism is that it talks a lot about "fate" as a motive force, which seems awfully abstract compared to the rest of the show's very real--if unexplainable--circumstances. And that I really, really hope time travel doesn't play this huge a role in the overall mythology--that would just be a cop-out.


Currently listening: "March" from Second Suite for Military Band, Holst

How Narrow are your Stairs!

Review: Narrow Stairs

"Unquestionably the best thing Death Cab has ever done" from music writers; "I heard it was really bad" from music listeners. One thing's for sure: we're not on Barsuk anymore. This is apparently Death Cab's seventh studio CD, or sixth, depending on what you consider a "studio CD". (I think that's akin to giving an adequate definition for "indie" or "alternative", so we're going to ignore the question for now.) Indie kids were all abuzz over The Photo Album and Transatlanticism--I can never keep these two straight, but they're both good. Then came the dreaded Major Label Debut of Plans, where droves of indie kids started whining, because "Soul Meets Body" was played on mainstream radio airwaves. Talk about an infraction.

They'd of course argue that they weren't complaining about that, they were lamenting the decline in quality associated with Being on a Major Label. Except, you know, there wasn't a real decline in quality. In fact, the album sold a million copies--which, in retrospect, probably didn't help in the eyes of those hardcore indie kids either. No, Plants was not the same record as Transatlanticism, but if it were the same, there would be complaints about that too.

Oh, to hear the indie kid reaction now.

If Plans isn't the same record as the previous ones were, then Narrow Stairs isn't in the same dimension. I've talked already about the album's influences and what about it made me sort of scared. I remarked specifically about the CD sounding like 1960s wind band music, and thankfully it does not. It does, however, sound like whatever-decade prog-rock, a direction that I was not at all expecting the album to go in. It's not per se bad, except when the songs get too absorbed in their own progginess to seem like Death Cab anymore.

"Gee, Mr. Gibbard! Is that a B3 rock organ I hear on 'You Can Do Better Than Me'?"
"Yes, it is, clever listener! Did you hear it anywhere else?"
"Now that you mention it, at the end of 'Grapevine Fires'! And I thought it really interesting how you included not real strings, but synthesized strings in 'Your New Twin-Sized Bed'."
"Right, that gave it a completely unique sound. But can you guess what my favorite random instrument to throw in was?"
"Easy! The tabla on 'Pity and Fear', of course."

All of the positive reviews I've already read have said things like Death Cab has traded in their brightness for something dark and brooding, a process which we saw beginning on Plans and that's continued into Narrow Stairs. And they say this as if it made the CD significantly better. If dark and pessimistic is your cup of tea, then you'll get along with this album splendidly. See "No Sunlight" as an immediate example of this mood.

For those of us that like a little more sunshine in our music, "Long Division" sounds happy enough, and ironically "No Sunlight" does too. I agree with just about every other reviewer out there in that "Cath..." is the best song on the album, no matter what mood you expect to get out of Death Cab. And "The Ice is Getting Thinner" is probably the weakest track in both energy and storytelling--shouldn't the otherwise lyrically adept Death Cab be able to come up with some better metaphor than thin ice?

On a whole, don't let terms like "sludgy" and "dissonant" and "lunar" scare you. Narrow Stairs doesn't turn into any of the horror that it conceivably could. While it's not as good as Plans or Transatlanticism, at no point did I ever ask aloud, "Death Cab, what in the hell are you doing?" Maybe a few "?" thought to myself, but that's going to arise anytime something takes a new direction, regardless of if that direction turns out be good or bad. Here, it turns out to be mostly decent, with a few missteps. Not "the best thing they've ever done" by a long shot, but after the disappointment I'd been bracing myself for since February, something of a pleasant surprise.


Currently listening: "We Are What You Say," Sufjan Stevens