Five Song Friday: Analog Can Suck It

This Week: Bank Robbers, Special Guest Stars and Killer Bees

Aug 26, 2022

I love digital music so much I want to marry it.

Yes sir, give me a streaming service with a billion songs and a decent set of headphones and I’m good to go. Pleased as a plump little piggy in paradise.

What’s not to love about wandering around inside the world’s largest jukebox with an infinite supply of quarters? I used to have to beg money from my parents to hear one measly spin of “Whip It” or “I Love Rock and Roll” at the Pizza Inn. Now I can listen to whatever, wherever and whenever I want.

It’s a beautiful time to be alive and I’m not going to apologize for embracing technology and holding that embrace for an uncomfortably long time.

As far as I’m concerned, analog media had its run.

Records, 8-tracks, cassettes and compact discs fought the good fight and got us to where we are today. I thank you all for your service.

But it’s time to leave.

Your time was in the past. You don’t just get to come back and act like you never left.

You died. We buried you. We had a funeral. There was cake.

But somebody decided to dig you guys up and put you on a pedestal. They call themselves “purists” and “audiophiles.”

I call it a cult.

I was always a bit skeptical of the vinyl revival.

I’m literally NOT buying it for two main reasons. One, because new records are stupid expensive. And two, because I’ve always felt that turntables were the least convenient way to listen to music ever invented.

(A close second was the abysmal Sony Discman, which skipped if you bumped it, breathed funny or blinked with excessive force.)

Some might say, “But what about the physical joy of sitting down with a record?”

They say, “You can’t beat the feeling of pulling the vinyl out of the sleeve and getting lost in the liner notes. Carefully guiding the album until the shiny metal nub pokes through the tiny hole. Placing the needle in the groove and feeling the excitement and anticipation of those first crackles and pops. Flipping it over to side two. It’s a full sensory experience. There’s nothing better.”

Sounds like a lot of work.

I can think of something better: clicking a button and having things appear as if by magic.

What exactly happens AFTER this elaborate unpacking ritual? I’m supposed to sit quietly, crosslegged on a pillow with headphones through the entire record? No thanks. I can’t wait around, holding my breath while this thing just spins and spins and spins. I’ve got shit to do.

Look, I’m not trying to start a fight.

I know that this will rub some people the wrong way.

But you have to understand that me and analog used to be tight.

Not long ago I had 20,000 records stashed in a building in my backyard. In the nineties, my vast and varied CD collection was a point of pride whenever company came over. And after punks burgled my house in the eighties and stole half of my beloved cassette tapes, my heart was broken.

I have nothing but respect for OG media.

But the world has changed.

Records and tapes are not holy objects. They are awkward and flawed delivery devices for audio tracks that have been replaced by something that cannot scratch, warp, crack, snap or get eaten by the stereo in your 1981 Honda Civic.

Digital music is basically indestructible.

Yes, it is possible to download a file from Limewire that was supposed to be the full Jane’s Addiction back catalog but is actually malware that gives your PC some kind of internet STD. But that happens maybe two, three times at most.

I know one of you is thinking, “Yes but vinyl has a warmth and a fullness that gets lost when music gets reduced to a cold, hard sequence of ones and zeroes.”

Okay. If you say so. I’m not going to debate you on the hard science of sound, because my head hurts when I try to understand how vinyl records work.

I’m not an audio engineer or an otolaryngologist, but the whole “organic sound” argument smacks of cultural snobbery.

The more I hear it, the more it reminds me of people who sip and sniff and gargle for ten minutes before deciding on a glass of wine. Or people who silently judge you for buying fruit with stickers. Or people who are like, “Sir, we can’t make you a Salted Caramel Cream Cold Brew because this is a bank.”

If you love records and tapes and all that junk, I’m not trying to change your mind.

Ultimately, records are just stuff.

Maybe part of me is just cranky because the world is already so crowded and cluttered with stuff. Do we need more of it? Do we need to fill shelves and rooms with cardboard and vinyl that will only grow old and collect dust?

Probably not.

Especially not when we can take what’s on that stuff and put those songs in the cloud, where they can live for all eternity and never take up an ounce of physical space.

I think we owe it to future generations to clear out the junk drawers and attics of history to make space for everything that’s coming next.

But this doesn’t apply to books.

I’ll give you my books when you can pry them from my cold, dead hands.

Thanks for reading!

Sincerely,

DJ CrankyPete

Five Song Friday 027

“Blue Song” - Mint Royale

Here’s a golden oldie from way back in 2002. You remember 20 years ago, right? My Big Fat Greek Wedding was all the rage; three members of the cast of Stranger Things said hello to life outside the womb (Sadie Sink, Gaten Matarazzo and Finn Wolfhard) and filmmaker Edgar Wright was directing music videos.

He did one for this song by Mint Royale, using an idea for a film that he’d later make called Baby Driver. The video stars Noel Fielding and Julian Barratt from The Mighty Boosh and Nick Frost (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz) as bank robbers who hit the Bank Royale. Fielding is the getaway driver who gets his groove on while waiting for his heist mates to finish heisting.

I know that I’ve disparaged music videos in the past, but I make an exception for the guy who writes lines for Nick Frost like, “Is it true that there is a place in a man's head that, if you shoot it, it will blow up?”

“Three Girl Rhumba” - Wire

When the English band Wire released their debut album, Pink Flag in November 1977, there was nothing like it. The collection of 21 tunes was all raw energy, attitude and original weirdness. One could argue that there STILL is nothing like it.

But I’m not going to be that guy. Why? Because I’m not a black belt in late seventies British punk. At best, I’m a white belt. An amateur who still takes classes on Sunday afternoons with little kids and the elderly. I will make no grand statements as to where Wire stands in the canon of Western music.

But what I will say is that I can hear the seeds of about a dozen other indie songs inside this tight and tangy minute and 24 seconds.

I’m looking at you Elastica and Blur… I know what you did.

”Getting Away with Your Gal” - The Echocentrics featuring Bill Callahan

The Echocentrics has been described as the “brainchild” of Austin-based musician and producer Adrian Quesada.

“Brainchild” is a weird word, right? Like Quesada walked around for 9 months with a big lump on his head.

“What’s that? Oh that’s my brainchild. Thanks for asking. Sure, yes, you can touch it. I’m not sure if it’s a boy or a girl, but I know for sure that I want it to be a solo project with a rotating roster of musical guest stars.”

“Getting Away with Your Gal” is from the 2016 LP Echo Hotel and features singer-songwriter Bill Callahan (formerly of Smog). The album also features guest appearances from James Petralli (White Denim), Alex Maas (The Black Angels), and Natalia Clavier (Thievery Corporation).

Sadly the list of celebrity guest stars did NOT include Telly Savalas, Harvey Korman or Cathy Lee Crosby. Hey Quesada, check this out if you need some suggestions for next album.

“Catch Yer Own Train” - The Silver Seas

The Silver Seas used to be called the Bees. But there was already a band in the UK called the Bees. And the British Bees forced the American Bees to tag the end of their name with “U.S.” in parentheses.

But that was awkward and not very rock and roll (parentheses are lame).

Now, the American Bees were understandably miffed since the British Bees were already being marketed as “A Band of Bees” in the states. So the American Bees were thinking, what gives? Why can’t we all just get along, right?

But the British Bees weren’t budging. One of them even came all the way over to America and threatened the band with physical violence!

He ambushed the band in the studio. Dressed as bumblebee (naturally), he cornered them and yelled, “If you don’t change your bloody name, I will bloody shoot you all with this bloody gun!”

Thankfully the pop-rock band from Nashville, Tennessee kept their cool. They knew a gun when they saw one and it was clear that this mentally unstable English person was holding them hostage with a hot dog.

A struggle ensued and the hot dog slipped out of the bun and onto the floor. The man in the bumblebee suit looked down at the hot dog, then up at the band and then back to the hot dog before sprinting for the exit.

The band took off after him, just as the Benny Hill music started. They chased him for almost 15 minutes at 3x normal speed through the city and the countryside and (for some reason) a Renaissance Faire.

It was so hilarious, you should have seen it!*

*This did not happen.

“Lucky Today” - Cloud Cult

Cloud Cult is an experimental indie rock band from St. Cloud, Minnesota.

Singer-songwriter Craig Minowa once said that the band name “refers to some early Native American prophecies that talk about a future where humans let technology grow faster than spirituality. It’s basically a call for balance.”

It’s a good thing those Native Americans didn’t know what they were talking about. Technology overtaking spirituality? As if.

My extensive research also brought to light that the band was featured in an animated Esurance commercial back in 2008. The band is shown playing “Lucky Today” while floating in the clouds and battling some sort of oil drilling super-criminal.

Fun Fact: This commercial inspired James Cameron and provided the basic plot for the next seven Avatar movies.

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Special Bonus Song!

Social Media find of the week… ripped from the headlines!

A big slide in Detroit turned out to be too fast for comfort and caused a bunch of banged-up spines, bruised bottoms and concussed craniums. So a Detroit rapper made a song about it and this guy from Twitter added footage of the flailing riders. UPDATE: The slide has been “slowed down” and is set to reopen today.