I’m in love with only you

The new issue of Spin arrived in the mail yesterday. It’s nothing I’d ever pay money for, but my wife got a cheapo subscription deal for the magazine, and it’s a handy way to keep my finger on the pulse (or is that "dissect the corpse?") of the current pop music scene. There were a couple of things that caught my eye amidst the nonsense of the ridiculous scene guide (complete with an assortment of photos presumably yanked from either random MySpace pages or Girls Gone Wild vids) and a fashion feature chock full of skuzzy looking hipster models dressed in earth tone corduroy (Rock and roll!).

The eyewitness history of the ’82 and ’83 Us Festivals was interesting, but full of weird transitions between segments. Was following up Andy Gill’s recollection of the Gang of Four’s set with Marky Ramone’s assertion that The Ramones were the only “hardcore punk” band at the ’82 festival an intentional decision? (It’s funny how The Ramones used to distance themselves from the “punk” label until punk became “cool,” meaning “commercial,” in the 1990’s. It strikes me as a case where you stop spinning your wheels and change your address to the rut you’ve dug.) The Clash got mentioned a few times – the 1983 festival was the last time Mick Jones played with the band – but dismissively, due to their unhappiness over the bloated “rawk” atmosphere. Yes, The Clash were a mass of contradictions in thought and deed, but I didn’t need Steve Wozniak or David Lee Roth to tell me that.

After that informative and depressing musical history lesson, I flipped ahead to the only part of the reviews section I bother to read, the roundup of recent noteworthy reissues. Most of them I’m already aware of, but there’s always a chance that something noteworthy has slipped passed my radar. Second on this month’s list was the Stax Records 50th Anniversary Celebration, which would have been a must buy if didn’t already own the Stax/Volt singles and Atlantic R&B box sets. The Spin folks liked it, as well they should (though I take nothing for granted where modern music criticism is concerned), but the last sentence made something hard and bitter catch in my throat:

It’s what Amy Winehouse eats for breakfast.

Hey, I’m all for getting “the kidz” into what I consider to be some of the finest popular music ever recorded, but that…that’s just plain wrong. It’s an “Amazon.com recommends” level of wrong. (If you like Clive Barker’s Books of Blood, you’ll love Maeve Binchy’s Tara Road!) Jon from Underneathica has already discussed the vortex of contradictory comparisons that surround Ms. Winehouse and her music, which I partially attribute to critics unfamiliar with jazz and/or soul making facile connections that most of their readers will never pick up on in any case. How do you reduce decades of output from a diverse stable of artists to a simple single "sound"? And why does music that has stood the test of time have to be presented in terms of the industry’s current darling of the moment?

It’s a common enough practice, but still irksome. When Interpol and The Killers were being lauded as the next big things, one couldn’t swing a dead optical mouse without landing on a reference to Joy Division specifically or postpunk in general, despite the fact that neither band really had a sound that fit the tags. Strong bass lines, mopey lyrics, and black dress shirts do not automatically equal “postpunk,” not to mention the fact that postpunk wasn’t so much a genre as an aesthetic notion of pushing punk’s “anything goes” ethos to the limits. To quote Jon’s excellent piece, “…is [it] the equal of the classic recordings that it tries to evoke? If not, why listen to it when the originals are readily available?”

I freely admit that my love of soul music came from a secondary source, in this case the Blues Brothers, but the Blues Brothers did not musically aspire to be anything more than two white comedians paying homage to a style of music they loved. (Well, that Ackroyd loved. Belushi was apparently a huge fan of Fear.) Plus, they were backed by a roster of veteran soul musicians who had been part of the original scene. The critics were decidedly unimpressed by the results, but they were an unparalleled gateway band by which to develop an appreciation for the sound before graduating to the real deal.

Otis Redding – I Can’t Turn You Loose (from The Very Best of Otis Redding, 1992)

Wilson Pickett – Everybody Needs Somebody to Love (from Wilson Pickett’s Greatest Hits, 1987)

My wife still says she prefers the Blues Brothers’ version of the two songs. She also prefers the glossy Motown sound to the pressure cooker beats, yelps, and moans of Memphis soul, so her opinion doesn’t count.

I went with “best of” compilations for the purchase links to keep things simple (and affordable) for the budding enthusiast. If you have the cash and inclination to dive in head first, the complete Stax/Volt singles collection and the Atlantic Rhythm & Blues box set both make for some exceptional listening.