"You Don’t Want To Hear The Story Of My Life..."

Time for another What I've Been Listening To post. If I did one a week from now until Easter I might just have a chance of catching up with myself. Am I going to do that? Probably not but it's an idea.

The question is, do I go on digging into what I guess I should start calling the backlog or do I try to keep it in the moment and move forward? I've bookmarked about thirty more tunes since last week so it's not like I'm going to need to go back to the old ones. But there are so many good ones there I haven't used yet!

Oh, the choices we have to make. Better start making some, I guess.

Okay, here's a gimme. If there was a new Lana del Rey song you know I'd have to lead with that. Well, there isn't but there's the next best thing and here it is.

T&A - Blondshell

Sabrina Teitelbaum, aka Blondshell, is now undoubtedly my favorite contemporary artist after Lana. I love everything about her music, from her voice, which sounds like sunlight wearing away sandstone, to the squalls of barely-controlled anger in the guitars, but I particularly, especially love her songwriting, which is just genius. Her ability to evoke specific emotion through both sentence structure and word choice is all but unparalleled. I struggle to think of anyone who can do more with less.

This is from her just-announced second album, If You Asked For A Picture, due out in early May, which is far too long to wait. It's pre-orderable through multiple outlets and the only reason I haven't is because I want a hard copy. I will be pre-ordering the moment the CD comes up on Amazon. It's already on my wishlist.

The problem with opening your career with a near-flawless, critically acclaimed debut is that you have to follow it. Not many can. I'm betting on Sabrina all the same.

This Body - BAUM

Then again, last year's Blondshell album wasn't the beginning of Sabrina Teitelbaum's career. Before she reinvented herself as an alt-rock, post-grunge cult figure, she went out for a while as a would-be alt-pop princess. She released half a dozen singles between 2017 and 2019 under the name BAUM, the most successful of which was probably the excellently-named if radio-unfriendly Fuckboy.

The BAUM material is a revelation, especially the wonderful live set she did for SOFAR. I love the way she sings as Blondshell but I'd made the incorrect assumption that it was a style chosen as much from necessity as aesthetics. Many - quite possibly most - of my favorite singers don't have the greatest range or the most complete control and they're all the better for it. I thought Sabrina was from that school of making the very best of what you have but now I understand she's making a conscious, considered and skillful choice to sing these songs the way they need to be sung.

It's absolutely the right direction for her and for us but I have to say I love what she did as BAUM, too.

American Girls - MGNA Crrrta

Was it all getting a little too earnest and tasteul for you there? Never mind. We'll soon put a stop to that.

MGNA Crrrta are indeed American girls so why they chose to call themselves after a thirteenth century icon of English history is anyone's guess. I happened upon them when they were mentioned in dispatches as I was going through The Hellp's back catalog. Another footnote in the indie sleaze revival, maybe? You need a scorecard to keep track of this stuff.

Yameii - Baby My Phone

At least the MGNA Crrrta girls are real. I'm not at all sure about Yameii. Fifteen million people have watched this on YouTube so far, though, so I don't know if it even matters any more. 

"Where has the time gone?" indeed...

Tetoris - Kasane Teto

I'll see your 15m views and raise you 22m. 

Makes me think of that Russian dance where they're sort of down on their heels and kicking their legs out. What's that called again? Ah yes! That's the one! My mother took me to see a Russian ballet troupe in the 1960s and they did a lot of that. Also there were two bears that wrestled and it turned out the bears were one man in a bear suit. Or something. It was a long time ago...

Kimi to Motorbike - PUFFY

Look, I don't know what to tell you. The feature's called What I've Been Listening To Lately and this really is an accurate reflection of that. Obviously I've been in a bit of an odd frame of mind. Not that there's anything wrong with a bit of PUFFY now and again. 

It's going to get a lot worse before it gets better, I'm warning you now.

Boku No Migite - PARANMAUM (or possibly PARAN MAUM)

I could have saved this for the next covers post, seeing as it is one, but there doesn't seem to be much point highlighting covers of songs no-one is likely to have heard by bands no-one is likely to have heard of. The original is by The Blue Hearts and the video is from cult Japanese movie Linda Linda Linda.

There really needs to be a U.S. remake of Linda Linda Linda starring the Linda Lindas. 

That would be a much funnier line if the Linda Lindas weren't, in fact, named after the movie Linda Linda Linda. Which they are.

I wonder why they didn't call themselves the Linda Linda Lindas?

I'm Gonna Smash Your Face In - Laurice

Is anyone still there? You deserve some kind of award. As David Byrne always says "You may ask yourself, "Well, how did I get here?"

Good question. There was something on Stereogum or maybe it was Pitchfork (No, it was Stereogum.) about an indie band with a new song out, and I clicked on it because it sounded mildly interesting. It was quite nice (It was Sharp Pins doing "I Can't Stop") but I wouldn't have bookmarked it except for some of the names they dropped in the brief notes they gave about how they came to write it.

One of those names was Cleaners From Venus, national treasure Martin Newell's best-known vehicle from the 1980s but the others, Laurice and Peter Jeffries, were new to me. So I looked them up.

Laurice has his own website on which he's described as "Formerly Canada's Number One male dance vocalist " but in the 1970s he was also "a session singer, songwriter and producer in London", although whether that was London, England or London, Ontario isn't made clear.

Sometime around then, he recorded the ditty above as the B-Side of When Christine Comes Around, a single he put out under the deeply appropriate name Grudge. Laurice's current record company describes it as "an underground punk rock classic" but I notice that it turns up on a lot of Outsider Music playlists. 

You've heard it. Decide for yourself.

Immigration Song - This Kind Of Punishment

Since we've had Laurice, I guess we'd better have Peter Jeffries too, here in his role as lead vocalist for This Kind of Punishment. As the person who posted it on YouTube says "...their style may take a little getting used to". 

I probably ought to stress here that I don't much like this one. I just felt it needed to be here.

At least it's short.

Indian Weed - Rasputina

You might be worried Rasputina is going to turn out to be another weirdo but no. She's a perfectly normal cellist who just prefers to wear a ballgown and take her carpet with her when she plays with her friends in the woods. 

Every second mention of her I've seen likes to remind us she was in Nirvana's touring band on their final outing but that was a long, long time ago and she's done plenty since then. I have tunes from her shortlisted both for my Songs About Drugs post and my next Covers post so you may as well get used to her now.

Yellow Cat(Slash)Red Cat - Say Anything

Winding down time. Absent a banging finish, I'm going for the big emotional ending and what better for that than some mid-west emo? To be strictly accurate, most descriptions call Say Anything pop-punk but if it fights like a cat...

Also, any song that has a verse that begins "I watch my neighbor's son/Play with his shotgun in the street" has pretty much labeled itself right there.

The Summer Ends - Blondshell (American Football cover)

And here we are, right back where we began. What a wild ride it's been, eh? Or maybe not.

Whatever, this is just gorgeous. I'm getting to be very fond of American Football and I can't think of anyone I'd rather hear cover them than Blondshell.

Nearly all of those were songs I did actually listen to in the last week so maybe that's it for the backlog. 

Probably for the best.