The Terror

I'm listening to "The Terror," and I'm trying to make sense of The Flaming Lips. I am four tracks in. The music is very electronic / synthesized, but with bursts of distorted electric guitar or drums. Wayne's vocals are often doubled-up and artifically reverbed with a distant-echo sort of floating-in-space ambience. The song structures are repetitive and enlongated; the melodies play out like dramatically slow tin pan alley ballads (but more simple, harmonically).The overall sound is ambient, with little of the dynamic punches or contrasts found in pop music -- or, even, found in much of The Flaming Lips' earlier albums. I note that The Lips have drifted this way, from organic instruments and pop style into electronic instruments and, uh, dirge-style. This evolution tells a story of the descent into technology during The Lips' years of work. The lyrics on "The Terror" seem hopeless. "Try To Explain" is about a failed relationship. "You Lust" is about the destructive lust for success, but also about how each person possesses that lust. I remember now "Sun Blows Up Today," the teaser single for the album. Its tone was much more celebratory than any of these songs so far, and its dynamics much poppier. I almost suspect that The Lips' released that single as the bait of a bait-n-switch: an attempt to lure an audience that might not suspect the album would not gratify in the same way. If so, that's a brilliant artistic "promotional" move.

Blue Flames

I watched Blue Flames. I want to investigate it online. Apparently,
this was an anime pilot for a series which never happened. That may
explain some things about the show. Kaizu is such an empty character.
He seems motivated primarily by the thrill of dicking people over,
followed closely by sex, and also somewhat by money. The blue-tinted
sex scenes suggest some metaphysical action going on, but just what
exactly isn't clear. (More likely, the blue tint is just for
atmosphere; or to reinforce the show's title, whatever that's supposed
to mean.) The show's structure also disoriented me a little. It moved
in short episodes that weren't substantially related: we meet Kaizu,
he fucks his sugar-mommy (hostess?) for money and pays off two
bullies; Kaizu meets the rich girl, fucks her, blackmails her father,
beats up her boyfriend and ruins his (the boyfriend's) chances at
college; Kaizu leaves his family for Tokyo, meets the college tennis
captain, fucks the captain's girlfriend, learns tennis, works at a
disco and gets laid often, gets into a fight with his sugar-mommy and
fucks her for a new car, then beats the tennis captain at tennis,
drives off with another rich girl and fucks her. The show discards
characters so quickly. If it were extended into a series, I suppose
each episode could reveal more about certain characters: Kaizu, his
sugar-mommy, his family (maybe). But most characters serve a single
purpose in the narrative and then disappear; and Kaizu severs his ties
with them so completely as to make their return implausible. Although,
many of these characters might search out Kaizu for revenge. The music
also plays up the show's immorality. So much of the music sounds like
blandly cheerul 80's synth-pop. Some of it is mock-romantic,
sentimental, cutesy. Anyway, the show doesn't work on its own: it's
incomplete: it starts and ends without proper introduction or
conclusion; but this all works to make it seem more disorienting, more
immoral, more unruly. It reminds me of our idea to write "the most
immoral movie ever," which wouldn't simply depict immoral behavior but
actually had to upend narrative conventions to become totally immoral.

Recording "Soundscapes"

I've been listening to music in the evenings. I've been listening closely to how the recording sounds, trying to imagine how it might've been recorded and where, and trying to hear the aural soundscape of the recording.

With an album like Nirvana's In Utero, I have some idea where the sounds were recorded: Steve Albini's studio. So I might theoretically picture the recording being done in a large basement area. I guess I get a similar soundscape from the sound: it sounds as if everything (but drums) are being amplified (i.e., recorded by mic'ing the amp), including voice. The bass hits you from the left; the guitar from the right; the singer from the middle, just like a stage set-up... And it sounds as if this is happening in a basement, and your ears are next to the speakers, and the sounds are ricocheting off cement walls.

So, In Utero creates a reasonable, sane soundscape. It emulates a grungy basement rock show. ((Which of course is what Kurt wanted after the pop success of Nevermind.))

I also listened to some of my songs. I could hear the difference in recordings, there, too. (But only in "live" recordings, not four-track ones, because those were recorded differently.) My Corvallis songs sound as if I'm hunched by the microphone, singing pretty loudly, and I'm in a smallish room; because the reverb is slight and quick in the recording. But I can hear much more space in the live songs I recorded at The Finger Complex: the sounds come from further away, as do the echos; and the sounds tend to blend more in harmonic sympathy.

Anyway, these are all reasonable, sane soundscapes, too.

But I've just been listening to Odelay! It does NOT have a reasonable, sane soundscape. It's not like heavily processed music, which just suggest abstract spaces. It juxtaposes spaces: as in, you're listening to the drums playing in the corner of the room ... and then another drummer suddenly plays a snare beside your head; or, the vocals sound as if Beck and his clone were singing together in a shower, it sounds like someone is playing accordion in the other room, and there's a jazz band playing outside the window. It's just a totally unreasonable, insane soundscape!

Then I remembered that Odelay uses many samples. It's possible that they recorded a drum track in an arena, another drum track in a portapotty, and another drum track on an 808, then edited them all together. It's more likely that one or more of these aspects of the soundscape comes from a sample. So, say, the arena drum track was stolen from a live Ozzy Osbourne recording, right? Now not only is the soundscape unreasonable, but the "historic" sense of the recording becomes incoherent. You're hearing Ozzy's drummer in 1974 London (or whatever) and Beck is sitting beside you holding a drum machine to your ear.

Scott Walker Mix

1. Pilgrim........................BB

2. Fat Mama Kick........................NF

3. Bolivia '95........................TILT

4. It's Raining Today........................3

5. Long About Now........................5

6. The Seventh Seal........................4

7. Time Operator........................5

8. Part 2........................AND

9. Angels Of Ashes........................4

10. Patriot (A Single)........................TILT

11. The Bridge........................2

12. Plastic Palace People........................2

13. Corps De Blah........................BB

14. Track 6........................COF

15. Such A Small Love........................1

16. Winter Night........................3

1 = Scott, 1967

2 = Scott 2, 1968

3 = Scott 3, 1969

4 = Scott 4, 1969

5 = 'Til The Band Comes In, 1970

NF = Nite Flights (by The Walker Brothers), 1977

COF = Climate Of Hunter, 1984

TILT = Tilt, 1995

AND = And Who Shall Go to the Ball? And What Shall Go to the Ball?, 2007

BB = Bish Bosch, 2012

The songs on this CD were selected and sequenced for you [my brother]. Because you own The Drift, I included no songs from it. (Although, I selected "Clara," "Hand Me Ups," and "A Lover Loves" before deciding not to use any material from The Drift.) I have tried to emphasize Scott's mature compositional style, often through songs from his earlier creative period; I've also tried to emphasize Scott's accessibility, often through the less fatiguing songs from his mature period.

I set the scene, so to speak, with "Pilgrim" from Bish Bosch. Here is a short song, lyrically violent, musically minimal, repetitive as hell. Like much of Scott's mature work, this song is easily divisible into contrasting dramatic sections. You can hardly get lost in a song this short, but in Scott's longer compositions, it's easy to feel lost. That's when it's easy to stop listening. So take a hint here: even when a song seems unstructured, you can find the underlying structure and not get lost. "Bolivia '95" is one of these longer, more complex songs; but it is not too obtuse, it's fairly musical, and it has a hook (of sorts), "Lemon bloody cola, lemon bloody cola."

Starting with "It's Raining Today," you'll hear songs from Scott's earlier creative period. I included songs that hint at the semi-musical sound textures Scott uses in his mature work. (Listen, e.g., to the strings that open "It's Raining Today" and the chattering, layered saxes that close "Track 6.") I also included songs with strongly contrasting sections, sections that sometimes contrast so strongly you may suspect a new song has begun. (Hear, e.g., the disparirty between sections in "Plastic Palace People.") These ideas dominate his mature songs.

Some earlier songs here showcase Scott's pop and melodic sensibilities. I chose "The Bridge" because its dramatic structure is typical of popular songs: rather than sharply contrasting sections, it builds a musical emotion to a peak, then falls back from it gracefully. ("Winter Night" and "Long About Now" work similarly.) The lyrics of "The Bridge" are also characteristic of Scott's earlier work: they describe an earthly scene in near-hallucinogenic detail and metaphor: "At night, the people's faces danced like pearls colliding on the breasts of fat Marie whose thunder laugh was just a thread from crying." Scott's sense of melody isn't totally absent in his mature work, but it shows up almost exclusively in fragments and rarely builds as it does in these songs.

I made a couple odd song choices. "Part 2" comes from Scott's musical score for a dance performance. Nonetheless, it works alone as a musical piece, and it showcases Scott's use of contrasts and textures in a somewhat sprightlier, more musical setting than his album material. And I included "Time Operator" (co-written by Scott's then-manager, Ady Semel) as an example, perhaps, of Scott being untrue to himself. But I wouldn't say it's a bad song.

I know nothing of Scott's work with The Walker Brothers (outside the four songs Scott wrote for Nite Flights), and I know nothing of Scott's solo albums between 1970 and 1984; although I know he wrote no songs on those albums. Anyhow, I included no songs from these periods of Scott's career.

I'll leave all exegesis of Scott's lyrics to you, as I've done none of that myself. (But that time is approaching for me.)