New Monday #39
Happy Monday!
We hope you’re enjoying the Pumpkin Spice Latte we just released. For those unfamiliar, it’s an analogy sounding channel strip, for want of a better word, that has a vintage tube console vibe along with lo-fi snap, crackle and pop pretensions. You can get a lot of sounds out of it and it’s only fifteen bucks, give or take a penny.
Everyone is into the vintage vibe when it comes to sound: old mics, old consoles, old guitar amps, old snare drums, compressors. Vintage vintage vintage. We also tend to like vintage music, or at the very least, the music we most identify with at a particular time in our lives. When we were young.
What we don’t seem to be as into is old people. Specifically old musicians. Specifically old musicians making new music. Or maybe it’s just an issue I have. Maybe. But I’ve not detected a lot of clamor for a new Mötley Cruë (Good lord—there are two umlauts in that) album.
I spent the last week listening to new records by some old guys, partially out of curiosity for what they’re up to, these guys I grew up with (and now old with), and partially for the learning aspects.
Music, the arts in general, is something from which one can learn. This seems to be a staple feature of culture at any time in history. As a kid, I learned rebellion and defiance, risk-taking and experimentation, love and loss... I learned a lot from records. It’s the same today, music is still culturally informative, but for old me, I’m looking for music from other old guys. Older than me. But not old stuff. I don’t want to recycle 1973 - 1998. I already know how to Fight the Power and that I’m Unlovable. Now I’m curious about how to grow old and still be cool.
The Cure
'Songs of a Lost World' dropped November 1st. It’s selling really well, considering it's about death and loss, delivered with The Cure’s patented gloom and doom keyboard patches and flinkie guitar parts. Critics seem to love it. I dunno. I’ve always thought The Cure worked best on quirky pop tunes that seemed to hint at something darker rather than extended noise jams with Robert Smith yelping on about something. What’s more interesting: Robert Smith buying escarole in the produce aisle at the local supermarket or Robert Smith in a black draped goth temple, lounging on a black couch? I prefer the juxtaposition in the supermarket.
However, what is cool, and generous, is that they released a three-hour concert on YouTube that’s beautifully shot and recorded. They play the entirety of the new album, along with a smattering of the hits. The new stuff, though, can’t compete with oldies like Close To Me, and they end the show with Boys Don’t Cry, something I already learned...
The The
The The, the nom de plume of singer/songwriter multi-instrumentalist Matt Johnson, released their (His? Their? How very modern—pronoun trouble!) first studio album in 25 years back in September. This is some smart smart music.
The The has always been smart, and confounding expectations, musically zigging when you might think it should zag. Their big song, This Is the Day, was one of the more interesting hits of the early 80s, with its Trio-esque drums, farty bass and accordion. The link is to a lame video that Matt Johnson hated when it was released. It’s easy to see why, between the totally cheesy video comping and his haircut.
'Ensoulment' is very smart—how could an album with a song on it titled Linoleum Smooth To The Stockinged Foot be anything but? Didn’t get enough politics over the past, oh, eight damn years? Try Kissing the Ring of Potus. My personal fave is a thudding lump of song called Zen & The Art Of Dating. It’s not a pretty picture and it makes me want to stay home and watch Yellowstone. But Mr. Johnson is an active participant in our increasingly unpredictable world, and the album is an invitation to dip in.
Slick, noisy, strange production, very The The. Love how they did the vocals on this. It’s like he’s staring at you from a few inches away. You can feel the stubble and smell the Chardonnay on his breath.
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
'Wild God' came out in late late August. At first listening it’s dour, but with a bit of poking around you’ll find joy under it. Frogs is a cinematic treasure, uplifting and melodramatic to the edge of cloying, if not for the lyrics, which come at you in a montage of images: frogs, rain on a Sunday, some guy with a gun, Kris Kristofferson walking by, floating over a bed of keyboards and strings, with a choir out of a 70s Italian movie.
O Wow O Wow, How Wonderful She Is... oh, it’s phenomenal. Featuring the most modern production of the record, it’s a giddy celebration of a girlfriend, the Australian singer Anita Lane. She and Cave were lovers as well as writing partners, and although they stopped being a couple in the mid-80s, they remained friends and collaborators. Towards the end of O Wow, there’s a spoken word section, an obvious home recording of Anita Lane recounting an earlier time with Nick Cave, writing songs, being in love. Her laughter... It’s a snippet of the last audio she ever sent him—she passed in 2021. Heartbreaking in the best way.
If anyone wants to send me some old guy music, please shoot me links. And if you’ve got some new stuff that’s cool, that’s even better.
Warm regards,
Luke
