PLAYBACK:stl May 2003

may 2003

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Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players

By Jim Dunn was the AV guy in high school: 16 mm projectors, record players, videos—all loaded on a cart and rolled down the hall, put together with my fat ass, dorky hair, and clothes—classic geek. Like all geeks, I wanted to be Angus Young, but I believe the closest Angus and I ever got was vinyl—he recorded on it and I played it. Turns out I was closer to rock stardom than I thought. My instrument, the slide projector, is the hot new instrument, especially in the hands of Tina Pina Trachtenburg.

Tina, along with her husband Jason (vocals and guitar/keyboard) and their nine-year old daughter Rachel (drums), are the Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players. Last month, they played to a packed house at the Mad Art Gallery.

As Jason and Rachel played a loopy set of songs, Tina showed the slides (meticulously timed) that inspired the songs.

This all started back in Seattle, where Jason would spend his days tending to their dog-walking business and his nights in the local clubs, playing guitar and singing. One day, Tina picked up a packet of slides and a projector at an estate sale. Obsessed with the anonymous family’s tale they told, Jason wrote a song to go along with the slide. Thus, “Mountain Trip to Japan, 1959” was born, and next came the coordination of the family into the act (Rachel started on harmonica and moved to drums). What was one song at the end of his act soon became the act and a hot ticket around Seattle. The Trachtenburgs decided to move to Brooklyn, and soon they were appearing twice a week at local clubs to sellout crowds, opening for They Might Be Giants and becoming the first unsigned act to appear on Conan O’Brien’s show.

Talking with Jason Trachtenburg can be somewhat disorienting. He has the look, mannerisms, and enthusiasm of the guy who rhapsodizes eloquently—too eloquently—about how good the tofu at Whole Foods is. There is a part of him that knows this act is part unique art rock and part Second City TV skit, but he is as earnest as can be. He declared that the TFSP was “formed as a necessity to save entertainment. We have had it with all the sorry, sad, monotonous, predictable music out there.

We have been commissioned by a higher power, whatever that means, to bring entertainment back to the masses…and good songs.” No small job this band has set up for itself.

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Using the slides-as-inspiration method, he has come up with songs like “Fondue Friends in Switzerland,” “Eggs,” and the irritatingly memorable “European Boys.” The songs are good and fun and any thought that they might not hold up on their own without the presence of the slides or the nine-year-old drummer with pigtails and poise were dispelled the first time I put it in my CD player. The songs fall somewhere into They Might Be Giants territory and, like TMBG, carry all sorts of underlying messages. According to Jason, the band has raised audience expectations. “Some of our songs can be interpreted three or four different ways depending on how you look at it. There are many different levels,” he said, adding, “We are really deep.” He theorized that the recorded output of the band must be strong. “People say ‘Is it going to be OK without the slides?’ Then I feel defensive and we have to prove ourselves, moreso than almost any other band out there, by making the best CD possible.”

Though they are unsigned, TFSP have talked with several labels, including Bar None, Minty Fresh, and V2. Signing with V2 would put them on the same label as the White Stripes, who have turned out to be fans. They showed up at their concert in Detroit and Spin ran a piece comparing Rachel’s drumming style with Meg White’s.

Some of the slides shown during the performance edge into people’s private lives. During one song called “Look at Me,” the mundane slides

“I think, for some of these people, we have made their lives worth living,” Jason said. “Their life was meant to be immortalized in our song. That was the whole purpose of it.

Not working for Boeing.”

PROFILE show the lives of two women as their friendship takes them through war, marriages, and life.

Suddenly the slides take a detour, as one of the women appears topless. The Trachtenburgs walk that thin line between an invasion of privacy and a shot at immortality. “I think, for some of these people, we have made their lives worth living,” Jason said. “Their life was meant to be immortalized in our song. That was the whole purpose of it. Not working for Boeing.”

While we talked, Rachel Trachtenburg was running around the gallery, chased by a person wearing a cheesy fake mustache. He turned out to be her drum teacher. It is sometimes easy to forget that this girl is nine. She has amazing poise, whether staring out into the audience while keeping a steady beat, or reacting (sometimes disdainfully) to her father’s joke-heavy stage patter. One minute she is Ringo Starr and the next you realize that her father is carefully making sure that her equipment is put away for her. Having once been nine, I think this must be a totally cool life for a kid. But the more adult me wonders if this is any kind of life for a little girl.

Wouldn’t she rather have a nice, “normal” life?

“As fate would have it, our real life is the exact same thing as the show,” says Jason.

“Rachel is brought up in this environment where everything we do is part of our act and that is normal for her. We wouldn’t work in a traditional situation.” That is not to say they don’t have their moments. Jason went on to say that there are time when he would want himself or Tina to be a better parent, or Rachel to be a better child; this is true of all families.

However, he noted, “There are those times during the day that we do these miraculous things together. Totally full of synchronicity and universal connectiveness parenting, music, rock and roll, slideshow situation…” At that moment, in his normal earnest way, Jason Trachtenburg was nothing but a proud parent, content to have combined his family and his musical passions all into one basket.

WHEN THE

CULTURE POPS

Playback St. Louis Pop Culture

TED LEO & THE PHARMACISTS May 7, Creepy Crawl You might remember Ted Leo from the New York hard-core scene with bands like Citizens Arrest and Animal Crackers, or as leader of the DC mod-punk band, Chisel. You may even be lucky enough to have caught the short-lived but long remembered Sin Eaters, whom Ted fronted from 1997-1998, or his touring stint with the Spinanes during those same years. Probably, though, you are most familiar with the understated but forceful path he’s been blazing as a solo artist since 1997. His songs are fragile but proud, and exalt in social and musical purpose, with inescapable melodies and tangible yet romantic lyrics that could easily draw comparisons to greats such as Billy Bragg or Alex Chilton.

photo courtesy Lookout! Records

In May...we’re there

THE SAMPLES May 10, Mississippi Nights The Samples had appeared to be a band that successfully bucked the system, playing to devoted crowds across the country and releasing albums on their own terms, without record company hassles nor the benefit of radio support. So it was something of a shock to read frontman Sean Kelly’s incredibly emotional letter on the band’s Web site back in early March. In it, Kelly laid bare the band’s financial woes and asked fans for financial support. The response thus far has been quite positive; see for yourself when Kelly & Co. make another stop in the Gateway to the West.

Contents Profile Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players . . . . .1 Justin Tolentino . . . . . .3 Play by Play . . . . .5 Aphex Twin, Black Keys, Rosanne Cash, Vic Chestnutt, Nicolai Dunger, Exies, Flaming Lips, Matthew Good, (hed) Planet Earth, Daniel Johnston, Damien Jurado,

My 2 Planets, Serengeti, Summer at Shatter Creek, White Stripes, Lucinda Williams, Yo La Tengo, Pete Yorn, Saddle Creek 50 Backstage Pass . .10 Sea and Cake, Mary Alice Wood, Jump, Little Children, Fire Theft, North Mississippi All Stars, Datsuns, Keller Williams, Cave In/Piebald, Postal Service, Jurassic 5, Ani DiFranco

Cover Story . . . .14 Cursive

College Radio Confessions . . . .23

Now Playing . . . .16 Anger Management, Confidence, Morvern Callar, Till Human Voices Wake Us

Take Five . . . . . . .24 The Reactions

Play’s the Thing .20 HotHouse’s In the Blood

You Are Here . . .26 Private Sector

Elliot Goes . . . .20

Backstage Pass . .27 Playback St. Louis One-Year Anniversary Party

Local Scenery . .21

Page by Page . . . .25 Mark Bego, Lloyd Kaufman

Publisher Two Weasels Press LLC Managing Editor Laura Hamlett Associate Editor/Art Director Jim Dunn Contributing Editors Bryan A. Hollerbach/Kevin Renick Contributing Writers Kyle Beachy, Jim Dunn, Rick Eubanks, Jessica Gluckman, Alex Graves, Laura Hamlett, Dan Heaton, Bryan A. Hollerbach, Jeremy Housewright, Mandy Jordan, Kevin Korinek, John Kujawski, Cayte Nobles, Wade Paschall, Andy Rea, Kevin Renick, Stephen Schenkenberg, Jeremy SegelMoss, Pete Timmermann, Ross Todd, Rev. Mike Tomko, Michele Ulsohn, Taylor Upchurch, Ben Weinstein, Mike Zapf, Rudy Zapf Contributing Photographers Jennifer Carr, Alex Graves, Molly Hayden, Cayte Nobles Cover Photograph Courtesy Saddle Creek Records Printing by Kohler and Sons Inc. Nancy Allen • 314-428-9800 Distribution Two Weasels Press LLC

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may 2003

ustin Tolentino’s studio in the Lemp Art Stables doesn’t much adhere to the finer principles of decor. In one jumbled corner there’s an aging “L” couch, its yellow and orange cushions saggy from years of strain. A short wooden coffee table sits awkwardly within the couch’s crook; on it sits the obligatory glass ashtray packed with butts and thick tiers of slag. The only other piece of furniture is the small end table that supports a simple, black boom box, which in turn supports a sloppy stack of CDs.

Everything else in the room either is, or is becoming, Tolentino’s artwork. There are rows of glass bottles (too many to count), some the approximate size of your standard alcoholic grandfather’s flask, the others probably five gallons each. Both sizes are painted with various faces, characters, or animals. On one, what looks like a drunken, deranged cartoon chicken is squawking at nothing. Dominating the studio, though, are the paintings, either hung or leaning in rows against the wall, that span the gamut from 3” x 5” postcards to 4’ x 4’ canvases. In between are the found wooden objects of various size and shape: old oak shutters from a forgotten window, discarded, tired signs from a long-gone era, etc. In other words, anything that will accept several coats of paint.

When I stopped by, there were a bunch of flags draped over two pipes that run just below the ceiling, hanging almost to the floor like a bizarre set of multi-colored curtains. In between the two rows stood Tolentino, his truck-driver

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cap restricting his wild, neck-length thatch of brown curls. He wore what he always wears: jeans, slick Euro-style shoes, and a T-shirt. He usually has a mustache and sometimes a goatee, neither of which is ever especially full.

“It’s my new medium,” Tolentino said, nodding to the flags he found ditched in a trashcan somewhere. One was from A.G. Edwards; others weren’t immediately identifiable. But there were also a couple Missouri State flags. Tolentino pulled one of these from among the group and, wearing a devious expression that would send any mother worth even half a shit to her early grave, said, “This is really going to piss some people off.”

If it were up to him, Tolentino would still be practicing his craft on an entirely different set of canvases. He started painting graffiti during the eighth grade, after opening up an issue of The Source magazine and seeing photos of tags in New York. “Listening to the music, I felt like I was already a part of this hip hop culture, but I didn’t feel like I was taking part as much as I could. I wanted to do all four elements and just be good at all of them, but because of my background in art, this was the part I focused on.”

And for years, throughout high school in Fenton and a four-year stint in Tennessee attending the Memphis College of Art, graffiti was a major component of Tolentino’s life. “There’s no drug that will ever match the feeling you get going out and painting a wall and wondering if you’re going to get caught.”

Property owners, though, aren’t especially fond of graffiti, nor are many city courts.

Tolentino admits, “I’ve been locked up too many times to go out any more. It gets expensive. Last time cost me like $1,200, with court fines and vandalism and trespassing fines.”

These days, he spends a lot more time indoors. Now 25 and one of two curators of the ever-revolving collection at the Art Stables, Tolentino’s paintings aim to capture the urban aesthetic of a bombed freight car in a more potable, marketable dosage. His work is like visually matured graffiti, condensed and refined for a smaller stage. Most involve figures—myriad cartoon faces that convey things like frustration, disappointment, constipation, intellectual malaise, a hangover, etc.—against rudimentary, simply colored backgrounds aimed at emulating the textured surfaces of train cars and weathered walls. Many of the images, including the several tobacco-themed works, deal with “mocking myself, mocking people’s vices. Just the things

people do.” Others represent Tolentino’s jabs at American culture. Explaining a pair of paintings, one an eyeball hanging open by its lid from a fishing hook, the other an ear plugged with a cartoon cork, he said, “Western culture wants you to see, but they don’t want you to hear. They force you to see everything, and then downplay what’s actually going on.”

There always seems to be a CD playing in Tolentino’s studio. “I listen to everything,” he said, “a lot of raggae, and I do listen to a lot of underground hip hop.” Acts like Slug, Eyedea, and Sole, along with the Anticon crew, who, he says, “allow my brain to concentrate on something completely different than the painting, so my subconscious just streams through my hand.

It takes my mind off of what I’m doing.”

Tolentino’s is one of five permanent studios at the Lemp Art Stables (sidebar: if you haven’t been to one of the monthly shows put on by ArtDimensions in the Stables, go as soon as possible). Out of his disorderly studio comes a brand of artwork that likely wouldn’t have found a home had it not been for Davide Weaver and ArtDimensions. Tolentino understands this, and is eternally grateful for the opportunity. “There’s a lot of people out there who can paint really pretty portraits or really pretty landscapes, and a lot of the galleries in St. Louis, that’s what they’re looking for. What we do here, we’re pretty much open to anything.”

Just outside of Tolentino’s studio are two enormous paintings, each featuring a photo-realistic image of what looks to be an Abercrombie or Gap model. Behind them, in an ocean of sepia tones and pencil strokes, are the skewed, misshapen faces and figures that exemplify Tolentino’s artwork. Though from early in his career, the pieces are a perfect summary of the artist: a trained painter capable of realistic renditions of the beauty in our world who would rather focus on the madness that stays hidden in the background. “Those were basically me telling my school to fuck off,” Tolentino said with that devious smile.

Tolentino’s art was born of a culture that defies domestication. Now, with ArtDimensions finally providing a venue for local art that stretches beyond really pretty landscapes and portraits, he’s found a home for his brand of refined graffiti. A messy, crowded, smoke-filled home with a constant soundtrack bridging the gap between consciousness and his rag-tag collection of unlikely canvases. For more info, go to www.studiotolentino.com.

may 2003

P L AY P L AY

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BY

APHEX T WIN: 26 MIXES FOR CASH (Warp) Years ago, Aphex Twin was approached by a record company and asked to remix a song by ’90s pop-punk band the Lemonheads. Weeks later, a courier arrived at his door to pick up the DAT, but Aphex Twin had completely forgotten to do the remix. In fact, he never listened to the source tape! But the courier was waiting, so he grabbed the nearest random tape and passed it off as the remix. He got $5,000 and the Lemonheads shelved the “remix.”

If this tale doesn’t lend valuable insight into Richard D. James (better known as Aphex Twin) and his attitude toward remixing, then consider this two-disc compilation. Nowhere in the liner notes will you read something like “These are artists I enjoy and it was a privilege to work with their material!” As the title says, these were about the money.

26 Mixes for Cash sounds more like an Aphex Twin album that samples other artists to varying degrees. Aphex Twin’s opinion of the original determines what stays and what goes; he prefers the word “fixing” to “mixing.” He liked Seefeel’s “Time to Find Me” enough to allow the band’s distinct sound to move with few obstacles through his percussion. Nobukazu Takemura’s “Let My Fish Loose” retains the lush innocence of its acoustic instruments and child vocals.

Conversely, is there one note of Jesus Jones’ “Zeros and Ones” in the ambient “reconstruction?” Both Nine Inch Nails–related pieces are 100% Reznor-free (debate rages on over whether or not this is a good thing; I say it is).

Other standout material on this collection includes James’ own remix of SAW2 CD1 TRK2, the haunting splice job of Curve’s “Falling Free,” and his lounge-exotica version of Gentle People’s “Journey.” While rabid Aphex Twin collectors may be mourning money spent hunting down singles and white-labels, other fans, especially those disappointed by 2001’s drukqs, will find plenty to be pleased with.

—Jessica Gluckman P.S.: The Lemonheads remix wasn’t included.

THE BLACK KEYS: THICKFREAKNESS (Fat Possum) Since the inception of the Jack and Meg White magical, musical, rock ’n’ roll juggernaut, bluesy duos have been a hot commodity in the wonderful, wave-riding world of album sales. No exception to this attention is the Black Keys, two Midwestern boys with a penchant for garage-y, stripped-down blues-rock. Guitar and drums. Sound familiar?

(Ignore obvious lack of a female presence.) They brought us The Big Come Up in 2002, and while

the album was incredibly earnest and raw, it lacked the staying power of a Stripes effort. Now the Keys come back, rather quickly, with thickfreakness, an album that, well, sounds a lot like the last one.

Could their return be premature?

Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney hail from mighty Akron, Ohio, and have learned, somewhere along the way, how to rock a lot like Howlin’ Wolf or a poor[er] man’s Credence. Auerbach’s gruff, starchy delivery packs a serious punch, and Carney’s vicious on the drums, challenging Auerbach’s ambling guitarwork with chunky beats that hit harder than any blues I’ve ever heard. Where the duo falls short is not in their competence, but in their inability to move forward with their basic punk-garage-Creamlike-swamphearted-blues formula. At points on thickfreakness, it even seems they’re slipping backward. Whereas The Big Come Up featured some vocal sampling and a great unexpected cover of “She Said, She Said,” thickfreakness offers no samples to break up the songs and only a paltry version of Richard Berry’s “Have Love Will Travel.” And while a few tracks definitely stand out, like the especially rollicking “Set You Free” and the album’s closer, “I Cry Alone,” the latter of which contains a striking Leadbellyesque sparseness, most of the album reeks of monotony.

Recorded in a single 14-hour session, one begins to wonder if the Black Keys new effort is a bit unripe for the picking. The same riffs, the same beat, even the same song length; almost all my initial interest in the Keys’ sound was gone by track five.

The Black Keys don’t have the range, or the desire, to be “the next White Stripes.” Thank God. What they do have going for them are their driving, catchy melodies and their keen ability to sound like Muddy Waters, which proves very handy, and very groovy. Their vintage approach is appealing, and thickfreakness is only disappointing because one gets the feeling the Keys could really push their rather straightforward approach further into a corner of the blues, or closer to the brash garage-punk so palpable in the album’s production. Either way, the Black Keys have seemingly chosen to rush past their laurels still fresh from last year, and thickfreakness has unfortunately suffered for it.

—Andrew Rea VIC CHESNUTT: SILVER LAKE (New West Records)/ROSANNE CASH: RULES OF TRAVEL (Capitol Records) Songwriting is a craft. It must be nurtured and developed over time. A well-written song has the ability to transport the listener, causing him to reflect, cry, or even take a step back.

Some people may never even write one good song in their whole career, while others are driv-

en to make words their nemesis. Two such artists who have been writing great songs throughout their careers are Vic Chesnutt and Rosanne Cash, and now both have released what may be considered their best work to date.

Over the years, Rosanne Cash has had 11 number one singles and while walking her own path from Nashville to New York. She was never quite right for the country crowd. Her confi-

dence as a songwriter has grown, and may have reached its peak on the song “September When it Comes.” On the other hand, Vic Chesnutt has never had a number one single. His career, as his life, has had a few twists and turns. Through it all, he has been writing songs as a way to keep himself alive. His newest release, Silver Lake, is his warmest and most mature recording to date.

These are two of the most literate singer-songwriters working today.

Words alone will not carry a song, and on both releases, the balance between lyrics, voice, and music helps to propel these works. Both discs prosper from sparse production and warmth. The songs on Rules of Travel have a timeless quality to them, while Silver Lake feels more like a fresh breath that is meant to be enjoyed in the present.

Cash is not afraid to work with other writers or to have people write songs for her. “Beautiful Pain,” the lead track on the new CD, is written

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PLAYBACK ST. LOUIS

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Play by Play

by Canadian Craig Northey. When listening to this track, you get the feeling that this is Cash writing about herself; in fact, one line most closely resembles her: “In love, in love with your beautiful pain…” The highlight of the album has to be the reflective song, “September When it Comes,” as Rosanne shares vocals with her father, Johnny Cash. This is a haunting number that deals with mortality and unresolved issues buried deep within. You can feel time slowly drift away as both father and daughter’s voices sing with a yearning for another chance.

Silver Lake is the album that fans of Vic Chesnutt have been waiting for him to make since he released The Salesman and Bernadette (1998). The slogans and stories on this new release have a spontaneous and natural feel to them; they fit like an old pair of jeans. The first three songs have the confessional feel that let you into the world of Chesnutt. In “Band Camp,” he creates characters and scenes that only the finest Southern writers are capable of. In a line that almost describes Chestnutt as it does the girl in the song, he sings, “You never played the part as it was written/you would always vamp.”

Shifting from confessionals to telling stories, we find a song that is as much of a slogan as it is a song. On “2nd Floor,” the music builds as he repeats, “You’ve to climb to the second floor/ short chore great reward.”

Quality writing and music is hard to come by these days. Take some time from worrying about what alert level the country is at, kick back with the smoke of your choice, and wrap yourself around these two great records.

—Rick Eubanks

from previous page

THE EXIES: INERTIA (Virgin) If you took one part Collective Soul and mixed it with one part Stone Temple Pilots, then threw in a dash of ’80s glam, a pinch of grunge, and a sprinkle of electronica, the resulting concoction would be a tasty and accurate description of the music created by the Exies. This four-piece from southern California (whose name comes from a John Lennon quote referring to extraterrestrials) caught the attention of Grammy award–winning producer Matt Serletic at a summer festival in 2000.

Shortly after that, Serletic became the guiding force behind the creation of the band’s debut CD, Inertia, which successfully combines classic songwriting with a modern, edgy flair and a smart pop sensibility.

Each of the 11 tracks on this disc is just about three minutes in length, making them all primed and prepared for their potential journey to the airwaves. So far, only the first single, the grungy yet catchy “My Goddess,” has actually found its way there, and has reached a relatively high position on the modern rock charts. Another very strong track which could eventually end up as a single is the disc’s last song, “Genius,” which has an Alice in Chains–ish, slow-paced, moody vibe. Inertia’s crown jewel, however, is undeniably “Creeper Kamikaze,” which features rich harmonies, a highly addictive melody, as well as an orchestrated string section. This is the song that possesses the most potential to elevate the Exies to big-league status.

Lyrically, song topics range from personal tragedy, exemplified in “Can’t Wait,” to the forgiveness and redemption theme found in “No Secrets.” Lead vocalist/guitarist Scott Stevens sounds as if he sincerely means every word he sings, and plays his instrument with just as much honesty and credibility. His bandmates sound equally talented and competent, and it seems apparent while listening to this CD that the Exies would put on an impressive, adrenaline-fueled live performance. Currently on an extensive tour of the East Coast (which you can read all about on the Web site’s tour journal), the Exies just might make enough of an impression out there to cause the rest of the nation to take even more notice of this promising young group. www.theexies.com —Michele Ulsohn THE FLAMING LIPS: FIGHT TEST (EP) (Warner Brothers Records) Eclecto-college-rock pioneers the Flaming Lips had set out to change the world with their exalted 2002 release, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, but now they continue to expand upon its success and acclaim with the aptly titled Fight Test. The tracklist includes an ultra-rare remix of Yoshimi’s “Do You Realize??”; covers of Kylie Minogue’s “Can’t Get You Out of My Head,” Beck’s “The Golden Age,” and Radiohead’s

“Knives Out”; an ode to White Stripes’ frontman Jack White (“Thank You Jack White: For the Fiber Optic-Jesus That You Gave Me”), as well as two brand new tracks (“Fight Test” and “The Strange Design of Conscience”). This sevensong stunner plays games with its listener’s stream of consciousness, effortlessly floating between bliss and despair. “Can’t Get You Out of

My Head” teases a folk-dance fusion; the electrorock remix of “Do You Realize??”, chiming in at just over nine minutes, eases the troubled soul, while “Thank You Jack White” manages to make you laugh and cry simultaneously with fabled tales about the lives of Meg and Jack and their on-the-road exploits in their van. Also included on the disc is the video for “Fight Test,” as well as the trailer for the band’s forthcoming feature film, Christmas on Mars. All in all, such an eclectic EP normally only serves as a promo-platter for a record label to shove off b-sides and rarities, but the Flaming Lips’ Fight Test manages to maintain a cognitive cerebral flow from beginning to end.

—Rev. Mike Tomko MATTHEW GOOD: WEAPON (Universal Music Canada) First, I’ll tell you this: Matthew Good is the absolute best thing Canadian music has going for it. For some reason, Universal can’t quite figure out how to market Good in the U.S. It’s not that he sounds so unlike anything we’ve produced…or maybe it is. Good is a very intelligent, thought-provoking songwriter, and he doesn’t mind singing it as he sees it. In this day and age, the U.S. isn’t so fond of anyone, artist or otherwise, who speaks his mind—that is, if his mind thinks anything different than the Bush administration wants it to. (Maybe that’s why I like Matthew Good so much.)

Second, there’s this background: Two years ago, Matthew Good made Canadian headlines by severing his ties with his former band, the Matthew Good Band, with whom he had released four albums. Speculation instantly flew: had he grown too difficult to work with? Was he creatively dried up?

The answer comes as a resounding “No” on both counts with Avalanche, Good’s first solo effort and his most political album to date. The first two tracks on the disc seem directed at the current American administration. “Pledge of Allegiance” initially claims to be “a rehearsal for all the empty promises I will be.” Behind the lyrics, a simple drumbeat and synthesizer loop lend an undertone of gravity before a chorus of

may 2003

voices kicks in. Good’s voice, with its slight vibrato and nasal tones, has a rich range with which to present his thoughtful words. Next up is “Lullaby for the New World Order”; dramatic strings add tension as Good asks, “How can you take your heart out of this?/Somebody gave you a choice/ and all you do is abuse it./And how do you stop once you’ve started?” Truly, this is a beautiful and frightening song.

The slow-building “Weapon” is a gorgeous display of the heartbreaking qualities of Good’s voice.

In the beginning are a gently picked guitar and haunting violin; as the music soars, Good warns, “Careful, you be careful/This is where the world drops off.” The single-ready “In a World Called Catastrophe” blends an upbeat melody with strings and Good’s soaring vocals.

“One foot in front of the other,” a low-voiced Good repetitively intones to begin the title track; this is a stylistic switch for him, and evokes R.E.M. Still, the post-apocalyptic words are vintage Good: “The world’s spinning and we’re laughing/and I’m charming, the devil’s charming/and we’re ruined but we’re still building.”

The gimmick of the highly political (and tongue-in-cheek) “21st Century Living” is a cacophony of voiceovers remarking on the ten-

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dency toward exaggeration. Says one, “You know, today I was only asked one question: Do you want that supersized? It’s like the whole fucking world’s supersized.” “Near Fantastica” comes off as an anthem with swells, silence, and sounds, a futuristic sci-fi tale wherein we’re all cogs in this great computer: “After the mission it will let you go.” “Song for the Girl” is the closest thing to a love song that we’ll get from Good.

Again the strings supplement guitar, drums, and piano, on “A Long Way Down,” as Good bids farewell to the world: “Today I’m leaving/this bullshit one horse town/full of cowboys and Indians/who only have balls when there’s a camera around.” Good closes the album with “House of Smoke and Mirrors” (also the title of his long-running Web blog) and presents himself as untrustworthy, a self-deprecating dash to put into question all the wizened words that preceded it: “You can see right through me.”

With Avalanche, Good is free of the band that backed him for so long. The result is a more honest glimpse of Matthew Good, in which he proves himself a protest singer for the 21st century. Don’t wait until Universal signs an American distribution deal; thanks to the magic of the Internet, you can buy Avalanche today and hear it for yourself. www.matthewgood.net —Laura Hamlett

(HED) PLANET EARTH: BLACKOUT (Jive) On (hed) Planet Earth’s second major-label recording, Blackout, the sextuplet from Southern California shows their tuneful sides while staying true to their rap-metal thrash sound that fans love. While the band has enjoyed success within their realm of the rap-metal industry, this album is their shot at breaking out of that category and into the mainstream.

Though the band’s first album, Broke, continues to sell three years after its release, there are obvious differences between the albums. Broke had a much more raw and darker feel, whereas Blackout is still heavy but also has a melodic pop sense to it. On it, the band shows not a softer side, but an almost humane side.

Vocally and musically, Blackout leaps bounds over Broke. The heavy bass guitar riffs are masterfully placed over the smooth vocal sounds of frontman Jahred. There are several standout tracks on the album, including, “Suck it up,” “Bury Me,” “Dangerous,” the first single, “Blackout,” and “Other Side.” “Getaway” is also a standout track, as it mixes reggae with aggressive, angst-filled rock.

With all the rap-metal acts on the music scene at the moment—including Korn, Linkin Park, and Limp Bizkit—hopefully, (hed) Planet Earth will not be put on the back burner of the industry. continued on next page

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Play by Play With the release of Linkin Park’s new album Meteora, fans may forget about Blackout, but don’t make that mistake: this album is a perfect time capsule of the world that we live in today, a world filled with hostility, mystification, and fear.

—Jeremy Housewright MY 2 PLANETS: THE OTHER SIDE OF SUMMER (self-released) The title suggests that this, My 2 Planets’ third full-length offering, is about the darkening days, after the heat and the haze of summer have passed and the weather’s growing cooler, the nights longer. A close listen to Jim Ousley’s lyrics (as sung by Eric Wulff) confirms that hunch: it’s a looking back, a letting go, a regretting and a forgetting. Don’t let the upbeat, poppy music fool you: My 2 Planets comes with a very heavy heart, indeed.

Beginning the album is “Goodbye, Norman Rockwell,” a farewell to childhood innocence.

“But everything looks better in the snow,” Wulff finally sings, and we wonder: it is optimism, or is he merely fooling himself? “Pasadena” begins as a concrete picture of a girl who came by Greyhound, proving Ousley’s strong lyricism; unfortunately, he steps back and the picture blurs as the tale turns generic. “Fortunate Me” is another taste of irony, the tale of a man who wakes alone and lonely, only to proclaim his thankfulness at being free and available; the rain outside, however, tells a different story.

On “Summerdress,” Wulff sings achingly of days gone by; behind his strong vocals, the music ebbs and flows gently. Showing a poetic command of language, Ousley gives us this gem: “Summer is in the breeze,/I found myself/upon my knees/hands on the small of your back/And I dream dream dream/of that hand-me-down summerdress.”

The upbeat “Seven Stories High” features a textured guitar and a steady beat, its message both optimistic and bittersweet. Wulff sings sweetly of the need to change his life: “I’m going to stop pretending that I’m fine/Looking at the wreckage left behind/You deserve all the love

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that’s true/so I’m letting go of you.”

“Compass” is a gentle love song; “Down With the Silence,” a more upbeat pop number, has been a part of the M2P live set for some time. “The Bells of St. Theresa” begins, appropriately enough, with the chiming of bells and continues to tell a somber tale of childhood abuse and neglect against the backdrop of a foot-tapping melody.

The highlight of the disc’s second half has to be “If,” a rocking protest against racism. Earl’s Jimmy Kennedy lends his harmonica as Wulff stretches his vocal abilities to new heights as he implores, “If you could untie me/you could understand me.” “Mercy Tonight” closes the album with a gentle plea for domestic peace. The bongo drum and flamenco guitar lend a worldly feel, while the vocal harmonies evoke something of a Beatles feel. “I don’t want to fight about it now/let’s just go to sleep,” Wulff croons—and it’s the perfect answer to a long and tiring day.

Available at venues around town and from the band’s Web site: www.my2planets.com.

—Laura Hamlett SUMMER AT SHATTER CREEK: SUMMER AT SHATTER CREEK (Absolutely Kosher) Summer at Shatter Creek sounds like the title of an artsy independent film, maybe set in a small Appalachian town where young love is derailed by unspeakably sad events. Instead, this evocative title is the name of a low-key, oneman-band recording project helmed by former Kalamazoo native Craig Gurwich. Any musician who tries to sing and play everything on his album is taking a big risk; the possibilities for undisciplined self-indulgence are all too obvious. Gurwich has, therefore, worked a minor miracle by recording this sweet, lovely, inwardlooking series of meditations on life, love, and the passage of time, all distinguished by his high, fragile, Jeff Buckley–tinged voice.

The sound is simultaneously lo-fi and lush; the recording has the aesthetic of a late ’60s Jefferson Airplane sort of emotive psychedelia.

The wistful vocals and echoey production of

“The Essence of Time” and “The Drive” reminded me of something I couldn’t quite place, as Gurwich’s songs made me feel “lost in time.”

“My Neighbor’s Having a Seizure” is the closest thing here to a real pop song; it’s not too dissimilar from latter-day Wilco, and the way Gurwich reaches for the high notes amid a thick swirl of loopy background noise is quite charming.

Mostly he’s playing acoustic guitar on these tunes, and sparsely so. “I need a vacation/Some relaxin’ time/Cause I don’t wanna be angry and stressed all the time,” Gurwich sings plaintively on “I Need a Vacation,” with simple piano chords plunking along with his voice.

I positively grinned at the next few lines: “Traffic, it kills me/When I drive I’m always on edge/I feel like everyone’s out to cut me off/To get one car ahead.” You just don’t hear that kind of plain honesty on too many recordings. Gurwich doesn’t need gimmicks to make his music compelling; he’s just playing what he wants to play, saying what he wants to say, and you just know he’s not too worried about who likes his music and who doesn’t. He did all this himself, remember, and you don’t spend that much time creating in isolation like that if your goal is to be Mr. Popular.

Old-fashioned self-expression is Gurwich’s goal, and he’s achieved that while reminding us what a miraculous little thing it can be to simply render a sad little tune over a few decently played instruments. “Driving Through Texas” is evocative in a very disarming way; it leaves more and more haunting little impressions as it goes. And “Thief” conjures the spirit of Nick Drake, save for Gurwich’s higher, rootsier vocal style. Summer at Shatter Creek doesn’t make a big statement, and it’s the kind of recording that will probably get overlooked except by those who read the indie music press. But it’s testament to the power of one person, one vision, and one inexpensively produced

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recording. The whole of this disc definitely adds up to more than the Summer of its parts.

—Kevin Renick

Games of Hearts:

WHITE STRIPES: ELEPHANT (V2) The Stripes appeared like a car on a darkened highway over the last two years. With each release, those headlights became brighter. On this, their fourth release, the light is blinding. Last year’s White Blood Cells had effectively broken the band to most of mainstream America, and now Elephant arrives with a lot of hype and anticipation.

Elephant continues on the template of less-ismore, classic rhythm and blues that is pre-1960 (and I mean really pre-).

Thirteen of the 14 songs are composed by Jack White (in the case of “Hypnotized,” recomposed, since it is basically set to the tune of “Secret Agent Man”). The album tends to follow the same pattern we heard on White Blood Cells—sweet song (“You’ve Got Her in Your Pocket”), rock scorcher (“Black Math”), blues assshaker (“Ball and Biscuit”)—none of them exceptional, but certainly better than most of the stuff out there. However, there are several standouts.

On the album’s opener and current single, “Seven Nation Army,” there is what sounds like a bass (Jack swears it is an octave guitar), which adds a bit of roundness to their sound. It is as elegant as rock can get—grainy, threatening, and with a melody that will linger for quite some time. “There’s no Home for You Here” is a sonic blast which offers the Whites’ best take on TRex, and they handle the duty beautifully. “In the Cold, Cold, Night” is Meg’s turn at singing lead. Her voice is reed thin, but in this situation it works pretty well. The carefully chosen material is exceptional, and engineer Liam Watson does everything to give Meg the aura of Peggy Lee. Several songs (“Little Acorns,” “Well it’s True That We Love one Another”) really don’t work, and this is one of those touchy areas for a band like the Stripes. They are supposed to be stripped down, guitar and drums for the most part; gimmicks, even those that are homage to classic songs, don’t need to be in here. Compare them to “Girl, You Have no Faith in Medicine” and the difference is obvious. This is where the Stripes excel: a brilliant 3:17 song with little more than Jack, Meg, and a whole lot of attitude. It truly carries the spirit of what makes the band great.

The best track on the album is the only song not composed by the band. “I Just Don’t Know What to Do With Myself” is a Burt Bacharach/ Hal David song best know for the Dusty Springfield version, though Elvis Costello recorded an amazing live version at the Stiffs Live concert/album in 1978. The simplicity of the Stripes’ version showcases Jack Whites’ voice and points out that great lyrics can help any band, even one as good as the White Stripes.

—Jim Dunn continued on page 9

NICOLAI DUNGER: TRANQUIL ISOLATION (Overcoat Recordings)/DANIEL JOHNSTON: FEAR YOURSELF (Gammon Records)/DAMIEN JURADO: WHERE SHALL YOU TAKE ME? (Secretly Canadian)

Three different songwriters show three different hands

Poor Nicolai Dunger, the former Swedish national soccer player and unsurprisingly handsome songwriter whose voice, a friend who'd heard his new record told me, brings to mind both Van Morrison and Rufus Wainright. Add to this that on his new release, Tranquil Isolation (Overcoat Recordings), Dunger is playing, producing, and singing with the indie prince Will Oldham, to whom Dunger had mailed an early EP years back. Given these gifts, Dunger makes the most of his fortune. Isolation is an inspired, soulful, and often bluesy record, delivered with a warm blend of acoustic guitar, piano, violin, and harmonica. While Dunger sings in a followable English—with a few memorable turns of phrase, such as one song's opening, “Beautifully, I read it on a record sleeve"—the highlight of Tranquil Isolation isn’t so much the stories it tells, but the continual sound of Dunger’s voice. Through varied tempos and subjects—friendship, love, and music—it reaches and dips and carries over the instruments with emotion. With Tranquil Isolation, Dunger, the receiver of many gifts, gives one to us.

Perhaps less fortunate in the genes department is Daniel Johnston, a lumpy manic-depressive Texas singersongwriter who’s just released Fear Yourself (Gammon Records). I’d been meaning to get around to Johnston for some time—reading other musicians’ praise of him and having heard Jeff Tweedy’s concert cover of Johnston’s “True Love Will Find You in the End”—but Fear Yourself has me left thinking I’ve started with the wrong record. Like the Tweedy-covered tune, Fear Yourself is completely concerned with love (the word’s in four song titles and sung in every song), but the record is so lacking in details of the songs’ subjects that it’s neither moving nor believable. “All my life I have loved you,” Johnston begins one song in his original lispy whine, but he never reveals why, much less who he’s loving. When another song starts up, “Well I saw her last night/what a beautiful sight,” I hoped Johnston was setting up a scene he’d continually paint in, providing a descriptive image to balance out the pile of declarations. He wasn’t. While the record has its merits— Sparklehorse’s Mark Linkous adds compelling layers as producer and arranger, and more than a few songs ride on undeniably poppy hooks—it

suffers from that old cliché of unremarkable writing: it’s all tell and no show. Fear Yourself sounds like what I thought didn’t exist: generic passion.

Seattle’s Damien Jurado may have ruined us with his 1999 masterpiece Rehearsals for Departure, a record of love delivered lovingly.

Through detailed and memorable narration, Jurado made a contained, unified work—a record for my bookshelf.

Following Departure, Jurado hauled out the amps and made a full-on rock record, I Break Chairs, which gave fans something new as well as a longing for the old. With his new release, Where Shall You Take Me? (Secretly Canadian), the fans are back in familiar territory. And while this new record doesn’t hit the heights of Departure, it has many moments of trademark Jurado: vivid imagery, dark tones, complete stories. Of the 10 songs, two sound a bit out of place (“Texas to Ohio,” with its loud echoing vocals, and the charming but toss-off-sounding “Matinee”). Two of the other 10 are classics, maybe the best pair of songs I’ve heard this year. The first of these is the opener, “Amateur Night,” which begins with these lines over mournful, slow acoustic strums: “First came the scream/and blood on the floor/the alcohol and magazines.” Jurado continues the harrowing in-character narration over a steadily rising dirty-motel buzz: “In my flashlight you were a star./Smile for the camera/take off that dress/It’s me who made you/It’s me who will take you.”

The song ends as startlingly as it began: “I am not an evil man/I just have a habit I can’t kick/It starts with an urge/and ends with—Hang up the phone/I ain’t finished yet.” Jurado’s range as a writer is evidenced in the record’s second classic, “Window,” a warm and timeless ode to coupledom, which features beautiful harmonies throughout by Rosie Thomas. “I am looking at a beautiful window,” they sing together, “that window is your eyes,” a sentiment that here somehow blows past cliché. By the time the couple hits the fourth verse, the spare song moves into a spiritual, with the female vocals doubling over themselves, until it sounds like the song’s being led by a small congregation, In just two songs, Jurado movingly portrays the two poles of passion: its most vile, its most lovely.

—Stephen Schenkenberg

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B A C K S TA G E PASS The Sea and Cake The Gargoyle, March 22 When the Sea and Cake took the stage at the Gargoyle, it was for a young, mostly college-aged crowd. Considering that the band members are—dare it be said—pushing their 40s, the youth of the audience seemed puzzling. At first it seemed like an Autumn-Spring romance, but when the band started playing, the mystery became clear. The Sea and Cake craft songs that, if not hummable, are moody and atmospheric.

Multilayered guitars and keyboards, melded with a Yo La Tengo–ish bass and quirky drumbeat, all suffuse to create an esoteric experience. In a nutshell, it’s art rock. The crowd knew and loved their work, and they shouted their pleasure when vocalist Sam Prekop began “Left Side Clouded” from the latest release, One Bedroom.

After five years and at least as many CD releases, the Chicago-based band has garnered a devoted following on both sides of the Atlantic as well as Japan. This is appropriate to their style, which sounds more European than American. It’s an audio mimosa—sophisticated, urbanely jazzy but not urban, smooth, and deceptively intoxicating.

Guitarist Archer Prewitt, reminiscent of the sincere and intense Ethan Hawke from Dead Poet’s Society, performed with a quiet precision.

He and Prekop played foil for each other onstage, faceting the thousand planes of a song with a notch, cut, or glance towards the other. They were clearly enjoying the gig, despite Prekop’s complaint about the frigid air that the Gargoyle provided. (He was not overstating the truth.

Those near the stage shivered under an overzealous cooling system.) Drummer John McEntire of the tattooed arms and anarchy T-shirt was the

Sam Prekop (left) and Archer Prewitt front the Sea and Cake. Photo by Laura Hamlett. only band member that actually looked like a rock god. For most of the set he seemed to be in a trance, staring straight ahead while battering an earthly groundline to keep the lighter songs from floating away. Unfortunately, Prekop’s breathy voice added no weight to the diaphanous songs.

His Cocteau Twins–type vocals work best when they are considered part of the scenery, merely another layer to the songs and not the driving force which moves them forward.

Although this was ostensibly a tour to promote One Bedroom, several of the tunes were from the band’s earlier releases, including The Biz and Oui. One of the set’s best numbers was “An Echo In” (Glass EP), which allowed Prekop and Co. to examine frision of energy and let it build into something almost punk. The band encored with a cover of Bowie’s “Sound + Vision” and “The Argument” (The Fawn), which is as cryptically straight as any of their songs have ever been: “I’m messing with the soul untied/And all it takes you is anywhere.” Leaving the States for another European tour in May, they will acquire new inspirations while they extend their own unique version of post-rock.

—Rudy Zapf

lady has a piercing gaze—in person and in performance, she frolics like Friday night. That frolicsome nature took center stage, figuratively and otherwise, in Blueberry Hill’s Duck Room during the release party for the St. Louis singer-songwriter’s second solo CD, Daisies in My Hand.

Knoxville artist Leslie Woods and her band opened the evening as smoothly and dangerously as a free flow of Tennessee sipping whiskey.

Woods’ smoldering debut, Velvet Sky, appeared last year.

Once Woods yielded the stage to Wood—a clause that hints why this magazine’s copyeditor spends most of his free time drinking—the lady behind Daisies in My Hand reprised most of the 12 tracks from that disc, among them the inestimable “Angel” and “Two Feet,” the incandescent “Hey Diddle Diddle,” and the instrumental “Cowboy in a Curl” (enigmatically dubbed “the kitty song” by one of Wood’s young nieces).

Interspersed among such original compositions were covers charming in their diversity: Jennifer Warnes’ “I Know a Heartache When I see One,” Hank Williams’ “Your Cheatin’ Heart” (in the key of G, by the way), Loretta Lynn’s “You Ain’t Woman Enough,” and—hello, chutzpah!—the theme to the Mary Tyler Moore Show.

Also featured on the set list were various numbers from Wood’s tenure with local groups like sugarstickygirl: “From the South Side,” “Carrot,” “Hey Hey Hey” (which she characterized as the closest she’s ever come to penning a Monkees ditty).

Mary Alice Wood w/Leslie Woods Blueberry Hill, March 22 A fundamental incongruity applies to Mary Alice Wood: although in most of her press photos, she looks as solemn as Sunday morning—the

Mary Alice Wood shines onstage at Blueberry Hill. Photo by Mickey Bernal.

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Otherwise included was one new-as-newgets number, “Miles to Burn,” with characteristically splendid lyrics: “My window’s dusty, a farmer’s residue—funny how an open road can set its sites [sic] on you.”

For most of the set, accompanying Wood (who, for most of the set, played acoustic guitar) were bassist Mark Robke and percussionist Brian Reed, who drummed with such concentration that he appeared to be in pain. The electric sixstring wizardry, meanwhile, came from John Horton, a guitarist astonishingly stolid and immobile as well as astonishingly masterful; Horton, frankly, needed no cheap theatrics to distract from deficiencies in his performance because no such deficiencies existed—from the first note, he wowed the crowd.

All things considered, with the CD release party for Wood’s Daisies in My Hand, local music lovers received a fine aural bouquet with which to start the spring.

—Bryan A. Hollerbach

Jump, Little Children Blueberry Hill, March 25 Blueberry Hill was swimming with familiar Tuesday night opportunists, smoke and drink in hand, each waiting for his or her respective buzz to either kick in or wear off. Down in the Duck

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Bassist Jonathan Gray of Jump, Little Children.

Photo by Mandy Jordan.

Room, though, something altogether different had begun to breathe.

Jump, Little Children is a funky South Carolina–based five-piece whose sound is a dynamic mix of Irish-influenced intricacies and solid alt-rock explosions. I’ve been following the band for seven years and, in my opinion, this performance was one of their finest.

Jay Clifford’s lead guitar and vocals were simultaneously soothing and igniting, haunting the melodies of songs like “Say Goodnight” and “Dancing Virginia.” Evan Bivins beat drums while his brother, Matt, a jack-of-all-trades (mandolin, tin whistle, accordion, harmonica…), shook the set with the beatnik-like, spoken-word pieces “Habit” and “Body Parts.” Up against Jonathan Gray’s upright bass and Ward Williams’ skillfully

interchangeable cello and guitar, the band is its own ebb and flow.

Their music is engaging, not simply because they’ve mastered interesting tools, but because as a group, their talents and energies create a vision of effortlessness as multiple sounds and instruments compliment each other delicately.

The band is working on a new album to follow their most recent CD, Vertigo (released on their own EZ Chief Records), though no official date has been set for its release.

—Mandy Jordan

The Fire Theft Mississippi Nights, March 27 It seemed as if, just as I was getting into Sunny Day Real Estate, they were breaking up.

That's probably not too far from the truth, considering the band broke up twice-once after 1994's Diary and again in 2000, after reforming in 1998 for How it Feels to Be Something On. Lucky for us listeners, three of the members of SDRE—Jeremy Enigk, vocals and guitar; Nate Mendel, original bass guitar; and William Goldsmith, drums—have reformed, adding a few friends accumulated along the way. Original SDRE guitarist Dan Hoerner has departed; in his place are second guitarist Bill Dolan and key-

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Backstage Pass boardist Nick Macri. As with all good things, though, there’s a catch: they’re no longer SDRE, and have no plans to reprise SDRE songs. But they’re written an album’s worth of new material, and they’re taking it on the road.

Appearing as the Fire Theft, the quintet made a stop in St. Louis last month before an enthusiastic if undeservedly small crowd (but, hey, they’re touring without an album, label, or recording contract, and they’re doing no interviews until they’re signed) at Mississippi Nights.

The audience was largely male, and young— early ’20s, most of them, despite the fact that

Three to See Here are just three of the great original St. Louis bands that play around town on a regular basis. Check them out as soon as you get a chance.

6—There is nothing more satisfying than finding a young, creative local band that can delight teenagers and annoy parents. Armed with a loud volume and plenty of profanity, this industrial-goth band are pretty much a parent’s nightmare multiplied by six. They have a ferocious sound that turns two synthesizers and a guitar into dangerous weapons, as opposed to the more mellow ’80s sounds often heard on the radio. The sound is aggressive and original, and the band’s live show is so full of energy, it’s hard not to be drawn in.

To add a visual effect to their set, they have TV screens on stage playing clips of popular horror movies. Fans of exciting live shows have nothing to fear; 6 is here.

Somnia—It makes sense that this band’s CD is titled The Rock EP, because over the past year, Somnia has really developed into a solid and entertaining act. This four-piece, guitar-based group has all the catchy hooks and memorable stage antics to become a national act. Singer/bassist Aaron Popp has a strong stage presence that sparks so much energy in audiences as to use club floors as trampolines and sing along with the catchy songs. Somnia is a local band that proves the St. Louis music scene is far from asleep.

7 Shot Screamers—7 Shot Screamers are a young band with a unique sound that blends rockabilly and punk rock to create a lively set sure to leave audience members screaming for more. The band has a charismatic lead singer who puts everything he has into the show and comes across like he’s ready for MTV. His showmanship is so strong and the band’s sound so distinct, it’s well worth it your time to check them out. I actually missed their last show at the Way Out Club but I look forward to getting another shot at seeing them play.

—John Kujawski

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Jeremy Enigk fronts the new incarnation of Sunny Day Real Estate, now performing as the Fire Theft.

Photo by Cayte Nobles.

SDRE’s most highly regarded album, Diary, was released a full ten years ago. So the story goes, and the cultlike fan base continues to grow, even after SDRE’s separation. The only source now is the highly informative fan-driven Web page, (www.thefiretheft.com), mastered by one of the biggest SDRE fans; leading us all to the music Enigk, Goldsmith, and Mendel are now making.

From the start of their set opening with “Uncle Mountain,” there it was: Enigk’s angelic voice. But the music that backed it was rockier, more straightforward, even showing the great influence of classic rockers like the Who, the epic sounds of Zepplin. Instead of the meandering SDRE staples such as “Pillars” and “The Ocean,” the Fire Theft brought us straightforward rock songs. Enigk’s playing and singing style-swaying side to side while he sings, guitar in hand-resembles the Sting of older times. He seems uncomfortable on stage as he always has, not talking with the crowd, preferring simply to just play without introduction or distraction giving the performance a genuine pure intensity.

After the third song of the band’s set, a fan called, “When does the album come out?” Enigk admitted, “We don’t know yet. We wish we did.” Though at this time, over 10 songs have already been recorded and are seeking final touches and a home to be released.

It’s when he screams that he’s at his best-fullthrottle emotion, conveying everything in a single, sustained note. The Fire Theft is branching into what seems to be new emotions for this intriguing man, a more hope-filled outlook, as exemplified by the personal touches in “Sinatra.

After a two-song encore—one of which featured Enigk on keyboards, alone onstage save for a chord here and there from the guitarist—the Fire Theft slipped away, into the early spring night, leaving us to wonder: would they return again? And if so, how long would we have to wait for the next reincarnation of these music makers?

—Laura Hamlett and Cayte Nobles

North Mississippi Allstars Blueberry Hill, March 28 Let’s get it out of the way right now: This show jumps into the innermost circle for consideration of the finest performance of 2003. I don’t care what happens for the rest of the year. Jesus himself could return and perform alongside a

reunited original Meters lineup (he would play the triangle), and this would still be better. The North Mississippi Allstars (singer/guitarist Luther Dickinson, drummer Cody Dickinson, and bassist/big man Chris Chew) have always had a lot going for them, but they’re starting to cross over from “very good” to “ridiculous.” Scientists have determined that if they improve any more, they’ll explode.

And at Blueberry Hill on this particular night, we got unadulterated excellence from opening bell to closing washboard solo. The Allstars led off the festivities with “51 Phantom” and never really looked back. Their brand of rootsy slideblues might suggest one-trick-ponydom, but they dismissed with that idea thoroughly, casting every tried-and-true song in a new light.

Whereas the album version of “Drop Down Mama,” for example, had a one-tick-faster beat that instantly set it apart from most blues/rock fare, we got a groovy funk-down for six minutes.

In fact, many of the songs were in a slightly different tempo. There are a number of different ways to make the leap from being a one-set act to a two-set headliner, and that’s one of the neat little tricks available.

The last couple of times the Allstars rolled through St. Louis, they played at Mississippi Nights and confined themselves mostly to material from their first two albums, Shake Hands With Shorty and 51 Phantom, but this time there was a healthy measure of new songs. Not only that, but some songs came out of extended improvisations that would have done the Allmann Brothers proud. That wasn’t always there before. And here’s an advance tip: there won’t be a dropoff in quality on the next album, either, if this show was any indication. Those who fell in love with the rootsy Shake Hands when it was released in 2000 would find that hard to believe, but it may well be true.

At each of the earlier Mississippi Nights concerts, the highlight of the night was predictable: the “Po’ Black Maddie/Skinny Woman” combo, the arrangement of which doesn’t stray from the album version. It’s always been catchy enough to stand on its own and be the band’s money shot. But at Blue Hill, “Po’ Black Maddie/Skinny Woman” blended right in with everything else, like “Shake ’em on Down,” “Sugartown,” and the always crowd-pleasing “All Night Long.”

There’s really no more to say. As a critic I’m supposed find something to criticize, but for three hours I was reduced to being just another fan with my head bobbing, standing in my own drool, along with everyone else. And you schmoes think this reviewing stuff is easy?

—Taylor Upchurch

The Datsuns The Galaxy, April 2 I must say that I attended the Datsuns show with some trepidation. After hearing the New

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Zealand foursome’s debut self-titled album, I was unsure exactly how a rather bland ten tracks would translate into a live show. The songs hit somewhere in the dangerous middleground between the cock-rock schoolboy antics of AC/DC and the searing garage of the Stooges.

They almost make me scared we’re going to be assaulted by nu-hair metal soon.

The Galaxy, still unable to aid in smoothing the raw edges of live balls-to-the-wall rock ’n’ roll with alcohol, was not as full as I’d hoped it would be. In fact, the crowd was downright sparse. At the show’s climax, there were, at most, 25 people in the audience, most quite stoic in composure. Not exactly that balls-tothe-wall rock atmosphere I was hoping for. The show began with local noiseniks Sullen, who proved solid in their Breeders-meet-the-90-DayMen aural assault. Their set was short, but in sheer amplification alone, they paved the way for the oft-hyped headliners.

After a short interim, the Sights hit the stage for what became a fairly disappointing jaunt through their sophomore album, Got What You Want, which runs unabashedly from the same musical wellspring that gave us the Who and the Jam. Songs like the album opener, “Don’t Want You Back,” demonstrate a deftness for emulating the intensity of early, jangly English garage, but the

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delicate piano and Hammond organ, along with singer Eddie Baranek’s rousing vocals, were drowned out by guitar noise that hardly translated into “jangly.” All the band’s dynamic, incendiary elements were lost behind a curtain of noise that did nothing for their more polished sound.

When the Datsuns finally took the stage, I desperately hoped they could inject some adrenaline into the audience—and the ambiance—of the otherwise lifeless venue. Hype has surrounded the band since the middle of last year, with NME touting them as “the next big rock blah blah blah.” Thus, England loves them. Thus, Europe loves them. In the U.S., though, they have yet to find acceptance. And it was a tough gig: an empty Midwestern bar, but after opening with a medley that included the thorny “Sittin’ Pretty,” it was obvious that the lads from Sort-Of Down Under were not going without some type of very loud, guitar-involved fight.

The rest of their set was blistering, with song after song of ridiculous guitar wankery. I don’t usually like guitar solos very much, but those that came squealing out of Christian Datsun’s guitar were miraculously dumb works of feedback and fingering. Highlights of the night included the album’s best material, like “Harmonic Generator” and “MF From Hell.” The band’s “encore” consisted of one song: the

album-closing “Freeze Sucker.” I think at least three overblown solos punctuated the song: a crowd member played Christian’s axe with a pool cue, and both Dolf and Christian slammed their entire arms against two guitars strapped to the latter’s body...back to back, of course. In the end, Dolf de Datsun screamed a lot, Christian played many, many solos, and my ears were brutally attacked by both. I even saw some onstage headbanging. And despite the relative disinterest of the crowd, the Datsuns delivered exactly what I’d hoped for: devastatingly loud, stupid, energetic rock music.

—Andrew Rea

Keller Williams The Pageant, April 4 Laugh is an engaging album and all, but there’s nothing in it to suggest a link between its creator, Keller Williams, and Off the Wall–era Michael Jackson. That’s reason number one to see Williams live: he made the leap effortlessly, at the Pageant on the first Friday of April, with a note-perfect version of “Don’t Stop (’Til You Get Enough).” That made two Michael Jackson covers in two concerts for this reviewer (the North Mississippi Allstars being the other, having blindsided the audience with “The Way You

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PLAYBACK ST. LOUIS

Although Cursive released two albums before Domestica (1997’s Such t’s 8:30 p.m. and we’re still waiting for our 7:00 interview with Cursive’s Tim Kasher. I have my questions, painstakingly composed Blinding Stars for Starving Eyes [Crank!] and The Storms of Early Summer: on the drive to Columbia and then rewritten (legibly) over a steamSemantics of Song in 1998 [Saddle Creek]), it was really this 2000 release ing latte at the Cherry Street Artisan that solidified their sound and began the when we got into town. It rained most of the growth of their underground following. After drive up, a cold, chilling rain with even a bit of Storms, Kasher had moved to Portland, hail. It rained while we walked up and down 9th Oregon, effectively breaking up the band.

Street, distributing Playback St. Louis to the fine Within a year, he was back in Omaha, a failed marriage providing creative fodder. With origifolk of Columbia. This is Jim’s first time in the nal guitarist Steve Pedersen away at law town; he’s decided that he doesn’t like it school, Kasher recruited fellow songwriter and because it rains too much. longtime friend Ted Stevens for the group’s We arrive at the Blue Note ten minutes reincarnation. On Domestica, his songwriting before 7:00 to find all of the night’s bands mingling in the club, post-soundcheck. Kasher turned personal; he had, after all, the eruption doesn’t seem to know anything about the of a love gone wrong—and all its inherent interview, or else he’s forgotten, claiming to swaths of destruction and still-simmering lava CURSIVE: Kasher, Stevens, Cohn, Maginn, and Schnase keep his schedule in his head. Not that it’s a flows—from which to mine.

And now, we proudly present problem, but it will have to be later, as the Maybe it all happened exactly as Kasher Songs perverse and songs of lament. band is off to dinner. So we are off, too, wrote it; maybe he captured all the emotions A couple hymns of confession, to…well, drive around town aimlessly for an but changed all the events...except one. I want And songs that recognize our sick obsessions.

Sing along—I’m on the ugly organ, again. hour, killing time. It rains some more; we get to believe, as Kasher sings on “The Casualty,” Sing along—I’m on the ugly organ, so let’s begin. lost, but not too badly. Then we’re back at the that the phone, thrown in anger, really did go There’s no use to keep a secret, Blue Note, a little before the allotted hour, as through the wall. In any respect, just as you Everything I hide ends up in lyrics, we don’t want to be late. We wait in the lobby, start to feel the pain and truly empathize with So read on—accuse me when you’re done— If it sounds like I did you wrong. where we can watch the door and avoid some Kasher, he throws in a line to remind that is he —“Some Red Handed Sleight of Hand,” of the noise of the opening band. wholly conscious of this act, this writing down The Ugly Organ It is 8:45 when they return from dinner. of his life in order to sell albums: “I’ll try to Kasher is apologetic; they’d gone to make this perfectly clear, I’m so transparent I Shakespeare’s Pizza, found it crowded, and so went somewhere else. “It disappear/these words I lyrically defecate upon songs I boldly claim to creended up taking even longer than Shakespeare’s would have,” he says, ate/…/this is the latest from Saddle Creek” (“Sink to the Beat,” Burst and apologizing again. “Let’s do this.” By now, the second of four bands is Bloom). It’s commerce, baby; nothing more. ready to take the stage; the bar is too loud for a taped interview. We head Yet it is, much more. With Domestica, Kasher crossed a line into the realm next door to Coffee Zone II, noisy in its own right, but a better spot for an of the personal—a move, he admits, was frightening but necessary in his interview than backstage at a rock concert. We begin. growth as a writer. “For any writer, you need to build the courage to actually Hot off the heels of their recent front-page article in The New York write personal; it’s the closest any that any of us can get to universal.”

Cursive has created some hard sounds at times, some very loud instruTimes’ “Arts & Leisure” section, Cursive were completing the first leg of a mentation and vocals, but it’s all part of the emotive quality of the music. six-week tour, with a week’s break in the middle. Columbia was the last “We really don’t like to consider ourselves so much of a hard rock band, night of the first three weeks; as Kasher said during the show, “We had but more of just mining away at the field of aggression and frustration; thought it might be one show too many, but we’re getting through it.” internally, I think, that is loud, and that’s kind of just where it ends up. But Cursive is one of those brilliant indie-emo bands out of Omaha, the curit was a great way for me to stay interested, to stay excited about music.” rent hotbed of indie rock and home of acclaimed Saddle Creek Records.

For their next recording, an in-between-albums EP entitled Burst and Cursive is a quintet—in addition to Kasher on vocals, guitar, and organ, the band includes Matt Maginn on bass and vocals, Clint Schnase on drums, Bloom, they introduced yet another oddity: a cellist. Oh, but if that wasn’t Ted Stevens on guitar and vocals, and Gretta Cohn on cello—but, really, it the wisest addition I’ve yet to hear in a band; Gretta Cohn’s stringwork adds all boils down to frontman Kasher, the group’s primary lyricist and selfan achingly melancholy contrast to the shattering guitars and Kasher’s appointed teller of truths. Basically, he takes the most intimate, embarrasswail. When I ask Kasher how he came up with the addition, he confessed ing aspects of his life—largely those involving matters of the heart (the it wasn’t initially his idea. “It was a suggestion I got from Todd [Baechle] of “ugly organ,” as he calls it)—and, painfully, peels them apart. One can the Faint. He said, you know, a four-piece rock band is such a format, such only hope the result is cathartic for him; for listeners, it’s both captivating a regular medium, and a new [instrument] would really help expand the and disturbing. sound.

Band photo (this page): Saddle Creek. Live photos (opposite page) Laura Hamlett/Jim Dunn

may 2003

See more photos of Cursive and read a review of The Ugly Organ at www.playbackstl.com

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ON THE COVER

it’s like, ’Wow, great record; now we have to do a “Once we got the idea, we startrecord that’s as good as that.’” ed asking around. [Frequent Saddle It also helps that much of the current Omaha Creek producer/contributor and owner of Presto scene is composed of friends who have grown up Studios] Mike Mogis had kept [Gretta Cohn’s] together. “Ted [Stevens] and Conor [Oberst, of number, because he’s an engineer and producer Bright Eyes] and I hang out; we’re very close and he had remembered her as an excellent celfriends, so we’re very comfortable talking about list that had opened up for Bright Eyes a couple absolutely anything and everything. It’s easy for us of times. So we got in touch with her and she to have a really open dialogue about what we want came out to a show, and then flew out and songs to be like. [With] every release, we kind of worked on Burst and Bloom. That was kind of a open the conversation up to each other and try to trial period, and everything went great, so she figure out which direction we should go.” moved to Omaha.”

In listening to the progression of Cursive’s Burst and Bloom was mostly written by the sound and the disquieting beauty of their current time Cohn came on board, so she added cello offering, it’s obvious the process has worked thus parts where she thought they would fit. Creating far. It helps that Kasher’s a thoughtful songwriter, The Ugly Organ was a different story, as Cohn someone who gives equal weight to both lyrics was an integral part of composing the instruand music. To him, The Ugly Organ is a concept mentation. The difference is clear, as her cello lends a haunting maturity to the album that in album, similar to a book of short stories or a colON OMAHA COMPARED TO SEATTLE: lection of poetry—pieces tied together by a comunmatched in most indie rock records today.

We definitely wouldn’t be Nirvana; that That said, to keep in line with the trend thus mon theme. “Having everything be relevant is a far, the next Cursive album should hold some would probably be Bright Eyes. Who else was conscious effort,” he says. “I think that the music changes, right? “Every time I’ve tried to foresee there? Soundgarden, Pearl Jam…no, none of industry has a bad name, rock ’n’ roll has a bad those would be us. Maybe we’ll take it, I’ve always been wrong,” Kasher said. “We’ve name; it’s not really taken seriously. To try to do just barely touched the surface on what we want Mudhoney, how about that? They’re kind of something literary in music is [seen as] kind of like good luck underdogs. to do next, [but] the dialogue that Ted and I have dumb. I’ve always seen it as a shout out to all the started…is that we would like to go further into other musicians: try to take your lyrics a little more something that people haven’t heard yet and that seriously.” would take a repeat listen. The best compliments Eventually, Kasher says, he’d like to take some I have gotten from The Ugly Organ is…that it’s time off from music to focus on his writing. “I’m trying to figure at what point I can slow down discomforting, because discomfort is a very real music so I could start writing a book of short stofeeling. It’s like Requiem for a Dream; it’s nauseries. It’s really hard, because it’s this snowball ating to watch, but I think it’s a masterpiece; it effect, and it’s sometimes hard to escape from. I makes you so uncomfortable. The Ugly Organ is don’t want to escape too early, because you don’t a difficult subject matter that we don’t like to want to lose the momentum…and I might be makdeal with. So, musically, we were just kind of ing a mistake if I don’t keep pursuing that.” considering getting further into that discomfort.”

If there’s any justice in this convoluted world of Any discussion with Cursive must, ultimately, airplay, charts, and concert sales, Kasher will find include a discussion of Saddle Creek and all the time for his fiction writing and Cursive will go on wonder they’re promoting out of Omaha. But to enjoy even greater acclaim and recognition. Of just what is it about Omaha? “There’s been a lot course, life doesn’t always work out the way it of speculation,” Kasher admits. “I think it has a should; musicians and writers with the most talent lot to do with [the fact that] when you’re raised aren’t always the ones that find the greatest sucin Omaha, you don’t expect anything. I think cess. In addition to tremendous talent, though that you get to have that beautiful situation Cursive have two other points in their favor: they have a notable label where you are writing because you just want to write something really behind them, and they are part of a larger scene. I can see it now: one day, good; you don’t really see a light at the end of the tunnel, you’re just trythere will be a movie about Omaha and all the Saddle Creek musicians. And ing to do it. I think kids that grow up in L.A. or Chicago can see how it can who, I ask Tim Kasher, does he envision playing his role in the film? He turn a profit; none of us could have seen that. We were our own fans, suplaughs, considers the question. “I think I’d like it to be a woman. I think porting each other. It’s really important that nothing was ever competitive; Maggie Gyllenhaal would be great.” instead, it was raising the bar. We’re often saying that to each other, where

PLAYBACK ST. LOUIS

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NOW P L AY I N G ANGER MANAGEMENT (Sony Pictures), Rated PG-13 Anger Management is a film that pairs the unlikely duo of Jack Nicholson (hot from his critically praised performance in About Schmitt) and Adam Sandler (fresh from getting good reviews for his acting, believe it or not, in Punch Drunk Love) with a script ostensibly about a very real therapeutic concern. A large percentage of the populace has anger management “issues,” but it would have been silly to expect any insights or revelations on the subject from the director (Peter Segal) who gave the world Tommy Boy and Nutty Professor II: The Klumps. Segal is going for laughs here, and he wants to keep the audience on edge about who really needs the therapy more, mild-mannered ad exec Dave Buznik (Sandler) or unconventional, abrasive therapist Dr. Buddy Rydell (Nicholson). Segal is only sporadically successful with these aims.

The hapless Buznik is on a flight one day and, after another passenger refuses to vacate Dave’s rightful seat, ends up seated next to the odd, unhinged-looking Rydell. A contrived altercation results in Dave being blamed for assaulting a flight attendant, and he soon finds himself in court facing a no-nonsense judge (Lynne Thigpen). Dave’s ordered to attend an anger management session with Rydell, who presides over a motley crew of screwballs that include Luis Guzman, John Turturro (a guy with serious anger problems), and a pair of lovey-dovey porn chicks that are really into public displays of finger sucking. Dave is glad when the session ends, but events conspire to force him into further treatment with Rydell. In fact, another altercation ends up with Dave facing either prison time, or taking Rydell as his full-time live-in therapist.

Jack Nicholson and Adam Sandler star in a disappointing Anger Management. Photo courtesy Sony Pictures.

This is just one of many credulity-straining events to come.

Rydell doesn’t seem to be following any standard “anger management techniques” with Dave; he’s abrasive, frustrating, and downright weird. When he makes lewd comments to Dave’s girlfriend, Linda (Marisa Tomei), and goads Dave into doing seemingly irrational things like hitting on another woman at a bar (Heather Graham, in one of several curious cameos), you’re left really wondering what the doc is up to, and why Dave keeps putting up with it. As well, you’re wondering what the hell the director is trying to do, as the plot continually frustrates the viewer and makes Rydell seem wackier than Dave. There are some laughs, to be sure, but most are of the lowbrow variety. Some are just jaw-droppingly weird, as when Woody Harrelson turns up as a German crossdresser...or something. Nicholson is in shining mode here for the most part; he’s edgy, irritating, and unpredictable, and we’re supposed to wonder if it’s just part of the treatment, or if this doc is a quack. The surprise is that Adam Sandler actually underacts, and I can’t believe I’m saying that.

I’ve never been a Sandler fan, but he genuinely seems to be trying to learn a bit of craft lately, and he plays a decent, sincere character that is mostly free of “Sandler-isms.” His meekness contrasting with Nicholson’s bizarreness is one of the film’s conceptual twists, but it’s not as effective as the filmmakers think because of some poorly wrought scenes and childish humor

that tend to undercut the proceedings.

The many surprise cameos are entertaining, but gimmicky. John Turturro is a hoot in his brief scenes; this guy seems incapable of giving a bad performance. My biggest problem with Anger Management was the waste of the theme.

Therapy is a subject ripe for parody; even Analyze This scored more points then this film on the topic. I think it was a mistake to contrive Sandler’s treatment in the manner depicted here; what he’s made to go through seems misguided and sadistic, reflecting more on the “issues” everyone else around him seems to have. And there’s no real revelation at the end, despite an interesting climactic romantic scene set in a baseball stadium. But hey, if you like cheap comedies and Jack Nicholson having a good time, you might enjoy parts of Anger Management. Oh, and that “goosfraba” word? They don’t explain where it came from, but it’s as good a word as any to say to yourself next time you wanna slug somebody, run some asshole off the road, or tell your boss/coworker what you really think.

Popularizing an obscure word is likely to be this film’s lasting cultural contribution.

—Kevin Renick CONFIDENCE (Lions Gate Films, Rated R) “So I’m dead.” Thus begins the flashback confession of Jake Vig (played by Edward Burns) as he lays motionless in a filthy alley behind an even filthier bar. Confidence is a film about the seedier side of the streets, a world filled with two kinds of people, con artists and marks (the latter a term used by the former to mean victim), with a considerable amount of crossover between the two. This film has a dash of Snatch and a pinch of Pulp Fiction, but its main ingredient is more in keeping with the maturity and (albeit grittier) elegance of The Sting. There are times during this movie when we don’t have the slightest idea what is going on, but there is always the comfort—that quiet confidence—that Jake Vig does.

There are some incredibly good actors in this film, although a few of them do feel miscast.

may 2003

Edward Burns and Dustin Hoffman play con men in Confidence. Photo courtesy Lions Gate Films.

Dustin Hoffman as the crime boss whom Burns crosses (and then must make amends) isn’t able to make you forget he’s Dustin Hoffman, as he as done so well in other films. Likewise, it’s hard to buy the lovely Rachel Weisz as the sleazy yet vulnerable small-time pickpocket looking to trade up for a bigger score. Weisz comes across as more of a sweet, beautiful woman trying to dirty up her sexuality to make Burns forget she’s sweet and beautiful, rather than a seductress from the streets using sweetness and beauty to make Burns forget she’s as much of a con artist as he is. This part of the casting was a bit surprising given that the film’s director is James Foley, who orchestrated one of the most incredible ensemble performances of all-time when he directed David Mamet’s Glengarry Glen Ross.

Foley did, however, nail it pretty good with the other actors. Burns gives a great performance as the smooth-talking, slightly conceited grifter with “integrity,” as does the barely recognizable Andy Garcia who plays the frumpy, unshaven, and paunch-laden federal agent. Other supporting roles are filled with cream of the crop “know the face, but can’t think of the name” actors such as Paul Giamatti, Luis Guzman, Donal Logue, and Morris Chestnut.

Confidence has all of the plot twists and turns you would expect (or not) and want in a film of this genre. There are more than a few good lines and great moments. And ultimately, it’s the journey, not the destination, that makes Confidence a fun film to watch. In the end, it doesn’t necessarily show us something we haven’t seen before, but the ride it takes us on to get there is pretty good fun.

—Wade Paschall MORVERN CALLAR (Cowboy Pictures, Not Rated) There is an interesting corner of films that often goes unnoticed by the general onlooker: films that are based on books, and wind up being exponentially better than the source material. The number of times I’ve heard people say that they thought “the book was better than the movie” or some similar line has to be close to infinite, but the number of times that I’ve heard people say “the movie was great, but the book

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really sucked” is zero. Why is this? Cases where the film is considerably better than the book aren’t all that uncommon; take The Silence of the Lambs, Out of Sight, or Trainspotting, for example. It is something that happens.

The newest addition to this category is the new Lynne Ramsay film Morvern Callar, which is based on Alan Warner’s book of the same name.

The book, while having an interesting plot, is suffocated by two things: it suffers from the Forrest Gump problem of being composed of sentences made up of no more than three or four monosyllabic words, in an annoying attempt to create a narrative voice akin to a stupid person (this is a valid device, I guess, but it makes the book as annoying as hell to read); and it tries, Trainspotting-style, way, way too hard to be hip and nihilistic.

Filmwise, comparisons between Morvern and Trainspotting are plentiful. Among other things, between them, they have two of the greatest soundtracks of the past decade. However, and even though the genre of music featured on the two soundtracks is decidedly similar, the music in the respective films is used in two completely different ways. Trainspotting was amazingly fast-paced, feeling like it was about as long as a commercial break rather than a feature-length movie. Morvern, on the other hand, is undeniably slow, so much so that one has to wonder how a soundtrack littered with tracks from bands such as Can and Stereolab can result in a film that is almost maddeningly slow-paced.

Morvern’s namesake is the title character, played headache-inducingly well by the alwaysbrilliant Samantha Morton. The plot is as follows: Morvern wakes up Christmas morning to discover her boyfriend (who is also her flatmate) dead on the floor next to her; he’s committed suicide. He has left Morvern a handful of Christmas presents: a jacket, a mix tape called “Music For You” (which is where pretty much all of the soundtrack is derived from; we hear the music only as Morvern hears it, and we do not hear music as an audience if Morvern is not listening to any, borderline Dogme 95-style), a suicide letter, some money for his funeral, a recently finished novel, and instructions on which publishers to send the manuscript to. When Morvern discovers her dead boyfriend, she walks around her neighborhood is a state of disorientation (she seems to do this because she feels obligated to, and not out of any kind of sadness or mourning), then eventually gathers herself and goes to a party with her friend Lanna (feisty newcomer Kathleen McDermott), with her dead boyfriend still untouched on the floor of her flat.

Morvern isn’t particularly smart, but she is extremely street-smart, which makes her and the way she deals with her boyfriend’s death an interesting counterpoint to the way most characters deal with death in films.

Another thing that Trainspotting and Morvern Callar have in common: their two respective greatest scenes (where Renton overdoses and sinks into the carpet in Trainspotting and where Morvern finally decides what to do about her dead boyfriend in Morvern), among the best scenes in contemporary film, period, are both played to the strains of Lou Reed songs (it was “Perfect Day” in Trainspotting and now it is

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A conversation With Confidence’s Edward Burns I’ve been doing this for a few years now; I don’t generally get nervous before an interview.

But for Ed Burns, I was ridiculously nervous.

I’ve been a fan of his since 1995’s The Brothers McMullen, a film he wrote, directed, produced, and starred in. Since then, he’s been creatively involved with a handful of other films (She’s the One, No Looking Back, and Sidewalks of New York, notably), and also starred in Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan. Perhaps, I reasoned, it’s because he’s “big,” a name most people would know. That interpretation was quickly shot down when I told my parents who I was interviewing. “Ed ‘Kooky’ Burns?” my dad asked, sounding—for the very first time—geniunely interested in my pursuits.

Burns was on the second stop of an eightcity tour to promote his new movie, Confidence. Produced by James Foley, Confidence was an anomaly for Burns, being that he hadn’t written the script, yet had the starring role. Which begets the obvious question, then: How hard is it to switch from doing everything—writing, acting, directing—to merely acting?

“It’s pretty easy, quite honestly, because it’s such a relief to show up on the set and not have to worry about all the details that a filmmaker has to worry about,” Burns said. “It kind of frees you up as an actor to focus on just that. The first thing I acted in that wasn’t my own was Private Ryan; showing up on that set, I knew I wasn’t going to be offering any suggestions to Spielberg about where to put the camera or what have you.”

For the complete interview with Edward Burns, as well as additional photos, go to www.playbackstl.com.

Photo by Ashby Walters.

PLAYBACK ST. LOUIS

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Now Playing

from previous page

attempt to regain both. In his previous screenplay, The Dangerous Lives of Alter Boys, Petroni captures a unique impression of adolescence.

Till Human Voices Wake Us sketches a picturesque portrait of youth but never reaches Alter Boys’ idiosyncrasy.

Samantha Morton plays a very confused Morvern Callar in a film of the same name. Photo courtesy Cowboy Pictures. the Velvet Underground’s “I’m Sticking With You”). This kind of odd coincidence might lead to some people thinking that Ramsay borrowed a little too heavily from Trainspotting’s director Danny Boyle, but she didn’t at all, really; Morvern is a very individualistic film, the likes of which are very uncommon in any country (both Boyle and Ramsay were born, raised, and made their films in the U.K.).

Ramsay’s only other film to date was 1999’s equally brilliant but little-seen Ratcatcher, which was an original story by Ramsay, so the theory that she has the singular ability to make films that are better than the books upon which they are based cannot be tested. There have been rumors, which, as far as I know, are unconfirmed, that Ramsay’s next project is an adaptation of last year’s runaway bestseller and critical success The Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold. It makes one wonder: if Ramsay can make an incredible film from a crappy book, how would a film of hers be if it were based on a great book?

—Pete Timmermann TILL HUMAN VOICES WAKE US (Paramount Classic, Rated R) In Till Human Voices Wake Us, Guy Pearce plays opposite an amnesiac but displays the same deadpan stoicism that so purely defined his character in Memento. Writer/director Michael Petroni creates a semi-supernatural tale of loss of innocence, loss of memory, and the

Helena Bonham Carter is a woman without a past in Till Human Voices Wake Us. Photo courtesy Paramount Classics.

Pearce plays Melbourne psychiatrist Sam Franks, a memory and repression specialist who travels to the rural town Genoa to attend to his deceased father’s final arrangements. On the train, Sam meets Ruby (Helena Bonham Carter), a slightly disheveled otherworldly woman with whom he senses an inexplicable connection.

From Sam’s first step onto the platform, Genoa evokes memories of a momentous summer when 15-year-old Sam (Lindley Joyner) returns from boarding school to stay with his father but spends most of his time falling in love with childhood friend Silvy (Brooke Harman).

Between flashbacks, Sam meets Ruby again, saves her from drowning, and learns she has amnesia. The remainder of the film alternates between present and past, with Sam trying to help Ruby recover her memories while she helps him confront his own.

The film begins with a series of scenes establishing both Sam’s cool, distant character and his buried past. He lectures to a class on active and passive forgetting and the loss of identity, shortly thereafter learning his father has died. What follows is a mixture of supernatural Australian

wilderness film (Picnic at Hanging Rock, Walkabout) and Vertigo, Sam playing the lovesick Stewart character who closes off emotionally after a traumatic event, then tries to relive and undo the past. Although the photography is lush and enchanting, the story has neither the disquietingly uncanny effect of classic outback films nor the perverse tension of Hitchcock. Additionally, Petroni strains to draw parallels between Ruby and Silvy, past and present, and self-consciously lays on the irony of a psychiatrist who cannot dream.

Beautiful images of moonlight swims and the quaint Victorian town bolster Till Human Voices Wake Us, and Carter plays a compelling Ophelia figure, neither here nor there. The film, however, never quite evokes the wonder and emotion to which it aspires.

—Ben Weinstein

may 2003 Play by Play LUCINDA WILLIAMS: WORLD WITHOUT TEARS (Lost Highway) Lucinda Williams long ago mastered the art of using music to transmute pain to pleasure,

and that mastery remains on blissful if sometimes blistering display on her new Lost Highway release, World Without Tears.

Although it may not quite equal her 1988 eponymous disc or 1998’s Car Wheels on a Gravel Road, the new CD fascinates; like much of Williams’ work, it has a loveliness bordering on the abhorrent, the aural equivalent of stigmata. Not coincidentally—we are, after all, contemplating an artist whose last release, Essence from 2001, included a track entitled “Get Right With God”—certain of the 13 songs here seek to bridge the chasm between flesh and heaven.

“Atonement,” the bluesy longest number, rumbles like the end of the world, “Ventura” lyrically blends the everyday and the ineffable with breathtaking skill, and in the treatment of its title, “Righteously” fuses the front pew and the back seat. (Four tracks later, incidentally, the hesitation of “Righteously” shades into the excoriating doubt of “Those Three Days,” a straight-razor anthem for the jilted.)

Other highlights of the disc include the languorous opener, “Fruits of My Labor”; Williams’ stinging paean to rock ’n’ roll in general and (perhaps) Keith Richards in particular, “Real Live Bleeding Fingers and Broken Guitar Strings”; and “Sweet Side,” the shortest track here, which movingly sketches both the blight of childhood abuse and the redemptive potential of adult love.

On the chorus to the eleventh track, “American Dream,” Williams (who will open for Neil Young at the UMB Bank Pavilion Sunday, August 10) drawls, “Everything is wrong.”

Happily, on World Without Tears, the obverse mostly obtains.

—Bryan A. Hollerbach YO LA TENGO: SUMMER SUN (Matador) It’s fit that Summer Sun starts out with a drone. But the sound that has defined a past five amazing efforts, the inimitable murmur of Yo La Tengo, is beginning to sound slightly different to me. Could it be there’s something predictable? No. No way, I tell myself. Since the release of Painful, back in 1994, the Hoboken threesome has made, at worst, one imperfect album. So what do I make of Summer Sun, a very pleasing 13 tracks that let me ease on down the smooth, paved road toward the horizon? Do I just up and ask for a little difficulty? Well, maybe. Much like their last widely

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available LP, When Nothing Turns Itself Inside Out, Summer Sun is an album for the evening, one that plays with quietude, that speaks volumes while saying little, like soundtracks to Raymond Carver stories. But there’s always a jolt in there somewhere, something to make me rethink the album entirely.

Since Nothing Turns, the Yo La family has widened, with guest musicians regularly adding their expertise this time around, including jazz heavyweights Roy Campbell Jr. and William Parker. The result is a fuller, almost orchestral feel to the songs.

“Nothing But You and Me” and “Tiny Birds” are a testament to this rounder sound, but instead of toying with different textures, the band seems content to keep rhythms and tempos fairly uniform throughout. So I ask myself: “Cherry Chapstick” and “Sugarcube” can’t be on every record to spike the silence, right? But that’s exactly what Summer Sun needs: a slap of brusque steely guitar, the grind of unforgiving feedback. Something that stands apart, if for no other reason than to stand apart. The aforementioned “Nothing But You and Me” does a satisfactory job, and it’s a great song nonetheless. It just doesn’t hit that decibel level so important in creating a perfect Yo La Tengo album (or so the formula has gone in the past).

This album has a hell of a lot going for it, too.

More than most albums this year, in fact. Ira, James, and Georgia’s ability to get damn funky while simultaneously staying nerdy and unassuming is unparalleled in the world of rock; no exception on Summer Sun. Tracks like “Georgia vs. Yo La Tengo” and “Moonrock Mambo” are some of their most playful since coming to Matador. This album is good, very good by most bands’ standards. But Yo La Tengo has upped the ante with each successive effort, so that finally they pay for their own greatness by having to deal with only a very good album. May most bands have half as much luck.

—Andrew Rea PETE YORN: DAY I FORGOT (Sony) On Day I Forgot, Pete Yorn continues compiling his resume to be this generation’s Springsteen. Yorn shares more than the Boss’s blue-collar fashion sense, Jersey roots, and brooding good-looks; Pete’s knack of finding the universal in his personal stories echoes the elder statesman of rock ’n’ roll singer/songwriters.

Day I Forgot takes Yorn fans down a similar path as his previous effort, the critically acclaimed musicforthemorningafter. The first single on the new record, “Come Back Home,” is a classic endof-the-road song. Like much of the album, the song was written and recorded at the end of a year-and-a-half marathon touring schedule. The resulting sound is a mix of euphoria and exhaustion; it captures that 3:00 a.m. rush of energy

continued on page 26

PLAYBACK ST. LOUIS

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THE P L AY ’ S THE T H I N G In the Blood HotHouse Theatre, April 25–May 4 While inspired by The Scarlet Letter (Nathaniel Hawthorne), Suzan Lori-Parks’ powerful play In the Blood shares more parallels with Daniel Defoe’s The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders. Despite the protagonist’s streetside urban lifestyle, her love and optimistic struggle is unfaltering. However, unlike Letter, The Blood’s Hester La Negrita’s protective love is born solely for her children. Her perpetual hope leads her into constant exploitative liaisons. Similar to Moll Flanders, this leaves her with more children, greater desperation, and spiraling self-destruction.

As in Letter, Hester shares a child with a minister. However, her minister-lover is an antagonist, unscrupulously preaching the responsibilities of men to their families, encouraging single mothers to pursue the pockets of their children’s fathers, while withholding financial assistance from the desperate Hester.

Like Moll Flanders, Hester’s cycle of affairs and one-night stands, beginning with the pursuit of love, is now a means to establish emotional connection with those who influence her life and to stimulate a cash flow. Conversely, Hester’s lovers use her to fulfill more than their base needs. Unwittingly, she falls into their sexual machinations, such as the plans of her best friend and co-purloiner, Amiga, to sell videos of the two together. Not even is her first love, Chili, exempt from this characteristic. After returning in style to propose marriage to the impoverished

Elliot Goes

Hester, he quickly rescinds his offer after his fantasy of a pious Hester is shattered upon his collision with four of her five children.

Writ with the heartbreak of a woman trying to improve herself for the sake of her family but without the strength and means to do so, this moving drama is a social commentary. As a single mother, abandoned by her many lovers, she is the superficial archetype of the urban welfare mom. She demonstrates the battle of many loving mothers to raise their children in good health yet without the resources. In order to meet the family’s basic needs, which include emotional, the social constrictors unwind.

As a result, Hester finds herself conflicted by vying and troubling solutions. Amiga, dancing in the background like an internal devil over Hester’s shoulder, encourages her to give up her children to pursue life’s pleasures. To prevent future children, Hester’s doctor wants to remove her uterus. Using threats, Hester’s duplicitous welfare councilor encourages her to pursue employment, training, or education, without providing clear support for her children or herself. Hester’s minister-lover has offered to treat her as a charity case, so long as she keeps quiet about their son’s parentage and comes to the back door. Yet Hester refuses the one thing that might rescue her, namely, providing the names of her children’s fathers to the government.

Five superb actors perform this daring play.

Most remarkable was Monica Parks, who poignantly portrayed Hester’s teetering dark character. The remaining four key actors perform the parts of two characters. Most endearing was Bryan Keith as Hester’s first love, Chili, and her first child, Jabber. As Jabber, Keith eloquently portrayed the budding young adult beginning to realize the faults of his parent yet still determined to protect her from the world. The saddest part is the crushing conclusion when the child’s dawning import of Hester’s faults—and his ensuing

disappointment—leads to the drama’s crushing conclusion. Tann Moore, Hester’s welfare counselor and daughter, Bully, provided overwhelming strength and realism to the bubbling, assured daughter and the absorbed counselor. Chopper Leifheit easily entertained the audience as Hester’s rambunctious yet troublesome son, Trouble, and also provided the drama’s first chill as the doctor. Larissa Forsythe provided bursts of brilliant and humorous energy as Amiga while, at other times, portraying Hester’s adorable little princess, Beauty. Lastly, as both the Reverend and Hester’s fifth child, Baby, Jack J. Gipson smoothly vacillated from the comical caricature of a playful two-year-old to a charismatic preacher who had audience members nodding their heads to his sermons.

—Alex Graves

by Bosco (with illustration help from Jessica Gluckman)

It was the Playback St. Louis anniver- We got to watch the bands from the sary party, and Elliot and I were MCs. giant wagon wheel chandelier.

Finally, it was our chance to rock.

Thank you, St. Louis!

may 2003

21 MY 2 PLANETS

LOCAL SCENERY Wydown have released their first EP, Rock Ends. Song samples will soon be available at www.wydown.com; in the meantime, you can procure your very own copy by sending $10 (postage paid) to 1240A Moorlands Drive, St. Louis, Missouri 63117.

Maxtone Four (B Brian McClelland, Karl Dodson, Jeremy Miller, and Chris Clark) are currently working with producer Drew Johnson on their debut recording, slated for a June 2003 release. Check out the MP3 page at www.maxtonefour.com for a preview. Based on a two-song sampler received at Playback headquarters, the music’s catchily poppy and worth a listen.

Anyone who enjoyed Shame Club’s opening set for Ghoul 5 at the Hi-Pointe will be glad to know the group’s eight-song CD, Bad Idea Realized, is now available. The actual CD release party was at Frederick’s and, after their recent performances, it seems there will be many CDs to come.

Wedding Laine is in the National Shorts Competition at the USA Film Festival in Dallas.

The festival runs April 24 to May 2, and director (and Cinema St. Louis/SLIFF coordinator) Andrea Sporcic plans to attend.

When the basement bar of Lemmon’s closed late last year, it meant the end of one of St. Louis’s most promising venues for music.

Now Lemmon’s is going to try hosting live music upstairs; the debut show will be a CD release party for the Rowdy Cum Lowdies. Held on Saturday, May 10, the party runs from 8:00 to 10:00 p.m., with free pizza and other giveaways throughout the event.

Spring Clock Wonder have completed their first CD, The Great Purification. The disc is currently available via their Web site (www.springclockwonder.com); look for it in local record stores in the coming weeks, with upcoming CD release parties at Sally T’s and three-1-three.

While the large crowd waited, candles burned onstage and a slide show flashed messages that proposed a somewhat fictionalized history of My 2 Planets. I wondered, did one of the members really play sax on several Metallica albums? All part of the fun of the CD release party at Mississippi Nights April 12 for The Other Side of Summer. The show, like the new CD, featured a combination of great lyrics and

intelligent melodies and sounded fantastic from the big stage. The all-ages show really did attract all ages: one of the funniest and telling sites of the night was a four-year-old shaking his butt to a My 2 Planets tune…proof that good music knows no particular age, only quality. Playback St. Louis wishes them the best of luck.

The City Museum is now open Friday and Saturday nights until 1:00 a.m.

All About Fun and Entertainment St. Louis are putting on ACT One, Washington Avenue’s first street festival of 2003, the weekend of May 3 and 4. Free for all ages, ACT One encompasses art, culture, and tunes, along with a downtown St. Louis housing tour.

Mark your calendars for May 16, when yet another Ticketmaster New Music Spotlight rolls into the Pageant. The all-ages show features local rock bands Nadine, Magnolia Summer, Tinhorn, Grandpa’s Ghost, and American Minor.

Go to www.playbackstl.com for your chance to win free tickets.

PLAYBACK ST. LOUIS

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Backstage Pass

Cave In w/Piebald

Keller Williams onstage at the Pageant.

Photo by Molly Hayden.

Make Me Feel” at Blueberry Hill a week prior).

Really makes a man think.

Well, maybe it doesn’t, but how about when Williams weaves back and forth between Dave Brubeck’s “Take 5” and Phish’s “The Sloth” without hesitation, as he did almost immediately after the King of Pop shenanigans? Now that’s innovative. And did I mention that he specializes in the vocal trumpet?

Williams’ secret weapon is deconstruction. He starts with one melody, be it vocal, guitar, or drums, and uses his pedals to loop it back, maybe trying again until the audience approves. Then he heads over to another instrument to add on another line. He creates each song one building block at a time, right in front of everyone. Occasionally he’ll wander over to his own little mixing board and fiddle with that. Then, when it’s all assembled, he takes his axe and solos over the whole concoction, often ending up in some other song entirely. At the end of the show, the only man Williams acknowledges is his soundman.

But nobody can sustain interest for two sets on gimmickry alone. Williams writes relatively simple songs that belie some serious chops. One more reason this guy is building a following exponentially: he can play upbeat song after upbeat song for three hours and not miss one single beat. And though he doesn’t have the reputation of jaw-dropping guitar wizardry (yet), when his spastic strumming it at its best, it wouldn’t stand out too much from the catalog of Leo Kottke. And his best shows up more often than you might expect.

For someone who performs in solitude (aside from the occasional cameo with String Cheese Incident), it’s interesting that Williams needs to be in front of an audience to really make a connection. The first reason is that his songwriting is a little one-dimensional: it’s all upbeat and bouncy, and most attempts at creative variety, such as “Spring Buds” and the idea to electronically remix Laugh into Dance, haven’t succeeded. But onstage, his talent outshines everything else. And he’s charismatic, too. He prances and cavorts about, unafraid to ham it up at any point along the way.

And that’s part of the point: not just anyone can strut around onstage all by themselves night after night and succeed. It doesn’t take just fast hands, uncanny rhythm, or a sense of humor.

You need them all. That’s why Keller Williams can flat-out entertain, no assistance required.

—Taylor Upchurch

The Galaxy, April 9 The nerd rock revolution that began in ’94 with the notorious blue album that swept millions of square pegs into a bad fashion show of armyissue glasses and “nerd-sheik” culminates nearly ten years later with the maturation of Piebald. As the band members took the stage, it was not surprising to see that they were all wearing crappy Tshirts. From their greasy hair and pale skin (which has probably only seen the interior light of a tour van for the past months), they all shared the similar look of the mad scientist, toiling over unending algebraic equations. They shouldn’t be wearing guitars; they should be wearing white lab coats, fussing over calculations, buttons, and red alarms. Singer Travis Shettel performs a high-wire act between keyboards, guitar, singing, and splashing in his own infectious Costello-esque prancing. These guys really leap into their playing, teeth snapping into fleshy boredom. I was honestly not much of a fan of Piebald, but their live show has changed my mind.

Those of you who are familiar with the Boston quartet Cave In know that they have cashed in on the image and imagery of the final frontier, inadvertently cultivating a broad yet accurate description of their new sound: “space rock.” In fact, it seems only natural that they would play in a place called the Galaxy. As the lights dim, the band walks onstage in movie slow–motion, like astronauts embarking on a somber mission of exploration. His axe swinging like a star from his shoulders, rhythm guitarist Adam McGrath reaches not for a pick, but a $4.95 toy ray gun, complete with pulsating lights and sound! He presses the trigger while placing the gun over the pickups, and the amazing journey has begun. Singer Steven Brodsky is last on stage, donning his guitar with confidence and sending crashing waves of dark, looming chords that echo within the Galaxy, shaking the walls and our ribcages.

Most of Cave In’s live show is built around their ability to create sonic atmospheres and mental landscapes of feedback loops. As some of the crowd considered this weird, noisy, or—my favorite—“artistic masturbation,” let’s not forget the aesthetic value of creating walls of sound within a limited sphere. They played everything off their new RCA album, Antenna, and deafened many youths who haven’t yet learned that standing two feet away from speakers twice your size is bad.

—Kevin Korinek

The Postal Service Creepy Crawl, April 10 Perhaps I set myself up for disappointment. I curled up with my best headphones and the Postal Service’s album, Give Up, for nearly a month, growing to like the imperfect balance

from page 13

between sad indie rock and bloopy electronic pop more with each listen.

However, I should have known that this kind of album is difficult to reproduce in a club setting, much less the Creepy Crawl, which is better suited for shows driven by electric guitar. The intricacies of Jimmy Tamborello’s synthesizer programming were swallowed by crowd chatter.

Ben Gibbard frequently asked for more volume, more bass, more vocals, but for all practical purposes, the band still sounded like a copy of a taped copy of the CD. The show consisted of songs off Give Up, plus the original Gibbard-Tamborello collaboration, “The Dream of Evan and Chan.” Apart from lengthy outros and extra bleeps and blips, there were no surprises on the setlist. While some indie synthpop bands revel in covers of ’80s new wave cheese, the Postal Service apparently wasn’t interested.

If you managed to wedge yourself between the merch tables and the video games on the side of the stage, as I did during the second half of the show, you were treated to an excellent visual display. You could also witness Ben Gibbard play the drums, clumsily dance to “Clark Gable,” or clap his hands like a little kid while singing “Such Great Heights” with touring female vocalist Jenny Lewis. Watching the band enjoy themselves in spite of acoustic obstacles was the most redeeming part of the show. Sadly, though, we couldn’t all stand on the side of the stage.

Gibbard apologized while attempting to adjust the sound, “Sorry about this, guys. We’re a stereo band in a mono world.” Unfortunately, that may be true.

—Jessica Gluckman

Jurassic 5 The Pageant, April 17 Truly forming a bond with an audience and maintaining it for 90 minutes is a rare feat.

During their dynamic performance at the Pageant, Jurassic 5 removed any boundaries and established an effective connection with the young, mostly white audience.

Also known as J5, the four MCs and two DJs of one of hip-hop’s rising groups provided tremendous vocal and musical skills throughout the upbeat performance. Beginning the show with the call-and-response fun of “I Am Somebody,” funky beats of “Break,” and inventive grooves of the 2000 single “The Influence,” they generated plenty of movement from the enthusiastic floor crowd. Mixing superbly between all four MCs and supported by a booming, ear-throbbing bass beat, J5 served notice to their unique sound. The predominant tone does borrow considerably from old-school hip-hop pioneers, but it remains fresh when conveyed with this much talent.

continued on page 28

may 2003

I Think I’ve Said Too Much: College Radio Confessions

By Rev. Mike Tomko

Episode 1: “What is college radio anyway?”

Welcome, one and all, to the first installment of “College Radio Confessions.” This column will serve as a venue for bands, artists, club owners, fans, etc. to learn the inside scoop of what college radio is and how to get a record on air.

Each month we will feature a new topic, as well as tips and tricks from industry reps, A&R1 guys, promoters, artists, and my own experiences as a college program and music director. Hopefully by reading this, you will be able to more effectively promote your band, but more importantly avoid the common pitfalls associated with ignorance to the ins and outs of the system.

In order to help you decide if your band is ready to venture out into college radio, we must first define what it is. The word “radio” often confuses people because by no means is college radio within a stone’s throw of good old commercial radio. The commercial side is totally geared toward revenue, whereas college radio delves deeper into the world of diversity, presenting a more freeform listening environment with a not-for-profit twist. This turns some people off when they first listen to a college station because most are not used to

23

the absence of commercials, less repetition, or the crossing of genres (i.e., a world track into a techno track into a metal track into a folk track).

Jerry Sellers, Director of Radio Promotions at Tinderbox Music explains, “From established artists that see far less commercial airplay than they used to receive (Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Lucinda Williams), to bands that have fostered huge following that have no help from commercial radio (Flaming Lips, Death Cab For Cutie, Cat Power), to up-and-coming bands who just want to be heard (Troubled Hubble, Fruit Bats, D4), college radio is willing to take a chance on good music that commercial radio assumes the public has no interest in.”

Here’s how it works: For a college station to be serviced2 by a record label, they have to submit their charts to CMJ (the College Music Journal), which is a weekly tabulation of charts submitted by all of the college stations around the country.

This, in turn, helps promote the label, because if a lot of stations play their records, then they chart high, which boosts sales and everyone goes home happy. The types of charts that are submitted are World, RPM3, Loud Rock,

COLLEGE RADIO CONFESSIONS Hip-Hop, Jazz, Core Rock, and each station’s individual Top 30. This is where you come in…

In the current state of the record industry, there are many deals available for unsigned artists. However, as the number of bands being signed goes up, the quality of their contracts goes down. This means that the best you can hope for is the label to give you a small advance4, which has to cover recording, touring, and living, as well as providing you with a small college radio distribution/promotion deal. (Statement based on survey results, not intended as a tried and true fact. Of course, there are always exceptions to every rule.) I say, skip the middleman.

Rex Donati, Head of College Promotion at Howard Rosen Promotions, stresses that, “If you really want to make it, if you really want to be the next big thing, establish reachable goals, and establish a game plan on how you are going to achieve those goals.”

Take this advice to heart, because realistically trying to go from the local bar to the arena isn’t going to happen overnight, but what you do while getting there can determine whether you soar like an eagle or fall like a fledgling baby bird. Try this approach: Take the money you make from gigging and working side jobs to record a good demo, get it duplicated, and then let the promotional storm commence. By taking the initiative to get your record out to college radio on your own, and doing it right, when the labels come knocking, you leave them no choice but to give you a better deal because they can’t just put you back into the college scene. All of these topics will be covered in greater detail in further episodes.

Tune in next month for Episode 2: “Shedding Your Baby Fat—Is it Time?”

1 2 3 4

A&R: Artists & Repertoire serviced: to be on the record company’s list to receive record releases RPM: a genre encompassing all different versions of techno music advance: an advance is a stipend of money fronted to an artist by a record label to cover expenses before a record is released; this money is only a loan and has to be repaid

Mike Tomko is the acting Program and Music Director for KGLX The Galaxy, the radio station of Webster University, www.kglx.org.

PLAYBACK ST. LOUIS

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Five Quick Questions With the Reactions

TA K E F I V E

By John Kujawski The Reactions are a local three-piece—Jacob Daniel Alspach (drums, vocals), David Steven Rocco II (bass), and Robert William Mayfield (guitar)—with a unique, clean guitar sound and a drummer who sings a bit like Mick Jagger.

Their sound is so sophisticated that it’s hard to believe this group is made up of three local teenagers who play better than most people in their 30s. Their self-titled CD can be purchased at shows, and their live set leaves 15-year-old girls as well as baby boomers screaming for more. The Reactions have a band image—they only wear striped shirts onstage—and bring a lot of energy into the clubs when they play.

I spoke with guitarist Robert William Mayfield about his group.

1. Who would you say are your big musical influences?

I would say the Beatles and maybe the Beach Boys. Anything that is “older rock.” I don’t think we’re really a punk band, but we get thrown into

those shows just because there are so many punk rock bands here in St. Louis. I’d say that the 15-year-olds like us, but there’s a lot of older people who like us, too, and they get into it.

2. How did you come up with the idea of wearing striped shirts on stage?

We all went to Marshall’s and went shopping for clothes that we could wear; I thought we were gonna be getting things like white shirts with ties or suits, and we ended up getting these silly shirts. Some people like them, and some people

don’t. There was this one guy at a show who was really mad at us. It made him really mad because he didn’t like the shirts, and he just kept yelling at us because he thought we looked just fucking retarded and it made him mad.

3. Do you get a lot of reaction from people at school because you’re in a band?

No, they don’t really care. If you go up to someone at school and tell them that you’re in a band, they just say, “Oh…” 4. How has it been taking guitar lessons from local guitarist Jeb Sloan?

He’s a great guitar teacher; I’ve learned a lot from him. I’ve been taking from him for a few years now. He’s full of energy. I get ready for my lesson, and I think that I have a lot of energy and I’m wide awake, and then he shows up and at the end of the lesson I’m totally tired.

5. What are the Reactions’ plans for the future?

It would be nice to keep going, but we would have to have some good opportunities to move on.

may 2003 MARK BEGO: BONNIE RAITT: STILL IN THE NICK OF TIME (Cooper Square Press) Woe betide the biographer who identifies too closely with his subject, as Mark Bego does in Bonnie Raitt: Still in the Nick of Time, an updated edition of which just issued from Cooper Square Press.

That way lies disaster.

Translation: this biography of the uncategorizable musician behind such releases as Nick of Time (1989) and Luck of the Draw (1991) makes uneasy reading. Sloppy writing, frankly, mars the bio; in particular, it brims with what grammarians and other fussbudgets would flag as dangling modifiers—leading one to suspect the population of competent editors is fast dwindling. Moreover, tonally, Bego fawns like a pup rescued from the pound, and he exhibits a deadly affection for the exclamation point. (Might a discerning reader find his prose effusive? Assuredly not!!!)

Where Raitt’s own voice comes to the fore, happily, things start to swing, as one would expect from a woman who has distinguished herself both in her music and in her activism for such causes as the anti-nuclear movement, environmentalism, and the Rhythm and Blues Foundation. By way of example, Bego retails the following Raitt commentary, a 1988 quotation from Frets: “One of the reasons I like to play slide guitar, what drew me to it in the first place, was the fact that it sounded like a human voice crying—it was very evocative. Especially when you’re singing about something that’s so intensely personal that you have to stop singing and play instead. It takes over for the voice.”

More such commentary would have strengthened the volume.

Still, as a reviewer, one perforce plays the hand dealt, not the hand desired. Including more than two dozen black-and-white photographs, a 28-page discography, 19 pages of source notes, and an index, Bonnie Raitt: Still in the Nick of Time tops 300 pages. For this edition, the back matter has been updated, and Bego has added a 45-page thirteenth chapter which carries his subject from 1995, the publication date of the original, to last year and which, among other things, sketches the mysterious end of her happily-everafter marriage to actor Michael O’Keefe. (“[B]y 2002,” notes Bego, “neither Raitt’s official Web site, nor O’Keefe’s own Web site, even mentioned the other one’s name.” Hmm.) Serviceable but tedious, it’s a flawed bio of an artist who deserves better.

—Bryan A. Hollerbach

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LLOYD KAUFMAN: MAKE YOUR OWN DAMN MOVIE (St. Martin’s Griffin) Lloyd Kaufman, the cofounder of Troma Studios, was approached

by Penguin Putnam some six or seven years ago to write a how-to on the subject of independent filmmaking. The book that he wound up turning in to them, All I Need To Know About Filmmaking I Learned From The Toxic Avenger, read more like a guide to Troma’s greatest hits, and not much like an instructional guide at all. Now Kaufman is two films further into his 25-plus film career (Terror Firmer and Citizen Toxie: The Toxic Avenger IV are his most recent), and he has finally written his tome about how to make an independent film.

An important distinction to be made here is that Kaufman gives advice not just on how to make an independent film, but on how to make a Troma film, which is not much like any other independent film you are likely to see. If you are unfamiliar with the films of Troma, they are usually made up of a minimum of three distinct criteria, among others: they will have an unbelievable amount of violence, which is shot in maybe the most unrealistic but somehow more disgusting fashion possible (Kaufman’s films in particular are notorious for having head crushings in them, and this is accomplished by hollowing out a cantaloupe, then filling it with raw hamburger and Karo syrup, dressing it up so that it could pass for a human head in the editing process, and then violently smashing it on camera); they have so much sex and nudity that calling it gratuitous does not do it justice (witness a chapter title in Make Your Own Damn Movie: “Chapter Four: Get Your Women Nekkid and Other Invaluable Casting Tips”); and they have funny titles (my favorites are attached to otherwise horrible films: Stuff Stephanie in the Incinerator and Fat Guy Goes Nutzoid).

PAGE

BY PA G E Make Your Own Damn Movie, assuming you don’t mind making a Tromaesque film, is actually pretty ideal for those who are wanting to make or making a film in a city that is not New York or Los Angeles, as Lloyd gives sound advice on how to weasel money out of people who are still impressed by the potential glitz factor of having their name in the credits of a movie.

Furthermore, Kaufman does know how to make the most (or least, if you prefer) with a small budget; he claims that Citizen Toxie’s budget was less than that of the original Toxic Avenger, which was made more than 15 years ago on $475,000 (he hasn’t disclosed Citizen Toxie’s budget)—which, by comparison, is about 2% of the budget of Glitter. His legal advice is equally credible to his financial advice, as his father is a lawyer who has taken care of Troma’s legal concerns for years, and can, as a result, point to the many loopholes that one can jump through to get a film made quicker, cheaper, and with less hassles from the law.

Aside from all of the advice, from how to weasel dentists out of large sums of money to how to make realistic fake poop, Lloyd has not forgotten to include what made All I Need To Know About Filmmaking I Learned from The Toxic Avenger such a fun book to read—the horror stories from production.

Where else can one expect to hear stories of losing a filming permit for having a fat man run naked through Times Square?

Make Your Own Damn Movie will undoubtedly appeal to two groups of people: Troma fans and poor, would-be filmmakers struggling to make a movie. Make is well suited to both of these groups, as well as many others. Kaufman does not use much technical jargon (perhaps because he doesn’t know any), and as a result, it is easy for anyone to pick up Make and be entertained. Just like the best Troma movies.

—Pete Timmermann

PLAYBACK ST. LOUIS

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Play by Play

YOU ARE HERE Private Sector

by Rudy Zapf This is the second of four articles about living and working for the arts in the St. Louis area.

This month’s focus is on private sector arts organizations in the city.

On a recent Saturday morning, West End gallery owner William Shearburn spent some time conversing about local art. The recently opened exhibit in his McPherson space shows paintings by artist Kit Keith. Although Keith is a former St. Louisan, she relocated to New York in 2000. Her paintings, which incorporate the nostalgic thrall of ’40s and ’50s items and historical female stereotypes, have been described in earlier reviews as “cutting edge” and “daring.” She is one in a handful of area artists that Shearburn represents.

There has been a deeply cut line of demarcation between private and volunteer-dependent art groups, as if they were opposing camps in the art wars. Surprisingly, private galleries share similar objectives as nonprofit arts organizations: they want to support the arts and do it well enough to still be open next year. For Shearburn, this means that the bulk of his business revolves around finding, acquiring, and selling blue chip post-WWII American art. This includes, among others, works by Close, Christo, Lichtenstein, Motherwell, and Rauschenberg. He acknowledges, “St. Louis is a very conservative town, so I’ve always had a difficult time showing emerging work.”

Ironically, dealing in major-name art actually affords him the luxury of supporting a small group of local talent. The gallery/artist relationship is not one he takes lightly. Often, Shearburn knows an artist several years and watches as visual language and aim of intent matures before the offer of representation is made. For him, it is a carefully nur-

tured friendship. “The people that I represent are ones that I’m really committed to, and have had long term relationships with. I feel that I can continue to be enthusiastic about their work.”

The talk segues into the question of who is buying art in St. Louis, and who is not. Due in part to the slumped economy, one sector that has not been purchasing artworks is business.

The effects of this can have a lasting effect on a city’s intellectual vitality.

St. Louis likes to think of itself as a cultured city. We look to New York, L.A., Chicago as bigger,older, more sophisticated siblings. Out of our league, to be sure, but we don’t compare ourselves to other Midwest, midsize towns like Indianapolis or Cincinnati. We deem them to be provincial “cowtowns.” The sad fact is that, yes, we are that small, both in size and in sophistication. We don’t have a city-wide tax base to fund public art programs, as do Portland and Seattle.

And gone are the days when large local businesses invested in regional arts. Over the past ten years, several businesses have changed hands from local to offsite ownership. When locally owned, a corporation’s governing bodies are naturally invested in the community’s quality of life.

Shift headquarters to a remote region and the atmosphere of hometown pride is displaced.

“When Mark Twain Bank was around, they were very supportive of local artists.” remembers Shearburn. “They would come in and they would spend and they would want to know locally the people I represent. They would want to participate on all levels.”

Back in the ’90s, when big banks became mega-banks by swallowing others, Mark Twain Bancshares was bought by Mercantile. Since then, it has changed names and hands more than once. Its championing work for the arts has not been preserved by its successors. As has happened repeatedly in the past ten years, the bottom line for profits has depleted business’s inclination toward recognizing those that offer less tangible rewards.

Companies that have in the past profited from big name art investments might reconsider their position.In another ten years’ time, it’s quite possible that there will be a shortage of blue chip names from the ’90s and ’00s in which to invest.

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before the inevitable crash. Yorn creates straightforward rock ’n’ roll without the trappings of “modern rock” and the glut of garage revivalists.

There are faint echoes of Jim Morrison on “Carlos: Don’t Let it Go to Your Head” and David Bowie on “When You See the Light.”

Above all, Yorn has a unique gift for writing realistic love songs. On this album, absent is the Your Body Is a Wonderland imagery of more radio-friendly fare and in its place is a strange little gem called “Burrito.” Yorn croons, “It’s a 7-11/Do you wanna take a walk outside/If you want a burrito/You can have a bite of mine…/Come on over tonight.” Though Yorn delivers the album with an expressive voice, he has yet to master vocals like the other dozens of instruments he plays on Day I Forgot. Fans of musicforthemorningafter will not be disappointed, but Yorn has left himself with some room to grow.

—Ross Todd VARIOUS ARTISTS: 50 (Saddle Creek) All right, I’ll admit it: I’m a Saddle Creek whore. I’ve reviewed a release of theirs every month for the past three months, and I’ve put a Saddle Creek band on the cover this month. The truth is, I’ve never heard a Saddle Creek release I didn’t like. I have, however, been privy to an advance copy of their 50th release, a two-disc compilation entitled, simply, 50. The set features two songs each from 10 of their top artists—one old, one new and unreleased—and it will quickly revive your sagging faith in compilations.

Those who long for the goth-edged techno dance music of the ’80s will take instantly to the Faint, Omaha’s hard-hitting techno band who kick off disc one. “Worked up so Sexual” is reminiscent of mid-career Cure; Todd Baechle sings with a lazy loll, backed by an underlying buzz of synthesizers. Their second offering, “Take Me to the Hospital,” has more of a contemporary trance feel to it, with vocal distortions and a slower, more serious beat. Now It’s Overhead gives us “Wonderful Star” and “Dark Cycle,” and on both tracks, Andy LeMaster sounds like he would be just as comfortable singing country music. The second track is especially nice, a gentle and somber reflection about being caught in a depressive loop; vocal distortions heighten the solitary effect.

L.A.’s Rilo Kiley, hot on the indie scene, offer the country-tinged “With Arms Outstretched,” complete with end choir. “Jenny, You’re Barely Alive” is more indicative of the band’s indie rock strengths.

Cursive’s offerings include “The Martyr” (from their 2000 release, Domestica) and “Nonsense,” both strong, both obviously Cursive with their sharply contrasting sounds and Tim Kasher’s deprecating wails. continued on next page

may 2003 Play by Play

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The two tracks from Son, Ambulance provide a good introduction to the music of former Bright Eyes contributor Joe Knapp. Gentle innocence abounds in “A Book Laid on its Binding” from Son’s only full-length, 2001’s Euphemystic.

“The Moral of Rosa, Parolee” has a darker feel to it musically, but the same lazy, youthful singing style as Knapp’s counterpart Conor Oberst.

Oberst’s other band, Desaparecidos, begins disc two with “Man and Wife, the Latter (Damaged Goods)” and “Popn’ off at the F,” two tracks so strong that you realize the acclaim this Omaha folk-rock singer’s been getting is incredibly well deserved. Nobody conveys emotion and urgency the way this kid does; the music soars, crashes, and crescendos along with the message.

Tim Kasher finds his alter ego with the Good Life, a more straight-ahead keyboard-driven sound compared to his work with Cursive.

Evoking the timelessness of Dick Dale is “I Am an Island,” an upbeat sound combined with a slice of hope. “Aftercrash” is a slow, technobased number, but the voice is still unmistakably Kasher’s as he sings, “Drag me from this constant car crash/Pick out all the glass.” Athensbased Azure Ray, a female duo (also the other half of Now It’s Overhead), offer us “November,” a somber song that lives up to its name. “Beautiful Things Can Come From the Dark” also features the girls’ signature strings and whispery harmonies; if played outdoors on a clear night, you can believe the voices will reach all the way to the heavens.

Sorry About Dresden’s “Sick and Soar” is radio-ready, and while it seems a bit out of place on this indie-laden double gem, there’s no denying its catchiness. Matt Oberst’s scratchy voice is equally charming on “People Have Parties”; I still want to claim a Wire Train influence to their music, and it works. Recent Cursive addition (and Lullaby for the Working Class frontman) Ted Stevens fronts Mayday, and from them we have “Captain” and “Pond Love.” The former has the feel of an old sailor’s song; the latter is a song of love, more appropriately plucked out around the campfire after a hard day of riding.

Finishing the disc is Bright Eyes, the act who put Saddle Creek on everyone’s radar. For the uninitiated, the two tracks here—“Something Vague” from Fevers and Mirrors and the unreleased “One Foot in Front of the Other”—provide a glimpse into Bright Eyes’ sound. Whereas “Vague” is dreamy and dramatic, “One Foot” is a definite folk song. “I’m drinking the ink from my pen,” Oberst sings at one point—and maybe that explains the magic of his words and his voice.

Also on disc one are all of Saddle Creek’s online weekly movies from 2002.

—Laura Hamlett

B A C K S TA G E PA S S

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SPECIAL EDITION

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The Playback St. Louis First Anniversary Show A great big thanks to everyone who attended our first birthday bash April 5 at Off Broadway! It was a rousing night of music, giveaways, and general goodwill as we were entertained by five of the area’s most talented bands.

Thank You...

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First, to the bands, who donated their time and their talents: the Bottoms Up Blues Gang, Kevin Michaels, Supercrush, Somnia, and Just Add Water. To Joe and Connie at Off Broadway, for being such wonderful hosts.

To Kevin Barry, for coordinating all the bands’ scheduling and instrument changeovers. To Jennifer Carr, for taking the night’s photographs. To ADA, Landmark Theatres, EMI/Capitol Records, and Bloodshot Records, for providing CDs, movie tickets, and schwag for us to give away. To all of our talented and dedicated writers, photographers, editors, and illustrators, without whom we could never have built this magazine. And, finally, to you, our readers, for attending the show and for reading the magazine, month after month.

Photos at left, from top: 1

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Bottoms Up Blues Gang: Adam Andrews, Kari Liston, and Jeremy Segel-Moss.

Kevin Michaels: Mike Gregory, Jill Aboussie, Kevin Barry, and Mike Flynn.

Supercrush: Brian O’Connor, Ryan Hoelting, and Ronnie Day, with Radomir Ratkovic on drums.

Somnia: Mike Heeley, Aaron Popp, and Jack Walker, with Mike Lowder on drums.

Just Add Water: Mike Steimel, Steve Waller, Dan Martin (background), Brian Nicoloff, bassist Dan Martin, and Peter Lang.

All photos by Jennifer Carr.

For more photos from the anniversary show, visit www.playbackstl.com.

PLAYBACK ST. LOUIS

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Backstage Pass Formed in Los Angeles from Rebels of Rhythm and the Unity Committee in 1993, Jurassic 5 first appeared on the national hip-hop radar with the release of the single “Unified Rebellion” in 1995. They performed this innovative track during the encore section, finishing with an excerpt of Run DMC’s “It’s Like That” as a tribute to Jam Master J. Each of J5’s four MCs performs with a distinctive method of delivery that makes their combination even more impressive. The group’s visual centerpiece is Charlie 2na, a tall, imposing figure with a booming low voice and genuine stage presence. His style matches nicely with Marc 7’s quick rhymes, dreadlocked Ali’s clever wordplay, and Zaakir’s fluid delivery to generate remarkable music.

Much of the rightful credit for Jurassic 5’s success goes to DJs Nu Mark and Cut Chemist and their innovative grooves. 1997’s self-titled EP and the full-length debut, Quality Control, owe much to their unpredictable, go-in-any-direction creations. Following an initial set of tunes, the DJs took over and provided all types of interesting music. Nu Mark sat at a school desk and tapped on a beats machine while Cut Chemist matched him on a nearby drum set. They next placed small, peculiar electronic mixing devices around their necks and conducted minor orchestras of sound. While nicely mixing up the show, this interlude also served notice that all six Jurassic 5 members play a key role in the band. They leave the arrogant egos at the door and produce a more diverse brand of entertainment.

The quick, 50-minute regular set closed with “What’s Golden,” the opening single from 2002’s Power in Numbers record. While not their most innovative creation, this track does

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summarize Jurassic 5’s central tenets: “We’re not balling, or shot calling, we take it back to the days of yes-y’all-in’; we holding on to what’s golden.” At the start of the lengthy encore, they introduced “Freedom” with a hope for peace and an anger directed toward President Bush. “A Day at the Races” provided the breakneck highlight of this section with Marc7 leading the way. A batch of impressive freestyling from each MC concluded the evening. Exuding no worries about security, they quickly jumped into the enthusiastic crowd for an extensive and very friendly autograph session.

Jurassic 5 will be joining alternative favorites Jane’s Addiction, Audioslave, Queens of the Stone Age, Incubus, and the Donnas this summer for the return of Lollapalooza. This tour should increase their crossover fan base even more and lead to greater success for the group.

The lack of racial diversity in their audience remains a mystery, but it shouldn’t make them any less relevant in the hip-hop community.

DJ Format entertained the crowd with assistance from a talented group of breakdancers during the show’s first hour. The three guys performed impressive head spins and moved energetically across the stage and on the floor. The DJ spun plenty of crowd favorites, including classic numbers from Run DMC, A Tribe Called Quest, Outkast, and the Roots.

—Dan Heaton

Ani DiFranco The Pageant, April 18 Ani DiFranco shows never start at their appointed time. Usually, DiFranco’s annual stop in St. Louis starts about three months prior, when the show is announced. Fans start buzzing about their favorite songs, CDs, and previous shows in corner bars, living rooms, bedrooms, and in the long lines surrounding the Pageant on Friday night.

There is no dismissing the fact that DiFranco has created a worldwide community for herself.

A soldout crowd surrounded the Pageant hours before the doors opened, fans lining up early for a glimpse of their own heart by getting a peek at hers. Honestly, for a group of self-proclaimed activists, troublemakers, and extroverts, they were calm, orderly, and well-behaved while being herded into the Pageant 50 at a time.

Once settled, the crowd was treated to a tremendous show by Bitch & Animal. Bitch & Animal’s energy, attitude, passionate groove, and Righteous Babe–style set the stage for DiFranco to come out and blow the roof off the room. If you haven’t heard their songs, especially “It’s Eternally Hard” and “Ho-Licious HoeDown,” pick up the albums ASAP. These days, DiFranco is in full tour mode. She explained to the audience that she’s been touring since shortly after September 11, 2001 and it

Ani DiFranco, folk star, onstage at the Pageant.

Photo by Molly Hayden. showed. The first half of the show was good, but didn’t seem to have her trademark zeal to match the audience’s excitement so well created

by Bitch & Animal. DiFranco seemed to be easing her way in, shaking off her road weariness, taking her time. The crowd took to some of her more familiar older songs, but never reached the excitement that has filled venues in the past.

This could be due to the idea that the crowd was waiting for the rest of the band to show up.

It’s been so long since she released a solo album that many of her fans were unprepared for the lack of power. Truth is, DiFranco’s true genius is in her solo act. When she performs solo, you can hear the very core of DiFranco’s sound, her voice and poignant lyrics. This was especially true in some of her older songs, like “Back Back Back” and “Dilate.”

DiFranco has made the case on her new album, Evolve, that she is changing and maturing. Lyrics like, “The people who actually like me/won’t allow me to say no” (from Puddle Dive) show her frustration with those who criticize her evolution, and she has no problem saying so. This was especially clear when she hit the first few notes to “Names & Dates & Times” and the crowd went crazy. “Do you really know what song this is?” said DiFranco.

DiFranco seemed to shake off her weariness as she started playing some of her new songs, as if the older songs were somehow a weight on her shoulders. Her grin and surge in energy when she reached “Evolve” and “Second Intermission” oozed out like the old Ani, even if the crowd didn’t seem to pick up on it.

Finally, this much is true about Ani DiFranco: she is a folk star, not a rock star. There were murmurs of disagreement among the crowd about her constant dissent toward what the U.S. government is doing these days. She talked about it throughout the show and finished off the night with her 9/11 poem, “Self Evident.” A folk musician’s true responsibility is to dissent, to talk about life from the perspective of the folk. Even if you don’t completely stand in her corner about the ways of the world, you can’t ignore anyone with that much passion, heart, and energy. Folk on!

—Jeremy Segel-Moss

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The Playback scooter is getting an extra big workout lately with its monthly delivery duties: nearly 300 locations!

Luckily, it has that auxiliary gas tank and a place to store snacks. Each month, we update you on what is going on in the land of the Arch with interviews, reviews, and previews. Also, don’t forget to check out www.playbackstl.com for our weekly Events page, featuring previews on many of the great things that are going on in the STL. MISSOURI CENTRAL CORRIDOR Atomic Cowboy Borders - Brentwood Crazy Bowls & Wraps Rock Hill Disc-Connection Dogtown Gallery Drum Headquarters Eddie’s Guitars Farotto’s Focal Point Music Folk Pro Sound Store Sam Goody Tomatillo Wild Oats CENTRAL WEST END Coffee Cartel Daily Planet Einstein Brothers Bagels Eternity Vegetarian Euclid Records The Grind Left Bank Books Llewellyn’s Pub Magee’s Nik’s Wine Bar Racanelli’s Strata 34 Club Tomatillo Tom’s Bar & Grill Viva CLAYTON Brevé Coffeehouse Café Manhattan CJ Mugg’s Crazy Bowls & Wraps Central Crazy Bowls & Wraps Forsyth Einstein Brothers Bagels Fontbonne University Library The Gargoyle Hi-Pointe Café Hi-Pointe Theatre Il Vicino Imo’s Pizza Kaldi’s Kilkenny Pub Krueger’s Pub Plaza Java Ron Busch Guitar Studio Starbuck’s Forsyth/Central Star Clipper Strata Subway

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