Musical Chairs

Posted on September 30, 2010 – 7:49 AM | by OldManFoster

• 

We’re stoked to have local legend Charles Albright inaugurate our new format for the Musical Chairs feature: five things, 500 words. (Some of the past contributors were skewing a little verbose.  We always have the comfort of you, the reader, in mind.)  If you pay any attention at all to Sac’s music scene you probably already know all about Charles, his headphones, the guy who made fun of his headphones in the pages of the SNR, his dozen or so bands, his solo project, his Black Flag obsession, his love of mathematics and his penchant for making lists.  The other eight of you who’ve never heard of him are just going to have to take our word for it: the guy is a city treasure.

Dream Date – Come Over Now

MidMo Associate Editor Becky Grunewald (or HeckaBecks, as I call her) tried to clue me in to these ladies for months before I caught on. What a fool I was – Dreamdate’s Come Over Now might be my favorite record of the last two years. The title track typifies the best aspects of Dreamdate: beautiful melodies, beautiful harmonies, subtle wordplay and the courage to stand by how you feel even if you know you probably shouldn’t. Please, someone book a Nacho Business, Dreamdate & Knock Knock show this fall. Please.

Black Flag – “I’ve Gotta Run”

Among the many great artistic successes and failures of Black Flag, this song somehow gets lost in the ipod shuffle. “I’ve Gotta Run” digs, crawls and stumbles in the best possible ways as a B side on their TV Party EP. The song is quite possibly Greg Ginn’s best recorded guitar work on any Black Flag record – next to his guitar solo on the 1982 demo of the My War classic “I Love You.” But remember, I’m so far gone (pun intended) when it comes to Black Flag, that you may have to ignore everything I am saying right now.

Slayer – Live Undead

It was between Slayer’s Live Undead and Dinosaur Jr’s “The Lung” off of You’re Living All Over Me. Since I just saw Megadeth and Slayer recently at Arco, I’ll go with what’s on my mind. Now most people are going to tell you that Rein in Blood is the definitive Slayer record, and they are right. However the record after Rein in Blood, South of Heaven, demonstrates that Slayer’s vision on Rein in Blood was no accident. South of Heaven is slow and sloppy for a Slayer record, which for Slayer means it is actually neither of those two things. The most amazing thing of all to me about this record is that drummer Dave Lombardo can swing a thrash-metal beat. I have no idea how that is logically possible.

The Wipers – “Telepathic Love”

To be totally honest, this Wipers song had fallen well below my radar for years. I had only taken notice of it while wasting time looking up Vivian Girls videos on youtube. The Vivian Girls did a great cover of this song and it made me seek out the original. To me, this song captures what is likeable about the Wipers perfectly. It’s sad, wistful, alone and defiant. “Telepathic Love” reminds me that one of the best gifts a songwriter can give to the world is to show us the true complex nature of our emotional lives. A song can safely admit to us the things we can’t admit to anyone else in the world.

Dog Party – “U Doubt Me”

Take note critics: DOG PARTY IS NOT A GIMMICK BAND. Sure, we, the audience, may give more to them than the average band because of their younger age, but that’s where it stops. Their song “U Doubt Me” is a perfect rock and roll song: call and response vocals, a simple idea (being doubted) and a grasp of song composition dynamics (stops, starts, accents, development of parts) that most bands twice these ladies’ age still don’t have.

Tags: Black Flag, Charles Albright, Dog Party, Dream Date, slayer, The Wipers