Music, musings and miscellanea

This video, unearthed by media gossip site Gawker of all places, shows Nine Inch Nails performing on some American Bandstand bastardization back while promoting Pretty Hate Machine, probably sometime in 1989. Along with being absolutely ridiculous, it shows two things: how closely related dance and industrial music are and were at the time and just how out-of-step with the mainstream Nine Inch Nails were. Obviously Trent’s label at the time, TVT, had no idea how to promote the band. Trent Reznor was at one time considered one of the most important figures in music. And while he continues to push boundaries with new marketing and distribution models, it would be nice to see him stretch himself musically, so he might once again seem so out of place in the mainstream.

“Down In It” – live on Dance Party USA

This has very little to do with music, but its too good to pass up. It was made by one of the staff writers at Macleans. It really makes you realize how far the genre’s been pushed over the last decade, and thank God for that.

30 Rock Re-tooled

Last night Ben Folds played an excellent set at the Kool Haus here in Toronto. He and his four piece band delivered a slew of stuff from his latest record Way To Normal including a pair of the leaked fake tracks while mixing in a lot of old favourites like “Alice Childress,” “Philosophy,” “Annie Waits” and a phenomenal version of “Army.” Having never seen Folds back in his heyday with The Five, I was obviously stoked. Good times had by all.

UPDATE: YOU CAN CHECK OUT THE SET LIST HERE

During the set, Ben took a minute to discuss some controversy that had been stirred up earlier in the day. While on Laurie Brown’s CBC Radio 2 show, he described Do Make Say Think/Broken Social Scene member Charles Spearin‘s new record The Happiness Project as “bad spa music.” Someone claiming to be Torq Campbell from Stars, and using Stars myspace page then wrote a blog post calling folds a MOR has-been, a hipster and an asshole all for just not digging a record. Folds wanted to clear things up last night, explaining that he actually meant the “bad spa music” quip as a compliment and that he actually quite liked the Charles Spearin track Brown played. Further he said that anyone whose writing on blogs about the debacle should (and yes, I do see the irony in me writing about this) “write a politician or something.” He made no mention of Campbell specifically though he did cite the pitchfork post about the blog post.

Anyway, to further complicate matters, today Campbell issued a statement explaining that he never wrote the original blog post and that Stars myspace page had been hacked. They’ve since changed the password he says.

So to recap, Folds never insulted anybody and Campbell didn’t write an angry rant about the non-insult. If anything came of this it’s that a whole lot of people now know who Charles Spearin is. You can get a good sense of the whole debacle by reading the P4K post here.

Ben Folds Five – “Army”

Did you see the Grammy’s? Lame, I know. Still we got that killer performance of “Swagger Like Us” with the most pregnant woman in the world and this “don’t even try to be as good as us cause you will fail miserably” performance of In Rainbows opener “15 Step” from Thom York and Johnny Greenwood. To avoid listening to Gwyneth Paltrow skip ahead to the 57 second mark. See it again for the first time.

Thom Yorke, Johnny Greenwood and the USC Marching band – “15 Step”

As I’ve previously mentioned on this blog, the new U2 track “Get On Your Boots” blows. But during U2′s rather drab Grammy performance tonight (which despite mega-efforts is turning out to be the usual snore fest), it was pointed out to me that the verses from No Line On the Horizon‘s lead single bear a striking resemblance in rhythm and tone to Bob Dylan‘s immortal “Subterranean Homesick Blues.” Of course, Dylan did it better. Dig it…

U2 – “Get On Your Boots”

The future needs a big kiss
Winds blows with a twist
Never seen a moon like this
Can you see it too?

Night is falling everywhere
Rockets at the fun fair
Satan loves a bomb scare
But he won’t scare you

Hey, sexy boots
Get on your boots, yeah

You free me from the dark dream
Candy floss ice cream
All our kids are screaming
But the ghosts aren’t real

Here’s where we gotta be
Love and community
Laughter is eternity
If joy is real

Bob Dylan – “Subterranean Homesick Blues”

Johny’s in the basement
Mixing up the medicine
I’m on the pavement
Thinking about the government
The man in the trench coat
Badge out, laid off
Says he’s got a bad cough
Wants to get it paid off
Look out kid
It’s somethin’ you did
God knows when
But you’re doin’ it again
You better duck down the alley way
Lookin’ for a new friend
The man in the coon-skip cap
In the big pen
Wants eleven dollar bills
You only got ten.

Maggie comes fleet foot
Face full of black soot
Talkin’ that the heat put
Plants in the bed but
The phone’s tapped anyway
Maggie says that many say
They must bust in early May
Orders from the DA
Look out kid
Don’t matter what you did
Walk on your tip toes
Don’t try, ‘No Doz’
Better stay away from those
That carry around a fire hose
Keep a clean nose
Watch the plain clothes
You don’t need a weather man
To know which way the wind blows.

Get sick, get well
Hang around an ink well
Ring bell, hard to tell
If anything is goin’ to sell
Try hard, get barred
Get back, write Braille
Get jailed, jump bail Join the army, if you failed
Look out kid
You’re gonna get hit
But users, cheaters
Six-time losers
Hang around the theaters
Girl by the whirlpool
Lookin’ for a new fool
Don’t follow leaders
Watch the parkin’ meters.