White Album Mix Tape – Pt. 2

Well, my point was proven: all 30 tracks of the White Album had been covered by other bands, including the songs you wouldn’t expect, like Glass Onion and Revolution 9.

The White Album definitely contains some of the Beatles artistic low points. Some of these cover versions show that even on an off day the Beatles showcased great song writing talent. Dear Prudence, Why Don’t We Do It In The Road, Everybody’s Got Something To Hide and Helter Skelter are great tracks in the hands of others.

So here goes side 3:

  1. Birthday - Happy Occasion Singers. A secret favorite of mine, and the only song on the White Album that Lennon and McCartney wrote together. So I was disappointed I couldn’t find an agreeable cover version of this song. The only one I could find was this one from an album of occassional party music. Anyway, I had a point to prove and that’s what counts!
  2. Yer Blues - The Jeff Healey Band. Blues. Jeff Healey. Can it be any more obvious? Dark and heavy version of a song that’s not frivolous to begin with.
  3. Mother Nature’s Son - John Denver. There are several versions available out there, all of them very true to the original. This is the only one I could find where the cover band made it their own. Besides, I have always been a sucker for a banjo.
  4. Everybody’s Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Monkey - The Feelies. This is not a rock song, this is a zen moment. Mesmerizing, shoe gazing and stomping version, definitely surpassing the original.
  5. Sexy Sadie - Sexy Sadie. When you name your band after the song, you have no choice but to cover it. This Spanish rock band from Mallorca waited ten years to give us their version. Likeable version with lots and lots of guitar.
  6. Helter Skelter - Dana Fuchs. I always found the original unstructured McCartney jam a bit hard on the ears. This show stopping live version brings the song back to what it basically is: a very good rock-n-roll song.
  7. Long, Long, Long - Yim Yames. My Morning Jacket’s front man stayed in touch with the loving waltzy atmosphere, in what surely must be one of the finest Beatles’ love song.

And finally, side 4:

  1. Revolution 1 - Stone Temple Pilots. This cover version manages to combine both versions of Lennon’s rock song. It’s got the “shoe-be-do-wa” chorus from what the Beatles dubbed the Glen Miller version, as well as memories of Billy Preston’s organ from the single version.
  2. Honey Pie - Debby Lennon. This version is exactly as McCartney meant it to be: a broadway tune sung by a broadway lady.
  3. Savoy Truffle - They Might Be Giants. Stripped bare of its heavy horn section, this tune doesn’t have much to offer. There’s also a version by Ella Fitzgerald but it’s too weird and too loungy for me.
  4. Cry Baby Cry - Throwing Muses. The naive voice of Kristin Hersch goes perfectly with this anti-lullaby.
  5. Revolution 9 - Neil Cowley Trio. A single spoken reference to the “number nine” is enough to make this a cover version. In anyway, free style jazz surely is the perfect way to cover this weird collage of sound bites.
  6. Good Night - Fabio Koryu Calabrò. Calabrò’s project to cover the entire White Album in Italian and accompanied by a ukele has already been mentioned here. I could have taken that as an example to prove my point, but where’s the fun in that. Gone are the string arrangements, instead a beautiful Italian a-capella version. Buona notte a tutti.

UPDATE: Rutger pointed me to an initiative of Mojo to cover the entire White Album. It makes me want to revise some of my pickings, but I stand by it. At least I got Revolution 9 right.

2010
02/04
CATEGORY
music
TAGS
Write comment

White Album Mix Tape – Pt. 1

On a wintery day I ran into a discussion with a close friend of mine about the ubiquity of the Beatles.

I coined the unsubstantiated and rather bold statement that there was not a single output of the Beatles uncovered by other bands, making it the only band in the world whose entire catalogue could be multiplied.

He challenged me to collect a mix tape of Beatles songs played by other people. We agreed on compiling the White Album, not only because it is the Beatles’ longest album, but also because it is the most versatile in the fab four’s  catalogue, making it difficult or even impossible to find cover versions for some of the tracks.

With the help of iTunes we set forth on a long journey that took us through the basements of pop history, some of them well-lit, others murky and best left inundated. Also, the absence of the Beatles on iTunes would make for an ironic touch.

We were pleasantly surprised by some of our findings. For starters, we had to choose from several good versions of Revolution #9. In the end we came up with cover versions of all 30 tracks.

These are the versions we picked for side 1:

  1. Back In The USSR – Billy Joel. Culled from the historic soviet concert (it took a piano man to cross the iron curtain), this entry is a faithful and playful rendition of the original, the cheers of the crowd recollecting the airplane’s noise that opens the original album.
  2. Dear Prudence – Siouxsie and the Banshees. This underrated Lennon gem made a surprising transition to 1980’s gothica and survived the adding of lots of echo, creating a cover version that is more famous than the original.
  3. Glass Onion – Will Taylor & Strings Attached ftg. David Rice. Uninspired version as performed by session musician. Then again, how easy can it be to cover Lennon taking a piss on his own psychedelia.
  4. Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da - Howard Carpendale. Obviously, this was the song with the most choice on cover versions. Obviously, I bypassed the version by the Marmalades and picked the most cheesy one. Licked German schlager version to stress the polka rhythm.
  5. Wild Honey Pie – The Pixies. When in Rome… Ueber indie rock band play Beatles when in London for a BBC session.
  6. The Continuing Story Of Bungalow Bill – The Punkles. Punk version of Lennon’s story of an Indian safari, that lasts way too long.
  7. While My Guitar Gently Weeps – Peter Frampton. Always a highlight when listening to the original album, I was happy to find this version. Frampton takes the screaming guitar licks from Clapton and then adds some. This powerful version literally sends chills down your spine and is a fitting monument to the song writing talents of George Harrison.
  8. Happiness Is A Warm Gun – The Breeders. Wacky songs should be performed by wacky bands. Back in the days I could fall for a band if they were able to do a good Beatles cover. I fell very hard for the Deal sisters and their joyful band.

And for side 2:

  1. Martha My Dear – Brad Mehldau. It is safe to say the Beatles are very popular among jazz bands. This is the first of four jazzy installments on this mix tape. A single piano takes the lovely tune and takes it all over town.
  2. I’m So Tired – Phil Campbell. Slow faithful version of the blues. Nothing more, nothing less.
  3. Blackbird – Bobby McFerrin. This is a workshop by the master of the larynx, showcasing the song and the sound effects by a single human beatbox. Funky, yet light.
  4. Piggies - Nonato Luiz. Gone are the snorting sound effects. In comes a jazzy guitar.
  5. Rocky Raccoon – Gabor Szabo & Lena Horne. Who doesn’t want to hear the jazz diva sing these nonsense lines of a faux western hoedown? The stomping bass and funky rhythm give this otherwise silly song some relevance.
  6. Don’t Pass Me By – The Georgia Satellites. Loud and rocky square dance version of Ringo’s first composition.
  7. Why Don’t We Do It in the Road – Hans Esbjerg. How much fun can you have with this throw-away ditty? Apparently over 7 minutes in this live jazz version by the Danish master, that keeps on rocking. If you’re not in the mood for jazz, a very good alternative would be Lowell Fulsom’s blues version.
  8. I Will – Daniel Johnston. This is actually the only track that was not culled from iTunes. To my surprise I could not find any version of this song on iTunes. A cross-check on Google and wikipedia pointed me to this rare-to-find early work of the low-fi master. It is a sweet and lovingly performed tune.
  9. Julia - Bongwater. The etherial voice befits Lennon’s cry to his departed mother. The weird sound excerpts in the beginning do not.

I will post the other two sides of my White Album Mix Tape soon.

2010
02/02
CATEGORY
music
TAGS
Write comment

International Filmfestival Rotterdam 2010

This Thursday the 2010 edition of the International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) starts. I got my tickets! Unfortunately I only have time to visit the festival a day and a half, so I had to select from what the day had to offer. You will find it’s a rather light selection (only one non-western film).

Down Terrace, A British black comedy.

Under Great White Northern Lights, Rockumentary of the White Stripes touring through Canada.

Manila Skies, Fillipino thriller about an airplane hijack.

Ruhr, American love letter to the German post-industrialist Ruhr area. I expect a lot of beautifully decaying architecture.

Life During Wartime, Tod Solondz already makes pictures that look like Talking Heads songs. Now he’s even naming his film after one of their songs.

Les Barons, Belgian immigrants drama, set in the beautiful suburbs of Brussels.

2010
01/26
CATEGORY
film
places
TAGS


Write comment

Watch out for crapping monkeys

As seen in Artis ZOO in Amsterdam.Watch out for crapping monkeys

2010
01/26
CATEGORY
places
random rants
TAGS
Write comment

Steel Robbie

Stalen RobbieMy old hometown of Rotterdam has finally decided to dedicate a monument to the men (mostly men) who built the city by working in the harbor. The monumentis a 24 meter high steel representation of a metal worker, for which a fromer employee of the Rotterdamse Droogdok Maatschappij (RDM, or Rotterdam Dry Dock) stood model, and which was already nicknamed Stalen Robbie.

Like most beautiful things in Rotterdam, erecting the monument is a private initiative by its artist Sandy Warnaar. A location has been dedicated by the city, steel suppliers have been contacted and a marine salvage company has promised to hoist the monument to its place. The artist is currently seeking funds to cover the production costs and has launched this website to promote her idea (disclaimer: I built the website).

2009
11/13
CATEGORY
places
visual arts
TAGS


Write comment

Cold War Angst

I recently watched two old film-noirs, both recommended by my good friend Shane: Robert Aldrich’s Kiss Me Deadly, and Samuel Fuller’s Pickup on South Street. If you ever want a double bill of original cold war angst from the 1950s, consider these two.

Pickup on South Street (1953) is a thrilling chase after a classified microfilm, stolen by communist spies and accidently pickpocketed by low-life Skip McCoy. Although the film can be considered anti-communist – the commies get their upcomence – J. Edgar Hoover personally complained with the director about the main character not being patriotic enough. More timeless is the great black-and-white cinematography of the streets of New York – the film was almost entirely shot on location – and the great oscar worthy performance by Thelma Ritter.

Kiss Me Deadly (1955) is a wacky story which gets weirder near the end. Ralph Meeker swears revenge after a blonde he has set out to help gets brutally killed. He follows the perps in the underworld and stumbles on a suitcase with a mysterious but deadly content (supposedly the source of inspiration for the object of desire in Tarantino’s film-noir homage Pulp Fiction). The deadly glow of the suitcase taps into the new fear of radioactive atomic weapons, which I find prophetic, because in the mid-1950s atomic energy was all the rave and would lead to a brave new world as demonstrated in the 1958 World Fair in Brussels.

2009
10/14
CATEGORY
film
TAGS






Write comment

Albume Bianco

While looking for something else on iTunes, I stumbled on this hidden gem, called Albume Bianco by Italian master of the ukulele Fabio Koryu Calabrò. He has translated the entire Beatles’ White Album into Italian, and recorded all 30 songs (yes, including Revolution #9) acoustic while accompanying himself on the ukulele. What more could you possibly want!

The result is an at times tongue-in-cheeck but most of all lovely homage to one of the most schizophrenic pop albums ever made.

All four Beatles themselves have said that the album contains some weak points that could have been shelved in order to produce a more solid album. Albume Bianco contains all 30 songs, but not all of them in full length, causing both sides of the White Album to fit on one cd. After all, why drag on a song like Wild Honey Pie. The complex rhythms of Happiness Is A Warm Gun have been simplified, the stomping saxophones on Savoy Truffle have been deleted and the fact that all songs are recorded on a single instrument gives the songs more unity and puts a heavy focus on the songwriting talents of the fab four.

Now available at iTunes for just 8,99 euro.

2009
10/10
CATEGORY
music
TAGS

Write comment

Stop Making Sense

Only recently I purchased myself a copy of the legendary Talking Heads live registration Stop Making Sense. Although recorded over 25 years ago, the songs are strikingly contemporary, covering consumarism, global economy, war, modern age anxiety. My all time favorite song from the album would be Life During Wartime. It’s full of one-liners you can use any time of the day at the office:

“I sleep in the daytime, work in the nighttime, I might never get home”.

“I changed my hairstyle so many times now, I don’t know what I look like”.

“The sound of gunfire off in the distance, I’m getting used to it now”.

I changed my hairstyle, so many times now,"
I don’t know what I look like!
2009
08/07
CATEGORY
music
TAGS
Write comment

Willy DeVille (1953 – 2009)

Today Willy DeVille passed away. Mister DeVille was the embodiment of joy, crossing styles and was haunted by a Robert Johnson “Crossroads” kind of music.

Willy DeVille was 58 and died of pancreatic cancer.

Hey Rosita! Donde vas con mi carro, Rosita?

2009
08/07
CATEGORY
music
obituaries
Write comment

Canal Pride

Canal Pride

This weekend is gay pride here in Amsterdam. Highlight of four days of festivities is a parade of barges through the canals of the city. I took this picture from the Magere Brug (Narrow Bridge) across the river Amstel, about an hour and a half before the parade was about to pass. These boats pictured here are just lying and waiting for the show to start. The police were frantically trying to create a passage through the river Amstel for the 80 barges to pass. A cheer went through the crowd whenever someone took to the water.

I’m glad to see that Canal Pride, as the parade is know, gets more political every year. Gay rights were taken for granted the past years and a lot of work needs to be done to recreate those rights. So a lot of political and social organisations take a stand and participate in the parade, which used to be a float of free publicity for dance clubs and the likes. This year, for example, the mayor of Amsterdam leads the parade and performs a civil marriage on a barge of four Dutch-American couples, to make a statement to US society where same sex marriage is not a given. I also noticed a guy wearing a t-shirt, commenting the California proposition, saying “I never got to vote on straight marriage”.

2009
08/01
CATEGORY
places
TAGS


2 comments