Odds and Ends

A few random notes about this and that.

1. Thickfreakness – The Black Keys
I mentioned liking what I'd heard of this group and a friend brought this one in to borrow. I like them even more. Dan Auerbach's guitar and Patrick Carney's drums are all you need to produce crunchy, fuzzy, hard-hitting fat-toned blues. Auerbach opens the set with a Jimi Hendrix style line, Carney punches in, and the two man band is off and running on a group of mainly original material that sounds like it's been around a long time (and for this music, that's definitely a compliment). Auerbach sings with heart and the sound of hard-earned wisdom, unexpected in a young man, although the voice is mixed a little muddy (that's small "m" muddy). These guys are on Fat Possum, where they definitely belong (there's a shared song credit with Junior Kimbrough). Solid stuff.

2. Check out WFMU's website for the Van Morrison Contractual Obligation Album. All tracks are downloadable MP3's, and it's a hoot. Not quite as great as the American Song Poems (which merit a posting of their own), but this set laid down in 1967 (Astral Weeks time) represent Van's last efforts for Bang. The set of songs about some record company honcho named George are worth it just for themselves (including Dum Dum George, Here Comes Dumb George and, of course, Good-bye George). These tracks are essential for Van fans (like myself), and people with a taste for the weirdly funny (hey - that's also like myself; there's a pattern here). WFMU is cool, too.

3. If anyone is in NYC looking for an interesting off-Broadway play, Mrs. DJStan and myself saw The Artificial Intelligence of Jenny Chow yesterday, and it was good, smart, entertaining theatre. The story is hard to categorize, but it's a comedy-drama-fantasy with some good twists, and uniformly fine performances - especially Remy Auberjonois (yes, Remy - not Rene, so don't go expecting Odo) who plays several parts with flair and wit. And no, it's not a musical.

4. And speaking of Fat Possum, I caught another good music documentary on IFC called You See Me Laughin'. This one is the history of the label and the stable of Mississippi hill country bluesmen they've promoted - people like Cedell Davis (amazing saga), Junior Kimbrough, T. Model Ford, and my personal favorite, R. L. Burnside. Good story, and plenty of performances of rawest kind of blues still being made and recorded (thanks to Fat Possum) in this country today.

5. Some music for a rainy Sunday: Beyond the Missouri Sky (Pat Metheny, Charlie Haden), The Melody At Night With You (Keith Jarrett), The Black Balloon (John Renbourn), Charlie Parker with Strings - the Master Takes (Bird), Divertimento in E Flat Major, K.563 (Mozart), Return of the Repressed (John Fahey).

6. By the way, on second and third listenings, McCartney's new album (Chaos and Creation in the Backyard) impresses me more than it did at first. It's better than OK.