Category: Music

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Spectrum Check

Dan Seeger

There were plenty of my upstart opinions flung around digitally this week at Spectrum Culture. Among the film reviews, there was my take on a new indie thriller, the sort of neo-noir that had a momentary spell of prominence in the mid-nineties. That’s not to imply that this new effort was outdated. Instead, it’s major sin was its unrelenting dullness. I’ve been sitting on a fair number of albums from late 2012 while still picking up new releases to review, and that stockpiling led to a pair of pieces this past week. I reviewed the second full-length from the Joy … Continue reading Spectrum Check

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One for Friday: Peter Case, “Put Down the Gun”

Dan Seeger

The first time I knowingly heard of Chekhov’s gun, it was in a song. The monumentally important Russian playwright used the gun as a mean to articulate the importance of efficiency in dramatic storytelling, writing, “One must not put a loaded rifle on the stage if no one is thinking of firing it.” The way Peter Case put it in his 1989 song “Put Down the Gun” was as follows: “I don’t want to swear it/ But it’s something that I’ve heard/ A gun in the first act/ Always goes off in the third.” So I came to my knowledge … Continue reading One for Friday: Peter Case, “Put Down the Gun”

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College Countdown: KROQ-FM’s Top 40 Songs of 1987, 8 and 7

Dan Seeger

8. “True Faith” by New Order New Order’s 1986 album, Brotherhood, may have still had an impact in 1987 (see #39 below), but it was the two-record set released during the year proper that represented a major turning point for the band. Called Substance or Substance 1987, depending on how deeply one feels the need to accede primacy to the Joy Division collection of the same name released the following year, the album compiled all of New Order’s singles and b-sides up to that point, although some of them in rerecorded or otherwise modified form. To help fill out the … Continue reading College Countdown: KROQ-FM’s Top 40 Songs of 1987, 8 and 7

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Spectrum Check

Dan Seeger

I had a busy week over at Spectrum Culture. I usually lead off this recap with the pieces I wrote for the film section, but given yesterday’s One for Friday post in this space spring directly from the new music review I wrote, it seems more appropriate to begin there. I often pick up releases from the bands that endure from my college radio days since I figure I have a little more authority in writing about them. That rarely results in getting the chance to celebrate a genuinely great records, but that’s exactly the pleasure I had with the … Continue reading Spectrum Check

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One for Friday: Yo La Tengo and Daniel Johnston, “Speeding Motorcycle”

Dan Seeger

This week, I wrote a review of the new album by Yo La Tengo, which naturally got me thinking about my long history with the band. I’m honestly not sure if my college radio station had either of the Hoboken group’s first two albums, but I actually remember putting their 1989 effort, President Yo La Tengo, into rotation. I can’t claim we were some brilliantly forward-thinking predictors of future greatness, embracing the record wholeheartedly. In fact, as I recall, it barely got played at all. For whatever reason (because it’s good, I’d like to think), I did return to it … Continue reading One for Friday: Yo La Tengo and Daniel Johnston, “Speeding Motorcycle”

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College Countdown: KROQ-FM’s Top 40 Songs of 1987, 12 and 11

Dan Seeger

12. “A Hazy Shade of Winter” by the Bangles “A Hazy Shade of Winter” was first recorded and released as a single by Simon & Garfunkel in 1966, about a year-and-a-half before it took up residence deep on Side Two of their album Bookends. The song charted at #13 for the duo, making it their fifth straight entry in the Billboard Top 40. Around twenty years later, the Bangles were recruited to contribute a song for a movie soundtrack, because it was the eighties and that was what happened then. The band was still basking in the enormous success of … Continue reading College Countdown: KROQ-FM’s Top 40 Songs of 1987, 12 and 11

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Spectrum Check

Dan Seeger

Spectrum Culture eased back into operation after a holiday break this week. Even though we had a very limited amount of content, I still squeezed some of my high-falutin’ words in there. On the film side, I wrote about the new film from director Miguel Gomes, which has been turning up on some of the more esoteric year-end “best of” lists. It’s not quite at that level for me, but I certainly see the appeal. This week also marked the return of a regular yearly feature in which the writers collectively look back at the albums and films from five … Continue reading Spectrum Check

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One for Friday: Randy Newman, “Something Special”

Dan Seeger

Randy Newman is one of my favorite songwriters, which is a phrase that, to paraphrase Jack Donaghy, anyone with two ears and brain should be able to say. Though I revel in the reservoirs of dark cynicism that bubble up into his most famous songs (the bleakly brilliant slavery sales pitch “Sail Away;” the satiric “Political Science” that remains shockingly relevant forty years after he first recorded it; even the widely misunderstood mockery of prejudice in “Short People”), I have to admit to having a particular soft spot for, well, Newman’s underappreciated soft spot. When Newman started penning songs for … Continue reading One for Friday: Randy Newman, “Something Special”

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That’s my favorite song. Baby, do you wanna dance?

Dan Seeger

One of my fairly recent year-end traditions is to share those songs included on my personal tally of the best of the year that didn’t make the collective Spectrum Culture list. I did it last year and the year before that. My top six and eight of my top ten made our big list, so I go fairly deep into my grouping to deliver my five favorites that aren’t represented. It’s a measure of a pretty good year that all of these, then, are first-rate. Passion Pit, “Take a Walk” I have a feeling the couple of excellent Passion Pit … Continue reading That’s my favorite song. Baby, do you wanna dance?