Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Do you remember Ween/Parsons? Funny how I gravitate towards certain genre combinations.


1) Mr. Bungle, "None of Them Knew They Were Robots". I shut the band off totally after cursory listens to tracks off of Disco Volante many years ago. It seemed then to be the kind of weirdness in music that I least appreciate, because there was no core that gave it any meaning. Imagine my surprise on learning that the successor to Volante, California, is one of the strongest albums of the '90s. My first reaction to this fine track was that it must be telling a pretty epic story underneath all the noise and stylistic shifts. My later reaction after sifting through said noise and shifts was confirmation of this hunch.

2) Townes Van Zandt, "Pancho & Lefty". Sometimes one encounters a supposedly classic track and finds it no different to any other track by the artist. While things sometimes settle on that state, other times there is a gradual process where one starts to appreciate the subtlety of the song. With "Pancho", it's probably the understated melody that's easy to lose sight of initially; with it, the words become that much rougher.

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