This winter shall be reflected upon as a season of snow days. I am home now, the victim of the latest snow day (actually due to icy conditions in my county of employ). I am sitting at my desk sifting through the mountain of redundant files in my computer. I come across a file labeled Bootleg Babies. I open it up and investigate the contents. The title is a collection of live recordings from the band Underworld. I scan the track lists and one gig lights up my eyes and lights up my ears. Koln, Germany, 1999. Couple of clicks later I am at the trusty, crusty iTunes library. Scroll down and there it is, as it always is, between Udi Nevres Bey and Vampire Weekend: Underworld — Live in Cologne, Germany ’99. Immediately I start listening. Immediately I am back. Back where?

There are many details about my childhood that I don’t remember. I can’t tell you much of anything about Elementary school, middle school or high school. I struggle to remember things I’ve said or commented on in the past. Yet I listen to this live recording and I can pinpoint in exact detail how I ended up with this extraordinary show in my computer.

I began downloading this show on May 30th, 2000. How do I know that? In 1999 Underworld released Beaucoup Fish, a tremendous disc full of hands in the hair dance music with hips. In the month of May 2000 I was working at JAM Music on the West Side of Lansing and on May 31st, 2000, I had tickets to see Primal Scream at St. Andrews Hall in Detroit. This show, 11 songs long with a running time of 1 hour and 52 minutes, took several days to obtain via Napster. The songs of the show were all together, laid out in the banks and banks of songs. And over those days I downloaded them all. When I returned from St. Andrews and the epic, white noise, white light Primal Scream show, with my ears still ringing (my ears rang the next four days) the middle four songs of the set had completed. I have been listening to this show, in some form or fashion, ever since.

Beaucoup Fish was great, but this was even better. In 1999, the notion of an electronic band as a great live act was no longer just a joke. With Karl Hyde dancing and singing, Rick Smith and the great Darren Emerson manning the controls, Underworld delivered glistening, shimmering, beautifully euphoric music performed in front of a screen filled with art and blotches and blokes dancing. The show was devastating and for a long time it was a litmus test for people I would meet. They liked the show? Good people. Didn’t like it? Not so much.

Even now, my opinion of the show is infused with my own youthful energy and enthusiasm. When I listen to it I feel that sense within, that passion, that glow, that everything everything everything you hear in the band’s lyrics. The energy within those songs, squirrled away within me, is occasionally put to good use. Two songs from this concert are on my running iPod: “Kittens” and “Rez.” “Kittens” starts with a rollicking thump and a pounding rhythm. It pulls you in. At two minutes there is a dark undertone, with voices flitting in the mix. The rhythm breaks into percussion that builds up, a deep tone cries out, the percussion continues and then. . . silence. And then it keeps going relentlessly and (I have goosebumps right now as I type and listen) through the dark some synth pattern begins to play. And then the percussion drops away and it is just synth.

This is the part where I imagine what it would be like to have been there, at age 25. Would these sounds, accompanied by what they were, have brought me almost to tears like they do now? Would they have given me goosebumps? I wonder how I would have reacted to the version of “Rez” that closes the show? In “Kittens,” the glimmering synths arrive from the dark. In “Rez” they start the song on top of a peak and build everything else around those initial high sounds. I could sit here and try to describe the way it sounds, or the way that it makes me feel, but I would not be anywhere close to doing it justice. Just know this: To me, the song feels like a cool breeze on a hot day, and it fills me with the feeling that there is nothing, nothing on this earth, that has the power to transcend time or space or the physical the way music does. Not film, not books, nothing can capture that instant where your body changes from hearing music. Nothing.

—

Mike Vincent is a teacher, dreamer, grouch, and runner. He lives in northern Michigan and his favorite Beatle is George Harrison.

This is not a rant about getting rid of physical records to make way for digital music. It is a straight up and simple fact that as I’ve reach my current age I feel increasingly disconnected from music in my ability to find anything new and interesting and even in my ability to enjoy what I’m listening to. I begin to question whether or not I ever did enjoy music or if it was simply a venue to pour my addictive personality traits into. Before music, it was baseball cards. Before baseball cards, it was comic books. Music has lasted the longest, for sure, but it hasn’t really been the same since I left my music store job. And when I consider that statement I realize that it actually hasn’t been the same since I achieved my own goal of running my own music department in 2001. Somewhere, the responsibility and the increasing loss of leisure time robbed a certain fundamental enjoyment of music in my life. That is a hard thing to realize. Having kids and work and such just also reduces the amount of time one has and then reduces the amount of enjoyment one can find in the music.

And what really has this wall of sound done for me in the past 20 years of accumulation? What? Twenty years of buying music has gotten me what? Nothing. The content knowledge accumulated got me two jobs and nothing more. The knowledge collecting dust in my head has no purpose, no real world application. This is a stinging realization, even if it’s not a sudden thing, that this area of my life has resulted in a gigantic emptiness. At a point music became a commodity to me, a unit of measurement lacking any emotional center.

I used to be proud of my record collection. Now it is a giant black hole. Something no longer relevant to me. “Well what about playing the music for your kids?” I’ve asked myself. Why? I want my children, even now, to be independent of me. I want them to like what they like because they like it, not because I like it. A former co-worker (the one who I wrote about in “The language of letting go”) posted recently that he was listening to Axis: Bold As Love at age 13 and that everyone else are busters with no taste. Something charming like that. And I got to thinking: Who cares? Who cares what you listened to at 13? Who cares what you listen to at 37? Pride is a sin (if you believe in sin), and is that not a prideful statement?

In my first Idler column I wrote about Neal Pollack, a writer I feel less than charitable about (even tho he is more famous than I, a better writer and probably facing less financial calamity) and his music time with his child. I recall finding the music he would play a typical, holier-than-thou hipster collection of drivel. I flashed back to this thought while looking at pictures from an in-store at Amoeba Records in Hollywood. Smack dab in the middle of the photos one literally burned my eyes and into my brain. There was this shaggy guy in a checkered shirt, looking to be in his mid 20s. Black hair, shaggy beard. Holding in his arms a CHILD. What was the in-store? Jomo Podmore and Irmin Schmidt. I realized I reached a new point in the circle of hipster garbage. Like Miles Davis I started at zero and have reached zero again. Only the zero is me.

All I know is I can’t even stand to look at my CD collection right now. I used to think it was bad when both racks were in the master bedroom in my house. Then I would wake up and see it and hate it and wish it was gone but never could bring myself to do anything about it. Then I noticed that the light from yonder window was bleaching the color from my beloved little investments and so I moved both racks across the house. And now I see the entirety of my life spread out on one wall. Not only that, but my bookshelves are in that same room, four IKEA bookshelves of wasted money and unread texts. I’ve spent too much time thinking about these items, too much money purchasing them. Just too much.

Our slogan at this site is “Refusing to apologize for the things we enjoy.” I fully support that slogan and the idea behind it. But neither can I apologize for what I do not enjoy and I no longer enjoy music. Hate might be a strong word but I sure am over it right now. And that void, that abyss, is scary.

Maybe this will change, maybe it won’t. Maybe I will be back. Maybe this is it. In the event of my non-return let me thank the editor and founder of the site who asked me out of the blue if I wanted to write about music. Thanks man. (QUITTER!-ed.) And finally thanks to you, the readers. I thank both of you for reading these bemused and reflective ramblings of a man slowly wondering about life itself. I’m going to sign off with the last song I played on WNMC in 2009. I’ve been back on-air since, but not in a regular capacity. It seems fitting now.

—

Mike Vincent is a teacher, dreamer, grouch, and runner. He lives in northern Michigan and his favorite Beatle is George Harrison.

While never quite forgetting the song I was shocked a number of years ago to hear it under an early montage in a film. Seeing the song used in such a way made me fall in love all over again, as cliché as that sounds, with the song and INSTANTLY made me love the movie I was watching. Layer Cake (2004), a film I had initially dismissed as being too close to the umbrella of Guy Ritchie (directed by Ritchie producer Matthew Vaughn) seemed on the surface to be one of those new-fangled UK crime dramas that used accents and scenes as something to focus on instead of character. I was wrong. Not being one to throw opinions around I will say that the film is smart, clever, fashionable and paints a portrait of London that I only dream of ever being a part of. I could go on and on, spurting lame poor man’s clichéd attempts at wordplay to describe Layer Cake. I won’t. I’m not that good of a writer. What I will say is that one thing the film truly succeeds at is the use of music within the film.

There are three main and major music beats in the film; three parts where the music is prominent and really establishes a feeling. The first cue is the last cue in the film, a “wrap up” as we see in many films with varied plot points. Set to the lovely and so very foreign singing of the Australian singer Lisa Gerrard. Originally in the band Dead Can Dance (1994’s Toward the Within was a regular record store staple when I started selling CDs so long ago.) Ms. Gerrard has busied herself with mainly soundtrack work the past 12 years. The song “Aria” rises and falls to the plain, exotic sound of her vocalizing. As you listen to the song on its own then listen while the film is playing you really feel the match of the sound of the music and the action on the screen. The piece moves around, lightness, darkness, you feel all these different sensations when listening. Add the visuals and the punch is that much harder, that much more direct, that much more centered on your solar plexus.

Next we find 1993’s comeback hit from Duran Duran’s self-titled release. Yep, Duran Duran. The scene begins with our hero, Daniel Craig, and Kinglsey Shacklebolt from Harry Potter in a diner debriefing. They encounter a man fresh out of gaol who had a history with Craig’s acquaintance. In the background, in a tinny and hissed sound is the song “Ordinary World.” The scene builds, and you don’t know where it will lead. And then there is an explosion — violence, something unexpected. In that instant, the song goes from being in the background to being in the foreground. The first crash brings the guitar solo up right onto the screen and then as the song plays out (and dips out) you wonder if the choice of the music and the song is appropriate. “And as I try to make my way/To the Ordinary World/I will learn to survive.” Given the context of the film the choice of the song, both for the sound of the song and the words of the song make perfect sense.

And with the third film cue we come to the beginning of the film. After the opening montage set, again, over moody instrumental music (FC Kahuna fwiw) Daniel Craig’s XXXX character shuts the door to his flat at night. Pull back and it is daylight. A car waits on the street and XXXX enters the car. The music builds, the car takes off and a sweeping view of the English countryside leads to a zoom in on the car as it approaches the amazing Stoke Park. Out of the car comes Craig and his companion. The walk in, no, they ENTER the building. The take it all in. They look drop-dead cool, that old time sense of glamour that we all aspire to: looking cool, dressing sharp. I think they would have looked that way no matter the song but the whole montage gives me the chills. I knew the song the minute I first watched the film and it was almost as if this song and my appreciation for the song, assured me that I would love the movie. The song, of course, is “She Sells Sanctuary” by the Cult. That Billy Duffy guitar riff that chimes and drives just fits perfectly. I truly can’t think of a better film moment set to music. And it isn’t even the whole song, only running for about half the song’s original length.

Martin Scorcese is probably the first director that comes to mind when I think about song cues in films. Problem is, for me, that his cues are not subtle, rather they club you in the head. In his first film as a director, Matthew Vaughn (or whomever put this together) understood the subtletly about using music in films and how to make the most impact with the littlest bit of song. Oh, and about Vaughn and the UK crime films I sort of lumped Layer Cake into. The first two Guy Ritchie films also use music in a very satisfying way, my personal favorite being Brad Pitt’s entering the ring in Snatch (2000) as the film builds to its close. Here is the link, just watch his arrival in the gym and listen to the music and watch things unfold. Amazing what music can do.

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Mike Vincent is a teacher, dreamer, grouch, and runner. He lives in northern Michigan and his favorite Beatle is George Harrison.

This is a music column. What the hell does this have to do with anything? I suppose I should pay tribute to MCA, the artist and member of the Beastie Boys. I’m 37, and I first heard the Beastie Boys the same time as everyone else my age: on MTV on the back of Licensed To Ill. I remember driving into Baltimore late one night as a kid on a family trip listening to the song “Girls.” I loved that tape, loved all the videos the band produced, loved the snotty personae. I was 12, in middle school. I remember hearing that tape in a science class, listening in the classroom. Unwittingly through this tape I began to lay an invisible framework for my future tastes in music. I recently heard “Rhyming and Stealing” for the first time in an eternity. I had completely forgotten that the intro sample is from Led Zeppelin’s killer cover of Memphis Minnie’s “When The Levee Breaks.”

Moving out of middle school I recall buying the cassette EP Love American Style at Record Land in East Lansing. I recall walking home with the tape and then listening to it (I didn’t have a walkman until I was a senior in high school). “Hey Ladies” makes me think of summer, it always will, yet the one song that stood out for me is called “33% God.” Basically it is the instrumental version of “Shake Your Rump.” I have to confess that I didn’t own Paul’s Boutique until years after it was released. When I finally got into that CD and listened I noticed that the big scratch break in “Shake Your Rump” was missing from the CD and was only in the video and on “33% God.” Strange but true.

Check Your Head is a classic, seminal release. Everybody knows this, and the CD to me IS high school. The sound, that sense of cool, that sense of dress. This CD opened up my eyes to Paul’s Boutique and soundtracked many warm nights in my own mind. I loved “So What’cha Want.” That beat felt oppressive and welcoming. Years later unpacking CDs at the bookstore I marveled at the cheek of Beck to sample the song on his song “E-Pro.” I had the CD single for the song, and on that disc was a lost gem from the band: “The Skills To Pay The Bills.” After (foolishly) selling that CD it took me eight years to get the song again, this time as part of the short lived MusicMaker CD burning service in conjunction with the band’s greatest hits. The song remains a fine piece of work.

Ill Communication was the last Beasties LP that I bought before I got my record store job. I was 19 and shopping at Flat Black & Circular. I don’t remember the circumstances (but I do remember the old location with no windows) of discovering the record had come out before the CD, but I do remember shopping and not seeing the LP on the rack. My brother asked and one was pulled from behind the counter. I took it home, opened it up, marveled at the green vinyl and began to listen to the disc. Over and over and over. I remember the smells of early summer, the first rays of late sunlight. When the CD was released I bought it, and I bought the release on tape. The cassette tape was green. By this point part of the appeal of the band was not only their points of reference but also the samples in their music. “Root Down” sampled “Root Down” by Jimmy Smith, a song I always opened my Afternoon Jazz show with some 11 years later.

Hello Nasty came out four years later. Wherehouse got our stock on the Friday before the release date. Most new releases arrived on Saturday, but not this one. I called my co-worker Doug and left him a message. He showed up within ten minutes, gigantic grin on his face. We exchanged a high five, maybe even a bro hug, as we both bought the CD and then started to play it over the store hi-fi. That is what you did; you drummed up business by word of mouth and by playing something during customer hours. If someone picked up on what he or she were hearing you talked them into coming back. At the time I remember listening and relistening to the references and samples, but also the styles of music on the disc. I had it in my head that the band had become futurists, and that music would eventually bend towards the styles on this disc. I don’t think I was right in that assumption but I do remember strongly voicing that point to whomever asked about the disc. As with each release there were more little things that I noticed within the music that piqued my ears and caused thrills. There is this little upwards horn sample loop on the song “Unite” that always makes me smile, as well as a wacky sample in “Body Movin” of “Oyo Como Va” which just destroys in such a short bit. And then the disc ends with a song that sort of haunts me: “Instant Death.” Adam Horowitz had suffered some loss and it showed on this song. It is slow, calm, gentle and powerful. When I read that MCA passed away it was the first song I thought about.

For myself and my ears the band stops with this music, fourteen years ago now (can that be accurate?). There have been releases since Hello Nasty (Sounds of Science, 5 Bouroughs, Hot Sauce Committee) that have come and gone but haven’t stuck in my head. This is not to say that I have been living in a Beastie-free world, only that at some point our paths diverged. And that is ok.

It has been a week now since the passing of Adam Yauch. The tributes have grown silent and the news has moved onwards, ever forward to the next story, the next loss, the next thing. The impact, if any, of the loss is already gone, already an afterthought, already yesterday’s papers. This is grief in this age of ours: the age of social media, of 24-hour news, of the Internet. Musicians pass away all the time. There will always be tributes. But those tributes used to feel as though they lasted longer. Maybe that is ok, the speed with which we move on from news like this. Maybe it is not ok. Why do we feel the need to eulogize the famous, to celebrate their own achievements that impacted our own lives? It is easier to do this, to cast warm thoughts and reflections on people we don’t know. It is safer.

Eddie Izzard commented once, in relation to Princess Diana, that his mum died when he was a child and no one gave a shit. My own family suffered a loss before Christmas, one that I am myself only slowly getting over and moving on. The closure or whatever that took me four months or so takes, what, seven days for the famous? Not even seven days, more like three or four. Is that ok? Are his band mates, friends and family for thirty years, doing ok? Are they going to be able to move forward? What about his wife? What about his child? We, the grand We, do not care about these facts, these family members. We only care about the art created and the memories generated. We take what we need and want from celebrity and when their time is gone we pay tribute and then we move on and we forget. I liked his band. I liked his causes. I don’t care that a musician died of cancer. I care that a father, husband, son, and friend of others died at 47. I hope that for those who now have this void in their lives that the epicenter of their grief is non-toxic and I hope that the grief lessens naturally and healthily. My hope is for Adam Yauch’s child to grow up with the memory of the love of his father in his heart and in his head. In the end no amount of music, no amount of celebrity can come close to what that means.

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Mike Vincent is a teacher, dreamer, grouch, and runner. He lives in northern Michigan and his favorite Beatle is George Harrison.

England may not the best example, since the UK has produced so much of our popular music in the past 50 years. Let’s think about other English-speaking countries like Canada and Australia. Have you ever tried to watch the Juno awards on CBC and felt that even without a language barrier that you may as well have been watching a program on how to learn Morse code? A quick trawl through the record books shows an unmatched FIVE YEAR WINNING STREAK FOR BRYAN ADAMS. On the female side, Anne Murray and Celine Dion have four-year streaks. The Tragically Hip, a quintessentially Canadian band, have won multiple Juno awards.

The Aria awards, from Australia, can feel equally as disjointed. The Hall of Fame class of 2011 consisted of Kylie Minogue and the Wiggles. Yes. The Wiggles, torturers of parents for over a decade. Yet a swirl through the award winners does not always yield a wacky result. For in 1998 the Aria Album of the Year was Unit by the Brisbane band, Regurgitator. Never heard of them? Of course not! But I have, and let me tell you, they’re great.

In 1998 I spent some time participating in an overseas study program through Michigan State University. I spent time in Australia, folks, Sydney and Canberra to be more precise. Now you would not know this from looking at me but I LOVE Australia and have for thirty years. (Is that possible? When did I first learn of Australia? Let’s see. . . Superman 2 on HBO, Gene Hackman as Lex Luthor wanting beachfront property, globe spins to. . . Australi. New Year’s Day 1982. Yep, thirty years) Once I got over my initial cowardice and signed up for the program, I departed from Detroit in early January of 1998.

Once in Australia, I heard bits and bobs about this band from Brisbane. The HMV store I lived at in Sydney had the CD on display, a silver cover with a great yellow circle on the front. Yet I didn’t buy it. When our group arrived in Canberra I remember talking with an Australian girl about the band, “the Gurge” she called them. I was really trying to chat her up when my attention was distracted by a ditz with big brown eyes (look it up) and when I turned around the Aussie was gone. But her words on the band stuck with me. I bought a Rolling Stone with the band on the cover and read up on them before really digging into their catalog. It took my return to the states before I got a chance to buy Unit. Actually, I came into work one day and there was in my locker. I had no idea my manager ordered it for me from the import sheets, and it was such a wonderful shock. I bought the disc and took it home to listen to it.

The disc opens with the song, “I Like Your Old Stuff Better Than Your New Stuff.” You need to know the first LP, Tu Plang, to understand that opening song. On their first CD the band is very rockish, muscular and melodic, with lots of crash and sturm und drang. The humor is evident (“I Sucked A Lot of Cock To Get Where I Am”) as are the band’s interest in different sounds (“G7 Dick Electric Boogie”). Hearing those songs and then this first song, you come to an understanding that the band is branching into a new direction, one that may not be well received. But then on “Everyday Formula” the band is just a ripping motor of super fast, super fun music. Two songs in and Unit is only about 6 minutes long and just tons of fun. Then you get to the third song, called “! (The Song Formerly Known As)” which is a killer. Sort of like a hybrid Prince song, catchy and rocking and vibrant. In these songs you hear the sounds that were being planted on that first disc and watching them bloom is very exciting. The disc was strong in 1998 and while it isn’t quite as strong in 2012, the tracks that stood out still stand out. “Bubble Boy” is the second greatest song about an inflatable sex doll, only trailing Roxy Music’s “In Every Dream Home A Heartache” on that sparsely inhabited trail.

The not-yet-extinct music video helped the band with their image and the videos from the Unit LP are as strong as the songs. “Everyday Formula” acts out the plot to Tron, while “!” shows the band standing around in Japanese crowds.  Other videos are computer animated and silly and disposable but somehow entertaining and engaging as well.

There are a few themes that pop up on Unit that make their way into Regurgitator’s follow-up CD, . . . Art, most notably a sense of disconnection from humanity and the embrace of technology as a substitute for traditional human interaction. These themes are sometimes subtle, sometimes not. Even on their poppiest of songs, and man oh man does . . . Art have some poppy songs, there is a bittersweet underpinning to every lyric. On “Everyday Formula” from Unit, Quan Yeomans sings “everyday I talk to my machines/more sense than talking with human beings.” This disconnect, the withdrawal into the virtual doesn’t sound too far-fetched today but in 1998 could it have seemed real? The last song on . . . Art is titled “Virtual Life” and the words are about needing everything from the TV screen and needing nothing else from a regular life. As a man who spends too much time on Facebook, this song feels prophetic. We surrender so much of ourselves to exist online.

When I was in Australia I noticed a sign in the classrooms on my second day in the country: a sign beckoning students to turn off their cell phones. Back home, cell phones were car phones and were the size of a foot. They weren’t everywhere and they certainly weren’t “your phone.” In some ways it feels strange that one of the most removed continents, hell, THE most removed continent on the globe would be so quick to adapt to new technology. At the same time, with that early adaption, perhaps that is where the burnout so aptly described on these songs originates. In the late 90s there was so much of an undercurrent of chatter speaking to “pre-millennium tension” but without any substance or understanding of where that tension originated from. Here, in Australia, was a band that was singing out about a different type of tension between technology and human connection, which has grown and overgrown the globe in the 14 years since the words were put to tape.

When I listen to Unit and . . . Art, I am magically whisked away from here to another land and another time. As with any nostalgia, some of the memories hold up, some don’t. The tracks on these two LPs, however, hold up in all their poppy greatness. I see that the band continues to record and release music. I’m glad for that as we are all better off with a band like Regurgitator in the world. Humor, discontent, observation and melody. What more do you need?

—

Mike Vincent lives in Northern Michigan. He wrote this piece at the Eastfield Laundromat.

As I write this I look down at my hands, illuminated by the computer monitor. I see wrinkles, thinning skin, veins rising as the flesh thins. They are the hands of my parents not my own anymore. I lived with Urban Hymns as my soundtrack for six weeks. I listened to the album like taking vitamins. Every day it started my day. Every evening it ended it. Many a time I awoke to my walkman on the floor, batteries expired, the tape paused midway through. The walkman, the trusty yellow walkman with auto-reverse, ensuring a never-ending continuous play.

I remember the sounds of the street and the sights of the city soundtracked by this LP for hours at once. I remember listening to the closing song, headphones on, stereo speakers having moved out with the roommate, listening, high volume, sitting on the floor, singing along howling along screaming along, pounding the floor, pouring out frustration and anguish and anger and loneliness and insanity. I remember finding the promo copy of the LP, shaped like a prayer book next to the store stereo and feeling my pulse rise. I remember writing a pretty clunky, cliché ridden review for Michigan State University’s State News (some things never go out of style). I remember buying a ticket to the concert at the Palace and I remember telling a co-worker that she didn’t want to go to the concert with me ’cause she didn’t want to get pregnant again.

I remember, years later, finding the LP that the sample of the song came from and feeling those waves in a different fashion. I remember watching a record label promotional video reel loop and seeing dark hair and black leather walking down a street in an unmoving line, impervious to everything around him, a trait one wishes was available to everyone. I remember hearing the direct, pure “fuck you” in the closing track, a declaration of intent, of anger, of challenge, of everything people tried to get rock music banned for in the 60s. I feel youth slipping away, opportunity slipping away, life slipping through fingers like strands. I would give anything to feel it again.

—

Mike Vincent is a teacher, dreamer, grouch, and runner. He lives in northern Michigan and his favorite Beatle is George Harrison.

Smile was the first record the Beach Boys began to work on as a follow up to the famous (and overplayed to the point of rendering the LP overrated) Pet Sounds LP of 1966. As Brian Wilson receded into the studio to create the band’s music he began to create a “teenage symphony to God.” Working with the lyricist Van Dyke Parks, Wilson began to create and oversee the recording of this symphony. But the project was hijacked by mental illness, drugs, fire, and intra-band relationships and recording stopped. The failure of Smile is the stuff of legend. There are books’ worth of information on this LP but it just flattened out like a flan in a cupboard. “The Fire Symphony” was stopped when Wilson became convinced that the work on the music was causing fires around the Los Angeles area. Leonard Bernstein came to the studio and recorded Wilson performing “Surf’s Up” alone at the piano. The high praise that came from Bernstein had an opposite effect on Wilson and he withdrew further.

Smile was not released as the follow up to Pet Sounds. Instead we got Smiley Smile. That record contained many tunes from the aborted Smile project. This would be the band’s M.O. for years to come. Every few LPs would have a few Smile songs on one side or another. Some records only had one song, 20/20 featured three; 1971’s Surf’s Up was (obviously) named for one of the more famous and notable Smile songs. What happened as Smile failed was the failure of the Beach Boys to adapt. I’ve always been intrigued at the strange tale of the band after Pet Sounds. From Smiley Smile through Holland the band produced some downright great music yet were I to stop and ask you about the Beach Boys, what would you first think of? Would it be Pet Sounds? Or would it be “Little Deuce Coupe,” “Surfin’ Safari,” or any other of their first surf hits? I think it would be the surf hits, even after all the Pet Sounds love over the past 15 years. How could the band survive in the wake of the greatest artistic success when the public (and Mike Love — that dude never wanted to grow) had a solid, unshakeable association with their past. Or you will think of their last hit, 1989’s insipid “Kokomo.” Ask yourself, what do you think of when you hear the name the Beach Boys? Do you think of the early stuff or the later stuff? Now think about trying to be a serious band playing surf music while you approach 40 years old.

But this is not an article about how the early Beach Boys music pigeonholed the band for the rest of their existence. Rather this is a piece about Smile. When I worked at Wherehouse Records I would read Billboard magazine and one day in 1995 I read about Capitol Records’ plan to release a three CD set of Smile. I knew enough in my early adventures of wanting EVERYTHING that Smile was famous, unreleased and supposedly great. So this set was really getting me hyped up about Smile. The set was cancelled, it never came out. The next year, still wild about wanting Smile, I found out that the 1993 Good Vibrations box set contained thirty minutes of unreleased music from Smile. Eleven songs from the original sessions, released on CD for the first time. The fifth disc of the set also featured a few tracking (instrumental) versions of Smile songs as well as a 15-minute working version of “Good Vibrations.” I bought this box set and on a trip out West I put together a tape of those 11 songs and a few of the tracking versions. This tape, all on one side, became my Smile. And in the face of the subsequent versions, this remains my Smile.

In 2004 a version of Smile was released under Wilson’s name. This versions was a re-recorded version of the lost LP, with help from Darian Sahanaja from the Wondermints. Not only was this version released, but it was toured as well, bringing a newer, older Smile to the public. Last year Capitol finally released The Smile Sessions, bringing the original recordings to the public in a form that was as authentic as one could hope. There are, of course, a variety of versions. You could opt for the double disc or the ultra five disc set which contains disc after disc of session work. This is the version Matt K. mentioned he got and the version befitting a die-hard fan. I received the double disc set and while I enjoy listening to it, it does not top the tape version I put together so many years ago.

As I listened to the new release, and as I thought about my dances with Smile over the years, I really got to thinking about the nature of unreleased recordings. By nature when we fall for an illicit bootleg, the fact that it is unreleased makes it so much better. It becomes immediately more personal than you could ever expect. Bob Dylan’s famous 1966 Manchester Concert (JUDAS!–look it up) was unreleased for years, you could only hear it in various forms, but in those forms it became more and more famous. I used to have a double CD version with nothing, no information, nothing. The sound was off the charts, the whole show was there, and you could hear the infamous heckle. This was a pinnacle release. And then Columbia released the show as part of the Bootleg Series. I bought it, it was exactly the same thing as I already owned, but there was no life to it, no spark. Bootlegs are for fans, they aren’t from the artists and they aren’t for the record companies. Live recordings, outtakes, sessions, all these things that found their way onto plastic are for fans and are treasured, collected, and listened to. That double disc set from Columbia felt soulless, even with everything about it being 100% the same musically as the silver disc CD version I’d owned. I still have that show, but my copy is a double disc Sony promo with no artwork, no notes, nothing. Just two CDs. I cannot tell you why, other than to say in this form the concert retains some of the purity of fandom I found missing in the proper release.

The same thing goes for Smile. Am I glad it has finally been released? Yes. Is it what I was hoping for? That is a hard question to answer. I think that it is not what I was hoping for. And at the same time I can’t tell you what that was. The LP is reconstructed, the heartbreaking and colorful original cover has been restored. All the music thought lost has been found and released. And yet why hasn’t it sent a chill up my spine? Who knows. I found it interesting that Matt K. also found the set interesting. He too came to Smile via a bootleg, but his was different than mine. So his Smile is not my Smile, yet when he spoke of listening to The Smile Sessions his Smile was different than the box set’s Smile. There were songs snippets in different places, things out of place to his ears, ears that had only known one way. Much like when you would tape an LP and the LP would skip, resulting in a skip on your tape you always heard and never forgot, so too are your own experiences with music a tapestry onto which you project your own desires and experiences. Matt heard differences, didn’t hate them, but he knows where they are and what they are. I haven’t heard my Smile in years, but my memories are stronger than my present. Without my Smile I wouldn’t have discovered that the drone under the chorus in “Cabinessence” are actually cellos, the same cellos that you can hear all of a sudden in “Good Vibrations.” Without my Smile I would not have made that connection. Without my Smile I would not have opened up the lid on a love of the Beach Boys and their overlooked important works. Without my Smile I would not feel so sad at the state of the band, their beholden existence to their past, and their diminished standing in today’s landscape.

I cannot recommend The Smile Sessions to anyone reading this, as it is not my Smile. Heck, the version of “Good Vibrations” is different on the set, and how can that be? Rather I suggest, no, strongly suggest, that you invest the time and energy into picking up the band’s catalog recordings. Due to the extreme brevity of many of the band’s works you can find really nice double LP sets on one CD from Capitol. Smiley Smile and Wild Honey mix the ashes of Smile with a rootsy R&B sound driven by the tones of Carl Wilson. Friends and 20/20 continue to combine solid work with a few Smile songs. The single disc with Sunflower and Surf’s Up contains two of the band’s greatest records into a single package. Watch as each part of the band grows within the band. Listen to Carl Wilson soar and discover Dennis Wilson coming into his own as a musical artist. Listen to the band and work to remove your old associations from your mind, learn to remove your own biases towards your expectations of the Beach Boys and just listen to the music with your eyes closed and your ears open. Find the band all over again and lose yourself to the music.

This year, 2012, marks the Beach Boys’ 50^th anniversary as a band. Remember that the band is more than just their work up to Pet Sounds and Smile. Remember that the band continued on well into the 1980s, but that everything after 1977 is pretty weak. Remember a band that grew and was then ignored and remember their remarkable art for what it is. I’ll leave now with what could have been a great Beach Boys song, the title track from another “lost” LP. “River Song” opens Dennis Wilson’s 1977 classic Pacific Ocean Blue, which was released for a few months on CD in 1991 and became a legendary out-of-print title before Legacy’s 2007 reissue righted that wrong.  Listen to “River Song” and think about its genesis in 1970. Had it gestated fully it would have been released on Sunflower. It would have been the greatest Beach Boys LP ever.

Would it have erased their past? Of course not. But it would have attracted a new generation and opened the doors for more discovery. Summer is approaching. This summer rediscover the Beach Boys, but do it on your own terms and remember that their career is far more rewarding than it appears on the surface.

—

Mike Vincent is a teacher, dreamer, grouch, and runner. He lives in northern Michigan and his favorite Beatle is George Harrison.

The band has been on my mind lately for two reasons. A recent trip downstate was accompanied by my bringing along the band’s third LP as well as one of their EP releases. The LP is Guerilla, and I had forgotten just how strong the record is. From the opening strains of “Check It Out,” the CD just cooks with an energy and a freshness that still feels authentic so many years later. The first song on the disc I ever got stuck on is “Wherever I Lay My Phone (That’s My Home).” Folks, this is a song that was recorded in mid-1998. Did you have a cell phone then? A mobile phone? No. They hadn’t taken America in their grip at that point in history. But they were enough of a cultural thing in the UK to be mentioned in a song. So this song with its dancey bits and bobs really drew me into their catalog and I bought as much as possible from the band. But it took me years really to appreciate the band’s work, scope, and creativity. As I listened to Guerilla again I just marveled at how great it sounded, how it gently drifted from one song to the next, how it all fit and felt right. Some songs have odd sounds, like steel drums, in the mix. Others move along at a peaceful pace, like an exhalation of breath from your speakers. The band set out to make a “pop” disc and I honestly still cannot think of a pop album as diverse as the sounds of this one.

I went to the wall at home, found the catalog and gave the music another listen. It was interesting to see if I thought that their other works held up quite as well as Guerilla. Fuzzy Logic was good, with a few tracks I remember being standouts holding up very well to my current ears and taste. The songs I still gravitated towards included the very first song by the band I knew, “If You Don’t Want Me to Destroy You,” and I do hold a fondness for the opening track “God, Show Me Magic.”

Next was the band’s second disc, Radiator. At the time, in the span of the catalog, this was my least favorite disc by the band when I first picked it up. And it was one of the most fun discs to rediscover. The cover depicts an animated creature walking down the street, the first move from a photographic reality to an animated one. The Welsh artist Pete Fowler would go on over the next few years to add to the aura of the band, designing specific “monsters” to adorn their stage, singles and LPs. I love the plastic brightness of Fowler’s work and his work with the band really makes me feel like a de facto band member. Radiator is a strong CD, and when you peruse the lyric book you see the wild and interesting topics the band sings about. Two songs stand out to me, the second and third singles released. The second single is called “The International Language of Screaming” and it just is catchy, fun, and filled with the fun sounds that hook your brain and stick in your brain for years. High praise for a song that is only 2:16 long. Listen for the big WOOOO, which is so great it may, just may, supplant Ric Flair as the greatest WOOO of all time.

The second song, third single, is called “Play It Cool.” I love this song, and placed it on a mix CD called Summer Sun. The song is super super catchy and it feels like a full length, traditional song — something that the band doesn’t always feel like they do on record. The video for the song is notable as it feels so dated! The band gets together to play FIFA Football on the PLAYSTATION and all become characters within the game. The graphics and such just make the video seem antiquated. It also is striking to me that while music stripped of era can sound timeless, a video of then-modern technology will be instantly more dated. Listen to the melody and listen to the handclaps. Man, those are some great handclaps.

The disc the Super Furry Animals followed up Guerilla with is great. I’ll just say it now. It is great and I have very, very specific timeframe associations with the disc, Drawing Rings Around The World. It came out in 2001 and I remember listening to the music again and again that summer. I was on vacation in Benzie County (where I now spend lots of time every week) and listening to this disc over and over. The song “Juxtaposed With You” contains the line, “I’m not in love with you/but I won’t hold that against you.” That line meant a lot to me that trip, for reasons best left to my memories. The disc was accompanied on release by a DVD surround sound version with accompanying visuals. I own it, or at least used to, and have watched it a few times. As an event it isn’t much, but at the time it was fun to fire up the surround sound system my then-roommate had and watch and listen. This LP is strong, with one great song after another, any and all of which function both on their own as individual songs and as part of the whole of the LP. The line “you expose the film in me” from the title track says so much, and yet it is a line that will forever be empty as the future will wonder just what film was.

The surround sound gimmick would continue on the next release, Phantom Power. I like the disc, but I don’t remember it that much. Even giving it a re-listen in the car didn’t trigger any strong emotions or attachment. It is just a disc, a good disc, but not one that sticks in my memory. The only song that does is the closing track, “Slow Life.” I’m drawn to the sound of that song, the way it sounds and the way it feels. And with that last LP I stopped listening to the band. Not out of disgust, or anything stronger than apathy. My ears grew closed to nearly everything, and when the band next issued a CD I was out of work, in school and unable to lay hands on the music. I didn’t cry, I didn’t even notice. I just moved on.

As part of my adventure back in time I did spend some time with two of the band’s stand-alone singles. The first is the Ice Hockey Hair EP, and the second is the band’s greatest moment (I think) the non-album release “The Man Don’t Give A Fuck.” On the former a sample from Burning Spear forms the basis for a song “Smokin’” that bubbles and moves and grooves. The whole EP is great and the “Smokin’” reprieve at the end of the single is just so much fun. The latter track is also built around a sample, that of Steely Dan’s 1973 song “Showbiz Kids.” For time, it was said, this held the record for a single with the most amount of profanity, using the F word 50 times in the song. Whatever the case it is great, it builds and builds and there is a frenetic craziness and happiness in the song that just makes you smile. There is also something about the song, about any song with that much cussing, that brings out your smile. It is almost like being a child again and discovering the illicit and secret nature of dirty words. They make you laugh, the make you think, they empower you the first time you use them and then they knock you right down when they are used against you. The power of language comes through and something about the song always makes me think. And then smile.  A few years ago the band released a 23-minute LIVE version of this track. I need to find that and dig it up and give it a listen. Could it be as great as the original? We’ll see!

Any non-American band really brings out my inner linguist. I’ve always been fascinated by accents, the sounds of our voices and how they are all the same yet all different. There are vague recollections of hearing an English accent for the first time (Terrence Stamp aka General ZOD comes to mind) and just marveling at the difference. As I reach middle age I find myself less interested in accents and more interested in vowels. Think about it. Where does the root sound of a word come from, forgetting about morphemes and graphemes and such. Maybe it’s not all the vowels, maybe I’m more intrigued with A’s. Those are the sounds that really stand out when one first encounters a foreign accent (and to be fair, does this boundary even exist anymore? With YouTube, the Internet, BBC America, friggin’ Downton Abbey, etc., etc., etc., do the children of today, the future of tomorrow, have such strong reactions to accents? They’re everywhere). Except with the Furries. They make all the vowels sound individual and unique. Take the song of theirs I first fell into, “If You Don’t Want Me To Destroy You.” Say it out loud, right now. Notice the feeling of your tongue in your mouth, the way it feels to say that simple sentence. Now say and stress the N’s in the song. Feel the difference? Can you hear the difference?? Griff Rhys sings in both English and Welsh, but I read that his primary language is Welsh and that he is always processing the two languages in his head. This is what gives his conversations rich pauses in which he can address his thoughts and put them in the correct language. In the end that is what stuck with me ,and what I took away from my dance with this music from my past 15 years. By rediscovering this music it sort of shows me where my mind is at in my life right now. Inner linguist? Really? Really.

The sound of the voice and the sound of the music and the sound of the voice AND music has always been as big an appeal to me as the music itself. Having been through more education since I first heard these songs that new education, or forms of it, opened my mind to think about these songs and their sounds in a wildly different way. I almost feel like at this stage in my life the next 15 years will be more about rediscovery than discovery. Normally I think that would have made me feel sad, but it doesn’t. Rather it fills me with anticipation and excitement the likes of which I hadn’t felt since flipping my fifth grade teacher the bird behind her back. That thrill, that rush, that feeling is still there, and I just need to find it in different ways now. Wonder what I should listen to next?

—

Mike Vincent is a teacher, dreamer, grouch, and runner. He lives in northern Michigan and his favorite Beatle is George Harrison.

With a tape you could have side one and side two. You could start with a bang on side one and end the tape with a song that was so amazing you just wanted to flip the tape over to see how it was going to follow the first side. You could build 30 or 45 minutes of music, throw in snippets of whatever to ease the flow of songs, and then just kick it up and out into the ether. Then you’d name the tape and the sides, and take it with you. A CD demanded 74 continuous minutes. It felt like an eternity to build up that much music with no pauses or breaks. To find yourself creating something that felt familiar you would have to create two CDs to replicate what you could do on one tape. It was challenging and felt unnatural.

Over the next few weeks I will be writing about a few of these early mix CDs I made, the stories behind them, finishing with a fat file of the mix itself, mixed together for your listening pleasure. Along the way I hope to talk about mix tapes, how I view those tapes now in my middle age, and how the advent of MP3s and digital playlists make the issues I felt when I transitioned from tape to CD feel quaint. I’ll begin, as I so often do, in the past.

I remember the day and the circumstance as if it was twenty minutes ago. The CD title says it all: Winter 1-1-02. The six weeks prior to this date were incredibly up and down for me. The bookstore I worked in had moved from our cozy old space to a new, mall-sized store. The selection got bigger, and so did the responsibility as the addition of a media section bumped me up from bookseller to manager. I’d spent a solid month in a cavern-sized space unpacking pallet after pallet of music, organizing it, setting up sections, and alphabetizing everything to build to the store’s re-opening. It was everything I had ever wanted up to that point in life, the opportunity to build something of my own. I won’t say looking back that it was what I thought it would be, but at the time it was everything.

After opening the store with what felt like five employees, we were driven nearly insane by post 9/11 inspired spending, the new location, the new areas of the store, and so on. I would leave the store at lunch and remember driving back into the parking lot, my mouth on fire with stress-related sores due to the mania I felt like I was descending back into. When the holiday was over, it felt like a vacuum. I decided to make a calm mix CD for myself and my girlfriend. My gift to her two weeks prior was a mix CD for Christmas. And I was growing into wanting to make calm, quiet mixes to allow me to soundtrack emotional events and things like the weather. And so I looked at the music on my shelves in the basement, on my dresser and in my dresser drawers and put together a series of songs that I thought felt needed to be heard on a dark snowy nights and cold blue winter days.

There are two “sides” to the mix; one without words and one with words. This isn’t a hard-and-fast rule of the mix, but I did try to find soft, soothing songs to bump up between songs with words. A quiet guitar version of the Shadows’ classic “Apache” starts the disc and quickly, and quietly, shifts into Sinatra’s version of “Dindi” by Jobim. “I haven’t sung so quietly since I had laryngitis” is the Sinatra quote that placed the song on the mix. The peaceful sounds of Satie’s “Gymnopédies” gave way to a Bill Evans number before an instrumental Creeper Lagoon song gave way to an old Coleman Hawkins track, which makes me think of fireplaces and big soft flakes of snow. Now after the Hawk I feel like I made a miss-step (one that I did not correct on this new edition of the mix) by plunking a George Harrison song right before a nice old jazz track. I should have swapped those out, especially as I placed an instrumental Roots Manuva cut before a (now) famous Sigur Ros track. The nine minutes of “Svefn-G-Englar” remain a favorite of mine. I have always delighted in the singing of Sigur Ros and the way that the sounds of the songs may or may not be words. This song was meant to transition between side one, with its mostly instrumental tracks, to side two, the side with words.

In my heart, side one ends with Sigur Ros, and side two starts with John Martyn. “Over the Hill,” from the LP Solid Air, is so different than what came before it on the mix, so pastoral, so sunny and cheery. I love it so very much and the song brings so much out of me each time I listen to it. It can make me smile or make me cry by making me think, making me remember, making me feel so many different things. Next a fun song by Milton Nascimento pays respect to the volume of Verve LPs I was buying at the time, then a song by the French band Mellow. Great opening line, great refrain, great sound. Talking about snow tied into the winter theme, especially thinking about the cover of snow on the ground. Next comes another fantastic song, “Countdown” by the great Lindsey Buckingham. The lyrics are questioning, open. “How the madness fades” still resonates with me. Another song that can make me weep like a baby, especially now when I hear the lyric “Right through your fingers/time slips away”. I was 27 when I put that onto the mix. A song by the band Oranger turns into a Cat Stevens song (Rushmore soundtrack anyone?) before heading into the closing parts of the mix. “River” by Joni Mitchell is next, with its Christmas piano opening and its gorgeous sound.

This disc was put together in late 2001 when Ryan Adams was the new genius on the scene. I remember hearing “Goodnight, Hollywood Blvd” the first day I was being trained at my store’s Grand Rapids headquarters. It stuck in my head then and has been in my head ever since. And ending the mix, unbeknownst to me at the time foreshadowing how I would spend the latter part of 2002, is the song “Winter” by the Rolling Stones. It felt natural, to end the mix with a song of the same name. Goat’s Head Soup may not have been everyone’s favorite, but this song rightfully sets it up among the Stones’ greatest tunes. I always felt that the song ends romantically and that was part of my mood at the time: romance.

On January 1st, 2002, I loaded up my 35mm camera and my medium format Pentax that was the size of a tank and drove across town to the Fenner Nature Center. I went walking on a crisp, clear day with white snow and blue skies. I took rolls of film and took picture after picture. The images of the day, coupled with the music, fused into one in my brain. I will always remember the circumstances of the mix. I will always remember the circumstances of the day. 2002 went on to being a true annus horiblis; summertime was difficult beyond anything I could have comprehended. And yet it passed, as so much does.

Here is a link for the mix, in one handy/dandy track. Once again my attempts at uploading to SoundCloud were waxed due to the estate of JURGEN INMAN! And here are some of the photos I took that day, to better give you an idea of where I was at the time in my life and within that moment.

http://www.mediafire.com/file/78immr91a6etkbu/Winter.m4a

—

Mike Vincent is a teacher, dreamer, grouch, and runner. He lives in northern Michigan and his favorite Beatle is George Harrison.

You read that right: LMFAO. Who are they? Two dudes, one is the uncle of the other. Both are descended from the line of Motown Records founder Barry Gordy. I first heard the “band” on a mix created by Fatboy Slim. Mr. Slim featured a snippet of their song “I’m In Miami Bitch” at the start of one of his always incredible free mixes available on his website (www.fatboyslim.net plug plug). The song and group didn’t make its way into my brain like some songs on those mixes but it did stick with my a bit. Now when I first was told about the group it was right before a road race in Ann Arbor. My best friend’s wife asked me if I had heard of LMFAO and their song “Party Rock Anthem.” She described the video as a wacky, fun, 80s-style party. The adjectives were intriguing but I didn’t check into the song for another few weeks. Finding things like this are what YouTube was invented for and that is the place I first totally fell for the song. Truth be told, digging the hell out of the song really threw some egg on my face. Driving home from my birthday dinner with my wife (a beautiful drive down the Old Mission Peninsula during the magic hour with a beer in my system) I began making fun of the song playing on the car radio. Which song? That’s right. “Party Rock Anthem.” OK, crow eaten, I just watched and rewatched the video. The conceit in the video is just off the charts. And it is absolutely hilarious. As I fell for the song and sought it out on iTunes I discovered the Miami song connection. This made me like the act all the more. (Sidebar: The greatest iTunes discovery is the SIXTY SEVEN dollar roving party version of the clean version of the same song, 67 different towns are available with city-specific shout outs. I could not bring myself to download “I’m In Grand Rapids Trick.”)

While I find the song catchy, the video knocked it out into the ionosphere, what with the elaborate lead-up to the point when that fellow trying to escape is absorbed by the party rock zombies. (I cannot believe I just wrote that sentence). The looks on the Gordys’ faces make the video. It is ridiculous and hilarious. I will also admit that the video’s copious use of the Melbourne Shuffle endeared me as anything Australian in essence is highly rated in my book. I watched their other videos and never have I felt a new band was such a brand right out of the box. The logo, the continuity of the videos, the repertory players utilized in the videos, all these pieces create a wacky world that the band occupies. Now all these things would be worthless if the music was true Shaggs-level shit, but it isn’t (I think). The cheesy, high-pitched electro noises and grooves in the songs are catchy and fun and just bore their way right into your subconscious.

After watching the video for “Party Rock” a million times I recently heard a new single from the album, “Sexy and I Know It.” Hilarious is one way to describe the clip; the other is to point out that the clip offers most flagrant banana hammock flaunting since Hammer’s 1994 epic “Pumps and a Bump.” In this follow-up you see the brand in action, the company players popping up as they have in other videos. The band’s stature has grown, and there are celebrities in the video: Ron Jeremy, Wilmer Valderama, and MMA gargantuan Alastair Overeem! The lyrics are hilarious if you can focus on them. The imagery is ridiculous and the video ends with a shake off on a bar. The last bits of the video have more cock than the “Little Jerry” episode of Seinfeld but is done in a way that just make you laugh rather than cringe. The video is also set on and around a beach, and there is a heart of sunniness in the music that makes me think not only of being young (which is strange since the afro-ed Gordy is only a year or two younger than me) but also of California, of sun, surf and warm weather. The music’s energy is lively and the sense of fun you hear in the lyrics in contagious.

One fine afternoon I flipped on MTVU and found an image of what I believe to be an Aboriginal man singing and playing music. An Aboriginal band, actually. LOVED the image. Then I sussed out that the band of white men on scooters was probably the band, not these Australian fellas. I was disappointed but found the song catchy, albeit a tad bit less. The sound of the music was good though, and I enjoyed the little hints in the mix: chorus vocals that sound churchy, a bouzouki(?), a banjo, horns. I looked them up, found out the name of the band. And then I started to read a bit about the band. The more I read, the more I found out, the less I liked them.

What did I uncover? What tilted my impression? Was it that this Mumford guy looks like the English playwright Patrick Marber? No, that is actually the one thing that I like about the band (and that’s just cos I like Patrick Marber and his contributions to Steve Coogan’s universe). Was it the breathless accolades after the band played at the Grammys? For a time I couldn’t quite put my finger on what I didn’t like about the band, but something about them felt inauthentic. That one song was catchy enough but something about this group felt off. Phony even. And while I do not remember why I didn’t like them I do remember reading something in Rolling Stone about the band that really cemented my dislike. Their circumstances. The lead singer, the Marber-alike, is the child of influential religious folk; his parents are leaders of the evangelical Vineyard Church in the UK. And not only that, but he is a lad of privilege. Mumford met one of his band mates at King’s College, a school associated with the famous Eton Group of Schools in the UK. The band mate Mumford met at King’s College is the child of a rich Englishman. Rich to the tune of 250 million pounds. Let’s do the math. . . 250 times the current exchange rate (1 GBP=1.53USD) and that is 382 million dollars. The men, this band, are the children of wealth and privilege. These kids are the people written about in the song “Common People,” they are the wealthy, they are the lucky, they are the golden children who never worried about meals, lodging, or the like. Granted, this is a generalization, but one that is a giant millstone for me. Or, to cater to the literary nature by which the band communicates (the leader of the band blogs about BOOKS on their website), their albatross. Perhaps not in the true sense of the Coleridge interpretation but something close. Something about being born to extreme wealth and then finding fame makes me believe that there is something inauthentic about the experiences the band creates.

Now wait a second. Let’s go back to LMFAO. They are the child and grandchild of Berry Gordy. Berry Gordy is worth, according to Forbes in 2009, about 325 million dollars. Why aren’t I holding the “band” to the same derision as Mumford & Sons? Why am I not bothered by the video of Redfoo on Mad Money with Jim Cramer talking about his investment portfolio? (The video is incredible, actually, watching the character come and go while hearing an interesting intelligence behind it — however listen to him talk about Apple stock. $13K in shares? Then buying $32K worth, which is now worth $160K?)

Is it the geography? What differentiates the wealth of the children of bankers vs. the children of Motown? What separates opulence from opulence? I know nothing of the background of LMFAO other than their parentage. But I have been able to find out about Mumford & Sons and their backgrounds. What differentiates these two? Is it abandoned in the music of one vs. the other? It feels like with LMFAO that you know they come from wealth, it informs who they are but doesn’t feel flaunted. You learn they are of Berry Gordy, you know his accomplishments, and it makes sense then that his relatives are in the music business.

With Mumford & Sons you don’t know where they are from, but when you do the nature of the British class system starts creeping in. And all their intelligence and worth feels like it comes from a system that is created to form a certain advantage. I am not sure if it is the Eton stigma; when I first heard Vampire Weekend one of the first things I remember is being glad I’d heard their music before having seen the band or read their bio. I bristled at Vampire Weekend’s self-described “upper west side Soweto” sound and their connections to Columbia University, but the music was so fantastic these issues felt like quibbles. Not so with Mumford & Sons. Vampire Weekend, the band, makes me want to send my children to Columbia University in NYC to soak up the city, the sounds, and the culture as they enter adulthood. In America I feel like Ivy League schools are the choices you wanted to attend, the intelligence you wanted to obtain, all the while realizing that in spite of legacy recruits you could imagine yourself or (more importantly) your children attending one of these highly prestigious schools. The English system of higher education seems the opposite. When I think of Oxford or other schools I think of the class system that still exists, where if you go to Eton you are set for life. It feels like getting your child into such British schools would be an uphill struggle that would make Sisyphus weep. And if you are a member of the lower classes your only chance for wealth and fame comes from being either a musician or a page three girl. It seems greedy that a band with such extravagance behind their lives should achieve success in the field of the arts. I can’t shake it. I can’t shake the feeling that when it comes to comparing two bands composed of wealthy kids that the American band seems more likable not only for the style of their music but the attitude they project. You will find no book reports on the LMFAO website.

This is not to say that they are idiots, watch again the clip of Redfoo talking about stocks. But I find LMFAO somehow more honest and authentic than the band comprised of four chaps playing instruments and playing songs fitting more easily into the normal continuum of contemporary music. I’m not sure if this attitude is one that I have grown into or one that has never felt as obvious as it does now. Two bands with nothing in common, more differences than similarities, with two totally different opinions within my head. Maybe it is my age, but my head tells me always go for the hedonistic option. Better to have fun than think too much. Watch the videos, laugh and giggle and think about what makes music so much fun. Is it contemplative, heartfelt lyrics? Or is it something that makes you want to laugh and dance?

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Mike Vincent is a teacher, dreamer, grouch, and runner. He lives in northern Michigan and his favorite Beatle is George Harrison.