Archives for October 2018

Certain Songs #1357: N.W.A. – “Straight Outta Compton”

October 31, 2018 by Jim Connelly

Album: Straight Outta Compton
Year: 1988

“You are now about to witness the strength of street knowledge.”

Those words, spoken by future mogul Dr. Dre, are the introduction to one of the most influential albums ever, N.W.A.’s Straight Outta Compton.

We’re now three decades from this particular musical moment, and time and respectability has diluted — if not obliterated — the impact of Straight Outta Compton to the point where nobody blinks an eye at the fact that a major motion picture dramatizing that moment even exists.

But in 1988, to a privileged white twentysomething like me, Straight Outta Compton felt a bit like a transmission from outer space, where I couldn’t really relate to the circumstances under which it was created, but it sure was fascinating to me.

Certain Songs #1356: Nova Mob – “The Last Days of Pompeii / Benediction”

October 30, 2018 by Jim Connelly

Album: The Last Days of Pompeii
Year: 1991

We’ve already discussed how, after the break-up of Hüsker Dü, Grant Hart almost immediately got on his horse and released the eternal classic single, “2541,” and then followed that with the mostly overstuffed Intolerance, which at least featured one of the greatest songs ever about trying to get off the horse, “The Main.”

Since all of that, of course, Grant Hart has passed away, which will probably make the mean things I’m about to say in regards to his next project, Nova Mob, seem even meaner.

Certain Songs #1355: The Normal – “T.V.O.D.”

October 29, 2018 by Jim Connelly

Single, 1978

The Normal was the nom de pop of a guy named Daniel Miller, who felt that even the minimal amount of guitar playing required to be a punk was too damn much, and so he bought himself a synth and recorded a single seminal single that perfectly straddled the border between novelty song and profound statement.

There were a few songs like this as the DIY sea change associated with the punks reverberated across wannabe musicians who didn’t really give a rats ass about punk guitar music. Suddenly, anything was possible.

Certain Songs #1354: Nirvana – “Jesus Doesn’t Want Me For a Sunbeam (MTV Unplugged)”

October 26, 2018 by Jim Connelly

Album: MTV Unplugged
Year: 1993

Coming full circle with Nirvana in a way: I opened these posts with one of their obscure covers, and I’m closing it with the greatest cover they ever did.

It goes without saying that even in 1993, the original Vaselines version of “Jesus Wants Me For a Sunbeam” was pretty fucking obscure. Hell, I’d bought The Way of The Vaselines in 1992, and I had totally missed it. So when it popped up as the third song on the MTV Unplugged broadcast, it was a beautiful surprise.

Certain Songs #1353: Nirvana – “About a Girl (MTV Unplugged)”

October 25, 2018 by Jim Connelly

Album: MTV Unplugged in New York
Year: 1993

Recorded in November of 1993, and airing a month later as a Christmas present, Nirvana’s appearance on MTV Unplugged encapsulated almost everything that made them a great band — only the noise was missing — and provided a tantalizing glimpse to the future as well.

Like all things Nirvana, it’s nearly impossible these days to look at it as a performance in and of itself without trying to dissect it for clues, but I’m convinced that it would still be remembered as a classic performance even if it hadn’t become a inadvertent self-provided eulogy.

Certain Songs #1352: Nirvana – “All Apologies”

October 24, 2018 by Jim Connelly

Album: In Utero
Year: 1993

“All Apologies” is my favorite Nirvana song.

“All Apologies” is the song that I most associate with Kurt Cobain blowing his brains out with a shotgun.

I’m not sure what it says about me that the Nirvana song that makes me the happiest is also the Nirvana song that makes me the saddest, but somewhere in the Leonard Cohen afterworld, I’m guessing that Kurt Cobain is nodding his head in recognition.

Certain Songs #1351: Nirvana – “Pennyroyal Tea”

October 23, 2018 by Jim Connelly

Album: In Utero
Year: 1993

Originally scheduled to be the third single from In Utero, but withdrawn because, you know, suicide, “Pennyroyal Tea” is perhaps the song on In Utero that would have fit the most on Nevermind, both structurally and sonically.

The irony, of course, it that “Pennyroyal Tea” was the one song where Kurt publicly said that he was dissatisfied with how Steve Albini’s mix came out, because he knew that it needed more of the sheen that glossed up the Nevermind singles.

Certain Songs #1350: Nirvana – “Dumb”

October 22, 2018 by Jim Connelly

Album: In Utero
Year: 1993

To say that the run-up to In Utero was tumultuous would be an insult to the concept of tumult. Nirvana was caught in between having to follow an massive and unexpected hit record with yet another hit record and the nagging feeling that having another hit record was the worst possible thing that could possibly happen.

So naturally, coming from the punk rock side of things, where any kind of success was frowned upon, they went with Steve Albini to record In Utero, knowing that the supersonic sheen that Butch Vig & Andy Wallace gave Nevermind would be nowhere to be found. In addition, Cobain wrote a bunch of songs that weren’t nearly as melodic, delving into the more abrasive side of his songwriting, and doubling down on his personal punk rock bona fides.

Certain Songs #1349: Nirvana – “Something in the Way (BBC 1991)”

October 21, 2018 by Jim Connelly

Album: Nevermind
Year: 1991

Nirvana was always going to be heavily bootlegged no matter what: there was just too much demand and too little supply. And naturally, the demand skyrocketed in the wake of Cobain’s suicide, and so we got MTV Unplugged and Live from the Muddy Banks of the Wishkiah, and eventually the With The Lights Out box set.

But, of course, there was a lot more stuff out there. Not so much studio recordings, but plenty of live shows, radio dates and other ephemera that got collected on bootlegs with titles as Outcesticide or A Season in Hell, as every single thing that Kurt Cobain had played on felt like it was interested to those of us who felt like he was a generational talent who took himself away too soon.

Certain Songs #1348: Nirvana – “On a Plain”

October 20, 2018 by Jim Connelly

Album: Nevermind
Year: 1991

While the back half of Nevermind didn’t have any commercially released singles, it still had a plethora of amazing songs, the amazingest being the penultimate track, “On a Plain,” which on a lesser album would have been the lead single, instead of stuck all in the back near the end.

And of course, as part of the juggernaut that Nevermind ended up becoming, “On a Plain” was released to radio stations as a promotional single, and getting a pretty decent amount of airplay in the process, and as far as I’m concerned, it’s right up there with “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” or “Come as You Are” in terms of their greatest songs.