Liz Phair

Certain Songs #940: Liz Phair – “Uncle Alvarez”

July 23, 2017 by Jim Connelly

Album: whitechocolatespaceegg
Year: 1998

After failing to catch lightning in a bottle a second time with 1994’s good-not-great Whip-Smart, Liz Phair changed direction completely with 1998’s transitory whitechocolatespaceegg, which abandoned the low-fi sound of her first two records for a more slick, Scott Litt-produced approach.

This sounds like I’m winding up towards an insult, but actually, quite the opposite. I really liked whitechocolatespaceegg. It was the closest thing to traditional singer-songwriter album she’s ever produced, but retained some of the musical weirdness that marked her first two albums. The lyrical themes expanded beyond love and sex, and she was writing about characters and situations that clearly weren’t autobiographical.

Certain Songs #939: Liz Phair – “Divorce Song”

July 22, 2017 by Jim Connelly

Album: Exile in Guyville
Year: 1993

Oh god, “Divorce Song.” My favorite song from Exile in Guyville, and my favorite Liz Phair song.

We’ve all been there, right? One last road trip in a relationship that was clearly already a dead shark, maybe taken as a last-ditch effort at reconnecting, maybe taken because of an obligation larger than the relationship, maybe taken because you didn’t know how not to take it.

And it was a fucking disaster.

Certain Songs #938: Liz Phair – “Fuck and Run”

July 21, 2017 by Jim Connelly

Album: Exile in Guyville
Year: 1993

Of course, part of the thing surrounding Exile in Guyville was Liz Phair’s utterly fearless openness about her sexuality. It wasn’t unprecedented, of course — Chrissie Hynde, among others wrote with the same fearlessness — but her explicitness did feel fresh.

And so you had a song like “Fuck and Run,” which not only had an explicit title — “fuck” is right there in the title, as a-verb-not-an-adjective — but was right there with Liz the morning after a one-night stand.

Certain Songs #937: Liz Phair – “Explain it to Me”

July 20, 2017 by Jim Connelly

Album: Exile in Guyville
Year: 1993

Of course, if Exile in Guyville had been nothing but straight forward indie pop songs, it wouldn’t have been nearly as interesting.

Instead, Liz devoted a significant chunk of the album’s running time to more experimental or atmospheric songs, featuring offbeat sounds, slow tempos and, in the case of “Dance of the Seven Veils” and “Flower,” some of her most explicit lyrics, as well. My favorite of all of these was the sad, shimmering “Explain it to Me.”

Certain Songs #936: Liz Phair – “Never Said”

July 19, 2017 by Jim Connelly

Album: Exile in Guyville
Year: 1993

Ah, 1993. I’ve pointed out a few times how weird 1993 was, especially from the perspective of nearly a quarter-century later, when artists as seemingly uncommercial as Lemonheads, Belly and The Breeders could have at least minor hits on MTV.

So it wasn’t all that surprising to see the video for Liz Phair’s “Never Said,” on MTV. In fact, given all of the hubbub surround Exile in Guyville, it seemed almost natural.

Certain Songs #935: Liz Phair – “6’1″”

July 18, 2017 by Jim Connelly

Album: Exile in Guyville
Year: 1993

An instant landmark when it appeared in 1993 and a record that I hope is passed down through the ages in the same way that Violent Femmes debut has been, Exile in Guyville still sounds as amazing as ever.

Of course, “amazing” is a relative term for an album that helped define what we all called “lo-fi” back then: records that sounded unfinished and unpolished, with all of jagged edges sticking out for unsuspecting folks to scrape themselves against.

Certain Songs #934: Liz Phair – “(Sometimes a Dream) Is What Makes You A Slave”

July 17, 2017 by Jim Connelly

Album: Girlysound
Year: 1991

I think it was Ranjit who sent me a copy of Liz Phair’s Girlysound tape. This was, of course, after Exile in Guyville came out, and definitely after he and I had met in person after becoming friends on Prodigy’s Replacements bulletin board.

I got quite a few tapes (and hopefully sent a few) that way. People who I met online from all over the country exchanging music with people who were otherwise just words on a low-rez computer screen, and without even the benefit of avatars or bios or anything, you had to determine who you liked or disliked just by the words they wrote.

19 Musical Moments To Die For

February 13, 2009 by Jim Connelly

This month, in honor of St. ~~Hallmark’s~~ Valentine’s day, it’s a special theme version of Musical Moments To Die For.

Love songs! Nothing but love songs!

Well, that’s not exactly right: not so much love songs, but songs about love, which is a totally different head. Totally.

However, just because I’ve applied a theme to this month’s post, it isn’t meant to be a definitive list of greatest songs about love or anything like that. It just happens that all of the songs this month are about it, that’s all. Which means, not uncoincidentally, a lot of these songs were huge hit singles or are incredibly familiar or obvious. Which, of course, doesn’t make them any less to die for.

This is the seventh in a series: The first one had 25, the second one had 24, the third one had 23, the fourth one had 22, the fifth one had 21, and the sixth had 20.