Tiny Desk Concert: Sam Phillips

by Bob Boilen

I don't think enough people have heard the music of Sam Phillips, and now seems like a good time to change that. Her songs unfold like perfect miniature pop dramas, and her new album, Don't Do Anything, is loaded with great ones. Of all her incarnations as a performer -- first as a Christian singer, then as a pop singer -- the current Sam Phillips is the one I find most alluring.

All Songs Considered recently asked Phillips to play an intimate concert at my desk here at NPR. She listened to the Tiny Desk Concert we did with Laura Gibson, and that convinced Phillips to play for us. Little did we know that our air conditioning would die during a record-breaking heat wave on that day, but she was a trouper.

Now you can see and hear Sam Phillips perform four songs with the help of Erik Gorfain, who plays an electric guitar with amps the size of cigarette boxes. He also trots out a Stroh violin -- a contraption that must be seen to be believed.

Here's the set list:
Sister Rosetta Goes Before Us
No Explanations
Signal
Little Plastic Life

Enjoy.

Bob Boilen

4:17 PM ET | 06-25-2008 | permalink

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Take the Poll: Best CDs of the Year (So Far)

by Bob Boilen
THE POLLS CLOSED ON JULY 7TH..
RESULTS ARE HERE

We have hit the halfway point in 2008. What are you loving so far? Below is a list of 50 albums to get you thinking. Choose five of these, or submit a write-in for whatever isn't on this list, but in the end choose only five total CDs. If we get a groundswell for something not on the list, we'll will add it.
You can also put the poll on your site blog or facebook page by clicking the share button at the bottom of the list.

To write in your choice, put a comment on the blog. The voting now ends midnight on the 6th of July.
On July 7th we will take a look at the results and play some of the music we haven't covered that did well in the poll.

Bob Boilen

10:49 AM ET | 06-20-2008 | permalink

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Paolo Angeli and His Frankenstein Guitar

by Bob Boilen

On this week's episode of All Songs Considered, I tried my best to describe the Sardinian guitar that Paolo Angeli retooled. I'd never heard anything like this.

On his CD Tesutti, Angeli plays songs by Fred Frith and Bjork. I knew it was all done by one musician, but I figured it was all overdubbed. When I saw a video of Angeli playing his monster guitar, my jaw dropped. Watch, listen, and be amazed.

Bob Boilen

9:49 AM ET | 06-16-2008 | permalink

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Weezer? I Hardly Know Her!

by Robin Hilton

Here's an advantage I have over the rest of you: I've never heard Weezer. Apart from knowing that they were wildly popular in the '90s, I couldn't tell you a thing about them.

This fact made me the target of relentless hazing by the other music producers here at NPR earlier this year, when Stephen Thompson made some reference to Weezer that I didn't catch. This was immediately followed by a chorus of incredulous jabs over how, exactly, I could have possibly avoided hearing this band.

Here's how: I never listened to the radio, I didn't own a TV and none of my friends listened to Weezer. I also spent a good chunk of the '90s living abroad, so I was completely detached from American pop culture for several years.

After everyone at work jumped on me for being so clueless, my girlfriend took pity and loaned me her essential collection of Weezer CDs to study, including the Blue and Green albums, Pinkerton and Maladroit.

I'm embarrassed to say they've been sitting here on my desk for several months now and I still haven't listened.

Now Weezer has a new CD -- their first in three years. From what I've been reading, a lot of long-time fans of the band think it's "a huge disappointment" or "the worst Weezer album ever." (Check out Amazon customer reviews or Metacritic.com). Of course, this happens all the time with bands that have been around a while. How many times have you heard someone say "I love (band name), but only their early stuff"?

It occurred to me that this was the perfect time to discover Weezer. Having no context at all for hearing the new album, I could listen as though they were some completely new band I was just discovering for the first time. I'm like that guy who emerges from a forest after hiding out for 60 years because he thinks there's still a war going on and he doesn't recognize anything in the modern world.

Okay, maybe not quite like that. But I've spent the past couple of days listening to Weezer's Red Album over and over and have come to one immutable conclusion: it's really good! Seriously, people. This is a great album. From the opening notes to the opening track, to the last note of the last track, I just loved it. Every song on the album is ridiculously infectious. The opener, "Troublemaker" has been banging around in my head all week and I seem powerless to stop it.

I was particularly surprised by how... surprising The Red Album is, from the deftly orchestrated choral part on "The Greatest Man that Ever Lived," to the "Sympathy-for-the-Devil" hoots on "Everybody Get Dangerous" and all the intermittent synth flourishes and crunchy guitar hooks. It really left me wanting more.

If I had one criticism of the Red Album, it'd be that it's all a little too perfect. It's so perfectly produced and so perfectly performed and polished that it felt, at times, a little soulless.

Anyway, it all makes me want to go back and hear the older Weezer albums. It also makes me wonder how many late-in-their-career albums I've dismissed by my favorite bands. Maybe I should give them a second chance, too.

Here's an interview NPR's Weekend Edition did with Weezer frontman Rivers Cuomo.

Robin Hilton

4:44 PM ET | 06-13-2008 | permalink

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Sigur Ros vs. My Spell Checker

by Bob Boilen

The new Sigur Ros CD is remarkable. We'll feature a track from the disc, titled med sud i eyrum vid spilum endalaust, on All Songs Considered. The Icelandic band is known for creating moody songs, not catchy hooks, but this disc offers both.
The CD comes out on the 24th of June.

As for favorites, the songs "inni mer syngur vitleysingur" and "vid spilum endalaust" are running neck-a-neck. Titles are often an issue with Sigur Ros; either I can't remember them or they don't title them.

I decided to run the titles for the new CD through my spell checker, which caused "nni mer syngur vitleysingur" to become "Inane Merry Singers Vitleysingur" and "vid spilum endalaust" to become "Avid Spilled Endoblasts," both of which are so much easier to remember.

Below are the rest through the spellchecker.

SAGUARO EROS (SIGUR ROS)

1. Gobbledygook
2. Inane Merry Singers Vitleysingur
3. Gonad Dragon
4. Avid Spilled Endoblasts
5. Festival
6. Stud in Serum
7. Art Batter
8. Lingers
9. Fljotavik
10. Stamens
11. All alright

Bob Boilen

12:11 PM ET | 06-11-2008 | permalink

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Old Music Tuesdays: Sparks

by Bob Boilen

There are bands you either love or hate; there's no in between. Sparks is one of those bands. I loved them when they first started putting out records in the early '70s. But most everyone else I knew couldn't stand them. When I worked in a record store, I'd play Sparks' music and customers would wince, or or more often, just stop browsing the bins and leave.

Sparks were brothers Ron (mustache and keyboards) and Russell (curly hair and vocals) Mael. The only thing that closely resembled their sound was Roxy Music or maybe a David Bowie LP sped up to 45 rpm. They were funny, charming and great pop song writers.

Sparks moved from L.A. to England in the early '70s in the midst of the "glam rock' days, and while they have the drama of those times, I'm not sure they ever fit into that scene.

Elton John bet their producer Muff Winwood that they'd never break into the charts. The song in the YouTube video above -- "This Town Ain't Big Enough For the Both of Us" -- became a smash in 1974. I still love it. You on the other hand may hate it.

What's a band you love that your friends can't stand?

Bob Boilen

10:36 AM ET | 06-10-2008 | permalink

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Sam Phillips' Tiny Desk Concert

Okay, once again... if you missed it, we had a lovely Tiny Desk concert with Sam Phillips today. We went live at 4 p.m. ET with video. We'll post an archive of it here later in the week.

Robin Hilton

3:50 PM ET | 06- 9-2008 | permalink

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About a Song: I Am Trying to Break Your Heart

by Bob Boilen

Let's play a game.

We're going to give you a song -- probably one you've heard -- and you tell us what it means. It could be what it means to you, or it could be what you think the songwriter was trying to say. We'll start with one of the more curious ones we love: "I Am Trying to Break Your Heart" by Wilco, written by Jeff Tweedy:

Here are the words:

I am an American aquarium drinker
I assassin down the avenue
I'm hiding out in the big city blinking
What was I thinking when I let go of you

Let's forget about the tongue-tied lightning
Let's undress just like cross-eyed strangers
This is not a joke so please stop smiling
What was I thinking when I said it didn't hurt

I want to glide through those brown eyes dreaming
Take you from the inside, baby hold on tight
You were so right when you said I've been drinking
What was I thinking when we said good night

I want to hold you in the Bible-black predawn
You're quite a quiet, domino, bury me now
Take off your Band-Aid 'cause I don't believe in touchdowns
What was I thinking when we said hello

I always thought that if I held you tightly
You'd always love me like you did back then
Then I fell asleep in the city kept blinking
What was I thinking when I let you back in

I am trying to break your heart
I am trying to break your heart
But still I'd be lying if I said it wasn't easy
I am trying to break your heart

Disposable Dixie cup drinker
I assassin down the avenue
I've been hiding out in the big city blinking
What was I thinking when I let go of you

Bob Boilen

2:19 PM ET | 06- 6-2008 | permalink

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The Sound of a Generation

by Robin Hilton

Right Now on All Songs Considered we're looking at the music that's defined passed generations. Bob Boilen talks with Carrie Brownstein (Monitor Mix blogger and former guitarist for Sleater-Kinney), Stephen Thompson (editor for NPR's Song of the Day), and Amy Phillips (senior editor with Pitchforkmedia.com) about the most memorable music of the past 40 years. We've got a lot of amazing music on the show, so be sure to check it out, then let us know what you think here.

Every generation has its own soundtrack. The Silent Generation (people born in the '20s and '30s) had big band and swing. Baby Boomers (born in the '40s and '50s) had rock and soul. Generation X (born in the '60s and '70s) had grunge and hip-hop. There's plenty of overlap, of course, and these are incredibly broad distinctions that don't take a lot of other genres into consideration. But it's probably fair to say that these were the most defining moments in music for each generation.

Big-band jazz and swing was the sound of a nation celebrating itself during and after the War. What's now called classic rock was the perfect soundtrack for a rebellion, while the mopey angst of grunge captured the, well, mopey angst of disillusioned teens and twentysomethings coming off the Reagan years.

Now it's the Millennials' turn. Also known as Generation Y, these are people born in the late '70s to early '90s.

I confess I don't listen to much Top 40 radio or watch much MTV. I do read a number of music magazines and music Web sites (Hype Machine, Stereogum, Pitchfork) and listen to the hundreds of CDs we get in the mail each week, so I'd like to think I have at least an inkling of what's going on. But I can't for the life of me figure out what the Millennial/Generation Y soundtrack is. Maybe it hasn't been defined yet. I've been talking with the other producers here -- several of them Millennials themselves -- and we're a little stumped.

What do you think it is? Or what will it be?

Robin Hilton

9:46 AM ET | 06- 6-2008 | permalink

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