As ’09 closes, I look back at another year that passed like a lightning bolt and look forward to 2010…which, to me, is The Future.
We’re living in The Future…or about to.
The world according to I am Legend is just two years away; Rollerball is eight years away, and Blade Runner is just one past that; Soylent Green is set in 2022; and the Terminators are set to walk to Earth in less than 20 years from now.
How about that?
Why am I even mentioning this?
Anyways, here’s some of my very favorite things of 2009:
Wilco at The Wiltern, June 22, 2009: Sure, I’m gay for Wilco — everyone knows that — so anything I say about the band, you’re gonna dismiss as “Billy’s just gay for Wilco”. I’ve been to a lot of shows in my day, and this band is at its peak as far as playing live is concerned. They do things at an instinctual level I’ve never really seen any other band do. Six dudes play as one. There’s not been many shows I’ve ever seen that compare to this one, either. And I don’t give a fuck what you think: Nels Cline is the greatest living American guitarist…and Tweedy’s a lyrical genius. Speaking of, let’s toss in Tweedy’s 12/27 solo show in Phoenix…since I just left it a hour or so ago. He even played an Uncle Tupelo song!
Black Mass: Apocalyptic Religion and the Death of Utopia by John Gray: If you think the Mayans have the End-of-the-World-2012 biz cornered, just know there’s been all sorts of whack jobs predicting our demise since Jesus walked the Earth. You already know every single one of them’s been wrong, too. Wildly wrong. This book isn’t really about that…just kinda. But be warned: when you sit down to read it, make sure it’s in a quiet place and you have your thinking cap securely fastened.
Violet Monroe: The thing I like most about Violet is she doesn’t look like a Porno Princess. She doesn’t act like one, either…most of the time, anyway. Besides, she turned me on to The Raveonettes.
Disc #4 from Big Star’s Keep An Eye on The Sky: Don’t get me wrong — the outtakes, demos, the weird and rare tracks that make up discs 1 – 3 are great, too…but it’s the fourth disc that seals this deal. In January of ’73 Archie Bell & The Drells played Lafayette’s Music Room in Memphis, TN. Opening for them that night was Big Star. No one gave a shit about Big Star (duh…no one really did for another twenty years), so it’s dead silent as they played; since this was a recorded with a mic from the audience and everyone was as lazy as a church mouse, the audio is great. It’s almost like no one was there to watch what has become (arguably) one of the most influential bands of all time play their opening set. In fact, no one was — they were all there to see Archie do “Tighten Up”, which means they missed Alex Chilton and his crew rip through “Back of a Car”, “The Ballad of El Goodo”, “Thirteen”, “O My Soul” and a whole bunch of other great songs.
Mister POV: It took that silly sonofabitch three years to give me enough content to launch his site, but now that it’s out there, I don’t think there’s a better POV site in the whole wide world. Sure, I’m biased…I own 1/2 of it. But still, between Bree Olson, Jackie Daniels, Natalie Norton, Abbey Brooks, Ginger Lee, Ashley Fires, and Barbie Cummings (among others) I don’t think anyone would argue this chubby mofo (and his pervy “pals”) are the luckiest guys in the world.
An Evening with R. Crumb: At the end of October at UCLA’s Royce Hall, a somewhat reclusive Crumb sat down with Françoise Mouly for about an hour and talked about his life (in general) and his Book of Genesis specifically. In the end, I couldn’t decide what I liked better: the whack jobs in the crowd or the whacky Crumb.
Up In The Air: I saw it right after Thanksgiving, and I still haven’t been able to shake it. While I’m talking movies, let’s toss in The Hangover and Inglourious Basterds.
The Raveonettes: Sune Rose Wagner and Sharin Foo kinda remind me of Jim and William Reid and The Jesus and Mary Chain…only I like the Raveonettes more. Way more. They’re Danes, too! How about that?! I mean would someone please name any band hailing from Denmark that’s worth a shit?! Uh huh…I knew you couldn’t. From their site: “Their music is characterized by close two-part vocal harmonies inspired by The Everly Brothers coupled with hard-edged electric guitar overlaid with liberal doses of noise”.