CHRMAPHNY

I got a random email today from LJ basically telling me that this community was here. So I'm just posting this to see if there's anybody out there that would like to see some posts on here again...?

Spoon - I Summon You (Demo)
Someone else posted the demo for Sister Jack. Here's the other one that was available on their website a few years ago. Get the final version on Gimme Fiction.

Queen - Feel Like (Under Pressure Demo)
This is probably the gem of the this entire post! Under Pressure has gained a lot more popularity lately (at least here in the States). The finished song is pretty much a demo in itself. The story goes, Queen were writing new songs in the studio one day and David Bowie stopped by while they were working on this cut, tenatively titled Feel Like. David Bowie isn't on this demo, but I'm pretty sure this was recorded the same day (maybe even within hours) as the final version of Under Pressure we here on the Hot Space album and on the radio. Bowie also added his voice to a song called Cool Cat, which is also on Hot Space, but the version with Bowie was released only on some 12" singles.

David Bowie - Space Oddity (Demo)
Here's your David Bowie fix, if the last song left you wanting more. It's just over a minute long, though. The complete song ended up on Hunky Dory.

Queen - I Want It All / Chinese Torture (Demo)
This is kind of a combination demo. Both songs ended up on The Miracle album. Well, the second one was added as a bonus track on the CD.

Foo Fighters - DOA (Demo)
This demo was released on the limited edition Five Songs And A Cover EP which I believe was only at Best Buy. Lots of good songs on there, like a cover of Cream's I Feel Free and a studio version of Skin And Bones.

I recently sold my first book. In conjunction, I've established another LiveJournal to report on the project's progress, occasionally provide links about, and writings by, its subject, Paul Nelson (famous for his Rolling Stone reviews of Jackson Browne, the Sex Pistols, Neil Young, Leonard Cohen, and the Ramones, as well as his cover story about Warren Zevon's battle with alcoholism), and share snippets of information or parts of interviews that may or may not be covered further in the final product.

The new journal shares the book's working title, Everything Is an Afterthought: The Life and Writings of Paul Nelson. Just follow the link.

Anybody interested in learning more about this brilliant critic, whose own life proved just as mysterious and fascinating as the artists' about whom he wrote, is welcome to join. As well, tracking the process of how a book goes from sale to publication should prove interesting. I'm rather curious about that part myself...

Could people post their favorite slow songs?

Here's a couple more.


Scala - Life On Mars
Year: 1974
Album: On The Rocks
That girls choir covers a David Bowie classic. Actually this features vocals by a guy named Jasper.

Gus Gus - Believe
Year: 1997
Album: Polydistortion
This song is from a sampler CD I found at a thrift store. I like it because the beat and overall sound creates a very distinct atmosphere in my mind, but it's hard to describe.


Let me know what you think or just give me some preferences for what you'd like me to post. Variety is my musical preference.
Don't forget, you can all post as well.

Just a quick post to try out my new free upgrade* to YouSendIt. Both are .m4a files.

Led Zeppelin - The Crunge
Album: Houses Of The Holy 
Year: 1973
"Where's that confounded bridge?"


Incubus - Oil & Water
Album: Light Grenades
Year: 2006
It got stuck in my head recently, so I just went with it. Good for anyone who's been in a relationship that felt like they were trying to mix oil and water (as the song illustrates).



*Links last 14 days! That's nice.

Is anyone still out there that would be interesting in bringing this music community back?

http://www.myspace.com/acetrigonom…
http://myspace.com/dineperil
http://myspace.com/vovabraxas
http://www.myspace.com/pteradons
http://www.swamilive.com

This is a twist on the Letter Meme. Instead of coming up with ten items for a certain letter, you come up with five song titles for a certain letter and explain why you picked them. If interested then leave a comment. I’ll give you a letter. You post this blurb in your journal along with your list.

(I even uploaded them for you.)

R given by erroroperator

Camera Obscura: Roman Holiday
It's so happy. "If I was good at hating, I'd hate you. If I was good loving I'd fall."

Jenny Lewis: Rise Up With Fists!!!
I loved her as the lead in Rilo Kiley and I love her solo project.

La Oreja de Van Gogh: Rosas
It's the name of my favorite city in the world and I love her voice.

Cursive: The Recluse
It's so beautifully sad.

The Jim Yoshii Pile-up: Reckless Driving
Story of my life.

Live albums have always been a way for rock artists and record companies to put out product (a) at Christmastime, (b) after the artist has died, or (c) during creative dry spells. Learning to Flinch, the 1993 live album by the late Warren Zevon, qualifies on one count: (a) was released closer to Memorial Day than the yuletide, (b) predated his death by ten years, but (c) indeed was issued to bridge the four-year span between Mr. Bad Example in 1991 and Mutineer in 1995.

This live effort by a singer/songwriter who was never that prolific is well worth remembering for his arresting performances of songs both odd and personal. The album title came from what Zevon liked to call "the vicissitudes of life on the road" (it was recorded the previous summer and fall in concerts around the world); he said it also accurately described his attitude toward the then approaching millennium.

Zevon plays solo on the album, employing only guitars, electronic keyboards, and piano -- all with extreme prejudice. Going at his guitar with the lonely passion of a flagellant, when he's done it's surprising there's anything left of the instrument. But it's his work at the piano that reveals his early training. As a boy, Zevon's musical interests tended toward the classical, and by the time he was thirteen he was visiting with his Hollywood Hills neighbor Igor Stravinsky in the great composer's home. At the same time, Learning to Flinch demonstrates that Zevon's ivory-banging could be every bit as brutal as Jerry Lee's.

The album's centerpiece is a complex rethinking of "Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner." Utilizing a Bartok-influenced piano arrangement, for more than thirteen minutes Zevon sings "of arms and the men" and lays waste to his original 1978 version of the song. The album also introduced three new Zevon songs, the best of which was "The Indifference of Heaven," a quietly intense tale of raging existentialism that begins:

Time stands still
Time on my hands
Time to kill
Blood on my hands
And my hands in the till
Down at the 7-11

The song's protagonist finds himself waking to the "same old sun, same old moon" and, like Paul Schrader's Travis Bickle, moving each day closer to violence.

Learning to Flinch was Zevon's twelfth album (counting his stint as lead singer for the one-shot Hindu Love Gods, a blues unit he formed a few years earlier with R.E.M. sans Michael Stipe) and it still sounds sharp as a knife. It serves as a fine compendium of, or introduction to, the work of an immensely gifted artist whose own dark sense of humor finally caught up with him when he died from mesothelioma in 2003.