Classic or Dud: Smog

Sometimes I Wish We Were An Eagle LP/CD DC385 forth. 2009

:)

http://www.zuverza.com/job/bcallahan1.jpg

wow, his best cover in ages.

<3 the title

not using the Smog name now?

nope, not since his last lp woke on a whaleheart

googling the title throws up this. mmmm.
& i know the above's a poster; i don't know how it'll correlate with the sleeve.

i liked the last cover.

http://dragcity.com/catalog/posters/dc332post.jpg

really love the cover. last cover was cool too. wasn't so keen on the songs though :/

Those looking for Callahan’s old viciousness might be struggling here, apart from the odd hiss and snarl on the exceptional motorik of “My Friend”. While “Whaleheart” was conspicuously jolly in parts, in stark contrast to some of the earlier records like “Rain On Lens”, say, the general mood here is reflective. He still has a capacity for good jokes, though, notably “Eid Ma Clack Shaw” – the title comes from the narrator reading back “the perfect song” he wrote in the middle of a dream. Callahan sings an entire verse of this, all entirely incomprehensible. Weirdly, though, it’s also one of the most profound and moving, as well as funny, songs I’ve heard in a while.

did anyone hear this yet? apparently it's all syrupy-strings, which sounds like the couple of (pretty good) cover things he's put out recently, kinda rhodesy and tasteful.

what is this? new album? bill callahan or smog?

pumped. i didn't like whaleheart that much but i don't know if he's ever put out two weak albums in a row, at least in his recent run. plus i love sappy smog

new bill callahan album, release data in april i think?

ah good. i didn't like whaleheart one bit but i'm still looking forward to this.

uh huh, april fourteenth. otm about two bad albums in a row - he has such weird rhythms, like rain on lens -> supper. i love sappy smog (the best bit of the last lp being the syrupy middle bit in honeymoon child), but i hope it isn't too easy going. emotive violins can be boring.

above review was from here btw. and there's a new song on youtube too.

first song - the youtube one, jim cain - is floating around, and is lovely

I really liked Whaleheart . Psycht for new one.

Whaleheart is great when the occasional song comes on shuffle, I never turn it off. Will def pick up this new one.

Anyone else diggin the new one? Sounds pretty great on the few several listens. How is it possible for a songwriter to consistently progress over the course of almost twenty years?

dude's got some long hair these days

as seen here
http://pitchfork.com/forkcast/12704-rococo-zephyr-live-in-store/

I really like "Jim Cain" off the new one. Not sure about the rest of it yet, although the string arrangements are lovely

And i just found out it's about James M. Cain!

all thoughts are prey to some beast is terrific. i think the record's pretty great; there's a little of him being too authorial (twitching withers and all) but it's really kinda comforting.

Anyone seeing him on his record store tour? I saw him at Sound Garden in Baltimore tonight and it was fantastic. His new songs (and I like the new record a lot) sound even better with just him and a guitar. Fucking potent stuff. And that voice!

shitty cell phone pic, but yeah, dude's got long hair now:

http://i26.photobucket.com/albums/c102/OfMarrow/GetAttachmentaspx.jpg

am gonna be at the other instore after some amount of queueing etc. have never seen him solo so am pumped; there are real nice bootlegs of like conway hall and stuff where he plays a river ain't too much to love stuff solo, sweetly.

there weren't many people at all at the show i went to, i was kinda surprised. i was looking at some criterion dvd's (not a bad selection Sound Garden!) and Bill walked up onto the stage kinda right down the aisle from me and started setting stuff up. i took a decent standing spot along with like a dozen other people. folks began filing in as he got started and during the set but by the end i'd say there were probably less than 30 people there watching. i was expecting a packed house, the place isn't that big. boo baltimore.

ok, sorry to keep reviving this thing here, kinda drunk outta my head. listening to the album now again. jesus, these songs sounded so much fucking better and severe and HEAVY with just Bill + Guitar. I kinda wish there were two versions of the album. always bootlegs i guess.

there are badass bootlegs of the instore tour he did around supper, electric guitar and a tambourine under his foot - playing strayed, blood red bird, etc too. can not wait.

this album is okay. i'm only really feeling Eid Maw Clack Shaw so far but overall it's certainly an improvement on Woke on A Whaleheart.

i dreamed, it was a dream that you were gone.
i woke up feeling so ripped by reality
yeah, love is the king of the beasts
and when it gets hungry it must kill to eat.
yeah, love is the king of the beasts
a lion walking down city streets.

i fell back asleep some time later on...
and i dreamed the perfect song!
it held all the answers, like hands laid on.

i woke half way and scribbled it down,
and in the morning what i'd wrote i read.
it was hard to read at first but here's what it said:

"EID MA CLACK SHAW
ZUPOVEN DEL BAWM
VERTIPPY VIN SEENER
GO FALLY RAG DOLL."

I love the song after that^ one. The chorus is so warm-sounding.

Also the drums are v much at the front of this album i found.

I'm kind of in love with the fact that he's got a song called Faith/Void on his new album. A DCHC split I've always loved (well, the one side everyone loves anyway) that I've just now realized is a goddamn perfect pairing of bands/band names and a great goddamn song name.

Also loving this album more and more as time goes on.

Will stan.

just heard it for the first time a couple days back. sounded really, really good.
faith/vod ref is crazy bonus points too.

Who's it referencing? His new album is awesome, but, ironically, I think Faith/Void is the least impressive song on it. My Friend and Eid Ma Clack Shaw are my favourites.

The Faith/Void split on Dischord Records... maybe? Insanely classic DC hardcore

Ah.

Ow, was pretty drunk there but yeah the classic The Faith and Void split on Dischord Records was what I was referring to.

"It's time to put God away." It's gotta be one of my favorites from this new one. I can understand folks not digging on it too much, sucker's almost 10 minutes long and not exactly dynamic, but that resigned mantra is fucking chilling. "This is the end of faith, no more must I strive/To find my peace, to find my peace in the light". The song's kind of rooted itself in my brain and it's a little scary.

getting slowly obsessed w/ callahan. 'eid ma clack shaw' worked its way into my itunes most played list pretty quickly.

is it only me who feels as if callahan's music always sound a bit like a parody on the subject,than the real thing?
(same goes with Oldham as a matter of fact)
i'm not saying this as a negative thing btw.i like his music.

Not sure I'm following you. Parody of what exactly? And how? I've heard Oldham criticized as being "ironic", but I don't really think that's totally fair. I guess a bearded Kentuckian covering Mariah Carey is "ironic", but he never does that sort of stuff in a condescending, winking sort of way. Weird idiosyncratic things like recording the old ragged Palace standards with slick Nashville session musicians seem to stem less from "lol" and more "hey, i like this kind of music too, it would be cool to reinterpret my old songs this way."

I'm rambling about the wrong dude, what's this about Callahan making parodies?

maybe irony is a better word to describe it,yes.
what i mean is,that he is obv. influenced by the classic singer/songwriters
but i feel he never sound as serious, or emotionally involved on the music as they were, more like a little wink,a precise and serious gesture to their music,but a gesture still.

I think callahan just approaches songwriting from a very sober, removed sort of place. It's self-aware, yes, and often ironic in that sense ("I am singing a song") but it's in no way unserious.

What was the odd spiky guitar he used up until Dongs (he's playing it on the cover)?

I Feel like the Mother of the World

^^^^^^^^^best song ever, right?

past week or so i've gone from feeling like this body of work is 'okayish songwriter dude' to feeling like it is 'essential American genius'

like it's only just now that i've paid attention enough to notice that he, like, never uses three chords where two will do - i'm not sure if it's real amateurism or entirely a decision - and i was wondering if that changed, when he went from being 'smog' to being 'bill'