Joanna Newsom - Have One On Me (RIP blogs)

"Easy" when she sings that word sounds a bit like Kate Bush "Breathing".

She performed "Soft As Chalk" on Jimmy Fallon last night. You can watch the episode on nbc.com.

http://i49.tinypic.com/igcjed.jpg

Mike Myers' clapping for Newsom made me lol

here's the URL for the video, btw: http://www.latenightwithjimmyfallon.com/video/episodes/#vid=1206946

just fast forward toward the end. thanks to Moodles for the heads up.

Way, WAY better than the studio version.

Jody Rosen's NY Times piece is exceedingly kind in describing her voice

Jody Rosen's NYT Magazine piece today is okay.

that NBC link doesn't load for me. here it is on youtube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZV0PfHemuvs

I kinda want to ask every musician now, when I interview them, what their "spirit animal" is.

so hers is a domesticated wolf kept by a property owner

So, that NY Times piece is excellent, and anyone who's interested in Newsom's music should read it. In it, she recalls a really awesome story, which has been told partially in Erik Davis's Arthur piece on Ys and partially in her song "Cosmia," about an important moment from when she was younger. When I was reading her account of this story in the NY Times piece, I had the ilx unicorn crew's voices in the back of my head, and I couldn't stop myself from laughing. So, yeah, great story, but impossible not to laugh after you've read this thread. Here's an excerpt for the benefit of Que, J0hn D., et. al:

She also had a spiritual streak, which her parents likewise indulged. When she was 18, in the middle of her senior year of high school, she decided that she needed “some sort of ritual marker of the end of childhood.” Her plan was to camp in the open air for three days and nights, eating little, seeing no one, communing with the great outdoors. Newsom’s mother sanctioned her missing school and helped her daughter scout out a place by the Yuba, in the middle of 35 wild acres owned by family friends.

“I hesitate to speak about it because it sounds so corny, but one of my goals out there was to find a spirit-animal,” Newsom told me. “On the third day, I was kind of delirious. I’d only eaten a little rice. I’d just slept and looked at a river for three days. I was prepared to be visited by my spirit animal — I was just sitting there, saying some sort of prayer, inviting that presence into my life. And then I saw three white wolves charging down at me. I thought maybe I was hallucinating; but I was also prepared to die. But the wolves ran up and started licking my face. Then I remembered that the daughter of the woman who owned the property kept domesticated wolves.” A few hours later, Newsom hiked out of the woods and went home. Her mother had organized a celebratory dance party for Newsom and her girlfriends. She strung up lights and served four kinds of cake.

Pertinent lyrics from "Cosmia":

and all those lonely nights down by the river
brought me bread and water (water, in)
but though I tried so hard my little darling
I couldn't keep the night from coming in

and all those lonely nights down by the river
I was brought my bread and water by the kith and the kin
now in the quiet hour when I am sleepin'
I cannot keep the night from comin' in

For the non-unicorn people who care, here's the excerpt from Erik Davis's profile I refer to two posts above:

Rough stuff. But Newsom’s relationship with the Yuba goes deeper than such idylls. Towards the end of high school, when she was eighteen, Newsom went down alone to a wild spot along the river. After asking their assistance, she arranged some stones into a circle, and then sat down within the ring. She stayed in the circle for three days, fasting, facing the river. Her best friend and some pals camped a few miles away, bringing her water and small portions of rice while she slept. She had assigned herself things to do but abandoned them all. She just sat there and watched the river, and, even more, she listened to it.

“I was a completely different person before I went to the river, and a completely different person after,” Newsom says. When she first got back the girl was a total wreck. She would start crying when she woke up and not quit until she slept. She stopped going to school. She’d pick up the local paper, and read a headline like “Man Dies in Car Crash,” and then the crash would be in her mind, and the man’s bloody crumbled body, and his pain and dread and fearful exit from this world. “None of the calluses or borders or walls we put up to protect ourselves from going absolutely insane while experiencing life – none of those stood anymore. They had been worn completely away. I was like infantile and dysfunctional, a weepy, drunk mess.”

Weird. It's like instead of her liminal moment inaugurating her into adulthood, it had the opposite function. Maybe this is what happens sometimes when people invent their own liminal rituals based on cartoons they've seen and that one Carlos Castaneda book they've read and not on personal, communal, familial traditions.

the NY Times piece was pretty meh, but the magazine sucks these days anyway.

^ A++

glad you at least gave it a chance, tbf

not sure what was A+ about my comment. it was either read that article or the one about "can we teach teachers to teach better," or better yet the article last week "clinical depression might actually be good for us"

gotta say that excerpt appears to be grade-A evidence for the case against going on a vision quest

yup

hahaha, the A+ was just because a lukewarm comment from you on Newsom was in character. no big thing. but i'm glad you gave it a chance, really

i feel like my childhood is meaningless after reading that. i threw a history text book into a river once but that's it

my comment was on the article not Newsom.

http://www.google.com/search?q=reading+comprehension&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a

no wolves tbf

http://www.neatorama.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/article-1192276-054d437a000005dc-575_634x734.jpg

you knew what i meant dude. yawning @ you

maybe you need to go on a vision quest and learn how to read

christ get a room you two

i haven't fucked a sock since high school

okay no

i laughed

lol

http://dinosaursinnewyork.files.wordpress.com/2009/09/221106-unizoom2.jpg

Only vision quest I've ever done was when I picked up my new glasses.

I do love "1981."

"'81," rather.

retagged "51" in my playlist - sounds better now

the more i listen to this the more i think she could have just released the first disc as a whole album and i would have been satisfied

second disc pretty important too imo. third disc i'm not totally sold on.

http://cdn.pitchfork.com/media/newsom2.JPG

http://i49.tinypic.com/igcjed.jpg

I swear that "slow as molasses [. . .] time passes" line is from the opening theme song to Evening Shade...

http://sharetv.org/images/evening_shade-show.jpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZV0PfHemuvs

snorg girl looks crazy

xxxp

calling a song about AD 1, '81 is very shrewd

so is the domesticated wolf story — it's the whole born-in-the-80s thing of being aware of how ludicrous yr attempts at 'spirituality' are and feeling the need to undercut them

on the other hand ppl seem v capable of missing the point

where is that gif oh yeah:

http://i275.photobucket.com/albums/jj303/Thatairsoftkid/HatersGonnaHate.jpg

yeah i thought the wolf story was kind of sweet. clearly it was an experience that meant a lot to her but its also clear how silly she realizes the whole thing was

And then I saw three white wolves...

http://timberwolfhq.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/3-wolves-howling-tshirt.jpg

http://maliciousglee.com/site/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/joanna-newsom.jpg

Has she always made such faces while singing?