TS: ivor cutler's "women of the world" vs jim o'rourke's cover thereof

Jim O’Rourke: Well, I appreciate that. I feel like someone’s finally listened to the record. There are two things about that song: one I knew beforehand and the other I didn’t figure out until recently. I’m really into songs like "Slowride" by Foghat. What’s interesting about that song – and it only works because of its length – is that through the constant reiteration of the words "slow ride" the words go from its obvious sexual connotation to just absolutely nothing. Because it’s being reiterated so much it just becomes another instrument. But when you take it over the long haul like that, what happens is the song actually starts singing about itself. It’s actually confirming its own existence in its own time. And because it’s such a banal statement – "slow ride, take it easy" – it works that way. So I thought it would be interesting to do that with a statement that was so loaded that it would actually resist that. Saying "women of the world take over" isn’t exactly banal. So it interested me what would happen if I reiterated this perplexing statement over and over again like that. Hopefully there would be this conflict between its desire to become this kind of mantra and something you don’t hear anymore.

(nb - I love his cover)

ok, i'm just listening to the O'Rourke for the first time and Ivor wins this hands down. i usually like JimO and i've never had a problem with his voice but the vocal on this is pretty awful.

i disagree a lot. theyre some of the least-affected vocals i can think of. not that i have any problem with strongly-affected vox, but i have a soft spot for plain plain plain "normal person trying to sing prettily" vocals. agh im gay.

I love this, it's from Cutler's website:

Ivor is a member of the Noise Abatement Society and the Voluntary Euthanasia Society. He remarked once when asked if he was a member of the Noise Abatement Society "Yes, for years and years, it makes my life a great misery, noises. I always carry earplugs with me" and "The thing that drives me nuts is a lot of the fans that I have - because of Peel, I think, or because of the taste of the day - are people who go home and play very loud music in their homes, and they go in their motor cars playing very loud music with the windows open. Then they come to my gigs and I play as quiet as I can get away with because that's how I want to communicate it. I think, "I ought not to let these people in if they play loud music." Maybe I should stand at the door and you have to fill in a questionnaire before you can hear me."

(last one, promise)

I think you'll find Ivor was a left winger himself