These guys's albums (and some Silver Jews) are pleasing me today.
― caek, Wednesday, 31 December 2008 14:56 (fifteen years ago) link
here is info http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/01/05/090105fa_fact_sanneh?currentPage=all
― ❤¯\㋡/¯❤ (ice cr?m), Wednesday, 31 December 2008 15:18 (fifteen years ago) link
I pick Callahan because I'm a euro-pig.
― u s steel, Wednesday, 31 December 2008 16:03 (fifteen years ago) link
oldham 4 sure i used to love this guy so much as a teen - arise therefor is the best
― ❤¯\㋡/¯❤ (ice cr?m), Wednesday, 31 December 2008 16:05 (fifteen years ago) link
OLDHAM
That said, I never managed to get very deep into either. LOVE I See a Darkness, which I picked up at random after years of occasionally buying (and usually liking) this or that Oldham/Palace/whatever LP or 45. That and the roughly contemporary "South Side of the World" / "One With the Birds" 45 are incredible, but I haven't liked subsequent stuffs nearly as much. Also remember extra digging the Palace EP w/ "Horses" & "Trudy Dies", and that "Big Balls" mutilation Oldham did for Skin Graft. Makes me think I oughtta do some backtracking here...
In the very early 90s, I liked the idea of liking Smog. Bought Sewn to the Sky because she look intersting, handmade, but never really got the hang of it. A couple years later, picked up Julius Caesar, which was okayish, but I loved "37 Push Ups" and still do. Favorite Smog song by far. Friends have gotten real deep into subsequent Smogs, esp. the Red Apple thru Dongs era, and I can't deny, but it's never quite pushed past like into love for me. Again, I probably just haven't given it the time it deserves.
― served by boot-face (contenderizer), Wednesday, 31 December 2008 16:28 (fifteen years ago) link
That article was nice. My favorite part: He was wearing a maroon tank top, orange-and-pink pants, blue Crocs, and a pink Boston Red Sox cap, with “cam” and “odia” scrawled on either side of the “B.” Does anyone know where I can find a good picture of this, showing the handwriting? (The Pitchfork pix don't).
― dad a, Wednesday, 31 December 2008 16:40 (fifteen years ago) link
its quite the aggressive look eh
― ❤¯\㋡/¯❤ (ice cr?m), Wednesday, 31 December 2008 17:30 (fifteen years ago) link
i like them both v much
― ullr saves (gbx), Friday, 4 February 2011 01:43 (thirteen years ago) link
oldham is a bit of a blind spot for me, i would struggle to name three songs. callahan is a longtime fave otoh, so he wins this by default.
― psycho yahtzee (haitch), Friday, 4 February 2011 01:53 (thirteen years ago) link
Like hilarious to see someone choosing Callahan over Oldham based on voice. Callahan has the biggest joke of a voice upon which an actual career is premised I have ever heard. Even pre-voice lessons Oldham was schooling him vocally on all counts. Oldham is the only answer.
― Badmotorfinger Debate Club (MFB), Friday, 4 February 2011 01:55 (thirteen years ago) link
Callahan has the biggest joke of a voice upon which an actual career is premised I have ever heard.
utter bullshit. have you heard anything he's done in the past few years? gorgeous voice. feel like Oldham's voice peaked around I See a Darkness and Ease Down the Road. it's gotten... scratchier?
― circa1916, Friday, 4 February 2011 01:59 (thirteen years ago) link
I heard his last record and found it just as unbearable as his other records and most of the Smog records (I have heard most of them). I love Oldham, Berman and most of the Drag City po-mo singer-songwriter stable to death, some of my favorite music ever. I have never heard anything by Callahan that approaches that level, his whole approach is bizarre, unfunny, devoid of emotion. Just nothing to offer. I understand why he is compared to Oldham for obvious reasons but as far as the singer-songwriter milieu they are an opposite ends of the aesthetic spectrum IMO.
― Badmotorfinger Debate Club (MFB), Friday, 4 February 2011 02:04 (thirteen years ago) link
his whole approach is...devoid of emotion.
I guess I can understand why you don't like his songs (if not your hostility), but this claim is just...bizarre. Maybe you should listen to some recent records? I find his music to be deeply emotional.
― Hadrian VIII, Friday, 4 February 2011 02:30 (thirteen years ago) link
also 'unfunny'?? dude's hilarious
― iatee, Friday, 4 February 2011 02:32 (thirteen years ago) link
Yes.
― Hadrian VIII, Friday, 4 February 2011 02:33 (thirteen years ago) link
everybody knows/a menage a trois/is just the desire/to do it with/your ma, and pa
― schlump, Friday, 4 February 2011 02:43 (thirteen years ago) link
dress sexy is a sweet, quietly hilarious song imo
― ullr saves (gbx), Friday, 4 February 2011 04:03 (thirteen years ago) link
utter bullshit. have you heard anything he's done in the past few years? gorgeous voice.
otm. the dude has a beautiful voice. kinda sounds like willie if you dropped him to a baritone
― ullr saves (gbx), Friday, 4 February 2011 04:04 (thirteen years ago) link
Well these guys are all idiosyncratic personalities to a degree so perhaps Callahan's personality just doesn't appeal to me, like at all. I think lyrically he has a bit in common with Jim O'Rourke's approach, and I love O'Rourke's pop records. I don't know, there is just something "off" about him to me.
I would maintain that his voice is, at best, a very acquired taste whereas I think Oldham has broad appeal, at least vocally.
― Badmotorfinger Debate Club (MFB), Friday, 4 February 2011 04:16 (thirteen years ago) link
i love both these dudes, and obv diff't strokes and all, but man i can't help but think this is totally backwards for most people! oldham's voice is great, now esp, but his early stuff is uh challenging to say the least. callahan's 'problem' is not that his voice is bad, but that he doesn't let it loose more often. if he went as hard as oldham does (there doesn't exist a smog rave-up as far as i know) i'm guessing he would sound great. as it is, his whole ish is that he's pretty restrained, and seems to ride the edge between 'sonorous talking' and 'barely croony'.
― ullr saves (gbx), Friday, 4 February 2011 04:27 (thirteen years ago) link
does callahan use backup singers? oldham has been using them with very excellent results for the last several records. good tact for a marginal singer imo
― buzza, Friday, 4 February 2011 04:30 (thirteen years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lg5VAOG67So
― buzza, Friday, 4 February 2011 04:34 (thirteen years ago) link
callahan leaves me p cold
love oldham tho
i like silver jews best but i guess thats not the thread
― cloudy predecessor (Lamp), Friday, 4 February 2011 04:38 (thirteen years ago) link
love both these guys, might give a slight edge to callahan but who cares they're both good
OPOs are 'river guard' and 'strange form of life'
― ciderpress, Friday, 4 February 2011 04:44 (thirteen years ago) link
Will is a far more interesting artist, his whole career path is pretty amazing. I think he has many more years and surprises left in him.
― i love you but i have chosen snarkness (Steve Shasta), Friday, 4 February 2011 05:38 (thirteen years ago) link
Oldham by leaps and bounds
― O_o-O_0-o_O (jjjusten), Friday, 4 February 2011 06:08 (thirteen years ago) link
wtf @ this... bill callahan's voice these days is beautiful
― just sayin, Friday, 4 February 2011 09:04 (thirteen years ago) link
pretty sure Oldham, Callahan, and Silver Jews accounted for about 50% of my listening in college. Oldham was always the favorite back then but i've since moved over to Callahan. i think that's mostly because Oldham's last few records, while fine, are just kind of... eh. he's fallen into a bit of a groove and it's a bland one. Callahan on the other hand is doing some of the best work of his career. still dig Will. i think he's a wonderful lyricist. but Bill's stuff hits harder these days.
― circa1916, Saturday, 5 February 2011 07:38 (thirteen years ago) link
i think will had a great 00s actually
superwolf might be my fav overall thing he ever did, i thought the tortoise things was a pretty successful experiment, really like the letting go, lie down in the light, jeez was the nashville record this decade? can't remember
― basedketball (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Saturday, 5 February 2011 15:46 (thirteen years ago) link
yeah i agree. those are three of my favorites. the nashville one never grabbed me but it's due for a revisit soon. bill though put out his best album in 2009 and people his vocals and sense of humor (seriously!!) are way offtm.
― Moreno, Saturday, 5 February 2011 17:57 (thirteen years ago) link
there are two threads comparing callahan and oldham, but i feel like david berman might be a better comparison for callahan? or like callahan is the intersection between oldham and berman?
― congratulations (n/a), Tuesday, 12 April 2011 15:53 (thirteen years ago) link
ha just looked upthread and saw several silver jews mentions. so much for my "original thought"
― congratulations (n/a), Tuesday, 12 April 2011 15:54 (thirteen years ago) link
been listening to a lot of the drag city weirdo troubadour poets (oldham, callahan, berman) lately. really impressive bodies of work from all of 'em...
― tylerw, Tuesday, 12 April 2011 15:57 (thirteen years ago) link
a poll of oldham vs callahan vs berman would be impossible to vote on.
― Algerian Goalkeeper, Tuesday, 12 April 2011 16:01 (thirteen years ago) link
kind of feel like berman has an unfair advantage because he really hasn't been as prolific as the other guys....
― tylerw, Tuesday, 12 April 2011 16:02 (thirteen years ago) link
yeah you are probably right
― Algerian Goalkeeper, Tuesday, 12 April 2011 16:02 (thirteen years ago) link
would be an easy choice of callahan for me
― congratulations (n/a), Tuesday, 12 April 2011 16:13 (thirteen years ago) link
i need to listen to more silver jews though
pitting all three against each other would be like cohen vs. dylan vs. young. i'll let you decide which is which...
― tylerw, Tuesday, 12 April 2011 16:15 (thirteen years ago) link
I think on ILM berman would win but maybe someone should just do the poll and find out.
― Algerian Goalkeeper, Tuesday, 12 April 2011 17:12 (thirteen years ago) link
Jason Molina would have to be in the poll too
― Algerian Goalkeeper, Tuesday, 12 April 2011 17:21 (thirteen years ago) link
Callahan got to date Chan Marshall, so he gets a few points for that.
― nicky lo-fi, Tuesday, 12 April 2011 18:07 (thirteen years ago) link
and Dame Darcy.
― it's time for the fish in the perculator (Steve Shasta), Tuesday, 12 April 2011 18:12 (thirteen years ago) link
and lisa carver
― kate78, Tuesday, 12 April 2011 18:19 (thirteen years ago) link
he was also liz taylor's last husband
― tylerw, Tuesday, 12 April 2011 18:20 (thirteen years ago) link
and father of ned raggett
― Algerian Goalkeeper, Tuesday, 12 April 2011 18:21 (thirteen years ago) link
(not really)
― Algerian Goalkeeper, Wednesday, 13 April 2011 00:06 (thirteen years ago) link
Like the dude a lot but he seems...second string?
Anyway that poll would be good
― FUN FUN FUN FUN (gbx), Wednesday, 13 April 2011 00:11 (thirteen years ago) link
seems like we are afraid to start the poll for some reason
― Mark, Wednesday, 13 April 2011 00:13 (thirteen years ago) link
Wire readers might see it?
― Algerian Goalkeeper, Wednesday, 13 April 2011 00:21 (thirteen years ago) link
it's not really possible to do an "ironic" version of Dan, they are miles ahead of anyone else in irony
― longtime caller, first time listener (man alive), Tuesday, 17 November 2020 15:30 (three years ago) link
I guess I don't know why you'd assume they would do an ironic version to begin with
― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 17 November 2020 15:31 (three years ago) link
the song arrived on the same day that tom scharpling promised to dedicate his whole show to telling people why the dan is bad
― la table sur la table (voodoo chili), Tuesday, 17 November 2020 15:32 (three years ago) link
ugh ffs scharpling
― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson), Tuesday, 17 November 2020 15:52 (three years ago) link
this cover is really excellent btw
I kinda want Callahan and McKay to join Superwolf for the next album.
― soaring skrrrtpeggios (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Tuesday, 17 November 2020 16:06 (three years ago) link
I think I'd prefer it if Will sang the lead vox? Bill has all the range of a parents-basement Astrud Gilberto fanatic.
MacKay really saves this cover.
― Jersey Al (Albert R. Broccoli), Tuesday, 17 November 2020 16:35 (three years ago) link
(that's not to say that Donald had incredible range, yet he understood the limitations of his gift which he then built songs around, as ambitious as he was at the time)
― Jersey Al (Albert R. Broccoli), Tuesday, 17 November 2020 16:36 (three years ago) link
Weirdly I guess I'm the only one who really doesn't like the guitar on this - it sounds like a mess to me.
― longtime caller, first time listener (man alive), Saturday, 21 November 2020 04:55 (three years ago) link
I mean some of it sounds good but all the different layers together sound bad
― longtime caller, first time listener (man alive), Saturday, 21 November 2020 04:56 (three years ago) link
Bill's vocal is good enough and I like the part where Will comes in on harmony
― longtime caller, first time listener (man alive), Saturday, 21 November 2020 04:57 (three years ago) link
I mean really this sounds like a fucking mixed level guitar class playthrough
― longtime caller, first time listener (man alive), Saturday, 21 November 2020 04:59 (three years ago) link
I get nothing out of Oldham while I like a good handful of smog records so it’s gotta be bill
― EvanP, Saturday, 21 November 2020 06:01 (three years ago) link
I don’t know the original song, but I agree w/ man alive re: the guitar playing in that track.
― down like 6:30 (morrisp), Saturday, 21 November 2020 06:06 (three years ago) link
I'm a fan of both McKay and Callahan (indifferent about Bonnie), but this cover is horrendous and really showcases the limits of Callahan's voice
― Paul Ponzi, Saturday, 21 November 2020 10:53 (three years ago) link
It sounds like there is one good acoustic track, which I assume is McKay, but then there is some real awfulness layered on top, like that sloppy delay electric. But also a fair number of clashy notes and rhythmic ideas in the multiple acoustic tracks. The background "ooohs" are also terrible and take away from it. It's an extraordinarily harmonically and rhythmically nuanced song and extremely hard to cover for that reason. A laid-back, vaguely bossaish cover of it is a nice concept but Bill is the wrong guy to do it and there's a lot of bad, amateurish stuff stepping all over it here.
― longtime caller, first time listener (man alive), Sunday, 22 November 2020 15:26 (three years ago) link
Ah guys. I love this, but any Bill/Steely combo was going to make me happy since those are two Big Musics for me.
― Cow_Art, Sunday, 22 November 2020 16:44 (three years ago) link
those are two Big Musics for me.Same. I honestly really like Bill’s vocals on this — his voice sounds great over these kinds of chords. But I’m also in the camp that thinks all the guitars here sound like a mess. I made a mono version using only what’s in the left channel and I find it a lot more palatable. Oldham’s vocals are less prominent too, which is fine with me.
― Vaguely Threatening CAPTCHAs, Friday, 27 November 2020 16:06 (three years ago) link
there are so many of these covers now! I'm keeping a playlist since it doesn't seem to exist anywhere
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7EoNfsSBILMQ9vpxq9KIWv
― stylish but illegal (Simon H.), Wednesday, 6 January 2021 15:50 (three years ago) link
Oldham's stomping take on "Our Anniversary" is great
― stylish but illegal (Simon H.), Wednesday, 6 January 2021 17:41 (three years ago) link
Thanks Simon!
― A Scampo Darkly (Le Bateau Ivre), Wednesday, 6 January 2021 19:02 (three years ago) link
A Bill Callahan playlist in here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0012h6l
I must admit I'm putting it here so I can find it again.
― djh, Friday, 24 December 2021 23:29 (two years ago) link
oh this is interesting. his mixtape starts at 1:06, by the way
― Punster McPunisher, Saturday, 25 December 2021 00:43 (two years ago) link
Oldham and Callahan's collaboration is a big disappointment, nothing of what I love about either artist is on display. Everything just sounded very basic rock music. And I was excited to hear it.
― JacobSanders, Saturday, 25 December 2021 00:52 (two years ago) link
I’ve had the opposite reaction! I’m a much bigger fan of Callahan, and this album takes him a bit off of the slow and steady path he had been sticking to. I’ve already listened to it mire than his last couple albums combined. “That Night in Santiago” is a stunner.
― Cow_Art, Saturday, 25 December 2021 02:14 (two years ago) link
"The Wild Kindness" felt like a full-on Drag City tribute to Berman and was especially moving for that reason. I liked "Deacon Blues" as well.
― ... (Eazy), Saturday, 25 December 2021 02:32 (two years ago) link
*puts on Roberts Evans voice* Was every tribute paid their due by lifelong indie artists? No. Did I put "Our Anniversary" on my year end list? You bet your ass I did.
― Western® with Bacon Flavor, Saturday, 25 December 2021 06:24 (two years ago) link
Wow, I don't hear very much "basic rock music" on this album at all.
― a superficial sheeb of intelligence (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Wednesday, 16 February 2022 21:22 (two years ago) link