Oh! An interesting bit of RHP trivia I noticed. The bridge verse of "Uncle Joe" always struck me as oddly-phrased. Til I worked out why:
And I am not very well readAnd did you say that I will lose my houseAnd can you spare me of my pain?And can you spare me of my tearsOh Uncle Joe...
Re(a)d House Pain-tears. Har har! That card Kozolek.
― Trayce (trayce), Friday, 11 March 2005 04:05 (nineteen years ago) link
― scott seward (scott seward), Friday, 11 March 2005 04:06 (nineteen years ago) link
― scott seward (scott seward), Friday, 11 March 2005 04:07 (nineteen years ago) link
― michaeln (kid loki), Friday, 11 March 2005 04:13 (nineteen years ago) link
― michaeln (kid loki), Friday, 11 March 2005 04:23 (nineteen years ago) link
― Chris 'The Nuts' V (Chris V), Friday, 11 March 2005 11:13 (nineteen years ago) link
― Chris 'The Nuts' V (Chris V), Friday, 11 March 2005 14:04 (nineteen years ago) link
RHP were very, very important to me for a while; I still love them but listen to them less often these days. Drop is a masterpiece though, a resonant well of horrifying beauty I don't Kozelek ever really matched again. Old Ramon gets a bad rap (even from me), but it has a couple of great tracks alongside some songs that just didn't work at all. the SKM album (which may as well have been an RHP album, it at least has Jerry and Anthony on it, which is more than you can say for Blue Guitar) was a massive improvement.
I used to go see RHP all the time, they would play forever, they were usually amazing. Koz solo can get dull; but the "SKM" show I saw (Koz with Phil and someone else on guitar, and two violin players) was astounding.
― kyle (akmonday), Friday, 11 March 2005 17:24 (nineteen years ago) link
― Brooker Buckingham (Brooker B), Friday, 11 March 2005 18:44 (nineteen years ago) link
― jed_ (jed), Friday, 11 March 2005 19:38 (nineteen years ago) link
― alex in mainhattan (alex63), Friday, 11 March 2005 20:04 (nineteen years ago) link
― alex in mainhattan (alex63), Friday, 11 March 2005 20:55 (nineteen years ago) link
― Bimble... (Bimble...), Saturday, 12 March 2005 08:40 (nineteen years ago) link
― Curt1s St3ph3ns, Saturday, 12 March 2005 17:01 (nineteen years ago) link
― fact checking cuz (fcc), Saturday, 12 March 2005 23:34 (nineteen years ago) link
― gygax! (gygax!), Saturday, 12 March 2005 23:38 (nineteen years ago) link
― earinfections (Nick Twisp), Sunday, 13 March 2005 00:43 (nineteen years ago) link
Good individual songs and moments, though. "Michael" probably my choice, though "San Geronimo" would be the followup.
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Sunday, 13 March 2005 00:53 (nineteen years ago) link
― Chris 'The Nuts' V (Chris V), Sunday, 13 March 2005 14:02 (nineteen years ago) link
― Chris 'The Nuts' V (Chris V), Sunday, 13 March 2005 14:05 (nineteen years ago) link
― Curt1s St3ph3ns, Sunday, 13 March 2005 16:53 (nineteen years ago) link
― Chris 'The Nuts' V (Chris V), Wednesday, 16 March 2005 14:26 (nineteen years ago) link
― rentboy (rentboy), Wednesday, 16 March 2005 15:21 (nineteen years ago) link
This song has always gotten me; it starts off sounding like one of the band's usual slow, spooky wanderers, but somewhere along the way it blazes up into something full of drama. How? It's a loss-of-innocence song, or a coming-of-age song, and maybe it really is drawn in emo terms. But there's also something incredibly un-emo about it, something almost literary: Kozolek manages to come at the thing from two different perspectives, even using different parts of his vocal range to delineate different points of view. It's very nearly a short story, and it's through that approach that he gets to capture both sides of that loss-of-innocence: at moments it seems like a kindness ("the good things that we've done for you" / "show you life"), and at moments it seems violating and cruel ("we know who you are / I read your palm while you were sleeping").
It's hard not to imagine that the "new kid" in this song is Kozolek, whose backstory seems to have had him troubled and drugged-up by the age of 13. The low voice at the opening comes from that point of view, and sets him apart: he sits listening to the kids drink in the next room, "lose control and get louder," thinking of the one girl out there who might worry about him. Sure: emo. But then the voice shoots up an octave, and we're out there, louder, in the other room, talking about the new kid; "he's not like us," "he says nothing," "he's afraid to drive a car." These aren't kind voices, and in the second verse they border on assault. That high Kozolek voice is the perfect vehicle for their taunts -- they know his secrets, they've read his diary. Just imagine: they sing "We know who you are" and it sounds like the scariest thing in the world. The kid is quiet and frightened and they barge in and shout: We know who you are.
But there are those "good things we've done for you," and it's in the chorus that both sides come perfectly together. The chord structure goes from spooky to anthemic, nearly a hymn: "It's our duty," they sing, "as Californians ... to show you life." And just check out the literary value of the arrangement! Suddenly overdubbed voices swim in around the central one, and it's like actually being surrounded by these kids -- maybe frightening, maybe bullying, but right about to take you out and show you the world.
I can't think of many songs where the progress of the music is quite so perfectly and subtly geared to drive home the text of the story; I can't think of many songs that have a "story" on this level in the first place. Emo? No. Emo-as-badthing is one-sided, self-absorbed, personal, solipsistic; this song is none of those. This song, no matter how much the lyrics wander freely into opacity, is a snapshot of something weirdly universal. Who hasn't gotten that mix of fear and excitement when someone grabs you roughly and thrusts you out into a world you don't feel ready for -- whether it's older friends or the "cousins from L.A.?" Who hasn't had some variant of the Kozolek story that seems to be on show here -- going somewhere new and falling in with people who scare and excite you and are ready to drag you out?
So on the train this morning I finally noticed just how well the elements of this song pattern into that story, and I'm absolutely floored.
― nabisco (nabisco), Thursday, 23 June 2005 17:02 (eighteen years ago) link
Also: is it me, or is there a rich history of new-kid-in-California stories that work a lot like this song? Something about it feels very, very Californian, but I can only come up with three referents for what I mean -- something like The Lost Boys, the Karate Kid, and every Coloradoan friend of mine who spent summers in LA with divorced parents and went through exactly all of this.
― nabisco (nabisco), Thursday, 23 June 2005 17:06 (eighteen years ago) link
― gygax! (gygax!), Thursday, 23 June 2005 17:10 (eighteen years ago) link
Incredible note gathered from Kozelek: "The chorus of Strawberry Hill ... was sung by a group of strangers we gathered from outside the Divisadero Street studio where we were recording."
― nabisco (nabisco), Thursday, 23 June 2005 17:25 (eighteen years ago) link
faves right now. picking one...probably Katy's Song b/c its nearly perfect lyrically and pop-wise (and still obsessed with the "rad da ta ta" at the end.) Medicine Bottle and Down Through...cannot believe the lyrics on those. wow. almost makes you wince but its pretty darn amazing at same time.
anyone else think he sounds sooooooooooooooooooooo bay area?
chris (upthread), i was listening to one of his songs in the dark deep woods northern calif and nearly had a panic attack. totally ruined my vacation. m.k. be makin us crazy.
― Susan Douglas (Susan Douglas), Thursday, 23 June 2005 17:49 (eighteen years ago) link
― mookieproof (mookieproof), Thursday, 23 June 2005 18:10 (eighteen years ago) link
― kyle (akmonday), Thursday, 23 June 2005 18:20 (eighteen years ago) link
― kyle (akmonday), Thursday, 23 June 2005 18:21 (eighteen years ago) link
― Susan Douglas (Susan Douglas), Thursday, 23 June 2005 18:39 (eighteen years ago) link
― katie, a princess (katie, a princess), Thursday, 23 June 2005 19:22 (eighteen years ago) link
― nabisco (nabisco), Thursday, 23 June 2005 19:28 (eighteen years ago) link
― mookieproof (mookieproof), Thursday, 23 June 2005 19:45 (eighteen years ago) link
― cutty (mcutt), Thursday, 4 August 2005 19:07 (eighteen years ago) link
― cutty (mcutt), Thursday, 4 August 2005 19:10 (eighteen years ago) link
― Curt1s St3ph3ns, Thursday, 4 August 2005 23:33 (eighteen years ago) link
― Susan Douglas (Susan Douglas), Thursday, 4 August 2005 23:37 (eighteen years ago) link
― Lupton Pitman (Chris V), Friday, 5 August 2005 10:01 (eighteen years ago) link
― Bill A (Bill A), Friday, 5 August 2005 11:55 (eighteen years ago) link
― Charlie Howard, Thursday, 12 April 2007 15:56 (seventeen years ago) link
Incredible note gathered from Kozelek: "The chorus of Strawberry Hill ... was sung by a group of strangers we gathered from outside the Divisadero Street studio where we were recording." -- nabisco (nabisco), Thursday, June 23, 2005 10:25 AM
― Steve Shasta, Thursday, 12 April 2007 16:10 (seventeen years ago) link
Shit that song "Dragonflies" is amazing- I just listened to it for the first time while reading along to the lyrics that Chris V. posted up thread- fucking spine-chilling! And I've had the album for years!
― ColinO, Friday, 27 February 2009 02:01 (fifteen years ago) link
Summer Dress
― 2 ears + 1 ❤ (Pillbox), Friday, 27 February 2009 02:02 (fifteen years ago) link
Anyone else gets a tiny bit annoyed when he rhymes "nice" with "nice" on Have You Forgotten?
― Moka, Friday, 29 April 2011 11:29 (twelve years ago) link
And my pick would be their cover of the Cars' "All Mixed Up", also one of the best musical recontextualizations I've heard.
― Moka, Friday, 29 April 2011 11:31 (twelve years ago) link
SF folx, do you know which studio this was?
― Steve Shasta, Thursday, April 12, 2007 9:10 AM (4 years ago)
I'm pretty sure there used to be a recording studio by where the Little Chihuahua is on by Page Street in one of the old Victorians. I used to get pizza at that Bus Stop pizza when I was a freshman in college and I remember one being around there. I used to live at Page @ Pierce at the time.
― svend, Friday, 29 April 2011 12:58 (twelve years ago) link
Sundays and holidays hits home hard when my wife got sick.
― impeccable suit shit stained underwear (thebingo), Friday, 29 April 2011 13:51 (twelve years ago) link
And i started this thread long time ago
overall i think he should've written more songs about cats though
― american bradass (BradNelson), Thursday, 16 January 2020 19:57 (four years ago) link
kozelek can have a little cat
― bold caucasian eroticism (Simon H.), Thursday, 16 January 2020 20:09 (four years ago) link
I guess we've all got bored of something? Or found that we couldn't do something that we previously could?
― djh, Thursday, 16 January 2020 20:24 (four years ago) link
I haven't listened to anything since Perils and don't feel the need to at the moment. I think it's worth taking the long view though. The Dylan comparison is fraught and lazy but who knows what it's like up there. He might have a New Morning moment, work this out and find a new space.
― Life is a meaningless nightmare of suffering...save string (Chinaski), Thursday, 16 January 2020 20:35 (four years ago) link
I think 'Blue Guitar' and 'Old Ramon' are my favourite RHP albums. I always liked how they sound, and I think 'Old Ramon' was the first RHP studio album I bought.
I started to drift away from Sun Kil Moon when the nylon strung guitar took over. I wish Mark well as he follows his instinct.
― michaellambert, Thursday, 16 January 2020 22:16 (four years ago) link
leaves are turning brownall over the ground
― mookieproof, Friday, 11 December 2020 07:05 (three years ago) link