It being a long weekend and all, I figured I’d face the wrath of sixteen angry eyeballs if I didn’t post something for the faithful to consider, so here I am with a couple items to keep you busy on your day off tomorrow. First comes a really solid article off Stereogum on the 20th anniversary of Oasis’ B-side compilation The Masterplan. The article does a good job reminding everyone just how huge this band was in the early 90s, based largely on their enormous first two albums and their totemic “Wonderwall” and “Champagne Supernova,” which formed the soundtrack for proms and unrequited love mixtapes worldwide. (A part of me still listens for that slight drone and hushed guitar part every time I go to the beach, so deeply has that latter one been imprinted on my brain.) Aside from those albums, though, the band was also throwing out multiple B-sides that were as good or better than the main tracks — that line from the article about Oasis’ B-sides being better than most other bands’ greatest hits was a real argument back in the day, and it’s tough to dismiss when you hear songs like “Acquiesce,” “Talk Tonight,” and the title track.
Oasis in that span really was living that Midas moment where everything they did was huge — gigantic songs, iconic videos (back when those still mattered), sold out tours and festival slots to carpets of people as far as the eye could see. (Their live album — a double album naturally, as one could not contain all the hits — was titled Familiar to Millions and whether they were referring to the band itself or every word of their songs, both were applicable.) I remember seeing them back home on the Morning Glory tour and it’s still one of the loudest shows I’ve ever been at — Noel had a literal wall of amps probably 20′ high behind him in addition to the normal arena speakers and despite being in the nosebleeds my ears rang for over a week. The Masterplan was intended to capture all the moments outside those anthemic albums and it does a decent enough job, but for one-time diehards like me who remembers driving all around town to tracking down the import singles it misses some old favorites. Thankfully we’ve got the internet, so I’ve kindly collected those additions for you below — there’s simple beauties like “Sad Song” and “D’yer Wanna be a Spaceman,” as well as rockers like “Round Are Way” and “Step Out” and the soaring Beatles-like close of “Whatever.” Put with the best stuff on Masterplan it again boggles the mind — these were all B-sides, songs they felt weren’t good enough to land on the official albums! — which reinforces this paragraph’s initial point: this band was firing on all cylinders and was untouchable at this point, and would remain so for several years. That they faded some after that was inevitable, whether from the fame, the infamous infighting, or the sheer laws of the universe (what goes up MUST come down, after all…) but for this span they gave us an incredible number of huge songs. So dust off your aviators and pop the collar on your Croc polo to show off your puka shell necklace and take a trip back to a simpler time here:
Next we’ve got the latest single from the lovely Neko Case’s latest album, Hell-On, which has been a hit or miss affair for me so far. Similar to her last album, the underwhelming (at least in impact, but not title) The Worse Things Get, the Harder I Fight, the Harder I Fight, the More I Love You, Case’s lyrics occasionally veer towards the overly ornate or unnecessarily cryptic, which prevents her characteristically catching melodies and otherworldly voice from connecting the way they used to. Which is unfortunate because there are some winning moments on the album — the soaring conclusion to “Halls of Sarah,” the imagery of the line “sorry dyed my mouth gumball blue” from the song of the aforementioned color’s name, the beautiful pairing of Case’s voice with Mark Lanegan’s gruff baritone on “Curse of the I-5 Corridor.” (One of the album’s best.) Far too often those moments are buried by the aforementioned frustrations, though, and the effect is lost.
It’s not clear what’s driving the change — Case has always come across as a fierce warrior of a woman with a spirit as indomitable as that incredible voice, though her lyrics were slightly tinged by the sadness of heartbreak. Perhaps it was that glimmer of vulnerability that made her songs resonate so strongly, that juxtaposition of minor weakness with the ferocity of everything else around it. Now that it’s gone, either eliminated thanks to personal happiness or consciously buried behind the armor of cryptic lyrics as a defense mechanism, the songs often fall flat. They sound lovely enough in most cases — honestly, Case could sing that you’ve got terminal cancer and your entire family just died in a horrific bus crash and you’d probably still swoon — but the impact isn’t there like before.
This is a woman who could destroy you with a single line — think of tracks like “Star Witness,” or “That Teenage Feeling” that had several daggers thrown straight at your heart. Or “Magpie to the Morning” and “The Needle has Landed.” Or “I Wish I was the Moon” and “The Pharoahs.” Or “Maybe Sparrow” and “Vengeance is Sleeping.” Those and so many others were undeniable because of that glimmer of weakness (even when glimpsed amidst vows to harm/murder the transgressor) because you could identify with that feeling. You knew what Case was referring to and had been there before. Contrast that with recent songs about “oracles of the maritimes,” songs about God (he’s a “lusty tire fire” among other things), or songs about the last lion of England (aka Albion, because even the location we’re singing about must be obscured). It’s just not clear what Case is getting at anymore. It’s a bit like a crossword puzzle — you can figure out what the words are, but their greater meaning is missing — and that emotional vulnerability (or just the ability to connect emotionally) is sorely missed. See what you think, though, with the aforementioned track about the English lion — if nothing else it sports a pretty little video, so there’s that:
We’ll close with the latest single from fellow Chicagoan Andrew Bird, an off album track where he contrasts another characteristically lush, languid melody with lyrics comparing our combative political landscape to the Spanish civil war (which hopefully is mere hyperbole and not a true harbinger of things to come — I’m too pretty to be shot at). It’s a pretty listen, whether you agree with the sentiments or not — give it a whirl here: