Listen or Die

We talk about albums from two artists of stratospherically different backgrounds, who both incidentally got a big career boost from a movie.

Behind the unmistakably gnarled vocals of Richard Butler, the Psychedelic Furs added proud '60s influence and wall-of-sound instrumentation to the postpunk UK. Their 1981 album, Talk Talk Talk, is an anti-romance manifesto with plenty of suburban ennui. It is also super horny.

Then we discuss Miriam Makeba, the mightily voiced first global superstar from the African continent. A rebellious movie director maneuvered around the South African government to bring her to the US, where she instantly enchanted New York City sophisticates, who were sometimes kinda weird about her. Her 1960 self-entitled debut album is the sound of a gloriously unauthorized rise.

Questions pondered:

• Is “world music” a legitimate or condescending category?
• Did Molly Ringwald actually read the lyrics to “Pretty in Pink?”
• Why did '50s-era South African groups have names like the Manhattan Brothers and the Mississippi 12?
• What is diegetic music and is it the key to world building for the show Stranger Things?
• Why was everyone, even an African singer who performs primarily in Xhosa, covering "House of the Rising Sun" in the early 1960s?
• Is rock's tireless amplification of the young male ego maybe, kinda a little bit alienating towards women?

Our logo is by Kelsey Byers. Our theme song is "Stuff that Sounds like This" by Women's Basketball, used courtesy of Brian LaRue.

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Steely Dan fail upwards into rock stardom and Chic write songs to get past the world’s doormen.

Pardon us for going long but on this episode; we examine a total of five entries from the 1,001 Albums You Must (supposedly) Hear Before You Die.

First, we dig into the early days of your dad’s favorite band, Steely Dan. Walter Becker and Donald Fagen met in the weed-stenched dorms of Bard College, tried to sell their songs in the Brill Building and somehow convinced the label they failed to impress as songwriters to sign their band. This begat a discography of musically complex, pulp-inspired, slyly sour — or perhaps melancholy — jazz-rock albums. We consider the first three, Can’t Buy a Thrill, Countdown to Ecstasy and Pretzel Logic.

Then it’s another band that’s more or less two people. After an insane childhood, perpetually beret-capped guitarist Nile Rodgers met bassist Bernard Edwards. With some inspiration from Roxy Music, they donned designer clothes and presented an image of urban sophistication while writing damn good simple songs as the core of Chic. We’re talking about two albums from their prime, C'est Chic and Risqué, which have songs that defined the disco era and eventually became timeless.

Questions pondered:

• How did the cohesive musical evolution of the 1960s lead to the stylistic clashes of the ’70s?
• Was Steely Dan fandom once a stand-in for the anxieties of American fatherhood?
• What is chugging and was it the key to Chic’s success?
• Why do Donald Fagen and Walter Becker make us look up so many words?
• Was it really necessary to blow up a crate of disco records after a baseball game at Comiskey Park in Chicago on July 12, 1979?

Our logo is by Kelsey Byers. Our theme song is "Stuff that Sounds like This" by Women's Basketball, used courtesy of Brian LaRue.

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On this bonus episode, Nick talks to Adam Bernard, music writer and author of One Hit Wondering: The Stories of 40 One Hit Wonders + Other Tales From The Crates. It's a compilation of columns on artists overlooked even by the standards of one-hit wonders. Get ready to remember and reevaluate Jennifer Paige, Chumbawamba, OMC, Meredith Brooks, Len, the Cardigans and others.

Questions pondered:
Did the '90s major label gold rush propel bands into one-hit wonderdom?
Is a band a one-hit wonder if no one remembers their other big hit?
How did Chumbawamba doggedly maintain their integrity?
Is one-hit wonder a prerogative term?
Was Tones and I, of "Dance Monkey" fame, the last one-hit wonder, ever?

Adam's blog is at: https://adambernard.blogspot.com/
You can buy his book on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0H42BDSSV
As well as this other book: https://www.amazon.com/ChemBro-Embracing-Beastmode-Beat-Cancer/dp/1947381369

Our logo is by Kelsey Byers. Our theme song is "Stuff that Sounds like This" by Women's Basketball, used courtesy of Brian LaRue.

https://linktr.ee/listenordiepodcast

No one's keeping it real this month; Outkast keeps it surreal and X-Ray Spex are ART... I.... FICIAL!!!

On this episode of album deep dives, we check out the band that broke the mold of punk rock just as that mold was set. X-Ray Spex, lead by the wonderfully pseudonymous Poly Styrene, had acute social perceptiveness, a saxophonist and the wardrobes of 40-somethings at a dinner party. Their debut album, 1978's Germfree Adolescents, is a loud cry from a consumer generation that a plasticized, exploitative society tried to subdue.

Then it's another boundary pusher. The only thing East Coast and West Coast rappers agreed on in the '90s was the the South was deficient. Atlanta's Outkast defied them, with a firm "it's like this though" at an awards show and with a hard-hitting, crowd-pleasing hybrid of rock, funk and rap. They reached new heights on 2000's Stankonia, which had a few immortal songs and several creative ways to declare oneself really good at sex. At the heart of it is the eruptive synergy of André 3000 and Big Boi, two men with very different personalities.

Questions pondered:
Is Prince a cool hip-hop influence? How about Kate Bush?

Why does punk rock get burdened by deeply stupid fan behavior?

How many pop culture references are stuffed into "So Fresh, So Clean?"

What was each person thinking in that famous photo of six punk or punk-adjacent frontwomen?

Don't everybody like the smell of gasoline?

Our logo is by Kelsey Byers. Our theme song is "Stuff that Sounds like This" by Women's Basketball, used courtesy of Brian LaRue.

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Paul Revere and the Raiders say no to kicks and Elton John says Yes to orchestration.

This episode, we're discussing Midnight Ride and Madman Across the Water.

Paul Revere and the Raiders were just a Pacific Northwest party band in funny outfits when Columbia Records paired them with producer Terry Melcher and gave them a chance to partake in rock's artistic advancement, resulting in the mostly self-written 1966 album Midnight Ride.

Then we examine Elton John's large-sounding fourth album and discuss some of the people who helped uplift this piano prodigy to rock stardom. Madman has "Tiny Dancer," "Levon" and some songs even weirder and moodier than "Levon." Rick Wakeman stops by to help serenade a dude named Razorface.

Questions pondered:

• Why were '60s garage rock bands so fixated on mean girls?
• Whatever happened to rock and roll television?
• What does a lyricist do on tour?
• Did Paul Revere and the Raiders invent grunge?
• Did the New York Times really say that God is dead?
• Did Cynthia Weil and Barry Mann write the song "Kicks" as an attack on anyone personally?

Our logo is by Kelsey Byers. Our theme song is "Stuff that Sounds like This" by Women's Basketball, used courtesy of Brian LaRue.

https://linktr.ee/listenordiepodcast

Mariah Carey surprises Rolling Stone by understanding hip-hop and Laibach is outlawed for being confusing.

In this episode, we try to move past our rock-centric tastes and enjoy Butterfly, the 1997 album on which vocally superpowered top 40 hit machine Mariah Carey found artistic freedom and conveyed an uplifting message to burn her ex. Then we unpack Laibach, the semi-industrial band that provoked and baffled Yugoslavia and then created a theater of totalitarian kitsch on their 1987 album Opus Dei. (We think.)

Questions pondered:
- Is it ever a good idea to cover Prince?
- Was Mariah Carey to pop radio what Full House was to syndicated TV?
- When is a German-language Queen cover more than just a German-language Queen cover?
- Can creating a safety hazard be art?
- How infuriating are those Miss Dior ads with Janis Joplin singing “Cry Baby?”
- Do people in Slovenia actually listen to Laibach?
- Can Mariah Carey communicate with dolphins?

Our logo is by Kelsey Byers. Our theme song is "Stuff that Sounds like This" by Women's Basketball, used courtesy of Brian LaRue.

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Os Mutantes did not actually break your turntable and Talking Heads learn to get along and really collaborate, for a few weeks.

After taking a month off, we are back to discuss the cross-continental pollination of ideas heard on both the Brazilian band's 1968 debut and the most beloved album in Talking Heads' catalogue. Stacey rates both one head exploding emoji.

Learn about the Tropicalia, precarious rock-fusion movement that briefly prospered despite and also sort of because of Brazil's authoritarian government and how the wild song structures and stylistic cacophony of Os Mutantes convey deeper meanings.

Talking Heads, the nerd table at CBBG, nearly came apart before taking some sonic and organizational cues from Afrobeat to make the 1980 classic Remain in Light. Then everything got uncomfortable again. Same as it ever was.

We discuss where is the line for cultural appropriation and ask: Is it a net positive for a band to have Brian Eno around? Also, we get around to defining what is an album you must hear before you die.

Our logo is by Kelsey Byers. Our theme song is "Stuff that Sounds like This" by Women's Basketball, used courtesy of Brian LaRue, and you can now listen to Women's Basketball on all the major streaming platforms.

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The Who relieve themselves of prog-rock ambitions and the Cocteau Twins will not dress up for you.

We're again considering three albums from 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die, that staple of the classic rock starter kit, Who's Next, and the Cocteau Twins' cultier Treasure and Heaven or Las Vegas.

Does a song lose its meaning if you've heard it on FM radio thousands of times? Does it gain a meaning if you literally don't understand it? We consider these questions, plus the time misuse of a toilet brought needed political reforms within the Who, "Won't Get Fooled Again" as a conservative rock song, the coolness of the UK's indie charts and the auditory Rorschach test that is interpreting Elizabeth Fraser's lyrics. Join us as we think about Las Vegas because it's more brighter and the soonest to see.

Our logo is by Kelsey Byers. Our theme song is "Stuff that Sounds like This" by Women's Basketball, used courtesy of Brian LaRue.

https://linktr.ee/listenordiepodcast

Nanci Griffith tries to make folk-a-billy happen and Elliott Smith backs up Madonna, literally.

This time, we ponder three albums from 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die, Griffith's The Last of the True Believers and two by Smith, Either/Or and Figure 8.

We also dive into Texans' profound love of all things Texan, learn about the Great Credibility Scare and why it meant payday for some oddball country artists, ponder the limits of empathy and cognitive load and try to pick a sad boy Mount Rushmore.

Our logo is by Kelsey Byers. Our theme song is "Stuff that Sounds like This" by Women's Basketball, used courtesy of Brian LaRue, and you can now listen to Women's Basketball on all the major streaming platforms.

https://linktr.ee/listenordiepodcast

Pink Floyd's awful fans punish them with more rock stardom and Supergrass discover that meeting the strange ones isn't actually so great.

We also learn about Pittsburgh's Aerosmith riot of 1976, revisit the homogeny of mid-'90s alt-rock radio, stumble upon a celebrity cameo in the Supergrass story and discover that under and overachieving as an adolescent can both tragically lead to a career in journalism.

Our logo is by Kelsey Byers and our theme song is "Stuff that Sounds like This" by Women's Basketball, used courtesy of Brian LaRue.

https://linktr.ee/listenordiepodcast