Brandon's Buzz

Jen Trynin — “Rang You and Ran”
(from Gun Shy Trigger Happy) —

The edgy yet satisfyingly subdued Gun Shy might be as close as the ’90s ever came to an ignored slow-burning masterpiece, and the fabulous Trynin’s trajectory in the bidness was nothing more than a triumph of horrendous timing. (Signed in the immediate wake of Liz Phair’s ball-busting breakthrough, her first album — 1995’s Cockamamie — got buried by the Alanis avalanche, and Gun Shy, her shattering second stab at fame, was swallowed whole by the mellow grooves of the Lilith landslide during that long hot summer of 1997; if you haven’t read her riotous, wickedly moving memoir about her experiences as a recording artist — 2006’s electric Everything I’m Cracked Up to Be — get thee to a bookstore at once.) Her commercial prospects were probably always gonna be cultish — generally, that’s what happens when you’re waaaay too smart for the room — but her sense of songcraft (as evidenced on this gorgeously sultry stunner) was a shot right through the heart.

Tim McGraw — “Southern Voice” (from Southern Voice) —

From a bona fide, full o’ pride son of the American south, a loving tribute to a place where everybody is somebody, and where somebody has left the porch light on for y’all.

I got distracted last night doing other things, and I failed to wake up in time this morning before work to submit today’s honey from the hive, so two Sundays running have failed to have their own song with which to celebrate the day. (All I can say is, dreadful sorry. I’ll try to do better.) At any rate, if you missed any of the rest of the past week’s tunes, I offer a quick recap:

MONDAY: Kings of Leon — “Manhattan” (from Only By the Night) —

TUESDAY: Westlife — “When You’re Looking Like That”
(from Unbreakable: The Greatest Hits, Vol. 1) —

WEDNESDAY: Chantal Kreviazuk — “Surrounded”
(from Under These Rocks and Stones) —

THURSDAY: LFO — “Every Other Time” (from Life is Good) —

FRIDAY: Mary Chapin Carpenter — “Grow Old With Me”
(from Party Doll and Other Favorites) —

SATURDAY: Train — “Respect (Everybody Needs a Little)”
(from Drops of Jupiter) —

Train — “Respect (Everybody Needs a Little)”
(from Drops of Jupiter) —

Nine years ago today, Sherry Ann and I found ourselves in, of all places, Shreveport, Louisiana, where we had journeyed to do a bit of gambling, share a little best friend time, and take in a concert. See, that season, she was mad about Matchbox 20, and I was all atwitter over Train (who had just beaten the sophomore jinx big time with their staggeringly ferocious second album), and miraculously, they were co-headlining a tour in the summer of 2001, and Shreveport was as close to us as the they were gonna stop. So we drove up there on the 10th and had an utterly amazing trip: we made fantastic time, we listened to a passel of fabulous music, and we painlessly found both our hotel and the concert site (which, crazy enough, were within one half-mile of each other). The day was so great that I was powerless to fight the increasingly nagging fear that it was all too good to be true.

The next morning, I woke up early and flipped on the television just in time to catch the second airplane plowing into the South Tower, and even though it didn’t quite dawn on us how serious a situation this was until later in the afternoon (when, while trying to get some CD shopping done, we discovered that the Mall of Shreveport — Sears excepted — was closed), when I called the arena to check the status of the concert, I was crushed to hear a recording calmly explaining that the show would be postponed.

I still have yet to see Train live, and in its own crazy way, that fact has probably exacerbated the mythic quality that their music has taken on inside my deranged brain. I’ve listened to this tune (and its album) probably two hundred times in the past decade — and sung along at full blast most of those times — and I’m still not tired of it. You may not win the respect you and your work so richly deserve from the high-falutin’ critics, Pat, but you decidedly and forever win mine, sir.

Mary Chapin Carpenter — “Grow Old With Me”
(from Party Doll and Other Favorites) —

Recorded in 1995 for an all-star tribute to John Lennon, Carpenter’s serene, sweet, achingly tender take on one of Lennon’s final compositions stands as a simple but potent testimony to the true and total power of love.

LFO — “Every Other Time” (from Life is Good) —

Please understand that, ordinarily, it would not have been my preference to go with boy band tuneage twice in three days. But even though he hadn’t even been heard from in eons, I found myself strangely crushed last night when I read of the tragic passing of Rich Cronin, who died at a way-too-effin’-young thirty-five years of age yesterday after a protracted battle with leukemia. Cronin was the (painfully gorgeous) lead singer of LFO, a late-’90s pre-fabricated group of buff dudes who could harmonize and whose primary reason for existing was to cash in on the already-waning teen pop craze. (If *NSYNC was Coke and 98 Degrees was Pepsi, then LFO was, at very least, Shasta.) Cronin was also the physical manifestation of whichever behind-the-scenes ghostwriter insisted that the phrases “New Kids on the Block had a bunch of hits” and “Chinese food makes me sick!” must rhyme. In other words, it is quite true that nobody was ever gonna confuse this kid with Dylan or Springsteen (or even Daryl Hall!). But he was magnificently easy on the eyes, and he had the craziest knack for bringing to life perfectly ridiculous pop tunes — like “Time,” a miraculously melodic chronicle of the up-and-down intricacies of young lust love — which were deviously digestible and hauntingly hummable.

Fall’s new music slate looms large, but for this week at least, it’s still awfully lean out there, with only one major release vying for attention. If one-day sales reports are to be believed, however, that one release is looking competitive to be the crunchy’s best-selling album by week’s end. Dig in:

My startling lack of use for one Sara Bareilles and her relentlessly cheery brand of power pop has been documented well in a handful of previous Buzz posts. Regardless, I am man enough to admit that I find myself utterly intoxicated by “King of Anything,” the masterfully melodic lead single from Bareilles’ sophomore album, Kaleidoscope Heart, which makes landfall this week. I have not a clue how the remainder of this record sounds — and, for all I know, “King” is an anomaly and Heart is otherwise more of the same — but I think Sara still deserves major props for stepping outside the box and seeing where the groove might take her, and I’m greatly looking forward to seeing where it might take me. (Take note: Target has an exclusive deluxe version of Heart, which contains three bonus tracks, including a strings-laden acoustic take on “King.”)

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Chantal Kreviazuk — “Surrounded”
(from Under These Rocks and Stones) —

Another discussion for another day is why, in spite of her status as a go-to writer of agile, dependably catchy pop tunes (her work has been snapped up by the likes of Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood, Gwen Stefani, even my beloved Hilary Duff), the magnificent Kreviazuk has never — at least not here in the States, despite having crafted four exquisite, exhilarating albums — become the megastar she has always, always deserved to be. This one — a wrenching portrait of a best friend’s senseless suicide — knocked me flat when I first heard it thirteen years ago, and it still gets me where I live. Every time.

Westlife — “When You’re Looking Like That”
(from Unbreakable: The Greatest Hits, Vol. 1) —

An instant sensation across the pond, Daddy Clive tried his damnedest to make these guys stateside stars, and even shepherded their debut single “Swear It Again” to the top of the charts at the turn of the century. But America had other plans, because by then, we had become weary of our own boy bands, and we weren’t about to throw our arms around a group of Bri’ish teenyboppers that we didn’t grow ourselves. Too bad, that, because these guys were (and remain) ferociously talented, and not by half did the Backstreet Boys ever have material this great.

Kings of Leon — “Manhattan” (from Only By the Night) —

The countdown has already begun toward the October 19 arrival of Come Around Sundown, the white-hotly-anticipated fifth studio album — and first this side of Night, the thrilling opus that made them instant stars — from those tantalizing Tennessee titans Kings of Leon. But I’ll happily confess that I have yet to unlock and unravel all of Night‘s ravishing mysteries, perfectly notwithstanding the fact that that disc contiunes to stay in heavy rotation in my house two full years after its release. This tune — an epic, electrifying ode to tripping the light fantastic — is sparse lyrically, but the peerless Caleb Followill’s dynamic (and, in its own odd way, quite delicate) vocal performance is just extraordinary to behold.

The work schedule was beyond crazy this weekend, which is why I had to flake on yesterday’s honey from the hive (although I did manage to scribble it out on a miniature legal pad, and I am mere moments from typing it up and plugging it into today’s slot). But if you missed any of the remainder of last week’s tunes, below is a quick recap. (Incidentally, I’ve an update to Thursday’s 90210 discussion: Sherry Ann sent me a couple of great snapshots of the scrapbook yesterday, and I’ll be posting those later this week, as soon as I can get them from my phone to my computer.)

MONDAY: Dave Matthews — “Gravedigger” (from Some Devil) —

TUESDAY: Pat Benatar — “All Fired Up” (from Best Shots) —

WEDNESDAY: Tanya Tucker — “Down to My Last Teardrop”
(from 20 Greatest Hits) —

THURSDAY: Chris Isaak — “Wicked Game”
(from Heart Shaped World) —

FRIDAY: Tori Amos — “I Don’t Like Mondays”
(from Strange Little Girls) —

SATURDAY: Annie Lennox — “A Whiter Shade of Pale”
(from Medusa) —

Annie Lennox — “A Whiter Shade of Pale” (from Medusa) —

Sherry Ann and I have this thing we call “The Annie Lennox Rule,” which simply states that once Annie has lent her golden pipes to a particular tune, said tune has been officially and irrevocably sung. And so it holds here, as Procol Harum’s densely cinematic, drug-addled classic becomes, in Ms. Lennox’s eminently capable hands, a lush, wistful, dreamlike masterpiece.

Tori Amos — “I Don’t Like Mondays” (from Strange Little Girls) —

A and I trekked down to Austin’s Alamo Drafthouse last night to join in the obscenely awesome fun of the ’90s alternative sing-along, hands down my all-time favorite among the Action Pack’s festivities. For damn sure, we got our quota filled of classic Smashing Pumpkins, Stone Temple Pilots, Bush, and No Doubt. (We even got a little Jamiroquai tossed in for good measure!) And of course, we all in that theater got our moment in the sun to scream along with Eddie as he relayed a riveting story about King Jeremy the Wicked. And that got me thinking about other songs about school shootings and apeshit-crazy teenagers, which naturally led me to
The Boomtown Rats’ “I Don’t Like Mondays,” and that immediately brought me to my astonishing Ms. Amos, and to her devastating 2001 cover of same. How crazy-brilliant is Tori? Here’s how: The Rats’ Bob Geldof sang his take on “Mondays” from the point of view of the confused little girl who inaugurates a fresh week by opening fire on her classmates; Tori, meantime, without changing a damned syllable of the text, unspools the same story from the point of view of the peace officer who first encounters the carnage. You’d best believe this was dicey stuff a decade ago, released as it was in the immediate wake of 9/11, but rarely has such wrenching, raw material emerged this riveting, or this breathtakingly cool.