Big, melty sweet syllables. Lyrics layered with surprises (sometimes funny, sometimes devastating). Music that makes everything throb, in a sustained, rather than specifically ‘urgent’ way. Meandering, but it damned sure knows where it’s going, and you’re just grateful for the ride, its tracks played and replayed, fresh sonic and emotional discoveries revealed with each close listening.
marinelli's miscellany
Victoria Marinelli • Richmond, VA
Welcome to my Medium sized blog! A plus-sized version, Southern Discomfort, is also available.
On Twitter, I'm @vmarinelli, (following is NOT recommended for not for family members, ex-lovers, or the otherwise faint of heart) .
Email: vmarinelli(at)gmail•com.
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Randonesia: Blabbering mouths, the rotting corpse of human decency, and accountability in the internet age.
Two things:
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If you thought the person (known variously as “Randy,” “D. Randall Blythe,” and “D.,” among other monikers) responsible for the Cookie Monster vocals on a series of recordings in a hardcore metal genre couldn’t also have a great deal of serious thoughts in his noggin, you were wrong, as the 7000+word below-linked post indicates. (Also, see Lamb of God play live before you go about your judging.)
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I still remember the time, ca. 2004, when D. texted me from the LOG tour bus as it rambled through some far-flung part of the country (or emailed, or blog-commented… I forget which) thanking me for some thing - now long-forgotten - I’d written on my then-blogspot-hosted blog - because he was homesick, and needed a bit of RVA-related goodness to carry him through, and he could barely access my site via whatever cell phone he was carrying then. The band was just beginning to “blow up” (as the kids say), but wasn’t yet (to my recollection) a Grammy nominated, gigondo ‘phenomenon,’ - to his friends back home, he was still, for the most part, just Randy - but at that time, he believed in my writing (he, alone, gave me shit if I had no new posts for a long time), and it made a huge difference to me.
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Okay whatever, make it three things. Whether, in the future, this band continues to “blow up” or slides, somehow, into obscurity, the guys in it (Randy and Mark, especially) will continue to be like brothers to me, and I will never not love them.
Ah, the internet. That fabulous land of free information, free expression, and convenient online bill paying. It’s a tool that has radically changed the lifestyle of anyone residing in an area with a minimal telephone line system. It makes things possible that existed only in the realm of… [full text here.]
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High on The National’s ‘High Violet.’
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Here, from my stack of ancient Ms. Magazines, I give you the goofaliciously adorable cover from September 1980 documenting the rise of women in pop music of the era (Cris Williamson in the same article with the B-52’s? Really?)
You can read the whole article here, or as embedded below (may only be visible at this post’s permalink, not in Tumblr dashboard).1
I was a few months shy of ten when this issue was published. Also of note: the month before, Pat Benatar (also featured in the article) came out with Crimes of Passion, containing among its tracks Hell is for Children.
That song got me through a lot.
Thanks, all you brave ladies who went before the furious, chiefly punk-leaning lot of us.
1980_09 Ms Magazine - The New Woman Sound Hits the Charts
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1Please don’t be mad at me, Ms.! Here, I’m including a link so people can remember to support you in your present incarnation! Also, I am a subscriber - you can totally check! (A gift subscription from @MsNovember, who rocks.)
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If you needed more reasons to hate the Jonas Brothers
Other albums on target for high debuts on next week’s Billboard 200, based on sales reflected on the Friday Building chart, include Lamb of God’s “Wrath” (Prosthetic/Epic) and Jake Owen’s “Easy Does It” (RCA).
- qtd. in Jonas Brothers’ ‘3D’ Poised For Big Billboard 200 Debut.
If you needed more reasons to hate the Jonas Brothers, looks like Lamb of God, with only the most righteous metal release ever, is going to take second place behind them in the forthcoming Billboard ratings.
Related: See here for why, the other day, I personally apologized to Mark Morton on behalf of my daughters, and here for a photoset that coincidentally includes both said daughters at a Jo Bros show, and at the same state fair, hanging out with Lamb of God’s vocalist among others in our nutty crew. (On which day, I might add, my eldest daughter famously punched said vocalist in the stomach - all in play, of course; where he’s kind of like the brother I never had, she regards him as his slightly annoying but loveable uncle.)
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With regard to this tweet, one of the most exultant songs (among many, really) on the one Nada Surf record I have (The Weight is a Gift) is this one: Blankest Year.
Listen and sing along to the simplest and most awesome line: Aww, fuck yeah. I’m gonna have a party.
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Richmond’s own Erik Larson (formerly of the very-much-missed Alabama Thunderpussy) covering Elliott Smith’s Say Yes. I fucking love it.
From his solo album Faith, Hope, Love.
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The National - Bitters & Absolut.
I have a story about this song here.
Also, lyrics:
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Sweetie, you don’t look so good
your bottom lip is bleeding.
I cut it on your collarbone
go on, go back to sleep.Sugar, who were you thinking of?
you woke me with your breathing.
Honey, how am i supposed to tell?If I were a spy in the world inside your head
would i be your wife in a better life you led?Thought I saw you on the stairs
of this american century.
I went up through all the years
you were years ahead of me.Remember when you dipped your hand?
I never saw it coming.
You took the wind out of me.If i were a spy in the world inside your head
would i be your wife in the better life you led?I’d do you better than you do
I’d do you better than you ever will
When I am on bitters and absolut… -
I didn’t watch Late Night with Conan O’Brien too regularly, but I damn sure appreciated him having my friends on the show, and O’Brien’s comment later, about Randy: When he sings, he summons the actual devil… and then he goes and has a losenge! (Comment is not on this clip, alas.)
So, thanks dude! And good luck with the new gig in Cali.
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The Long Winters - Scared Straight
From Live at the Showbox (DVD/CD set). This track and two others from same are available free from the label here; you can also find more at the band’s site.
By now this track (along with others by same, since purchased) has become incredibly dear to me. The back story has too many layers to confer here, but at the beginning of the song, when John Roderick (@johnroderick on Twitter, well worth following even without considering his band) says “How’s it going, Seattle? We’re the Long Winters and we’re from here,” my ears curl around the words and I imagine myself there, in that city I miss so terribly. I go back to June of 1993, when its skyline first disappeared from view, because I was reluctantly following my insane girlfriend to Fargo, ND of all places (fucking Coen Brothers stole my movie title), a few months following which I ended up in FBI custody in the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport which is another story entirely, but suffice it to say, I’ve never healed from the visceral regret of Seattle being ripped away from me, or me from it. Still, somehow, this song helps.
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Stevie Ray Vaughan. He died on the same day I left my future husband - after the summer we were first together, in 1990. Jeff was driving me to the airport in DC and stopped at 7-11 to get a drink, while I fiddled with the tape deck. He got back in and I told him I really, really needed to hear some Stevie right then, and he got all pale and weird. Asked if I’d seen the papers , which he had, just then at the 7-11. I said no. So he had to tell me the news, that my favorite musician of all time had died in a helicopter crash that very day. And I did whatever I could to avoid crying all the way to DC, partly in mourning for the artist, partly because I wasn’t sure I’d ever see Jeff again. (I would, but not for another 7 years.) Stevie Ray Vaughan - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Me on left, husband behind me, Mark in the foreground. (via vmarinelli)
Screenshots are up. See whole video here. Related tumblr post here.
\m/
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Lamb of God’s new video, Set to Fail, premiered today on myspace. My husband’s in it - he’s one of the burly, bald white dudes who appears in a fair number of the scenes. I’m also in it, but since I showed up when 80% of the shoot was over (metal mamas have kids to feed dinner and tuck into bed, y’know), you’d have to know where and when to look for me (mostly at the 5-second mark) or you’d miss me altogether (which would be okay, seriously).
I’ll post some screenshots later on with some of the more awesome stills.
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BLACK CAB SESSIONS - CHAPTER EIGHTEEN : THE NATIONAL
I could kiss sniffyjenkins on the mouth for turning me on to the Black Cab Sessions. (Here’s The National with You’ve Done it Again, Virginia.) (Also, WTF no embed option? Am I missing something here?)
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of Montreal - Women’s Studies Victims
I thought of Montreal would be good boinking music - until this song came on and - well, it was weird.
(So no, the song won’t be appearing on this list.)
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Common - Go!
This song makes me want to, well, go.
(Not in the peeing myself way though. Like, it’s all about hope and stuff.)
