“Hey, check out this Tom Waits cartoon!”

(Via MeFi; check the comments there for more Waits goodness.)

JazzTube is a compendium of links to YouTube performances by awesome jazz greats. Check it out. (Quality’s uneven, and some have been removed, but overall it’s a great resource.)

How ’bout this “Seven Nation Army” cover? Enjoy.

(Hat tip to Mike!)

This story suggests that the Grammy haul enjoyed by the Dixie Chicks is representative of a “disconnect” between the Academy and country music fans. Apparently, the fact that country radio doesn’t play them anymore, and that the same radio stations didn’t play the last couple years’ Best Country Album artists — in 2006, Alison Krauss; in 2005, Loretta Lynn for her Jack White-produced Van Lear Rose.

But the rift with country-music radio seems impossibly wide. The Chicks have said they never felt at home on Music Row, even when they were a top-selling country act.

“If you’re trying to offer an olive branch to country radio, that’s not the way to do it,” said Ken Tucker, Billboard country music correspondent. “The Chicks are celebrating being the outlaws.”

Outlaws? You mean like Willie and Waylon and Billie Joe — otherwise known as “real country artists” compared to the generic bullshit Music Row produces?

Uh, duh. And it’s a good thing they are, too.

The mouthbreathing jokers who consider Music Row’s output the pinnacle of the form aren’t exactly discriminating consumers. How else could we explain the never-ending stream of crap they produce? Remember, Music Row is who abandoned Johnny Cash, and country radio is who provided zero support for his Rick Rubin-produced end-career masterworks.

The problem isn’t a disconnect between the Recording Academy and country fans. The problem is that mainstream country fans wouldn’t know good music if it bit them on the ass, and country radio is too busy pandering to the lowest common denominator to do any education at all. (Of course, Nashville perpetuates this, by having their own ghetto awards at the CMAs where everyone sounds exactly the same, and all the politics are reactionary and Bushite.)

So, yes, there’s a disconnect. One organization cares about good, groundbreaking music of all kinds — jazz, rock, rap, metal, classical, country, bluegrass, you name it. They reward on quality, not sales. And then there’s Nashville, which has driven out groundbreaking and interesting artists almost as long as it’s existed.

As Robbie Fulks said, Fuck This Town.

Steve Jobs has published a long open letter on iTunes, music, the myth of iTunes “lock-in,” and (most of all) DRM. It’s pretty clear and very cogent, and the part that’s got the Intarwub all a-twitter is this:

The third alternative is to abolish DRMs entirely. Imagine a world where every online store sells DRM-free music encoded in open licensable formats. In such a world, any player can play music purchased from any store, and any store can sell music which is playable on all players. This is clearly the best alternative for consumers, and Apple would embrace it in a heartbeat. If the big four music companies would license Apple their music without the requirement that it be protected with a DRM, we would switch to selling only DRM-free music on our iTunes store. Every iPod ever made will play this DRM-free music.

Why would the big four music companies agree to let Apple and others distribute their music without using DRM systems to protect it? The simplest answer is because DRMs haven’t worked, and may never work, to halt music piracy. Though the big four music companies require that all their music sold online be protected with DRMs, these same music companies continue to sell billions of CDs a year which contain completely unprotected music. That’s right! No DRM system was ever developed for the CD, so all the music distributed on CDs can be easily uploaded to the Internet, then (illegally) downloaded and played on any computer or player.

In 2006, under 2 billion DRM-protected songs were sold worldwide by online stores, while over 20 billion songs were sold completely DRM-free and unprotected on CDs by the music companies themselves. The music companies sell the vast majority of their music DRM-free, and show no signs of changing this behavior, since the overwhelming majority of their revenues depend on selling CDs which must play in CD players that support no DRM system.

Apple’s taken a lot of heat for using DRM at the iTMS, and for not licensing it elsewhere, but the actual fallout of that turns out to be pretty minimal: the overwhelming majority of music on iPods is ripped, not bought, which means almost nobody is buying into the DRM. Now Jobs is pointing out how broken the idea of DRM is, and he’s by no means alone (archrival Gates said as much in an offhand comment recently, but he’s not the music power that Jobs is).

If Apple manages to drag the music industry into the DRM-free sunlight with this switcheroo move, it’ll be a pretty neat trick. Consider it, though: in retrospect there was no way the RIAA was going to participate in an online marketplace devoid of DRM, so Apple creates one that has perhaps the least onerous terms of any in existence. Apple then makes the iTMS an enormous success — it’s one of the biggest retail outlets for music online or off — and then starts agitating about ditching the DRM. The RIAA is crazy about the revenue, and Apple’s holding all the cards because the music boys have all their eggs in their basket. Nobody else is more than a blip on the radar, but iTMS tracks are only compatible with Apple’s tools. What happens next?

It’s obvious consumers don’t want DRM, but neither does the RIAA want to be beholden to a single vendor like this. Opening the tracks would free both the glorious Heathen hordes AND the RIAA.

Of course, this presupposes that the music industry and the RIAA will behave rationally and realize what business they’re really in instead of trying to protect their existing (and broken) model. We’ll see. No matter what, we’re pretty sure the next steps will be interesting.

Or: How we lost the last 20 minutes on Wikipedia. Anyway:

Tom Waits’ pseudolive Nighthawks at the Diner (Asylum, 1975) featured someone named Mike Melvoin on piano. It’s one of our favorite records.

Mike Melvoin’s daughter Wendy is Wendy of Wendy and Lisa and The Revolution.

Mike’s son was the late Jonathan Melvoin, the Smashing Pumpkins‘ touring keyboardist who overdosed in 1996.

Wendy is twins; her sister Susanna is also a working musician, and is married to Austinite and Stevie Ray Vaughan associate Doyle Bramhall II.

Weird.

Update: In answer to the question in the comments, Melvoin has a Bacon number of 2. She was in Toys with Ralph Tabakin; Tabakin was in Sleepers.

Susie Horgan took a bunch of pictures in DC in the early 80s that ended up chronicling a big part of the punk scene there, all while working at a Hagen-Dazs shop with, we shit you not, Henry Rollins. Check it out. We defy you to have some reaction other than “holy crap, they’re all babies.”

This video is pretty damn cool; it’s even cooler when you realize that the guy in question is also the frontman for the previously-blogged Seattle band Maktub, which you should also check out.

Via BoingBoing, we present an excellent list of YouTube links to 20 of the greatest guitar solos ever.

Bjork and PJ Harvey do “Satisfaction”:

Overheard…

NEW YORK (Billboard) – Kelly Clarkson’s next album will boast some punk rock flavor.

The inaugural “American Idol” champ secured the services of bassist Mike Watt, who co-founded ’70s punk band Minutemen, ’80s combo fIREHOSE, and is now working with Iggy Pop and the reunited Stooges.

“I ended up playing on six of the songs. I had no idea what it was going to be like, but it ended up being pretty interesting,” Watt said of the sessions for Clarkson’s third RCA studio album.

Watt said he was a bit skeptical about working on the project, since he knew hardly anything about “American Idol” or Clarkson herself.

“I heard that Kelly won some game show, but I was really impressed how she sang her ass off. It was intense. I’m really glad I had the experience — it was trippy and everyone gave me much respect.”

The album is being produced by David Kahne, who previously worked with the likes of Paul McCartney, Tony Bennett and Stevie Nicks.

“(Kahne) let me try all kinds of stuff like fuzz bass, fills and solos besides just making things fatter,” Watt said.

Watt also found an admirer in Clarkson guitarist/songwriter Jimmy Messer, who “was very enthusiastic and helped me much — he was a skater when he was younger and knew all about my music.”

The Stooges, meanwhile will release “The Weirdness,” March 20 via Virgin. Watt is expected to be on the road with the group in the spring.

Remember that fantastic flash thingy from earlier in the week?

Apparently, it’s (a) 4 frames from a Japanese Anime combined with (b) a section of a Finnish folk song performed by a down-on-their-luck Finnish band that (c) turns out to be not actual Finnish, but gibberish with a few Finnish words stuck in it. See for yourself:

The cartoon uses the second half of the fifth stanza (four lines) and the complete sixth stanza (eight lines) from the song. Unlike the rest of the song, these two stanzas have no meaning, consisting mostly of phonetically-inspired gibberish that vary from performance to performance and are usually made up on the spot by the singer.

We love the Internet.

In a surprise move, Shane MacGowan is still lucid and blogging, which suggests the degree to which he’s said to have become a derelict may be slightly overstated. In any case, the aforelinked entry is about the other voice in Fairytale of New York, Kristy MacColl, who’s been gone now six years (and was recently lionized at Gawker, which is in fact where we picked up MacGowan’s blog).

In the entry, Shane mentions those who’ve sung Kristy’s part at the inevitable live renditions of Fairytale since her death:

When we do the song live these days, there are people in and around the Pogues who nominate guest singers for the Kirsty part. I leave it to them to argue it out. I can’t be bothered with the politics any more than Machiavelli could. To say I have any favourites for that role other than Kirsty is to sully her name. I’m old fashioned like that. Besides, it’s hearing the original group playing it that keeps me happy.

The role – and it is a role – frequently goes to Ella Finer, daughter of Jem in the band who co-wrote the song with me. It works fine with Ella, partly as it keeps it in the family, and partly because Fairytale is meant to be a song from an older man to a younger woman. And I knew her before she was born.

In Irish pubs where they still sing together, Fairytale has become as much a standard as Danny Boy or The Fields of Athenry or whatever. So I’m now like the writers of all those other traditional standards, except I’m not anonymous. Or dead. The best surprises in life are the ones you never dream about.

We like that last sentence rather a lot.

Anyway, go back up to “inevitable live renditions” link above, which is an MP3 of just such a live performance, from Brixton (we think from 2001; it lacks Kristy). Hearing the crowd sing along is wonderful and raises the hair on our Heathen necks. Enjoy, and toast Kristy. We certainly are.

James Brown died this morning in an Atlanta hospital, probably of pneumonia. Brown needs no introduction; he belongs in the musical pantheon with folks like Elvis, the Beatles, Ray Charles, and Bob Dylan. It’s sad to note how few of these folks we still have walking among us — basically, just two Beatles and Bob.

The Yahoo Obit was the first one we found, and the NYTimes is still running an AP obit, though presumably they’ll have one of their own soon. The Wikipedia article is worth your time, too.

Back in college, we used this record to empty rooms. Lou must be trying to clear Manhattan, since this week he did a semitheatrical production of Berlin live.

Wow.

(The 2nd link is NYT; it may rot, so here’s a local PDF.)

Techdirt points out how well the number-2 online music provider, eMusic.com, is doing. A bit:

The idea that DRM-free music might just make good business sense smolders along, as eMusic is announcing they’ve managed to sell 100 million unprotected songs without the world coming to an end. As part of the promotion, the customer who purchased the milestone track will have a song written about him by the Barenaked Ladies, who’ll include the song on as a bonus track for their upcoming album. The record labels have consistently claimed you can’t be successful selling music that isn’t copy-protected — but eMusic’s second place showing (behind iTunes) shows that’s clearly not the case. They continue to sell more music than Rhapsody, Napster and MSN Music combined, all while catering to indie music fans by avoiding major label content.

We added the emphasis, but that’s a big point. eMusic has a subscription model; you pay ’em X dollars a month for the right to download Y number of unprotected MP3 tracks in any given month. Plan costs and volumes vary, but they’re all quite reasonable. Content’s fresh — for example, they’ve got the new Tom Waits. Check ’em out.

The Atlantic Records founder, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame member, and all-around music industry legend fell and hit his head at a private Rolling Stones show in October, and never recovered. He was 83. The Guardian has a comprehensive obit; they open with this:

The word “legend” is liberally bandied about in the sphere of popular music, but it is a term which can truthfully be used to describe Ahmet Ertegun, the co-founder of Atlantic Records. Ertegun’s death, at the age of 83 following a fall, severs a vital link to some of the most significant chapters in the development of soul, rhythm & blues and rock. He helped to discover or nurture many of the most influential musicians of the last half century, including Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, The Drifters, Wilson Pickett, Percy Sledge, Bobby Darin, Cream, Led Zeppelin, Crosby Stills & Nash and the Rolling Stones.

Wikipedia points out that this Ahmet is why Zappa named his kid Ahmet.

So, in a real “sky is falling” sort of piece, the Register reported yesterday that iTunes Music Store sales were “collapsing,” purportedly based on research from one of those “never in doubt, seldom right” firms (this time, it was Forrester). Predictably, the story was picked up by some big blogs. Trouble is, it’s bullshit, as several have pointed out.

We’re sure that the idea of something like iTMS sales tanking is a great way to drive traffic to your site, but wouldn’t it be nice of researchers and tech journalists cared about whether what they ran was accurate? As the aforelinked debunking noted, iTunes is still one of the biggest music vendors in the country — online or off. They rival the Best Buys of the world, something that no other online vendor can claim, and have sold better than a billion tracks. That’s not exactly “collapse,” now, is it?

Update: Techdirt has more. Unlike Forrester, et. al., they seem to mostly be right.

RoughType.com has an interesting bit on why Digital Rights Management — i.e., copy protection for music — is completely and utterly doomed. Hint: EMI is actually looking into selling unrestricted MP3 files. Why? Because right now, that’s the only format other than the iTunes protected format that works with iPods, and selling online music that you can’t put on your iPod is a nonstarter at best.

Surrender, live. Budokan? No idea. Still cool.

Tom makes an appearance firmly “in character” on the satirical pseudo-talk-show Fernwood 2Night, ca. 1977.

Tom Waits on the Mike Douglas Show, 1976. From the “Nighthawks at the Diner” era, when he was in his late 20s.

Stay for the interview.

Douglas: Do you classify yourself as a poet, or as a singer?

Waits: I’m a Methodist.

So, Redmond’s shot at the portable music market is out, and the pundits have noticed. Unfortunately, the big boys (Mossberg at WSJ and Pogue at NYT) didn’t care for it, and now the mass market is weighing in. Check out this video clip from CNN’s morning show; it’s clear the anchors are pretty underwhelmed with what the Zune can’t do, and even go so far as to ask their gadgeteer “Why can’t they [Microsoft] get some good designers in there?” after the other announcer pulls out her new iPod Shuffle to brag about. Oops.

Oh, and it gets worse. First, instead of making the Zune store experience simple and clear, like the iTunes store, the Zune store is priced entirely in “points,” which Microsoft makes you buy in $5.00 lumps, even if you only want to buy one song. This translates into people making no-interest loans to Microsoft, which I don’t think is what people mean by “microfinance.” WTF?

We almost forgot! The Zune’s much-tauted “sharing” feature over WiFi works only for that — you cannot download music from your PC with Wifi at all. Also, if you share a song, it gets a 3-day time limit for your buddy even if you ripped the song from CD yourself (i.e., this limit is attached to songs not purchased from the Zune store). Speaking of DRM, not only will the Zune not play iTunes songs (which is huge, since the iTunes music store is one of the largest music retailers in the US — only Wal-Mart, Best Buy, Target, and Amazon sell more music), it also won’t play any songs from Microsoft’s previous effort at online music sales (known amusingly as “Plays4Sure”). That’s right: they expect you to buy that shit again. There’s more Zune Q and A here.

Finally, according to Microsoft itself, the Zune doesn’t work with Vista. Are those guys even trying? Yeah, we know it’s a first effort and all, but with a multi-billion-dollar war chest, you’d think they could make something that didn’t suck.

Go here.

Skip the first 26 minutes or so. Starting at about 27:00, he starts mixing in six billion songs you know, but faster than you can identify them, and sometimes 3 or 4 at a time, and it almost always works. It’s astounding. He mixes the Spice Girls into Grand Master Flash, for Christ’s sake.

(Thanks Rob.)

The musical Wainwrights (Loudon III and his children Rufus and Martha) are direct descendants of Peter Stuyvesant (1592-1672), the last Dutch Director-General of the colony that eventually became New York City.

This is easily the finest puppetshow based on a Motorhead song we’ve ever seen.

Here at Heathen HQ, we have lots of music — so much so that Mrs Heathen grumbles about how much space the CD cabinet takes, in fact. Even so, sometimes you need to hear new stuff. Back when we were mere apostates (as opposed to full-growed heathen), that answer could be radio. Alas, with ownership rules relaxed (more accurately: downright slutty, and not in an ironic hipster way), the variety available on radio is sadly lacking even in markets that don’t suck — and the Heathen market, we’re here to tell you, sucks like an Electrolux.

Fortunately, there’s a little bit of cool radio available online. Our current favorite source is the Secret Agent feed from SomaFM: it’s commercial free, listener supported, and available at high enough bitrates that it sounds pretty nice even through the absurd boom-era equipment that graces the Heathen GeekCave. Best of all, if you’ve got the iTunes, you can play it through that — just click on “Radio” in the left-hand area and find the feed; it’s filed under “Electronica,” but that’s really not a fair description of the channel. Don’t like this one? The SomaFM site has plenty others to choose from.

As our occasional spiritual advisor is wont to say: Pick up on it. If you’re so inclined, send ’em some money.

Twenty years ago, MTV showed videos. Lots of them were crap, but some, a tiny but measurable fraction, were the inspired minifilms that defined the genre. Sometime in the 90s, though, they stopped being a music channel and started being a lifestyle channel, which is why we’ve never before today seen Michel Gondry‘s utterly brilliant video for Bjork’s “Bachelorette,” off her 1997 record Homogenic.

If they still played stuff like this, we’d have it on all the time.

Fox News (we know, we know) is reporting that Scarlett Johansson will release an album of Tom Waits covers next spring.

From an IM, just a moment ago:

MAD: So what is the “smiley” for your head exploding?

We’re not sure, but we’re pretty certain this event calls for one. Especially if it doesn’t suck.

You know what’s creepier than Michael Jackson? Bollywood Thriller.

Though, if you think about it, the original video is pretty darn close to Bollywood anyway.

We don’t need to give you a list; his concert rider is enough in and of itself. Lust for life, indeed.

We’ve spent the last couple hours listening to the Grateful Dead (August 6, 1971, from the Hollywood Bowl).

Go figger.

Via Kottke, we find this list from Blender magazine of The 50 worst things to ever happen to music. Our favorites: 46, 45, 42, 35 through 32, 24, 20 (hi, Mike), 17, 14, 13, 10, 9, 8, 7, and of course 1.

Enjoy.

The original line-up reunited briefly at a benefit at the 40 Watt in Athens on the 12th.

We know there’s a whole generation who think they really started at “Monster” — like this writer — but for us the key material ends at “Document.” The performances linked above reflect that reality, as does the new I.R.S. years retrospective and companion DVD we’re awful close to one-clicking at Amazon.

(Via MeFi, which has more relevant links.)

Sparklehorse r00lz. Which is sad for you, unless you live in Austin, as he’s taking his tour elsewhere after 3 US dates: two in Austin, and the one we saw last night here in lovely, crime-free Houston, TX.

The opening act? Daniel Johnston.

ChetIsOnFire. Sadly, they also own “ChetIsOnFire.com.” However, that leaves “ChetIsMerelySmoldering.com” and “ChetIsQuiteWarm.com” available, we guess.

Universal is said to be working on a new online music store called SpiralFrog that will offer music for free. However, there are several dealbreaker problems:

• Users must log in to the system at least once a month, or the files will stop working;
• Users will not be able to burn the music to CD;
• Users will be unable to download the music to iPods.

Yeah. We’re sure Apple’s quaking in their boots on this one. No thanks.

So, in Houston, unlike many places, we still have an actual local record shop or two. (We used to have two serious ones and a handful of smaller ones, but this year Cactus closed up shop after 30 years.) Because they’re a dying breed and because we prefer physical CDs to downloads, we tend to patronize them when we don’t just point our browser at Amazon, which is about half the time, give or take, and depending on what we want (something new and still on the charts is easy to buy locally; obscure back catalog stuff is almost impossible).

Yesterday, while Mrs Heathen was watching implausibly attractive doctors whine about fucking, we happened to be browsing through our podcast list when we found something cool from Morning Become Eclectic. An Austin-based band called The Black Angels made noises we enjoyed, so we figured we’d head over to Soundwaves and pick up the disc today. After all, Austin band, right? Amazon has it, and so does iTunes. Surely they’ve got a few copies.

Er, no. Not only that, the only record of theirs that Soundwaves can even get, it seems, is their eponymous EP, not the full-length LP released in April. And when we left the shop, Mrs Heathen’s car wouldn’t start. It’s about 95 degrees today, which is precisely the sort of weather you want to be push-starting a Hyundai in. Guess we’ll order it from Chez Bezos after all, since the only thing that sucks more than Houston weather in August is DRM.

Reckon we’ll have better luck buying a new battery for the Hyundai tomorrow? Let’s hope so.

Absolutely brilliant: Clinton Got A Blowjob, by Eric Schwartz. Not safe for work, but funny as hell.

(We’ve got a local copy, so let us know if the link goes sour. Hat tip to Mike!)

The Guardian has reviewed Paris Hilton’s new CD:

For a woman apparently ill-suited to anything more taxing than standing around nightclubs in a pair of really enormous sunglasses, Paris Hilton is quite the polymath. In recent years, the hotel heiress has variously revealed herself to be a TV star, a perfumier, a jewellery designer, a nightclub owner, a model, an actor and an author (albeit one whose book, Confessions of an Heiress, was described by a disgruntled Amazon customer as “a huge blow to the medium of literature as a whole”). You read her CV and boggle at what wildly improbable occupation she might turn her hand to next. Spot-welding? Cognitive neuropsychology?

Alas, no: it’s singing. Lest one carp, Hilton has been quick to point out that singing is a vocation for which she is eminently skilled. “I know music,” she reassured the Sunday Times children’s section. “I hear it every single day.”

While this obviously gives Hilton a massive advantage over those who have never heard any music and thus believe it to be a variety of cheese, there remains the nagging suspicion that this might not represent sufficient qualification for a career as a singer, in much the same way as knowing what a child is does not fully equip you for a career as a consultant paediatrician. (emph. added)

Ouch. (Oddly, they go on to give the record 2 of 5 stars. Go figure. Perhaps they’re also more charitable over there.)

Watch this.

OH MY TEETH HURT OH MY TEETH HURT OH MY TEETH HURT AH OH AH OH MY TEETH GOT TO BE MY TEETH HURT WOOO ITS GOT TO BE ITS GOT TO BE MY TEETH HURT ITS GOT TO BE WHOA ITS GOT TO BE MY TEETH HURT

(Also, squirrels are seldom seen, etc.)

Miles and co. from 1959. Jazz fans know this already, but the quiet dude in the back with the sax is, of course, John Coltrane. The whole combo at this point (Kind of Blue era) is like a who’s who of jazz greats. In addition to Davis and Coltrane, they had Wynton Kelly on piano, Paul Chambers on bass, Jimmy Cobb on drums, and Cannonball Adderly also on sax.

It’s particularly cool that, when Coltrane takes his solo, you can see Davis slip off to the side for a smoke.

In 1992, Keith Richards released Main Offender, the second of his two solo records. Unlike its predecessor (1988’s Talk is Cheap), it spawned no Top 40 hits, and sold poorly. Inevitably compared to Mick’s solo outings, we think it’s aged much better. Instead of preening, wiggling Jagger, we get full-on Keef, uncut by the other half of the Glimmer Twin collaboration. Open chords, simple arrangements, and a rock fucking solid band.

It’s all you need, really. Here’s a taste; the record’s still in print if you want more: Wicked As It Seems (8MB mp3)

OK Go has the best Goddamn video involving treadmill choreography ever. Seriously.

The New York Dolls implore you to Dance Like a Monkey in this fantastic and topical song. It’s got monkeys in it. And Dick Cheney.

Wil Wheaton points us to this choice bit about Journey from Scalzi:

[F]or the vast majority of Suburban Americans between the age of 14 and 24 in the early 80s, when it was time to make out and you put Escape on the turntable, you were automatically spotted two bases. Honestly, if you didn’t have a hand under a bra or massaging a button fly by the end of “Who’s Crying Now,” Steve Perry would stop what he was doing, fly to your house and then beat the crap out of you for blowing a sure thing. God forbid you actually flipped the LP, because then, baby, you were going home.

Now, if you’ll excuse us, we have to go to Soundwaves and buy a CD before our wife gets home.

Billy Idol and Slash do “In the Summertime”.

This is remedial, but some of you may not have heard the news:

I heard there was A secret chord That David played, And it pleased the Lord But you don’t really care for music Do ya? It goes like this The 4th the 5th The minor fall and the major lift The baffled King composing Hallelujah…

Mr Cohen via the late Mr Buckley. Go listen. If you’ve no idea what I’m talking about, go find someone who does.