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More from Dr Frank
As this guy on twitter points out, the auto-generated "Dr Frank Music" link on YouTube is illustrated with a pic of the other, chubbier, German Dr Frank, and our stuff is all mixed up together. Tragic but I'm fine with it. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChD4RftsBqccMrDujlnT28A twitter: https://twitter.com/random_jonas/status/1346537377553068039?s=20
38 views · Jan 6th
When good enough isn't good enough
Hey, it's Wodnesdæg, and after a couple of weeks off we, somewhat to our own surprise, are back with a Song for Odin, the first of 2021. Our holiday was weird but good, and we hope your was similar.
So here we go, it's the MTX doing "Parasite," from a show at the Rivoli in Toronto, October 5, 1997.
https://youtu.be/kJcdWukNBQ4
As I've noted when I've posted songs from this set before, I was deathly ill at the time, which possibly accounts for my relatively low-key demeanor. I know it's a little hard to tell the difference - deadpan is about as exuberant as I get. You know me: in love with lethargy.
Anyhow, this was already an old number at the time, from the 1990 album Making Things with Light. We're basically covering our own song. And I like what we've done with it. It's an understated, simple arrangement of a tune we were never able to do all that well before, and it comes off a whole lot better like this. Plus, that guitar sound is outtasight, always. I'd say we took a deflated old thing and breathed new life into it.
Whether or not it was worth inflating is another question. I'm weirdly fond of the song, though I certainly see its flaws and I'm not sure I could defend it beyond a reasonable doubt. It's perfectly okay but not that... good, I guess you'd say, even if it ain't half bad (which it may not be.)
What it's got going for it is a pretty good melody, and glib syllables that fit it well and that include some memorable, though willfully obscure, lyrical absurdities; plus a fair bit of attitude. And maybe that's good enough. I know at the time I thought it was good enough. And for all it mattered, at the time, it was. It could have been way, way worse and still have been good enough for the purpose, which was to give us something to do while we were standing around on the stage.
But good enough isn't always good enough, if you know what I mean. What's missing is a purpose for all these not-half-bad elements, beyond just jostling against each other at random. Write the word "parasite" at the top of the page and scribble a bunch of glib free-associations below it, hoping it'll all congeal into something worthwhile, somehow. This parasite person sounds like a pretty disagreeable character, about time someone denounced him properly. These parasite people are getting away with murder. (I no longer recall if this song referenced anyone in particular, but: probably not.)
Many, many a song has been "written" this way, including, I suppose, some genuinely great ones. But the odds are against this method in re.: producing greatness. I'd "written" many such songs by this point, some of them pretty good by accident. It still hadn't quite dawned on me that you could, with a little effort, make them do more than this, a lot more. It took me way longer to figure that out than it probably should have.
On the other hand... well, a ways back I considered the song "Christine Bactine" (link in notes below) and found it surprisingly focused and coherent in terms of "standard rock poetics"; and I suppose you could say the same about this one? I'm going to go ahead and say that, but, on the other other hand, maybe all it needed was a wild guitar and some new backups, as here. Anyhow, in both iterations, it's what happened.
One further "minor secret" and I'm out: you'll notice a strange drill-like "outer-limits" sound fading in and out in the studio recording. This is an actual drill they were using at the machining shop that shared a wall with Sound and Vision Studios in San Francisco, where we recorded Making Things with Light and much of the "middle period" MTX stuff. Not the ideal situation for recording: the drill and other such machinery came through the mics and through the amps and the board, and basically affected anything you plugged in. It's probably there to some degree in all those recordings. Of course, the thing to do with such sounds is, use them. Don't try to hide them, but rather make them the focus. And in context with all those "come back on my next show" TV referencing lines it almost sounds planned. All self-deprecation aside, and despite the fact that this recording and arrangement is no great shakes, that's recording magic right there.
notes:
-- that studio recording: https://youtu.be/L8ka3euvBwM
-- that essay on "Christine Bactine" and "standard rock poetics": https://www.minds.com/newsfeed/1026151537353957376?referrer=frankportman
-- playlist of songs already posted from this show: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLommF46BbnAS2KIeIeqpKu183co1AWok_
-- Songs for Odin playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLommF46BbnATopffORs0YkspebJHka2o_
#music #songs #video #punkrock #minds
1.1k views · Jan 6th
More from Dr Frank
As this guy on twitter points out, the auto-generated "Dr Frank Music" link on YouTube is illustrated with a pic of the other, chubbier, German Dr Frank, and our stuff is all mixed up together. Tragic but I'm fine with it. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChD4RftsBqccMrDujlnT28A twitter: https://twitter.com/random_jonas/status/1346537377553068039?s=20
38 views · Jan 6th
When good enough isn't good enough
Hey, it's Wodnesdæg, and after a couple of weeks off we, somewhat to our own surprise, are back with a Song for Odin, the first of 2021. Our holiday was weird but good, and we hope your was similar.
So here we go, it's the MTX doing "Parasite," from a show at the Rivoli in Toronto, October 5, 1997.
https://youtu.be/kJcdWukNBQ4
As I've noted when I've posted songs from this set before, I was deathly ill at the time, which possibly accounts for my relatively low-key demeanor. I know it's a little hard to tell the difference - deadpan is about as exuberant as I get. You know me: in love with lethargy.
Anyhow, this was already an old number at the time, from the 1990 album Making Things with Light. We're basically covering our own song. And I like what we've done with it. It's an understated, simple arrangement of a tune we were never able to do all that well before, and it comes off a whole lot better like this. Plus, that guitar sound is outtasight, always. I'd say we took a deflated old thing and breathed new life into it.
Whether or not it was worth inflating is another question. I'm weirdly fond of the song, though I certainly see its flaws and I'm not sure I could defend it beyond a reasonable doubt. It's perfectly okay but not that... good, I guess you'd say, even if it ain't half bad (which it may not be.)
What it's got going for it is a pretty good melody, and glib syllables that fit it well and that include some memorable, though willfully obscure, lyrical absurdities; plus a fair bit of attitude. And maybe that's good enough. I know at the time I thought it was good enough. And for all it mattered, at the time, it was. It could have been way, way worse and still have been good enough for the purpose, which was to give us something to do while we were standing around on the stage.
But good enough isn't always good enough, if you know what I mean. What's missing is a purpose for all these not-half-bad elements, beyond just jostling against each other at random. Write the word "parasite" at the top of the page and scribble a bunch of glib free-associations below it, hoping it'll all congeal into something worthwhile, somehow. This parasite person sounds like a pretty disagreeable character, about time someone denounced him properly. These parasite people are getting away with murder. (I no longer recall if this song referenced anyone in particular, but: probably not.)
Many, many a song has been "written" this way, including, I suppose, some genuinely great ones. But the odds are against this method in re.: producing greatness. I'd "written" many such songs by this point, some of them pretty good by accident. It still hadn't quite dawned on me that you could, with a little effort, make them do more than this, a lot more. It took me way longer to figure that out than it probably should have.
On the other hand... well, a ways back I considered the song "Christine Bactine" (link in notes below) and found it surprisingly focused and coherent in terms of "standard rock poetics"; and I suppose you could say the same about this one? I'm going to go ahead and say that, but, on the other other hand, maybe all it needed was a wild guitar and some new backups, as here. Anyhow, in both iterations, it's what happened.
One further "minor secret" and I'm out: you'll notice a strange drill-like "outer-limits" sound fading in and out in the studio recording. This is an actual drill they were using at the machining shop that shared a wall with Sound and Vision Studios in San Francisco, where we recorded Making Things with Light and much of the "middle period" MTX stuff. Not the ideal situation for recording: the drill and other such machinery came through the mics and through the amps and the board, and basically affected anything you plugged in. It's probably there to some degree in all those recordings. Of course, the thing to do with such sounds is, use them. Don't try to hide them, but rather make them the focus. And in context with all those "come back on my next show" TV referencing lines it almost sounds planned. All self-deprecation aside, and despite the fact that this recording and arrangement is no great shakes, that's recording magic right there.
notes:
-- that studio recording: https://youtu.be/L8ka3euvBwM
-- that essay on "Christine Bactine" and "standard rock poetics": https://www.minds.com/newsfeed/1026151537353957376?referrer=frankportman
-- playlist of songs already posted from this show: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLommF46BbnAS2KIeIeqpKu183co1AWok_
-- Songs for Odin playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLommF46BbnATopffORs0YkspebJHka2o_
#music #songs #video #punkrock #minds
1.1k views · Jan 6th
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