Video Of The Week: David Bowie

Look, I admit I'm not the biggest David Bowie fan out there. He has two albums I can listen to through-and-through without skipping any songs: Outside (1995) and Earthling (1997).

From his other songs, say if I go by the two-disc Best Of Bowie release from 2002, there are songs I like: Space Oddity, The Man Who Sold The World, Suffragette City, All The Young Dudes, Rebel Rebel, Young Americans, and Heroes.

As a teen, I also liked Changes, Ziggy Stardust, and Under Pressure, but they were overplayed (by others, but myself as well), so I tend to skip them nowadays.

But I could never listen to The Jean Genie, Fame, Let's Dance and Jump They Say. Not seriously, anyway. I did like his band Tin Machine, however.

Anyhow, all that's to say his passing didn't move me as much as pretty much all of my Facebook friends, though I recognize the man has a strong legacy, and was influential particularly among those who struggled with issues of self. And that's huge.

For me, however, the passing of Lemmy Kilmister of Hawkwind and Motörhead was a much bigger blow. Both died of cancer shortly after their birthdays, Lemmy four days after his 70th, Bowie two days after his 69th... if he died at all.

Sure, his Blackstar record came out on his birthday, and would have made a terrific parting gift; then again, a lead single and video called Lazarus leads a man to thoughts like "well, if Chuck D can doubt of Tupac Shakur's death after his first postmortem album was called Makaveli"...

Time will tell.

In the meantime, here's the video, directed by Johan Renck, who usually specializes in "pure pop" with a resume that reads collaborations with Madonna (Hung Up and Nothing Really Matters), Kylie Minogue (Love At First Sight), All Saints (Black Coffee), Robbie Williams (Tripping and Lady Madonna), Beyoncé (Me Myself and I) and Lana Del Rey (Blue Velvet), among others:



It's a bit dark, more in line with the director's work on TV series such as Breaking Bad and The Walking Dead...

Video Of The Week: Gulfer

Back to the underground with emo/math rock/indie band Gulfer, with their track from the split vinyl "F'Real For Real" (b/w Bob Abate) which also includes Del Paxton's  Paline and Bad Batch.

Gulfer's my type of indie band, having released stuff for a handful of different labels, being constantly on tour despite none of their members having a driver's license, and playing an honest, open type of soft-emo rock that is so much from the heart that it would only have been fashionable 10 years ago.

Guillaume Lebel shot the video in an apartment - a setting in which the band has often performed - and each band member brought their own dog to the shoot, which hits a soft spot for me.

Let me open myself up a bit and go full-confession: oftentimes, when I see a (local or mid-level American touring indie) band live and like them, I think to myself that one of their band members (usually a drummer, sometimes a bassist or singer, rarely a guitarist) would be amazing... in my group, playing my songs. (Not instead of their usual bands, but in addition to). Not these cats. They sound like this is the ideal setting for them, they sound like a unit. And there's nothing I could bring to the table to make any of them feel like this isn't the lone place where they can shine on their own.

F'real.

Video Of The Week: The Postal Service

It's been more than a decade since their debut and lone album came out, and it remains among the top-10 independent releases of the past 30 years, probably in the top-5. Funny how a side project from Death Cab For Cutie's Ben Gibbard and Dntel's Jimmy Tamborello with help from Rilo Kiley's Jenny Lewis turned into the biggest hype-making machine since Nirvana...

And yet, when I get out of my circle of musician friends and the vinyl buyers, I still encounter people my age, in my city, that have never heard of The Postal Service. And while their electronics-induced soft folk-rock may not be as fresh as when it came out in 2003, songs like Such Great Heights, We Will Become Silhouettes and, of course, The District Sleeps Alone Tonight still pack a hell of a punch.

The video for The District (...), directed by Cobra Kai, was nominated for many awards, including ''Best Video Made For Under $10K''. To me, it's by far the best track on the record; the music is just a notch above the other ones, but the lyrics ring so true, which happens when they are: Gibbons was chronicling his girlfriend leaving him in Seattle and moving to Washington, D.C. (known locally as ''The District'', since it belongs to no state).

Video Of The Week: Joseph Arthur

(As many of you know,) I'm a writer, and I'm a musician. I write my own songs, and I like to re-interpret those of others, particularly when I really love the song and the person who wrote it no longer does it the same way, or no longer can (old age, death) or wants to. And my versions usually differ greatly from the originals.

For years, I'd wanted to cover Lou Reed's Walk On The Wild Side, and this is exactly how I would have done it (so I kind of no longer have nor want to):



Director Ehud Lazin also did a good job of capturing the slow vibe of Joseph Arthur's version, and juxtaposed it with images of today's New York City - not quite the nightlife, excess and cultural hotbed it was in the 1970s, but still a fine place to live, both literally and figuratively, at any time of the day. The low-fi effects just add a bit of a late-1970s/early 1980s touch to the whole thing, with taste and subtlety.

Joseph Arthur hails from Akron, Ohio, but moved to Atlanta to pursue his music career - or so he thought. He was soon picked up by Peter Gabriel's label and moved to Brooklyn, becoming (with the likes of Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - a.k.a. Will Oldham - and Jeffrey Lewis) one of the artists who would - inadvertently - turn it into the hipster haven it is today.

Like many musicians working today, he is involved in many projects, namely the bands RNDM (with Pearl Jam's Jeff Ament) and Fistful Of Mercy with Ben Harper and Dhani Harrison, and also has received some acclaim as a painter and designer. He's made his own album art, which is cool, but opening his own self-serving museum may have been a tad much. In my humble I-operate-a-music-festival-around-my-birthday opinion.

Video Of The Week: Red Mass

Red Mass is a Montréal collective with a 10-person core but that encompasses over 60 contributors thus far from members of over 200 bands. It was started by Roy ''Choyce'' Vucino in 2008, so you can say he's its leader and figurehead.

Their live shows are spectacular and eclectic, like a modern-day Mr. Bungle with the showmanship and spirit of King Khan & The Shrines, who they will be touring with, incidentally, through the end of June all across North America (tour dates here).

The Hart-directed video matches the band, moody at first, setting a tone if not the tone, then bursting in pure rock energy just when it could have just as well ended. Mac De Marco and HannahLIsDead sing on the track, titled Sharp.

Video Of The Week: Red Hot Chili Peppers

They were a truly important voice in music from 1988 until 1999; they were influential from 1983 to 1991. They have recorded one of the best albums of all time, Blood Sugar Sex Magik.

After BSSM, though, the once-experimental, punk-meets-funk outfit Red Hot Chili Peppers started getting repetitive, with each funk song resembling Give It Away and all ballads sounding too much like Under The Bridge, but for the moment of an incredible record, they came up with 17 (!!) incredibly different, all great songs full of witty and/or intelligent lyrics, nervous and funky bass lines, inventive guitar work and percussions worth a record of their own.

One song they'd never try to replicate was Breaking The Girl, a rare 6/8-timed song in their catalog, with building beats and guitar chord progressions reminiscent of Led Zeppelin's Middle Eastern-influenced songs best captured when Robert Plant and Jimmy Page went Unledded.

The lyrics detail a rocky relationship - classic ballad material - but with the music, it just created a whole different universe for it to live and evolve in. The video, directed by acclaimed director and (war) photographer Stéphane Sednaoui (who also directed their video for Give It Away) is an experimentation in saturated colours, not unlike his previous work with U2 (Mysterious Ways) a year earlier, and adds yet another layer to the whole ordeal:



At a time where pop/dance videos shot in front of a white background were clinging on for their life, grunge bands were concentrating on live clips or two-tone videos full of close-ups and Guns N' Roses were waving the 8-minute epic flag by themselves, Breaking The Girl stood alone as a work of art, a testament to the song's authors for creating such an oddity that was still right where it needed to be.

Video Of The Week: The Raveonettes

In the first half of the 00s, I legally downloaded thousands of live concerts from bands I knew, loved, respected and was fond of. From going on such sites as Etree or Dime A Dozen and its predecessor whose name I forget, I also got to learn of new bands I'd otherwise never have heard of, like The Kills, Sahara Hotnights, and The Raveonettes.

The Raveonettes hail from Copenhagen, Denmark and draw their influences from 50s and 60s rock (the chord progressions), the Velvet Underground (the atmospheres and lyric content) and dark electronic pop à la Joy Division.

And while the line-up has changed and diminished from one record to the next (they're now on their 12th release - six albums, 5 EPs and one B-sides compilation), there have been two constants: vocalists Sune Rose Wagner (also guitarist and composer) and Sharin Foo (one-time bass player, now percussionist). They are the two remaining members and have been for the last six years.

This particular track is from their 2003 release, Chain Gang Of Love, which I listened to a lot back in the day, interspersed with some Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, White Stripes, VU and Richard Hell.

Kim Gordon Wisdom

Elle Magazine had an awesome interview recently with (former?) Sonic Youth bassist and vocalist Kim Gordon, where she mentions what turns her on artistically these days, her current projects, and how she's handling the dating life now that she is divorced from co-founding SY member, co-vocalist and guitarist Thurston Moore.

It seems Gordon blames book editor Eva Prinz for the couple's break up (well, that and Moore himself):

''We seemed to have a normal relationship inside of a crazy world,'' Gordon says of her marriage.'' And in fact, it ended in a kind of normal way—midlife crisis, starstruck woman.''

 Other people have other views but, really, the only people who should worry about that shit are those directly involved: the guy cheating on his wife, the woman he's been seeing since, and the woman scorned who moved on with her life. The one thing everyone else on the planet should be allowed to ask is: is that shit bad enough to put an end to one of indie rock's best success stories of all time, of a band who did things their way from Day 1, who own all rights to all their works, who kept it real and experimental the whole time, and eventually got support from a major label (Geffen), but only after proving they could do it on their own, and still held their rights, their freedom, their autonomy - and were allowed to release stuff independently at the same time (Geffen has a similar deal with Beck, so they're cool like that).

Should it mean the end of Sonic Youth, then we should all get our hands on pitchforks (the tool, not the website, who likely still support everything Moore does - he is to them what Jack White is to me!) and walk over to Thurston Moore's house and seek revenge/retribution/justice/his head on a stick. Anything else just isn't our business.

In any event, Kim Gordon remains a ground breaker, a trend setter, a smart, poised, strong, articulate person who rocks harder than a lot of them. I saw SY many times between 1996 and 2002 - I stopped going when the shows got more expensive and shorter at the same time - and I met the band twice - once after a show at Métropolis, and another time after one at Le Medley. Both times they were affable, took the time to sign my ticket stubs and talk a bit, and really seemed to care about all the fans who waited outside for them. ''Good, simple humans'' I thought. Still do.