Near Miss

Posted by Tony @ 10:30:00 pm |

I was driving up Strowd Hill on East Franklin Street last Saturday toward downtown when I suddenly realized that the Earth had stopped its wobbling and was spinning normally on its axis again after four long years of weirdness. Carolina was back in the Elite Eight and all was right with the world again. I actually thought for a moment that maybe I'd turn on the radio and find out that George Bush and his entire cabinet had resigned in favor of John Edwards and Dean Smith, but even without that bonus I was a happy camper. It didn't take the win Sunday against Wisconsin to make me feel this way - don't forget that there were nine years between Final Four appearances in the 80's. It was being back in the Sweet Sixteen and then the regional finals that let me know that we were no longer in Bizarro World and that things in the basketball world at least were returning to normal.

I haven't decided yet whether to watch the game Saturday at the Dean Dome. I did go down to Carmichael in 1993 with a couple of guys from work to watch the final with Chris Webber having to try twice to screw up the game before it took (I still can't believe not a single ref saw him drag his pivot foot from under the basket all the way to the freaking foul line - he looked like a bird pretending to be wounded to draw a predator away from its nest). We ran down to Franklin Street after the game but it was cold and a little rainy and we didn't stay too long. 1982 was a different story - I remember walking around downtown Saturday afternoon after watching the semifinal win over Houston down in the basement of Cobb Dorm. We must have stood in line for a half hour just to get into the Happy Store to buy six packs of cans (take one off to drink and hang the rest on your belt - you could do that back in those days). Lex and some of his friends from Davidson came up Monday to watch the final against Georgetown at my apartment - we drove through Carrboro until traffic stopped and then started walking in when we got picked up by a pickup truck with a keg in the bed and a bunch of people who'd been in school here for the 1957 championship.  Nice continuity - they'd been there 25 years before and it's been almost 25 years since so that's why I'll almost definitely be on Franklin Street Monday night with blue paint in my hair and my voice long gone, should we get by Michigan State Saturday and then manage to win it all. Ya'll come on and we'll make it a party!

Sunday, March 27, 2005

I've mentioned that I haven't bought a lot of new music the last few years, spending more of my time ripping my vinyl collection and my money on used CDs (yeah, take THAT, RIAA!!). But I did pick up a couple of new disks Friday night that I'm enjoying for wildly different reasons - John Doe's latest solo disc, Forever Hasn't Happened Yet along with Worlds Apart from ...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead.

I was a huge fan of X and have enjoyed what I've heard of John Doe's solo discs but this is the first one I've picked up. No real surprises here - just good songwriting, a helluva good voice and excellent guests like Dave Alvin, Grant Lee Phillips and Cindy Lee Berryhill that add to the mix rather than distracting as sometimes happens on many-guested efforts. Favorite track so far is Hwy #5, not because it sounds the most X-like, although being co-written by ex-X bandmate and spousemate Exene Cervanka it certainly does - it's just a great song. Neko Case takes the female vocals - her voice is sweeter if maybe not as distinctive as Exene's and the song becomes a really nice duet. Oh, and listen to the first couple of lines of The Losing Kind and tell me John Doe didn't grow up worshiping Jim Morrison - the phrasing is perfect. Call it alt.country, Americana, No Depression or whatever you want - it's good stuff.

I had no idea what to expect from ...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead - I've just always liked the band name and I knew they were coming to the Cat's Cradle in a couple of weeks, so I sampled a couple of tracks and figured what the hell. After a more in-depth listening, that turned into more a "what the hell?!?!?!?!" - like I said, I didn't know what to expect but this wasn't it. Some headbanging, a lot of classic prog rock, some emo - it's big, loud music!  Think the Beatle's A Day in the Life, Trans-Siberian Orchestra and not a little Spinal Tap, although I suspect the latter may be somewhat unintentional. Some of it doesn't work at all, but what does work (and that's at least 75% of it) works well on a number of levels. Pretend you're sixteen again and have some fun with it! I'll admit that I have to bite my tongue over some of the excesses, but my tastes are eclectic enough to handle the ELP-esque overindulgence of ...AYWKUBTTOD as well as the stripped down roots rock of John Doe.

Speaking of stripped-down vs. big noise, the other two disks receiving heavy rotation right now are also from different ends of the spectrum.  I got the White Stripes De Stjil as a Christmas present and picked up New Order's Get Ready at the used rekkid store a couple of months ago - they both rock my ass off in very different ways. JennySlash is confused by my affection for the White Stripes as she is convinced that a couple of years ago I said I didn't like 'em.  A couple of years ago I don't think I'd heard anything by them so I can't imagine I said that but as all women seem to be capable of remembering every nuance of every word in every conversation spoken by every guy they've ever had a relationship with, I guess I musta. So I changed my mind - it's a man's prerogative. I like 'em.