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FrequencyOfGlow
- FB Fan -
USA
157 Posts |
Posted - 07/15/2005 : 14:26:39
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Is anybody else a little ticked off at some of these reviewers, who, while praising the hell out of Honeycomb, keeping digging at the so-called mediocrity of his solo (and Catholics) career to date?
Personally, I am blown away every time I hear Black Letter Days, Dog In the Sand, TOTY and so on.
Why must they trash some of his finest works in order to shine the spotlight on Honeycomb?
I think the winter is going to be a real whirligig |
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speedy_m
= Frankofile =
Canada
3581 Posts |
Posted - 07/15/2005 : 14:57:56
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It seems every album he releases is "his best work in a few years". So... they count the time when he's not releasing albums, or what?
watch me jumpstart as the old skin is peeled |
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martha_promise
= Cult of Ray =
USA
398 Posts |
Posted - 07/15/2005 : 15:13:13
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Yeah, a lot of these reviews, if they happen to mention the Catholics at all, is in a passing comment with no nod whatsoever to all the great albums they did together.
It's nice to see Honeycomb getting such good press, but I would like to see Frank's Post Pixies/Pre Honeycomb work held in the regard that it deserves. Which in my opinion is Brilliant, Genius,..etc.
~~Come inside, or...Go Away.~~ |
Edited by - martha_promise on 07/15/2005 15:29:43 |
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kathryn
~ Selkie Bride ~
Belgium
15320 Posts |
Posted - 07/15/2005 : 15:28:49
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I've been reluctant to clog up the review threads with my disgust over this matter, so I am glad you started this thread, FrequencyOfGlow.
May the mighty Catholics rise again! Or at least be remembered with the proper awe and respect.
I'm signing off and putting on Pistolero.
Sometimes, no matter how shitty things get, you have to just do a little dance. - Frank
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Jontiven
= Cult of Ray =
USA
347 Posts |
Posted - 07/15/2005 : 15:38:01
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Let us try to control our venom and focus on the three-quarters full portion of the glass rather than the 1/4 empty. This is a very fortunate time to be alive, when an album of this substantive value can be recognized for its very greatness. It is not always the case.
bye, Jon Tiven |
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Carl
- A 'Fifth' Catholic -
Ireland
11546 Posts |
Posted - 07/15/2005 : 17:55:25
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Indeed, although I hav'nt heard the whole album and therefore cannot say how good it is, as an FB fan it's nice to see him get some recognition for a change. In fact, he's getting a lot of press...this truly seems like his 'comeback' album! |
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billgoodman
>> Denizen of the Citizens Band <<
Netherlands
6194 Posts |
Posted - 07/16/2005 : 01:31:50
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Show Me Your Tears is a masterpiece that should be mentioned so is Dog in the Sand that should be mentioned
although I think Honeycomb is his most consistent 'masterpiece'
--------------------------- God save the Noisies |
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IceCream
= Quote Accumulator =
USA
1850 Posts |
Posted - 07/17/2005 : 07:31:51
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well, i don't really like much of his stuff with the Catholics (besides 'pan american highway') so I don't mind when they trash Catholics work, but I probably won't like Honeycomb either. I'm more set agog (not necessarily in a good way) by people on this forum who like his Catholics work but don't like disc 2 of Frank Black Francis. |
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The Marsist
= Cult of Ray =
Ireland
730 Posts |
Posted - 07/17/2005 : 07:55:51
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i hate disk 2 of fbf
"i had to store my urine in jars so the wizards could not enchant me" -Bowie |
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kathryn
~ Selkie Bride ~
Belgium
15320 Posts |
Posted - 07/17/2005 : 09:40:37
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I love it all.
Give Honeycomb a chance. It is haunting.
Sometimes, no matter how shitty things get, you have to just do a little dance. - Frank
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IceCream
= Quote Accumulator =
USA
1850 Posts |
Posted - 07/17/2005 : 10:40:22
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oh, I'll buy it, Kathryn. It will probably be the first (and hopefully only CD that I ever buy) |
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Jontiven
= Cult of Ray =
USA
347 Posts |
Posted - 07/17/2005 : 10:52:00
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This from today's Boston Globe......hope I'm not breaking any copyright laws........
POP MUSIC Frank Black's sinister sensibility has a sweet new sound On his latest album, the artist changes direction -- again
By Joan Anderman, Globe Staff | July 17, 2005
Pixies frontman Frank Black is known for his mammoth howl, brief explosive songs, and impenetrable lyrics about space and mutilation. A spotty, sprawling catalog of solo efforts that touch on most every pop music style, from heavy metal to spaghetti western, has done little to forge a post-Pixies identity for Black. With the band's massively successful reunion tour well into its second year, it would seem that Black is ready to settle into a comfortable career peddling alt-rock nostalgia.
On the contrary. Black's 11th solo album, ''Honeycomb," comes out Tuesday on Narada's Back Porch imprint, and it's a carefully conceived, supremely focused Southern soul surprise -- one of those midcareer swerves that forces you to reconsider a known musical quantity.
On paper, ''Honeycomb" reads like a giant step back in time. The disc's producer, Jon Tiven, has worked with Wilson Pickett and B.B. King. Black's new labelmates include John Hammond and the Neville Brothers. A who's who of session aces -- grizzled veterans of the famed Muscle Shoals, Stax, and American studios -- gathered for four days in Nashville to help Black realize a decade-old dream inspired by the 1966 Bob Dylan album ''Blonde on Blonde."
So unabashed is Black's affection for Dylan's country-rock opus -- the album is filled with the sort of inventive structures and bizarre imagery that would later become Black's calling card -- publicity materials for ''Honeycomb" winkingly refer to the project as ''Black on Blonde."
''I took my cue from another record that I really like a lot," says Black, on the phone from a Pixies tour stop in Milwaukee. ''I don't know how much is myth, but I've read accounts of how it was made and you get a picture of this hot young kid composing couplets while the other guys are playing cards, and then they bang out a record. While I'm certainly not as popular as Dylan, and I'm a lot older now than he was when he made it, I feel a similar thing happened. My muse was present, and these heavy hitters, with all of their restraint and groove and prowess, supported it. Magic happened."
Black may be an icon among the alt-rock set, but his reputation hardly preceded him in Nashville. Producer Tiven says that's precisely why the Dylan comparison is apt.
''He came down here with stuff that was so far beyond what these guys were used to playing for a living. It was such a joy to play some new chord changes and hear lyrics about falling in love with a half-sea-creature. It's different from Dolly Parton."
Black isn't the first midlife musician to confront the future by plumbing the past. The natural impulse to slow down and settle down has driven many a rocker to discover his kinder, gentler roots. The first song Black wrote for the album -- the icebreaker, as he refers to it -- is a waltz called ''Violet," named after Violet Clark, his girlfriend and the mother of his 6-month-old son, Jack. He worked his affection for blood into the first verse, but Black's fans will still find this tender love song exceedingly weird. Which proves, in a backwards sort of way, that the call of Southern soul hasn't entirely subsumed Black's weirdness. His cover of the classic ''Dark End of the Street" -- crooned in the soft, pained reaches of his falsetto -- is, considering the source, truly shocking.
In fact, Black believes that this mellow mash of dulcet country sounds and sinister sensibilities is as radical in its rejection of all things hip as the Pixies were for their groundbreaking dynamics.
''People like to say you can't do that or sound like that or try to be that because you're not being real," he says. ''But rock 'n' roll is not about what's happening right now in 2005, nor is it about what was happening in 1989 when I was first successful with the Pixies. It's about the '50s and '60s and jazz and folk. There's nothing wrong with being really in tune with what's going on or inventing a new sound. I just don't like it when that's all you're supposed do."
This warm, muted record involved some serious risk taking. It was written during a chaotic period marking the end of the musician's marriage to Jean Black -- who performs a surreal duet with her ex on ''Strange Goodbye" -- and the beginning of Black's current relationship with Clark. The Pixies, which had come to an antagonistic finish a decade prior, were in the tentative first throes of a reunion. While the sadness and exhilaration that colored those days came as no surprise to Black, the ease with which formerly well-concealed feelings made it into the songs did.
''A lot was going on, not just in romantic relationships but in professional relationships, too, and suddenly I was getting ready to put on my leather jacket and fly to Nashville and record with Steve Cropper [soul guitarist and founding member of Booker T. & the MGs]. All of it combined to up the ante, and I touched on things that maybe I would have been afraid to touch on in the past. I think my audience when I was writing this album became those guys in the band. I didn't know them personally, but I kept imagining these bearded older guys with long careers who are used to working with Neil Young, and I really had to deliver for them. . . . Yes, I was a little nervous. You have to stand tall."
Black and his bandmates in the Pixies may have to wear shoe lifts next month when they headline the legendary Newport Folk Festival.
''I have this fantasy of showing up and Pete Seeger socks me," Black says. ''But I listen to a lot of Burl Ives, and some of those songs are just totally psycho, dark, weird songs about murder and heavy stuff. Folk music isn't only Peter, Paul and Mary doing 'Lemon Tree.' I love that song, but a lot of great folk music is also quirky and kind of raw. I think that if you remove the amplification, the Pixies are pretty folky."
If you remove the rules -- something Frank Black's been doing for years -- the past leads to the future, where a rock 'n' roll screamer can make something as unlikely and lovely as ''Honeycomb."
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The Marsist
= Cult of Ray =
Ireland
730 Posts |
Posted - 07/17/2005 : 10:54:32
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[quote]I'll buy it, Kathryn. It will probably be the first (and hopefully only CD that I ever buy) [/quote)
cheap bastard ha ha ha
"i had to store my urine in jars so the wizards could not enchant me" -Bowie |
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Carl
- A 'Fifth' Catholic -
Ireland
11546 Posts |
Posted - 07/17/2005 : 16:19:05
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Thanks for posting, Mr. Tiven!
"I think that if you remove the amplification, The Pixies are pretty folky." :D |
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IceCream
= Quote Accumulator =
USA
1850 Posts |
Posted - 07/17/2005 : 20:21:02
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quote: Originally posted by The Marsist
[quote]I'll buy it, Kathryn. It will probably be the first (and hopefully only CD that I ever buy) [/quote)
cheap bastard ha ha ha
"i had to store my urine in jars so the wizards could not enchant me" -Bowie
Hey, I buy plenty of vinyl. |
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two reelers
* Dog in the Sand *
Austria
1036 Posts |
Posted - 07/18/2005 : 02:23:44
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i think HC is so hymnically praised (compared to his solo/catholic-stuff) because it sounds extremely good. because it is extremely well produced, like the pixies-albums. honestly, i don't think the songs on HC are "better" than his solo/catholics stuff. i would even say there is more song-writing quality, more diversity in some or many of his solo/catholics-songs (don't get me wrong, i loooove HC, and i think, especially lyrically, this is one of his best albums). i think this all just shows that most of the critics are plain ignorant and don't sratch beneath the surface. like many people, they have not much idea of music, which is sad, because they are getting paid for it. but it seems, they judge just after the first listen, and of course, then the sound becomes more important than the raw flesh of the song itself. just my opinion.
I joined the cult of Souled American / 'cause they are a damn' fine band |
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Carl
- A 'Fifth' Catholic -
Ireland
11546 Posts |
Posted - 07/18/2005 : 06:51:47
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It's getting a lot of good-to-fantastic reviews! Only read one or two reviews that grumbled about it a bit (but still praised a number of the songs!). |
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billgoodman
>> Denizen of the Citizens Band <<
Netherlands
6194 Posts |
Posted - 07/18/2005 : 14:17:36
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listened to Black Letter Days today it's also a great chunk of music you know Frank should have been recognized ages ago but I'm glad that he's now
--------------------------- God save the Noisies |
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VoVat
>> Denizen of the Citizens Band <<
USA
9168 Posts |
Posted - 07/22/2005 : 17:25:20
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quote: I'm more set agog (not necessarily in a good way) by people on this forum who like his Catholics work but don't like disc 2 of Frank Black Francis.
Well, I wouldn't say Disc 2 is really Frank. It's the Two Pale Boys messing with Frank's songs.
I was all out of luck, like a duck that died. I was all out of juice, like a moose denied. |
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Erebus
* Dog in the Sand *
USA
1834 Posts |
Posted - 07/22/2005 : 17:41:36
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quote: Originally posted by billgoodman
listened to Black Letter Days today it's also a great chunk of music
Yes. For at least the past year that's been the disc, whether Pixies, FB, or FB&C, that I've listened to the most. Really sweet. |
Edited by - Erebus on 07/22/2005 17:42:25 |
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DivisionPelagic
- FB Fan -
USA
48 Posts |
Posted - 07/22/2005 : 18:56:11
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"A spotty, sprawling catalog of solo efforts that touch on most every pop music style, from heavy metal to spaghetti western, has done little to forge a post-Pixies identity for Black. With the band's massively successful reunion tour well into its second year, it would seem that Black is ready to settle into a comfortable career peddling alt-rock nostalgia."
Anyone else find that insulting? Or at least highly under-researched and quite possibly stupid??
Alt-rock nostalgia....that makes me want to puke.
I've heard a lot of noise, so I'm going to the stereo store, to get a white noise maker and turn it up to ten. |
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Carl
- A 'Fifth' Catholic -
Ireland
11546 Posts |
Posted - 07/23/2005 : 06:21:10
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Yeah, I mean he's just released an album that branches out again from previous musical styles. |
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