Sometimes I Know Things about Obscure Music

I saw The Wolf of Wall Street the other day.  I was leery, because my father had previously said that he had found it tedious and because my previous, somewhat limited experience of Scorsese had not prepared me to look forward to a three-hour Scorsese movie.  As it happened, I hadn't realized it was a comedy and found that to be a pleasant surprise, and, in addition, I went to see it with friends who quite liked it, which led me to be positively inclined towards it as well.  It was very long, but I found my interest picking up again towards the end for the oddest reason - because of the soundtrack - and not even because it was playing songs I am particularly fond of but because it played, in two scenes directly in a row, one after the other, two songs that are related to songs I'm particularly fond of.  First, the original Italian version of "Gloria" - I had not known there was an original Italian version of "Gloria," but I had been aware of the English version as an influence on "Disco 2000" (it is a pretty clear influence, even if I like the latter better because Pulp).  And then, following on that immediately, right in the next scene,"Ça Plane Pour Moi", which for some complicated reason has the exact same backing track as "Jet Boy Jet Girl" (ummm. . . NSFW).  Considering that they're musically almost identical, I sometimes wonder if I prefer "Jet Boy Jet Girl" for purely purient reasons - I mean, it's awesome to be barely able to resist screaming out, "He gave me head," because the song is just stuck in your head so badly - but it is the one I heard first (on Internet radio).  At any rate, it's an amazingly catchy backing track, and when "Ca Plane Pour Moi" came on, nearly at the end of the three hour marathon, I started literally bouncing around and dancing in my seat, I was so excited.  Good musical choices, Scorsese, or whoever else is in charge of that.

Both of You Dance Like You Want to Win

Why do I say indie-pop, not indie rock? I don't know. It's just a habit I picked up, but to the extent that there's a conscious motivation, I think it's because of the way all the bands I like turn out to have some relationship with dance music. The odd thing is that this happens regardless of whether or not the songs that get me into the band are like that. So. . . let's go through bands I like:

-Pulp: Dance-y from the first, I think. "Common People" sounds dance-y to me. What's more, this is a band that has a compilation CD named "Goes to the Disco" and actually recorded a song that is pretty straightforward house music.

-Yoko Kanno and the Seatbelts - Well, this isn't even indie to begin with ;-). "Cosmic Dare" is kind of dance-y nonetheless, but it's hardly typical.

-Franz Ferdinand - "Music that girls [such as myself] could dance to." 'Nuff said.

-Belle & Sebastian - Okay, I first got into B&S thanks to "Get Me Away from Here, I'm Dying" and "Judy and the Dream of Horses." Not dance-y at all, right? So how could I expect when I first heard those songs that I was also falling in love with the band that put out "Your Cover's Blown"?!?

-The Delays - Actually, their third album was less dance-y than the first two, and I didn't like it nearly as much.

-of Montreal - I think this is the most egregious example. Started out intrigued by hearing "Penelope" on Pandora. Wound up addicted to, I don't know, "Faberge Falls for Shuggie" or something. "Faberge Falls for Shuggie," btw, would be the most hilarious title ever, but "Strawberry Letter 23" is actually probably less funky than "Faberge Falls for Shuggie," which ruins the joke.

Bah-Bah-Bah BAH BAH

Last night, I saw a friend of mine playing keyboards in a band. I've never seen a rock performance by any of my friends before; it was fun. For one song, my friend basically got to play a waltz by Bach (I think he said), so that was one of the most enjoyable.

I have to admit, I really like synths, and I'm glad that when I went to see this performance from a friend of mine, he happenened to play the keyboards. Sometimes, I have trouble figuring out exactly what the guitar part is in a song, but I'm usually able to recognize the synth part really easily. Of course, the part of any song that catches my attention the most tends to be the vocals (hence my fondness for pop music over classical), but, next to that, the synths make a big difference for me.

Coincidentally, after my friend's band played, the venue happened to play "Common People." It was extremely exciting for me; "Common People," after all, is the first contemporary song I ever really fell in love with, way back in eleventh grade. Furthermore, I would say that Candida Doyle's synth playing is one of the key elements of Pulp's style (and something I really miss on Jarvis's solo release). Pulp went through different stages and never only performed one style of song. Candida was good throughout all of this, but I have to say that the swirly synth sound (that's how I think of it) that she produces on "Common People" and similar tracks (the short, poppy, disco-y 90s Pulp tracks) seems to be fundamental to my idea of Pulp. When I think of what makes Pulp Pulp, next to Jarvis's singing, it's Candida's swirly synths.



Bonus Completely Unrelated Pulp Video:



Everyone should watch the spoken word version of "Babies!" Even though it is completely unrelated!