This week's album cover comes courtesy of friend of the blog -- and, indeed, friend of all mankind -- Pedro.Just look into the eyes of little Eli Manning there. He has a secret to tell, but I'm not sure just who it's about. Maybe it was his dad Archie, taking out some trauma from his days with the Aints. Maybe his brother Cooper, the one without the football gene, trying to dominate his little brother with his own version of the hurry-up offense. Or maybe the pervert in the park had a present in his pants.
Who knows? But it's bad. Tom Coughlin naked bad.
Alright, let's do this thing.
For those of you just joining us, here's how it's done, in three easy steps. First, take out whatever music storage device you use -- an iPod, an imitationPod, a 1958 Wurlitzer jukebox, the rhythm-blessed wino on your corner, whatever -- set it to random, and give us the first ten songs that come out. Second, if you'd like to kick it up a notch Elzar-style, rate the songs on a scale of one to ten, with one being the biggest bunch of sucks who ever sucked a suck and ten being a song so cool that it collapses upon itself to form a black hole of coolness that not even Barry White's voice could escape. Third, and most important, mock everyone else's music.
And. Here. We. Go.
1. Wilco, "I Am Trying to Break Your Heart" -- A song so perfectly Wilconian that they named a tour documentary after it. Just a little bit off-key and off-kilter, this slow strummer from Yankee Hotel Foxtrot really is the band at its best. 8/10
2. Greenskeepers, "Lotion" -- Lordy, Lordy, I love this song. It's catchy as hell, but you'll hate yourself for singing along, since the entire tune is written from the perspective of Buffalo Bill from "Silence of the Lambs." The song is absolutely brilliant on its own, but the video -- which syncs the song up to actual clips from the film -- is pure genius. 10/10
3. Big Boi, "Kryptonite" -- This is a fairly mediocre offering from Mr. Antwan Patton, a song that suggests that if the long-rumored Outkast break-up ever does come to be, then Big Boi is destined to join Andrew Ridgley, John Oates, and Art Garfunkel in the annals of castaway sidemen. 5/10
4. The Gruesomes, "Way Down Below" -- Fairly decent bit of garage rock revival from the 1980s. They're not as good as the premier garage rock revival group, the Gories. But then again, they're not as bad as the other retro group of the 1980s, the Goonies. 6/10
5. Earth, Wind and Fire, "September" -- A great song, and usually the one song I can count on for rump-shaking inspiration at a wedding. But if Aunt Reba is shaking her considerably large groove thing at the same time, I suppose the song can't be all that cool. 7/10
6. Yo La Tengo, "Cherry Chapstick" -- Hoboken's finest deliver the goods here on a nice strummy bit of indie rock. I think the entire And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out CD is terrific, and this song is certainly no exception. 7/10
7. Archers of Loaf, "Might" -- Two minutes of stripped-down indie-rock love. Sweet. 8/10
8. ...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead, "The Rest Will Follow" -- Not surprisingly, a band with the balls to use that as their name also throws a wall of sound at you too. Two drummers and what sounds like a half dozen guitars lead to a nice driving rocker. Solid stuff. 8/10
9. TV on the Radio, "Heroes" -- The original is probably my favorite Bowie song of all time, but this cover may be even better. Holy shit this is good. Do yourself a favor and go get this on iTunes. 10/10
10. The Guess Who, "Laughing" -- Aw, fuck. And I was doing so well. 3/10
Alright, that gives me a 7.2 average. Either I'm getting cooler as the summer heats up, or just getting much less judgmental. I prefer to think it's the former.
Let's see what you've got, folks. Drop your own Random Ten in the comments below, with or without the Coolness Self-Audit.
3 comments:
It is my pleasure to present double-entendre album covers of questionable taste to the fine gentlemen of LLATPON. Hopefully, I can use my formidable picture-searchin' skillz to contribute more of these to future FRT's.
1. Ride, "Walk On Water" - Such a great band. Lumped in with the shoegaze movement because they were...well, shoegazey, Ride nevertheless endures in my mind as the best band from that group not with the initials MBV. This song was originally on the album Tarantula which I don't have because it's supposedly their worst album by a mile. It's a pretty good jangly number though. 8/10
2. Nirvana, "Rape Me" - I like Nirvana all right, but I have two problems with this song. One, I'm not a fan of political songs for the most part and this strikes me as Cobain at his most Eddie Vedderish. Second, the riff is the same riff they used for "Smells Like Teen Spirit". For a band that I think has a number or original and exciting riffs, this is disappointing. 6/10
3. The Jesus Lizard, "Good Thing" - I love The Jesus Lizard. I think they might be the most underrated band from that early-mid '90's "alternative" band era. But this is from their first album Head which isn't quite as focused and...well, good as the two albums that followed that one (the classics Goat and Liar). 6/10
4. T. Rex, "Main Man" - You know a T. Rex song when you hear one. It's got some pseudo-hippie title and lyrics like "Are you my main man?", bongos and face-melting guitar solos. Marc Bolan's done better songs, but since it's T. Rex and it's off The Slider, 8/10.
5. The Replacements, "Election Day" - This is an outtake from Pleased to Meet Me. It's a pretty good pseudo-blues number. The funny thing about this song was that the Mats wrote this song about not being able to buy liquor on Election Day. That's the political statement they had to make. 7/10
6. Fugazi, "Give Me the Cure" - I'm not the most ardent Fugazi fan. I mean, "Waiting Room" is one of the best songs ever, but I'd be hard-pressed to find a song in their catalog that I like nearly as much. This song is pretty good, but again, it's no "Waiting Room". 7/10
7. Led Zeppelin, "I Can't Quit You Baby" - When Led Zeppelin plays "the blues", I'm not always as rapt as I would be otherwise if say, "Communication Breakdown" was playing. And my main complaint about Led Zeppelin I is that it plays it a little too close to straight blues. I much prefer the mutated fuzz-rock blues on Led Zeppelin II. 6/10
8. Grant Hart, "You're The Victim" - I've always been a big proponent of Grant Hart deserving more credit for Hüsker Dü, but Grant, give it a rest already about Bob Mould! This was off Hart's underrated 1st solo album, Intolerance which was only a few years after the Dü broke up, but in every interview I've read with Hart since, it seems he still holds a giant-sized grudge against Mould for whatever reason. This song doesn't quite have the bile that John Lennon's early solo stuff did against Paul, but the barely-veiled sarcasm doesn't endear me to this. 5/10
9. The Replacements, "Heartbeat: It's A Lovebeat (Outtake - Rough Mix)" - This was off those reissued Mats albums that came out last year. I guess the original version of this song was made by some Partridge Family wannabes in the early '70's. The Mats rock it up some, but I suppose there's only so much you can do with cheesy pop songs. 7/10
10. The Beatles, "Let It Be" - Oh, Paul, you optimistic dog, you. No matter how much shit John talked about your sappy songs and how many more songs George deserved to have on albums instead of you, you somehow managed to get a couple of ballads on each of the Beatles' last few albums. Luckily for you this one as it is a classic. 9/10
So I get a 69 total the day my suggestive photo is used on a FRT. COINCIDENCE? Yeah, probably.
Sheesh, quiet day here. At least Pedro is bringing the high heat.
T. Rex kicks twelve kinds of ass. In my only T. Rex trivia, Marc Bolan was enough of a badass to date Gloria Jones, the soul singer who did the original version of "Tainted Love."
What's worse, the next album was called "Eli's Coming."
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