erik ribeiro.com photos blog music rotation

music rotation:

2009.06.30
gary numan/tubeway army - "are 'friends' electric?"
an pierlé - cover of "are 'friends' electric?"
from the tubeway army album replicas (1979) and from the gary numan tribute album random (1997) respectively.

"You know I hate to ask
But are friends electric?
Only mine's broke down
And now I've no one to love

"So I find out your reason
For the phone calls and smiles
And it hurts and I'm lonely
And I should never have tried
And I missed you tonight
So it's time to leave
You see it meant everything to me"

it's rare that i would put a cover of a song up with the original, but the two versions are so different, and yet of the same soul. the song has been covered by so many artists, it was only a matter of time before a really great version surfaced. "are 'friends' electric?" is considered to be one of the first if not the first synthesizer record to reach number 1 in the UK in the days after punk (1979). but it's not the song's history that makes it so haunting. it's the melody during the spoken word breaks that makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up. it's stark, but every note so perfect. and perhaps it's an pierlé's version that illustrates this. sort of from the school of tori amos circa little earthquakes/under the pink era, she sings from whisper to whaling over expressive piano that does the same. pierlé's version has virtually no repetition, which makes it all the more stark and alienating. numan's version has repetition and his yelpy indecipherable singing style, working well to enforce the song's robotic, sci-fi theme. it's as if it should have been inspired by blade runner, but came before. no doubt he was influenced by philip k. dick.

but his lyrics are so personal and emotional. it perfectly touches alienation, loneliness and confusion in an age of technology. how do we relate to each other when we have machines to turn to? what if we become attached and fall in love with our machines that can never love us? those of you who know me well know it is in many ways the story of my own life, struggling to find love, abandoning the search, and taking comfort in the machines in which i surround myself. but there's always the moment when you're faced with the truth that machines can't love you. ok, so some of you may not be feeling the sci-fi love theme. but tell me you've never turned to your ipod or worked on a car after a girl dumped you. did it make you feel better? rejection sucks. machines may not love you, but they don't reject you either. you have a sense of control in your life again. until you find yourself lost and alone among your machines.

up until i saw gary numan live years ago (best sounding show i've ever been to), i had never heard anything other than cover versions. i barely remember the song from the live show. about five months ago, i was playing songs in random mode in itunes (out of a 22,000 song collection) when pierlé's version popped on. i was blown away. yes, when you buy compilation after compilation, you do miss a lot of treasures. it was really only after hearing it that i seeked out numan's version when he was recording with tubeway army.

anyway, i highly recommend both versions. even numan's live versions are quite good. for those of you too good for 80's-style synth pop, check out pierlé's version.

2009.06.09
echobelly - "dark therapy"
from the album on (1995 - sony)

"if you close your eyes then i will take you all the way
let me close your eyes and i will take it all away"

it never fails. i've been playing this song for people since i first bought the CD in 1995, and every time i play it, someone asks about it. who the hell is that? that's all they can say. not "i love that song" or "oh, i've heard that on a cell phone commercial." just a deeply personal connection to this haunting song. it takes over the listener, if even just for a few seconds. they almost seem afraid to ask or glow about how great the song is. as if they we somehow missing out on what the rest of the world knew. i love it because i get to witness that moment even today, some 14 years after it came out. it's an old favorite for me. a song i still don't get sick of hearing, despite many hours on repeat over the years.

ah, if only echobelly could get some credit for the great band they can be. but "dark therapy" never even played on the radio here. they are perhaps forever branded by the bubbly pop song "king of the kerb," which actually got some radio play. i've come to love that song too, but they might have been dismissed as another mid-nineties british invasion pop act with a cute girl at the mic.

i saw them live at some radio event back when i was obsessed with curve. the only way i could see curve, broken up at the time, was to try to catch members who had scattered into other bands. debbie smith, second guitarist to curve had joined echobelly. my girlfriend back in '94, ever the anglophile, had hooked me onto echobelly, as i think we both had a crush on the gorgeous sonya aurora madan, lead singer of echobelly. by the time i saw them live, my girlfriend and i had parted ways, so i could indulge my fantasies of meeting the band and hitting on the indian-born goddess with the somewhat loungy voice. well, she never wandered out into the uninterested crowd, but i did get to chat up some curve with the black, lesbian, short, ball of energy guitarist known as debbie smith (she might have been playing bass). she made fun of sonya (not in a mean way), but was probably one of the friendliest musicians i had met at a show. don't worry, sugar (buffalo daughter). you'll always hold a place in my heart.

anyway, that was the first echobelly live show i attended. they didn't play dark therapy if i remember it right. it may not have been out yet. but i later caught them at the tiny urban art bar in downtown houston for a second show. this time there was a crowd to see them, though UAB wasn't that big. but when they played "dark therapy," it was total silence. you could hear a pin drop. everyone was gasping at this amazing song, many of us hearing it for the first time. it blew us away. i wanted them to play it over and over again.

i could describe elements of the song here, but i think you just have to experience it for yourself. listen to it. buy it. the EP version is much better than the album version if i remember it right. see if it changes your life. support the band, even if the rest of their stuff doesn't necessarily live up to this masterpiece. how many masterpiece can any one band create anyway. give credit where it's due. hook other onto echobelly. pass the word. and make it part of your personal soundtrack.

2009.06.02
juana - "connected"
from the album misbehavior (2005 - warner music philippines)

"i am a lost cause
i am a zero
always a victim and never the hero"

"i'm gonna go
you won't even notice
i'm gonna go electric
when i'm on the outside
that's when it's so right
gonna be something real
wanna feel connected"

"you have the reasons i have excuses
how can you make me feel so useless"

"i'll disappear don't interfere not that i ever expect it"

pretty much sums up my dating life. for the last 2 days, i've had this song on constant repeat in the car. i've become addicted to it. yes, it's a poppy guilty pleasure. could of come from natalie imbruglia, and no doubt has some influence from the likes of the loathsome lisa loeb. yes, i thought she was cute. definition indie girl. just couldn't stand that whiny crap on food network a few years back. burst my bubble. so back to juana. out of the 30 or so filipino CDs i picked up on my last trip, this was one of the better ones. but it's "connected" that i latched onto. it's kind of pissed, melancholy girl vocals on top of very upbeat pop. acoustic guitar up front. electric reinforcement. like so much bipolar pop, for me it ranks up there with the smith's "there is a light that never goes out" in a category of song that's almost suicidally depressing (lyrically), but it's so upbeat, catchy, and marginally hopeful as to be a feelgood song. i love that. i need to learn how write like that. everything i write is depressing lyrically and musically, even though i consider myself a happy person in general. but i'm trying to stay out of the trent reznor wannabe territory. anyway, if you can stand the indie girl pop song, give it a listen. it will grow on you. really good when you want to feel sorry for yourself after being shot down by the goddess at the end of the bar.