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(EMI/Odeon, 1971)
No need to bore you with musings on “Imagine”; not only is it one of the most famous songs of all time, it’s also pretty doggone straightforward in its moist-eyed utopianism. Perhaps very much to Lennon’s credit, what you hear is what you get, and most commentary on the thing is no more than worthless word-diddling. Pairing the track with the dirty, bloozy throwaway “It’s So Hard” makes for a good illustration of the Imagine LP as a whole, as it’s an album where Lennon swings from syrupy ballads (“Jealous Guy”) to nasty personal attacks (“How Do You Sleep”). Overall, it’s probably his most well-balanced, accessible record, and it actually contains a handful of lesser-known songs superior to the two chosen for this 7”. Of minor note is the fact that the absence of a Yoko-composed B-side makes this the first John-only 45 to have hit the racks, and, as such, in a way his first “true” solo single.
(EMI/DFA, 2007)
LCD Soundsystem pulls a nifty trick on the multi-part “All My Friends” single, drafting John Cale to cover the title track on one version of the 7”, and Franz Ferdinand on the other. Cale even gets A-side honors, giving the song more of an ominous Bowie/Eno feel by emphasizing the stark and jagged elements of its composition as he half-bellows what are actually quite reflective lyrics. The LCD Soundsystem take is included on the other side, and, while one of the band’s best tracks, it adds little value here in standard LP form beyond making clear, in this context, that the song’s repeating piano line likely owes a fair amount to Cale’s influence (for example, see his New York in the 1960s series of releases). But even if one already owns Sound of Silver, this is well worth finding for the excellent Cale cover. Heck, might as well get the Franz Ferdinand 7”, too; it sounds exactly like you’d expect it to sound and thus isn’t too bad.
Playing this record and digging out my copy of Fear has renewed my interest in John Cale’s catalog, so I headed over to eBay, where I bought Vintage Violence, Paris 1919, Helen of Troy, Animal Justice, and Sabotage to supplement the handful of LPs currently in my clutches. My question now is whether it’s worth pursuing his music after 1980, having heard and loathed both Caribbean Sunset and John Cale Comes Alive. “All My Friends” suggests that all hope is not lost… any hidden goodies from his later career?
(EMI/DFA, 2005)A little clubbier than I might prefer, this one, subtracting the grit and humor of the best LCD Soundsystem songs in favor of a somewhat beat/coke-oriented W’burg/LES sheen. B- material, and the synths sound bigtime like a late-’70s Kraftwerk sample… “Hall of Mirrors”? The liners don’t indicate any such samplery, however, so I’ll take their (its) word for it. THIS TIME. And the flip? Another live-on-Brit-radio cover, here a driving BUT so-so take on Siouxsie and the Banshees’ “Slowdive.” If you don’t own this single – which EMI mysteriously and expensively jazzed up with heavy vinyl and a bonus poster – feel free to keep those tempting razors far, far away from your eminently slittable wrists; thing’s no hot dick-shake. Still…you know what I like about James Murphy? Guy’s a schlub. A nasal shouter. That hair might be carefully mussed, but he still comes off as a used-bin record-geek everyman, and I have found him to be quite likeable both on stage and on disc. So let that be known, o town of NY!
(EMI/DFA, 2005)Reckon I got into LCD Soundsystem like most people did: “Losing My Edge” came out in 2002, I loved it, and I then religiously followed the trickle of singles that led up to the eventual full-length in 2005. In retrospect, I’m a little surprised that I was committed enough to walk over to the now-dead Virgin Megastore during my lunch breaks in order to buy the band’s major-label import 7”s… and yet here’s the vinyl evidence gathering dust in my apartment. No regrets, though. “Daft Punk is Playing at My House” is a beefy, handclappy, percussion-laden nerdfest that narrates the tense hours before the titular happening, and it’s nearly as funny as the aforementioned “Edge” while upping the overall instrumental density and twitchiness. The 7” presents the radio edit, which is effectively a partytime cockblock, truncating a song that absolutely deserves to stretch out to LP/12” length. The B-side turns that complaint into a minor quibble, however, as a fantastic BBC recording of “Jump Into the Fire” shows off James Murphy’s touring band, a tuff but tight dance/rock group that features pretty nasty bass and non-puss guitar; Harry Nilsson ends up being a great fit for a cover. Could be that I’m just getting old, but this stuff – unlike most of the other NYC dance-oriented bands of the time – strikes me as having aged extremely well. Still exciting to these ears.
(EMI, 1984)Awful. AWFUL. Like Let’s Dance, but worse. Not only is a shockingly complacent Bowie sticking with that sterile saxes-n-synths sound, his pop songwriting has also seriously nosedived on the wannabe-hit “Blue Jean”; when a braindead failure like this is your album’s lead single, there’s trouble afoot. “Dancing With the Big Boys” sinks even lower, with nadir-scraping lyrics and jaw-dropping bloat (female backing vocals? Silly “deep voice” effect?! STOP IT PLEASE.). This stuff is so forgettable and without merit that it manages to defy lengthy comment. Grasping for very, very small comforts, at least we can be happy that the drums on “Blue Jean” sound halfway natural. Uh… congrats?
(EMI, 1983)With his move to EMI, David Bowie electrified the world – again! – by taking on the exciting new persona that he would maintain for more than a decade to come, “The Thin White Guy Who Releases Shitty Albums.” Maybe he wanted to prove something right out the gate to his new label (and his old one) (and himself?), because the Let’s Dance singles are as crass a grab for the mainstream, the charts, and the big bucks as you’re gonna hear: peppy, unchallenging, synthesizers up the wazoo, awful sax solos, rough edges all smoothed away and coated with production gloss… Yeesh. Take the blandest of his earlier rock ’n’ roll efforts, dress them up in expensive state-of-the-’80s studio nonsense (those fake-sounding drums…!!), and this is the result. It’s impossible to deny that “Modern Love” is catchy, but it’s still a little sad to see the difficult late-’70s Bowie – frustrating as he could be – disappear into those designer suits. Even his failures a few years prior were always at least identifiably HIM, which can’t be said for this numbingly straightforward bit of radio pop. He even pulls the ultimate cop-out with a live version of the A-side on the flip that sounds IDENTICAL TO THE STUDIO RECORDING. Except with cheering, of course. Oh boy. It serves to prove nothing more than how soullessly reproducible and plastic this material is. Thumbs down.
(EMI, 1978)Having successfully cashed in on the Manson murders two years earlier with the 45rpm re-release of “Helter Skelter,” the record label Powers That Be decided it was time once again to reach into the Beatles’ back catalog and turn a quick buck on an unspeakable tragedy. But instead of hitching their wagon to media-star serial killers, they would now hop onto the back of the Bee Gees’ much-hyped cinematic Sgt. Pepper fiasco. And so we have this lazy single, which slaps the opening Pepper mini-medley on one side and “A Day in the Life” on the other. Here, stripped of its context, that A-side is exposed as the slight intro piece it really is; it feels naked without the rest of the album following, its ending abrupt and unsatisfying. The listener can easily forgive the song(s) thanks to the undeniable presence of much charm – and the power of familiarity – but when listened to critically, “Sgt. Pepper”/“With a Little Help From My Friends” simply doesn’t work on a 7”. While “A Day in the Life” holds its own as a standalone track, EMI manages to screw things up by including a version (as on the 1967-1970 compilation) that does not have a clean beginning; despite trying to mask this fact by employing a quick fade-in, the audience noise from the end of the Pepper reprise can still be heard quite clearly at the song’s outset. Strictly amateur, to the point of being insulting. Faint praise or not, at least the sleeve on this Italian issue is attractive, which is more than can be said for the yellow monstrosity vomited forth by Capitol in the United States.
(EMI/Odeon, 1971)
