Concert Recommendation:  The Church, House of Blues, Friday, March 12

How great a live band are the Church? Great enough to make me reconsider my career plans. In October, 1998, I was fed up with the music industry. My love of music was embittered by trying to make a living with it, specifically in seeing too many stupid people success. So I was embarking on a new career by going to library school. But in the middle of an intensive weekend of grad school classes, I saw the Church. I'd seen them several times previously but not in about eight years. To use a bad pun, it was a religious experience, utterly transformative. I altered my job plans and became determined to incorporate music into my career in librarianship, which I have done successfully.

A year later, they were back in Chicago. Guitarist Marty Willson-Piper was once again absolutely on fire, but the band's performance as a whole didn't coalesce. A few days later, lead singer/bass player Steve Kilbey was busted in New York for buying heroin. Draw your own conclusions.

Best known for their 1988 hit "Under the Milky Way," that is hardly their best song or even the best song on Starfish, the album it came from. I'd have to go with "Reptile," which couples an original analogy with a sharper guitar lead. To resurrect one of my own better analogies, I'll copy what I wrote about the band in B-Side Magazine in 1990:

Gold Afternoon Fix is a walk across a velvet blanket spread over a bed of rounded stones. The surface is lush and inviting, but conceals a convoluted terrain underneath, unexpected but never too jagged. Dense and slightly impenetrable, the Church's music stands up to or requires repeated listening. No "I'm in love with her and I feel fine" simplicities here. Like mental New Year's Eve confetti, it soars immediately and ultimately finds its way into unlikely nooks in the mind; months later, those bits of pastel paper caught in one's shoe or pocket recall that blurry, forgotten celebration.

The Church play Sea Ray at the House of Blues, 329 N. Dearborn, Chicago, 312.923.2000 at 9 p.m. on Friday, March 12.

Concert Recommendation: Robert Randolph and the Family Band, Aragon Ballroom, Thursday, February 26

Talk about truth in advertising: Robert Randolph and Family Band's album Unclassified is on display in the Rock/Pop, Blues and Gospel sections at Tower Records.  If their full live show, admittedly only an opening slot for O.A.R., is anywhere near as smoking as their performance on the Grammy's, it'll be a great night of funk/jam band/blues/gospel/pedal steel music.

Robert Randolph and the Family Band play with O.A.R. and Toothpick at the Aragon Ballroom, 1106 W. Lawrence Ave., Chicago, 773-561-9500 at 6 p.m. on Thursday, February 26.

An open letter to Henry Rollins:

In your spoken word performance at Chicago's Congress Theatre on February 20, you lamented your inability to find a well-read woman in Los Angeles. I have a simple solution: get yourself to Seattle this week. The city will be overrun with well-read women as it hosts the Public Library Association national conference. I can't make promises on how many will be single and within your preferred demographic since it is an aging profession, but it is a group of thousands that will be dominated by well-read females.

You will also be hard-pressed to find anyone with Nickelback in her CD player. I'll go out on a limb and guess that most attendees will have never heard of the Canadian band featuring the guy with the tragic hair and the three other guys. And I'd like to think that those librarians who have heard Nickelback would agree that you were justified in rejecting a date for liking them.

You would probably find a lot of sympathy in your views on patriotism, that is doesn't mean blindly accepting the policies of the current regime. For librarians, this mean challenging the Patriot Act's potential for civil liberties abuses. But your definition is much catchier: the land of the free, the home of the brave, the country that gave the world the Ramones and P-Funk. Pick your favorite motto for getting people to vote: "Hey, Ho, Let's Go!" or "Shit, God Damn, Get off Your Ass and Jam!"

I'm holding off my essay extolling Prince's virtues until the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony. Until then, here's a piece on why we need him now, specifically because the music world has a split between serious artists and sexy musicians, that the two factions are mutually exclusive. Except for Prince.

Some random thoughts on the Grammys, both the awards themselves and telecast:

Funk ruled the night, starting with Prince's medley that reestablished his preeminence as both songwriter and performer, aided by Beyonce making like Tina Turner. The mid-evening funk jam showed off older and newer generations of funksters, even if Robert Randolph and the Family band's music sounds like it predates Earth, Wind & Fire's or George Clinton's. While most of the musical pairings looked designed to just showcase musicians from less mass media-friendly genres (Foo Fighters and Chick Corea - why?) the inspired teaming of Andre 3000 with a marching band meant that the bassline for "Hey Ya!" was played on sousaphone.

Samuel L. Jackson was also the only non-musician who justified his inclusion as a presenter. As with his appearance on other award shows, he is one of the few actors who clearly memorizes his speeches and imbues them with feeling. Based on his joining in the P-Funk jam, this wasn't just acting; he was clearly excited to be part of the music. He may have a new movie coming out, but he was the only actor who didn't look like he was just there to plug his latest project.

Why don't they create a category Best Late-Career Album by an Artist We Ignored in Their Creative and/or Commercial Heyday so that they can clear out dreck like the Eagles and leave room for artists who are currently doing quality work in the "real" categories.

The Beatles tribute was like last year's to Joe Strummer: musicians chosen because there were there already as nominees, not for any musical connection to the honoree. About all Dave Matthews has in common with the Beatles is that he probably smokes pot. About all Sting has in common with the Beatles is that, like Paul McCartney, he did his best work in a band with creative tension, and his solo work has been boring in comparison. Fortunately, the Warren Zevon tribute was done by people who worked with him and admired his music throughout his career.

And I'm disappointed that Fountains of Wayne was shut out, but perhaps they are destined to be forever on the verge of superstardom.

The rumors I reported on September 22, 2003 are true. The Pixies are reuniting, with a tour starting in April, specific dates yet to be announced. One hopes that the time apart and some rehearsals will make them as good a live band as they were on record.

Update on yesterday's post: Elvis' web site shows that his Chicago concert has been rescheduled to March 16, listed in the Appearances section ("Appearances" refers to public performances, not his "Oh no, my image!" exclamation when Homer Simpson destroyed his glasses at Rock 'N' Roll Fantasy Camp.)

Elvis Costello's concert in Chicago has been postponed, rescheduled from March 1 to March 16, since he will be attending the Academy Awards in support of his nomination for  "Scarlet Tide," the song he cowrote with T Bone Burnett for Cold Mountain. The news does not appear to have otherwise hit the web yet, but the folks from TicketMaster actually phoned people who bought tickets.

Just who invented punk rock? The Who often get credit for the anger, the Stooges for the rebellion, the Ramones for the brevity. But after listening to the Sickidz's Now and Then, it appears that credit should go to Mel Brooks for "Springtime for Hitler."

One night in 1990, I walked into the Khyber, then still officially known as the Khyber Pass, my favorite bar for seeing bands. Well, just my favorite bar since I've never seen the point of hanging out a bar that doesn't have live music. Anyway, I looked to my left and saw most obnoxious bully from my high school class. To my right was the guy who'd recently dumped me. An inauspicious start to the evening. But it improved. Alan Hewitt, of a bunch of different Philly bands, eventually and most famously of the Low Road, regaled me with the legend of the Sickidz. Mick Cancer, at that time a member of local favorites Pink Slip Daddy, got his start with Sickidz. Mick was a Philly writer who started touting Sickidz in whatever publication he worked for, raving about what great shows they put on, attracting the coolest crowds. Except that this was all a figment of his imagination. So he created the band to exploit the hype he'd generated. Eight years later, I was interviewing Palmyra Delran for a story on the Friggs for ROCKRGRL. She'd been in Pink Slip Daddy with Mick and confirmed that the legend was essentially true.

The Sickidz called it quits in 1984 but reformed in 2002, and last year released Now and Then, a collection of new recordings and live material from their original incarnation. It's got plenty of fire, drawing obvious influence from the Cramps but more garage-y and less rockabilly. Little Steven must not have a copy because, if he did, he'd be spinning it regularly on his radio show. It's a toss-up which song, or even which rendition, deserves to be named "Coolest Song in the World This Week."

"Mixing pop and politics/he asks me what the use is" - Billy Bragg
OR
Some things are better left unsaid.

I'm not sure it would swing my vote against him, but Democratic Presidential candidate Wesley Clark told the Associated Press that his favorite album is Journey's Greatest Hits. Politicians can be so cagey on important issues; wouldn't he have been better off not admitting that he has horrible taste in music, an unimportant issue?

Concert recommendation:  Steve & Liam of Frisbie, Double Door, Saturday, January 17

It's unfortunate to consider the musical careers that were derailed by substance abuse. The outright casualties are obvious, but there are also those for whom their addiction destroyed their creativity. One person to not add to that list is Evan Dando, who headlines at the Double Door tonight. His drug problems certainly derailed the momentum of his career as alt-rock pin-up boy, but he was never that great a musician or even that cute. It's unfortunate when anyone struggles with addiction, but it's not like the music world has been worse off without his high profile.

But there's still reason to hit the Double Door tonight: opening act Steve & Liam of Frisbee. Their latest CD period. shows that their beautiful harmonies and catchy pop are still enticing with acoustic backing, not just with a full band.

Evan Dando and Steve & Liam of Frisbie play the Double Door, 1572 N. Milwaukee, Chicago,  773.489.3160, at 10 p.m. tonight.

Concert Review:  David Bowie with Macy Gray, Rosemont Theater, Wednesday, January 14

It's astonishing that David Bowie has never considered live performance to be his strength since he is blessed with so much charisma. Besides showing off his stage presence in his show Wednesday at the Rosemont Theater, he also showed that he is one of very few rock stars who are still cool well into their 50's and that, unlike the Rolling Stones, he views touring as yet another opportunity for risk-taking, not just raking in the cash.

One downside of his making a specific effort to vary the set list each night of his three-date stop in Chicago is that he spent a great deal of time talking to the audience about each song; it came across as an attempt to remind himself and the rest of the band what they planned to play next. On the other had, they clearly put thought behind the arrangements, starting "Let's Dance" with a samba rhythm and "Heroes" with a raunchy guitar line.

He obviously couldn't do all his hits in a 2 1/4 hour set, but he chose from throughout his career, from "The Man Who Sold the World" through his excellent cover of the Pixies "Cactus" that highlights the song's sexual longing by bringing the vocals to the forefront. Plus he did lots of stuff from his latest disc Reality. Two timely selections were "Life on Mars" and "Ziggy Stardust," with enough mentions of the red planet to leave a NASA publicist giddy.

For Macy Gray, "neo-soul" hardly seems the right term.  Considering the sonic and visual references to P-Funk, the Jackson 5 and Morris Day & the Time she and her backing band made, neo-funk is much more apropos. The whole bunch of them looked like they were having a blast, and Gray really knew how to work the audience. It's unfortunate that the public hasn't embraced anything by her since "I Try," because she looks more likely to be written off as a one-hit wonder than  respected for the depth of her talent.

It wasn't just me who thought, while watching Iggy Pop's 2001 tour for Beat 'em Up, that he should get a better backing band, one that matched his magnetic stage presence and wasn't just a generic substitute for the Stooges. Iggy must have reach the same conclusion because the surviving original Stooges have reunited for several tracks on Skull Ring, his latest album. The CD opens with "Electric Chair," where Iggy and the Stooges come up with a song Iggy still might be performing in another five years, which unfortunately can't be said for many of his recent solo albums.

The rest of the albums tracks have varying success. Green Day continue their atonement for Dookie's fake British accents with their support on "Supermarket," carving their own distinctive sound while letting Iggy shine in his innate Iggy-ness. One "Private Hell," Green Day resurrect the staccato propulsion of "The Passenger." The same can't be said of Sum 41, who, on "Little Know It All" not only are generic in their own right but bury Iggy's baritone to the point that it isn't obviously him singing. With "Rock Show," co-vocalist Peaches continues to prove that she is utterly devoid of music ability and her only talent is shock value. When Iggy goes solo and acoustic on "Til Wrong Feels Right," he comes up with something that would fit onto the O Brother soundtrack except for being about the sorry state of radio and containing a profusion of obscenities.

Great music requires great musicians. But for great music to find an audience, it requires the hard work, often unnoticed, of others to connect the great musicians with the listening public. Unfortunately, it sometimes take death for such efforts to be recognized. I never heard of Rick Van Santen until seeing his obituary, but he was crucial to the L.A. concert scene as a promoter for punk shows that others were too wary or unimaginative to work on.

Back in 1986, I heard of Ruth Polsky when Rolling Stone ran an obituary for her. The irony was that, had she lived, I would have met her but never known that she embodied my career goal at the time. An American who loved British music, she booked the first U.S. tours for many English bands that would become quite influential. At the time of her death, I think in a car accident, she was scheduled to manage the New Order tour that was playing at my college and for which I worked backstage. In other words, I might have served her lasagna without knowing that she was my role model.

Looking back over my ticket stubs and blog entries, the best concerts of 2003:

Best weekend of music:  In just over 24 hours, Buzzcocks at the Metro, Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds at the Chicago Theatre, Cinerama at the Abbey Pub.

Best overdue comeback:  Forget the idea of a comeback as a return to prominence after dwindling popularity. The Fall made a welcome return for just showing up after numerous canceled tours. It took them a few songs to hit their stride, but when they find it, they are always the greatest band in the world at that moment.

Best double bill:  Highlights of the second wave of garage rock still going strong with the Cynics and the Fleshtones at the Double Door in June.

Best double appearances:  It's impossible to name only one best performance for Fountains of Wayne, who played the Metro in July and returned to the Vic in November. The same holds for the Mooney Suzuki's shows in April and July at the Metro and Double Door, respectively, although the earlier evening gets the slight edge for the worthy-in-their-own-right Realistics as the openers while the October support acts were far less memorable.

Just missed on best triple appearance:  Interpol hit Chicago three times for four shows in 2003. While their January and September concerts were mesmerizing, there were too many distractions, including the Q101 guy wearing nothing but a Q101 bumper sticker loincloth at the free outdoor Belmont-Sheffield Festival.

Doubt-destroying performances:  Ian McCulloch's solo work and a previous lackluster show by Luna when one member had the flu left we waivering over whether to bother seeing Echo & the Bunnymen or Luna again.  But their respective shows in October at the Metro and February at Abbey Pub sent shivers up my spine.

It's time to put to rest a misnomer: file sharing. To share means to take turns using a single item. What most people refer to as "file sharing" with music is file copying, not sharing. Some otherwise intelligent people have said that making illegal copies of music files is no different from what the public library does. No, it's entirely different. If a library wants to allow multiple simultaneous users of a work of intellectual property, be it a book or a CD, then the library buys enough copies to satisfy that simultaneous demand. But if they library only owns one copy of an item, then each person has to wait until someone else is finished with it before they can use Led Zeppelin's Complete Studio Recordings or Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code. And with each copy that the library buys, as with any other legitimate purchase, the creator of the work earns royalties for the intellectual property.

Others have argued that musicians should be happy about illegal file copying because it exposes their music to a wider potential audience. Such people are oblivious of the meaning of "copyright." The words are obvious: it means the right to copy. Joe Schmoe with his PC does not have the right to copy a recording unless Joe Schmoe created the recording to begin with or it falls under narrowly-defined exceptions under copyright law. It's true that many musicians have benefited from encouraging copying and recording of their music. The Grateful Dead allowed taping at their concert and copying of such recordings under the tacit agreement that the recordings are traded, not sold, so that the bootleggers aren't making a profit. Especially for bands that don't get much radio or MTV airplay, offering their songs for free online exposes their music to a new potential audience. But in both situation, it is up to the artist, not the listener, to decide which recordings and under what conditions music is free for the taking.

Some fans have used the dubious justification that illegal file copying is not only acceptable but even righteous because the music industry exploits the artist. No, the appropriate response to unconscionable business practice is a boycott, meaning that you don't buy or use their products. To take their products without buying them isn't a boycott, it's just theft. If you are really outraged by how the recording industry subjugates musicians, then lobby your legislators for government-mandated industry reform. It's a shame that Courtney Love's outlandish behavior has overshadowed and trivialized her efforts supporting changes in recording contract standards because she has a valid point regarding their unfairness relative to contracts in other creative arts.

If you think that recorded music should be free, ergo has no economic value, then make your own instead of copying someone else's work. Write your own songs, either perform everything yourself or recruit others to work with you, record it and listen to what you've created. First, see if you rack up any expenses in doing so. Then decide if you like what you've created so much that you don't need to listen to anything else, particularly the illegal copies of your favorite top-selling act.

Band name of the week and lyrics of the week both come courtesy of yesterday's Full on Friday Show with Nick Tristano on WLUW.

My favorite new band name: the Bloody Hollies. They play garage-inflected rockabilly in the vein of Reverend Horton Heat and the Cramps.  They are opening for Evil Beaver at the Empty Bottle next Saturday, December 27.

My favorite new lyric:

I used to want a girl
Who had a Ph.D.
Who looked just like a model
And never had to pee

Didn't catch the band name while I was driving, but it was from the Healthy Hair EP.

As if I didn't already love the comic strip Frazz enough for the title character's reading VeloNews and lauding Tyler Hamilton's performance in this year's Tour de France, today he was touting Fountains of Wayne.

Once you've sung enough choruses of "Over the River and Through the Woods" and have a hankering for some different Thanksgiving musical entertainment, WXRT, 93.1 FM in Chicago, is broadcasting a Radiohead concert from Earl's Court in London at 8 p.m. on Thursday. The only problem is that they are touting it on the air as a "Thanksgiving homecoming." Someone forgot to point out that Thanksgiving is an American holiday not celebrated in Great Britain.

Nelly Furtado has a new album, Folklore, and a new baby, daughter Nevis. Her label apparently only viewed the former as good news. According to an interview in Entertainment Weekly (November 21, 2003 issue, "Listen 2 This" supplement):

Last May, before she started to show, Furtado submitted to a marathon photo shoot (14 costume changes in two days), which generated enough images for a year's worth of promotion for her new album, Folklore. While that ploy (the preemptive thinking of DreamWorks, her record label) may have worked to disguise her expanding waistline, there's no covering up her musical growth.

Which invites the question: why was such "preemptive thinking" necessary? Why should a female musician have to hide her pregnancy? It's not like she's an actress playing the role of a non-pregnant woman. That she is not married to the father shouldn't matter considering that male musicians such as Mick Jagger, Steven Tyler and, most prolifically, Screamin' Jay Hawkins (said to have sired at least 57 offspring) have had children out of wedlock. If they were just doing as much work as possible in advance to allow her time off with the new baby, it shouldn't matter what state of pregnancy she was in when the photos were taken

Why not let a woman be a woman and acknowledge that pregnancy is part of womanhood at some point for most of the sex? Maybe all that was really needed was some cool maternity clothes; perhaps Kim Gordon, ultracool bass player, mother and occasional clothing designer can dream up some appropriately kick-ass duds.