Long before the Beatles kicked off “She Loves You” with a now-famous count, Lawrence Welk was doing it with “a-one and a-two.” A lot of musicians do a count at the beginning of a song, but that isn’t necessarily the part of a song you recall. That made finding a contribution for this week’s Contrast Podcast #184 theme a bit tricky, and it’s bound to lead to a fine mix. The songs I considered were all so beautiful that choosing one was difficult, so I am posting them all here.
My choice for the podcast was this song by McCarthy Trenching because I like the idea of imagining a history behind something as lowly as a crushed and disemboweled cassette tape found on the sidewalk. I often find myself imagining a story about shoes I see by the road. One abandoned shoe looks accidental, but a pair looks purposeful, like maybe an act of revenge.
A couple of months ago I found a single child’s shoe by the road near our mailbox. I imagined a mother starting to get her child out of the car seat and saying, “Bobby, where is your shoe???”
McCarthy Trenching - Cassette Tape Massacre from Calamity Drenching (2008)
MySpace | Buy
Beautiful and delicate. Nice album, too.
Flotilla - A Thousand Jacobs from One Hundred Words for Water (2009)
MySpace | Buy
I am pretty nuts about everything Woodpigeon has done. I’m sure you’ll see them in my end-of-year lists. If you haven’t listened to Treasury Library Canada, you must. Your ears will love you for it.
Woodpigeon - Matty John Chyzyk from Houndstooth Europa (2009)
MySpace | Buy | eMusic
Joel Thibodeaux, aka Death Vessel, only gets to three, but I love this song. This is the only one of this bunch I actually remembered had a count, because I have played it so often.
Death Vessel - Deep In the Horchata from Stay Close (2005)
MySpace | Buy
This song has been a favorite since I first heard it; from a very fine album.
Palomar - Bury Me Closer from All Things, Forests (2007)
MySpace | Buy | eMusic
The only one I found with a count down.
Daniel Ahearn - Down For the Count
from Pray for Me By Name (2008)
MySpace | Buy, eMusic
Art: The Beauty in Numbers by Vivek Dhage for Pixelgirl Presents, a website featuring hundreds of examples of downloadable desktop art. Hello, Indie Mom: there are iPhone wallpapers too. Some are photographic, some are anime-inspired, some are minimalist, many are fantastically gorgeous, and all are intriguing. Be prepared to spend time. (Note: the imgage above is a small version, not suitable for wallpaper.)
- alt-gramma (371)
- indie.mom (395)
- Uncle T (7)
When I see a lone shoe, I always wonder what happened to the other! Who loses one shoe?
Well, at least I used to wonder. Over 20 years ago, hubby and I went to the Ohio State Fair, where we strolled through the exhibition halls full of crafts, homemade goodies, etc. One of the halls housed displays of people’s collections. The oddest one we saw was a collection of “road shoes” some guy and his wife had collected. There were all different types of shoes, in various states of flatness and filth. We both just said, “Who the HELL collects nasty old shoes and why?” The guy heard us laughing and came over to talk to us. He wasn’t weird, really, and explained that he’d always wondered about the people who lost the shoes and decided to collect them. He kept them in boxes in his garage, as not to stink up the house. LOL.
October 7th, 2009 at 3:33 pm
What a laugh! Of course someone would get the idea of collecting roadside shoes. I bet they don’t stink as much as some other things I won’t mention.
October 9th, 2009 at 8:52 am