Three Imaginary Girls - Silver Jews

All my favorite singers couldn't sing...

Imaginary Shrie — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 00:08:51 +0000

This can't be true... it just can't.

SILVER JEWS calling it quits? Please dear Dog, tell me it's not true. I thought Smith and Jones were forever?

IG Shrie's Top Ten Plus Plus!

Imaginary Shrie — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 18:03:06 +0000

2008 was an interesting musical, and personal, year for me. I listened to a lot of indie rock, electronica and went to a shit-ton of shows (one of which was the best I've ever seen, thanks Of Montreal).

Erik Gonzalez's best o' 2008

Erik Gonzalez — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 21:57:04 +0000

It has now been 2.5 years since I moved out of Seattle for the Golden State. I've slowly drifted out of the NW music culture, so sometimes I wonder if I know what to say on TIG these days.

Combine that with the fact that I was so distracted from music for a lot of 2008, this year's "best of" lists were especially difficult. Heck, I don't even think I can make a Best of NW music list this year, not because there was insufficient music, but because I just missed so many of those important-but-not-well-known releases that make these lists. I did enjoy Fleet Foxes, Common Market, Colin Meloy live, Malkmus and the like, but really, that isn't a "Best of the NW" list but rather a list of albums I liked that happened to be from the NW.

That being said, I did get a last minute music revival for the year. Maybe it was the election being over (and the good guys winning), maybe it was finally getting a faculty position after many years of trying (lets just say Erik will be moving east in 2009), maybe 2008 just didn't mesh with me musically. Who knows? However, there was a lot of great music anyway, and here are my top 20 (for your praise or fist shaking). Feel free to read the full commentary.

Silver Jews: shining moments onstage

Imaginary Shrie — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 05:34:17 +0000

2 Oct 2008

silverjews08oct.jpg

I saw the Silver Jews at the Showbox at the Market last year, completely sold out and packed to the brim. I was completely ecstatic about seeing them, it being their first time in Seattle and their first tour in support of an album ever. I went to the expectedly overcrowded show because I had to. I had to see the Jews. I had to hear David Berman's darkly husky voice and experience his poetry first hand, from the mouth of the poet. Their second go-round, last night at Neumos, gave me the chance to see them in a more intimate setting and in support of their newest album, Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea.

Kicking off the show with an introductory admission, he shouted "You have no reason to trust us but we will rock!". Speaking through the lyrics rather than full-on singing he operated a no-bullshit delivery, quipping "romance is the douche of the bourgeoisie" in the Allman Brothers inspired guitar jam of "San Fransisco B.C". David Berman is a lyrical artist, his words nestled deep inside the full drawl of the southeast contiguous. Neumo's was sweltering, packed with the sweat-slick and shaggy-haired lifting their beers up to the Silver Jews, seconding the gospel of Berman's words.

The single most striking aspect of Berman's music is how damn quotable every single line of his songs are. They are deep, true, and steeped in the American landscape. His raspy baritone was the perfect wrangler to the loose lo-fi ramble of the music, singing of traveling from Odessa to Houston and everywhere in-between. Even oldie but goodies "Smith and Jones Forever" and "Random Rules" from acclaimed American Water (Stephen Malkmus joined the Jews as sometime member on this album) were represented, eliciting the most applause from the crowd.

A somewhat reluctant-seeming and uncomfortable performer, Berman had shining moments onstage. While singing and whipping his red foam microphone around theatrically he drew shapes of states on a pad of paper on an easel, illustrating his musical point. I kept wondering why he wasn't playing guitar as well as singing, per his norm, and after briefly speaking with his wife Cassie, Silver Jews bass player and secondary vocalist, I found out that while in Ireland Berman fractured his thumb while catching himself mid-fall. Cassie said that the injury had produced somewhat of a new dynamic in their performances that she was enjoying experiencing. They played the encore before even exiting the stage at all, which was refreshing, and during the second encore song, "Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea", Berman finally brought out the guitar for one raucous bout.

Berman is an enigmatic presence onstage, lurking like a mysterious sideshow stagecharmer, his voice emitting the solemn ring of a modern day Johnny Cash. The music of the Silver Jews is a sanctuary for the common man, scrubbed raw and as real as music can get. Seeing these songs performed right in front of you brings them to life, giving them credibility through the embellishment and becoming more believable and important as they tumble out of his mouth. This is a man that's been through some shit and you can hear it in the very essence of the Silver Jews.

A Silver Jews show is never the best show I've ever seen, but that's not why I go see them. I go because I've become trapped in the brusk irony and ramshackle delivery of songs that read more like literature and less like rock 'n roll. I go because you know he's a recovering addict, and his work after the drug use is just as good, if not better. The Silver Jews are an icon of indie rock... they stand on their own amidst the Pavement relation, and they bring something else to the table: pure battered heart and a recovering soul.

His raspy baritone was the perfect wrangler to the loose lo-fi ramble of the music.

Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea

Erik Gonzalez — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 14:44:42 +0000

8.4

http://www.amazon.com/Lookout-Mountain-Sea-Silver-Jews/dp/B0015XIE0O/

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I've probably spent a little too much time lately watching old episodes of The Muppet Show. I hadn't seen most of the episodes in a long time and I wasn't entirely sure what to expect from it all. I have many a fond memory of the show from back in the day when I would watch it on the family TV back when we had maybe 10 stations (and we liked it that way!) As I might have guessed, the guest stars were very hit-and-miss, with my reaction ranging from "hey, that was cool!" to "who the hell is this?"

Now, if you've made it this far, you're probably wondering what the heck this walk down felt-and-string memory lane has to do with the Silver Jews, well, hold your horses already. When I sat down with Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea, it happened to coincide with my watching of an episode of The Muppet Show that starred none other than Roger Miller. Mr. Miller surely doesn't get the due he so justly deserves, and even when watching his performance side-by-side with puppets I realized that his oeuvre was worth delving back into. This is in stark contrast with other guest stars like, oh, I don't know, Danny Kaye, who you watch in either horror or hysterics, whichever comes first.

And this is where we get to the Silver Jews. If, let us imagine, there is a new Muppet Show, one with modern rock stars and the like, I would imagine that at one point or another the Silver Jews would end up gracing the stage with the likes of Rolf, Fozzy and Kermit (but God forbid Robin). Fast forward 20 years or so, and future Erik might be watching holodiscs of this nouveau Muppet Show with the Silver Jews and have the exact same reaction that I had to Roger Miller, but to the Jews. They are a band that will survive whatever test of time might be thrown at them while the likes of Animal Collective or Broken Social Scene will be relegated to the Danny Kaye Memorial graveyard as passing fancies.

For those of you who might have forgotten, we are in year 19 of the Silver Jews existence, where David Berman has spread 6 albums over that timespan, including the classic American Water. The last time out, the Silver Jews were sounding a little down on Tanglewood Numbers, but Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea finds them feeling a little more cheery, a little more quirky and generally having a good time as they approach the big 2-0.That being said, if you already like the Silver Jews, you won't be disappointed. If you don't like them, then I ask you, why the heck not? Get with the system.

Berman puts together some of the catchiest songs that the Silver Jews. "What is Not but Could Be If" is a love song of sorts, with Berman harmonizing like a latter-day Johnny Cash as his raspy baritone. There are some good left field turns that the band takes on the album, including the raucous stomper "Aloyisius Bluegrass Drummer", remarkable piece of modern roots rock (and possibly the idea song for my Modern Rock Muppet Show). In that same vein, "San Francisco BC" is a rolling tale of living in bay area with a (now) ex-girlfriend, full of love and ideals lost. "We had sarcastic hair/we used pseudonyms/we got a lot of stares/on the street back then" sings Berman as he unravels the story. Meanwhile, "Strange Victory, Strange Defeat" takes a page from mid-80's R.E.M., twisting southern rock in a mellow evening. "Suffering Jukebox" and "My Pillow is my Threshold" are more typical for the Silver Jews, living in-between modern rock and country, but turning out smooth and rich, just like the closing ballad "We Could be Looking for the Same Thing."

Now, the Silver Jews don't pull any musical punches - they aren't trying to expand into the art rock world that all the hipsters love where music isn't about songs and melody but experiments and pastiche. No, the Silver Jews are just plenty happy making songs that feel timeless from the moment you hear them. Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea might actually be the most straight-forward pop record that Berman and company have ever recorded and it would be a shame if decades from now it is long forgotten. Where is our puppet savior when we need him?

Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea might actually be the most straight-forward pop record that Berman and company have ever recorded.

"Punks In the Beerlight" by Silver Jews

imaginary ash — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 15:23:33 +0000

The danger of playing iPod Roulette with an iPod full of compilations from a mix CD club I've been in for four years is that I have hundreds of songs I don't know much about. Such is the case with "Punks In the Beerlight." I credit one Jonathan W. for introducing me to this song, which he dedicated to George A. on one of our many compilations. It's a great song, probably one of my favorites that I've discovered through this mix club I speak of. High five, Jonathan.

The song begins with four drumbeats and then a guitar riff, before fully rockin' out, and the male voice comes in right away with the opening line "Where's the paper bag that holds the liquor / just in case I feel the need to puke." The guitars are the meat of this song, driving fervent melodies and licks from start to finish. After the first chorus, a female voice appears out of nowhere for a couple of lines ("If it gets really really bad / if it ever gets really really bad"), to which he answers "Let's not kid ourselves. It gets really really bad." As it wraps, the song's finishing lines are sung on repeat: "I've always loved you to the max / I loved you to the max / I loved you to the max / I loved you to the max," etc.

It's a very hooky song that is only a few years old, but I think you could have convinced me that this was an alternative rock hit from the '90s by the likes of Teenage Fanclub or The Lemonheads. It has a timelessness to it and is simply a well written, well composed rock song.

I've never heard anything else by Silver Jews, though I think maybe later today I'll hit the digital airwaves and listen up.

B000AGL1G6.01._SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg

Ain'tcha heard the news? Adam and Eve were Jews.

Tanglewood Numbers

Erik Gonzalez — Sat, 19 Nov 2005 08:00:00 +0000

7.9

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000AGL1G6/wwwthreeimagi-20

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If it's an uplifting time you're searching for, you ain't going to find it with your friends in the Silver Jews. Tanglewood Numbers is not gloomy as such, but a melancholy mood permeates the album. This turns out to be a pleasant change from the dance-rock obsessed world we exist in (well, the indie rock world). Silver Jews exist in a dimension trapped somewhere between Wilco-land and Pavementopia and what we end up with is an album that has equal parts a post-punk rock sound and Americana twang.

David Berman, the only permanent member of the Silver Jews, has one of the more distinctive voices in the business, fluttering around in the Johnny Cash-baritone territory, but that's exactly what these songs require. However, that being said, I can't think of a situation that Johnny would croon "I love you to the max" as Berman does in the opener, "Punks in the Beerlight", a fast paced track that recalls early R.E.M. with a harder edge. Berman enjoys mixing love, regret and religion in his songs and it can be quite subtle in many cases, but all his lyrics are infused with an infectious nonsensicality.

In "K-Hole", Berman laments "I'd rather live in a trash can than see you happy with another man" but then quickly changes gears to "closed sign in the window of the liquor store, better get inside the kingdom and close the door".

Sometimes, the Silver Jews border to straight up hoedowns! "Animal Shapes" has a fiddle than the Devil would envy and sounds like the sort of music a middle aged indie rocker might play for their kids: "God must be carving the clouds into animal shapes".

In a bit of a White Stripes turn, "How Can I Love You If You Won't Lie Down" rips along with some growling guitar, driving percussion and, well, banjo. Rarely do you find the combination of the words Fast cars, fine ass, these things will pass and fine finger plucking on the banjo, and in that, we find some of the understated beauty of the Silver Jews.

"Sleeping is the Only Love" and "The Farmer's Hotel" have the most obvious Stephen Malkmus influence on the album, with a jangly spirit with attitude. "Sleeping..." has an infectious love song, albeit not your most prototypical love song, with Berman confessing "I'd crawl over fifty yards of burnings coals just to make it with you" and if that doesn't tug on the ol' heartstrings, I don't know what does in this day and age.

The odd country/city clash that surrounds the Silver Jews is displayed prominently in "The Farmer's Hotel" with Berman's liberal pronunciation of abattoir (read "abertwar") and chronicles a night getting stuck in a backwater town in a sort of stream-of-consciousness lyricism.

The Silver Jews seem like an anachronism when lumped the "hip" bands in this day and age: they prefer to keep laidback and reach into the Appalachian sound that surrounded the Tennessee studio the album was recorded. Tanglewood Numbers is strong when it both sounds new and familiar simultaneously. Berman captures the tattered, working class backdrop that the Silver Jews fit into perfectly and you're left wondering what would have happened if indie rock would have followed this path instead.

Silver Jews exist in a dimension trapped somewhere between Wilco-land and Pavementopia and what we end up with is an album that has equal parts a post-punk rock sound and Americana twang.