Stephen Malkmus & the Jicks: 124 - 2012

124
2012/08/14, Paredes de Coura, Porto
Blind imagination
Chartjunk (PR Tomb)
Cinnamon and lesbians

In Porto the Jicks launch into another trio of new songs. 'Blind imagination' is the one that got lost. It's a damn shame, it could've easily fitted into side two of the record replacing some of the weaker songs (say 'Cinnamon & lesbiand' or 'Scattegories'). Hearing this one highlights what the other new songs are still missing: a real chorus. Yes, these new songs are more pop, they've got great, catchy riffs, they've got carefree and fun lyrics. But for all that they're built on a familiar structure: riff, verse over riff, semi-bridge acting as a surrogate chorus, back into the catchy riff. When you hum 'Lariat' or 'Houston Hades' or 'Chartjunk', you're humming the riff, not the chorus. Not so 'Blind imagination', which had a great '80s synth enhanced verse, a little bridge leading into a singalong chorus. Could've been a big one. I'm guessing what happened is, it got pitted against the other synthy new song in run for the album ('Shibboleth') and lost out. 'Shibboleth' is better but the album could have definitely supported both.

'Chartjunk' was titled 'PR Tomb' (as in 'Punk rock tomb') at this point. The title was annexed for the lyrics to another new song soon enough ('Rumble at the rainbo'), but the song didn't change much. I wouldn't say it completely realizes either of the two aspirations in its final title, but it's a great piece of riff rock fluff, with some of the most melodic soloing in the Jicks songbook. Stephen was obviously enjoying writing these songs to match the album's catchy and upbeat brief. He hasn't sounded this carefree and melodic since the debut solo album, I don't think.

But nevermind the rich flow of new songs, to find more of these pop songs, Stephen started looking through his coffers and he dug up 'Cinnamon', a forgotten song from the 'Mirror traffic' writing spree. In its 2009 guise it was heavy, laden with solos. But it had pop potential. Maybe if he added a real catchy word to the non-descript title? What about 'lesbians'? That's a single! I'm not a fan, couldn't he have dug up 'Astral facial'? Still, I know a lot of people like it. The breakdown and subsequent revving-up-again riff are hard to beat. The rest of the song, I don't know. As usual, Matador disagrees with me and made it the single.