Stephen Malkmus & the Jicks: 93/94 - 2009/2010

93
2008/9, Unknown
Happy (?)
Cinnamon

Two recordings of discarded candidates for 'Mirror traffic'.

'Happy' is more legendary than real to me, at this point. All I've heard is this 45 second Youtube fragment – if it is indeed 'Happy'. Sounds a bit like a souped up 'All over gently'? If anything, it sounds less than finished.

Who knows?

'Cinnamon' is of course a really early version of 'Wig out' single 'Cinnamon and lesbians'. Here in a rolling and tumbling (and fumbling – Joanna is discovering the song as she hears it) version. It sounds more explosive than the later version (though it may be the recording distortion) – more solos for starters.

I suppose Stephen decided this one needed a little more work/time, before committing it to tape. He's taking his time these day, no rush.

94
2010 Jan
Mirror Traffic
Recorded at Sunset Sound and the Library
Personnel: SM / Joanna Bolme / Mike Clark / Janet Weiss / Beck Hansen / Joshua Grange (pedal steel) / Tawnee Lillo (French horn)

If the Weiss years are stamped by the band's big project – be the best indie / 70s hardrock / jamband there is, reintroduce a real electric guitar to a landscape of polite bearded folksters – then 'Mirror traffic' is the fall-out, the aftermath post-script. In january 2010, a couple of months after the last 'Real emotional trash' concerts and a short month before Stephen was scheduled to join the reconvened Pavement, the Jicks gathered with Beck Hansen in Sunset Sound to record the basic tracks for their next album in two days (I thought I'd add Beck's last name, cause given their last record we could've easily figured they'd sought out Jeff Beck, and where would we have ended then?). These are the final recordings of a band exhausted by the last couple of years of hard rocking, 'here's another really long one' years. To my ears, it's also the best thing they did.

I wrote it before, it can take a couple of years for a Malkmus record to reveal itself to me – and 'Mirror traffic' (which I don't think is a simple record at all) certainly took that time. Musically, it's a catalogue record: a multitude of songs (more Malkmus originals than any record since 'Wowee zowee') in different styles, sequenced to highlight the diversity ('No one is' besides 'Senator', 'Spazz' next to 'Long hard book' to name but two effective contrasts). Lyrically it's a dense and meaningful text. Some songs are elliptical fables, others... uhm, elliptical essays. I believe the words were pored over, there is a new-to-Stephen economical sense, a soberness, clear lines and articulation of concepts. As a whole (cause it's definitely a 'whole' record, not just a collection of songs) he's taking a long hard look at himself and the world he's living in. Hence the title, he's examining himself in that mirror, but he's also holding up a mirror to all of us, the listeners.

'Mirror traffic' is a three sided record (five tracks each side). The sequencing of it threw me for a loop for a while – the whole record seems to slow to a standstill and then start up again right at the end of side one (end of 'Brain gallop' – 'Jumblegloss'). Now I dig the way it's constructed – one of its subtle pleasures. Side A collects the heavy hitter songs, the three singles – just get 'em out of the way first! – and 'Brain gallop''s epic riff rock (with shredding, but tasteful). Then 'Jumblegloss' – the curtain falls, you're whisked off to another place entirely. Side B and C are the real heart of the record, a subtle and deep song cycle of short tracks that together paint a much deeper picture than any of the separate songs. I won't say 'Abbey Road' medley, but it's definitely weird (for me) to hear any of these songs in concert, isolated from their context. They're like chapters in a dream novel (or something less pretentious). A 20 minute EP followed by a 35 minute mini-album song cycle. It makes no sense, but this time it really works.

Side A: 'Tigers' is a concentrated dose of Malk, the acid tongue hipster dishing out putdowns to one and all. Starts with a two line joke that makes me squirm at how forced it is (you know the lines I'm thinking of). Thanks for getting the one moment I can't stomach out of the way right at the start, and also for cushioning the blow with that pillow-y cloud of pedal steel! He knows the limitations of this lyrical stance all too well though:
Call me petty
I mean every word
The and's the if's the but's and the the's
Trust me because I'm worth hating
I'm the 1-800 you can vent
For all its bluster this is a character who's 'never had a dream'. The song criticizes as much itself as it puts down large dimwitted segments of our cultural population.

In 'Mirror Traffic' the catalogue record, side A is also the place where the Jicks revisit tropes from Stephen's past. 'Tigers' is part of that. 'No one is (as I are be)' is musically something new, an adventure in Southern country-soul, which is very welcome. (I hypothesized before Stephen's involvement with Dylan tribute 'I'm not there' may have played a role. There are similarities between 'No one is' and 'Fall away' on this record, and 'I can't leave her behind'.) But lyrically it continues the line from 'I want a range life' over 'A shady lane – everybody needs one' to 'I feel right at home beside the wood shed'. This narrator is a little closer to realising that dream.

Anyway, it's a real big favorite of mine, with its essential truth about aging: 'Unfortunately no one of us will get away spared / From the never ending night life that we shared'. Some days I hear it as -finally- the next in line of Stephen's out-and-out masterpieces (following on from 'Freeze the saints' back in 2005). Other days I stumble over the 'bourgeoisie sit-ups' line – just a little too self-consciously awkward. Hey, I'm pretty tough when it comes to out-and-out masterpieces. Near-as-masterpiece, definitely.

Something I never noticed before writing this note and looking up the lyrics, but 'Senator'- great rocking version on the album, the control of dynamics is pitch perfect, that note bending solo right at the end!, it's the continuation of 'Real emotional trash''s rock side – is also a pretty serious song about political hypocrisy and disillusionment, with a great lyric. Starts with naming some of the big problems: toxins, weapons, migration, chemical sunsets. But the only thing that moves the political system is a good old sex scandal. Not just the politician himself is motivated by lust and power, it's all that excites the antechamber and the press (cattle prodding the working classes) as well. Conclusion: we're fading fast. And then a real withering putdown; 'My duty to the Republic / Is to use double speak cause the halo's off'. That's telling 'em.

In the middle of it is a neat switchback to the stoned story of little Nicky, drop out musician harassed by the police. Back into the riff – 'Is it funny enough?' cause 'the serious business is void enough'. Political apathy, the complicity of empty media – all tied together. Meanwhile we're sticking a Mount Everest of trash where the sun don't shine, but the world turns, the sun shines everywhere, we're running out of options.

I want to mention the subtle production embellishments Beck adds all over the record. The work of the long months of production after the initial january recording date – all through the Pavement months and after and the turn of 2010-2011. Pedal steel on 'Tigers', bells and harmonica on 'No one is (as I are be)', the heavy reverb on the final chord of 'Senator' and all over 'Gorgeous Georgie', the sweet keyboard and percussion layers over 'Fall away', the third verse of 'All over gently'... It had been a while since we heard such nice touches – something they evidently took to heart and expanded on for 'Wig out'.

'Brain gallop' closes off this first part of the record with a dialectic between instinct (knife gets red, whisk you away, coming on too slow, throw you away) and civilized behaviour (words, talking bookends, facts). What did I write about this song when it first appeared in the live shows (see note 84): 'Brain gallop' may be the most abstract song Stephen ever wrote, and that's saying something. A further development on the archetypical 'Real emotional trash' heavy riff song – 'Brain gallop' has a counter intuitive groove, few hooks to speak of and no dynamic development. It just is. An inversion of the standard 70s gut riff rock – this one's all head. A remarkable achievement. I know, in any other hands, that description would point to artistic failure, but Stephen pulls it right out of the fire. It's a particular triumph.

Side A's lyrics are halfway there, but now we enter the heart of it, the rich text of 'Mirror traffic'. The key line is in the first track ('Asking price'):
This is the story of a man gone sad
Trapped inside a chaos pad
It's hard to imagine Stephen as a man who sees the world passing by with sighing regret and increasing incomprehension but it's a state most of us pass through occasionaly as we age. I know it gives me plenty to think about.

'Asking price' is a parable about a mythical 'indecision antidote'. The indecision paralyzation is as much personal as cultural state – those lines are pretty spot on.
We're unevolving have you heard of us?
Virtual unvirtuous
A game of faro, can't you see?
The backing vocals after the first chorus are pure third album Velvet Underground. I like the juxtaposition between the first chorus 'Many opportunities come rolling off your lap / I'm not gonna bait that trap...again', and the second (same line but ends at 'trap'). At the end he leaves open a window. Yes, the individual can escape from the disconnect, from the 'too many opportunities' seductive trap, from the distortion. I stumbled before, but I've got another chance. The melody of it is sparse and low-key, but just right for the sentiment.

There are more gentle songs about parenthood and family ('Share the red'), and sad songs about existential doubts. 'Long hard book' breaks my heart – but it also fills me with hope. The long hard book (of life lessons) can be read, can be learned. Songs about mutually agreed break-ups ('All over gently' ('The sweetest goodbye / You sweet little Sassafras / I want you out by July'). They're not arguing ('when they talk about bad blood / they don't mean us') they've just grown apart ('There's been some soft grass grown between us'). 'All over gently' leads naturally into 'Fall away''s goodbye. 'There's action in subtraction'. This narrator seems kinda hopeless: 'Skating on a thin ice pond / and I can't tell what for'. And another key line which I'm sure most of us have felt at one time or another 'Look to me, don't look through me'. (He may as well have been adressing the music press who, once again, welcomed the return of carefree Stephen Malkmus and his amusing wordplay lyrics).

The song cycle isn't all slow tempos and minor chords reveries, it offers a lot color and shade but the message is constant. 'Spazz''s return to Wowee Zowee nosebleed weirdness has a hilarious lyric about a generation fully conversant with violence ('Would you like to pet my rifle'), but aggressively unsure about the rules of love ('Someone's giving french kiss lessons / How else will we learn to love?') They baulk come-on lines at each other ('I am so damn good at tennis' cracks me up), then wonder when they'll feel the effect ('How long till we fall in love?').

'Forever 28' – another uptempo one, marvelous crashing riff in the 'It just might hurt' sections – is an anti-animistic dissection of the emotion love. Basically, it doesn't exist – a fact the narrator draws some perverse pleasure from ('There's no parade I cannot rain on with my poison eyes'). Still – and I dig that Stephen leaves the door open, he's an optimist at heart – at the end, he's still stuck with the 'mystery of you of me'. The resulting stalemate is pretty funny: 'Get it over with and just convert / It just might hurt'. Well, it makes me laugh. The other option of course is 'All over gently' which follows on 'Forever ''s heels.
So there you have it. Some mirror – was it Elvis Costello who sang about a 'deep dark truthful mirror'?

At the end sits another of my favorites, the record's 'Oh Sweet Nuthin'', 'Gorgeous Georgie' with its parade of luckless characters, all of whom are at the wrong place at the wrong time, seemingly none with a chance at improvement. They just sigh that this isn't what was meant for them ('It's not the way you drew / It's not the way you threw'). The song and record ends on a fatalistic note (at least I think, that's how I read it): 'You drive and form the dust'. At least Dylan had it 'He not busy being born is busy dying'. In this song it's all the same, you're either driving the dust or forming the dust (being dust). It's all dust. And still, the music won't let you lose that sad smile on your face. Just like 'Oh Sweet Nuthin'' really.

Maybe Stephen did write his 'Blood on the slay tracks' after all.