Jay Z and Alicia Keys Delay Performance of “Empire State of Mind” at Yankees/Phillies World Series To Thursday; Jay Set to Censor “Empire” For the Performance, Meaning All Uses of “Shit” Will Hopefully Get Changed to “Shoot,” “Poop,” or “Barnacles” [Brooklyn Vegan]
Watch Superchunk Frontman/Merge Records Founder Mac McCaughan Cover Merge Artists Spoon and the Magnetic Fields; He’s Playing “Come Back From San Francisco” Which Is One of the Loveliest of the 69 Love Songs [Spin]
Download Brand New Lil Wayne Mixtape No Ceiling Right Now; Man, The Next Weezy Mixtape May Be Live Mixed From Prison. Possible Prison Titles “Robitussin Prison Blues,” “Me and T.I. Out in the Stockyard,” “My Daddy (Remix)” [Nah Right]
Watch Strokes Frontman Julian Casablancas Sing/Laugh/Be Merry/Look Creepy During a Tonight Show Performance of “11th Dimension;” Upcoming LP Phrazes for the Young Released November 3 [Prefix]
Stream Swedish Duo Air France’s Remix of St. Etienne’s “Spring;” It’s Light and Organic, Unlike Most of Air France’s Material, Which Sounds Almost Directly Ripped From the Soundtrack of Sega’s Sonic Adventure [Gorilla vs. Bear]
Watch Video For Basement Jaxx’s “My Turn,” Which Makes Heavy Use of One of the Most Underrepresented Figures in Nature/Pop Culture: Bears With Swords [Stereogum]
Norwegian DJ Extraordinaire Lindstrøm To Record 40 Minute Version of the “Little Drummer Boy”; Elsewhere, I Pull Out My “List of Things I Really Don’t Need” And Add a 40 Minute Version of “Little Drummer Boy” [Pitchfork]
Watch Brooklynites Real Estate Jam Through a Bunch of Tracks in Uncomfortably Close Quarters in the Tripwire’s Studio; Imagine That it Must Not Smell So Good in that Studio [The Tripwire]
compiled by Max Sebela
August 20, 2009
Stephin Merritt | Eban and Charley
HIDDEN GEM
Stephin Merritt
Eban and Charley (The Soundtrack)
2002 | Merge
Stephin Merritt, creative force behind The Magnetic Fields and Future Bible Heroes (among others), couldn’t possibly be hurting for a creative outlet. Between 1999, with the release of The Magnetic Fields’ critical and commercial breakthrough 69 Love Songs and the 2003 release of the Pieces of April soundtrack, the songwriter has released a staggering 125 unique recordings into the atmosphere. Since 69 Love Songs challenged listeners with its sprawling, genre-hopping and disconnected narrative, everything Merritt touches has turned to gold, though his subject matter remains largely (dare I say, entirely) focused on yearning and/or broken hearts.
It is this unrelenting focus on love that makes Merritt an apt choice to compose the score for Eban and Charley. I’ve never seen the film, nor have I heard much about it besides its producers hyping Eban and Charley as the “Gay Romeo and Juliet.” Its plot synopsis on IMDB indicates that 15-year-old Charley meets and falls in love with 29 year-old Eban, to the chagrin of each of their fathers. I imagine a lot of rain (the film is set in Seaside, OR, not far from Astoria, which is where The Goonies was set), interspersed with a lot of long, pregnant pauses, dashed with a few screaming matches, and even fewer homosexual embraces. Largely ambient and instrumental, Merritt’s score is not exactly engaging, but also does not exactly encourage passive listening. Musically, Eban and Charley bears an awful lot in common with the more experimental tracks on 69 Love Songs: the arrhythmic meandering of “Experimental Music Love,” the troglodytic rhythm section on “Underwear,” and the crappy synth orchestra on “The Luckiest Guy on the Lower East Side” are all echoed here. My one complaint about 69 Love Songs has always been that it’s an amazing single-disc album, presented on 3 discs; there’s just too much there to avoid letting most of it go by unnoticed. Eban and Charley, then, is 69 Love Songs in chewable form, albeit a pill skewed toward the more self-indulgent aspect of Merritt’s sound.
More on Stephin Merritt | Eban and Charley
Paul McCartney Scoring Soundtrack to Film Based on Children’s Book [NME]
New Air Album in October, Single Drops in July [SPIN]
Beck to Cover Classic Albums with “Record Club” [Rolling Stone]
New Concert Series at the Guggenheim featuring Grizzly Bear, High Places, The Walkmen [Brooklyn Vegan]
Watch New These Are Powers Video, “Easy Answers” [Stereogum]
Book About Merge Records to be Released September 15 [Tiny Mix Tapes]
Record Store Day Presents First Ever “Vinyl Saturday” this Weekend [Record Store Day]
Os Mutantes To Release First Album in 35 Years [NME]
Klaxons Album Now Due Next Decade [Prefix]
Woods To Tour With Dungen [Pitchfork]
compiled by Erin Sheehy
