mj update
"Happy: Robbie Fulks Plays The Music of Michael Jackson" (and by the way, I sing on the record as well as play) is now available at most, maybe all, of the online digital-music retailers to whom I'm distributing. Those include Amie Street, Amazon, itunes, the usual assortment of cyberage boho-corporate jackals. This upload-and-release went a little quicker than I expected. The CD version of "Happy" (which contains the same musical content) hasn't arrived on my doorstep yet. So, if you like artwork and credits, or if you're a hi-fi nut, or if it makes you happier knowing that I get about $5 more from your purchase of a disc through my online store than if you buy the album from itunes, hang on for another 2 or 3 weeks, please.
I expect that in a short while we'll be offering the MP3's of "Happy" here as well as the mail-order disc. If you're one of those evolutionarily implausible altruists, with a singleminded intent to maximize my share of the proceeds from my music sales, rf.com MP3's are your bullseye.
If you want to review the record or play it on the radio, drop me a note. I mean real radio stations and press outlets. I can't very well afford to service every four-eyed bozo with an adolescent outlook and a blog!
Alex Chilton has died. I took a lot of inspiration and guidance from his records, or more exactly, from what I took to be his philosophical approach. Try to appreciate music, all music, without respect for denominations or hardline schools of thought. Do your homework. Don't let the hipsters and the know-it-alls bully you. Your flaws are yours alone -- revel in them. Take a straight job if necessary, it's not a concession of failure. Enjoy esoteric chords. Do what you must to maintain whatever isolation and perspective is necessary to improve your art and keep your mind steady. And so on. I'll probably write a little more about this singular and thorny figure in the days to come.
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8 comments
It sounds good. Post an update when it's available from you, and I'll buy it the Robbie Fulks dollar-maximizin' way.
"evolutionarily implausible altruists"? Feh. I know what you're saying, but it certainly isn't altruism that makes me want to maximize the profits of performers I enjoy. For me it's purely self-interested behavior. I figure that I'll be able to enjoy more of their work in the future if they can financially justify continuing to do what they do.
And on a completely different topic, the beginning of "The Girl Is Mine" reminds me a whole lot of the beginning of "So What" off of M. Davis' Kind of Blue.
Like the album - the sequencing works well, in giving an emotional/psychological narrative to the whole thing (That sounded really pseudish, but what the hell) It's good how it veers between gleeful (sic) enjoyment/homage and tongue-in-cheek knowingness, without ever going too far one way.
Many tanks (heh heh, Freudian typo) to Dan for reminding me of the non-word "feh".
Only the truly literate and enlightened can be trusted to deploy this term properly.
I will use it at every opportunity from this day forward.
Look out, world!
"The way you make me feel, you really turn me on, you knock me off my feet…"
This is quite possibly the most awesome version of this song I've ever heard. I think it's actually more what Michael had in mind. He always appeared to me to want to come off as more gritty and macho then he could pull out of his 100lb frame. The duet reminds me of performance of the same song that he did with Britney Spears during the Michael Jackson: 30th Anniversary Special in 2001.
This album reminds me in various places of something NRBQ might have produced (and that's high praise in my book!).
Interesting article about Alex Chilton
http://www.nola.com/music/index.ssf/2010/04/post_7.html
I just downloaded your MJ tribute album off iTunes. I'm listening to it now and totally digging in. It's soooo good.