Decided to pick up the blogging again, somewhat sporadically. Is it the final throes or a posting renaissance? What to start with...hm, gee can't really decide...ohhhh, I dunno, how about...
SKYE NEWS.
A heckuva lot has gone down in the Skye Universe since November -- most on the DL, with only cursory reports from Ms. Sweetnam, who is currently still soaking up sun in Los Angeles (I think). Let's do a breakdown:
NEW ALBUM:
Skye's new album is still being rerecorded on the West Coast. There is a scattered tracklist (one song is allegedly called "Contagious Monkey"...do I have that right? What?), but no recordings have surfaced yet. So we'll have to work with Sea World -- not a great performance (in Skye's own words) and probably a bad judge of things to come.
Facts: The album will be released in late June. No label/PR/whatever shenanigans this time, please, Skye has a FAN BASE and they deserve a bit of respect! Speaking of whom, one of them is STILL waiting on his interview questions, which are now embarrassingly out of date!
Rumors: Skye's recording a few songs with the Matrix. I haven't read anything to substantiate it outside of board talk, so perhaps it's all hogwash, but I really don't want to believe it. If it is true, I'll put in my two cents: the Matrix has NOTHING to offer Skye except their reputation. Listening to the most heavily Matrixified Avril stuff again, it's clear to me how overbearing the production style is -- instead of filling out sound naturally, the Matrix tends to completely saturate...a lighter touch will yield consistently excellent pop songs, and at this point a general aesthetic misstep is VERY harmful. Remember, she's first and foremost a bubblegum brainiac, not a plodding, moody adolescent upstart, or some other such confessional crap. Remember when Lindsay Lohan forgot how to have fun? KISS - Keep it sugar, stupid!
Anyway, the last thing Skye needs is a gloomy Evanescence vibe (or maybe Aly & AJ...who now have commercials on MTV or something, saw one at the gym...bleah). Or worse, the duo could simply misinterpret Skye's style entirely, a la Mooney Suzuki. This seems less likely because 1) Skye is clearly smarter than the Mooney Suzuki, and 2) James R should have some semblance of a hand in the rerecording process. Although I dunno, I wasn't really feeling this Esthero album so much...different post. (Coincidence that it wound up in the radio bin...weird.)
OTHER SWEET(NAM) STUFF IN RANDOM ORDER:
1. Barbie Diaries also got pushed back, but it looks great from what I've seen.
2. I voted for "Part of Your World" on my Pazz n Jop list, though I'm starting to think that "Sugar Guitar" would have been the better choice. I've listened to the Disney track over "SG" about 30:1, but I dunno.
3. Skye's fans are to be called "Skye Soldiers" now. Which makes my unofficial title (that's The Skye Captain to you, landlubber) a little too authoritative. Honestly it was just supposed to be a pun.
4. The b04rd found the ol' blog again. Flattered, guys n' gals (I hope you're all practicing Skye Friday semiregularly, I'm beaming ya know), but I don't do message boards these days. Just a friendly occasional lurker.
5. Speaking of boards, ILM has a Rolling 2006 Teenpop thread now, which I don't think I'll be participating in. Fun to read, though.
NON-SKYE GRIPES AND MUSINGS:
1. Stylus recently had a so-called ABBA appreciation week, which consisted of one weekly feature essay by an editor and NO daily features OR a comprehensive (or even surface-level) review of the monumental ABBA Box, which I was lucky enough to receive for Christmas. I've been poring over the liners and absorbing the music and videos. The historical stuff is pretty standard but relatively thorough.
Aside from the expected indie devotee bitching, there has been no thorough conversation or analysis of ABBA's output on the comment thread, either (wasn't expecting one there, I suppose, but it might have redeemed the lack of coverage through the week). For a group that, globally, is in the same sales echelon as Elvis, the Beatles, and Michael Jackson, ABBA gets no respect. The Stylus essay is entry level stuff ("Hey remember 'Dancing Queen'? Well there's more where that came from!") and doesn't acknowledge much of ABBA's most important later material.
The most glaring ommission is no mention of The Visitors; admittedly, Agnetha and Bjorn's divorce is cited as a partial impetus for Super Trouper, but The Visitors is more direct and, in my opinion, much more poignant in this regard. As it was recorded during Frida and Benny's divorce, it encompassed two relationships disintegrating and found stronger songs amid the chaos -- "When All Is Said and Done" is pretty much the best uplifiting song about life after divorce ever written! Even the mid-album novelty ("Two for the Price of One") finds unlikely pathos in a silly situation.
The essay is reductive -- perhaps to be expected when the topic is given such haphazard and limited treatment in a purported "week-long event" -- but also revisionist, wasting a good three paragraphs to expound on how "metapop" (what's "meta-" about it?) like Annie and Robyn has supposedly helped to bring ABBA back into the spotlight. There's some validity there, depending on which hypothetical audience is being invoked (Stylus readers? Closet pop fans? Both groups are a tiny minority in the grand scheme of ABBA's enormous international audience...how about that Broadway business as a sales booster?) but it still seems like a stretch, especially given the lack of real analysis of an extensive and diverse body of work.
Also, the author's suggestion that love for ABBA amounts to a growing appreciation for "irony" is disrespectful to the band's ongoing legacy. ABBA had a great sense of humor without needing the projected irony of smug young listeners who clearly don't detect the honesty and pathos in many of these seemingly facile pop songs. Which isn't to say that the intentionally facile novelties aren't classic, too. Context is key, and "irony" is not the right approach to this ouevre, even if it might work for Girls Aloud or whoever.
2. NOTE TO WORLD: META IS NOT A WORD! William Safire rules.
3. Haven't done writing links in a long while, so here's everything I've written since Novebemerish:
Ithacan Column: Skye Sweetnam
Ithacan Column: Overlooked Albums
Ithacan Column: Pop Quiz for Indie Kids
Buzzsaw Article: Bratz/Manufactured Pop
4. And finally...
Your Pazz & Jop albums ballot was submitted as follows:
1. The Mountain Goats - The Sunset Tree - 4AD (15)
2. Busdriver - Fear of a Black Tangent - Mush (14)
3. Gogol Bordello - Gypsy Punks Underdog World Strike - USA Side 1 Dummy(13)
4. Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings - Naturally - Daptone (12)
5. Ashlee Simpson - I Am Me - Geffen (11)
6. The Hold Steady - Separation Sunday - Frenchkiss (9)
7. Jamie Lidell - Multiply - Warp (8)
8. MIA - Arular - XL (7)
9. Datarock - Datarock Datarock - Young Aspiring Professionals (6)
10. Fiery Furnaces - Rehearsing My Choir - Rough Trade (5)
Your Pazz & Jop singles ballot was submitted as follows:
1. Kelly Clarkson - Since U Been Gone - RCA
2. Ashlee Simpson - Boyfriend - Geffen
3. Gwen Stefani - Hollaback Girl - Interscope
4. Lindsay Lohan - First - Universal
5. Skye Sweetnam - Part of Your World - Disney
6. Crazy Frog - Axel F - Universal
7. The Killers - Mr. Brightside - Universal
8. Robyn - Be Mine - Konichiwa
9. Art Brut - Good Weekend - Fierce Panda
10. Bratz - So Good - Universal
SO GOOD to be back...and fer yer troubles...
LOVE FOR LOVE FOR NANA ON A SPECIAL SKYE FRIDAY!
Skye Sweetnam - Sugar Guitar
NANA INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY WAR CONSOLATION PRIZE!
KB - Crazy Frog
Thanks to jolteon11 for a kick-ass logo for Skye Soldiers everywhere
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