Favorite Songs from the Singles Soundtrack : Mike Naughton – Nearly Lost You by Screaming Trees

 Mike’s a bit older than the rest, and he held a little more tightly to the Classic Rock of his youth, so it makes sense that his favorite song comes off like the ghost of Jim Morrison.

“Nearly Lost You” is a broken-hearted chest-thumper. The sound of wallowing in a misery that echoes off mountains.  A perfect fit for someone who watched his dad trying to be a good man against all odds and now finds himself fighting the same fight. 

Favorite Songs from the Singles Soundtrack : Terry Monaghan - Would? by Alice in Chains

For the rest of the week, I'll be blogging about what the adults in Mohammed's Radio would choose as their favorite "Singles" songs.

“Into the flood again
Same old trip it was back then
So I made a big mistake
Try to see it once my way…”

                           - Would? 

Terry’s favorite song is the darkest on the record. Regret and loss through a heavy drug haze. “Would?” resonated because Terry was the kind of teenager who hid his bruises under his dad’s old flannels. The kid who got drunk with friends and high alone, and “Would?” has a basement feel: lights out, candles lit, and dust swirling in the last bits of sun. Terry grew up thinking he could channel the anger and bitterness into something artistic, that he could overcome his feelings of isolation by becoming larger than life. He didn’t; he became his dad. 

"I wanna tell you that I love you, but does it really matter?" - Mohammed's Radio and The Singles Soundtrack

The Singles Soundtrack was an important record for my circle of high school friends. It’s a soundtrack that contained several brand new songs by a collection of bands that were just starting to get huge: it came out between Ten and Vs., between Facelift and Dirt, and rather than being just a collection of throwaways (though some songs were pretty inessential. Why did Soundgarden put all their terrible songs on soundtracks?), it features more than a few early 90’s Alt-Rock high points.

It contains Paul Westerbeg’s best post-Replacements songs, as well as “Overblown”, one of Mudhoney’s finest moments, a song that boldly criticizes the Seattle scene that the movie and soundtrack were meant to lionize, and if you asked a hardcore Pearl Jam fan to make a list of his/her favorite songs, “State of Love and Trust” would be near the top.

These were our songs. They were new, and we felt, momentarily, like we were part of something. Our High School years had been filled with other people’s music. We ran full-on into Classic Rock because that’s the bill of goods you’re sold when you want to be a Rock kid. “This is time-tested. It’s authentic. It’s Zepplin and Floyd and The Who. It’s the canon.” It took a couple of years to realize that these were not our stories and they likely never would be. There was no shortage of bravado and sexuality to these songs, but there was very little doubt, fear, or genuine rage.  

We were mixed-up, angry kids, and whatever Aerosmith songs WNEW was playing were not going to temper or hone it. By the end of our sophomore year, we discovered Punk, but by then, it was other people’s Punk. All the best bands had broken up. New York Hardcore was just crossover Metal bullshit, so we listened to The Clash and Minor Threat and we were sated, but it still wasn’t OURS in the way that holding a debut album in your hands and knowing that you’re at the start of something makes a movement yours.  

By our senior year, we loved Hardcore, but we also loved Siousxie and the Banshees and the Sugarcubes and the Pixies, and we were raised on Classic Rock structures, so were ready for something that rocked, but was weirder, more complex.

Enter Nirvana, who freaking howled the most amazing words at you, cushioned by perfect Pop and Pearl Jam who were Rock in the traditional sense but fronted by a poet who made you toss all your Jim Morrison books because you now found them lacking. This was real, and it was ours.

Then came the Singles soundtrack, and all of our best instincts were confirmed. What songs suck on this record? The old ones. The Hendrix one. The Led Zepplin cover. The ones we all fast-forwarded over.

For the adults in Mohammed’s radio, this is their most important record. It shaped them because it’s both tragic and uplifting. The movie has absolutely nothing to do with the death of Mother Love Bone frontman Andrew Wood, but it’s haunted by him. There are two songs by the former members of MLB (Pearl Jam), a song written in tribute to him (Alice in Chains’s “Would?”), and the man himself settling into the middle of the record with his most beautiful song: “Chloe Dancer/Crown of thorns”.

Every adult in Mohammed’s Radio has a favorite “Singles” song, and I’ll be posting them as we get closer to Thursday’s reading.

- Stephen 

www.dthreec.org

D3C presents: Look at the Fish benefit night 3/29 at 8PM

Dialogue with Three Chords (D3C) presents a benefit for the Look at the Fish (LatF) theatre company on March 29th at 8PM at Mr. Dennehy's at 63 Carmine Street, NYC.

The evening will benefit the company and it's upcoming production of: "The Genesis Collection of Plays; Nine Monologues for the Theatre by Don Nigro; Dramatic tales of creation, love, carnage, and obsession told by Look At The Fish Theatre Company" to be directed by Thomas Mckee and Thomas James Lombardo

An evening of monologues written and performed by members of Look at the Fish theatre and live music. Admission is $12 and comes with a raffle ticket. 21 and over, please: the benefit is in a room with a private bar.

Excerpts from selected Don Nigro monologues will be performed as part of the benefit, as well as two works by LatF company playwrights Bret Richard Hoskins and Stephen Gracia.

"I'm very pleased to be a part of the Look At The Fish Theatre Company...they investigate the text and trust the text. That's very important to me. I think they will do brave, honest, and good work." --LatF company playwright Don Nigro

The performances will include:

"Genesis" by Don Nigro
Eve tells her side of the story.
With Colby Minifie as EVE, directed by Thomas James Lombardo

"Diogenes The Dog" by Don Nigro
Diogenes, the homeless Greek philosopher and founder of Cynic philosophy who often lived in a bath tub outside of Athens shares his unique philosophy of life.
With Dorien Makhloghi as DIOGENES, directed by Thomas James Lombardo

"The Last Giddy Hour of a Woundless Heart" by Stephen Gracia.
In this modern day Prometheus monologue/tale, a man away on business gets more than he bargained for after hiring a prostitute.
With Philippe Chang as MAN, directed by Thomas James Lombardo

"Frankenstein" by Don Nigro
A young woman who wrote her dissertation on Frankenstein shares why this novel her a definition of what it means to be alive. With Rachel Troy as MEREDITH, directed by Thomas James Lombardo

"Gone Fishin' On A Cloudy Day" by Bret Richard Hoskins
A scene from the forthcoming short play. With Ridley Parson as JIMMY and Evan Daved as CHARLIE, directed by Thomas James Lombardo

With live music from composer Aleksi Glick, accompanied by Christina Bendetto. Please visit www.aleksiglick.com

There will also be a raffle full of great prizes! Tickets are $2 each or 6 for $5:

-5 hours of free rehearsal space at 36th Street Studios
-Original manuscripts of collections of plays by Don Nigro; not published
-Free tickets to any Look At The Fish Theatre Company show
-Free tickets to Barefoot Theatre Company's next play at the Cherry Lane featuring Lynn Cohen
-Half off a headshot session (200$ - original price is 400-500$) from Even Cohen Studios
-2 Concert Tickets to ZoSo, the legendary Led Zeppelin Cover Band.

End Of The World Ephemera

Fangtoothed & Wild
&
A Wig Full Of Spiders

Thursday, January 26th at 8pm
Mr. Dennehy's Irish Pub
63 Carmine Street, NYC

Thoughts on the sound of Fangtoothed & Wild and A Wig Full Of Spiders

“A Wig Full of Spiders” and “Fangtoothed and Wild” are my Garage Rock plays. They’re rough, a bit sloppy, and they stagger around the stage.

I’ve always had a love for Garage Rock and lo-fi Rockabilly, anything that sounds so overdriven that it’s about to turn into white noise, something that shakes and rattles and is always on the verge of falling apart.




The characters and tone of both plays are a bit different than what I usually write. They’re not strictly surreal or experimental, they’re just…off. I wanted to write something that put language first: the sound of it, the mythologizing, something a bit like the imagery in a song like Bo Diddley’s “Who do You Love?”:

“I walked 47 miles through barbed-wire; I use a cobra snake for a neck tie….”



“I’m just 22, and I don’t mind dyin’…”

Which was, just last year, repurposed into “California”, a beautifully apocalyptic song by Ema...



...which begins:

“Fuck California, you made me boring; I bled all my blood out…” and resolves into that same Bo Diddley line before crashing into the jarring:

“What does failure taste like? To me it tastes like dirt.”

This mirrors “Who do You Love?” ’s bravado vs nihilism. Of course a man who lives in a house of skulls doesn’t fear death, and of course a woman who’s bled all her blood out doesn’t fear it either.

The characters in “A Wig Full Of Spiders” fear death (and intimacy/vulnerability of any kind) and those in “Fangtoothed & Wild” either deny it or instinctively know how best to weather this Twilight of the Gods.

“A Wig Full of Spiders” is a groove, two repeating patterns playing against each other: drums and bass. It introduces the idea of being terrified of myths, especial a myth about the apocalypse, one led by Fenris, the world-eating dog.

“Fangtoothed and Wild” builds on that. It’s the fuzzed-out guitar. It’s the end of the world and Fenris is here, scamming drinks in a dive bar. The world shakes apart and much like the myth Fenris stars in; the Gods fall and the humans endure.

This Week! Dialogue with Three Chords Returns!