If you’re going to be inspired by other artists, you could do worse than to be inspired by the ones Liz Phair has been.
Her original album, “Exile in Guyville,” was famously a response to the Rolling Stones‘ “Exile on Main Street.” (It’s a comparison that, at times, has been done to death.) Now, on her new album, “Somebody’s Miracle,” coming out October 4, she’s responding to Stevie Wonder’s amazing album, “Songs in the Key of Life,” although it’s not a literal song-for-song response.
Here’s what she tells Rolling Stone magazine:
In writing the new material, Phair says she “talked a lot about the weaknesses that we have as human beings, and the weaknesses in relationships, and doubt and cruelty and betrayal,” but still aimed to create a record that was “hopeful and positive.” She attributed that optimism to the influence and richness of Wonder’s music.
“I thought, ‘This is what I wish music were today,'” she says of listening to Key of Life. “I was so blown away. I seriously had a real passion for it. So I wanted to just put a little more soul into what I was doing.
“And obviously with Stevie Wonder I was like, ‘How the hell am I going to do that?'” she continues. “Clearly, when you find a record like that, the first thing — and the most immediate thing — is how inadequate you are. But that’s why I did it. It’s like taking a course with the best professor in the world.”
I remember my parents playing Wonder’s album on the car stereo seemingly endlessly when it first came out. That’s a lofty goal to be aiming for, but I have to admire her for trying.
Amazon doesn’t yet have “Somebody’s Miracle” listed yet, but they do have the Japanese import version. As with the Japanese version of whitechocolatespaceegg, it will contain an exclusive track. It’s also an expensive $36.99. Decisions, decisions.
Billboard has a write-up on “Somebody’s Miracle.” It sounds like the album may try to appeal to both halves of the Liz Phair fanbase. Me, I see her recent stuff in a continuum with her other work, and not a sharp break, but that’s obviously not a unanimous opinion. Note that “Part of Me,” which was distributed on the album sampler now appears to either have been renamed or to have gotten cut from the album.
Liz is apparently an object of lust for Macintosh aficionados. Who knew?
Capitol Records released a sampler of Liz Phair’s new album, “Somebody’s Miracle,” a few weeks ago, but then took it down. Naturally, at least one fan has posted it for those who missed it, like me. (Update: The album’s out. Stop eating that guy’s bandwidth!)
None of the five tracks are complete versions of the songs — the longest checks in at only two minutes and 10 seconds — but they give a feel for what the album will be like.
Still no sign of her podcast, and only this could be found online from an official source talking about it. I hope she hasn’t abandoned the idea.
Originally spotted at Augie’s blaugie: Novelist C. J. Cherryh on what not to do as a writer.
Fairly technical, but a highlight:
florid verbs. “The car grumbled its way to the curb” is on the verge of being so colorful it’s distracting. {Florid fr. Lat. floreo, to flower.}
If a manuscript looks as if it’s sprouted leaves and branches, if every verb is “unusual,” if the vocabulary is more interesting than the story … fix it by going to more ordinary verbs. There are vocabulary-addicts who will praise your prose for this but not many who can simultaneously admire your verbs as verbs and follow your story, especially if it has content. The car is not a main actor and not one you necessarily need to make into a character. If its action should be more ordinary and transparent, don’t use an odd expression. This is prose.
This statement also goes for unusual descriptions and odd adjectives, nouns, and adverbs.
While I wait on Liz Phair to start her podcast, I thought I’d put up the links for my current ones. Add the following URLs to your podcasting program of choice. (I use iPodder, myself.)
From Our Own Correspondent
Hearing Voices
KCRW’s Film Reviews
KCRW’s Martini Shot
KCRW’s Music Exchange
KCRW’s Overbooked
KCRW’s The Business
KCRW’s The Road Less Traveled
KCRW’s The Treatment
On the Media
WGBH Morning Stories
I’m on the fence about and may cut the following:
Little Gray Books
Studio 360
Just added: KCRW finally has gotten the rights to podcast a portion of one of the greatest music shows of all time, Morning Becomes Eclectic. Get this one — you’ll expand your musical tastes exponentially before you know it.
On October 4, Liz Phair releases her next album, “Somebody’s Miracle.”
Given that each of her albums have chronicled her life (although lots of listeners seem to wish she was still the college student who recorded “Exile in Guyville,” and just making “Exile II,” “Exile III” and so on), it’ll be interesting catching up with her. “Little Digger,” “Rock Me” and other seemingly autobiographical tunes on her unfairly maligned last album were fascinating to me. It doesn’t hurt that we’re (roughly) the same age, and if our lives don’t match up exactly — she’s a divorced single mother at this point, for one thing — it sure feels like I’m listening to a peer catching me up since the last time we spoke.
I’ve decided to skip seeing her summer tour — it’s hitting San Francisco, LA, NYC and the DC area, all of which I could theoretically make, with varying degrees of difficulty — in favor of the one she’ll do in support of “Somebody’s Miracle.” If anyone catches her on tour, let me know how she was. (And yes, she still has a fair amount of stage fright for someone at this stage in her career. She’s still lots of fun in concert despite that.)
La Liz has always been fairly Web-savvy when it comes to promoting albums — the entirety of whitechocolatespaceegg was streamed for a weekend before being available in stores — and starting this Friday, she’ll be beginning her own podcast with interviews and music. The URL hasn’t been listed yet on her site, but it sounds like a goody to me. I wish more musicians would take this sort of hands-on approach when it comes to promoting their work.
While I’m now (mostly) over my college era lust for hot guitar-slinging chicks (or I was, until “Rock Star: INXS” came along), apparently I wasn’t as alone in that as I thought: outsideleft (the name is a soccer thing, not a political thing) has compiled a list of the top 12 hottest female guitarists ever. No honorable mention for the star of my one-and-only nudie poster I had in college — Lita Ford wearing only a strategically arranged guitar — but Liz is #2 on the list.
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