Fluxblog 473: CELEBRATING 30 YEARS OF MAY 24th 1994
Plus new songs by Lip Critic, Of Montreal, and St Vincent
This week’s playlist is 30 YEARS OF MAY 24th 1994 – music on the charts, on the air, and in stores on 5/24/94. This is a wonderful time for popular music and a very sentimental for me personally but I mostly just thought it'd be fun to do the anniversary of a random date. My apologies if 5/24/94 happens to be one of the darkest days of your life!
I recommend checking out the YouTube version of this one as it contains proper music videos for nearly everything along with MTV promos and clips from the period to simulate the “watching MTV on a couch for hours in 1994” experience.
[Spotify | Apple Music | YouTube]
My Timeline Is A Prison
Lip Critic “In the Wawa (Convinced I Am God)”
“In the Wawa (Convinced I Am God)” seems like it should be full-on punk-style satire, and it’s not NOT satire. There’s no way you shout that title phrase and follow it up with “so I’m gonna get any sandwich I want” and have it not be funny. But the velocity of the music and the intensity of the vocals introduce some doubt. Like, maybe he’s right? Maybe he’s seeing the cosmos clearly? Maybe he’s right to get buck wild in this convenience store? It’s the kind of crazy you don’t want to engage with, like the existential stakes of this aggressive weird guy being right about everything are a little too high. Great arrangement, by the way – love the way they build up pressure and momentum, and how the chorus feels like it’s punching down walls.
Buy it from Bandcamp.
A Creature Of Improbable Leaps
Of Montreal “Yung Hearts Bleed Free”
“Yung Hearts Beat Free” is an overtly horny song with a somewhat lackadaisical energy to it, like we’re just catching Kevin Barnes in a resting state. In other words, this is a lot like Barnes in Skeletal Lamping mode but without the manic freakiness that coursed through nearly every track of that record. This isn’t to say it’s boring in comparison – the groove is top shelf for Of Montreal, and I like how the lyrics declare a lot about who Kevin is and why they’re like that with some degree of certainty. I take this as being above all else a song about aging – for everything you lose to time, you get the opportunity to understand yourself and what drives you. You also get some clarity on the external things that shaped you – when Barnes sings “all of my heroes were drug-addled creeps” and “all of my heroes were sex maniacs” it’s less a point of pride than a statement of fact. It is what it is, and this is the result.
Buy it from Bandcamp.
A Pantomime Of A Modern Girl
St. Vincent featuring Cate Le Bon “All Born Screaming”
The groove of “All Born Screaming” is twitchy yet smooth, like a musical expression of an existential panic that’s buried deep enough that it doesn’t show up on the surface but is the animating force behind every movement. Annie Clark has been exploring this contrast of internal angst and outward placidity for a long time now, and almost always with some degree of dark humor. The lyrics for this song presents life as a cosmic joke, a sysiphean struggle played as slapstick from the cradle to the grave. The mood of the song is fairly light and as the song reaches its climax, it’s more like a shrug than a catharsis. She’s not letting go of frustration here, and it’s not a denial of desire. It’s mostly just admitting that it’s kinda funny.
Buy it from Bandcamp.
LINKS LINKS LINKS LINKS
• The Taylor Swift backlash continues with this essay by Jenny Jane at Dazed and in the comments for this Popcrave tweet announcing yet more expensive alternate editions of her current album.
• This Chase O’Donnell joke will probably change the way you hear “I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me)” forever.
• Tom Breihan has made it up to the first of the 90s alt-rock mega classic hits, R.E.M.’s “Losing My Religion,” in his The Alternative Number Ones column for Stereogum. It’s paywalled, but this column is worth your money every week!