Aging

My last post touched on something that deserves more than just another post to fully explore. Possibly a college course or a book. But let me try anyway. I inadvertently suggested that age is somehow a cause of music that isn't worthwhile or - simply - made fun of "old people." The point I mismade about age isn't really the case.
Let's absolve Stephen Malkmus for starters. I don't want him to stop making music. As Andrew already pointed out, his work with the Jicks is really good. It's good because it suits him as he's aged. He's older, more experienced in this world, his music should reflect that. It doesn't sound weird when he muses on fame and age through the voice of Yul Brenner on his debut's brilliant "Jo Jo's Jacket." He even has a song about basically giving up on the kind of youthfulness Pavement embodied about two lovers mismatched by age ("Jenny and the Ess-Dog"). He sings,

Neither one listens to 'brothers in arms.'/ The ess-dog waits tables and he sold his guitar./ Jenny pledged Kappa and she started pre-law,/ and off came those awful toe rings.

It's a lament for older times in a lot of ways, but it's also a recognition that those times are supposed to go by and be lamented. Lyrically, even on his first album, Malkmus had achieved a philosophy where Pavement had eschewed one for its entire career.
To sum up and move on from Malkmus for a while, it's with this in mind that is sounds so weird to hear him sing "We Dance." That song captures emotions of excitement and nervousness linked to young life*, feelings I'm not at all convinced Malkmus feels anymore (I'm not saying he doesn't feel excitement and nervousness just not in the same manner). So I wish him the best in going forward with his life and continuing to write his solo albums which have all been pretty brilliant.

*But no one will dance with us
In this zany town
Chim-chim-chim-cheerie sing a song of praise
For your elders, they're in the back
Pick out some brazilian nuts for your engagement
Check that expiration date, man,
It's later than you think
You can't enjoy yourself, I can't enjoy myself (lyrics from "We Dance")

Now, some people can sing their old songs and sell it to me still. Leonard Cohen for one. He just recently pulled off a world tour at age 75. That doesn't read as remarkably as it should on a computer screen. At 75, my grandparents had to cut down on playing golf because it was too taxing physically. Golf. You get to ride a cart when you play that. Mr. Cohen was not interested in slowing down though, he instead went globetrotting playing 3 hour-long sets everywhere he went! 3 hours! Most bands need to be on psychotropics and amphetamines for that! Here's what else is impressive. He can still sing "Suzanne" and not once give the impression that he is banking on nostalgia. Watch this:



His eyes still look full of amazement, tension, horror, and elation. The way a young person faced with fleeting love feels. Why is it that he can do this? Well, precisely because while Stephen Malkmus grew up, I don't believe Leonard Cohen ever has. Nor needs to, really. We're talking not only about a great songwriter, poet, Buddhist, etc., we're talking about a man whose conquests in the bedroom have led almost every lyric he's ever written. And we're talking about a man about whom I have heard women in their 20s say they would "still totally do." But most importantly, we're talking about a man that has never been married and views almost all of his romantic encounters with some sense of regret. Now true, he has a daughter, with whom he has a great relationship, but his views of women and relationships has always been firmly rooted in the psyche of a young adventuring man. Like a tragic Peter Pan. While I won't comment on whether or not I think this is good for him (I don't care), it does provide us with an elder songwriter whose oldest songs will never lose their weight and whose words will never ring false. Though I'd be remiss not to point out that his largest audience seems to be happily married middle-aged couples and young depressive loners in equal measure. The implications of that will have to wait for another time.

Pavement - We Will Never Forget

So I still read Pitchfork from time to time. I once applied to write for them, but guess what happened with that? That's right, they offered me the job and my 18 year old self said "nah I'm gonna wait for something a little more substantial, thanks." How cool is that? Pretty cool. For a lie. Anyway, they have this Pavement spotlight up right now which is cool and I guess it would be exciting that they're playing shows again if there were any chance I would be able to see them, but this video they put up of Stephen Malkmus playing "We Dance" at the Pitchfork festival a couple years ago really sort of opened my eyes to some things.

1. Pavement were a young people band. They still are, far as I'm concerned because I got into them when I was in high school after they'd been broken up for like 3 years. I had a teacher who was into them and saw them when they were at their peak back when he was young. So the only common factor between us was that we both got into them when we were about the same age, even though my fandom was after the fact.

2. Old Pavement fans are weird and need to buy new t-shirts. The printing is all faded and it looks like you're into a band called "Pa e t." I get it, you're old. How is teaching community college going?

3. Pavement did not need to reunite; this one is tricky. You would think that I, loving Pavement as I do, would jump at the chance to see them play. It's like a second chance I don't deserve. I missed out, they were long gone before I could even think about going to see them and now they're playing again!? I felt this way about the Pixies though when I saw them at Coachella a few years ago. Halfway through the set I wondered why I wasn't elated. This was like gaining an audience with the king. This was even better actually because the king, we all thought, was dead but now here he was getting his rings kissed left and right. I realized I wasn't that into it because it felt like too little too late. I wasn't at some club with a drink seeing a band that was really doing something new and special. They hadn't even written any new songs. What was the point? I missed out, why not just move on? I've since tried not to create these artificial brushes with legend since it just wouldn't be right.

4. Pavement do not need to have a "best of" collection. Seriously. Who is, as Ben put it, a "casual Pavement fan"? What are they Def Leppard now? People who listen to Pavement listen to every album. Most of us were happy to even buy them twice when every single god damn album got the remaster-plus-bonus-tracks treatment. So now who's the market? We all own two copies of every album. Some of us have 3 if we got them on vinyl. Do you really think there are that many people who just haven't really had the time to listen to this band just because there hasn't yet been a best of?

Now these points were all solidified in about 3 minutes of Stephen Malkmus playing an acoustic guitar with his voice cracking. Maybe he was sick or blew his voice out or something, but he was butchering this song. Not only a Pavement song but one of THE Pavement songs that made me realize I loved this band. And all of a sudden the big sunglasses didn't look cool and neither did the pink polo shirt. The sunglasses made him look old, like a rest home elder with massive shades on, and the pink of the shirt was sucking the color out of his skin making him look gray. Almost cancerous. And the whole display just made me wish Pavement had stayed in the coffin. That way they wouldn't look so dead.

Here is a song to play us out off of the oft-forgot mash-up album of Slanted & Enchanted and Jay-Z's Black Album. I give you my favorite track off "The Slack Album."

DJ N-Wee / Loretta Clarity