I don't have the words. I don't think any of us do. | | | | On Mars, every day is Halloween: David Bowie and Trevor Bolder in Los Angeles, 1973.
(Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images) | | | | | | “I don't have the words. I don't think any of us do.”
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| | rantnrave:// There are days when I'm pretty sure every song ever written is about the same thing. Hip-hop, R&B, rock, country, jazz, classical, new, old, Western, Eastern, doesn't matter. Sincere, sarcastic, happy, sad, doesn't matter either. (See also: all literature, all art, maybe all food). I'm thinking this right now as my shuffled SONOS playlist of last week's (unusually strong) pile of new albums segues BIG K.R.I.T.'s "KEEP THE DEVIL OFF" into LEE ANN WOMACK's cover of GEORGE JONES' "TAKE THE DEVIL OUT OF ME," and as I am simultaneously curled up with AMANDA PETRUSICH's DO NOT SELL AT ANY PRICE, a book about obsessive 78rpm record collectors, whose first chapter lets us know that the hunt for the one or two playable versions of SKIP JAMES' "DEVIL GOT MY WOMAN" still in existence is going to haunt us for the next 240 pages. "Keep the Devil Off" is one of the centerpieces of K.R.I.T.'s double-length 4EVA IS A MIGHTY LONG TIME, an album that's split in half between public swagger and private vulnerability and humility. The song is a bit of both, wrapping a gospel call-and-response asking his Lord to keep him on a righteous path around two verses of pride-filled biography. The organ samples give the track a Southern church feel and make clear his intent. But isn't that everybody's intent? Womack's song starts with an a cappella "Ohhhh" that might make you think she's about to tear into "O DEATH," but instead the oh is addressed to JESUS, and it's an upbeat, old-timey voice-and-electric-gtr duet about the most eternal of all duels. After a 90-second struggle, she's accepted him and he's saved her—or so she says. It's an aspirational conclusion that's somewhat undercut by the previous 13 songs on THE LONELY, THE LONESOME & THE GONE, a smoldering mix of throwback country and blues tracks that suggest the devil and the GOOD LORD still have some fighting to do over the owner of one of the best voices in country. As for Skip James' 1931 classic, I'll let Petrusich describe: "meandering and almost structureless, composed of little more than a three-bar vocal phrase and variations on two guitar chords, which are embellished and augmented by vocal and instrumental flourishes. That's the technical description. I can't really explain the rest." Which is just as well. If anyone could explain, we wouldn't have to keep pleading, cajoling, chasing and running a century later. And what on earth would we listen to then?... In 19 years, we have gone from SPIRITUALIZED performing on the top floor of the WORLD TRADE CENTER to, um, this... The first group to have three members hit #1 in the US with solo albums was the BEATLES. Can you guess who's the second?... That time BOOTSY COLLINS' bass turned into a snake and he realized it was time to leave JAMES BROWN's band... RIP ROB POTTS, MIKE HUDSON and JON ROSSI. | | | - Matty Karas, curator |
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