Monthly Archives: October 2010

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The Social Network

The Social Network is a brilliant movie — expertly crafted down to the smallest detail, flawlessly acted, easily one of the best films of the year. And yet I feel like some of the effusive praise of the film is seeing something that isn’t there.

The film, which explores the cutthroat dynamics behind the conception, creation and explosion of Facebook, does not set out to make a grand statement about the way people communicate in the 21st century. I’ve read a lot of commentary about the irony of a borderline anti-social person creating the ultimate social community, but I didn’t see that on the screen. This film could have been about the creation of anything… Facebook is entirely beside the point.

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Song of the Day #814: ‘Brown-Eyed Girl’ – Van Morrison

Top Ten Male Vocalists – #9 – Van Morrison

Like a lot of people on this list, Van the Man earns my admiration for far more than just his voice. He’s responsible for Moondance, after all, one of the finest albums ever recorded. But his distinctive vocals have always been a huge part of his appeal for me.

Counting Crows’ Adam Duritz has often been compared to Van Morrison, both favorably and unfavorably. I see the connection… a certain earthy-quirkiness and rhythmic quality they share. But, though I prefer Counting Crows to Morrison overall, I like Van’s voice more than Duritz’s.

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Song of the Day #813: ‘Everybody’s Changing’ – Keane

Over the next two weeks, I’ll count down ten of my favorite male vocalists in popular music. Notice I wrote “ten of my favorite” rather than “my ten favorite” because I’m sure I’m leaving some people out and I want to stress that this group is far from set in stone. That said, these are the ten I came up with after some deliberation so that counts for something.

Many of my favorite artists are lacking in the vocal department. That’s not to say they don’t sing their own songs well — in most cases, I can’t imagine those tunes sung by anybody else — but I’m a fan for other reasons. Bob Dylan is a prime example, but you can throw in Ben Folds, Rufus Wainwright, Belle and Sebastian’s Stuart Murdoch and many others.

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Song of the Day #812: ‘Dreamin’ Of You’ – Bob Dylan

Time Out of Mind is without question one of Dylan’s finest albums of the last few decades, but the tracks on Telltale Signs that were left off the album could have combined to make it the best by a mile.

One of those is ‘Red River Shore,’ which I mentioned yesterday. Another is ‘Marchin’ to the City,’ a passionate blues number.

And Dylan’s classic ‘Mississippi,’ which eventually found a home on Love and Theft, was originally recorded in a much different form for Time Out of Mind.

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Song of the Day #811: ‘Tell Ol’ Bill’ – Bob Dylan

It’s hard to pick a favorite among the volumes of the Bootleg Series, but I might cast a vote for Volume 8, Telltale Signs, a collection of rare and unreleased material recorded between 1989 and 2006.

During that span, Dylan released Oh Mercy and Under the Red Sky, followed by his folk music cover albums and then the celebrated trilogy of Time Out of Mind, Love and Theft and Modern Times.

He was at a creative peak, especially from the late 90s on, and Telltale Signs makes it clear that, as usual, many special songs never made it onto those albums. Among those is ‘Red River Shore’ (covered on the blog in early 2009) that maybe ties ‘Blind Willie McTell‘ as the best song ever left off of a Dylan album.

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