I am very sad that SK have broken up. They get better with each record and The Woods is a phenominal record. Corin Tucker is one of my favorite singers and is one of the only people who I can stand singing with that warbly vibratto.
I remember reading interviews with the band when The Woods was released and they were talking like band that was about to break up so I have to say this doesn't surprise me.
Well how glad am I that I got to see them before they split, Well at least they left while they were still 'hot rock' rather than clinging onto something that they once were.
Sleater Kinney Rock!
29/05/00 -Wembley
20/04/06 - The Astoria alley crew + got to shake Ed's hand
25/04/06 -Jools Show + got Mike's autograph
***********************************
27/08/06- 07/09/06- 09/09/06-13/09/06-17/09/06-13/06/07-18/06/07
...Three crooked hearts and swirls all around...
Never had a chance to listen to them. Anyone recommend a place to start with Sleater Kinney?
The albums are a bit different from each other, so that's a tough question. You could work backwards maybe and start with the latest, the Woods. My favorite is Dig Me Out. All Hands is the most 'accessible', and one of my least favorites. But it's sleater-kinney so it's still great. Oh wait, maybe this will help:
They came from the Pacific Northwest! They were young, and they had things to say. At first, it appeared that the weaponry, the system, the strategy, consisted of a lead singer who had an uncanny urgency to her voice, more so than anyone since Patti Smith, enough to make the hair on the back of your neck stand up. That was the first part of the weaponry, this lead singer, and the second part consisted of a remarkable chemistry between the two guitar players, viz. Carrie Brownstein and Corin Tucker. One guitar seemed on occasion to finish the other's lines, and vice versa, as if they were performing the medieval form called the hocket. Initially, these were the strategies. It was urgent, it was fierce.
They came from the Pacific Northwest! The second album, Call the Doctor, did things that could not be done on the first. Suddenly there were two voices, not just the amazing lead singer. There was the second voice, with its urbane, sexy drawl, fitted exactly around the first in a kind of contrapuntal exercise that was precisely calibrated to what the guitars were already doing. The noise got noisier. Where the songs had orbited around a certain feminist rage on the eponymous first album, the message got deeper as the noise got noisier, especially on "I'm Not Waiting," and "Good Things," and "Taste Test." Sleater-Kinney wasn't waiting to make the transition from promising girls to women, they were taking, and they were allowed.
They came from the Pacific Northwest, but they were beginning to sound like they weren't from a particular region, but maybe from the entire recent history of rock and roll. Dig Me Out, their first unremitting masterpiece, in which the tempos occasionally slowed, and the dynamics were more varied, all the better to allow the lead singer, Corin, to emerge from the howl somewhat, and for Carrie's more vulnerable voice to be more melodious and frontal than before. Also: a not-to-be-underestimated strategic coup. New drummer! Whereas there had never been a problem with the prior drummer, Lora McFarlane, she did seem to be chasing after the songs sometimes, instead of leading them. Not so with the amazing new drummer Janet Weiss, whose virtuosity and ability to find room for fills anywhere is as admirable and satisfying as any drummer in the punk tradition, etc. Dig Me Out was friendlier, more intimate, but it wasn't any less passionate. They may have come from the Pacific Northwest, but they weren't going to be ghetto-ized there, in the hippie-friendly blue states.
The Hot Rock and All Hands on the Bad One, the albums that followed in 1999 and 2000, consolidated the triumphs of Call the Doctor and Dig Me Out, and this is not a bad thing. The songwriting team revealed that it seemed to have an endless reservoir of those angular guitar riffs favored especially by Brownstein, guitar riffs that managed to sound both playful and funky, in the way that Pat Place's guitar used to sound in the Bush Tetras. This is satisfying, to know that a certain way of playing has innumerable variations. There also began to appear on the horizon a certain devotion to the possibility of melody, hooks, and to the instrumental coloration and variation that might be brought into what is after all a rather simple ensemble (two guitars and drums, with the occasional bass part on the recordings), a tiny bit of piano here and there, maybe an organ part, etc. Of these two middle period recordings, All Hands... with its frank erotics, its laments about anorexia, and its tour-band laments, seemed the more satisfying, evincing particular continuity in the use of John Goodmanson as producer, who worked on all the band's early albums except The Hot Rock.
Which brings us to the second masterpiece, One Beat, and the idea of a Sleater-Kinney television appearance. Or the idea of a Sleater-Kinney spot on some enormous world tour replete with buses and jets and roadies. Sleater-Kinney opening for that famous grunge band. Sleater-Kinney beginning to conceive of itself as a global organization, though remarking on this ambition is certainly to overlook the stunning array of styles and pop-music dexterity on One Beat, from Led Zep style riff-mongering on "Light Rail Coyote" (a song, it is pleasing to know, that is about exactly what it says it's about), to the political consciousness of songs like "Far Away" and "Combat Rock," the ersatz Motown of "Step Aside," in which, e.g., the violence of the world outside, and the domestic responsibilities of motherhood vie with the horn section in one of the funkiest punk rock songs ever recorded. Everything on One Beat reflects the confidence of a band of adults playing music the way they want to. Carrie sounds like Cindy Wilson from the B-52s, or Lene Lovich, and her guitar playing uncannily mimics Peter Buck on Document-era R.E.M. There is wah-wah, there are synthesizers, there are sing-along choruses, there are hints of the blues, and, so I am told, they even started dancing onstage.
If there were only the six albums described above, Sleater-Kinney would still be one of the most reliable, most creative, hardest rocking bands of the late nineties, which was not a period, after all, noted for much good rock and roll. They aren't a metal band, with tricky solos and lots of complaining. They aren't an R&B band with a canned drummer and a lot of come-ons. They don't rap, at least not yet. If the movement from Sleater-Kinney to One Beat were the whole story, it would be a great story. They came from the Pacific Northwest, from the land of hemp and used bookstores, and they conquered the world.
But this isn't the end of the story. Now, before us, we have The Woods, which appears in the Sleater-Kinney catalogue as opus number seven, and like many things with sevens on it, it features an itch, a need to try new things. Sometimes people get scared by new things, which is one of the reasons people are disappointing. This is to say that you should not be afraid of new things, dear reader, which in this case amounts to a really much more ambitious idea of how the studio can be used, like on the massive upsurge of guitars in the children's book parable "The Fox," which opens the album. The drums are recorded with a panoramic quality they have never had before, and there's Corin wailing in such a blood-curdling way that you would believe anything she told you, and all she's telling you is "Goodbye, little fox." This is the first difference: studio smarts.
But studio smarts is just a means to an end. It doesn't imply that longtime Sleater-Kinney fans will not find what they love, namely the strange, delirious interlocking guitars and the way Carrie and Corin seem to finish each other's lines, that doesn't mean that there aren't a bunch of great melodies. But it does mean that it's okay to have guitar solos. Yes, perhaps no development on The Woods is as indicative of the grab-the-rock-world-by-its-throat thrust of the album as the guitar solos. Everybody knows that Sleater-Kinney was never noted for guitar heroics. Well, if that's your version of the story, start here with "What's Mine Is Yours," a two-chord number in which the two guitars pick-up the opposite ends of the rhythm, in just the way the singers alternate verses, until, at the 2:13 mark, the song breaks out into an awesome silence, after which Brownstein's Hendrix-style guitar solo, replete with backwards sections and wall of fuzz, erupts, lasting an entire minute before the drums return. It's as satisfying as the ear-splitting second half of Sonic Youth's "Mildred Pierce," or the Ira Kaplan wall of sludge on Yo La Tengo's Painful. And that's not the only guitar solo. There are several!
If guitar heroics are not enough, there's an ersatz jazz number. "Jumpers," in which Carrie and Corin sing unison on the verses in a way that resembles Petula Clark. There's a nice keyboard part, too, and the lyrics are about California, about the Golden Gate, and about, yep, about jumping from the bridge, and there are A, B, and C sections, and there's no real chorus, because the new ideas of The Woods also include new ideas about song structure, like that there doesn't have to be a chorus in the usual place, and you can solo whenever you feel like it, passion is the thing, emotion is the thing, art is the thing, and art can knock you out, disorient you, unsettle you.
And there are the drum rolls on "Steep Air," and the insistence that the listener "please go away" on "Entertain," which features Carrie's desperate shouting, and there's a catchy chorus on "Roller Coaster," and the way Corin sings the words "cherry tomato" there, and the feeding-back of guitars on the out-chorus, and the incredibly sweet and beautiful and unadorned ballad by Carrie, "Modern Girl." Never has purchasing a television sounded like such an integral part of contemporary romantic experience, never have a sinisterly droning synthesizer and a harmonica seemed like such appropriate bedfellows, and never has the shift from the present tense ("My baby loves me") to the past tense ("My whole life looked like a picture of a sunny day") seemed so telling.
The album closes with an improvisation, recorded in a single, unedited take; that's right, an improv, which serves as the linkage between "Let's Call It Love" and "Night Light," just like on those old Grateful Dead bootlegs, or maybe like in those Led Zeppelin shows from the seventies, a big inflammatory guitar solo passage, with tons of noise, and why you ask, why is this necessary, why even connect the two songs at all, well, because they connect two halves of the experience of human psychology in these rather dispiriting times, these dark ages, the first half, "Let's Call It Love," being the totally outrageous and very sexy desire part of the story ("A woman is not a girl/she could show you a thing or two," or: "Let's call it my royal flush, I'll show you what to do with it,"), the second half representing the domestic impulse: "How do you do it/This bitter and bloody world/Keep It Together and Shine for Your Family." And the ligementary connection is the inarguable greatness of the instrumental passage, sort of like the over-the-top soloing in "Whole Lotta Love." In fact, rarely has a band digested the influence of the Zeppelin catalogue in such a creative and diabolical way. The point of the improvisation is that it sacrifices everything to feeling, it throws everything onto the fire, in the name of provocation, the better to illustrate the kind of Dionysian/Apollonian opposition of Carrie and Corin, the enraged, the outraged, the unignorable, and then, differently, the tender, the melancholy, the gentle, each of these things in each of the players, always completed ornamented and augmented by Janet's amazing drumming.
They came from the Pacific Northwest, but they won't be stuck there. They want history, they want time, they want art, they want to deal with culture, they have demands, they have needs, they have vision, they have aspirations. And now they have The Woods.
if you wanna be a friend of mine
cross the river to the eastside
The albums are a bit different from each other, so that's a tough question. You could work backwards maybe and start with the latest, the Woods. My favorite is Dig Me Out. All Hands is the most 'accessible', and one of my least favorites. But it's sleater-kinney so it's still great.
If anybody knows their S/K, it's VictoryGin. I agree with her statement regarding the excellence that is "Dig Me Out". I consider it an excellant starting point for the trip that is Sleater-Kinney. You can't go wrong with "The Woods" or "One Beat" either.
All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a thousand enemies, and whenever they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you, digger, listener, runner, prince with the swift warning. Be cunning and full of tricks and your people shall never be destroyed.
If anybody knows their S/K, it's VictoryGin. I agree with her statement regarding the excellence that is "Dig Me Out". I consider it an excellant starting point for the trip that is Sleater-Kinney. You can't go wrong with "The Woods" or "One Beat" either.
aww . . . that makes me weepy. in a good way . that's sweet. You're right--DMO is a wonderful starting point. I love all the albums! It just depends how you want to go about starting. Someone could be a purist and start from the beginning (some don't like the self-titled, but that is sleater-kinney. it was the time, it was what was needed. it filled a void and empowered! you can start with the more punky call the doctor. it's urgent, it built on what they started with. it rocks! it has some amazing songs, like 'little mouth' or 'i'm not waiting'. i mean who sings songs like that? and the way they did it? and they even had fun on the album! 'i wanna be your joey ramone', fantastic. then dig me out, wow. i just can't say enough about that one, so i'll stop there. hot rock is nice, different. quieter in a way, maybe more complex? more personal. all hands has some great songs--i don't care what anyone says, i love carrie's 'leave you behind'. and youth decay is amazing. that album had some hooks too, if you want a more mainstream starting point.
and tybird, 'one beat' is a great suggestion. it was a great capsule of a rocky time, but yet it is timeless. some of the guitar riffs on that album give me chills. oh, and the woods . . . sigh.
there just wasn't a band like this. they changed everything for me. they made me connect with music in a way that no other band has. i thought i had that with pearl jam, but with sleater-kinney i could just relate to them more, which made it even more powerful. they were closer. and now they broke up with me . ugh.
if you wanna be a friend of mine
cross the river to the eastside
Never had a chance to listen to them. Anyone recommend a place to start with Sleater Kinney?
Make sure to check out b-sides, too. Especially the song "Everything". It's a b-side to one of the singles from The Woods, and it will absofuckinglutely destroy you.
"Of course it hurts. You're getting fucked by an elephant."
isnt it sort of weird timing? i'm not a close follower but did enjoy them opening and from what i've seen, there latest album had great reviews and with the pull of PJ seemed to be getting recognition.
"There are teams that are fair-haired,and those that aren't so fair-haired.Some teams are named Smith,some Grabowski. We're Grabowskis."-Mike Ditka, January 1986
everytime i have to take a crap i sing EVACUATION!!!
EVACUATION!!
"i'll let you be in my dream if i can be in your dream." -b.dylan
I am disappointed to hear of the breakup of SK. I have had the chance to see them a few times by themselves and then on last years Canadian Tour I finally got to see my 2 favourite bands play together 4 times. I am grateful for that. They went out an a high note with The Woods. I love all their albums but I found The Woods to be an album that could reach more people.
This is sad. I'll admit, I tried really, really hard to really like them, but it's difficult. I can listen, but in small doses. I think seeing them three days in a row in Canada made me think that. However, I respect them as chicks that rock hard. I hope that they can get through this and get back together.
-- Makes the Modern Girl tag Saturday at Cincy a little poignant.
"You look like you'd be sticky" --
Indianapolis 1998, Indianapolis 2000, Alpine 2003, Indianapolis 2003, Toledo 2004, Grand Rapids 2004, St Louis 2004, Kitchener 2005, London 2005, Hamilton 2005, Chicago I 2006, Grand Rapids 2006, Cleveland 2006, Cincinnati 2006 The Vic 2007, Lollapalooza 2007, Chicago I and II 2009
Make sure to check out b-sides, too. Especially the song "Everything". It's a b-side to one of the singles from The Woods, and it will absofuckinglutely destroy you.
I love their version of "Angry Inch" w/the dude from the B-52s...........picked it up off of iTunes...........good stuff.
I really think that they need to release a DVD on their way out the door........something to give my friend, VictoryGin, and I something to watch when we need an S/K fix.
All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a thousand enemies, and whenever they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you, digger, listener, runner, prince with the swift warning. Be cunning and full of tricks and your people shall never be destroyed.
I love their version of "Angry Inch" w/the dude from the B-52s...........picked it up off of iTunes...........good stuff.
I really think that they need to release a DVD on their way out the door........something to give my friend, VictoryGin, and I something to watch when we need an S/K fix.
Sub Pop recently released a video sampler. It's like 20 videos by Sup Pop artists, and the videos for Jumpers and Entertain are both included.
A concert dvd would have been amazing (Lance Bangs could direct), as would a live album. Maybe they'll do that as a farewell kind of thing, who knows?
"Of course it hurts. You're getting fucked by an elephant."
Grrrr. all this negativity for one band? gee, show some class people! Okay, I KNOW they AREN'T for everyone,which I can understand, but have at least respect for these women. :mad:
Anywoo, it would be GREAT if they did a DVD of their final show. Lance did a GREAT job w/the DVD that accompanied The Woods album. I very much enjoyed it! Pretty cool they premiered the songs in their hometown
ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~
~*STONEY PONY all the WAY!*~
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~~*~*~
"For the world, not for the war"-Neil Finn
This is sad. I'll admit, I tried really, really hard to really like them, but it's difficult. I can listen, but in small doses. I think seeing them three days in a row in Canada made me think that. However, I respect them as chicks that rock hard. I hope that they can get through this and get back together.
-- Makes the Modern Girl tag Saturday at Cincy a little poignant.
awww, Sarah, that is beautiful! Thank u for at least having respect for these women Best response from a non-fan
ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~
~*STONEY PONY all the WAY!*~
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~~*~*~
"For the world, not for the war"-Neil Finn
that is an EXCELLENT song, 'angry itch' w/fred Schinder from the b-52s, I LOVE it how corin just sighs at the end of the song
i love Corin, I call her 'little Grace Slick' b/c she can wail like her. has anyone heard of the White Rabbit verison they covered?
Can't say that I had the pleasure of hearing their version of "White Rabbit".....I did get to hear their rendention of "Mother" twice in person.
All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a thousand enemies, and whenever they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you, digger, listener, runner, prince with the swift warning. Be cunning and full of tricks and your people shall never be destroyed.
Can't say that I had the pleasure of hearing their version of "White Rabbit".....I did get to hear their rendention of "Mother" twice in person.
ooo lucky you!! i have an mp3 verison of White Rabbit and they did a pretty good job. never witnessed it though. BUT i did witness at their last show, they did a cover of Promised Land
ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~ø~
~*STONEY PONY all the WAY!*~
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~~*~*~
"For the world, not for the war"-Neil Finn
Yes...Ed tagged Modern Girl onto the end of Better Man in Hamilton 2005. That was one of those moments in live music that make your hair stand on end. Quite an experience. SK was a great opener for PJ. Really really good band. Carrie was fun to watch on stage too...high kicker.
Sleater-Kinney's final show will not be at Lollapalooza. The band has added one more gig, at the Crystal Ballroom in their hometown of Portland, Oregon, on August 11. So they'll get to say goodbye among family and friends.
So here's what the band's last tour itinerary looks like:
07-29 Louisville, KY - Mellwood Arts Center
07-31 Philadelphia, PA - Starlight Ballroom
08-01 Washington, DC - 9:30 Club
08-02 New York, NY - Webster Hall
08-04 Chicago, IL - Grant Park (Lollapalooza)
08-11 Portland, OR - Crystal Ballroom
Why jump on the guys who say they don't like the band? Let them weigh in. I jump into threads all the time about bands that I don't like. Not to start a fight with people that like them, but to talk about why they like them and why I don't. Maybe they can change my mind, and get me to see something I don't at first from an artist.
I've really come to enjoy SK over the past 5 years or so, but jeez I will readily admit that vocals are not their strong suit. I can certainly see why someone thinks they sound like two cats going at it. They don't sing well, I don't see how you can argue that - but they write damn good songs, have a perspective that is not often heard in rock music (namely an intelligent female one) and they are above average musicians.
i got my DC tix today!!! hopefully it will be a good show at the 9.30 club (have never been before). i have to admit that i have not heard a whole lot of their stuff (other than the 4-5 shows i've seen them open for pj). but what i have heard i like - plus their cover of Mother with Mike McCready doing the Carrie leg kick at Ottawa was awesome.
I hope that they can get through this and get back together.
I wouldn't hold your breath, the term 'indefinite hiatus' usually means "the only way we are getting back together is if we are broke and need reunion tour revenues"
Which came first,
the bad idea or me befallen by it?
I wouldn't hold your breath, the term 'indefinite hiatus' usually means "the only way we are getting back together is if we are broke and need reunion tour revenues"
Comments
I remember reading interviews with the band when The Woods was released and they were talking like band that was about to break up so I have to say this doesn't surprise me.
Sleater Kinney Rock!
20/04/06 - The Astoria alley crew + got to shake Ed's hand
25/04/06 -Jools Show + got Mike's autograph
***********************************
27/08/06- 07/09/06- 09/09/06-13/09/06-17/09/06-13/06/07-18/06/07
...Three crooked hearts and swirls all around...
smashing pumpkins are now back, and i'm really scared that billy will waste the band's reputation, starting to talk about god, blahblah...
www.amnesty.org.uk
Katowice 2007
London 2007
The albums are a bit different from each other, so that's a tough question. You could work backwards maybe and start with the latest, the Woods. My favorite is Dig Me Out. All Hands is the most 'accessible', and one of my least favorites. But it's sleater-kinney so it's still great. Oh wait, maybe this will help:
I love this article:
On Sleater-Kinney | ©2005 by Rick Moody
They came from the Pacific Northwest! They were young, and they had things to say. At first, it appeared that the weaponry, the system, the strategy, consisted of a lead singer who had an uncanny urgency to her voice, more so than anyone since Patti Smith, enough to make the hair on the back of your neck stand up. That was the first part of the weaponry, this lead singer, and the second part consisted of a remarkable chemistry between the two guitar players, viz. Carrie Brownstein and Corin Tucker. One guitar seemed on occasion to finish the other's lines, and vice versa, as if they were performing the medieval form called the hocket. Initially, these were the strategies. It was urgent, it was fierce.
They came from the Pacific Northwest! The second album, Call the Doctor, did things that could not be done on the first. Suddenly there were two voices, not just the amazing lead singer. There was the second voice, with its urbane, sexy drawl, fitted exactly around the first in a kind of contrapuntal exercise that was precisely calibrated to what the guitars were already doing. The noise got noisier. Where the songs had orbited around a certain feminist rage on the eponymous first album, the message got deeper as the noise got noisier, especially on "I'm Not Waiting," and "Good Things," and "Taste Test." Sleater-Kinney wasn't waiting to make the transition from promising girls to women, they were taking, and they were allowed.
They came from the Pacific Northwest, but they were beginning to sound like they weren't from a particular region, but maybe from the entire recent history of rock and roll. Dig Me Out, their first unremitting masterpiece, in which the tempos occasionally slowed, and the dynamics were more varied, all the better to allow the lead singer, Corin, to emerge from the howl somewhat, and for Carrie's more vulnerable voice to be more melodious and frontal than before. Also: a not-to-be-underestimated strategic coup. New drummer! Whereas there had never been a problem with the prior drummer, Lora McFarlane, she did seem to be chasing after the songs sometimes, instead of leading them. Not so with the amazing new drummer Janet Weiss, whose virtuosity and ability to find room for fills anywhere is as admirable and satisfying as any drummer in the punk tradition, etc. Dig Me Out was friendlier, more intimate, but it wasn't any less passionate. They may have come from the Pacific Northwest, but they weren't going to be ghetto-ized there, in the hippie-friendly blue states.
The Hot Rock and All Hands on the Bad One, the albums that followed in 1999 and 2000, consolidated the triumphs of Call the Doctor and Dig Me Out, and this is not a bad thing. The songwriting team revealed that it seemed to have an endless reservoir of those angular guitar riffs favored especially by Brownstein, guitar riffs that managed to sound both playful and funky, in the way that Pat Place's guitar used to sound in the Bush Tetras. This is satisfying, to know that a certain way of playing has innumerable variations. There also began to appear on the horizon a certain devotion to the possibility of melody, hooks, and to the instrumental coloration and variation that might be brought into what is after all a rather simple ensemble (two guitars and drums, with the occasional bass part on the recordings), a tiny bit of piano here and there, maybe an organ part, etc. Of these two middle period recordings, All Hands... with its frank erotics, its laments about anorexia, and its tour-band laments, seemed the more satisfying, evincing particular continuity in the use of John Goodmanson as producer, who worked on all the band's early albums except The Hot Rock.
Which brings us to the second masterpiece, One Beat, and the idea of a Sleater-Kinney television appearance. Or the idea of a Sleater-Kinney spot on some enormous world tour replete with buses and jets and roadies. Sleater-Kinney opening for that famous grunge band. Sleater-Kinney beginning to conceive of itself as a global organization, though remarking on this ambition is certainly to overlook the stunning array of styles and pop-music dexterity on One Beat, from Led Zep style riff-mongering on "Light Rail Coyote" (a song, it is pleasing to know, that is about exactly what it says it's about), to the political consciousness of songs like "Far Away" and "Combat Rock," the ersatz Motown of "Step Aside," in which, e.g., the violence of the world outside, and the domestic responsibilities of motherhood vie with the horn section in one of the funkiest punk rock songs ever recorded. Everything on One Beat reflects the confidence of a band of adults playing music the way they want to. Carrie sounds like Cindy Wilson from the B-52s, or Lene Lovich, and her guitar playing uncannily mimics Peter Buck on Document-era R.E.M. There is wah-wah, there are synthesizers, there are sing-along choruses, there are hints of the blues, and, so I am told, they even started dancing onstage.
If there were only the six albums described above, Sleater-Kinney would still be one of the most reliable, most creative, hardest rocking bands of the late nineties, which was not a period, after all, noted for much good rock and roll. They aren't a metal band, with tricky solos and lots of complaining. They aren't an R&B band with a canned drummer and a lot of come-ons. They don't rap, at least not yet. If the movement from Sleater-Kinney to One Beat were the whole story, it would be a great story. They came from the Pacific Northwest, from the land of hemp and used bookstores, and they conquered the world.
But this isn't the end of the story. Now, before us, we have The Woods, which appears in the Sleater-Kinney catalogue as opus number seven, and like many things with sevens on it, it features an itch, a need to try new things. Sometimes people get scared by new things, which is one of the reasons people are disappointing. This is to say that you should not be afraid of new things, dear reader, which in this case amounts to a really much more ambitious idea of how the studio can be used, like on the massive upsurge of guitars in the children's book parable "The Fox," which opens the album. The drums are recorded with a panoramic quality they have never had before, and there's Corin wailing in such a blood-curdling way that you would believe anything she told you, and all she's telling you is "Goodbye, little fox." This is the first difference: studio smarts.
But studio smarts is just a means to an end. It doesn't imply that longtime Sleater-Kinney fans will not find what they love, namely the strange, delirious interlocking guitars and the way Carrie and Corin seem to finish each other's lines, that doesn't mean that there aren't a bunch of great melodies. But it does mean that it's okay to have guitar solos. Yes, perhaps no development on The Woods is as indicative of the grab-the-rock-world-by-its-throat thrust of the album as the guitar solos. Everybody knows that Sleater-Kinney was never noted for guitar heroics. Well, if that's your version of the story, start here with "What's Mine Is Yours," a two-chord number in which the two guitars pick-up the opposite ends of the rhythm, in just the way the singers alternate verses, until, at the 2:13 mark, the song breaks out into an awesome silence, after which Brownstein's Hendrix-style guitar solo, replete with backwards sections and wall of fuzz, erupts, lasting an entire minute before the drums return. It's as satisfying as the ear-splitting second half of Sonic Youth's "Mildred Pierce," or the Ira Kaplan wall of sludge on Yo La Tengo's Painful. And that's not the only guitar solo. There are several!
If guitar heroics are not enough, there's an ersatz jazz number. "Jumpers," in which Carrie and Corin sing unison on the verses in a way that resembles Petula Clark. There's a nice keyboard part, too, and the lyrics are about California, about the Golden Gate, and about, yep, about jumping from the bridge, and there are A, B, and C sections, and there's no real chorus, because the new ideas of The Woods also include new ideas about song structure, like that there doesn't have to be a chorus in the usual place, and you can solo whenever you feel like it, passion is the thing, emotion is the thing, art is the thing, and art can knock you out, disorient you, unsettle you.
And there are the drum rolls on "Steep Air," and the insistence that the listener "please go away" on "Entertain," which features Carrie's desperate shouting, and there's a catchy chorus on "Roller Coaster," and the way Corin sings the words "cherry tomato" there, and the feeding-back of guitars on the out-chorus, and the incredibly sweet and beautiful and unadorned ballad by Carrie, "Modern Girl." Never has purchasing a television sounded like such an integral part of contemporary romantic experience, never have a sinisterly droning synthesizer and a harmonica seemed like such appropriate bedfellows, and never has the shift from the present tense ("My baby loves me") to the past tense ("My whole life looked like a picture of a sunny day") seemed so telling.
The album closes with an improvisation, recorded in a single, unedited take; that's right, an improv, which serves as the linkage between "Let's Call It Love" and "Night Light," just like on those old Grateful Dead bootlegs, or maybe like in those Led Zeppelin shows from the seventies, a big inflammatory guitar solo passage, with tons of noise, and why you ask, why is this necessary, why even connect the two songs at all, well, because they connect two halves of the experience of human psychology in these rather dispiriting times, these dark ages, the first half, "Let's Call It Love," being the totally outrageous and very sexy desire part of the story ("A woman is not a girl/she could show you a thing or two," or: "Let's call it my royal flush, I'll show you what to do with it,"), the second half representing the domestic impulse: "How do you do it/This bitter and bloody world/Keep It Together and Shine for Your Family." And the ligementary connection is the inarguable greatness of the instrumental passage, sort of like the over-the-top soloing in "Whole Lotta Love." In fact, rarely has a band digested the influence of the Zeppelin catalogue in such a creative and diabolical way. The point of the improvisation is that it sacrifices everything to feeling, it throws everything onto the fire, in the name of provocation, the better to illustrate the kind of Dionysian/Apollonian opposition of Carrie and Corin, the enraged, the outraged, the unignorable, and then, differently, the tender, the melancholy, the gentle, each of these things in each of the players, always completed ornamented and augmented by Janet's amazing drumming.
They came from the Pacific Northwest, but they won't be stuck there. They want history, they want time, they want art, they want to deal with culture, they have demands, they have needs, they have vision, they have aspirations. And now they have The Woods.
cross the river to the eastside
... but it does not mean they are going to stop making music forever!... have hope!
aww . . . that makes me weepy. in a good way
and tybird, 'one beat' is a great suggestion. it was a great capsule of a rocky time, but yet it is timeless. some of the guitar riffs on that album give me chills. oh, and the woods . . . sigh.
there just wasn't a band like this. they changed everything for me. they made me connect with music in a way that no other band has. i thought i had that with pearl jam, but with sleater-kinney i could just relate to them more, which made it even more powerful. they were closer. and now they broke up with me
cross the river to the eastside
Make sure to check out b-sides, too. Especially the song "Everything". It's a b-side to one of the singles from The Woods, and it will absofuckinglutely destroy you.
everytime i have to take a crap i sing EVACUATION!!!
EVACUATION!!
"i'll let you be in my dream if i can be in your dream." -b.dylan
-- Makes the Modern Girl tag Saturday at Cincy a little poignant.
Indianapolis 1998, Indianapolis 2000, Alpine 2003, Indianapolis 2003, Toledo 2004, Grand Rapids 2004, St Louis 2004, Kitchener 2005, London 2005, Hamilton 2005, Chicago I 2006, Grand Rapids 2006, Cleveland 2006, Cincinnati 2006 The Vic 2007, Lollapalooza 2007, Chicago I and II 2009
I really think that they need to release a DVD on their way out the door........something to give my friend, VictoryGin, and I something to watch when we need an S/K fix.
i love Corin, I call her 'little Grace Slick' b/c she can wail like her. has anyone heard of the White Rabbit verison they covered?
~*STONEY PONY all the WAY!*~
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"For the world, not for the war"-Neil Finn
Sub Pop recently released a video sampler. It's like 20 videos by Sup Pop artists, and the videos for Jumpers and Entertain are both included.
A concert dvd would have been amazing (Lance Bangs could direct), as would a live album. Maybe they'll do that as a farewell kind of thing, who knows?
Ya really.
"Sorry is the fool who trades his love for high-rise rent, Seems the more you make equals the loneliness you get"
.NJD.
Anywoo, it would be GREAT if they did a DVD of their final show. Lance did a GREAT job w/the DVD that accompanied The Woods album. I very much enjoyed it! Pretty cool they premiered the songs in their hometown
~*STONEY PONY all the WAY!*~
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"For the world, not for the war"-Neil Finn
awww, Sarah, that is beautiful! Thank u for at least having respect for these women
~*STONEY PONY all the WAY!*~
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~~*~*~
"For the world, not for the war"-Neil Finn
"my whole life was like a picture of a sunny day"
blew my mind wide open...
i though SK rawked, and this is sad news
ooo lucky you!!
~*STONEY PONY all the WAY!*~
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~~*~*~
"For the world, not for the war"-Neil Finn
So here's what the band's last tour itinerary looks like:
07-29 Louisville, KY - Mellwood Arts Center
07-31 Philadelphia, PA - Starlight Ballroom
08-01 Washington, DC - 9:30 Club
08-02 New York, NY - Webster Hall
08-04 Chicago, IL - Grant Park (Lollapalooza)
08-11 Portland, OR - Crystal Ballroom
I've really come to enjoy SK over the past 5 years or so, but jeez I will readily admit that vocals are not their strong suit. I can certainly see why someone thinks they sound like two cats going at it. They don't sing well, I don't see how you can argue that - but they write damn good songs, have a perspective that is not often heard in rock music (namely an intelligent female one) and they are above average musicians.
Anyway, bummer that they are hanging it up.
I wouldn't hold your breath, the term 'indefinite hiatus' usually means "the only way we are getting back together is if we are broke and need reunion tour revenues"
the bad idea or me befallen by it?