🎵 Monthly Song Challenge 🎵

Day 2: A song that reminds you of yourself

The Smashing Pumpkins - Muzzle

Holy shit, I haven't listened to that track in more than half a life time. Hello junior high.

Couldn't resist this one. @vagrantx might be familiar with these guys. Not Swedish, but neighbors with a similar flag.

Turbonegro "All My Friends Are Dead"
 
Holy shit, I haven't listened to that track in more than half a life time. Hello junior high.

Couldn't resist this one. @vagrantx might be familiar with these guys. Not Swedish, but neighbors with a similar flag.

Turbonegro "All My Friends Are Dead"
sadly so is Hank von Hell
 
Day 3: A song by an artist no longer living

Seba Jun, alias Nujabes. What an astounding mind you had. A pioneer of fusion hip hop, you brought so many genres together in such brilliant ways it boggles the mind. Passed away in 2010 in a car accident, at just 36, the world lost a little piece of its soul that day.

As he was recording his album Modal Soul, his magnum opus, he'd laid down a jazzy track and contacted the American Jazz musician Terry Callier, wondering if he may sample his 1972 track Ordinary Joe. Terry, after having listened to Nujabes' music, did not allow him to sample his jazz classic, instead opting to travel to japan and re-record the song for him, to make it fit perfectly with the vision Jun had for this track! 33 years added so much soul to Terrys voice.

Unfortunately we lost Terry as well just two years later, in 2012, to cancer. Rest in peace you wonderful wonderful man.

A fusion of jazz and hip hop.
Lovely.

Nujabes, ft Terry Callier - Ordinary Joe

 
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Day 3: A song by an artist no longer living
Saw him on the Glass Spider tour in 1987. He normally wouldn't have played Portland, I think, since it was smaller than many cities they toured, but the stage and show were so big, it required an outdoor stadium, and we had that. Duran Duran opened. It was a monumental show, and really opened up the idea of what concerts could do as a story telling medium. It has multiple acts and an intermission. Oh, and 60 foot tall glass spider for the set. Aerial acts, Bowie descending from the spider on cables, Peter Frampton as his guitarist. It was a good night.
 
Day 3: A song by an artist no longer living

I am glad this prompt came up. I have been thinking of Andrew Wood a lot these last few days. Not as common a name as it ever should have been, but if you ever heard "Would?" by Alice in Chains, that was about Andrew. As was Soundgarden's “Reach Down” and “Say Hello 2 Heaven." He was influential beyond his years. Wood was originally in a band called Malfunktion, and it could be reasonably argued that their they were the beginning of what became grunge, though Sub Pop said they weren't "grunge enough." Andrew was most of that, infusing his hippie rock and roll with a massive glam edge. After Green River, another prop-grunge band, broke up, a bunch of the members joined Andrew as Mother Love Bone.

I still remember him, more than 30 years later. He was mesmerizing on stage, just took the room, and had fun with it. God, he was good! Bowie and Mercury were his heroes, and he didn't ape them, he added their styles to his own. He did everything full on, and his stage persona was whatever he felt like that day. Costumes, make up, whatever he felt like. And he made it work. Talented and gifted, he was a multi-instrumentalist as well as a singer and writer. Just fucking talented. And a damn good guy, always trying to get people to laugh, to smile. He took his music seriously, but that was about it.

He started on drugs when he was very young, and had been in rehab multiple times. In 1990, Mother Love Bone had recorded their debut album, Apple, and Andrew wanted to be clean for the release, for the tour. He went into rehab again, and they thought it stuck. Three months clean. Then, one night he wasn't, and three days later he was dead of an overdose. He should have been great. No offense to Kurt, but he should have been the face of an entire sea change in music. Instead, he was an inspiration for songs mourning his loss, some quite angry. I get that. I mourn him, but I am still pissed at him for dying on me. Not fair, but there I am.

This is "Chloe Dancer/Crown of Thorns," which is actually two songs. "Chloe Dancer" was never released as a stand along track, which is a shame as it is a beautiful piece of music, but "Crown of Thorns" was on Apple. The combination was on the Singles soundtrack, and brought Mother Love Bone to light for the rest of the world. "Chloe" is about breaking up with his girlfriend over his heroin use.

"And a dream like this must die..."

"Chloe Dancer/Crown of Thorns," Mother Love Bone.

 
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