Balarama Music

Frusciante Friday: John’s Peak Period

{Jul 09}

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Yay! Another Frusciante Friday! I can’t really express the elation I feel being able to write these ones up…and that’s not sarcasm. Being completely honest, I once warned my fiancée that I would be “as giddy as a tween Jonas Brothers fan” when the new Frusciante album was released. And guess what? I didn’t disappoint. [Sigh] Let’s move on, shall we?

In all seriousness, I talk about John Frusciante a lot here in this blog. Quite honestly, he’s my favorite musician, but he’s also right up there with the best guitarists of all time, was part of one of the biggest bands ever (the best parts too), and is probably one of the most musically diverse artists out there. The man is a great musician – there’s no doubt about it – and with anything great, there’s always a peak period in their career/life. Athletes have it, television shows have it; hell, even some people’s relationship’s have them. Just like Shaq had his best run during the three-peat with the Lakers & Seinfeld shined bright popping Bubble Boy, John Frusciante had a peak period as well. Writing that though is a little cryptic; almost like I’m writing it as if he stopped making music or is making bad music now. No, he hasn’t “jumped the shark” by far and hopefully he has another peak period, but with his sporadic career thus far, Frusciante has really had one truly great peak period and obviously that’s what I’d like to talk about today.

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Frusciante Friday: Tricky Interpolations

{Apr 09}

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So I just realized today that I haven’t covered any hip-hop for the site yet. I also realized that today is Friday which means only one thing: Frusciante Friday! Luckily, Frusciante is such a varied musician that he has done collaborations with a bunch of hip-hop artists so we have a lot to choose from. My original pick for today will have to be saved for later as it’s an interpolation of a popular Beatles’ song (so I’d like to do it following that song in the countdown), but luckily, the song I have for you guys today is also an interpolation!

I know a bunch of you guys are scratching your head at that big word I just used twice so let’s go over that first off. For a straight definition, interpolation is the abrupt change of elements while still continuing the first idea. This process was generally used in the classical world in order to stretch out musical ideas & phrases to give diversity to pieces (and, let’s be honest, as filler too). A great example of this would be Mozart’s Piano Sonata No. 10. Look at that – classical music discussion in a blog post about hip-hop music; now you know why you keep coming back for more. Anyway, interpolation still goes on today, but it is now known widely as the same practice as “sampling” & “covering.” While covering is just a bad term to lump it with, sampling & interpolation are not that far off in reality. In fact, it’s one of those things where all interpolations are samples, but not all samples are interpolations. A good example of the difference would be the classic sampling war over “Ice Ice Baby.” We all know it samples Queen’s “Under Pressure,” but the lyrical and musical differences in the songs are huge with the only thing really connecting them is that (in)famous bass line. The rest of the music is changed, the tone is quite different, and the lyrics don’t even belong in the same grouping. See the difference? But if that’s a good indication as to what isn’t an interpolation, then what is? Well our song choice today is!

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Allow Me To Present: Codeine Velvet Club

{Mar 16}

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It’s exciting for me to say that Balarama Music has done its first interview today with the lovely & talented Lou Hickey of the band Codeine Velvet Club. Huzzah! You should definitely check that out by clicking here. If that band name sounds familiar, well it should. Not only have I referenced the band many times here since I first heard of them in September, but I also ranked their debut album as the third best album of last year (see the rest of the list by clicking here). Now, I’m not writing about CVC simply because Lou granted me an interview. It’s great she did, but I’ve been meaning to write this one for a while. With The Beatles countdown going on, it’s been a little hard to write about other stuff. With that said though, Codeine Velvet Club is a band that everyone should be checking out right now so let’s dive right into them.

CVC is really the collaboration between Lou Hickey (did you read the interview yet?) and Jon Lawler. His name won’t sound familiar to my readers here, but I have talked about his main band many times here before: The Fratellis. My fandom of that band is really how I got into CVC. After discovering The Fratellis, their debut album Costello Music from 2006 quickly became one of my favorites from the last decade and their follow-up Here We Stand from 2008 easily contained one of my favorite songs from the last decade in “Mistress Mabel,” a song I love to cover when I’m playing at open mike nights across Richmond. When I’m a fan of a band, I know it’s weird, but I almost have to stay updated on the band. Whether it’s checking Wikipedia or the band’s webpage, I find a way to stay abreast on any new rumblings from the band. It could be a new album in the works or just a random B-Side being released on a soundtrack; I want to know all of it. I’m just a curious guy like that which is really why this site exists in the first place. Anyway, originally hearing that the band wanted to release two albums in 2009, I was ecstatic. Of course, it didn’t turn out this way, but I kept checking back for any bits of news I could. News of a solo album by Lawler came & went and it wasn’t until a random day in September searching through Wikipedia (I’m addicted!) that I came across three words that would drastically change my iPod for the next six months: Codeine Velvet Club.

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Frusciante Friday: Going Inside For His Birthday

{Mar 05}

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I love The Beatles as much as you guys, but I need some variety in what I’m covering here. Hopefully next week I’ll introduce some new bands to you guys like The Avett Brothers & Codeine Velvet Club. Today though, it seems to be the birthday of perhaps the greatest musician around today so let’s get to John Frusciante in one of my favorite parts of Balarama Music: Frusciante Friday Seeing how it is his birthday & how he’s left the Chili Peppers, I’ll honor that he wants to be on his own & cover a solo song of his. I still think some of his best material lies in that band, but it’s his birthday & he gets what he wants so let’s cover one of his finest songs: “Going Inside!”

Appearing on To Record Water For Only Ten Days, the genesis of “Going Inside” is a long-ride that I’ll try to briefly sum up here. Key word there: try. After the Peppers hit it big with Blood Sugar Sex Magik in the early 90s, the sudden success proved to be too much for Frusciante. He would later recall a conversation he had with the original guitarist for the Chili Peppers Hillel Slovak that would weigh on his mind in this time. Slovak asked: “Would you still like the Chilis if they got so popular they played the Forum?” Frusciante responded with: “No. It would ruin the whole thing. That’s great about the band, the audience feels no different from the band at all.” Hard to think about when playing to sold-out arenas in Japan. While recording the album, the band holed themselves up in the famed LA Mansion for the duration of the recording process, isolating Frusciante from the real world. What was waiting for him when he came out wasn’t the same world he left either. No, he came out to find the Peppers played on virtually every radio and selling out arenas worldwide. Interviews, television appearances, constant traveling; it’s a lot to expect of a guy who as a teenager spent his days just playing guitar in his house by himself virtually all day. So he quit and retreated to a life of quiet isolation that was haunted by drugs while bordering on becoming a recluse.

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Frusciante Friday: Johnny Cash?

{Feb 26}

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Let’s take a break from the Beatles countdown and do a Frusciante Friday post. It’s going to be hard for me to muster up the strength to do it as I’m still a little depressed from him leaving the Chili Peppers. Yeah, Klinghoffer’s good, but RHCP has always been at their best with Frusciante. Damn, I’m going to get more depressed typing this. What to do, what to do, what to do? Wait, I could do a Frusciante song done with someone else to get my mind off of it. Yep, that sounds like another genius idea, Doug. Way to go! By the way, I am talking to myself in my own blog post here and I find nothing wrong with it. It’s the effect listening to Kid A at five in the morning will have on you. Go ahead and try it – it’s great! But back to the point, we’re going to talk about Frusciante’s work with a legendary artist who had an album just come out posthumously: Johnny Cash!

The beginning of Frusciante working with Cash actually starts with Cash’s American albums with Rick Rubin. An already legendary producer, Rubin began to branch out of the rap & hard rock genres he was famous for in the mid-90s. What he got was Johnny Cash looking to go a new direction in his career and the two helped each other out immensely. Rubin got his smaller record label a lot of notice and Johnny Cash got another fresh breath for a career that was winding down. From 1994 on to his death, Cash would record with Rubin ultimately releasing six albums with him that churned out immense classics like “The Man Comes Around” and his legendary cover of “Hurt.” That’s saying a lot for Rubin too as Cash had a long history of despising his producers, most notably Jack Clement who tried to add a barbershop quartet to some of his songs. Knowing Rubin’s lengthy history with the Chili Peppers, it’s no surprise that Rubin enlisted John Frusciante’s help in collaborating with Cash to re-work some famous songs for his new albums.

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Balarama Revealed!

{Aug 21}

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Before I delve into this, I invite you to check out some of the sections of the website that were added recently. The Reviews section has Album Reviews (which will start with the Wilco album), Best Of 2009 lists, and Concert Reviews (which has a Carbon Leaf show reviewed). The FAQ is up for those curious about the site and contains my contact information. The Tools section is not up at this time, but will be by the end of the week and will contain places to grab music and where to learn and what-not. All in all, just make sure to keep looking as the site keeps adding content! Let’s get to what you came to read though.

Oh, the best day of the week for Balarama Music: Frusciante Friday! Since the site is now official at balaramamusic.com, I figured I would explain where I got the name from and the story behind the song to me.

The lyric I got the name from comes from “Wet Sand” which is near the end of the first disc of Red Hot Chili Pepper’s 2006 album Stadium Arcadium. It’s a good time to talk about this seeing as how there is news & rumors (check out Invisible Movement for the best RHCP/Frusciante news!) galore of RHCP back in the studios this fall for their follow-up album, especially after people thought they were done as a band, so let’s look at their last work.

I love Stadium Arcadium. I would rank it up there as probably one of their best albums, falling definitely short of Blood Sex Sugar Magik, Californication, & By The Way. Depending on my mood, I might rank some of their albums from the 80s ahead of it, but most of the time, it ranks consistently above those. I have to say that as much as I love the album though, I adore what it could have been. As the band recorded thirty-eight songs in the studio, the original plan seemed to be to release three separate albums three to six months apart as System Of A Down did in 2005. Pressure from who I’m sure was the record company made them cut out ten songs and make it just a double-album released at once. While both had positives and negatives, ultimately, the triple album idea would have been the best in my mind.

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Let’s Try This Again…

{May 30}

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Well that worked out well, huh? Let me see if I can actually do this though. They might not be every day since work does get in the way sometimes, but we’ll see if we can’t keep it around seven posts a week.

I’ll make it something simple today too so it’s easy to start back in. Today’s band: Carbon Leaf.

How am I going to describe this one? Well, let me first tell you how I got into listening to them. Carbon Leaf is from the Richmond, VA area as am I so naturally, they’re local celebrities. Yippee. Growing up in middle & high school, it seemed like Dave Matthews Band was the local celebrity band since they were from Virginia, but towards the end of high school, into college, and currently, Carbon Leaf took that mantle & held onto it with most of the people that I know from the area. They played a benefit concert for our high school in my Junior or Senior year which is what started most of my friends on their descent into fandom, but it took me a lot longer. To be frank (although my name is Doug), I just never really listened to them until last year. For about five or six years, they were just that band that all my friends drooled over. How do I explain this? Well, have you ever had a friend tell you that a certain movie was great only to have the rest of your friends agree and all begin fawning over it? Then you see the movie, it sucks, and you silently judge your friends for being dumbasses for loving a horrible piece of cinema? Well, that’s the feeling I tried to avoid with Carbon Leaf.

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