by publius
Using the title "Celebrity Skin" to discuss the McCain ad, Michael Crowley offers a timid half-hearted compliment of Hole:
Terrible video [Hole's "Celebrity Skin"] but this album actually had its moments.
"Had its moments" -- please. Don't make out with Courtney on Saturday night and deny her on Sunday. Unlike the cowardly Crowley, I'm not afraid to say it -- Hole rocks. Live Through This is also very good, particularly the first half of the album.
Take it away Courtney -- we love you.
UPDATE: And this too. Melissa Auf der Maur on bass added value (which this video illustrates). Mess with me people and I'll do this all night. I've been having high school nostalgia anyway, so I'll move on to Siamese Dream if I have to. Then Dirt. And then there's just no telling...
Live Through This and Celebrity Skin are BOTH great, with almost no clunkers on either one. The latter alone has the title track, "Boys On The Radio," "Reasons To Be Beautiful," "Malibu," "Awful" . . . the planet on which those five songs consist merely of "having some moments" must have terrific music.
Posted by: Phil | July 30, 2008 at 10:18 PM
Melissa Auf der Maur ?
Kim Deal.
Posted by: cleek | July 30, 2008 at 10:31 PM
Pssh. Aging fanboys.
Pathetic.
(Laura Ballance.)
Posted by: matttbastard | July 30, 2008 at 10:45 PM
Also, Kim Coletta and Bridget Cross (VA/DC in the hizzouse!).
And representing from across the pond:
Miki Berenyi and Emma Anderson.
Posted by: matttbastard | July 30, 2008 at 10:58 PM
When it comes to female rockers, its all about http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5RAQXg0IdfI>Joan http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M3T_xeoGES8&feature=related>Jett.
Posted by: MeDrewNotYou | July 30, 2008 at 11:00 PM
Live Through This did rock. No doubt.
Posted by: Eric Martin | July 30, 2008 at 11:08 PM
Last two before bed:
Stereolab (RIP Mary Hansen) and Velocity Girl (*sigh* Sarah Shannon = teh swoon. Ok, Archie Moore was a cutie, too.)
Bonus: some bedtime acid on a now-for-something-completely-different-remix-tip (TUNE!).
Night y'all.
Posted by: matttbastard | July 30, 2008 at 11:13 PM
I like Hole too fwiw.
Posted by: Feddie | July 30, 2008 at 11:28 PM
Ok, I lied. One more (keeping with the original theme): nuff respect the one DJ Rap.
Proper tune from a hardcore/jungle legend.
Posted by: matttbastard | July 30, 2008 at 11:28 PM
Publius, I must take issue with you flamboyantly posting videos from our generation's Yoko Ono. For some rockin' female awesomeness, I humbly suggest you click here.
Posted by: LT Nixon | July 31, 2008 at 12:31 AM
Wow, forget Hussein. What if Obama's name included 'Auf Der Mar'?
Posted by: Rottin' in Denmark | July 31, 2008 at 01:23 AM
Fun fact time: Melissa Auf der Maur's father, Nick, was a fairly well-known Montreal-based journalist and politician who hob-nobbed with the likes of Conrad Black and Mordecai Richler (and, while working for the CBC, was arrested during the October Crisis).
wikipedia:
I used to own a cassette by AdM's old indie band, Tinker. I'm sure it's worth money now (much like my also-long-lost copy of an indie cassette by Feist's old teen-punk band, Placebo [no, not that one--the one from Calgary]).
Bonus: recent Can-con feat. Auf der Maur.
K, bed for realz this time.
Really.
:-P
Posted by: matttbastard | July 31, 2008 at 02:17 AM
"K, bed for realz this time."
I keep saying that, but the insommnia, she is bad.
Posted by: Gary Farber | July 31, 2008 at 02:22 AM
I heard on the radio the other day that Siamese Dream was 15 years old. Boy did I feel old. Even my two cherubs from that time have left home for college now.
Posted by: KathyF | July 31, 2008 at 02:41 AM
"Awful" is almost perfect, and "Malibu" is a stunner.
Posted by: Pinko Punko | July 31, 2008 at 04:22 AM
Yikes. I'm more of a fan of rockers that can actually sing, like Pat Benatar and Ann Wilson. This is one of my favorite ohmigawd-what-pipes pieces. Not really rocking, but I'm a sucker for mandolin, and two of them together is more than I can resist.
Not that a little shrieking (well, more like bellowing, in this case) isn't fun, from time to time.
Posted by: Slartibartfast | July 31, 2008 at 08:08 AM
Kids today. Nobody remembers Suzi Quattro or Genya Ravan anymore.
Posted by: JerryN | July 31, 2008 at 09:11 AM
Tina Weymouth!
(Belew!)
Posted by: cleek | July 31, 2008 at 09:18 AM
Hole was pretty good there for a bit, if you ignored the rest from Courtney.
To me, the end-all-be-all of 90's rock women is Elastica.
Posted by: Platosearwax | July 31, 2008 at 09:27 AM
Feh.
Give me PJ or give me death.
Victory, b*tches!!!
That is all.
Thanks -
Posted by: russell | July 31, 2008 at 09:56 AM
Wow. I like Pj. New one on me.
Somehow her voice reminded me of this; dunno why.
Posted by: Slartibartfast | July 31, 2008 at 10:10 AM
Pj was also new to me; she's good. Thanks Russell for the link.
Posted by: cw | July 31, 2008 at 10:53 AM
PJ is indeed great.
But you guys are totally ignoring Kathleen Hanna.
Posted by: publius | July 31, 2008 at 11:39 AM
Throwing Muses + Belly + Breeders ?
a.k.a. the many bands of Tanya Donnelly (and her stepsister Kristen Hirsh) ?
Posted by: cleek | July 31, 2008 at 12:01 PM
Gee, in one of my highly rare intersections with relatively contemporary music -- as it was at the time -- I saw Throwing Muses live in some not very large NYC venue, at some point back circa maybe 1996-7, thanks to one of my few music industry pals.
I mention this only because it's my only entre into this thread, and one of my extremely few opportunties to say a word about the music you kids talk about. Gotta bunch of Throwing Muses mp3s a long while ago, too.
Posted by: Gary Farber | July 31, 2008 at 12:07 PM
Pacific Northwest represent!
Posted by: Hogan | July 31, 2008 at 12:22 PM
Don't forget 50 Foot Wave (Hirsh's current project) and solo Hirsh & Donnelly (Love Songs for Underdogs was inexplicably and woefully ignored by both critics and the general public).
Posted by: matttbastard | July 31, 2008 at 12:35 PM
and, of course... Liz Phair
her shift to wanna-be pop diva is the outrage of the century. well, maybe not the outrage of the century... but one of them.
Posted by: cleek | July 31, 2008 at 12:42 PM
I suppose I shouldn't be shocked that there are people who have never heard of Polly Jean Harvey before.
However, I am shocked that no one has mentioned Patti Smith, or the Slits, or Polly Styrene (without whom there'd be no Kathleen Hanna).
Posted by: matttbastard | July 31, 2008 at 01:00 PM
Penelope Houston, Exene Cervenka, and Eve Libertine.
Posted by: matttbastard | July 31, 2008 at 01:18 PM
Vi Subversa, Lydia Lunch and Gaye Advert.
(Thought I'd take things back a few decades so Gary doesn't feel so left out. ;-))
Posted by: matttbastard | July 31, 2008 at 01:34 PM
(Love Songs for Underdogs was inexplicably and woefully ignored by both critics and the general public).
AS it happens I just had "Land Speed Record" pop up on my iPod last night on the way home from work. Also "Shark" from Throwing Muses' Limbo.
Posted by: Phil | July 31, 2008 at 01:35 PM
solo Hirsh & Donnelly
yeah. luv em both.
Posted by: cleek | July 31, 2008 at 01:45 PM
Speaking of the twins on the cover of Siamese Dream, they had the baby from the Nevermind cover on NPR the other day - an all grown-up surfer(ish?) Cali dude. I'M GOING TO BE EFFIN' FORTY THIS YEAR!!! HOW THE FNCK DID THIS HAPPEN TO ME???
Posted by: hairshirthedonist | July 31, 2008 at 01:48 PM
Patti Smith, on the other hand, I have a lot to say about.
Posted by: Gary Farber | July 31, 2008 at 02:12 PM
"I'M GOING TO BE EFFIN' FORTY THIS YEAR!!! HOW THE FNCK DID THIS HAPPEN TO ME???"
Weird, innit? I turned into a grown-up somewhere along the line? How did that happen? I coulda sworn I was still 17, or 22, or 26, mostly, it seemed like.
Now I'm full of this "taking responsibility" stuff, and I clean, and I'm all emotionally mature like, and I shake my cane at you kids, hey, get offa my lawn!
And I keep using lines my parents used. And having the urge to talk about back when I was a kid and you wouldn't know this.
Also, I'm all old and tired so much. And my body keeps falling apart.
Still got all the sensawonda, though.
Posted by: Gary Farber | July 31, 2008 at 02:23 PM
Patti Smith, on the other hand, I have a lot to say about.
Having read the post at your second link, Gary, I now know how utterly dull, comparitively, my life was at 16 to yours. It makes me think, "Gee, what a gutless, unimaginative, doltish, immature, little boy of a 16-year-old I was."
Posted by: hairshirthedonist | July 31, 2008 at 02:40 PM
"Having read the post at your second link, Gary, I now know how utterly dull, comparitively, my life was at 16 to yours."
I was always a precocious kid.
Hell, I should tell you about how I wound up running four departments at Lunacon (the NYC science fiction convention) that year, including Facilities, creating a Fan History Display, a fannish programming thread, moderating several panels, though it was the next year that we caught Rex Weiner of Pie-Kill International, I had to deal with the pepper gas bombing, and... it was a busy couple of years. Though '77-78 even more so.
But I made up for it by crashing and burning later on. Also the whole college drop-out thing. And the screwed-up life. I probably peaked at 19. So the cosmic balance is preserved.
Posted by: Gary Farber | July 31, 2008 at 03:11 PM
Garbage! It's all http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=RzqueC8A-as>garbage! (Shirley Manson rulz! And http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=m6o7N2yQV3M>here, she talks about Courtney.)
Much love for Ann & Nancy Wilson, Joan Jett and Suzi ("Leather Tuscadero", but so much more) Quatro.
We all love Annie Lennox, and, on the folkie side, Joan Baez, right? RIGHT?
Posted by: Jeff | July 31, 2008 at 03:41 PM
On the more metallic side there's Karyn Crisis. She's out of the music biz these days, AFAIK.
Posted by: hairshirthedonist | July 31, 2008 at 04:05 PM
On the more metallic side there's Karyn Crisis. She's out of the music business these days, AFAIK.
Posted by: hairshirthedonist | July 31, 2008 at 04:05 PM
Karyn Crisis.
Posted by: hairshirthedonist | July 31, 2008 at 04:07 PM
I'm only happy when it rains. Look, here comes the rain again.
Posted by: Gary Farber | July 31, 2008 at 04:09 PM
The spam filter won't let me link to google results for "Karyn Crisis," so google it yourself if you're interested in reading up on the unsung Queen of Extreme Metal.
Posted by: hairshirthedonist | July 31, 2008 at 04:09 PM
Big fun.
More PJ for y'all.
She's a woman of parts. The stuff she's doing now is nothing like any of this.
Hey, Kim Gordon
Anybody digging Cat Power?
Patti brings it all back home. Crappy sound, but the woman's a shaman. She cuts through it all.
Thanks -
Posted by: russell | July 31, 2008 at 06:57 PM
her shift to wanna-be pop diva is the outrage of the century. well, maybe not the outrage of the century... but one of them.
I read an interview with Phair in which she said that if she'd put out a more typical album and it sold as expected instead of the more commercial "Liz Phair," she'd have lost her house. So blame America for not buying enough of her albums, but don't blame her for wanting to keep her kid fed.
Posted by: Cliffy | August 01, 2008 at 12:59 PM