Thursday, July 12, 2007

These Blondes, They Don't Dick Around.

"I feel like C.C. Baxter in Wilder's 'Apartment',
That particular arrangement just came out of the blue
And who was it who sang 'I know that you love one
So why can't you love two?'
I was in full-time education when I got scared of the future
And I've only got a job so I don't disappoint my mother
It's like I've painted myself into a social corner
Well, that's what happens when you listen to
Saint Scott Walker
On headphones
On the bus.
"

Those words as mewled by The Long Blondes in the coda of "You Could Have Both" cut straight to my quick today much in the way that Pulp's "Common People" did back in the heady days of 1998 when I was in grad school and wrestling with class issues or much in the way that the mopey, autumnal stanzas of "These Days" stroked my malaise back in 1991, back when I imagined myself to be some sort of doomed love-struck Romeo. Yeah, I fancied myself the sweaty, spastic Henry Miller of my particular set of friends (barflies all of them) and yet I got laid rarely (imagine that).

I had a fairly agitated imagination.

What I like most about The Long Blondes is that they have this whole Faye Dunaway noir femme fatale aesthetic so figured out both visually and aurally which makes for some of the most seductive pop/rock to have diddled my ear-holes since Blondie's 'Plastic Letters'. Check out "Weekend Without Makeup". How classic is this song and how lethal is lead Long Blonde Kate Jackson?



Concrete Blonde has been weirdly dismissed by many as being an early 90's one-hit wonder, faux-goth fluke ("Joey" and to a lesser degree: "Still In Hollywood") but check out lead singer Johnette Napolitano's chest-tightening video/ single which dropped just a year ago last month: "Scarred".



I wake up just like that every morning, btw (apnea).

And here's a pair of footloose blondes bonding on the set over knives and plastic spatulas:

1 comment:

Martin said...

Fuck, the ending of the Johnette video scared the shit out of me. I like the song. Will any radio station play that ever? I always like her sludgy version of the Carpenters' "Hurting Each Other".