“I’m glad people like ‘Eureka’,” he says, “but to me it’s a very sad record. I still meet people and they’re like, ‘I played it at my wedding, it’s so happy’, and I’m like, ‘Oh my God! People think it’s some happy, good-time record.’ So therefore, I failed. I don’t want people to be happy when they listen to my music."
good. i love this. jim o continues to rule my universe
― flappy bird, Tuesday, 26 May 2015 18:49 (nine years ago) link
Hah hah. I have literally never met anyone who merely thought "it's so happy" about Jim's lyric-based music. I mean, I don't think he is lying, it is just funny to imagine who these people are.
― grandavis, Tuesday, 26 May 2015 18:54 (nine years ago) link
Loud popping on the first few minutes - yep. Mine jumps there too.
― kraudive, Tuesday, 26 May 2015 21:18 (nine years ago) link
I'm trying to think of which Eureka song would make any sense at a wedding... "Please Patronize Our Sponsors"?
― Jersey Al (Albert R. Broccoli), Tuesday, 26 May 2015 21:24 (nine years ago) link
most of eureka would make sense at a wedding as long as you don't listen to the words
― flappy bird, Wednesday, 27 May 2015 18:23 (nine years ago) link
i mean, that nasty SNL sax solo on 'Through the Night Softly'? that's 2am running around with a lampshade on your head music!
― flappy bird, Wednesday, 27 May 2015 18:24 (nine years ago) link
love the record but listening to the digital version on cans makes me feel like i need to pop my ears
― diamonddave85 (diamonddave85), Wednesday, 27 May 2015 18:43 (nine years ago) link
the vocals sound as if they're being broadcast on the radio, with that sort of fizzy compression. it's not that bad, but it sorta sounds odd. kinda dig the filtering he's got going on, with some of the piano on track three.
― braunld (Lowell N. Behold'n), Wednesday, 27 May 2015 18:54 (nine years ago) link
'through the night softly' was used for an Embassy Suites commercial. The early piano instrumental on Sam Prekop's first s/t album was used for a Tylenol commercial.
― braunld (Lowell N. Behold'n), Wednesday, 27 May 2015 18:55 (nine years ago) link
there's a '70s dadrock vibe on some of this that i am enjoying. maybe "dadrock" isn't the right term. like MOR rock that's only vaguely proggy but not rootsy either. like supertramp or something. mostly in the textures. o'rourke is the consummate allusive musician (all of his "pop" records seem like they are consciously evoking some bygone--and often out-of-fashion--style) so this doesn't surprise me.
the compression on this album (esp. the vocals) is weird, it often sounds like a thin low-bitrate MP3 even when I'm playing it from CD. o'rourke is a masterful sound engineer (among other things) so whatever effects are on here i'm assuming are deliberate. but there are some odd choices, almost like a rough mix, or like o'rourke was taking the piss on his own record (which also would not surprise me).
― he quipped with heat (amateurist), Friday, 29 May 2015 19:38 (nine years ago) link
btw since all his other "pop" albums are named after (or in reference to) nic roeg films, what's this one a reference to? or has he abandoned that?
― he quipped with heat (amateurist), Friday, 29 May 2015 19:39 (nine years ago) link
ah i just skimmed the online uncut interview. i guess a reference point was genesis. makes sense. listening to "last year" again, i guess i underestimated the progginess of this new one.
― he quipped with heat (amateurist), Friday, 29 May 2015 19:42 (nine years ago) link
o'rourke is obviously a sunuvabitch (i have some stories i probably shouldn't mention here, but they don't differ in essence from a million other stories that have been shared here and elsewhere) but for me he's been something like guiding star for a long time (20 years!), in terms of the expansiveness (and strangeness) of his sensibilities.
― he quipped with heat (amateurist), Friday, 29 May 2015 19:44 (nine years ago) link
weird that people get that general idea about him when he comes across as incredibly gracious and affable in that recent interview posted above:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3z8twRBz24
― linee, Friday, 29 May 2015 23:41 (nine years ago) link
well, yeah, like a lot of people, he contains multitudes
― he quipped with heat (amateurist), Saturday, 30 May 2015 14:42 (nine years ago) link
well yeah, i just think it's interesting that he's got that reputation in the media when it seems like every interview i've heard or read with him gives me the opposite impression. almost feels like with what he's addressing in that interview with people mistaking his unreliable-narrator voice in insignificance as being "him" or everyone assuming he's working in the film industry in japan.
not claiming to have any inside route to him as a person in general.
― linee, Saturday, 30 May 2015 21:34 (nine years ago) link
that interview feels really stilted. interviewer sounds oddly impatient/bored.
― braunld (Lowell N. Behold'n), Saturday, 30 May 2015 22:41 (nine years ago) link
yeah exactly, that's what makes o'rourke seem completely unlike the cantankerous/curmudgeonly person i'd been lead to believe he was. sounds like he's being interviewed by a 15 year-old for their school newspaper and he's actually actively trying to help the clueless guy out and entertaining all these drab questions.
― linee, Saturday, 30 May 2015 22:50 (nine years ago) link
yeah, interview is odd, and o'rourke seems nice (if very nerdy).
― he quipped with heat (amateurist), Sunday, 31 May 2015 19:02 (nine years ago) link
Hotel Blue sounding right today, haven't played this album in months. Also, don't understand the complaints about 'out of tune' bowed cymbals on The Visitor.. everything sounds in order, functional, on the album. Still love the 12 minute mark, or maybe it's 12'30"...
― braunld (Lowell N. Behold'n), Saturday, 12 September 2015 20:33 (nine years ago) link
"functional": exactly. it's a showreel extravaganza. not out of tune. just always imagine a better key for that passage. "better" is a subjective judgement. y'all free to love the key it's in.
― massaman gai, Sunday, 13 September 2015 14:00 (nine years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=olXUf4dDLS4
― sʌxihɔːl (Ward Fowler), Sunday, 13 September 2015 21:07 (nine years ago) link
Wow the bit he plays starting at 8:57 sounds a lot like one of my own:
https://soundcloud.com/factual-1/open
― Evan, Monday, 14 September 2015 04:01 (nine years ago) link
Now you just need a masked wrestler to preface your work with a personalized SWOT analysis.
― doug watson, Monday, 14 September 2015 12:59 (nine years ago) link
fuck
does anyone live in Tokyo?
http://www.tinymixtapes.com/news/jim-orourke-perform-simple-songs-and-bad-timing-their-entirety
― flappy bird, Thursday, 1 October 2015 17:45 (nine years ago) link
recent live showhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sM1RGmBQjwwsounds great, wonder if a world tour is in the works? :P apparently he's got a solo acoustic LP coming out next year on VDSQ which is good news.
― tylerw, Thursday, 1 October 2015 17:49 (nine years ago) link
all downhill from here live!!! fuck
― flappy bird, Thursday, 1 October 2015 18:39 (nine years ago) link
Thanks Tyler, that sounds great - really like the pretty droney swirly interlude about ten minutes in - very Dark Star! I miss this kind of stuff on Simple Songs.
Another slightly dispiriting interview here:http://bombmagazine.org/article/9761825/jim-o-rourke
― sʌxihɔːl (Ward Fowler), Thursday, 1 October 2015 19:34 (nine years ago) link
Whoa, acoustic album eh? Would not have thought that was coming. Nice.
― grandavis, Thursday, 1 October 2015 19:37 (nine years ago) link
Also, I am pretty sure that at this point I am not interested in hearing Jim talk about his own work. It just ... does not help.
― grandavis, Thursday, 1 October 2015 19:38 (nine years ago) link
haha yeah... no idea what to expect about the solo acoustic thing. for some reason i kind of doubt it'll be along the lines of the solo playing on bad timing, but who knows?
― tylerw, Thursday, 1 October 2015 19:43 (nine years ago) link
he sounds like such a miserable bastard
― on entre O.K. on sort K.O. (man alive), Thursday, 1 October 2015 20:59 (nine years ago) link
he sounds happy :)
― flappy bird, Thursday, 1 October 2015 23:19 (nine years ago) link
god this performance is amazing
― flappy bird, Thursday, 8 October 2015 22:39 (eight years ago) link
Three recent collabs here: (oh this looks so tempting)
― EvR, Tuesday, 20 October 2015 15:48 (eight years ago) link
oh holy SHIT
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xizxQ8L78T8
― flappy bird, Monday, 9 May 2016 01:35 (eight years ago) link
i cant believe these were just sitting on youtube for 9 months before i saw them. super raunchy version of halfway to a threeway
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OeKCOaRPflY
― flappy bird, Monday, 9 May 2016 01:42 (eight years ago) link
Never pegged him for a Dylan fan, but JO covers Sad Eyed Lady on this new Mojo giveaway CD:
http://www.mojo4music.com/23985/mojo-celebrates-bob-dylans-blonde-on-blonde/
― Chicamaw (Ward Fowler), Tuesday, 24 May 2016 13:21 (eight years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTDDdnKWxDcsynth patches by Jim O'Rourke
― EvR, Monday, 3 October 2016 20:36 (eight years ago) link
Cool retrospective review of Bad Timing by Mark Richardson: http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/22870-bad-timing/
This seesaw between mischievous subversion and slack-jawed beauty is the key to O’Rourke’s best music. His sense of humor is both generous and slightly dark; there’s irony in his touch, but it’s not a negating one. It’s more about being open to hearing every possibility in a given piece of music. In a 2001 interview O’Rourke was asked if Bad Timing had an element of parody. “Not a parody at all, or infatuation, it’s more like trying to reconcile what is imagined, learned, real, and imaginary.” And then he added, “Is it really that impossible to believe that something can be funny and sincere at the same time?”
― flappy bird, Monday, 13 February 2017 00:08 (seven years ago) link
UMMMM THIS IS NEW
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vca6NLVKYrI
― flappy bird, Saturday, 11 March 2017 06:23 (seven years ago) link
^full band
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGr-BadCPHQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llkXDZ4w3IM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kX4ivPin3U
― flappy bird, Saturday, 11 March 2017 06:25 (seven years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-AO4OPCjTuU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSdB29FlILc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4hNo1vKyOM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bg72sUd6w3I
― flappy bird, Saturday, 11 March 2017 06:26 (seven years ago) link
Woah!
― Le Bateau Ivre, Saturday, 11 March 2017 12:01 (seven years ago) link
I was at that show! So great.
― Michael Jones, Saturday, 11 March 2017 12:50 (seven years ago) link
Lots of video from this tour on youtube, this was uploaded 10 years ago:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2c2XblYcOc
― Jersey Al (Albert R. Broccoli), Saturday, 11 March 2017 15:25 (seven years ago) link
Yeah those are the only live recordings I'd heard or seen before last year when a proshot video of full band Not Sport, Marital Art and Halfway to a Threeway showed up on YouTube. Having even more full band live versions of the Roeg records is blowing my mind.
― flappy bird, Saturday, 11 March 2017 21:47 (seven years ago) link
New album with Kassel Jaeger (sp?) on Mego is truly gorgeous and strange and one of my favorite things this year.
― Acid Hose (Capitaine Jay Vee), Sunday, 12 March 2017 01:31 (seven years ago) link
already posted this in another thread but it needs to be seen - Jim singing karaoke of "Thanks But No Thanks" by Sparks in 2000. Thurston on Casio.
22:52https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_yuTYi4xpM
― flappy bird, Saturday, 29 April 2017 00:16 (seven years ago) link
I never got into the Sparks but that is a very good impression with showmanship
― the ghost of lorax past (FlopsyDuck), Sunday, 30 April 2017 19:05 (seven years ago) link