Dead and Lovely - Real Gone [323]

Dominic is back with Sam and Martin, thinking about both the beauty and exploitation-of-beauty that this song contains, and considering how it compares with the traditions of murder ballads. 

Music extracts used for illustrative/review purposes include:
Dead and Lovely, Real Gone (remastered), Tom Waits (2004/2017)

Dead and Lovely, Real Gone (original), Tom Waits (2004)

Long Black Veil, single, Jenny Owen Youngs (2017)

Long Black Veil, single, Lefty Frizzell (1959)

Long Black Veil, Music From Big Pink, The Band (1968)

The Long Black Veil, The Long Black Veil, The Chieftains / Mick Jagger (1995)

The Long Black Veil, Orange Blossom Special, Johnny Cash (1965)

The Suspicious Death Of Carol Wayne, Facts Verse, via YouTube (2021)

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Bram Stoker's Dracula (film, dir. Coppola, 1992) [F12]

For the last episode of our 2020 film mini-season, we welcome back Helen Zaltzman and Jenny Owen Youngs (of The Allusionist, Buffering The Vampire Slayer, and Veronica Mars Investigates) for a somewhat contentious discussion of this vampire-staple retelling. With some strong feelings and heavy levels of confusion, as well as a solo outing by Sam as guy-who-can-find-a-positive-in-almost-anything, Song by Song… well, we kind of get this one out of the way. Sorry to all the big fans, we did our best to find a balanced response, it just wasn't loved OK WHAT'S NEXT?

Music extracts used for illustrative/review purposes include:
Dracula Trailer, via YouTube (dir. Francis Ford Coppola 1992)

The Costumes Are The Sets - the design of Eiko Ishioka (via YouTube)

In Camera - the naive visual effects of Bram Stoker's Dracula (via YouTube)

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In the Colosseum - Bone Machine [196]

For this bread-and-circus-iest (breadiest and circusiest?) of tracks, guest host Jenny Owen Youngs comes out strong for Waits and his political diatribe... while Sam and Martin are more equivocal.

Music extracts used for illustrative/review purposes include:
In the Colosseum, Bone Machine, Tom Waits (1992)

Pretend We're Dead, Bricks Are Heavy, L7 (1992)

Pretend We're Dead, live on The Word, via YouTube (1992)

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A Little Rain - Bone Machine [195]

Amateur meteorologist and part-time Muppet Tom Waits takes another stab at bleak reportage in this song about loss and the threat to childhood. Jenny Owen Youngs returns for another discussion around Randy Newman, Django Reinhardt and our old friend the Smooth Marble Egg.

Music extracts used for illustrative/review purposes include:
A Little Rain, Bone Machine, Tom Waits (1992)

I Think It's Going To Rain Today, Randy Newman, Randy Newman (1968)

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Jesus Gonna Be Here - Bone Machine [194]

Our latest guest-host Jenny Owen Youngs joins us as Waits goes full-spiritual for this street-corner preacher scream. We chat about ironic or revolutionary attitudes to religion in LA and Scotland, some of our own religious experiences in music, and the role of coughing in exorcisms.

Music extracts used for illustrative/review purposes include:
Jesus Gonna Be Here, Bone Machine, Tom Waits (1992)

Jesus Wants Me For A Sunbeam, Enter The Vaselines, The Vaselines (1987/2009)

Jesus Doesn't Want Me For A Sunbeam, MTV Unplugged in New York, Nirvana (1994)

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