2 posts tagged “streetlight manifesto”
7) “Somewhere in the Between”, by Streetlight Manifesto
As some of you may or may not know, ska is one of my musical weaknesses. For instance, if I were, for instance, some sort of superhero (which I’m not…), then ska would be my Kryptonite, so to speak. But that doesn’t mean I’m choosing this album because of some stupid soft spot in my heart. Quite the opposite, Streetlight Manifesto has been the target of much animosity from me for the last few years. I didn’t and never will hate them; Tomas and the gang were everything I knew for basically half of my high school days. But I began to be disenchanted with them in 2006, when (even though they had new material) they re-released “Keasbey Nights”—Catch 22’s ska-shattering debut. For those of you who aren’t too familiar with ska, Keasbey is one of the most well-known albums out there, put out by Tomas Kalnoky and the rest of Catch 22. After this, he promptly left Catch 22 to form Streetlight Manifesto and Bandits of the Acoustic Revolution. BotAR put out a mediocre EP and then went on hiatus while Kalnoky started working with Streetlight. SM put out an amazing debut, “Everything Goes Numb”, and then quickly petered off. Kalnoky, I don’t give a shit whether or not you’re a perfectionist, but five years between albums is just ridiculous! But somehow, I couldn’t walk away, and I got my hands on “Somewhere in the Between” as soon as it was released. And I listened to it, expecting a total shitty copout sophomore album, because no matter how much I love Streetlight, I really didn’t expect anything mind-blowing this time around. And now it’s number seven out of the top ten. Oops?
This album is not quite perfection, but it’s still really good, and more than a pleasing sophomore effort (the “Keasbey” re-release doesn’t count, and it never will). The most striking thing about the album for me was its lyrics. Kalnoky has always had a morbid streak in him, and “Everything Goes Numb” and “Keasbey Nights” both had death as a major theme. But these were different. Everything Goes Numb was a high schooler’s wet dream; a pseudo-intellectual album focusing on the human perception of death at the point of dying, and an anti-suicidal message. Not going to lie, it’s a great album with a great message, but at the end of it, I kept thinking to myself that Kalnoky could do so much better if he expanded his lyrical topics. Tom, I’m so glad you didn’t. “Somewhere in the Between” still talks highly about death, but from a philosophical standpoint looking at the relationship between life and death. Songs like ‘Would You Be Impressed?’ and the title track both ask what will happen to a person when they die. The past tense Kalnoky uses in ‘One Foot on the Gas, One Foot in the Grave’ is simply chilling, and ‘The Receiving End of it All’, although it is a bit pretentious, makes me nod my head in solemn agreement every time I listen to it (“You beg and plead, but no one here can save you/Why should we try when we can't quite save ourselves?”). There’s no doubt that this album is lyrically sound, and Kalnoky’s singing style, although changed, is still that unique, raspy half-scream. The horns all do their part to keep the melodies going, and the harmonies and solos scattered through every song show how talented all the members of SM are (as if Chris Thatcher didn’t show off his amazing drumming skills in “Keasbey Nights”).
The negatives on this album, although fairly small, are not beyond noting. The album has a distinctly weak closer, ‘What a Wicked Gang We Are’. From the title and everything else on the album, I expected a near-epic song that would keep the album fresh in your mind for a long time. Unfortunately, this is not the case, and ‘Somewhere in the Between’ or ‘The Receiving End of it All’ would have been much better album closers. Also, the solos and harmonies, although amazing, get annoying. Yes Tomas, you are a music major who loves to work with theory and other techniques in your music. We get it, now get some new tricks! A lot of the harmonies are either thirds or fifths, and as a music person myself, it’s rather disappointing that a guy of his caliber doesn’t try writing more complicated horn parts. They’re not displeasing, just really similar to people who are big on music theory. The final thing that bothered me about this album is the format of all the songs is despairingly similar. Songs in Somewhere in the Between come in three formats, all of which find their variation in the introduction. The songs either have a catchy drum or guitar hook, an extended horn solo, or Kalnoky singing in an actual singing voice under soft guitar. This is then followed by typical verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-chorus progression, with instrumental solos in the bridge. The songs are great, but after ten tracks it seems that the gang could have put some more thought into the structure of the album. Nevertheless, the album has a great feel, intelligent lyrics, and incredibly talented musicians; it would have to be an amazing music year for this album not to be on a ‘Best Of’ list like this.
Recommended Listening: “Down, Down, Down to Mephisto’s Café”, “One Foot on the Gas, One Foot in the Grave”, “Somewhere in the Between”, “The Receiving End of it All”.
Okay, so here goes one of my first anecdotes. I'll try to make it a relative quickie, because I'd like to get a bit of sleep tonight after the horrible episodes I underwent today.
Today was supposed to be the best day of the weekend. I had all of my immediate homework done, a work schedule where I didn't have to wake up until noon, and a loving mother who was going to come up to Bard, visit me, and give me money/real food. What I wouldn't give to have any one of those things happen at any given time, let alone all within 24 hours of each other. Of course, as it's been said, the best laid plans of James Blake always go awry, and today's was no exception. I woke up from a semi-drunken stupor at about 10:30, and didn't feel the need to go back to sleep. That's right, in the first five seconds of my consciousness, I somehow destroyed one of the many beautiful events of my day: I didn't want to sleep in. I wasn't complaining at the time, but now that it's 12:30 AM, I'm starting to grumble inwardly, which might also be caused by a lack of food...
Anyways, I'm up at 10:30, so I decide to go get myself some breakfast at Kline. They have to have good food for parents' weekend, right? The whole desire-to-impress deal has to come into effect in the food, which is probably one of the most miserable items on campus. Yet again, wrong. After trudging 10 minutes in the grisly downpour that generally symbolized today, I got to Kline to discover they hadn't done shit about their food. It was still the same old shit, but they decided to put away some of their less delectable items, such as their "Tangy Tofu". It was the cream of the crap, so to speak. Being the genius I am, I decided not to waste my entire trip up by not eating, and I grabbed an entire bowl of Fruit Loops! After downing the part of this completely unhealthy breakfast with water-milk, I made the 10-minute trudge back soaked to the bone, and checked my e-mail.
At 12:15 PM, I realized that my mom had sent me an e-mail, in which she expressed her excitement at some of the parent/student activities going on that weekend. And then there was a but. There's always a but in these sort of things. In this case, the but was that she didn't want to drive five hours in the rain 'just' to see me, and that she'd come up some other time. At 12:16 PM, I realized that, of course, my dad had told her not to go, and, of course, my mom had complied like the feeble puppet she is. Let me clarify something here; I detest my family as a whole, and wish nothing less than their complete and total destruction. My father is a manipulative, lazy, greedy bastard who doesn't give a shit about anything or anyone but himself. My brother is a lazy idiot who spends more time playing video games then caring about the classes he's failing in his sophomore year of high school. And my mom, well, my mom's great. She cares, she listens, and she understands the things I choose to do...when she's not around my dad. When my dad has even one word to say about a topic, my mom doesn't care, turns a deaf ear, and castrates even my right to be heard in the family. Naturally, I was incredibly excited about seeing just my mother for the weekend; my dad (alas) had gotten caught up in yet another one of my brother's failed attempts to fill my shoes.
Then it started raining, and my dad just used it as an excuse not to see me. Of course, my brother can go be driven an hour each way to do a Scout thing that he'd just slack off during; dad's in charge of that. But let poor old mom get behind the wheel for 5 hours total to see little old me for 10 hours for the last time before Thanksgiving? 'Feh, let the bastard rot there' is my dad's general philosophy. I'm not joking, either. The night before I left for college, he literally told me that that night was the last chance I had to pack my bags and leave forever. That's almost word-for-word what he said. But enough about dad. I was more pissed that my mom had bowed to his will yet again, and in doing so, ruined my day. Everybody else at the dorm was doing stuff with family today, so I was going to be alone for the rest of the day if I chose to stay there. Alone in my room with nothing to do, because, like the genius I am, I got homework out of the way to see my mom. So at about 12:20, I quietly started plotting my revenge.
This revenge would manifest itself a lot sooner than I would ever have thought. At 12:23, my friend Dan started talking to me about a concert at his college. He commutes from home to Montclair State University, and is majoring in music education. The concert in question was called "Oc-TUBA-fest", and was a celebration of our favorite instrument, (you guessed it) the tuba. I responded to him with jealousy, saying that I'd give an arm and a leg to see that show. "Well, why don't you take the train down here, see it, crash at my place, and go back to Bard Sunday?" he queried. And so, at12:25 the dice were cast.
The plan was so: I would ask to get the last half hour/hour of my shift off so I could grab a 4:00 train into the city at 5:55, changeover at a 6:10 train, and get to South Orange at 6:45, where I would be picked up and go to the 8:00 concert with Dan. I ran like a madman through the rain to the gym to get in contact with the lifeguard who would take my shift, and after being soaked from head to toe and shivering, I had the shift off. I was going home, and I was going to bring pneumonia with me. It was supposed to be fantastic.
Of course, it wasn't. I packed, went to lifeguarding, got off, and eagerly rushed to get my ride to the train station. I got on the train, which was 10 minutes late, and got antsy around 5:40, when we pulled into Yonkers. We were still about 20 minutes off from Penn Station, and as a relative newbie to changeovers in the station, I had no idea where to go. I figured that a 15-20 minute gap would be fine, but with the current schedule, I'd be lucky to get a 5 minute gap. At 6:00, as we rolled through upper Manhattan, I had one hand on my cellphone and the other on my bag. The train got into the station at exactly 6:07, and I practically sprinted out and up the escalator to try and find a quick-ticket window and get my sad, sopping ass to Jersey. By some ill-founded miracle (what God in their right mind would help me?), the ticket machines were literally right in front of the escalator's top, and so was a train schedule. The Dover line, which went through South Orange, just started boarding, so I had to hurry my ass up. I muttered curses to myself to the amusement of the passersby while punching in factors of my journey, when a man walked up to me. He was a short-ish, but incredibly stocky black gentlemen who greeted me as I was putting my credit card in. After I'd fucked up the direction twice, he asked me if I had any money I could give him, to "help a brother out" (not being racist, that's the exact terminology he used).
I calmly explained that I was really late for a train as I got the credit card right, but he persisted. I finally caved. "How much do you need?" I asked impatiently, opening my heart and my wallet to him. "Ten bucks would be fine, man." he said calmly to me as I punched in the final details and waited for my ticket to print. "I only have six I can give, sir," I said, shelling out the only small change in my wallet. Unfortunately, I shelled out too obviously, and revealed a series of 20-dollar bills. Big, big mistake. "C'mon man," he said, taking an ID card out of his pocket. I flinched as his hand went in. "I just got out of prison, man. Did ten years, hard time. How about that twenty, man?"
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I was being mugged through veiled threats in the middle of Penn Station as the soothing voice interrupted classical music on the PA to say "Last call boarding for the Dover line on Track 1..." And as my ticket dropped from the machine, I gave him the 20 and tried to suppress my disgust for the entire human race as he pounded my fist and said "Thanks, bro. You made a good choice." And, taking the twenty-six dollars I had foolishly given him, walked away.
Resignedly, I sprinted to the train, caught it, and went to South Orange. I had twenty dollars left to my name, but goddammit, I had made the train in 4 minutes, and I was going to see some amazing tuba antics. And see some amazing tuba antics I did, but nothing could prepare me for the hell that was the grand finale of my night. Dan neglected to tell me that he actually had a trombone lesson tomorrow morning, but he'd made sure to tell his parents who keep him on an incredibly taut leash. Lesson in the morning plus orchestra practice in the afternoon equals no friends over for the night. James can go sleep at his own house...or can he?
Dan drove me to my house in silence, where the lights appeared to be on and all appeared to be well. Alas, that was not the case. My bastard father was asleep in front of the TV, and nobody else was anywhere to be seen. I got as far as the sun-room as Dan pulled away, and then was confronted with the problem of locked doors. Great, everybody's sleeping, I'm locked out of my house, I've been mugged, and my knight in shining armor just drove out of my life in a '92 Toyota pickup. I'm on the last dregs of my battery as I type this, but let's just say the garage isn't as warm as the house could be.
What in any deity's name made me think that tonight would work, even in the smallest part? My mom's not going to be happy to see me; I'm just going to get bitched out for not telling them, losing my money, and wasting money on the train. Then I'm going to get bitched out for making them drive me back, because I sure as hell am not going to be allowed to take the train.
My message of the day to you: Don't trust your impulses. Ever. I don't think there's ever been a case, at least in my experience, where acting on your impulses has led to a positive outcome.
Also, the new Streetlight Manifesto album has apparently found its way onto the tubes. The link (links aren't illegal, yay!) is here. Enjoy, if that's your thing. I hear that it's really good, and really intense. Knowing Tomas and Streetlight, it'll probably make my top 10 list at the end of this year.
Until Sunday, when I'll have stories.
-blake.
