ramblingsoul: Boomtown Rat Redux

Friday, December 23, 2005

Boomtown Rat Redux

This week, I'm starting a retro tribute of sorts on seminal bands/artists of the past two or three decades. Mostly because I find many existing music columns incredibly self-indulgent. I think we need less of these collaged, cut-and-paste, namedrop-this-and-that band sort of thing. Let's go back to the music.

Secondly, and honestly, because I simply miss doing music reviews. Back in the mid '90s, I maintained a column called "Boomtown Rat" in the pages of the then Gokongwei-backed Manila Times. It was good while it lasted. Hay...(the faraway look, the audible sigh).

Ehem...Anyway, I'm not saying that the write-ups here will be critical reviews, really. More of "tribute" reviews just to share the poetry and music of certain bands.

So there.

Boomtown Rat

"Philosophy is a walk on slippery rocks,
Religion is a lie in the fog..."
What I Am

Artist: Edie Brickell and the New Bohemians
Album: Ghost of a Dog

Ghost of a Dog is Edie Brickell and the New Bohemians' follow-up to the critically-acclaimed (and much loved) first album, Shooting Rubber Bands at the Stars.

While most second albums have a high suck ratio and often plays up on the pop allures and ditties of the first, this one is immediately redeemed by the intelligent lyrics and stripped-down melody. Ghost of a Dog is easily more melancholic, subdued, and poetic.

Brickell's future hubby Paul Simon and Johhny Lydon (Sex Pistols, P.I.L.) make vocal contributions to certain songs in this album. I'll leave it to you guys to find out which ones.

Choice cuts from the album are the short, folksy ones "Oak Cliff Bra" and the title track "Ghost of a Dog" and the angry "Stwisted".

My fave track is the ballad:

Me by the Sea

I'm glad no one's here just me by the sea
I'm glad no one's here to mess it up for me
I'm glad no one's here just me by the sea
But man, I wish I had a hand to hold

I saw an orange starfish on the side of a rock
I poked on his back & tried to pull him off
A crab scared me away he ran close to my toes
And man, I wish I had a hand to hold

The moon is nowhere almost time for the sun
The voice of the waves sound anciently young
I'm a prisoner of freedom ten toes in the sand
And man, I wish I had a hand to hold

I'm in the habit of being alone
I try hard to break it I can't on my own

I'm glad no one's here just me by the sea
I'm glad no one's here to mess it up for me
I'm glad no one's here just me by the sea

About Joel

Joel M. Toledo holds a Masters degree in English Studies (Poetry) from the University of the Philippines Diliman, where he likewise finished two undergraduate degrees (Journalism and Creative Writing). He has authored three books of poetry – Chiaroscuro (UST Press, 2008), The Long Lost Startle (UP Press, 2009), and Ruins and Reconstructions (Anvil Publishing, 2011). Chiaroscuro was a finalist for the 2008 National Book Awards. Toledo was the recipient of the 2006 NCCA Literary Prize, and has won several literary awards for his poetry in English, including two Don Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards, The Philippines Free Press Literary Award, The Meritage Press Poetry Prize in San Francisco, USA, and the Bridport Prize for Poetry in Dorset, United Kingdom. He was a recipient of the Rockefeller Foundation Creative Arts Residency at the Bellagio Center in Italy in March 2011 and was the Philippine representative for the 2011 International Writers Program (IWP) at the University of Iowa, USA. Toledo is the current Literary Editor of the Philippines Free Press. He teaches Literature at Miriam College.