Jarrett House North

At Art of the Mix: Sting Sundries. This one goes back a ways: 18 years, to be exact.

I was just getting started in pop music and was discovering the wonder of the b-side. Since I only listened to a handful of artists and since Sting’s 1987 release “…Nothing like the Sun” was in the process of rocking my world, I was seeking out Sting singles for the b-sides. I found two: the 12″ vinyl of “We’ll Be Together” and the CD3 of “Englishman in New York.” I subsequently went crazy trying to figure out how to get the CD3 to play so I could tape it. You could buy an adapter to make it a 5” disc, but the adapter wouldn’t work in my parents’ CD player so I had to beg friends to let me see if it would play in theirs. I finally managed to tape the songs and in my infinite wisdom sold the CD3 some years later. At least I still have the vinyl.

I filled half a 60 minute tape with Sting rarities and shared it with Fury, who filled the other side with Dream of the Blue Turtles era b-sides and cuts from the Eberhard Schoener album Video Magic. I was hooked. I still have the tape.

Fast forward: many b-sides and the Internet later, I’m still missing five of the songs on the original tape in digital form but decided to release an updated version anyway with some newer rarities added in, including prototype cuts from Strontium 90, the band in which Sting met Andy Summers and Stewart Copeland, and a 1978 single from Sting with a backing band called the Radioactors. For those missing five songs, including the ten-minute version of “Up From the Skies” recorded in the studio with Gil Evans’ band, I’ll have to keep looking.

So much to write about and so little time! I’ll update about Lisa’s new car later, but for now here’s a completely indecipherable list of what’s on my iPod today:

1. Stafrænn Hákon, “Tætir rækju” (Skvettir edik á ref)
2. Anonymous 4, “A mundi domina” (A Star in the East)
3. David Byrne, “U.B. Jesus” (Look Into the Eyeball)
4. Loretta Lynn, “Little Red Shoes” (Van Lear Rose)
5. The Breeders, “Mad Lucas” (Last Splash)
6. Jane’s Addiction, “Up the Beach” (Nothing’s Shocking)
7. Vic Gammon, “Bring Us In Good Ale” (The Tale of Ale)
8. Peter Gabriel, “Stigmata” (Passion)
9. Pavement, “Starlings of the Slipstream” (Brighten the Corners)
10. Grandaddy, “Gentle Spike Resort” (Concrete Dunes)

Here we go again, with a journey down the twisty little roads of my iPod:

1. Sloan E-52s, “Son of a Preacher Man” (2001-2002)
2. Yo La Tengo, “Autumn Sweater (Remix by Kevin Shields)” (A Smattering of Outtakes and Rarities)
3. Billy Bragg and Wilco, “Ingrid Bergman” (Mermaid Avenue)
4. Steve Reich Ensemble, “City Life III ‘It’s been a honeymoon – Can’t take no mo’” (City Life)
5. Tom Waits, “Lost in the Harbor” (Alice)
6. Elvis Costello and the London Symphony Orchestra, “Tormentress” (Il Sogno)
7. Pulp with the Swingle Singers, “My Body May Die” (Randall and Hopkirk Soundtrack)
8. Early Music Ensemble of London, “Christe, Qui Lux Es” (Guilliame de Machaut), Music of the Gothic Era)
9. Run-DMC, “My Adidas” (Raising Hell)
10. Cat Power, “Back of Your Head” (Moon Pix)

This is why pressing Shuffle on any musical device I own is a little dangerous.

I pressed play on the new Arab Strap and was immediately transported—to the standout track on the last Reindeer Section album, a song called “Whodunnit.” Surprising? Not really. The guest vocalist on that track, which was a prickly pear among the mannered (and wonderful) songs from Snow Patrol frontman Gary Lightbody’s Scots supergroup, was Aidan Moffat, the vocalist for Scots band Arab Strap. And once you hear Moffat, you never forget.

As on that release, with The Last Romance it’s that voice that hits you first, that unmistakable Scots slur that lies somewhere between Bob Dylan and Dylan Thomas after a bender. Moffat has one of the great distinct voices in indie music right now, on first listen a mix of mumble, weird Scots, and hangover-perfect enunciation. The great part is that in spite of the apparent defects, Moffat is a master of delivery, with impeccable phrasing, emotionally expressive diction, and a well-concealed melodic sense that leaves the songs stuck in your head long after they’ve stopped playing.

Of course, the other half of Arab Strap, multi-instrumentalist Malcolm Middleton, has a lot to do with the memorableness of the songs. Songscapes as bleak as anything in Mogwai or 1980s-era The Cure drift around Moffat’s woozy vocals in the desperately driving “If There’s No Hope for Us,” the opening depressive waltz “Stink,” or the bitter rocker “Speed Date.”

But the record isn’t one-note simple. The cautious optimism of “Don’t Ask Me to Dance” has the scope of a Peter Gabriel uptempo ballad with lyrics that could be by Johnny Cash, while the acoustic “Confessions of a Big Brother” is positively tender even through the bitter confessions of the narrator’s failings. And “There Is No Ending” is a fine ending indeed, complete with major key, a horn section, and one of the greatest declarations of love ever: “If you can love my growing gut/My rotten teeth and greying hair/Then I can guarantee I’ll do/The same as long as you can bear.”

It’s early in 2006, but this is definitely one of the top releases of the year.

Also published on Blogcritics.