Welcome to the Sunday Sizzle™ where I pick 5 tracks from my past, give a little story, then move on. Here’s the inaugural playlist: I’ve also just posted each song before blabbing about it. My advice? CRANK IT.
1. CONSTANTINES “Draw Us Lines”
Is any band in the world other than Canada’s Constantines capable of a one-chord song? “Chords are expensive,” guitarist Bry Webb once said in a magazine interview. Took me a while to figure out what he went. Constantines rarely come bashing out of the gate. Like Animal Collective, patience is their greatest virtue, See also “Young Offenders,” “Little Instruments,” and “On to You. The Cons instead play verses of restraint, characterized by what Fugazi pioneered as “joined guitars.” This is where one guitar plays a two-note 7th, the other a 5th, and heard together it’s a full chord. In this context, one guitar at a time sounds sparse and rather naked, as we shall see. But back to 2005’s “Draw Us Lines,” a song consisting entirely of a G chord. Webb had hit his hippie phase, hence the opening line about Starhawk, an American Wiccan feminist, spiritualist and author. She was well-known as a theorist of feminist neopaganism and ecofeminism, as well as public street performer. But none of this is relevant why Webb screams “hey!” before each chorus.
2. FUGAZI “Long Division”
See above about Fugazi and joined guitars.
3. KYUSS “Phototropic”
This is less a song than an atmospheric experiment. No chorus, no verse. Just Part 1, 2 and 3.
4. RADIOHEAD “True Love Waits” (Live 1995 version)
I have no idea why they finally released a much more-minimal version with just Tom and an acoustic guitar on 2001’s I Might Be Wrong: Live Recordings. Then, bafflingly, they released an even more minimal version on 2016’s A Moon Shaped Pool. But that gorgeous circular synth line is why this is the best version of the song by a British kilometer.
5. WOLF PARADE “Fine Young Cannibals” (Live 2007 version)
I can’t think of an indie rock album with a more tepid response than Wolf Parade’s At Mount Zoomer (2007). This live version features a gorgeous ascending keyboard line each chorus. Perversely, the band did not keep that keyboard line, so I’ve featured it in my playlist,