|
 |
by stephen cody Artist and Album: Broken Social Scene You Forgot it in People (Arts & Crafts) Cheese: Peluso's Tomales Bay Teleme Bread: Grace Baking Pugliese Italian Country Bread 
As promised, I'm back with some teleme. This is one of my favorite cheeses. It's similar to a Monterey jack, but it has a much softer consistency. Very creamy texture and flavor, with a faint rennet bite at the end. A pleasing aftertaste. Much like Broken Social Scene's album "You Forgot it in People." The album starts off a little rough with "capture the flag", but it really hits its stride with "kc accidental" and "stars and sons". "Stars and sons" is the kind of music Sonic Youth would make if they could control their feedback or tune their guitars better. Don't get me wrong, I like Sonic Youth, but there are some interesting possibilities for them if they would stop acting like Patti Smith and Lou Reed drunkenly jamming in 1976. Whatever happened to Daydream Nation? But I digress... 
The bread I'm using tonight is an old standby Grace Baking's Pugliese Italian Country Bread. A nice, soft crust and doughy complexion, this bread falls right between a sour and sweet batard and provides a wonderful foil for just about any cheese. The teleme is soft enough to be spread, but also firm enough to be cut into slices without going all over the place. Track four, "almost crimes (radio kills remix)" sounds a lot like the music I hear when I'm frantically cleaning my apartment or just digging through a stranger's belongings. All this talk about cleaning and digging has made me thirsty, so I've decided to cleanse my palate with a nice COLD BUDWEISER. There is something about an ice cold Budweiser fresh out of the bottle that really hits the spot on a warm night like tonight.
I may have to have several. Track 5 gets nice and mellow. It's called "looks just like the sun" and it takes a casual detour from the rocky roads the album began upon. I'm glad Mike 2 recommended this album at Amoeba today these are exactly the kind of recommendations I look for from Frankie which he can never come up with when I need them. When I'm over at Frankie's house, or actually anyone's house that has a CD collection, Frankie will play a brilliant array of albums, each cascading over the previous in terms of greatness. He'll know every chord change; he'll mime every climb up the neck of the bass line; he'll rock his head back with every cymbal crash. He'll know who the band is, the name of the CD, every band the band members used to be in, and which song on the album is "the best song ever." Odds are he'll play several CDs you've never heard of. Then, when you're in front of Amoeba and ask him for a recommendation, he'll just shrug his shoulders and act like he's never been in a record store before. If I had to film such a scene in a movie, a song I'd have to consider using would be track 6 "pacific theme". It reminds me of the kind of song I'd hear on the radio if I was trapped in the world of Three's Company and Jack Tripper is driving, and I'm riding in the backseat and we're both stoned out of our minds. The sun is just past high noon, and it's Highway 1. And the day goes on, and the sun sets as the song ends. John Ritter really was a brilliant comedian, although I must confess I've never watched his new sitcom. I was thinking the only way they can save that thing without him would be to have Jerry Seinfeld suddenly appear as a long lost uncle, and they could change the name of it to "Eight Simple Rules for Dating my Niece." ABC, if you're listening, please consider it. I don't think Jerry is that into NBC anyway. "pacific theme" fades into "anthems for a seventeen year-old girl". Very pretty distant violins and hushed harmonized vocals that get better the further the song goes along. This is mix-tape worthy! A great highlight, and as the CD packaging is condescending enough to point out, this would be the end of side one if I were listening to it on vinyl. 
I missed track 8 because my drunken neighbors came over with a chilled bottle of 145 proof absinthe that they brought back from Paraguay. Tasted vaguely like Jagermeister, only more subtle, and definitely had that old 151 proof burn going down. This is the official stuff with wormwood, but I personally don't know what wormwood does or why it made Edgar Allen Poe or whoever go bonkers. It certainly had a nick kick. Track 9, "late nineties bedroom rock for the missionaries" sounds a lot like what I was playing in my bedroom in the late 90's. Bits of guitar noodling and sporadic drums. This is actually better formed than most of the stuff I played, but whatever. Back to the cheese.
I think Teleme is just screaming for a bit of basil; I also feel that this would make a wonderful compliment to smoked salmon and finely diced red onions. It's Italian enough to have some Mediterranean zest, but not enough to be threatening sort of like Tony Danza. 
Track 9 fades smoothly into track 10, "shampoo suicide", a title I really wish I had thought of for a song or movie or even this column. It's pretty and droney, like a beautiful girl on drugs who keeps nodding off. But it keeps building, sort of like a pretty girl on drugs who keeps nodding off but seems to be getting closer and closer to throwing up all over the kitchen. Nice groove, good high-hat action melding with the piano.
Track 11 starts off sounding like a song by Pulp, but the singing changes that moment... This is a drinking song or a love song depending on if you're in love or if you're drinking alone. Thank god people keep writing drinking songs. It's called "lover's spit", which is the perfect title for it. I'm out of Teleme. If you like Monterey Jack, I can assure you that you'll love Peluso's Teleme. It just dawned on me how perfect this would be in an omelet, especially a really uppity one with shitake mushrooms and shallots. Track 12, "I'm still your fag" goes back in to that late 70's vibe outlined in pacific theme, but to a lesser extent. It's probably due to that horn solo and the generally mellow instrumentation. The final track, "pitter patter goes my heart" brings the strings back in droves. Wonderful harmonization and fullness, the first minute sounds like a well conducted quartet. The drums start coming in and push the song into something that feels important and emotionally powerful... and then it stops. We're returned back to an endless atmospheric melding of strings and bass, and the song fades and ends. Great album. Final Grades: Arts and Album: Broken Social Scene You Forgot it in People: A- Cheese: Peluso's Tomales Bay Teleme: A- Bread: Grace Baking Pugliese Italian Country Bread: A Please feel free to write me at StephenCody2002@yahoo.com if you have any questions, comments, or requests. All cheeses, albums and singles are fair game but the more elitist, the better. I prefer to write about singles, but albums are fun as well. |
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| lunchboxing.com 2003 | all content © | all rights reserved | suck it so hard | feel the rhythm of the night |
