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A Look at “Saturday Nights & Sunday Mornings”

When you have a friend that you’ve known long enough, you know when they’re being insincere. Basically, you can tell when they’re bullshitting you. No matter how hard they try to cover it up and spin in, you can look into their eyes and tell “you don’t mean that”, and you’re insulting us both by lying.

You can see it in today’s music. Sometimes on purpose, sometimes on accident. When musicians are under contract to make X albums, they have to do it. Or when they are commissioned to write a song for specifically for a movie soundtrack, they do it. If you listen to the lyrics, watch the way the songs are performed, and just say “how does this feel”, you can tell. Take Jay-Z for example. Watch the videos for 99 problems, then Blue Magic done for American Gangster. You can feel the sincerety in the first and the obligatory stuff in the second. Get past the catchyness of the song you’re listening to and you can feel how sincere the person singing it is. When Chad Kruger belts out “I wanna be a rock star” he really hopes he will get there one day, and who knows, maybe he will.

I’ve been listening to the new Counting Crows album Saturday Nights and Sunday Mornings (while I’ve already mentioned how much I was looking forward to). Despite a Best Of Album and an Oscar-Nominated Top 40 hit, there hasn’t been a new Crows album in six years. And six years is a long time for an active, touring band to not record an album of any sort.

However, I can assure you that it has been worth the wait. A lot can happen in six years and this album is a true reflection of that. It tells the tale of what happens when you are just reckless, you get drunk, fuck things up, do things for all the wrong reasons and come the morning time you try to pick up the pieces and move on. Unlike what we heard with Accidentally in Love, this is some of the most sincere stuff I’ve heard Adam (Duritz) sing. His lyrics are strong and heartfelt.

As bands get bigger, the subject of their songs changes, and it becomes more about making a hit record then it does about the music. When you are first starting, you do it for the music, you throw your sound out there and hope someone picks it up, which is what they did with their now famously called “Flying Demos” album and even on August. But with Recovering the Satellites, This Desert Life, and Hard Candy behind them, the Crows now have enough staying power to truely do what they want as far as a record goes. I’m not dismissing their other work by any stretch, but this album is as sincere as any other words you have ever heard. It speaks honestly, from the heart, and in a very powerful tone.

I get the same feeling listening to this then I do with August although the albums themselves are very different. It is the feeling of the album being so honest that is done so well here and helps me to draw the parallel. There are also a few lyrics throughout the album that are similar to some ones from that album.

As a whole, the album is very polished, although some of the mixes I find a little strange (I did with AIL as well) but that’s a mute point at best. It also feels like a complete album. I was disappointed with You can’t count on me as the first single, as there are about half a dozen songs that would have made for a better single than that. It also sounds weird by itself, you almost have to listen to it in the album for it to make sense and transition well. The cool thing about this album is that it feels like a complete album, a group of songs that belong together. As opposed to an album which is just a bunch of songs thrown together on a disc.

It’s a shame that the Best Of album has already been done. It’s been amended once already to include AIL, but it might get re-released again with some of the amazing tracks on this new album. I’m not going to get into detail here about what each song is like and rate each one in turn. I’m not even going to say this album is a “X out of X stars”. That just doesn’t work here. The album is amazing, be sure to pick it up when it hits the shelves on March 25th or preorder it from amazon.

At this point, the actual album review is over, below is some person stuff of mine that relates to it.

Adam said about the album “Saturday Nights & Sunday Mornings is the story of what happens when all the bright lights start to burn instead of glitter and you become more of a part of the shadow they cast behind you than the person you are in front… it’s about a flood of sin and liquor and dissolution and insanity and it’s about trying to rebuild the life you wrecked in the wake of that flood. It’s about the way it feels.”

Unfortunately, that has been my life during 2007. In my 22nd year on this planet, I have magially managed to have more sin and regret than I really want to admit to, but at the same time here I am, still trying to pick up the pieces of a live that I screwed up in more ways than I imagined I could. There are too many things on this album that I have said to myself over the course of the past year that I could do an entire book on how these lyrics relate to something that has happened to me, or something that reminds me of someone or a situation.

At the beginning of 2007 I was on top of the world. Newly single, I had the freedom to do whatever I wanted. I had a good job, was driving a Cadillac, and didn’t have any set commitment to anything other than myself. The year ended with me lying on my back unable to walk, stairing up at the sky. In that time I took my new found sense of self and came to the realization that I didn’t know who I was anymore. I tried to figure it out with concerts and parties, but there were too many Saturday (or Sunday) mornings where I woke up and said to myself “dammit, how can I be so fucking stupid?”.

I burned a lot of bridges without regret. I did some things that nobody should do and said some things that nobody should say. I took some risks that backfired on me and didn’t take other ones that I wish I would have. Some people I miss terribly, others I hope I never see again. 2007 started off with a bang, and ended up with a wimper of me trying to recover myself. Unfortunately, I wasn’t all physical recovery.

Cheers to Saturday Nights & Sunday Mornings, the soundtrack to my life in 2007.

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Back to Square One

So in 3 days of canvassing for Clean Water Action I’ve threatened to have the police called on me in Mount Clemens, Been picked up by the police in Wixom, and fell and screwed up my knee in Shelby Township. I’m done with this stuff. Combine that with the fact that after nightfall NOBODY wants anyone who looks like me knocking at their door. Which I can understand, I look like “that guy” that they always show on the news who is pretending to be a building inspector, meter reader, etc. who then proceeds to hold you up at gunpoint and rob you blind. So needless to say, the job just is not a good fit for me, plain and simple. So I’m back to square one, time to start looking again for employment. Probably better this way, as not all of their issues I agree with and could never see myself campaigning on global warming (I much rather prefer Simon Que’s take on the matter, which you can read over at Lew Rockwell). Maybe I’ll wait till after Monday when I talk to my doctor again and see what the deal is with my damn knee before I make any decisions.

Who knows where I’ll end up. But it should be interesting. I’m also going to get the rest of the pages on this blog/site up and running. There’s been nothing on here for too long now, it’s getting ridiculous I know. So I’ll get it all taken care of.

It’s also come as quite a surprise to my how controversial my hair has become.  When you have short hair, people don’t ever say to you “You should grow it out”even if they like long hair. But if they don’t like long hair, when it’s long they all tell you to cut it. I only bring it up because I did one of those stupid MySpace bulletins that was a Valentine app, and this seems to be the consistent message: If you have short hair, people don’t tell you they hate it if they do. But if you have long hair, you will get hell for not cutting it. Well, not hell as much as harassment. But still, very weird.

In other news, Jenn’s taking me to Flogging Molly next Month. I’m super stoked, last year’s show was such a blast.Maybe this year one of us standing outside will have a camera that actually works. They have a new album dropping in March which I’ve been listening to quite a bit of lately. It’s called “Float“, and the title track is just awesome, it’s such a good song. The rest of the album is pretty good too. It’ll be great to hear some new material (hopefully) at the show. I’ve decided that I don’t care if I can’t fully walk by then, I’m going into the pit and will be pushing my way to the front regardless. I’m well used to standing on my feet for hours on end, so I’m not too worried about how it’ll all end up. As long as I can still walk at the end of the night, it’s all good

Speaking of concerts and new albums, I sincerely hope Counting Crows keep touring as their new album “Saturday Nights & Sunday Mornings” is dropping 3 weeks after Flogging Molly’s. To make things juicier, 3 tracks have already been released for download through the internet (MySpace, their website, etc). I doubt they’ll release more with the album right around the corner. If the rest of the album is half as good as the first 3 tracks has been, then I’ll definitely be one of their best. From what I’ve heard thus far, it sounds like it would chronically fit in between August and Recovering. I’m sure Gil Norton (who produced Recovering the Satellites and half of the new album) had something to do with all of that. On a more personal note, how Adam describes the album is “…it’s about a flood of sin and liquor and dissolution and insanity and it’s about trying to rebuild the life you wrecked in the wake of that flood. It’s about the way it feels.” Sounds entirely too much like my life over the past year or so. Liquor, sin, and regret. Que sera sera I suppose.