Muppetpastor 3.0

I was recently “dismissed” from my job for reasons I find rather…lacking. I’m fighting it, but for right not I’m enjoying a small unpaid vacation. (That was not a hint to hit the Ads or T-Shirt Hell link, but by all means, do so).

So this week’s theme is, well, less of a theme than a collection of songs I listened to repeatedly. Whether they helped or not is left to those who know me and my moods.

Track one this week comes from Country music legend/one-hit-wonder Johnny Paycheck. Only in the 70’s could someone become both a legend in one genre and a one-hit-wonder in all others. And I plundered a biography site for the following information, which made me want to download more.

In 1978, with the nation in a recession, inflation running rampant, and unemployment steadily in the mid-teen percentages Johnny Paycheck struck a nerve and shot a country hit straight out of Nashville and deep into the American culture like no country record had ever done before. David Allan Coe’s love-gone-bad tune “Take This Job and Shove It” became one of the most misconstrued singles in history, as it was popularly mistaken as a defiant workingman’s anthem, and made Johnny Paycheck both a star and, in the end, a caricature.

“Take This Job and Shove It” was certainly the anthem of the late ’70’s” John Morthland recorded in his wonderful book The Best of Country Music, and he wasn’t confining such a claim to the country music genre. The song was an absolute cultural sensation. It opened millions of ears to country music as men and women in office spaces, people on assembly lines, teachers, lawyers, doctors, short order cooks, all of the working in America who were witness to a shrinking dollar value, increasing costs of living, and an economic future that hardly seemed worth all of the sweat and stress of their jobs all took up the cry: “Take this job and shove it!” Like Peter Finch’s Howard Beale in the 1976 motion picture Network, howling at his captive television audience and telling them to run to their windows, fling them open, and yell, “I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!” the slaves of a pitiful economic reality found an affinity for this trite dirty cowboy tune sung by a rebel who’d been broke, busted, and counted out himself once or twice before, and, if they were never to be so bold as to say it themselves they were comforted - thrilled in fact - that someone was finally saying it. “Take this job and shove it!”

Twenty-five years into his career Johnny Paycheck was a forty-year-old overnight success - and he’d never live that success down. “Take This Job and Shove It” became an inevitable albatross and Johnny Paycheck pretty much became that outlaw country guy who’d sung “Take This Job and Shove It.” Sure, to the knowing few who’d followed his entire career, he was still a honky-tonk singer like few others, but to the wider audience who’d embraced the “Take This Job and Shove It” moment, muddied up its message, and then ran with the idea of weekend urban cowboy-dom, Paycheck was just another disposable character who’d helped them feel like suburban southern rebels for the two-minutes and thirty six seconds that it lasted. The song had rendered Paycheck a trivial national curiosity and nothing more. But “Take This Job and Shove It” impacted: it reached out to listeners across every industry defined demographic and was at the peak of the cresting wave of country music’s first commercial swell - one that would, from that point on, open up many doors for country music as a viable trans-demographic sound and saleable music.

And the random comment said by someone special to using this song to open the blog this week: “You were looking for that, weren’t you?”

Johnny Paycheck - Take This Job And Shove It

Track two this week hails from Led Zeppelin, a British rock band who were pivotal in the development of hard rock and heavy metal and became one of the most popular and influential bands of all time. They are also a music of choice for most of my high school’s shop class, which I was not allowed to be in due to my usual opinion of all things powertool. (This does what, saws concrete? Cool, what’s it do with my physics book?)

Led Zeppelin debuted in 1968 with a boisterous and revolutionary approach to British blues-rock. In the early 1970s, they became one of the most popular bands in the world. More than two and half decades after the band dissolved in 1980, their music continues to sell well, gain widespread radio play, and continues to influence modern rock. To date, they have sold more than 300 million albums worldwide, including 100 million albums in the United States alone.

“Communication Breakdown” is a song from their eponymous debut album. It was a popular live song that usually either opened early shows or was played in an encore, and one of the few songs Jimmy Page sang a backing vocal on. The guitar riff was inspired by Eddie Cochran’s “Nervous Breakdown.”

This was chosen for it’s fittingness to trying to get straight answers at work.

Led Zeppelin - Communication Breakdown

Track three hails from Neptunes-spinoff N*E*R*D. N*E*R*D or N.E.R.D consists of Pharrell Williams and Chad Hugo of The Neptunes and their friend Shae Haley. The band’s sound is hard to classify, but is described by some as a mixture of hip hop and soulful rock. The name is an acronym of No-one Ever Really Dies, as Pharrell Williams explains in the biography section of the website:

“What does N*E*R*D stand for? N*E*R*D stands for No-one Ever Really Dies. The Neptunes are who we are and N*E*R*D is what we do. It’s our life. N*E*R*D is just a basic belief, man. People’s energies are made of their souls. When you die, that energy may disperse but it isn’t destroyed. Energy cannot be destroyed.”

Williams and Hugo originally recorded an album for European release in 2001 using the same digital production techniques used on Neptunes productions. However, they decided that if N.E.R.D was to be different from the Neptunes it should sound different. This led to them recording the album In Search Of… with the funk-rock band Spymob for worldwide release in 2002.

In Search Of… achieved moderate success in the US: the album reached number 59 on the Billboard 200; its first single, “Lapdance”, reached the top 40 on the modern rap charts; and its second single, “Rock Star”, reached the top 40 of the modern rock charts in the US. “Lapdance” also went top 40 in the Netherlands and its music video received heavy airplay on American MTV2. The album was well-received by critics even though it was not as successful as the Neptunes’ previous productions for Jay-Z, Busta Rhymes, Usher, Babyface, Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake and No Doubt.

The album won the second annual Shortlist Music Prize, awarded (by a group of musicians, journalists, and other music professionals) to the best album of the year which had sold less than 500,000 copies at the time of nomination. The band performed at the show, bragging that the week prior to the ceremony, the album had, in fact, achieved gold status by selling over 500,000 units.

It’s “Rock Star” that is the third track here, notably for its ability to get me pissed off at something, anything. So I listened to it a lot these last few days. Anger is a good thing, sometimes.

N*E*R*D - Rock Star

Fourth track was picked sorely because the last three threatened to make this post way too long, plus, it’s a fun song.

The Offspring - Why Don’t You Get A Job?

And finally, the fifth track this week hails from Bristol, England. (Shit, I listen to a lot of U.K. music) Massive Attack began as an offshoot of the Bristol art community The Wild Bunch. In 1991, they released their first album, Blue Lines, featuring the hit singles Unfinished Sympathy and Daydreaming, and this week’s final track.

Unfinished Sympathy has frequently been described as one of the best songs of all time, according to polls produced by MTV2, NME, and various other magazines and reviewers. A reviewer for the BBC has said that: “More than a decade after its release it remains one of the most moving pieces of dance music ever, able to soften hearts and excite minds just as keenly as a ballad by Bacharach or a melody by McCartney.”

Blue Lines subsequently became one of the most influential British records of the 1990s, inspiring other projects such as Portishead and Morcheeba. Blue Lines ushered in a new genre of music best referred to as “the Bristol sound”, but the press began to use the label “trip hop”, which the members of Massive Attack dislike.

During the first Gulf War, several British media channels became anxious to avoid using words suggestive of war and violence, and Massive Attack (then struggling to become established) were forced to temporarily change their name to simply Massive. Lead band member Robert Del Naja makes no secret in interviews of his political objections to what he sees as U.S. aggression against the Third World in the name of democracy, often expressing regret that he ever agreed to the name change.

In 1994 Massive Attack released their second effort Protection. Featuring two string instrumentals arranged by Craig Armstrong, this album featured a more lush, deeper sound than the first. This marked the last collaboration of Wild Bunch member Tricky with Massive Attack, as he afterwards concentrated wholly on his solo career. Two songs (”Protection” and “Better Things”) feature Everything But The Girl’s vocalist Tracey Thorn.

Massive Attack’s third album Mezzanine was released in 1998. Mezzanine showed the band moving towards a dark, distorted guitar-based sound, and, according to many fans and critics, marked a significant evolution. Several songs from this album have been featured in major motion pictures; the opening track, “Angel”, appears in Snatch, a film by Guy Ritchie as well as an episode of The West Wing and in the independent film Pi. The fourth track, “Inertia Creeps” is used in Stigmata. The sixth track, “Dissolved Girl” was featured in the films The Matrix and The Jackal. The Japanese release of Mezzanine featured one additional track, “Superpredators”, which was also used in the film The Jackal as the opening theme.

A fourth album, 100th Window, was released on February 10, 2003. It entered the Top 10 in the UK charts. Del Naja was charged with possession of drugs that month. While some critics found 100th Window album not up to par with previous offerings, many found it a worthwhile listening experience.

In 2004 the band, now consisting of Del Naja, Neil Davidge and Alex Swift, released an Instrumental Soundtrack for the film Danny the Dog, which was produced by Luc Besson. The film’s title was changed to Unleashed prior to the American release, though the album was initially released under the original title as it came out months before the film.

2005 saw the band contribute to the soundtrack for the movie Bullet Boy. They are also working on music for the film adaptation of V For Vendetta due for release in 2006.

Massive Attack originally consisted of three members, Robert Del Naja (”3D”), Grant Marshall (”Daddy G”) and Andrew Vowles (”Mushroom”). After the recording of Mezzanine, Vowles — dissatisfied with the change in sound — left the band. He was replaced by Neil Davidge, who worked in tandem with Del Naja for much of his material on Mezzanine. Marshall elected to sit out during the recording of 100th Window.

Each Massive Attack album features guest vocalists, and so far the band has worked with Mos Def, Tricky, Shara Nelson, Tracey Thorn of Everything But The Girl, Nicolette, Sara Jay, Elizabeth Fraser of Cocteau Twins and Sinéad O’Connor. The Jamaican reggae legend Horace Andy is a fixture of Massive Attack albums.

Part of their song Teardrop is being used as the theme music for the American television show House, M.D. in the US (whilst versions of the program aired in other countries, such as the UK, use a generic snippet of music that resembles Teardrop) and part of their song Angel is being used as the theme music for the American television show 24.

Their work has paved the way for groundbreaking artists around the globe such as Carnage and the Fiasco, Hooverphonic, Fischerspooner, and Delerium.

From “Blue Lines” comes this this track with vocals by Tony Bryan. Lyrically, it sums up my current mood about this whole job fiasco.

Though you may not drive a great big Cadillac
Gangster whitewalls TV antenna in the back
You may not have a car at all
But just remember brothers and sisters
You can still stand tall
Just be thankful for what you’ve got

Massive Attack - Be Thankful For What You’ve Got

Next week, hopefully, will find us employed and grumbling. Until then.