« Denver/Boulder: Shows this week | 11.09.2009 - 11.15.2009 | Main | Retrohump: On my way to where the air is sweet »

November 11, 2009

Numerology: Nouveau Ocho

As I mentioned previously, Prof. Klein is a bit of a stickler about getting these Numerology pieces right beyond a shadow of a doubt. Instead of chalking early attempts up to the blogging learning curve like the rest of us, he stays awake at night, shaking with regret that low hanging fruit like the number 8 was not given its proper due. So today, as we all hold our breaths waiting to know if we'll ever know how bad the U2-scored Spiderman musical can possibly suck, Dave gives the mark of the arachnids its due, and continues to rewrite history. (JK)

A few years ago, on 8-8-08, to be exact, the Times published an excellent tribute to the number 8, titled “Crazy Eights.” Readers learned about the “deranged Roman Emperor Elagabalus,” who held octal-themed dinners to which he’d invite eight very tall men, eight men with gout, eight men with hooked noses, and so on. Mary Queen of Scots decreed that no one with a rank lower than an earl or archbishop could eat more than eight dishes at one meal. Rather than try to compete with such erudition, I just tip my eight-cornered hat, offer up a toast (V-8, naturally) and proffer my own list of associations, which, as is my wont, is a lot less high-minded and a lot more contemporary: “Eight Arms to Hold You” was the original title of the Beatles’ Help. The 8-track, an endless loop of 1/4" magnetic recording tape, is a low-fidelity icon invented by Bill Lear of Learjet fame. The boogie-woogie bugle boy of Company B played his horn “eight to the bar,” and Tobor the Eighth Man was an American adaptation of 8-Man, a Japanese cartoon from the mid-‘60s starring what’s considered the first robotic manga character. Tobor (“robot” spelled backwards) derived extra strength by smoking “energy cigarettes.” Of course, these days, any purveyor of children’s entertainment who suggested such a plot point would be declared a Section 8, the Army term for a soldier who is too mentally addled to participate in war, as in this line from Full Metal Jacket: “I don’t think Leonard can hack it anymore. I think Leonard’s a Section 8.”

Tobor the Eighth Man
(opening theme song)

While 8 may not receive the attention as 1, 3, 7 or 9, as the Times article alleges, it still makes its way into a bevy of song titles—only there’s not much of a pattern. And while there are some fine offerings, the 8 slot comes down to a cage match between two classics of the mid-‘60s, both stellar offerings from seminal bands. But before attempting to make the deeply personal choice between these two superlative contenders, let’s take a look at the mixed bag of offerings clamoring somewhere beneath these titanic tunes. “I’m Henry the VIII, I Am” our lone Roman numeral entry, is a remake of a hoary English music-hall ditty and a no. 1 hit in the U.S. for Herman’s Hermits in 1964. “Henry” was one of the fastest selling singles ever, at that point, although the Hermits didn’t think much of it. And while it helped break the band in America, it fostered their lightweight reputation, a source of tension throughout the band’s brief but successful run.

Most songs about times of day stick with nice round numbers (e.g., “Six O’Clock” by Lovin’ Spoonful, “12:30” by the Mamas and the Papas, “5:15” by the Who). Breaking the mold is the languid, lugubrious “8:05” by Moby Grape, which imbues a pretty mundane time of day with heretofore unimagined drama, courtesy of the hushed harmony singing of the Grape. David Bowie’s “Eight Line Poem” makes a neat segue from “8:05,” with its slow, bluesy guitar and general air of torpor. The third song from Hunky Dory finds Bowie in a reflective mood, which he would soon jettison when he adopted the Ziggy Stardust persona.

“Behind the eightball,” a billards term for “in a disadvantageous position,” has entered the vernacular with a vengeance. The term has provided song titles for the likes of Bill Haley, Madness, and Lee Dorsey. Eightball is the name of a seminal ‘90s comic drawn by Daniel Clowes, father of “Ghost World,” and Eightball songs referring to a large amount of cocaine are plentiful, such as NWA’s “8 Ball” and Super Furry Animals’ “Baby Ate My Eightball.” Less Than Jake’s “Ask the Magic 8 Ball” is an homage to the Mattell toy that’s been answering yes-or-no questions with oracular authority since the 1940s, and which is now available in both online and sarcastic versions. Plain-old “Eightball” or “Eight Ball” has been tapped by a slew of rockers, from Boston’s Gang Green to ex-Saint Ed Kuepper to the numerically named Salem 66. But it is “8-Ball” by Underworld, from the soundtrack to Leo DeCaprio's big emission of cinematic greenhouse gas, 2000’s The Island, that really takes the cake. From all the pressure that went into making that piece of hokum, a diamond was squeezed out, in the form of this gorgeous track, with its chugging mellow groove, scrappy guitar break that slowly builds to a rousing finale, and lyrics that are faintly ridiculous yet perfectly aligned with the song’s seductive rhythm.

Underworld - "8 - Ball"

The top ten 8-bit video game themes...

The protagonist in Alfred Bester’s The Demolished Man plots a murder in a crimeless future where telepaths monitor the minds of the populace to prevent crimes before they can occur. To keep the telepaths at bay, he hums this disturbingly catchy jingle:

Eight, sir; seven sir;

Six, sir; five, sir;

Four, sir; three, sir;

Two, sir; one!

Tenser, said the Tensor.

Tenser, said the Tensor.

Tension, apprehension

And dissension have begun.

The Liars incorporate the sequence in “The Pillars Were Hollow & Full of Candy So We Tore Them Down.” Not an eight song in the strict sense, but it seemed too cool not to mention. The following, however, is a bona fide 8-themed assortment:

* “After Eight,” the closing track of Neu ’75, feels like a New York Dolls-style stomp that’s been picked up and tossed headlong down the autobahn.
* Cloud Cult earns a double dose of octal props for the shape-shifting “Your 8th Birthday” off The Meaning of 8.
* “Eight Piece Box” by Southern Culture on the Skids is the last word in woman-as-roadside-meal imagery.
* “Mix Number 8,” left off the initial release of Eno & Byrne’s My Life in the Bush of Ghosts (it was included on the 25th anniversary re-release) has its charms, among them a stuttering rhythm track that recalls Eno’s work with Cluster, a Harold Budd-sounding spray-can trumpet, and spoken vocals in an unnamed language ingeniously manipulated into a sort of melody.
* Beginning with the line, “When you sleep, no one is homeless,” “Eight Full Hours of Sleep” is a paean to the redemptive power of unconsciousness by Against Me. It should not be confused with “Track 8” by the largely unheralded late-‘80s Lincoln, Neb., outfit For Against, which, despite an uninspired title, boasts dark, echo-y guitar lines, a crisp rhythm section and candied, yearning vocals that predate the shoegazer sound of the early ‘90s by several years.

For Against - "Track 8"

* “Eight Days on the Road” is a versatile nugget by Howard Tate that has been covered by the Queen of Soul and Foghat. (Incidentally, Foghat, whose name comes from an imaginary character from the childhood of the band’s singer, Dave Peverett, gave the world the so-called Foghat Rule, namely, that every fourth album has to be a live double.)
* Styx’s anti-greed “Pieces of Eight” does nothing to burnish the reputation of this oft-maligned art rock outfit of the ‘70s.

But we’re reaching now. The fact is that 8 comes down to a contest between two out-and-out ‘60s rock classics: “Eight Days a Week” and “Eight Miles High.” It really comes down to this: Are you a Beatles man or a Byrds man? In this corner, you've got Lennon and McCartney at the peak of their collaborative powers, their voices melding in a delirious, rough-hewn harmony of rare beauty. The song was one of the Beatles’ many firsts: the first time they took a rough sketch of a song and experimented with various ways of recording it in the studio. Those swelling, heavenly chords that seem to arrive out of nowhere to mark the song's beginning—the first fade-in on a pop song—came about well after the best take (no. 13), during remixing sessions. Those ringing guitars, those bracing handclaps, and lyrics that perfectly embody romantic infatuation add up to 2:44 of pure, magisterial hook. The song has been covered by everyone from Alma Cogan (a Monty Python punch line) to the Runaways and the Dandy Warhols, none of whom could possibly hold a candle to the original.

the Beatles - "Eight Days a Week"

But maybe the whole “ooh I need your love babe” thing is no longer relevant to your nuanced existence. Perhaps you prefer the challengers, in the corduroy trunks and rectangular purple shades: The Byrds. From the ominous distorted bass line that opens the track, like a Morse code signal, joined by those unmistakable Byrds harmony vocals, and that guitar—Coltrane lines squeezed through a lysergic play-doh factory via McGuinn’s 12-string Rickenbacker—this is perhaps the quintessential aural equivalent of the drug experience. While it spawned scores of formulaic psychedelia à la the Lemon Pipers’ “Green Tambourine,” “Eight Miles High” manages to convey both the euphoria (through, what else, euphoric vocals) and the paranoia that a lysergically altered consciousness can bring. Building to a satisfyingly chaotic ending—always a plus—“Eight Miles High” is, no pun intended, hard to top.

the Byrds - "Eight Miles High"

R.E.M. - "Driver 8"

In a certain sense it’s pointless to say one is better than the other, unless it makes sense to argue that a lemon is better than a lime, a crocus better than a snapdragon. It’s tempting to consider these two old warhorses akin to Dame Judi Dench and Helen Mirren canceling each other out at the Oscars, and award the statuette to Anna Paquin in an upset (in the form of R.E.M.’s “Driver 8.”) Great song, to be sure, but how could R.E.M. win out over the Byrds, when R.E.M’s trademark sound is, like, two-thirds Byrds? With my back to the wall, I have to give the nod to the Beatles, using the following criterion: If stuck on a desert island with a close-and-play record player and a vinyl 45 of one of these songs, I would opt for “Eight Days a Week.” Its jangly, smile-inducing beauty just might give me the strength to carry on, while the spooky, drug-induced beauty of “Eight Miles High” would surely make me a Section 8.

Numerology is our pal Dave's ill-advised quest to find the definitive song for every number from one to a hundred. We hear 60 is the new 40, and now we're not even that impressed by his progress.

Previously: No. 1, 2 (redux), 3, 4 (redux), 5-7, 5 (redux),6 (redux), 6.4, 7 (counterpoint), 8, 9, 10/11, 12/13. 13 (counterpoint), 14/15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26/27, 28 , 29 , 30, 30 (counterpoint), 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, Footnotes, 57, 58, 59 , 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67

Posted by David Klein at November 11, 2009 10:00 AM

Trackback Pings

TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.merryswankster.com/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi/2213

Comments

Post a comment