L Magazine's "Albums of the Decade": The Knife's Silent Shout

For those of you who miss me getting long-winded, here's a massive 1800-word treatise on The Knife's frozen opus, as part of the L's great "Albums of the Decade" essay series. Lists are great and all, but really getting into the nuts and bolts of it is more satisfying. Yesterday was Ben Sutton on Kanye, before that, Liz Colville tackled Joanna Newsom's Ys.

For those of you who miss me getting long-winded, here's a massive 1800-word treatise on The Knife's frozen opus, as part of the L's great "Albums of the Decade" essay series. Lists are great and all, but really getting into the nuts and bolts of it is more satisfying. Yesterday was Ben Sutton on Kanye, before that, Liz Colville tackled Joanna Newsom's Ys.






The still prevalent archetype of parents living out their lost glory through their offspring has certainly reached the music world as well. By 1972, sturdy ‘50s rocker Marty Wilde had no reasonable prospects for further success in the cod-pieced, glitter-eyed glam scene of the British charts. But he did have progeny to work through, and an ear for the sparkly zeitgeist of the times. The result is the minor hit “I am an Astronaut,” in which young Ricky Wilde’s Our Gang-worthy gravel voice plays wonderfully off of twinkling Hunky Dory pianos and a playful glam stomp. As delightful as the track is, it’s hard to see it as anything but a cynical ghost-write. I shudder to think at what sort of trouble modern 11-year-olds get up to, but I think it’s safe to say that even in ’72, they were probably a bit past crawling around the house, pretending to be polar bears. It remains a fun little novelty, though. Once past Tiger Beat suitability himself, Ricky recaptured a bit of his pre-teen glory vicariously through his little sister Kim, as producer and co-writer of her 1981 new wave classic, “Kids in America.” 











collage by Jon Williams


















This is what kind of great guy I am, it's my birthday and I'm giving you, the loyal MS reader, a gift. A gift of a horribly memorable, and quite possibly profoundly disturbing, personalized birthday song that's been laser engraved into my cerebellum since I was very small. It was tracked down by my sister and brother in law, on the anniversary of my arrival to existence. Seeing as it is by the wildly popular (











































However, unlike 'Nam there are rules here. The whole world has not gone mad Mr. Sobchak.. 













