SCORES & UPCOMING GAMES



CHAMPIONSHIP FINAL SCORE: (2) JEFF BUCKLEY 168, (7) Tracy Chapman 159 .......... FINAL FOUR FINAL SCORES: (7) TRACY CHAPMAN 154, (1) Joy Division 90 ..... (2) JEFF BUCKLEY 137, (1) The Cure 89 .......... ELITE EIGHT FINAL SCORES: (1) JOY DIVISION 74, (14) Low 60 ..... (7) TRACY CHAPMAN 85, (1) Elliott Smith 69 ..... THE CURE 65, (2) Radiohead 58 ..... (2) JEFF BUCKLEY 74, (1) Neutral Milk Hotel 44 ..... FINAL SWEET SIXTEEN SCORES: (1) JOY DIVISION 75, (5) PJ Harvey & Nick Cave 24 ..... (14) LOW 73, (2) Concrete Blonde (64) ..... (1) ELLIOTT SMITH 78, (4) Gary Jules 44 ..... (7) TRACY CHAPMAN 74, (6) Kate Bush 53 ..... (1) NEUTRAL MILK HOTEL 54, (13) The Church 49 ..... (2) JEFF BUCKLEY 73, (3) Sinead O’Connor 35 ..... (1) THE CURE 109, (3) Tori Amos 86 ..... (2) RADIOHEAD 76, (6) This Mortal Coil 50 ..... (1) JOY DIVISION 96, (9) Mazzy Star 91 ..... (2) CONCRETE BLONDE 76, (7) Bob Mould 28 ..... (14) LOW 60, (6) Crowded House 51 ..... (5) PJ HARVEY & NICK CAVE 65, (4) Alphaville 38 ..... (1) ELLIOTT SMITH 113, (8) Replacements 88 ..... (6) KATE BUSH 87, (3) Nirvana 64 ..... (7) TRACY CHAPMAN 99, (2) The Eels 62 ..... (3) GARY JULES 103, (12) Morrissey 63 ..... (6) Kate Bush 72, (3) Nirvana 53 ..... (3) SINEAD O'CONNOR 66, (11) Ride 27 ..... (13) THE CHURCH 106, (5) James 44 ..... (2) JEFF BUCKLEY 95, (10) Smashing Pumpkins 40 ..... (1) NEUTRAL MILK HOTEL 80, (9) New Order 56 ..... (2) RADIOHEAD 102, (7) Nine Inch Nails 99 ..... (6) THIS MORTAL COIL 61, (3) Indigo Girls 60 ..... (4) TORI AMOS 89, (5) Swans 40 ..... (1) CURE 82, (8) Tom Waits 68 ............... FINAL 1ST ROUND SCORES: (5) PJ HARVEY & NICK CAVE 93, (12) Midnight Oil 38 ..... (7) BOB MOULD 63, (10) Peter Murphy 47 ..... (1) JOY DIVISION 117, (16) Erasure 19 ..... (6) CROWDED HOUSE 98, (11) Leonard Cohen 54 ..... (7) TRACY CHAPMAN 199, (10) The Smiths 162 ..... (5) MORRISSEY 115, (12) Morphine 83 ..... (3) NIRVANA 137, (14) Slowdive 102 ..... (8) THE REPLACEMENTS 128, (9) Dream Academy 82 ..... (13) THE CHURCH 262, (4) Magnetic Fields 193 ..... (10) SMASHING PUMPKINS 165, (7) Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds 155 ..... (9) NEW ORDER 160, (8) Sarah McLachlan 78 ..... (1) JEFF BUCKLEY 204, (16) Bjork 92 ..... (4) TORI AMOS 78, (13) Echo & the Bunnymen 22 ..... (8) TOM WAITS 72, (9) The Pretenders 22 ..... (6) THIS MORTAL COIL 51, (11) Yaz 31 ..... (3) INDIGO GIRLS 71, (14) Pavement 26 ..... (9) MAZZY STAR 132, (8) REM 46 ..... (2) CONCRETE BLONDE 88, (15) Psychedelic Furs 34 ..... (4) ALPHAVILLE 71, (13) Dead Can Dance 36 ..... (14) LOW 120, (3) U2 65 ..... (1) ELLIOTT SMITH 63, (16) 10,000 Maniacs 24 ..... (2) EELS 50, (15) Counting Crows 46 ..... (4) GARY JULES 62, (13) Depeche Mode 19 ..... (6) KATE BUSH 59, (11) Sisters of Mercy 20 ..... (1) NEUTRAL MILK HOTEL 42, (16) Violent Femmes 12 ..... (11) RIDE 25 (6) Peter Gabriel 24 ..... (3) SINEAD O'CONNOR 37, (14) Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark 17, ..... (5) JAMES 24, (12) Red House Painters 23 ..... (7) NINE INCH NAILS 46, (10) Wilco 31, (5) SWANS 31, (12) Pet Shop Boys 18 ..... (1) THE CURE 50, (16) Gear Daddies 10 ..... (2) RADIOHEAD 40, (15) Liz Phair 35


CURRENT GAMES BELOW — PAST GAMES ARCHIVED AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE

Saturday, March 12, 2016

First Round Matchup: ERASURE at JOY DIVISION

(16) Erasure, "Fingers & Thumbs (Cold Summer's Day)"

At first blush, Erasure is a not a band known for their sadness, and certain members of the selection committee expressed skepticism at their inclusion in the bracket. Still, in terms of quality wins, we might look at early single, “Oh L’Amour,” as counterpoint (sample lyric: “Oh L’Amour / Broke my heart and now I’m aching for you”), and actually, the more you start to listen to the songs, very many of them are rooted in sadness. Like how their big single (“A Little Respect”) is about its lack, and in that song it’s almost like the speaker is trying to talk himself into asserting himself. So this song comes at the end of their middle period, I’d say, which is about as long as I’ve seriously tracked them. It’s from their 1994 self-titled album, easily the most “serious”-seeming in their oeuvre. It’s a really good album, though! I forgot how much I like listening to Erasure. Of all the synth bands that once soundtracked my life, they’re the one that’s disappeared most obviously from my adult life, and only when I was trying to explain them to my friend Dolly it occurred to me how much I know about Erasure. I had lunch once with the poet Reginald Shepherd in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, at a Waffle House there. He was not happy that the various foods on the plate were touching one another. I asked him: have you ever been to a Waffle House? He was living in Alabama at the time. He had not. Well, I said, that's kind of the jam here (and in adult life, I wanted to say). How we got from that onto Erasure's b-sides (I've always been partial to "Supernature," for instance) I'm not sure, but Shepherd impressed me: I haven't met anyone with as equally encyclopedic knowledge of Erasure as he had. Anyhow, it was a lovely meal even if his foodstuffs were touching, and we parted ways, and would see each other over the next few years a few times in passing.

Anyhow, in this song I very much like the mix of sadness and anthem that makes up the chorus, how “Gone / And blown it all / How can you say / It doesn’t matter much to me” isn’t exactly a consolation, but it is a kind of stiffening of resolve, a celebration of this particular sadness. I like the instrumental break of sorts as a bridge, how the lights go dark for a while, and then how it surges back. And I realize that Erasure will get rolled over by Joy Division, which is probably the right result.

Reginald Shepherd died maybe five years after we talked Erasure at the Waffle House. I can't think of the man without the band and without the restaurant. Of course I hadn't ever got around to telling him how much I liked his work or enjoyed that conversation and being part of his life, if only in passing. So I'll quote a couple lines of his poem "A Brief Manual for Swimmers" for y'all here: "History has written its ritual runes and we / have scrawled some moments of / conversation into damp sand." And I'm sending this long distance dedication out to you, Reginald:



vs

(1) Joy Division, "Atmosphere"

We can't imagine a sad songs bracket without Joy Division in it, and of the Joy Division discography we probably could have picked five or six songs that would go deep in this tournament. The most obvious and best-known would have been "Love Will Tear Us Apart," a brilliant song, but I've always found this sadder, the pinnacle really of this sort of sadness: the desire for communication—for kinship—for friendship—for love—for understanding—and the failure of all attempts to reach it, largely because of personal failure, and the despair that comes with that understanding and the subsequent giving up. There's no irony here, and very little distance, it seems like. Though the song certainly feels like a requiem for Ian Curtis (and the video goes all-in on that reading), it's almost too beautiful for that, and stranger, really. It's easy, after all, to mythologize the dead. As Peter Hook points out in his recent memoir, Ian Curtis was a guy who farted and drank and behaved badly, not just this isolated and haunted poetic genius that we've made him into. Yet it's inevitable that we make myth of the songs we love and those who made them, especially if they're dead, even moreso if they're dead of suicide, at least if those songs and bands and musicians are any good at all.

Anyhow, I find the video beautiful in part because it's all-in too, and thus it's easy enough to make fun of (the jawas and the symbology? wtf? & it does look sort of like the kind of project I would have made in college if I wasn't then so allergic to even seeming vaguely sentimental) if that's how you want to roll. Well, you don't need to read me reading it: better to do cue it up yourself. For me, "Atmosphere" is one of those songs that you're either all in for or what are you doing with your life? (Actually maybe you're doing something awesome and successful, in which case that's super rad. As for me, I'm going to close my eyes so as to skip the video and enjoy the darkness and the memory of the isolation.)

>



Which is Sadder? Vote by 9am 3/13

Fingers & Thumbs (Cold Summer's Day)
Atmosphere
Do Quizzes

1 comment:

  1. My contrarianism is pushing me to vote for Erasure, but I'm going to resist and make the obvious choice. I do think that song is genuinely sad, if a little too stuck in cliche to get past my critical defenses.

    "Atmosphere"'s music is so damn uplifting I could imagine it, on its own, soundtracking a very different scene--like someone on a sailboat at dawn, the wind in their face--but the power of Curtis's voice and words transforms it.

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