Tag: elliott smith

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So, if you read the post I wrote pre-show that was a major spoiler as I quite clearly blew the secret that I would perform an Elliott Smith song.

And believe me I had every intention of recording the actual live performance but among all the moving parts of playing my show I forgot to press record. Alas. You had to be there.

So last night I figured I’d record the songs I played live since my camera crew (myself) blew it so bad. This way you can imagine I’m playing a huge arena… although a cozy brick walled room with loads of friends and listeners in the heart of Silver Lake was, I think, much better.

I’ll post more songs from the set in the coming little while, even trying to get them on the podcast first to give you subscribers your due priority!

Let me know what you think of the cover. It’s such a fine line with songs you love… you want to show your love, but you really don’t want to disrespect them by ruining them either.

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I’m playing a show this Wednesday, May 21 at Malo in Silver Lake, Los Angeles. It’s really been toooooo long since I’ve played a show and I’m super grateful to Surely Lorraine and Kondo Exurbia for including me.

I’ve been working up new songs because what happens when you don’t play is you forget ALL your lyrics and when you get on stage your brain turns off completely its ability to recall such information and since there likely won’t be a teleprompter it’s better to get it memorized!

I decided I wanted to do a cover because covers are fun for everyone especially when in my case all this material is new and I don’t know what works and what doesn’t. Some songs work live and are kinda lame on an album, and vice versa. So I thought about doing “I’m On Fire” which I’ve always played on the cello but I thought perhaps I’d think of something not done so often (Bruce’s popularity has risen yet again and to my relief his street cred is much higher than I think it used to be… I remember people would ask who my favorite musicians were and I’d say Bruce and they’d think I was joking, which is absurd! Because, well, you know, he’s the best songwriter perhaps ever.)

ANYWAYS so I was letting my mind wander and I was walking down Sunset Blvd. and I happen to live really close to where the show is Wednesday and I realized that the “Elliott Smith wall” is right next door to the venue.

Which is weird and for me kind of eerie and moving because:

• Elliott Smith influenced my life and especially my identity as a songwriter probably more than any other musician. Either/Or changed my life in so many ways. If I had to put it into words (poorly) I would say because he made me realize that beauty and melancholia are not necessarily taboo to all people. People love his music rightly so and it’s sad but not sad at all because it is just aching and oozing with so much life, and feeling FOR life. I’ve never written anything as beautiful as his, but it certainly gave me a context for where my music fit in to the world. And I don’t know if my music is especially sad, I don’t think so and I never set out to make it that way or any way, but people have often told me that in one way or another. So it makes sense, the kinship I felt, musically.

• Elliott Smith kinda really, as silly as it sounds, or naive, is the reason I moved to Portland. Again, I just figured “if music like that is being made there, I need to be there.” And so I moved there, and I walked Elliott Ave. in Ladd’s Addition many many times, often on my way to the Red & Black where I played my favorite shows in that city. And I was enveloped in the rain and the comfort Portland is and it was a beautiful, beautiful time.

• Elliott Smith moved to LA and here I am. And I don’t know where “From a Basement on the Hill” was specifically recorded, but I ended up on a hill in Los Angeles and I never, ever ever would have guessed that. And I’m still making the music I do, for what it’s worth.

• I’m still mad at Elliott Smith for dying. Yeah, I know he “killed himself” which makes me more mad at him… but there’s some doubt and I’ve always felt how if it is true that he stabbed himself in the chest with a kitchen knife there’s so much sadness around that act and everything surrounding his death that truly I can barely listen to his music anymore. Which is a shame. To be clear he wasn’t my hero. But he was a beautiful inspiration.

And so, for what it’s worth I’m going to play an Elliott Smith cover on Wednesday, by his wall, and maybe some closure will come about and maybe I’ll blow it and forget the lyrics! Who knows! It’s unknowable.

It would be nice to see you there, if you are in the neighborhood…

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SEAQUENCER, Luke Janela, Round Mountain
Date/Time:Thu., July 31, 9:00pm
Price: $7-$10

Dreamy Cello + Dark Beats + Smart Emotional Vocals
“Elliott Smith with a cello” would be a lazy and reductionist way to introduce the music of Luke Janela, despite the parallels between the two songwriters — namely, their intimate, minimalist, melancholy acoustic elegies originally born in the bedrooms of gray and rainy Portland, Oregon. Janela’s inclusion of a drum machine and effects pedals, combined with the rich, deep, sonorous tone of his cello, gives his performances the time-collapsing atmosphere of ancient eras meeting the future. This is no mere gimmick at work, though: Janela’s welding of words to melodies is as accomplished as any erudite troubadour. That Janela left Portland for Nevada City, CA, hasn’t altered his desolate atmospheres, either — it merely means that maybe he’ll wheel his way into the city more often. Good news for us indeed. — J. Graham

Read the original review here.

This is a really nice, and amazingly insightful review of my music in the SF Weekly. I wish that I could write these words, the way that it so respectfully and accurately conveys what I am attempting to do musically really blows my mind!