10 for '08...

…being a semi-random (well it is in alphabetical order…more or less… so it’s not as random as it might otherwise be) list of 10 pop culture people and things that warmed the cockles of Neverending Rainbow’s jaded heart in 2008.

CSI: CRIME SCENE INVESTIGATION

The original…and still the best…CSI was firing on all cylinders from the tragic death of Warrick that opened the season to the inexorable feeling of loss as Gil Grissom prepared to take his leave.

GEOFF JOHNS

This super-hero comic book fan’s hero was a writer…a writer who brought amazing, utterly engaging life to some of my favorite four-color adolescent power fantasies :-)

JON STEWART & STEPHEN COLBERT

The Daily Show and The Colbert Report were consistently entertaining and insightful companions throughout the seemingly endless political campaigns that informed life here in the States

NEW MUSIC FROM SOME OF MY FAVORITE FOLKS

Any year that features great new music from music making folks I unabashedly adore…Cassandra Wilson (the sublime Loverly), Emmylou Harris (the beautifully-realized All I Intended to Be), Tracy Chapman (the charming Our Bright Future...see below), and Willie Nelson & Wynton Marsalis (the accomplished and delightful Two Men with the Blues)…is more than all right in my book.

PUSHING DAISIES

I’m not really surprised that this quirky and whimsical show didn’t find a large enough audience to survive…it was, probably, one of those shows that either you liked or you didn’t with very few people in-between…but I am happy that it got a chance to exist at all.

SUPER-HERO MOVIES

A good year for the fanboys with the grim but amazing Dark Knight and the slam-bam wizardry of Iron Man heating up the box office in such a big way. Kudos as well to flawed by still sometimes very interesting offerings such as Hancock, Wanted, and Incredible Hulk (and we shall let things like Punisher War Journal and The Spirit slip into obscurity without comment.)

THE SOUP

The Soup is perhaps the one good reason for the E Network to exist. Joel McHale and his merry pranksters take a biting and often hilarious blowtorch to all of the silliness of pop culture in a fast-paced weekly half-hour.

THE WIRE

Yeah, I’m late to the party but thanks to the good folks at Netflix I’ve gotten completely caught up in the gritty streets of Baltimore as explored on this amazing show (a crime drama worthy of being brought into the conversation alongside classics like Homicide, Hill Street Blues, and The Sopranos.) Santa didn’t hook me up with the complete series box set (admittedly I was THAT good this year :-) but I’ll keep pestering him.

TINA FEY

Tina Fey’s dead-on impersonation of Vice-Presidential candidate Sarah Palin was a godsend to Saturday Night Live…and to all of the rest of us as well. Combine that with the fact that her sitcom 30 Rock has become a consistently funny shows on network TV and we just have to take off our hats to the remarkable Ms. Fey.

YOUNG SOUL SINGERS FROM THE UK

Amy Winehouse spent most of the year in tabloid hell but the baton of great soul music…retro but not in a navel-gazing, nostalgia-worshipping way…from enormously talented young women from the United Kingdom was ably picked up by Duffy (with the stunning Rockferry) and Adele (the powerful and passionate 19) and it was a good thing indeed.

* * * * *

Here's hoping your 2009 is filled with an abundance of love, light, and laughter.

This is Tracy Chapman's simply charming "Sing for You":

Duets...Friends and Legends

There are a few ways that pop stars who were popular in the 60’s or 70’s (or even 80’s) can make a bit of splash on the scene long after radio has relegated them to the oldies stations; one of them is to gather together some famous friends and fans and take a trip through the old songbook with a collection of duets.

Anne Murray’s voice is not as supple as it was 30 years ago (but then whose is?) but it still has beguiling warmth that caresses the lyrics and brings a smile to jaded ears. On this disc, Murray (aided and abetted by legendary producer Phil Ramone) and her friends (all women) remake some of her old hits to very fine effect.

Murray’s creamy voice blends sweetly with her still potent contemporaries including the great Dusty Springfield (a charming take on “I Just Fall in Love Again”), the always-amazing Emmylou Harris (the sweetly plaintive “Another Pot o’ Tea”), Olivia Newton-John (the lovely, bittersweet “Cotton Jenny”), and Carole King (the wistful “Time Don’t Run Out on Me”).

She also holds her own with younger singers: Shelby Lynne (the feisty “You Won’t See Me”), Martina McBride (a grand take on “Danny’s Song”), the Indigo Girls (the hopeful “A Little Good News”), the ever-remarkable k.d. lang (a very beguiling version of “A Love Song”), Amy Grant (a luminous “Could I Have This Dance”), Sarah Brightman (a neat remake of Murray’s first big hit “Snowbird”), Shania Twain (“You Needed Me”), Celine Dion (a charming live duet on “When I Fall in Love”...see below), Celtic Woman (“Song for the Mira”), Nelly Furtado (“Daydream Believer”), Jann Arden (“Somebody’s Always Saying Goodbye”), Dawn Langstroth (who is Murray’s daughter, on a lovely spin through “Nobody Loves Me Like You Do”), and Isabelle Boulay (on a stately French version of “If Ever I See You Again”).

17 fine duets… as comfortable and soothing as a warm summer’s day…coming together to make a very fine CD.

A Tribute to Joni Mitchell

Tribute albums are always a slippery slope. If the covers are slavish copies of the original songs there is little point but, that said, if the covers are so different as to be unrecognizable hardcore fans of the artist being feted will likely be put off (and, as a matter of course, some hardcore fans are going to be put off no matter what.) Finding an entertaining and illuminating middle ground…coming at the music with a fresh but respectful vision…is something artists participating in tributes struggle to achieve.

This tribute problem is heightened when the honoree is a singular, distinctive talent like Joni Mitchell. A Tribute to Joni Mitchell…featuring an eclectic and interesting assemblage of pop artists…is all over the place when it comes to trying to surmount the aforementioned slope.

I have, as I have doubtlessly said before in this space, a strange fascination for tribute albums and combining that with my abiding respect and affection for Joni’s work it was a foregone fact that I was going to be all over this one. Add in the fact that some of my favorite artists…Emmylou Harris, Cassandra Wilson, Prince, Elvis Costello, Bjork, Sufjan Stevens…were involved was sweet icing on the cake.

Stevens kicks off the proceeding by turning “Free Man in Paris” into a horn-driven baroque fantasia that gets points just for sheer audacity. The fact that it works…capturing the spirit of Mitchell without aping her version of the song…is a cool bonus. Bjork follows with a spare, aching, vaguely other-worldly take on “Boho Dance” (from Joni’s underappreciated The Hissing of Summer Lawns, which is also the source of “Don’t Interrupt the Sorrow” presented here as a lovely piano instrumental by Brad Mehldau.)

Caetano Veloso offers a percussion-driven of “Dreamland” (originally from Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter) giving it an appealing carnival vibe in the process.

Cassandra Wilson’s husky, sultry, beguiling voice…supported in a superb way by understated guitar, acoustic bass, harmonica, and percussion…smoothly inhabits “For the Roses” and the ever-amazing Emmylou Harris takes a grand, heartfelt tour through the plaintive “The Magdalene Laundries” (from Turbulent Indigo.)

Prince’s abridged version of “A Case of You” has a certain earnest charm (he plays piano, guitar, bass, and organ on the track) while Sarah McLachlan’s voice eerily channels Mitchell’s on her ethereal take on “Blue”.

Annie Lennox’s “Ladies of the Canyon” has underpinnings of sitar, tabla, and santoor giving it a “world music” vibe…but those touches are overwhelmed by the keyboards. Lennox’s voice, of course, stands out over the din.

Recorded back in 1997, Elvis Costello’s version of “Edith and the Kingpin” (again from The Hissing of Summer Lawns)…featuring a horn section (flute, clarinet, trumpet, flugal horn, sax, two French horns) aided and abetted by bass, vibes, and drums…never really catches fire despite a nice vocal.

The disc closes with two covers that deviate only slightly from the originals: k.d. lang’s “Help Me” (lang’s vocal is, of course, lovely) and James Taylor’s “River” (from his Christmas album…it’s fine but not distinctive enough to merit repeated listenings.)

As these things go, A Tribute to Joni Mitchell, has more hits than misses and if it leads fans of the artists involved to go discover the original Joni tracks and albums then it’s all good by me.

I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning

There was a time when music critics would have anointed Bright Eyes's frontman Conor Oberst...with his earnest, ragged voice (self-mocked at one point with the couplet,"I could have been a famous singer, if I had somebody else's voice"), the sparkling seriocomic wordplay of his lyrics, and his powerful feel for enticing melodies...as the "New Dylan".

Luckily for Oberst, the critics finally got hip to the fact that nobody was looking for a new Dylan since the old one was still alive and kicking and still making good to great (and sometimes even downright wonderful) records and so, reluctantly one supposes, they stopped anointing people.

This collection is ragged, heartfelt, wryly poetic, insanely catchy and utterly engaging...from the wistful opening of "At the Bottom of Everything" to the controlled cacophony of the coda to the closing rocker "Road to Joy".

Extra points for bringing in the peerless Emmylou Harris to sing harmony on three cuts.

Cool beans all the way round.