...If You Apply Some Pressure
Download: LCD Soundsystem: "North American Scum" (LP Version)
LCD Soundsystem: "North American Scum" (Live on Letterman)
Please hold back your vomit, but Sound of Silver is also my favorite album of this short year. I find "North American Scum", though, to be quite drab and punishingly anticlimactic. It's maybe the 7th or 8th best song on the album, buoyed only by what is some pretty great writing and that awesome "TAKE MEEEEE BACK TO THE STAAAAAAATES MAAAAAAAN!" part.
This live version here is worlds better. James Murphy and his band are forced to condense the song into about three-and-a-half minutes (basically half the runtime of the original), and the forced speed by default forces the song to muster the punch it never really had . And I know this laid-back impassiveness and detachment is part of Murphy's steez, but this sped-up version sounds like a complete call-to-arms, and it works better on about seven different levels.
Then there's the instrumentation: percussion by a few dudes that sounds like about 700 guys playing exclusively coconut and sea shells, blaring blaring blaring horns from the Letterman house band and itchy, scratchy guitars. And then there's the vocals: a pretty cute Asian girl provides the more assertive female backing vocals, but it's Murphy— with about 9 improved parts to overshadow him— who's the clincher. A completely virtuosic performance; a pitch-perfect exercise in taut restraint leading to a transcendent final minute.
Labels: 2007, does david letterman actually like indie music?, lcd soundsystem
posted by Jordan @ 9:00 AM
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