listieshadows

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Listie reviews/babbles about Pink Floyd's A Collection Of Great Dance Songs ('coz she was bored at, like, 4AM)

A Collection Of Great Dance Songs — I don't get you.

I think any Pink Floyd fan out there worth their mettle has the idea in their head that this band doesn't lend itself very well to compilations. Their work, especially in their imperial period, was so strongly contained and conceived around the album experience that it's hard to just chop it into pieces. It's like cutting up several great paintings and stitching together random bits: why would you partake in that when the originals were already so perfectly constructed? The idea isn't unfounded — or, for that matter, wrong.

I can't say I fully believe in it myself, though. You can make a good Pink Floyd compilation: it just requires a bit more work than the average greatest hits set. And in fact, they both already exist.

To this day I'll hold up both A Foot In The Door and Echoes as great Floyd compilations. The former is a nice run-through of some of the band's bigger hits. There's some quirks about it, like "Hey You" being an odd choice to kick things off, or the three song stretch of uninterrupted Dark Side has always struck me, though it's still a fun time. Meanwhile, Echoes is a good deeper dive beneath the surface. Sure, you can balk at a lot of the edit choices (particularly the fragment of "Marooned"), but with how much Pink Floyd that was crammed onto these two discs, some sacrifices had to be made.

Now, I won't front: these are mostly options for beginners, whether they want an easy intro or something that scratches a little further. I mean, I figure most compilations are, but you know. However, as a big Pink Floyd myself, I still revisit these from time to time. Every now and then, I just want some quick hits of Pink Floyd tunes, and these hit the spot quite well. ("Quick," I say — these are both over an hour; two in Echoes' case.)

And I figure what makes them work, besides the song selection, is the work that went into the flow of them. There was good effort put into making these songs segue into each other like a regular Pink Floyd album, and, like, come on, that's way more than any other compilation would be. I mean, there's real thought here, especially on Echoes. You just look at how that thing begins and ends with the first and last songs off of The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn — that's pretty cool! Not to mention, the stretch of songs that goes from "Arnold Layne" to "Wish You Were Here" to "Jugband Blues" to "High Hopes" to "Bike". The sequencing is genius, frankly. Just recognize, too, that they actually included songs like "Jugband Blues" and "Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun", when I'm sure anyone else would've been happy to just take the "Money" and run.

Which then brings us to A Collection Of Great Dance Songs. And I just get confused.

To begin with: only six songs. In total clocking in at, what, forty minutes? That's hardly enough to capture a band with a roster of amazing albums like Pink Floyd — and, yeah, I'm sure that wasn't the point of this thing. In fact, I'm very sure given the random-ass song selection here.

Like, I'm just stuck on a very simple question here: "What do these songs have to do with each other?" They're very much not great dance songs, as I'm very aware that this thing's title is a joke. It's a hits collection, 'coz then what would "Sheep" and "One Of These Days" be doing here if it was? And I am 100% that this isn't a "best of," given how the shortest version of that I'm aware of runs 80 minutes.

So, what in the hell is this thing, then? More than likely: a contract filler. Like, this is to Pink Floyd what The TV Album or The Food Album were to Weird Al — for all the people who get that comparison. As far as I can tell, this only exists so there'd be... Some kinda new Pink Floyd product out on shelves while The Final Cut was waiting four years to be called the weakest Pink Floyd album (I mean, I like it). I doubt anyone really gave a shit about what went on to this thing: someone who I doubt was a band member just picked a small handful of hits and a couple bones for the deeper fans and shoved it out to market.

On the whole, there's really only two things that interest me about this album. For one, there's the cover design, which always made me believe this was released after The Final Cut — I mean, right? A lot of the graphic design looks copied from A Momentary Lapse Of Reason, so I would've figured it was released somewhere around that time. But no: this dropped 1981, two years before The Final Cut. Strange.

Then there's the second thing, because the chopped together edit of "Shine On You Crazy Diamond" hardly counts: the re-recording of "Money". This seems to be the biggest bone for deeper fans. "Wowie! A whole new recording of that one big hit from Dark Side! I gotta get that!" More casual fans might not care, but for the real Floydhead, it'd be interesting to hear how differently the band would record it nearly a decade later. Now, of course, by "the band" I mean "David Gilmour and special guest Dick Parry," and by "differently" I mean "exactly the same." This isn't some radical new take on the song like Roger Waters's spoken blues dump from the other year, or even features any new spins. It's just "Money" again. Except it sounds, like, maybe a bit different? With some late 70's production? It just comes across as incredibly pointless — and even more so when you learn that the only reason this re-recording happened in the first place was because Capitol refused to license the original to Columbia. Just think: if Capitol hadn't refused, this album wouldn't have had anything notable about it! What a world that would've been, huh?

Honestly, I'm not sure why I spent this long babbling about this album. At best, it's only worth mild consideration as an oddity in Pink Floyd's discography. Beyond that, it's hard to see this as anything more than a stop-gap for the holiday seasons. I mean, jeez, even the two Weird Al compilations I mentioned earlier work if you want a quick gathering of songs around specific themes. This, though... Like, if this is how someone got into Pink Floyd, hey, more power to them. It's just, I probably would've preferred starting with any of their albums. Or, like, waiting thirty years or whatever for Echoes and A Foot In The Door. I mean, hey, my AuDHD ass can be patient when I want. Sometimes. Maybe.

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I've been thinking about the past couple of days now: Marcy Wu might legitimately be the first kin I've ever had. I relate to her way too hard for that not to be the case.

Crazy that this is the mileage I've been getting out of the funny frog show.

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Me, upon finally looking up what the intro and outro instrumentals of Vaxis III are supposed to be: "What do you mean I hafta find out what an 'Afterman' is?"

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Last night I randomly decided to doodle mine and some Discord friends' profile pictures. Honestly, I don't think the one I did for mine came out too badly, given that in terms of hand-drawn art I've yet to evolve past stickfigures.

(Original art by natfoe.)

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Me picking out Marcy Wu Discord profile picturesfor the year and adding a piece of Don't Drink Unlabelled Potions fanart to the mix with absolutely no intention of explaining to anybody what's supposed to be going on it. They can be just as confused as I was the first time I came across art for this AU.

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Having Fun With Elvis On Stage: A Review, Or A Babble, I'unno—I Didn't Write 1.2k Words To Just Not Share 'Em

Y'know, any review or discussion of Having Fun With Elvis On Stage is basically just trying to answer one simple question: well, did you? And the answer should be a simple "yes" or "no," but, me being me, I have thoughts.

To begin with, knowing why this record even exists does make it a little hard to have fun with Elvis. 'Coz, like, literally the only reason why this thing exists is because Colonel Tom Parker wanted all of the money. I mean, you look at every other Elvis album ever released — they have songs on 'em, right? Written by songwriters? And those songs are owned by publishers, who, naturally, get part of the profit whenever a record's sold. Not to mention, all Elvis song recordings belong to RCA anyway. Obviously, these are all obstacles. Big ones, at one. But, hey, clearly there was a simple way around these roadblocks: just make sure Elvis doesn't sing any songs.

Thus came into existence Having Fun With Elvis On Stage, 37 and a half minutes of between-song banter cut entirely out of context — musical and otherwise.

It's... A bit of an odd experience, honestly. Like, lemme start with this take: some part of me listens to this and hears an unintentional precursor to modern "[x] out of context" videos. I mean, at its core, that is what's going on here. Taking some of the funniest and best moments from something and presenting them rapid-fire, one after another. I've had enough of these recommended to me to know what I'm talking about. In fact, it nearly uses the title format of some of 'em. Switch a few around, add the runtime: "Elvis having fun on stage for 37 minutes..." It works.

Of course, there's a difference between a fan lovingly pulling together some of their favorite moments and clips, and Elvis's manager hacking up concert tapes and assembling them in a random order. Y'know, a fan would have some kind of structure, even just chronological order — Parker here all but slaps the tape fragments in your hand and grunts for money.

Which is a shame that that's the presentation, because, legitimately, Elvis is a funny guy. I've heard at least one of his early Vegas performances, where he's still buzzing from the '68 Comeback Special, and, yeah: he's got the chops. Not to mention the classic "What kind of girl do you like?" exchange. I mean, sure, maybe later Vegas Elvis doesn't have it as much, where he's told the same jokes a billion times across the same show he's done a billion times, but early Vegas Elvis? Yeah, no, I dig it.

But it has to be in the larger context of a show, 'coz, y'know, most of this banter is lead-ins to songs. You don't hafta hear too many Elvis shows to recognize them, and every time you do it's such a tease. Like you're just about to get a bit of "Hound Dog" or a medley or — nope! Dollar bill gets pulled away again. Even worse when there is a bit of music left in (I thought I recognized some of the riffs, but I couldn't put my finger on 'em) and then it just hard cuts to something else. Or, y'know, there's the billion or so times Elvis sings "WEEEEEELL." The only real bit of music you get on this whole album: "WEEEEEELL." If you didn't know better, you'd swear that was the only song he knew: "WEEEEEEELL." Well what? Goodness.

And if it's not that, then it's clips of him kissing women and having them scarves, or it's just... Purely bizarre without anything surrounding it. For instance: "I'm the NBC peacock!" It's, like... I'm sure he's referring to his jumpsuit, but devoid of any visuals, or the rest of the show that clip came from... Even knowing what he was talking about, I still hadda look up at the iPad I had playing this album like, "Wha—? Huh?"

So, that's the verdict, then, eh? I didn't have fun with Elvis on stage? That's the simple answer I shoulda said to begin with?

To borrow a phrase: "Well..."

'Coz, yeah, this thing is a nakedly cynical train wreck of a cash grab. Just another Elvis product to wring a few more bucks out of his fans' pockets, though this time they'd go directly into the Colonel's — no middle men! What a joy! And even Elvis himself absolutely hated this thing, from what I remember hearing. There shouldn't be anything redeeming about his incomprehensible mess.

And yet... I still found some amusement from this thing.

Oh, sure, it's not a lot, and I doubt I'll ever listen to this thing again, but... Look, my qualification for "having fun" isn't a complex one. If I get anything out of this, and if the needle generally doesn't fall too below the negative, then I can't say "No."

There are a few scattered moments here and there I can get some chuckles out of. Elvis saying that you hafta pronounce "Memphis" as "memffif?" That's great! It's something I randomly say to myself all the time. Then there's, like, "BEE-FIFTEH-TOO BAWMA, BWAAAOOOOW." Just random enough that it tickles me. Plus, on the first side you do get, like, a couple uncut minutes where Elvis talks about his early days, and while I generally enjoyed this spiel more when I heard his entire first Vegas show, it still has him describing his acting in movies as: "HUH? WHA?" Also great! Heck, I referenced it unintentionally a few paragaphs up. So, like, it requires some digging, but if you wanna spend the time to find the highlights, you'll probably come out with some.

Although, that said, regardless of my answer, I still can't in good conscience recommend anyone actually listen to this thing. It's still 37 and a half minutes of Elvis babbling to himself like a crazy person and endlessly teasing songs he'll never play. Do you wanna sit through all that unconnected stand-up? Like, I don't think I could even say I'd think the die-hards would get a kick out of this. I mean, if you're this down for The King, you've likely heard every live recording his estate has dumped out, so you've probably heard all of this a million times over. I suppose you could use this as one of those "out of context" videos like I mentioned above, but that's still a crazy amount of work to hafta put in to truly "get" this, y'know? And how are there actually people who've made further volumes of this? Goodness me.

If nothing else, hey, at least this scheme didn't work for the Colonel anyway. After all, he found out that any sound recording made while Elvis was under contract to RCA belonged to them, so it wasn't long before they'd reissued it under their own label. So that's a little something to have fun with.

And I'll say as well: is this the worst rock album ever made? Well, there's not even any rock on it, so categorically, no. But I can't get too mad at it, anyway. After all, I did have some kind of fun with Elvis on stage. And I can't truly condemn anything that accomplishes that much at least.

[listieshadows]

The "me watching the Dog Man movie" experience can easily be summed up as "spending every scene with this character eagarly waiting for someone to say her name so I can go home and look her up, 'coz I like her hair and her attitude and I just think she's neat."

(Well, all that plus "generally enjoying the movie," but I feel like that goes without saying, y'know?)

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Some sashannarcies 🥰

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I feel like my favorite part about Sashannarcy—and I feel like this might apply to any poly ship, actually—is that, when you get down to it, you just can't lose. Like, you support this, and then suddenly you can see any 1-on-1 ship art (Sashanne, Sasharcy, Marcanne) and go, "Well, that's just those two on their own, without the other one." It's great.

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One of the craziest things about my life post-Amphibia is that I've been eating up a lot of fan content based on it. Trust me, that's never happened before: not with The Owl House, not with Gravity Falls, The Last Airbender, the 2017 DuckTales, Phineas And Ferb... None of it. I'm actually out here reading fanfiction and watching fandubs of fancomics. It's nuts to me.

Although, to be fair, none of the other shows I mentioned have had a trio quite like Anne, Sasha and Marcy, so that alone puts Amphibia rather a few points ahead in my mind.

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And finally, I got mysef my own dang Pomni shirt. It's about tiiiiime.

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It really was a small skip from me suddenly loving Marcanne to watching the rest of Amphibia and the finale and starting to support Sashannarcy like, "Ah, but I'd feel kinda bad if I left Sasha out of this."

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No, but the crazy thing about Dream Productions is that it would've been completely appropriate for Xeni to go "I know writers who use subtlety and they're all cowards."

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And it makes me incredibly happy to report: Amphibia was not a hoax.

Seriously, bless this show.

You're my favorite forever, Marcy.

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Also, 'coz this happened in the show while I was dilly-dallying posting my last post:

I KNEW THAT MOON WAS TROUBLE

I NEVER TRUSTED THAT MOON

I ALWAYS THOUGHT THAT MOON WOULD BE BAD NEWS

THAT MOON WAS RED AND I CALLED IT!!!

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Seriously — I've just about said this before, but holy shit, I fuckin' love how much stupid anime bullshit this frog show has by its end. Like, on top of everything else, that absolutely makes Amphibia my favorite animated Disney TV show I've seen. And I've still got the finale left to wreck me! Goodness me, I can't even.

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Happy Friday the 13th, everyone! And since this is the first one that's come around since I watched the complete film series in August, here's the OC cosplay I took today as an excuse to wear:

I think she looks pretty good in it, eh?