the width of my smile

good afternoon ~

(click the link / glorious river sunset to listen)

My Big Breakthe width of my smile

today's track was made with tomorrow's gig in mind and some of these bleeps and saxophone samples might make it into the Friends Meeting set

so yes - - we're playing at the Avalon tomorrow with sets by the Early and Matthew Ryals

I'm also playing a solo set at Tubby's in Kinston on Tuesday - - -

by the way, this is the track discussed below

Don't give me the single version. That's fucking bullshit! Three minutes? What am I, a wimp? I'll earn the hook the old fashioned way, okay? I'm listening to the whole thing.

It starts off somewhat abruptly. The sloppy, flammy handclaps over what sounds like a looped bongo sample and high up in the rafters a held synthesized string, like something you'd hear on a budget disco record - someone trying to simulate sweeping orchestral glamour with a pedaled note in the heavens. Then the picked bass rolling in over itself, caught in a perpetual forward falling stumble. The world established, the full EQ range of drums drop in, grounding the track around an incessant but to my ears very polite kick drum, like this track wouldn't necessarily knock you sideways in the club. A pause for some mumbled vocals and then a funky electric piano and shakers emerge - now we are veering dangerously close to what might be considered house music. An analog delay break in the rhythm signals that something is about to happen, and here we are - the unsubtle, lacking in variation, cheap piano chords that are such a beautiful hallmark of many such attempts at this style of music. The cheesiness of their sound is vivid - we learn everything we need to know about the coming un-subtlety in the hammering of these chords, a stage set. Despite the monochromatic, robo-cool-guy vibes that the Juan Maclean were trying to cultivate in their overall image at the time, the lettering on the label of the single of this record gives it away: this is a fucking rainbow song on a bright yellow background, a birthday cake of a recording. And here comes Nancy, undoubtedly one of the coolest people who ever lived and in many other recorded personas truly sounds like she does not give two shits, singing of renewing love from her chest like an absolute cornball. "Thank you for being so excellent." It's fucking glorious.

"Happy House" came out in 2008 at the height of DFA's powers. This is long before James Murphy would be known for opening a bougie wine bar, long before LCD Soundsystem would be known for partnering with American Express for their incessant comeback shows. This was the year following "Sound of Silver" and cool people with music world influence were totally down with a particular brand of white guys being emotional over aggressively danceable and somewhat generic-sounding club beats: catharsis allowed. Despite loving that world of music myself, I never heard this track at the time - I was much more interested in playing guitar and making loud rock music. I, too, was seeking to make "spiky" and "angular" postpone, a different flavor of allowed catharsis. A much less fun version, I was making serious music, although everyone seemed to like my band's songs you could dance to the best.

I never consciously heard "Happy House" until about a decade after its release. Deep into my manic year of treadmill - having already run and meticulously logged 500 miles in a spreadsheet - I got the chance to go do an artist residency in Greensboro, North Carolina. The residency itself was whatever. Though I enjoyed waking up at dawn every morning to play guitar, the thing I really got out of it was time to really seriously be on the treadmill. There was a gleaming, enormous YMCA within walking distance that let me purchase a very affordable guest past for the month and it's possible that I may have spent more time there than I did working on my own tunes. That I also forced myself into a pause from all social media and all podcasts and all headphone time but for the treadmill likely intensified my experiences running. One day I remembered some guys: VHS or Beta, remember that band? I saw them open for Electric 6 one time in San Juan Capistrano. Maybe they'd be good for running. What's this? They did a remix for the Juan Maclean? Wow I haven't heard them in forever, amazing that there's this point of intersection here. Wow cool giving it some Gary Numan vibes...this is pretty good...let me check out the original.

Twelve minutes is a great length. It's enough time for the world of the song to really pull you in and transform you. Plus it helps the miles feel a little shorter. It was only later that I realized why extended club mixes are that way - they give you a handful of bars of drums at the beginning and the end to give you plenty of time to mix in and out of the track. One could argue that you're not "supposed" to listen to extended dance mixes one at a time all the way through. But I like what I like.

I had taken a long absence from this recording. And though I'm right now deeply obsessed with the treadmill again, it wasn't the need for propulsion that brought it back into rotation. No, nearly sixteen years after its release, I'm listening to the song again because - for the first time ever - the lyrics resonated with me. Approaching the place where I now live I recognized the mythical, eponymous "happy house" from this track, a beautiful double entendre, a home where I eat rainbow colored cake every single day. Before, I had never located myself within the singing. I had never met or been with anybody who could have compelled me to repeat such powerfully corny utterances, and when this track and I first bonded, I was really having a moment of single living, laughing, and loving. Up until that point a romantic partner was someone to spar with, grist for the mill of emotional pain - I knew no other way. And the treadmill, I know, a form of masochism. But now the song is a mirror. I myself could sing "you're the reason for the width of my smile" without a second thought. I don't want the single version. I want the whole thing.

But what about you? Are you brave enough to embrace the corny and the cringe? What song makes you run? What is the reason for the width of your smile?