adam balbo: big kid now

sorta fucked-up pop folk is what i do.

so said adam balbo.

how could i resist.

i’ll get the adam green thing out the way.  dude with lo-fidelity guitar murmerings and a notebook scrawled fulla wry deprecation and cocky popculture rifforamas.  actually much closer to the moldy peaches than green’s solo semi-scott-walker cabaret pop anyway.  so they partly share a name and somethingorother. and that’s fucking it.

i love the moldy peaches for the same reason i love the vaselines.  they both remind me that should you want to, anyone can pick up a guitar and belt out some chords and sing in as much of a tune as they can. granted many have tried and many have fallen foul like rod hull from a wet midnight roodtop.  but it’s the act of trying of being of possiblies and mights that appeal.  it’s the very same sentiment that i dig about adam balbo.

the music itself is pretty minimal, minimally pretty, acousticky strum and pick. occasional half remembered percussion, whistling (god i love a song with whistling) and a teensy organ.  heh.  teensy organ.

oh yeah and lyrics.

verbs nouns and adjectives arranged in lots of lovely ways, delightfully proposed and exhibited for yr aural pleasure.  by turns clever stupid and smart alecky tear provoking.

whether it’s the fucked love song of ‘let’s feel terrible together’

let’s feel terrible together
we could stand in each other’s shoes
talk right past each other, while we
trade disparaging news
you point your finger and reallocate the blame
eventually we could share the same name

or the fucked love song of ‘god musta fucked up makin’ everyone else’:

yeah, i can be an ass, but you can be whiny sister
but you’re so damn cute, i still wanna kiss ya
it’s mean when i ignore ya, but i’d never dismiss ya
even when they call you ma’am, and start callin me mister

or the fucked love song of ‘let’s make a porno’

i don’t mind pornstars, but you know its not the same
see, they get paid to fuck eachother, then there’s all that fame
but we still get to get it on, in sweet obscurity
so, let’s make a porno, and watch it for free

the closest and most accurate description i can think of is that it sounds like the words sloshing around inside of my head when drunk.  maudlin or delirious.  not unlike the picture above (with newcastle brown ale in hand).  and unfortunately dear reader only i, david icke and our sweet lord baby jeebus know what that sounds like.

or as another review goes:

“with all due respect, i have probably heard worse music with a folk sound, but i honestly can’t remember when.  i also can’t remember when i was happier to have a cd end”

anyway this is my favourite track.  positively dylan-esque (which frankly is a stupid thing to say/type) but with more obscenity.  which if we’re all being honest old bob could’ve done with.

workin’ for a commie mouthpiece

look at me i’m a fuckin mess, been in it so long i’m about to confess i used to have ideals, might’ve stayed that way, now i’m a cynical man, what can i say i forgot why i’s supposed to give a fuck, but fuck it now, i’m gonna take a fuckin vacation at my own behest, i’m all bitched out, ain’t got no bitchin left right, well, in retrospect what did i expect, i’m a tool of the state, i work for uncle han when i stop i’ll make my peace, but as of right now, i’m workin for a commie mouthpiece you guessed it right, i’m that foreign man, from that space west of china that stretches to japan mongolia and north & all that’s in between, personally, i’s never into that scene but anyway, the money’s good, i make over twice than my chinese colleagues do i’m a visitor, a friend, an expert, if i drop my (biased) politics & candor from fuedalism’s fall through the republican nation, from beijing ‘49 through tibet’s liberation the CCP’s been a peaceful organization, if you don’t know that go get some re-education socialism’s marchin on with chinese characteristics, but beware of right-wing japs & western statistics from the far-flung west of the people’s republic to that so-called democracy -its just a renagade province no independence forces gonna split this motherland, don’t care if it’s their will, don’t care if they can magnanimous, glorious, objective, prudent, timely & righteous selected facts distorted truths, a partisan perspective, that’s what we bring to you “making china better know to the outside world,” this country’s leaders have the confidence of an adolescent girl if you’re gonna be dogmatic, why not at least have fun, (jesus) even fox news bring on liberals to laugh at ‘em but honestly it’s gettin better each day, just look at the farmers smile & minorities parade now new moneyed men, with their man purses, are sittin’ with their skinny women in urban cafes slurping there are new found luxuries, expectations are changing; but the right to assembly is still considered dangerous seems like every fuckin cadre’s shakin some business prick’s hand keepin the nutjobs out of power that’d probably wanna bomb japan stability, wealth & national defense, are pretty costly human expenses i can’t begin to imagine, i ain’t here to prove it, but believe me when i tell you that i’ve live partly through it there’re whole portions of these past generations, that are shut up or punished for direct confrontation with a handful of those who control & believe, that their’s is the only way to be chinese at any cost, they say, at their designated speed, how much is it worth to you to challenge what that means? there’s simply no place, except for underground, where the discontent & noisy, have room to make a goddamn sound

big kid now:

“goodbye, nice to know ya, by the way fuck you”

loads of free stuff and cheap purchases available here…

balbospace