Did you know Liz Phair never wanted to be on a major label? That Matador “left” her at Capitol and her infamous self-titled 2003 album (which is pretty good, BTW) was her attempt to “make the best of it”? Now that she’s on Dave Matthews’ label ATO she feels more “creative” than she has since, well, Exile In Guyville. “I can honestly say, for the first time in 15 years, I feel creative. I don’t have to start with a mindset that thinks about how to sell the record and works backward.” So she didn’t even feel “creative” for Whip-Smart or Whitechocolatespaceegg? Who names an album Whitechocolatespaceegg and doesn’t feel “creative”?
She’s got plenty to be excited about now, though. Like the upcoming reissue of the one album she felt creative on!
I’m also excited about the way the re-release turned out. Alan Light did the liner notes, and I’ve been meeting with artists about the packaging for the 2.0 version. There are three bonus tracks, but there is a good minute separating them from the rest of the record. It was cool to go through my closet and find the songs — some are from [demo] “Girly Sound” but they are very much of the “Guyville” era.
Ooh, liner notes by Alan Light! To go with the DVD introduced by Dave Matthews himself! Now there’s a reason to skip Itunes. While I tried to be classy and not put the word “blowjob” in the headline, I couldn’t leave the phrase out entirely.
Fifteen years ago, things seemed a lot more male-dominated, and now you get women busting out everywhere, so that’s good. But the way they are busting out is still very much within the constraints of what men want them to do. Maybe we don’t need to have as much anger as we did back then, but we still need strong women. I see all these young women on porn sites, all these sorority girls posting pictures of themselves giving blowjobs and thinking that it’s empowering, and I feel like they really missed the point.
And how could anyone miss the point of “H.W.C.”? I’m curious to hear the outcome of her newfound independence (her only album I don’t think highly of is the quickly forgotten Somebody’s Miracle), but it sounds like she’s still suffering from Sheryl Crow exposure and whatever awkward past-rationalizing ailment bands like R.E.M. have.
The Billboard Q&A: Liz Phair [Billboard]
The whole “not feeling creative in 15 years” bit sharply contrasts her 2003 album press, where she talked about her newfound creativity and her thirst for hit singles. I love Liz Phair (and agree that “Miracle” was her only weak album), but if she wants to make points about convictions and all, maybe she should be more careful about contradicting herself. That said, I am so buying the “Exile” reissue.
which is pretty good, BTW
It’s really too bad everyone walked away from the s/t album. It succeeds as both a mainstream pop record, and as a Liz Phair record. There’s nothing wrong with that.
@Charles A. Hohman: “The whole “not feeling creative in 15 years” bit sharply contrasts her 2003 album press, where she talked about her newfound creativity and her thirst for hit singles.”
Because she will do and say ANYTHING to remain relevant. Why is this still surprising after all this time?
And as far as decrying a “Gone Wild” culture goes, what sort of positive gender role model is Ms. Phair providing for our nation’s young women?
[www.p45.com]
I rest my case, your honor. The defense has no pants.
It’s really too bad everyone walked away from the s/t album. It succeeds as both a mainstream pop record, and as a Liz Phair record. There’s nothing wrong with that.
I dunno, man. I was a big fan all the way through Whitechocolatespaceegg. I didn’t just walk away from the s/t, I had to hide the motherfucker and tell myself “it’s awful, stop trying.”
Why all the Liz-hating?
I’m eagerly anticipating her sex tape that will come out 3 weeks before the release of her new album. I’m sure the creativity will be palpable.
Wait-didn’t I have to read all that poop about how great it was to be a mommy when Whitechocolatewhobuysthiscrap came out? And then how she liked working with the Matrix and having hit singles and her old fans who weren’t happy could suck it? It’s’ not surprising her next move is Born-Again Indie Cred. Hey Liz, this time, no one cares. Seriously, for reals.
She’s had more throw-something-at-the-wall-and-hope-it-sticks career reinventions than Jewel.
More blow-job songs please.
@tigerpop:
Agreed.
@Jupiter8: She’s had more throw-something-at-the-wall-and-hope-it-sticks career reinventions than Jewel.
For a while I wished Liz would do a BET-inspired album like Jewel.
The greatest fear is that she’ll be further burnished into adult-contemporarydom by an ATO production stalwart like John Alagia or Ethan Johns. DM is doing a lot for worthy artists, but a good number of ATO artists end up sounding muted on their label bow — Radiohead notwithstanding.
[blog.newsok.com]
Three bonus tracks? If only she had a load of legendary unreleased demos, the kind that would have gotten her the first record deal–the kind of demos that fans would have traded bootlegs of and cataloged online–so this could be a big lavish two-disc release that would have done just to Exile in Guyville, like those Pavement reissues. That would have been great.
The s/t album was great. As was whitechocolatespaceegg. I know why people hated on her for moving to a major label, but I don’t think the music justified the anger.
@Cannot Find Server: The Juvenlilia EP is way underrated, but I guess that qualifies as Whip-Smart material (even though it consists of Girlysound demos). But maybe she just hates the tape-era stuff even though it could easily fill up a box set worth of space, though I would be willing to pay for a lavish edition of it, hiss and all.
Matador may still hold the rights to that b-side material, but I would think it transferred with the Capitol split in total. And staying in the same place over the years is what, I guess, made the Pavement reissues that much more easy to compile in the grand scheme. I don’t know what I’m even talking about anymore.
@tigerpop: I have to disagree based on the way they pitch-corrected the living shit out of her voice. Part of Liz Phair’s charm is her sometimes off-key delivery when she sings. On her s/t major debut they teched that aspect of her away and it sounded like some lost Michelle Branch album.
@joshservo: Isn’t it sad when the musicians of a decade ago that you wanted to sleep with start looking more and more like Iggy Pop??
@Jay-C: Who knows. I like all the albums, SM less than the other four (of course), and I have no problem with this. Liz even says in the interview that she was having fun at the time, when she made her self-titled album. People do stupid things all the time that come out less poorly than expected and/or seem like good ideas at the time. I doubt Liz is any different. And I question the idea that this is honestly that much of a repudiation of her past work:
When I did the first pop record, I have to say it was fun for me. [Then-Capitol president] Andy Slater came in and we just decided to give it a shot. I felt like I had fun and learned a lot, although I certainly would not have made that record had I not been on a major.
I also suspect Liz isn’t releasing any of the Girly Sound stuff because it’s all available online anyway (newer, slightly higher quality versions came to the Internet around 2005) and so anyone who has any interest in that stuff probably already has it, or so the record label’s reasoning would go. Me, I’d pay Radiohead-box-set prices for CDs of Girly Sound. But what do I know.
@kisskisskiss: Where did my line breaks go???
@NeverEnough:
Good call! Maybe Liz Phair is the real Rock of Love!
I thought ‘Guyville’ was great at the time.
‘Whipsmart’ disappointed me, sounding underwritten, but i forced myself to try and like it and played it a lot. It didn’t repay the effort.
I waited an age for the SpaceEgg one, didn’t mind half of it and spent a lot of time trying to convince myself it was good.
Another five years later the s/t one dropped and i’d given up expecting anything great from her and had almost completely forgotten her existence. Heard it, didn’t buy it. She told everyone to ‘move on’ from Guyville.
Listened to ‘Miracle’ once online - complete irrelevance. Didn’t buy it.
Listened to ‘Guyville’ recently, out of curiousity. 15 years on my tastes have changed enough to realise that not only doesn’t she have the songwriting ability or discipline to produce great work, (thereby guaranteeing she is never going to do anything but disappoint anyone expecting anything from her), that original release is probably the most overrated debut album of all time, sounding like someone mucking around in their bedroom without even bothering to tune the strings first.
It’s ok enough, but it’s hardly Shakespeare to hang onto it for 15 years.
Thirty seconds in, ‘Guyville’ is already a classic worthy of anniversary celebrations:
I bet you fall in bed too easily
With the beautiful girls who are shyly brave
And you sell yourself as a man to save
But all the money in the world is not enough
“H.W.C.” was empowering because she chose to swallow the semen, thus preventing a pregnancy and enslaving her to the chains of motherhood etc. etc. Grrrl power… or something.
Just to add to her general annoyingness, she reminds me of Ambre on ‘Rock of Love 2′.
i enjoyed Jewel’s video that was like a “Sprite” commercial
@joshservo: There’s a ton of these types of photos out there - many used to be on her own website. But with a teenage daughter, it’s more “do as I say, not as I did.”
Exile could have been a great 10 or 12 song record - listen to all 18 sounds and the 200 snippets that make up girly sound tapes and you realize anything halfway decent has been released. Every album since then has been about continuing a career that should have lasted 6 months.
Why does anyone care about this nobody? “Cause she’s hawt?” Bag it and tag it, Liz. It is over.
I blame Sheryl Crow.
Well, not totally. Though I’m really not tempted by the revisionist line here. ‘Exile’ holds its own, especially if you’re prepared to judge it as a product of its time; the s/t is just not a good record, pop, Phair or any points between.