The Orange Peels >> It's dangerous to fly a kite when it's raining

California Month, tremor #16:

The Orange Peels - "I Don't Mind The Rain"

(Minty Fresh Records, 1995 or '96)

The album cover says "recorded in 2-dimensional california sound."

I got this album, Square, in '97 or '98 for about a dollar on promo CD at The Mushroom or Underground Sounds, and instantly fell in love with this song, despite not normally being into this kind of thing.  I probably bought it because I was really into the Cardigans' First Band On The Moon, and I knew they had been on Minty Fresh.  The co-ed vocal harmonizing is so beautiful that it could theoretically melt the heart of someone as cold and callous as Simon Cowell, Lindsay Lohan, Clarence Thomas, or Anthony Bourdain.  This band was/is fronted by a guy named Allen Clapp and once known as, I kid you not, Allen Clapp And His Orchestra.  According to Wikipedia, "The Roland [RE-201] Space Echo would become an important part of Clapp's production of musical soundscapes, helping him achieve a cool, coastal sound."  The album was released in 1997, but was recorded from '95 to '96 at two very cool-sounding studios: The Terrarium in Minneapolis, MN, and Mysterious Cove in Campbell, CA.  Rain is always a great lyrical topic; the Peels' next album even had a song called "The West Coast Rain."  And their website even has a page about how great California life is!  Way to rub it in, guys.  Leave it to a geeky Cali band to tell us not to fly a kite during a storm.  Like it ever rains in California.  I think I remember one drop of rain in the six years I lived there, and it was probably just morning fog condensation.  It took an East Coast dude, Ben Franklin, to have to guts to do that, and that's how he discovered cable TV, and now we all benefit from it.  For example, we can use the Weather Channel to tell us when a storm is coming and thereby know when to avoid it.

The Japanese edition of Square had totally different & better cover art than the U.S. one did:

Japanese front cover

Japanese back cover

Fun Story Time: A week or so ago, I was at my parents', watching the Saints-Packers game with my mom & sister, and for some reason I felt impelled out of the blue to show my sister one of my all-time favorite videos/songs on YouTube, "Only A Memory" by the Smithereens:

My mom even overheard it and said she liked it.  I think she was pretty surprised when I mentioned they were: a.) from New Jersey, and b.) from the '80s.  (She was born and raised in Philly.)  Then this past Sunday, my sister and I went to The Mushroom in order to show her boyfriend it for the first time, and while I was at the bottom of the long stairway that leads up to the store, located on top of popular frat bar The Boot a few feet off of Tulane's campus, I realized they were playing a Comsat Angels song!  It was "My Mind's Eye" from their 1992 "comeback" album of the same name.  (Remember "I Come From The Sun"?  Well, that was the very next song that came on.)  I just about fainted.  It turns out this guy had brought some of his Comsats CDs over to the store that night, not to sell them, but just to have the store play them while he shopped.  I think he was about 50-ish.  The first I told him was "I have all the Comsats' albums."  So we talked for about an hour until they closed at midnight, and they practically had to kick us out.  He had grown up in England and had seen all the cool punk and post-punk bands of the late '70s / early '80s, such as the Comsats, The Sound, Simple Minds, Cocteau Twins (I think), Siouxsie & The Banshees, Wire, etc.  He said he grew up in the Banshees' city so he saw them a lot.  And later on he saw My Bloody Valentine and Slowdive, among others.  We briefly talked about Miles Davis' The Birth Of The Cool after my sister showed me a live Miles DVD from that era.  (I swear, this all has a point, so read on...)  I found some cheap used CDs on the racks and instructed him to buy them.  These included The Death Of Cool by Kitchens Of Distinction, The Back Room by Editors, a CD by Celebration (blatant Banshees clones), and Green Thoughts by the Smithereens (the album that houses "Only A Memory").  Amazingly, I also found "Only A Memory" on 7" in a big box of used 45's!  I had been wanting this damn thing for many years...  I informed him (his name is Brian or Ryan) about the greatness of Film School and told him about my blog, the last three posts of which were coincidentally about said band.  

Then today, my sister excitedly texted my from Holland to tell me she heard "Only A Memory" on XM radio over there.

To summarize:

1.) Sept. 8: I show the video to someone

2.) Sept. 18: I recommend the song/album to someone else at a record store

3.) I find & buy the song on 7" that same night

4.) Sept. 21: The person from step 1 hears the song on satellite radio on another continent

And the circle gets completed.  I guess this is what Jung or Sting would refer to as synchronicity, or what others may call kismet or just plain old fate.  Whatever you call it, it's pretty cool when, after focusing on something and attempting to spread the word that thing, you are swiftly rewarded with something pertaining to that entity.

If a tree falls and no one hears or sees it, did it really fall?  If you like something and don't spread the word about it, do you really like it?

Planets with similar climates: Eleventh Dream Day - "After This Time Is Gone" (1992), Jale - "Despite" (1996), Over The Rhine - "How Does It Feel (To Be On My Mind)?" (1991), Papas Fritas - "Smash This World" (1994), Cornelius - "Star Fruits Surf Rider" (1996), Tommy Keene - "Places That Are Gone" (1984/86), Matthew Sweet - "We're The Same" (1995).