Tune Tag #58 with Tommy Blanchard of "Cognitive Wonderland": Bad Religion, Tool, Yardbirds, Joe Boerne, Genesis, F(x), Meredith Bull, Jake Holmes
A mix of the classic and the punk, and a few things in between! Would you believe we've uncovered members of two bands who attended the same L.A. high school 30 years apart?📣Rah rah!😱
Hey, Tommy! TagTagTagTagTagTag….You’re IT!
Tune Tag welcomes of Cognitive Wonderland!
I did my PhD in neuroscience at the University of Rochester, hold degrees in computer science and philosophy, and did a postdoc at Harvard. By day, I work as a data scientist. I’m also a science fiction writer, having published a handful of short stories in various venues. I recently started writing on Substack, where I write in my publication Cognitive Wonderland about philosophy, science, and science fiction.
You’ll notice nothing above mentions music. That’s because my closest relationship to music comes from having married someone with two music degrees. I also learned how to play a few chords on a ukulele last year (mainly so I could strum “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” to entertain my young kids). So expect some extremely ill-informed musical takes from my end!—Tommy Blanchard
Last week, we enjoyed the musical company of aka Ryan Stubbs, with his Memoir in Real Time Substack:
Next week, join us for more vinyl-centric Tune Tag surprises, with our guest, of Record Shop Stories!
Tommy’s song #1 sent to Brad: Bad Religion, “Shattered Faith,” 2002
Tommy’s rationale: I went back and forth on which song to start with, but all of the ones in contention were by Bad Religion! They’re one of the few bands who write intelligent lyrics about topics that are near and dear to my heart.
“Shattered Faith” to me is a story of the intellectual journey of someone trying to make sense of the world:
The world won’t illuminate what really matters
And I’m an imperfect mortal meaning extractor
Processing the complexity
The protagonist of the song is grappling with a complex world and things like free will and morality. This eventually becomes too heavy and overwhelming, with the mournfully sung verse:
I had a dream
Light and carefree
But now there’s doubt
And gravity
Despite the gravity, the song ends on a positive note. The vocals become more optimistic as singer (and evolutionary biologist), Greg Graffin, begins the last verse:
But I won’t run in place
In the human rat race
I can set the pace
And accept my fate
The song finally ends with the line:
Shattered faith
The part of me I can’t erase
This line really resonates with me because in a lot of ways, it was my own “shattered faith” (losing belief in the Catholic religion I grew up with) that started my own journey looking for “what really matters” as an “imperfect mortal meaning extractor.”
Brad’s response: Formed nearby in Hermosa Beach four years earlier: Punk/power poppers, The Last. It’s quite likely they have long-known the members of Bad Religion. FR&B did an Audio Autopsy (includes a photo of their Hermosa Beach house!) on their astoundingly diverse 1979 album, L.A. Explosion, an article a couple of their members have read, via online contacts:
Brad’s song #1 sent to Tommy: f(x), “Summer Lover,” 2014
Tommy’s response: We’ve gone from an old West Coast punk band to a short-lived Korean pop band. I’m immediately realizing I’m way out of my depth, and Brad is going to bury me in esoteric connections on dimensions of music I didn’t even realize existed.
I suspect Brad’s connection is something along the lines of: the intern at the studio “Shattered Faith” was recorded in had a secret fling with the third cousin of the producer on “Summer Lover,” or something!
I’m going to go with my first thought: What first stood out to me was the band’s name—f(x) being a surprisingly nerdy reference for a pop band (it’s the mathematical notation for a function). Bad Religion, in general, is pretty nerdy—the lead singer has a PhD and has taught biology at Cornell and UCLA. “Shattered Faith” itself started by talking about scientists and theologians, so maybe it isn’t such a big leap to mathematical notation from there.
Brad’s rationale: Then-18-year-old guitarist, Brett Gurewitz (above), helped form Bad Religion in the San Fernando Valley’s Woodland Hills (an L.A. county suburb) in 1980, with Greg Graffin (vocals), Jay Ziskrout (drums) and Jay Bentley (bass). All four attended Woodland Hills’ El Camino Real High School.
Amber Liu (aka Amber) of f(x), shown below, also attended El Camino Real, graduating around 2010. She contributed some of the music to f(x)’s “Summer Lover.”
Tommy’s song #2: Meredith Bull, “Never Stop,” 2020
Brad’s response: A wild guess would be a rough genre-related connection between the sound of f(x) and Ms. Bull. I don’t play in this sandbox, so it’s, admittedly, a shot in the dark, if not a dot in the shark.
Tommy’s rationale: As I was desperately trying to figure out the connection Brad saw between “Shattered Faith” and “Summer Lover,” I looked up the English translation to “Summer Lover.” I was struck by these lines:
Falling down is a process of growing up, it hurts, but you’ll get better some day
(Happiness is about the journey not the destination)
The upbeat female vocals combined with that lyrical theme of keeping a positive perspective on life reminded me of Meredith Bull’s song all about never stopping loving life despite the changes it brings.
Brad’s song #2: Joe Bourne, “Don’t Stop,” 2016
Tommy’s response: I hadn’t heard this jazzy version of “Don’t Stop” before; it’s a lot of fun! I’m hoping Brad is throwing me a softball here: “Don’t Stop” vs “Never Stop,” extremely similar song names. I think the connection goes deeper though: Both songs are also about dealing with some difficult present or past aspect of life by having optimism in the future, so thematically seem very close, too.
Brad’s rationale: A longtime jazz singer with whom I’m quite unfamiliar. A cool, swingin’ Fleetwood Mac cover, written by Mac’s Christine McVie, matching “Never Stop” with “Don’t Stop.”
Related:
Tommy’s song #3: Days N Daze, “F*** It,” 2013
YouTube’s video of this Days N Daze song is “age-restricted and only available” on the YouTube site by clicking here.
Brad’s response: Not sure I’m seeing the direct correlation between the Joe Bourne “Don’t Stop” cover, and this gratuitously-titled D’n’D song.
Tommy’s rationale: The jazzy version of “Don’t Stop” called to mind the trumpet-infused songs of Days N Daze (I don’t listen to much jazz, okay? Folk punk is as close as I get). Both songs are about how to deal with life and get out of unhealthy ruminations. “Don’t Stop” calls for thinking about the future instead of dwelling on the past. Days N Daze prefer a different mentality on this song from their 2013 album, Rogue Taxidermy: Just stop taking it all so seriously, treat life like a game because we’re all going to die in the end: In other words, F*** it!
Brad’s song #3: Jake Holmes, “Dazed and Confused,” 1967
Tommy’s response: Seems like another clear connection (Daze in the band name connecting to “Dazed” in the song title). In terms of sound, I could see some connections: Acoustic guitar and vocals that are a bit gruff/unpolished.
Brad’s rationale: Matching Jake’s “Dazed” with “Daze” in Days N Daze. Daisy👉🌼
Holmes and Jimmy Page apparently settled for an undisclosed amount regarding “Dazed and Confused,” but Holmes found a successful and lucrative career in commercial jingle writing well into the 1980s! Sometimes another singer sang on the ad, but there are a few where Jake, himself, is singing (click here for the YouTube playlist of his collected jingle videos).
wrote about Holmes and his purloined song, recently, plus 8 other tunes Plant, Page & Company apparently thought was theirs…ahem:The Yardbirds with the shameless Page:
Tommy’s song #4: Tool, “Schism,” 2001
Brad’s response: To be honest, I figured this Tool jam would be all but unlistenable, but, it borders on the more than listenable, and the lyrics more mature than I would have guessed. My first thought went toward matching a lyrical theme of a communication gap between loved ones (granted, lovers) with the glaring communication chasm (between a father and son) as laid out in “No Son of Mine” by Genesis, my next song-send to Tommy.
I gave a passing nod to Led Zeppelin’s “Communication Breakdown,” but it not only was a little too obvious for my tastes, but we just did a Led Zep “drive-by” above!
Before pulling the trigger on the Genesis, though, I wanted to see some of the names involved on the tech side of this Tool song. I first did a resume dive into the co-producer (with the band), one David Bottrill, with whom I was unfamiliar. Turns out, he’s responsible for something of an “inner Tune Tag,” as he’s produced and/or engineered several ‘80s and ‘90s post-Genesis Peter Gabriel sides, including “Biko” and “In Your Eyes”!
Meeting Gabriel in 1974, after their Armadillo World HQ gig in Austin:
As tempting as Bottrill’s resume (and production catalog) is, I nevertheless elected to go with my first “communication-gap” instinct. It’s got a great story on how they derived the so-called “Elephantus” sound, as well as how Phil Collins came up with the song’s narrative.
Tommy’s rationale: The Jake Holmes instrumentals had this haunting quality that, to me, called to mind Tool. I’ve always loved Tool, but they’re one of those bands I listened to in high school and keep forgetting they exist—it doesn’t help that for a long time, they stayed off Spotify.
Realizing they’re on there now (as of 2019, apparently) gave me an excuse to go through and give them a listen. “Schism” has always been a standout song to me, and shares that haunting quality that Holmes’ “Dazed and Confused” reminded me of.
Brad’s song #4: Genesis, “No Son of Mine,” 1991 (acoustic in-studio, 2000)
K(no)w “Son of Mine”
Phil Collins and keyboardist, Tony Banks, discuss the genesis of “No Son of Mine,” and how the lyrics came about. Banks, Collins, and guitarist, Mike Rutherford, also play an acoustic version of the song, in-studio. Video director, Jim Yukich, discloses how the official video’s ending (called “the drop,” on-set) was shot, with feathers, snips of paper and Vermiculite falling incessantly over the singer/actors (official video is just below the photo of Martino Lazzeri, who played the young man in the video):
Tommy’s response: I seem to keep focusing on the lyrics of songs for connections. I blame growing up on punk songs, with their very explicit lyrical themes and messages!
“Schism” is very clearly about the loss of a relationship (between two lovers), knowing that “the pieces fit,” but not knowing how to put them back together to repair the relationship. In “No Son of Mine,” the schism is between a son and father. It similarly talks about the falling out of the relationship, and the attempt on the son’s part to repair the relationship—and the father rejecting him for leaving home.
Official music video, with UK native, Martino Lazzeri (above; he was 18 at the time of the 1991 video shoot), as the boy. In interviews, Phil Collins has said that the lyrics are deliberately vague as to whether the narrator or his mother is the victim of the abuse:
As for that odd sound that starts the track (after the clock-ticking/metronome), it was called “Elephantus,” and it stood in as the song’s “placemark” working-title for the song as Phil was writing it. Bassist/guitarist, Mike Rutherford has said in interviews: “I was playing a guitar phrase, and [keyboardist Tony Banks] sampled it and turned it upside down and slowed it down. Which is that kind of strange elephant noise which starts the track.”
Banks elaborated in another interview: “Sounds like an elephant being sick. It’s just a very distinctive sound, you know? It was just Mike, actually, sort of thrashing around and I just cut out this little bit in the middle of it, and then slowed it right down and just used the front end of it, and stuck it with this E-minor chord. The effect was fantastic.”
“No Son of Mine” with Phil, and longtime Genesis concert guitarist Daryl Stuermer, on guitar, Phil’s studio and concert pianist, Brad Cole on piano, unplugged on VH1’s Storytellers, 1997:
The amount of connections you guys were able to find is impressive. Your different backgrounds, approaches and, in some cases, genre preferences played in your favour, as each of you brought something different —and very interesting— to the Tune Tag table.
That acoustic version of No Son of Mine, though 🥹 Exquisite!
Thank you, Brad and Tommy, for keeping an open mind, for trusting each other, and for making all this magic happen!
Super fun TT! It’s not a Tune Tag until Genesis makes an appearance !