Something Is Wrong Here, Something Is Terribly Wrong

I like to say I don’t care about lyrics in pop music, but I tend to exaggerate. This Bishop Allen song, for instance, seems to have a rich, sad short story in it about an obsession with the JFK assassination masking guilt over not being there for a suicidal friend/lover. It sounds so reductive to summarize it thus, I know, so just give it a listen. (But you may notice that great lyrics or no great lyrics, the song would be much less memorable without the dramatic guitar chords and piano flourishes in the chorus.)

• Bishop Allen, “The Bullet & Big D”

And to further mark this Kennedy death-day anniversary, here’s Steinski & Mass Media with “The Motorcade Sped On,” which, in case you don’t know it, is constructed from samples of the news coverage surrounding the assassination and its aftermath. Well, OK, he cheats a bit, working in some JFK speeches, etc., plus of course that guitar whaaaang from “A Hard Day’s Night.” Y’gotta hear it.

It was a long time before I clued in that in structure this song is actually totally conventional: verse chorus verse chorus bridge verse chorus.

• Steinski & Mass Media, “The Motorcade Sped On”

The Bishop Allen song is on their January EP, which can be bought here. No link for “Motorcade” because I really don’t know where or if you can buy it these days.