Forget Wolves and Horses -
Cat Bands are In

Chelsea Mushaluk, OP Contributor

 

 

Wolves are overrated. There, I had to come
out and say it. Not only do they inspire those
horrible velvet paintings with forest scenes
and the Northern Lights, they were also part
of the most popular band naming trend in

 

recent memory. Forget “The” bands. Wolves,
with their Eyes, Parades, and Mothers, were
the shit. Not anymore, folks. Another animal
is making a comeback, and this one isn’t
found on souvenir t-shirts from Whitehorse.

Smaller, fuzzier, and cuter: cats are back.

Our feline friends were used to unfortu-
nate effect on the cover and artwork of
recent buzz band We Are Scientists, lame-o
debut album. Luckily there’s been another cat
holding it down in music for kittens every-
where: Cat Power. Sure, she’s been hawking
products recently (and expensive products at
that... DeBeers? Chanel?), but in doing so has
produced some of the fantastic covers that
made me a fan of her music in the first place.
There are two things that I love about Cat
Power (AKA Chan Marshall): her songwriting
and her voice. The covers she performs, most
of which are on the aptly titled Covers Record,
are beautiful. Listen to “Wonderwall,” “TI
Found a Reason,” “Wild is the Wind” or “
Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” and you'll see
what I mean. If the depth of her voice does-
n't move you, listen again, as you may or may
not have a soul.

If covers aren’t your thing, try You Are
Free. Pitchfork gave it an 8.9, and it was
released just before the Fork started touting
Top 40 pop tarts like Ciara and Nelly
Furtado, so it’s a rating well deserved. Online
music bible A//music found these happy words
to describe Cat Power’s songwriting: angst-

ridden, cathartic, gloomy, bleak, atmospheric.
And you know what? It’s all of those things.
But it’s also the opposite of all those things.
Her latest record, The Greatest, is not my
favourite album, but it’s a fairly strong record.
She’s not as angry on this album, and I’m not
sure if that works in her favour or not. She
has, however, thankfully moved away from
the Liz Phair-type anger of some of her earli-
er work, and her live shows are reportedly
less erratic. Does this mean that Cat Power is

* becoming a little more domestic? Find out for

yourself, when Cat Power plays the
Commodore Ballroom on November 29, with
the Memphis Rhythm Band.

I’m going to make an early prediction for
the next year in music: it’s starting to look like
the new trend will be cats. Wolves have had
their day. That’s right wolves, I’m calling you
out. P’ll even go so far as to say that cats are
the new wolves. I will leave you with this
question though: what other animal could sit

“on a suitcase, smoking a cigarette and eating

an apple, be stopped by Chanel designer Karl
Lagerfeld, and appear in his next ad cam-
paign? I don’t know, but I think it’s safe to say
that it’s not wolves. Meow!

 

 

Song of the Week:

“T Wanna Be Your Dog” by The Stooges

Patrick Mackenzie, OP Columnista

When I was told the last issue of the Other
Press for the semester was going to revolve
around an animal theme, I immediately rum-
maged through the store of songs cluttering
my mind like forgotten invitations to all-night
parties where the object of attending is to get
" laid or to consume as much drugs and alco-
hol as humanly possible. There’s gotta be
tons of songs about animals, I thought, espe-
cially in rock music with it being reasonably,
um, animalistic. Look at Jim Morrison. He

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was like an animal with his drunken swagger
and willingness to use the word “fuck” on
stage or give the cops the finger all the while
singing “love me two times baby.” Or the way
Jimi Hendrix mimicked making love to an
amplifier or doused his beautiful Fender
Stratocaster with lighter fluid and set it on
fire, tossing the charred rerhnants into the
out-stretched arms of an enraptured audi-
ence. All very animalistic. I would even ven-
ture, dog-like. Think about it: dogs, like rock-

icons, strut around on stage, and they mark
their territory with lighter fluid or something
similar. (I’m making a huge leap here.)

So, speaking of dogs, there’s a song that
comes to mind that captures the drunken
masculinity of Jim Morrison, the sexed-up
attitude and flaming guitar of Jimi Hendrix,
and teenage male, dog sniffing, leg-humping,
sexual frustration. Because no other medium
other than rock music can capture such loin-
centtic, visceral appetites, ladies and germs,
for this year’s final installment of Song of the
Week and just in time for Christmas, I give

- you, “I Wanna Be Your Dog” by The

Stooges.

Fronted by an Iggy Pop barely out of his
teens, The Stooges, along with the MC5, were
the quintessential proto punk band. They
were (actually they’ve re-formed, so I’m not
sure whether to use the present or past
tense), the nausical stem cells, as it were, that
many believe evolved into punk rock and
heavy metal as we know them today.

As rock songs go, “I Wanna Be your
Dog” doesn’t get much more primitive. As
I’ve already alluded to, it is sexual desire made
manifest through the beating of drums and
the stroking of guitars (oh my god, I can’t
believe I just wrote that). Although the song
was released in 1969 on a self-titled record, it
sounds as if it were recorded last week in a
garage in New Westminster by beginner musi-
cians with more imagination than technical
ability. Feedback and distortion begin the

song in what is anticipated to be a barrage of

noise and intensity, but the feedback soon

falls into three chords played down the neck
of an electric guitar in a slow, brooding ode
to lust. The rest of the music is fleshed-out

by drums, bass that follows the same chord
progression as the guitar, and what sounds
like Christmas bells in the background. “I
Wanna Be your Dog” doesn’t really get past
the plodding repetition laid down by the gui-
tar, and there is no real chorus to speak of
except Iggy’s twice repeated plea, “Well
c'mon.”

Lyrically, the song evokes images of
unmet teenage longing: “So messed-up I want
you here / In my room I want you here.” But
what could otherwise stay in the realm of

_ everyday human desire descends into the bes-

tial plane in what the singer is willing to do in
order to have his appetites satisfied: “Now
we're gonna be face-to-face / And T’ll lay
right down in my favorite place / And now I
wanna be you dog / Now I wanna be your
dog.” The singer’s willingness to become his
lover’s animal, that is to debase himself,
seems to suggest the surrender of traditional
male power. In what appears on the surface
as a naughty song about the lengths one will
go in order to get laid, is in fact the subver-
sion of traditional, socially prescribed roles
based on gender that is of course, if we
assume that the singet’s lover is of the oppo-
site sex. But even without such a distinction,
the song still stands as a denial of culturally
sanctioned sexual practices.

This is probably not what The Stooges
had in mind when they first wrote the song;
however, “I Wanna Be Your Dog” captures
the subversive undercurrent that seems so
essential in creating influential and revolution-
ary rock music.

Now get on your hands and knees and
bark like a dog,

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