25.  The Army You Have, “See You in November”

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Conservatives’ music has long been stuck in the Lee Greenwood model of “Let’s make this the most epic, patriotic tearjerker song evarrr!” and has stagnated for decades.  When we dare to quit preaching to the choir, the result is often a low-rent parody with hacky buzzword lyrics.  This year, The Army You Have bucked that trend, featuring a lineup of Bigs writers fronted by Gary and Shelli Eaton.

“See you in November” is a modest, light-hearted power pop tune that’s more subversive than it lets on; it’s a generous helping of wiseassery in response to the steaming bottomless pit of dumbassery known as the “F*ck Tea” movement.  It’s emblematic of the sea change occurring in conservatism today; progressives are the Man– stuffy and overbearing, scrambling to control the minutiae of others’ lives– and we are the snide, rebellious punks.  “SYIN” was a song of the moment, a perfectly snotty and righteously angry anthem for the Tea Party; even though we’d been disfranchised by the media and actively smeared by know-nothing pundits, our overwhelming vote could not be ignored on election day, and The Army You Have was serenading us all the way to the polls.

24.  Trampled by Turtles, “Wait so Long”

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This is the direction country music needs to go:  away from glammed-up, over-produced pop rock with a twang and toward acoustic, no-frills bluegrass.  Those who like their jug bands with an extra helping of rawk will find much to like in the debut album of Minnesota’s Trampled by Turtles.

23.  Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings, “I Learned the Hard Way”

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Just because no one else is making music in a particular classic genre anymore doesn’t mean it can’t or shouldn’t be done.  It’s just difficult to do, since you’re in the looming shadows of the stars of yesteryear.  Sharon Jones does more than hold her own against the titans of ’70s pop.  With breezy brass and jazz-band instrumentation behind her and funneled through the warm sounds of entirely analog recording equipment, you could sneak this one onto an XM funk channel and nobody would notice a difference between it and their favorite classics.  It’s a songwriting triumph, avoiding the pitfalls of cheap nostalgic imitations and achieving an original, timeless quality.

22.  Caribou, “Leave House”

A fairly innocuous flute loop and electronic beat descends into a dark world full of droning pads, sounds of breaking glass, and dingy square synths. Daniel Snaith’s falsetto vocals relay a tale of domestic unrest that’s sufficiently ambiguous without being pretentiously obtuse.  You get the idea more from the paranoid, claustrophobic mood than from the lyrics themselves, and it’s a delightfully chilling experience.

21.  Antoine Dodson/Gregory Brothers, “Bed Intruder Song”

——

Possibly the most popular song of the year, it was the single most viewed video on YouTube, and “Bed Intruder” has something for everyone.  For the hipsters, there’s ironic hip hop.  For everyone with a funny bone, there’s the inspired performance of Mr. Dodson, flush with righteous anger and triumphant in his mockery of the fleeing felon.  And for conservatives, it’s a story of capitalistic success and charity.  The Dodsons elevated Dodson’s celebrity and opened up methods to monetize the viral hit, graciously sharing the profits and allowing him to buy a house and a better life for him and his family.  So while you double over laughing at the pure goofiness of the video, you’re also weeping tears of joy.

20.  Big Boi, “Shutterbugg”

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A classy party song bursting with energy, hopping from idea to idea without losing cohesion, showcasing some of the greatest production values possible in the music industry.  I feel sorry for the readers who categorically dismiss rap and miss out on enjoying true gems like this.

19.  Janelle Monae, “Oh Maker”

R&B’s new queen Janelle Monae has some moments on her debut album that drag or don’t seem to know quite where to go, but “Oh Maker” is one of the songs that is just perfectly structured, hitting all its marks while making genre-hopping look easy.  While she sings in many styles and voices throughout the record, here she seems in her native element, really belting it out for a sweet, we-all-want-love-and-world-peace ballad with a massive kick drum and grooving bass.

18.  Arcade Fire, “Sprawl II”

The most condescending, sneer-at-middle-America song on the Arcade Fire’s The Suburbs just happens to be the only good song on the album.  It’s a New Wave near-masterpiece with a huge chip on its shoulder and a passionate performance from frontman Win Butler’s wife, Regine Chassagne.  It’s a song about how people who conform to working a normal job are stupid rubes who can’t understand the singer’s awesome artistry, a song about how people’s businesses and livelihoods are such a drag on the scenery and aesthetics in town.  It’s a pure expression of raging leftist id, and I love it.  If only the other 15 songs on the album could be this honest and stop trying to sound like the work of some wizened statesman (which often just turned into imitating Springsteen at his cheesiest), The Suburbs would’ve been a lock for me like Fahrenheit 9/11 was for John Nolte.  But, sad to say, “Sprawl II” is the only one that makes the cut.

17.  Avey Tare, “Oliver Twist”

The de facto frontman of Animal Collective’s solo album uses swamps as a visualization of Hell, with gurgling, trippy (drippy?) synths and heavily modulated vocals helping him channel the pain of losing his marriage, seeing his sister battle with cancer, and just about every other existential quandary you can get bummed about.  ”Oliver Twist” shows Avey searching the world for some form of purpose or human connection, finding nothing, realizing he’s orphaned and lost.  The song’s highlight comes when all the instruments drop out and Tare bellows a series of “Oh”s, howling out into anywhere for a response from anyone.  The distortion and octaver on his voice give the moment, and the entire song, a haunting resonance.

16.  Wavves, “King of the Beach”

Nathan Williams’ speaker-destroying pop-punk project is finally all growed up…  well, sorta.  Gone is the obvious digital clipping and intentionally rough recording; instead, there’s some masterful production that straddles the line between lo-fi punk and stadium rock.  Williams’ nasal snarl perfectly compliments the acerbic youth-in-revolt lyrics; there’s something crazily endearing in the obnoxious proclamation that he is “king of the beach.”  So prideful, yet so petty.

15.  Hot Chip, “One Life Stand”

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It’s hard to pin down what I love most about this song:  the effortless transition from a menacing minor verse to a bouncy major chorus, the post-chorus synth solo morphing in and out of crazier and crazier sounds, or hearing another immaculate performance from Alexis Taylor’s sonorous tenor voice.  If you prefer your pop music electronic and genial, One Life Stand ought to have been one of the highlights of your year.

14.  Blackbird Blackbird, “Pure”

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When it comes to shoegaze, I’m firmly in the camp of My Bloody Valentine and other acts that tried to push the boundaries of recorded music to completely overload all frequencies.  You don’t see it happen too often today, but San Diego’s Blackbird Blackbird is a synth pop outfit that does just that, squeezing every bit of saturation they can out of their instrument tracks through aggressive compression and slathering a layer of hazy vocals on top of it all.  Keep an eye out for these guys; they’re going places if they keep up the quality of their debut LP, Summer Heart.

13. Cee-Lo Green, “Fool for You”

Contrary to popular opinion, I didn’t dislike Cee-Lo’s third solo album The Ladykiller. I just felt that it was a stronger album listen without its infamous first single.  There are plenty of great radio-friendly songs on the album, and none of them quite stand out like “Fool for You,” a desperate plea for a woman to return the singer’s love.  The drums roll forward with their hits snapped tight to the 4th notes while a truly overpowering bassline and brass provide a bed for Cee-Lo to let go and just wail.   When it all drops for the chorus, a lush string riff allow him to open up his soul, completely vulnerable, quietly admitting that he, the Ladykiller himself, is willing to drop his cool, charismatic persona for this girl.  That is the essence of love– self-sacrifice– and I figure the world would be about 65% better if our pop songs celebrated this theme rather than self-absorbed immediate gratification.

12.  Sleigh Bells, “Infinity Guitars”

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A short and sweet encapsulation of everything that’s right with the best rock record of the year.  Just when you think it’s at its biggest and loudest, it gets bigger and louder and awesome-er.

11.  Sufjan Stevens, “Too Much”

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It was difficult choosing a single track that stood above the rest of The Age of Adz, so I just went with the track that first chipped away at my skepticism about the album.  The second released track “Too Much” is the gateway between Sufjan the folk songwriter and Sufjan the 21st-century multi-genre composer prodigy.  Like Dylan switching on that electric guitar, the electronics of the song open with a low gurgle that soon elevates into screeching feedback before the synthesized beat kicks in.

“Too Much” is a coy, light-hearted admission of trepidation in romance and the only danceable song in 7/4 I’ve ever heard.  As it progresses, more and more analog instruments come into the mix– brass, strings, piano, and choir.  Once the chaotic breakdown storms through, the melody bouncing back and forth between orchestra sections and synth patches, Sufjan’s embrace of all things digital has finally brought his audio engineering to a level that matches the quality of his compositions.  Previous highlights such as “Chicago” or “The Transfiguration” sound austere and stale compared to the aggressive, world-shattering sounds of The Age of Adz, and “Too Much” is quite the appropriate introduction to this new sonic world.

Stay tuned for Tracks 10-1.

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In the “old days”, a.k.a. “a few years ago,” multiple obstacles of various size and difficulty stood between your music/message and your potential audience.  In order to make any real headway, you had to be signed to a major label that was interested in promoting you heavily.  Someone made sure you had the right clothes, the right hair and the right sound.  If, however, you had the Right point of view (outside of the country music scene), keeping it to yourself was probably the right thing to do.  Oh, how the times are changing.

As we now know, the term “New Media” doesn’t just apply to journalism.  YouTube and other video sites have provided a platform for all points of view.  It’s the artist’s job to attract traffic and bump that view count.  The advent of social networking sites has made connecting easier.  So easy, in fact, that even non-professional protest types can manage to connect for the occasional event, shindig or soiree.

It used to be a one-way street.  Only the major artists could get their message out in any effective way.  Not long ago, President Obama sailed into office on the pleasant breeze of Will.I.Am’s viral video campaign.  The Left dominated the entertainment world and that’s all there was to it.  In many ways, that’s still true.  They have the money, the access and a willing and compliant media.  That’s changing, too.

Contrary to the talking points of our political rivals, The Tea Party movement has always been D.I.Y.  It’s always had a bit of a punk feel to it.  Any pissed off kid that could save up enough dough for a used electric guitar and a battered amp could learn three chords and start a punk band.  Hell, the punk movement started as a reaction to the self-indulgent wankery of the seven-minute guitar solo and the elitism of the disco crowd only fueled it.  Swap out the kid with the guitar for a taxpayer with a hand-made sign; swap out the seven-minute solo for a stimulus package and you’ve got something brewing (or is that “steeping”?).

Time and again, they’ve failed to counter the Tea Party.  The Coffee Party?  Please. 

One of the more recent attempts to rally the progressive base was Erica Payne’s ill fated “F*ck Tea” campaign.  Before founding Agenda Project, Ms. Payne was a co-founder of the Democracy Alliance, an organization financed by the likes of billionaire George Soros and others.  So, these folks have all the money in the world at their disposal and they came up with “F*ck Tea.”  That’s all they came up with. 

What about that catchy little video, though?  That cute Lily Allen song?  Yeah, that already existed.  They just re-purposed it for their ingenious “F*ck Tea” idea.  Why bother writing something original laying out your great progressive vision for America when you can just borrow a song?  Well, I guess if you can’t put a fellow American to work, you can at least make sure they get some royalties, right?  What’s that?  Lily Allen is British?  Oh.  Way to outsource, Erica!

So, in order to combat the well-heeled Ms. Payne, the vast amounts of capital at her disposal and her obvious abundance of talent and creativity, Gary wrote “See You in November.” As he tells it:

Coming up with a title for a response to the ‘F*ck Tea’ campaign wasn’t hard. Watching the video and reading about their campaign, the four words that kept popping into my head were ‘See You In November.’  Four words my wife, bassist/vocalist Shelli Eaton, spit out as a throw away at the end of ‘Bon Bon.’

But I didn’t want to write a Lee Greenwood anthem. That horse has been beaten to death. The response had to throw their words and failed attempts to discredit the Tea Party movement right back in their faces.

I think he hit the mark squarely. “See You in November” takes all the sugary sweetness of Allen’s song and packs it with a punch reminiscent of The Clash’s “London Calling.”

What it all boiled down to was Erica Payne, Lily Allen (peripherally) and tons o’ cash versus a few friends, Gary Eaton’s garage and a guy with a camera.  We’ll leave it up to the viewer to declare a victor.

“The Army You Have” started out as just Gary Eaton.  Shelli joined up, then Michael, then Boris and, later, ‘Zo jumped in to help with the video.  Now, we need you. You are “The Army You Have.”  No, strike that.  You can be a part of “The Army You Have.”  We don’t draft.  You enlist.

Join us on Facebook.  Visit the website and please hit the tip jar.  100% of the proceeds go to help our wounded warriors at UCLA Operation Mend.

Spread the video.  Spread the message.  See you in November.

TAYH

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Yes, Yosi’s still out there working to make the world a progressive paradise, but that’s cool because it’s not on our dime. Good on ya, Yosi. We conservative types like the First Amendment. 

Don’t know what I’m talking about, my friends? Go here, here, and here . 

But this song isn’t just about Yosi Sergant. It’s also an ode to Mr. Patrick Courrielche, a very brave man 

Shortly after the song “Yosi Needs a Hug” debuted on The Stage Right Show, I had a couple of opportunities to hang out with Patrick and it proved to me, once again, that the Left doesn’t get us. They have no idea who we Conservatives are or what we’re all about. But the silver lining is they have no idea what’s coming. 

Speaking of what’s coming, watch Big Hollywood for the video premiere of “See You In November.” 

In the meantime sit back and enjoy “Yosi Needs A Hug.” Directed by Michael Broderick and featuring Gary Eaton’s face. Although “Yosi” started as a test in preparation for the upcoming, larger scale “See You in November” shoot, the video has turned out quite nicely, we think. Special thanks to Glen Hombre who lent his considerable talents to the project and even took the time to spin Michael up on Final Cut.

To download this song and others for free, visit our, The Army You Have. All donations to the tip jar go directly to Operation Mend.

See you in November,
TAYH

When the story broke that a woman, ACORN activist Bon Bon Hurd, was caught on tape admitting that she and her comrades had basically gotten Obama elected, my wife, Shelli and I went in the studio and laid down “Bon Bon.” 

When it was “suggested” that Retracto the Correction Alpaca needed a theme song, Michael Broderick, Shelli, a diva alpaca and I went into the studio and knocked out “Retracto’s Theme.” 

And most recently, when the Agenda Project launched their astroturf “F*ck Tea” campaign with a video featuring Lily Allen’s song, “Fuck You,” Michael, Shelli, Boris Zelkin and I recorded “See You In November”: 

As with the Tea Party movement, some days you have to roll with “The Army You Have.” Today it’s one person. Tomorrow it’s ten. The next day it’s a thousand. The other side starts to worry and look for ways to knock off the leader, only to discover there is no leader, only an army, spiritually connected, sharing the same values and vision for the greatest nation on earth. 

These songs and more, including Michael Broderick’s “Liberty Loves Company” can be found at www.thearmyyouhave.com. You can listen and download for free. We ask you consider leaving a donation to UCLA Operation Mend in our tip jar (all proceeds go to UCLA Operation Mend. We are not affiliated with them in any way, just love their cause and want to help.) 

See you in November,
Gary Eaton 

[Ed. Note: Below is a mildly NSFW  Army You Have appearance on The Stage Right Show.]

Lyrics: ‘See You In November’

When our mommy told you to use your words
I don’t think that’s what she meant
You’ve forgotten all about the good old days
When it was patriotic to dissent

Ooh, aren’t you so clever
With those words we’ll always remember
But nothing lasts forever
See you in November

Shuffling your feet and your moping around
No more change in your cute man-purse
I can see your future in your coffee grounds
It’s only going to get much worse

Ooh, aren’t you so clever
With those words we’ll always remember
But nothing lasts forever
See you in November

That’s a nice shirt it says, I’m with stupid
And the arrow’s pointing at your friends
Another swing and miss just like all the others
We all know how it’s going to end

Ooh, aren’t you so clever
With those words we’ll always remember
But nothing lasts forever
See you in November

“Retracto”
Credits:

Shelli Eaton- Lead vocals
Michael Broderick – Lead guitar, background vocals
Gary Eaton – Guitar, bass, drums, tambourine, background vocals
Retracto - Vocals
Music and lyrics by Gary Eaton

Retracto

The ass says he doesn’t have a horse in this race
But Retracto knows he does now he’s got egg on his face
The donkeys on the left got owned by a kid
They can say it was a crime but Retracto knows what he did

Retracto
The Correction Alpaca
Retracto
He’s comin’ at ya

The story’s gonna come out whether they like it or not
If they told it like it is they wouldn’t be in this spot
Lyin’ to the people gets a psychotic reaction
But Retracto calls them out now they’re makin’ retractions

Retracto
The Correction Alpaca
Retracto
He’s comin’ at ya

We need the news not projection
Or he’s gonna demand a correction
We need the news not projection
Or he’s gonna demand a correction

Retracto
The Correction Alpaca
Retracto
He’s comin’ at ya

Retracto’s theme song debuted on “The Stage Right Show” last week.

One of our ongoing segments has been to read aloud (in suitably dramatic fashion) Yosi Sergant’s twitter feed.  (It really is quite entertaining).  It became such a popular segment with the handful of friends who listen to our practice shows that Moxie decided we needed a “Yosi Update” theme song.  She “Volun-Told” our friend and musician, Gary Eaton to write the diddy and within twenty four hours he had completed his masterpiece.

We hope that you, our the loyal readers of Big Hollywood, who are well-versed with the players involved in this story, will appreciate our “Yosi Update” song:  

YOSI NEEDS A HUG — by Gary Eaton

Barack and Kalpen, Buffy, Rahm, Rocco and Yosi
You can look all you want,
But you’ll never find a Doug
Then  Yosi got caught ‘cause he got too cozy
Now he’s out on his ass
Poor Yosi needs a hug

Blame it on Glenn Beck
Blame it on Faux news
If that doesn’t work
You can blame it on the Jews

Barack and Kalpen, Buffy, Rahm, Rocco, and Yosi
They want to change the world
Whether we like it or not
But someone named Patrick whose last name I can’t pronounce
He went rogue
And they all got caught

Blame it on Glenn Beck
Blame it on Faux news
If that doesn’t work
You can blame it on the Jews