New York, I Love You but You’re Bringing Me Down, by LCD Soundsystem.
There are a lot of songs about New York City. There are not a lot of songs that manage to encapsulate a certain period of change in New York City as clearly or precisely as this song. To be clear, it’s not even about the period when I lived in New York City (peak Giuliani years) and it still hits hard.
I think this is the song that finally got me into LCD Soundsystem, way after their run, maybe even after the famous final MSG show. And I’m pretty sure it was the Kermit the Frog video that sealed it for me. And that even came with the Miles Davis mashup, which, whoa, what? Yes.
Anyway, I love this song. A lot. It still hurts a little. A lot.
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Made a project out of it today, starting with the electric rhythm guitar (and I kinda whisper sung a demo vocal there that you can’t really hear, but was helpful for the rest.) Miked it too hot, but whatever. Added a bassline from the acoustic transposed down an octave, then MIDI organ, flute, drums, before getting to the solo vocal (wayyy too hot, Ryan, back off the dang mic please), a little doubling with effects there, and then a guitar solo that’s not terribly off, but is off, and I have to say, I aimed for a good freakout at the end, but listening to the original now, I missed the BAM BAM BAM chords there, and I thought about adding something just like that before I processed the video, but I didn’t, so we’ll leave it at that.
The closing lyrics of this one have always confused me a little. I sang “here’s this song” tonight, because that’s what was written down on the internet, but I like it better if it switches to “maybe I’m wrong” at the end and then it’s a question at the end: “and if so, is there [somebody there for me]?” But who am I to argue with what is written down on the internet.