Blue Lives: Fire Diamond Edition

The Massive Attack album Blue Lines came up twice lately. With Neil for sure, and perhaps with our new friend MarguaX-Y-Z.



I was telling Margauz about music I listened to in high school, and told her and Neil both that a lot of so-called 'trip-hop' hasn't aged so well. Massive Attack, however, is just as great now as then: "Same As It Ever Was".

Blue Lines' cover (see above) reminds me of this:


which is called NFPA 704 (?), and more provocatively, a FIRE DIAMOND .

It sums up the dangers associated with any chemical, on a scale of 0-4 (0 = NBD, 4 = vewwy bad) : blue is health risk, red is flammability, yeller is instabilty/reactivity (think about it, they mean the same thing), and white, much like my blog readership, is 'special'.


Neil knows about Massive Attack because he is Irish. They are one of those bands, like Super Furry Animals, where you know them automatically if you are British, and probably don't know if you are an American, and still only maybe know even if you are an American Indie Nerd.
"Just as great" also includes another album, Mezzanine.

Maybe some other time I will tell you what I think about Mezzanine, which I like even more than the excellent Blue Lines.
But today is not that day. All I will say is this little creepy American Indie Nerd gem: 'it has really good production'.

ew
that's grosser than the bug picture, innit?

The song you are listening to is a cover, although for the longest time I took it to be the original. Still never heard the original (by William DeVaughn), although I now know it to be a cover. This knowledge comes to me courtesy of the American Indie Nerd band Yo La Tengo.
Download their live cover of "Be Thankful for What You've Got" here
Yo La Tengo do a lot of covers, because one of the nerds people in the band used to be a record clerk. So he knows a bit about old obscure business, you see.
All versions of the song say "Gangster Whitewalls", which I like.