SCORES & UPCOMING GAMES



CHAMPIONSHIP FINAL SCORE: (2) JEFF BUCKLEY 168, (7) Tracy Chapman 159 .......... FINAL FOUR FINAL SCORES: (7) TRACY CHAPMAN 154, (1) Joy Division 90 ..... (2) JEFF BUCKLEY 137, (1) The Cure 89 .......... ELITE EIGHT FINAL SCORES: (1) JOY DIVISION 74, (14) Low 60 ..... (7) TRACY CHAPMAN 85, (1) Elliott Smith 69 ..... THE CURE 65, (2) Radiohead 58 ..... (2) JEFF BUCKLEY 74, (1) Neutral Milk Hotel 44 ..... FINAL SWEET SIXTEEN SCORES: (1) JOY DIVISION 75, (5) PJ Harvey & Nick Cave 24 ..... (14) LOW 73, (2) Concrete Blonde (64) ..... (1) ELLIOTT SMITH 78, (4) Gary Jules 44 ..... (7) TRACY CHAPMAN 74, (6) Kate Bush 53 ..... (1) NEUTRAL MILK HOTEL 54, (13) The Church 49 ..... (2) JEFF BUCKLEY 73, (3) Sinead O’Connor 35 ..... (1) THE CURE 109, (3) Tori Amos 86 ..... (2) RADIOHEAD 76, (6) This Mortal Coil 50 ..... (1) JOY DIVISION 96, (9) Mazzy Star 91 ..... (2) CONCRETE BLONDE 76, (7) Bob Mould 28 ..... (14) LOW 60, (6) Crowded House 51 ..... (5) PJ HARVEY & NICK CAVE 65, (4) Alphaville 38 ..... (1) ELLIOTT SMITH 113, (8) Replacements 88 ..... (6) KATE BUSH 87, (3) Nirvana 64 ..... (7) TRACY CHAPMAN 99, (2) The Eels 62 ..... (3) GARY JULES 103, (12) Morrissey 63 ..... (6) Kate Bush 72, (3) Nirvana 53 ..... (3) SINEAD O'CONNOR 66, (11) Ride 27 ..... (13) THE CHURCH 106, (5) James 44 ..... (2) JEFF BUCKLEY 95, (10) Smashing Pumpkins 40 ..... (1) NEUTRAL MILK HOTEL 80, (9) New Order 56 ..... (2) RADIOHEAD 102, (7) Nine Inch Nails 99 ..... (6) THIS MORTAL COIL 61, (3) Indigo Girls 60 ..... (4) TORI AMOS 89, (5) Swans 40 ..... (1) CURE 82, (8) Tom Waits 68 ............... FINAL 1ST ROUND SCORES: (5) PJ HARVEY & NICK CAVE 93, (12) Midnight Oil 38 ..... (7) BOB MOULD 63, (10) Peter Murphy 47 ..... (1) JOY DIVISION 117, (16) Erasure 19 ..... (6) CROWDED HOUSE 98, (11) Leonard Cohen 54 ..... (7) TRACY CHAPMAN 199, (10) The Smiths 162 ..... (5) MORRISSEY 115, (12) Morphine 83 ..... (3) NIRVANA 137, (14) Slowdive 102 ..... (8) THE REPLACEMENTS 128, (9) Dream Academy 82 ..... (13) THE CHURCH 262, (4) Magnetic Fields 193 ..... (10) SMASHING PUMPKINS 165, (7) Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds 155 ..... (9) NEW ORDER 160, (8) Sarah McLachlan 78 ..... (1) JEFF BUCKLEY 204, (16) Bjork 92 ..... (4) TORI AMOS 78, (13) Echo & the Bunnymen 22 ..... (8) TOM WAITS 72, (9) The Pretenders 22 ..... (6) THIS MORTAL COIL 51, (11) Yaz 31 ..... (3) INDIGO GIRLS 71, (14) Pavement 26 ..... (9) MAZZY STAR 132, (8) REM 46 ..... (2) CONCRETE BLONDE 88, (15) Psychedelic Furs 34 ..... (4) ALPHAVILLE 71, (13) Dead Can Dance 36 ..... (14) LOW 120, (3) U2 65 ..... (1) ELLIOTT SMITH 63, (16) 10,000 Maniacs 24 ..... (2) EELS 50, (15) Counting Crows 46 ..... (4) GARY JULES 62, (13) Depeche Mode 19 ..... (6) KATE BUSH 59, (11) Sisters of Mercy 20 ..... (1) NEUTRAL MILK HOTEL 42, (16) Violent Femmes 12 ..... (11) RIDE 25 (6) Peter Gabriel 24 ..... (3) SINEAD O'CONNOR 37, (14) Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark 17, ..... (5) JAMES 24, (12) Red House Painters 23 ..... (7) NINE INCH NAILS 46, (10) Wilco 31, (5) SWANS 31, (12) Pet Shop Boys 18 ..... (1) THE CURE 50, (16) Gear Daddies 10 ..... (2) RADIOHEAD 40, (15) Liz Phair 35


CURRENT GAMES BELOW — PAST GAMES ARCHIVED AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE

Monday, March 7, 2016

First Round Matchup: EELS vs COUNTING CROWS

(2) Eels, "Dead of Winter"

The Eels are not a band, they are just a man named Mark O. Everett, and Mr. Everett is a man who does not shy away from writing sad songs. “Dead of Winter” is, for my money, his saddest work. An autobiographical song about the songwriter’s mother’s death from cancer sets the sadness bar pretty high—yet the song still manages to be even sadder than you expect. It’s just immensely, heart-crushingly sad. The focus on the minutiae of death (“Radiation sore throat got your tongue / Magic markers tattoo you / and show it where to aim”) gives the song a matter-of-factness that rises above the emotional swamp of grief. The moments (like at 1:20) where it starts to rally, briefly, and gets all major-key, only increase the emotional range and make the lowers lower. This is not a song about crying or losing control; it’s about the pure clean sadness of “Standing in the dark outside the house / Breathing in the cold and sterile air.” The amateur video on youtube below is the one we're linking, since the original song had no video and you have to kind of love amateur videos. We'd have loved if the video lost its sepia tone in those brief major-key moments, actually, but hey, maybe we should have made our own video if we wanted to bitch about it. Just listen to the song. This one could go all the way, we think. 



vs

(15) Counting Crows, "A Long December"

Man, I know that by the time they released their second album, you'd already decided the Counting Crows kind of suck, and the main guy, the dude with the hair, just seems like an annoying guy you want to hack up with a hatchet attached to a hacky sack on some abandoned campus somewhere, but you know what? We really like this, their second album. Actually, their first album was pretty great too: if you could reverse the degree to which their first album got overplayed in every dorm in America you could listen to August and Everything After fresh and be blown away again. But you can’t. We get that. So give a listen to Recovering the Satellites if you want. Or at least this particular song, which will go real well with your late-90s breakup. Not sure the video will help things along, since it's not dated super well, but at a 15 seed we think this song's underranked, and this will be a closer fight than anyone expected. If you'd asked us in 1996, we would have said this song would go deep. Just maybe it still will.





Which song's sadder? Vote by 9am 3/8

Dead of Winter
A Long December
Poll Maker

9 comments:

  1. Maudlin but compact contra jangly and treacly. I grant the Counting Crows nothing.

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    Replies
    1. This isn't the saddest Crows song... there are some really good ones.

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  2. The Eels is objectively sadder. I mean, it's great realism. But there's so much going on intellectually with the music trying to obstruct and obscure things that my affect gets interrupted. At some point, affect is what matters, right?

    I can't help it: nah nah nah/ nah nah nah nah nah nah nah/ nah nah nah yeah!

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  3. There is something about the na na na nas in "A Long December" that turn the song outward, that invite us to participate in its sadness perhaps more clearly than "Dead of Winter." Agreed that the Eels here are objectively (much) sadder, but that call to us to sing along in "A Long December" remains weirdly inviting. Close matchup so far. I kind of can't imagine the bracket without Eels in it but they're trailing here, albeit with lots of time left.

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  4. I mistyped Counting Crows as Counting Bro(s) on Facebook and now I'm going to call them that forever. Just letting you know, world.

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  5. I loathe the Counting Crows. I don't even really know why.

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  6. the nasal, plaintive 'yeahs' ending A Long December remind me of the sad, sad reply of a sad, sad child who's mother has asked her "did you drop your ice cream cone?"

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  7. The singing along thing is huge for me. Sad has to feel good. Or something.

    Which is why I think "Joey" is a real contender: I can belt that sucker AND it has made me cry sober tears.

    Also: Ander's nas are probably spelled correctly, but my nahs set up an antithesis with the yeahs.

    BOOM.

    ReplyDelete