The Magnetic Fields - 50 Song Memoir: a concept and a challenge
March 29, 2017 10:51 AM   Subscribe

Stephin Merritt likes a concept and a challenge, and here he's set himself up with a big one: To create an album with 50 songs, one for each unfolding year of his life. The result is 50 Song Memoir, made with over 100 instruments, with Merritt and his cohorts playing seven or fewer instruments on every cut, in different combinations on each, with no instrument used more than seven times over the course of five half-hour discs. Stream it all via Apple Music or get a 5 song sampler via Spotify, or 16 tracks on YouTube (though there might be some geoblocking), and another YT playlist of 15 videos, starting with an official unboxing video, then getting to the official music videos.
Of course, for anyone turned off by the idea of Merritt—an escapist pop descendent of Bacharach and Sondheim—getting all Benji on us, you will be relieved to know that the story of his life sounds a lot like a Magnetic Fields album, and a very good one at that. There are some deeply revealing moments here. The opening songs, in particular, pinpoint the origins of Merritt’s career-spanning themes of placelessness and unrequited love—how they began with his parents’ wanderlust and a childhood cat, respectively. But 50 Song Memoir often takes a less literal route through Merritt’s life. “’76 Hustle 76*” illustrates its time period by mimicking the then-inescapable sound of disco. Judy Garland’s death gets its own song*, as does the rise of synthesizer music [YT] in the early ’80s. For a songwriter who once formulated an entire record around the first-person pronoun, 50 Song Memoir is more selfless than its title indicates. Here, Merritt seems more interested in exploring the moments that mark time—where we’ve lived, who we’ve loved and lost—than tracing his own particular narrative.
* links to Amazon streaming music samples, for a taste of those tracks.

If you want help unpacking the lyrics, the whole album worth of lyrics is up on Genius, with significant annotation already available.
posted by filthy light thief (17 comments total) 32 users marked this as a favorite
 
I saw this the weekend before last at Lincoln Theatre in DC, and I enjoyed it quite a bit. But I think I enjoyed the intros he provided to each song as much as the songs themselves.
posted by me & my monkey at 11:08 AM on March 29, 2017 [3 favorites]


Also, the AV that went along with the songs was often stunning. We only saw one of the two nights. I hope he tours this again so we can catch the other.
posted by whuppy at 11:13 AM on March 29, 2017


I've only heard the first half (but it was live!) and besides "'76 Hustle 76" '81 How to Play the Synthesizer and '83 Foxx and I were my absolute faves from it.
posted by griphus at 11:25 AM on March 29, 2017


Also, I've seen them live a whole bunch of times and this time it was really different and far more uh theatric than I've ever seen them (which is usually lined up side-by-side on stage with no frills).

This time Merritt was in front in a sort of setpiece that looked like a little house full of (real) instruments and the band was in the back. It was sort of astonishing considering Merritt generally did not want to be or be seen as the center of attention in their previous shows and yet he isolated himself in front of the audience this time. I think it actually helped the album theme quite a bit and made the show more intimate and personal than I'm used to seeing them.
posted by griphus at 11:34 AM on March 29, 2017 [1 favorite]


Fell in love to 69 love songs. Can't wait to get my hands on this album.
posted by Made of Star Stuff at 11:36 AM on March 29, 2017


My wife and I, our first dance at our wedding was to Peter Gabriel's recording of The Book of Love.
posted by Talez at 11:37 AM on March 29, 2017 [1 favorite]


My wife walked down the aisle to Forever and a Day!
posted by griphus at 11:42 AM on March 29, 2017 [1 favorite]


A question for folks who have seem the new material live: do they change instruments a lot, or is that a feature only in the album?
posted by filthy light thief at 12:00 PM on March 29, 2017


Me and Fred and Dave and Ted has been on heavy rotation on my local radio station - I'm looking forward to listening to the rest of it.
posted by dinty_moore at 12:05 PM on March 29, 2017


Great timing - we have tickets to see them in a few weeks! Looking forward to listening to all of this.
posted by gingerbeer at 12:16 PM on March 29, 2017


Merritt hasn't written a great album in over 17 years. Writing another album with a similar format to 69 love songs invites comparisons--Merritt is nothing but bold but I hope to give this a serious listen and hope he recaptures *some* of the magic he used to have.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 1:18 PM on March 29, 2017 [1 favorite]


They change instruments a lot, and Stephin comments on what the instruments are, and provides various background on them.
posted by me & my monkey at 1:21 PM on March 29, 2017 [1 favorite]


My introduction to the Magnetic Fields was "69 Love songs" and I am hoping this will break the spell of disappointing albums. I'll listen to some of the songs now, thank you.
posted by acrasis at 2:46 PM on March 29, 2017


The DC show was really lovely, I only went to the second night but agree on all points -- setup, stage patter, projections all beautiful and effective in delivering this newly personal approach. "Have you seen it in the snow" is a new fave.
posted by PandaMomentum at 4:10 PM on March 29, 2017 [1 favorite]


At my wife and my reception, we played a music video we made set to "The Luckiest Guy On The Lower East Side." Magnetic Fields is teh love.
posted by Joey Michaels at 5:51 PM on March 29, 2017 [1 favorite]


...Merritt hasn't written a great album in over 17 years...
...the spell of disappointing albums...

Distortion is underrated.
posted by Gerald Bostock at 9:29 PM on March 29, 2017


Distortion is a great album and I have a brand-new battle axe to fight anyone who disagrees.
posted by lmfsilva at 7:02 AM on March 30, 2017 [3 favorites]


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