Noah Gundersen - White Noise (September 22, 2017) Album • Page 23

@Craig Manning I need deetz, pleaseeeeee

 

Bloody nose and a crooked tongue,
I always wanted to be someone.
Face down on the concrete floor,
I guess God don't talk to strangers anymore.

 

On the one hand, the songs that Noah picked for White Noise were absolutely the right ones to get across the theme he was going for. On the other hand, I'd be okay if I never heard "Cocaine, Sex and Alcohol" or "Bad Actors" again.

 

"Some Nights" is... wow. So lonely.

 

“All of Your Love” is criminally good, one of the best songs he’s ever written. Dead serious. Moved me to tears. “God Don’t Talk to Strangers” is also a standout.

 

genuinely surprised it's not on the album. i need this in FLAC. luckily, Noah said on Twitter the B-sides are gonna be released online eventually, so hopefully that means in a quality higher than 160 kbps mp3.

 

Some of these b-sides are incredible. I know everyone is saying that, but I’m seriously floored by them. I get why they were left off, but an album of the best stuff from White Noise and “All of My Love,” “God Don’t Talk...”, “Sentimental Kids,” etc. would be amazing.

 

It's pretty clear now that he could have made a third masterpiece. He was probably chasing theme more than songs, but an album with the 13 best songs from the record + the b-sides would have been right on par with Carry the Ghost.

 

I usually don’t find it interesting when people try to make revised track lists for albums to try to improve them, but it’s pretty tempting to play around with for this album now that we have all these extra songs. I’d definitely remove Cocaine Sex and Alcohol. I don’t mind Bad Actors too much.

 

I like that he pushed himself on the album and still let us hear these, rather than playing it close to the chest. For all the hate it gets, I’m happier having a CS&A-type Noah song in the world than another song like “God Don’t Talk...” which he’s written before. Let the man stretch!

 

Does anyone have the b sides they can send to me? I bought the singles at the show but can’t rip them. Message me if you can help out. Thanks y’all

PS what’s the set list been like since Abby left. Saw him at Thalia and wondered if the set would change a lot without her

 

Cocaine, Sex and Alcohol is pretty awful. Bad Actors, though...really? It's one of my favorite songs on the album! Especially because it really works as aural smelling salts - coming off of this sprawling, messy, disjointed jammy song into a super tight, super limited song to kind of reorient yourself. Plus that melody just hits me in the feels.

I'm not exactly sure why he felt the need to put CSA on there, but once that decision was made, Bad Actors was absolutely the best possible way to follow it up in the tracklist.

Actually I kind of have this theory about the album. I think the whole point he was trying to make - about being distracted to death by an overabundance of blah blah - is reflected in the dynamics of the record as well as the lyrics. You start off with a handful of pretty dense songs - even the less-complex ones on the first half of the record have some pretty out-there production going on. That's like a sonic version of what he's talking about - a sound that's pretty cluttered, at least compared to his usual stuff that's fairly spare. It all culminates on Cocaine Sex and Alcohol, where it's like this big out-of-control thing that goes on too long and has too much noise, etc etc - like the ultimate fulfillment of what he's talking about. Then you have an apotheosis with Bad Actors - it's like the moment where you realize "this can't continue any more," and you're kind of at the depths of yourself - which he represents sonically with this incredibly spare song. Then after that the rest of the songs are fairly close in sound to his older stuff - more acoustic guitar, just cleaner-sounding mixes in general. It's like the character (himself? the listener?) has realized the error of their ways and is trying to get back to a simpler, cleaner life.

That's all super impressionistic and based on no actual evidence other than my own impressions of the album. But to borrow a term from fanfiction, I'm sticking with this headcanon until Noah says otherwise because I think it perfectly explains why Cocaine Sex and Alcohol is on this record.

 

I will take a wheelhouse song that is great over a departure song that is bad 100% of the time.

 

I have no idea where the hate for C,S,&A and Bad Actors comes from tbh

 

haven't listened to this album nearly enough

 

If anyone has the tour Bsides I'd be eternally grateful

 

Cocaine Sex and Alcohol is still cool as hell sorry craig

could possibly lose a minute or so from the end though

 

Yeah, I love that song haha.

 

CS&A is incredible live.

 

Finally listening to b-sides. It's crazy that he left some of these out but I'm so glad they exist.

I'm on "California" now which was great live. "White Noise" is better than any of the experimental songs on the actual album. "God Don't Talk.." is insanely good.

edit: Just got to "All of Your Love" holy shit

 

Are you guys buying/streaming this B-sides album anywhere, or are you getting it the "old-fashioned" way?

 

I just hate it so much. Haha

 

The first half of it is absolutely beautiful, but the 2nd half loses me completely.

 

The difference is that I don't think that song is bad, haha.

 

Ha, that's fair!