Comments on: Tracking The Hold Steady’s MN-Talk

By: Henry Hormann

Henry Hormann — Sat, 17 Dec 2005 00:16:10 +0000

The Thunderbird lyric must be a reference to the Bloomington hotel. The line is, “The carpet at the Thunderbird has a burn for every cowboy that got fenced in.”

There’s nothing better than the Hold Steady, and especially nothing better than this album, which I still listen to constantly even though I’ve had it since the day it came out early this year (I think it was early May?). It just never gets old.

By: Rex

Rex — Thu, 19 May 2005 03:38:02 +0000

Here’s East-Lake’s post kinda pulling together a few more Hold Steady recent meanderings.

By: Rex

Rex — Thu, 19 May 2005 03:25:27 +0000

That’s a good question. If I get a chance to talk to Craig when he comes to town, I might ask him to give me a list of “unknown msp references” too.

By: Gomer

Gomer — Wed, 18 May 2005 22:58:29 +0000

I just bought the album on iTunes today, it’s great. Besides these, I did catch a line about cigarette burns on the floor of the Thunderbird as well. This has to be referencing the amazingly kitschy Thunderbird Motel in Bloomington, yes?

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 18 May 2005 16:50:44 +0000

Has there ever been a modern rock album that so aggressively referenced hoodrats?

By: Tim

Tim — Tue, 17 May 2005 01:33:05 +0000

How about an aborted album? Strawberry Fields Forever and Penny Lane were to have been included on a Beatles' album about Liverpool, an idea that was scrapped in favor of Sgt. Pepper. Or so I've heard.

By: Moe

Moe — Mon, 16 May 2005 22:19:45 +0000

Good point CK, I can’t think of any either.

The Hold Steady were interviewed in Pitchfork today. My favorite quote when talking about Lifter Puller, and also probably relates to The Hold Steady.

“All the characters from Lifter Puller seem to comprise this sealed universe, like a really fucked up Lake Wobegon.”

By: CK

CK — Mon, 16 May 2005 16:53:29 +0000

This is interesting. Has there ever been a modern rock album that so aggressively referenced a U.S. city that *wasn’t* Los Angeles or New York? Like, has there ever been a mainstream rock album that was completely about Phoenix? Or about Boise? I mean, it’s not like the Smashing Pumpkins spent a lot of time describing the downtown geography of Chicago.

There must be some other examples of this, but I can’t think of one.