The best thing that happened to me so far today (so in the last 46 minutes) happened when I logged onto the Official Elliott Smith Site for the first time in months. It looks like they have revamped it… and on wordpress! But, if you go there and look closely, they are using the same theme I am. Of course, Elliott is deceased and so its not like he chose the theme himself so its not like we have similar tastes in themes, but it made me happy.

I consider Elliott Smith to be one of the greatest song writers of this (well those of us that are 30s-ish) generation. His deceptively transparent rock style includes avante garde, atonal chord intervals and melodic/harmonic lines that beautifully intersect and make invisible spider webs. Some of his songs include “Miss Misery” which was featured in the film Good Will Hunting, “Needle in the Hay” which was featured in the film The Royal Tennenbaums, my favorite, “Condor Ave.”, “Somebody I Used to Know”, “Son of Sam”, “Baby Brittain”, and um, about 115 other songs.

Brief Bio

I’m not going to regurgitate his life history here, but you should go to the official site, Sweet Adeline, and read it. His life was pretty riddled with heavy heroin use and sordid developmental stages. It ended in the beginning of 2003 with multiple stab wounds to the chest. Although his death was originally reported as suicide, his close friends reported that Elliott was on the up-and-up at the time, and that he had shown progress in rehab. The case was reopenned to homicide investigations.

Anyhow….

If you are an Elliott Smith fan or would like to be introduced to music that is important to today’s musical landscape, check out the site. You will find tabs, lyrics, and even rare and free downloadable music files (some are mp3 some are .rm). There is enough music there to fill about 3 albums.