Callahan started out as a highly experimental artist, using substandard instruments and recording equipment. His early songs often nearly lacked melodic structure and were clumsily played on poorly tuned guitars (possibly influenced by Jandek, whom Callahan admired), resulting in the dissonant sounds on his self-released cassettes and debut album Sewn to the Sky. Much of his early output was instrumental, a stark contrast to the lyrical focus of his later work. Apparently, he used lo-fi techniques not primarily because of an aesthetic preference but because he didn't have any other possibility to make music. Once he signed a contract with Drag City, he also started to use recording studios and a greater variety of instruments for his records.
From 1993 to 2000, Callahan's recordings grew more and more "professional" sounding, with more instruments, and a higher sound quality. In this period he recorded two albums with the influential producer Jim O'Rourke and Tortoise's John McEntire, and collaborated with Neil Hagerty. After 2000's Dongs of Sevotion, Callahan began moving back to a slightly simpler instrumentation and recording style, while retaining the more consistent songwriting style he had developed over the years. This shift is apparent in albums such as Rain on Lens, Supper, and A River Ain't Too Much to Love.
Smog's songs are often based on simple, repetitive structures, consisting of a simple chord progression repeated for the duration of the entire song. His singing is strikingly characterized by his baritone voice and a style of delivery without being over-emotional. Melodically and lyrically he tends to eschew the verse-chorus approach favoured by many contemporary songwriters, preferring instead a more free-form approach relying less on melodic and lyrical repetition. Themes in Callahan's lyrics include relationships, moving, horses, teenagers, bodies of water, and more recently, politics. His generally dispassionate delivery of lyrics and dark irony often obfuscate complex emotional and lyrical twists and turns. Critics have generally characterized his music as depressing and intensely introverted, with one critic describing it as "a peep-show view into an insular world of alienation." Despite this there is also a broad swathe of joy throughout Callahan's work and more attentive critics have picked up on Callahan's tendency to black humour, a tendency often confused with a depressed mental state or a genuine obsession with the morbid, a confusion no doubt caused by his deadpan vocals.
Cat Power (Chan Marshall) recorded Callahan's song Bathysphere on her 1996 album What Would the Community Think. She covered him again in 2000 on her Covers Record doing the song Red Apples.
Smog's Cold Blooded Old Times appears on the High Fidelity soundtrack. The song Vessel in Vain (from Supper) was also used on the soundtrack of the independent British film Dead Man's Shoes in 2004. In October 2007, Cadillac released a commercial which featured Smog's song Held and Bob Dylan driving a 2008 Escalade through the desert.
As of 2007 he lives in Austin, Texas where he released Woke on a Whaleheart. It was his first record release as Bill Callahan.
Universal Applicant
Bill Callahan Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Or love's coltish punch
What would I be?
An animaless isthmus beyond the sea
Bees only swarm when they're looking for a home
So I followed them
I found the bees nest in the buffalo's chest
I've seen this taste cased in almost every face
That's working to see it in all
And this kidnaps me
Tied up in a boat and kicked off to sea
In tight baby binding technique
My arm chews through the swaddling slings
There's a flare gun in my hand
I point it straight
I point it high
And to the universe it applies
It lit things up in lavender
Where I'd been was might go
I saw the calf I saw the bees I saw the buffalo and the colt
Well I'm sure they all laughed at me at me solo in my boat
The flare burned and fell
The boat burned as well
Hm!
And the punk and the lunk and the drunk and the skunk and the hunk and the monk in me all sunk
The first two lines of the song "Universal Applicant" immediately present two ideas that are central to human existence: work and love. The singer muses about what they would be without these experiences, and ultimately concludes that they would be an "animaless isthmus beyond the sea." This metaphorical phrase represents a life without passion, purpose, or direction, a life empty and void.
The next lines of the song speak about bees and how they swarm when looking for a home. The singer follows the bees and finds their nest in the buffalo's chest, and drinks their honey like milk. This could represent the idea of following passion, of trusting instincts, and finding fulfillment in something unexpected. The singer recognizes this as a universal experience, something that he has seen in almost every face and that has "kidnapped" him.
The final verse takes an unexpected turn with the image of the singer being tied up in a boat and kicked off to sea. The singer chews through the swaddling slings holding him, and points a flare gun up to the universe. The flare lights up the world around him and he sees everything that he had seen before, the calf, bees, buffalo, and colt. The boat and flare burn up, and the singer concludes with the list of "punk and lunk and drunk and skunk and hunk and monk in me all sunk" suggesting that he has accepted his fate with all aspects of his personality.
Line by Line Meaning
Without work's calving increments
Without the regular progress of work
Or love's coltish punch
Or the youthful energy of love
What would I be?
What kind of person would I become?
An animaless isthmus beyond the sea
A disconnected and unfeeling landform surrounded by the ocean
Bees only swarm when they're looking for a home
Bees only gather in a new location when they have no place to live
So I followed them
So I followed their lead
I found the bees nest in the buffalo's chest
I found the place where the bees had made their home, within the buffalo's body
And I drank their honey that milk
I consumed the sweet nectar produced by the bees
I've seen this taste cased in almost every face
I have observed this same feeling in almost everyone I meet
That's working to see it in all
That's striving to understand it in everyone
And this kidnaps me
And this feeling captivates me
Tied up in a boat and kicked off to sea
Trapped in a boat and cast out to the open sea
In tight baby binding technique
Bound tightly and helplessly, like an infant
My arm chews through the swaddling slings
My arm breaks free from the restrictive bindings
There's a flare gun in my hand
I am holding a gun that shoots flares
I point it straight
I aim it directly ahead
I point it high
I aim it upward
And to the universe it applies
And it has an impact on the entire cosmos
It lit things up in lavender
It illuminated the surrounding area in a soft purple hue
Where I'd been was might go
Where I had been was where I might end up
I saw the calf I saw the bees I saw the buffalo and the colt
I had a vision of these animals which I had encountered earlier
Well I'm sure they all laughed at me at me solo in my boat
I imagine that the animals found my predicament amusing
The flare burned and fell
The flare ignited and descended back to Earth
The boat burned as well
The boat also caught fire and burned
Hm!
An interjection denoting confusion or contemplation
And the punk and the lunk and the drunk and the skunk and the hunk and the monk in me all sunk
All the different facets of my personality were lost or diminished in this experience
Contributed by Liliana H. Suggest a correction in the comments below.