Thursday, October 10, 2024
Naima Bock - Below A Massive Dark Land
Some people are prone to say that the best Rock music has already been made.Frankly I think it's preposterous idea. Just as the idea that the old days were the best. Nostalgia's not whar it used to be.
I think it's pretty easy to look around and find music that compares with anything in the canon. Look ar Syfjan. Look at Kamasi Washington. Listen to the latest Mercury Rev or Grandaddy albums. They're music with the scope and grace of Van Morrison, David Bowie, The Band or Miles Davis records.
They just draw on different sensibilities and modes of expression. They're every bit as much works of art as what came before them. Is there any need to say one is beter than another.This seems a strange way to appreciate good work
Listen to the new Naima Bock album Below A Massive Dark Land. It's very good work.I'm very taken by Naima. This is her second album. Her frst Giant Palm was an enormous favourite of mine when it came out
I've been listening to Below A Massive Dark Land on a daily basis this week. I went into RPM Records, a go to refuge from the travails of the modern world on Monday and Rich and Craig, the record shop guys who know were listening to it. It even got Craig's approval and that's saying something. Rich doesn't approve of much that didn't come out in 1967.
Parts of Below A Massive Dark Land sound like it might have come out n 1972. Echoes of Van Morrison, John Martyn and Richard Thompson. But this isn't retro. It's the joys of music refracted through a post millenial lens.
Naima has a lovely voice and a lovely soul. She's playing at The Cumberland Arms in November. I'll pop down and see her. Last time we metwe talked about Joni. I wonder what we'll talk about this time.
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,785 The Kinks - Kinks
The Kinks at their rawest in their infant days. Their are some Spinal Tap moments frankly. The hit singles that broke them You Really Got Me and All Day & All of The Night.. Elsewhere they#re nascent. In the act of becoming.
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 224 The Cars - Heartbeat City
The Cars had their moments. At their best they were excellent, sightly leftfield, chart fodder. But by 1984's Heartbeat City their best was largely behnid them. Whereas their early albums had been Television that got played on AOR radio - and frankly who could complain about that, Heartbeat City was largely affected weirdness for the Pretty In Pink High School generation.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 76 Einsturzende Neubauten - Rampen
I've become an enormous Germanophile of late. The last month and a bit to be precise. Though I suspect I always have been at heart. Big changes in my life and I've decided I like changes. They're good for me. I've broken away from the icy grip of 'the man' and am considering myself as semi-retired from now on. I'm intent on enjoying my life from this point. That's what it's there for anyhow isn't it?
So instead of dragging myself into an unhappy office, I've been teaching German business people online. Digging into the culture again, brushing up my German, learning about the way of and attitudes to life. I think there's much to embrace, relish and admire. So we come to the new Einsturzende Neubauten record. Rampen (apm; alien pop music).
It's a perfect soundtrack for this moment for me and encapsulates everything I've always loved about teutonic culture with a wry restraint that resists the maniacal self destruct button. Blixa Bargeld and his boys have matured nicely over the years. Still in black, no longer so intent on raising messy hell and waking the neighbours. But the Faustian pact was made many moons ago and they remain bound by the same prnciples. This is a disquieting but nuanced listen. Perfect for my Monday morning as I wait for my online workshop with young Leipzig bankers.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,881 John Roseboro
Bossa Nova corner. Not a general It Starts With obsession but this is a neat record. John Roseboro's Fools tends your inner soul. And as any Fule Noesm the inner soul requires tending.
Roseboro works out of Brooklyn, one of the workd capitals of New Bohemianism. In the words of the Bandcamp page the record 'subverts traditional conventions on what alternative music is. Disposing of tored chord progressions, kitschy themes and larping emo aesthetics.' Somebody's swallowed a dictionary.
Still I'm happy to endorse the principle. I like manifetoes. And this is a rather lovely record. Thanks againt Darren Jone for tending to the Captain's Table. I'm off to listen to Sade.
.
.
Wednesday, October 9, 2024
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,786 Paul Weller - Stanley Road
Stanley Road came out at an odd moment in British Pop. When Oasis had just hit and most bands in the publuc ete seeed to be looking cakwards rather than forwards. The recird had its moments but U honestly don't feel like listening to the whole thing, Everybidy was buying CDs, vinyl seemed to have died a death. Albums were just two damned long. There's nothing wrong with ten orr twelve song albums.
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 225 The Go Betweens - Tallulah
Tallullah is an odd album in The Go Betweens narrative. Some of theur finestmoments, the love that was developing between Amanda Briwn and Grant McLennan but some odd missteps. An iver earnest attempts on Grant's part to achueve commercial success. Right Here and Cut It Out. Neither of them the hit single they craved but were fated never to realise. His other more literary ventyres drag. Elsewhere, his one gem on the record, Bye Bye Pride. One of the finest things he ever wrote. The essence of this wonderful band.
But really this was Robert's album. Gothic mastery. Tallulah, I Just Get Caught Out. Clarke Sisters, Spirit of the Vampire ,The House Jack Kerouac Built. He died his hair into a majestic auburn shoulder length mane in tribute to Dynasty's Blake Carrington. It was Cult stuff. But Cult of the most magnificent elan. The band moved onto their Pop Masterpiece 16 Lovers Lane.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 77 Night Beds - Mountain Radio
A Rocky Mountain reared dreamer now based in Nashville, Tennessee. Winston Yellen's lastest record Mountain Radio is a joy from the off. It seems to concern itself mostly with the creation of beauty and awe. I'm not about to complain about that.
It's a lovely record, right the way through. Yellen comes across a better adjusted hick cousin to Mark Kozalek's urban toiler. This is a much more contented listen than Kozalek's remarkable but deeply troubled records.
There's something of Bon Iver's late career poetic ennui to Mountain Radio too. This is a very American record in essence. A gorgeous one. Lost in the stars.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,880 Ada Lea
Toronto artist Ada Lea releases a new a EP notes. Amiable and atmospheric electro emotionality. These sound like sountracks to a long night drive over darkened landscapes. Worth a punt.
Tuesday, October 8, 2024
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 226 Cowboy Junkies - The Trinity Stations
Another record that reminds me of my youth. A few years later. I wasn't very well. Still with the same beautifu girll. Everything was great about it. The name of the band. The slow, loving narcotic drag of the songs. They way they introduced you to classics you weren't aware of. Patsy Cline. Waylon Jennings.It's still such a wonderful record. Carrying me to my 8.15.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 78 Oso Oso - life till bones
Lethargic, slightly depressed but trying to put a bright face on it Indie Rock from Jade Lilitri out of Long Beach, New York. New album life till bones boasts a terrific sleeve. As if the Ray Harryhausen skeletons have decamped from Jason & the Argonauts screen and are rockin' American suburbia.
The record is cool. Geeky Strokes. I went to Oso Oso Radio on Spotify in search of further comparison points but didn't find many. I just found plenty more interesting leads.
Anyhow life till bones is loads of fun. The kind of slacker American indie that's all over my It Starts With a Birthstone 200 countown as we come towards my Top hundred. I'm increasing realising that along with raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens, this is uncreasingly one of my favourite things.
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,787 Suzanne Vega - Suzanne Vega
I'm always happy to give Suzanne Vega's first album a play. It reminds me of my first relationship. Being young and being in love. Suzanne was a precocious and finely formed tlent who made you want to be in New York. Th efinest city on God's Earth. Wriing poetry and making art in a loft somewhere o the Lower East side.. In Manhattan.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,879 Pop Filter
'
I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be...'
Back in Newcastle. The skies are dark and we begin the run towards Christmas. The pavements are wet with night rain and I'm up early as is my wont. Enjoying a mug of peppermint tea. Preparing to run my bath and head for the fitness centre before my morning online lessons.
Darren Jones has sent me another wonderful suggestion of another lesson to listen to; Pop Filter's Ray & Lorraine. Another pick & mix of wonder off the Melbourne conveyer belt. Members of Ocean Band, Cool Sounds and Snowy Band.
It's a mixture of confection and profundity. And isn't that a wonderful description of what's best about life itself. Exactly Where I Want To Be stood out for me but there's plenty more here that's worth your while. Friends having fun and laying down some deeper moments/. Cheers Darren !
Monday, October 7, 2024
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 227 The Proclaimers - This Is The Story
'When you go. Will you send me. A letter from America...'
The records I find myself listening to this morning seem to be working common seams. Guitar fuelled, impassioned. Literary. Detemined. Scottish and American. Proclaimers fit perfectly,
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 79 Being Dead - EELS
Arch Texan weirdo cowboy and cowgirls Being Dead are back with EELS a second serving of their nutty B52s meet Ler's Active with a spoonful of Pylon, Rank & File and Guadalcanal Diary.stirred in.
A delight for the likes of me who was reared on this kind of stuff in the Eighties. This is 16 songs and forty minutes of carefree wackiness.
I had the pleasure of seeing Being Dead a few months back supporting En Attendant Ana at the Cumberland Arms. They were everything I could have wanted back then. They're even so more here. Slippery characters. And all the better for it.
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,788 Frightened Rabbit - The Midnight Organ Fight
Frightened Rabbit's The Midnight Organ Fight. Tender, brittle guitar missives. Out of Glasgow. Headed for the Highlands. Magnificent. Jagged.
Within a Scottish tredition. The Vaselines, Teenage Fanclub, Idewild come to mind. All of them inspired by American Independent Noiseniks. It's Monday I'm in Love.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,878 Parlor Hour
It's somerimes difficult to be entirely sure what constitutes an actual album these days. This one seems slightly short to be pegged quite that. Seven songs. Just short of twenty minutes . It's probably an extended EP if you want to get technically inclined.
Anyway, Parlor Hour's Little Known Secret is a sparkling, jagged debut. Described as a Slacker Twee outfit though frankly they don't sound very Twee here. The barbed kiss of Sonic Youth's Evol seems the obvious reference point here.
It's a record that's a compelling, magical opening salvo to It Starts week. Zoe, Noah, Nancy and Eli are out of Portland, Oregon but now find themseves working out of New York City according to my notes. All of this makes perfect sense. ;Mystery Trane, Freeway Plane. Expressway to your skull....' Some thingsnever get old.
Sunday, October 6, 2024
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,789 The Wailers - Burnin'
What to say about The Wailers. What to say about Bob Marley & The Wailers. My Dad saw them play. Not In London. But in Zimbabwe. In the Zimbabwean Independence Ceremony. My Dad is now 90. Burnin' is one of any number of incredible records Marley made. I'm listening to it now on my television. The modern worled is great. But so is the ancient one.
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 228 The Go Betweens -Before Hollywood
The Go Betweens know and understand the meaning of home. And loss. And pain. And consolation. This is their first classic LP record. Angular. Literary. Questing. Tumbling. Profound. How can some so young know so much.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 80 Richard Tripps - Between The Morning
Fantastische ! Fabelhaft ! Wnuderbar ! And other German synonym adjectives for pretty bloody great.Richard Tripps is not a name I've heard before an I doubt very much whether you're very familiar with either his name or work. But sit up and pay attention because his debut album Between The Morning is something rather special.
Out of New Hope, Pennsylvania which is immediately a place I want to g to right now. The album sports a picture of Tripps trudging up a hillside in blue clothing towards a blue sunrise shoulers hunched by determined.
The sound is meandering Lo Fi strumming out of The Mk 2 Velvet Underground, flights of pastoral Seventies Folk frippery, Beck and Allah La's garage. This is an expansive, idiosyncratice album at ease in its skin. I couldn't think of a better way to start a Sunday morning.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,877 Fred Thomas
Good to travel. Good to be home. Odysseus. Someone like that. Waking up in Newcastle after a big adventure in Sicily. Home from the sea.
And listening to Window In The Rhythm by Fred Thomas. An American somgwriter, producer and general audio alchemist Fred Thomas. A philosopher.
This is neat and lovingly assembled. It observes the world and crafts its reponse. A good soundtrack to watching the sun rise in the Newcastle heavens.
Saturday, October 5, 2024
Song(s) of the Day # 3,876 Seafarers
London's Seafarers are story tellers and I'm always eager to endorse that basic guiding principle. Latest album Another State is a dreamers paradise.
The A Pessimst is Never Disappointed website, always an invaluable point of reference, listed the finest monebts of Florence & The Machi8ne and Elbow as signposts. I'm happy to go with that.
The songs here take flight, which is all you can ask from music. Like that moment when a large plane leaves the runway and is airborn. Floating on banks of clouds. That happened to me today. The miracle of existence. An interesting album. I really like this and will return.
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,790 Camera Obscure - Let's Get Out Of This Country
I love Camera Obscura. Their focus is on tenderness and love. I'm essentially a sentimental person and this is distilled and crafted sentimentality. Not to mention the beauty.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 81 Vampire Weekend - Only God Was Above Us
My first listen to the latest Vampire Weekend album Only God Was Above Us, on the Friday it came out was underwhelming to say the least. I know they're a band that produces music that is layered and deserve repeat plays before you make a judgement. But overall I'd say they're a band that has lost something with the departure of key member Rostam Batmanglij in 2016.
There is certainly stuff on here that's notable and impressive. I always found them an impressive band that could exercise your brain cells and tug on your heartstrings. Cerebral but also emotional in the manner of a great Fitzgerald short story Ezra Koenig and the other two cannot be discounted.It's a bit of a curate's egg though this one. Some tracks pass by without making an impression while elsewhere things are more interesting and you feel that would warrant and repay further investigation.
So I decided I'd listen to Only God Was Above Us five times before making a judgement. Vampire Weekend are a band that have always dealt with the poignancy of the moment in the passage of the Post Millenial age. Koenig has the writer's eye. He knows his Fitzgerald and his Bellow. I suspect his Cheever, Salinger and his Jay McInerney too.
There is plenty here to divert those who have been prone to the bands well heeled vision previously. I miss Rostam personally. I sispect he's involved here to some degree but I don't think the band are quite what they were in the days of his full engagement, particularly their magisterial and defontive third album Vampires of the City. Ultimately Only God Was Above Us was a little too formulaic for my tastes.
P.S. The more I listen to this, the more I suspect I mght be wrong. It may need fifteen plays..
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 229 Robyn Hitchcock- Black Snake Diamond Role
I have plenty of time for Robyn Hitchcock's ingrained, controlled lunacy without ever tumbling over to a state of obsessive love. But this , from 1981, is inspired.
Friday, October 4, 2024
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 230 Martin Stephenson & The Daintees - Boat To Bolivia
I'll be on my way back hime from Sicily to Tyneside shortly and there are worse albums to listen to than Martin Stephenson & The Daintees gorgeouse 1986 album Boat To Bolivia. A reminder of a time when people knew how to dream and live. Before the Internet came along to confuse matter.A romantic dewy eyed pearl.
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,791 Rosalia - El Mal Querer
A multi Grammy Winning Latin American music artist. A good thing to listen to as I swelter in Meditteranean sun.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 82 Richard Thompson - Ship To Shore
I saw Richard Thompson play live at the Sage in Gateshead earlier this year. It was the first time I'd seen him play live and he's a magical performer and in many ways a magical person.
He's someone whose lived mre in a lifetime than may of us can ever hope to. But remains essentially modest. With his extraordinary gifts and talent.
His album which he was touring ti support is easy grace and insight. His guitar paying is fluent, his band suppirts his vision. It's another fine record.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,875 The Asteroid No 4
The Asteroid No 4, a band from the Bay Area of California. Several Shapes of Solar Flares. An album that offers up remiders of Ultra Vivid Scene and The Sixties. Two of my favourite things,
This is not the only record you will hear today that reides largely in the past. I have no criticism of this kind of pursuit. The past is something to be loved, cherished and venerated.
Several Shapes of Solar Flares venerates a time when bands wore shades and Beatles bowl haircuts. pretended that they were in The Byrds ir The Velvet Underground.
Thursday, October 3, 2024
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 231 -Pete Shelley - Heaven & The Sea
Pete Shelley in 1986. A strange thing to imagine. This is driven by those New Order, occasionally slightly bloodless rhythms. For essential Pete rewind eight years.
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,792 Bad Company - Bad Company
Bad Company were something of a Spinal Tap exercise after the myriad joys if Free. The magic had gone and we were left with the meat and potato riffs and the thrusting crotch. Plenty were satisfied. I think it's pretty awful.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 83 Hinds - VIVA HINDS
Hinds are such a lovely band. Madrid Garage all girl band. Punky and unashamedly young though the years are passing.
VIVA HINDS is most of all a celebration of friendship. A thing that's always worth celebrating and immersing yourself in.
It's an against the odds records. The band have struggled to survive finabcially and are down to their core duo Carlotta Cosials and Anna Perrote. No longer truly Garage perhaps. This is a Pop record to m years. A damned good one Fuelled by positivity and love of life. Go girls go !
Song(s) of the Day # 3,874 Alan Sparhawk
White Roses, My God the solo album from Alan Sparhawk, the former Low man is a strange disembodied affair, Driven by treated vocals and driven electro rhythms.
The strangeness of the record may not be to all tastes but for me that's precisely what makes it so compelling, A weird, wonderful and celebratory record.
Wednesday, October 2, 2024
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 232 Robert Wyatt - Nothing Can Stop Us
'At last I'm free...'
Tobert Wyatt is trully treasurable. A one off . He put this out in 1982. Like almost everything he has released it's worth listening to.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 84 Jack Name - Fabulous Soundtracks
Fabulous Soundtracks, the latest record from Jack Name a moonlighting venture from sometime White Fence musician. Ghostly Seance Psych.. OK I just made that up. But I imagine you catch my drift.
Sounding like someone has revivified Lee Hazlewood, Gomez Adams, Lux Interior and Bela Lugosi, kept them up all night and got them intoxicated on inadvisable cocktails before driving them down to a recording studion with Jack Nitzcshe propped behind the mixing desk.
More fun and less comprehensible than The Master & Margarita or Night of the Hunter on acid. Fabulous Soundtracks may be the weirdest record that's come floating down the pike this week but its also probably the most delightful.Fans of Broadcast, Pram and Johnny Depp form an orderly queue.
Some of the best dark songs you're likely to hear in 2024. The result is a disorientating but delightfully skewed record that never for a moment pretends to play to the rules. This is so good it makes you wonder why anyone ever bothers.
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,793 Fleetwood Mac - Then Play On
Peter Green's Mac in their pomp. There are fewer finer sounds.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,873 Christian Lee Hutson
Christian Lee Hutson's Paaradise Pop 10. Tis will do as the soundtrack for a dya when I'm planning to swim in the Meditterranean Sicilian sea and then catch up with one of the great friends of my lifetime.
This will more than do. Gentle, melodic musings on the passages of life. Minnapolis to LA. In the words of the Spotify bio 'like fnding a collection of short stories. Whispered wisdom.
Tuesday, October 1, 2024
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 233 AC Marias - One Of Our Girls (Has Gone Missing)
One of any number of excellent side projects from ex-Wire members. This one involves Graham Lewis, Bruce Gibert and frequent collaborator Angela Conway. Prepare to be in turns unsettled and reminded of your own excellent music taste. Splendid !
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,794 Hotelier - Home Like Noplace Is There.
Deeply emotive alternative American independent rock music. Rushing through the doors that Neutral Miilk Hotel threw oen. If you venerate them I imagine you will enjoy this.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 85 Goat Girl - Below The Waste
Goat Girl remain one of the most interesting bands in England. In terms of their ideas and also in terms of their sound which always makes its own road. Called a 'London Art Rock Tri'o, by Pitchfork who pride themselves on being able to put ridiculous labels on things that don't need labelling. They're back anyhow. With thir album Below The Waste.
A band apart. Unlike most of the groups that came out of the Brixton Windmill scene that brought the label Post Punk back into fashion a few years back. They were never particularly interested in hanging with the pack. Nor one that seemed to prioritise high positioning on a Glastonbury stage over going on a genuine journey of discovery.Perhaps the only label that makes any actual sense to me is as an English Warpaint. They trade in texture.
Below The Waste, is uncompromising.and fascinating in terms of its shifting surfaces and musicianship. It immediately suggests that it will reward repeat play. The name of the record indicates a determined gender defiance of a similar sort to the names of previous records and indeed the name of the band itself. Goat Girl continue to go their own way..
Song(s) of the Day # 3,872 Marce Lemon
I'm in Sicily. Did I mention that. A paty of me would just like to stay here forever. In the sun. Marce Lemon seems an appropriate listening pleasure. Lemon is a big Sicily thing.
Her latest album Watch Me Drive Them Dogs Wild is poetic. Dreaming, wandering. Reeling. I recommend it to you.
Monday, September 30, 2024
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,795 Digable Planes - Blowout Comb
There's not mych better than waking from siseta and preparing emotionall for a night out. Than this ...
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 86 Rosali - Bite Down
There are no end of fantastic new records being released at the moment and coming down the pike in the coming weeks and months. It's a welcome refuge from the heinous state of the world outside our windows. I don't shy away from political comment. But I'm inclined to choose my company and conversations these days. I don't care to waste my breath, Cause agitation to others or invite it upon myself.
As an alternative to such wasted endeavour, you might choose to spend some time with Rosali. She's a North Carolina based singer songwriter. Her new album Bite Down has just been released and in short I think it's excellent.
Rosali is probably an Americana artist if you want to file herself somewhere in the Record Shop you no doubt have located somehwere in your head. Bite Down is further testimony to her fantastic gifts.
She's an artist who generally deals in aesthetic pastoral loveliness. In the way that Monet did for much of his artistic career. If you're after musical comparisons, some of her songs sound not unlike Christine and Stevie harmonising together. The Weather Station or Joan Shelley if they were more inclined to rock out and let their hair down.
Anyway the record is further evidence that she's an artist worth investing your time in. And making an effort to go out and see her live is she happens to play a venue near you. I have a good friend who loves her truly and should really write his own testimony. Mine is brief. This is great. Maybe he'd care to expand.
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 234 Ian Hunter - Welcome To The Club
Ian Hunter having a good time with Mick Ronson and his band in the States.Fot fans it seems to me.There are lots of extended guitar solos. I think I'd prefer to listen to Mott.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,871 Neva Dinova
'It takes some time to change.'
Sun comes up. It's Monday morning. It's the last day of September . I'm in Sicily. And I'm going to Mount Etna.
I start the day listening to Neva Dinova's latest album Canary. It's a fine record. Plangent, slightly tear and regret stained There are worse ways to start the day.
Sunday, September 29, 2024
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,796 Massive Attack - Heligoland
You can't lose with Massiv Attack. Their's is a magical spiritual quest which may not be over yet . 2010's Heligoland may not be the record you immediately think of when you think of them. But iy's bot plenty going for it. And people seriously listen to Oasis in 2024.
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 235 Venom - Black Metal
Urgh! Not today. Or any other morning I supect !
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 87 Lunar Vacation - Everything Matters, Everythings's Fine.
A slinky bass run that might have been one of Krist Novolesic's on Nevermind , A lead voice from the Kim Deal school. That will do me amd I've gpy somehing to listento as I rise on Wednesday morning as we dive into the second half of September. Decatu, Georgia's Lunar Vacation's Everything Matters,Everythings's Fine.
I was also mided of Chicago's Rat Boys. A band that have done fine work in recent years for constituents that are prone to thes kunds of sinuous, narrative guitar driven narratives. Another band to watch.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,870 Mustafa
Waking up in the sun. In a beautiful Bed & Breakfast. In Bel Paeso, Sicily. A short but interesting car ride from Catania where I lived and worked twenty five years ago. I think I appreciate the beauty an freedom it offers more than I did twenty five years ago. In the words of someone, can't remember who, 'I was so much older then I'm young than that now. '
An appropriate album to listen to as I prepare for my shower. And breakfast. Mustafa's Dunya. A young man with a questing mind and a lonely, hunting but wise heart.
This is his first album. First album's are often the greatest. But judjing by Dunya he's got a lot more in the tank. It sounds great as the sun streams through my open window which leads onto the balocny. .
Saturday, September 28, 2024
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 236 Rain Parade - Emergency Third Rail Power Trip
An incredible record in many many respects that still has a considerable appeal
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 88 Conor Lynch - Slow Country
This looks like becoming Darren Jones week here on It Starts with a Birthstone.. I may not be entirely exaggerating. The last two Songs of the Days have been Darren suggestions.
This is the third in a row and the best so far as well as be one of the best albums I've heard all year . So we may well keep going until the man runs out of ideas. He doesn't seem to. Well it makes things very easy for me.
This. Michigan songwriter Conor Lynch's fourth album Slow Country is a record that attains classic status almost within the first five minutes of its run. Sometimes you just need the first song to know you're on a good road. .
This is a melifluous and relaxing Folk Rock record in the classic tradition. Think Nick Drake most obviously. But then think Midlake, Kevin Morby, Phosphorescent. Any of those people, R.E.M's Find The River. Conor Lynch is not an artist and this is not a record that is shamed by such esteemed company.
One to listen to with a cat on your lap. or else a blanket. This establishes and maintains a pace and momentum of its own that I suspect you might want to stay with it, Thanks Darren. This is a peach..
Friday, September 27, 2024
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,798 Lady Gaga - Born This Way
I had a friend who got very angry once about Lady Gaga. About how she was bettere than Madonna. I didn't get involved. To me they are bith Pop Stars. A lovely girl once sand I'm Crazy For You down the line for me down the line from Malaysia to me. So if pressed this gets my vote.
I don't listen to a lot of frontline Pop Music. I'm not counting the days to my next Swiftie encounter. I found this rather vulgar and garish. I did love the Lady at the Parisian Olympic Ceremony recently. I was watching with my parents in their living roomin Canterbury. It made my mum smile. As for this.
AU SUIVANT !!!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)