Saturday, August 31, 2024
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 265 Sonic Youth - EVOL
Yes Sonic Youth. Yes EVOL. Screw you Journey.
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,824 Journey
Journey. Do I really have to listen to a fucking Journey record. I'm sorry diehard Journey fans but I think they're shite and you need to have your heads examined. I don't have children and I love music so I'm not personally open to the idea that it's a great world and everyone can like what they want. Alright Pollyanna.
But please don't expect me to listen to crap like this with a smile on my face. I will stand to the side of the dancefloor while they play bleeding Don't Stop Believing and wait until they play Le Freak. If you want some great AOR play that terrific Boston song or Don't Fear The Reaper. Then I will get onto the dancefloor. Oh thank god. I've finished this review . I can take this monstrosity off now.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 117 Cults - To The Ghosts
Indie Schmindie. I've realised with time that I am essentially an Indie person and my tastes both musical and in terms of my general lifestyle preferences and choices are Indie. I'm far from being alone. Perhaps I should get a T Shirt. .
When I was coming of age in the 1980s things were simpler than they are now. You just liked whatever you liked and nobody seemed particularly bothered about putting everything and everybody into categories. There were categories of course, Goths, Punks etc but I was never particularly anything and many people I grew up weren't either.
Labelling everything, putting them in a jar and preferably in a list seems to gather apace. I've had conversations with record shop owners who have kids coming in with lists of records they need to own in some act of assembly of sensibility. A Smiths album, a Pavement one, a Beastie Boys record, a Tupac one.
That strikes me as compiling a record collection and constructing a personality to go along with it in a rather self- conscious fashion. In contrast with my adolescent fumblings in the early Eighties. Haunting libraries. Reading Fitgerald, Camus but also Agatha Christie, Buying all of The Doors studios albums in a few months when I got my first Saturday job. Then finding my way towards key R.E.M, Go Betweens and Velvet Underground albums. Of course I'm fully aware that I'm taking a 'things weren't that way in my day' approach. But isn't that just what you start to do at a certain point in life.
There's something about this compulsive and slightly relentless listing impulse that increasingly reminds me of the Terrence Stamp character in The Collector. A story about a butterfly collector who decides to collect young women instead, and one day abducts a beautiful young women and imprisons her in his cellar. A wonderful if slightly ghoulish film adptation was made of a wonderful if slightly ghoulish novel by John Fowles which I read and liked as a teenager. Morrissey of course loved the book and the film. He has since become a slightly ghoulish figure himself.
Since the millennium everything has become stratified. Channel Four has programmes about 1973 where people like Stuart Maconie decide and proclaim that the great thing about the year was Curley Wurlies or Space Hoppers rather than being alive. Ir seems a rather strange way to look at our your childhood. But the past is a foreign country as they say.
Anyway. Ir's 2024 and if I say I'm Indie you will understand broadly what I mean. I like The Velvet Underground and Audrey Hepburn. J.D.Salinger. I like French and Italian Films. I like Truffaut and Fellini. I prefer old football to modern football.
Which brings me belatedly to the record this post is for. Cults. Cults, are essentially a duo, Formed in New York City in 2010. They make Indie music in the purest sense of the word.. Theirs nods its head to Saint Etienne and Belle & Sebastian and on latest record To The Ghosts they don't break any of Indie's cardinal rules. They play to the rules. I liked this. If you are a bit Indie like me, you might like it too.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,841 Head Portals
Saturday. 'Saturdays the day for fun,'as my dear Father says. Darren Jones AKA Starbuck to the rescue once more. A band from Salt Lake City and their staggering new album A Lesson In Object Permanence.
I can tell you no more about Head Portals. You don't really need to. The recird speaks for iyself. It's conflicted. It's anguished and then sensitive. It's a journey.Its a record that suprrises you and doesn't need labels. If you want some I would just mention Bob Mould.The sporit probably mre than the actual sound. Compliments don't get much higher.
It's another good one Darren. Fetch yourself a gold star and put it next to your name on the wall. Another good deed.
Friday, August 30, 2024
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 266 The Waterboys Fisherman's Blues
The Waterboys played my university in my first year there. I didn't go but by all accounts that was a mistake on my part, Thise who went, a small contigent at my students accomodation halls never stopped going on about it every time you saw them. The band had apparently played any number of rapturously received encores and the evening came to take on a legendary status.
This album came a couple of years later and did well critically and commercially. Mike Scott Waterboys leader's vision was going largely against the grain of the times, (Kevin Rowland was a fellow traveller) Folk Music did not seem like a cool thing in the Eighties. Things have changed and quite right too. The album is a dizzy, poetic, dreaming reel !
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,825 Terry Riley - A Rainbow In Curved Air
Terry Riley was just a name I vaguely knew before I listened this morning. Fabulous Electronic avant gard ambience,
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 118 Penny Arcade - Backwater College
When Ultimate Painting split so sadly a few years ago, Jack Cooper seemed the one of the band's core pair to keep an eye on. His records with Modern Nature have proved interesting Jazz and Folk abstractions and there's surely more to come.
But James Hoare's projects have been equally fruitful. He has quite a CV to his name now. Veronica Falls, Ultimate Painting, Proper Ornaments now Penny Arcade and an album called Backwater College.
Ot's a slightly downcast, mournful recird as you'd half expect with Hoare given his legcay. In a line from Ray Davies, Robyn Htchcock, Peter Astor and other great English wordswmiths.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,840 Astrid Sonne
Astrid Sonne is a Danish composer and viola player currently living in London. Her latest record Great Doubt has a cover shot of her face. She has a nice smile and is wearing a plain gold earring.
The album is avant gard and probably won't be heard by many people. The kind who might listen and persevere will probably be prone to this kind of stuff already and more than likely have some Laurie Anderson, Yoko One and Post Punk records from back in the day when it was genuinely Post Punk.
I found this a cool lesson sat listening in the dining room of my parents house. As my dear mother cooked us all a lovely meal.I thought it was great. As I listened later on in the evening, weirder and more wonderful still. My current favourite off the wall Danish viola player.
Thursday, August 29, 2024
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 267 Butthole Surfers - Locust Abortion Technician
The delightfully named Butthole Surfers always struck me a the kind of band that the eternally hipper than thou type in your class aould always mke a huge deal of being the greatest ever fan of. Did they actually listen to the records they always made such a show of having at the front of their record racks when you went round to visit them I wondered. Did they actually like these records or was it more important that everyone knew that they had them. Listen to Locust Abortion Technician without coming up for air. I dare you !
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,826 Shabbazz Palaces - Black Up
Shabazz Palaces are as cool as it gets.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 119 Sour Widows - Revival of a Friend
Bay Areas trio release a debut album that invites the descriptions plangent and poignant. Sour Widows offers solace for those underwhelmed by the imminent Oasis reunion World Tour.
Revival of a Friend offers something gentler and to my mind worter of celebration. Why not buy a cake at your local artisan bakery and light some candles and incense sticks in your living room, make a pot of peppermint tea and enjoy listening to this record in the company of a friend.
It's a record which reflects on difficult memories and experiences. And plays them out with singular craft and emotion. Fans of Throwing Muses, Sleater Kinney and Mazy Star might be drawn to the flame of this excellent record.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,839 The Softies
The Softies have ben plying their trade since 1994. Their trade, most obviously is female friendship and jangling indie melodicism of the sort there's always been a ready audience for. Going back to the early singles of The Byrds, The Turtles and Mamas & The Papas.
The cynics response is 'Isn't it all rather wet!' But screw the cynics, They're all dried up and loveless. There'll be a happy congegation that will enjoy The Sofeties latest Love In The Bed I Made. Nothing like curling up iunder the duvet and stuffing your face with chocolate and cookies. The next best thing to a new Teenage Fanclub album.
Wednesday, August 28, 2024
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,827 Syd Barrett - Barrett
As with Throwing Musics, this is a record made by someone familiar with the scary and distinctly unfamiliar. This is a gentler take but you can sense that Syd is going through a not altogether easy ride here though his talent harnesses the energies within him. There are very few listening experiences I treasure more than listening to Syd Barrett records. His is the spirit and muse of Lewis Carroll unleashed in the recording studio.
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 268 Throwing Muses - Throwing Muses
'Summer's gone. Summer's pver...'
A wonderful record and one which in some ways stands pretty much alone in the Rock & Roll canon though of course it has significant precedents and antecedents . Patti Smith, Hole, Riot Girl and Sleater Kinney come to mind.
If Sylvia Path had made an album it would sound like this. An album by terms gentle, sensitive, furious, unhinged. Always deeply colouful. I bought and listened to this when it came out, at a time when I was young and not very well. Like the best art it was a consolation. A solace. And something I learned from to move forwards.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 120 Ride - Interplay
I've always liked Ride a lot even though I've been aware that they haven't always generally been percieved as the hippest merchants on Pop's block. Perhaps excepting their early days when I think it was generally agreed that they were a damined good thing as the Eighties ended and the Nineties began,
I was commencing my last year at university and things very definitely seemed to be on the move. Ride were impossibly young and ptting out one great EP after another. Full of bright and vibrant guitar tunes that appreciated The Velvet Underground but also The Beatles and The Byrds. As well as the time they were in. Things got increasingly nostalgic and reverant and also strangely arrogant as the decade proceeded. Ride were never arrogant.
As they progressed through the Nineties they very visibly seemed to lose their direction and sense of mission. Guitarist and joint songwriter Andy Bell, fell under the spell of Oasis and joined them as a hired hand which I always thought was a shame as his own brand had great appeal to me and others.More to me at least long term certainly.
Ride's reformation and reignition as a going concern has been that rare thing. A band reforming that's welcome because there's a sense of unfinished business. I saw them play in Newcastle about ten years back and it was one of the best gigs I've ever seen. Their talent was nakedly obvious and quite awe inspiring that night.
They have a new album out called Interplay and I've just taken great pleasure listening to it, on my television set, (I still find it difficult to totally adjust to the technology leaps of my lifetime). It's a great record and I supect I'll put it on again as soon as it gets to its end.
The standard criticism of Ride has always struck me as a criticism of them, who they are and where they come from as much as of their music. That they are musical standard bearers for a Home Counties blandness. This implicit criticism strikes me as unfair given an actual focused listening to Interplay. It has so much going for it. The lyrics were never primarily what you go to with Ride. They fit fine here too.
You really get the sense that Ride appreciate their own gifts now and are happy to stick to their own set of rules and sonic guidelines, rather than wanting to be Traffic, The Creation or god forbid Oasis. Interplay is a great and highly varied record which concentrates on the band's consistent asset. Their appreciation of the light. It's almost an hour long and I'd say they're a band worthy of an hour out of anyone's life.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,840 The Secret Beach
The Secret Beach are a modern /retro collective led by Micah Erenberg a maverick hipster who reminds me of Sufjan, Beck, Wayne Coyne and Tiny Tim by turns. A neat trick.
Their latest album We Were Born Here, What's Your Excuse is a fabulous album that has been growing on me like fur with every new play over the last few days.In thrall to the late Sixties Woodstock ethos but deeply 2024 at one and the same time. I guess that's the Internet and modern living for you. Everything is accessible.
Erenberg has previous. I listened to one of his solo albums a few years back and posted it on here. Almost saw him at a cool venue in Newcastle where I live around about lockdown but didn't for reasons I've forgotten. He's a name to keep an eye on clearly because he drips offbeat class.
We Were Born Here, What's Your Excuse takes its name from a Simpson episide. About a nowhere town in Winnepeg and what it must be like to live there. This record doesn't actual make that seem to be such an awful thing. There's a world of wonder here.
Tuesday, August 27, 2024
Fontaines D.C. - Romance
Fomtaines D.C. seem generally to be regarded as a band on the verge of breking out in a genuinely huge way. Mentioned in the same breath as Arctic Monkeys, Libertines, Pulp, Blur and, gasp Oasis. A trad-ish guitar, cigarettes and paperbacks proposition except that they have broader horizons than Oasis ever did. Didn't Liam mention The Lion The Witch & The Wardrobe as a formative influence.
I took a while with their latest, Romance. The first three tracks were distinctly unppealling. Indie gruel. Grian Chatten lyrics are generally much more to my liking than his vocals. As someone once put it, ' I know you and you cannit sing.' But then singing well is hardly a requisite for Rock & Roll approval. Bob Dylan, Lu Reed, Neil Young. Shane McGowan.
Eventually proceedings began to pick up. I have little doubt that this will continue to elevate Fontaines D.C.'s profile, prospects and bank balances though they're always likely be a proposition primarily for the estranged and apart.
In the latest issue if Uncut the band sing the praise s of Bladrynner, Rumble Fish, Micky Rourke in general, My Own Private Idaho as well as Joyce.They're still struggling with themselves.Embroiled in their Irishness and their identity
Anyhow, Romance is another good record. Chatten talks of dissonance in the Uncut article. An unease. It's more interesting I'd say than Bono plnating flags in an anplifier stack All power to their pointy disaffected elbows.
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 268 Minutemen - What Makes a Man Start Fires?
I suspect Minutemen came to England as support on R.E.M's first tour here. I stood outside the Marquee in a long queue but they had sold out. Minutemen were gnarly, fearsome, bassy proposition.Pocket manifestoes. Genrally ninety seconds at most. As soon as one ends another is off. Uncopromising.
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,828 Chuck Berry - One Dozen Berrys
'Just let me here that Rock & Roll music...'
A new poetry. Fundamental to the likes of Richard, Jagge, Lennon, McCartney. Page and Beck. You can still sense the youth, vigour and backbone. An education. Modern poetry.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,839 The Sorcerers
There are worse places to look when seeking new things to listen to than browsing through Aquarium Drunkard recommendations. AQ is dn eclectic Los Angeles originated audio journal that consistently leads the curious and committed off the beaten path.
Their latest half year rundown of favourites led me to The Sorcerers I Too Am A Stranger a melting pot of instrumental Jazz weirdness, right down the street of Sun Ra aficionados. .
Ethio inspired rhythms and beats. A chance to wear shades and don kaftans. Grow a goatee and indulge your inner beatnik of an evening. I'm indebted to Aquarium Drunkard once more.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 121 Peace De Resistance - Lullabye For The Debris
A weak gag. The band name I mean. A strong record,.Mose Brown of Institute goes solo once again for the second time with Lullabye For The Debris and uses the opportunity to indulge his inner Iggy.
Who can blame him. Part of Iggy's appeal, particuarly during his golden run from 1967 to 1980 was the fact that he was always something of a dork. Quite deliberately so. An idiot savant. And Brown follows suite here to deranged effect.
If you're looking for Iggy precedents for what's going on here.I'd go The Idiot and New Values.. The Ig influence is immediate and defining here but I'm not complaining. Not enoigh people channel his spectre to such good effect I'd say.
Artistic as Johnny Jewel always was. Urgent too. A fantastic set of songs. I've used this one before but if you've got a good line why not use it again. The most fun you can have with your close on. At least for this week. .
Monday, August 26, 2024
New York in 100 Songs - # 87 Tom Waits
I saw Tom Wits live just after Rain Dogs came out. I saw R.E.M. on their Fables of the Reconstruction tour four days later at Hammersmith Palais. It won't get better than that.
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 269 Jane's Addiction - Nothing's Shocking
I've never listened to the first Jane's Addiction problem before this morning. In many ways Jane's Addiction grabbed the baton from The Doors. They had similar preopsterous ambition and tightrope daring. Not everything works, But when it does...
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,829 Regina Spektor - Begin To Hope
I love Regina Spektor. A treasurable, one off ingenue talent, Bridges the gap between the delight of childhood and precociousand enduring classical brilliance. Also her songs can cut deep. She has genuine emotional range. Cool way to start the week.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 122 Rui Gabriel - Compassion
It's a Friday morning and the sun is rising slowly in the Canterbury heavens as I prepare for my working day. Tume to put my headphones on and listen to a dreamy Indie album put me in the best mood for my labours.
Rui Gabriel's Compassion ticks all available boxes. Gabriel is a bearded, avuncular customer. Born in Venzuela, raised in Nicaragua and based in Indiana he's a wooly hatted, chunky proposition and Compassion is a dreamy, self asurred and pleasurable ride.
Full of indie goodness. Gabriel joins up with fellow travellers Kate Teague and Stef Chura or goes it alone. For anyone who makes a point of rewatching Juno at some point in the calendar year. Feelgood. Summertime Tiger particularly is a quality tune.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,838 Niningashi
'A long lost acid folk gem'. So it says on Bandcamp. Niningashi's 1974 lost classic Heavy Way is the sound of 'banjoes playing through the broken glass.'in Osaka.
Harvest is the most immediate and obvious American Folk Rock precedent for Heavy Way. It has the wonky melancholy wistfulness that characterises Neil Young's great masterpiece.
But it also plenty of plenty of charm of its own. This is a splendid set of songs which in the words of the Spotify bio are 'honest and raw, deep and strangely funky.'
Out on Time Capsule, a reissue label which specialises in sonic experiences across time and space. This would make an excellent surprise gift for the friend in your life who delights in such unexpected oddities.
Sunday, August 25, 2024
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 270 Echo & The Bunnymen - Porcupine
'Say we can. Say we will. Not just another. Drop in the ocean...'
1983 was a year of journey, discovery and becoming for me. And Echo & The Bunnymen were there. A band on a mission. Driven. I bought Porcupine early in the year and though it was a bristly, ferocious and embattled record, it kept me going. They were a band that you looked to for leadership and guidance. Whenever a camera was pointed at me during those years I set my face in profile and gazed at the horizon. Imagining I was on a Bunnymen album sleeve, Inspired by their example.
Not everything works on the record though their's was a defiant and inspiring valour. But there was a sense that they needed to reset their compass which is what they proceeded to do. By the end of December I'd discovered R.E.M and Murmur and embarked on a new journey of personal discovery. Ploughing through A Levels and fundamental experience and heading towards university.
Porcupine is still a fierce, utterly committed album forty years on. It's not one for compromise.. The band were sent back to the studio by WEA who demanded a more commercial and accessible approach. It was released to a slightly mixed reception. I recall a critical review from Richard Cook in the NME a paper that had previously garlanded them continually. From here they set their sails for the charts.And Smash Hits became just as important to them as The NME. A softer, lusher focus, Their Blue Period.
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,830 And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead -Source Tags & Codes
Punk fury. A band that was utterly unrestrained and impassioned.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 123 Nadine Shah - Filthy Underneath
At the end of February I saw Nadine Shah play a fine instore set at The Reflex Record Shop, a medal winning stone's throw from my flat in Newcastle . It was a splendid evening and she's source of no little local pride. She hails from South Tyneside.
Her latest album Filthy Underneath is a slinky, sensual and highly adept record of sharp, metallic Pop. Nadine is a smooth operator but not in the Sade vogue. This is a record that feeds into the rich multicultural traditions that Britain can proudly call on now. She's such a talent. The record rewards repeat plays.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,837 Jack Name
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.
Saturday, August 24, 2024
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,831 Swans - White Light of Infinity
It's early on Saturday morning. I'm in the mood for a Belle & Sebastian record. Swans assault, much as I respect them, and am open to their intense experience, is the last thing I'm looking for.
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 271 The Go Betweens - Spring Hill Fair
'rap, rap, rap on the lid...'
First loves still work their spell. A discovery. One of my most important ones. Bought in 1984 when I was on the cusp of life.It still weaves its spell and in many ways means more to me emotionally than the fabulous records that went before and came after which I came to later. Like I said. First loves. First kisses. Bachelor Kisses.
I bought this at a record shop which is no longer there just around the corner from Twickenham Library which still is. Richmond Theatre, where they shot the cover of Spring Hill Fair is a short bus ride away.on the Green. As for the title. Spring Hill Fair. What a name for an album. There was a band that understood the meaning of romance.True Romance. Like the band I was going through by reading years. Devouring literature. Arming myself for life. They were days of perpetual harvest. Scott Fitzgerald. A writer I associate particulatly with those days. There were others.
The Go Betweens were just right for me. I was just like them. I dreamed. I was dreaming. I've since met Robert. And Lindy. Briefly. You only need brief encounters with your heroes. Neither disappointed. They're people who meet your eye.
Others, including the band, have been disparaging about Spring Hill Fair's production and song selection. I don't hear it. I can't be objective. To me it's a glorious band, in their pomp. This is an album that has enormous heart and considerable brain power.This blog takes it's name from a line on the record.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 124 English Teacher - This Could Be Texas
A much hyped Leeds band that have risen quickly through the ranks and are playing the sizeable Boiler Shop venue, close to me soon in support of their debut album This Could Be Texas.
Generally, I'm suspicious of the kind of hype a band like this draw. I haven't been impressed by the likes of Black Midi, and Black Country New Road that have emerged to waves of adulation and rave reviews in recent years..
There's also the dreaded sobriquet 'Post Punk' which is applied to any young British band that step up onstage with guitars, drum and bass and a trendy haircut these days. It's laziness frankly. Both from the press and also often on part of the bands themselves. It's high time to move on.
But hold on a moment because This Could Be Texas is a deft and sinuous record.It talks eloquently and with genuine craft and warmth about a world where there is an intolerance to difference. The world we live in frankly and does so by being engaged, different and not resorting to anger. I was moved and engaged,
It doesn't sound like the bands of my youth. There are no traces of The Fall, Gang of Four or Joy Division. This is a record you need to listen to again and get to know on its own terms .
With a singular frontwoman in Lily Fountaine and a deft guitarist in Lewis Whiting they seem immediately as ones to watch. I can't quite work out why this is riding the wave it clearly is right now but it's credit to the band and the audience that are attaching themselves to it that it is. This seems a record to return to and get to know in the coming months and one that will reward this effort.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,836 Lilacs & Champagne
Starbuck is back. And not a moment too soon. Another post a few days back from Darren Jones, (AKA Starbuck) first mate of this Blog, pointed me into the orbit of new quarry just in time for Friday's breakfast.
Today we feast on Fantasy World by Lilacs & Champagne, a side project of Portland, Oregon experimentalists Grauls. This is a very modern sounding record though these kind of things have been being made for thirty years at least now so the expression 'Brand new - You're Retro comes to mind.
We're talking DJ Shadow and Avalanches territory. Sample heav sounding, shifting instrumentals to a film which may have been dreamed up, but not necessarily made yet. All highly atmospheric. With a slightly creepy dystopic record cover to boeat. Keep them coming Darren !
Friday, August 23, 2024
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 272 Siouxsie & The Banshees - Tinderbox
The Banshees had a tendency to work their way through guitarists rather carelessly. Not to say callously. . They'd used up John McGeogh by 1986 and recruited Clock DVA's John Valentine Carruthers on six string duties. By now they'd established their modus bvivendi. This comes across as inessential, slightly generic Goth Product where previously they had been vital. The singles aren't bad
.
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,832 Clipse - Hell Hath No Fury
I seem to remember Zane Lowe the MTV dudester playing a Clipse track that piqued my interest 20 years or so back and led me to buy a CD which I never listened to properly. Like almost everything these days, it feels like a long time ago.
Hell Hath No Fury talks the 'I'm so tough' dirty street talk that is frankly such a tiresome argot of so much Hip Hop and Rap music.But this is funky, inventive stuff The album took several years from Genesis to Revelation and it was clearly time well spent. The Neptunes handle the production duties as deftly as you might expect. This is state of the art stuff. All hooks, beats and rhymes. I imagine Jesse Pinkman owned this.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 125 Camera Obscura - Look to the East, Look to the West
Camera Obscura are a band that chime with my own tastes, my past my sensibility. Very, Glasgow, even if they are named after an Edinburgh landmark just down the road from Edinburgh on the Golden Mile. But in terms of their musical heritage they're very Glasgae. A little sister band to Belle & Sebastian. Solid in the musical tradition of Postcard. Orange Juice, Axtec Camera, Lloyd Cole.
The band suffered a terrible blow with the loss of core member Carey Laner who passed in 2015. It's difficult for bands like them to maintain the forward momentum in the face of such a loss. Look ToThe East, Look To The West is their first album since 2013. It's spiriting to see it so richly and solidly in their romantic and melodic tradition.
It's made up of excellent, lovingly crafted songs first and foremost. You can't go far wrong if you get that bit right. This is as good a collection of pure, swooning and delicate Pop songs as you'll hear all year. Great to see them back in the saddle.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,835 Marlin's Dreaming
My new favourite band Part Blah, Blah, Blah Sometimes the chance discoveries are the best ones. Marlin's Dreaming'st HIRL fell into my lap yesterday afternoon, browsing through a playlist of new releases. Within a couple of songs I was hooked on their sreamlined, minimalist guitar driven sound and sensibility. They're a band with enormous heart and soul.
Hailing from Otepoti, New Zealand Marlin's Dreaming have a few albums under their belts and seem to be a good example of the wisdom of keeping thing simple if you can. At various points I thought of Feelies,Chastity Belt, The Shins, Alex G and other favourite things. Their playlists on Spotify feature Big Thief, Duster, Wilco and other things which may recommend them to you. . And also themselves. Never a bad idea.
When I started off with the record, I wondered for a moment whether Chris De Burgh was at the mic, but this sensation soon disipated and Marlin's Dreaming settled into an easy groove and began to quietly astonish. They remind me in many respects of Antipodean forbears. The Flying Nun bands. The Go Betweens. They have a fluid, comfortable grace and the record dips and flows in a manner that few contemporary bands are capable of these days. They're special. Let's put it that way.
This is a record I'm still getting to know but one that I already love, in the way that I used to love records when I was seventeen. Spring Hill Fair. Rattlesnakes. This is the best guitar album I've heard for some time. I'll post this again later in the year. Well into December, as my rundown of my favourite records of the year draws to its close.
Thursday, August 22, 2024
New York in 100 Songs - # 92 Interpol
I saw Inperpol in New York City in 2001, playing with The Walkmen. I wasn;t impressed. The Joy Division influence was so numbing that it was difficult to bet beyond it. Since I've come to appreciate their songs. This one for example. There's a genuine millennial awe at work here.
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 273 David Bowie - Tonight
It took me a while to fully catch on to Bowie. A late developer musically he didn't appeal to me particularly during his sharp suit and shiny shoes days. With time I worked my way back. Tonight still sounds completely patched together, shorn of inspiration and oddly for the man, looking constantly back. It's a dreadful, dreadful record. Take my word for it.
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 126 Amen Dunes - Death Jokes
A few years back I got slightly obsessed by Amen Dunes dark anthem Miki Dora and Freedom, the album it was attached to. Both had a vaguely sinister but appealing undertow that I kept coming back to.
That was 2018. Freedom registered at 30 in my rundown of records in an exceptional year. Now Amen Dunes, or more precisely Damon McMahon, the rather earnest young American who plots their course is back with a belated follow up Death Jokes.
It steers a similar edgy path to its predecessor. Songs that don't adhere to traditional pathways and rhythms and instrumental patterns. McMahon has taken his time, often a sensible option. Death Jokes is dark but illuminated with insight and hypnotic purpose.
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,833 U.S. Girls - In a Poem Unlimited
Until earlier on this week I was quite unaware of the existence of U.S.Girls, the project of multi-media Canadian artist Meghan Remy. But I started hearing tracks from her sixth album In a Poem Unlimited, before its official release on 4 A.D on Friday and became intrigued. On listening to it in its entirety, I'd say it's destined to be one of the records of 2018. It's a quite blistering album.
An angry, defiant record, walking the line between art, pop and protest in a quite brilliant way. A State of the Nation address. Whereas Remy has previously drawn on the Ronettes and the girl group sound, In a Poem Unlimited fast forwards into the seventies and beyond, feeding off Blondie, ABBA, Disco 54 and Madonna to create a glorious, swirling feast,tipping a nod to the avant garde with eight minute closer Time, but elsewhere just revelling in the most wondrous grooves and melodies,
So, a highly political and timely album in a week where Alela Diane, Joan as Policewoman and Courtney Barnett have all put out great records focusing on different aspects of the world that women live in. U.S.Girls in many respects is the bleakest and most furious of the lot, commenting on the #me too campaign, male violence and abuse of power, Obama's drone bombing campaign and now to the times of Trump. The promo videos posted here attest to that. It's artistic and social statement but also a wonderfully seductive pop album.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,834 dog eyes
There are records that I immediately think of as Juno Culture as soon as I hear them.A couple of gloopy teenagers sat out on the porch strumming acoustic guitars like Juno and Paulie Bleeker in that movie. Staring into each others eyes and sharing orange tic tacs between kisses. Listening to Belle & Sebastian and Velvet Underground albums together.
That's a conforting film and records that remind me of its sensibility are immediately comforting albums which I find myself clinging to. Like Linus and his blanket. Juno soundtrack for this year seems to be dog eyes holy friends.
It seems to tick all the requisite checklist boxes with astonishing efficiency given that a stand out quality of albums such as these is lazy DNA. The songs here though are alert and keen even if they also project that contended snug lethargy.
dog eyes are David Leach and Hally Firstman. He sports a sloppy moustache. She has cute plaits. Nancy & Lee for millenial kids. These songs won't change your world so much as confirm to you that you have great taste. It's a new shade of fun !
Wednesday, August 21, 2024
Best Ever Albums - 2,000 - 1,001 - 1,834 Travis Scott - Astroworld
Contemproary Hip Hop, R&B and Rap play very little part in my world these days. If I'm lucky I come across a couple of albums a year that I can relate to. This wouldn't beone of them if it was still 2018. The vocoder was a revelation to me when I first heard it on a Herbie Hancock record in the late seventies. Less so now. I found this tiresome a couple of tracks in, and bailed.
500 Greatest Albums of the 1980s ... Ranked! # 274 Paul Kelly & The Colored Girls - Under The Sun
'A pleasing Australian twist on heartland rock.... Songs about cricket, youthful mostalgia and the long ride to the pub...'
It Starts With a Birthstone - 200 Albums for 2024 # 127 Liana Flores - Flower Of The Soul
'If we shadows have offended,
Think but this an all is mended,
That you have but slumbered here.
While these shadows did appear.'
Liana Flores was born in East Anglia of Brazilian stock. Her debut album Flower Of The Soul is proper throwback stuff. To the likes of late Sixtues and early Seventies elfin types like Pentangle, Vashti Bunyan and Brdget St John but also to the Jazzy traditions theydrew on and beyond that to the times when people really believed in Fairy folk.
This won't be for everyone. The Uncut review reasonably incited Phoebe from Friends as a reference point for some of the lyrical flights of fancy here. It certainly flirts with extreme preciousness.
But somehow the sheer beauty on show prevails.Flores venerates Antonio Carlos Jobin and sometimes it pays to kneel at the knees of the greats. This is a wonderful record to listen to as the sun rises on a Tuesday morning. Nice !