Tasty treats
I was thinking of shambling my way through another collation of heady ruminations on assorted musics tonight, but I presently reached a startling conclusion:
Everything I’ve listened to for like three days has either been really really good, or really really bad.
And because I frankly don’t want to talk shit about reams of music at one time*, before telling you again (seriously? aren’t you all getting the message yet?) that you need to listen to mewithoutYou, I decided not to bother. And then decided you clearly needed to know about this logical process.
I have begun to make it a daily goal to listen to something I’ve never heard before (and often something I’ve never even heard of, any random band or singer giving away their stuff for free basically), just to broaden some very literal horizons. Of perception and awareness and stuff.
Do you have something, anything, that I’ve probably never heard of, that I can easily access? LET ME KNOW. I will repay you in inevitably scornful deliveries of words in this space whenever the whim next descends upon me, and the sense that nobody cares simultaneously ascends once more from my listless shoulders, before disappearing into the outer stratosphere of my inconsequential apathies.
P.S. Just a little shit-talk snippet for good times. The Temper Trap suck worse than my apartment block’s hoover.
The new album from mewithoutYou, entitled Ten Stories, is a concept album about a circus train crash and the dark and philosophical adventures of the animals that escape (or don’t) in the aftermath. Aaron Weiss uses typically detailed and mysterious lyricism, and thus I thought a glossary for the phrases and names of plants and animals and even fabrics that he throws at you might be valuable. This is best used when listening to the album and reading along in the lyrics booklet.
So useful for plugging the gap that is my absolute lack of botanical knowledge!
[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]
A strange thing happened recently.
I heard two Biffy songs I’m fairly sure I’d never listened to before.
Or at least, I didn’t recognise them to the same extent that I know every part of every other song they’ve done EVER. It could be relative here. I was listening to Missing Pieces, the companion (b-sides) album to Puzzle. I have to say that beyond a passing familiarity I had for a long time neglected these songs, beyond a particular two that might just rank as my very favourite Biffy songs. Perhaps maybe there’s a chance I’d say that.
But it was strange to hear something by them that I couldn’t predict, for the first time in a good couple of years. Hm, not of course counting the new song they played live in MK. This instilled in me a fleeting modicum of excitement; limited as it was by being two songs I probably have heard before at some point on a b-sides compilation from 4 or 5 years ago. For the two new albums this year, it acted in some way as a preview of preparation, an exercise in excitement, and I am practically foaming at my rabid and expectant gnashers.
Here, listen to a really awesome song called Kittens, Cakes and Cuddles. The start is a little odd, fine, but the intertwining vocals in the chorus (if you can call it that, the song is more…a progression of parts) are THE BEST.
I’m saying it now: this is the best record that will be made this year.
Although crap, I already know I’m speaking far too soon, when Biffy Clyro will probably take first AND second place come August or so.
But I think the world has told me to give mwY my money with the reappearance of their super-value box set after it originally sold out in less than a day. Fuck it. TREAT YO SELF. Ahem, that’s not my urban affectation, it’s a reference to a thing.
They deserve the funds in any case.
If I haven’t made it clear, you need to listen to this music.
I know I post about a lot of music things, but hey, most of them suck. This does not. The fact you continue to read here instead of going here is baffling to me. What you are doing is simply wrong. Stop letting yourself down.
Expect relentless torrents of posts about this album.
Oh god, here we go again with one of these posts…
Don’t worry. I know nobody reads these, and basically - like at a basic level - they’re just an increased scrolling effort for you all, meandering up and down your feeds in the jaunty manner I know you all assume. If you’re even this far into it, I apologise profusely for such an encroachment on your valuable attention. It’s not like I think I have anything particularly witty or illuminating to say - at least not outside my absurdly high estimations of my own humour and insight. I just like to think about things with words. Then put them here. So let’s do this, guy(s)!
Marina and the Diamonds - Electra Heart.
Why the shit did I even listen to this? I know I listen to music I’m sure I’ll dislike far too often for it to be healthy, but this was a wild card in every respect because I knew I’d be almost completely indifferent. And so it was, and I took nothing from this. Maybe a slight disheartening if anything, because I know she got bummed out that her first album (which I didn’t listen to, ever. No really I didn’t. I’m not being ironic. NO I’M NOT. STOP THINKING THAT) didn’t make her a superstar, so this seems like a reaction to that, some sort of method to securing success. Which is not something I dislike in its theory, just often in the practice. Three songs were pretty damn catchy, but I listened to the pre-song commentary too, and it just seems like if an artist has nothing to say outside a 10-20 second clip of ‘oh, I really really like this song, I wrote it and it’s about how sucky this ex-lover is’ then there’s not much reason for me to give it 3-5 minutes of my time. Of course that’s not universally solid logic, and of course I did so anyway. Mea culpa.
Norah Jones - Little Broken Hearts.
Okay, hypocrisy levels already rising because this had a commentary too, also very brief, and I quite liked this on the whole. Hey, I said it was a bad rule as it stood. I think my only gripe here is one of cohesion, which is slightly strange to me because this record was made with a theme, a general construct, a frame of reference, and all other reception I’ve seen has applauded that very strength. It’s still all decent enough music in itself though, and I like that not only is Norah Jones kinda hot musically talented, in an official, educational sense, but can write a solid bluesy-folky-pop song that could definitely do well in charts.
Birthmark - Antibodies.
I have little idea who or what this is, but as far as I know it’s one multi-instrumentalist Dude. I stumbled across it and being only 8 tracks I decided to take the half-hour plunge and see. So many unexpected instruments. Not that they all required virtuoso talent for this record, but major musical respect for Mr. Dude is earned. It’s pretty weird stuff, though. Fans of slightly different and interesting things, you can find this streaming here and there on that magical internet place I’ve been hearing such pleasant and marvellous stories about.
Regina Spektor - Soviet Kitsch.
Sad world truth time. Here we go. I don’t think I’ll ever be more than a distant appreciator for Regina Spektor. I chose a somewhat terrible time to listen to this (first time in full - never listened to more than single select songs before), that time being just as I went to bed. It was really fucking annoying, with the piano-piano-pianoooOOO and the HELP A BROTHER OUT and all the lines being repeated super-fast in ever-escalating yelping(ish…) tones. Okay I know that made approximately 3% sense and was vastly unreasonable. Sorry about that. But I remember first hearing Fidelity a long long time ago (I can still remember!) and thinking ‘WHAT’ and being irritated at people (…a person…) I saw who thought it was so cool for them to listen to something so different that nobody else ever listened to. Righto. Retrospectively I might have been misconstruing that in a display of bias. Either way I didn’t really like the song, which is what’s more important. I think what I’m trying to get at here, is that I have some almighty cognitive issues in this field, which is a shame because I very much enjoy songs like The Calculation. I’ll listen to that album in full sometime and maybe try to get to the bottom of this grey zone.
My Bloody Valentine - Loveless.
The following is either a fantastic form of praise or a striking damnation - the first 6 times I tried to listen to this, I fell asleep around halfway. This is either the most potent aural anaesthetic conceived, or it’s a dreadful bore - or maybe I was just incidentally tired from jumping over fences, fighting bears, and running many miles in the snow. I’m naturally inclined toward the latter. The mix on this record is so bizarre - and I listened to a recent remaster - because all the vocals seem barely audible, while the instruments are so overpowering. Yet the drums still suck in a major manner. It’s hypnotic in its own noisy way but that means there’s very little specific to say about the content. By listen #7 the first half was starting to make some sense to me, but on the whole, and in a wholly biased viewpoint, it just felt like something Billy Corgan would be liable to knock out on a rainy afternoon. Hmm? What was you all just said that about TheFutureEmbrace? Don’t get me started on that. Conclusion: shoegaze is a genre with a terrible name, and some even worse music.
Matt Skiba and the Sekrets - Babylon.
This delivered exactly what I expected, and the majority of what I wanted. It’d be nice to see Skiba really push the boat out sometime though. I never listened to his Demos album from a while back so I didn’t know the tentative song Angel of Deaf, but when I saw a 7-minute song on this tracklisting, I was excited for something epic. A tad disappointed that that wasn’t the case, but he still delivered some massive choruses and even more verses about hell and demons. Some stellar work from his all-star backing band too. I just realised I never listened to Heavens, maybe that album pushed the proverbial boat out, but it’s just that for a guy with so many side-projects popping up these days, everything therein feels strongly unified. For a fellow with his certifiable place, a neat niche in the scene, I guess that’s not a significantly justifiable point of contention. I’m still happy in any case.
Such a good song, loved New Wave when it came out. Yeah I probably should’ve known them sooner and all but hey, I was like 15. Been meaning to revisit some Against Me! music for some time now, today shall be the day.
Best wishes and massive respect to Laura.
Note to self: avoid AM! youtube comment areas for the rest of my life. Probably a good general life mantra there, to be fair.
Scene from Dark Knight. That would be Matt Skiba.
Give that man an Oscar, such feeling, such presence!
Gonna listen to Matt Skiba and the Sekrets’ album tonight if all goes to plan, so I’m hoping it’s as good as it should will be. Wait I think that’s a paradox completely sound logical expectation. It’s just inevitably going to be good, okay.
[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]
NEW BEN FOLDS FIVE.
Took me about thirty seconds to decide this is awesome, posting this before it’s even halfway through.
Don’t care if it’s at all cool or not to love them as much as I do. Es ist mir egal!
Been catching up on the Listener podcast today. I love that such a thing exists, even if it’s mainly just them talking about sandwiches and the Hunger Games over a bad phone connection, then being trolled by fan questions.
I also love it every time they make a reference to the internet and their website being open 24 hours a day. I don’t know why.
[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]
Entry X in ‘songs what I done heard and stuff that I would define as being the individual instances that made me into a categorical fan of the bands in question’ - thinking of shortening that title, not sure though, I think it has a certain primal punch to it.
So, in this edition: the Dillinger Escape plan. Let’s see. Miss Machine was released in 2004 which, as in several of these entries it seems, is pretty ridiculous if I think about it too hard. I’m not 100% sure where but I got hold of this song, Unretrofied, on a compilation somewhere. I have a distinct feeling it was a Taste of Chaos (holy moly, remember those tours?) compilation from a year or so after MM was unleashed. I’ll have to hunt that CD out for reminiscence purposes, to see how everything has aged in accordance with my vague recollection of its content. But from wherever it might have surfaced exactly, this song was an immediate and massive highlight in my mind - with my burgeoning fondness for complexity of texture and ferocity of vocals. So long riffs, loud drums and screams. Yep.
Unretrofied was way cooler than all that, though, being what I now come to deem the ritual oddball left-field song of a DEP album - paradoxically bizarre and unexpected because if anything it’s the least jarring and bizarre part of the record. It’s still weird. The verses are sort of glitchy and menacing, and then oh my word, that chorus. Then the contextually normalised heavy section. Then a surprise chorus. Then a heavy bit. The end. That’s about as musically precise and descriptive as any of these things is likely to get. The drum beat in the verses is so good though, I remember having some fun messing around with that beat myself a few times. And the mid-verse drum fill in the second verse. So perfect.
On a grander scale, pretty glad this song led me to Dillinger, although to this day I don’t love to listen to Miss Machine. Some of it is still too unhinged, or indeed never had any apparent hinge, and remains a little rough without any inculcating pay-off. It’s pretty good stuff though. But it took until Ire Works for them to provide me with a personal masterpiece. Which is an exploration for another time.
