Freitag, 6. Okt 2006, 14:41
On the Side:
Updated Thursday, 10.05.2006:
Favourite Album of the Moment: The Dears Gang of Losers
Favourite Song of the Moment: TV On The Radio A Method…“Return to Cookie Mountain” is an epic of gradual brilliance.
Favourite Recommended Album: Anna Ternheim Somebody Outside…(Thanks, MrKite1)
Most Recent Musical Purchases/Gifts:
Anna Ternheim Somebody Outside… gives Ane Braun a run for her lyrical money. Folk pop you can feel.
The Rapture Pieces of the People We Love…Like !!!, The Rapture makes danceable punk music. I like it, but love takes time.
*Beck The Information…makes me want to play The Eraser by Thom Yorke. Uhmm, right, they share the same producer.
Honeycut The Day I Turned to Glass… a slight disappointment. It starts off strong and flags towards the middle where a sameness takes hold of its electro-soul, rendering some songs indistinguishable from others. A few more listens might remedy this.
Bedouin Soundclash 12:59 Lullaby EP…they make it very easy to like reggae pop.
*Van She Van She EP…I honestly can't remember what this sounds like:(
*Similou So Hot Right Now…their take on 80s pop just didn’t grab me.
*The Russian Futurists Our Thickness…a surprisingly good electronica rock album. I dare you not to be seduced by “2 Dots on a Map”.
*Sparklehorse Dream For Light Years… I know I am supposed to like it…I know. It needs a bit of salt. I won’t give up trying.
OK Go Oh No…satisfied my graving for pop rock (what is not to like about “A Million Ways”?). Now time to brush my teeth.
Moondog Sax For Pax… a 1950s blind jazz musician who wrote short, bursting, melodic tunes…and he had to go to Germany to be truly appreciated. Go figure. (thanks for the recommendation gocam)
Koop Koop Islands… a breezy interpretation of 1950s/60s lounge jazz that swings while telling interesting vignettes.
The Killers Sam’s Town (See most disappointing acquisitions).
The Whitest Boy Alive Dreams…Scandinavian pop doesn’t get any sweeter and more engaging than this. Fantastic.
The Roots Game Theory…dark, tense, insightful, but not brilliant enough to go back for a fifth or sixth helping. Might try to stuff down the tunes a bit more, though, out of sheer loyalty.
Corrina Repp The Absent and The Distant (see most disappointing acquisitions).
Radio Citizen Berlin Serengeti… an immediate favourite, with its vocalist coming off like Marlena Shaw more than once over modern jazz beats. OK, I am obviously a sucker for this stuff (see Koop).
*Recommended by nialloleary…a great musical resource.
Most Disappointing Recent Acquisitions:
The Killers Sam’s Town…Channeling Bruce Springsteen is not a good look when your first album was full of new wave hooks and glamour boy posing (That is why Hot Fuss was such fun). Now that they went all stadium rock on my ass, singing along is impossible when lyrics like “burning down the highway” and being "chased by a hurricane" – one of the lamest, clichéd images in rock history – is as good as it lyrically gets. And Mr Flowers' vocal cord-snapping yowl gets pretty annoying. I'm in pieces.
Corrina Repp The Absent and The Distant…Unlike the Killers, Repp’s songs are wispy, whispered things. While it works fantastically well on her song, “A Safe Place in the World”, an album of this soon made me incredibly sleepy. I know it is good, but I don’t know if I will ever remain fully conscious to appreciate it.
Favourite Albums of the Year, thus far: Herbert Scale, Ane Brun Temporary Dive, Jehro Jehro, Camille Le Fil, Dani Siciliano Slappers, Hem Funnel Cloud, The Dears Gang of Losers
Favourite Lyric/Quote at the Moment: "Freedom's when caution has had enough." From Abraham's song Freedom When
Really Want: Brazilian Girls Talk to La Bomb, The Decemberists The Crane Wife
Now Reading: The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai