Thursday, August 26, 2010

Lush - Hypocrite



I love this song for so many reasons. I still love you Emma! Here is a recent interview by the website When the sun hits! I still remember that show at Maxwells, NJ like it was yesterday.

HEALTH - We are Water


One of the best bands around, IMHO.

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

New album from Jenny Lewis and Johnathan Rice


I love this song! Jenny and Johnny are playing in NYC 9/19  Brooklyn, NY - Opening for Pavement (Maxwells is sold out!) anyone want to go?

Songs in Commercials



I just heard The Cloud Room's song "Hey Now Now," from  2005, featured in a Pringles commercial. It still holds up. It's weird how many indie/alternative bands are featured in advertisements nowadays. I could do that job, finding music for TV or movies, someone call me!

Monday, August 16, 2010

Weezer Live


I'm watching "Across the Sea: Weezer Live in Japan" and it's weird that his band-mates are singing some of the songs. What's up with that? It sounds like a cover band, very odd. I like Weezer but I wouldn't pay money to see them ever again. I saw them in 1996 supporting "Pinkerton," my personal favorite, and it was the most boring show I saw. I didn't like the albums that followed. Rivers hardly moved except for swaying his guitar left to right. I think I might have bootlegged it since I did that as much as I could, admittedly badly, with a cheap cassette recorder (not as big as Rerun's below). I've been meaning to convert them to mp3 and post them. More things to do!

Monday, August 2, 2010

Best albums of the year....what??

I started this blog years ago as a reaction to everyone's "Best of the year" lists. I couldn't understand how the major music sites and publications, like Pitchfork and Filter, were way off on their choices for the year. I understand that music is not a perfect science, everyone has different tastes that are dictated by the total exposure of music and possibly the influence of people around them. I respect other peoples tastes and I try very hard to listen to mostly everything I can get my hands on. There are definitely certain types of music that I avoid because I just don't like them, hey you can't like them all. 

We live in a time that I think albums are irrelevant. With many services like iTunes and Amazon, buying full albums doesn't make sense when you can buy the best songs. I remember in my youth carrying a boatload (seriously a small luggage or lunchbox) of cassettes to listen to and wasting my batteries fast forwarding past those duds on the album. I can't remember when I didn't have some sort of music player in my pocket from a Sony Walkman wm-102, Minidisc, pre-ipod mp3 players to my current 160gig ipod. The idea of buying the best songs off a record was not possible with records and cassettes unless the song was a released single, but if you wanted other songs, you had to buy the entire album. Bands fill up these albums with filler with song titles like "Intro, reprise, or instrumental tracks." Anyway, we don't have to waste our money with this rubbish if we get what we want, the best tracks off the album.

I listened to the albums on the Amazon and NPR "Lists so far of 2010" and the 98% of those albums don't have more than 2 or 3 good songs on them, if any. How can you recommend an album that doesn't have more than 50% of good songs on them? Instead of telling you about good songs, I try and create a podcast so you can listen to them. I do apologize for not releasing a new music podcast in the last 7 months. I plan to be more vigilant in my endeavor and share my favorite songs and albums of the year.

Albums I didn't like this month - July


2010

1973 - Bye Bye Cellphone
93Millionmilesfromthesun - All You've Found EP
A Place to Bury Strangers - Ego Death EP
Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti - Before Today
The Babies - Meet Me In The City 7"
The Band In Heaven - Demos
Band of Horses - Infinite Arms
The Baudelaires - Little Rhino EP 
Beach Fossils - Beach Fossils
Beach House - Zebra EP 
Broken Bells - Broken Bells
Broken Social Scene - Forgiveness Rock Record
Caribou - Swim
Cats On Fire - Dealing In Antiques
Change Leopardon - Juchitán
CocoRosie - Grey Oceans
Crocodiles - Sleep Forever
Dr. Dog - Shame, Shame
Flying Lotus - Cosmogramma
Forming - Forming EP
The Fresh & Onlys - August In My Mind  
Frightened Rabbit - The Winter Of Mixed Drinks (Deluxe Edition)
Fungi Girls - Turquoise Hotel Doldrums
The Gaslight Anthem - American.Slang  
Happy Birthday - Happy Birthday
Hold Steady - Heaven is Whenever
Holmes - Have I Told You Lately That I Loathe You
Insect Guide - Dark Days & Nights
Janelle Monae - The ArchAndroid  
Joanna Newsom - Have One On Me
Jonsi - Go
Josh Ritter - So Runs The World Away  
The Knife - Tomorrow, In A Year
Knight School - Revenger
LCD Soundsystem - This Is Happening
Male Bonding - Nothing Hurts
Mathemagic - Mathemagic EP
Me You Us Them - Post-Data
The National - High Violet
Pale Sunday - Shooting Star EP
Panda Riot - Far and Near EP 
Party Photographers - 7 inch
Pearl Harbor - Puro Instinct EP
Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings - I Learned The Hard Way
Shattered Darlings & Liquid Kisses - Shattered Darlings & Liquid Kisses  
Sleigh Bells - Treats
Sourpatch - Crushin'
Spoon - Transference
Various Artists - The.Twilight.Saga.Eclipse OST
Veil Veil Vanish - Change In The Neon Light
Wavves - King Of The Beach
Whirl - Distressor EP 
Wild Nothing - Gemini
Yeasayer - Odd Blood

2009

The Elms - The Great American Midrange
Freelance Whales - Weathervanes  
Ganglians - Blood On The Sand 7"
The Hillfields - It'll Never Be the Same Again
Local Natives - Gorilla Manor  
The Mantles - The Mantles
Mumford and Sons - Sigh No More
Tone Rodent - Pascalito

Older

April Fool's Day - 9th (2007)
Bmx Bandits - Gettin' Dirty (1995)
Broder Daniel - Broder Daniel (1996)
The Cigarettes - Will Damage Your Health! (2002)
The Clouds - Tranquil 12'' (1987)
David Crosby - If I Could Only Remember My Name (1971)
Dr. John - Gris-Gris (1968)
Elvis Presley - Pure Diamonds [1971-1973] 
Fonda - Catching Up To The Future (2003)
The Frenchmen - Sorry We Ruined Your Party (2004)
Funkadelic - One Nation Under A Groove (1978)
Grass Show - Something Smells Good In Stinkville (1996)
Health - Health//Disco (2008)
The House Of Love - Days Run Away (2005) 
The Incredible String Band - The Hangman's Beautiful Daught (1968)
Iron Butterfly - In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida (1968)
Joni Mitchell - Blue (1971)
Keith Moon - Two Sides Of The Moon (1975)
Lake - Oh, The Places We'll Go (2008)
Miaou - Make These Things Alright (2005)
Miaou - All Around Us (2008)
The Minders - Hooray For Tuesday (1998)
Mittens - Mingering Mike EP (2008)
Neil Young - On The Beach (1974)
The Pandoras - It's About Time (1984)
Robert Pollard - Not In My Airforce (1996)
The Ropers - All The Time (1995) 
Rumblefish - 1234 [1987-1992] (2006)
Sarah Dougher - Day One (1999)
School Of Seven Bells - Alpinisms (2008) 
Scout Niblett - This Fool Can Die Now (2007)
Shy Child - Please Consider Our Time (2002)
Silversun Pickups - Pikul (2005) 
A Sunny Day In Glasgow - Tout New Age (2007)
Spontaneous Overthrow - All About The Money (1984)
Spoonfed Hybrid - Hibernatium Shock EP (1996)
Spoonfed Hybrid - Spoonfed Hybrid (1993)
Various Artists - Buddy Holly Days - 30 Rare Buddy Holly Sound-A-Likes 
Various Artists - Yellow Pills Vol 2 More of the Best of American Pop! (1994)