Sonic Youth - The Eternal

Sonic youth have a new album, Sonic youth have a new album, Sonic youth have a new album, Sonic youth have a new album, Sonic youth have a new album, Sonic youth have a new album. Did you know sonic youth have a new album?? well it's probably not that new anymore but anyway it's been three years since their last release Rather Ripped which was awe-some ( said with zach braff style high intonation on the 'awe' ) I'm not sure if this album has yet reached the heights of a braffish style complement, but it's certainly up there. Reviews will tell you that the albums highlights are the rocky, punky, so sonic youth it hurts songs such as openers 'Sacred Trickster' and 'Anti-Orgasm', but thats a sonic youth so overdone that Kim Gordon's voice starts to grate, and you really do see them as 50 year olds trying to pretend they're teenagers. The real goodstuff comes when they forget about making a slogan song, and just concentrate on the music. 'What we know' and 'poison arrow' will make you think it's 1992 again. Although maybe someone can explain to me why track 3 'Leaky Lifeboat' has a near exact intro to 1998's 'Sunday'. Maybe i'm missing the meaning behind the reference

Spiritualized - Laser Guided Memories

I'd never heard of spiritualized before this album was suggested to be by one of this blogs most loyal devotees. ( i know, i know, what a sheltered life i lead. did i have me head in the ground during the 90's?) I should've heard them before, ( NME gave them album of the year for 1997's Ladies and Gentlemen we are floating is space) they make the sort of music i like; slow building, atmospheric rock which moves through the realms of relaxed, to urgent, intense and then calm, the way some of the best albums do. They start off slow, build up to the point of explosion, hold you there for a few moments and then bring you back down. It's influence on bands like Mogwai and Explosions in the Sky are obvious especially in songs such as Angel Sigh, which would fit in comfortably on any Mogwai Album.

Stereolab - Dots and Loops

Ahh, sparkling, cheesy, sunny, euro pop. If this album is not the perfect example then i'm Connie Chung. This should be played on your walkman whilst roller skating through jardin des tuileries ( if people roller skate through there. and if not they really should ) Otherwise it should be played at loud volumes at madame brussels, because it fits that garden party, summer flirting, white shoes and socks, pims and lemonade, jumper round the shoulders kind of vibe. It's the perfect start of the night party album and doesn't have a dull momement. Many have tried to emulate this vibe since but stick with the best. it's impossible not to bob your head or click your fingers to these songs. Right, Flirtinis all round eh?

The Dirty Three - She has no strings Apollo

There's not many bands that you can play air fiddle to. Fortunately Dirty Three is one of these and even more fortunately i've had the pleasure of seeing one of my friends stand in the middle of a crowded concert manically playing air fiddle in time with the Dirty Three's Warren Ellis on stage. Of course by doing this he created a large circle of space as the surrounding concert goers slowly moved away from this obvious lunatic. this in turn created an even more surreal experience as suddenly said friend was standing on his own with no one whithin 5 metres of him still blindly flaily away with his imaginary bow and fiddle. This only enhanced my enjoyment of the concert and if you've ever attended a Dirty Three concert you'll know that they are mentally and physically exhausting experiences. Mentally because the music of D3 is so intense, so emotive and so loud that it consumes every part of you. The fact the it is all instrumental heightens your senses as you have no vocal lead to tune into. Your brain gets slammed from all sides with ellis' wailing violin, jim whites thrashing guitar and mick turners manic drums. Physically because some of this becomes a matter of endurance, D3 songs are built around intros and crescendos, and the cresendos can be extreme and lengthy. The violin is not always your friend at such decibels.She has no strings Apollo is the Dirty Three's sixth album ( of 7 LPs ) only 6 songs long, but boy, the intensity of those songs. bookended by the absolute corker of an openener "Alice Wading" and the rough and tumble closer "Rude" it's as good as any of their previous 5. if you're not familiar and want to get an idea this is not off this album but one of my favourite songs of all time here

Death in Vegas - Dead Elvis

Tipsy - Triptease

Boards of Canada - Trans Canada Highway

Well it has been a long time between blogs and for that i apologise. blame internet providers, telcos and my work for making it impossible to have the means or the time to blog. I have been managing to continue the download stream and the listening process so it's just the writing process that i need to catch up on. but of course, you all know that i wouldn't be happy with just sitting down and typing out a few lines of meaningless garbage. My standards are just too high and i work tirelessly trawling through music literature, referencing reviews, writings and interviews on artists and albums before i dare analyse them myself. or at least i skim read wikipedia for a few interesting facts that i can add to my blog to make it look like i know more than i do. so more coming shortly, until then just read the wikipedia page of each artist and you'll pretty much get what i would've written anyway. including the same bad grammar and questionable factual statements that you've come to know and love from me.

Unkle - War Stories

I made a point a few years back of getting rid of all my 1 song CD's. that is all the cd's i had purely because of 1 good song surrounded by loads of offal. I burnt all these "good" songs onto mix cd's so that i could at least listen to 10 or 12 good songs in a row without having to skip through the rubbish. Now the question i pose to you is this.. are the rest of the songs on these '1 song albums' so un-listenable because a) the good song is just so so good everything else pales in comparison or b) the band just got lucky with one good song and wrote 10 complete pieces of tripe to fill out the album. the reason i ask this is because i cant decide whether the songs of war stories are just filler around the standout track 'burn my shadow' or just that that song is so good everything else sounds lame. OK maybe i'm being a bit harsh, there are a few decent tracks, opener 'Chemistry' sets the scene for a dark moody thrashy album but it's not until track 5 that we get that feeling back. in fact the sequencing of the whole album is strange with the more upbeat songs annoyingly dispersed evenly through the album destroying any theme that was trying to break through. And it is a theme of desolation and desperation that is captured by these stronger tracks, 'keys to the kingdom', 'price you pay' and 'burn my shadow'. Anyway, if burn my shadow is the only track that comes out of the album it was well worth the listen.

David Bowie - Space Oddity

Neil Young - Neil Young

TV on the Radio - Dear Science

you know that feeling when you come up with a really good idea, or write a really good essay, or make an really good dinner and then someone comes along and absolutely smashes you out of the park with their far superior idea, essay or dinner. that makes your idea look like it was thought up by a lunatic, your essay written by a brain dead monkey and your dinner taste like a dog vomited a dead rat onto a plate? well this is my version of that feeling. it's hard to think about continuing when someone does it so much better than you. but anyway enjoy my sister blog while i try to come up with something slightly more interesting...

Sia - Some people have real problems

This album went straight onto the background music player at work. Also known as the Muzak player. Should i bother writing any more? why did it go on? well it's harmless, and by harmless i mean it has no swearing, it has no real peaks or troughs, it has no spikes in decibel level, it has no weird instruments, no sitar, banjo or bagpipe solos, the vocals are mellow, there's no screaming, no wailing, it's all slow tempo, there's no thumping bass drum, and the vocals and music blend into one, so that all you get is a nice pleasant background hum. it's music to sit down and wait to, music to go to the bathroom to, music to..dare i say..forget. Wow. that all sounds so harsh. This isn't a bad album, Sia has a wonderful voice and in the past she has written some great songs. there's some very beautiful moments on this, but unfortunately it also fits perfectly into my criteria for acceptable BGM. So this means i'll get to hear this album many times over the next few months, which is ok. it's nice and pleasant and..oh..well you get the idea.

The Middle East - The Middle East

This is a sneaky effort because i didn't quite download this one, but due to the non-australian bias on my dodgy russian mp3 site i thought i should get in some local talent to balance things out. Anyway, check out these little babies from townsville here it's like early Art of fighting meets fleet foxes meet Explosions in the sky.

Throwing Muses - In a Doghouse

Throwing muses was the first project for two of musics most accomplished female artists, Kristin Hersh and Tanya Donelly. Hersh would guide the band through several line up changes from 1981 to now, form the indie punk band 50 foot wave, whilst also releasing several solo albumns. Donelly would go on to join The Breeders, form the indie band Belly, and then release a number of solo works. Throwing muses would pave the way for many female led rock/punk groups in the late eighties and nineties such as L7, sleater kinney, juliana hatfield trio and liz phair. This is their first 'official release' a 1985 self distributed cassette of early recordings ( later released as part of a compilation ) and it packs a serious punch. It is raw, it is rough,it is angry, it is in parts brilliant and in others scary. The most amazing thing about this album is the number of current artists that can be heard in the repetitive single chord strums, the basic reversed arpeggios; the yeah yeah yeah's, interpol, the white stripes, they all owe something to this melding of new wave post-punk meets the ramones, iggy pop and siouxsie sioux. It's a hard album to get through, some of it is just too raw for my liking, sort of like when kate bush goes crazy or when sonic youth start wanking over their guitars. "look how much noise my amp can make!". But this was early experimentation, and the end result is some classic tunes that formed some iconic bands.

St Ettienne - Foxbase Alpha

Tegan and Sara - So Jealous

These canadian twins have been writing catchy indie pop tunes for ten years now and have always been around the edge of my music radar without me ever managing a serious listen. but there's something comforting in the simplicity of songs such as 'back in your head' off 2007's "the con". as well as the three opening tracks on this 2004 album - "So Jealous". It's simple guitar, bass, keyboard/synth with well delivered harmonies and mirrored vocals. ( most songs have a dual vocal line sung by both tegan and sara, matched with harmonies in the chorus or verse or both ).The vocals may take some getting used to, there's a certain grating to the voices ( think Gwen Stefani or Veruca Salts' Nina Gordon ) that one must get past to enjoy this music. but after that it's very approachable pop with lots of lyrics about former requited and current unrequited love as well as some internal soul searching about the suitability of themselves as lovers. And interestingly both tegan and sara write the songs independently of one another and only collaborate on the actual recording. It might get a bit 'samey' but there's enough good songs on here to make it worth your while.

Crystal Castles - Crystal Castles

Here's a case of taking a good idea and then re-using it to the point of mis-use, and
alienating the listener in the process. I get the idea, this is computer altered music taken to the next degree. The introduction of sampled 80's computer game sounds into a
somewhat blondie, somewhat daft punk sound is cute and it's clever....for about one song. then it becomes annoying. oh yeah and by song 15? then it's just ridiculous.
And whilst some of the songs tred the electro-pop lines of the previously mentioned bands and contemporaries the ting tings and santogold, most degenerate into a storm of electronic feedback that leaves you searching for the skip button to move onto the next song. If i wanted to be blasted by incomprehensible video game noise at extreme decibels i'd go back to work at timezone. The album is worth a listen because there are some well structured, well made, catchy songs but be warned that it's hard work and i'm yet to decide whether there is enough reward for the effort.

Jarvis Cocker - Further Complications

Gary Numan - The Pleasure Principal

Brian Eno - Here Come the Warm Jets

Oh Eno, you freaky bastard. I really don't know who was scarier, Eno, Bowie or Numan. they were all freaks, and amazingly talented ones at that. Eno and Bowie are the sound of Glam Rock. and this album ( Eno's first solo, after leaving Roxy Music ) has all the good and bad of that Genre. The good being the rocky guitar driven "Needles in the Camel's Eye", The laid back, echoey instrumental piece "On some faraway beach" The bad being the weird, disjointed, wall of bizarre that is "Blank Frank" and the scary spoken word of "Dead finks don't talk". Having said that these aren't necessarily bad songs and the album over all is a triumph, and one that is referenced by almost any affecionado of the glam, art and post rock scene. It's amazing that this album and the Siouxsie and the Banshees album still stand the test of time and could easily be mistaken for a current release. Whether this says something about the cyclical nature of music or just that fact this is still relatable quality music i'll leave up to you to decide.

Siouxsie and The Banshees - A Kiss in the Dreamhouse

It may appear that i'm quite behind on my schedule. but i'm merely behind on the posting part rather than the listening. You'll be pleased to know, my quintet of readers, that more insightful, intriguing and incoherent musings are just around the corner. I've been given a time frame of 5-15 working days for delivery of my spanking hot ADSL2 connection, and preparations are already in place for its arrival. I have removed the old virgin modem from the spot where it sat sniggering at me for the past year and beaten it to death with a sock full of 20 cent coins. I've created a nice home for the new modem, clean and dry with plenty of fresh air and some snacks in case it gets hungry. I've decided i'll give it a few days to get settled before i start thrashing it to within an inch of its life. But boy, i hope it comes prepared because i am going to beat the living hell out of this thing. Today's album and the following are connected in one way or another so i might just mosey on through them with the odd comment or two and then by the end it'll all make sense. well at least to me. I would say that around 80% of the bands i know and love owe someting to Siouxsie and the Banshees. Pioneers for their time they made music that influenced not only the style of future bands but also for their creativity, their almost arrogant flair and their raw power on stage. Lead singer Siouxsie Sioux is an icon of female vocals and has inspired the likes of PJ harvey, Peaches and Karen O. This album is thought of by music critics as their finest.

Songs:Ohia - The Magnolia Electric Co.

Jason Molina aka songs:ohia aka Magnolia electric company is an intriguing man. he's got one of those love it or hate it voices; think tom waits, paul demsey, that moron from nickleback. so his fan base is quite limited. that's a shame because his music is quite amazing. I would be hard pressed to leave Ghost Tropic, Axxess & Ace, and The Lioness from any list of favourite albums. These albums were full of simple songs, with desperate, heart broken lyrics. The songs of a man on love's death row, a heart so full of love, destroyed over and over its only outlet in song. I adore those songs, their simplicity, often just simple muted chords, their honesty, he's a man not afraid to share his hurt with world. This is the final album he recorded under the name Songs:Ohia before forming the Magnolia Electric Company referenced in the title. It's the first to include a full band on every track and whilst not as good as the earlier work, or the Magnolia Co. albums it is still a fine piece of work, the band allowing Molina to experiment with a number of dynamics and styles that he develops further on the later albums. This is a good bridge between the old and the new Molina. But really, if you care even a little about music you should check them both out.

The Black Keys - Big Come Up

ok so i've been getting pretty lazy lately and haven't been keeping things up to date. But in fairness to myself, i have no internet access at home at the moment meaning the only time i get to post is at work. and of course i'm not going to waste company time with a frivilous thing such as a blog....am i....? And in all seriousness no one is actually reading this anyway so i can pretty much write whatever i want. purple, monkey, dishwasher. This is the first Black Keys Album and my first Black Keys album but it pretty much feels right at home in my collection already. It's stripped back bluesy rock, it's dirty, dusty and distorted. There's nothing really cutting edge here, it's a sound familiar to fans of muddy waters in the 50's, hendrix in 60's, lynrd skynrd and cream in the 70's, but the beauty of it lies in its simplicity, the fact that it could be a 50's or 60's blues record ( if not for the rather random bursts of electronic beats throughout the album )

The Maccabees - Wall of Arms

The astute amongst you may have noticed that i've let a few posts go by without actually mentioning the album of the day. No, this is not an oversight on my part, and all will be revealed in good time. In the words of the great man John Bongiovi ( yes this is his real name, look it up ) you gotta keep the faith. So my good friend Dick Kingsmill told me that if i like Arcade Fire then I'll love the Maccabees. Immediately this puts me on the back foot because from the first bar of the first song all i can hear is Arcade fire and from lead singer Orlando Weeks first quivering, sighing vocals all i'm getting is Win Butler. Add to that the fact that the album has the same producer as Arcade Fire's Neon Bible and really my judgement on this whole album is going to be clouded. Not that i need to pass judgement, hey i'm just here to listen, not to review so i take a step back, i empty my mind of all these thoughts ( not hard when your mind is pretty empty to start with ) and i give this album another unclouded listen. What i find is some great music in its own right, a coming of age from a band previously lost in the sea of british indie, it's gloomy without being mundane, it's certainly the style of arcade fire, moody ambience, strings and brass, passionate lyrics, and choral reprises; and like Arcade fire remains upbeat for the most part. The opener 'Love you better' is a cracking start that locks you into focus for the first 5 or 6 songs, the closing tracks "seventeen hands" and "bag of bones" wind down the album in a way that makes you reach for the repeat button for another listen. Is it to early to start talking album of the year? this'll be in my top 10 at least.

Gui Boratto - Chromophobia

Continuing on from my rant that ended quite abruptly in the previous post ( i tend to experience periods of intense rage that cloud my judgement and render me unable to speak, the mental equivalent of what artic explorers would call a 'whiteout' when coming across an incapacitating snowstorm ) i'll try and get to the point, if i even have one. Music critics and reviewers refer to alot of the music they listen to as sounding like, or being a version of or having that "insert band name here" sound. They're not usually suggesting that the music is a copy of or just another version of a previous band. they're just using another band as a reference point as you may not have heard the band before. But what happens when an influence becomes the defining point for a band. When does a band stray from sounding like, to just being a blatant ripoff?
Because a band came first does that make their sound more original than a band that started later with a similar sound? Or can we only make judgements if the musician has heard the other bands music? Are two people on opposite sides of the world capable of coming up with the same song without hearing the other? If a tree falls in the woods, and i stop writing this blog would anyone care? so many questions....
I downloaded this album after hearing Gui Boratto's latest song on the radio. It was quite sensational, this is his previous album, and it's not quite so sensational. Apparently his new album is more ambient, and laid back, minimalist house, whilst this album is more your, chillout room at a night club, still enough beats to keep your drug riddled heart pumping, bleeps and blips, electro. Whilst in the past i may have preferred the later i'm now very much more jean michel jarre, than armand van helden. So rewind 10 years and this album would've been a regular on my post night out playlist, but now i think i'll wait for the more lamo friendly recent release to come out for my electronica hit.

M Ward - Transistor Radio

I once wrote an essay on the theme of musical derivation. that is that all modern music is derived from 50's and 60's music, and all 50's and 60's from the 1800's and so on an so forth. The general idea being to state that no music made today is original, it has all been done before, and everyone who writes music today is just stealing from Mozart or Stravinsky, or Duke Ellington or John Lennon... Even taking into account that music has evolved over the years, and new genres and style have been created that move away from normallity on such random tangents that they appear to have no connection to standard musical scales, they fact is music is made up of rythym and melody and these are standard elements. these are elements that can be gauged. There are only a certain amount of notes than can be heard by the human ear, there are only a certain amount of times that a beat can be played within a minute. This is mathematics. So surely if the creation of music is limted to a combination of a number of definable elements, repetition, whether purposeful of not, is going to occur, and the more likely occur in popular music as this seems to be the type of music that is most created... Anyway, i got a C for that essay. it was a load of crap. As i do here, i finished an extraordinary amount of sentences with a question, leading most of my university teaches to wonder why i bothered writing essays when i never had answers, just more questions. But then again University is a load of crap. Why do i need to show in 2000 words what i could happily describe to you in a 5 minute conversation? Why does writing down on paper prove that i understand a concept? why the F*&^ should it matter if i forget to underline or italicise in a bibliography? and why can't i ask more questions than i have answers to? that's what life is about.

Bruce Springsteen - The Rising

There are chestnut singers in every country that personify a vast majority of that population or at least are representitive of beliefs and values that the country holds most dear. Some are iconic in that they are recognisable worldwide as an artist from a particular country. Others whilst well known within their own borders don't translate to other cultures. Australia has Paul Kelly, England has Billy Bragg, and America has Springsteen. All completely different in their approaches but all similarly balanced in their appeal to their audiences, producing songs that are uniquely nationalistic, even when many of them are protest songs of sorts, the underlying them us that i love my country which is why i'm allowed to question it. Which is why i can point out its flaws. This goes someway to explaining the longevity of these artists, themes of love, hope and desire set against a backdrop of working class society add a sense of the believable, of the shared experience. Whilst Springsteen's songs are very much love songs, his imagery always conjures up middle america, and his characters are always working class heroes experiencing the loss, pain or joy and hope that the end or start of a relationship bring. Springsteen has about 15 albums, most of which have reached number 1 on the american chart. 2002's The Rising was released in the haze of the 9/11 attacks and contains several references to the events, and effects that this troubled time had on the american psyche. There is no cliches though, it it a reverent, realistic, and reserved approach to writing songs about an incident that angered so many americans. It is patriotic without being jingoistic and allows the listener to reflect rather than become suggestive of emotions. It's chesnut Springsteen.

Spoon - Kill the Moonlight

Stories regarding my demise are premature. Being the staunch monarchist that i am i was just merely giving the queen's birthday weekend the reverance it deserves by not posting for a few days. Perhaps a more likely reason is the fact that my god damned home internet connection no longer works. I have suffered through 18 months of the slowest, most unstable, useless piece of shite internet for the sole reason that i stupidly signed a 24 month contract with Virgin( i mean who signs a 2 year contract for ANYTHING these days ) and that paying it out would cost me $60 for every unused month. And if there's something i hate more than paying good money for a pathetic excuse for a service it's paying good money for the privilge of NOT having a pathetic excuse for a service. Last week the interenet, which had at best been intermittent just stopped working altogether.So now i have nothing. Thanks Virgin. you assholes. if you want any more money from me you'll have to pry it out of my cold dead hand. I'm moving on though. I've ordered a service from internode that promises one billion gigabytes of nano speed high tech futuristic thingamigs at a minimum speed of twenty trillion parsecs. But more importantly, no contract. more power to the people. peace out.

Manchester Orchestra - Mean everything to nothing

To paraphrase the start of every review of Manchester Orchestra ever written, No, they are not an Orchestra and no, they are not from Manchester. Instead they're an indie rock band from the states, that shift between making Pavement style slighty loud, busy and dirty rock songs and Shins like heart-felt, stomach-jerking, ballads. The single off the album 'Friends in all the right places' is the sort of song that would be blasting out of any angry teenagers bedroom while their parents wondered what passed for music these days. It's a teenage anthem of sorts, a mixture of all the right elements of punk, screamo and good ole rock'n'roll. It's surrounded by similar tracks, with the occasional slow restrospective, tapping into the listeners angst, grief or heartbreak. It's not a knock out album, but there are many that have come before Manchester Orchestra and built their success on this formula so two albums in this might just be the beginning of bigger things.

Polvo - Today's Active Lifestyle

This was a recommendation from one of my loyal readers. To say he has an eclectic taste in music is an understatement. You could say this album personifies what he likes in his music; to be challenged by extremes, of pitch, of tempo, of decibel levels, but ultimately to be rewarded through revelations of beauty and power within the aural chaos. I'll be honest and say that the first listen through i was struggling, i'm not the biggest fan of noise rock. sure i love sonic youth, the pixies, dinosaur jnr but the more extreme purveyors of this craft ( black flag, the melvins, white zombie ) i never really got. This is an album of severe pitch changes, tempo changes, and alternate tunings. It is a sonic youth style wall of noise in some parts, it is a stratching, screaming, wailing, teeth grinding, fractured mess in others. But out of this comes some great music, songs such as my 'kimono' and 'time isn't on my side' reward the listener for braving past the initial onslaught of distorted jangly guitars in opening track 'Thermal Pleasure'. It's a thumbs up from me which means that now i have no reason not to brave the remaining albums of the recommendation list. If they are all as good as this then i am a happy man, but i'm worried about the next one already. very worried