Category Archives: Listening To…

Listening To... and Reading!

This week, in my consumption of media:

  • Vampire Weekend - Contra. (music) It's a bit less immediately awesome when compared to their first record. The style is familiar now, so simply putting a quasi-African song behind some smart lyrics isn't enough to trigger that "wow!" anymore. They changed things up a little, though - many of the new songs substitute keyboards for that twittery guitar, and hence it sounds a bit more polished in places. There are still a handful of really catchy songs, and the bulk of it isn't exactly bad; it's just more of the same. It was fantastic the first time around. Now it's just good.
    Three raquos » » ».

  • Roberto Bolano - 2666. (book) This was my first Bolano book, and I didn't know what to expect; I only knew it that it was critically acclaimed. So, what did I get ? I got nearly 900 very densely-set pages of wonderfully written (especially for a translation!) prose. It's hard to call it a story - it's a dozen stories, all linked, more or less, to a long string of murders in the (pseudonymous) Mexican city of Santa Teresa. It starts off with the story about a group of European academics who are researching an obscure German author. Their research brings them, eventually, to Santa Teresa where they meet a bunch of people (there's the first couple of hundred pages). Then we learn about some of those people (another couple hundred pages), and from them, we eventually learn about a couple of police officers, etc.. Along the way, we get to read dozens and dozens of gruesome accounts of the murders - Bolano loves lists, he put countless lists of things throughout the book: jokes, species of seaweed, phobias, classic bad lines from literature, countries, ways in which women have been murdered, etc.. And all of this is taking place across different time spans and through the eyes of different characters. After the Mexican section (with hundreds of pages left to go), the book spins back and forth through time, and across the world, through a half-dozen more characters.

    Which sounds like it must be a tough read. But it's not. For the most part, Bolano handles these changes in time, space, and subject almost seamlessly. One of his typical methods: a new character appears on the scene, hangs around for a few pages, eventually gets into a long conversation with someone, starts talking about his past and then, three pages later you suddenly find you've left the old scene completely and are now in the new character's world. And, more often than not, it's pleasantly surprising at how smoothly the transition happened. Sometimes that leaves you hanging though - you might never see the previous main character again. Then again, you might. A lot happens in those 900 pages.

    But without giving it away completely, I really can't really say anything more about the plot of the book. About the most I can say is that it's a book which, maybe, is best enjoyed as it moves along, page by page, scene by scene. Bolano was a great writer: witty, clever, insightful and daring. So, there's a lot of good stuff in there. So enjoy it, and don't be surprised if, in the end, 2666 doesn't turn out the way you think a book should.
    Four raquos » » » ».

  • Spoon - Transference. (music) It's in the same vein as their Gimme Fiction or Kill The Moonlight records, and not a lot like their last, GaGaGaGaGa. Most of the songs are unpolished and sketchy in that Spoon half-finished way - very little of that GaGaGaGaGa sheen. And while there is nothing as diabolically catchy as Spoon's best songs, "Written In Reverse", "Trouble Comes Running", and "Got Nuffin" are all good and could each be the 2nd best song on most Spoon albums - believe me, that's high praise.
    Four raquos » » » ».

  • Jesse Ball - The Way Through Doors and Samedi the Deafness (books). Jesse Ball is a clever writer. He writes surreal, brain-twisting books in which his characters jump from one absurd surreal scene to anothe - across time, space, realities, dreams, etc.. And that can be quite disorienting. It's intentionally disorienting - that's what keeps it fun! You're expected to go through it not knowing exactly what's going on all the time. But he gives you just enough clues throughout the books to allow you to eventually figure out the structure behind it all, if you pay attention. Luckily, they are short and compact books, written with a poet's ear for prose, so it's fun. And while they are puzzling, they don't require superhuman mental capabilities to keep things straight. You only need a bit of willingness to go along on their strange journeys.
    Four raquos » » » ».

Listening To

  • The Beatles - Stereo Remasters. An XMas present from dear, sweet, Mrs Cleek. This is 15 CDs worth of stuff, and I've been going through them in chronological order - haven't made it through all of them yet. But, what I have heard sounds awesome. The earlier albums, especially, really pop compared to previous version - voices are clearer, drums have more punch, bass is more defined, etc.. Very nice.
  • Robyn Hitchcock - I Often Dream Of Trains, In New York. Last year, Robyn jumped aboard the play-a-classic-album-live train, and played 1984's "I Often Dream Of Trains". It's most of that album (but skips a few tracks, ex. "Mellow Together", "The Bones In The Ground", "Furry Green Atom Bowl"), with a couple of newer things thrown in. The songs are fairly faithful renderings of the originals, just a couple of minor changes here and there; but since the original is not one of my favorite R.H. records, straight versions of those songs don't really thrill me. YepRoc, his record label, likes to do special promo editions of everything he puts out (and knows they have at least one person who is happy to buy them!), so my copy came with a R.H. Christmas ornament, the DVD of the show, and all the parts necessary to make an old fashioned rotating "moving picture machine" - if I wanted to dismantle the CD case - which I don't.
  • Flaming Lips - Embryonic. This is a much darker-sounding record than their last few. With a few exceptions, it's heavy and grinding, with fuzzed bass and hyper-compressed drums. And many of the heaviest songs sound a lot alike - thankfully, those are my favorites. But when every fifth song sounds a lot like the first song, and there are 22 songs, it feels like just too much to listen to at once - like it keeps starting over, forever. I would've been happy with half the number of songs. Still, not bad.
  • Spiral Stairs - The Real Feel. Spiral Stairs is Scott Kannberg, former guitar player and sometimes singer from Pavement (ex. "Date With Ikea", "Kennel District", "Passat Dream"). So, as you might expect, this sounds a bit like Pavement. What you might not expect is that it doesn't really sound all that different from the solo stuff from Pavement's other former guitar player, and lead singer, Stephen Malkmus. Malkmus has been putting out albums for almost a decade now, solo or with The Jicks. And based on what they've sounded like, it seemed pretty clear that Malkmus' songwriting was the sound of the last few Pavement records: when they kinda mellowed-out and pushed a lot of the really edgy stuff to the side. You listen to Pavement's last two records and then you listen to Malkmus' stuff and well.. not much of a difference. So when I heard this Spiral Stairs record was coming out, but before I actually heard it, I expected that this would be the off-kilter, playful-freak-out stuff that was dominant on the earlier Pavement records, and the stuff that turned Malkmus' pop songs into Pavement songs: guitar abuse, screaming, 30-second freak-outs - the stuff that gradually faded-away in Pavement and was apparently replaced by more and more of what Malkmus wanted to do. Nope. Really, the Spiral Staircase record may be even more straightforward than Malkmus' solo/post-Pavement stuff - there's a bit more of a California country/western feel, and some of the songs aren't quite as strong, and none are as polished, as Malkmus' recent stuff. But it's the same kind of stuff (sounds like late-era Pavement) and it's mostly pretty good. And after hearing this a few times, I can better hear Kannberg's what contribution to Pavement really was. Which is cool. It just wasn't what I was expecting it to be.

Listening To...

Been listening to this...

  • Beatles - Let It Be. I actually just got this. I know the hits, obviously, but the other 2/3s was mostly unknown to me. This album has always had the reputation as the weakest of the later albums, so I avoided it, not wanting to hear the Beatles fuck up. But, the completist in me demanded that I buy it. And... for me, it's a mixed bag. I cringe when I hear those syrupy strings in "The Long And Winding Road", and "Let It Be" is worn out. "Across The Universe" and "Get Back" are still fine, though. "Dig It" is pointless, "Maggie Mae" is a fragment. On the other hand, "Dig a Pony", "I've Got A Feeling" and "One After 909" are all great. So, yes, it's a bit uneven, but on the whole, I think it's pretty good.
    Four percents %%%%.

  • Middle Distance Runner - Sun And Earth. I picked this up at their show in Chapel Hill a few weeks back. I like it a touch better than I like their last one. It reaches a bit farther, it's richer, denser, and the high points are higher: "The Unbeliever" (which I've mentioned many times before) simply rocks, "Let Nothing In" is a great little stomper, "The Wrong Hole" is catchy (here's an early, slower, version), and "Sundays Are Hell" with it's 70's glam-rock vibe is fantastic.
    Four percents %%%%.

  • Polvo - In Prism. It has that unmistakable Polvo sound: tangled, thick and prickly guitars, constant tempo and timing changes, barely-comprehensible lyrics. It's different from other Polvo records in that some of those timing changes lead to bits of what sounds like standard hard rock. They'll come out of a section of baffling changes into a section of straight-ahead, muscular, hard rock chugging. They don't linger long anywhere, of course. This is Polvo; there's always a change coming. Unfortunately, I'm a little burned-out on Polvo these days, so I don't find myself listening to it much. Beggars Bowl.
    Three percents %%%.

  • Yo La Tengo - Popular Songs. Recent YLT records have left me a little unsatisfied. They're a little bit too mellow, a little bit too safe. Sure, they'll have an uptempo song of two, and there's usually an extended guitar freak-out song, but the mellower songs have become more mellow and more numerous, the rockers are a little too easy, and the freak-outs feel obligatory. That's not to say it's a bad record; I don't dislike any of it. It just doesn't grab me the way Electr-o-Pura or Fakebook or President Yo La Tengo did. I dunno. Maybe it's me.
    Three percents %%%.

  • Nick Drake - Bryter Layter. It's OK - a bit too heavy on the strings for my taste. But the songs are decent. And there are two or three songs in here which sound like the root of everything that Belle And Sebastian ever did - musically, anyway.
    Three percents %%%.

Listening

  • Cold War Kids - Loyalty To Loyalty. Love it. Minimal, and bare-bones, but intense and surprisingly melodic. They've got the raw retro R&B sound of a darker Black Keys but with a wider dynamic range and more depth in the lyrics. In addition, they use the same lo-treble, high-reverb guitar sound that The Walkmen use, which is cool thing to have. I wish that one song didn't remind me of "Taking Care Of Business", though. Still, great stuff. Thank you, RobC for the tip.
    Four iquests: ¿¿¿¿

  • Os Mutantes - Everything is Possible. It's impossible to know where to start with a band that's been around as long as these guys have, so I got a best-of collection. Most of the words are in Portuguese (I assume, since they're from Brazil), so I don't know what the songs are about, but the music is great fun. It runs all over the place, stylistically; some are light jazzy things, some are psychedelia, there is straight-up Latin dance music, ballads, and things I don't know how to classify - but it's all fun. So far, my favorite song is "Cantor De Mambo" (the mambo singer), which I believe is a tribute to Brazilian jazz legend Sergio Mendes, but sounds sometimes like a golden-era Santana song and finishes off with a sizzling Robert Fripp-style guitar solo. Wild stuff.
    Four iquests: ¿¿¿¿

  • Middle Distance Runner - Plane In Flames. I really liked their single, The Unbeliever, so I went looking for the album. But (as of yet!) there is no album - it's just a single. They did have this earlier album, though, so I bought it. There are a few fairly fine songs on there from the same vein as The Unbeliever; but then there a bunch of things that sound like U2RadioheadColdplay... which don't do much for me. Overall, a good disk, though. It's been stuck in my car CD player for weeks.
    Three iquests: ¿¿¿

  • Ozzy Osbourne - Blizzard Of Ozz. I had some credit at a used book store, so I grabbed this - only $3. Heh. Memories. To think how this freaked-out parents all over the world when it came out - oy. If you couldn't tell he was play-acting, then, as most jr. high kids could, it's impossible to miss, now. OK, there are a couple of solid songs here and Randy Rhoades was surely a brilliant guitarist, but Ozzy's lyrics seem so cartoonish (even for Ozzy!) that it makes the parental freak-out look even more hilarious in hindsight than it did at the time.
    Two iquests: ¿¿

I'm Listening

... to this stuff:

  • Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. I love it. It's quirky and fun and goes great with reading blogs. As any review will tell you, there's some Talking Heads and V.U. in there, sure - but just a little bit, not too much. And if the odds of such a thing happening weren't close to zero, I'd say the singer had spent some time listening to Nod. Regardless of the influences, the songs are catchy, quick and fun. It's a new favorite. My only complaint is that the record isn't even 25 minutes long. Feels like it just gets going, and then it's over.

    Five laquos «««««.

    Update: I just noticed why the record seem so short: iTunes failed to download three of the tracks.

  • We Were Promised Jetpacks - These Four Walls. This band does a great job of sounding like the whole of modern college rock; all the songs are instantly familiar, with one difference: the singer's heavy Scottish accent. And since I, as an American, have three references for such an accent (Groundskeeper Willy, Mike Myers ' various characters, and The Proclaimers) the accent is a bit of a novelty. Still, I like it. I don't know if it will stay interesting, but for now, it's fun. Also this reminds me of a nearly-unknown band called "Twin A" - they grew up listening to the same influences, I presume.

    Four laquos ««««

  • Foxboro Hot Tubs - Stop Drop And Roll!!. In the words of singer Billie Joe Armstrong, "The only similarity between Green Day and Foxboro Hot Tubs is that we are the same band". And yeah, it sounds just like Green Day - so much that I wish this had been the next Green Day record. It's a lot more fun than "21st Century Breakdown", even if half the songs sound like they were err... heavily inspired by other garage/punk songs. It took me a while to get into it, but a few days in the car CD player did the trick. It's good driving-around music.

    Four laquos ««««

Listening To...

Shit I been listening to:

  • Wilco - Wilco (the album). I'm going to guess that the self-referential title apparently refers to the way many of the songs here sound like they were grown from clippings of old Wilco songs. For example, "I'll Fight" sounds like a reworking of "On and On and On" from the last Wilco record (Sky Blue Sky); the verses in "Wilco (the song)" reminds me of something from Mermaid Avenue; and there are subtler echoes of other songs scattered throughout. Or maybe that's not the point. I haven't read any interviews about this, so I don't know the official explanation for the title. But, either way, many of the songs here remind me of songs on other Wilco records, and the new songs just aren't as good as the ones they remind me of - a lot of the songs feel lifeless or bored. And that's a problem. It's one thing to have less-than-stellar songs, but when those songs remind you of older, better songs, it makes the new songs seem like a real letdown. And that hurts my heart.

    Two raquos: » »

  • The Breeders -Mountain Battles. The Breeders, too, have echoes of their older stuff, on this new record. But, to be fair (and really, to be fair to Wilco, as well), a lot of that is simply style. Unlike Wilco, however, The Breeders wrote an album with a bunch of interesting songs. Well, they're interesting if you dug the weird, angular minimalism of their Last Splash and/or Pod records from way back in the early 90's, that is (the whole albums, not just "Cannonball" and "Divine Hammer" - there's nothing like either of those on this record). There is a version of the old Mexican classic ballad, "Regalame Esta Noche", however, which somehow doesn't seem strange, and in fact shows off how surprisingly nice Kim Deal's voice can be. I like it. I've missed The Breeders.

    All Wave Recording.

    Four raquos: » » » »

  • Polvo - Polvo (EP). This was their first release. It's really raw and the songs aren't quite as strong as things they'd do later on, and the mixes are pretty rough. But, it's a good first step.

    Review updated after i gave it a listen with open ears, and a quart of Brooklyn Local 1! It makes everything better. Also, I've discovered that it's trivially easy to play along to any Polvo song - play a note on the B string, and strum all three bottom strings, then play a note two frets higher with a lot of vibrato. Slide up and down the string every now and then. As long as you keep in time with the drums, it'll work just fine.

    Three raquos: » » »

  • Black Sabbath - Volume 4. I like the previous two (Paranoid and Master of Reality) much better. And if only somebody had stopped Ozzy from doing the ballad on this record, the world may have been spared decades of subsequent Ozzy ballads. And the strings? Blech. If only someone could've stepped in and said "No, this is not metal! Bad Ozzy!" that shit could've been nipped in the bud. Two songs, "Supernaut" and "Snowblind", save the record from being completely horrible, though.

    Two raquos: » »

You?

Listening To...

  • Sonic Youth - The Eternal. I haven't really dug a new SY album since 1994. And even that one (Experimental Jet Set, Trash & No Star) was exciting mostly because the four albums before it were so good - on its own, Jet Set isn't great, but after two albums that were great, but were also clearly attempts at commercial success, it felt like an interesting experiment, so I could understand and accept it. After a couple of listens, though, and contrary to all the reviews I've read, this new album doesn't even feel like an experiment to me; I hear nothing new; it sounds exactly like I thought it would. Not even adding Pavement's bassist makes it stand out. I don't think I could have said that about any SY album pre-94.

    "White Kross" from SY's Sister (1987) just popped up on the iPod. It kills. Even though it's slathered in reverb and muddy production, the song just bristles with energy. The band's on fire. There's nothing like that on the new SY record.

  • Green Day - whatever the new album is called. It's too long. Too much of it sounds like things they've already written. I know Green Day's not really known for their experimentation, but come on - listening to a new album shouldn't feel like a game of Name That Tune.
  • The Decembrists - The Hazards Of Love. Oy... another fucking Decembrists record. Why do I buy these things? I don't have the attention span, nor the time, to sit through another album-length story told by that guy and his fucking voice.
  • Nod - Tree Stuff And Lightning. Now Nod can do a change-up. Sometimes they sound like a stone-drunk jazz fusion band, or a demented Vaselines-style indie-pop band, or a blues band playing left-handed in the dark, on a boat in the middle of a nor'easter. Sure, everything they do is irreverent and crazed, sometimes unlistenably so. And a Nod album always sounds unmistakably like a Nod album, but they don't sound alike; each new album sounds freshly unhinged. They're not recycling the same cliches, unlike some other bands I could name. Nod wins.

Listening To...

Black Sabbath - Master Of Reality. Have you ever put on a record, not really expecting much from it except background music, but somehow find yourself completely falling into it? Every song and verse absolutely resonates with you; and when it's over, you're a little amazed at what just happened ? Yeah, that happened with this record a few weeks ago. This puzzled me because, while I like Sabbath well enough, I don't consider myself to be a huge fan, nor a huge fan of metal in general (at least not since high school). But, nonetheless, it happened. I was one with Ozzy and Tony. Mostly Tony. I think it had something to do with the copious quantity of Allagash Black I had consumed. Four Psis for each: ΨΨΨΨ .

Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Real Emotional Trash. This is the first album from them that annoys me less than it pleases me. I think it's because much of the record has a real live-in-the-studio feel; many of the songs have long loose sections where you can hear the members playing off each other, waiting for cues, taking chances, etc.. No, they aren't a jam band, or even close, but this record definitely has a more relaxed feel than most of their other stuff. That interplay also makes the record seem like more of a group effort than just a Stephen Malkmus [with backing band] record. Three Psis: ΨΨΨ .

Paper - An Object. Like Joy Division + Red Bull. They've got that raw goth/punk feel of classic Joy Division, but Paper is louder, faster and twitchier. There's a clip at Flux-Rad. Four Psis: ΨΨΨΨ .

Listening To...

  • MGMT - Oracular Spectacular. It took me a little while to get into this one, but after putting it in my car's CD player for a few weeks, I've grown to like it. It's shiny modern alternative electro-pop, very much in the same league as the New Pornographers and Broken Social Scene, but with retro-echoes of things as anachronistic as the Pixies and early Prince.
    Four raquos : » » » »

  • Q-Tip - The Renaissance. Another trial in my eternal quest to find hip-hop that I like which wasn't made in 1992: a new record from the guy who made his name as part of one of those early-90's groups (A Tribe Called Quest). Q-Tip is still as fun as he was back in the day, but the music is much more modern - even being so modern as to pick up on the same early 80's revival vibe as MGMT mines. I like it much better than most of the other modern hip-hop I've been sampling, though I'm afraid a lot of that's because it's so similar to ATCQ.
    Three raquos: » » »

  • Rokia Traoré - Tchamantché. I don't have a lot of experience with music from Mali. I have a little Boubacar Traoré (no relation, AFAIK) and some Ali Farka Touré, and what I have is all bare-bones and hypnotic guitar with repetitive lyrics. You can tell this comes from the same place where those two, older, musicians came from, but this has a much more polished and contemporary production - the recording is better, the sounds are much more balanced, and the songs don't do that heavy repetition. It's quite good. Except for a deconstructed version of Billie Holiday's "The Man I Love", I don't understand any of the words (I think she's singing in French, sometimes) but she has a fine voice and the music is great, so it's still a nice listen.
    Four raquos : » » » »

  • Andrew Bird - Noble Beast. I'm still waiting for this to grab me. It feels low on hooks and high on mellow. I can't bring myself to rate it.
  • Update, also: The Fratellis - Flathead EP. Do you like the new punk-esque sounds of the Hives, the Vines, Artic Monkeys, etc? Well, you might like The Fratellis, too.

Listening to the Higsons

Nothing to do at work today (shh... don't tell my boss), so here's some quiky reviews of things I've been listening to:

  • Caribou - Andorra. I'm loving this. It's like a flashback to mid-period Pink Floyd (post-Barret, pre-Dark Side), with maybe a hint of Lilys here and there. Dense, swirling psychedelic pop-rock: it's hooky in places but trippy all over. The songs near the end of the record pick up bits of modern electronics (drum machines, etc.), which turns me off a little. But the first 2/3rds are strong enough to carry me through the rest.
  • Paul Simon - Paul Simon. This is also great. Solid all the way through, brilliant in places. And I just love Simon's voice. Also contains what is likely the only reference to chow fun in all of Western pop music.
  • Robyn Hitchcock - While Thatcher Mauled Britain. A gigantic unreleased/outtakes collection - 2 CDs, nearly 40 songs. There are good things scattered throughout, but, overall, it's probably more of a curiosity.
  • Robyn Hitchcock - Shadow Cat. Another unreleased/outtakes collection: his second in a year, and one of at least a half-dozen that I know of. I've given it a few listens, and while I haven't found anything truly outstanding, there are some interesting things here and there: the instrumental "The Cat Walks Her Kind of Line" is nice; there's a version of "The Wind Cries Mary" (though the one on Storefront Hitchcock is better); "Statue With a Walkman" is arrrite.
  • Soft Boys - Underwater Moonlight. Before Robyn Hitchcock was Robyn Hitchcock, he was in the Soft Boys. Also in the Soft Boys were guitarist Kimberley Rew, who later founded Katrina And The Waves (he wrote "Walking On Sunshine"), and bassist Andy Metcalfe, who later played with Squeeze and XTC, and drummer Morris Windsor who, along with Metcalfe also played in Robyn's 80's-era-backing band, The Egyptians. Whew! Clearly the Soft Boys was a breeding ground for 80's Brit-pop.

    This record is 28 years old now, and being as, errr, familiar as I am with Robyn's post-Soft Boys work, as I hear this for the first time, I hear Robyn: his voice, lyrics, song writing, and even his guitar playing, are all so immediately recognizable that he tends to dominate the whole thing - plus he still does a lot of these songs in his live shows. So, even though it's probably unfair to the rest of the band, this one goes into the Robyn Hitchcock bin. It's pretty good, too.

  • Andrew Bird's Bowl Of Fire - Thrills. Like Oh! The Grandeur, this is old-school small-group swing jazz: Django-esque, 30's cabaret . It's also a long ways from his current sound. It's well-done - the playing is great and the way they recreate the sound is impressive - but it's so alien to this 21st century boy, that I don't find myself reaching for it.
  • Bears - Shortest Day Of The Year. This short little record is part neo-psychedelia, like the previously-mentioned Caribou, and part sweet alt-folk-pop. The mere seven songs, totaling something like 16 minutes, simply fly by. They barely have time to wear themselves in, let alone wear themselves out. And so the whole thing comes and goes in a beautiful little flash - an approach I think more bands should take.
  • Beastie Boys - The Mix-Up. This is a collection of songs they've done as instrumentalists, instead of as rappers. They're all funky, laid-back instrumental jams - a little reggae here, a little 60's lounge there. The drummer uses the same rhythm in most of the songs, so they all kind of blend together after a while. But it's still fun. There's a certain kind of party where this would be very sweet as background music.