| Author | Message | ||
     skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1423 Registered: 10-2008 |
Aphex Twin - Selected Ambient Works 85-92 Genius! | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 4081 Registered: 05-2005 |
Jason Falkner - Can You Still Feel? Beatles-influenced power pow majesty (not for Kevin then). | ||
| Allen Belz Member Username: Abpositive Post Number: 2167 Registered: 09-2006 |
Spending some time with the milkmaids: Fairport Convention - What We Did On Our Holidays, Unhalfbricking, Liege & Lief The Bunch - Rock On | ||
| Shane Greentree Member Username: Realinspectorshane Post Number: 104 Registered: 03-2007 |
Gene Clark: No Other | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 481 Registered: 10-2006 |
Always good to hear Sandy D. an'udder time, Alan. | ||
| Lewisdhead Member Username: Lewisdhead Post Number: 76 Registered: 01-2007 |
The Doors-The Soft Parade | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 4086 Registered: 05-2005 |
The Triffids - Stockholm | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 4094 Registered: 05-2005 |
The Rolling Stones - Stripped | ||
| peter ward Member Username: Peter_ward Post Number: 158 Registered: 06-2005 |
The The - Infected & soul Mining | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1441 Registered: 10-2008 |
Can - Tago Mago Just been reissued yet again, must be like 40th anniversary or something. My copy is a reissue that Mute released from just a couple of years when they re-released the whole back catalogue to considerable fanfare. The reviews I have read of this latest reissue of Tago Mago make it sound like the greatest Krautrock album ever, which is very debatable to say the least no matter how great it is. | ||
| Michael Bachman Member Username: Michael_bachman Post Number: 2285 Registered: 01-2005 |
Can - Tago Mago is the greatest Krautrock albums ever? I wouldn't rate it that high, then again I have only the bare bones 1998 Mute CD. I do have a decent reissue of Soon Over Babaluma. Maybe it's time to step up to the pump and invest in some of the Can reissues like Tago, Future Days, Soundtracks and Ege Bamyasi to replace my Mute CD's? I still prefer Neu, although maybe the Can reissues could close the gap. | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1443 Registered: 10-2008 |
teenage fanclub - bandwagonesque been meaning to dig this out since watching the documentary on creation records last week. by far the best band on the roster, although screamadelica is probably the greatest album released on that label. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 4112 Registered: 05-2005 |
Tin Machine - Tin Machine Matthew Sweet - Girlfriend U2 - Achtung Baby Sugar - Copper Blue | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 4115 Registered: 05-2005 |
Right Said Fred - I'm Too Sexy. I'm never again listening to music that isn't 20 years old. | ||
| Allen Belz Member Username: Abpositive Post Number: 2168 Registered: 09-2006 |
Stand firm there, Padraig.  I'm enjoying revisiting Achtung too, though I'm having more fun with Zooropa, which I've long preferred. | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1453 Registered: 10-2008 |
Must admit I'm surprised to see the reviews of the re-release for Achtung Baby. It seems to be getting universal praise, nearly every review has been 5 star or 10/10 - even Pitchfork gave it 9.5. Any album that includes the rancid,turgid, po-faced "One" should automatically be docked 4.5, or 9 stars! | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1454 Registered: 10-2008 |
Michael Head - The Magical World Of The Strands Inspired to dig this out after reading an article in The Quietus in which Luke Haines listed his 13 favourite albums. Quite an eclectic choice! http://thequietus.com/articles/07311-luk e-haines-favourite-albums | ||
| Geoff Holmes Member Username: Geoff Post Number: 779 Registered: 05-2005 |
Ditto Allen re Zooropa. The song Zooropa came up on the ipod yesterday and it was not an unwelcome intrusion. | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1455 Registered: 10-2008 |
Big Youth - Dreadlocks Dread. Again inspired by Luke Haines list from the Quietus link in the post above. Have got another from the list, The Doors Morrison Hotel cued up for later on. Morrison Hotel seems to be raising its head a lot recently in features and interviews as peoples favorite Doors album. History being re-written? | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 4118 Registered: 05-2005 |
I couldn't understand the fuss about One at the time, but I do now. Great song, brilliant album. Right now I'm listening to Eskimo Beach Boy by Ten Speed Racer. A Dublin indie record from a decade ago. It's been at least nine years since I've played it, but it's just as good as I'd remembered. Three of the band are brothers! | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 2771 Registered: 03-2005 |
Believe it or not, Kevin, "Morrison Hotel" is the ONLY Doors album I ever personally owned. I liked it well enough at the time but mind you I was a "discerning" 14 year old; I also owned the likes of Ten Years After way back then. It went away in a purge decades ago--long before I learned to stop doing that! I'm not missing the Ten Years After though. | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 492 Registered: 10-2006 |
I'm no U2 fan, but I'd have to stick up for One as a great song, especially in the Cash version. The lyrics are fierce and avoid the banal - the most you can hope for often enough in a rock ballad - and the tune is a killer. Even artists we can't stand sometimes produce good work. | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1456 Registered: 10-2008 |
Padraig, great result by Ireland last night, Poland and Ukraine stamps on your passport next summer? Randy. a cheap way to fill the Doors hole? http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B 0052FG750/ref=dp_olp_new?ie=UTF8&qid=132 1089173&sr=1-24&condition=new It has all six albums in one box, with each album reproduced in replica mini album sleeves made of card. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/images/ B0052FG750/ref=dp_otherviews_2?ie=UTF8&s =music&img=2 Can't believe this has not been released in the US and is available only as a UK import. I bought this a few months back, its excellent. Just a pity Rhino never took a leaf from their own book and included Weird Scenes from Inside The Goldmine in the box, like they did by including The Smiths compilations in the recently released Smiths box, that would have just topped it off. Weird Scenes was my introduction to The Doors in 1980 despite vaguely being aware of Riders On The Storm from the radio. Up till buying the box I only had the debut album and Morrison hotel, although my wife, who is a massive Doors fan had all the albums in her own collection of CD's so I always had access to the rest of their stuff. | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1457 Registered: 10-2008 |
Stuart, I'm afraid I'm with Eno on this one. Apparently he hated One. I actually thought Achtung Baby was reasonably listenable, and I normally loathe U2. This stems from seeing them live at Edinburgh Playhouse circa 1982, and cringing when I saw Bono mount speaker towers and behave like a rock dinosaur at the age of 20 or whatever he was, up till then I had liked the debut album and their early singles. I thought The Fly and Mysterious Ways were fairly decent songs, as were one or two others, but One just encapsulates all that I hate about bloated rock bands and rock stars like Bono and Chris Martine and their ilk. Lighter waving Glastonbury anthems like One just get my dander up, it may well be a decent song underneath all the bluster but thats the whole point for me, they chose to record it and play it live with all the bluster! | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 493 Registered: 10-2006 |
That's why I love the blusterless JC version! And blustery Bono is indeed one of those things that makes the band hard to approach. Sometimes a decent tune and lyric can cut through the bluster, though. I also admit to having Run and Come Undone on my car singalong CD... | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1458 Registered: 10-2008 |
Is it that great a tune? Not for me. | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 494 Registered: 10-2006 |
If you find yourself singing it in the shower, it's probably a good tune. | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 2772 Registered: 03-2005 |
Johnny Cash could turn the phone book into a moment of soul-stirring recognition. I am definitely not a U2 fan at all. Was it their first album that had "I Will Follow"? That already sounded like something tailormade for a huge stadium venue. But somewhere along the line they did learn how to write songs. The secret is to hear them done by somebody else. Here's another demonstration. I particularly love the comment by the person who posted this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTBweDwBy CA | ||
| Allen Belz Member Username: Abpositive Post Number: 2171 Registered: 09-2006 |
If I've already detailed any of the below before, apologies...my memory has long ago reached the point where it has to regularly discard things in order to take in new stuff... Though I've always had a U2 album or three lurking in my collection it's only in the last few years that I've had a real conversion. I've never had a real problem with the anthemic and/or ultra-sincere - it certainly leaves out pieces of what real life is about, but so do many, many other forms of musical expression, and since when has holding a 100% accurate mirror up to life the only possible goal of art? Robert Christgau (from a disappointed pan of Zooropa) : "I've never seen the point of hating U2. Their sound was their own from the git, and for a very famous person, Bono has always seemed thoughtful and good-hearted." In other reviews he also has plenty to say about Bono's ego as well, and while I'd agree with a lot of it I'd also say that, as interviews make clear, Mr. Hewson is well aware of that ego and deliberately spends a fair amount of time in his lyrics and public pronouncements undercutting and doing battle with it (not always successfully, of course). On the other hand I can fully understand those for whom Bono is the sticking point, as that was also the case for me - something changed for me, though as in many such changes I couldn't tell you just why. And the big jump for me was how much I'm digging their sound now whether in sincere mode or the more "ironic" years. Christgau captured a little of it: "Let it build and ebb and wash and thunder in the background and you'll hear something special--mournful and passionate, stately and involved." | ||
| Allen Belz Member Username: Abpositive Post Number: 2172 Registered: 09-2006 |
Apologies for not grammar-checking the above more thoroughly...hope it's mostly clear. | ||
| Andrew Kerr Member Username: Andrew_k Post Number: 669 Registered: 04-2005 |
I had a very similar experience to Kevin's in '82 with U2. I walked out of their gig in Glasgow's Tiffanys for the same reasons. Bono showering the crowd with champagne was my exit point. And yet with 'Boy' and the first time I saw them live at Strathclyde Uni (Altered Images were the support!) they were the shiny new future of passionate rock. A someone once wrote if only they had stayed with European music as an influence and not chased the American "Rawk" Dream... | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1459 Registered: 10-2008 |
It's probably just me, but I find Christgau a boring old git,with shit taste in music. That's certainly how his latter day columns come across, as for the old stuff he listed to great fanfare at the end of every year he just seemed to like the same as me and everybody else. He probably wrote about it with better grammar and punctuation than I could muster mind you. Like I say it's probably just me, but my recollections are that other American writers are held in far greater esteem in the UK than he is/was. | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1461 Registered: 10-2008 |
Bob Dylan - Blood On The Tracks. I've always preferred his 60's stuff from Bringing It All Back Home onwards, and always thought this inferior although obviously still pretty good. Tonight it sounded magnificent on headphones, maybe thats the way this highly personal album should be heard! | ||
| Allen Belz Member Username: Abpositive Post Number: 2173 Registered: 09-2006 |
I'm sure that if you started taking it case by case, you and Christgau would have some areas of real contention, but glancing over his lists and using my (already admittedly) faulty memory of things you've mentioned liking I also have the feeling that on average you'd be in agreement with him about as much as many of your pals on or off this board. There's this, for instance: http://www.robertchristgau.com/get_artis t.php?name=drive-by+truckers | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1462 Registered: 10-2008 |
He might like DBT Allen, and I don't slavishly read his stuff cos I can't say I admire him, but of the stuff I do read we don't seem to share much common ground. Maybe I've just read the wrong columns. He does like reggae mind you! | ||
| Andreas Severins Member Username: Andreas_severins Post Number: 210 Registered: 11-2007 |
Doll By Doll - Remember Doll By Doll - Gypsy Blood my highest recommondations for Janice, Butcher Boy, Teenage Lightning and co. Jackie Leven's early works - playing on... | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 498 Registered: 10-2006 |
Journalist Neil McCormack makes a convincing case for "Gypsy blood" as a "lost rock masterpiece" here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music /rockandjazzmusic/3664428/British-rocks- lost-masterpiece.html | ||
| Andreas Severins Member Username: Andreas_severins Post Number: 211 Registered: 11-2007 |
Hi Stuart, thank you for linking the article. In one of his official bootlegs jackie refers to Neil McCormick ;) the guy who wrote the following as well http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/culture/nei lmccormick/100006846/the-rock-star-and-t he-prime-minister/ enjoy and you may imagine how jackie's stories during his concerts have been! | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 4124 Registered: 05-2005 |
Kevin, I'd love to go to Euro 2012. I will have to see who Ireland draw, if they are based in Poland or Ukraine and what kind of packages are available. I had such a great time at the World Cup in Germany in 2006, it would be great to have that sort of experience again. Not that it could ever be replicated. | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 499 Registered: 10-2006 |
I hope Brown wasn't really so obtuse in reality. A shame he didn't make a better showing as PM, just as it's a shame Jackie didn't sell as well as he might have. All it needed was the right song at the right moment, but sometimes that doesn't happen. Not everything he did was brilliant, but there was always grit and passion and poetry in his work. | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1478 Registered: 10-2008 |
Talking Heads - 77 Never my favourite Talking Heads album, (that would be FOM), but listening to it today it just sounded brilliant, and absolutely unique. If this had been the only album they ever released it would be considered one of the greatest records ever made, so I guess on its own merits that means that it is!! | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 4129 Registered: 05-2005 |
The Dust Brothers - NME Christmas Dust Up. Mix tape that came free with NME 18 years ago. Now have it digitised. Still brilliant. | ||
| David Gagen Member Username: David_g Post Number: 360 Registered: 02-2007 |
I agree, Talking Heads 77 sounds so fresh and new, uncluttered ,just interesting songs, a band with a promise of something great in store. | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1482 Registered: 10-2008 |
John Cale - Fear Also played Paris 1919 the other day, toss up as to which is his greatest album imo. A lot of people go for Music For A New Society, which is very good but you have to be in the mood for it, unlike the other two which you can put on any time I find. | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 2782 Registered: 03-2005 |
The Fall--Live at the Witch Trials The Fall have a LOT of records. Because of this there are a lot of them that I've not put on my iPod in order avoid an "all Fall all the time" situation. I used to think this record was a tentative start so I left it off. "Frightened" sounds pretty damn good now. And I always loved "Rebellious Jukebox", "No Xmas for John Quays" and "Futures and Pasts." | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 2783 Registered: 03-2005 |
Wow. There's nothing tentative about "Live at the Witch Trials". It just has crap recorded sound. The band is on fire and everything they are doing is well considered. There's no filler in the long tracks which blithely flout the punk anti-long-song edict. When MES lets the band take over the band does something with that opportunity. "Two Steps Back" is brilliant. It had escaped my notice previously. I suppose it would be considered sacrilege but I'd love somebody to take the original multitracks and aggressively remix and remaster this album. It deserves better. | ||
| Allen Belz Member Username: Abpositive Post Number: 2178 Registered: 09-2006 |
I like Slow Dazzle a lot, too | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1485 Registered: 10-2008 |
Randy, Frightened is another Fall classic. The amount of classics this band has is just frightening, pardon the pun! Witch Trials doesnt have great production, but it sounds like it had a 10 million dollar budget compared to Dragnet. I can never make my mind up about my feelings on how Dragnet sounds. Part of me admires the fact that its brave, and a statement blah blah, but another part says that all these wonderful pop gems are ruined by the "recorded in a toilet" sound. I wonder if MES took cold feet at how "pop" and "hooky" these songs were and decided to sabotage them sonically to counter any claims that may have came about selling out. | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 2784 Registered: 03-2005 |
Kevin, "Dragnet" is one of the relatively few Fall records I don't have. It used to be hard to find. I was going to pick it up yesterday but was afraid I'd come home and find out I had already bought a copy and forgotten that I had (like with Nick Cave's "Boatman's Call"). I knew it was famous for obnoxious recorded sound but your description makes it sound like I definitely want it. | ||
| Jeff Whiteaker Member Username: Jeff_whiteaker Post Number: 2270 Registered: 10-2004 |
I never totally warmed to "Dragnet." It's a good album, but I've always felt that "Grotesque" and the live "Totale's Turns" were so much better! As for John Cale, my favorite of the Island trilogy is "Helen of Troy." It's got some of his most tortured and abrasive songs, like "Save Us," along side some of his poppiest, like the very Brian Wilson-esque "China Sea." "Fear" is quite good, too, but "Slow Dazzle," while definitely containing some wonderful songs (like "Mr. Wilson") is the least consistent of the three, imo. "Paris 1919" is, of course, a classic. | ||
| C Gull Member Username: C_gull Post Number: 174 Registered: 05-2005 |
Grandaddy - The Sophtware Slump Their albums sound even better now then they did at the time I find. | ||
| Allen Belz Member Username: Abpositive Post Number: 2179 Registered: 09-2006 |
I was recently wondering if that might be true for me, C...maybe I'll try one soon. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 4136 Registered: 05-2005 |
Still loving The Dust Brothers - NME Christmas Dust Up on my iPod. | ||
| Geoff Holmes Member Username: Geoff Post Number: 791 Registered: 05-2005 |
I'm trying to choose a colour to paint my house and the words of the Violent Femmes "Country Death Song" came to mind... "And I'm a thinking and a thinking 'til there's nothing I ain't thunk, breathing in the stink 'til finally I stunk, it was at that time I swear I lost my mind!". The rest of the album is fantastic too. I haven't had such a Violent Femmes binge since my University days (cue wistful sighing...). | ||
| andreas Member Username: Andreas Post Number: 856 Registered: 04-2006 |
jethro tull - thick as a brick taken notice that ian anderson will perform the whole album live in 2012 i thought i have to think about the possibility to buy tickets for that event. i never saw them live. neither in the seventies, nor nowadays when they playing year after year in my neighbourhood and i am getting soft due to age (or just getting senile). while listening to the album and reading the paper cover (yes, i have one) i felt from enthusiastic to bored and back to enthusiastic. but in the end i was more bored than enthusiastic and i decided not to buy a ticket. an interesting thing was to realize that my vinyl copy is in a perfect shape. like new. maybe that means something... | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 4167 Registered: 05-2005 |
C86 - V/A NME cassette | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1508 Registered: 10-2008 |
The Fall - The Real New Fall LP Classic late period Fall, in its own way the equal of the 80's output. | ||
| andreas Member Username: Andreas Post Number: 869 Registered: 04-2006 |
rachel unthank & the winterset - cruel sister since nearly six years they bedazzle us with their own way of interpreting folk songs (o.k. I know them only for four years, since Bairns was released) | ||
| Michael Bachman Member Username: Michael_bachman Post Number: 2295 Registered: 01-2005 |
Andreas, the 40th anniversary edition of Aqualung sounds great. The remastering is just this side of the remastering strides we saw on the double disc edition of Tallulah. | ||
| andreas Member Username: Andreas Post Number: 873 Registered: 04-2006 |
hi michael, thanks for the information about tull's aqualung 40th anniversary edition. indeed i thought about buying it, but didn't realized it until now. jethro tull's music is an ambivalent thing. like i wrote above some tunes are fantastic and some tunes you can't stand. but maybe in a nostalgic moment or maybe together with the 40 th anniversary edition of heavy horses :-) | ||
| Michael Bachman Member Username: Michael_bachman Post Number: 2296 Registered: 01-2005 |
Andreas, I never ventured past Aqualung as far as Jethro Tull. Missing Glen Cornick's bass playing was bad enough on Auqalung, but after drummer Clive Bunker left post Auqalung I lost interest. | ||
| andreas Member Username: Andreas Post Number: 874 Registered: 04-2006 |
michael, at the time aqualung has been released i was too young (i listened at that time to suzy quatro , sweeet and slade :-)). i liked them in the midst of the seventies. heavy horses - a folk album - seems to me an album you can listen to until today. | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 2807 Registered: 03-2005 |
My copy of the new Byrds box arrived yesterday. I listened to the first disc last night with "Mr. Tambourine Man" and associated extra tracks. I'm currently listening to the second disc with "Turn, Turn, Turn" and its associated extra tracks. I already had these two albums on earlier CD issues but haven't played them in many years. When I was a kid, my two older brothers would put one or the other of these two albums on one of those cheapie automatic record changers with the arm that stabilizes the records on top waiting to be played or, if it's put in the position to the side where it doesn't get in the way of lifting a record off then the player will just keep replaying the same record over and over until you hit the "stop" control (or you lose your mind). This is how my brothers played these records: the same 15 minute side over and over and over. This has always made it difficult for me to listen to the Byrds' early records. So keep that in mind with my comments about these albums. First off, my absolute favorite Gene Clark song from his entire career--however much I love so many others--is "Set You Free This Time." This song survived that repeated playing for me, again and again and again and never lost its wonder. That's an achievement for a song, if you ask me. It also amuses me to realize how the attributes of this song have subliminally influenced my own writing style, from the busy syllabic lines to the rhyme pattern, which is one of my favorites. When I describe something I've done as "Dylanesque" I should remember that really it's "Gene Clarkesque." Virtually all of the Gene Clark songs, and especially those on which he's allowed to step forward in the vocals, are highlights on these first two albums. Listening today it's easy to understand why I got tired of them. McGuinn's 12 is just too omnipresent. The Byrds' records improved when he started using the instrument more judiciously rather than just plastering it all over everything. I have two electric 12 strings that I use regularly and also an acoustic 12, but enough is enough! The jangle ends up overpowering the songs and, god forbid, even the harmonies. It's a shame that with such a relatively adult selection of songs the Byrds felt they needed to cling to a trademark that started to sound like a schtick more than a trademark. I'm sure that's one of the reasons that I've always appreciated the bass playing of Chris Hillman and Crosby's rhythm guitar so much. They're both good and they provide a welcome counterpoint to McGuinn's racket. It was the early/mid '60s; time allowed in the studio was minimal and you had to have a gimmick. It's interesting to contrast with the Beau Brummels who also used a lot of 12 and whose second album in '65 was clearly a response to the Byrds. Ron Elliott always knew to put down the 12 and pick up a 6 or switch from electric to acoustic at regular intervals to keep the record from sounding monotonous. I will be loading judiciously edited versions of these albums onto my iPod with a lot of tracks left behind. | ||
| Geoff Holmes Member Username: Geoff Post Number: 792 Registered: 05-2005 |
Never enough 12 string to my ears Randy! I think Hillman got better as time went on with "Everybody's been burned" being one of the standout bass parts of the 60's for me, WELL up there with "Rain". | ||
| Michael Bachman Member Username: Michael_bachman Post Number: 2298 Registered: 01-2005 |
Those McGuinn 12 string tunes were sure a groundbreaking sound for me when I first heard them as a pre-teen. However I didn't buy anything beyond their Greatest Hits vinyl album for many years. I thinking it was Sweetheart Of The Rodeo around late 1975, a few months after I bought Grievous Angel, and then in quick succession GP, the first FBB album, Sweetheart and Sleepless Nights. | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 2808 Registered: 03-2005 |
Geoff, I agree about Hillman's work on "Burned" which also--in my book--is Crosby's best song. I've since listened to "5D"--one half of a brilliant album, imagine how fantastic it would have been with Clark still in the band--"Younger Than Yesterday"--probably my original favorite Byrds album--"Notorious"--ok I have to comment on "Notorious." "Notorious" was released to near total apathy originally. The group hadn't had a hit in a period of time that was dangerous in the fast-moving '60s and "Lady Friend" didn't do the trick. The Byrds were officially old hat by this time. I always liked this album for its great coherence and consistency of feel and all-around lovely recorded sound. However, even as an 11 year old I noticed the possibly desperate gambit of inserting jarring instrumental sections in the middle of a lot of the songs (craziest example: "Dolphins Smile") rather like the I.M. Pei pyramid in the courtyard of the Louvre. You like it or you don't. It's as if they lacked confidence in the essence of the songs themselves and they needed to create these distractions. Does "Wasn't Born to Follow" need the silly acid-rockish interlude in the midst of the melodic country rock? Not really. Clearly, my Byrds-loving brothers didn't think so which meant that I got to keep "Notorious" pretty much for myself. Sometimes this technique worked very well, as on "Get to You" but on that song the break still used their vocals and was much better integrated with the song. It's interesting to see some people nowadays fingering this as the best Byrds album. I can't agree but it definitely has its appeal. "Space Odyssey" is a brilliant match of sci-fi and sea shanty--two things McGuinn excels at. Geoff, there's another brilliant bass part from Hillman on "Draft Morning." I'm very glad the uber-dull "Triad" didn't make it onto the album. That was definitely something for a Crosby solo album and not a Byrds album. Enough has been said about "Sweetheart." I'll only comment on how much I love the two Dylan covers, particularly "Nothing Was Delivered." My oldest brother went full-on into country at this time so this record came in for endless play. The extras unexpectedly include some International Submarine Band sides including three from 1966 (before the "Safe at Home" album). One of them is a mystifying rocker on which it's hard to hear Gram at all but the lead guitar is superb. Apparently they had not yet decided to commit to country. My oldest brother listened to "Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde" quite a lot. I don't have a copy (until now) and hadn't heard it in years. I remember disliking the fuzz-box stylings by Clarence White. I definitely still have that opinion on their version of "This Wheel's on Fire" which is terribly over-reverbed and generally gutless. McGuinn's vocal is particularly underwhelming. Want to know whose version kicks this one aside? The Hollies' version from "Hollies Sing Dylan." It's economical, forceful and intense even though they hadn't quite gotten their harmonies with Terry Sylvester worked out yet. On the other hand, I was surprised to find how much I really like two of McGuinn's other rock numbers on here: "Child of the Universe" and "Bad Night at the Whiskey." On these two the excessive reverb creates an entertaining and suitable doom sound. I haven't decided about the rest (well, yes, "Drug Store Truck Driving Man") but I know I'll be loading these two tracks onto the iPod. | ||
| Geoff Holmes Member Username: Geoff Post Number: 795 Registered: 05-2005 |
Andreas, I was also into Suzi Quatro and Sweet when I was about 8! I WAS familiar though with "Aqualung" and "Thick as a Brick" as my sister's fiance had them, along with "The Slider" and "Bolan Boogie" which I loved too. I bought the early Suzi Q and Sweet singles on iTunes earlier in the year for ol' times sake. Be warned...Don't go there! VERY embarrassing apart from Datona Daemon which is o.k. KEVIN ALERT. Read no further or get your bucket ready! I can still listen to Beatles, which is older but doesn't sound SO dated as the pop glam stuff. | ||
| andreas Member Username: Andreas Post Number: 876 Registered: 04-2006 |
Geoff, my first record should have been suzi quatro's first album. but my father bought me a middle of the road record instead. you can imagine how disappointed i was (i think i have told this story in former times here on this board, but to phrase the byrds and their lovely song 'full circle' (so we are not very far away from randy's proper examinations on the byrds; great as ever!)- in this message board the 'full circle is a common thing -i don't mean this disrespectful). for a short period in my life (i think around 1974) i loved the beatles, but soon as i started my love affair with prog rock kind of music, they weren't important any more. in the eighties, when i listened to all this post punk and so called indie stuff, they also weren't important for me. but that doesn't mean that their music isn't good, maybe just a bit overrated. to be true: in the last few days i discovered myself whistling and singing some beatles tunes without any previous 'input' like listening to a record or hearing a song on the radio. it seems i should exorcise this by listening to fall album :-) | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1521 Registered: 10-2008 |
Always a joy to listen to this http://thequietus.com/articles/07608-tee nage-fanclub-bandwagonesque | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1525 Registered: 10-2008 |
The Fall - Dragnet | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 4190 Registered: 05-2005 |
Prince - Parade. Still love this album. | ||
| Rob Brookman Member Username: Rob_b Post Number: 1627 Registered: 08-2006 |
Me, too, Padraig. I ranked it as a disappointment when it first came out. Now, it's among my most-played Prince. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 4193 Registered: 05-2005 |
Select at the Heavenly Social: Mixed by Jon Carter. Tape given away with Select magazine in 1996. | ||
| skulldisco Member Username: Skulldisco Post Number: 1529 Registered: 10-2008 |
The Fall - Bend Sinister | ||
| andreas Member Username: Andreas Post Number: 902 Registered: 04-2006 |
kevin ayers - whatevershebringswesing |