Tuesday, December 30, 2008

familiarity breeds attempt




I find modern dancehall or dubstep or grime or whatever The Bug's London Zoo (lala) is to be so abrasive and obnoxious that kind of like it for how much I don't like it. It removes all the chill infinitude from reggae, the seamlessness from electronica, and the amiable swagger from hip-hop leaving the worst characteristics to commingle, and well, I got to admire that a little. My editor at outsideleft accused me of having catholic tastes, and when something crosses my line, I have to tip my hat before I swat it away.

...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead's Madonna (lala) hits me in the polar opposite way, an amalgam of everything I like in the music I like. It's The Replacements doing The Fall covering a Wire album in a Dinosaur Jr. style. I pulled out my bike from the muck of disuse, pumped up the tires and hit the road to this to get some of this New Year Enthusiasm for Achievement under way.

Upon arriving at the coffee shop, I needed the deafening fog of Gavin Bryars' A Listening Room (lala) to drown out the chatter and the din to get down to business but as usual, dense monolithic minimalism draws everything to it rather than repels it. I guess you can't drive by the abyss without at least peering over the edge. Or, perhaps, I am still on vacation and these stabs at accomplishment are just a ruse. I spent my time at the coffee shop talking to newcomers about how much I like Baton Rouge in that it is easy to get something started here; the difficulty comes with keeping up momentum because it is solely up to you to do so.

So back home, and my family is making enchiladas in the adjacent room and requested some music. Common's pulsating clubby glossy Universal Mind Control (lala) is a bit of a letdown if you are expecting another streetwise hipster philosophy statement like his greatest records, but then statements are just talk. Everyone knows it's only when you are in the groove that you can actually get anything done.

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