Love - Forever Changes (lala) - Not that this record needs any improvement whatsoever, I'd love to hear it remade by a crack Baroque chamber orchestra on period instruments (lute, fife, harpsichord, etc) with Julian Cope as the singer
Calexico - Carried to Dust (no link) - This more than made up for there being no Fleetwood Mac on my phone (perhaps that is a resolution in the making) that I wanted to hear after Forever Changes. This might have moved onto my formal top 10 of 2008.
Gavin Bryars' String Quartets (lala) - I don't know if they stand up with the finest of his work, or specifically A Listening Room from the other day, but those little wavering, quaverying tones added a touch o hyperspeed needed for the drive down to my parents yesterday.
Guided By Voices - Bee Thousand (lala) - Twice on the ride back. Even though this is one of my all-time favorite records, I was a little surprised I still know al the words to all of it, considering the words don't make any lateral sense
Yes - Relayer (lala) I think this is the same record that bore me home as last time I drove back from my parents' a month ago. But then it does kind of seem like the same trip every time, so, why not.
Neil Young and Crazy Horse - Greendale (lala) Somehow I've never listened to this record all the way through, even though I think the first couple of songs are precisely what I want when I come to Neil Young - simple, trudging, a little relentless, heavy as hell but manageable. And I didn't listen to it all the way this tiime either, because I got distracted by this excellent WFMU's Sound and Safe with Trent playlist that starts with Animal Collective and goes into even lovlier directions.
I was into Bee Thousand until I saw GBV and got another few GBV albums. The endless shows and compulsive output of half-developed ideas made the whole enterprise seem nutty in a not-funny way. And the lyrics that fans called "elliptical" or non-linear were actually word soup - automatic and easy. Funny how if I'd have stopped with that album, I'd likely think about it very differently.
ReplyDeleteI dug them through Mag Earwhig. When they tried to go legit, like with actual production values they kinda lost me. GBV, especially Bee Thousand and Under the Bushes sits as a will-to-power rock, a guy with no business being a rock star (late 30's, high school teacher, not much more skill than loving the Who and Cheap Trick a lot going for him) suddenly becoming a rock star.
ReplyDeleteI saw them live in Kansas City in 2002 as a last minute addition on a big outdoor festival, and he was, of course, drunk and doing the Elvis karate kicks and all and the transparency in his deal became, well, clear.