Random Music Talk CXXVII: Crickets

[iron yuppie]

I went for Grizzly Bear's Horn of Plenty.

 

[Axver]

I want all of you to know that Isis's Panopticon remains one of the best metal albums ever released.

No overdone jokes about the name please, Jeremy Bentham.

 

[mikal]

I want all of you to know that Isis's Panopticon remains one of the best metal albums ever released.

No overdone jokes about the name please, Jeremy Bentham.

I'll have to check it out, thanks!

 

[LemonMelon]

The new Jessie Ware album is incredible and instantly catapults into the top 5 of a stacked year. It's like if Prince put out a late 80s/early 90s house album.

 

[gump]

This is my once-a-year attempt to promote older Brazilian music. You cannot convince me that this is one of the best songs of the 1970s:

 

[LemonMelon]

You cannot convince me that this is one of the best songs of the 1970s:

So you don't really like it? [emoji8]

I listened to two Milton Nascimento records last week (Geraes, Clube da Esquina 2) and loved them both.

 

[gump]

I hate when I miss a double negative.

You know, one of my best friends is close to Milton Nascimento. I once spent like 2 hours with him (and my friend) just chatting. I was too young, like 19 or so, to fully enjoy that opportunity but it was such an amazing time. He's getting up there in age now and has been pretty frail, but I love him so much. The Clube da Esquina records are great (I prefer the first one personally). Have you ever tried Chico Buarque? His album Construção is amongst the very best Brazilian records ever, and the title song is incredible (he's a particularly good lyricist).

This is the kind of stuff that I grew up listening due to my dad, so it's pretty close to me.

 

[mikal]

Axver, you souls show up to talk about Metal more.

And you should check out the song “Feels Good” by Volumes.

 

[Jerry Dunk]

The new Jessie Ware album is incredible and instantly catapults into the top 5 of a stacked year. It's like if Prince put out a late 80s/early 90s house album.

Listened to it once and thought it sounded phenomenal. Definitely one that's going to get a lot of play.

I listened to the new Haim record and it seems like a bounceback from their sophomore effort. Can't say I love it after one listen, but I want to return to it, which is more than I could say about the last one.

 

[cobl04]

I would really like to hear people's thoughts on Court and Spark, please.

 

[cobl04]

Ax have you come across Sweet Whirl? I think I heard a track of hers on Triple J and noted it down - listening to her 2020 album 'How Much Works' on Spotify and I think I'll be buying it!

 

[Axver]

Axver, you souls show up to talk about Metal more.

And you should check out the song “Feels Good” by Volumes.

Must admit Volumes are a bit too metalcore for me. The kind of band I wouldn't mind someone else put on one of their albums, or as an opener for another band, but not quite the sort of thing I reach for myself. Not a bad song though!

 

[Axver]

Ax have you come across Sweet Whirl? I think I heard a track of hers on Triple J and noted it down - listening to her 2020 album 'How Much Works' on Spotify and I think I'll be buying it!

Perhaps I should listen to her again! I gave the album 3/5 on RYM from a first listen but don't recall much of it tbh. Saw her old group, Superstar, live, but haven't seen her perform as Sweet Whirl.

 

[lazarus]

I would really like to hear people's thoughts on Court and Spark, please.

Point:
https://www.u2interference.com/forums/f287/random-music-cxxvi-the-woy-eet-eez-222670-9.html#post8300570

Counterpoint:
https://www.u2interference.com/forums/f287/random-music-cxxvi-the-woy-eet-eez-222670-9.html#post8300573

For what it's worth, I should have ranked C&S above Mingus. But I've been listening to For The Roses a lot more recently, and that one might be her most underrated, certainly from that decade.

I think if you have an appreciation for jazz, you might prefer her deeper excursions into that territory. Check out Hejira or The Hissing of Summer Lawns.

 

[gump]

Fulfillingness' First Finale is a freaking amazing album.

 

[mikal]

OMG this is too great!

https://youtu.be/TwZmtvD-Xgo

 

[cobl04]

Point:
https://www.u2interference.com/forums/f287/random-music-cxxvi-the-woy-eet-eez-222670-9.html#post8300570

Counterpoint:
https://www.u2interference.com/forums/f287/random-music-cxxvi-the-woy-eet-eez-222670-9.html#post8300573

For what it's worth, I should have ranked C&S above Mingus. But I've been listening to For The Roses a lot more recently, and that one might be her most underrated, certainly from that decade.

I think if you have an appreciation for jazz, you might prefer her deeper excursions into that territory. Check out Hejira or The Hissing of Summer Lawns.

Interesting, I didn't realise Court & Spark was her most successful - I always assumed it was Blue, given that's her most famous, no?

Anyway, I quite liked it - plenty of stylistic diversity across the record, some hard-hitting lyrics.

The reason I actually finally listened to it (I've owned it for years) is because Em & I had some challenging conversations about our relationship over the weekend, and I remember LM once recommending it to me, when I was asking for albums that speak to challenges in relationships. It didn't really hit the spot I needed it to, so if anyone has recommendations for that, let me know. But it was great.

 

[cobl04]

It kind of feels like a concept album, to me. Lots of songs carrying over into one another. I'd say my fav tracks are Down to You, Help Me (the soaring chorus), Car on a Hill.

 

[LemonMelon]

The reason I actually finally listened to it (I've owned it for years) is because Em & I had some challenging conversations about our relationship over the weekend, and I remember LM once recommending it to me, when I was asking for albums that speak to challenges in relationships. It didn't really hit the spot I needed it to, so if anyone has recommendations for that, let me know. But it was great.

Listen to Tallahassee by The Mountain Goats. A very barebones album musically, as is the case with much of their work, but it has just enough color and shimmer to stand out in that regard.

The lyrics are, of course, the focal point. John Darnielle is one of the greatest lyricists and storytellers of all time and his story of a married couple drinking themselves to death in a collapsing house on the Florida panhandle resonates now as well as it ever has. Though I must say that it hit a little differently when I was living with my parents and they would scream at each other multiple times per week and I would sit alone in my room wondering what the point of marriage was.

Then I got married 3 years later!

 

[cobl04]

not sure where the original post is iYup, but that playlist you posted led me to Yasuaki Shimizu's Music for Commercials, which I'm greatly enjoying!

 

[Axver]

The reason I actually finally listened to it (I've owned it for years) is because Em & I had some challenging conversations about our relationship over the weekend, and I remember LM once recommending it to me, when I was asking for albums that speak to challenges in relationships. It didn't really hit the spot I needed it to, so if anyone has recommendations for that, let me know. But it was great.

Dunno if it will help you like it helps me right now, but Long Beard's album from last year, Means to Me, is getting me through strange times. Hazy, almost folky dream pop, it has the right emotional resonance for me at the moment and singing/lyrics that are abstract yet provide something to latch onto. Could leave you totally cold but I thought I'd mention it.

 

[iron yuppie]

not sure where the original post is iYup, but that playlist you posted led me to Yasuaki Shimizu's Music for Commercials, which I'm greatly enjoying!

Cool. Japanese music has a huge amount to dig into. I wasn't aware of the sheer scope until these Light in the Attic compilations started showing up.

 

[gump]

As we are at the halfway point in this terrible year, what have been your favorite albums so far?

In no particular order:

Fiona Apple - Fetch the Bolt Cutters
Waxahatchee - St. Cloud
Perfume Genius - Set my Heart on Fire Immediately
Phoebe Bridgers - Punisher
Caribou - Suddenly
Bob Dylan - Rough an Rowdy Ways
TORRES - Silver Tongue
Moses Sumney - grae

 

[cobl04]

I suspect most of those will make my list, but I've yet to listen to them.

Destroyer - Have We Met
The Soft Pink Truth - Shall We Continue Sinning So That Grace May Increase
Moodymann - Taken Away
Against All Logic - 2017-2019
A Girl Called Eddy - Been Around

 

[Axver]

Mine so far, alphabetical order:

Cable Ties - Far Enough
Ellis - Pringle Creek
Hum - Inlet
Mint Julep - Stray Fantasies
Myrkur - Folkesange
Pure Reason Revolution - Eupnea
Purity Ring - Womb
Soccer Mommy - Color Theory
Solkyri - Mount Pleasant

My favourite release, full stop, is Sleepmakeswaves - No Safe Place EP. The best thing they've ever made. They're releasing three EPs this year, which will also function together as an album.

I feel like I should draw mikal's attention to Hum. Not sure if you've listened to them? I think you might like them, they were an amazing nineties alt-rock band that sounded quite unlike their contemporaries. I love their guitar tones, thick and shoegazy but with a meatiness that's almost metal. Downward Is Heavenward is their finest album... and suddenly they've dropped this new one 22 years later that picks up exactly where they left off. It sounds like they recorded it in 2000, not 2020, in the best possible way.

 

[iron yuppie]

Three standing out to me:

1. Nicolas Jaar: Cenizas
2. Perfume Genius: Set My Heart on Fire Immediately
3. Hayley Williams: Petals for Armor

 

[U2inUtah]

Caribou
Charli XCX
Destroyer
Fiona Apple
Hayley Williams
Grimes
Run The Jewels 4
Tame Impala

and maybe HAIM...too early to tell but liking what I've heard so far

great year so far for music

 

[cobl04]

1. Nicolas Jaar: Cenizas

Crazy how vastly I prefer his work as AAL and Darkside to his solo stuff.

 

[gump]

I had forgotten that the new Destroyer is a 2020 album (it’s an old world, pre-pandemic album after all). Add that to my list.

 

[iron yuppie]

Crazy how vastly I prefer his work as AAL and Darkside to his solo stuff.

Cenizas really spoke to me. Love that fractured sax running through a lot of the tracks with the minimal, low-fi beats. Very apocalyptic but somehow also comforting, to my ear at least. Easily the best album of the year so far.