Albums I Like

A new update?

2009-01-10T14:59:00.000-08:00

Not really.

We've revived www.retrolowfi.com, so this blog will no longer be maintained. Thanks for reading... and please direct your browsers to our newly revamped home!

Thanks,
Marc

Albums I Like: Volume Four

2008-11-12T22:40:00.000-08:00

This entry came a bit late, didn't it? Well, you name the issue, and it happened to me. Computer viruses, musical tension, stomach flu, etc. Regardless, here it is for you to enjoy. And I hope you do, because writing this was a great escape, when I could get around to it. Hopefully the next entry will throw you some real curveballs!

(And don't forget to scroll down for your free mixtape!)

31. Frank Zappa - The Man From Utopia (1983):

Let me preface this FZ talk with the following statement: I LOVE Frank Zappa. In fact, one of the best ways to shut me up is to put one of his albums. Like it or not, all conversations will cease while I just sit there, staring athe speakers. I may occasionally emit a "wow". That being said, I do not proclaim to *understand* Zappa in any way. And man, have I ever tried. I attempted to start from the beginning of his works and work my way down, thinking it'd all make sense that way. Nuh uh. Somewhere around "Brown Shoes Don't Make It" on Absolutely Free is when I gave up on that tactic.

The best way that I've found to really absorb Zappa's catalog is just to sort of jump in randomly. If you like what you're hearing, cool. Keep playing it. If it doesn't work for you that day, have no fear... there are exactly 8271 other albums you can try, and you might be better suited for one of those! I stand by the snetiment that anyone who claims not to like Zappa simply hasn't heard the right stuff by him yet. But even when you find that FZ release that totally tickles your pickle, you won't be able to shake the whole "this guy is wayyyy smarter than I'll ever be, and so is this music". You'd be right. Frank's intellect was otherworldly, but if we're judging him on a purely compositional level? He might best represent some type of super-evolved human being that happened to know how to write music.

So, now that I've told you all of those things, you'll understand why I can't spend a ton of time analyzing why I find The Man From Utopia to be so enjoyable. Lots of hardcore Zappa addicts might even tell you that they don't think it's his best work... or even one of his "decent" albums.. And I don't really care about all of that nanny nonsense. If anyone, I repeat, ANYONE came out of nowhere today and had made this platter as their first record, people would praise them, offering them zany things like solid gold toilet bowls. Keep that in mind.

On this album, you'll find many jokes that usually involve genitals and inside jokes that you won't realize were supposed to be funny until you've absorbed like twenty other Zappa albums. Many of the tracks are a weird sort of free-jazz with lots of speak-singing from Zappa and his cohort Ike Willis. Some of the songs were recorded live. A good portion of this will sound unconnected and dissonant to the uninitiated listener, and even when it's relatively direct - take "Sex", for example - the music behind the "bigger the cushion" chorus gets downright atonal.

But that's one of the best things about The Man From Utopia! Frank welcomes you in with some silly and simple - for him - stuff like "Cocaine Decisions", and by the time the proceedings get REALLY weird, you're absolutely hooked, playing the album on repeat trying to figure out why *you* don't understand all of it. It's like a big and welcoming Rubik's puzzle... that continues to make itself harder to play the better you get at it. Figuring it out is half the fun, and if you ever do... email me. Until then, I'll happily rock out to The Man From Utopia while "real" Zappa fans tell me that I shouldn't be wasting my time with it.

Hah. The joke is on them.

32. The Pretty Things - S.F. Sorrow (1968):

My reasons for checking out this album were incredibly shallow. I'd long belived that Tommy was the first definable "rock opera", but I'd occasionally see rock journalism that communicated that, no, maybe Pete Townshend had stolen the entire concept from The Pretty Things. And let's just go ahead and call it what it is: S.F. Sorrow is almost certainly the first "rock opera" that extends to the length of an entire album, but Pete had already done it in 1966 with "A Quick One (While He's Away)". And said track blows away nearly anything in the entire Pretty Things catalog, especially in it's live incarnations.

That being said, S.F. Sorrow is one intensely enjoyable album on it's own. It's sound is in line with that of many rock groups from 1968: The Small Faces, Love, The Kinks, etc... but there's something infinitely tougher about these guys. Maybe the drums are slightly more driving, and heck.. even those harmonies sound confidant to the point of anger. If this album had no storyline whatsoever, it'd still be a great rock album. I mean, those overdriven guitar tones kick my ass all over the room, and I barely have any idea what this record is about. Of course, I haven't ever really picked these lyrics apart, but the story isn't readily apparent on first listen, which does kinda bug me about it's stature as a "rock opera". And that makes me wish that no one had ever brought that up to me... I wish that rock history would just allow me to accept this album on it's own terms.

What I have gleaned from S.F. Sorrow's story is actually not terribly interesting: the main character is born to a boring environment, serves in his countries miltary, and becomes a crotchety old man with no friends that dies alone. Great. Didn't need a rock opera for that, but thanks for trying. There is probably much more to the story, but it isn't presented to me in any way that tries to invite me to the storyline. Instead, it's the melodies that kick my ass all over the room here. And the band as a whole. I bet that The Pretty Things were a force to be reckoned with live.

Instead of a rock opera, I like to view S.F. Sorrow as a really fucking good rock album by a band that I always mean to listen to more often than I do. Every time I play it, I hear something new, and I especially marvel at the daring stereo seperation that this band would try out. If nothing else, this is one heck of a headphone album. But I think what I like about S.F. Sorrow the most at the moment is as follows: the more I listen to the album, the more that it will reveal to me, beause while I enjoy it... I don't fully "get it" on the level that the average rock critic wants me to. They want me to think that they know something that I don't... but there's nothing wrong with simply dropping the needle on a record and liking what you hear without understanding the bigger picture. Christgau, I'm looking in your direction.

33. Jellybean! - Breakfast Burrito & A Coffee To Go (2007):

Jellybean! is the recording persona of Santa Barbara's Kelly Bold, a gal with a penchant for butterflies, ukeleles and... appropriating popular hip hop songs and rearranging them with new melodies/the most sparse arrangements possible.

I know, I know... the idea should wear thin after the first song, right? Not the case at all. Kelly not only has the voice of an angel, but she's got a penchant for melodies that adhere themselves to singalongs, even though the original songs themselves don't really beg for repeated listenings. On this record in particular, Kelly takes on Sisqo's infamous "Thong Song" as "Underwear Is Wearing, Not For Showing", and makes it one of the catchiest tunes you've ever heard, armed with only a few chords, a coat of recording hiss, and way more heart than anyone should put into a cover tune.

And that's Jellybean's hat trick. You're completely confused at every turn. Is she joking? Is she serious? She's doing gangsta rap in the stylings of... twee pop? But if you spend too much time picking it all apart, you'll miss the fun of her reinvention of R. Kelly's "Ignition"!

But wait a second! These original tunes may actually be better than her reinterpretations! Just try and get "That Bitch Ruined 6th Grade" out of your head. Can't do it. I'm willing to bet dollars to doughnuts on it! Because I'd just spend all of my dollars on doughnuts anyways, so you'd be saving me a trip!

So, yes. Jellybean! She may be on a hiatus, but the happiness I get from her albums will never take a vacation...

Yeah, I'm actually ending the review that way.

34. Hot Lava - Lavalogy (2008):

I'm positively addicted to this album by Hot Lava. And you know... I'd have never heard of them had I not been given the chance to play a show with them in Georgia. Both Chris and I had checked out some of their stuff on MySpace, and we liked it, and I dug it live, but I wasn't at all prepared for just how long these songs would stick in my skull.

So, let's go through all of the things I love about Lavalogy. First off, these songs are wonderfully irreverent and fun. Songs about mummies at the beach, online gaming, dragons that eat vegans and something called a "lovefoxxx", and they're all punctuated by Allison Apperson's wonderful baritone. And those aforementioned vocals? Coated in various effects. Not to "fix" her voice or anything, but more to do weird things to it. Ten songs with hooks that never quit, all in under 30 minutes.

Onstage, Hot Lava is a restrained animal, but the album really gives the songs room to drill their way into your head. And while the story goes that Hot Lava was started as a joke, it's a joke that the band seems to take incredibly seriously. I don't really find anything "funny" about the songs, instead I see them as wonderfully executed and FUN. Like have-a-living-room-dance-party fun.

Lavalogy is an album full of three minute or less pop wonders, crashing through in all of it's treble-laden glory. And now the album has been nationally released by Bar/None, home of Oppenheimer and those great early albums by Yo La Tengo and They Might Be Giants. I can only hope that the album blows some hipster minds, and that this band will infect everyone else with their giddyness the same way that they crept up on me. Long live the Lavatory!!!!

35. Dr. Dooom - Dr. Dooom 2 (2008):

I'm terrified to review this album, because of lyrics like these:

From "Mopped Up".
"First thing you gon' do as a journalist is compare this to the first Dr. Dooom / Fuck you / I come and find you and slice your kneecaps into coldcuts in the room / You criticize these raps so advertisers / watch me pour some gas on your face / And set your hair on fire / Move your nose off your body with hammers and workman tires / Texas Chainsaw Massacre liars / Punch you in the face like Aaron Pryor".

From "Always Talkin' Out Your Ass":
"Yo everybody wanna talk shit, when you make a new album / It's not good as the last one / How many have sold? / See all them cheap-ass niggaz that review your record / Them suckers with fancy iPods, like a bitch they download/ And go on the internet like a booking agent asking you for a free show / They destroyed the goodness like somebody pissin in the snow
A bunch of underground groups, fuckin up the game / Goin out with they ass out and a cheap-ass band / For five hundred a night, that's the reason why hip-hop is dead".

Uhhhh... so yes. Dr. Dooom 2 is a Kool Keth record. It's really good. I bought it. I have faith that other people will like it as well. Please don't hurt me, Mr. Dooom.

Please?

36. Tsunami - The Heart's Tremolo (1994):

I had a raging crush on Tsunami-frontwoman Jenny Toomey back in the day, you know. It wasn't the reason I bought her albums, but it didn't hurt after I had my head torn off by their Deep End LP and the "Flameproof Suit" single - which I really wish I still had. I mean, not only did she have a voice that could melt butter while jackhammering skyscrapers, but she was one of the few indie folks that perfectly balanced artistry with business. After all, she was the main gal behind the wonderful Simple Machines label, but... jesus christ, this gal was more talented than anyone gave her credit for.

As a band, Tsunami was a muscular, angular and unpredictable group that teetered the edge between stop/start precision and barely restrained chaos. Sometimes those ringing guitar lines were doubled to make a noise so thick that it almost stopped being pretty. Other times, like in The Heart's Tremolo's opening track, "Loud Is As Loud Does", the band was such a whirling and pummeling ball of energy that the guitars would actually go out of tune... and then be beaten back into tune by the end of that measure.

In short, I have no earthly idea why this band never truly got their due.

But it's Jenny Toomey's vocals and lyrics that glue this wall-of-atonality together. Vocal acrobatics abound on the shoulda-been-a-hit called "Be Like That", and even though her lyrical subjects sometimes went a little too far into "the woes of being independent", few could do it more poetically than she did on this albums "Kidding On The Square".

I am under the impression that this and all Tsunami albums are out of print and will remain that way, but I'm telling you this as a friend: if you ever run across one, buy it. If you spend time "sampling" it, you may not catch all of the nuances that get stronger year after year, and you may put it back down. You will never know the joys of how a Tsunami album ages in your head. Seriously, just buy any one of their albums. They are all wonderful. Gear up for an indie rock rubiks cube like you've never experienced.

And while Toomey has been busy in the years past with her Future Of Music coalition... here's to hoping she releases some more records for us all to enjoy again soon.

37. Queen - A Night At The Opera (1975):

I don't have anything new to say about this, an album that is not only one of the finest rock albums ever recorded, but also one that may be among the most important and definitive statements of the twentieth century. But I'll tell you some of my favorite parts about it.

When I'm looking to show people exactly why I think that vinyl sounds better than compact discs, I don't look any further than A Night At The Opera, the very definition of "dynamic range". You drop the needle on "Death On Two Legs", turn the volume up, and you can literally watch your listener go from thinking "oh come on, how much different can this really sound" to thinking "hmmm... how much can I get if I trade in my entire compact disc collection". It's really a sight to behold.

But not quite as impressive as a song like "You're My Best Friend": one of the most popular bubblegum pop songs ever committed to wax, and one that bassist John Deacon apparently just made up on the spot while trying out his new piano or something. And then you've got stuff like the dixeland horn solo of "Good Company"... which doesn't have a single horn at all. Nope, it's just Brian May approximating what such a thing might have sounded like via experimentations with various guitar tones and effects boxes. The rumor goes that every single note was recorded seperately.

Huh?!?!?!?!?

Of course, one can't talk about A Night At The Opera without bringing up the massterful "Bohemian Rhapsody", a track that builds into an immeasurable spine-tingler to this day, over thirty years after it was recorded, and it still stands as one of the brightest hallmarks in the history of studio wizadry, and certainly one of the most daring tracks to ever grace the A-side of a single.

But the real gem here - as if there was a bad track to be found - is easily "The Prophet's Song". I mean, yes, there is Freddie Mercury's famous acapella solo that pretty much makes the best usage of tape delay in rock history, but this is just one epic, crushing melody... and besides the monstrous riff that anchors the meat of the tune, there's almost no predictable resolution to any of the chord patterns here. You'd never even realize it, unless you were sitting there studying the song with chord charts, and I imagine that those would look similar to Stockhausen's scores after you spilled a Pepsi on them.

A Night At The Opera is talked about so often today, that we often forget just what an amazing and listenable album it really is. One of the few albums that's always brought up in "best albums ever" list that still warrants the title and the praise. But, uh... stay away from the CD versions. They still haven't gotten it right on that format.

38. The Capstan Shafts - Cretin Flowers (2008):

Here's a novel thing. As of this writing, I have had the new Capstan Shafts release in my paws for roughly one day. It's only available online, and as I've made clear millions of times... I prefer "albums" that I can actually hold in my hands and own. This one is only digital, and it's so good that I almost don't give a fuck that there's no physical release.

Now, I could go on and on about the head of the Shafts, Dean Wells, but we'll just boil it all down to this: he's a lo-fi genius that churns out hissy pop songs that are so good, you'll swear he's the second coming of Tobin Sprout. He releases between 50-150 songs per year, and each album tops the last in some way. He used to be a pretty reclusive guy, but the last year has seen him playing mysterious shows that are only the stuff of legend. Few bits of proof exist that the shows ever occured, really... although there are a few YouTube videos that show either Dean playing with a band or... there's a really, really good Capstan Shafts cover band out there.

Now, this is also a novel release for me to write about since it's not technically an "album"... it's actually a six song, nine-minute EP. But since it's got enough hooks to dwarf an average record by any johnny-come-lately tunesmith, we'll make an exception. The biggest highlights here for me are "3 Million Weeks Of Leaving" with it's "she's American where it counts" refrain, and the relentless "Space Nut To Ape Length".

Many people would have you believe that all Capstan Shafts releases are interchangable, but if you compare any of these tunes to, say, 2004's Chick Cigarettes album, the only unifying quality is really Dean's voice. The songs are still brash and decidedly lo-fi, but the hooks cut deeper, and the guitar leads are a little tougher. Hell, I'd venture to say that he almost sounds more confident here than ever. It's not that there hasn't been any progression in the Capstan Shafts camp, it's more that the releases have come out so quickly that it's nearly impossible for the average spectator to notice any sea change between each album.

Hear me now and believe me later: if this is the throwaway "online-only" stuff, then Dean is silently cooking up his best material yet. For those that are so inclined to make GBV references, this is The Grand Hour EP, and he's steps away from his very own Bee Thousand. Mark my words, people.

39. Helium - The Dirt Of Luck (1995):

You know how sometimes you'll run across an album and say to yourself "that's it... I'm following this band from here on out"? The Dirt Of Luck did that for me with Helium. It's slow, it's sludgy. It may be the very definition of the word "dissonant". And I'll be honest... it might be one of the most unfairly treated albums in my collection.

You see, Mary Timony had her own thing going on with Helium before this. The band lost their bassist, and Mary had her boyfriend, Ash Bowie, come in to fill in on the needed duties. The only issue was that Ash was in another band called Polvo. And this "Polvo" had a diehard fanbase in the indie rock community, and most folks attributed Polvo's dissolution to his tenure in Helium. Not to the fact that Ash Bowie might've been perfectly capable of making up his own mind over which band he wanted to devote his time and skill to. And frankly... I've heard his solo record. He's a talented guy, but I'm thinking neither band would have suffered all that much without him. But what do I know?

Anyways, let's look at all of the components here:

Mary Timony's voice: Mary has the voice of a slightly tone-deaf angel. She has a wonderfully piercing falsetto, a delicate yet angry whisper, and a smooth baritone that can absolutely destroy you with a simple phrase. Most of her lyrics are seemingly drawn from the Mary Daly school of feminism, but her tonality screams "I'm strong, but am I really *that* strong"? For every saccharine "I like pretty baby candy" line, she's answering herself with something like "The only good man's a dead man". Her voice is the anchor of Helium, and the first thing you'll notice.

The stringed instruments: It might sound silly that I'd lump the bass and guitar together here, especially when you consider that Mary Timony is a guitar wizard that deserves to be spoken of in the same breath as your Curt Kirkwood's and your J Mascis's. But there are simply times that it's impossible to tell the dreamy aspects of her playing apart from what might be a bass harmonic. Timony and Bowie blend so seamlessly that it's almost as if they're playing from the same consciousness. Take "Trixie's Star" for example. I've even seen live videos from the era, and I still can't tell exactly who is playing which part.

Those drums: Shawn "King" Devlin is a rare sort of drummer indeed. He's not a timekeeper. He's not showing off in any way. He does keep a beat, sure. But his job here is mostly to provide atmospherics for the song at hand to work inside of. For years, i actually thought that the only way the band could be MORE perfect was to get a drummer that called a bit more attention to himself, but after living with this album for over ten years, I have to say... that notion was fucking stupid.

When Mary Timony went solo a few years later, I thought to myself that it was okay, as she really was the whole band. Boy, was I wrong. She's made some great records on her own, don't get me wrong, but the direct vision apparent in the Helium records is just... gone. I'm sure that Mary probably looks back on these early records with some embarrassment, and judging by her setlist in years past, I'm probably not far off.

The Dirt of Luck is it's own hypnotic animal. There is no record like it on earth, and the same can be said for anything else the band produced. But for me, this is the one that stands above the rest, looking down on society with a hazy, opiate-induced sneer. They don't make 'em like this anymore, and the indie community would do well to get off of their high horse and wise up.

40. Rilo Kiley - The Execution Of All Things (2002):

I loved this album "back in the day". So much so that I probably saw this band at least four or five times on their tour supporting this album. But... I didn't like it at first. Not at all.

I'd been a fan of this band for qa few years when Execution came out. And by "for a few years", I mean since I saw the video for "The Frug" on MTV like everyone else. I tracked down a copy of their first CD - the one with "Glendora" - and immediately decided that they were the best indie pop band going at the moment. My fanaticism continued through the release of their much different, much darker second platter, Take Offs & Landings. But when this album came out? Oh man, it was so slick, and it had all these ill-placed electronic moments, the lyrics sounded more like prose that anything coherent, and I simply didn't get it at all.

So, on a chilly winter night, I went to go see Rilo Kiley support this album while opening for Rainer Maria. I was hoping that they'd do a ton of older stuff, and I'd planned to politely clap during the "new" songs. It was my first time seeing RK live. I didn't want to hear the title track, a song that i considered disjointed and... ungood. I wanted to hear "Teenage Love Song", "Wires & Waves" and maybe even "Troubadors". Instead, Jenny lewis and co hop on the stage and jump into "My Slumbering Heart". My patience was already being tested... until the track built into the "it just feels good when it's waking up" portion. I looked behind me, and saw the entire venue turn into a gigantic dance party. I stopped being so uptight, and after seeing it live, it all made total sense. I didn't even care that the only pre-2002 song they played that night was "Science Vs. Romance".

Afterwards, it's fair to say that Execution clicked for me. It probably didn't leave my car's CD player for about six months, and I have friends that can back up said statement. I'd routinely rock out to "Spectacular Views" on the long rides to shows, and try in vain to figure out the ridiculous harmonies on the record. I'd scream along with "A Better/Son Daughter" and "With Arms Outstretched" just like everyone else did. I thought that jenny lewis was the second coming of the rock frontwoman, and that Blake Sennet was the guitar god we'd all been looking for. From start to finish... the album destroyed me every single time.

I never really got into their post-Execution work. Saw them do it live, and it didn't do it for me. I'm a big fan of those first few albums, and EOAT somehow became my favorite. It's the one I played the most and eventually identified with more than any of their other work. Now, it's also the one that stands up best for me. And to think... I didn't even like it at first!

And now, as promised, here's your mix! You can download it from: http://sharebee.com/03aeb1f5

It contains:
01. The Capstan Shafts - Space Nut To Ape Length
02. Jellybean! - That Bitch Ruined 6th Grade!
03. Hot Lava - Apple+Option+Fire
04. Dr. Dooom - Mopped Up
05. Queen - Good Company
06. The Pretty Things - She Says Good Morning
07. Rilo Kiley - Capturing Moods
08. Frank Zappa - Sex
09. Helium - Superball
10. Tsunami - Kidding on The Square

See you in ten albums!

Albums I Like: Volume Three

2008-10-20T10:06:00.000-07:00

Yay! It's time for the third installment! Let's not waste any time...

21. Robert Pollard With Doug Gillard - Speak Kindly Of Your Volunteer Fire Department (1999)

Man, was 1999 an epic year for Mr. Pollard or what? Both this album *and* the Guided By Voices Do The Collapse LP? I mean... damn. Most songwriters write that many great songs in a *lifetime*. But between the two, this is the 1999 LP I turn to the most. Maybe it's the lo-fi fanatic in me, or maybe it's the fact that these songs have hooks that stick in your head for days. I dunno.

This record has gloomy stuff, "I Get Rid Of You", seemingly off-the-cuff-masterpieces, "And My Unit Moves", and songs that oughta be considered some of the greatest fucking rock anthems of our time: "Tight Globes", "Do Something Real", "Frequent Weaver Who Burns"... the list goes on.

Every single track on this album is a mini-epic in it's own right. And later, the pair would attempt a much more prog-influenced follow-up under the Lifeguards moniker. And on certain days, I actually prefer that album. But every single time I put this one on? It's almost hard to even remember that this guy has written and released more songs than nearly any human in the history of music. If this was the only album Pollard had ever done, he'd still be a living legend.

It's just some quickly recorded arena rock done 4-track style, but it pretty much beats everything else in the genre at it's own game. Highly recommended to those folks that think Pollard stopped being relevant after Bee Thousand and Alien Lanes.

22. The Monkees - The Birds, The Bees & The Monkees (1968):

And speaking of bands I should have covered by now...

I'm not gonna get into my patented Monkees defense mechanism just yet. We'll say this, though: as far as *pop* groups of the sixties are concerned, The Monkees are my ultimate favorites. Yes, I like them better than the Beatles. I like them better than the Kinks. Wayyyy better than the Stones. And the Who? Well, The Who were a fucking balls-out rock band, so there's no comparison.

I won't get into all of the groundbreaking things that the Monkees did for music and film. Today, I'm just going to concentrate on this fucking phenomenal overlooked gem, The Birds, The Bees & The Monkees. You may know it as "the one with 'Daydream Believer' on it". You may not know anything about them at all!

The band decided to do a double album this time around. Each member would get one side of a vinyl record to showcase what they thought the Monkees were all about. And then that idea was scrapped for reasons unknown to me. As a result, I'm not sure that Peter Tork is even present on this album in any way. I could go and consult that bitchin' Monkees sessionography website - the one that details that, yes, this was in fact a real band - but I'm not that interested, really. Besides, his best contributions to these sessions would later be released to much greater effect on the soundtrack to Head, the greatest film you've never seen.

When this was all whittled down to one solitary platter, though? Holy. Fucking. Shit.

Since this is sort of a "best of what would have been Monkees solo EP's" sort of album, let's do this by band members:

Davy Jones: He's usually the weak link for me. His compositions are often so schmaltzy that I get truly uncomfortable listening to them. Like, I know that they are good songs, but his delivery? Blech. Usually it doesn't do it for me. But these songs? He gets every single one of them dead right. There's all the schmaltz one could ask for in the surprisingly wonderful "We Were Made For Each Other". The prettiness turns to anger in the string-laden "Dream World". Some find "Valleri" to be sickening bubblegum pop at it's worst... I say, that's a heavy-ass guitar riff, and a great chorus to boot. Some folks say that "The Poster" is a less-than-memorable track here... I say that it's possibly my favorite Davy tune ever. Some are incredibly sick of "Daydream Believer". I'd put it in the 20 best pop compositions ever written. And performed. By anyone. Ever.

Micky Dolenz: Okay, let's get it out of the way... "Zor And Zam" lays it on a bit thick as as the marching album closer, but that's about the extent of the issues I've got with this record. "I'll Be Back Up On My Feet" is like the great lost Monkees single, people. How in the hell was this never released on at least a jukebox 45 to be played at your local soda fountain? Seriously. These guys would later think nothing of releasing pap like "D.W. Washburn" as an A-side, but stuff like *this* gets relegated to "album status". I don't get it, but fine. I'll keep it our little secret. Beyond that, dig those falsetto vocal gymnastics in "P.O. Box 9847"! Marvel at the Dolenz/Nesmith mastery of the country rock canon in "Auntie's Municipal Court"! Wonder why the hell "I'll Be Back Up On My Feet" WAS NOT A SINGLE, BUT "Someday Man" GOT THE GO AHEAD? WHAT THE CRAP!

Mike Nesmith: Well, look. Nez is just a fucking genius, and we all know it. Let's stop pretending otherwise. Remember the country stomper we just talked about? "Auntie's Municipal Court"? It's the weakest of his tracks here! The real gems on this album in general are not only Nez's tracks, but the ones that he sang lead on. Take "Writing Wrongs" for example. This track doesn't even make any musical sense, really. It's like two songs pasted together, and drowned out by an almost offensive church organ, but repeated listenings reveal this to be one of the best reverb-laden bits of psychedlia ever. And psych-freaks will never hear it because of their prejudice towards anything Monkees related. Hah. Joke is on them. Same with "Tapioca Tundra", which is so fucking driving and birlliant that I don't even want to talk about it. And that leaves "Magnolia Simms". The original pressing left all of this track in one channel to replicate the sound of an old Victrola, complete with skips and all. Just a few weeks ago, my buddy Chris sent me an angry message about how he forgot that this was the case. He spent ensuing hours fucking with his headphones, wondering what the hell happened to his computer.

Nez: 1. Chris: 0.

The whole is greater than the sum of it's parts here on The Birds, The Bees & The Monkees, but what a whole it is!

Hopefully this one will be reissued soon. Otherwise you'll just have to thumb your nose up at Rhino Records and download this illegally. Which I would never condone. Not for such a great album that the owners refuse to make available for public consumption. No, not me.

I recommend SoulSeek.

23. Patrick Bell - The Confessor (2008):

Patrick Bell is a buddy of mine, let's just get that out of the way now. If you're familiar with him, it's likely because of his work with his older spazzcore band Bucket Of Nails. Said group was loud, confrontational and pretty obnoxious... but they certainly left a lasting impression anywhere they played. He was the vocalist/drummer/wild man, while his brother made the bulk of the ruckus on guitar while barely moving a muscle. If you ever saw the Bucket, you've still never forgotten it.

The Confessor is a whole different animal altogether, really. It's relatively quiet, but it's a bit too emotive to comfortably sit amongst the current indie scene. There's a bit too much sonic depth for it to fit into the lo-fi genre. And there's way too much thought put into the arrangements for it to be tossed off. Heck, this mostly acoustic album is coming out of the guy who was once known for a two-minute noise extravaganza called "This Sounds Better Than Bright Eyes"? Wacky.

Now, Mr. Bell has made some records in the past. They are good, sure. But none of them could have prepared any of his listeners for the attention to lyrical detail we'd get on The Confessor. You wouldn't be expecting such great melodies, and you certainly wouldn't be ready for the unexpected yet controlled outbursts of the title track.

Here's what you should know, in short: this is a fucking fantastic record. It's built on quiet drums, some keyboards, cheap acoustic guitars and Patrick's voice. There's an overarching theme to the album, but it's more fun to just figure it out for yourself than for me to tell you. The album is a creeper, and one can only hope that he's got more stuff like this up his sleeve.

You need this album.

24. All Girl Summer Fun Band - LP (2002):

Ahhh. It was a breezy autumn day back in 2003. Chris Zabriskie absent-mindedly obtains this album and forgets to let me know. Might not seem like a big deal, but the guy knew that a platter full of simple three-chord pop, anemic instrumentation and girl group nods was right up my alley. I think after I heard it, I got really mad and asked something like "what on earth were you doing with this twee record and when the hell were you going to let me know about it?". He made me a copy, and I drove home, windows rolled down, enjoying the cooling temperatures and the feel-good vibes contained on the debut full-length from AGSFB.

Of course, this was all before I knew that it was pure anathema to admit enjoyment of something so innocent and fun. Indie folks don't really like fun unless they have to think about it really hard. You know, the type of people that claim to dance to Can and Deerhoof. Pssh. Whatever. I didn't care that this record was getting trashed by Pitchfork. Pitchfork also gave Juliana Hatfield's brilliant Made In China a 5.0, Low's mind-blowing The Great Destroyer a 5.5, and Tsunami's epochal A Brilliant Mistake a mere 5.8. They also thought that the last Animal Collective platter was worth a 9.3. A 9.3???? People... that's 0.1% higher than they rated THE FIRST ALBUM BY THE MODERN LOVERS.

So yeah, ever since, if I see a relatively low-rated album by a pop band in said zine, it's usually like a big flashing neon sign for me to go and check it out ASAP. For example, they really liked the 2008 AGSFB album, and while it's good... that "summer fun" spirit just isn't as apparent as it is here on this nearly flawless lo-fi pop gem. In 27 minutes, these four gals talk about boys, ex-boys, future boys, angels, cell phones and... boys. Oh, and they give themselves a theme song. It may be self-consciously cute, but if you couldn't predict that by simply reading the name of the band, then I'm not quite sure what the fuck you are doing when buying records.

The guitars jangle, the harmonies drift in and out of pitch, but the band always sounds like they are having just as much fun as the listener. This album is a classic. Fuck the critics.

25. Donna Lynn - Java Jones / My Boyfriend Got A Beatle Haircut (1964):

I don't know too much about this album, and I think that the surrounding mystery likely keeps me coming back more often than I might otherwise. Then again, I drop the needle on this hard-won platter and any of the peripheral bullshit melts away. It's just such a joyous slab o' pop that I can never get enough of it. One spin turns into twenty, and my wife can attest to this.

Here's what I definably know about Donna Lynn: she was around fourteen years of age when this album came out. Capitol records didn't so much know what to do with her, so they had her record a bunch of those "gee, I really like the Beatles" songs that were all the rage at the time. She was linked to Keith Richards, and the jury is still out on just how linked she actually was. He did write her first minor hit, "I'd Much Rather Be With The Girls", which sadly isn't present here. There are very few credits on the album itself, and beyond a throwaway Japanese 45 or two, this would pretty much be the last anyone ever heard of her.

The instrumentation is pretty indicative of the girl-group sound of the day, sure. But the real treasure her is Donna Lynn's voice itself. When she's covering "Roll Over Beethoven", just try not to swoon over her overtly emphatic falsetto "woooo" that puncuates, well, nearly every damn line in the song, for example. But there's more here than meets the ear upon first listen, mostly the I-want--to-be-on-an-even-playing-field-with-the-boys-but-I-am-merely-a-little-girl attitude in her voice. Try to overlook her phrasing on the "I have been taught / A girl shouldn't speak" line in "The Things That I Feel". And when she dreams of being a Beatle? She might be fantasizing about rocking out with her favorite band, but in her daydream, she's right up front taking the lead. In 1964? That was fucking ballsy.

The real gem here is the album closer: "That's Me - I'm The Brother". Here's what I originally wrote about the track in RetroLowFi:

"Now, while I’m sure that this tune titled “That’s Me - I’m The Brother” probably wasn’t meant as anything but a silly novelty number, it’s actually one of the most beautifully sad things I’ve ever heard in my life. There’s just something about the way Donna tells the tale of being sheltered from the world by her numerous older sisters, but also casually mentions that she has a younger brother named Joe that utterly destroys me. Mix that in with the absolutely gobstopping harmonies in the chorus and I’m crying into my soda. I don’t know why, it’s just kind of a sad tale overall.
My take on the song shouldn’t scare you off, though. I would easily put it up there with the best novelty pop of the decade without batting an eye. Give Donna Lynn a chance!"

There are further laments on being too young and sheletered to do what she really wants - which mostly seems to be dating without a chaperone - on "Our Day Will Come", and keeping in mind her age... "Navy Blue" is more than a little unsettling. Her boy left for the Navy, right? She's 14, and I don't think I have to remind you of the minimum age you had to be to join the American armed forces at the time.
This is an accidentally layerd and loaded pop album that will keep you fascinated - and singing along - for years to come. Oh, and if anyone is sitting on a copy of any of her non-Capitol singles, let me know. I'm dying to hear them.

26. The Simple Carnival - Girls Aliens Food (2008):

It's probably a bad thing that I'm writing about Girls Aliens Food, because I really have no idea how to describe it to you accurately. Nowhere in my vocabulary have I found words to express the joy that pulses through me when I hear the easy-going pop of Jeff Boller's Simple Carnival. So instead, I'll ramble for a bit until I get somewhere.

Okay, so... Jeff is a one-man band. He's a damned fine one at that. In a way, it sort of bugs me that I'll probably never get to see Boller take these songs on the road, but if he did, I'd probably mourn the loss of character that a live band might bring to the songs. See, many one-man deedlybobs stay very one dimensional, but not Jeff's Simple Carnival work. No way, Jack. Girls Aliens Food is a very restrained sort of fun, but it's fun nonetheless. Every instrument and voice is so clearly defined that you almost imagine him whispering every vocal line in a soundproof environment, not a speck of dust in the room. The best musical description I can come up with is if you were to cross Harry Nilsson's Schmilsson albums with a more tongue-in-cheek late period Beach Boys. And I'd be willing to bet that Jeff has worn out a copy or two of Wings At The Speed Of Sound.

I first received some Simple Carnival music in the mail for review at the old RetroLowFi site. It was an EP that contained different versions of a few tracks from this album, as well as a fleshed out cover of Nilsson's "Me And My Arrow". When I reviewed it, I said something to the effect of "if I don't get a full length album from this act soon, I'm gonna cry like a little bitch". Now I can honestly say that if something happened to my copy of Girls Aliens Food, I'd be standing there in the corner with a snot bubble coming out of my nose, peeing myself, weeping softly for my mommy to make it all better. I'm that attached to it, folks.

Some of my favorite moments on the album include, but are not limited to:

- the effortless multi-part harmonies present in the soothing acapella "Nothing Will Ever Be As Good"
- the Esquivel by way of early Komeda mood of the wacky "Cocktails"
- that soaring falsetto chorus in "Caitlin's On The Beach" that I just cant get over
- the way those "bop bop" backing vocals play against the honky-tonk piano in the sublime "Really Really Weird"
- who couldn't love the phone ringing phone being answered by a quick "shhh" in , of course, "Keeping It Quiet"?

One listen to Girls Aliens Food, and you're gonna fall for it just as hard as I did. It's the "Albums I Like" guarantee!

27. Pink Floyd - Atom Heart Mother (1970):

I know, I know. I wrote about Pink Floyd in the last entry. Boo hoo. I'm a Floyd obsessive, and people... this is the risk you run when you read a blog. You never know what you're getting into, and you certainly can't predict the tastes of the author. And you know what? I really don't care if you want to read about Atom Heart Mother or not. Most of the world hates this album. Including the band members that made it. Seriously, let me punctuate my point with quotes that I researched in a very, very exhausting manner. (Or pulled directly from Wikipedia. You be the judge.)

"Atom Heart Mother is a good case, I think, for being thrown into the dustbin and never listened to by anyone ever again!" - Roger Waters (Pink Floyd's resident egomaniac and bassist)

"Atom Heart Mother strikes me as absolute crap" - David Gilmour (Pink Floyd's other resident egomaniac, but he's much more polite, so people give him a hall pass)

"I listen to it with acute embarrassment... didn't really work on record but was great fun live. I've never heard Roger lay claim to it, which makes me think it must have been a group idea." - Nick Mason (Pink Floyd's drummer who rarely has anything bad to say in public)

"If somebody said to me now: "Right...here's a million pounds, go out and play Atom Heart Mother", I'd say: "You must be fucking joking...I'm not playing that rubbish!". 'Cos then I really would be embarrassed." - Roger Waters (Pink Floyd's crochety old man in an obviously jovial mood).

"..." - Richard Wright (Pink Floyd's keyboardist that I couldn't find any quotes from)

"I didn't have anything, really, to do with the start of Atom Heart Mother, and when I asked them what it was about, they said they didn't know themselves." Storm Thorgerson (The guy that makes Pink Floyd's ALBUM COVERS even distanced himself from it).

Yes, folks. Everyone on earth pans this album. And seriously... how far up your own ass do you have to be in order to disown an album that you had complete creative control of that *went to number one*? Yeah, rubbish, that one. Oh, Gilmour and Mason were busy dreaming up brilliant shit like "One Slip" or something, and they were just making this masterpiece to pass the time. Right? Proof positive that enough money and pats on the back will make anyone go insane, because if I ever make anything half as good as any part of the Atom Heart Mother LP, I'm never making another goddamn thing. You could come and visit me, but I might not even talk to you. I'll be too stuck up. After all, I'd be the guy that made something that rivaled Atom Heart Mother. Suck it.

Side one of the album is the big ol' "Atom Heart Mother" suite. It has an orchestra. You should know that I almost universally loathe orchestral compositions. They don't move me or anything. This one kicks my ass all over the place. The ensemble sounds huge and is capable of taking you though about a billion nightmarish moods in the twenty-minute lifespan of the track. I do slightly prefer the version that the Floyd would play live as a mere four-piece, but... only slightly.

Side two has one of the first truly great Waters compositions in "If" (get a load of the hidden noise after the "Please don't put your wires in my brain" line!), Gilmour's "Fat Old Sun" which he sure performs a lot for hating this album so damned much, and a multi-part suite called "Alan's Psychedelic Breakfast" that is the very definition of... um, mood-enhancing? I dunno. I didn't think that through. It's a very relaxing end to the album, though. I especially like the acoustic "Daybreak" portion. But seriously... "Summer 68"? Quite possibly the greatest Rick Wright composition of all time? Somehow *this* is not as good as, say, "Dogs Of War" to Gilmour and Mason?

I'm actually getting visibly upset writing this. The world doesn't understand Atom Heart Mother, but that's because they want another Dark Side Of The Moon. This isn't it, obviously. It's a brilliant album in it's own right, and you should own it. It's the one with the cow on the cover. Get over yourselves and give this one another shot. Have your mind blown.

28. Velocity Girl - Simpatico (1994):

I know, I know. I'm supposed to think that every Velocity Girl album gets progressively worse. I'm supposed to prefer the shoegazey dreamland of their previous LP Copacetic to Simpatico, which was supposedly an obvious bid towards becoming more accessible and radio-friendly. It doesn't work that way, though. While Copacetic is very nice, it's actually one of the few times that I think Steve Albini's patented recording techniques didn't work out so well. Sarah Shannon's voice is buried on that record, and therefore all of the great hooks are buried underneath some swirly guitars. It's good, but it almost sounds like the group was trying to hide themselves. Simpatico has an air of self-confidence that was *just right*. All of the band members were equally balanced in their duties, and you still had to work just a little bit for the pop hooks that'd undoubtedly have you coming back for more.

On Simpatico, you'll find twelve of the finest tracks recorded by an indie pop band, anywhere, ever. Sarah Shannon's voice is so direct, pretty and upfront that she almost sounds out of place in an indie rock band, but like it or not, she's the anchor for Velocity Girl. Behind that unforgettable and classically trained soprano, you'll find a bed of chiming guitars in alternate tunings and weird capo positions. On first listen, it's easy to miss the fact that these songs aren't actually that complex, they just don't sound like anything we were used to back in 1994. They didn't break a ton of new ground, but they polished existing standards well beyond expectations.

Also perfectly balanced here is the vocal interplay between Shannon and guitarist Archie Moore. On tracks like "The All Consumer", they wield an unpredictable and deceptively perplexing vocal harmony at just the right times. Of course, that vocal interplay would find quite a bit of seperation on the later Velocity Girl songs, but here? Not only are they damn near-perfect, but they seperate Velocity Girl from all of the comparisons to other dreamy pop groups of the time, specifically Lush. Where Lush would sing a ton of held notes for harmonies and bury them under a wall of studio dross, Velocity Girl would mix those vocals front and center with a totally dry mix, showing off all imperfections... and there weren't any.

Simpatico is a warm and inviting album with a few dark lyrical overtones of confusion, apathy and heartbreak, but mostly it just sounds good. Doesn't really come across as a period piece as so many Sub Pop albums from this era do. I've spun this album more times than nearly any other from this decade, as if I'm trying to unlock some mystery about this band - mostly why they didn't turn the world on their collective ears. The attempted mystery in earlier releases were obvious production tricks, but this record? It's a wonderful example of why it's a good idea to try and lay your musical cards on the table for everyone to see, at least once. Simpatico is all substance, very little style. Absolutely brilliant and endlessly playable.

Now... if we could just get them to do a reunion tour...

29. R.E.M. - Up (1998):

I'm not gonna be all big and bad, pretending that I understood this record right off the bat. Hell no. I was just like the average lifelong R.E.M. fan that got this on the day of release, wondering where the hell all of the jangle pop went. At the time, I'm pretty sure that I chalked it all up to the departure of Bill Berry, because as history has shown us... these were four guys that really, really needed each other. With Berry in the drummers seat, there was no end to the jangly empire. Sure, there were weird rest stops along the way, like Monster. And while I've got your attention... can we please collectively stop pretending that we hate that album? I know. It's loud, it's distorted, and "King Of Comedy" is a bit annoying. Beyond that, come on, we *all* bought the thing, and it was the modern rock soundtrack of 1995, whether you want to admit it or not. If you can give me one good reason that Monster isn't as good as, say, Fables Of The Reconstruction then... I'll be fuckin' surprised.

Anyways, back to Up.

Up is one of those records that's either gonna be one of your lifelong favorites, or it's gonna be the R.E.M. record that you always intend to understand one day. It's melodramatic, multidimensional... and it really might just be the band's masterpiece. Here's four good reasons to like this album:

1. THE BALLADS: Admit it. You like a good R.E.M. ballad as much as the next person. You know all of the words to "Everybody Hurts", even though you pretend that the song annoys you when you hear it in an elevator. And you're in luck... two-thirds of this album is as slow and beautiful as the dizziest heights of Automatic For The People.

2. LYRICS, BABY: Once Stipe gets past the silly outbursts of "Lotus", this album is all about finding beauty in lonliness, strength in nothing, etc. He does it especially well here. Sometimes he's a martyr, ("Falls To Climb"), sometimes he's giving a pep talk to someone as down as he is, ("Why Not Smile"), and sometimes he's almost a creepy-yet-lovable stalker, ("At My Most Beautiful"). But he's also pretty straightforward here. You won't find a ton of poetic Stipe-isms here... just direct observations over situations. It's telling that this was first R.E.M. album to ever come with the lyrics enclosed.

3. SPACE: When played on a regular ol' sound system, Up might sound super quiet to you. Strap on a decent pair of headphones and marvel at an album that sounds utterly huge. This ain't no guitar/bass/drums vehicle. Nope. This thing almost predicts tones that people would lose their shit over when Radiohead later dropped Kid A, and I'm absolutely stoic in my position that Up was a fucking huge inspiration for said project. Of coruse, I've never heard Thom Yorke say anything that backs up my claims, so I'm probably talking out of my ass. But, yeah. What was I saying? Oh, yes. This album is the very *definition* of space. Try it on your walkman sometime. You'll see what I mean.

4. "SAD PROFESSOR": The greatest R.E.M. song of all time? It's highly fucking likely.

I don't care if the world at large didn't really "get" Up. Actually, I do. It means that there's less chance that the band will play songs from it in concert, and that's a damn shame, because these songs rule in a live environment. Like, "Walk Unafraid"? That's a pretty good tune on record. But in a live setting? Holy crap, that song becomes the kind of anthemic barn burner that would the members of U2 run into the woods, crying, screaming for their fucking mommy.

I'll say it loud and proud: Up is R.E.M.'s finest hour. Unless you don't like R.E.M., in which case you're just not thinking straight, and your mother and I think that you should seek some counseling.

30. The Breeders - Title TK (2002):

Okay, I've always liked the Breeders, right? Well, ever since I picked up Last Splash way back in the day. I obviously loved Kim Deal from her Pixies stint. And heck, I even really liked that Amps album that no one seemed to notice. But Title TK is the album where I truly fell in love with Kim Deal's musical output, the moment that the gal could simply do no wrong in my eyes. It's also the album that got her band dropped from Elektra. It sold less copies than the label expected after a nine-year bout of hype, but the label also didn't exactly push the singles and videos. You had to actively seek these things out, and I wouldn't have known that "Huffer", "Off You" and "Son Of Three" had their own standalone single releases unless I'd have been actively trying to figure out what the hell happened with this album at the time.

Kim Deal was accused of many things at the time of Title TK's release. Rumors had flown that she was just as fucked up as her sister was in the mid-90's, and that she was an obsessive studio perfectionist that had scrapped years and years worth of recordings. She'd reportedly even learned to play the drums because somehow Jim MacPherson wasn't good enough for her standards. And finally, after years of waiting to see what she'd claim as the true follow-up to the Breeders album that made everyone's head explode? Blam. 38 minutes of darkness that seemed like it was held together with scotch tape. And scotch. And opiates. Seriously, people. Kim Deal vocally slurs her way through this album that sounds like one big Mad Lib, both musically and lyrically.

The first thing you've got to contend with here is that this is not the Breeders you were expecting. Kim and her sister Kelley are here, but the rest of the lineup? There's no Josephine or Jimmy Mac here. There's no Tanya Donelly. But... the guys from Fear have joined the band. Or some weird bastardized version of Fear. Regardless, it ain't your daddy's Breeders. This one is sloppy in all of the right places, tighter than you'd expect in others... and druggy as all get out. Seriously, if this album wasn't made by a heroin addict, it was certainly designed for them.

Don't believe me? Give a spin or two to the lurchingly slow "Off You", and dig that Moog that comes in for one quick and distorted line early on. Get a load of that one-chord minimalist deal called "The She", in which you are reminded that the narrarator has "Smoked the bible / Rolled it up". And sure, you can rock out to "Son Of Three" and "Huffer", but those songs are about nitrous oxide and gas huffing. I'm not crazy here, people. This album is about getting wasted, by people that were wasted... and it sounds like they rehearsed it to death, but performed it while being more fucked up than a billion Scott Weiland's performing in a swimming pool full of horse tranquilizers.

And really, wouldn't that make for the ultimate rock and roll record? You get a group together. You rehearse together militantly. You write the songs within an inch of their lives. The band hires Steve Albini to produce your record on the best vintage equipment known to man. And then... you come to the session blitzed out of your mind, press record and watch the controlled chaos unfurl. For a couple of years.

Of course, you still couldn't make Title TK under solely those conditions. You'd have to have Kim Deal's self discipline. The gal only writes when she's got something to say, and she only seems to say it when she's got a way to convey it that no human being on earth can decipher.

Frankly, if I could decode Title TK, I'd have written it myself by now. You've never heard anything like it. You aren't prepared for it. Just... get it.

And as promised, here's your mixtape of songs from these albums:
http://sharebee.com/f05a38af

It contains:
1. All Girl Summer Fun Band - "Cut Your Hair"
2. Patrick Bell - "All The Ways"
3. The Monkees - "I'll Be Back Up On My Feet"
4. Donna Lynn - "The Things That I Feel"
5. Robert Pollard with Doug Gillard - "Tight Globes"
6. Velocity Girl - "Drug Girls"
7. The Simple Carnival - "Really Really Weird"
8. The Breeders - "Sinister Foxy"
9. Pink Floyd - "If"
10. R.E.M. - "Hope"

See you in ten records!

Albums I Like: Volume Two

2008-10-06T00:54:00.000-07:00

Okay, time for the second entry! If you're just catching up, for fun, I'm attempting to tell the world about at least 1000 albums that I really like. The records in question don't have to necessarily be my favorites ever or anything. The only prerequisite is that I have to really enjoy being in the room for the entire length of the album. No mudslinging here.

Although, I came close this time. I deleted a whole article on The Rolling Stones LP Their Satanic Majesties Request, because all I did was bitch about the rest of their catalog. Of course, I was just in a bad mood that day.

Whatever! Without further ado, I present to you:

1000 Albums That Marc With a C Really Likes: Volume Two!

11. Belly - Star (1993):

To me, this album sounds exactly like my eighth and ninth grade years of school. At the time, I'd migrated to a little hick town in the middle of Florida. If you even wanted to get to a record store in a mall, you had to drive for at least an hour. But somehow - mostly inexplicably - this town where a kid named Ben actually rode his tractor to school, went absolutely gaga for Belly. I don't think it had anything to do with Tanya Donnelly's stint in Throwing Muses, and the Breeders connection possibly wasn't in anyone's mind, although everyone did eventually lose their shit in the same way for Last Splash.

But seriously? You were hearing esoteric Belly songs like "Slow Dog" and "White Belly" booming out of gigantic pickup trucks with gun racks in our high school parking lot. And it wasn't just some of them, either. When Belly came to Orlando - a good hour and fifteen minute drive from that location at best - it was THE social event of the season. For weeks, all anyone could talk about was what happened at the Belly show. Not so much what the band did or played, but all of the high school drama they brought to the show. I'm still not clear on the details.

If you have ever heard this album, you are understandably perplexed. It's a ton of song fragments that sometimes eventually go somewhere conclusive, but often are very busy just being the very essence of luscious dream pop. To hear something as gorgeous and choppy as "Every Word" coming out of the car stereos that were playing Travis Tritt the year before... it was something else.

I didn't ultimately understand Star upon it's release. It sounded like the album that all of my female friends liked. That's it. I equated it with those that were closest to me, accepted it, and never really plunged it's depths. Until the bass player of my high school band handed me a copy of the follow-up, King. My head exploded and I immediately backtracked and proclaimed Star to be one of the weirdest, dreamiest albums I'd ever heard.

Tanya's voice is the centerpiece of the album. Alternately strong and embarassingly hushed, it stands alongside the producers penchant for reverb as the very essence of Star. I could go on and on about lyrics and try to dissect them for you, but ultimately it won't make much difference. These songs have never made a lick of sense to me, and I'm *fine* with them being this impressionistic.

What I'm not fine with is that this record has largely been forgotten to the sands of time. You can currently buy a used copy on Amazon for about a penny. It's a shame... I mean, it's 2008 and I'm still trying to make some sense out of it, and that's amazing in itself. Fifteen years later and I still find the sequencing, melodies, mixing and lyrical quotient to be mysterious? I'm still picking up on new things every time I play it? That's a damned fine work of art, if you ask me.

12. Chris Zabriskie - This Silent Bloody Night (2008):

As of this writing, there isn't yet a physical release of this, Chris Zabriskie's second album of 2008. And I have a long-standing vendetta against reviewing records that I can't hold in my hand and get the feel of the overall package and presentation. We'll make an exception here, only because this is such a fabulous record.

The more astute of you will know that Chris and I have played in bands together before, and it might make this review seem "less than objective" to you. It will help you to know that I talked to Chris after absorbing this album for a week or so and gave him my overall impression of what the subject matter must have been about... and he told me just how dead wrong I was. And when you consider that I had about as much insight into the writing and recording process as you, the reader, did... I think I can still be an okay candidate for talking about this album as if I'd never met the writer, let alone shared a hotel room with him.

At first, one might think that this is a very quiet and sparse album, but there's actually quite a bit going on here. But those things mostly become apparent after multiple listens on headphones. The general focus here is piano, acoustic guitar and Chris's vocals. The lyrics seem to depict the more dysfunctional aspects of relationships, but as with any Zabriskie record... it's deceptive. Sometimes he's actually talking about a horror film that only he appreciates, and other times he's shifted the perspective so effectively that you couldn't be paid off to believe that it wasn't his point of view. The striking thing about the lyrics on This Silent Bloody Night is that they seem to depict the situations and attitudes of the people involved *during* the events, mostly using only matter of fact statements and vocal timbre to relay it all. There's not a lot of aftershock explained... that's only dished out in the mood and atmospherics of the platter.

There aren't a ton of musical comparisons that can be drawn here, but I will say that the verses on "Silent Night, Bloody Night" immediately bring to mind the quiter passages on Toto IV, and the harmonies present after "Oil On Glass" builds take me to the better moments of Graham Nash's contributions to the first two CSN albums. And musically... the album all but begs and pleads to be listened to while it's cold outside. Preferably on a long night drive with no distractions. Not that the album ever runs the risk of becoming background music - especially with the explosive passages in "Behold The New Design" - but it does demand a bit more attention than your average disc. It isn't your average album. There's something really, really special going on here, and mere words aren't going to sum it up.

Dig the dirty organ sound on the title track, seemingly plucked directly from "Yours Is No Disgrace". Let the instrumental ending pat you on the head and reassure you that everything is okay. But mostly... accept it as a whole, and be prepared to build a shrine to Chris Zabriskie in your backyard.

13. Juliana Hatfield - Only Everything (1995):

Okay, so my goal is to get to 1000 reviews of albums I like, right? Anyone that knows me at all is likely shocked that it's taken me until the second installment to get around to my incessant Juliana Hatfield worship. Well, let me assure you that it wasn't on purpose. I wasn't stalling. It's more hard for me to pick a place to start talking about her output. The issue is that my favorite Juliana Hatfield album is whichever one I happen to be listening to at the time. And tonight... I'm listening to Only Everything.

When this album came out, anyone remotely interested in Juliana's career either knew her from her radio hits, "My Sister" and "Spin The Bottle". She had a teensy, squeaky voice, which was usually framed by some jangle pop guitars. While the lyrics usually bordered on unhappy things, it was hard to hear her stuff as a sort of advanced version of twee and the C86 scene, mixed in with a little bit of Paul Westerburg damage. So when this album dropped with it's wall of guitars, Juliana's slightly rougher voice (which is relative, but, you know... these songs weren't exactly "Everybody Loves Me But You"), the more muscular rhythm section and of course... Juliana's newfound ability to absolutely stun innocent bystanders with her off-the-cuff genius guitar wizardry.

Now, about the last statement. It's not like you're gonna drop the needle on Only Everything and find a bunch of solos that are impossible to replicate. Her playing has one foot in the J Mascis door of texture, and the other in the "how-the-fuck-does-she-play-that-rhythm-over-that-set-of-chord-changes-while singing-a-totally-different-meter-altogether" door. Seriously. Pick a random song of hers sometime and try to learn it from the ground up. She sure makes it look easy, and after recently finishing her book of memoirs, I don't think she has any idea just how inhuman what she does is for the average musician.

"But Marc? What does she actually sound like?". That's easy... she sounds like a cross between her first big loves in music: 80's indie rock ranging from X, Gun Club and The Replacements meets... Wilson Phillips. Yes. Wilson Phillips. Imagine their big megahit "Impulsive" stripped of it's cheesy production, right? Keep the almost embarrasingly stunning pop hooks and harmonies of said band you're pretending to turn your nose up at and replace it with a wall of guitars so dense that the songs almost become impenetrable.

It's not impenetrable, though. Not at all. It might take awhile for all of her technicolor tones to make themselves totally obvious to you, but once they do, you run the risk of becoming a life-long Juliana Hatfield obsessive, like myself. This is as good a place as any to start. She's never made a record that was less than phenomenal, and Only Everything was just the moment that I first noticed that everything she touched turned to gold. It still does.

14. They Might Be Giants - They Might Be Giants (1986):

As some of you know, I make up pop songs in my spare time. Sometimes these songs make people laugh. I also wear glasses. I'm dorky, socially awkward, and I am a bit of a know-it-all in my few areas of expertise. Due to the combination of these factors, most people assume I must be an absolute They Might Be Giants fanatic. They are wrong.

Keeping in mind that the few friends I'd garnered in my youth were also dorks, TMBG music was a pretty ubiquitous fixture around me. I just never really thought about it either way. Didn't pay much attention. At some point, I ended up with a copy of their Dial-A-Song compilation, and I was really fond of roughly half of the songs. There was no specific reason that I wasn't blown away, and despite the fact that I wasn't drawn to build a statue of the two Johns, I really appreciated that these two guys could pen some amazing compositions... and were absolutely lyrical geniuses. Didn't mean I found, say, "Dr. Evil" all that interesting.

That being said, I decided recently that I should try to see what all of the fuss is about, and that I'd do it by trudging through -and really paying attention to - their discography in the order it was released. This plan backfired, because I'm too blown away by their debut to even think about moving on yet. I mean, as far as pop composition goes, these guys know their shit, and I knew it from the second I heard the first verse of the opening "Everything Right Is Wrong Again". And when I got around to the faux-country of "Number Three", I was utterly gobsmacked by the genius on display. Sure, they lived up to the "quirky" description I'd heard about them, and there are times that I felt that they were just being weird for the sake of it. ("Boat of Car", anyone?)

But something kept pulling me back to this album. Sometimes it was trying to understand just how seriously they were taking this admittedly non-serious material, and how intent they were on sculpting sounds that didn't seem to fit together. I mean, a bass clarinet in the aforementioned "Number Three"? The stop/start sound effects in the brilliantly catchy "I Hope That I Get Old Before I Die"? These things started to reveal themselves for what they really were: something to hold your attention once you had the hookline firmly implanted in your brain.

This first TMBG record is fascinating. It succeeds on every level despite it's own attempts to sabotage itself. And once I'd finally penetrate it's wall o' quirk, it's so addicting that I'm actually afraid to go further into the depths of the TMBG disccography. What'll happen to me? Will I be one of those folks trying to extoll the virtues of relative obscurities like "Sensurround" to friends that couldn't care less? Will I run out and buy an accordian and start writing songs that constantly reference the '64 World's Fair?

Fuck it. This stuff is amazing. I don't care what happens to me. I'm playing this album again... right now.

15. Kirsty MacColl - Tropical Brainstorm (2000)

I'm almost ashamed to admit that I came pretty late to the Kirsty MacColl game. Even though she wrote my favorite pop song of all time - "They Don't Know" - I just somehow never got around to actually digging into the meaty stuff, past the few singles she was known for. I couldn't be blamed for my lack of exposure to her stuff, either. She was most well-known in the UK, and her albums are next to impossible to track down in the US. I mean, seriously hard to find. You want a copy of Desperate Character in Florida? You'd have better luck convincing the world that Peter Jackson didn't invent hobbits.

So the first thing I found was a silly little collection of singles. And each one of those songs blew me away in some aspect. I'm not kidding here. Every. Single. Song.

Before I knew it, I was ordering wildly out of print box sets and anything else I could get my hands on of hers. But this one, Tropical Brainstorm, I'd heard was sort of an oddball. Where her other albums were full of slick, girl-group inspired radio-friendly pop... this one was supposed to be wall to wall calypso or something. Turns out that it wasn't the most apt despcription in the world. Tropical Brainstorm musically sounds exactly like what it is: Kirsty MacColl writing pop songs after falling in love with the Cuban lifestyle.

But oh... if only this album were that simple to explain. Yes, there are danceable island rhythms all over the place, oodles of horns, and Kirsty's usual impeccable knack for melodies. However, there's something about the marriage of those musical pieces to these lyrics that are... well, quite possibly the greatest study in middle-aged female sexuality ever penned. I can stand by that statement without flinching once.

You'll find odes to cybersex that don't make you want to cringe, wholly believable stories about stalking fans that stopped paying attention to her, and more than a few lessons that Kirsty was not a woman to be fucked with. In "England 2, Columbia 0", she airs the dirty laundry of an already married man that attempted to bed her, but also gets quite fragile in the heartwrenching "Wrong Again". You can actually hear the poor gal choking up with tears towards the climax of the latter tune.

This would be the last album that Kirsty MacColl ever released. She was killed roughly one year later while swimming by a drunken boater that just happened to be a very powerful man in those international waters. It's a tragic story, made even worse by the fact that she was instantly killed while saving her son from the drivers path, and the ensuing punishment that the alleged killer had to face - a fine of roughly 90 pesos or something equally insulting. But really, if you've got to make a final album, you probably couldn't top Tropical Brainstorm on your best, most inspired day. If Kirsty had lived yet chosen not to record another note after completion of this platter... you pretty much couldn't bitch.

I'll go on record with this one: Tropical Brainstorm is not only one of the ten best records of this past decade, but it's easily one of the best records of all time, hands down.

16. Ramones - Ramones (1974)

Riiiiight. Like I can say something about this album that hasn't already been written a thousand times.

Who? The Ramones. The ultimate portrait of four guys that you wouldn't wanna meet in a dark alley. Mostly because you'd be sucked into their legendary in-fighting and tension.

What? A band that dreamt up the perfect marriage between bubblegum pop and Black Sabbath.

Where? New York, but they had a trickle-down effect that would coat the entire world, and eventually - albeit unintentionally - give birth to ridiculous crap like the very, very punk rock Warped Tour which raged against numeroud machines. Namely machines that produced good music. I don't think that's what the Ramones intended with songs about Texas Chainsaw Massacre and beating up bratty kids, but that's where we are, and it's largely their fault.

When? From the second these guys got together. All Ramones albums are slight variations on this first one. Sure, they'd get all wacky and poppy with End Of The Century, and sometimes the band would get all slow and trudgy, but the hooks and subject matter were always in this general vein. Singalong choruses about things they didn't wanna do.

Why? Because we fuckin' needed it. We needed four guys to just walk it like they talked it in '74. Short, loud pop songs played and recorded exactly the way that the creators intended. Tons of compression and bleed-through in the recording... just like the Ramones would sound in your garage.

Now, yes, we could split hairs all day on whether or not The Modern Lovers were directly responsible for this, and exactly how much impact their much-ballyhooed early period had on the musical climate that eventually allowed this group of hoodlums to do their thick wall-of-sound bidding, but to the world at large? The Ramones were fucking *massive*, and they totally deserved to be. They knew how to make a balls to the wall pop record that appealed to all comers, even this jaded reviewer.

I'll say the following: this record got me through the eighth grade. Seriously.

Also: Jonathan Richman was reportedly the first person to "dance" at a Ramones show. Do with that information what you will.

17. The Who - Odds & Sods (1974):

Yes, it's another round of talk about Pete Townshend & The Who. But it's the first Who entry on this list... and I'm talking about an outtakes album? Yes, I am. Because any band on earth would feel honored to have a list of outtakes like this! No, seriously. Somehow a song like "Pure & Easy" wasn't good enough for fucking WHO'S NEXT??? That's a band, right there, folks. Stop trying to say otheriwse, The Who was the best rock group in the history of mankind by that very definition alone.

You know that big classic rock hit of theirs, "Long Live Rock"? That was an outtake from this compilation, too. And if you've ever seen The Who live, you'll have no doubt heard relentless cries for a performance of "Naked Eye". And guess what? That one also was relegated to "unreleased" territory until this album came into being.

In 1974, there were rock groups that were bigger that these four Shephard's Bush lads, it's true. Zeppelin could outsell them in an arena by a country mile - mostly due to managerial decisions. But The Stones were putting on shoddy performances when they even bothered to give them, and those Beatle boys were long gone. While The Who was known as the "greatest live band in the land" or what have you, their records had only briefly touched upon the power that they could offer up when pushed. There had been the trancendental experimental nature of Tommy, the poppy sarcasm of Sell Out and the well-known sequencer-laden arena triumph we now know as Who's Next. But, really... when you walked into a Who show around this time, you had no idea what kind of sonic onslaught you were in for unless you'd studied the Live At Leeds handbook and memorized it by heart.

There were compilations of The Who's biggest hits that almost seemed cartoonish in comparison to the bigger picture. This original ten song version of Odds & Sods is like a bizarro history of the band up until that point. You've got your pompous arena rock in "Put The Money Down", some silly stuff like the anti-smoking track "Little Billy" and a bit of brass-laden jokery courtesy of John Entwistle in one of the weirdest choices for the A-side of a single in the whole Who catalog: "Postcard".

Basically, here's my challenge to any Who naysayers: find yourself a copy of this collection of stray tracks. Not the rerelease with twentysomething songs. That thing is bloated and unneccessary, and some of the tracks are presented at the wrong speed. Nope, get yourself a copy of the original. It isn't hard to find. Spin it twice. If you aren't blown away by these songs that the guys couldn't find room for on their records... you're simply not listening.

18. Os Mutantes - A Divina Comédia ou Ando Meio Desligado (1970):

Os Mutantes were a Brazillian group. Their name translates to "The Mutants" in English. The name of this album inexplicably translates to "The Divine Comedy Or I Feel A Little Spaced Out". It's okay if you've never heard of them. Uncle Marc is here to make it all better.

The Os Mutantes saga is long, drawn-out and kinda sad, really. A few Brazillian youths (Rita, Arnaldo and Sergio) wanted to start a group equally influenced by the few rock and roll albums that they'd gotten to hear, traditional Brazillian rhythms and a mixture of DIY know-how and absolute sracasm. Now, to appreciate the sarcasm, you'd probably have to incredibly fluent in Portugese to notice their tongue-in-cheek California accents on otherwise straight forward tracks like "Quem tem medo de brincar de amor". But even if you're listening with the most discriminating ears, you'd likely miss lots of the fun here: straws in fast food cups were used to produce wacky samab tones, and when no high-hats were obtainable for their drum set... they just recorded the sound of a bug spray can to fill in the gaps. As a matter of fact, the bulk of the Mutantes musical arsenal was homemade due both to a lack of money and an oppressive government that didn't like rock and roll very much.

But Mutantes didn't really play rock. They pioneered a weird hybrid that we now know as Tropicalia... and if you've never heard it before, your head will likely explode. It sounds so cliche, but the average Os Mutantes album really does invoke the sound of Disneyland on acid. Mix that with some out of this world boy-girl harmonies and some explosive guitar work, and you've got a band that should have set the entire world on fire.

This particular album was the third in the canon, and it's arguably the best. The band had never sounded more focused, and it's genre parodies were apparent to anyone with ears this time around, not just the surrounding masses in Brazil. On a nearly seven-minute sojurn called "Meu refrigerador não funciona", you'll hear the various vocalists screaming their lungs out Janis Joplin-style about... yes, a broken refrigerator. It's underscored musically by a driving pump organ that would have even made Bloodrock jealous. And then there's the title track, which might be one of the finest rock compositions ever penned, sitting next to nonsensical but nearly overwritten bits like "Ave Lucifer".

For a guy like me that just likes to take records at face value and find my own meaning in them, A Divina Comédia ou Ando Meio Desligado is like a godsend. It's a wildly unpredictable record that allows you to make your own conclusions while still having subtle hints at their original points underneath. It's all framed by one of the most inventive musical acts of our time, and frankly... I'm not sure why Os Mutantes isn't considered one of the finest rock groups in history. If there were any justice in the world, we'd speak of them in the same breath that we use to bring up The Kinks, The Stones, The Who, The Beatles and Zeppelin. Hear me now and believe me later... Os Mutantes will fuck you up.

19. Pink Floyd - Animals (1977):

If you're just a casual fan of Floyd that likes some of the songs you've heard on the radio, ("Money", "Wish You Here Here", "Young Lust", etc...), you're going to be taken aback by this one. Not just the epic song lengths, but also the epic and destructive political anger apparent through out this seething and timely record.
This was arguably the last gasp of Pink Floyd making a record as four guys in a room that really liked to play music in a room together. Rick Wright's signature color washes punctuate an underlying dissatisfaction that pulsates all through the five songs here. But really, one shouldn't let the tracklist fool you. This is an album that's meant to be heard start to finish, and that's likely why this album didn't have any super-mega-bitchin' radio hits. Radio programmers didn't know what to make of a seventeen minute track like "Dogs", one that goes through so many movements and melodies during it's playing time that it took me *years* to make sense of it. And I'm a certifiable Pink Floyd nut.

Gilmour's guitar had rarely sounded tougher, Roger Waters lyrics hadn't yet carried such vitriol, and... well, we love Nick Mason. And while the music supplies a zig-zagging framework for a bevy of uncomfortable moods, it's those cutting lyrics that keep me spinning this album. I'll list some of them and let the work speak for itself:

"Blasting and bubbling I fell on his neck with a scream / Wave upon wave of demented avengers / March cheerfully out of obscurity into the dream." - from "Sheep"

"Bus stop rat bag, ha ha, charade you are / You fucked up old hag, ha ha, charade you are / You radiate cold shafts of broken glass" - from "Pigs (Three Different Ones)"

"And it's too late to lose the weight you used to need to throw around / So have a good drown, as you go down alone / Dragged down by the stone." - from "Dogs".

I simply do not have the words in my limited vocabulary to explain just how powerful this album is. I'll say the following though: In my humble opinion, Animals is the best and most important political rock and roll album of all time, and we need it now more than ever. Plus, it just rocks. Get it.

20. Cars Can Be Blue - Doubly Unbeatable (2008):

Alright. We've covered a lot of emotionally trying records this time around on Albums I Like. I think it's time that we cap this entry off with some fun.
Cars Can Be Blue is a two-piece pop group based out of Athens, GA. Nate and Becky have pretty much two speeds: fun, singalong pop... and some of the dirtiest twee you've ever heard in your life. The lines blur on this album a bit, though. I mean, yes, they are still just as guitar driven as they were last time around, but now the lyrics seem like they are coming from one effervescent mindset. And it's also worth noting that on their last album, some of the sillier songs seemed like well written jokes... but on Doubly Unbeatable, it sounds just like Nate and Becky are telling you like it is.

There's still a few songs here that are comedy for the sake of being silly, like the drawn-out dick jokes of "I Think It's A ..." and the scream-a-thon heard in "Ribbon", but the bulk of the album is made up of really straight ahead and honest songs. And you know, when some lyricists tell the truth... it makes an audience laugh. So when Becky begs a local groupie to "put that pussy down" in "Pretty Special", it might make the listener giggle, but you have to imagine that she was really, truly annoyed at the gal in question.

And I would be amiss if I didn't mention "Cycle Of Violence", which may be the best Tom Waits parody ever penned. You've got to hear it to believe it.

Even when Cars Can Be Blue's fun backbone gets overshadowed by their in-your-face lyrics... they'd be nothing without those fanfuckingtastic melodies. They may just be the best pop band you've never heard. And it's happening *now*, people.

Look! Another mix featuring highlights from all of these albums!
You can download it directly from http://sharebee.com/3a280a8c and here's the tracklisting:

01. Cars Can Be Blue "Sun Blows Up"
02. They Might Be Giants "I Hope That I Get Old Before I Die"
03. The Who "Little Billy"
04. The Ramones "53rd & 3rd"
05. Juliana Hatfield "My Darling"
06. Kirsty MacColl "England 2, Columbia 0"
07. Chris Zabriskie "Silent Night, Bloody Night"
08. Belly "Slow Dog"
09. Os Mutantes "Oh! Mulher Infidel"
10. Pink Floyd "Sheep"

See you in ten albums!

Albums I Like: Volume One

2008-09-24T10:52:00.000-07:00

About two years ago, I made a list of my 100 favorite albums. You can still probably find it buried somewhere in my MySpace blog, but I'm not sure that it's worth the effort. It's woefully out of date, but I still really like most of the albums I talked about. But, in the order I listed? I dunno. My listening habits are at the mercy of my moods and other circumstances: some albums I only like late at night, some I only like when I don't feel well, and there are even a batch of albums I won't play unless it's cold outside. And what with RetroLowFi shutting it's doors, I do have to admit that I've missed talking about albums that I've enjoyed. You know... I wrote a lot of negative reviews for that site as well, but it wasn't something I really relished doing. I wrote about what people sent us, and sometimes I didn't like it. Thanks to our policy of reviewing, well, everything we were sent, I had to wade through some steaming piles of mediocrity from time to time.

But I've found a solution. I can instead just use my existing resources to tell you about albums that I enjoy. Not necessarily things that I think are unbelievable "get out of the way and duck" masterpieces, but moreso records that make me happy while they are playing. I'll release this list in increments, and I'll make a downloadable mix for you of key tracks from each of the ten albums I've discussed. Maybe you'll hear something you really love.

If you are an artist that doesn't want your stuff distributed in the interest of garnering new fans and potentially selling records through this medium... I suggest you shutting the fuck up, taking a look at the world in which we live, and then choosing another line of work. (I'm kidding. Contact me, and I'll take it down. In most cases, I wouldn't be distributing your most popular tracks anyways.)

Without any further ado, I present:

1000 Albums That Marc With a C Really Likes: Volume One.

1. Napoleon XIV - They're Coming To Take Me Away Ha-Haaaa! (1966):

I'd be very, very surprised if you hadn't heard the title track of this album. Not only is it easily the greatest novelty single of all time, but it's possibly among the catchiest pop songs with little to no melody. (Think "88 Lines About 44 Women" by The Nailz). It's the one with the handclaps, the tambourine and the pitch-shifted vocals that detail a man losing his mind. He's being drug to "the happy home where life is beautiful all the time". And it sounds like some girl really did a number on him... but it's actually a dog that drove him mad. Or so one would think. (I won't spoil the surprise you'll get if you take the album in as a whole.)

That song is a modern fucking wonder. If you get bored, find an interview where Napoleon XIV (aka: Jerry Samuels) details how he recorded the song. Prepare to have your mind blown.
But the rest of the album? Oh my god. It hardly even clocks in at thirty minutes, but disturbs me worse than nearly anything else on the planet. In a good way, though. You know, the way a good tongue-in-cheek horror flick oughta shake you. Samuels makes light of the mentally ill from every conceivable angle, and while it's done from a novelty standpoint, he occasionally sounds almost furious at those that have behavioral issues. He's also usually singing from the viewpoint of the "crazy person", and only on "Bats In My Belfry" does he ever seem to take pity on those with such afflictions, stating "Who is there among us / To say who is normal".

They say that the truly insane will never actually realize it, but in that way, Samuels pulls a double mindfuck on you: is he so busy making fun of people with unfortunate emotional issues that he is actually covering up his own? Well folks, I'd like to tell you for sure, but I actually called him up once - seriously. Tried to get him to do a RetroLowFi interview. As soon as I said I was a fan of Napoleon XIV, he all but hung up on me, and would offer no comments.

This album has been out of print for nearly 40 years now, and has been the subject of much controversy. It fetches up to a hundred smackers on eBay now, but you can get all of it's tracks on Rhino's bowdlerized The Second Coming compilation. However, the extra unreleased tracks don't offer much, but one has to wonder what would have occured if his second album "For God's Sake, Stop The Feces" had ever actually been released. What if this guy had actually had a *career* doing shit this disturbing?

And if you're sitting on a vinyl copy of the original, contact me immediately. I will make it worth your while.

2. Meat Puppets - Rise To Your Knees (2007):

Okay, so it's not my favorite Meat Puppets album. Not even in the top five. But do I really like it? I sure do, and it took a long time. It's not a reunion, since Derrick Bostrom isn't playing drums. It's not a return to the early material, as all of the instruments and vocals are nicely in tune with each other. And yeah... I'll admit that this album rarely rises above the pace of slug sex. It's pretty slow and monolithic, and probably not the best soundtrack to heading down to "your favorite swimming ground".

What this album offers is mood. A full hour of atmospherics. Curt Kirkwood's guitar heroics are mostly used to fill up the frequency range here instead of doing the "look at how big my indie rock dick is" thing he's so well known for. That's just as well, because those tones when pushed to the forefront would sound marvelously dated. But the harmonies of the Kirkwood brothers is a welcome sound for me any day of the week, especially when reigned in this tightly.

It's a slow, lurching rock record that doesn't make much sense. And really, who beyond some seriously die-hard Pups freaks were clamoring for a reunion album in 2007? If I'm being totally honest, I don't even reach for Rise To Your Knees all that often. But when I do put it in the player? I'm really glad that it's on, for the entire hour of it's duration. It doesn't make me think, but it feels quite nice filling up the space in my house. That's all I ask, really.

3. Yes - Going For The One (1977):

Okay, there's not a single mention of wizards, wishing wells, magic spells or slaying dragons on this album. However... to me, it sounds like the very definition of "wizard rock". Maybe it was Rick Wakemen's penchant for wearing big sequined-coated robes back in the day, or the fact that his synthesizers actually *sounded* like the magical rays shooting from some off the wall Dungeons and Dragon characters fingers.

If you want an easy-to-listen-to album void of pretense... move along. No, seriously. Avoid Yes altogether, in that case. Because, I swear to fucking God, even though I'm a bigger closet Yess geek than I'll ever fully admit, there are times where their music is so complex and dense that it's pretty much *daring* me to try and listen to an entire song... let alone like it.

Another good reason to avoid Yes is this: this band is crazy about filling up the midrange frequency range. Aaaannd... that's about it. The bass is often mixed way upfront, but is tweaked to sound like a heavily effected guitar. And while we're doing disclaimers, I hate to say it, but there are times where it almost sounds like these five guys are playing completely different songs from one another, but they just happen to sync up enough that they were able to call it a "composition".

I feel guilty when I play this album. And then I stop being a pretentious dickweed, enjoy the musicianship that I could never hope to replicate, and dirft off to some other realm. One that invokes science fiction, fantasy... and more music theory than I could ever hope to pay attention to.

However... the song "Turn Of The Century" does bore the ever-living shit out of me. It's the other four songs that I'm so wild about. Try on the title track for size.

4. Dr. Dooom - First Come, First Served (1999):

Okay, try and follow me here: Kool Keith was in the highly influential rap group known as Ultramagnetic MC's. He took on the persona of Dr. Octagon in the mid-nineties, which completely redesigned the idea of the MC as the world at large knew it. And then in 1999, he became Dr. Dooom... and shot Dr. Octagon dead in the first 30 seonds of this album. Literally. Bunch of gunshots and everything.

Kool Keith is a lyrical genius... if you like him. If it isn't your thing, you're going to get really annoyed at the samey beats, his stream-of-consciousness lyrics, and his ability to shock through both subject matter and unexpected rhymes. On First Come, First Served, Keith spends his time killing people, telling you not to come over, using body bags to decorate his apartment and... it's fucking twisted. If the following couplets appeal to you, you may have a new favorite hip hop record:

"With blood on my fingers I blast a CD by the Staple Singers / The cops told me to turn it down, they like my shoes from Buster Brown"

"Dangerous Action, I'm the movie, I'm the main attraction / Fuck up your front lawn with M&M's, Jiffy Popcorn / Piss in your mailbox, throw shitty Pampers every two blocks"

"You couldn't rap with me if we was twins stuck together / You be the deformed one, catchin the warm one / I pay a crackhead five dollars to fuck up your million dollar marketing plan / with a brand new sub-machine gun / and a hot dog, on a Yankee Stadium bun"

For my money, while Dr. Octagon was important, this album is unequivocally superior in both lyrics and music. Kool Keith had something to prove at this point: that he could do absolutely anything. Between 1995-2000, he did nearly everything that hadn't been done in hip hop, improved on existing formulas, and changed personas like pajamas. Which may have a bit to do with the fact that he's certifiably insane... or that he is the greatest and most important hip hop artist of all time.

5. The Free Design - One By One (1972):

If you do any research on The Free Design, you'll often see essay after essay devoted to the notion that this band should have been absolutely fucking huge in their day.

I do not agree. I think that they had the proper amount of success, frankly. They were so out of touch and outdated by the year of One By One's release that I have to wonder how in the hell they even kept Enoch Light's interest for this long.

Now, let me explain: I love The Free Design. If I had to choose between losing a toe and never getting to hear them again... well, I'd keep my fucking toe, but I'd really miss this band's easy breezy baroque pop.

The musical climate of 1972 was intense: David Bowie busted out with Ziggy Stardust, Lou Reed had his Transformer, The Stones were blowing minds with Exile... people, this was the year of fucking *"Smoke On The Water"*. I don't know that I've ever owned an album as out-of-step with itself as One By One.

To those unfamiliar with the Design, the group consisted of the Dedrick clan: brothers and sisters that sang in such hushed harmonies that it would make James Taylor call them a bunch of wusses. Add in the heavily orchestrated (and seemingly ever present) string sections, and you've got an album that even your mom would have considered out of style should you have brought it home on the day of it's release.

So why do I like it so much? Hell, I don't even know. There's nothing as instantly memorbale here as their epochal "Kites Are Fun", nothing quite as self-aware as "2002-A Hit Song", and nothing nearly as infectious as "Bubbles". Other than a few tracks that occasionally work up a bit of a fire - a very clinical elevator music fire, of course - this thing is just... wonderfully pleasant. I suppose if I had to sum the record up in one word, it'd be *polite*. This thing puts itself back into the package afterwards, thanks the turntable for spending time with it, and dusts itself before climbing back into place on your shelf. It also goes into the closet to fart, but thinks it would be inappropriate to discuss such things in public.

I dunno. I'm actually at a loss for words on this one. It's a record that I really love, and I can't come up with a single reason for it. I can't even analyze it. Nothing makes sense here, it didn't make sense in the past, and it will never run the risk of being considered ahead of it's time. It's just a very, very likeable thirty-eight minute album.

6. Pete Townshend - Who Came First (1972):

Let's stick with 1972 for a moment so that we may talk about my favorite songwriter of all-time - Pete Townshend.

This was Pete's first solo album, and it's a real oddball. By '72, Pete was deeply entrenched in the teachings of his spiritual guru, Meher Baba. Now, lots of artists go through that phase, and it normall yaffects their music in really, really unflattering ways. Anyone remember those late seventies Dylan records? But in Pete's case... fuck, the guy wrote Tommy based on some of those spiritual leanings. And the stuff that eventually came out on Who's Next. That's enough to make any songwriter want to jump headlong into some weird middle Eastern philosophy, right there.

Pete contributed a ton of songs to Meher Baba's fundraising albums, and those songs were widely bootlegged. In an effort to keep the money going where it oughta go, Mr. Townshend released this nine song meditation... and promptly blew the mind of anyone lucky enough to know of it's existence at the time - as this wasn't the most heavily publicized release he'd ever made.

Alright, so imagine this... it's 1972. You know Pete Townshend as the guy behind "My Generation" and "Won't Get Fooled Again". You know him as the guy who breaks guitars onstage with The Who. The guy beats up both hippies and cops in front of huge audiences. So, you rush out to your local record shop, plunk down the cash for Pete's first solo statement in the dead center of his "voice of a generation" years. You expect to hear some loud, crashing rock and roll... and instead, you hear stuff like the seven-minute ode to heaven - "O'Parvardigar" - and relatively quiet odes to the one chord that could save everyone on earth - "Pure & Easy". You're confused as to why he's not even singing on "Forever's No Time At All". I wouldn't have blamed you for tossing this album aside and never thinking about it again... at the time.

But now? We've got perspective, and you can plainly hear that this was Pete's true calling and voice. He was done singing of clenched fists and teenage wasteland... instead concentrating on the things that saved him from those types of dreadful endings. Turned out that his voice was much easier - and honest - than Roger Daltrey could ever muster when interpreting Pete's writings. And his guitar playing? Totally restrained and nuanced. He made a really beautiful and inspiring solo record... *out of whatever was lying around*.

This is one of the few albums I'd recommend that you seek out on compact disc and not vinyl. Sure, the original issue is a masterpiece in it's own right, but the bonus tracks? Holy fuck! I seriously don't know how songs as brilliant as "Sleeping Dog" and "Day Of Silence" weren't good enough to make the final cut. The original album rightfully should have been a double disc set, and it could have stood up quite well over time, never once being accused of sounding bloated or looking overinflated.

Who Came First? Beauty be thy name.

7. The Dead Milkmen - Not Richard, But Dick (1993):

When I'm in the mood for some sloppy and irreverent college pop, there's simply no substitute for some Dead Milkmen. While it was impossible to avoid them on the college radio and modern rock radio stations that I tended towards as a kid, I didn't really dive into their catalog headfirst until about... ninth grade? Prior to that, I'd only owned their seminal Big Lizard In My Backyard cassette, and while I liked it, I couldn't really claim to *understand* what the fuck they were doing.

But this album? This is the one where everything totally clicked for me. When the band was doing one of their trademark lyrical rants, they were laugh out loud funny. I mean, c'mon... if you can't find some humor in "I Dream Of Jesus", you're probably some type of hardcore fundamentalist, but the rest of you have no excuse. And even I got a bit offended by "Let's Get The Baby High", but once I started looking at it as social commentary, I lightened up a bit. I seriously doubt that Rodney Anonymous was blowing pot smoke up the noses of infants.

There's hooks here that you wouldn't believe, too. It's impossible to get "Leggo My Ego" out of your head after the first listen, but... the real gem here is "Not Crazy". And especially in the light of bassist Dave "Blood" Schulthise's suicide, lines like "I'm not crazy, I'm merely entertaining the thought / Of going insane". The song was always the best on the album, but now it's downright chilling.

Many people accused the Milkmen of selling out with this record and it's predecessor, Soul Rotation, simply because they were signed with Hollywood Records at the time. My judgemental high school ass did it too. But this album is every bit as good as their earlier work, and probably miles above it in many aspects. The only real reason to hate Hollywood Records involvement with the Milkmen is because... they have a tight stranglehold on this album and refuse to re-release it in any form. This album was practically out of print by the time anyone knew it existed. Hollywood wouldn't even let the band lease the best tracks for their greatest hits album. (Said label has also pretty much disowned and removed the brilliant Blake Babies albums and early Gwenmars catalog from circulation, and it's a fucking crime against humanity).
So yes. Fun, irreverent, disturbing, and wayyyyy better than we ever gave it credit for being, Not Richard, But Dick might be The Dead Milkmen's silent masterpiece. I dare you to give it a spin today, totally taken out of it's original context and argue aginst this work in any way. You simply can't do it. It's a true lost classic.

8. Existential Hero - The Great Sublime Melancholy (2008):

In the interest of full disclosure, Steven Ray Morris - the sole proprietor of the Existential Hero empire - is probably more familiar with my musical catalog than I am with his. That's due only to the fact that I listen to a *lot* of records, and he makes more than I can keep up with. This year, he's released roughly... six albums? I think? I can't keep up. This album, The Great Sublime Melancholy, is part of his "New Zealand trilogy", which adds up to almost three hours of music. It was a lot to digest.

While I enjoyed all three of the "New Zealand" albums, this one is my heads and tails favorite. Every which way you look, you're gonna run into some interesting tones - dig those horns on "The Cherry Orchard"! - and he's come a long way from the guy-with-a-stringed-instrument feel of the last few releases I absorbed of his. I'd even go as far as saying that the title track might be among the best album openers I've heard all year.

And despite the seemingly sad overtones of the title, there is an undercurrent of "hey, it's all gonna work out" in most of these tunes. I mean, no one has ever penned such an ode to the end-times like "Until The Very Last Moment", a track that doesn't ponder what to do with your last day, but reminds you that it's all of the days prior that really count. Another great thing here is that Morris knows how to sequence an album within an inch of it's life. Shorter tracks that seem to pass right by, like the sonic feast heard in the twenty-nine second "Piano Bashing", actually do wonders for the fully fleshed out tracks. It doesn't so much beat you over the head with songs, but it creates the exact mood that the author intended, and it oftens plays as one really long track that just has different movements... and if you blink, you're gonna miss a lot.

The most likable thing about Steven Ray Morris is as follows: he's making records that he'd like to hear. Albums that he'd still make for his own amusement, even if no one bothered to listen. For this reason, he sits in the company of folks like Robert Pollard, Kool Keith, The Capstan Shafts and R. Stevie Moore. With one major difference...: Steven Ray Morris is completely unpredictable, and he never sounds less than earnest. You can hear that this guy means every single tone that he places on a record.

And those tones bounce between heavily effected pop, gloomy downbeat meanderings, sound collages and a few voice- and-stringed-instrument goodies. This album is the best of the three that he released on the same day to these ears, but man... much like the artists I listed earlier, can you imagine if he were to condense all of the best bits into a single disc offering? Morris would seriously blow some minds. As it stands, he's already well on his way.

9. Robby Roadsteamer - The Cryin', The Niche, And The Stronghold (2008):

Here's a fearless prediction: it will take me longer to write about this album than it will to actually listen to it right now.

I first ran across Robby Roadsteamer via his YouTube clip for "Heart Of A Rhino". At the time, he was leading a harder-edged band that was intensely serious about being as non-serious as possible. They took every single rock cliche imaginable, smashed it, and usually namechecked Duck Hunt in the process. Mr. Roadsteamer wore a big fake wig and a silly oversized moustache... and then the band broke up. I don't know why. I could probably figure it out if I dug deep enough, but I'm actually happier with the records he's making now in his "sensitive acoustic guy" phase. Which is a joke, too. Or it isn't.

What you should know about Robby's output circa 2008 is as follows: he's releasing albums faster than Robert Pollard and The Capstan Shafts combined, he sometimes sings in his overemphasized "rock guy" voice of yore but occasionally dips into what I think his actual singing voice, he has very little regard for rhythm, and his lyrics are funnier than all get out.

And seriously, those lyrics are why you're going to love Robby Roadsteamer. Whether he's singing about telling his dad about his new job at Staples, watching Mulholland Dr. on mushrooms or mourning the loss of the aforementioned band (because he'll now have to settle for "normal guy pussy"), you're alternately going to be wiping the tears of laughter out of your eyes, wondering why the hell you've never heard of him, getting offended by every third sentence that comes out of his mouth and then wanting to give him a high five for referencing something that you thought was your little secret.

The more music Robby puts out, the more interesting his stories get. And of course, the unabashed Who fanatic in me was flabbergasted when he parodied "Christmas" from Tommy as... "Fat Kids At Best Buy". I highly recommend this and all of Robby's albums... and if you're offended by his stuff at some point? I'd say that it's a sign that you need to lighten the fuck up.

10. The Pixies - Bossanova (1990):

Some would have you believe that this is the album where the Pixies began to "lose the plot". For the record, that's an absolute load of rubbish. Even if the bandmembers didn't think much of each other at the time - or ever, reportedly - they worked astoundingly well together. Everything these guys touched turned to gold, period. There is no bad record, no truly terrible song in their catalog, and even on their best days... the countless imitators have only scraped the surface of the magic that thse four individuals were capable of.

Now, that being said, make no mistake... by this time Black Francis was running the show. But you can't tell me that the surfy elements of "Cecillia Ann" and "Ana" didn't give slight hints as to where Kim Deal would go just years later on some wildly popular Breeders records. But under Black Francis's guiding hand, the Pixies explored surf, space and the loudQUIETloud dynamics they were known for beautifully on Bossanova.

All of the expected elements are here, yes. The "scream it like you hate the bitch" vocals of "Rock Music", the boy-girl harmonies accentuating the chorus of "Dig For Fire", the heavenly falsettos in "The Happening", and the word play that gave Pixies fanatics tons to pour over - the lyrics to "Ana" are an acrostic, you know. Everything is perfectly paced on Bossanova.

And every great once in awhile, you might run across a track that doesn't seem to stand up to the others. That's because it was there for the sake of the albums flow. This was a band that knew that weird, unexpected segues were the key ingredients to classic albums. So yeah, maybe you don't always wanna hear, say, "Havalina". But as an album closer? It's utterly breathtaking.
Screw the naysayers. There aren't a ton of "Monkey Gone To Heaven" rewrites on this record, and thank the stars for that. If you wanna hear Doolittle... go listen to Doolittle. This is Bossanova, one of the five Pixies masterpieces, each as important to their legacy as the last. It takes you into the stratosphere with stuff like "Allison" and tucks you into bed with the last two tracks. I'll even go on record as saying this: "Velouria" *is* the very sound of the butterflies and mystery surrounding the early stages of falling in love. Sonically, of course. I don't usually equate "lemur skin" with puppy love, but your mileage may vary.

Here, have a mix featuring highlights from all of these albums! You can download it from http://sharebee.com/b293daf2 and the tracklist is:

01. Robby Roadsteamer "I Got Construction Boots"
02. Napoleon XIV "Dr. Psyche, The Cut Rate Head Shrinker"
03. The Dead Milkmen "Not Crazy"
04. Existential Hero "The Great Sublime Melancholy"
05. The Meat Puppets "Stone Eyes"
06. The Pixies "The Happening"
07. Dr. Dooom "I Run Rap"
08. The Free Design "Light My Fire"
09. Yes "Going For The One"
10. Pete Townshend "Parvardigar"

See you all in ten albums!