Looking Back Briefly Before Burying the Year Once and For All

2008 was a pretty rough and ugly year. Reading the year end best of lists on various websites, I realise there's a lot I missed this year but none of it seems overly remarkable. Last year the glut of amazing movies and albums overwhelmed me and I was catching up for months but this year, I don't feel that same urgency. I pretty much heard and saw everything I wanted to in 2008 and look forward to starting 2009 and putting this year behind me. There seemed to be a collective holding of breath anticipating and hoping for a sea change which may have caused pop culture noise to be more of an afterthought than it usually is in my life. Whatever the cause, I acquired very few albums this year and very few of them stand out along the best of previous years but let's examine them anyways, shall we?


Radiohead - In Rainbows - I know this was released in 2007 digitally but I'm a Luddite and had to wait for an actual physical copy before I would listen to it so this counts as 2008 for me. Good album, not my favorite of theirs but it has some stellar songs including "Nude," "All I Need" and "Videotape." Is there any band out there less fun than Radiohead? They are so serious - on album, in interviews, in videos. They are as grim as the most severe black metal band and their music is about as anti-joyful as you can get. I still love their music but it takes a rainy day or bad news to make me want to join in their misery.


Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago - A perfect winter album and nearly a perfect album in any season. Spare and achingly gorgeous. I don't understand a single lyric but it rarely matters as the emotion pouring forth is enough to carry the themes of loss and sadness that creep into every crevice of these songs.

Wye Oak - If Children - A friend from Baltimore sent me a copy of this album when the band still called itself Monarch but then they signed to Merge and re-released this debut to thunderous silence. I'm not sure how much of a splash this album made but I hold it in high esteem and love its melancholy dreamy mindset. It's one of those records where all the songs sort of blend into each other in your mind and I can never remember how any specific song sounds but as a whole, it's a wonderful soundtrack for a lazy weekend day.


Animal Collective - Water Curses - Continuing their journey into the subconscious, Animal Collective once again floor me with their all out insanity, bizarre sound explosions and incredibly affecting vocal freakouts. "Water Curses" is wonderful enough already even before the sped-up, merry-go-round out of control sample on the chorus and the blips, beeps and screaming on "Street Flash" are some of the most touching sounds I heard all year.


Cat Power - Jukebox - I would say this is the biggest disappointment of the year but I didn't have high hopes for it anyways so it didn't really surprise me when I got a collection of limp covers and soul music sucked of all soul. The R&B by the numbers back up band doesn't do anything for me and her whispery put-on of a voice on some of the tracks makes me so sad. She used to write incredibly personal songs that sounded like no one else and for two albums now she's been wearing an ill fitting costume. Here's hoping her dalliance with Memphis and the 60s is coming to an end.


Ratatat - LP3 - Solid a a rock. This band bores some people but not me. I found this album to be quite a step forward for two guys who keep rewriting the same song. "Shiller" is quite possibly the greatest lead off track of the year and "Black Heroes" is the best album ender with everything in between these bookends making me shake a little action as I do the dishes.


M83 - Saturdays = Youth - The Kate Bush renaissance has begun. I've read a lot of reviews of this album mentioning the obvious 80s New Order, Flock of Seagulls and Jesus and Mary Chain influences but there's a lot of semi-operatic "Running Up That Hill" type music on here too. As wonderfully nostalgic, awkward and overdramatic as you'd expect from one man's tribute to his adolescence with a beautiful, endless drone to close it out and carry you back to the modern age.


Jay Reatard - Singles '06-'07 & Matador Singles '08 - Ever since I first heard "Night of Broken Glass" I've been obsessed with this guy and his dirty, hirsute compadres. I think I like the raw, home recorded earlier singles better but the last few songs on the Matador album point the way to an interesting future. He nails straight ahead revved up punk/rock but can also sing a pretty tune or two. Who knew such a maniac could also make you shed a tear?


Crooked Fingers - Forfeit/Fortune - This was Britt Daniel's favorite of the year and it's slowly becoming mine. This one took me the longest to warm up to of all the Crooked Fingers albums but it's stunning as usual with the most disturbing cover of the year. Eric Bachmann continues to toil away in relative obscurity but songs as stellar as "Let's Not Pretend (To Be New Men)," "Cannibals" and "Your Control" deserve more attention than they've received. Maybe he should consider adding some Memphis soul to his diet to garner the attention his talents warrant. Just look what it's done for Chan Marshall.

What is That Sound?

For Christmas, I received The Psychedelic Sounds of the 13th Floor Elevators from my brother and I've been listening to it a lot lately. It features their insanely wonderful hit "You're Gonna Miss Me" which is the only song I really knew by them. It's a killer and aside from the lovely screeching by Roky Erikson, it also blows my mind because of that bizarre noise in the background of the song. It's hard to describe but it's kind of like a "wooka-wooka-wooka" sound but really really fast. Imagine a hummingbird outside your window with plastic wings. Or maybe someone pulling their zipper up and down very quickly and amplifying the sound. It's kind of like that.

I cannot imagine what could possibly make that noise. Some kind of bass string manipulation? A toy harmonica of some sort? Possibly a broken down hurdy gurdy? So I went on You Tube to check out the video and found this:

What the hell is that guy playing? A lampshade? He's obviously holding something near a microphone and it must be the mystery instrument making that mystery sound.

I continued on to allmusic where I finally found the answer - It's Tommy Hall and his electric jug! Of course. But what, you ask, is an electric jug? Next stop - Wikipedia: "The jug, a crock-jug with a microphone held up to it while it was being blown, sounded somewhat like a cross between a minimoog and cuica drum." So they were just a jug band who plugged in and loaded up on psychedelics and reverb. Fascinating. Thank you internet for once again coming to the rescue!

Revisiting the Classix: Five-Eight

I was thinking the other day about my cd collection and how there are so many cds hiding in there that my eyes pass over daily without even stopping. It's automatic at this point. I've conditioned myself to jump over them, taking no notice, and it's gotten to the point where sometimes I'm not even sure if I own a certain album or not even though my eyes glance at it several times a week as I pass by it on the way to the shiny new soundz. Five-Eight's I Learned Shut Up is one of these forgotten cds. It's actually one of the first cds I ever purchased but it's probably been about 10 years or so since I last listened to it.
The album came out in 1992 and I remember being introduced to them around the same time as I became obsessed with Barenaked Ladies. It was a year where I was first starting to make headway into forging my own musical tastes and choosing some bands who weren't part of the Lollapalooza set. Five-Eight were from Athens, GA (just like R.E.M. so they were already cool) and I loved them immediately. Over the years, I soured on both them and Barenaked Ladies but couldn't bring myself to ever get rid of this album. The Barenaked Ladies' Gordon is another story. I have tried selling it several times and nobody wants that piece of shit. It's currently selling for $0.75 on half.com, which is the lowest price you can possibly list a cd for, so you can see what a hot commodity this thing is. If they still had cut out bins, Gordon would fill about 20% of the available space. It's the Whipped Cream and Other Delights of the modern era.
The other day I needed some music to keep me company while I did the dishes and for some unknown reason, my eyes stopped on poor, forgotten Five-Eight. After years of neglect, I was horribly excited to listen to this artifact from the past. I often wonder when listening to albums how many other people in the world are currently listening the same cd. When I put I Learned Shut Up on the other night, I had a pretty fair shot at being the only person listening to it in the entire universe at that point. Now I don't know if it was the years of absence making my heart grow fonder or what but it did not disappoint.
Right away, I was soaping up silverware and doing the head bop to the furious rocking of lead off track "Looking Up." As with all albums that burrow their way into your brain during the influential high school years, I still knew every guitar lick, drum fill and lyric. I wasn't even enjoying it purely nostalgically. The 15 year old Gamera loved it as an escape from the drudgery of teenage life and the 30 year old Gamera can think of nothing better to assist in the cleaning of greasy pans. It's a stone rocker, even the ballads.
And oh, what ballads. "Desperate Tonight" and "Destroy this World" are absolute killers but even they pale in comparison to the masterpiece that is "She's Dropping the Bomb." I may be wrong, but it appears that this song is about two young guys attempting to save a stripper from her dreary life through poetry and utter sincerity. Their plan fails beautifully and culminates with these crushing lines: "I was the poet in the bar/Do you remember me/She said no." Oh! It's torturous and brilliant and it blows my mind to see someone write such a painful song about themselves where they don't look cool for a single second. Singer/Guitarist/Songwriter Mike Mantione is nothing if not a heart on sleeve type. Brutally honest lyrics paired with at-times shrill singing let you know HE IS NOT JOKING. I saw him once at JMU standing at the edge of the stage sans band, singing the song "Weirdo" without aid of a microphone to open the set, laying his soul out there for everyone to witness and wince at. The picture of him singing naked inside the Angriest Man ep basically sums it up. This man is not afraid to overshare.
So it was a pleasant revisitation and I don't see going another 10 years before another listen. If you are one of the others out there who still own this cd, give a chance this week, you just may be surprised how awesome it still is.
And now for the requisite viddeo post. This time it's Five-Eight plus members of R.E.M. playing at the 40 Watt in 2006. Athens superpowers, activate! Form of "Sitting Still!"

The Jazz Purge

I remember when I was in college, I was being exposed to all sorts of new sounds and falling head over heels in love with each and everyone of them at a pretty rapid pace. Old timey country, blues, opera, modern classical, funk and jazz. Indie rock was still my mainstay but I was happy to fill my ears with a wild assortment of new noises. At one point in my Sophomore year, I found myself sick to death of all that boring indie rock and all the old standards I had relied on for years and wanted to sell my entire cd collection and start over fresh. I remember Frank Black's album "The Cult of Ray" as being the impetus for this desired purging. A major disappointment from an artist I thought I could rely on came at the exact right time to highlight what was lacking in my music choices.

I never did sell everything but it started me on a path of constant evaluation, reconsideration and revision of my music collection. It seems lately that every 3 months I am checking the shelves and pulling out the dead weight. I'm not someone who wants a showpiece, I want a vital, active collection that actually gets listened to. Nostalgia affects me as much as anyone, if not more, but I don't want to hang on to too many cds simply for sentimental value when I will never actually listen to them. I've gotten to the point where a memory is good enough.

So during my most recent journey through the stacks, I made significant discovery. I don't care for jazz very much. In college I fell for it hard - every era had something to offer me whether it was hard bop, swing, free or even fusion but over the years I find myself listening to it less and less. There are a number of reasons for its fall from grace, including:

1. No guitars. Unless you're way into Wes Montgomery (I'm not) or *shudder* John Pizzarelli, you're not going to get much guitar action in your typical plunk plunk toot music. I have recently accepted my addiction to and slavery to the guitar and jazz guitar just doesn't feed the sickness.

2. Too many damn solos. If Phish and the rest of the sea of jam band losers are acceptable to mock mercilessly, why not jazzbos? Whether on a guitar, flute or alto sax, wankery is still wankery.

3. No words. I like a melody to sing along with and it's hard to sing a jumpy little trumpet line for long without feeling alittle bit insane.

4. Terrible reissue nonsense. I like jazz but I don't love it which is too bad because many lables like to include alternate takes on their reissues. This wouldn't be such a problem were they to put the Take 3 version after the official release but they don't. Both Impulse and Blue Note, and others I'm sure, like to mix them right into the album so you sometimes get back to back versions of the same song. It's not a hobby of mine to play spot the difference between Bobby Timmons' solo during two different versions of "Sincerely Diana."

I'm not getting rid of all of it, I'm just cutting off the fat. The albums I'm excising have become background music and I feel guilty not giving them my full attention when listening but I just don't have any interest in putting them on these days. Maybe when I'm older I'll get my attention span back.