What Are You Listening To?

[Music Head]

from my library



Liverpool band formed in 1978. They never made it that big in the states, but much chart success across the pond. This is their 5th album and the last before Ian McCulloch jumped ship for a solo try, returning in 1997. Tiffs with the band over his heavy drinking were the reported cause of the split. Drummer Pete de Freitas was killed in an auto accident in 1987. They are still at it with a new album in 2009. This one reached #4 on the U.K. charts and #51 in the U.S. with singles of Lips Like Sugar, The Game and Bedbugs and Ballyhoo. That was their best chart achievement in the U.S. Was thinking while listening how much some of this sounded like the Doors, read some liner notes to see Ray Manzarek appears.

I LIKE THIS ALBUM

Worst Track - Over You

Best Track - The Game

A sense of duty was my one intention
And an ugly beauty was my own invention
Pride a proud refusal and I refuse
To need your approval
Too many seekers
Too few beacons
But through the fog
We'll keep on beaming

Through the crying hours
Of your glitter years
All the living out
Of your tinsel tears
And the midnight trains
I never made
'cos i'd already
Played...the game

Everybody's got their own good reason
Why their favorite season is their favorite season
Winter winners and those summers sons
Aren't good for everyone
Aren't good for everyone
Spring has sprung
And autumns well done
So well done

And it's a better thing
That we do now
Forgetting everything
The whys and hows
While you reminisce
About the things you miss
You won't be ready
To kiss...goodbye

The earth is a world
The world is a ball
A ball in a game
With no rules at all
And just as i wonder
At the beauty of it all
You go and drop it
And it breaks and falls

I'll never understand
Why you thought i would
Need to be reassured
And be understood
When i always knew
That your bad's my good
And i was ready
Ready...to be loved

Born under mars
With jupiter rising
Fallen from stars
That lit my horizon

I'll never understand
Why you thought i would
Need to be reassured
And be understood
When i always knew
That your bad's my good
And i was ready
Ready...to be

Through the crying hours
Of your glitter years
All the living out
Of your tinsel tears
And the midnight trains
I never made
'cos i'd already played

It's a better thing
That we do now
Forgetting everything
The whys and hows
While you reminisce
About the things you miss
You won't be ready
To kiss...goodbye


1) The Game - *** - video
YouTube - ECHO AND THE BUNNYMEN THE GAME
2) Over You - *
3) Bedbugs and Ballyhoo - ** - video
YouTube - Echo & the Bunnymen - Bedbugs and Ballyhoo
4) All In Your Mind - **
5) Bombers Bay - ** - audio
YouTube - echo and the bunnymen - bombers bay
6) Lips Like Sugar - ** - live
YouTube - Echo & The Bunnymen - Lips Like Sugar
7) Lost And Found - ** - audio
YouTube - Echo and the Bunnymen - Lost and found
8) New Direction - ** - audio
YouTube - Echo & The Bunnymen
9) Blue Blue Ocean - *
10) Satellite - *
11) All My Life - *** - audio
YouTube - Echo and The Bunnymen -All My Life -1987

3's - 2
2's - 6
1's - 3

Rating - 1.9

[JonG]

Midlake - Winter Dies from The Courage of Others [Bella Union, 2010]

This'll be released Feb. 1st/2nd depending on where you are.

[Music Head]

listened online



Not sure where this guy goes. Mostly instrumental stuff, which is not my thing, but I do try. Oregon/Ohio/Pennsylvania dude with a background in instrumental hip/hop and rap producer who began his career as a DJ. His first album on his own label and his 4th overall. A lot of instrumental here with some featurings from people I never heard of. How about Kenna, Phonte Coleman, Aaron Livingston, Catalyst, Illogic and NP. They must be prominent enough to mention but they've never made it to my ears till now. Games You Can Win is the single. A throw away talking track of Salud. I have no idea.
That monster in that first clip is freaking me out.

I DO NOT LIKE THIS ALBUM

Worst Track - A Spaceship For Now

Best Track - Games You Can Win

1) Let There Be Horns - 1.0 - video
YouTube - Let There Be Horns
2) Games You Can Win - 2.0 - audio
YouTube - RJD2 - Games You Can Win feat. Kenna
3) Giant Squid - 1.0
4) Salud
5) The Glow - 1.5
6) A Spaceship For Now - 1.0 - audio
YouTube - RJD2 - A Spaceship For Now
7) The Shining Path - 2.0
8) Crumbs Off The Table - 1.5
9) A Son's Cycle - 2.0 - audio
YouTube - RJD2 - A Son's Cycle (Feat. The Catalyst, Illogic, and NP)
10) Tin Flower - 1.0 - audio
YouTube - RJD2 - Tin Flower
11) Small Plans - 1.0 - audio
YouTube - RJD2 - Small Plans
12) Gypsy Caravan - 1.0
13) The Stranger - 1.0 - audio
YouTube - RJD2 - The Stranger
14) Walk With Me - 1.5 - audio
YouTube - Rjd2 Walk With Me

Average Rating - 1.3

[JonG]

Ed, have you been reading pitchfork.com recently? I ask this based on some of your recent listens.

RJD2 is one of those artists that seems to get worse with each successive album. I really like his debut. I can't stand his third. I'm not even bothering with this one.

[Music Head]

Ed, have you been reading pitchfork.com recently? I ask this based on some of your recent listens.

RJD2 is one of those artists that seems to get worse with each successive album. I really like his debut. I can't stand his third. I'm not even bothering with this one.

Hey Jon

I'm all over the net as far as source material. I do read Pitchfork but don't think I picked that up from there. Probably Spinner, which is where most of my full album online listening comes from.
Yea that album sucked for me, but I haven't heard any previous stuff.

[Tiggi]

Modest Mouse - We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank



A recommendation from here from a few weeks ago. I know Music Head bigged it up, but there was someone else who recommended it...

Angular, funky Alt-Rock containing elements of Talking Heads, mid-period Pere Ubu, & Franz Ferdinand.

Enjoyed this muchly.

[JonG]

Modest Mouse - We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank

Is Modest Mouse new to you? Or just this album? It seems to me that you would have come across them before.

Lambchop - Please Rise from OH (ohio) [Merge Records, 2008]

For those that may not know, allmusic.com describes Lambchop thusly:

Touted as "Nashville's most f*cked-up country band" by their label Merge Records, Lambchop was arguably the most consistently brilliant and unique American group to emerge during the 1990s. Their unclassifiable hybrid of country, soul, jazz, and avant-garde noise seemed at one time or another to drink from every conceivable tributary of contemporary music, its baroque beauty all held together by the surreal lyrical wit and droll vocal presence of frontman Kurt Wagner.

[Music Head]

listened online



English gal who received many accolades for her debut in 2006, when that album debuted at #1 in Britian, along with Grammy and Brit award nominations. Didn't hear any of that, but this one didn't do much for me. The mellow tracks are just too mellow maybe? It could also fit in the Soul/Jazz/Folk categories. When you can do all that, you gotta be alternative. I can feel some Norah Jones, Joss Stone or even Adele in here. First single is I'd Do It All Again with a follow up already scheduled of Closer. Many of these songs are dealing with the death of her husband in 2006 to a suspected drug overdose, but autopsy results were inconclusive.

I DO NOT LIKE THIS ALBUM

Worst Track - I Would Like To Call It Beauty

Best Track - Feels Like The First Time

1) Are You Here - 2.0 - audio
YouTube - Corinne Bailey Rae "Are You Here" [STUDIO/FULL VERSION]
2) I'd Do It All Again - 1.5 - video
YouTube - Corinne Bailey Rae - I'd Do It All Again (official video)[/url]
3) Feels Like The First Time - 2.0 - audio
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I2kF7uryKbg
4) The Blackest Lily - 2.0 - audio
[url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pL4La7a_U2s]YouTube - Corinne Bailey Rae - The Blackest Lily
5) Closer - 1.0 - live
YouTube - !!CORINNE RAE "CLOSER" LIVE!!
6) Love's On It's Way - 1.5 - audio
YouTube - Corinne Bailey Rae - Love's On Its Way
7) I Would Like To Call It Beauty - 1.0 - audio
YouTube - Corinne Bailey Rae - I would Like To Call It Beauty
8) Paris Nights/New York Mornings - 1.5
YouTube - Corinne Bailey Rae - Paris Nights New York Mornings.wmv
9) Paper Dolls - 1.5
10) Diving For Hearts - 1.0 - audio
YouTube - Corinne Bailey Rae - Diving For Hearts
11) The Sea - 2.0 - audio
YouTube - Corinne Bailey Rae - The Sea

Average Rating - 1.5

[Tiggi]

Is Modest Mouse new to you? Or just this album? It seems to me that you would have come across them before.

I've known of them, Jon, but have never knowingly heard them.

I live a sheltered life...

[Iota]

Codeine - Second Change