Monday, May 7, 2012

MUSIC DIARY 2012: DAY 1 REPORT

#musicdiary2012 for Monday, May 7th, 2012

I listened to both of these this morning on my laptop as I made my daily internet rounds and got ready to go to campus. The Lapalux is quite good; I'm planning on writing a review of it sometime this week. It does a really nice job of framing the Brainfeeder aesthetic as a kind of warped and distorted party music that is quite catchy. I listened to the Girl Unit song after reading Larry Fitzmaurice's review of the EP for Pitchfork. I didn't enjoy it as much as the review led me to think I would. Oh well.

  • CFCF - The River EP (2010)

I listened to this on my iPod as I waited for and then rode the bus to campus. Quietly beautiful and enchanting, this EP is quite hypnotic (which makes it great as music for commuting). It's not quite as good as the just released Exercises EP, but still a worthwhile listen, though. "Frozen Forest" is a definite highlight, and if the title track's noisy climax is marred by some out of place drumming, it's a pretty thrilling song regardless.

I listened to this on my walk from the bus stop to the office (again on my iPod). I've written enough about this EP lately, so I'll just say that this quickly becoming one of my favourite songs of 2012.

I listened to these on the way home from campus (once again, on my iPod). The Four Tet songs are great when it's sunny out as they make the whole world seem magical. I particularly enjoy how well they work together; as a pair, they're one of the better 1-2 punches in his catalogue. The live version of "2 Rights Make 1 Wrong" is my preferred take. Something about the glitchy, vocodored vocals is even more affecting than usual on this album. Both "Herod" and "Megasnake" were to drown out the people sitting behind me who were having a loud conversation about their personal lives that I had no desire to overhear (or to have thrust upon my hearing). Luckily, those are two really awesome songs to drown people out with!

I listened to all of these on my laptop after I got home from campus as I wasted time on the internet, answered emails, and thought about what to make for dinner (it ended up being spaghetti, for those who might be curious). I'd had the R.E.M. song buzzing around in my head the other day (particularly the "Conversation / Fear" part at the end), so I decided to look it up on YouTube and get it out of there. Same thing with the Creedence track. I really like that song because I associate it with a great road trip to California I took with some friends a few years ago. Also, there is some killer guitar playing throughout and the song itself just cannot be touched. The next three all came about via Pitchfork, with Melody's Echo Chamber (great band name) being the big winner: a warm, blown out bit of psych rock that's perfect for the higher temperatures (and humidity) that we've been having. The Godspeed track is nice and pretty, lacking a lot of their usual bombast, and given how quiet the recording is (and its quality), I was surprised to discover it's a live track. The Last Step (an alias of Venetian Snares) track was boring. I did not enjoy it at all.


I had these on in the background as I did some cleaning (my apartment is a wreck right now from the chaos of the end of the semester). I'm still not one hundred percent sold on the Lone album, though there are bits that make me perk my ears up and take notice. The Lotus Plaza album I quite like and I'll try and get a review up in the next week or so. For me, it's the best Deerhunter member solo project release (though I do love Logos) and the best Deerhunter related release since Microcastle.

  • BNJMN - "Lava" from Black Square (2011)
I listened to this after I finished cleaning while I looked at twitter. I've written about BNJMN and this song before, so I'll point you in that direction and leave it at that for now, other than to say that this song still holds up.

I listened to these as I wrote a draft of this post (after I accidentally deleted a draft I'd written earlier--serenity now!). The Flying Lotus EP (along with Cosmogramma) was my album of the year in 2010, and it still blows my mind how much stuff is going on in those songs. I've written on the Gonjasufi mini-album, but it's taken on an added hallucinatory quality tonight as lightning keeps flashing outside my window. The Lokai album is a low-key (sorry!) gem, really overlooked, and great music to read and write to. I rarely hear it mentioned by anyone (and by "rarely," I mean "never"), but it's been in fairly consistent rotation since I picked it up a few years back. "Salvador" and "Volver" are probably my favourite tracks on the album.

Until tomorrow!
Posted by at
Labels: , , ,

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)