#musicdiary2012 for Wednesday, May 9th and Thursday, May 10th, 2012
Forgive the twofer here, but I was unable to complete an entry last night and as today's is going to be a relatively light report, I figured I'd just combine them.
- A Lull - "Summer Dress" from the Meat Mountain EP (2012)
- Richard Hawley - "Standing at the Sky's Edge" from Standing at the Sky's Edge (2012)
I listened to these on Wednesday morning as I made my internet rounds. The A Lull track caught my eye as I looked at Pitchfork, but I can't say that I found it particularly enjoyable. It seems to belong to the whole Vampire Weekend school of indie rock that I can't say I've got much interest in. I'd seen a few people talk about this Richard Hawley album, and given that his name was unfamiliar, I decided to check out one of the songs. The Quietus review, in which Julian Marszalek describes the album as "an album that looks more to the cosmos for aural inspiration rather than the surrounding of the People's Republic of South Yorkshire" before asserting that it's "the music Jason Pierce should be making," had me thinking that it might be a rock record after A Northern Soul. Unfortunate, then, that it might be just that and I couldn't quite warm to it. Based on the title track, there's nothing that I want to explore further. [Side note: with their Kevin Shields interview and Neil Kulkarni starting up a US version of his "A New Nineties" feature, The Quietus has been on point the past few days]
- My Bloody Valentine - EPs and Rarities 1988-1991 (2012)
I put this on while I did some work coming up with ideas for an SF panel I'm trying to put together and had my face blown off. The sound is just glorious--especially after years of shitty mp3s and YouTube videos--and it allowed me to get into the material here in a way that I've never been able to before. Given how much I've listened to Loveless and Isn't Anything, it's nice to have something that feels genuinely fresh to listen to from My Bloody Valentine. And if the rumours swirling around the internet--rumours that Shields' interviews with Pitchfork and The Quietus seem to be confirming--of a new album finally being completed are true (the boards over here were buzzing about a July release a few months ago), well, that would be something. Of course, until I am actually listening to a new album by My Bloody Valentine I refuse to believe one will actually ever materialize, but a man can dream. Anyway, having heard the Loveless remaster when it first leaked years ago, I'm more excited to hear the Isn't Anything remaster--maybe that will allow me to understand why people (so many these days, it seems) love that album more than (the superior, to my ears) Loveless.
- Ultraista - "Smalltalk" (2012)
- Amirali - In Time (2012)
After coming home from a meeting and before heading out to meet a friend for dinner I listened to these. The first is the only song so far from Nigel Godrich's new band. It's not bad, but I'm not super impressed. To me, it sounds like Lykke Li singing over leftovers from The King of Limbs, and given that that was not my favourite Radiohead album by any stretch, I could take or leave it. I was expecting something a little more like Broadcast. The Amirali album is streaming over at Resident Advisor. It's good, but not so good that it compels me to keep listening. I'll keep half an ear open for his stuff from now on, though.
- Darkstar - "Gold" from North (2010)
- Burial - Street Halo EP (2011)
I listened to these as I walked over to meet a friend for dinner. I quite like North, and "Gold" runs through my head now and again. I put it in between Kanye West's "Paranoid" and the Weeknd's "Initiation" on a mix CD I made for a friend, and I think that that's actually an inspired three song mini playlist. Street Halo is my favourite Burial release (though Kindred is excellent), and "NYC" is my favourite Burial song. It was overcast and cool as I walked, which felt like a perfect time for Burial's melancholy.
- Music on jukebox at bar
This is the reason there was no report for yesterday. I don't really remember a whole lot of last night--what had been planned as a fairly low key dinner turned into a pretty wild and raucous night--but I can say that I put "Common People," "Tender," and "Cortez the Killer" on the jukebox at some point. Really, this entry should read like David Foster Wallace's report on the dessert competition at the Illinois state fair in "Getting Away From Pretty Much Being Away From It All," if I'm honest. I spent most of last night getting reacquainted with my dinner and much of today as a miserable, nauseated puddle.
- My Bloody Valentine - EPs and Rarities 1988-1991 (2012)
I listened to this again this evening as I browsed the internet. It still sounds fantastic and I keep finding new treasures.
Until tomorrow!
No comments:
Post a Comment