Recent CD Purchases

[StrictTime]

Well, Regina Spektor Begin To Hope yesterday.

For Xmas I recevied:

• The Dr. John Anthology
  Coltrane's Blue Train
  Rufus Does Judy At Carnegie Hall, which I quite liked, actually
  two Waits albums (I'm too lazy to go check which two)

It made a list! See, I can do the Internets too!

[Otis Westinghouse]

Well you got Heart Attack and Vine on vinyl, and, erm, I'm too lazy to remember.

Hope you begin to like Begin to Hope. It's got about 5 absolute crackers. Some of the best songs of recent years. Hope she goes on to do equally great stuff.

[StrictTime]

Well I hope you really start to love Soviet Kitsch. It's one of my favourite albums recently. And I do like Begin To Hope, it's much more downbeat but I think I'll love it.

[pophead2k]

The Rosebuds - Night of the Furies
Whiskeytown - Faithless Street

[Mike Boom]

Keep listening to SMILE Otis, its awesome.

[Otis Westinghouse]

I guess I'll have to. Do I need to read the sleevenotes to appreciate it properly? I will anyway, but I wondered as I listened if it was the kind of thing where you needed to know more of the context to appreciate the content. What is it that makes you rate it so highly?

[Mike Boom]

Well, its a kindof strange record , being essentially a reconstruction of something written and recorded 30 or so years ago. Its also difficult for me to be objective about it because I love the Beach Boys and to me the original SMILE would have been the greatest record ever made and had it been finished and released would have blown Sgt Pepper out of the water, so hearing a finished version after all these years is sort of like the holy grail of records for me. Obviously its not the same record it would have been, and it lacks that edge of madness and sixties ambience in the actual sound of the record, but hell, they did an amazing job putting it all together and linking the songs up. Songs like "Wonderful", "Roll Plymouth Rock", "Surfs Up" and "WindChimes" are just brilliant, innovative, moving songs. The lyrics and structure of these songs is really quite stunning. "Cabin Essence" is the first song that got me into the Beach Boys who I had always thought of as "Help Me Rhonda", stripey shirt kinda goofs. But when I heard that bizarre "doing doing" intro to Cabin Essence, and the way the sounds actually transported you to that "home on the range", I realised that there was a whole world of pyschedelic Beach Boys gems that I went on to discover were simply the weirdest most wonderful songs Id ever heard. The whole vision and scope of Smile is just amazing. The whole album is a journey across America from California to Hawaii and also a journey from Child to Man, and is filled with a childlike humour and innocence that lives in all of Wilsons best work. You can hear the stuff that inspired countless muscians from McCartney to Partridge - (Wonderful is very XTCish song). I can only guess that for you the tunes havent sunk in yet or that because the production values that were so amazing and ahead of their time on the original recordings are now obviously standard perhaps you need to hear the original versions to hear the magic!

[Otis Westinghouse]

Second play the tunes were beginning to sink in better. It's the sense of trying to recreate the unrecreatable, I guess. They give it a good shot. I need to listen to it more closely, clearly.

[Who Shot Sam?]

Bruce Springsteen's Magic (finally) and Robert Plant/Alison Krauss' Raising Sand, with the last of my X-mas gift cards.

[verbal gymnastics]

Wha'ppen? - The (English) Beat

One of my favourite albums of the era. And it includes my favourite song by them ie Walk Away.

[StrictTime]

Arrived today in the post: Poses, Want One, and Overcome By Happiness. Earlier in the week came North and Il Songo, completing my major studio album Elvis collection. I don't know if that's an accomplishment or just really really pathetic....

....God bless Amazon gift cards.

[Who Shot Sam?]

Arrived today in the post: Poses, Want One, and Overcome By Happiness.

Some fine purchases there Strict. Hope you enjoy the Pernice Brothers album as much as I do.

[Otis Westinghouse]

Poses I wasn't too moved by, but Want One is massive. I haven't heard the last one, but a fan friend said apart from Going to a city it wasn't that good.

[StrictTime]

Want One is the one I'm currently focused on. I'll get around to Poses, but like you said, Want One is massive, and commands all my attention right now. I think I still prefer Want Two, but this is really good.

I'll probably pick up the new one as well, because I think I'm going to collect Rufus. I mean, unless he really starts to suck. Now that I've got all the Elvis studio stuff, I need someone new to collect.

[Otis Westinghouse]

And now the Judy Garland live show is out too.

[Who Shot Sam?]

And now the Judy Garland live show is out too.

Will be passing on that one. Just a wee bit too gay for me.

[verbal gymnastics]

At what stage does gay become too gay?

[Who Shot Sam?]

At what stage does gay become too gay?

Anything involving Judy Garland is too gay for me.

[so lacklustre]

Does anything ever become too heterosexual?

[BlueChair]

Death metal

[Who Shot Sam?]

Death metal

Some hip hop. Well, most for me.

[StrictTime]

And now the Judy Garland live show is out too.

Will be passing on that one. Just a wee bit too gay for me.

Got that for Christmas. It is certainly a fag-stravaganza (and please, I use the term endearingly) and my first remark upon opening it was 'Oh my god it's the gayest thing ever!' I quite like it though. It's something different than what I usually listen to, so I enjoy it.

And yes, rap music is waaaaaaaaay too heterosexual.

[so lacklustre]

Does anything ever become too heterosexual?

John Wayne?
NFL players

[mood swung]

people who quote themselves?

that could go either way, I think.

[Otis Westinghouse]

Speed of the Sound of Nothingness? Or something like that.