I'd like to try something a little different, here. I'd like some audience participation, if that's not too much to ask. Hands up if you know the Polyphonic Spree. OK. Keep your hands up if you call them "the Spree". Keep them up if you find their unabated glee to be refreshing in a business filled with angry, jaded cynics. Keep your hands up if you find them to be listenable on a regular basis. Now, if your hands are still up, fuck off. The Polyphonic Spree are sickening. If you're smart enough to read this blog, you should know better.
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This is tough for me. On the assumption that you've blocked it out, I'll tell you again that Blur are my favourite band. This makes Damon Albarn my favourite guy by default. As mentioned earlier, I'm that horrible breed of Blur listener who only got into them via Gorillaz. It is my crowning shame. In addition to Blur, I discovered Cibo Matto, Del tha Funkee Homosapien and Dan ("the Automator") Nakamura through the Gorillaz debut, so I have a lot of respect for them, and what they were able to do with a widely heard single ("Clint Eastwood") and a previously closed-minded listener. I don't know that this blog would exist without "Clint Eastwood". I like to think I'd have noticed that all my music sucked eventually even without it, but I can't prove that, so all credit goes to Gorillaz on that one. And yet, here I am criticising them. I may have some explaining to do.
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Sometimes I am pretty bad at music. If alltimes were a word, I would probably use that, but you know. It's not. And as a defender of the English language, it's my job to not do that. Also I get certain perks like a leeway on sentences starting with "and". Are you a defender of the English language? No. So you don't get to complain. So anyway, music. The title of this entry sure sounds pretty good, but the hell does it mean? Iono. Ask … Epstein? Their frontman is just named Epstein? It doesn't even have a first name, it just says Epstein. Apparently, "Epstein" will not die for his country. Whatever the implications, that's good news for us, because his band are pretty good at music.
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Not me, my computer, but thank you for the confusion. I guess Judas was the guy driving the car that rammed a power pole? Though I suspect he was charged rather than paid for his actions. Unless he's dead. Either way, times change. And besides, Judas wasn't so bad. Nils Runeberg knows the score. Here in 2007, it's getting alarmingly close to 2008. I was going somewhere else with that sentence but then I had that realisation. Here in 2007, I've been listening to a bunch of music I've been missing in the downtime. One band was high on that list.
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Scott should post an entry soon.
It's still 1998 over here. With all credit to the Books, Quasi and Fly Pan Am, I've been having some pretty serious musical withdrawal. I have actually listened to a couple of CDs recently, which I pretty much never do (you can listen to CDs? I thought they were for ripping). It is tedious. In addition to that, I (re-)downloaded a couple more things to fill the time with. The re-download was Tori Amos's Hey Jupiter. It wins, go listen to it and you can win too. The other thing I downloaded, though …
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Not like that. Although …
Yesterday, my computer died. From the sound of things, it's not the permanent kind of death, rather closer to the Jesus school of dying. The culprit? Some bad driver. On a rainy day. Car went bang, power pole went splash, computer went boom. Or, if you're prefer a straight answer, we had a power surge. I know, I know, surge protector, quit telling me. I've always suspected it might be a good idea to have one, but I suppose I needed to see the aftermath first-hand before I would believe the hype. Ta-da, it lives up to it. So here's how I'm doing with my music stuck in the cave.
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The arresting conclusion.
With Carmelita back in town, a couple of new ways of finding music emerged: both involving letting her find it for me. They've been remarkably successful. The first may seem a tad obvious: she recommends artists she's heard who I might like. Unforeseen! The difference is that Carmelita's recommendations don't blow. After the 83rd time you're told that Heathen Chemistry isn't as bad as you've heard (believe the truth, it is), you learn to be skeptical of other people's uneducated guesses as to your taste, even such as it is. I dare you to parse that sentence.
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In which you notice your increasing disinterest.
There was plenty going on on the other side of the Atlantic. My first indie albums from the North Americans (not a band as far as I know) were Interpol's Turn on the Bright Lights and Arcade Fire's Funeral. These guys knew what they were doing! I was getting better at listening to good music, I'm sure you'll agree. I fooled around over there for a while, checking out Wolf Parade via their Modest Mouse connection, and (much) later going nuts on Spencer Krug's work. But something else was going to drive my musical expansion for a while.
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In which the exciting journey of myself toward non-crappiness continues.
I had finally realised that music, in fact, sounds good. Or at least that it should. I noticed that I had been listening to the wrong stuff. It took a pop musician to show me that I was missing out on most of the excellent music because it never hit Billboard. I discovered that chart-topping music wasn't successful based on its quality, but on it's palatability. If our buddy J. Tim could offend few enough listeners, he could fool people into thinking they liked him. Being rich and attractive might have helped, too.
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