Sunday, 01 February 2009

Sunday, 25 January 2009

  • "I'm Not Here, This Isn't Happening"



    II.  Radiohead
    Kid A
    (Capitol; 2000)

        Kid A, to skew a quote coined by Winston Churchill, is an incongruity wrapped in a contradiction inside a non sequitur:  the most anticipated rock album of the last 15 or so years that was anything but, an apparent sonic indictment of technology and its enslavement of our culture that employs some of the most sophisticated gadgets of the medium, and finally an ostensible act of career suicide that still managed to sell millions of copies.
         Perhaps my biggest initial shock listening to the album was the title of the first song, Everything In Its Right Place.  A more fitting title for the song would have been Nothing In Its Right Place.  Gone was Johnny Greenwood's guitar and the relatively simple song structures of OK Computer and in their stead was a song built around an organ and electronically distorted blips of Thom Yorke gibberish.  Also gone was any semblance of the arena rockers that I had fallen in love with in the 1990's.  They had been kidnapped and replaced by clones who were sustained by a steady diet of Krautrock, Squarepusher and Aphex Twin.  The only song that even remotely sounded like Bends or OK Computer-era Radiohead was Optimistic and perhaps the only aspect of the album that still held any bearing to the old Radiohead was Thom Yorke's continuing lyrical obsession with technology and its effect on humanity. 
        I remember having a conversation with a friend recently about how it was kind of ironic we lived in an age where technologically we are the most connected we've ever been and yet we live in an unprecedented era of social disconnect.  That statement pretty much sums up Thom Yorke's technology obsession.  You could first see a hint of it in the last song off of The Bends, Street Spirit:
     
    Rows of houses all bearing down on me
    I can feel their blue hands touching me
    All these things in all positions
    All these things will one day take control
    And fade out again and fade out

    By the time OK Computer came along, that theme had spread to the entire album.  Yorke even said of OK Computer that "the outside world became all there was...I'm just taking Polaroids of things around me moving too fast."  Listening to the album now, it sounds very much like a society struggling to assimilate technology into the everyday.
         Kid A, by contrast, sounds more like a surrender to that technology.  It's beautiful, ethereal, haunting and altogether sounds soulless.  I could imagine Idioteque being played in a dance club on the surface of the moon.  Even the cover art gives it an otherworldly dimension as if it was straight out of an H.G Wells story.  It would probably even work well as a sonic accompaniment to Brave New World.
         It's indeed tempting to hail Kid A as some sort of forward thinking masterpiece that portends a dystopian future of consumerism and technological triumph.   Most of the indie music community sees it as such.  I find it kind of interesting that if you craft an album that is rabidly anti-consumer and has music derived from several disparate esoteric sources, the indie community will hail you as some sort of visionary (it would come as no surprise to me if several indie mags rank it the #1 album of this decade).  Which is exactly what happened to Kid A.  I don't go quite that far in my praise of the album.  It has some great songs to be sure and it's also nice that they introduced a mainstream audience to German rock and Warp Records.  But I don't think I need a Rob Gordon or a Pitchfork media or even the biggest band in the world for that matter to validate my liking Neu! or Kraftwerk or Aphex Twin.  It is nice however to be pointed in the right direction every once in a while.  If that's the enduring legacy of Kid A I'm fine with that.  I think even Thom Yorke would be too.

               
       
        



Saturday, 17 January 2009

  • "Forever never seems that long until you grown"


    I.  Outkast
    Stankonia
    (La Face; 2000)

         Outkast stopped being interesting  after Stankonia (musically at least, Andre 3000's wardrobe continues to interest me to this day).  That's not to say Stankonia was a bad album (it wouldn't be on this list if it was) nor that with it Outkast had finally reached some brilliant creative apex, it's just to say that they had finally hit that high-water mark where record sales met rave reviews and the long crash to mediocrity had begun.  Anyone who thinks Speakerboxx/The Love Below was a great album was just a critic or fan who was late getting to a party that had started about 10 years earlier.  
         From about 1994 to 2000, Outkast was without question the most consistent act in mainstream hip/hop.  Rap careers often have a shelf-life of most nuclear material, but Outkast was the rare element that actually made a string of great, not good, albums.
         It started for me in 10th grade with SouthernplayalisticCadillacMuzic (yes I can claim I started on the ground floor with this band, something I can't remotely claim about many of the others that will invariably appear on this list).  This was my friends and I's soundtrack to playing basketball at our church gym for the better part of a year.  Atliens (1996) was my roommate's soundtrack for our freshman year in college so due to confined spaces it became my soundtrack as well.  Aquemini (1998) came in my junior year of college and with it came Outkast's first real taste of commercial success (Rosa Parks is still my favorite song of theirs).  And then Ms. Jackson and Stankonia came and it all exploded.
        I'll argue til I'm blue in the face that Stankonia was not Outkast's best album (that distinction belongs to Aquemini).  I think its critical reception (95 on Metacritic, unheard of for a rap album) still can be attributed to lazy critics trying to atone for past sins.  Still, it's hard to argue that it didn't contain Outkast's best singles.  I can't think collectively of three better ones than So Fresh So Clean, B.O.B., and Ms. Jackson.  And while I bemoan the fact that they have turned into the hip/hop version of the Beatles (seriously was Speakerboxx/The Love Below not their White Album?), they were one of the first hip/hop acts to start taking the gangster out of rap and prove you could leave (or come back, they have a rumored reunion album much like Dr. Dre's mythical Detox) the music on your own terms rather than in a hail of gun fire.
        
         

  • A Note About This List

    These albums will be in chronological order by year.  Which is not to say exact.  I have no idea whether Stankonia or Heartbreaker was released first, I just know they both came out in 2000.

Thursday, 08 January 2009

  • A Panda Bear's Domestic Bliss


    "I just want four walls and adobe slats for my girls."

        This post has nothing to about Panda Bears, but rather my giddiness in listening to yet another great Animal Collective album.  I remember writing a year or so ago that Animal Collective captured the innocence and wonder of entering adolescence better than any band I could think of (or something to that effect).  Turns out, they write equally well about entering adulthood.  I've had the track "My Girls" on repeat for the past day.  It's Noah Lennox's (that's Panda Bear to the initiated) ode to his wife and little girl.  It's absolutely irresistible.

    http://www.myspace.com/animalcollectivetheband





Friday, 02 January 2009

  • A Note About End of Year (or decade, in this instance) Lists

    One of the reasons I started this blog was to keep my writing skills sharp and  in the year or so I've kept this blog I have realized its hard to find things to write about consistently.  So for the new year I've decided that I'm going to try to do a weekly post on my favorite albums of this decade since it's nearing the end of the decade and all.  That way I don't have to cram it all in at the end of '09 and it will give me something to post weekly.  I've already got a few good ideas kicking around for a few of them. 

         

  • Words of wisdom from Ignatius Riley



     I'm currently reading A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole.  I'm only about 1/3 of the way through, but I can say it is one of funniest books I've read in a long time, also its quite good.  Ignatius, the main character, is quickly rivaling Yossarian (from Catch-22) as my favorite literary character.  I laughed out loud reading this, in the middle of the Wal-Mart break room no less:

    "'You got a job?' (a police officer, addressing Ignatius)

    'I dust a bit,' Ignatius told the policeman.  'In addition, I am at the moment writing a lengthy indictment against our century.  When my brain begins to reel from my literary labors, I make an occasional cheese dip.'"




Sunday, 28 December 2008

  • It's Been Awhile (sigh...)

    So I see its been a good six months since I've updated this thing.  I really meant to be a bit more diligent with my updates, but hey, there's always next year.  I guess the biggest thing that has happened over the past six months is I've become quite domesticated  (put simply it means I am now quite fond of cooking), which a simple inventory of my christmas gifts would prove.  I got a cuisinart food processor that looks something like this:


    My aunt was also kind enough to give me a Kitchen-aid mixer that her daughter was no longer using.  It looks something like this:

    I have no doubts my body weight will increase by about 20 lbs in the new year and I'll add an inch or two to my wasteline.  Which is quite sad, because I worked pretty hard this year at losing the 30 lbs that I did.  I'm also learning Spanish via Rosetta Stone.  It was quite expensive, but must say that it works quite well thus far.  I now know phrases to go along with my curse words when I'm talking to my fellow Spanish speakers I work with.

         And I suppose this blog post would not be complete if I didn't mention what music floored me this year, as I seem to only be passionate writing about that particular topic.  I won't make it as extravagant as last year's, but here are 6 records that I loved in '08 in no particular order other than to say The Walkmen's You and Me was hands down my favorite this year:

     

    No that last one is not a joke.  It seems I too, am susceptible to the Lil' Wayne kool-aid.  My favorite description of him this year is "a mush-mouthed Dadaist."  I'd go with foul-mouthed myself but mush-mouthed works too.

     

     

Sunday, 08 June 2008

Wednesday, 07 May 2008

  • My (tame) PETA rant

         So I've had a day to calm myself over PETA's ridiculous call for the suspension of Eight Belles' jockey and her trainer in the aftermath of the horse breaking down after finishing 2nd in the Kentucky Derby.  PETA's logic being that Gabriel Saez use of the whip in the stretch is what caused both of Eight Belles ankles to shatter when she was galloping out.  Anyone who has watched horses race could tell that Eight Belles was under no duress during the stretch run of the race.  She did briefly yank her head in the stretch, something she also did while racing at Oaklawn, but she obviously had not hurt herself yet.  Anyone who had the misfortune of watching the 2006 Preakness stakes could tell you what a horse looks like when they are running on one shattered ankle.  It's not a pretty sight.  Even the Churchill downs vet was at a loss to explain her injury.  Perhaps he should have consulted the fine people at PETA because obviously they knew who was to blame for her injury.
         The frustrating thing is that PETA could have done alot of good with this publicity had they known what they were actually talking about.  By blaming the trainer and the jockey (and in essence looking completely ignorant), PETA's other points that make alot of sense are being completely ignored by everyone in the racing community.  It's not the trainer's and jockey's abuse and neglect that cause horses to breakdown more frequently than they once did.  It's simply a matter of economics now.
         Breeding, for better or worse, is now the most profitable part of horse racing.  If a horse wins the Kentucky Derby or any of the triple crown races, he is more valuable in the breeding shed than he is on a race track.  And when it comes to breeding in America, speed is the only variable that matters.  If you have a 2 year old who can run an eighth of a mile in under 11 seconds, you can sell him at auction for a huge price.  Breeders for years have emphasized speed over everything else (most principally soundness) and now thoroughbreds are a breed that have become very fragile.  In the 70's horses would average at least 10 starts per year.  These days a horse averages around 6.      
         Breeding is not the only factor to be sure.  U.S. Horse Racing has a drug problem that would rival both the MLB's and cycling.  They also have very lax rules when it comes to race day medication.  And yet with all of these problems to choose from, PETA chose to blame the jockey and her trainer.  Now I hear that they are planning on storming the track when the Preakness starts.  Not sure who PETA will blame if a horse breaks down trying to avoid a mob of people in the Pimlico homestretch.