Emily's Albums A to Z

Listened: Tuesday June 7

They Don’t Know is one of the weirder albums I own, in terms of the style of music I usually listen to. For those who don’t know – ha – which is probably everyone in America, So Solid Crew was one of the early garage superstar groups in the UK. It’s basically gangster rap over dance music.

I have no earthly idea how I found out about them – maybe when I was in England after college, since that’s when this album came out. I remember digging up some songs on the Internet ( Haters and 21 Seconds) and I got addicted to their sound, despite popular rap not being the usual thing I gravitated toward.

Ms Dynamite (called Lady Dynamite then) is a great rapper, and I was surprised at how much space they gave her to do her thing. I realized that I was confused by the cover – the woman featured prominently is actually Lisa Maffia, so I naturally assumed she was the one doing all the badass rapping. However, in doing research for this entry, I’ve figured out Lisa doesn’t rap a great deal on the album and was probably put so far in front as eye candy to sell albums. Yet another reason why I don’t usually gravitate towards this stuff – if Ms Dynamite was annoyed by this, she had good reason.

Listened: Tuesday June 7

Wow. This is going way back. Ten Summoner’s Tales was one of the first CDs I ever owned. And as I owned few albums on cassette, it’s probably one of the first 20 albums I ever owned. I hadn’t listened to it in 15 years.

A lot of the songs remind me of the early 90s because, frankly, they were everywhere at the time. I loved Fields of Gold back then. Listening to the album now, for what it is – vaguely jazz easy listening – it’s not horrible, but some songs are quite cheesy. It’s not really my style now.

I do remember breaking this album out when I finally saw the director’s cut of The Professional – Shape of My Heart is used quite appropriately in the closing scene. Of all the songs, I enjoy it the most, simply because it reminds me of that brilliant film.

Listened: Tuesday June 7

Coachella 2010 motivated me to study up on Beach House. Teen Dream is a very beautiful, cohesive album and I’m glad I checked it out.

I’ve seen some reviews comparing singer Victoria Legrand’s voice to Nico; I’m not sure I see that. She reminds me of Erika Wennerstrom if she decided to sing more gently and less bluesy. The sound of the album is very 70s-pop-hits, in the best possible way. It could go back in time and no one hearing it then would be tripped out by it a la Back-to-the-Future-Johnny-Be-Goode.

I’ve only just learned this is actually their third album. Clearly, the older albums warrant checking out.

Listened: Tuesday June 6

After having reviewed so many GZM albums, I’m running out of things to say. As usual though, they have completely badass psychedelic cover art.

Unlike Patio, on Tatay, the band’s second album, they seem to have acquired better instruments and mixers and such, so it sounds much less like a band playing in a garage. There are obvious references to Captain Beefheart and the Velvet Underground here, so they’re a bit past noodling and onto emulating their heroes.

After hearing all the older albums, I have new appreciation for how well Introducing… collected all the gems together!

Listened: Tuesday June 7

Talkie Walkie is when I started to like Air again. I loved Moon Safari, but then 10,000 Hz Legend was a bit of a letdown, being quite different. With Talkie Walkie, they got their mojo back.

I particularly love Alone in Kyoto, which I’ve heard used as background music in a great many online videos of beautiful landscape photos and the like. It’s relatively simple, but very evocative and alive. I also love the weird beats in Universal Traveler. I can sing the oddly enunciated lyrics for hours.

Despite loving this album, I’ve been remiss at purchasing their later releases. I need to catch up!

Listened: Wednesday June 7

I love Sigur Ros. I’ll always remember them as one of the important bands of my twenties. That said, I just can’t deal with their music at work. There are very few bands I like who fall into this category. It’s just too emotionally stirring, in an ambiguous way. I have to think too hard about what I want/need/should feel when I’m hearing it, and that distracts me from my work.

That said, Jonsi‘s singing is wonderful, and the soft touches of piano are stirring. I have great memories of hearing the songs from Takk in concert over the years. They bring up so many visual memories for me – the band playing them, the lovely environments I heard them in (The Fillmore, The Warfield, The Paramount, The Greek, The Fox, Coachella), and the visuals at their shows (which are always incredibly well done). I hope Jonsi going solo doesn’t mean they won’t do any more shows!

Listened: Monday June 6

Take Them On is more fabulous bluesy rock from BRMC. After their Jesus and Mary Chain-like debut, Take Them On drills farther into a more bluesy sound. I can even hear traces of the more folky gospel sound of the followup, Howl (particularly in And I’m Aching). Howl’s style seemed like a shock at the time, but really, the sound  it embraced is hiding in the shadows of Take Them On.

Both when the album was released in 2003 and now during the project, I’ve found myself singing lyrics like “I don’t feel at home in this generation” and “You’re gonna suffer, you’re gonna make it” like my life depends upon it. BRMC really knows how to end their albums with an exclamation mark as well – Heart + Soul isn’t as good as Salvation, but it closes the album like a slamming door.

Listened: Monday June 6

Explosions in the Sky keep improving with every album. Take Care soars with guitars singing praises to my ears. Especially here, it feels like the guitars are almost vocal. I want to sing along to songs like Postcard From 1952.

Woody and I saw Explosions live recently at the Fox Theatre in Oakland. The show was amazing and transporting. Oddly, we saw a bunch of people pass out at the show. Maybe Explosions in the Sky is too much for some people. Or it could be the drugs. Maybe.

Listened: Monday June 6

Swords is a collection of B-sides from Moz’s recent “comeback” albums’ singles. While I wouldn’t say they’re up to the standard of the straightforwardly released songs, there are still some gems here – Don’t Make Fun of Daddy’s Voice, The Never-Played Symphonies, Ganglord, Christian Dior, Friday Mourning (Who doesn’t love a Morrissey song that starts “Friday, mourning, and I’m dressed in black”?).

I know all along Morrissey has dropped a lot of hints about liking the company of men, all the way back to Hand In Glove. But I love that he’s a bit less covert these days (though still reasonably poetic mind you, not vulgar). I mean, “Swords”? He might as well have named it “Penises”. Don’t Make Fun of Daddy’s Voice makes this extra clear by saying “Don’t make fun of Daddy’s voice, when he was a teenage boy, something got stuck in his throat.” As I’ve said in previous album reviews, Morrissey is funny, which many people seem to miss.

Listened: Monday June 6

Caribou’s Swim is difficult to describe. It’s electronica, clearly, but also decently pop-structured and almost 70s rock-like. The soundscapes are very unique yet flow together well enough that they aren’t a listener’s only focus.

The influences vary wildly – sometimes I think of it like a less bizarre Sparks (Odessa), other times it’s very chillout jazzy (Sun, Kaili). I think Bowls uses the same “flourish” sample as Writer’s Block by Just Jack (unless it’s a sample of a well-known song I’m not usually able to pick out samples, so it was surprising I noticed this). I’m addicted to the flute sample in Leave House; I think I could listen to it for a long time. Hannibal sounds like a lost Underworld song.

Yet despite all these experiments, the production and organization is very clean. Girl Talk, this ain’t.