The joke is on us

Tom Waits - Bad As Me (2011)
Rating 4.0/5.0
Where 5.0 is the album that screens you for your intelligence before giving in and to top it all, its not even an album!

Tom Waits tells you not to blend in. But then,he also wants you to buy his record.

Everyone is trying so hard to blend in...its as if mediocrity finds something even more ordinary than itself and blends in with it and the cycle continues unabated till everything seems like a giant ball of turd. In a parallel world, a set of very smart individuals who are definitely not on Facebook are on a permanent, beautiful vacation -- its an all inclusive trip paid by the rest of the world i.e., idiots like us. These are the people who do what they are terribly good at, who do what they want to do, who live life on their own terms -- really on their own terms not 'on their own terms' the way the idiot box would like us to believe. These people - they build, destroy, reveal, hide, control, let go, manipulate, detail, unveil, discover, find and laugh as they give it all away -- they do something new each day, they don't wonder what they'll do to make the evening exciting.

Tom Waits wants us to buy his record so that he can continue doing what he's terribly good at while we screw ourselves. Don't listen to it -- its way too smart -- its a subtle joke hidden behind a beautiful rock record.

The actual review 

how can you name a band Peter Bjorn and John?

Peter Bjorn and John - Writer's Block (2006)

No ratings ever again. I end up giving everything a 4.0. No point really. 

Rating 4.0/5.0
Where 5.0 is my favorite My Morning Jacket album because its the only album by the band I've listened to

I tried my best not to review music because everything I heard sounded kind of same to me...same old guitar and drums, playing fast, playing slow, someone trying to be melancholic, deeply sad or overtly joyful. What's the difference? Then I came across Writer's Block which is exactly this - a band which tries to be melancholic, sad and joyful in the same song (!!) and even then they succeed in avoiding being stereotyped by doing childishly simple things like whistling...yes they whistle and then they whistle some more; and they believe in tunes and conventional stuff like that while everyone else is into sound sampling and they're predictable in their lyrics too...they talk about ending it, starting it, loving each other - the usual crap and maybe some of it I misheard because I wanted to. Peter Bjorn and John are smart people who act like average joes to avoid detection..they seem to be very keen on making me like them and so I did and I do. This is the only album I've been listening to for the last three weeks or so.

Watch this Objects of my Affection video to learn how to strum guitars

Allmusic link here

Download it here

I'm eternally grateful; to my past influences

The Virgins - The Virgins (2008)

Rating 3.5/5.0
where 5.0 is a cheesy american record i really like

My wife today sang "How I wrote Elastic Man"
and I'm eternally grateful....

The Virgins released just one album since they came into existence in 2006. It was the self titled debut in 2008 and what a fantastic collection of songs it is. These kids just take indie and make it danceable, they write really well and when they want they can be melancholic which is nice because too much of happiness makes me sad.

Download it here

You remind me of a TV show

The Feelies  - Crazy Rhythms (1980)

Rating 3.75/5.00
Where Mozart's Symphony # 40  is number 5

Formed in 1976...jittery, thump-wump-thump drums, funny and opaque - here are the Feelies!
The Feelies are (as the name suggests) - funny and sensitive and cynical and sarcastic at the same time...they're boys and men and whatever comes in-between. To top it all, in this album they do a version of Everybody's Got something to Hide (except me and my monkey) which makes me like them even more :-)
Now now...this is too short...too short...shorty shorty shorty short...

That line made it longer...the review I mean but what can really elongate it is if  I talked about all the other music I've heard. I've  been listening to a lot of Mozart nowadays....it'll take time and sweat to understand the technicailities but the music is ethereal..it is stunning. In addition, two albums that have really impressed me are -

Buena Vista Social Club - which is music from the other side in a way. RY Cooder goes to Havana, gets hold of  musicians who have never been heard outside of Cuba and records an album with this assorted group. The music takes you on a short holiday while driving to and from work...it really does!

Elephant by the White Stripes - A rock record can't be better than this - paranoid, progressive, angry, ambivalent. This is what I should have heard when I was in college instead of repeat listens of Queen's I want to Break free.

Allmusic Link to the Feelies here

Splashdown

The Telescopes - The Telescopes (1994)
Rating 4.00/5.00

 
Where 5 is an album which I heard yesterday while making carrot cake and the cake came out brown and smarter

The Telescopes are what I would call pop intellectuals - a breed which owes its roots to anything even remotely cult or obscure but who intend to make music which derives and remoulds their influences into a listenable and entertaining package - I mean they would know their blues and their jazz but would not become Captain Beefheart even for a day! Pop intellectuals make music which is poppy but intelligent; the songs have ambient sounds and traffic noise but if you notice (and that demands more than one listen) there will be a nice melody to compensate for all the abstract bullshit; they won't do instrumentals with someone scraping the bottom of a tin dustbin as the main piece; and they don't eat uncooked flesh on stage.

Pop intellectuals have their poster boys in bands like the Soft Boys, Sebadoh and My Bloody Valentine and like all other movements it was all started by the Beatles and Love and the Stones and the Who and whatnot long time back when pop and rock had no distinctions and any 15 year old boy with a guitar could rock the pop out of anyone who cared to listen. This is safe genetic tree analysis and is meant to ensure that my VERY broad classification and largely ridiculous detailing of the pop intellectual movement goes unnoticed.

This album is a minor pop masterpiece - nice acoustic guitars; smart, emotional lyrics and it is well packaged into brief catchy songs which run after one another like a merry-go-round.. The catchy pop has its eccentric ups and downs to ensure monotony is avoided - and they do succeed most of the time though the B side is not as good as the first 4-5 songs. Its definitely worth several listens and is a solid 4 on my rating scale

Happy new year to all and lets all pray that this journey of adventure and discovery never ceases to amaze and amuse.

Download it!

Allmusic link here

Pablo Picasso is not an asshole

Modern Lovers - Modern Lovers (1976)

Rating 5.0/5.0
where 5 is not a Velvet Underground album

The band's name is really zee pits! I was in this record store in Christchurch many moons ago and for me it was like what my wife feels when she goes to a sale - absolute, unhindered delight! India doesn't have a single decent music store - not one and here I was -  buying The Pixies - Doolittle (I always wanted to own a copy), Surfjan Stevens - Illinois and Elvis Costello's This Year's Model and I came upon this album - the record store owner - Brian, recommended it but I didn't like their name. Mistake. Noone would every buy a Beefheart album if they went just by name, will they?

I do not take any responsibility for the trash downstairs. Now lets go through the rubble.

Who influenced Modern Lovers?

Velvet Underground. If for a minute you forget that the Velvets were the pappy mummy of all that is rock in a strange, twisted creme brulee mixed with alligator soup sort of way, then Modern Lovers' existence and their continuing influence would make much more sense.

Who did Modern Lovers influence?

And here's where I might be completely wrong but then I like UFO theories. Two influences that seem like Frisbee to my untrained ear are -


The Fall - You got to hear Someone I care about and then tell me that Fall released their first album in 1979! This song can be in any good Fall album (which means nearly all of them) and it came 3 years earlier! Now this is controversial, because you could easily say that Fall were influenced by Velvet Underground and to that I would say ding ding ding.......which means maybe the musical approach influence is valid but not the SPIRIT - Velvets were serious people and they generally sung songs of desperation/addiction/depression and stuff like that..not the Modern Lovers and subsequently the Fall - their songs are playful, sarcastic, odd and still happy (most of the time).


The Fleshtones  - they were formed in 1976 (the same year that the Modern Lovers' one and only album was released) - ok ok...not good enough eh? Listen to the Lovers sing Government Centre with the organ happily whistling in the background and then switch to Fleshtones' first album - Roman Gods (1982)...


Why are we establishing this connection?


Nothing better to do. Please get this album. Please.


Allmusic link for a pointed review
Buy it here

They ordered me to make mistakes

The Strokes - Is this it (2001)

Rating 4.5/5.0

where 5 is a brilliant album - a study in what can be done with a guitar

There are brilliant albums which have their ups and downs and then there are perfect albums which have no ups that are too high but then they have no lows at all. 
Some examples of perfect albums

• Elvis Costello - This year's model (point out one bad song here and I'll slit my goat's throat)
• Caravan - In the Land of Gray and Pink (no dud, not even Golf Girl)
• Any Spoon album (they're brilliant that way!)
• Beatles - With the Beatles (perfect but no stand out songs)
• Camera Obscura - Lets get out of this country (perfect voice, perfect tunes)

and then there are brilliant albums......

• Beatles - White Album (inconsistent but when its good, its just awesome)
• King Crimson - In the Court of the Crimson King (what is Moonchild doing in this wonderful set?)
• Wire - Pink Flag (the middle section just passes to make way for the brilliance at the end)
• Imagine - John Lennon (except that idiotic title song and some fillers)
• Any early Frank Zappa album 

Is this it is a perfect album. If perfection had a scale, I would give it 10/10. Not a single bad song! When you debut with this, you never get better. They never did. Get it now!


Here's the allmusic link
Buy it here

- on the other hand is a nice phrase -

Spoon - Transference (2010)

Rating 4.5/5.0

where 5 is a an album similar to this in more ways than one

There comes a time when every good band makes terrible albums either because they don't care anymore and everyone wants to go solo (except the drummer who doesn't know where to go) or because they are experimenting with 'new sounds'. REM is a good example- they made wonderful wonderful music and then they made average stuff and then they made bad, really bad albums and now they are coming up again. Unlike REM, Spoon are yet to make a really bad album. They will soon, they should but they haven't till now. Isn't that great?

I felt a little weird when I got hooked to Spoon - the reason - I was going through a phony intellectual phase in my life where the more obscure the band, the more obtuse the lyrics, the more random the music or sound, the better it was for me and this is when I came upon Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga (not sure how many Ga's are there actually). I was hooked. I was ashamed of myself for liking them but I couldn't help it. This doesn't mean they don't have depth...they do! Spoon is like the girl next door who becomes a spiritual Guru just about the time when you had mustered up the courage to dismiss them in search for a higher meaning. Decoding this sentence is easy. Here it goes -

Spoon is like the
- girl next door
- she's fun and makes you laugh
- but you dismiss her as the girl next door
- and you start reading the Bhagavad Gita
- then the same day she turns into Eckhart Tolle
- love, again.

Transference is another fantastic album. Right from the sweetness and naivete of Mystery Hour to the sadness of Goodnight Laura to the fun of Got Nuffin' to the strangeness of Who Makes your money?

Allmusic Link here
buy it here - Transference

It’s sad and it’s cold at the bottom of the sea but at least I got my blueberries with me.

The Fiery Furnaces - Blueberry Boat (2004)

Rating 4.50/5.00
Where 5 is THE best concept album in rock history

Why I don't dig the Who....
Because they were very good. Infact they were perfect. I guess that's the reason I don't give a fuck.

See the point is, I could never connect with them during their concept album phase - Tommy and what nots. Although I liked the music, I've got to admit that a concept album takes time and effort to get into and if you don't connect with the concept (however absurd it might be) then its a complete waste! And here I come up with my controversial statement - I don't think the Who (mainly Townshend) had the maturity (good noone reads this blog) to write concept albums. Tommy is a weak concept album. Whew! I'm done.

On the other hand, consider the Kinks and their two perfect albums - Arthur and Musewell Hillibillies. Please do look them up. Its a shame hardly anyone remembers this band.

Now we get to Blueberry Boat. This is a concept album (as vaguely as Sgt Pepper's is one) and it tells nice stories (as nicely as the Kinks did in Musewell Hillbillies) and all the songs have some 3-4 mini songs in them - my guess is they wrote the entire things first, it sounded like a newspaper, they tried to put a song structure to it, it sounded like a rhyming newpspaper, then they gave up and made the music. Fantastic stuff. Reeks with sincerity and toasted bread in the backyard overlooking a medieval lake.

Allmusic link to read about the brother-sister duo who don't like each other as much as they like their grandmother

disco lessons from the apples

The Apples in Stereo - Travellers in Space and Time (2010)
Rating: 2.75/5.00

where 5 is one of the greatest pop-rock-indie-rock'n roll record of all time

In the three years since the release of New Magnetic Wonder, fu*%$#*&&)*)GJD6654...

I think its time to come clean now - my Dad introduced me to the Beatles! There, I said it. Whew! And they're still my favorite band of all time - and since I reached 30, I've started liking Paul and yesterday I watching the anthology with the reverence reserved for the Rain God of a drought hit village.

Apples in Stereo are what I'll call a true representation of a present day indie band...willing to experiment with different music and genres, having their own set of influences (mostly 60s) and making music they feel like making while trying their best to cater to the indie listening masses....and they do it well. This is not a record which makes me go Ga Ga Ga Ga but it has speaker friendly music (I can sense my beleaguered car speakers taking a renewed interest in life since I put this on) - it is disco influenced and that makes it interesting because people who did Disco wrote inane lyrics and had intolerable hairdos...this time the lyrics are tolerable, the disco sound is used but is not a rule..all in all it works well.

Allmusic Link (to know more about why they got into disco? the reviewer has the imagination of a gnat!) -

they got tunes...

The Intelligence - Deuteronomy (2007)

Rating: 3.75/5.00
where 5 is an album where Al Green sings the entire If you're feeling sinister...

I just saw two fat buffaloes stuffed in a small tempo being driven somewhere. Animal cruelty was the last thing on my mind - what I was wondering about is how the heck they could get the two fatsos to go in - I mean the first one might have gone in easily but the how did she adjust to the next in line - did she draw a deep breath to flatten her tummy?

I'm a huge Mark Prindle fan (www.markprindle.com) and I got to know about this band from Mark. He had recommended them and to add to that - they are hard to find - no piratebay download for this! That was just too much to resist so I sought it out and gave it 3-4 listens. It got me excited enough to write this review...This is getting too long but just to summarise -

• This is as if the Fall had a singer who sang tunes - Lars Finberg sings tunes!
• There's a lot of cacophony below which there is this guitar going keeng keeeeng keeennnnn wuuunnn wuuuunnnn and the drums go dhish bhish dhish bhish BooooMMMMM and cops go waauuuun waaaaunnnn in Dating Cops :)
• Lars screams in between - I nearly hit someone on the road when he screamed in Tubes
• THIS IS A GOOD ALBUM though I don't like the title song but if given time i just might...

Allmusic Link (for the reasons why albums should be recorded in a studio) -
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:wnfrxztgldfe

my broken bells...

Broken Bells - Broken Bells (2010)

Rating: 2.75/5.00
where 5 is a Fall album with Mark E Smith in it (;) ) - Imperial Wax Solvent.

Soft pop-rock - something like Sufjan Stevens.This is the kind of music which grows on you if you keep playing it - the only reason you'll keep playing it is 'coz you're crazy. My office is close by so I get a 20 minute listen every morning and I hated it in the beginning but because it was in the same CD as Spoon's Kill the Moonlight, I couldn't take the CD out, could I? So it creeped up through my socks and caught my balls before I knew it...then I knew why its called Broken Bells.

Bad zoke...that.

Allmusic Link (for a historical journey through the world of the broken bells :-) and all about how one of them is an ex-Shins) -
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:39fyxztsld0e

into Nick's sunlit cave..

Grinderman - Grinderman (2007)

Rating: 4.25/5.00
where 5 is an album with Sticky Fingers' Side A and Abbey Road's Side B ;o)

Nick Cave may be known for a lot of things but music bordering on cheerful is not one of them...gothic - yes; tragic - yes, mellow - at times; violent - all the time nearly (his voice can hit you like a hammer).....but cheerful in a manic, paranoid, sad way? - here's the album we have all been waiting for - a Happy (as happy as it can get possibly) Nick Cave album!

Read the allmusic review (and grab that monkey) here -
http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:fxfyxqurldfe