SOUNDTRACK: HÜSKER DÜ-Land Speed Record (1982).
Mentioning Hüsker Dü during the Replacements reviews made me bust out their records too. Land Speed Record was their first release, and it always amazed me that their first record was a live record.
It is an amazing blast of hardcore punk.
It is poorly recorded, stupidly fast and impossible to follow. The CD is divided into two track (sides one and two) despite the 17 songs. Most of the songs are simple, balls-out screaming punk. In fact, it’s surprising how much you can tell it is Hüsker Dü given how shouty Bob Mould sounds.
In truth, it’s not entirely impossible to follow one song to the next (there are times when you can hear the choruses (“Guns at My School” and “Do the Bee” stand out). But really it’s a pretty shocking discovery for anyone familiar with their alterna-pop that would come later.
The one real highlight is the final song, “Data Control.” It slows the pace and adds some mood (although it’s not that easy to discern). But it contains a great deal of depth (for this album) and suggests that maybe the Hüskers were going to be more than a simple hardcore band.
The funniest part is that after the 25 minutes or so of noise, Bob Mould says, “we’ll be back for another set.”
[READ: Week of June 22, 2009] Infinite Jest [78 pages + endnotes]
So as I said, I’m going to be doing this Infinite Summer thing, reading 75 or so pages every week. I haven’t figured out what I’m going to say each week, just some observations and characters to help keep things straight. But there will be spoilers, so be warned.
Having read this before certainly helps put some context on things, even if I don’t remember a lot of the book. But, for instance, it helps to know ahead of time that the “Year” chapter headings have been subsidized. However, I don’t remember the chronology of them at this point. See below, footnote endnote for more on the chronology.
The characters: (as of page 78): (more…)
I’m a fan of David Foster Wallace. I read Infinite Jest when it came out (1996) and loved it. I still vividly recall scenes from the book even 13 years later. However, I’m a very different person and a very different reader now. And I wondered if I would get more out of the book reading it as an older, hopefully [DFW would hate that usage] wiser person (and certainly a second read could only help with this incredibly dense book).
SOUNDTRACK: LOVE-Da Capo (1967).
A few years ago, my friend John gave me Love’s Forever Changes. I’ve enjoyed that disc very much and decided to get some other Love music. I chose Da Capo (their second album, and the one just prior to Forever Changes) for two reasons. One: Rush did a cover of “Seven and Seven Is” on their Flashback CD and two: there’s an 18 minute song on it, and I love me an eighteen minute song.
SOUNDTRACK: BARENAKED LADIES-Everything to Everyone (2003) & Barenaked for the Holidays (2004).
Everything to Everyone. I was pretty down on this album when it first came out. I remember being rather disappointed in it because BNL had, gasp, matured somewhat, and were making more “serious,” less “wacky” songs. To me, the whole CD was somewhat flat. But, after a recent listen (possibly the first time in 4 years) and expecting the worst, I was pleasantly surprised by the record.
Barenaked for the Holidays. This has become one of my favorite Christmas/holiday records (and it’s a good time of year to be writing about it.) It ranks up there with Brave Combo’s It’s Christmas, Man, 
South Park’s Mr. Hankey’s Christmas Classics, 
Sufjan Steven’s great boxed set Presents Songs for Christmas, 
and Brian Wilson’s What I Really Want for Christmas, 
which has also quickly jumped to the top of my Xmas list.
SOUNDTRACK: DEATH CAB FOR CUTIE-Something About Airplanes (1999) & We Have the Facts and We’re Voting Yes (2000) & The Photo Album(2001) & Transatlanticism (2003) & Plans (2005).
collection, but not really planning on delving into any of the artists. And yet, this song just kept coming back to haunt me. The lyrics were great. And the melody was superb. There’s a part where the voices all sing “colli-i-i-ide” that is really just sublime. So, I bought the record and immediately fell in love with it. There’s really not a bad song on it. From the beautiful opening of “The New Year” to the ba-bah’s of “The Sound of Settling,” to the vivid description of teenagers skipping their classes and seeing how their bodies work. The whole thing made me go back and get the rest of their records. And I wasn’t disappointed.
SOUNDTRACK: THE DECEMBERISTS-Castaways and Cutouts (2002) & Her Majesty (2003) & Picaresque (2005) & 5 Songs (2003) & Billy Liar [single] (2004) & The Tain (2004).
SOUNDTRACK: TOM WAITS-Orphans (Bastards) (2006).
This is the piece de resistance of the Orphans set. All of the really, really weird songs by Waits get thrown together on this disc. Weird and wonderful, including a crazy cover of “Heigh Ho” from Snow White. 
I Just Read About That... 