SOUNDTRACK: THE HOUSEMARTINS-Live at the BBC (2006).
I found out about the Housemartins after enjoying the Beautiful South, and since they only released two albums, it was easy to get into them quickly. This is a collection of live tracks from the BBC, some have an audience and some do not. What is most striking about the record are the amount of acapella works that are on here, and the, surprisingly religious aspect of many of the songs (especially for a bunch of guys who on the latest Beautiful South album say “No thanks to God, he did fuck all.”)
They sound great, and can totally pull off the acapella, and when they do break out the instrumentation it sounds even better. I would have resequenced it so that the acapellas were sprinkled throughout but hey, what can you do. My only sad moment was that “Happy Hour” was done acappella, and as I said, the acapellas are great, but that song just screams for full instrumentation. Anyhow, this collection will definitely get me listening to the Housemartins again.
[READ: October 21, 2007]: The Latke Who Couldn’t Stop Screaming.
What better way to get back into reading books than with a 20 page book full of illustrations! This is a holiday story of a latke who, because of his inherent religious beliefs, feels left out at Christmastime. As it is written by Lemony Snicket, it is twisted and even more twisted.
SOUNDTRACK: MARILLION-Fugazi (1984).
Ah, the delights of Marillion. My best friend in high school, Al, got me into Marillion. And he started me off with this record. As such, I can’t imagine how I could realistically critique it. I must have listened to this thing hundreds of times at this point. I also got into the other Marillion albums (until the theatrical madman and lead singer, Fish, departed). I did get one post-Fish album, Season’s End, but didn’t think too much of it. Although I still regard them highly, and anyone who names an album Anoraknaphobia is still alright in my book, I haven’t heard a note of anything post-Season’s End.
SOUNDTRACK: THE KINKS are the Village Green Preservation Society (1968).
This record seems to be a very important record in the history of British pop rock and in the history of The Kinks. I feel that I had always heard about it in practically hushed tones (much like the hushed tones of the record), and yet I had never heard it. Finally, my friend Carrie gave me a copy of it and I listened and was surprised that I didn’t know one single song on it. You can look here and see that I have two Kinks greatest hits records, and not one song from this record is on any either of them.
SOUNDTRACK: TORI AMOS-American Girl Posse (2007).
I had been pretty down on Tori records since Scarlett’s Walk, which I felt was kind of blah. The Beekeeper followed and it didn’t do that much for me either. So, I was basically not that excited when this latest record came out. I probably would have gotten it eventually, but then my wife bought it for me for my birthday. Thank you!
SOUNDTRACK: LUTHER WRIGHT AND THE WRONGS-Rebuild the Wall (2001).
I first heard Luther Wright on an episode of 
SOUNDTRACK: RICHARD THOMPSON-Sweet Warrior (2007).
I recently posted a bunch of reviews of RTs back catalog, and here’s his latest release. I almost feel like it’s a waste of time for me to review this because, what can I say? It’s great. Strong songs from start to finish. Catchy rockers, bitter ballads, everything is fabulous. My only negative mark is that the third song, a slow ballad, is really long, about 7 minutes, and there’s nothing remarkable about it to justify that length. It’s a pretty enough song, but could have a few minutes lopped off of it. Otherwise, the album is great.
SOUNDTRACK: TORI AMOS: The Original Bootlegs (2005).
SOUNDTRACK: THE BEAUTIFUL SOUTH-Welcome to the Beautiful South (1989) & Choke (1990) & 0898 (1992) & Miaow (1994) & Blue is the Colour (1996) & Quench (1998) & Painting It Red (2000) & Goldiggas Headnodders and Pholk Songs (2004).
When the Housemartins broke up and The Beautiful South sprang into existence, I was working at our college radio station. I received a Beautiful South poster of the debut album, Welcome to the Beautiful South, and I remember hanging it on the hallway bulletin board of our dorm. It stayed up there an unreasonably long time for a public bulletin board Maybe everyone liked the picture of the women with the gun in her mouth. But really, that’s all I knew about them for a pretty long time. Then sometime around Blue is the Colour, I started paying attention to them and really started to like them. I was also amazed to hear that Carry On Up the Charts, their greatest hits record was one of the best selling records in England at the time. 
So, I thought I would have to check them out more fully.
SOUNDTRACK: MATTHEW SWEET-Inside (1986) & Earth (1989).
Inside is so so keyboard heavy, it could be ANY synth band from the 80s. And, the keyboards are so loud in the mix that Sweet’s voice, which is not very powerful to begin with is almost totally lost. Sweet’s voice is not even that powerful on his 90s records. He has a very delightful, but very soft, voice. So, you can barely tell much about the songs, because it seems that every one has synth horns or whatnot masking what’s really happening.
Earth falls in line of what you think the Matthew Sweet sound is. It’s still pretty heavy on the synth, but you can see the song structures that Sweet perfected in the 90s. There’s nothing really striking on Earth, but it’s a good bridge to his 90s albums.
SOUNDTRACK: BLUE ÖYSTER CULT-Spectres (1977).
Let’s face it, Blue Öyster Cult are silly. If I didn’t know better I would swear that Spinal Tap is a takeoff on them. And yet, they have such well regarded people associated with them: Patti Smith; Michael Moorcock! I first got into BOC because of MTV. Back when MTV first came out they played videos by basically anyone who had a video. And it seemed that at the time it was mostly new wave and metal bands. And naturally, we metal heads embraced all of the metal videos and scoffed at the new wave ones. But it was through MTV that I found out about some of the best metal bands around: Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Blue Öyster Cult to name just a couple. And it was through MTV that I got Fire of Unknown Origin, my favorite BOC record. Several years later when I got to college my roommate was a huge Rush and BOC fan. He got me into BOC in a big way, and even though I know they’re silly, I still love ’em. And this album is a pretty strong classic.
I Just Read About That... 