SOUNDTRACK: The Best Albums of the Year
Andrew Womack, fellow Infinite Summer player and founder of The Morning News has begun retroactively listing The Best Albums of the Year for each year since 1978. This is a project that I have often thought about doing myself, yet never had the time to sift through all the music I have.
I was delighted to see how much I not only knew, but also agreed with his decisions. Although if I’m honest, my list would have more metal and less new wave in it. But the overall tenor is pretty on par with my feelings.
But, imagine my surprise to see that on the 2004 list I barely knew any of the discs at all! I wonder what happened to make us diverge so much in that one year.
Anyhow, it’s a noble, well, not noble so much as worthwhile pursuit. One that we can all enjoy.
[READ: Week of July 27] Infinite Jest (to page 434)
In the August 2009 issue of Wired, they have a little scroll across the bottom of one of the pages that lists “Word Counts”. King James Bible: 784,806; Where the Wild Things Are: 338; Infinite Jest: 483,994. So, at almost halfway done we’ve read over 240,000 words!
Also, I haven’t sufficiently acknowledged some of my fellow Infinite Summer bloggers. So I want to send a shout out to Infinite Tasks. I especially enjoyed this post which takes a decidedly more philosophical approach than I did about a section that I found really enjoyable. And Chris Forster, who gives a lovely discussion about Eschaton. And I would be remiss if I did not mention Infinite Zombies, just because he may have written a letter here but his posts always get sucked up into spam, so I’ll never know. (And because the posts are really thoughtful and worth reading too).
But enough back patting, onto the book.
It was a fun place to pick up reading. At the small paragraph where I left off, we learn that the Statue of Liberty’s book now advertises that year’s Subsidizer.
On a couple of occasions there is the suggestion that the year 2000 is the first year of Subsidization, as they talk about things being different in the new millennium. Although Matthew Baldwin’s argument here is very convincing which would make Subsidization begin in 2002.
And then we return to A.A.
SOUNDTRACK: SONIC YOUTH in concert from NPR (July 7, 2009 at Washington DC’s 9:30 Club).
I’m not sure how I learned that this show was online. But I was pretty delighted to see 
SOUNDTRACK: SONIC YOUTH-EVOL (1986).
Ah, EVOL. Here’s where Sonic Youth became Sonic Youth. Who knows how much Steve Shelley had to do with it, but he shows up and the band becomes amazing. The cover art is pretty darn scary and yet the music inside is amazingly beautiful. While by no means a commercial album, the album is chock full of melody.
SOUNDTRACK: THE TRAGICALLY HIP-We Are the Same (2009).
first heard of The Hip when I saw their video for “
SOUNDTRACK: FRIGHTENED RABBIT-Midnight Organ Fight (2008).
My friend Jarrett introduced me to this band. He rather casually called it his favorite album of the year, so I figured it was worth checking out.
SOUNDTRACK: SONIC YOUTH-Bad Moon Rising (1985).
nother Sonic Youth record, another record label. Bad Moon Rising is a pretty big leap from Confusion is Sex, in that there are actual songs. Well, that’s not fair, what I mean is that the songs have structure like proper songs do. In fact, “Death Valley ’69” (with vocals by Lydia Lunch) is quite catchy!
SOUNDTRACK: SONIC YOUTH-Sonic Death: Early Sonic 1981-1983 (1984).
This document shows just how scary a Sonic Youth show could have been back in their early days. Well, not scary so much as noisy! They mention that they’ve been touring with the Swans, so you can imagine how intense these shows must have been.
SOUNDTRACK: SONIC YOUTH-Confusion is Sex (1983).
On the Sonic Death album, a collection of live recordings from 1981-83, Thurston mentions that they are touring with the Swans, a New York City doom and gloom band of thunderous proportions. [This was before the Swans put out their first album, an incredibly slow, bass heavy bombastic disc of nihilism. I can only imagine how raw they were BEFORE that one.] Anyhow, that explains somewhat why this disc sounds like it does…if they were a part of a scene with the Swans, then their music would naturally be all about notes, not necessarily music.
I can’t help but hear his voice when I read his words, which makes it sound even funnier.
SOUNDTRACK: MORRISSEY-Years of Refusal (2009).
I’ve been a fan of The Smiths for years. And I think that Morrissey’s debut, Viva Hate, is on par with much of the Smiths’ catalogue. Over the years his output has been mixed, but with Years of Refusal he comes fighting back with a really solid disc. The disc is so good that if one had no idea of who he was, one could easily get into it with no preconceived notions of Morrissey, The Smiths or any of that glorious past.
A few years ago I was visiting my friend Roman. He asked me if I read 
I Just Read About That... 