Coolest Wedding

Way back when my wife and I were nearly married, we used our pre-marital bliss to our advantage at a Depeche Mode show. The show was a Jones Beach and took place two days before our wedding. We approached a radio station that was there and told them our situation out of mere joy. The DJ used us in a station promo and upgraded our nose-bleed seats to the center of the front row. It was such a cool experience to kick off the string of wedding celebrations that would follow.

This Norwegian couple out did us by leaps and bounds. Proposing to someone at a concert is pretty cool, but getting them to come to your wedding and perform for you out of the kindness of their hearts is unreal. I have been quite taken by Band of Horses of late and this just makes them all the cooler.



Great sound recording too!

Cat-2883 Nine Inch Nails

an overview of the Nine Inch Nails catalogue:




Essential

The Downward Spiral(1994) – The masterpiece. Trent Reznor found himself in a position of artistic freedom and major label backing. Noisy and bold, TDS was an unlikely success. In the age of grunge flannel and garage band rock, Reznor defied the odds with keyboards, static, fishnet stocking and becomes a household name. TDS was the pinnacle of Reznor’s emotional decent. Each album took his doubt and angst a little farther. TDS is extreme and deals with themes of suicide, rejecting religion, complete loss of self, and a hit single with the chorus, “I Want To F*#k You Like An Animal.” The album is so intense and sincere, that it left him nowhere to go from there. How do you follow up an act like that? Closer

Year Zero(2007) – When it seemed that NIN had run it’s course and reached a point of being an act that had offered up the best of what they had to offer early on and were costing on good material and nostalgia, Year Zero erupted. YZ is perhaps the most brilliant artistic and business move that Trent Reznor has made. Once your demons are confronted with the ferocity of TDS, facing them again felt old and tired on the follow ups. Reznor must have put a ton of thought into his approach for this album that largely veered from the rock numbers of With Teeth and built his songs around an imagined future. Each song is from the perspective of different characters in an elaborately imagined future America. Even beyond the freshly charged music vision, YZ is bigger than a group of songs. There was an entire alternate reality created online and in the packaging that immersed and engaged in the unfolding and revelation of the experience. More here and here


Great

Pretty Hate Machine(1989) – Another fantastic album. The promise of what Trent would have to offer is there even though it not fully realized yet. This was the soundtrack to my high school years. I don’t think there was a single day during that span of four years that I didn’t listen to this album. The production is naïve, but Trent squeezes more life and passion out of keyboards and synthesizers than most artists can out of conventional instruments. HLAH

Broken(1992) – In the midst of a career starting to take off came a label dispute that nearly ended his career as a musician. The anger and frustration of this time for Trent is more than evident on his hardest and shortest release. Broken is a 20 minute bombardment of guitars and pounding beats driving the “fuck you” attitude Reznor clearly had towards his old label. Wish


Good

With Teeth(2005) – A solid album with some high points. There are a few missteps that make you question whether or not Reznor’s rage had run its course (revisiting themes, a single lamenting the repetitiveness of daily life). Most importantly, this album put Reznor back on track after The Fragile. Doubters from the last effort could take comfort that Trent can still deliver. Everyday


Ok

The Fragile(1999) – The 1999 flop. Reznor waited five years to follow up his masterpiece and foolishly fell victim to expectation. He felt compelled to continue to top his own efforts and forced together an opus spanning two discs in an elaborate tri-fold package. Careers and genres of popular music came and went between albums and this grand gesture was delivered to an audience that had moved on. The singles were weak and the album was terribly disjointed. Like any other release of Trent’s, there are some fantastic songs, but 2 discs is asking a lot of listeners to sift through.

The Slip(2008) – It’s free! More or less, this one sounds like a compilation of songs not used on With Teeth and Ghosts. Still, it’s good and it’s free. FREE!

And All That Could Have Been(2002) – The live companion to The Fragile. I so wish that they had done this after TDS. That was by far the best line-up and tour that NIN has had. It’s good and kind of a best of for his earlier work. Oddly, the Fragile numbers mostly are the more forgettable ones especially placed among Wish and Head Like A Hole. The companion disc has some worthwhile stuff including “acoustic” versions of some older tracks and other tracks from the Fragile sessions.


Hard listen

Ghosts 1-4(2008) – Great instrumental collection. But it’s two discs of instrumentals.

Fixed(1992) – The partner to broken remixes the songs and clocks them in at more than twice the length of the original. Fixed clears up any fears that nin were turning into a guitar rock band. This is a noisy industrial powerhouse.


Fans only

The next three are remix albums and eps that work as companions to legitimate albums.
Things Fall Apart(2000) – companion to The Fragile
Y34RZ3R0R3M1X3D(2007) – companion to Year Zero
Further Down The Spiral(1995) – companion to The Downward Spiral

Pancake Albums

A pancake album is an album that plays out like a plate of pancakes. They are all exciting at the beginning and by the end you're pretty sick of them. Sick of them is a little bit harsh. There are plenty of albums out there that the front end is so heavily loaded with great music that the back end is totally overshadowed.

The best example that I can think of is U2 - The Joshua Tree. It is a solid album through and through, but it is the first three tracks that make it memorable.

Phoenix - Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix is another fine example of a heavily front loaded album. It is another fantastic album through and through, but I could be totally satisfied with the first six tracks alone.

Any other qualifiers out there?

SOTD - Heartbreaker-Dread Zeppelin

Campy, campy, campy! What a fantastic gimmick though!

To their credit, this song could be considered a pioneering move in the development of the mash-up.

Band of Horses - Infinite Arms

Infinite Arms is one fine example of rock music that is catchy, witty, and passionate. On their third album, Band of Horses seam to have perfected their sound. The vocal harmonies are to die for and they deliver simple sentiments in grand gestures. Neil young is a clear influence on them and the easiest way to classify their sound. Neil Young channeled by Death Cab For Cutie, perhaps.



The album opens with Factory, a sweeping and grand tail of looking back at time wasted longing for a lost love. Stings swoon and cymbals crash as the protagonist wanders through his lonely hotel. The tension rises with Compliments. The beat stomps and the amps and reverb jack up. That, and you have to love a song that starts with the line, “fixing a drink in the morning with the way things are.” The current single Laredo follows. Great guitar pop with visions of escaping it all conjures recollections of Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow at the Posies peek. Blue Beard grabs onto classic American rock. The chorus is 70’s Eagles worthy. The vocals take off even farther and dig deeper into the spirit of American rock on On My Way Back Home. This track could be a lost Beach Boys song. Infinite Arms is a gorgeous acoustic waltz with beautiful lyrics and vocals. The chorus of, “and my thoughts drift to you,” do exactly that. Dilly rebounds you from the dream space of Infinite Arms and gets you bobbing again with lofty pop. Suddenly the mood becomes very personal again with Evening Kitchen. It is the most bare bones track on the record delivered by two acoustic guitars and two voices. It is the reminder of the southern origins of BOH. The alt. country tinge persists through Older, a song that recalls their North Carolina brethren, Whiskeytown. Far Annabelle is another warm and sweet waltz. NW Apartment rocks out with some loud and catchy pop. Neighbors wraps things up with warm organs and a slow build to power chords at the end. It is important to know your place. BOH name check white trash wine so earnestly that it comes across as charming and not as silly as it should be, “Now if Bartles and James didn’t need no first names…”

Then at 45 minutes and 12 seconds I find myself satisfied, yet wanting more.

listen

I Love Summer

Summer. Longer days. Time off of work. Friends and Family. And a rekindled love affair with music.

I am very pleased with my handiwork in moving my music archives out of my son's bedroom and to a place where they are all together and on display in our family room in their very own built in shelves. Carpenter Brad was on the job. There is even room to grow at the bottom. Of course my wife brought up the issue of what is to happen when that space is filled. Her disks will be the first to go (elsewhere in the house that is).



I've been able to spend so much more time listening to and enjoying music this summer. It has been wonderful. New finds, and old rediscoveries alike. More to come soon.

Countdown to Disintegration

The re release of Disintegration is less than two weeks away and there has been quite a few goodies dropped to wet the whistle. The re release comes with two extra discs. One that is out takes and rarities from the recording sessions and the other is the entire album played live in 1989 at Wembley Arena. There site has posted free streams of an alternate rarities disc and alternate live version of the album from Dallas. So good!!!