Along The Way - Bob Mould - The Last Dog and Pony Show - 1998

Sonically, this sounds like a left over from Mould's generally fantastic Workbook...but lyrically...Jesus Bob, rock's a lot more gay friendly now than it was in the mid-80's. We don't really need the preachy anthem about lack of understanding. I liked it better when your delimas were oblique and menacing rather than pointedly on the nose.

Along The Banks of the River - Tortoise - Millions Now Living Will Never Die - 1996

Has anyone else noticed the odd trend towards giant men's watches? It's like people are going to start wearing sundials and old school alarm clocks on their wrists before it's all over. Anyone who saw Roberto Donadoni's watch at the Euro 2008 games will know exactly what I'm talking about. If you didn't...Google that shit.

With their obvious debts to Ennio Morricone and Angelo Badalamenti, Scottish post-rock bands like Tortoise and Mogwai always owed something to the cinema. But following Mogwai's work on 28 Day's Later, it seems like post-rock has become the defacto music for edgy, tense soundtracks. The backwards effect of this is to make even post-rock albums that pre-date this trend seem like soundtracks. I listen to this, and I expect to be stumbling upon Laura Palmer's body any second now.

Alone, Together - The Strokes - Is This It? - 2001

I moved to NYC when I was 25 (in the summer of 2000). And for the few years after, that was the clear line of demarcation for my life; pre-NYC and post...it was understandable to have nostalgia for the pre-NYC days, but the post days were my undeniable present...but 8 years down the line funny things have happened and my perceptions have changed. This album is an interesting barometer of those developments.

Not to drop an indie-cred bomb, but I was at the first Strokes show at Bowery, when they opened for GBV on Valentine's Day of 2001. (Does seeing the Strokes first show even count as Indie-cred anymore?). My girlfriend at the time lived a couple hours away and valentine's day was mid-week. All of my friends had in town girl friends, so I went to the show alone and watched from the balcony. My feelings about the album that band would go onto release went from "Huh, this is a fun album" to "Oh dear God, if I hear this album one more time I will go on a killing spree" to "Wow, I haven't heard this album in forever, it reminds me of that time in 2001 when..."

And all of the sudden I have nostalgia for a time I didn't even realize was all that long ago...strange stuff.

Anyway, the album actually holds up pretty well. It's not amazing, but it is what it is.

Alone, Stinking, and Unafraid - Guided by Voices - Unknown Late 90's Bootleg

It sort of amazes me that I haven't written about GBV more. Considering the sheer bulk of songs that have come out of the mind/pen/cassette tape of Robert Pollard and my willingness to buy about 75% of it, I figure that Pollard's music probably accounts for about 2.5% of the contents of my iPod...and considering that the current count is 10, 192...that's not inconsiderable.

A little bit of obscure anthropology for you. When one GBV fan meets another it must be immediately determined which tier of fandom the other exists at, because there are many.

Tier One: The Nostalgic - "Oh, I remember 'I Am A Scientist'...what a great song, that takes me back to my sophomore year..."
Tier Two: The Essientialist - "Yeah, I own Bee Thousand, it's one of the classic albums of the 90's"
Tier Three: The Indie Snob - "I own the albums from Propeller to Alien Lanes/Under Bushes, Under Sky/Mag Earwhig, but after he fired the band he was dead to me."
Tier Four: The Strict Constructionist - "I own all of the GBV albums (or everything since Propeller) but I don't mess with the solo records."
Tier Five: The Avid Fan - "I own all of the GBV records, and the well reviewed/well regarded solo work/side projects."
Tier Six: The Obsessive Compulsive - "I own ALL the GBV records, even the ones from before Propeller. I own all of the side projects and solo albums. I have an original press copy of Propeller from when they were on SCAT records. I saw them at Sudsy Malones on the Same Place The Fly Got Smashed Tour and I won a free dinner with Robert Pollard."

Tier Sixes exist to make us Tier Fives feel better about ourselves...."Well, I may have spent way too much money on Bob Pollard releases, but at least I'm not that guy. I have no need for the early records, or the current wierd side projects...but I do love Bob and all that he stands for.

Anyway, this song was originally released on the Lexo and The Lepers album (another of his bizarre side projects) which I do not own (I'm not that twisted) but it became a staple of the GBV live shows. Which is why having a bootleg version of it seems more appropriate than the anaemic studio version. The song does capture Bob's wonderful chip on his shoulder. He's a lone warrior standing bruised and bloody, yet defiant...defiant against what? and for what cause? are the questions to be asked...but answers are never the point with Bob...the defiant stance is the point.

Alone, Jealous and Stoned - The Secret Machines - Ten Silver Drops - 2006

I'd like to talk for a moment about Rollercoasters...rollercoasters are awesome. End of.

Well, no...I'll say a few more words. I went down to the Brooklyn landmark that is The Cyclone on Saturday. I wasn't sure it was still running as the Astroland at Coney Island has been on the way to closing down...but thank the heavens The Cyclone is still going strong.

After an afternoon of sitting in the sun and sand drinking beer on Beer Island (yes, that is a real thing now and not just something I dreamed up...it replaced the putt-putt course, which is an upgrade in my book) I was all ready for some action, and the Cyclone rarely dissapoints. Part of the thrill, of course, is that it is so old and rickety. You could actually die. This could be the one time that the car derails from the track and flies off into the ocean hurtling you to the most fun demise you could imagine...hands in the air and screaming. But fortunately I survived.

My attempt to listen to the iPod on the ride (and thus having an appropriately soundtracked experience) was less succesful though. I managed to keep the headphones on my head and the volume at a sufficient level. The problem was keeping the audio jack in the iPod. Perhaps next time I'll duct tape it in or something. Suggestions are welcome.

Alone Down There - Modest Mouse - The Moon and Antarctica - 2000

Modest Mouse played a free show here in NYC but I made the decision to skip it. It was late at night on a school night for starters. And as I suspected, my friend confirmed that the crowd was full of assholes. Instead I got bombed with my co-workers at a bar called Antarctica...which is appropriately Modest Mouse-esque.

Aloha Spirit - Seam - The Pace Is Glacial - 1998

Somewhere around the summer of 1985 my Grandfather ran an ice cream bicycle franchise out of the back of his army surplus store in Kokomo, IN. During the summers, when I wasn't in school, I'd hang out at my grandfather's store, playing with the army surplus stuff, wishing I could shoot the guns, and looking for excuses to break into the giant freezers in the back room.

My Grandfather and I had a deal that I was allowed to eat any "rejects"...a surprising number of ice cream products came out broken that summer, but I only feel so bad about that now. My Grandparents still managed to be top sellers in the state and won a free carribean cruise out of it, which represents the only time my Grandmother was ever on a plane.

But what I think about most about that summer...when I think about it at all...is the lives of the young men who worked for my grandfather. Late high school or college age guys who spent their summers riding a bicycle with a freezer basket full of ice cream around the booming metropolis of Kokomo. In a day and age before Internet, without much video games, and in a town where office jobs weren't exactly plentiful...it doesn't seem like such a bad way to spend your summer. Occassionally, when the sun is out, it even sounds better than jockeying a desk in NYC. But then on the other hand, when their work days were over they had nothing to do but drive around the same city they'd biked around...whereas I get to go play in the city that never sleeps. It's a trade off.

Anyway...Seam rules.

Alms - The Futureheads - The Futureheads - 2004

The Futureheads represent an intersting phenomenon...I heard this album, fell in love, listened to it for about a month, got bored, and four years later have yet to get unbored with it. I respect the album, and keep it around with the idea that at some point I will want to hear it again...but every time it comes up, I find myself hitting the next button.

Almost Was Good Enough - Songs:Ohia - Magnolia Electric Company - 2003

And here is the original, recorded under his bands original moniker.

It's not bad, but the striped down and dirty version on T&E is so much more vivid.

Almost Was Good Enough - Magnolia Electric Co. - Trials and Errors - 2005

It would probably sadden Jason Molina to know that I think this record is the best thing he's ever done. This album sounds like what I thought the bands that played in bars sounded like, before I had ever stepped foot into a bar and heard how ass-y bar bands actually are. Sure it's just Crazy Horse redux...but I find this format so much more interesting than the versions that appear on the proper studio albums...with the edges sawn off. This gritty performance (given in Belgium of all places) just has the right feel for what makes "bar rock" work...the bad boy swagger, the sense of sin and sweat and Calvinistic desperation.

No line probably sums up the appeal of this entire album like "This didn't used to be so hard/it used to be impossible". Delivered with a wail of the damned...a man that knows that his past is bleak, but the future will only be worse, it encapsulates everything that makes this cinematic style work. You can totally hear this as a soundtrack to a film like Blood Simple or One False Move...the simmering southern heat building as a jealous lover walks upstairs with a gun, not sure if he's going to kill her or have mind blowing sex that he'll regret for the rest of his life.

Almost Forgot Myself - Doves - Some Cities - 2005

Of all of the "Radiohead Clones", Doves are probably the ones I enjoy/respect the most. They are generally sonically interesting, have a good sense of melody and the typical Mancunian ability to make every song sound like it's raining outside. Plus there is a certain quality to Jimi Goodwin's voice that I can never quite put my finger on. He sounds like someone...or reminds me of someone. His voice is almost too smooth. Like the song you are listening to is almost easy listening, except vastly more interesting and aggressive.

I don't know...it works for me.

Almost Crimes (Radio Kills Remix) - Broken Social Scene - You Forget It In People - 2002

They say that music, along with scents, is one of the biggest triggers for memory...which is certainly one of the reasons I love music. But I can distinctly remember the first time I heard this song. Nothing extraodrinary happened, and it's not like the hearing of this song was a life changing experience. I mean, I like this song but...it's not like it "changed my life" or anything.

I was sitting in what was then my new apartment in Greenpoint in 2003. It was before I would come to realize what a total clusterfuck that place would be, so I was still excited about my new pad. My friend who is also named Josh came over and put this album on the stereo. The first couple of songs are mellow atmospheric pieces but this song comes along with it's 30 second tune up...and then that drum beat kicks in.

I find this album very hit and miss, but when it hits...it hits just right.

Allison Krause - The Stills - Logic Will Break Your Heart - 2003

A month and a half later, and we are finally out of the "all"s.

So since I've talked quite a bit about my love for summer being based on the inverse relationship between the temperature and the amount of clothing women wear, I guess it's time I talk about some of the things I love about the summer that don't make me sound like a giant perv....which is why you are going to get an ode to my love of the grilling.

I am rarely tempted to leave the city all behind and go grab a suburban life...but one of the few things that would appeal to me about that is the grill in the back yard. Grilling involves many things my caveman-self loves...building a fire, cooking meat, drinking. In addition to that, being the guy running the grill serves another, larger, social purpose. As the grill master at a barbeque you are relieved of the responsibility of mingling. People come to you. They bring you meat to cook. They make you drinks. They come and talk to you because they feel bad you are "Stuck at the grill" and as long as you don't under-cook chicken, you come away looking like the hero.

Allison Krause niether seems to be about the Alt-Country singer nor does it particularly sound like her...in any way...however this song does contain a great joke about technical virginity...which is funny in and of itself. The Stills managed to piss away all the good will they earned with this album with their subsequent releases. Yes, the album is entirely derivative, but it's a good listen...and will always remind me of the crazy second half of 2003.

All You Need Is Love - The Beatles - All You Need Is Love (Single) - 1967

Okay, so I gave myself a pass about having to write about over played classic rock songs, and this is most certainly that...but I do actually have a story about it.

I used to date this girl who hated this song...that's not really a story. I mean, I kinda hate this song too (It's a sign of what a completionist dork I am that I have songs on here that I hate), but unlike me it was not the hippy nostalgia, the cloying sentimentality, or whimsical horn parts that made her hate the song. She hated it for one little moment.

As the song comes to a close, descending into cacaphony, the band incorporates pieces of many other songs...La Marseillaise, a bit of Bach, Greensleaves, a Glenn Miller tune. In this stew Paul sings a small snippet of "She Loves You". Now this particular girl had an issue with any overt display of ego, and to name check your own song in the mix of these undeniably timeless tunes to her was arrogant in the extreme. (She'd grown up the youngest of five sisters, and was therefor uncomfortable with a great deal of typical male behavior).

I counter-argued that, despite not particuarly caring for the song, I did respect it's efforts at being a post modern pastiche...she was fine with that, it was the self elevation that bothered her. I pointed out that, even as early as 1967, "She Loves You" was already a part of the musical canon, but still the self-congratulatory aspect of bothered her too much.

It's always odd when you find yourself in the position of defending something you don't even like that much.

All You Need Is Hate - Delgados - Hate - 2002

I really feel like I should like Delgados. They seem like they should be up my alley, dense orchestral pop with a slight country tinge...Scottish, bitterly depressed (is that redundant?). I keep trying. And they just never really grab hold of me in anyway.

At best, they are blandly pleasant...at worst, just out and out boring. This song however, isn't so bad. Plus the general concept (and implicit Beatles joke, complete with a guitar line that seems to reference the earlier song) amuse me a bit.

Was tempted to delete this, but I'll keep it around.

All You Deliver - Jose Gonzalez - Veneer - 2003

I feel like Jose Gonzalez is rapidly over taking Iron & Wine as the Hipster version of Spanish Fly. I shudder to think of the shear number of Williamsburg babies (and cases of herpes) that have been conceived soundtracked by the Argentinian Swede.

All of his songs sound pretty much the same. Either you like that song (Which I like well enough) or you do not.

This is another one of his songs.

All Worked Out - Semisonic - Feeling Strangely Fine - 1998

I'll be honest, while this isn't neccesarily my favorite song on this album, this album as a whole is one of my guilty pleasures. Semisonic will always be remembered as "That 'Closing Time' Band", but like a few of the band from the dying days of the Alternative Nation nonsense they were better than their one hit.

All We Have Is Now - The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots - 2002

For those that follow such things, the story behind The Soft Bulletin is pretty well known. For those that don't here is a short version: Wayne Coyne lead singer and cult leader behind The Lips experienced the death of his father in the late 90's. While this was going on his drummer, a musical savant who basically ended up playing most of the instruments on the album, was in the throes of one hell of a heroin habit. Coyne, in his acid head way, was struck by the profundity of human mortality and together with his smacked out genius put together an orchestral psych pop album that was one of the high points of the 90's.

However by 2002's Yoshimi album...this focus on themes of our short span on this earth and lush keyboard instrumentation was getting a little tired. There are good songs on Yoshimi, but this isn't really one of them. Though I am sort of amused by the DEEP TALKING VOICE on the chorus.

All We Have Broken Shines - Brightblack Morning Light - Brightblack Morning Light - 2006

I got nothing to say about this band that Pitchfork didn't already beat me to. Frankly, I've never heard a band sound this stoned in my entire life.

All We Have - Brazilian Girls - Brazilian Girls - 2005

So, since I ripped apart the MTA a few posts ago, I should probably sing it's praises for a thing or two. I had that moment this morning, on my way into work, were I realized that there were an absurd number of hot chicks on my subway car. This was the car that, should it be the only thing to survive an apocalyptic event, you'd be perfectly happy to assist in repopulating the species.

Anyway, this is more of Brazilian Girls and their weird German mime sex.

All U People - Jon Auer - Private Sides - 2003

This song is probably Auer's best song on this odd split EP, with three songs each from both of the primary songwriters for The Posies...as I've previously discussed, the two of them were just not the same without each other...and put on the same EP together this mutual deficiencies. Auer misses Stringfellow's bitter cynacism and clever word play, while Stringfellow in turn misses Auer's rock instrumentation.

Incidentally, has there ever been another case of a songwriting partnership in which the more bitter is also the more musically mellow?

Also, this song is almost ruined by the odd, dated and lame Austin Powers ref at the beginning. I don't understand why he'd do that.

All Tomorrow's Parties - The Velvet Underground - The Velvet Underground and Nico - 1967

I know there is probably a roving gang of East Village Rock Snobs that will hunt me down and kill me for this, but...this song bores the ever-living shit out of me.

All Those Expectations - Peter, Bjorn, and John - Falling Out - 2005

Speaking of expectations...I nearly wrote this blog post last night, in which case you would have gotten a lengthy screed involving me giving a viking blood eagle to the children of the head of the MTA. I would have summoned dark gods to devour his soul and the furies to chase him through all eternity, but my lady friend came over and calmed me down. Now I'll settle for forcing him to watch endless episodes of Mama's Family and eating nothing but brussel sprouts and matza.

Anyway, after a single drink (no really, just one) with my co-workers I headed to the Q train...at 742 on a Monday evening...hardly late...the sun was still out for christ sake! I waited on the platform for a Q train for 45 minutes, before I finally went and berated the poor attendant in the booth. She called Dekalb Station, who told her to call City Hall, who then sent her back to Dekalb Station. Apparently, no one had any clue where the Q trains were. She then informed me that the heat was causing mechanical problems on several lines.

Two things:

A - How the fuck do you lose an entire train line? The Q isn't even that long, sure it goes out to Brighton Beach, but it stops at 57th St...where did all those trains go on a Monday evening?

B - HEAT!!!!????!!?!?!?!?!? That's your fucking excuse!?! Heat? Really? Word? That's what you got? 102 years of MTA service and you fucktards haven't figured out how to make your shit work on a hot day?

Honestly, despite my grumpy demeanor, I'm a pretty laid back guy, BUT, and this is a Michael Moore sized but, nothing infuriates me more than the incompetence of the MTA. The steal my life, a little bit at a time...and I can be as angry as I want to be about it and it will not affect them in the slightest. The fact that I eventually stormed out and took a cab in no way impacted the MTA...they can continue to be awful with no regard to their customers. Makes me go batshit feral.

Anyway, this PB&J being mellow, which I like far less than PB&J when they rock.

All Things Ordinary - The Anniversary - Designing a Nervous Breakdown - 2000

You know, today was supposed to be a quiet peaceful Monday. Several of my co-workers were out, and after the sweltering weekend we had here in NYC it seemed like a decent way to break in the working week. Sit in the free AC. Pay some bills. Work on this blog...but no, that's just not the way things went down. I've had two reports to put together in a matter of minutes, rather than hours, and that's not even counting the report that was due last week that slipped through the cracks. Sigh.

Anyway, you don't care about that...

The Anniversary was one of those bands I got into in the musically confusing turn of the millenia. At the time they (along with other embarrasing "emo" precursers like The Get Up Kids) seemed like the logical progression of Superchunk. Their hook-filled pop melodies couched in punkish instrumentation seemed an obvious debt to Chapel Hill's favorite sons, but on further inspection, these kids always lacked the spikey attitude of Chunk. Still I keep a couple of songs around for those hooks. I do have a sweet tooth somewhere back there...

All The Young Dudes - Mott The Hoople - All The Young Dudes - 1972

I have little patience with Boomer nostalgia (unless we're talking about the former Cincinnati Bengels Quarterback, but that's another story). I've spent my entire life being beaten over the head with the fact that nothing I ever do will be as revolutionary as what they did in the 60's, no movement in film will be as groundbreaking as the French New Wave and their American acolytes in the 1970's, and no music will ever be as revelatory as The Beatles, Stones, etc (and I like both the Beatles and the Stones)...

Given that fact I have some trepidation claiming anything is "The Greatest xxx Ever!"...but I must say that this Bowie penned gem does contain one of the best opening lines ever with "Well, Billy rapped all night about his suicide/how he'd kick it in the head when he's 25" With it's mournful guitar intro and Ian Hunter's too-many-cigarettes vocals it immediately grabs your attention. Its pitch perfect harmonies keep the vibe going, and like with so many things with Bowie, the lyrics seem to prescient, prefiguring the resentment later generations would have with Boomers and their "Revolution Stuff".

Honestly just a great song.

And on final word on Boomer nostalgia...Hilary can bite me!

All The Wine - The National - Alligator - 2005

Okay, so Facebook exists for only one purpose...so that I can sit at work and look at pictures of hot chicks but claim that I am not viewing porn if asked. That is why it is extremely annoying when I see an attractive woman in one of my friends' pictures and click on her name only to find out that she has set her profile to private.

Ladies if you are uncomfortable with the notion of your pictures being used by a thirty something guy as mildly sexual entertainment, then please get off the internet. If life has taught you nothing else, it should have taught you by now that the internet is a vehicle to bring pornography to the masses. Lead, follow, or get out of the way.

Like most of the songs on Alligator, this one seems like a warm up for a better version that would appear on Boxer.

All The Umbrellas In London - The Magnetic Fields - Get Lost - 1995

This is one of the few Magnetic Fields songs that I can still stand to listen to (the still durable Charm of the Highway Strip excluded). Even when I loved TMF, Get Lost was always something of a dud of an album...except this song. Stephen Merritt actually manages to find an appropriate setting for his melencholia and the right melody to go with it.

All The Trees Of The Field Will Clap Their Hands - Sufjan Stevens - Seven Swans - 2004

Sufjan and his banjo sing about Jesus.

I'm profoundly ambivalent about Sufjan...well, ambivalent might not be the right word...let's go with conflicted. On one hand he's a great number of things I hate: precious, kinda fey, way too mellow, "spiritual"...but then on the other hand he can write one hell of a melody. Even this song with it's banjo's, it's biblical allusions, and it's relentless twee-ness is still almost insufferably catchy...and the guy does know how to keep his cloying tendancies enough at bay that they don't overwhelm...usually.