Music
Here is everything I listened to that was released in 2008, ranked.
Mike Doughty - Golden Delicious - Hands down. I listened to this more than all the below combined, probably.
Kings of Leon - Only by the Night - Great songs. Damned compression...
Rise Against - Appeal to Reason
The Hold Steady - Stay Positive
Guns 'n Roses - Chinese Democracy - I'm still shocked. This had disaster all over it. It's really good!
Raconteurs - Consolers of the Lonely
Foxboro Hot Tubs - Stop Drop and Roll!!!
David Byrne & Brian Eno - Everything That Happens Will Happen Today
Kaiser Chiefs - Off With Their Heads
Weezer - The Red Album
Girl Talk - Feed the Animals
REM - Accelerate
Beck - Modern Guilt
Metallica - Death Magnetic
Judas Priest - Nostradamus
The Ting Tings - We Started Nothing
Tokyo Police Club - Elephant Shell
AC/DC - Black Ice - Blech.
Rachel Yamagata - Elephants... Teeth Sinking Into Heart - Blech.
Other stuff, not released in 2008 but new to me:
Eddie Vedder - Into the Wild (soundtrack). Mellow and meditative, good instrumentation and singing. I haven't seen the movie yet, but this sounds like it would be just about right.
Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings - 100 Days, 100 Nights. Wild, funky, soulful, amazing album. The Dap Kings are part of the period-music movement, playing vintage instruments and recording on vintage analog equipment. You may know them as the band on most of Amy Winehouse's Back to Black. Sharon Jones was a struggling backup singer, discovered by two members of the band. Awesome.
I completed my Queens of the Stone Age collection. I fucking love that band. Pure unadulterated id.
10 Years - The Autumn Effect. My buddy the IT guy at work was talking these guys up, and let me borrow this CD. They're a real good band, but just didn't grab me with any emotional connection. I listened to the album a few times, and they show up in a shuffle every now and then, but nothing made me say WOW!
Movies
I only saw two movies that were actually released in 2008. So, here are all the movies I saw, ranked:
Life is Beautiful - yes, I know I'm just a decade or so late to the party.
Walk on Water
Children of Men - wow.
Speed Racer
The Girl in the Cafe
Juno
Pi
Simpsons Movie
Harold and Kumar 2 (2008)
The Squid and the Whale
Ready-to-Wear
The Break-Up
The Incredible Hulk (2008, with Ed Norton) (Hey, I was trapped on an airplane. Just awful.)
That's all I can remember, with the help of the Netflix history. I'm sure there are a couple movies I can't remember that we DVRed and watched.
Showing posts with label Kings of Leon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Kings of Leon. Show all posts
Friday, January 02, 2009
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Short music reviews
AC/DC - Black Ice
Angus Young is a great guitar player, a riff-writer extraordinaire, and a great showman. Why this band bothers releasing albums (even if every 9 years), is beyond me. This thing sucks. Just tour until Brian Johnson's wheeze gives out for good, and be done with it. These songs took 9 years to "perfect?" Godawful.
Rise Against - Appeal to Reason
This, on the other hand, is very good and rapidly growing on me. I've only been through it three times so far, but there will be more. Vital, political punk-rock that engages from start to finish except for one poor attempt at a ballad at track 10. Fortunately, 11-13 pick it right up again. It's funny that as I get older, my rock actually needs to rock harder. Anything less (see above) is just a waste of time. I want my ass hammered and some lyrics at least two steps above pure drivel. This delivers. Big time.
Kaiser Chiefs - Off With Their Heads
These guys are critical darlings, and each of their albums has at least two fucking outstanding, addictive, catchy, hooky masterpieces. The rest, though not bad, just doesn't grab me for some reason. I don't know why. Solid tunes, solid melodies and hooks, nothing generic/boring, and yet it doesn't stick. I'm looking at my iTunes now, and here is the "Play Count" for this album, in 4 days: 2, 12, 2, 3, 4, 9, 1, 2, 3, 1, 2. Yup, pretty much like the other albums: two songs that'll be in my road trip playlists forever, one of them in my "Kick Ass" playlist, and some other songs that are just fine but that I'll forget about soon enough.
Rachel Yamagata - Elephant... Teeth Sinking Into Heart
She was featured in the latest issue of Rolling Stone, and it sounded like something I'd like. Not even close. If I remember correctly, the article even used the word "rock." ¿Que? There is no rock here. I put the thing aside for a couple days to regroup. Obviously, I had been mislead, and my expectations were not met in the slightest. Not her fault, I'll try again later. {Tries again} Fucking terrible. Boring and self-indulgent.
Kings of Leon - Only By The Night
An astounding collection of songs, but my enthusiasm has been tempered by the compression. Not as bad as Metallica, but still, muddy. I'll be buying the remasters in a few years. I'm not sure where they land yet, but this band is in my top 5, without a doubt. I've been too tongue-tied and too busy to put the time into a full-on review, but I will soon.
Metallica - Death Magnetic
Arguably the second-worst sounding album of the compression era. It's neck-and-neck with Rush's Vapor Trails, but I give the nod to Rush because they're better musicians, and make better music. They should be producing perfect, bell-clear albums. Metallica, on the other hand, is mostly noise. Good noise, but noise. If you bought the CD or iTunesed this, I'm sorry. Of course the band doesn't give two shits, they're rich already. Maybe if they deem you worthy, they'll sell you the remastered version in a few years. Meantime, go torrent the GH3 version. Orders of magnitude better. Sad, but true.
OK, on to the songs themselves. I've never heard Load, Reload, or St. Anger, but from what I gathered, I didn't miss much. This new one is decent, though only a couple songs have truly impressed me so far. I really like All Nightmare Long and End of the Line; powerful, razor-sharp riffs that take you back to the old days. Those are keeprs. On the other hand, did we really need Unforgiven III? Signs point to no. I'll pop it in every now and then, see if anything else sticks.
------------------
I've also been getting into everything Josh Homme does. You're probably familiar with Queens of the Stone Age's Little Sister:
Or maybe In My Head:
Heavy, filthy, sexy, booty-shaking grooves are Homme's stock in trade, and few do it better. In fact, the stated goal "is to create a heavy sound based on a solid jam, and just pound it into your head." Mission accomplished, sir. On all five albums.
I delved into another of his projects over the weekend, The Eagles of Death Metal. That stuff is quite good too, but horribly produced. Those need to be not just remastered, but re-recorded. They have a third album coming out soon that's been well-reviewed, and I wonder if they hired a real producer or not.
Here are a couple TEoDMs:
I Want You So Hard (Boy's Bad News)
(yes, Homme is on the drums in this band)
Cherry Cola
Is that the most fantastically awful video or what? It makes Warrant's Cherry Pie seem like a feminist tract. Maybe it's something about the word "cherry."
Anyway, good times. No pretense, just rawk.
Angus Young is a great guitar player, a riff-writer extraordinaire, and a great showman. Why this band bothers releasing albums (even if every 9 years), is beyond me. This thing sucks. Just tour until Brian Johnson's wheeze gives out for good, and be done with it. These songs took 9 years to "perfect?" Godawful.
Rise Against - Appeal to Reason
This, on the other hand, is very good and rapidly growing on me. I've only been through it three times so far, but there will be more. Vital, political punk-rock that engages from start to finish except for one poor attempt at a ballad at track 10. Fortunately, 11-13 pick it right up again. It's funny that as I get older, my rock actually needs to rock harder. Anything less (see above) is just a waste of time. I want my ass hammered and some lyrics at least two steps above pure drivel. This delivers. Big time.
Kaiser Chiefs - Off With Their Heads
These guys are critical darlings, and each of their albums has at least two fucking outstanding, addictive, catchy, hooky masterpieces. The rest, though not bad, just doesn't grab me for some reason. I don't know why. Solid tunes, solid melodies and hooks, nothing generic/boring, and yet it doesn't stick. I'm looking at my iTunes now, and here is the "Play Count" for this album, in 4 days: 2, 12, 2, 3, 4, 9, 1, 2, 3, 1, 2. Yup, pretty much like the other albums: two songs that'll be in my road trip playlists forever, one of them in my "Kick Ass" playlist, and some other songs that are just fine but that I'll forget about soon enough.
Rachel Yamagata - Elephant... Teeth Sinking Into Heart
She was featured in the latest issue of Rolling Stone, and it sounded like something I'd like. Not even close. If I remember correctly, the article even used the word "rock." ¿Que? There is no rock here. I put the thing aside for a couple days to regroup. Obviously, I had been mislead, and my expectations were not met in the slightest. Not her fault, I'll try again later. {Tries again} Fucking terrible. Boring and self-indulgent.
Kings of Leon - Only By The Night
An astounding collection of songs, but my enthusiasm has been tempered by the compression. Not as bad as Metallica, but still, muddy. I'll be buying the remasters in a few years. I'm not sure where they land yet, but this band is in my top 5, without a doubt. I've been too tongue-tied and too busy to put the time into a full-on review, but I will soon.
Metallica - Death Magnetic
Arguably the second-worst sounding album of the compression era. It's neck-and-neck with Rush's Vapor Trails, but I give the nod to Rush because they're better musicians, and make better music. They should be producing perfect, bell-clear albums. Metallica, on the other hand, is mostly noise. Good noise, but noise. If you bought the CD or iTunesed this, I'm sorry. Of course the band doesn't give two shits, they're rich already. Maybe if they deem you worthy, they'll sell you the remastered version in a few years. Meantime, go torrent the GH3 version. Orders of magnitude better. Sad, but true.
OK, on to the songs themselves. I've never heard Load, Reload, or St. Anger, but from what I gathered, I didn't miss much. This new one is decent, though only a couple songs have truly impressed me so far. I really like All Nightmare Long and End of the Line; powerful, razor-sharp riffs that take you back to the old days. Those are keeprs. On the other hand, did we really need Unforgiven III? Signs point to no. I'll pop it in every now and then, see if anything else sticks.
------------------
I've also been getting into everything Josh Homme does. You're probably familiar with Queens of the Stone Age's Little Sister:
Or maybe In My Head:
Heavy, filthy, sexy, booty-shaking grooves are Homme's stock in trade, and few do it better. In fact, the stated goal "is to create a heavy sound based on a solid jam, and just pound it into your head." Mission accomplished, sir. On all five albums.
I delved into another of his projects over the weekend, The Eagles of Death Metal. That stuff is quite good too, but horribly produced. Those need to be not just remastered, but re-recorded. They have a third album coming out soon that's been well-reviewed, and I wonder if they hired a real producer or not.
Here are a couple TEoDMs:
I Want You So Hard (Boy's Bad News)
(yes, Homme is on the drums in this band)
Cherry Cola
Is that the most fantastically awful video or what? It makes Warrant's Cherry Pie seem like a feminist tract. Maybe it's something about the word "cherry."
Anyway, good times. No pretense, just rawk.
Sunday, September 28, 2008
SNL recap Weeks 2 and 3
Forgot to do this last week.
SNL Week 2
Opening skit, McCain "approving" all his bullshit commercials, was pretty funny. Everything else was horrible, with the exception of Kings of Leon. OK, the Digital Short was passable, where he had the small weenie or something. James Franco has no charisma, and from what I can tell, no actual ability. Of course he was decent as the hateable douchebag in the Spiderman movies. He is a hateable douchebag! That solves that mystery.
SNL Week 3
The opening was fantastic. Tina Fey is out of her fucking mind as Sarah Palin. Everything else was terrible, except one that was a "meh." The one in the boat, where he's supposed to kill her; that one had a couple giggles. What the hell is going on here? This is the result of 5.5 straight days of work by a huge team of "comedy" writers and performers? Anna Faris is, um WHO? The whole episode, all Erica and I could think of was how much she looks like Britney Spears post-hottie but pre-total-meltdown. Then, about 10 minutes before the whole thing was over, Erica recognized her as the ditz in a couple scenes from Lost in Translation. So we had that going for us, which was nice.
And don't get me started on Duffy. What the fuck is that trainwreck?!?! No rhythm, no talent, no voice, shit songs. Love those tits-based record contracts. Awesome job, SNL. Just awesome.
SNL Week 2
Opening skit, McCain "approving" all his bullshit commercials, was pretty funny. Everything else was horrible, with the exception of Kings of Leon. OK, the Digital Short was passable, where he had the small weenie or something. James Franco has no charisma, and from what I can tell, no actual ability. Of course he was decent as the hateable douchebag in the Spiderman movies. He is a hateable douchebag! That solves that mystery.
SNL Week 3
The opening was fantastic. Tina Fey is out of her fucking mind as Sarah Palin. Everything else was terrible, except one that was a "meh." The one in the boat, where he's supposed to kill her; that one had a couple giggles. What the hell is going on here? This is the result of 5.5 straight days of work by a huge team of "comedy" writers and performers? Anna Faris is, um WHO? The whole episode, all Erica and I could think of was how much she looks like Britney Spears post-hottie but pre-total-meltdown. Then, about 10 minutes before the whole thing was over, Erica recognized her as the ditz in a couple scenes from Lost in Translation. So we had that going for us, which was nice.
And don't get me started on Duffy. What the fuck is that trainwreck?!?! No rhythm, no talent, no voice, shit songs. Love those tits-based record contracts. Awesome job, SNL. Just awesome.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Tuesday, January 01, 2008
The Year in Music
My rankings of 2007 releases
Arctic Monkeys - Favourite Worst Nightmare
Bruce Springsteen - Magic
Lyle Lovett - It's Not Big It's Large
Amy Winehouse - Back to Black
Kings of Leon - Because of the Times
Gogol Bordello - Super Taranta!
Rush - Snakes & Arrows
Foo Fighters - Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace
Radiohead - In Rainbows
The White Stripes - Icky Thump
Same band, new band, takes the top spot two years in a row, with each of their first two albums. I can't even explain how small the odds of that happening are. They beat out Pearl Jam in 2006, and Bruce and Lyle this year. Even I'm astounded.
Acquired just recently, too soon to tell
Robert Plant & Alison Krauss - Raising Sand
M.I.A. - Kala
Fall Out Boy - Infinity On High
Rilo Kiley - Under the Blacklight
Grinderman - Grinderman
Against Me! - New Wave
New to me (acquired, but not released, in 2007)
The Replacements - yeah, yeah. They were big when I was in Greece. I never heard of them until college, when their last album came out, and no one in my house listened to them. I always liked Paul Westerberg's solo stuff, though, so I got my hands on the originals, to see what the fuss was about. Not bad. Some great stuff, some meh stuff. In general, good old alcohol-fueled garage rock.
Dreamgirls - (2006) Soundtrack. Got it for the wife. Jennifer Hudson is amazing. I can do without the rest.
OK Go - Fun. Nothing too deep, just enjoyable party powerpoprock? I don't fucking know what to call it. Good shuffle tunes.
Silversun Pickups - (Carnavas) Meh. A little too noodly, and the guy whines even worse than Billy Fucking Corgan. And that's pretty fucking bad.
Chris Whitley - (Living With The Law, 1991) Toast insisted I listen to this. I knew the name, but couldn't think of anything he did. I really like the title track, Living With The Law. If no movie has that song playing at the end, with the heroes riding off into the sunset (fade to credits), then I may have to make a movie just so I can do that. And then... track fucking 2. I hate that song. Hated it when it was popular, and have managed to avoid it for 16 years. But noooooooo. Here it was again. I swear, I was so aggravated 30 seconds into the song, it colored my listening of the rest of the album. I couldn't give it a fair shake. So I stopped that day, took the song off the iPod, and gave it a week. Played it on another commute. Still love the first song, and the rest is very good too. Dark, creepy, blues/country/folk. Maybe a little too samey for many more straight-through listens (I'm way too ADD for an album full of low-energy music), but if any of these songs comes up in a shuffle, I won't be skipping it.
Blind Melon - (Goodfoot Demos, 1990) Apparently, 4 of these songs were on the demo tape that got them their major label deal. They then retreated to a barn in the country (one of the guys had a farm in the family) and practiced and practiced and played and wrote and jammed and practiced and jammed, until they were sure they had the chops, the cohesiveness, and the material. Then they started recording. These 8 songs were the can when they scrapped the whole project, because it sounded too polished, not organic enough. Of course, the A&R people were pissed. Money wasted, time wasted, buzz starting to fade and no album to release. Well, as luck would have it, Shannon Hoon hooked up with Axl Rose and did guest vocals in the Use Your Illusion albums, and appeared in the Don't Cry video. Buzz comes back. Meanwhile, they had been recording the album they wanted to make. Which was phenomenal. Anyway, 5 of these songs are on the album, so it's interesting to compare and contrast. They made the right choice. Ditched the over-produced, reverb-heavy "slick" sound, and came out swinging with a raw rock album; grinding staccato guitar rhythms, heavy driving bass, great vocals. Of course, if all you know is that fucking bee-costume No Rain song, well, you're missing out. That's not what this album is. Short story long, even though I like the songs as released better, I am getting a kick out of this. And hey, don't forget, three "new" songs too, at least to me.
Arctic Monkeys - Favourite Worst Nightmare
Bruce Springsteen - Magic
Lyle Lovett - It's Not Big It's Large
Amy Winehouse - Back to Black
Kings of Leon - Because of the Times
Gogol Bordello - Super Taranta!
Rush - Snakes & Arrows
Foo Fighters - Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace
Radiohead - In Rainbows
The White Stripes - Icky Thump
Same band, new band, takes the top spot two years in a row, with each of their first two albums. I can't even explain how small the odds of that happening are. They beat out Pearl Jam in 2006, and Bruce and Lyle this year. Even I'm astounded.
Acquired just recently, too soon to tell
Robert Plant & Alison Krauss - Raising Sand
M.I.A. - Kala
Fall Out Boy - Infinity On High
Rilo Kiley - Under the Blacklight
Grinderman - Grinderman
Against Me! - New Wave
New to me (acquired, but not released, in 2007)
The Replacements - yeah, yeah. They were big when I was in Greece. I never heard of them until college, when their last album came out, and no one in my house listened to them. I always liked Paul Westerberg's solo stuff, though, so I got my hands on the originals, to see what the fuss was about. Not bad. Some great stuff, some meh stuff. In general, good old alcohol-fueled garage rock.
Dreamgirls - (2006) Soundtrack. Got it for the wife. Jennifer Hudson is amazing. I can do without the rest.
OK Go - Fun. Nothing too deep, just enjoyable party powerpoprock? I don't fucking know what to call it. Good shuffle tunes.
Silversun Pickups - (Carnavas) Meh. A little too noodly, and the guy whines even worse than Billy Fucking Corgan. And that's pretty fucking bad.
Chris Whitley - (Living With The Law, 1991) Toast insisted I listen to this. I knew the name, but couldn't think of anything he did. I really like the title track, Living With The Law. If no movie has that song playing at the end, with the heroes riding off into the sunset (fade to credits), then I may have to make a movie just so I can do that. And then... track fucking 2. I hate that song. Hated it when it was popular, and have managed to avoid it for 16 years. But noooooooo. Here it was again. I swear, I was so aggravated 30 seconds into the song, it colored my listening of the rest of the album. I couldn't give it a fair shake. So I stopped that day, took the song off the iPod, and gave it a week. Played it on another commute. Still love the first song, and the rest is very good too. Dark, creepy, blues/country/folk. Maybe a little too samey for many more straight-through listens (I'm way too ADD for an album full of low-energy music), but if any of these songs comes up in a shuffle, I won't be skipping it.
Blind Melon - (Goodfoot Demos, 1990) Apparently, 4 of these songs were on the demo tape that got them their major label deal. They then retreated to a barn in the country (one of the guys had a farm in the family) and practiced and practiced and played and wrote and jammed and practiced and jammed, until they were sure they had the chops, the cohesiveness, and the material. Then they started recording. These 8 songs were the can when they scrapped the whole project, because it sounded too polished, not organic enough. Of course, the A&R people were pissed. Money wasted, time wasted, buzz starting to fade and no album to release. Well, as luck would have it, Shannon Hoon hooked up with Axl Rose and did guest vocals in the Use Your Illusion albums, and appeared in the Don't Cry video. Buzz comes back. Meanwhile, they had been recording the album they wanted to make. Which was phenomenal. Anyway, 5 of these songs are on the album, so it's interesting to compare and contrast. They made the right choice. Ditched the over-produced, reverb-heavy "slick" sound, and came out swinging with a raw rock album; grinding staccato guitar rhythms, heavy driving bass, great vocals. Of course, if all you know is that fucking bee-costume No Rain song, well, you're missing out. That's not what this album is. Short story long, even though I like the songs as released better, I am getting a kick out of this. And hey, don't forget, three "new" songs too, at least to me.
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