1.
Pupil Slicer - Mirrors
Ok, it’s finally the moment of the truth. Ever since I picked LedZep’s chart as a source of nominations, this was the kind of album I expected. Everyone acted like an overprotective parent so far, avoiding the most outrageous choices and playing it safe – appreciated that-, but it was about time I bite the bullet, as that was the point to begin with- thank you Mercury for nominating it. So, did I like it? Nope -let’s be real though, what were the odds, painfully close to zero. At least I knew what to expect right off the bat, the ominous intro sets the tone for what’s about to follow, the mission of this album is to make you as uncomfortable as possible and it emphatically succeeds, the word “claustrophobic” is being given a new meaning. I can breathe a sigh of relief now that it’s over, I’m amazed that I survived an airbag saved my life, this was a mere 37 minutes, yet it felt like 73 minutes of relentless violence. The thought that this isn’t the most extreme thing I could have been assigned cheers me up – for lack of a better option – it’s always comforting to be reminded that music and art in general knows no boundaries after all. On the other hand, it’s easy to identify a positive aspect of this album, these guys really know how to play music, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to claim that they are masters of their craft. If mathcore’s basic concept is being excessively technical and excessively aggressive at the same time, I’d say they are striking the right balance – obviously without being an expert on the scene or having the knowledge to compare them with their peers, I have no idea towards which direction this sub-genre is heading. To sum it up, it was ok for a change, I guess it’s needed once in a blue moon, maybe I’ll try my luck again with something similar in a few months – or maybe not, I don’t know.
2.
This choice is a walk in the park, as I happened to listen to it yesterday. Probably my favourite out of the 5 (!) Coltrane albums released in 1961 that I checked, though it's too close to call, Ole Coltrane is just as good. I nominate
John Coltrane Quartet - Africa/Brass
By the way, not that it matters that much, it's a silly stat as you correctly said, but Davis outlived Coltrane by 25 years or something close to that, so it's only natural to have more "bold" albums.
3.
Having made it through the bloodbath, it’s time to move on. Thanks LedZep, your chart was a window on the world, that I would have never opened on my own.
So, I intended to pick the chart of the user who posted right above me, but Mercury's and LedZep's charts are two sides of the same coin, so I’ll conveniently skip his chart and go with EyeKanFly’s. Curious to find out if there’s any common ground.
1. Afrique Victime - Mdou Moctar
2. Nafs At Peace - جو بھی [Jaubi]
3. Palais D'argile - Feu! Chatterton
4. Black To The Future - Sons Of Kemet
5. Slash And Burn - Ghlow
6. 42 Days 四十二天 -Southeast Of Rain 东南有雨
7. The Off-Season - J. Cole
8. Cor - Anavitória
9. Let's Throw A Party - Sammy Rae
10. No Branches Without Trees - Steven Van Betten & Andrew Rowan _________________ Bob Dylan Charles Mingus
RoundTheBendI miss the comfort in being sadProfile Ground Control
Nina Simone And Her Friends by Nina Simone
To be completely honest, this album was pretty ok. I think I liked the Carmen McRae track the most. It reminded me of the Ray Charles album of nearly the same name.
2. Afrique Victime - Mdou Moctar
3. Craola Top 100 (2 more)
5. Baabel by Leïla Martial
8. The Exotica Album by Øyvind Torvund
9. Junjo by Esperanza Spalding
10. Circles by Anne Paceo
13. Shoshan by שי בן צור [Shye Ben Tzur]
14. Orange by Caroline Shaw / Attacca Quartet
16. Aventurine by Linda May Han Oh
17. Excava 11 by Spartan Fidelity
18. From The Cliffs by Guillemots
19. Jewels Of The Sea by Les Baxter
baystateoftheartNeil Young as a butternut squashProfile Massachusetts
The noisy songs on this album are all great. It's too bad there aren't more of them. The softer songs are mostly very good, with a few highlights mixed in. Duster are skilled practitioners of slowcore, but not head and shoulders above their peers such as Low and Red House Painters. Apparently this is now RYM's favorite of the genre though, I suspect because of the integration of other styles. Between the lo-fi instrumentation and creeping tempo, the lyrics didn't usually grab my attention, but Reed To Hillsborough was a standout. Going back and reading lyrics for the other songs, they're fairly strong. Overall I still prefer their recent self-titled after one listen, but I can tell this is a gem as well, and it feels like a potential grower. 4/5.
~~~~~
2. I haven't heard this one, but really enjoy Esperanza Spalding's 2016 album.
D: Pilgrim’s Paradise (EP) - Daniel Caesar*
D2: LC - The Durutti Column
E: Phoenix: Flames Are Dew Upon My Skin - Eartheater
F: Let It Die - Feist
G: Oktember (EP) - Gas
H: Voids - Have A Nice Life
I: The 5000 Spirits Or The Layers Of The Onion - The Incredible String Band
J: Brel [Les Marquises] - Jacques Brel
J2: Femenine - Julius Eastman
K: Aerial - Kate Bush
Ok so... 2 hours of music. Most of which consists of cut songs from Davis' early 70's albums. The first half of the album was basically just lounge music. It's solid, but I very much understand why it was cut. Second half gets more interesting, infusing more genres, intense solos (Al Foster and Bernard Pudie have some solid drum solos on the second half), and overall just more enjoyable. What's very interesting is that the recording dates are all over the place, so it's not like the first die was during a lounge "phase" and the second during a more interesting phase. The similarly toned songs are placed together, and I think that's part of what makes this album so amazing. More so that Miles or any of his co-instrumentalists, it's the production and mastering which really ties this together. It's proof that you can make gold out of scraps: one man's trash is another man's treasure.
3)
- Irish Tour '74 by Rory Gallagher (live)
- Sun Bear Concerts Piano Solo: Recorded in Japan by Keith Jarrett (live)
- Silent Hill 2 by Akira Yamaoka (soundtrack)
- Rétrospective Vol. 1 & 2 by Magma (live)
- Colors_Live by Between the Buried and Me (live)
- Live by Magma (live)
- At San Quentin by Johnny Cash (live)
- First Utterance by Comus
- You Will Never Know Why by Sweet Trip
- Strangers in the Night by UFO (live)
PS)
@kokkinos: I'm honored. I'm glad Afrique Victime was the first pick, that would've been my choice too. Hope you enjoy!
@RoundTheBend: same feel about Nina Simone and Her Friends. It was a total afterthought by the record label. Some songs are solid, but totally disjointed. _________________ 51 Washington, D.C. albums!
MercuryTurn your back on the pay-you-back last callProfile St. Louis
Not much to say about this. Or, rather, not much that I myself can think to say about this. It’s great musicians making some music. I can’t say the music moved me, amazed me or blew me away. It didn’t break through and kick its way into my mind or hit me emotionally or spiritually. But that is the case with a lot of acclaimed jazz albums. Maybe I’ve been so thoroughly indoctrinated or trained into listening to music with an almost simplistic aim to make me relate or to make me see what is being communicated in a direct way that music like this which is a bit more … idk… aloof? Hard to grasp?… that I just can’t quite feel the music. I like it. It’s good. I don’t know.
I keep trying to really get classic jazz and especially Coltrane records of the pre-A Love Supreme/Spiritual Jazz/Free jazz eras. And it has yet to really blow me away or take hold of me. Although all of em have been good to great and always impressive (Talking about Blue Train, Giant Steps, Ole Coltrane, this album, My Favorite Things…), none have made me fall in love and feel something DEEPLY SPIRITUAL like A Love Supreme or has made me feel such deep primal feelings (at least partially of horror) like Ascension.
Whatever, this is a poorly worded post. Basically I liked it but felt like I was most definitely on the outside, observing respectfully from Afar.
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2.
@EyeKanFly, it is me again! This time I choose… well no need for suspense. I’ll nominate the other one I was thinking of nominating last time.
Just albums and mixtapes now. Pretty straight forward. The asterisk before some albums indicates I have never listened to this album. All of these, including ones with no asterisk, are quite vague and faint in my recollection and need revisits.
1. Deathconsciousness by Have A Nice Life/2008/RYM #116 all time album/mixtape (yeah I heard this in a very very workmanlike fashion, just kinda listening to it to get it listened to and out of the way maybe a year ago or 2. I remember thinking it was way way too somber and dark for my tastes especially at the time. But I just went and listened to that GYBE album and in listening to that I decided to make sure I wasn't giving short shrift to any albums before Ex Military and found this and found that I can't remember much about it except that I didn't like it. Need to revisit. May still not be a favorite but will pay closer attention this time.)
2. Exmilitary by Death Grips/2011/RYM #130 all time album/mixtape (I included mixtapes and voila! This appeared and I realized I've never seen this famous album on a RYM list before because I never ever included mixtapes! Anyway, I have heard this. When it came out. Should revisit.)
3. Geogaddi by Boards of Canada/2002/RYM #210 all time album/mixtape (Music Has The Right To Children at one point kinda took over my life and was on my overall chart briefly. Need to relisten to that as well but overall pretty familiar. This one, however, while i've heard it a couple times I never feel like I gave it ample time. Really wanna listen and listen good.)
*4. Human by Death/1991/RYM #240 all time album/mixtape (This was a big deal in the development of extreme metal. At least I think so. I've now heard their first 2 and their last 2 albums and then there are 2 early early 1990s albums sandwiched in between that I have never heard. Technical/Progressive Death Metal from the dawn of the 1990s sounds kinda cool.)
*5. Foxtrot by Genesis/1972/RYM #257 all time album/mixtape (Classic Genesis album - Prog stuff. Nice. I may have heard it. Can’t remember. I remember falling hard for Selling England... but never finding that next genesis album that blew me away - and I did look. Need to revisit this one.
6. The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway by Genesis/1974/RYM #277 all time album/mixtape (I have heard this one. Long time ago. I had just really fallen for the greatness of Selling England... and I remember thinking this wasn't nearly as good, too long, and a bit up its own ass. But also remember some great tunes. So really can't remember much about it. may be time to revisit.)
*7. Moving Pictures by Rush/1981/RYM #281 all time album/mixtape (Can CONFIDENTLY say I have never once heard a Rush album all the way through. I know weird right? I hated them and all they stood for for most of my musical life. Now that I don’t dismiss out of hand Prog and the sort of very famous rock music for my mom’s generation, maybe I’ll like it? We shall see)
*8. Mirage by Camel/1974/RYM #284 all time album/mixtape (A totally classic symphonic prog album and one that I can't recall listening to. Very intrigued by this one.)
9. Getz / Gilberto by Stan Getz & João Gilberto featuring Antônio Carlos Jobim/1964/RYM #297 all time album/mixtape (Surely I have heard this. I even distinctly buying it used on CD a decade ago or so. I remember it being kinda cool and unique and so forth. But my recollection is vague enough that I didn't rate it. So yeah here is another choice for y'all.)
*10. The Ape of Naples by Coil/2005/RYM #305 all time album/mixtape (Kind of a new record —- very tricky! - anyway, I have heard this at least I think so but can’t remember much about it. Post-industrial classix apparently. Kinda cool I am making my way through almost the top 300. Wonder what I get as a prize once I’ve heard the RYM top 500?) _________________ -Ryan
This was fantastic. I feel like I've heard her name before, but I don't feel like I've listened to an album. Great bass playing/tone/timbre and intriguing scat singing. I kinda wasn't a fan of the piano parts at times, but it's what's expected.
2. Deathconsciousness I suppose - I know a lot who find it amazing. I find it ok to good.
3. Craola Top 100 last pick
5. Baabel by Leïla Martial
8. The Exotica Album by Øyvind Torvund
10. Circles by Anne Paceo
13. Shoshan by שי בן צור [Shye Ben Tzur]
14. Orange by Caroline Shaw / Attacca Quartet
16. Aventurine by Linda May Han Oh
17. Excava 11 by Spartan Fidelity
18. From The Cliffs by Guillemots
19. Jewels Of The Sea by Les Baxter
20. Carrier by Daniel K. Böhm
baystateoftheartNeil Young as a butternut squashProfile Massachusetts
Last year a friend irl recommended Trinity to me and I really enjoyed it. Turns out that pop mixtape is a genre anomaly in her folk-centered discography, but there are definitely some commonalities between it and this record (avant-folk + chamber folk per RYM). First, the music and lyrics in both are sexual and edgy, which of course you can also see in this album art. Second, the instrumentals in both are original and sometimes ornate. But enough compare and contrast... When it comes to Phoenix, the best tracks are the ones with lush orchestration. Some are simply gorgeous. The more stripped-down acoustic guitar tracks are quite nice as well. The glitchy components are a bit hit and miss. Sometimes they enhance the music and sometimes they clutter it without being value-added. Eartheater's vocals are beautiful and fit the music well. The lyricism is of variable quality, but it almost never detracts. Overall a fresh and promising album. I learned she's now under a cloud of controversy for allegedly being a bad person in various ways, which is a shame. 3.5/5.
~~~~~
2. I've heard of Shaw before due to her collaborations with Kanye West, so check this out I guess:
L: Carbon Glacier - Laura Veirs
M: Maanam - Maanam
M2: Zoo Is Sad, People Are Cruel - My Little Airport
M3: Swimming - Mac Miller
N: Dez Anos Depois - Nara Leão
O: Straight Ahead - Oliver Nelson & Eric Dolphy
P: The Final Riot! - Paramore*
Q: Innocent Country 2 - Quelle Chris & Chris Keys
R: I Might Be Wrong: Live Recordings (EP) - Radiohead
S: Soul Men - Sam & Dave
Okay I have now listened and listened closely and I liked it. Was still not awed or blown away. But I found that the entire overly long length of the album was engaging and wasn't 100% a slog like I remember. This is a rich and powerful post punk album. The heavier, louder, more abrasive sounding parts are a bit much and actually kinda hurt my ears (punk roooock!!!) and that was not in a way I always loved. The slower more somber longer and drawn out slowly building ambient or even slow folk songs are great.
Something tells me this is like an onion... I am sure there are many layers of meaning and metaphor and sound that if I listened a bit more times through and listened closely, I would find myself more and more engaged in this modern classic. And I may yet do that. I certainly was impressed enouigh by the sheer beauty and ambition of the album and I am impressed with how, at times, this album pulls you into deep, swirling whirlpools of emotion and atmosphere. Very cool. Overall I did think (quite shallow comment coming) it is a bit too long, and it lost me at points. SAtill, even this "weakness" may be one that I won't even count as a critique after a few more revisits.
Good stuff and I am glad I am no longer giving it such short shrift.
-------------------------
2.
@Baystateoftheart, hmmm... mostly unfamiliar with those selections, but Laura Veirs is a bit of an unsung (relatively speaking... she is somewhat well known but not as popular or known as she should be)songwriting gem of a person. That album is solid as hell from what I recall, so I nominate:
RYM top 1000 albums which I haven't rated due to never heard 'em or because I can't honestly remember much or anything about the albums. I will take the top 5 I haven't heard or need to revisit plus the bottom 5 of the top 1000 that I haven't heard. Just to spice it up. Some interesting stuff down at #997 and stuff.
Just albums now. Excluding Classical and any sort of soundtrack or film score.
The asterisk before some albums indicates I have never listened to this album. All of these, including ones with no asterisk, are quite vague and faint in my recollection and need revisits.
*1. Foxtrot by Genesis/1972/RYM #242 all time album (Classic Genesis album - Prog stuff. Nice. I may have heard it. Can’t remember. I remember falling hard for Selling England... but never finding that next genesis album that blew me away - and I did look. Need to revisit this one.
2. The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway by Genesis/1974/RYM #256 all time album (I have heard this one. Long time ago. I had just really fallen for the greatness of Selling England... and I remember thinking this wasn't nearly as good, too long, and a bit up its own ass. But also remember some great tunes. So really can't remember much about it. may be time to revisit.)
*3. Moving Pictures by Rush/1981/RYM #259 all time album (Can CONFIDENTLY say I have never once heard a Rush album all the way through. I know weird right? I hated them and all they stood for for most of my musical life. Now that I don’t dismiss out of hand Prog and the sort of very famous rock music for my mom’s generation, maybe I’ll like it? We shall see)
*4. Mirage by Camel/1974/RYM #265 all time album (A totally classic symphonic prog album and one that I can't recall listening to. Very intrigued by this one.)
5. Getz / Gilberto by Stan Getz & João Gilberto featuring Antônio Carlos Jobim/1964/RYM #266 all time album (Surely I have heard this. I even distinctly buying it used on CD a decade ago or so. I remember it being kinda cool and unique and so forth. But my recollection is vague enough that I didn't rate it. So yeah here is another choice for y'all.)
-----------------------
*6. Somewhere Along the Highway by Cult of Luna/2006/RYM #996 all time album (Okay, so this is a famous somewhat modern metal album which is atmospheric sludge and I have never heard this all the way through. I may have sampled it when I was trying desperately to find atmo sludge I actually dug a few years back. Oh and the genre "Post Metal" is used to describe this - a possible red flag... we shall see.)
*7. Geraes by Milton Nascimento/1976/RYM #997 all time album (I have never heard this album nor heard OF it. I respect some - maybe only a couple - other Milton Nascimento albums which seem to be more famous. But yeah I always enjoy listening to some MPB legends.)
8. All We Love We Leave Behind by Converge/2012/RYM #998 all time album (Ah yes, 2012, the year everything changed. I joined BEA and started obsessively talking music. Anyway, I think I listened to this then. It was ... a bit extreme for my tastes at the time. I have since revisited it a time or 2. Its been a long long time since last heard and haven't revisited it after finally loving Jane Doe.)
*9. Confield by Autechre/2001/RYM #999 all time album (For those of you who sometimes read my lil diary, sorry I have not been doing my 1990s deep dive posts. I will return to it. But anyway, Autechre is on that list of great 90s acts. And this is a legendary album I can say I have never finished but started a few times.)
10. The Stranger by Billy Joel/1977/RYM #1,000 all time album (I kind of grew up around this album. I even relatively recently - maybe 3 years ago listened to it - but its been awhile and I never felt like I gave it its due respect as a famous classic.) _________________ -Ryan
Play With The Changes by Rochelle Jordan
I've been digging a lot of electronic pop recently. More specifically, various UK Bass, house, technopop, R&B and art pop combinations. Play With the Changes is not some of the best of that world, but it's still a nice album. The main concern is the most basic one: the songs aren't great. They're good, sometimes too repetitive, the production is excellent throughout but the core songwriting is mostly not blowing me away. The last 2 songs (Dancing Elephants and Situation) draw heavy influences from UK Bass, and those two were my favourites. It's more electronic pop than alternative R&B with some electronic influences to spice it up, which was the case in the big portion of the record. A pretty cool album overall, high 7.5/10
(2)
Cool picks, but go with Foxtrot. Bay had a good review some time back and he mostly enjoyed the album, let's see how much you like it.
(3)
Leftovers list + some 2021
Lawrence - The Absence of Blight
John Talabot - Fin
Flamengo - Kuře v hodinkách
Sadaf - History of Heat
Ataraxie - Slow Transcending Agony
Ranking Dread - Ranking Dread In Dub
Grachan Moncur III - Evolution
Area - Arbeit Macht Frei
Conway the Machine & The Alchemist - LULU
BRUIT ≤ - The Machine Is Burning and Now Everyone Knows It Could Happen Again _________________ Overall chart Fake overall chart
The applause was for Mercury having this on his chart. As far as I know this not a very well known album. I'm curious as tow how you came across it Mercury? Gareth Liddiard was born in the same country town as me, and grew up in the same city as me. He formed the band The Drones here and then the band relocated interstate and had quite a bit of success, receiving a lot of critical acclaim over the years. I think they are great and got to see them live once. Now he fronts the blues punk/art punk band Tropical Fuck Storm, who I like even more than The Drones. Absolutely amazing and incredible live performers. I've seen them twice, including earlier this year supporting King Gizz. Anyway this is a solo album he released in the middle of The Drones era. The full band noise of The Drones is gone and we are left with sparse acoustic guitar and Gareth in full singer/songwriter mode, but the lyrical and vocal strengths are still there...in fact highlighted even more. He has a love it or hate it unique voice, and I fall into the love it camp, and a way with words that captivates (even when I don't fully understand everything he is saying). Most of these songs are longish story telling songs, or rather character telling songs, often about looked down upon people on the fringes of society. Sometimes there is sympathy or empathy, as in one of the highlights of the album, the title track Strange Tourist, but most times it's just descriptive, while setting a sombre and depressing mood and atmosphere. He plays with dynamics superbly, from loud and quiet, emotionally soft to emphatically powerful, using just his voice and guitar. It really is impressive. The songs are not constructed using your normal verse chorus verse, but linear with only the occasional repeated line for effect, and keep you interested throughout, even especially in the almost 17 minute powerful closing track, probably the best song on the album. At times he brings to mind old bush poets and I can picture sitting around a campfire at the end of a long hard day with a few other tired workers listening to him and a guitar telling these tales. I only knew a couple of these songs well so I'm glad I finally got to hear this album that had been on my to listen to list for a while now in full. 8/10, and 29/97 for 2010.
Top 51 Music Albums of 2010 by Mercury (last pick)
3. Kamisori Otome by 青葉市子 [Ichiko Aoba]
14. Philharmonics by Agnes Obel
15. So Runs The World Away by Josh Ritter
16. Messenger by Joe Pug
17. Black Noise by Pantha Du Prince
25. The Bootleg Series Vol. 9 – The Witmark Demos: 1962–1964 by Bob Dylan
27. Flamingo by Brandon Flowers
29. Junky Star by Ryan Bingham
32. Under Great White Northern Lights by The White Stripes
33. Opus Eponymous by Ghost (SE)
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RoundTheBend
baystateoftheart
EyeKanFly
Mercury
LedZep
Purplepash
