This is my first encounter with Red House Painters and…wait a minute, it’s not? Apparently I positively reviewed their debut in 2017 but I have zero memory of that. I know from my review and from looking at the track listings that the debut is a different beast than this record but I wish I …
Symbolic (1995) by Death
Me Against the World (1995) by 2Pac
So I guess the first thing I have to talk about with this record is expectations, which is often a problem for me when I first encounter someone about which an absolute ton of ink (both literal and proverbial) has been spilt. 2Pac is one of the most lionized rappers in history as far as …
Fetch the Bolt Cutters (2020) by Fiona Apple
So, full disclosure: I love Fiona Apple. My least favourite of all her albums is her first record, which is still extremely impressive for someone of her age. (Compare it to records made by similarly aged artists through the history of pop music, I bet it stands out pretty strongly). So I don’t think I …
I Am Trying to Break Your Heart (2002, Sam Jones)
As a big fan of Wilco, and Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, it’s crazy it took me this many years to watch this movie. But it’s possible that the intervening years gave me some clarity with it, that I might not have had when I was first falling in love with this band (more than a few …
Moneyball (2011, Bennett Miller)
This is an enjoyable dramatization of the Oakland As’ 2002 season, from the perspective of their General Manager, who was trying to win games with the lowest budget in baseball. I say dramatization because there is a lot of poetic license here, and because the most important players on that team are barely even acknowledged.
Escape Room (2017, Will Wernick)
This is a stupid horror movie that is reasonably enjoyable for most of its run but which is utterly ruined by the ridiculous characterizations and its nonsensical ending. SPOILERS! By the way, this is not to be confused with the 2019 Escape Room.
Cocktail (1988, Roger Donaldson)
Can I review a movie I missed the first 20 or so minutes of? And which I cooked pastitsio through? Well, I’m doing it anyway!
Journal of the Pandemic Year: Day 50
Time has lost all meaning. Sometimes it slows to a crawl. Other times it moves so quickly I can’t believe it.
Uncover (2018)
Uncover is a unique podcast series, in that it features different stories and different hosts each season. This has potential to make it eternally compelling but the truth of the matter is that CBC is not a podcast provider and doesn’t necessarily know the medium. The result is an incredibly uneven series, and your interest …
Strap It On (1990) by Helmet
This is some aggressive and and aggressively loud but knotty post hardcore/alternative metal that should be sought out by anyone who is a fan of either genre, or who wishes hardcore bands were more accomplished musically or metal was weirder.
I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got (1990) by Sinead O’Connor
Sinead’s second album is considerably more self-assured and even than her debut, though it’s lacking a bit of the energy of the debut and, also, the pure shock factor of a woman so young seeming like such a self-assured songwriter and performer. And like the debut, it hasn’t dated that well, but that’s sort of …
Sex Packets (1990) by Digital Underground
What can I possible say about this insane album? It’s a concept album about a sex drug but, like most concept albums, that concept isn’t evident on many of the tracks. And it features the main rapper rapping both as himself and, infamously, in character, something I don’t know how often I’ve encountered before (and …
Icarus (2017, Bryan Fogel)
This is a maddening, over-stylized, over-thought, over-long documentary about a story that I paid basically zero attention to at the time, but which deserves a great feature-length documentary. This Oscar-winning documentary is not that film. SPOILER ALERT
Blacks’ Magic (1990) by Salt n Pepa
Contrary to what I thought, Salt n Pepa are a manufactured group, just TLC is (which I didn’t know either, at the time). They’re like proto TLC albeit with their own DJ. (That’s a joke.) Not knowing much about the state of Hip Hop in 1990, it still feels to me more authentic than “manufactured” …
Hell Awaits (1985) by Slayer
So I’ve never heard their debut, only later records, so I don’t know how this compares to that record, but I read that it is significantly better (more ambitious, louder, more professional), etc. Even without hearing the debut, those descriptions make sense, because this is a crazy pummeling record, especially given that it’s 1985.
Up on the Sun (1985) by Meat Puppets
The more that I listen to the Meat Puppets the more it feels like they are one of the foundational bands of American alternative rock, setting the template for what was acceptable. When I was young and first encountering alternative, it felt like the diversity was baked in but original. The more I listen to …
Women and Children First (1980) by Van Halen
I listen to this record and I don’t remember it a few hours, maybe even minutes later. The first time I listened to I wasn’t even sure I listened to it a couple of hours later, I had to look at the track listing to confirm. What I’m saying is that this record doesn’t have …
Half-Mute (1980) by Tuxedomoon
With the first track I thought this was going to get really out there, like a (much) more ambient version of Swell Maps or This Heat but with saxophone.
Diary of the Pandemic Year: Day 42
The Americans want to reopen things. But of all countries, the US is worst hit in terms of total numbers: they will hit 1,000,000 confirmed cases sometime week and they will likely hit 50,000 dead by the day after tomorrow (April 24).
Glass Houses (1980) by Billy Joel
I read somewhere that this is supposed to be Joel’s “punk” album, not in that it sounds like punk that it is his response. I think that comes from a way too deep reading of the lyrics to “It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me”, and if it is indeed his response to these trends …
The Psychedelic Furs (1980)
One has to think that the band name is a jab at old people, whether or not you want to categorize this music as neo-psychedelia. (And people categorize it as such? I find that very strange. Like, how?) Anyone who was really into psychedelic music in the late ’60s would have been pretty put out …
Necroscape (2020) by tētēma
I was super excited about Geocidal, mostly because it felt like the first time Patton had made interesting music in some time. So I listened to the record a bunch and gave it a very good review. And then I didn’t listen to it again. I don’t know whether that says I overrated it or …
A Journal of the Pandemic Year: Day 37
Continued from Day 36 I think one reason I don’t have much to say about our pandemic is because I have been putting my faith in the experts, to a much greater degree than I normally do. From the beginning, my girlfriend was paying far more attention than I was and was more informed. And …
Made You Look (2020, Barry Avrich)
This is a very well done, but very straight-forward, art fraud documentary that is apparently so new I can’t even rate it on IMDB yet. It turns out I was already familiar with the story – we think through an episode of American Greed – but the access the filmmakers get and the skill with …
A Journal of the Pandemic Year: Day 36
The WHO declared coronavirus a pandemic on March 11th. On March 12th my province extended the upcoming March Break for an additional week. On March 14th, my country recommended against international travel. On March 17th, my province declared a State of Emergency. (The day before, my girlfriend’s office instructed them to work from home.) On …
The Problem of Subjectivity
Throughout most of human history, we haven’t done a good job of understanding objective reality. Learning about objective reality has been a slow, difficult process, with many setbacks, but which has rapidly accelerated in the last few centuries, especially the last one. If you compare the growth of scientific knowledge about the universe versus the …
Katy Lied (1975) by Steely Dan
Here we go again: I do not like Steely Dan. This album does not change that feeling in any way. The problems I have with Steely Dan records are as present on this record as any of their ’70s records I’ve heard. The more albums I listen to, the more I become convinced that, once …
Between the Lines (1975) by Janis Ian
It sure feels like Janis Ian has been mostly forgotten all these years later. She was basically never mentioned in the various music things I consumed as a teen and my first exposure to her was the use of”At Seventeen” in an episode of The Simpsons. I don’t think I heard much about her again …
A Quiet Storm (1975) by Smokey Robinson
It’s impossible to ignore or understate the importance of an album that gave its name to a radio programming format. But that doesn’t mean I have to like it!