It sure is a good thing I didn’t know anything about Pete Yorn and didn’t read any of the reviews about this album before I started listening to it. Because reading some of the breathless critical acclaim this received would have just about guaranteed that I wouldn’t have liked it. Fortunately, I listened first.
Tag: Jangle Pop
Liberty Belle and the Black Diamond (1986) by The Go-Betweens
Oh yay, another Australian jangle pop record from 1986.
Born Sandy Devotional (1986) by The Triffids
There’s this weird thing which happens with what we might call “colonial bands,” specifically bands from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, places like that. If these bands produce decent music, British and American critics sometimes lose their shit, as if they cannot imagine such small, quaint countries producing decent music. I understand why we Canadians lose …
Different Light (1986) by The Bangles
I was moderately pleasantly surprised by the debut, having associated this group band mostly with “Walk Like an Egyptian” (on this record) and “Eternal Flame” (not on this record). But whatever surprise I got from the debut has disappeared this time around.
Turn! Turn! Turn! (1965) by The Byrds
If I were asked to make a list of the most underrated rock bands of the 1960s, the Byrds might top that list. The average person in the 21st century has no idea how important they were in the evolution of music between 1965 and 1968. So it’s safe to say I’m a fan. But, …
Suburban Light (2000) by The Clientele
I often wonder about the historical perspectives (or lack therefore) of ’90s and ’00s music critics, particularly the young people. Because I often encounter highly acclaimed albums from these decades which sound to me as extremely derivative of other times and places. Sometimes it sounds like nostalgia, sometimes almost outright plagiarism but, regardless, I’m always …
Underwater Moonlight (1980) by The Soft Boys
The beginning of the first song got me excited. Then the rest of the album happened…
Meat is Murder (1985) by The Smiths
One of two things is happening: either I am slowly – slowly – getting so inured to The Smiths that I no longer hate their guts – or I have listened to enough of the British music of the 1980s to finally understand why people thought they were such a big deal. I still don’t …
Reading, Writing and Arithmetic (1990) by The Sundays
Why do I know The Sundays’ biggest hit? I was 8 when it came out and absolutely not listening to contemporary radio. My only guess is that the video got played a lot on Canada’s music video channel when I was older. Because I’ve definitely heard this song, and I can’t come up with any …
On Fire (1989) by Galaxie 500
Having heard Luna a bunch before this band, I found their debut, Today, a bit of a deja vu experience (with a lot more grime and feedback) but I tried to put that aside due to when that album was recorded. Listening to this roughly a year later, I still don’t know enough about the …
The Stone Roses (1989)
Somehow in my mind I confused the Stone Roses with the Happy Mondays so my initial listen was kind of confusing. Anyway… I have read that this is the record that started Madchester/Baggy but listening to the first side of it it’s certainly hard to understand. You have to get to the second half before …
All Over the Place (1984) by The Bangles
So many of my impressions of ’80s bands with only a couple of hits have been formed by those hits, and so I often find myself encountering a band with strong preconceived notions and finding them just blasted apart by albums. I don’t know if I’m alone in thinking “Walk Like an Egyptian” is gimmicky …
Ocean Rain (1984) by Echo and the Bunnymen
It’s been a while since I’ve heard Porcupine and even longer since I’ve heard my favourite, Heaven Up Here, so I am having a hard time listening to this record and deciding whether my memory is bad or something else is going on.
Oranges & Lemons (1989) by XTC
I don’t know anything about XTC really, just that one of their early ’80s albums has been on my “to listen” list for a very long time. I sort of assumed they were a post punk band but knew basically nothing else. Not knowing anything was good, as it often is, because I didn’t see …
The Splendour of Fear (1984) by Felt
The first track made me think I was listening to some kind of proto math rock thing, only coming at it from a different direction. That idea disappears pretty early into the second track, but the thought was interesting.
The Smiths (1984)
The British music critic establishment and whomever else greeted this band as saviours must have been so desperate for guitars to greet this band – this jangle pop music – as the thing to deliver them from synthesizers, instead of something louder or more interesting (or both). The Smiths are one of those mystifying bands …
Technique (1989) by New Order
The fusion of alternative and dance was such a big thing in the late 1980s in the UK. But it’s not something I really get because, well, I don’t like dance music. But I wish I could appreciate it more, because there are all these bands, with all these acclaimed albums, and I listen to …
Learning to Crawl (1984) by Pretenders
I never liked Chrissie Hynde. I don’t know why I didn’t like her when I was young – maybe I just didn’t have an opinion and don’t remember – but I know why I didn’t like her as an adult: I watched her and Morrissey shit on prog rock in New York Doll while I …
Lincoln (1988) by They Might Be Giants
I have heard so much about They Might Be Giants over the years that I was bound to be disappointed by what they sound like. So count me disappointed by this record.
Perfect Teeth (1993) by Unrest
Imagine if Television were really an indie pop band with an occasional female lead singer and maybe you get some idea of what Unrest sound like on this record. Not really, actually, as that’s a pretty poor comparison for many of the songs here, but it’s the best I can do at the moment.
Altered Beast (1993) by Matthew Sweet
When I was a teen, I didn’t get Matthew Sweet. He had the odd video on Much Music and those videos made no impression on me. But some people in the media (and probably even some people I knew) spoke about him as if he was…someone, as if he had done something in the time …
Temple of Low Men (1988)
Like so much other music, I have come to this band backwards, having recently listened to Neill Finn’s solo debut before I had ever heard any of their records. What I discovered on his solo debut is that he is not my kind of songwriter and often not my kind of performer. This is not …
Green Thoughts (1988) by The Smithereens
This is one of those records that basically just fails to move me. I understand that it’s all very competent and I do not dislike the aesthetic, really, but something here is missing for me.
Viva Hate (1988) by Morrissey
One of my reasons for my antipathy towards Morrissey (and the Smiths) is the music, and I must say the music here is much artier and weirder than I was expecting. (I think we can thank Vini Reilly for that. He’s a musically interesting guy in ways that Street and Morrissey normally are not.)
Daddy’s Highway (1987) by The Bats
This is my first encounter with the ‘Dunedin Sound’ probably because, like so many music scenes from outside of North America and the UK, it didn’t get much play where I live.
Calenture (1987) by The Triffids
I can’t speak for the Australian critics, but i feel like the American critics who went gaga over this record are guilty of a fairly common problem, where they over-hype a band from a “smaller” English-speaking country like Australia or Canada when if the same band appeared in the US or the UK they might …
Tone Soul Evolution (1997) by The Apples in Stereo
I am not very familiar with Elephant 6 but, to the extent that I am, I am familiar with weird, idiosyncratic indie pop bands, with a big emphasis on the “indie.” I assumed that Apples in Stereo would be along the same lines as the other Elephant 6 bands but, at least based upon this …
Strangeways, Here We Come
To say I dislike The Smiths would be an understatement. I don’t hate them so much as I hate the aura around them and this idea that they somehow saved British music from itself (and synthesizers! don’t forget the synthesizers), almost like a younger, hipper Bruce Springsteen (because Springsteen saved rock music from disco, don’t …
Green (1989) by REM
When I first got into REM, my friends who got me into REM told me Green was the worst album. And so I didn’t listen to it for over 20 years. (Makes sense, right?) I do know a few songs from a mixtape a friend made me, but that’s less than half of the tracks.
The Best of James (1998)
I’m not going to go into how I got my hands on this, but let’s just say it wasn’t a deliberate decision; it literally fell into my lap.