Guided by Voices - Bee Thousand

Hi there! I've got about an hour to kill, so I thought I'd write some. This is good practice; school starts this Thursday, and it's time to start kicking my brain into gear.

Today's album: Guided by Voices - Bee Thousand

Genre(s): Indie Rock, Lo-fi
Released: June 20, 1994
Running time: 20 songs, 43:27
In a nutshell: tape-hiss bliss

One of my all time favorites has popped up today. This is good, I am totally in the mood for this music.

Bee Thousand is an indie cult classic, the masterpiece of GBV's songwriting duo, Robert Pollard and Tobin Sprout. I think it takes a couple of listens to really get this album, partly because the fuzzy lo-fi aesthetic doesn't come easily to everyone, and partly because of Pollard's schizo lyrics. If you can digest these aspects, then it comes to you: these songs are fucking catchy. And there is no filler! They could have taken a handful of these songs, extended them by a couple of minutes (most of the tracks are under two minutes), added filler songs, and still have had a nice album filled with rich moments.

In my head, I used to compare Pollard/Sprout to Lennon/McCartney. They do have some similarities; for one, they both have the same good-cop-bad-cop thing going on. Sprout adds a more sensitive, poppy sound to Pollard's rough, psych-punk tendencies, although he tends to contribute less than McCartney did (Sprout wrote 5 of the 20 tracks on Bee Thousand). Both songwriting teams also split up to pursue rather flat solo careers. Sprout's mewing sensitivity is boring without Pollard's louder musicianship, and Pollard's wacky imagination is too raw without Sprout's pop sensibilities.

I've never listened to any other GBV albums, mostly because I'm still stuck on this one. I have Do the Collapse, and I'm a little bit afraid to listen to it as it is frequently referred to as GBV's "clean album". I used to have time to listen to albums I knew I would hate, but I have been extra busy lately. That's fine by me.

Until next time, friends!

Flying Lotus - L.A. EP 3x3

I wasn't planning on posting today, but I'm not in the mood to finish packing or run the other million errands I have to run, so I'll procrastinate a bit.

New Philly tonight! Woo!

Today's album: Flying Lotus - L.A. Ep 3x3

Genre(s): Instrumental Hip-hop, Indie electronic
Released: due in a couple months or so?
Running time: 7 tracks, 28:42

Today's album is actually an EP; the third in a set of three being released by Flying Lotus. The EPs contain a couple new tracks, but are mainly remixes and re-imaginings of the tracks from his 2008 album titled Los Angeles.

I don't usually spend a lot of time listening to EPs. I feel like they usually exist either as an afterthought or a preview to their companion LPs. As a preview, they can be exciting if they represent a new direction the artist is taking, but as an afterthought EPs only really work if the prior album has been picked clean by a listener who is still hungry for more.

I've never listened to Los Angeles, but I think I'm going to have to now. Upon first listen, I couldn't help but feel a little let down. There were good beats on about 3 of the 7 tracks. The rest of the EP was slow-burning ambiance, like the aptly titled track Endless White. Where beats were actually present, they were glitchy and dissonant. It was obvious to me that these were meticulously crafted songs, but I suppose that the reason I felt let down was that they lacked the swagger and confidence one expects to hear in a hip-hop track.

Doing a bit of research on the EPs didn't make them any more enjoyable to listen to, but they did spark my interest in Los Angeles and Flying Lotus as an artist. First off, he is related somehow to the Coltranes (I think Alice Coltrane was his aunt?), and there's probably enough talent in that family tree to last generations. Second, apparently his tracks are featured on Adult Swim wipes. Listen to the track Grapsicles, you might recognize it. Third, I have yet to find a bad review of Los Angeles. I'm gonna have to check this out.

It'll probably be a while before I find time to post again. Until then...get yo shit!

Indian Jewelry - Free Gold!

Hello, dearest friends. Another beautiful day, another beautiful album. I only have two days left in San Diego! I'll miss my friends, but I can't wait to be back in school...

Today's album: Indian Jewelry - Free Gold!


Genre(s): Psychadelic Rock, Shoegaze, Experimental
Released: May 20, 2008
Running Time: 14 songs, 50:45
In a nutshell: pretty drones, no real songs

I think I've listened to this album in its entirety just once. I never listened to it again, because it's a bit tiring. Basically, this band focuses on recreating the 60's psychadelic sound with new, shoegaze textures. The guitars sound Eastern underneath the layers of distortion and effects, and they tend to just drone along with the unremarkable rhythm section. This format is wonderful at first, but the absence of any real hooks or discernible lyrical content makes the album as a whole seem dull. Then again, if you plug in your headphones and really pay attention, you might find the sheer amount of detail packed into every song rewarding.

I'm hungover. Time to pick up my little brother, and then maybe take a nap. Peace!

The Velvet Underground and Nico

Good morning! How 'bout them Chargers? They had me biting my nails last night. Let's see what we've got today, iTunes...

Today's album: The Velvet Underground & Nico

Genre(s): Classic Rock, Proto-punk
Released: January, 1967
Running Time: 11 tracks, 48:51
In a nutshell: seminal classic rock

There's not a lot to say about this album that hasn't already been said a million times before. This is, after all, a critic's album: it was widely acclaimed, but made very little money initially.

What really strikes me about this music is how Lou Reed and Nico mix glam and grit. A lot of Lou Reed's songs are dirty, lo-fi rock pieces about scoring drugs, the prime example of this being the screechingly loud Run Run Run. When Nico steps up to the plate, the infielders move in, so to speak. The music becomes much cleaner to match her exotic vocals, but at the same time the band still finds ways to muck it up just a bit. Take, for example, the stuttering of the eastern guitar lines in All Tomorrow's Parties. The hiccups in the guitar's timing, along with the slightly-too-heavy bass/drum combo make the song a little more unnerving than your typical 60's psychadelic trip.

I regret not owning this record on vinyl. I'd love to hear it with some crackle and pop, au naturel. This album is also a lot better if listened to as loud as possible. This is definitely a lo-fi album; you won't get anything from it with a pair of headphones.

First post! Sigur Ros - ( )

Hi! My name is Darick, but my friends call me Deekay. You can call me Deekay too. Don't worry, you aren't being presumptuous in doing so.

I love music. In fact, I love music so much that I am not content with simply listening to it. I have to think about it, and now, write about it too. Every day (or as often as possible), I will set my iTunes on shuffle and write about the album that pops up. My taste in music is more or less indiscriminate, and my collection is large and growing. Actually, there is a lot of music loaded into iTunes that I haven't even gotten around to listening to yet. So I suppose this blog is as much a personal record of my own explorations as it is something I would like to share with other enthusiasts.

Today's album: Sigur Ros - ( )
Genre(s): Indie, Post-Rock, Ambient
Released: October, 2002
Running Time: 8 tracks, 1:11:47
In a nutshell: Zzzzzzzzz....

There are a lot of Sigur Ros fans out there, I suppose. I'm not really one of them, but I'll admit that it's very good music. This particular album isn't really doing much for me.

I think Sigur Ros both epitomizes, and somewhat evades the post-rock genre. For those of you who aren't familiar with the term, post-rock refers to instrumental rock which usually focuses on a quiet-loud-quiet formula to create a sense of drama. Unlike ambient music, which will lie quietly in the background until the listener chooses to pluck interesting details from it, post-rock tends to slowly creep up on you, eventually hitting you with something loud and dramatic. Sigur Ros often manages to evade the post-rock label because of its strange vocals, crooned in a made up language. The vocals give Sigur Ros a poppier sound on other albums, making them more immediately rewarding.

But not on ( ). This album has all the post-rock build-up with none of the character. I would suggest only listening to track 7, which is the album's 13 minute magnum opus. The track starts with cold ambiance coupled with slow, melancholic vocals. As the instrumentation builds up in volume, the pace never changes. Much of the album is like this, making the listener sift through endless shades of gray. You have to be in a specific mood to listen to this, and even then it is probably better to just have it on in the background.