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July 2007
Mia Doi Todd -
The Golden State (2002)
A Californian singer-songwriter with a truly distinctive,
love it or hate it, voice. With arrangements and production
courtesy of the magnificent Mitchell Froom, this is mostly
slow, atmospheric, and quietly compelling.
Feist
- The Reminder (2007)
The Water and How My Heart Behaves are the
premium slices of dreamy melancholy on show here, and consequently,
the t-bo highlights.
Joan As Police Woman
- Real Life (2006)
After the extreme UK press hype, luckily, there remains a
solid and emotionally expressive debut album that promises
good things ahead.
Emily Haines - Knives
Don't Have Your Back (2006)
A radical departure from her day job in Toronto electro-rock
band Metric, this is possibly the best new album I've heard
over the last year. Gorgeously unexpected melodies and chord
shifts, complimented
by a seductively hypnotic/narcotic voice and sometimes direct,
sometime oblique, always memorable lyrics. Although less jarring
and more sensuous, this is closer to the Jazz-tinged beautiful
strangeness of Robert Wyatt and Carla Bley than to Haines's
contemporaries such as Feist and Joan As Police Woman. Crowd
Surf Off A Cliff has the dubious distinction of being
my most played track of
the year.
Peter Hammill - Singularity
(2007)
For me, this is probably the best and best sounding PH solo
album since 1981's Sitting Targets. His recent
successes with Van Der Graaf Generator seem to have given
this most English of musical mavericks a greater confidence
and intensity of vision in the studio. Acute lyrical observations
on the nature of ageing and the changes it engenders, married
to diverse, yet claustrophobic, arrangements
featuring some superbly wayward guitar noises, plaintive piano
and demonically inventive multi-tracked voices. The closing
White Dot is guaranteed to scare any living creature
within reasonable hearing range. A recommendation!
Paul McCartney - Memory
Almost Full (2007)
A good follow-up to Chaos And Creation In The Backyard,
that keeps the contemporary Nigel Godrich inspired sonic palette,
while adding liberal doses of lovely, Wings-era, melodies.
John Murphy - 28
Weeks Later (soundtrack) (2007)
A haunting electronic soundtrack mostly featuring a series
of variations on the theme of In The House - In A Heartbeat
from 28 Days Later. Luckily, even when I'm
not being chased by Zombies, it's a
theme I could listen to for several days on end.
Also playing:
Tori Amos - American Doll Posse (2007)
Bjork - Volta (2007)
Van Morrison - Common One (1980)
Mum - Summer Make Good (2004)
Prefab Sprout - Andromeda Heights (1998)
Paul Simon - The Paul Simon Songbook (1965)
Sufjan Stevens - Come On Feel The Illinoise
(2005)
Trees - On The Shore (1970)
The Walker Brothers - Everything Under The Sun (box
set, 2006)
Genesis, live at Old Trafford, Manchester (02/07/07)
Peter Gabriel at Blickling Hall, Norfolk (21/07/07)
April 2007
Baby Bird - Between
My Ears There's Nothing But Music (2006)
David Bowie - Outside (1995)
Friedman & Liebezeit - Secret Rhythms 2 (2006)
Genesis -1976-1982 (box set) (2007)
Rickie Lee Jones - The Sermon On Exposition Boulevard
(2007)
Mimi - Soak (1998)
Nine Horses - Money For All EP (2007)
Porcupine Tree - Fear Of A Blank Planet (2007)
Prefab Sprout - Steve McQueen (re-master and 2005
acoustic version) (2007)
Judee Sill - Dreams Come True (lost songs)
(2006)
Sunday All Over The World - Kneeling At The Shrine
(1991)
Neil Young - Massey Hall, 1971 (2007)
Van der Graaf Generator at the Cambridge Junction (10/04/07)
Mark Eitzel at Norwich Arts Centre (29/04/07)
Porcupine Tree at the Cambridge Junction (26//04/07)
January 2007
Some 2006 Highlights:
Glen Hansard/Marketa Irglova - The Swell
Season
Massive Attack - Collected
The Streets - The Hardest Way To Make An Easy Living
Scott Walker - The Drift
Hot Chip - The Warning
Thom Yorke - The Eraser
Damien Rice - 9
Robin Guthrie - Continental
Scritti Politti - White Bread, Black Beer
GG/06 - EP (online only)
Milosh - Meme
The Frames - The Cost
Joanna Newsome - Ys
Ursula Rucker - Ma'At Mama
Judee Sill and Talking Heads re-issues/Blue
Nile in Dublin/Ursula Rucker in New York
Current Listening:
David Bowie - Lodger (1979)
Robert Fripp - Exposure (re-issue) (1979)
Godley & Creme - Freeze Frame (1979)
Peter Hammill - The Future Now (re-issue)
(1979)
XTC - Drums & Wires (1979) |
