Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Scored some sweet records:

on CD:

Yann Tiersen & Shannon Wright - s/t: Yann Tiersen did the music for "Amelie", and Shannon Wright is just awesome. It's spooky and ambient but still rocks out in spots.

The Mooney Suzuki - Electric Sweat: Garage rock isn't usually my bag, but I've been listening to the Sonics1 a lot lately, and this CD was $4.00, so I figgered what the hell? Sure enough, it's pretty rockin'. From what I understand, the band teamed up with the folks behind Avril Lavigne's sonic drek, The Matrix, for their next record. Hrmph.

on cassette tape:

Quincy Jones - The Dude2: It's soooo 1981. James Inghram raps. Abe Laboriel channels Larry Graham. A Dave Koz clone rips out some gross alto sax solos. You can practically hear the lleyo being snorted off the mixing board. I like it.

3 Mustaphas 3 - Heart Of Uncle: I've been aware of these guys since about 1989 when I read a review of one of their records in Spin and it sounded really cool. I'm sad that I never actually procured a record until now. They take a kitchen sink approach, throwing in Middle Eastern, Baltic, and Carribbean bits together with vocals in French, Italian, and Hindi, and it comes out sounding pretty sweet.

Orleans - Waking And Dreaming2: You may recall that this album, which contained the 70s AM Gold hit "Still The One", also had one of the absolute worst album covers of all time*. Last night, Chris and I were listening to it, trying to imagine the band in the studio making this record, and not being able to figure how they could take what they were doing seriously. Dude sounds just like Peter Cetera. The music sounds like post-good Chicago. You can hear the cocaine on this album even more clearly than on The Dude. Definitely worth the $0.50 I paid for it.


(* PS: I will pay good American dollars for a copy of Devastatin' Dave's Zip Zap Rap.3)

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1 A little over three years after I wrote this, I got to open for the Sonics at their first Seattle show in 35 years. Guess it's good that I listened to all that garage rock.
2 I now also have both of these albums on vinyl. The warm, sweet, non-flutter-and-wow-y analog sound hasn't made the music suck any less.
3 This still holds true. Devastatin' Dave is my hero.

(Originally posted 07/20/2005)

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