What vinyl are you listening to?

[ifor]

It's A Beautiful Day

 

[Lost Angeles]

It's A Beautiful Day

It sure is, sat under the umbrella and played a few tunes off the ipod and done a bit of reading, done a bit of packing for next weeks holiday. All my albums are packed away as we have a big decorating job when we come back, and yesterday was beautiful at the cricket. Why couldn't I have retired years ago.

 

[DIB]

Just picked an LP at random out of my 70's sampler section..

.

 

[BIGBERNARDBRESSLAW]

 

[Marvindodgers]

ABC - The Lexicon Of Love

 

[stevebrock]

House of Love - House of Love

Judie Tzuke - Ritmo

Pink Floyd - Meddle

 

[Jim-W]

The House Of Love should have been massive. All of their records are brilliant imo.

 

[BIGBERNARDBRESSLAW]

 

[stevebrock]

is it the reissue? any good?

 

[Charlie Jefferson]

Another summer holiday hoves into view, another room in my septic palace of crumbs is completed and a slew of vinyl spills on to the carpeted floor as the breeze wafts in to urban idyll of a listening room. Okay, enough mauve prose.

Here's some LPs played since the weekend:

The Free Band (an original Vanguard pressing)

American Prayer LP (an early Todd Rundgren production on Ampex/Bearsville)

Victims Of Chance (best of the three. Like an American Keith West with less-catchy tunes)

(All three donated to me years ago. Varying degrees of success in mining that pop-psych-pseudo profound thing so many bands did in '66-69. Just re-discovered them in a filing cabinet in the garage).

Then:

And Justice For All - Metallica

Symphony 3- "Eroica" - Beethoven/Van Karajan/Berlin Phil

Faded Eyes - Horsebeach 7 inch. Top stuff. As recommended by a guy I met in my local vinyl emporium. The sound of middle-aged summer?

Recent Songs - Leonard Cohen.

A current fave of LC's. Inspired by reading the brilliant "philosophcal biography" (publsiher's words, not mine) of LC written by Liel Leibovitz

Wednesday Morning 3am - Simon & Garfunkel

Not so oblique link from watching Inside Llewyn Davis the other night.

World Peace - Moz.

This is on non-stop in the car. The vinly version is pretty impressive too. Three or four of his best ever songs (I'm Not A Man, Istanbul, Kiss Me A Lot, Staircase At The University). Any thoughts, Jim??

Unconditionally Guaranteed - Beefheart

Dust Sucker - Beefheart/

(Half-appalling low-qual cash-in, half very interesting out-takes from my fave Cpt LP, Shiny Beast)

Gold - Ryan Adams

Ten Years After Recorded Live

Apostrophe -FZ

Over-Nite Sensation - FZ

Theo Parrish's Black Jazz Signature compilation

This LP Crashes Hard Drives comp.

 

[Jim-W]

Mauve indeed! Sorry, I haven't an opinion on the Morrissey; my daughter was going to get me a copy but she'sgone off somewhere! She'll be back when she's hungry! I keep seeing it in Sainsbury's and I'm tempted to buy the cd because obviously I'd like to hear it. The reviews are positive anyway. I'll give you a considered opinion when I've heard it. Glad you like it.

'Victims Of Chance'! My God, I haven't played their records in about 40 years! Is it Johnny Kitchen? Stable Records? I've got one in the loft. I must get it down and give it a spin; I remember it goes off at tangents which makes it fairly interesting if rather muddled.

I know I shouldn't, but I rather like 'Unconditionally Guaranteed.' Who cares what the critics think? Not me.

Great playlist.

Hope you have a great holiday, Charlie; I'm beginning my second retirement!

 

[BIGBERNARDBRESSLAW]

is it the reissue? any good?

It's an original Steve, but very good. *wink*

 

[BIGBERNARDBRESSLAW]

Bauhaus - In A Flat Field

 

[Charlie Jefferson]

Hi Jim,

I'm sure the Moz LP will provoke some thoughts. For me, there are some startling moments, musically and lyrically. We're used to one of those down the years, but since he parted company with JM, not so much the former.

Yes, Unconditionally Guaranteed always sounds like a reasonable Doors tribute band having a go at some long lost Manzarek B-sides. Fun in its own way.

Yes, It is Johnny Kitchen at work. It always makes me ponder that phased production technique he so loved. Enjoyable.

Enjoy your second retirement, Jim. Is that definitely it now? No "farewell to all the classrooms you've loved"- tour?

Check out the Horse Beach LP, btw. Just bought it following on from the single. It's mighty fine in all it's limited glory. One of those bands who do one particular thing very well indeed.

 

[Jim-W]

Hi Charlie,

No, I've finished for good this time until I get the phone call that begins, 'We were wondering if you could just come in and help sort the Drama out....nobody seems to know quite what to do.'

I've read that the music is more adventurous...long overdue, I think. I'll ask Rachel, my daughter, what she thinks of it and let you know...she's a total Morrissey devotee.

'Doors tribute band' made me laugh as did the classroom farewell tour idea. It's actually rather sad because the majority of schools I've worked at no longer exist: they're either rubble or re-badged academies. The school I finished up at is set for closure in 2016 but I reckon it will be gone by the end of next year(July 2015): viability issues re kds drifting to other schools because of limited option choices and who can blame them?

OK, I'll check out 'Horse Beach' lp. Thanks for the recommendation.

Regards.

 

[DIB]

A rather good Daptone Records sampler double LP from last year..

... Daptone Gold

.

 

[Waxy]

Cinematic Orchestra - Ma Fleur

Astralasia - A Coloured-in Dream

Saddar Bazaar - Conference Of The Birds

Lalo Schifrin - Enter The Dragon OST

 

[Jim-W]

Hi Charlie

Listened to Horsebeach. Hmm. Sounds like The Smiths meets The Durutti Column to my ears. I prefer 'Dull' to 'Faded Eyes' but they're both nice songs and therein lies my issue:nice. Jangling mid-tempo ethereal loveliness used to floor me but it just seems to lack character to my jaded ears ie heard it all before. I think the production and the vocals are the chief culprit here: sort of nice boy singing ie a bit wet! If I'd heard this in say 1982 or 1992 I'd have dashed to the record shop to get it but I'm far too long in the tooth to be a sucker for this. Yes, as you say, they do it well but I wonder if that's enough: I think I've reached the stage with the limited art form that is pop music that everything sounds like something else which was once original. Having said all of that, I look forward to their lp.

Man, I wish was 18 again.

 

[Charlie Jefferson]

Hi Jim,

A spot on delineation of a very precise moment in a person's listening evolution*.

I've uttered that very thought so many times when a friend or my local vinyl dealer has played me something, "mmm, reminds me of. . . ". Which as you say used to be fine and re-assuring but there comes a time when it's not alluring enough.

By their very nature there aren't many Zappas, Van Vliets, Mark E.Smiths, Zims but there is a stack of old and new interesting stuff across the `"genres" to (re)discover. I remember reading Alex Ross' The Rest Is Noise a few years ago and that truly opened my mind and ears to sounds in the 20th century classical tradition and beyond. His book made me listen to R.Strauss and F.Zappa anew.

* I'm almost there, I fear, feel. And yet, and yet . . .

 

[Jim-W]

It might be more even more serious than that, Charlie! I've reached a point, God knows I hope it's temporary, where music seems less interesting than it did to the extent that I just don't feel like listening to anything. I think a few weeks away from the whole thing would cure it: no record-player, computer or earphones. I've seen this happen in other people's lives and now it's happening in mine. I'm saturated with the stuff.

I don't want to be prodded into an emotional response by music, books and films. Leave me alone! Ha!

Going on holiday in a few weeks: that might cure it.

 

[Charlie Jefferson]

It might be more even more serious than that, Charlie! I've reached a point, God knows I hope it's temporary, where music seems less interesting than it did to the extent that I just don't feel like listening to anything. I think a few weeks away from the whole thing would cure it: no record-player, computer or earphones. I've seen this happen in other people's lives and now it's happening in mine. I'm saturated with the stuff.

I don't want to be prodded into an emotional response by music, books and films. Leave me alone! Ha!

Going on holiday in a few weeks: that might cure it.

Hi Jim,

I hear you, I hear you. On many occasions recently I could say ditto to the above. Without disclosing too much personal info, there's a lot of tension and strife in my life at the moment and music has variously been shifted, nudged, brutally hurled from its central place in my life. I've found myself consciously questioning the stuff I'm listening to: is it music? why does it sound so ill-constructed? I used to love this stuff but now it's just blank vibrations, why? And on. . .

It's lasted hours, days, weeks, months at various times, it ebbs and flows, possibly dependent on the other stresses and strains of real life. That much is fairly obvious, I suppose.

I take refuge in tea. Oh, and then that leads to R3 and that leads to Mahler and that leads to R.Strauss and that leads to Shostakovich and that leads to Bartok and that leads to Cowell and that leads to Varese and that leads to Frank and that leads to Don. And then I'm simulataneously and temporarily cured and condemned.

A helpless, hopeless case.

This morning at 6am whilst the rest of the household slept I had the urge to play Side 1 of Geogaddi. So I did. A mostly sound-proofed room, a pot of Assam and I was in a good place. So it does still work me, occasionally.

Good luck, I feel your pain. And other clumsy colloquialisms of internet empathy.

 

[Charlie Jefferson]

Hi Pronster,

Thanks for the clarification. I'm now currently trying to hunt down a copy of that "original" Zappa Foundation release. Listened to a the clips on iTunes, very good.

The Beefheart site casts doubt on a vinyl version, so I will have to opt for the CD.

Suction Prints is a wonderful creation indeed. Do you think there will ever be a Pet Sounds type box set of Bat Chain, just so we could hear multiple takes and constructions of say, Ice Rose?? Nope. But we can but dream. Or bootleg.

 

[thescarletpronster]

Dust Sucker - Beefheart/

(Half-appalling low-qual cash-in, half very interesting out-takes from my fave Cpt LP, Shiny Beast)

It's not out-takes, it's the original version of the LP, which was recorded in 1976 but then became the victim of a fight between the band's manager and Zappa, and never got released. Shiny Beast is a re-recording (with some track alterations) from a year or two later with a completely different band. Dust Sucker is a bootleg release of the original version, with some random live tracks stuck on the end. I've not heard it, but it's reputed to be fairly poor quality.

However, good news - the original Bat Chain Puller finally got an official release by the Zappa Foundation last year, mastered from the original tapes and in fantastic quality at last - and a blistering album. It's well worth getting hold of. Here's a link to it on the Beefheart site: http://www.beefheart.com/tag/bat-chain-puller/

I'm kind of glad that the original release did get scuppered, simply because otherwise one of my favourite Beefheart tracks, Suction Prints, might never have got recorded.

 

[BIGBERNARDBRESSLAW]

Beatles - Rock n Roll Music

B-52s - Cosmic Thing

Jesus & Mary Chain - Psychocandy

Doors - Doors

 

[jamesrfisher]

Public Image Ltd - The Greatest Hits...So Far

Wu-Tang Clan - The W

Belle and Sebastian - If You're Feeling Sinister