Essential Studio Albums

[liebzz]

Siouxsie and the Banshees - Through the Looking Glass

I love a good cover, and have no qualms with a covers album. Rarely still are covers albums as good as this one. Pulling from so many different places, Siouxsie and the Banshees throw down some mind bending covers highlighted by This Wheel’s On Fire completely rearranged, Strange Fruit, and Sea Breezes. There are many ways to tackle a cover, from stripping it down, doing a largely straightforward cover, or in this case completely bending the covers to your creative will. I’m in for this one.

The Essential Track: Strange Fruit

Up Next: Jane Siberry - The Walking

[liebzz]

Jane Siberry - The Walking

On this album, I was fully absorbed by the opening The White Tent The Raft. I mean, after the song kicks in about 2 minutes in, pure bliss. Granted, I also liked Ingrid (and the Footman), but outside of those, I felt a little lost on this. I wouldn’t say I was put off as much as not finding the same kind of connection and investment I felt at that first track.

The Essential Track: The White Tent The Raft

Up Next: Swan - Children of God

[liebzz]

Swans - Children of God

This was a first in this particular thread in that I just couldn’t get through this album. I tried. I just really disliked every moment of the first four songs and had to make the executive decision that 71 minutes was just too much of my life to lose on this. ‘87 has been a roller coaster for me here so far, but this sadly was the absolute rock bottom. It really can only go up from here.

The Essential Track: I don’t have one

Up Next: The Triffids - Calenture

[Jorge]

Can you say anything about what you disliked?

[liebzz]

Can you say anything about what you disliked?

So, admittedly even if wrong, I have never been a fan of religion with music, at least where it feels like a fully dominant theme. Even mainstream rock bands that did this as a practice, like Live and Creed, I could never quite get into them.

Also, there’s been plenty of dark music that I have enjoyed but this was pretty hopelessly dark.

The singer’s voice, even if I am not often fully queued into the lyrics, is so damn deep it’s unpleasant.

The music generally seemed unendingly droning where you really had no sense of where the song’s been or where it’s going.

Now, I know there’s plenty of experimental rock music, and we’ve talked about a lot of it in positive lights, but for whatever additional reason I can’t even fully express, this was a bad kind of uncomfortable listen, not unlike if a friend asked me to join their religious cult or something.

[Jorge]

I'm glad you gave it a shot. If it helps in any way, Michael Gira assumes the persona of an evangelical preacher in "New Mind" but the album is largely anti-Christian, and the dark, hopeless, viscerally disturbing vibe is very much intentional.

Also, this may be Swans at their catchiest

[liebzz]

I'm glad you gave it a shot. If it helps in any way, Michael Gira assumes the persona of an evangelical preacher in "New Mind" but the album is largely anti-Christian, and the dark, hopeless, viscerally disturbing vibe is very much intentional.

Also, this may be Swans at their catchiest

Yeah, that was hard to listen to, and I don’t want to stomp on artistic merit because that’s just uncool, but I can say it just wasn’t something I could connect to.

[coptheriotact]

i didn't particularly enjoy this album from memory or get through the whole thing either.

but sometimes music that is unbearable/relentless/offensive/annoying etc. can stick in the back of the mind & become memorable, as it generated emotion whether bad or good.

does it get any points for making you feel some kind of way?

im now also interested in the bottom 10 albums..

[liebzz]

i didn't particularly enjoy this album from memory or get through the whole thing either.

but sometimes music that is unbearable/relentless/offensive/annoying etc. can stick in the back of the mind & become memorable, as it generated emotion whether bad or good.

does it get any points for making you feel some kind of way?

im now also interested in the bottom 10 albums..

So it definitely gets points for evoking a feeling. I think that’s kind of the point of art. It’s still at the bottom of my list though. I always feel bad posting the bottom ten since I don’t want to accidentally insult someone’s recommendations, though it’s more about how I reacted to the album than the “value” of the album itself.

Bottom 10 at the moment are

1029. Bonnie Tyler - Secret Dreams and Forbidden Fire
1030. Neu!
1031. Kool & the Gang - Emergency
1032. Chicago - 17
1033. Robert Plant - Shaken n Stirred
1034. Poison - Look What the Cat Dragged In
1035. New Edition - Candy Girl
1036. Whitney Houston - Whitney
1037. Rick Astley - Whenever You Need Somebody
1038. Swans - Children of God

[Jorge]

It really tickles me to see it among those other albums

[liebzz]

It really tickles me to see it among those other albums

Ha. Yeah, it is a lot different than these other albums.

[liebzz]

The Triffids - Calenture

Probably partially in response to the last album, I wanted to hear something that I felt I could predict, and this hit that mark. Straightforward rock in the classic rock sense, and at this point a band that consistently delivered solid material. This one is to me comparable with their first album, and there’s a bunch of good songs here - Bury Me Deep In Love, Kelly’s Blues, Trick of the Light, Hometown Farewell Kiss, Unmade Love, and the excellent Vagabond Holes (the song that might most pull away from the more traditional rock formula). I needed a bit of predictability and sometimes those albums are nearly as essential in the right moments.

The Essential Track: Vagabond Holes

Up Next: The Pixies - Come On Pilgrim

[Jorge]

I love "Trick of the Light" a lot

[LoathedVermin72]

I have to admit I also kind of hate Swans. They’re a band that looms large in a lot of the circles relevant to my musical tastes, but every time I’ve tried them I can never get through any of it either. They’re so droningly repetitive and none of the songs ever seem to lead anywhere or pay off. They’re so boring.

[Jorge]

That is level 1 of listening to Swans. Every Swans fan has gone through it. Push through!

[wease]

Meaning it only gets worse after the first one

[LoathedVermin72]

That is level 1 of listening to Swans. Every Swans fan has gone through it. Push through!

Life's too short

[liebzz]

Pixies - Come On Pilgrim

This could be among the top of my list of bands that this thing was intended for - bands I knew I needed to hear but never quite got to. I have indeed heard a very limited amount of their work, and certainly not this. It’s not perfect but really I don’t think it’s meant to be that. It’s really a band pushing rock music to the next movement - one that will build over the next few years in this thread until it breaks. All that said about the importance of the band itself, the short album, if you call it that, has a bunch of great moments slightly ahead of their time, and despite its short run time contains quite a bit of range - they are not just a quiet/loud/quiet band. My favorite of the bunch was The Holiday Song, but all this is good - I suspect it gets much better even, but this is a good start.

The Essential Track: The Holiday Song

Up Next: Descendants - All

[liebzz]

Descendants - All

This power pop punk album is a fascinating listen, in part because it’s all over the place, but also because it has the sort of youthful energy that bands like Green Day made a killing on in the mid 90s. Coolidge and Cameage are both excellent here, as is Jealous of the World. The rest plays on a bit of sophomoric humor, and there’s always a place for that kind of youthful charm. It’s not always something that appealed to me, but I still found this to be a solid outing.

The Essential Track: Cameage

Up Next: The Dukes of Stratosphear - Psonic Psunspot

[Jorge]

Descendents are cool because they do the poppy punk stuff but then they're also surprisingly sophisticated musicians with jazz and progressive influences that show up in their music. Imagine Green Day attempting something like "Iceman"