Binaural: Official Album Thread

[epilogue]

i gave bayleaf a listen a few months ago and it really didn't make much of an impression. DcT is making me think I need to try a bit harder

Oh you should.

The lyrics are abstract and wonky at times. That might be one of the reasons you're having a hard time connecting to it.

But I love the music. The vocal melodies are smooth and hooky. I love them. It's a really funky record. And Stone's voice is so unique and his imagery is a breath of fresh air (from the usual stuff I listen to, especially PJ).

it wasn't the lyrics. I usually don't hone in on those for a few listens. I'll give it a shot

Also, I think you mean "home in on those." Aren't you a teacher?

[Birds in Hell]

i gave bayleaf a listen a few months ago and it really didn't make much of an impression. DcT is making me think I need to try a bit harder

Oh you should.

The lyrics are abstract and wonky at times. That might be one of the reasons you're having a hard time connecting to it.

But I love the music. The vocal melodies are smooth and hooky. I love them. It's a really funky record. And Stone's voice is so unique and his imagery is a breath of fresh air (from the usual stuff I listen to, especially PJ).

it wasn't the lyrics. I usually don't hone in on those for a few listens. I'll give it a shot

Also, I think you mean "home in on those." Aren't you a teacher?

I sincerely hope you're making a joke here, Joey.

[epilogue]

i gave bayleaf a listen a few months ago and it really didn't make much of an impression. DcT is making me think I need to try a bit harder

Oh you should.

The lyrics are abstract and wonky at times. That might be one of the reasons you're having a hard time connecting to it.

But I love the music. The vocal melodies are smooth and hooky. I love them. It's a really funky record. And Stone's voice is so unique and his imagery is a breath of fresh air (from the usual stuff I listen to, especially PJ).

it wasn't the lyrics. I usually don't hone in on those for a few listens. I'll give it a shot

Also, I think you mean "home in on those." Aren't you a teacher?

I sincerely hope you're making a joke here, Joey.

What, he's not a teacher?

[Birds in Hell]

i gave bayleaf a listen a few months ago and it really didn't make much of an impression. DcT is making me think I need to try a bit harder

Oh you should.

The lyrics are abstract and wonky at times. That might be one of the reasons you're having a hard time connecting to it.

But I love the music. The vocal melodies are smooth and hooky. I love them. It's a really funky record. And Stone's voice is so unique and his imagery is a breath of fresh air (from the usual stuff I listen to, especially PJ).

it wasn't the lyrics. I usually don't hone in on those for a few listens. I'll give it a shot

Also, I think you mean "home in on those." Aren't you a teacher?

I sincerely hope you're making a joke here, Joey.

What, he's not a teacher?

You're one of the good ones, Clark.

[epilogue]

i gave bayleaf a listen a few months ago and it really didn't make much of an impression. DcT is making me think I need to try a bit harder

Oh you should.

The lyrics are abstract and wonky at times. That might be one of the reasons you're having a hard time connecting to it.

But I love the music. The vocal melodies are smooth and hooky. I love them. It's a really funky record. And Stone's voice is so unique and his imagery is a breath of fresh air (from the usual stuff I listen to, especially PJ).

it wasn't the lyrics. I usually don't hone in on those for a few listens. I'll give it a shot

Also, I think you mean "home in on those." Aren't you a teacher?

I sincerely hope you're making a joke here, Joey.

What, he's not a teacher?

You're one of the good ones, Clark.

I'm just trying to keep up.

[WtOB?]

i gave bayleaf a listen a few months ago and it really didn't make much of an impression. DcT is making me think I need to try a bit harder

Oh you should.

The lyrics are abstract and wonky at times. That might be one of the reasons you're having a hard time connecting to it.

But I love the music. The vocal melodies are smooth and hooky. I love them. It's a really funky record. And Stone's voice is so unique and his imagery is a breath of fresh air (from the usual stuff I listen to, especially PJ).

it wasn't the lyrics. I usually don't hone in on those for a few listens. I'll give it a shot

Also, I think you mean "home in on those." Aren't you a teacher?

I sincerely hope you're making a joke here, Joey.

What, he's not a teacher?

You're one of the good ones, Clark.

I'm just trying to keep up.

We all are, friend. We all are.

[stip]

I'd participate.

The music in fits was cool, but stone's vocals are a tough sell for me.

[TheDapperGent]

I love Bayleaf but Stone has a monotone voice that I can only listen to for 3 songs tops.

Okay about Binaural. My brother is an audiophile. Pays 800+ for headphones, has a small tube amplifier to power them. It's ridiculous and awesome at the same time. His set-ups sound amazing.
He used to like Pearl Jam in the early/mid 90s but kind of left them behind at that time. I had him listen to Binaural the other night on his headphones and he loved it. Then I made him let me listen to it and hooooly shit! I've listened to the album on headphones before but this was like the album was playing in my head. Heard things I've never heard before. Amazing!

[Norah]

Man, I thought I was going nuts with my $250 headphones.

[nyquillyn]

A tube headphone amp is pretty fucking hardcore.

[stupidmop]

All this talk About Lightning Bolt possibley being 'post-apocalyptic' got me thinking about how i've been viewing Binaural as as set of character studies set pre- or during the apocalypse; the world is going down the shitter but we haven't donned our leathers and gone knife fighting for fuel just yet.

Breakerfall, this ones a bit of a push, but it's a suicide of person who's waiting to be saved, when there isn't anyone to save them. They could save themselves but they're too busy being angry at the world. Love could save them, but it seems we're in short supply.

God's Dice is the guy waiting for the universe or god to show thier hand, all thier life they've believed that there's a reason things happen, and a path for them to follow. He's asking for something to point him in the right direction, to ' designtae his will' but he's growing inpatient and loosing faith. ( i had alot of trouble understanding the lyrics here, so this one may be complete bullshit, instead of only semi-bullshit like the rest)

Evacuation and Grievance are the calls to arms by the people that want to fight back, the people that want to live. The rebels rioting in the streets as well as the people in the small towns who refuse to be squashed down, or lose thier livlihoods.

Light Years - self explanatory, the people left behind when thier loved ones die.

Nothing As It Seems, the guy walking round his home and sees how its falling apart in small ways, he sees drug additction, and illness but it the end decides 'The little that he sees, is nothing' and 'He concedes, it's home' because he needs it. (Jeff's hard to decipher lyrics strike again!)

Thin Air, within the context of this excersize, is your lovers at the end of the world ballad, 'when the window shades are drawn' and they're together they can pretend that they can keep on going.

Insignificance- The town watching as thier homes are is blown to pieces. To late to escape, that final 'please forgive our hometown, in our insignificance' is being sung as they watch the final fireball head right towards them.

Rival - The disenfranchised taking matters into his own hands. He's making a difference, people are going to notice him, they're going to listen to what he has to say. The worlds gone to shit, he's going to have to do something big...

Sleight of Hand is the man falling by the wayside, dissillusioned with his life, no reason to fight and no one to fight for. He commits suicide, quitely, neatly, it doesn't make the news.

Of The Girl is the guy who allows himself to be consumed by something, drugs perhaps, to escape. He's not making a definite choice like sleight of hand man, he's not allowing himself to think about that but instead letting himself slowly waste away.

Parting Ways - Instead of being drawn together like the Thin Air couple these guys can feel the end coming. The stress of everything is driving them apart, they're trying to stay together but they know whats coming and they can't keep pretending.

And Soon Forget is the mr burns esque rich character watching all of this go on, who may have the power to change something if he wanted to but is instead hiding in his big guarded house going over his money like it actually counts for something till he dies alone, alongside half the rest of the world and he won't matter anymore either. I've always thought there was a little sadness to this song, he's an awful person and his death isn't sad or tragic but his actual life was a waste.

TL;DR I really like this album. This is probably a clusterfuck of bad spelling and grammar. Some of these work better than others.

[melonhead4]

Great Album, the songs kick major arse live...idk why they neglect this album so much....cant wait for the reissue

[4/5]

Guys, this may just have become my favorite PJ album. I'm not quite ready to say that definitively, but after not listening to almost any PJ for quite a long time I played this the other day and was blown away by how great it was. NAIS in particular hit me in a way it hadn't previously done. Of The Girl, Insignificance, Grievance, Rival, Light Years, Sleight of Hand, Parting Ways...the highs on this album are collectively higher than the highs on any other album.

[digster]

Guys, this may just have become my favorite PJ album. I'm not quite ready to say that definitively, but after not listening to almost any PJ for quite a long time I played this the other day and was blown away by how great it was. NAIS in particular hit me in a way it hadn't previously done. Of The Girl, Insignificance, Grievance, Rival, Light Years, Sleight of Hand, Parting Ways...the highs on this album are collectively higher than the highs on any other album.

I do agree with this, I think. There may be more top 10 songs here for me than on any other album, though I'm not sure I'd call it my favorite.

[Thejambi]

Guys, this may just have become my favorite PJ album. I'm not quite ready to say that definitively, but after not listening to almost any PJ for quite a long time I played this the other day and was blown away by how great it was. NAIS in particular hit me in a way it hadn't previously done. Of The Girl, Insignificance, Grievance, Rival, Light Years, Sleight of Hand, Parting Ways...the highs on this album are collectively higher than the highs on any other album.

I do agree with this, I think. There may be more top 10 songs here for me than on any other album, though I'm not sure I'd call it my favorite.

Mmm. I love me some binaural but I'd argue the highs on No Code are better. Maybe not as many.

[---]

Yeah, I always prim Parting Ways and pop Writer's Block after Education.

I also like replacing Breakerfall with Break Her Fall from that 4-song binaural preview sampler where the mix is a lot rawer and even has Matt's hi-hat count at the start and popping in NAIS and Insig from the single mix. Things get a little moar Tchad that way.

4-song binaural preview sampler???

Yeah, I don't really remember where it came from but it leaked on the net a couple of years ago. It just has some rawer-mixed versions of Breakerfall, Light Years, Insig and NAIS. The latter two were included on the single release of NAIS. I'm not sure if they are original Tchad mixes or just rough mixes though.

This is great. So glad I found it. And yeah, Break Her Fall >>>> Breakerfall

[---]

This is a desert island record for me.

[Thejambi]

This is a desert island record for me.

I wouldn't protest.

[---]

i remember the fan base being outrage when Binaural came out. They didnt like the cover, the music, ed´s vocals...and when the tour started most of them were bored with the band on stage. Weird.

The cover is lazy, uninteresting, and does nothing to compliment the music within. The music is inconsistent. Ed sounds great. The tour was awesome.

wtf

[---]

I really like a lot of the material here, and I love the fact that they were willing to try and redefine their sound. My problem is that the way the album was actually put together not only serves to disguise the degree to which the band was stepping outside their boundaries, but it also softens the album's personality.

First of all, you have two types of songs going on here. On one hand, you have the atmospheric pieces that maintain a strong binaural-recording presence. On the other, you have the more traditionally mixed pieces which favor close mic support. This might seem like a production-based assessment, but when you split the two types of songs into their respective camps the unique personalities of both stylistic approaches starts to come more to the forefront, and they start to feel like stronger collections because of it:

Song Set One
1. Of the Girl
2. Nothing As it Seems
3. Thin Air
4. Rival
5. Sleight of Hand
6. Soon Forget
7. Parting Ways

Song Set Two
1. Breakerfall
2. God's Dice
3. Evacuation
4. Light Years
5. Insignificance
6. Grievance

Now, I really really really cannot stand albums that have a 'fast' side and a 'slow' side....that's called two EPs pretending to be an adult, like midgets with a trench coat. And I normally feel the same about double albums that have a slow disc/fast disc setup. However, while separating these two sets does start to reveal the differences that give them each personality and allow them to invite curiosity. They also continue to share enough of an aesthetic bond, even divided up this way, to remain part of a single release. You could take either one of those sets all by itself, package it with that exact album artwork, and nobody would go "wow...talk about the cover not fitting the content." They just need to not give up their individuality in the act of getting married.

Binaural, in short, needs to be a double album.

It wouldn't be that hard, really. I maintain, at all times, a fresh mucusy spitwad that I can hurl at anyone who opposes the idea of Of the Girl as an album opener. But I go further than that. That song as such space...it's like a wide open sky. And the hypnotic acoustic is a great backdrop....Mike should be Change Your Minding the shit out of that track. Don't be in any hurry, you know. Don't get "look at all these notes" crazy. Just...decorate. Echo. Sustain. Crackle a little. Stretch the fuck out. Add a little vibraphone/soft keyboard in the back a'la Strangest Tribe, perhaps. Of the Girl song could be seven to eight minutes of slow burn orgasm and never get old. Done well, it would be the most amazing opening salvo/statement this band has ever made on a record. It would redefine, in a single track, who this band was and what they were going to be in the coming decade.

I'd do a few other things here and there...change the lyrics on Soon Forget, put something else into Thin Air so it feels more finished (gentle handed pipe organ? I dunno), but those are personal choices. The one thing I would insist on doing is investing another two minutes or more of blissful stretched out, distorted wave crash and moody string slide to the outtro of Parting Ways...as well as a minute or more of atmospheric dancing to either the middle or the end of Sleight of Hand (or both). Give people another 30 seconds of the end of Rival, too. Let that disc be the "put on your headphones and vanish into the music" disc. It's still got that "I'm Captain Rockhole from Space, and this is my GEEETAAAAAAAAR" badassery, so it feels like it has a connection to what's to come. It's just sort of like the far wall to the room.

Disc two, fleshed out by some of the pieces left off (the band might have to hang out long enough to come up with one or two other tracks for each disc), is the punkier, no-wasted-breath side of that equation. It's not all rockers (Light Years gives it a pretty good nod to what you just experienced on disc one), but it's aggressive and a little more outwardly focused....even Breakerfall and Sad come across like two sides of the same coin, combining to make a statement about valuing love rather than just serving as character studies.

So now the album as a whole has its personality, the two discs establish the different extremes of that personality, and you don't get those little two or three songs stints where you START to get a sense of cohesion, only to have it snapped away from you. Plus you get more Binaural. So it looks something like....

Disc One (currently at 35 or so minutes):
1. Of the Girl (8:00)
2. Rival (4:00)
3. Nothing As it Seems (5:30)
4. Thin Air (3:30)
5. Sleight of Hand (6:30)
6. Soon Forget (1:30)
7. Parting Ways (6:30)

Disc Two (currently at about 25 minutes):
1. Sad (3:30)
2. Breakerfall (2:00)
3. God's Dice (2:30)
4. Evacuation (3:00)
5. Insignificance (4:30)
6. Grievance (3:00)
7. Education (3:30)
8. In the Moonlight (3:00)
9. Fatal (3:30)

So, assuming you don't use Hitchhiker (your call), you might need to add one song to the first disc and three or four to the second. Honestly, I wouldn't have been sad if Strangest Tribe had been stretched and included, or an all acoustic guitar track (just don't make it a rip off of Going to California cos, you know, been there done that). There are also some instrumental ideas already sitting around, if you're feeling lazy.

I think it would have been more defined, more cohesive, and better received, thus better embraced by the band in the long run. That might be a sad way to get that to happen, but that's just who they are. It still wouldn't have been a radio smash, but with Sad on there to serve as single fodder I think they would have been alright. Critical love would have been more pronounced...and thus they would have been a little more confident going into Riot Act, which would then have allowed that record to more confidently step out into its own rather than being a little too sheepish about where mommy's skirts were. Finally, maybe we wouldn't have had a band that by mid-decade was desperate to show everybody they could still be those guys you remember from when you were 15.

Oh, and yes, I do realize that Light Years could go on disc one, but because it is as tightly woven structurally as it is I like it better this way.

i should have read this thread before today