I've even raped and killed a mountain panda in the hills of Shaanxi.

Four Tet has a new album out, There Is Love In You, and it is good. More melodic than his previous.

Here's a link to the Radio One Essential Mix he played recently.

Kurt Cobain killed himself in 1994, and Princess Diana was killed in 1997. Between these two events, Oasis released 3 albums, two that were rather good. Little-known bands Blur and Pulp also released some good shit, and some lesser-known British bands made some money when their music was featured on some obscure Scottish indie film known as Trainspotting.

Enough with the understatement. I rented Live Forever last night, it's basically summed up by the above paragraph. It could have had a lot more info in it, but I enjoyed it as a soundtrack to 1995-96. Plus for some reason I always forget how good-looking Damon Albarn was, to the point that when I first saw the video for "Girls and Boys" I thought they were a pop-boy-band. I still like about five Blur songs, although I've never been able to listen to their albums all the way through. And amazingly enough, Liam is still a complete tosser who should never be allowed out in public unless it's to sing. And Noel has the right amount of swagger. And Jarvis still has huge hands.

When I started getting into music, I focused on the stuff my brother liked. He was born in '73, and was a nerdy dude, so he was into Def Leppard initially. We both liked Weird Al primarily because he "mocked" MJ and Madonna. And we liked Huey Lewis mostly because of Back to the Future. Separately I kind of liked Genesis, but that was as far as pop music went for me. My peers were into Tiffany, right. Ew.

But then, but then, Guns'n'Roses came out when I was 11, and nothing was the same again. GNR and then Metallica and then, and then, Pearl Jam and Nirvana. Oooooh. Initially I didn't care for most of the Grunge scene, and I was still seriously into Bon Jovi - mainly sure, I was into the hair bands that had cute guys, and I preferred Eddie to Kurt.

Anyway, moving on, I was also getting into the Cure and Depeche Mode - especially after Violator, then Songs and Wish. I also caught glimpses of Rave, but only a few, till I graduated high school. Popular music started to fade away from Weezer and back towards Gin Blossoms. There were a few glimpses of coolness, but I mostly stopped listening to guitar stuff from '97-'01. I mentioned this to Reg - oh sure, there was the Radiohead Cult, but I am always wary of cults. Anyway Reg, who was born in '81 in Seattle, had a slightly more parallel music evolution to me, but still too "molded in 3rd Eye Blind." (I like their first record a lot, but you know.) And he agreed that most music of that era was total shit, unless you like Dave Matthews Band or whatever.

[Flashback for a minute - I was in jr. high, incredibly unpopular, and the only girls who hang out with me are either 100lbs overweight, or black*. The former likes metal, the latter likes shit I honestly can't take. R AND B, yall. Color Me Badd appears on 90210. This is what I was recoiling from. Yeah yeah yeah, CMB was just a white band capitalizing on the trend. The trend was very much there, people. I preferred gangsta rap to that shit, like woah. (My brother was into Sir Mix-A-Lot before "Baby Got Back.") The way I grew up, the time and place, you only heard of cool music by a) staying up and watching 120 Minutes, or b) knowing people who moved from big cities. Oil was big enough that there were lots of these people, at least.]

Anyway, I like electronic music a lot, but I was relieved as all hell when 2001 brought back some rock'n'roll.


*I was so dumb I didn't realize that I was being ostracized by the popular kids. Racism was too subtle for me back then.

We saw Into the Wild last night, which had the misfortune of being released the same year as Juno. It's pretty good, which was expected from Sean Penn, but to my shock and surprise, the folksy soundtrack didn't make me want to claw my eyes out. Because when hard rockers sing soft songs, it sounds pretty damn good. I knew this, but I didn't expect to enjoy Eddie Vedder doing it. You would have thought that would have gotten the attention of the Oscar fucks, but I guess not.

disclaimer: although I watched the Oscars, I muted every single musical number. Because otherwise my eardrums would have imploded. Still glad Disney lost.

(The movie is about a young man who goes to live on the land in the Alaskan wilderness near Mt. McKinley, the two years preceding this journey, and the months leading to his death.)

taken from xol0tl:

The idea is you look up the year you were born in wikipedia and under music find the albums that were released that year. Then list the albums that you would, or do listen to now...

So, I present to you, the cool albums of 1977:
( Read more... )

And boy, the new Arcade Fire album is really good.

(Available on Soulseek.)

reg forced me to read Killing Yourself to Live. despite myself I enjoyed it, although I'm rather glad I'm not that GenX. plus his music taste is slightly questionable, although I must say the bit about everyone going through the LED ZEPPELIN IS THE ONLY BAND EVER stage was spot on.

oh my god it's so nice to have my MP3s back.

two US stops with their SWORN ENEMIES

one week till mogwai

9 days till I Love You But I've Chosen Darkness