2. Phillip Lynott - Solo In Soho
3. John Grant - Queen Of Denmark
4. Dan Deacon - Bromst
5. Young Marble Giants - Colossal Youth
Right this month is my sister's, and whilst some may guess that is part of the reason that I'm not being a total prick about her musical choices, it's also in part because nothing in here is interesting enough to actually offend anyone. Most of it has a reasonable degree of musical competency too, without being toooo standard. Just. Barely. The fact that she has an upcoming wedding and I don't particularly want to do anything to upset her has nothing to do with the general lack of swearing and disgust. I was kinda hoping for some Clash and Ramones albums in here, but I suppose I've probably already heard a few Clash albums, and I'm not sure to be honest why she didn't chose the Ramones, but there you go. I always thought she was kinda more in to punk, but maybe that was her version of the teenage goth rebellion side of things, and now she's starting to turn full hipster.
Rory Gallagher - Tattoo (20/20 Vision)
After my Stevie Ray Vaughan experience with Mike's list, I was not looking forward to this. All I could think was another guitar wanker fiddling lick after lick and showboating. How wrong was I, I thoroughly enjoyed this album. Whereas a lot of other stuff in the category of "modern blues" seems to be a band centered around some guitar virtuoso, just giving the backing whilst he strokes his own ego drunk on Jack Daniels, cocaine and self absorption. Whilst the guitar does have more of a importance to the other instruments here, it's not at the expense of the other performers. I actually find it quite hard to chose my favorite track here, they're all pretty much a the same level. Even the slower songs have their own charm without being too self indulgent, and it's one of the slower ones I've chosen as my favorite, as it really has some nice piano mixed throughout.
Phillip Lynott - Solo In Soho
Now this is a man who can sing and write some music. I really enjoyed this album, and whilst many of told me this is not the Phil Lynott album they would chose, I thoroughly enjoyed it. As for the first track, yes, it's slow, yes it has those token "emotional" strings in a rock-ish ballad with those quaint flute in the background, but it actually all works rather well. I would have hear Lynott and Thin Lizzy from CDs in the past, but I wouldn't have been as familiar with his slower compositions, and this is an album that seems to have most of those. However, it does start to get a little more groove on in the following tracks, with "Ode To A Black Man" be a lot closer to the Thin Lizzy I would expect. And it all flows beautifully in to each other, not a particularly taxing album to listen to but worth a play through. If you don't like it the first time, you're probably ain't gonna like it after that either.
John Grant - Queen Of Denmark
OK, this took me by surprise. I generally don't like the mix of humor and music (whilst I appreciate Frank Zappa, he's just not for me), and slow acoustic guitar with a slow vocal running throughout usually drives me to despair. To be fair, usually when we're dealing with some hippie blonde chick in her twenties playing three chords whilst singing in a slow raspy voice that everyone thinks is amazing, but is the same fucking terrible Carly Simon/Janis Joplin wannabe without any of the actual talent or tune writing ability. But John Grant however, has no beans in making a joke of things, I think he's the kinda guy well capable of having a twitter page similar to James Blunt. It's a fairly relaxed album that does nothing new, but it's pared back just enough to be easy to listen to and enjoy. Doubt I'd ever bother to go to a gig, it's an interesting oddity that I'd probably not listen to again in the future, but I can't say it's bad.
Dan Deacon - Bromst
Meh. The first track straight away is just folksy noise. It's like they're trying to impersonate ELO, without any of the clarity or buildup of which they're know for. Most of the rest of the album has a similar vibe. I don't know whether to blame the band of the mix, it sounds like the whole thing is emanating over a rowdy club's sound system, and we're missing bits. The first few times I thought there was sometime wrong with my HIFI/Phone/Car Radio. It's more than a little distracting at the best of times. It does clear up from time to time, and some of the melodies seem fine, but it feels like I'm listening to the Ray D'Arcy show on Today FM about 10 years ago. This to me is kind of indie pop if you could call it such a thing. It's the new current thing that every hipster thinks they're the shit for listening to, and so far away from the conventional. I mean I can find Take That songs I enjoy more than this (think I'm lying? Go listen to Shine, and seriously tell me that's not a great fucking song. I don't give a fuck who sang it or wrote it, it's got a great danceable groove). Anyways, away from the sexual entities that are Robbie Williams and co., and back to Dan Deacon. Dan, you stay in your corner of the room and I'll be perfectly content to stay in mine. Come back when you find a decent sound engineer, and I can actually have a good idea what musical travesty you're trying to inflict upon me. I assume that tent on the album cover is where you recorded the album? Might want to address that issue too.
Young Marble Giants - Colossal Youth
Jesus. On the bright side, whereas everything was fairly similar and unoffensive this month, last of the pack was definitely the easiest to pick. Guess what, it's some hipster chick that thinks she's the shit whispering sensually and slowly in to a mic with some bassist behind her that is probably miffed that he wasn't enough of a try-hard too cool for school hipster to be considered for Vulfpeck. I mean, just look at the fucking album cover, all you need to know you can probably glean it from that. There's several tracks on here that sound like a bunch of depressed carnies. No, less than that, a bunch of Roma gypsies kidnapped by carnies and forced to play against their will. The girl is some 13 year old who was child-napped and cries herself to sleep at night. I mean are there actual musicians involved in this, I feel like this is some Andy Kaufman joke he's playing on the music scene. Do these people exist? And it's nearly 60 minutes. Did they really think they had enough in there? Guys, ye could have cut this at 30 minutes and just looped it, I don't think anyone would know the difference. Maybe they already have, and I haven't noticed. Dear god, it's track number 5 here and she's trying to raise her voice. Get back those carnies, the whipping must continue until morale improves. Or death. I'm happy with either. The best thing about this album is I don't have to listen to it again.
ADDENDUM
It has since been pointed out to me that Young Marble Giants are from the 1980s, so predate hipsterdom by quite a few decades indeed. Which on the one hand, makes them the godfathers of all the hipster kingdom has to provide, and lends further credence to my suspicion that this is in reality Andy Kaufman in drag.
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