starrynight

Just to add to what I said on this...I think the Rolling Stones for example were populist than The Beatles. The Beatles were most populist perhaps in their early period but after that I think they became more sophisticated and diverse.

Davey Moore

"Ain't no grave can hold my body down." Guess what Johnny Cash, it can, but I get what you mean, you ostrich slash victim. There will be a time when nobody'll know who Bob Dylan is. Same with Lennon. And everyone will forget about Jeff Mangum about 200 years before the former two. Yup. Forget about Can! Only the most dedicated music encyclopses(encyclopedia and cyclops) will ever know about those last two 100 years from now. I don't know what the point of this is, it has no relevant connection to the rest of this writing, but it's an observation that makes it's way into my surface thoughts from time to time.

The little title under my user name is apt. I'm like the drifter who comes into town every few months and then starts talking way too deeply. I really appreciate the kind words. I put that as my name to save face, The Great Disappearer, so it's as if my giant absences are part of the great scheme of things. Just so you know, that's bullsh*t, but hey, I'm happy with the little niche I've carved in this community.

And lo, the Earth opened up and swallowed Cpt. Beefheart and the hipster scum of the world wept. Frownland. I understand Trout Mask Replica and it's radical nature, but I will never claim to like it. Just sayin', I guess.

But here's the deal, I'm never going to finish this list, but that's okay. From now on this will be my musical essay/review depository, because hey, the word "journey" is in the thread title (Journey shall never be discussed in this thread by the way, maybe, depends on how far gone I am) and we've come to a new destination. Feels good man. An aside, my younger cousin lost his virginity last week to R. Kelly's Ignition(remix): YouTube - R Kelly - Ignition Remix. It happened to be on the girl's iPod and subsequently iHome. I find that hilarious. Mostly because I heard the song first as Dave Chappelle's brilliant sketch. But to be honest, it's catchy as hell. I've had it on repeat for a half hour now. It'll probably be on the list eventually, the list that starts in this post(look down and you'll see! Hooray!)

The 2000s were really good. And if My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy(which will be talked about when I review it in this thread eventually and assess the enigma that is Kanye) and The Suburbs(this'll be reviewed as well) are any indication, this next decade will be great too(I've now decided The Suburbs is superior to Neon Bible.)


1. Paper Planes(Diplo Street Remix) – M.I.A. : This is the best song that came out of the last decade, if I have any say. There's something intangibly awesome about this song, something so definitive of what this last decade was about. It's the perfect sample for the song, “Straight to Hell” by the Clash, re-appropriated and dressed up, and a decidedly better song by the way, and it would make Strummer proud, and if he doesn't, well the hoary old bastard can f*ck himself in his grave. Forgive the sacrelige, I am aware London Calling is the greatest album of the 70s(aren't you aware of this? )

It's the perfect millennial anthem, with the children(I assume they're children, M.I.A. channeling her inner Roger Waters) chanting about how all they want to do is shoot you and take your money, a common theme from the last ten years (Enron, the entire f*cking street named Wall) and the added verses on this remix vastly improve the relatively weak middle and latter verses of the original(although I do miss the “sticks and stones and weeds and bones” line, but that's about it). The added verses reinforce the gangster themes, and well, wasn't this the decade of the White Collar Gangster?

YouTube - M I A Paper Planes Street Diplo Mix

2. Maps – Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs : The Great American Ballad isn't dead, it just changed addresses and moved to Indietown (for the sake of the cool sentence I wrote, lets not argue about whether or not the Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs are “indie enough for ya”). The guitars are slippery yet forceful, sliding up and down and then walloping when necessary. Karen O gives it about as tender of a performance as she has in her, and my god if it isn't affecting I don't know what is.

YouTube - Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Maps

3. Stuck Between Stations – The Hold Steady : Any song that begins by talking about how right Sal Paradise is immediately falls in danger of being pretty goddamn pretentious. Instead, The Hold Steady write the best Bruce Springsteen song of all time(that he of course didn't think of, but listen to Stuck Between Stations and not hear Springsteen in that opening blast of sound when the piano chimes in, I dare you) and infuse it with literary chops(who the hell focuses the majority of their lyrics on the suicide of John Berryman? Seriously? Leaves of Grass my ass! as Homer Simpson would say, and even though he was talking about Walt Whitman, I think that sentence can be applied to any poet when talking in a demeaning way, But John Berryman is actually pretty damn good, so what the hell am I even talking about? Dream Song 42: O journeyer, deaf in the mould, insane - A poem by John Berryman - American Poems), and then somehow make that poet's suicide a metaphor on all of the outcasts living in America and you have a masterpiece a-brewin'.

YouTube - The Hold Steady - Stuck Between Stations

4. The Purple Bottle – Animal Collective : Of course they would do a strange, Acid-stained tribute to Stevie Wonder. And of course it sounds heavenly, pushing well past anything Wonder could have conjured in his vast musical mind. Forget Leonard Cohen through Jeff Buckley, Animal Collective does them one better by saying hallelujah(check), conveying a wellspring of emotion beneath the surface(check), and in true Animal Collective fashion, not make much sense in the process, making it that much more powerful because you know in that chaos there's a nugget of truth (haha, one-upped). “Sometimes I'm quiet and sometimes you're not quiet, hallelujah.” It gets me every time. And I don't know why. Also, give props to Panda Bear for almost stealing Avey's amazing song away from him by playing some fantastic drums. Watch live videos of this song and he basically replicates it perfectly. Underrated as a drummer.

YouTube - Animal Collective-Purple Bottle (Studio Version)

5. Rebellion(Lies) - Arcade Fire : Read my Funeral post earlier in this thread. And my new observations on Arcade Fire will wait until my Suburbs review(hint: Bono=Win Butler 20 years from now) This is definitely my favorite song off of Funeral. So instead I'm just going to post this badass live version : YouTube - Arcade Fire - Rebellion(Lies) from Miroir Noir DVD.mpg

I mean, for god's sake, listen to the crowd at the end.

6. Idioteque - Radiohead : Once again, the same as five, I've already written a lot on Kid A.

YouTube - 8. Idioteque

7. All My Friends - LCD Soundsystem : The live-in university I went to, the one I wrote about earlier, well, I failed out of that. Going to community college now. On a different track. More focused. Can't say the same for some of my contemporaries. Two of my best friends from that first years in college are in rehab for shooting up heroin. Another one of my friends will forever walk with a weird limp, because he was drunk and high and on some back road in the middle of the woods and hit a patch of ice, flipping his car. Other friends struggling with addiction, opiates. Others who haven't even hit the edge yet but my god they're gonna. Another one, a girl who always smoked with us had a miscarriage, attempted suicide and dropped out of school.

"You spend the first five years trying to get with the plan, and the next five years trying to be with your friends again" Damn straight, except for me it would be both of those, juggled at once, simultaneously for ten years, which is the same time equivalent anyway so who cares?

YouTube - LCD Soundsystem, "All my friends"

8. I'll Believe in Anything - Wolf Parade : If Maps hadn't been made, this would be the greatest love song of the decade. And if it weren't for All of My Friends it would be the greatest build-up in a song for the decade. Regardless, just because I like other songs slightly more doesn't mean this song is practically flawless. And there's no better compliment to give(maybe saying it has a really big d*ck?) so I guess that's that.

YouTube - Wolf Parade - I'll Believe in Anything

The rest of the songs won't be ranked, just songs I want to talk about.

(and so i disappear, but probably until tomorrow)

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The Edge... there is no honest way to explain it because the only people who really know where it is are the ones who have gone over.

Guitar

Nice essay but where do you find all that time!? it takes me 2 hours for an essay XD

Unknown Soldier

There's no point responding as this person hasn't updated in about 3 years, pity as it's a great read.

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Metal Wars

Power Metal

Pounding Decibels- A Hard and Heavy History