February is Music Writer Exercise Month #MWE • Page 71

“Drink enough of anything to make this world look new again” is the platonic ideal of a certain kind of lyric.

 

OK, this one really got me.

 

It is the best.

 

I knewwwwwww it. Now you can join us in bumping the Hats thread whenever you think of it!

Highly recommend this piece, I read it every six months or so: The Blue Nile's 'Hats' Turns 30: Revisiting A Cult Classic

 

I kinda can’t believe you’ve never heard hats before Craig

 

Oh man, I do love a good Stereogum retrospective. Will read tomorrow.

 

That last tweet gives me the feels. The magic we’re all chasing all the time, man.

 

Yeah, songwriter. I could've sworn wikipedia said that he sang also, but just looked again and it doesn't...whoops lol

 

Dizzy Gillespie - Swing Low Sweet Cadillac

I’m admittedly a simpleton when it comes to jazz and a lot of this wasn’t really my bag the first couple times I listened to it. I was super nervous at the start of the first song that I wasn’t really going to enjoy it at all, but it was pretty good in the end.

"Something in Your Smile" is far and away my favorite track on the album, but I also loved "Kush" and really did grow to love "Swing Low, Sweet Cadillac" as well.

 

Radiohead - The Bends

Okay, so here's where I maybe embarrass myself a little bit lol

With the exception of a half hearted listen to OK Computer about a month ago, I don’t think I’ve ever heard a Radiohead song before, let alone a whole album. (Okay, I listened to "Creep" because the internet told me it was their biggest hit and I've definitely heard that song before, but, if you had played it and asked who it was, I would not have been able to tell you it was Radiohead).

I kinda expected I wouldn’t like this for some reason. I definitely didn’t expect anything as pretty as “Fake Plastic Trees;” I can't even tell you how much I love that song. I think I excepted everything to be much harder and, maybe, grungier? Not that that would have been bad or anything, this just isn't at all what I expected Radiohead to be. Other highlights include "(Nice Dream)," "Sulk," & "Street Spirit (Fade Out)"

Going to end up doing a discography run on these guys soon. Really good stuff and glad to have finally given them a shot.

 

fwiw, the bends isn’t at all what radiohead is haha. love that record though! excited for your journey, they’re my favorite band

 

:whispers:

The Bends is their best album.

:runs:

 

oh chris

 

Neil Young - Homegrown
I like it!

Robert Wyatt - Last Straw
I don't!

 

What's the real answer?

 

I think you guys should all listen to Robert Palmer

 

won't be baited at this time

 

The Velvet Underground & Nico - The Velvet Underground & Nico

Apparently this album is not called Andy Warhol, but is actually self-titled. After multiple listens, I'm still not sure where I land on this one yet. A lot of it falls into the realm of "I think I like this, but I also kinda don't" - It alternates between sounding a bit like Bob Dylan and maybe The Beach Boys on at least certain parts of a couple tracks? I like when they lean into the latter more than the former and prefer the songs with the female lead (Nico, I guess?) over Lou Reed (although "Heroin" is pretty great).

I don't really see this slotting into any sort of a regular rotation for me, though.

(might try to post another one later to get ahead of the weekend, but I've been feeling pretty burnt out, so might not get to it until Monday)

 

It took me years to really love that whole album and not just the ones Lou sings

 

One of the “problems” with this exercise is that when you hear something really brilliant, it ends up dominating your listening in February. I’ve been listening to “The Creator Has a Master Plan” by Pharaoh Sanders pretty much every day since I heard it a week or so ago, which impacts how much time I can spend to get to other new records.

That’s absolutely a good thing, because I adore that record now, but I definitely have slipped behind my list.

 

Playing catch-up after a few busy days.

 

@Craig Manning you should check out the Young Veins record if you like that Panic one. it's full on power pop and a side project band. byrds worship basically.