February is Music Writer Exercise Month #MWE • Page 66

Listened to Spiritualised - Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space. Was reading a book about aliens at the time which paired well with it.

It’s an ornate collection of songs, lots of strings and very grandiose instrumentation. It also sounds a bit like a product of its times (in a good way!) here too, lots of mid 90s Brit Pop sounds on the fringes here, particularly something more psychedelic like Kula Shaker.

I bet the guys from Muse love this album.

 

i love that record haha

 

Yeah, so this album rules.

 

I went on a Zevon kick a couple weeks ago. Definitely prefer the S/T, and the accompanying Pitchfork piece is excellent as well

 

Lil Wayne - Tha Carter III

This album never takes its foot off the gas. Gets everything you’d want out of all the guests. Very impressive body of work I’m excited to spend more time with

 

The pitch black humor (the title track still elicits a “holy shit are you allowed to make that joke?” to this day) is rightly what he’s praised for, but what really makes it work is the balance with the big sentimental open heart like “Tenderness on the Block”

 

I couldn't believe where the lyrics went on "Excitable Boy." It's probably not surprising that I latched onto the "big sentimental open heart" a little bit more!

 

I’ve been a Zevon fan for probably 20 years so by now I couldn’t live without any of it. The dark, the silly, the love-lorn. It’s all so good together. It makes the heart of “Accidentally Like a Martyr” mean even more when you know this is the guy writing “Send lawyers, guns, and money…Dad, get me out of this”

 

Listened to Le Tigre - Le Tigre from 1999. This is the band that Kathleen Hanna formed after the breakup of Bikini Kill.

I can see it as a big influence on the various lo-fi mid '00s acts, with it's slightly childlike (not meant in a bad way necessarily) song structures and simple approaches to music, that I bet a lot of those sort of bedroom pop artists found influential.

I did find the vocals a little bit of a struggle though, very high and not particularly tuneful, which I feel you can get away with a bit more in a punk band. It doesn't quite become irritating, but it certainly threatens to become irritating.

 

Poor Righteous Teachers - Holy Intellect
Underrated gem. Not sure how I overlooked this when I initially got super into 90s hip hop. The Earth, Wind, and Fire sample in "Strictly Ghetto" is so dope

 

Love that record, need to go back to it. Was into them when De La Soul's And the Anonymous Nobody... came out because I wanted to educate myself

 

Dr. Dre - The Chronic

I'm sure that I've listened to this album at some point in the past, but outside of "Nuthin' But A 'G' Thang," I couldn’t tell you anything about any of the songs.

Rap/Hip-hop is one of my least listened to genres and I always feel out of my element when talking about it. I've gone through phases over the years, but usually I'm just listening to either what I listened to in the mid-90s or what friends/my wife like and tell me to listen to. This sounds like the quintessential 90s rap album, although you can hear some of the 80s bleeding through on "N** Witta Gun".

I was surprised at how involved Snoop was on this album. I knew they had done songs together, but he's featured on at least half of these tracks and gets a co-write on even more than that. Overall, I enjoyed it, even if many of the lyrics make me chuckle and roll my eyes. And that high pitched electronic bit that is on most of the songs (you'll forgive me for not knowing what to call it, but it's on a ton of these tracks and Snoop uses it on "Gin and Juice," also) gets old after awhile.

I don't really have much more to say than that, although I found I enjoyed it more when it was on in the background while I was working rather than front and center as the thing I was focused on. The skits, as they often are, are mostly misses here, but I did realize that, even at 38, a good Deez Nuts joke still makes me laugh, so there's that, too.

 

On most days I’d tell you Giraldo is my favorite guitarist. He’s just getting warmed up on that one (“You Better Run” shows some of it), but he really experiments with what you can do in a tight melodic guitar solo with technique and noise later on. He hardly plays one explicit note in the solo on “Shadows of the Night” and it works like gangbusters. And his solo on “Promises in the Dark” is my vote for the greatest guitar solo of all time.

I still think it’s bonkers that Myron Grombacher didn’t get inducted with the two of them to the Rock Hall. That was a BAND

I’m really glad you enjoyed it

 

The band is so good. I wasn't necessarily expecting that aspect.

I appreciate the extra homework you're giving me here, haha

 

Slowdive - Souvlaki

I've definitely heard this before, but not for a long long while, and I did fancy exploring a bit more of Slowdive. This is pretty much what I expected from it, lush guitar soundscapes, and floaty dream pop esque vocals. Reminds me lots specifically of Loveless from a couple of years previously.

Some beautiful sounds here, with vocals just washing over you. Lovely stuff.

 

Haha just two songs I promise!

 

Nas - It Was Written

If I were placing bets on which albums I would like more than others, I would have bet that I'd like The Chronic more than It Was Written. Honestly, I wasn't even really looking forward to this one. It's been on my list for awhile because I haven’t listened to Nas in probably 20 years and I remember the cover from a friend's brother's collection growing up. I was shocked to find that I liked this significantly more than The Chronic. Like it's not even on the same level.

The album is much more raw and honest sounding than Dre's. There are no real comedic skits here, and while there's still a lot of weed/guns/women, it's more serious. The beats are sparser, relying more on Nas' lyrics and delivery. It’s less produced sounding, less glossy, more gritty. It just seems more real. I also enjoyed the incorporation of the R&B elements on songs like "Black Girl Lost."

 

Rodan - Rusty
Pretty good blend of post-hardcore and post-rock. I doubt I will go back to it but I am enjoying it as I listen

 

He really was so far ahead. You can hear generations of spiritually exploring singer-songwriters being born in “On the Road to Find Out”

 

2Pac - Me Against The World

I'm so excited to spend more time with this and really let the lyrics sing in. Musically fun to jam to, great flow. I definitely need more listens for it to sink in but right off the bat it's great.

Had to switch Luda today for a shorter album. Then realized I'd heard Let's Get It On but hadn't heard What's Going On so went with that.

Could've sworn I'd heard this many times but then looked at the song titles and didn't recognize any outside the obvious. Eddie Brown was so effortlessly groovy on Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler). Maybe one of the smoothest voices there ever was.