Saturday, October 10, 2009

10 albums a day #61


All free label sampler downloads from Amazon.com, all 2009.

Eenie Meenie Records.
Eagle Records Live at Montreux.
Dead Oceans Sampler.
Chess Records Black History Month.
Lookout Records: Be On The Lookout!
JDub Records Presents Wild Peace
Jagjaguwar Sampler.
Ioda SXSW Opening Day Bash Sampler.
ESL World Music Sampler.
Emo is Awesome Emo is Evil 2

Eenie Meenie: 4/11. Overall: 1.8. A mostly mediocre collection of alt rock.
Starred artists/groups: Great Northern, Division Day, Golden Boy, Irving.

Eagle: 3/13. Overall: 1.9. Not a good overall score, but there was a wide range of really good and total garbage on this one. Two deleted tracks, both rap. The three really good tracks were so good that I will be more detailed than usual. First is "Frosty" by Albert Collins, a jazzy and bluesy instrumental. Second is "Smoke on the Water" by Deep Purple. Now, the thing that makes me bump this one up a notch isn't because it's a timeless classic [smirk], and not because it's a live version. The cool thing about this one is the jazz piano instrumental that riffs on the theme of the original song and which takes up the first 2 1/4 minutes of this 9-minute version. The piano part should have been longer. The third one is the awesome balled "Angel Eyes" by the great Jeff Healey Band. This one is no longer available, but all the individual artists' live albums from this event are available. This collection is mostly classic rock/pop, r&b and those two rap tracks.

Dead Oceans: 1/5. Overall: 1.6. Mostly meh alt rock. The one starred track is by a group called The Donkeys which sounds kind of like The Grateful Dead.

Chess: 0/3. Overall: 2. This was Amazon's token freebie in honor of "Black History Month." They could have done a much better job. Nothing at all wrong with these three tracks, it just seems like a shoddy effort in today's overly-politically correct world. Also all three tracks fade out at about 2:30; I know these old tracks were generally shorter than songs are now, but they still sound like they are sort of "demo" versions that were faded out before they really finished.

Lookout: 2/9. Overall: 2.2. Another generally unexciting collection of indie punk(ish) and hard(er) rock.
Starred artists/groups: Ted Leo, The Reputation.

JDub: 3/9. Overall 2.4. This is a collection of "world music," which is someone's lame idea for categorizing any music that is created outside of the United States. Therefore, if someone says "world music" they really aren't saying anything because it can mean almost anything (provided, of course, that it was created by someone outside the United States). I think this stuff is mostly from eastern Europe, and it's a nice collection.
Starred artists/groups: Deleon, Golem, Balkan Beat Box.

Jagjaguwar: 2/8. Overall: 1.9. Alt rock, nothing really exciting.
Starred artists/groups: Okkervil River, Parts and Labor.

Ioda: 1/11. Overall: 1.6. More meh alt(ish) rock. Don't really know what to say about it. Nothing really hit me as mentionable, but one starred group: The Phenomenal Handclap Band.

ESL: 3/8. Overall: 2.5. More world music, and not a bad collection with some of what you call "smooth electronica" verging into darkwave (a genre of which I'm becoming more and more of a fan) in here. This one is still available for free.
Starred artists/groups: Thievery Corporation, Ursula 1000, Natalia Clavier.

Emo: 1/15. Overall: 1.6. Well, I had to download this one for my own musical education. It's not completely horrible. Allegedly "emo music." To me it sounds like harder alt/college rock. They still have this one but it costs $4.98 now. Not worth it.
Starred artist: Surrounded.

Album count: 624.

Friday, October 09, 2009

Standby time

Paid to do nothing - Federal news, government operations, agency management, pay & benefits - FederalTimes.com
The U.S. Postal Service, struggling with a massive deficit caused by plummeting mail volume, spends more than a million dollars each week to pay thousands of employees to sit in empty rooms and do nothing.

It’s a practice called “standby time,” and it has existed for years — but postal employees say it was rarely used until this year. Now, postal officials say, the agency is averaging about 45,000 hours of standby time every week — the equivalent of having 1,125 full-time employees sitting idle, at a cost of more than $50 million per year.
This is my favorite part...
Nor can supervisors require employees to brush up on their training. One mail handler in Pennsylvania said a supervisor used to force employees on standby time to read postal manuals.

“The local union shop filed a grievance against the Postal Service,” said the employee, who asked to remain anonymous because of concerns about retaliation. “We’re on standby time, not training time. Standby time is different. ... You can’t make people read training materials on standby time.”

10 albums a day #60


All free downloads from Amazon.com. All various artists.

Badman: Has it Really Been 10 Years? (2008)
Deep Elm Sampler No. 8: Bonfire of Trust (2008)
P is for Panda Mix Tape Vol. 1 (2008)
The End Records Free Sampler (2008)
Vanguard Records and Sugar Hill Records: The Amazon New Music Digital Sampler (2008)
The Very Best of Naxos Early Music (2008)
Alive Records Sampler (2009)
Anti Sampler (2009)
Arts & Crafts Label Sampler (2009)
Barsuk Records Amazon Digital Sampler (2009)

I've now been through all the Amazon samplers and made brief notes. There's a lot of good music in here. There's also a lot of total meh. So what I did in my notes was to put a star next to the track that I thought sounded good enough to be worthy of further consideration and possibly even eventually buy something by that artist. Therefore, there are two ratings for each album. The first will be presented as a ratio, for example, 3/13, which would mean 3 starred tracks out of 13 total tracks in that collection. The second is an overall album rating on a scale from 0 to 5 (based on an average system of my own devise, with 0 meaning a track got deleted and 5 being almost impossible to attain--anything that reaches 3 or even rounds off to 3 means I think overall it's pretty good).

Badman: 4/12. Overall: 2.2. Mostly folky alt rock, but not especially remarkable.
Starred artists/groups: lanterna, Starf*cker, James William Hindle, Mark Mallman.

Deep Elm: 5/16. Overall: 2.3. A mix of country-ish rock and Americana.
Starred artists/groups: Ride Your Bike, Desoto Jones, Moving Mountains, 500 Miles to Memphis, Track A Tiger.

Panda: 7/16. Overall: 2.8. An overall rating of 2.8 puts this one fairly high up on this particular scale (trust me). This is a good one. I think that it's not longer free, but it is available and really cheap, and I would recommend it to anyone who likes that music that wanders across the genres of Americana and folky countryish rock.
Starred artists/groups: Josh Moore (has a Toad the Wet Sprocket flavor), Pasadena, J.R. Rund and the Holdup, Gasoline Heart (lead singer sounds like Springsteen, but don't hold that against him), Damion Suomi.

The End: 7/16. Overall: 2.7. Another fairly high overall rating makes this an interesting collection, at least for me. The End Records apparently specializes in metal of all sorts, and I found it an interesting exercise to look up all the sub-genres that these groups are categorized in and see how the metal genre has exploded since the mid-80s. Another one I would recommend for anyone who wants a snapshot overview of many of the different sounds that all fall under the "metal" genre. I especially enjoy the tracks that fall under what is called "power ambient" or "drone metal." It's like darkwave (or dark ambient) that has been supercharged with the energy and instrumentation of metal. These groups are bolded below. Unforunately this sampler is no longer available.
Starred artists/groups: Lordi, Nadja, Jarboe, Aqua de Annique, Ulver, Agolloch, Kosmos.

Vanguard: 4/5. Overall: 3.6. A small but excellent sampler of Americana music. Unfortunately no longer available.
Starred artists/groups: Matt Nathanson, The Watson Twins, The Duhks, Kasey Chambers & Shane Nicholson (wife & husband duo).

Naxos: 12/12. Overall: 4. A "4" means get this one by all means. This is a collection of very early music, both choral and instrumental, and if you like very early music then you will love this collection. It's still available, and it's still free.

Alive: 0/8. Overall: 1. Total meh. None of them actually deleted but just forget about this one. Alive Records publishes "lo-fi" music that sounds quite raw and unpolished, but that isn't what I hold against them. The songs themselves are just nothing to get excited about.

Anti: 11/13. Overall: 3.6. The overall rating from this one suffered because of one deleted track: a rap piece by NASA. Other than that this is a really good collection of alt rock. No longer available.
Starred artists/groups: Neko Case, Booker T., Ramblin' Jack Elliot, Jason Lytle, Bob Mould, Westbound Train, William Elliot Whitmore, Bettye Lavette, Michael Franti, Mavis Staples, Jolie Holland.

Arts & Crafts: 5/15. Overall: 2.4. A mostly mediocre collection of alt rock. Still available but now costs $8.99.
Starred artists/groups: Gentleman Reg, Amy Millan, Timber Timer, The Bell Orchestre, Charles Spearin.

Barsuk: 2/8. Overall: 1.8. More alt rock, and not a very good collection in my opinion.
Starred artists/groups: Rah Rah Riot, Mates of State.

Album count: 614.

Thursday, October 08, 2009

10 albums a day #59


The Rolling Stone Collection: 25 Years of Essential Rock (7 CD boxed set)

I know that I have several, perhaps many, albums that someone, somewhere at some time originally ordered from a TV commercial. However, there are only three that I can think of that I so ordered myself: a Mamas & the Papas CD, Freedom Rock, and this one. I remember that it didn't seem too expensive for such a large set,* and I thought it might help expand my own knowledge of rock history and fill in some blanks.

The reader should note that this is not a collection of the greatest hits from 1967 to 1992. It is a collection of what the Rolling Stone critics and editors believe are "essential rock." Caveat emptor.

It is an interesting journey through rock history. Many of these songs are by famous artists, but they are not necessarily songs that that artist is most famous for. Like I said, it's not a collection of the biggest radio hits.

The booklets with the CDs have a lot of information on the songs and artists, although skewed by Rolling Stone group-think and over-gushery.** I think this might be a good collection for a newbie who wants to learn more about how rock got where it is today (or at least where it was in the early 90s), but for the old-timers it would be pretty much useless.

I suppose since this is a boxed set I can't count it as 7 albums. So, it only counts for 1.

Album count: 604.

*A commenter at Amazon says it retailed for $100 when it was first released. No way did I pay that much for it. I think I paid around $40. Also, the other commenter there obviously 1) did not listen to the whole collection, and 2) wasn't paying attention to the description when he ordered it.

**I made that term up. I don't know how else to put it. It means: when someone says all kinds of cool things about something because they can't think of anything intelligent to say about it.

Wednesday, October 07, 2009

Well, I guess that's settled, then...

Wikipedia:
Plagal cadence: IV to I, also known as the "Amen Cadence" because of its frequent setting to the text "Amen" in hymns. However, William Caplin disputes the existence of plagal cadences: "An examination of such a cadence rarely exists...In as much as the progression IV-I cannot confirm a tonality (it lacks any leading tone resolution), it cannot articulate formal closure. Rather, this progression is normally part of a tonic prolongation serving a variety of formal functions - not, however a cadential one. Most examples of plagal cadences given in textbooks actually represent a postcadential codetta function: that is, the IV-I progression follows an authentic cadence but does not itself create genuine cadential closure."
A few days ago I slapped together a big "favorites" playlist for Winamp, and have been listening through it to see what I should delete or add. Just heard "Diggy Diggy Lo" by Doug Kershaw. The song ends, and suddenly there's this weird unresolved sub-dominant (IV) chord tacked on at the end, which made me do a mental WTF?

I remembered the IV-I cadence was called the plagal cadence, not from college, because I don't think I ever heard the term there, but from much earlier when I was learning music theory at a summer church music camp.

I'm almost certain I've never seen a real plagal cadence used in any hymn, and I'm pretty sure it's frowned upon in classical music theory. I've only seen it used in a tacked-on "amen" at the end of a hymn, and which no gospel singing group or congregation that I've been part of has ever actually sung--it's just ignored. Classical theory--which is also used for traditional hymn composition--insists upon a closing "authentic" or "perfect" cadence, V to I (dominant to tonic).

So what's this all about? Nothing really. Except I'm going to have to figure out some way to work that phrase "postcadential codetta function" into a conversation sometime.

10 albums a day #58


Various artists.

The Enigma Variations 2 (1987, CD)
The Finest Hours of U.S. 60s Punk (undated, mono LP)
The Glory of Gershwin (1994, CD)
Theodore: An Alternative Music Sampler (1990, CD)
Two Rooms: Celebrating the Songs of Elton John and Bernie Taupin (1991, CD)
Until the End of the World Soundtrack (1991, CD)

Getting more or less toward the end now, and what's left is going to be treated a little more specifically, so only six this time.

The Enigma Variations 2 was one of those cheap label samplers that used to turn up in the olden days (maybe they still do, I don't know). This was one of my favorites of this kind of collection, and was from the now-defunct Enigma record label. I could have bought albums from almost every artist/group in this collection, but most of them never turned up at Hastings. I might still hunt some of them down someday. Some that I went on to buy albums from because of this sampler: Mojo Nixon & Skid Roper, The Dead Milkmen, Agent Orange, Don Dixon. One song from the Milkmen really cracked me up, called "The Thing that Only Eats Hippies." "Now it's got a sweet tooth for long hair/So Bob and Greg and Grant you'd best beware..." That's a reference to the members of Husker Du. The other one is also funny, the poignant love song "Stupid Maryann." "Maryann/Can't you understand/I wanna be your man/Oh, stupid Maryann." Epic! Other artists from this one that I would like to track down: Peter Hammill, Plan 9, Wire, TSOL.

The Glory of Gershwin was a tribute to the Gershwin brothers, with pop artists covering many of their famous songs. I bought it just so I would have "The Man I Love" done by Kate Bush. Some of the other artists included are Peter Gabriel, Sting, Elton John, Carly Simon, Elvis Costello, and Meat Loaf. Sixteen tracks in all. Some of the artists I could do without (Cher, John Bon Jovi), but overall it's a decent album.

The Theodore CD was another label sampler that is also quite good, ignoring a couple of more or less rap tracks (Public Enemy, 3rd Bass). It has a few artists that I was already familiar with (Kate Bush, Indigo Girls, Psychedelic Furs, Big Audio Dynamite), but there were two groups that I discovered on this one that I went on to buy albums from: Poi Dog Pondering and--most importantly--Toad the Wet Sprocket. There's another group called Nuclear Valdez that I kept an eye out for, but to no avail. Another one I might try to track down sometime. By the way, I knew a couple of people who were big B.A.D. fans, but I never could figure out why.

Two Rooms, as the title states, was a tribute to Elton John and his song writer Bernie Taupin. I bought it just so I would have Kate Bush's version of "Rocket Man" (her version has a sort of reggae beat). Overall I think it's a decent album. Some of the artist/song combinations seem a little, I don't know, clichéd, maybe. Like Rod Stewart doing "Your Song." But some of the songs seem made for these alt versions, like The Who with "Saturday Night's All Right for Fighting," The Beach Boys with "Crocodile Rock" and Oleta Adams with "Don't Let the Sun Go Down on Me." I think I could have gone my whole life without having to hear John Bon Jovi belt out "Levon." Whew. Man, he must have missed the lesson on dynamics. But like I said, overall an okay collection. Oh yeah, and I must admit that I like Wilson Phillips' version of "Daniel."

I bought the Until the End of the World soundtrack for one song: "Summer Kisses, Winter Tears" by Julee Cruise. At that time, Cruise had released only one album and I was hungry for more. This album turned out to be an unexpected favorite. Overall, the music has a very dreamy feel. I should note that I've never seen the movie. Maybe I should get it from Netflix just so I know what the music is about. It has 19 tracks with some famous names like Talking Heads, R.E.M., Lou Reed, Elvis Costello, U2, etc.

Album count: 603.

Tuesday, October 06, 2009

10 albums a day #58


Various artists.

Rock Anthems (1993, double CD)
School House Rock! Rocks (1996, CD)
Summer Dance Party (1996, CD)
The Banjos That Destroyed the World (1995, CD)
The Best of Austin City Limits: Country Music's Finest Hour (1996, CD)
huH - CD5, CD6, CD7, Summer Bootleg (all 1995, CD)
Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? Soundtrack (2000, CD)

Rock Anthems. Well, this is a bunch of songs that somebody somewhere decided were rock anthems, based on their own personal mix tape, I guess. Songs from the 70s and 80s in here, all radio hits to some extent. I can't believe I never deleted "Addicted to Love." What a stupid, boring, tedious excuse for a song. Robert Palmer was the most over-rated pop star of all time. Two bars, repeat it for 4 1/2 minutes. Hit song. This is the kind of thing that fuels my contempt for humanity in general. Other than that, it's a decent collection of songs that I mostly like. Good for the full version of "American Pie," the radio version of "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida," and this may be the only CD ever sold that includes "C*m On Feel the Noise" and "Dream Weaver" on the same disc.

I was trying to find a CD of all the original School House Rock songs, but I couldn't find any such thing. I did come up with this, which is a bunch of the old songs recorded by various 90s pop/rock groups. It's okay, but I'd still rather have all the originals.

Summer Dance Party is another that my wife found somewhere. It isn't as bad as the title might suggest, but it does still lean toward the goofy. Tracks range from "Tequila" to "I Can See Clearly Now" to "Break My Stride."

The Banjos That Destroyed the World is extreme banjo music, subtitled "The Fastest 5-String Banjo Instrumentals of All Time." This is banjo music for the unapologetic banjo fan. This was the first in a series of albums (well, there's at least one more, anyway), and I want to get them all.

The Best of Austin City Limits...well, if you say so. I deleted all but six tracks.

The four huH CDs were from when I briefly subscribed to huH magazine in the 90s. Various artists of mostly pop music, though it wandered across genres now and then, for example, one CD has Dwight Yoakum and another one has Steve Forbert. The CD came packaged with a magazine every month that had new album reviews and reader commentary. I canceled my subscription mostly because the reader commentary was unspeakable juvenile and downright stupid. I didn't want even the mailman to think I was in any way even indirectly associated with idiots like that so I canceled. No kidding. I actually enjoyed the music (mostly), but I didn't want anyone to see me reading one of those magazines. These are sampler CDs, and the only group on any of these who I went on to buy an album by was Phish.

The Oh Brother soundtrack is a good collection of old-time country/folk/gospel, although some of it is somewhat "modernized" and performed by contemporary artists. My favorites are "Down in the River to Pray" by Alison Krauss and "Angel Band" by The Stanley Brothers. When I first wrote this post I had said that I had been looking for a score of that song but had been unable to find it. Well, I found it, but it was in disguise with the alternate title "My Latest Sun is Sinking Fast," which is the opening phrase.

Album count: 597.

Monday, October 05, 2009

Let's face it: Some people are just stupid

This post at Strange in San Antonio reminded me of this story from Italy that I heard mentioned on the news this morning.
The 26 year old, who has not been named, was traced by detectives after the owner of the house reported the crime.

Officers noticed the computer was still on and when the 52 year old owner touched the keyboard, the social network site's homepage flashed up.

The man, from Albano Laziale near Rome told police he was not a member, and they quickly realised the last person to use the computer had been the burglar.

He had written several messages on his wall - but not revealed he was carrying out a crime - and police were quickly able to trace him and recover cash and jewellery that had been taken.

Major Ivo Di Blasio, of the carabinieri paramilitary police, said:"He was tempted to log on during the break in and it led to his arrest - it was a silly mistake to make and we were onto him very quickly.

"The owner of the house had left the computer on and when the Facebook site flashed up on the screen we had the name of the burglar and we simply went to his house and arrested him, as well as recovering the goods.

"He did not expect us at all and was very surprised when we told him how we had tracked him down. He has a history of break-ins and will now go before a judge."

10 albums a day #57


Various artists.

Walt Disney's Merriest Songs (1968, mono LP)
H.R. Pufnstuf Soundtrack (1969, 7-inch EP)
Potatoes Volume I (1987, LP)
A Taste of Ireland: Irish Traditional Music (1997, CD)
American Roots Songbook: Americana (2002, CD)
Best of the Bubblegum Years (1988, CD)
Barbershop Harmony Time (1994, CD)
Country Hits of the 50s (1990, CD)
Freedom Rock (1987, double CD)
I'm a Man of Constant Sorrow and others (2001, cassette)

I don't remember where I found that Taste of Ireland CD, but I have the impression that I picked it up at a used book store that had some cheap and/or used CDs. It has some good stuff, if you like listening to (more or less) traditional Irish music.

Same goes for the Americana CD. It has ten tracks, and the only artist on it who I've heard of anywhere else is Don Edwards, who did a double CD of cowboy songs that I mentioned in a previous post. It's a good CD, though.

I think I actually ordered the Bubblegum CD from a music club in the early 90s. Fourteen bubblegum hits from Ohio Express, Lemon Pipers, 1910 Fruitgum Co., and a few others. I bought it mostly so I'd have "Yummy, Yummy, Yummy," because I had heard it on Monty Python.

The barbershop CD has 10 tracks, five each from The Buffalo Bills and The Cordettes, the latter of which is a female barbershop quartet. This is the only collection of barbershop quartet music I have.

The Country Hits CD must be another of those Dollar General possible "bootlegs." Artists included are Tennessee Ernie Ford, Ferlin Husky, Faron Young and others.

Freedom Rock is one of maybe three collections that I have ordered from a TV commercial. Some of the songs don't really seem to fit the theme, and some of them now sound so stupid that they're hard to listen to without an ironic smirk. However, it does have several songs that I like enough to count the collection as a good score, like "One Tin Soldier," "Signs," In the Year 2525," "Lay Down" and "Me and You and a Dog Named Boo."

The last one on cassette is another of those truck-stop tapes (possible "bootleg") that I bought somewhere while truck-driving. It has The Stanley Brothers, Cowboy Copas, and The Nashville Dulcimers (which I mentioned before), plus several others I hadn't heard of before. It's a good collection of that old kind of country/folk music.

Album count: 587.