What listening to this album made me think of: My friend Matt "Buck X" Lerner, because he first played it for me in college when we were at a stir-fry dinner together. He's still one of my favorite people.
The end of college. A guy I pined for 20 years ago, previously mentioned, because I did a cover of "Do You Love Me Now?" and he liked it. I don't know if he just said that to humor me, but I didn't fucking care. Review: What a rawkkkkkkin' album. I didn't mean to type so many k's, but the letters in the second row of my keyboard appear to be giving me trouble, so they just all flooded out at once as I pounded on the "k." But rawkkkkkkin' fits, so kkkkkkkeeping it.
My favorite song is "No Aloha." The Hawaiian vibe, her voice, everything. Also, I'm the best at purring, "And now we die. Oooooooh, all the treats." I say it/sing it whenever I can slip it into casual conversation. How I felt after: Like playing the guitar. Like a bad-ass. Like no one can ever fuck with me (says the person who is stretching).
Random fact I learned about this artist/album: Didn't know till this very moment that Spike Jonze and Kim Gordon directed the video for "Cannonball." Cool.
Today's album:Booth and the Bad Angel (Tim Booth and Angelo Badalamenti)
Length: 48 minutes
Activity: Stretching
What listening to this album made me think of: I had to take some time off to start this thing, even
though I tried to start it in August. I went down for an extended visit
with my parents in Florida, and between eight-hour workdays followed by
10-hour theme park/kid shifts, there was no free time. Zero. Zip. Which
was fine for bonding, but not for things like this. Whatever this is.
So now I'm back. This album reminds me of the second time (out of three) I returned to the same trade-publishing house in the industrial park that I fled shortly out of college to become an "entrepreneur" (more on that with a few future albums in my collection).
The powers-that-be stuck me this time around in an office in No Man's Land (probably to spite me for leaving the first time), and I was free to fill this dead zone all day long with my glorious music. The only other person was who there with any regularity was a woman named Esther who managed a magazine for the industrial paint industry. She was nice, though I did some freelance work for her once proofreading a chart all about specialty veneers, which made me want to blow my brains out.
Anyway, I listened to this album over and over that year, especially when I was bent over that chart. Review: This is one of my favorite albums (it's the guy from James and the guy who did the instrumental Twin Peaks music). It's just lovely. I don't have much else to say. How I felt after: The way I usually feel after listening to this album—a little haunted, a little like I'm falling out of the sky, a lot like getting into my car and speeding down to the ocean in the middle of the night and drinking myself into a stupor.
Random fact I learned about this artist/album: Tim Booth played Judas in a Passion play.
What listening to this album made me think of: The girl I worked with who gave it to me after she heard me listening to the English Patient soundtrack and the Peter Gabriel Passion album and figured I would enjoy this. I politely accepted it and meant to listen to it at some point, but I think it just unintentionally ended up in the back of the CD book. It also reminds me of the Spike Lee movie Inside Man with Denzel Washington, which had a very cool Bollywood-style song during the opening credits called "Chaiya Chaiya," except that was much better than this. Review: A cover of "I Put a Spell on You" on here made me want to die. You can't beat Screamin' Jay on this one. Actually, the whole thing made me want to die. I'm tired and want to go to sleep and don't want to listen to anymore.Which bums me out, because I thought I'd really dig this. I do think her name is pretty rad, though. And I sort of liked "Mish Fadilak." How I felt after: Cultured? Nah.
Random fact I learned about this artist/album: Natacha was born in Belgium but is of Egyptian ancestry and likes to sing most of her songs in Arabic. She also collaborated with Belinda Carlisle on an album.
What listening to this album made me think of: Fuck everything. Review: Fuck everything.
How I felt after: Fuck everything.
Random facts I learned about this artist/album: Kanye West said "Sleep to Dream" contained one of the best opening lines of a song he's ever heard: "I have never been so insulted in all my life." The entire song is the shit, actually. Macy Gray also supposedly tried to cover this song and couldn't because she said it was too difficult.
What listening to this album made me think of: College. I somehow acquired this album as one of the comps we'd receive for possible review for the school magazine. I don't know if I ever listened to it before tonight. I don't think so. Review: Take the worst song from a Black Crowes album, the worst song from a Pearl Jam album, the worst song from a Live album, and the worst song performed live by your local bar band—that's this. Or maybe I was cranky because I remembered this self-imposed exercise obligation after I came back at 11:30 p.m. last night from happy hour with old work friends from 20 years ago.
How I felt after: Cranky. Confused. Melancholy. Hung out with someone I fell in love with years ago but could never pursue because he was married, and everything came flooding back and put me in "a mood." We had an excellent time, but then the evening ended. All I could do was stretch and lie staring at the ceiling. Not even bad bar-band music could snap me out of it. Oh well. I suppose I'm healthier and more limber for my troubles.
Random fact I learned about this artist/album: This album/band is supposed to be Stevie Ray Vaughn Lite. Or something like that.
What listening to this album made me think of: I'm a YES-head, and more specifically a Jon Anderson-head. I never really know what the heck he's talking about, because he's way out there, but I always feel uplifted and alive after listening to either YES or his solo stuff. I know how corny I sound, but I don't care, because I just listened to this album and it all makes sense in the moment.
Deseo is one of his ventures into world music, this one influenced by Latin and South American sounds, and it always transports me far away from wherever I am (in tonight's case, my living room floor).
Review: It's got a very similar sound to 1989's Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe album, which affected me in similar but different ways. It's alternately soothing and seductive, and I get sucked right in.
How I felt after: Relaxed. Hopeful. In love with the idea of being in love. Able to breath better. Beset with an urge to be honest, and free in that honesty. Hopeful.
Random fact I learned about this artist/album: The same year (1994) Jon Anderson released this album and Change We Must (which I also own), he sang on a kids' video game called Tuneland, designed for children ages 3 to 6 and starring Howie Mandel, with other music by members of Pink Floyd and the Doobie Brothers. Huh.
What listening to this album made me think of: I have a feeling I acquired this album as a "Selection of the Month" through my Columbia House/BMG club memberships, because I can't recall ever listening to it. Or I might have grabbed it because of "Wonderful," because there was time when I had discretionary income that allowed me to throw my money away on one song like that. Review: This album confused me. Every song was weird and loud enough to catch my attention, but so is Donald Trump (sorry, watching the GOP debate). Some songs evoked James, some a bar band, some U2, some the Beatles—none of which are inherently bad, but mashed together are...confusing. Faced with such lines as "Just standing next to you is like making love," I had to make the call, in between swigs from my Poland Spring bottle and adjusting the treadmill's incline, whether lines like that were brilliant or stupid. I did like this song, though. I hated the last song. Run with that.
How I felt after: Confused. Also a little uneasy, because when Adam Ant's "Goody Two Shoes" came out in 1982, kids in my class started calling me Goody-Goody Gidman, and not in the cool, Nathaniel Hawthorne witch-way. I was a bookworm. I was an innocent. I was a teacher's pet. I was fucked. I regressed to age 11 during this run, and it was slightly uncomfortable.
In the physical sense, my right foot has either become Diabetes Foot or Pussy Foot or something else not that's not a Good Foot, but it hurt like hell through the entire run.
Random fact I learned about this artist/album: According to the Internets, Adam Ant has some interesting-sounding tattoos, including one that shows Lord Nelson's last prayer before the Battle of Trafalgar. Nice.
