My Own Biggest Fan

I’m a fan of Gavin Friday’s third album, Shag Tobacco. It’s crazy campy and over the top and sleazy sexual.

Each Man Kills the Thing He Loves, Friday’s first album, is like a slightly less ridiculous version of Shag. Gavin’s sense of humour doesn’t get shown off as much in this one, nor is there the hyper-sexuality I associate with Shag Tobacco. While I was listening to it I felt a little let down by this one, but about half way through I started getting into it. It feels more weary and retrospective, but only someone who heard Shag first, (or an idiot) could call this album “understated” though.

The album’s title and opening song is from an Oscar Wilde poem, about a man who slit his wife’s throat with a sword. The man was hanged in the same prison at the time that Wilde was incarcerated there for “performing homosexual acts”. If that’s any indication of what Friday is all about. (Not the misogyny part, the “holy shit life is a dramatic thing” part.)

There are magnificent cacophonies, messes of sound that I’d say took considerable engineering skill to not turn into an unlistenable sludge. There’s a Scott Walker cover, a Bob Dylan cover and a shout out to David Bowie’s Watch That Man, so he’s got a spectacular tripod of influences to prop his special brand of pop on.

I dig this album, it fits a niche mood where I’m feeling melancholy, yet cocky. Or maybe if I need a soundtrack to a particularly sad make-out.

Download Love is Just a Word

I was going to make some sort of clever-clever amalgamation of artists to describe FrankMuzic’s sound, but really it’s just pop music with a very self conscious nod towards the 80s. So much so that there are a few songs one could almost think that they were recorded 25 years ago. At one point there’s even a full scale ripoff of Golden Brown. (Think the relationship between Connection and Three Girl Rhumba)

The vocals remind me a little of Patrick Wolf at times, and sometimes the music sounds like A-Ha, so I guess you could say they are an amalgam of them, but I every time I use a combination of other bands to describe a third’s sound I feel like I’m being lazy. And really, there’s a bit more variety than that on the album … but fuckit, I’m tired, and it’s not like anyone paid to read this, so I’ll be lazy.

For my selection I’ve picked Time Will Tell because you can’t really go wrong lifting the same samples as Pump Up The Volume.

Download Time Will Tell

To be honest, I have no idea where this album came from. It appeared in my iTunes out of nowhere. No idea where or why I downloaded it. It happened to be listed close to my last MONM selection and me being as lazy as I am decided to just listen to that, rather than seek out something on my list.

I’ll be honest, I’m not the person that should be reviewing this album. I’m not a big fan of low-fi bands, or the warbal-ly singing that the lead singer employs. I was annoyed by the first 5 of the 9 songs on […]Grievances, but then the song named after the band bought me flowers (it reminded me very vaguely of The Clash) and then the epic No Future Part One and Two, (almost 15 minutes long put together) took me out to dinner and then made-out with me. This all came as a huge surprise considering how much the first half annoyed me. This album and I are the Sam Malone and Diane Chambers of MONM. I’ll admit, the winks towards classic Springsteen at times helped a ton.

I gave the album a second listen, to see if I was wrong about the first half. I’m still not into it but I’m sure there are a ton of people that will say I just “don’t get it”, and they would be right. Enjoy the parts I liked from this album below.

Download No Future Part One
Download No Future Part Two

I really really REALLY wanted to hate this album. Mostly because of that ridiculous title. (apparently it’s not pronounced Oh-verry, but Uh-verry like it would be pronounced if the hyphen never existed. Makes. Sense?) The only reason I checked it out is because it debut at #1 in the UK and has Ellie Goulding on it.

I enjoy Craig David. I enjoy Lil’ Wayne. I can handle a bit of Dizzy Rascal. If these guys annoy you, if you hate commercial R&B or if the words “over-produced” at all turn you off, you aren’t going to enjoy this album. I’m not saying this is quality R&B or Hip Hop, and I’m not even saying that if you like those other artists, you’ll like this. This is music that will blare out of cars that have more money put in aftermarket than they cost new, play in college dorms, and at every club in Brighton — while drunk kids slobber all over each other. It’s made for that, and I kind of love it for it.

There is enough going on here that that’s not ALL there is here, I mean there’s some sort of interesting sounds here. It’s heavily influenced by chiptune sounds and decent classic drum and bass rhythms. It also has enough 90s style lead stabs to speak to my inner 20-year-old. If I was 20, I’d totally be throwing this on all the mix CDs I was making this winter. And I’ll be looking for Tinie’s second album for sure.

Download

The Month of New Music. Where a loosely affiliated collection of people online try to listen to a “new to you” album a day. I’m stupid enough to give myself the additional commitment of a few (ostensibly, intelligent) words here. Last year I only managed seventeen albums out of an intended thirty one, because, let’s face it, I’m no good with commitment. In order to keep this fresh for me, I’m going to try and keep the writing down to a few sentences per album. Alright babies, let’s try this shit again.

If how loudly you listen to an album is any indication of how much one likes an album, I must fucking love this one. This album sounds like a gig in a train tunnel; and turning it up loud is necessary to get the full effect. I’m certainly reminded of Jesus and Mary Chain, maybe a little of Stereolab and at times the good bits of Oasis. The track I’ve chosen to give to you is quite Marychainy, I chose it because it sounded like what I’d imagine a surf rock band would sound like if it played on Twin Peaks.

Download

There Mason, that wasn’t so bad was it? 30 more to go.

Ping. Apple’s new musical social media experiment. It would be an interesting add-on to iTunes, but it falls far short of actually being useful. It reminds me a ton of Facebook, with it’s hard to read timeline and the vague “Like” function, and reminds me not-at-all of Last.fm, who got this exact idea exactly right. Apple has utterly ignored what Last.fm got right because of their desire to use Ping primarily as a way to sell songs through the iTunes Music Store and not as a fun and cool place for their customers to find new music.

How does Ping fail in both usability and in usefulness? Let me count the ways.

1: If it’s not int the iTMS, it’s not allowed. Ridiculous. Some of my favourite albums are not available there. Major label albums. Suede have zero songs there. Pulp’s final album? Like it never existed. All of the 12″ and bootleg remixes I find on mp3 blogs? Won’t find them here. Apple’s little network is so embarassingly MOR that it’s primary goal “To help people find new music” is laughably unobtainable.
2: No real-time display of what’s being listened to.
3: Can’t right click a song in my music library and add to Ping (have to add in iTMS).
4: No easy way to find friends.
5: The genres are too broad. (“Alternative”? REALLY?) / No sub-genres.
6:The “Music I Like” area isn’t self explanatory. At first I didn’t know it only pertained to that bit in the top right corner of my profile, I thought it managed all the info that went through my profile. How about calling it: “My Favourite Songs”?
7: No explicit notification when someone comments on one of your Posts.
8: What the heck is the difference between a Like and a Post anyway? A Post lets you comment, so why would I just Like something then?
9: Once I Like something, either an album or someone’s activity, there is no way for me to find it again, it just goes into the ether. If it’s meant to be a bookmark for later reference, it fails miserably at it.

What the hell is this?:

Where do you suppose the logic is in being able to Like the fact that I Liked an album? I’m amazed I can’t Like me Liking my Like. I can’t believe that sentence was something I felt I needed to write. I can even Like me Liking someone else’s Like of a song. The ability to do THAT is exactly what the internet has been waiting for!

Ping will probably to be something I play around for maybe the next week or so and then forget about. The first two items I mention are reason enough for me to not care about it. So, if you want, you can friend me there under Mason Hastie. Or if you want to ACTUALLY trade info about what we ACTUALLY listen to, you can go to my Last.fm profile.

Last night I was asked to choose five albums to be stranded on a desert island with. I’ve played this game before and my list always comes up short. It’s a tough one.

Last night I accidentally denied myself Suede’s Dog Man Star, which I’d replace my last item with (sorry, Boss):

1: Spiritualized — Ladies and Gentlemen We are Floating in Space
2: David Bowie — Low
3: Scott Walker — Scott 4
4: Beastie Boys — Check Your Head
5: Bruce Springsteen — Nebraska
5: Suede — Dog Man Star

The only reason I chose the Beasties over Bruce is because I needed something upbeat. Check Your Head is the only hip hop/funk album I’ve listened to for over 15 years and not gotten sick of.

What are the albums YOU can’t live without?

The Month of New Music ended long ago, but listening to this album feels like a continuation of my futile exorcise in listening . I’m a big fan of Sly Stone, The Spinners, etc. — I like the funk. I’m probably an unlikely funk fan, considering how whitebread my upbringing was and also my nature in general. I’m pretty sure that anyone who hangs out with me for a moderate amount of time would consider me completely unfunky. (my good friends know just how unapologetically off my music tastes divert sometimes, into territory that many of them find embarassing)

I received this album from Mark Hamilton, main man in Woodpigeon. A man as unlikely as any to feel the funk. He was trimming his collection and he told me to take this album in particular. (considering he was giving away this album tells us that he probably isn’t a closet funkmeister) If there’s one thing I trust Mark on, it’s his musical advice. He recommends things that he thinks I’ll like, not the things he does. I’m grateful for this recommendation especially, this is at least as good as Sly and the Family Stone’s earlier albums like A Whole New Thing or Life. I’ve only listened to it once through, (¾ of the way as of writing this sentence) but I’m certain that on relistening there will be stand out tracks.

One song in particular grabbed me, “I Have Changed” and it’s one fun fricking funk anthem. Coincidentally it started just as I was considering what I was going to say before writing this paragraph. It’s the lone survivor of this album within the digital milieu because it was put on the compilation Super Cool California Soul 2. Hence, it’s singular availability. Something else I learned while researching this post, HP Riot has auspicious beginnings that speak to me directly. Here’s an excerpt from the informative blog post found here.

Despite several attempts to uncover details about the band and the recording session, this LP remains one of the most mysterious in my entire collection. The band (known as H.P. Riot) was named after its San Francisco home neighbourhood that was marred by race riots in 1966. The band has often been confused as being Canadian because they spent much of their time touring western Canada. Concept Records was based in Regina, Saskatchewan – not exactly a funk music hotbed. It almost appears like this band signed a record deal while on tour.

I’m originally from Regina and the fact that a funk band from San Francisco, a REALLY good funk band, could come out to western Canada and feel at home (one member even stayed in Edmonton after playing in H.P. Riot) says something to me. What that is, I’ve no idea, but it borders curiosity, pride and amusement. Anyway, go over to The Basement Rug and download the album if you are so inclined. If you at all like Sly Stone, James Brown, The Spinners, even early Stevie Wonder, you’ll probably enjoy H.P. Riot.

I don’t know about you, but I have certain albums and songs that I habitually listen to when I get home at 3am from a late night boozing it up with friends — most likely louder than I should expect my neighbours to deal with politely. I’ve put together a sampler of music I tend to listen to in the wee hours, when I’ve had more than my share of libations and am feeling particularly sentimental, introspective or melancholic. For the record, I’ve done this tonight because I’ve had libations and I’ve been feeling particularly sentimental, introspective or melancholic.

The amusement I’m getting from repetition as a joke is a red flag, so I’ll leave you with a link to the mix and wish you goodnight. Enjoy, and please let me know what you think in the comments.

Feeling it.

You know what I think is an entirely reasonable thing to do?

Buy this book:

And then for shits and giggles attempt to download each piece of music recommended and listen to them in order.

I’ve spent the past two days attempting to find and download music from The Medieval, Renaissance, and Elizabethan Ages (chapter 1) on Bittorrent. It is as easy to find as you might expect. Short term goal: I’m hoping that when I’m done this chapter, Enigma won’t be my only point of reference when I hear a Latin mass being sung.

It’s a 700 page book, it seems to average about five recommendations per page. At the rate of — at most — three pieces per week… well, this isn’t a project I expect to finish anytime soon.