Day 12

Just in case any of you are wondering, I did manage to load a new batch of CDs over the weekend. So, no I haven't been completely lazy. Although not quite productive either. Here are the lucky 16 that made it into the library:

From left to right (top row down):
The Stars Of Track And Field - A Time For Lions
Mew - Eggs Are Funny
The Concretes - WYWY
Sum 41 - Chuck
Red House Painter - Songs For A Blue Guitar
The Radio Dept - Passive Aggressive: Singles 2002–2010
The Roots - Game Theory
Cut Copy - In Ghost Colours
One Night Only - Self Titled
Lonely Dear - Dear John
Stars - The Five Ghosts
Something Corporate - Played In Space
The Drums - Summertime EP
Twilight Singers - Dynamite Steps

The latest count is:

233 albums
2,830 songs

Think I need to increase my productivity otherwise this is really gonna take awhile ...

Day 11 (Part 2)

I am fat. Well that's what my (now not so) magic helper says to me everyday ... and if that doesn't knock your confidence, subliminally you are screwed anyway. So I guess if you can't beat it, just enjoy it! Now, where did I put those tortilla chips ...

Ok, here's the promised follow up to my last entry where I said I would write a lil about Gomez, Mew, The Legends, The Radio Dept, Blonde Redhead and Primal Scream. First up - Gomez. I love this band to bits. Sure, their recent releases may not match the sheer genius of "Liquid Skin" but hey they made "Liquid Skin". That's good enough for me. I like the fact that they have never been afraid of experimenting and their sound has always been a mish-mash of blues, indie, alternative, rock and folk. The combination of the softer vocals of Ian Ball and the warm Eddie Vedder-esque rasp of Ben Ottewell's vocals works brilliantly. "A New Tide" was released in 2009 and marked a shift back to the band's more experimental roots. I will be uploading the rest of their back catalogue at some point but, for now, check out the video for "Rhythm And Blues Alibi" (from "Liquid Skin") here. By the way, their new album "Whatever's On Your Mind" has just been released in the UK ... so go get it!

Right, next up is Mew. Another incredibly talented band. Mew is a Danish indie-rock band. They formed in 1994 and released their first album in 1997 called "A Triumph For Man". This was re-issued in 2006 (which is the version I have) following the success of "Frengers" which catapulted the band onto the international indie-rock scene. I remember the first time I heard "Frengers", I was at one of the listening stations in HMV and I nearly fell over when the opening riff of "Am I Wry? No" came pounding through the headphones. The band has more ideas in one song than some bands have in 5 albums ... it is just quite amazing how the melodies, guitar riffs, multiple key/tempo changes all come together. "A Triumph For Man" gives some insight to the early works of the band, which shows the ambition but perhaps not quite the finished article. It also includes the original recording of "She Came Home For Christmas", which was re-recorded for "Frengers". Check out the video here.

Ok, I'm gonna skip The Legends and The Radio Dept (for now) because I figure I'll do a separate entry on Labrador Records and all the bands under the label. So, next on the list is Blonde Redhead. Blonde Redhead is an American rock trio comprising of Kazu Makino and twin brothers Simone and Amedeo Pace. The band's music has been described as "beautiful and vacant". "Misery Is A Butterfly" is actually the band's 6th release but the first on 4AD. The album is pretty dark and the haunting/fragile vocals of Makino capture the vulnerability of the album. I was fortunate enough to catch the band when they performed at the Esplanade in February this year. It was a beautiful set and the music was incredible. You can visit their website to see/listen to a selection of their videos.

Ok, I'm gonna take a break and save Primal Scream for another entry as well cos I need to get ready for my Sunday kickabout with the gang ... laters!

Day 11

So another week has flown by ... sigh. It is incredible and a lil scary how you never seem to know where the days go. Anyway, just picking up from my last entry, it was a historic weekend (last week) with Li Na winning the French Open. I'm not sure how quickly this will get everyone excited about tennis in China but I'm pretty sure we'll be seeing a lot more asian players on the circuit in the near future. And it was a real pity Fed couldn't cap off what was a brilliant run at Roland Garros with a win over the (at times) seemingly superhuman Nadal. I think it was the closest Fed ever got to testing Nadal at the French and we can only imagine what could have happened if Fed had won the first set ... well, here's looking forward to the green green grass of Wimbledon.

On to the music, once again, to make up for being lazy the whole week, I've force fed the lil ripper with a small bumper load of 38 CDs. This is a breakdown of the latest upload:

Snowblind - The Falls
Simian Mobile Disco - Disco Is Fixed
I'm From Barcelona - Let Me Introduce My Friends
Delays - Star Tiger Star Ariel
Waikiki - I'm Already Home
Tinie Tempah - Disc-overy
The Herbaliser - Something Wicked This Way Comes
Interpol - Self Titled
Cut Copy - Bright Like Neon Love
Black Kids - Partietraumatic
Primal Scream - Beautiful Future
Common - Be
White Lies - To Lose My Life
White Lies - Ritual
Wiley - See Clear Now
Blonde Redhead - Misery Is A Butterfly
I Am Kloot - Play Moolah Rouge
Stereo MCs - Double Bubble
Adem - Homesongs
Nelson - Lightning Strikes Twice
Gomez - A New Tide
Mr Scruff - Ninja Tuna
Midlake - The Courage Of Others
Alone II - The Home Recordings of Rivers Cuomo
Funeral For A Friend - Your History Is Mine: 2002 - 2009
The Mary Onettes - Islands
Closer To Heaven - Original Cast Recording (Musical By Pet Shop Boys/Jonathan Harvey)
New Found Glory - Self Titled (10th Anniversary Edition)
The Strokes - Angles
The Legends - Facts And Figures
The Music - Strength In Numbers
Mando Diao - Give Me Fire!
Lostprophets - Start Something
The Early November - The Room's Too Cold
The Candy Skins - Space I'm In
The Radio Dept - Clinging To A Scheme
Kula Shaker - Pilgrim's Progress
Mew - A Triumph For Man

There are quite a few gems in there. Not sure where to start really. Let's see ... err ok this is going to be a cop out because I'm not sure I have enough energy to start this so I'm gonna save it for the next entry. Gomez, Mew, The Legends, The Radio Dept, Blonde Redhead, Cut Copy, Primal Scream all deserve a paragraph (or more) each and it's gonna take me all night to get thru all of them. It's 1:36 am so my bed is beckoning ... yawn

The CD count is:

213 albums
2568 songs

Back soon.

Day 10

To make up for some lost time, I've fed in a bumper crop of 54 albums to the lil ripper today. This is just the first instalment of what I am hoping/aiming to get through this weekend ...

I pulled most of the first stash from the inner stack of the 'L' section of my CD library so there quite a few albums which (a) I've completely forgotten ever owning, (b) I'm not sure I've listened to and (c) I wonder why I even bought them in the first place! ... anyway here's the full list of the first upload:

Laptop - The Old Me v The New You
Len - You Can't Stop The Bum Rush
Liars - Fins To Make Us More Fish-like
Liars - They Threw Us All In A Trench And Stuck A Monument On Top
John Frusciante - Niandra Lades And Usually Just A T Shirt
John Frusciante - Shadows Collide With People
Jon Spencer Blues Explosion - Acme
Laika - Sounds Of The Satellites
Lambchop - Nixon
Lambchop - Aw Cmon No You Cmon
Nine Inch Nails - Broken
Nine Inch Nails - The Downward Spiral
Nine Inch Nails - The Fragile
JPS Experience - Bleeding Star
Jubilee Allstars - The North Frederick Lane EP
Juliana Hatfield - Only Everything
Juliana Hatfield - Become What You Are
The Justin Warfield Supernaut - Self Titled
The Kelly Deal 6000 - Go To The Sugar Altar
Live - Secret Samadhi
Live - Birds Of Pray
Lizard Music - Fashionably Lame
Limp Bizkit - Chocolate Starfish And The Hot Dog Flavored Water
Mr Ed Jumps The Gun - Boom! Boom!
Lilys - Eccsame The Photon Band
Lilys - Services (For The Soon To Be Departed)
Lilys - Better Can't Make Your Life Better
Jason Becker - Perspective
Kings Of Leon - Youth & Young Manhood
Kings Of Leon - Holy Roller Novocaine
Kyuss - Muchas Gracias
Kula Shaker - Kollected
Tokyo Police Club - Champ
Fabriclive - Cut Copy
Jimmy Eat World - Invented
Athlete - Singles 01-10
Tokio Hotel - Humanoid
Ferry Corsten - The Very Best Of
Public Enemy - How You Sell Soul To A Soulless People Who Sold Their Soul?
Bent - Best Of
Those Dancing Days - Daydreams & Nightmares
Valencia - This Could Be A Possibility
The Teenagers - The World Is Not Fair EP
Godspeed You Black Emperor - Slow Riot For New Zero Kanada EP
Godspeed You Black Emperor - F♯ A♯ ∞
Love Is All - Nine Times That Same Song
Eve 6 - Horrorscope
The Montrose Avenue - Thirty Days Out

Some random comments: anyone remember Len? If there was ever a one-hit wonder band - that would be them. I bought (as probably hundreds of other people did) their album solely for the single "Steal My Sunshine", which I have to say is still a great song. It's one of those perfect pick-me-up-sunday-morning-drive-with-the-top-down-assuming-you-have-one songs. I was searching the net for the video and it turns out that TRL did in fact run a program featuring one-hit wonder bands and what do know ... you can catch the video here.

One band which was and still is (to my mind) one of the coolest acts around is Kula Shaker. I remember when they first burst onto the scene back in 1995, it was a complete breath of fresh air since no one else was playing their brand of music, which was heavily influenced by Indian culture/spiritualism and fused with Hendrix-esque guitar riffs that just rocked you outta your seat. Simply incredible stuff! Their first single "Tattva" captures all of that mysticism and psychedelic rock spirit. Check out the video here.

Unfortunately, the band came under the gun a few years later for comments made by their frontman (Crispin Mills) regarding Nazism. The negative publicity surrounding the incident hurt record sales but was not, apparently, the reason why the band broke up in 1999. The band later reformed in 2004 and have since released 2 new albums (Strangefolk and Pilgrim's Progress).

Ok, time to take a break and catch the Women's final of the French Open, which could be a historic event if Li Na wins. She would be the first Asian woman ever to win a Grand Slam so no pressure there! Jia You!

And the current CD count is:

183 albums
2,198 songs

Back in a bit ...