Thursday, January 12, 2006

What, …hunh? Did somebody say something? …sorry sir, could you repeat the question?…school was never this bad…the peer pressure!…marc, have another beer…why are you leaving so soon? you,ve only had six!….marc, when are going to get an mp3 player…a digital camera….a blackberry…high def tv decoder! Marc, when are you going to take some time off work so you can post something on the blog! Marc, when are we going skiing…well, considering the weather, at least I’m off the hook for the skiing.

Ok, ok, so I guess maybe I should make an effort on my top ten of the year before I have to start worrying about buying Christmas presents for 2006.

2005 was a peculiar year for me. In it’s twelve months, I don’t think I ever really got excited about anything other than work….how sad is that? No running, no biking, no climbing, no skiing, and way to little time spent with music, friends and loved ones (in no particular order). Maybe 2006 will see a change in that, although I somehow doubt it.

When I was young, I remember lamenting my father’s growing lack of interest in music over the years and it disturbed me because I could not understand how someone who had such a passion for something could loose it. Over the past few months I have found music taking a back seat in my life as well, and although it’s not as if I don’t have an interest…I just have little time for it…and I don’t even have kids!

So here goes. Since I bought scarcely 10 recordings 2005 my list is going to take on a slightly flavour…but then I always feel the pressure to be unconventional anyway.

#1 indie compilation: “Melodies” by KP? Sweet, energizing, crafted, and soulful. Finishing with Brubeck brought it all back home! Nicely done!

#1 worst highly anticipated compilation that I actually bought : Giles Peterson “digs America” I really expected more from this guy; Britain’s lord of the crates…he digs deep into the bins and usually come up with gems but his year he seems to have come up with a handful of beat up 45’s that were transferred directly to digital. The audio quality on a lot of this stuff blows and although some of the trax do have soul, the comp lacks direction and coherence.

#1 album released by a singer song writer that scored a score of classics over thirty years ago. Bruce Springsteen’s “Devil and Dust” Dark and gritty at times, always genuine and somehow manages to tweak the genre enough to bring new blood to the surface. …indeed, Stuart, a precious few artists are good for more that 10 years!

#1 album featuring an upright bass, violin, French horn, trumpet and a typewriter. Belle Orchestre. The concert at the music gallery blew me away (thanks Derek), and although the album has really strong moments, to me it somehow looses the thread on occasions. The sound is so different that maybe it’s me…I’m not able to stretch myself to fit within the space of the music. I find the production of the album fascinating, but the jury is still out on all the intervening street noise. That having been said, I really have the feeling that I am in an another physical space when I listen to this recording.

#1 Swedish pop rock album that I was able to buy used before it was actually released in Canada: The Shout Out Louds “Howl Howl Gaff Gaff”. Really good solid, driving pop. O.k, it turns a little Cure at times but we can excuse it for that, can’t we? Favourite stupid line from Oh sweatheart: “Someone studies archYtecture, someone works with fabric texture.” What’s that all about?

#1 revisited album: I had picked up Metric “Live It Out” back in the summer and was disappointed in it perhaps only because it was not what I was expecting it to be. The great thing about a year end review is that it forces you to look back at things that you might have overlooked though the year. “Live It Out” is a well structured album with many decent trax. Besides, you have to give cudos to an album that has a track called “Patriarch on a Vespa”

#1 disappointing follow up that I have not yet been able to get my head around: Broken Social Scene. It lacks the sweetness, drive, charm, craft and diversity of “You Have It In People”…I just don’t get it….yet. I’ll give it another try…again. To me it is still just a bunch of noise! I loved YHIIP to death. If it were on vinyl it would be worn out; but this, it just doesn’t click with me as much as I want it to.

#1 new-to-me band/album. Spoon: “Gimme Fiction” This was fresh and exciting. Nothing groundbreaking at all, but well worth listening in a “I want something that I don’t hear on the radio but is not too out there kinda way”

#1 industry discovery of a recording that was hidden deep in the library of congress…I don’t even have to go there do I ?

#1 album from a short bald guy who often deifies himself on stage: Moby. “Hotel” This is really solid stuff, and although it is not as ground breaking as “Play” was, both “18” and “Hotel” are really good offerings of well crafted songs assembled in fluid packages. The problem with creating an album like “Play” is that you set the “inventive” bar so high that few artists ever meet other’s expectations. A shame in a way that an artists work should be disregarded on the merits of it’s not living up to former brilliance.

#1 concert for which I have yet to buy any of the bands music. The Decemberists

#1 album that I have only heard a few trax of…have never seen and certainly do not own a copy of but am sure to pick up before the next get together: Nostalgia77 “The Garden”

#1 comfort food album: Jack Johnson “In Between Dreams” (no Brian, not that Jack Johnson…the other one!). Call it what you will…a guilty pleasure?…I can’t get enough of Jack Johnson. Something about his simple words and easy, melodic guitar… it’s a happy place for me to go, and it takes me there every time I put it on. Jack’s music brings contentedness to my body and soul and wafts of ocean salts and the moistness of air ripped by the breeze from a warm surf . It’s all good when I listen to JJ!
Peace, love and happiness.

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