Category: Editors’ Picks

LONG PLAYER OF THE DAY: Popol Vuh, ‘Revisited & Remixed’

October 21st, 2011 | File Under: Long Player of the Day | Leave A Comment

The Artist/Album: Popol Vuh, Revisited & Remixed: 1970-1999 (SPV, 2011)

The Reason(s) We Can’t Stop Listening: If SPV’s limited box set of Herzog scores looked like a little too much Popol Vuh, this tidy collection will do the trick in terms of delivering a proper amount of percussive psych, windswept micro-symphonies, frayed circuit boards and transcendental Krautrock. While the first disc features a ‘best of’ compilation—we use that term loosely considering it splices immersive interludes and more compact pieces with two side-long tracks—is a satisfying summation of a sprawling career, the remix-driven second disc is a more revealing look at just how widespread Popol Vuh’s influence is. So while most remixed reevaluations of experimental artists fail, this one provides a thrilling alternate reality of its own, from Mika Vaino’s engrossing ambient edit of “Nachts Schnee” to the techno entrails of Moritz Von Oswald’s “Dark Development edit” for “Gärten Pharaos.” Werner would approve.

Available At: Amazon · Insound · iTunes · Spotify

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LONG PLAYER OF THE DAY: Sunny Day Real Estate, ‘Diary’

October 17th, 2011 | File Under: Long Player of the Day | Leave A Comment

The Artist/Album: Sunny Day Real Estate, Diary (Sub Pop, 1994)

The Reason(s) We Can’t Stop Listening: Forget the Hot Topic-harnessed definition of emo for a second. In our office, that Dashboard Confessional-sullied word hinges on Sunny Day Real Estate’s dagger-drawing debut, a record that reveals its mission statement right in the middle of its second song, “In Circles”: “And I dream/ To heal your wounds/ But I bleed myself/ I bleed myself.”

As whiny as those lyrics undoubtedly look on a laptop screen, they cut like a rather unforgiving knife in the hands of Jeremy Enigk, a frontman who was born to bear the weight of a thousand kids in cardigan sweaters. That includes everything from a piano-led ballad that doesn’t bore us to tears (“Pheurton Skeurto”) to a power ballad that bleeds Enigk dry (“Song About An Angel”).

Available At: Amazon · Insound · iTunes · Spotify

Direct Link: Sunny Day Real Estate, “Seven” by selftitledmag

Posted in: Long Player of the Day

LONG PLAYER OF THE DAY: The Smashing Pumpkins, ‘Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness’

October 11th, 2011 | File Under: Long Player of the Day | One comment

The Artist/Album: The Smashing Pumpkins, Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness (Virgin, 1995)

The Reason(s) We Can’t Stop Listening: Well, for starters, this sprawling masterpiece—one of the most enduring documents of the grunge era—would never get made today. And not just because Billy Corgan seems incapable of writing one hit single, let alone five. Our collective inability to focus on anything for more than five minutes at a time would also be the kiss of death for a double album that opens with a windswept piano piece (the title track) and closes with a brittle ballad (“Farewell and Goodnight,” featuring a vaporized duet from the band’s dearly missed power couple, bassist D’arcy Wretzky and guitarist James Iha).

Not that Smashing Pumpkins’ third album is an over-the-counter alternative to Ambien or anything. In many ways, Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness captures Corgan at the peak of his prickly powers; playing the part of a frontman who flattens everything in his path, from the vein-popping vocals and charred power chords of “X.Y.U” and “Tales of a Scorched Earth” to the trademark temper tantrums of “Bullet With Butterfly Wings” and “Zero.” And lurking behind all that angst is some of the band’s most ambitious work, a series of palette-stomping deep cuts that includes claustrophobic new-wave nods (“Love”), slow but steady builds (“Galapagos”) and at least two genuine epics (“Porcelina of the Vast Oceans,” “Thru the Eyes of Ruby”).

Now does anyone want to lend us $300 for the triple LP pressing?

Available At: Amazon · iTunes · Spotify

Check out some classic videos from this album below…

Posted in: Long Player of the Day

LONG PLAYER OF THE DAY: The Sheila Divine, ‘New Parade’

October 4th, 2011 | File Under: Long Player of the Day | Leave A Comment

The Artist/Album: The Sheila Divine, New Parade (Roadrunner, 1999)

The Reason(s) We Can’t Stop Listening: Nothing against our New England readers or anything, but we’ve never been a big fan of Boston. Maybe it’s because our editor hailed from Buffalo, and the ’90s were spent watching bloody goalie battles between the Bruins and the Sabres. At any rate, one thing both cities could always agree on was the Sheila Divine. An angsty alt-rock band in the post-Pearl Jam sense, they combine crunchy power chords and unrelentingly climatic choruses in a way that makes us reach for the nearest Labatt Blue and bar stool. Why? Because these are songs that you scream at the top of your lungs, from screeching modern radio favorites like “Hum” and “Like a Criminal” to more subtle mood manipulators like “Spacemilk” and “Automatic Buffalo.”

Available At: Amazon · iTunes · Spotify

Direct Link: The Sheila Divine, “Hum”

Posted in: Long Player of the Day

LONG PLAYER OF THE DAY: Mister Heavenly, ‘Out of Love’

September 20th, 2011 | File Under: Long Player of the Day, News | Leave A Comment

The Artist/Album: Mister Heavenly, Out of Love (Sub Pop, 2011)

The Reason(s) We Can’t Stop Listening: As progressively poppy as Man Man’s gotten with every passing record, their wild-eyed frontman—a Rhodes-smacking, stage-prowling Ryan Kattner—has never embraced his Top 40 tendencies as freely as he does on Mister Heavenly’s debut album. Well, maybe not today’s Top 40; more like the long-lost decades suggested by the trio’s “doom-wop” sound, as co-piloted by Joe Plummer’s raggedy drum rolls and the slightly less manic melodies of Nick Thornburn (see: the lengthy interview below). This is soda shop pop spiked with vials of strychnine, right down to its surreal references to reggae pie and doe-like Diddy eyes.

Available At: Amazon · Insound · iTunes · Spotify

Posted in: Long Player of the Day, News

LONG PLAYER OF THE DAY: Biosphere, ‘N-Plants’

September 18th, 2011 | File Under: Long Player of the Day | Leave A Comment

The Artist/Album: Biosphere, N-Plants (Touch, 2011)

The Reason(s) We Can’t Stop Listening: The story behind the steam-pressed, ambient-prone beats of Biosphere’s latest album is a chilling one—after stumbling upon an old nuclear power plant photo from an area just outside Tokyo, the producer decided to “make a soundtrack to some of [Japan's plants], concentrating on the architecture, design and localizations, but also questioning the potential radiation danger…Are they safe when it comes to earthquakes and tsunamis?”

A month after N-Plants was finished, the country suffered one of its most devastating natural disasters, an earthquake/tsunami pairing that left many people wondering about the long term effects of the nuclear power plant damage nearby. Not that any of this back story is necessary to appreciate Biosphere’s winding passages and lattice-like loops. They’re compelling with or without any context.

Available At: Amazon · Insound · iTunes · Spotify

Posted in: Long Player of the Day

LONG PLAYER OF THE DAY: Barn Owl, ‘Lost In the Glare’

September 16th, 2011 | File Under: Long Player of the Day | 2 comments

The Artist/Album: Barn Owl, Lost In the Glare (Thrill Jockey, 2011)

The Reason(s) We Can’t Stop Listening: While Evan Caminiti and Jon Porras seem to release a new solo record every couple months—or in some cases, every couple weeks—Barn Owl’s latest full-length may be their finest hour yet. With their windswept sound now rounded out by organ drones, ungodly gongs, death march drums and mangled tape manipulations, the Bay Area duo’s arrived at a wildly expressive sound that can easily switch between charred power chords (the Sunn O)))-like “The Darkest Night Since 1683″) and majestic flourishes of moonlit melodies and feedback (“Light Echoes”). Definitely a contender for our year-end charts.

Available At: Amazon · Insound · iTunes · Spotify

Posted in: Long Player of the Day

LONG PLAYER OF THE DAY: Johnny Cash, ‘American Recordings’

September 13th, 2011 | File Under: Long Player of the Day | Leave A Comment

The Artist/Album: Johnny Cash, American Recordings (American, 1994)

The Reason(s) We Can’t Stop Listening: It’s hard to imagine a time where Johnny Cash wasn’t considered the Man In Black. And yet there he was in the early ’90s, struggling to regain his footing amid a growing field of gangsta rap and grunge. Enter Rick Rubin, the Jesus freak figure behind such essential ’80s records as Licensed To Ill, Reign In Blood and Raising Hell. Unlike the many other labels and producers who’d written Cash off years ago, Rubin remembered the one thing everyone else forgot—that the country legend has one hell of a voice, a commanding presence that can hold its own against the barest of chords. From its opening scene—a gun-toting, pipe-toking reminder of how songs like “Folsom Prison Blues” were basically country-fried versions of “Straight Outta Compton”—onwards, Cash plays the part of a conflicted poet with decades of bad decisions and good luck behind him.

Five more chapters would follow American Recordings weathered lead, charting the disintegration of Cash’s voice right up until his death in September of 2003, but this installment remains one of the greatest career reboots of all time.

Available At: Amazon · Insound · iTunes · Spotify

Posted in: Long Player of the Day

LONG PLAYER OF THE DAY: Bauhaus, ‘In the Flat Field’

September 8th, 2011 | File Under: Long Player of the Day | Leave A Comment

The Artist/Album: Bauhaus, In the Flat Field (4AD, 1980)

The Reason(s) We Can’t Stop Listening: Decades before Peter Murphy hit the honky tonk club circuit as a solo artist, the Bauhaus frontman was one of the most fiery figures in the emerging goth-rock scene. In the Flat Field is the group’s iconic debut, an album so ahead of its time that most magazines panned it upon its 1980 release.

It’s an essential listen in retrospect, however; the blustery, barnstorming sound of a band hitting its relative peak—and co-authoring an entire subgenre/subculture in the process—right out of the starting gate. Don’t worry if mascara and melancholy aren’t your sort of thing, either. If you look past the legion of grave robbers that pray at Bauhaus’ altar, you’ll find a full-length that’s got as much to do with gleaming glam guitars as it does with pasty post-punk lyrics. ESSENTIAL.

Available At: Amazon · Insound · iTunes · Spotify

Posted in: Long Player of the Day

LONG PLAYER OF THE DAY: The Field, ‘Looping State of Mind’

September 6th, 2011 | File Under: Long Player of the Day | Leave A Comment

The Artist/Album: The Field, Looping State of Mind (Kompakt, 2011)

The Reason(s) We Can’t Stop Listening: More locked grooves and gorgeous/grandiose tone paintings from the Swedish sample surgeon who redefined trance music for anyone who’d rather die than be caught with a Tiësto-clogged hard drive. As simple as it all sounds on the surface, every last track is an incredibly immersive, downright transcendent experience, helped in part by the iridescent instrumentation of Axel Willner’s ever-evolving live band. Floating hasn’t felt this good in forever.

Available At: iTunes (physical version available October 10th)

Posted in: Long Player of the Day

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