Moon Safari

Moon Safari by Air today, and I will be honest with you, I was pre-empting this to be the best that A could offer, its an album I like very much and should be rather conducive to pleasant drives in early summer sun. The weather helped this morning and the congestion around Coleshill was not going to dampen my mood.
But lets be objective about it. This is an album that has soundtracked so many home makeover programmes, reveal section, every track pictured in my mind Kevin McLoud extolling the virtues of a seed roof or rococo architecture, or Sarah Beenie criticising someone for going over budget because they fancied a granite worktop, this is the soundtrack to a Channel 4 produced home improvement show and there was no getting around that.
Also the over-use of the vocoder made me picture the Rah Band on Clouds across the moon, or was that the Zap Band, its neither here nor there, it was vocoder heavy.
So what of the album, it is one of my favourites ever and the fact that it is used by the UK's versions of Ty Pennington doesn't distract me from it, every track is rather gorgeous and due to the aforementioned congestion I got to hear it all twice. I recommend it heartily and think it should be a mainstay of every record collection. 9.5 out of 10, dropped half a point as they should have used a project manager.



Kelly Watch the Stars by Air

The Week Never Starts Round Here

I have learned not to trust weathermen, or in the case of GMTV, weathergirls (why is it weathergirls and weather men and not weather boys?) The weather girl this morning, not the delightful Claire Nazir I might add, but some Scots woman drafted in to cover her holiday/sick/maternity leave, delete as applicable. Anyway, Scots weathergirl said it would be fine, it wasn’t fine, it was grim, it was very grim, and it was made all the more grimmer by Arab Strap, for they provided the soundtrack and that soundtrack was The Week Never Starts Round Here.
Arab Strap, certainly on this album are the musical equivalent of The Dementors from Harry Potter, sucking every bit of life, joy and optimism out my commute, I entered a fog of despair in Stafford and didn’t come out of the other side until I was minutes away from Coleshill.
Arab Strap I daresay have never had a review where somewhere it doesn't say dour. I don’t even know what dour means, but I bet they are it.
That all said, some Arab Strap songs feature amongst my favourites, namely The Love Detective, Hey Fever and The First Big Weekend, and it was the latter that influenced me into buying this album, and even that doesn’t lift it from the depths of overriding ennui. You see, on songs like The First Big Weekend, where the vocal is effectively a monologue, you have to listen, but as the vocals on the album are so low in the mix, you are craning to hear, it’s the same for all of the album, you really can’t hear things too well, which on a song that’s chorus driven, it really doesn’t matter, after all you don’t really need to have “Hey Mickey, you’re so fine, you’re so fine, you blow my mind” really loud over the instruments, as it is repeated, you get the gist of it, well you may need to hear it better if you are an acquaintance of Toni Basil, you are named Michael, you are wondering if you are fine, and what Toni Basils mind does in your presence, then, and only then perhaps you might need the instrumentation turned down a notch. This isn’t Toni Basil though, this is Aiden Moffatt, telling a story, mumbled at best, over instruments, I still do not know what they did on their first big weekend.
So, I quite like one track on a dreadful dreadful album, how does that equate in my scoring system, 1 out of 13



The First Big Weekend by Arab Strap

Vehicles And Animals

I had a look this morning, I am definitely nearing the end of the A’s, only around 4 to go. In the meantime this mornings commute CD was Athletes debut, Vehicles and Animals.Now you may wonder how I came to own this, I ask myself the same question, it’s a copy if that puts any more sense to it, 2002 it seems that it must have had a place in my heart back then. I recall only ever playing this once, and that was at a bar b q where I got very very drunk, no, drunker than that, VERY drunk. So in effect outside of the singles the material on this album was all new to me.
I like Wires by Athlete, its an inoffensive song that I wouldn’t turn off if it came on the radio, that really is the extent of my Athlete liking, Joel Potts voice always seems astonished, you know, say in a drama class some one said “show me astonished” well he has adopted astonished as his singing voice.
That aside, I have a foggy memory that me and Lisa liked a song off this album for its video, Beautiful and that may have been the reason for having this album. So what of it? Much cop? If you get past that they will always be a V festival mid bill band, whats the album like?
I liked it, I really did, I got past the astonished vocals and all that came with it and enjoyed it, the singles are pretty strong, El Salvador, Beautiful, Westside and You Got The Style, and the album tracks if anything are stronger, yes its inoffensive pop in the vein of Snow Patrol (wait till the S’s, I have a large amount of Snow Patrol), or Starsailor (and these), it may have a political, or I suspect religious, message but you know as I am concentrating more on overtaking a seed lorry and less on the lyrics of Athlete, I can let all that go. An inoffensive 7 out of 10.



Beautiful by Athlete

Footprints Through The Snow

Alphabetically speaking it was the turn of ant today, Ant Harding and namely his last album, Footprints through the Snow, released on Homesleep records. Ant being a multi instrumentalist from the Isle of Wight that now resides in Malmo. Home Sleep I think is an Italian label.
I like Ant, and have effectively been following his career, its difficult to be subjective really but as I gave one of his other albums 6.5 I think I can and will be.
Todays journey through the midlands was a bleak one, the sky was black, torrential flooding was occurring, thunder, lightening and my soundtrack was Ant Harding, it was it has to be said a perfect soundtrack, the weather outside was frightful but the soundtrack was so de… you get the idea of that.
I personally think this album is the best piece of work he has recorded, he releases a reasonable amount of EP’s (he has just put one out recently, more details over at http://www.antpop.com/) and few albums, but I think personally this album is his best offering. Its love again, unless it is all metaphors and really he is speaking about Norwegian Swedish political relations and not about his life in Sweden, I will wager it’s the latter, its what he does well.
The songs on the album are better formed than any of his earlier works and his songwriting skill definitely kicked up a notch, you hear more of his influences breaking through as well, but not running all over the songs, Clifford T ward I know he is a fan of, similarly Drake, they are apparent, but not over bearing, Antony is his own man and the over riding voice is his. 9 out of 10.

Londinium

Commute soundtrack today was Londinium by trip hop band, Archive. An album it has to be said I have been looking forward to. For a very brief period in the mid nineties I really did like Archive, I liked their sound and the fact that it wasn’t out and out dance music.
Wikipedia has bought me up to date on them and it appears they didn’t split up, they carried on doing what they do but along the way losing the female vocalist from Londinium, Roya Arab and also briefly losing the rap guy Rosko John, only for him to return this year.
So Londinium, a magnificent album that was as enjoyable today on the A38 as it was when I bought it in 1996. If anything a little better as I am hearing things a little differently.
I hear the world music influence that possibly Roya Arab may have bought in, yes they are doing a similar thing to Portisheads Dummy and both albums are fantastic but Archive were always better in my opinion as they released an album that was extremely strong from start to finish, that still sounds fresh, (fr-fr-fresssshhh) and in my opinion doesn’t really produce any clichés.
The stand out track is definitely So Few Words and it was this single that I bought prior to buying Londinium, gorgeous vocals all over it and utterly the the best soundtrack so far to my commute. Therefore 9 out of 10.

Sugar Sugar

An Archies retrospective today, Sugar Sugar is its name, after their biggest and pretty much only hit. The Archies weren’t a real band as they were a cartoon, a 60’s cartoon that was pretty lightweight to be honest, this isn’t Raw Power. It is ok in a 60’s exploitation pop kind of way, there are more bandwagons on this album than John Waynes entire film career. That all said it is executed perfectly because Jeff Barry was the main songwriter and amongst other things Jeff Barry was responsible for Leader of the pack.
The album then, an enjoyable journey, background music is what it could be described as, I wasn’t craning an ear as it is pop after all, get in, get out and if you can do it under 2 minutes that would be excellent thank you.
I recall buying this album when I worked at Virgin, I think I bought a ridiculously expensive Lesley Gore album at the same time, this wasn’t ridiculously expensive. That all said a straight down the middle 5 out of 10.

The Autonomists

I thought I was coming to the end of the A’s, I looked this morning and I have at least another week of A’s, at the very minimum. Today though, the soundtrack to my commute was the self titled album by The Autonomists, what the Italian political movement? No, the British political punk band.
This album was given to me by the same man, a very close friend who also gave me the auf Der Mer album, he also gave me a Tuuli album, so its not all bad.
I really will apologise to him for this review, as I say he is a close friend and he not only went to the trouble of giving me this disc but he also knows the band. Sorry Paul.
I have quite a dislike for UK punk, particularly political UK punk, there are some exceptions, notably Stiff Little Fingers, but The Autonomists are all over the place, essentially taking their cue from Operation Ivy, more punk than ska but a mish mash of influences that Op Ivy had. Now the music is the usual punk fodder, but the lyrics are just dreadful, anarcho ramblings about the system, up the punx kind of stuff, and they have an anarchist symbol as the A of their name.
Thankfully the album was finished by the time I got to Lichfield and I saw no point in repeating it, so the car stereo went off. Not fun, not fun at all, a bigger chore than AC/DC. 0 out of 10.

Young Lust: The Aerosmith Anthology Disc 2

Disc 2 today and its shaping up to be better, the 80’s rock quotient is still high, but its Aerosmith so its like complaining that there is cheese in a cheese sandwich. They are heading for a little later career fodder on the second disc, Crazy, Eat the Rich and a faithful cover of The Doors love me two times, I think vocal duties on the latter are given over to Joe Perry as it doesn’t sound too much like Steven Tyler. Yesterday they did Hangman Jury which tellingly has been the best song so far, but you know as it goes, 5 out of 10 for this disc so for the album, an average of 4.5 out of 10.

Young Lust: The Aerosmith Anthology Disc 1

Continuing the Rock, Young Lust: The Aerosmith Anthology. One of many many Aerosmith Greatest Hits that exist, including boxsets I think they have about 8, they like compilations it seems. This album being long and a double album might mean that it stretches over two days. I am part way through the first disc, so in all likelihood it will be disc 2 tomorrow.
I asked for this one Christmas form Lisa and I think chopped down it would absolutely fantastic, of the 13 tracks listened to so far I like about half, that should indicate really that this is going to get a 5?
I quite like Aerosmith though, I like their image, their ethic, what they do and how they sound, I like that they remind me of the Stones, I just want more tunes out of them that this G.Hits isn’t giving me. It may happen on disc 2 and it this was an original album it would have got a 5, but as they are professing that the hits are great. 4 out of 10.

Let There Be Rock

LET THERE BE ROCK!!!!! No that’s not a call to arms, that’s todays album, by AC/DC, obviously and I state now, some people are going to be offended by this little review. I realised some time back that AC/DC are definitely a greatest hits band, I have heard albums by them and its really a chore getting through it, and let there be rock is only 8 songs long, I got through it twice this morning and I was frowning 3 songs in.
Why are AC/DC considered the epitome of cool and Status Quo aren’t? I mean for my money Status Quo have better songs and the two bands do plough a similar chugging well worn furrow, so why is one considered a bit of a joke and the other sells out the largest venues all over the world?
Anyway, outside of Whole lotta rosie I found this album tedious in the extreme, no real peaks or troughs, plug in the chug along guitar, the whiney vocals and talk about ladies and stuff. I love rock, I really do, classic vintage rock in particular and their greatest hits I am sure is chock full of great hits, but fucking hell, I have to sit through it a couple of more times on the way home. 0 out of 10.

ANThology

Anthology by Alien Ant Farm, as I have mentioned previously Alien Ant Farm are my guilty pleasure and one that I am really quite guilty about, them, Bowling for Soup, Sum 41 and Garth Brooks. I do have shame. But not that much.
So anthology, sorry ANThology, I quite like this album, quite a lot actually, I did think that I liked it more than the follow TruAnt, but hearing them close together, Truant comes out on top and I might have to readdress its mark out of 10, but this isn’t about Truant.
Anthology is the album that contains their take on Smooth Criminal, and the follow up, Movies, my favourite track on the album, but the album as a whole is utterly enjoyable, and one of few that I am looking forward to hearing a few times on the commute home. Some people may think it may have dated a little, its from 2001 if I recall rightly, but I don’t think so, yes there was all that Nu-mental and pop punk stuff happening then but if you look beyond that to the album as a whole and the clumsy naming, its really a very good album. Am I protesting too much? 7 out of 10.

Waking The Fallen

Todays trip down the CD lane came courtesy of metal band Avenged Sevenfold, that’s METAAAAAAAALLLL!!!!!. Their 2003 album Waking the Fallen, an album that I utterly adored when it was first released and in a nutshell, take away the truly metal lyrics, its still a pretty damn fine album, considering that they briefly turned into Poison on a later album, thank heaven for small mercy’s. But every staple has a yawn and although it is a pretty good album, it does, like most of its genre, age very badly, the screaming vocals that were very VERY popular in 2003, seem altogether misguided now and the best vocals are the ones that M Shadows delivers straight. That’s said it’s a minor annoyance.
I didn’t think to much of the follow up, I may have it, the forthcoming weeks will tell me that, and I think I am hitting a bit of a rock patch with the CD’s. I digress, I saw Avenged Sevenfold at Reading Festival one year, they really disappointed me and so I kind of stopped listening to them after that, it is therefore nice to listen to this one. Also its the first CD that I never finished on my commute, that said I did shave 10 minutes off the time. 5 out of 10.

Alone With Everybody

I was on my way to work this morning, just past Rugeley and it appeared that hell froze over, I know, its weird, and there was snowballs, and above me, a pig flying, and finally I found out that our king was none other than Pease Pudding and his reign was in full swing.

That all said, todays commute CD was one that I was given by my brother in law and up to this point had never been played, it was likely to remain that way into the far future, and it has to be said I was dithering as to if I should break my rules and skip it. I didn’t and so todays CD was Alone With Everybody by Richard Ashcroft. I must stress now I am not a fan of The Verve, not their early, mid, late or reformation stuff, they are the antithesis of what I look for in music and I make no apologies that if you like them, you have given up on music, seriously, you probably like Weller as well and find Oasis the ultimate band, in that case really we have little in common and you should de-friend me rather sharpish.

That all said, remove the singles form this Ashcroft album and you know, it aint half bad, its country rock in its barest form, outside of all the posturing and him going mad with the effects, it really is well written and the Dead, CSNY and The Byrds feature heavily, Gram Parsons WAS part of his soundtrack that year. Which works for me and was a pleasant surprise, prior to listening I was definitely going to put Shit! And 0 out of 10. How wrong can you be. Enjoyable. 6 out of 10

I WAs The King, I Really Was The King

Animals that Swim today and their album, I was the King, I really was the king. Just to remind you, I am going through all of my CD albums in the order that they are on the shelf, they are alphabeticised, but loosely, so all the A’s are together but not massively so. I play one CD for the entirety of my commute, there and back, regardless of its quality.
So Animals That Swim. We bought an EP of theirs prior to getting this album, Pink Carnations and it is potentially one of my favourite ever EP’s, released around the time Pulp and My Life Story’s very British sound was reasonably popular, Animals that swim could only do good right? Well they did get a bit of press from the NME and their like but they didn’t set the world on fire. I was the king, I really was the king was the album that followed up that ep, and the themes run a similar path, without sounding too Jilly Gouldon, I get council estates and student living, songs of faded glamour, like Bet Lynch on her second return to the street. I possibly would never have dug this album out again, I have a lot of CD’s and it is easy to over look particular ones and this is one. I really enjoyed hearing it again, the first time in over 5 years I will wager and think it is definitely one of the better A’s. It also prompted me to make a CD of the best A tracks for Lisa. 7 out of 10.

Pacer

The Amps album Pacer today, I must admit I as looking forward to this one, it’s a great album, it really is, it is possibly my second favourite Breeders album after Last Splash (what can I say I love pop) The Amps were a Breeders side project, effectively due to the rotating line up, The Amps were The Breeders, The Breeders play Amps songs and one of the tracks on Pacer was a Breeders tune. Anyhow, if you are really interested in Breeders history Wikipedia exists.
Pacer then, Pacer is potentially the best A album, I really have enjoyed listening to it a lot today and every time it restarts I look forward to it, I know of only 2 more A albums which I think will be as good, but for today on the trip between Stafford and Telford it was the perfect accompaniment. Full on idle, Tipp City, Bragging Party stand out, but it keeps good company very good company. 9 out of 10.

TruANT

The back roads of Staffordshire were this morning subjected to Alien Ant Farms TruAnt. The follow up to the hit spawning Anthology. I think as guilty pleasures go Alien Ant Farm are up there with Garth Brooks. Yes its easy to write them off as nu-metal chancers that got lucky with a cover and rode the back of that until the record buying public got bored, the thing is they really have some very good songs and none more so than off the two mid career albums, anthology and truant. Today was Truant and at some point in the future I have the conundrum as to if I play both copies of anthology that reside in Chez Donohoe.
Truant then, not choc full of hits but enough songs for me to get to the end and hope that there is a bit more road to hear it all again, more subdued than its predecessor and one that perhaps might see them more than a little jaded with the business, well it hints at it before exploring it more on the follow up. I do really like this album though and am looking forward to the journey home, yes it isn’t goats head soup, or in the aeroplane over the sea, but it doesn’t make it less worthy. 7 out of 10.

Anywhere But Here

This mornings ridiculously early soundtrack to my new route I may add, was Anywhere but here by The Ataris. Another chunk of pop punk and the weakest of their early to mid career albums in my opinion. Kris Roe is too heavily influenced by Green Day and to a lesser extent NOFX on this album. Not to way it isn’t quite wonderful but it does get a little repetitive after 20 tracks. I have to say it was good though and one that I recall I only played once or twice, its no So long Astoria but of the genre it’s a definite 6 out of 10.

Blue Skies, Broken Hearts...Next 12 Exits

Todays sojourn through my CD’s is the start of what I think will be three days of The Ataris, todays is Blue Skies, Broken Hearts...Next 12 Exits. This album contains my favourite Ataris song in San Dimas High School Football Rules. A song that initially got me into The Ataris and a song I still love today. The album was fantastic to listen to and a great pick me up after the last few mediocre albums. Extremely enjoyable and will potentially be the album of the week for me, depending on if so Long Astoria is tomorrow or not.
Pop punk at its best I think, as good as Green Day or Blink 182 at their very best and after playing 2 whole times each journey still enjoyable each run through. Marvellous. 8 out of 10.

The Apples In Stereo Live at The Black Cat Washington DC 2000

I don’t own many bootlegs, I think really they are a souvenir of a concert but if you were not there it's basically a ropey recording of a band. That leads me nicely to todays commute CD, The Apples In Stereo at The Black Cat Washington in 2000. I wasn’t at this gig and the sound is ropey. The songs are pretty good though, I did like The Apples In Stereo at one point, they were borderline Dawsons Creak/OC but I forgave them for that as they did display the odd flash of genius, it’s difficult to tell on this recording as it isn’t the greatest, and then if you put that on the speakers of a ford car its even less great. To be honest though after The Avalanches yesterday most things sound good.

So its not bad, if I had the studio recordings of the tracks on the live set it could be pretty excellent, but as it’s a bootleg with ropey sound of a gig I wasn’t at, it’s a straight down the middle 5 out of 10.

The Avalanches

Lisa, my wife wouldn’t let me play a CD for our travelling about this weekend, well she did, it was Bossanova by Pixies, but it was on an ipod and it wasn’t part of my loosely alphabetical trawl through my CD’s. Today it resumed though and it was the self titled album by New Zealand dance act, The Avalanches. I have to say when I first heard this album I liked it very much, in a similar vein to Lemon Jelly and Cowcube, the difference being I know when I get to those albums they will still be a joy to listen to. The Avalanches wasn’t. Every track is a 3 second loop repeated over an over, they aren’t songs they are breaks, good breaks but breaks none the less, and this really long album ( I was stuck between Jct 11 and 8 for 40 minutes and the album only finished as I pulled into work) but apart from maybe 1 or 2 tracks, you could listen to any 5 seconds within a song and it would sound the same as any other 5 seconds within the same song. They are using hip hop beats but not breaking it up with any rapping, it was a really tedious CD to listen to, Frontier Psychiatrist and Since I met you are pretty early on and EVERY other track is practically a 3 second loop. I really wished that I had skipped this album but that is breaking the rules. Appalling. 1 out of 10. It should be less as the album version is not the version of since I met you that I love.