Day 0976 - Seldom Seen Kid

Elbow "Seldom Seen Kid" (2008) - got it

I had no real expectations coming into this one, though I later remembered that my wife owns some Elbow albums. I'm happy to say that is now another taste that we share.

Loved it! It has such a great mix of sonic experimentation, clever arrangements.  It keeps things interesting by changing the approach to best suit each song.

The album opens with "Starlings" which begins with reverbed guitars, gentle pulsing vocals and vocals, almost sonically evoking the birds themselves, before bursting into huge soundings of horns, very loud in the mix.    Guy Garvey's gentle vocals ride the winds between.   Such sonic picture painting is also used in "The Loneliness of a Tower Crane Driver", which with its slow booming drums and slow strings underpinning a staccato guitar line seems to evoke a wide, beautiful city scape viewed from up high.

"The Bones of You" starts off much more stripped down with sparse guitar over a percussion groove, but it builds with fuzzed guitar and vocal harmonies that bring Muse to mind for me.  The middle section is wild guitar that wouldn't feel out of place on Radiohead's "The Bends".   But none of this is to suggest this band are derivative, these are just the nearest reference points I can draw.   For example, the band out-Black Keys the Black Keys with the bluesy rock of "Grounds for Divorce".   "An Audience With the Pope" has an angular piano-backed groove that hangs somewhere between Space (the band) and the Specials' "Ghost Town".

"The Fix" features guest vocals from Richard Hawley, and his deep croon nicely plays against Garvey's higher tone.   "Some Riot" has an almost Beatles-y/Lennon vibe to it.   "One Day Like This" has an uplifting choir backing.

After all the darting around and grand arrangements, the album ends on a subtle key with the subdued "We're Away".   Loved the journey and had no qualms about taking it back to the start and listening again a couple more times.

Day 0915 - Our Aim is to Satisfy

Red Snapper “Our Aim is to Satisfy” (2000)

An interesting band that blends live instruments/players with electronic elements, like samples, loops and scratches to make interesting, (mostly) instrumental music based in deep deep groove.

I liked the sound of this album on paper, and the music was ‘interesting enough’, but not amazing.   That is to say it didn’t impact on me enough that I'll rush out and check out multiple Red Snapper albums, but each new track would have enough of a “ooh that sounds interesting” moment to keep me ticking along.

There’s a reasonable range of sounds on the album, from the dry, hard funk groove of “Some Kind of Kink”, to the lurching groove and cinematic triphop feel of “Shellback”.   There’s the funky “The Rough and the Quick” which is filthy.  It makes its point adequately with its sultry groove and lyrics:

“I want the kind of life I read about

You know, the one you find on the top shelf”

and you’re like ‘yes I do know. I understand that reference’ but before that thought has even lodged itself in your head the lyrics have moved on to spreading thighs, rubbing clits and the singer moaning and panting… y’know, just to really ram the point home.

Album wraps up with “They’re hanging me tonight” which sounds pleasingly like it either emulates or is sampled from an old giallo film soundtrack.
 

 

Day 0896 - HMS Fable

Shack "HMS Fable" (1999)

I'd initially put this one on while I was cooking dinner.  I  was listening to the first track thinking "oh yeah I think I know what this one is about - sounds like a bit of 90s brit rock, like Oasis but with a touch of Suede.   But then that first track "Natalie's Party" breaks from its rowdy-yet-melodic rock to drop in a nice little string section.   I decided I needed to give the album a bit more of my attention rather than having it as background music.    

I've listened to it a couple of times through now and there are certainly some swirly rock tracks that have more than a hint of the 'Madchester' sound but this album is all over the place in an interesting way.

There's bouncy melodic "Lend's Some Dough" with its beautiful layered vocals.  "Captains Table" has a dreamy, folky vocal-heavy sound not unlike the last Tripping Daisy albums before they transitioned into Polyphonic Spree.   "The Streets of Kenny" somehow manages to build a mellow, vocal laden track into what feels like a crescendo before suddenly cutting out and dropping you into "Re-instated" which, with its strings and mellow trumpet parts almost seems to hint at Burt Bacharach.  After a couple of more guitar-heavy tracks, the album closes out with the delicate acoustic "Daniella".

Day 0805 - (What's the Story) Morning Glory

 Oasis “(What’s the Story) Morning Glory?” (1995) – got it

The band were signed to Creation records, released their successful debut “Definitely, Maybe”, fired and replaced their drummer then set about recording this, their second album.
 
The recording sessions went quickly though (as seems to be standard) not without fighting between the two Gallagher brothers.

The band have been accused of possibly wearing their influences a little two prominently on their sleeves with the Beatles being a very obvious influence, touches of David Bowie and even a possible lifting of an REM riff ("the One I love" for the song "Morning Glory").  Regardless of this, Morning Glory remains a great rock record, that takes the band's established swaggering rock ("Hello") and expands out into more melodic areas such as Lennon-esque balladry ("Wonderwall"), to vaguely psychedelic pop ("Champagne Supernova") to acoustic power ballads ("Cast no Shadow").

This album and the debut were everywhere when I was in high school.  The band have never really topped them with subsequent Oasis albums or their other projects, but these two albums are worthy enough to have stood the test of time.

Day 0643 - fROMOHIO

fIREHOSE "fROMOHIO" (1989)

Following the death of their guitarist/singer D. Boon, the band the Minutemen broke up.   Singer/Bassist Mike Watt and drummer George Hurely had considered quitting music altogether, but after Sonic Youth invited Watt to collaborate with them it made him realise he wasn't done with music yet.   

Minutemen fan Ed Crawford tracked down Watt in the mistaken belief that he was auditioning guitarists for a new band.  The move paid off as Crawford's passion and enthusiasm impressed Watt and Hurley, and convinced them to try forming a band with the less road-tested Crawford, thus fIREHOSE was born.

"fROMOHIO" is their third studio album and mixes their sound of post-punk, funk, folky acoustic guitar and restrained but pleasant melody.   A sound not dissimilar from the Minutemen, but maybe more stylistically focussed and with less punk rock.

Day 0589 - Hysteria

Def Leppard "Hysteria" (1987)

An interesting one... I mean the music itself is just catchy, bombastic, glammy rock with a touch of studio sheen to it, but there's a bit of a story to the album's creation.

The album was originally to be produced by Mutt Lange (he's produced everything from AC/DC and Foreigner through to Maroon 5 and Britney Spears) who had produced their previous album 'Pyromania', but Lange bowed out due to exhaustion.  The band tried to make things happen with Jim Steinman (of Meatloaf fame), but he wanted to make a raw, stripped-down rock record, clashing with Leppard who wanted to go with a more glossy and pop-metal sound.  Eventually Steinman departed and the band tried to produce themselves.  These sessions were eventually scrapped when Lange came back into the fold.

Of course, as is well known, Leppard's drummer lost his arm in a car accident.  The band stood by him and his decision to keep drumming, using a mix of traditional drums and some automation tricks to fill in the gaps left by his missing arm.

The long wait, the time put in, and all the studio work paid off.   At its peak, the album was moving around a million copies a week.

Day 0392 - Lust for Life

Iggy Pop "Lust for Life" (1977) - got it

Rawk! Since his days with the Stooges, the punk rock sound that they'd been chipping away at had come of age and started to find its way into the mainstream consciousness, which must have offered up some degree of vindication to Iggy.  This, mixed with his positive experience making "The Idiot" restored his confidence, and he felt comfortable shaking off the more prominent Bowie influences from his sound to produce another slice of gritty Stooges-esque rock but now with more of an underlying pop flavour.

The singles 'Lust for life' and 'the Passenger' feel like instant classics.  'Success' is a raging exorcism and 'Turn blue' is brilliant, drawn out bluesy jam.

The rhythm section for the album are brothers Hunt and Tony Sales, who would go on to become half of Bowie's (I feel unjustly) maligned Tin Machine band.