Achtung Baby by U2

When I was 17 I bought the first of what would be over a dozen U2 albums: the best of 1980-1990 and the best of 1990-2000. The first I loved, with a few exceptions (I still think “unforgettable fire” sucks). The second I didn’t like, with a few exceptions. As such, Achtung Baby’s critical acclaim was met by me with scoffs of derision. Come on critics. You’re just being contrarian. Their best decade was the 80’s. You’re giving them credit for doing good, not making good music (I still think “One” sucks).

Well, turns out I was wrong. Sporting sexy songs about God and sex with big bright, shimmering, chirping guitars, this is the last great U2 album. From the punky “fly,” to the funky “mysterious ways,” to the urgent “until the end of the world” to the gorgeous melodies in “so cruel,” this album paints a beautiful picture of a band creating one last monument to artistic validity before resigning itself to dinosaur status and writing songs about the weather (cough beautiful day cough).

Here is a track I heard in the film the Diving Bell and the Butterfly, “ultra violet (light my way)” (the track is forthcoming)

See also: “who’s gonna ride your wild horses?”

Yeah, well YOU should listen to “Suck it!” by You’re Not a Very Nice Person.

Some Nights by fun.

Hmm, so maybe every day was way too ambitious. How about roughly every week? Sound good? Cool.

Yes that one song has become troublingly ubiquitous. Yes, the chorus of that selfsame song is even more ubiquitous thanks to commercials featuring the tune. Guess what? It’s still an objectively good pop song. Aside from the aforementioned weapons-grade chorus, there are dynamic shifts and tasteful, dramatic transitions.

Fun. has been a pleasant surprise for a while now—the indie super-group’s most readily recognizable piece is singer Nate Ruess. The band he came from—The Format—was alright, but a little dull (Dog Problems in particular was unforgivably boring). This new creation is anything but. The first album (Aim and Ignite) was a modern iteration of a blend of Queen/ELO-ish pomp with progressive compositions and instrumentation informed by the modern indie rock landscape.

The second is much the same, only Ruess has been listening to a lot of hip-hop. They don’t rap, but there are a lot of production bells and whistles which occasionally misfire (see: “One Foot”), but in general give the band’s campy MO an appropriately hip coat of varnish.

For instance, “All Alone” and “All Alright” feature heavily syncopated synthesized beats. In addition, the tune “It Gets Better” has a beat heavily influenced by dubstep paired with electric guitar chords distorted and hyperprocessed.

In sum, this one’s a winner. The attention the band is getting because of the album (really, though, mostly the song) is not the case of getting an undeserved 15 minutes of relevance, this is a good band getting their due.

Here’s the first proper track on the album (and my personal favorite), “Some Nights.”

See also: “Out On the Town”

EDIT: Sorry I couldn’t find a post of the original song. The best I could do was the cleaned up version. For those who are curious, he’s asking “who the fuck wants to die alone” in the bridge.

Wha!? Two days between posts!? That’s crazy!

Yeah, it turns out doing this every day is really hard.

Alright, on to the entry.

Icky Mettle by Archers of Loaf—I know it sounds like I just pulled random syllables out of a hat, but this is a real band and a real album. Bonus, it’s also real good, which is a bit of a surprise, given that this early 90’s indie band enjoyed singing about, on occasion, indie music (see: “Plumbline”).

The Pavement-esque vocal delivery and general nonchalance clash a little on the hook-centric “Wrong,” but more often than not, it serves them well (and the song is s’darn catchy I don’t really mind). Anyway, here’s the first track, called “Web in Front.”

See also: “Might”

Morrissey—Your Arsenal

It’s Friday night and I have nowhere to go. I don’t even have any beer left, so I’m sipping on a vodka whatever that could quickly become a vodka-and-more-vodka as soon as I run out of juice. To top it off, I’m sitting in my room blogging.

Therefore, I can think of no better album to kick off my forays into blogging than Morrissey’s Your Arsenal. Moz always commiserates when I’m down, and this record is so catchy, it even cheers me up a little. Witness the tune “National Front Disco.” It’s the catchiest of the bunch and one of my favorites, despite the apparent controversy about the lyrics, specifically that they are anti-immigration. I suppose I can’t say for certain whether he was being serious, but my money is on no (who better to have as the new spokesman for the reactionary, nativist, far-right British National Party than a (probably) gay singer/songwriter who hates his own English-ness).

Anyway, this was (and is) Moz’s best post-Smiths foray, complete with big guitars, great melodies that were themselves a bit Smiths-ish, and a rockabilly feel to more than a few of the tunes that gives the record more of a rock and roll character than his other solo work. In keeping with this evening’s mopefest, here’s another personal favorite, “We Hate it When Our Friends Become Successful.” 

See also: “You’re the One For Me, Fatty” (for future reference, this is where I’ll reference other particularly noteworthy songs that I didn’t mention in the text itself)

Hello there,

About nine months ago, I discovered a great way not to get bored with your music—pick an album a day to listen to start to finish, then write a blurb about what I thought. If you remember the string of posts I put on Facebook from that time, you know the deal.

This iteration will be a bit different, though. Notice the “or so” in the title. Sme days I won’t feel like it and so won’t do an entry. Some days I might decide to use this little URL for an actual blog. Also, these blurbs might be a bit longer, this not being a Facebook status.

I might decide to follow a particular theme for a particular week, but then I might not. I’m not entirely sure how this will work out, or how much time I’ll have to devote to it, but I’m open to suggestions regarding format. Except for ratings. I won’t do ratings. Don’t get me wrong, I love ratings when I read them, but it seems difficult. You should be able to glean my general opinion by my comments, and as a rule of thumb I won’t listen to a whole album of garbage just so I can talk about how awful it was (unless the garbage is Garbage, in which case it’s not really garbage).

Enjoy!

Adam