01. Tiny Masters of Today – “Skeletons”

This sucks.

02. The Horrors – “Sea Within A Sea“

Sure, Geoff Barrow producing a band who so far have a very specific sound was always going to be interesting. But what’s crazy about this is that the Horrors have written a song that goes on for 8 minutes. The Horrors, previously produced by Yeah Yeah Yeahs guitarist Nick Zinner, used to make songs in the Wire/Ramones mode of two minute blasts of shouting and noise. This, on the other hand is space rock. The weird, anachronistic, synth-driven aesthetic of Barrow’s Third is here, but it’s a lot less doomy and inescapable. And the second half where the synths just ride out is just gorgeous.

03. Bat For Lashes and Scott Walker – “The Big Sleep”

She ain’t no Ute Lemper. Actually on this it sounds like she’s reaching for Boys For Pele-era Tori Amos and failing. And yeah, Scott Walker is completely wasted, singing backup. Scott Walker is singing backup. Fuck this.

04. The Who – “Naked Eye” live at the Isle of Wight 1970

I always forget that before Sabbath, the horns didn’t exist. So there’s all these fucking hippy kids throwing up peace signs as the Who play the greatest rock show in history (down to Entwistle’s skeleton jumpsuit). The Who basically stood for bad vibes. You can see why stuff like the the Isle of Wight and Woodstock pissed Townshend off enough to write Lifehouse, which eventually became Who’s Next. I would hate playing to hippies all the time too. And you’re sayng “that’s what Tommy is about too”. But it’s not nearly as angry as the shows of them playing the Tommy songs to thousands of fucking hippies who just don’t get it. And dear god this is right at that moment where the greatest rock and roll band in the world are playing to an audience that doesn’t understand or deserve them.

05. Devandra Banhart – “I Feel Just Like A Child”

One of the many songs introduced to me by way of East Bound & Down (this is up there with Lil Wyte), here is a filthy hippy I like. Banhart is someone I never listened to but knew of, and I just figured that he was not going to be something I like. The term “freak folk” being thrown so much, I never figured that he’d make songs like this. Odd production, kind of funky groove in the guitar, and his voice sounds like a lost 70s garage vocalist who really dug Sly Stone and the Byrds. Good shit, I will be checking out more of his stuff.

06.Land of Talk – “Give Me Back My Heart Attack”

Choppy indie rock with Elizabeth Powell’s kind of always struggling yet nonchalant vocals. Land of Talk is absolutely nothing new, but it is compulsively listenable and very very well done. They do the false stop better than most. Been playing this pretty constantly since I’ve got it.

07. Holger Czukay – “Boatwomans Song”

08. Faust – “Miss Fortune”

Krautrock is really just a term critics came up with to talk about Prog Rock albums they liked without ruining their cred. Because, dude, Faust and Can and Neu! and pretty much all the krautrock bands made prog rock. Classical pretentions, fucked up keyboards, synthesizers, electronically treated funny voices, 20 minute songs, fucked up time signatures, solos that turn into bridges that turn into more bridges oh look the song is over. The only difference between Can and Van Der Graaf Generator is that one is awesome and the other is fucking creepy. Anyway I just got both of these records, and holy crap have you heard the first Faust record? It’s all the shit thats impenetrable and unlikeable about this stuff and it’s compulsively listenable. It’s designed to make you say “What the fuck is this?” and keep the album on and then play it again. Once the chopped up stereo poetics and the acoustic guitar come in at the very end of “Miss Fortune” you’re a fan.

Czukay’s “Boatwomans Song” isn’t Krautrock or Prog Rock, it’s proto-sampling and 20th century electronic composition. Czukay was both the bass player and electronics manipulator for Can, he was a student of Stockhausen. “Boatwomans Song” is one of the hallmarks of early sampling because it’s just so beautiful and alien. Field recordings and instrumentation chopped up and manipulated into something that sounds alive, like Xenakis but actually listenable instead of profoundly disturbing one-time-experiences. “Boatwomans Song” is a fucking masterpiece.

09. Just Blaze – “PSA (instrumental)”

I found a torrent of a large portion of Just Blaze’s tracks as instrumentals. Which is a good thing for me, because Just Blaze has the strange distinction of being Just Blaze – one of the best producers in rap history, the guy who Kanye started out ripping off, who skips out on millions of dollars worth of studio time to play video games, who uses some of the greatest percussion and string arrangements you’ve ever heard and then gives them to the lamest rappers in existence. The man refers to himself as the Megatron Don. Who dicks around in a five minute video on youtube and makes a track that drops your jaw, seemingly while very bored. He is a legend, and he should be treated as such. PSA is the best song on Jay Z’s Black Album, hell it might be the best track Jay Z ever rapped over. Just piano, keyboard vamp and plane engines and drums that sounds live although they probably aren’t. It’s just so swinging, so boom bap, and he likely made it in ten minutes. I fucking love Just Blaze.

09. JG Thirlwell – “Bolly”

And the only person who could follow the great Justin Blaze is Jim Foetus and the Venture Brothers score. As I said on twitter when I first listento it, this album sounds like Lalo Schriffin fighting an entire disco full of spies. This is it, man. This is amayayayayayzing like Larry Dunn. “Bolly” is high tension wire chase music, done better than anyone has even tried to in years. Thirlwell’s done a legitmate score for this show, which is really something that doesn’t get done anymore – the thing about all those amazing action movie soundtrack that Schriffin and Morricone and John Barry anm Quincy Jones did is that they really didn’t fuck around. It’s blatantly manipulative music built to jack the tension up as high as it can go and still sound as funky as possible. And perversely by being music built solely for the express purpose of accompanying moments of drama – the music is actually amazing on it’s own. Thirlwell isn’t dicking around with making cool music, he’s here to do a job and in doing that he’s making cooler music than anything else that’s going to come out this decade.