everyday

Mogwai’s “Oh! How The Dog’s Stack Up” off of the album Come on Die Young. Mogwai is one of the bands that when they come into rotation on my MP3 player or on some internet radio station (not mainstream enough for broadcast?) I don’t realize it is them until the song is nearly over. While typically phenomenal, it isn’t music that is instantly recognizable. Mogwai’s music seems to settle a few layers behind my conscious thought and percolate. I absolutely love it!

P.S. I really wish Blogger had categories, one of a few reasons I am working on creating my own blogging engine.

Depeche Mode!

I can still remember the first time I heard “People Are People“, it was at a particular intersection (mapped here) on my way home from school. While the moment was not a groundbreaking moment in the formation of my musical tastes, it was a precursor to a much more influential album, Violator. I remember the anticipation I felt placing Violator in my tape player. I remember listening to each song in succession and wondering how anything could sound so amazing. I can’t tell you how many times I listened to that album, probably thousands. I would play it with my headphones on and marvel at the complexity and beauty of the deeply layered sound. I remember spending countless hours discussing it with my friends. I remember being fascinated with the design of the leaflet and the single rose on the cover of the cassette. Violator was truly a formative album for me. Violator helped get me hooked on music in general. I would spend every last dollar on the newest maxi-single just to get some new remix of a song I had heard thousands of times or some completely new and promising B-Side! In the case of the “World In My Eyes” single alone, it was worth every penny.

I just watched the webcast of The Cures performance in Paris for Live 8. It was an absolutely magnificent performance! For the first time in a long while, it seems as though Robert Smith is really into the music. And if I am not mistaken, Porl Thompson was playing guitar on stage with The Cure again. If that is true I certainly hope it is more than a one time deal for Live 8. Porl adds a beautiful layer of complexity and richness with his guitar playing that can’t be matched. The quartet played the following songs impeccably:

1. Open off of Wish
2. One Hundred Years off of Pornography
3. End off of Wish

On a side note, the future is now! I went on the web and viewed a relatively high quality, non interrupted webcast of a live concert in Paris, France. While MTV was busy showing advertisements and hypeing their, poor excuses for entertainment, shows, AOL was webcasting all of the concerts live, without interruption. I am definitely not a big fan of AOL, but MTV is getting really bad. MTVs airing of the concerts was inept at best. They only showed portions of performances interrupted with advertisements and hype. To MTVs credit, they did leave the Linkin Park / Jay Z performance alone and aired it in its’ entirety.

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So AOL Music has finally posted all of the performances for Live 8. A link to The Cure’s show is here: The Cure @ Live 8. You can click around and find shows for Muse, Coldplay, Pink Floyd and so on. The Cure’s set included two additional songs that I did not orginally list, because I didn’t get to see them. They played “Boys Don’t Cry” and “Just Like Heaven” as well as “Open”, “One Hundred Years” and “End”. And it is Porl!

A brief note: To view the videos, AOL requires Microsoft’s Internet Explorer and AOL’s Video Player, which should download automagically. I personally find this frustrating because I prefer to use Firefox, which in my humble opinion is a far better web browser.

Muse Origin Of Symmetry, if you like their most recent offering Absolution with songs like “Time is Running Out” then you will definitely enjoy this album. Origin of Symmetry isn’t like the typical initial offering from a band that has found commercial success with their sophmore effort, it is every bit as strong as Absolution. It was referred to me by a friend at a party who was playing a bit from the first track, “New Born” and I was very impressed. With that, I suggest getting this album and giving it a good listen.

PJ Harvey’s Uh Huh Her, the album is phenomenal. I absolutely love her voice. I particularly enjoy “The Letter”, fantastic guitar sound and of course amazing singing. I highly suggest picking this album up. If you don’t have any PJ Harvey yet, this would be a good place to start, you will get hooked.

The Cure’s Lost Wishes E.P.

1. Uyea Sound
2. Cloudberry
3. Off To Sleep
4. The Three Sisters

Depeche Mode has a new album coming out in October! The new single, “Precious”, is encouraging. DM’s latest effort, while not bad by any means, was not as good as I had hoped it could be.

Information from depechemode.com/news

I took this picture outside of Amoeba Records on Sunset Avenue in Hollywood, CA prior to the release of “Hail To The Thief” (an album from Radiohead). I was just listening to Radiohead and it reminded me that I had taken this picture, which I like.

I have been listening to Depeche Mode’s new album Playing The Angel for a little over a week now, and I must say that I enjoy it. I particularly enjoy the first single “Precious”. Some of my other favourites are: “John The Revelator”, “The Sinner In Me” and “Nothing’s Impossible”. That last one was written by Dave Gahan (with help from others), to those of you that are fans of Depeche Mode this will come as a surprise. Dave Gahan has written three songs on the new album. This is a radical departure from the tried and true formula of Martin L. Gore being the songwriter and Dave Gahan being the frontman/lead singer. The sounds on Playing the Angel harken back to some of the older synthetic sounds from Depeche Mode’s past, but it definitely has sounds derived from their more recent work as well. Of course there are a few super-bright moments when Dave and Martin harmonize in the way that only they can! All in all, I say that this is a good album, if you are a Depeche Mode fan you should be pleased with Playing The Angel.