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Post by kds on Sept 15, 2021 16:03:38 GMT
I agree that BWRG is a great sounding album. It might be his best sounding solo album, both from a production standpoint and a vocal standpoint. I'm just not a huge fan of the source material, although I will say The Like In I Love You is probably one of my favorite BW solo songs. Yes, that is exactly what I assumed was the primary issue for many people: this was music that, whether done in a Beach Boys style or not, is 75 years past its heyday. Now of course music can live on for a long time--we still have fans of Mozart, after all--but it is a bigger request of an audience. And Wilson's core audience was a rock and roll audience. So however good his Tin Pan Alley/Broadway album was, it's just not necessarily something that core audience would be most interested in hearing. Very true. And, also while not BWRG's fault, I don't think it helps that three of the four albums Brian released from 2005-2011 were covers albums.
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Post by The Cincinnati Kid on Sept 15, 2021 16:21:23 GMT
2010 is right in my wheelhouse. I know nearly all of that top 20 Kapitan posted and even like a lot of it. Brings back good memories. I haven't listened to a lot of music from then in a while, so I'll give my full thoughts later.
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Post by kds on Sept 15, 2021 16:50:20 GMT
Also worth mentioning is the biggest event in heavy metal in 2010.
It had been talked about for a long time, but the "Big 4" of Thrash Metal - Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer, and Anthrax - all performed together for the first time. I remember hearing that there was a band members only dinner prior to the show that was just a giant love fest.
Unfortunately, there would never be a Big 4 Tour.
One of the big parts of this tour was that Anthrax lured Joey Belladonna back into the band again (after their brief 2005-06 reunion), and this time it was permanent (at least as of September 15, 2021).
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Post by jk on Sept 15, 2021 17:25:06 GMT
2010... Thanks, kds. Well I've been through Wikipedia's 2010 in music in the US and the UK and found just one song!! Part of its appeal is admittedly sentimental. One evening in 2010, the band I was in had a local gig. At the end of the evening, while we were packing up our gear, the one truly memorable song the DJ played was "I Gotta Feeling" by The Black Eyed Peas. When I got home, I discovered my long-standing e-pal, the lady who died last May, had plucked up courage after a year of corresponding and sent me a picture of herself. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Gotta_Feeling
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Post by Kapitan on Sept 15, 2021 19:23:53 GMT
Here is one of the songs that I really loved in '10: Janelle Monae's breakout hit, "Tightrope" (feat. Big Boi, formerly of Outkast).
I loved her performance of the song on David Letterman's show, too. Talk about putting on a show. The James Brown move of getting the cape near the end is a great touch!
While it was performed on some pretty big shows and got a lot of airplay on our local public radio pop/rock music station, I see now the single didn't even chart in the US (or most of the world). The album did hit #17, which is funny in that I'd say the single is far and away the best track on the album... Oh well, no accounting for taste.
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Post by Kapitan on Sept 15, 2021 20:07:50 GMT
2010 was more about songs than albums for me. In fact, it was right around the time I realized I was finding more and more songs and fewer and fewer albums really good, and truly was all-in on buying individual songs.
Normally I don't really like dance music, but Robyn's "Hang With Me" is really exceptional in my opinion--not necessarily as a dance song, because how the hell would a nondancer like me know?--but rather as a pop song. Really good.
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Post by kds on Sept 16, 2021 12:27:39 GMT
I'd actually never heard of Monae until (Beach Boys tie in coming) she guested on fun's first hit We Are Young in 2012.
I swear to God, I did not start this thread to shit on 2010, but I do have to share this.
In the early 00s, desperate for a new band to like, I latched on to Godsmack. I'm not proud of this. But, I bought their first two albums, and even saw them in concert Labor Day Weekend 2001.
By 2010, I'd pretty much lost interest in them. But, I happened to hear a new song on the radio called Cryin' Like a Bitch. My God, this is the band that I thought might carry the torch for heavy metal in the 21st Century, and they release this crap. Ahhh, youth.
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Post by Kapitan on Sept 16, 2021 13:44:49 GMT
One of my big musical disappointments of 2010 was the return of Sufjan Stevens with not one, but two albums. In the first half of the '00s, he put out several really strong folk-chamber pop albums. He had a soft voice with a big range, a gift for melody, and an ambition for arrangements that incorporated reeds, horns, strings, everything but the kitchen sink. He did two state-themed albums (Michigan, Illinois) and tongue-in-cheek promised to do all 50.
But after 2005's Illinois, he began putting out occasional oddities, not real albums. A compilation of (often previously released) Christmas music. A soundtrack. An Illinois outtakes album.
In 2010, he released an EP (though, at an hour long, I think we can call that an album...) and an album, All Delighted People and The Age of Adz, respectively. It was around this time, I believe, that Stevens was quoted as saying he was no longer interested in the song form. And it showed. These albums were bloated, prog-influenced, highly electronic, repetitious/minimalist (and indeed, Stevens has since released more of such music, including what would've been called a "New Age" album in the '90s), with heavily processed sounds, and very little in the way of traditional melodies, harmonic development, or overall functional thrust.
Basically, the albums took what I considered the worst of Stevens's previous work, which is to say his penchant for repetition and over-arrangement, and made that the center of his work. I was tremendously disappointed.
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Post by Kapitan on Sept 16, 2021 20:11:11 GMT
Another twenty-tenner? Sure, why not? (I could actually keep going on this year for a while, for better and for worse.)
Somewhere in the '00s, I heard the first Vampire Weekend album. I was not impressed in the slightest.
In 2010, though, I was driving home from work one day and I heard a song on the radio that reminded me of a youthful, energetic version of Graceland-era Paul Simon. I forget which song it was, but it was something from Vampire Weekend's Contra. It was a hit for them, a gold record, a #1 album in the US, and #3 in the UK.
As I recall, this tune was used in some commercials. Target? Some airlines? I don't recall.
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Post by kds on Sept 17, 2021 12:26:11 GMT
One of the other big moments for me in 2010 was when Roger Waters took The Wall on tour.
When he and Floyd split in 1987, one of the things Waters retained was the rights to The Wall. Floyd could still perform songs from it, and did, but they couldn't do a full airing of the album with the Wall stage set up.
Waters didn't do much with this property other than a one off performance at the site of the Berlin Wall in 1990. But, in 2010, he finally decided to take the Wall on tour. Wisely, he spend a healthy part of the 00s making sure there was an audience for him to tour. It certainly helped that Floyd themselves were no longer active.
I got to see the Wall show on 10/10/10 in DC, and it was quite a site to behold in person. He continued to tour on The Wall until 2013, even having David Gilmour and Nick Mason appear at one show (in 2011).
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Post by Kapitan on Sept 17, 2021 17:40:26 GMT
An album I really liked in 2010 was my old favorite Of Montreal's False Priest. It was the last in their (occasionally interrupted) string of funk-RnB inspired albums. This tune, "Sex Karma," featured Solange Knowles (Beyonce's sister) on vocals in the refrain.
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Post by carllove on Sept 18, 2021 12:58:19 GMT
2010 wasn’t the best year for music, but I was blown away by Kanye West’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. Heck, he even sampled King Crimson! The videos were works of art. This was the first album I purchased on I-Tunes that year. He may be a polarizing figure, partially due to the fact that he is Bi-Polar, but I think he is correct in his assessment that he is a genius. This album followed on the heels of Graduation, which was my workout music jam, but I feel like MBDTF went somewhere beyond that. It elevated “hip hop”.
I think the only two other albums I bothered to actually purchase that year were Danger Days by My Chemical Romance, and Eminem’s Recovery. Can’t say either blew me away, but I liked them enough to make the purchase at the time.
Years later I would discover Vampire Weekend, LCD Soundsystem, Tame Impala, The National, Arcade Fire and James Blake, artists who all had strong efforts in 2010. Contra definitely comes to mind as a standout. Vampire Weekend played several of those songs live during their Modern Vampires of The City tour and they sounded great live.
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Post by carllove on Sept 18, 2021 14:17:54 GMT
The year is 1972 and I am 10 years old. I finally have enough allowance money to purchase entire albums for what I remember cost around $7.00 at the time. What a magical year for music. So much good from this year, I am only going to touch the surface here. I’m sure you all will fill in your highlights. Here are mine….
Close to the Edge - Yes. Every time I hear this song, this album - I am transformed. A desert island top 10 pick. It just has everything. It is magical with headphones on. You can’t explain it, it’s something that you have to experience. Not everyone will “get it”, but if they do, they will never forget it.
Keeping in the prog rock mode - Emerson Lake and Palmer Trilogy was released this year. “From the Beginning” is one of the most beautiful songs ever produced. Greg Lake’s voice, the guitar work and the lyrics are all sublime.
“Starman” was released as a single backed by “Suffragette City” from David Bowie’s Magnificent The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. Not sure which song is better. I love Bowie and this is probably my favorite of his personae.
Reggae is finally discovered in the US due to the release of The Harder They Fall, the movie soundtrack which contains Jimmy Cliff’s “Many Rivers to Cross”, a single from 1969, but I’m including it here because the single did not chart in the US and I dare you not to be moved by this song.
Lou Reed’s Transformer was released in 1972, and contains several of my favorites “Perfect Day”, “Satellite of Love”, “New York Telephone Conversation” and one everybody knows, “Walk on the Wildside”.
My favorite Chicago song “Saturday In the Park” is on Chicago V, which had its release this year.
I was “Happy” to hear Keith Richard’s get a lead vocal on a Rolling Stones song.
Van Dyke Parks released an album called Discover America of all cover songs. Why would he do that? Isn’t he known for his lyrics?
Also, I did discover that Jeff Buckley’s dad Tim Buckley, released Greeting from L.A. in 1972 and the contents sound very interesting, to say the least. I guess I always thought of him as a folk singer. Not sure my parent’s would have appreciated hearing the lyrics, had I discovered this album back then. I feel like I’m going to have to give it a listen today.
So, given all this wonderful output, what did I actually purchase that year with my allowance money? It was the Paul Simon debut album. At the age of ten, I wasn’t quite ready for most of what I learned to love later. I did discover the prog rock because of The Midnight Special and Don Kirschner’s Rock Concert, so it was only a few years later than 1972 that I discovered some of that year’s bounty. Until then, it was “Mother and Child Reunion” and “Me and Julio Down by the School Yard”.
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Post by Kapitan on Sept 18, 2021 14:34:08 GMT
1972 is a few years before I was born, but in hindsight it's a year with loads of classic songs and albums spanning genres and subgenres. I'm curious to hear more from those of you who actually remember '72, but I can at least mention my favorites.
The first album that comes to mind about '72 is:
Lou Reed’s Transformer was released in 1972, and contains several of my favorites “Perfect Day”, “Satellite of Love”, “New York Telephone Conversation” and one everybody knows, “Walk on the Wildside”.
I think Transformer is Reed's best album, and honestly one of the top few dozen albums in rock history. Maybe top 30-50ish.
What else do I love from that year? Well, how about one of the debut of one of the great power pop bands in history? Big Star released their cheekily titled #1 Record (which not only failed to top the charts, but to chart at all). The Raspberries, arguably the other giant of the genre, released two albums that year, as well as the #5 hit "Go All The Way."
Randy Newman released one of his best couple of albums, Sail Away, which those of us on this board will recall inspired Brian Wilson as he wrote his contributions to the Holland album, and especially the fairytale.
Frank Zappa was recovering from an attack he suffered in England, and wrote and recorded what is probably his most jazz-like album, the brilliant instrumental album The Grand Wazoo.
From Zappa's maximalism to British minimalist folk, Nick Drake released the dark, beautiful album Pink Moon, which came to the public's attention decades later via a car commercial.
Stevie Wonder's new Motown contract (which allowed him complete artistic control) went into effect in 1972, and he released two classics: Music of My Mind and Talking Book. The latter hit #3 on the Billboard charts and went gold, spawning two #1 hits in "Superstition" and "You Are the Sunshine of My Life."
And lastly for this post, the Rolling Stones released what is for my money the best album of their career, the sprawling, drugged-out Exile on Main Street. It went platinum and topped charts worldwide.
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Post by carllove on Sept 18, 2021 14:44:17 GMT
Kapitan,
I did purchase the 45’s of “Go All the Way” and “You are the Sunshine of my Life”, back in 1972. I got $5.00 a week allowance, and a single went for about $1.00, so they were an easy purchase. Once again, my parent’s were “appalled” by the lyrics of a song with “Go All the Way”. Not even sure I really quite knew what that meant then. It was a more innocent time. Now you get 10 year olds singing about their “WAP”.
Always wanted to listen to that Big Star LP.
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