Tag Archives: albums

Favorite Music Reviews: A New Series (hopefully the City Paper won’t steal my idea this time)

Earlier today, I tried starting a blog post series of my favorite–note, not best–songs. The first one was going to be Reverend Gary Davis’ I am the Light of this World (which would have been followed by about eight other Davis songs; I sweat him hard), but the limits of blog software led me to a cup of coffee instead. In this spirit, I launch a new series of Favorite Music Reviews, of which this post is the first.

For the record, most music reviews make me sick. (seriously; I’ve had a near panic attack over one in particular; ask SF). In fact, my own album ratings is an ironic and functional spin on the review process, where thoughtless albums receive a tremendous amount of column space and incredible albums register only a few gazillion hits on Google. Furthermore, the only music critic who does not make me want to throw my Internet out the window is Sasha Frere-Jones, and even he decides to write about inconsequentials such as Neko Case.

Nonetheless, about once every decade, there is a music review that I find so absurdly great that I put it on my fridge, mental or physical. To these reviews, I dedicate this series. Typically, my favorite reviews are those that are ruthless (in either a positive or negative manner), to the point, and demonstrate a wide knowledge of music without coming off as clever. People who know me, know that I feel CMJ reviews are the antithesis of this.

The first is Richard Gott’s Liberation Music, which appeared in the March 12, 2009, issue of London Review of Books. Now, Gott’s article is great, but it’s not his work that ranks him in my favorite music reviews. No, it is who he quotes. Specifically, I am keen on a Rodney Bennett review of a January 1960 performance:

It took time, though, for the new experimental music to be widely accepted in London. Cardew and Tilbury had played pieces by Feldman and Cage at a concert at the Conway Hall in January 1960, and Rodney Bennett, who was present, recalled that the audience of 70 sat ‘transfixed with gloom’ while the two pianists produced, slowly and laboriously, ‘a series of small tired noises, not violent, not beautiful, not exciting, not even remotely interesting: the whole effect as soporific as an evening spent listening to the complete Methodist Hymnal’.

The entire article is filled with these sorts of gem, and I encourage some of you to read the entire piece.

Album Reviews

1—->3—–>5
Terrible—>Fantastic

5

4
Alias – Resurgam
Baptista, Cyro – Banquet of the Spirits
Bembeya Jazz National – Syliphone Years, The
Budos Band, The – Budos Band II, The
Budos Band, The – Budos Band, The
Buraka Som Sistema – Black Diamond
Buraka Som Sistema – From Buraka to the World EP
Collins, Bootsy – Back in the Day The Best of Bootsy
Cranes – Cranes
Franz Ferdinand – Tonight

3
A Mountain of One – Collected Works
Adams, John – Road Movies
Astatke, Mulatu – Mulatu of Ethiopia
Atlas Sound – Let the Blind Lead Those Who Can See But Cannot Feel
Battles – Mirrored
Beans – Thorns
Cheveu – Cheveu
Durrty Goodz – Ultrasound
Gang Gang Dance – Saint Dymphna

2
Awesome Color – Electric Aborigines
Black Francis – Bluefinger
DJ Babu – Duck Season, Volume 03
Ipso Facto – Mannequin 7″
J Rawls and Middle Child – Rawls and Middle

1
Adele – 19
Against Me – tons
Glasvegas – Glasvegas
Jones, Grace – Hurricane

Album Reviews

1——>3—–>5
Terrible—–>Fantastic

5
Clinic – Do It!
Craig, Carl – Sessions
Flying Lotus – 1983
Flying Lotus – July Heat
Flying Lotus – Reset EP
Gas – Nah und Fern
Hancock, Herbie – Complete Blue Note Sixties Sessions
Hooker, John Lee and Miles Davis – Hot Spot, The
V/A – Music of Islam, Volume 10 (Qur’an Recitation, Istanbul, Turkey)
V/A – Music of Islam, Volume 11 (Yemen, Sanana)
V/A – Music of Islam, Volume 12 (Iran, Karaj)
V/A – Music of Islam, Volume 13 (Pakistan, Lahore)
V/A – Music of Islam, Volume 14 (Mystic Music)
V/A – New Orleans FUnk, 1960-75
Rodriquez Lopez, Omar – Calibration

4
A Place to Bury Strangers – A Place to Bury Strangers
Bear in Heaven – Red Bloom of the Boom
Cave, Nick and the Bad Seeds – Dig Lazarus Dig
Dae Holland Quintet – Prime Directive
Deerhoof – Offend Maggie
Ellen Allien – Sool
Ghetto Don, The – Ghetto Don, The
Insect Factory – Air Traffic Control Sleep
Insect Factory – Snowflakes
James Pants – Welcome
Kuti, Seun and Egypt 80 – Many Things
Loefah – Mad Ruffage [DMZ009]
Loefah – Roots Goat Stare [DMZ006]
Loefah and Skream – TEC003
Mitchell, Elizabeth – You are My Little Bird
Mogwai – Hawk is Howling, The
Portunondo, Omara – Flor de Amor
Psapp – Camel’s Back, The [Instrumental]
Psapp – Tiger, My Friend
Soulja Boy – SouljaBoy Tellem
TITS – Throughout the Ages
TITS – Tittie Tour Teaser
TV on the Radio – Dear Science
Wiley – Wearing My Rolex

3
Blood Red Shoes – Box of Secrets
DMBQ – Annular Music
Dorian Concept – Seek When is Her
Elzhi – Preface, The
Emynd and 4AM Jess – Shake Whut Ya Got
Heliocentrics, The – Out There
Jake One – White Van Music
JME – Famous
Kuti, Seun – Live at Festival Lugano in Switzerland [2007]
Loefah and Coki – Deep Medi Musik [MEDI003]
Loxy and Usual Suspects – StalkerFracture
L-Wiz – Girlfriend
L-Wiz – Strength
Psychosis – TempestInner Sense
Roberson, Eric – Appetizer, The
Roberson, Eric – Collection, The
Roberson, Eric – Left
Roberson, Eric – Vault, The, Volume 1.5
Samuel, Jeff – Bork
Shaggs, The – Philosophy of the World
Young Knives, The – Superabundance

2
Ay? – Joyful
Crystal Stilts – Alight of Night
Dirtbombs – Ultraglide in Black
DMBQ – Esoteric Black Hair
Fabulous Diamonds – Fabulous Diamonds
Greyboy Allstars, The – What Happened to Television
Hercules and Love Affair – Hercules and Love Affair
V/A – Jazz and ’80s
Loefah – Jungle Infiltrator [BAM006]
Nine Inch Nails – Ghosts I
Orient – Look at My Eyes EP
Ra Ra Riot – Rhumb Line, The

1
Elias, Hanin – Future Noir
Ghetto – Freedom of Speech
Mya – Sugar and Spice
Open City – Birth of Cruel, The
Risque Bouquet – Flood
These New Puritans – Beat Pyramid
Vivian Girls – Vivian Girls