Me too. I don't know the conext you've posted this in, though yes, I'm also having some troubling times at the moment.

:(

I'm sorry to hear that friend.

If I had your talent, I'd like to think I'd be on top of the world!

talented? ha-ha :)
man, I am a 36 year old fart. My talent doesn't mean much, given the stuff I need to face on a daily basis.

but thanks :) you're very kind.

Pearl Jam
Live On Two Legs
1998, Kind of a perfect time for a live album. Pearl Jam was five albums deep in 1998 and Live On Two Legs does a fine job of presenting the band's discography, spreading itself around with tracks from each. "Even Flow" feels a bit rushed but the version of "Black" is great. "Daughter" mixes in Neil Young's "Rockin' In The Free World" and PJ's own "WMA," but "Elderly Woman" is the real Vs. stand-out here. Vitalogy is represented quite nice with live opener "Corduroy." "Hail Hail" and "Red Mosquito" appear here from No Code in super rocking form. And then of course there's selections from Yield which the band were touring in support of while making this live album. The version of "Do The Evolution" is quite excellent and feels even looser than the original. Songs like this and a cover of Young's "Fuckin' Up" work well to counterbalance a lot of the slower material taken from Vs., Vitalogy and Yield. Overall this is a nice solid representation of where the live band was at towards the end of the 90's. It feels like a good retrospective that also manages to stay pretty loose and fun.

SP fans can buy some of Billy Corgan's gear.

https://reverb.com/news/billy-corgan...t-shop-preview

I get it... I'm about the same age, and I feel the same way, but still...
I don't know. You said you were struggling with some things. I am too, and I've found cold comfort in the usual distractions. A few kind words have meant a lot though, and I mean it when I say you're talented.

I highly appreciate that, really, thank you.
What's been bothering you lately?

Remember the teaser commercial for this? The one that had "Corduroy" playing in the background? That psyched me up quite a bit at the time.

Misread and thought you said "fear." Crying while putting my credit card away.

No but I'm gonna YouTube that shit.

Weezer
The Lion And The Witch
2002, So Weezer wanted to make a live EP and limit it to 25,000 copies to be sold only in indie record stores. But the label got in the way. They for some reason urged the band to cut it down from eight songs to six, and that 25,000 wasn't so limited as my copy is in the 30,000's. It's a weird release. It chronicles the Maladroit tour in Japan - the first with Scott Shriner on bass. I mean, for fans it works. But it's got some odd decisions. Like why include this version of "El Scorcho" where Rivers botches lyrics? Or why this version of "Holiday" where Scott messes up his big vocal debut? Well that last one maybe because it was kind of funny. It's not bad though. "Island In The Sun" actually rocks here in a way the album version never did. And "Death And Destruction" feels way more fleshed out than on Maladroit. And dudes they nail "Falling For You" which Rivers doesn't sound confident will happen. But it's still a strangle little blip in their discography. At this point why not just get a proper live album really?



Ryan Adams & The Cardinals
Cold Roses
2005, The first of three albums Ryan Adams would release in 2005, and this one is a double album! Like most of his albums this one comes with a theme of sorts. This is The Cardinals' Grateful Dead album. I mean, it's even got "Roses" in the title. It's nice. It's certainly not one I reach for often, but it has a certain relaxed charm. The kind of album I throw on in the background while cleaning the house, but not something I necessarily pay close attention to. "Magnolia Mountain" is a pretty solid opener, but honestly I feel like the second disc is heavier with the good stuff. "Easy Plateau" and "Let It Ride" are just great chill-out tracks. "If I Am A Stranger" is far and away my favorite here with some of the most poignant lyrics on this record. And the closer, "Friends" is just gorgeous. Overall, it's a really good album but that's something tough in a discography of great albums.

and because it's weird that this is the SY forum, and I don't really spend as much time talking about my favorite band as I do listening to them...


Sonic Youth
Sonic Youth
1982, When I was 18 or 19 I realized that Sonic Youth was my favorite band ever. I went crazy tracking down all their albums. And this - their debut - took me over a year as it was out of print and I was determined to find them all without resorting to the internet. This one was out of print but I finally found it in a shop in Boston for $25. It was worth every penny. "The Burning Spear" is a brilliant way to begin a career with it's dubby bass line, electric drill and opening manifesto of "I'm not afraid to say I'm scared." "I Dreamed I Dream" is amazing. It is a slow beautiful dirge with Lee and Kim doing a rare duet. "She Is Not Alone" is near tribal. This record just came out of nowhere and created the blueprint for an incredible career. Though it was only five tracks (with the band still insisting it was an album), it was finally put back into print in 2006 with a second half that featured the earliest live recordings officially released by the band. This is just excellent.

I found what I later realized was a bootleg version of this at a used record store in Vancouver in, like, 1999. It was enough at the time though. Listening to the official re-release was kind of a revelation. I realized "I Dreamed I Dream" was one of my favorite Sonic Youth songs. It's definitely different (Richard on drums and whatnot) but I think it's a good first step.
I actually didn't realize the band "insisted" it was an album. Really seems more EP to me, so that's how I think of it. I conisider Bad Moon Rising to be the band's true, full-length debut. But there's a lot to love about this release. It's definitely primitive, and almost, like, primordial sounding -- like you can hear the band crawling out of some oozy Cretaceous pit and moving slithering its way toward proper evolution. Sort of like Swans in that respect.
There are some reggae influences, and the entire sound of the thing is just really clean and normal sounding compared to what came next, but I still think it's an essential part of the their discography, and I don't really get why it sometimes gets a bad rap from critics.
I remember it was on a Rolling Stone list of "worst first albums by great bands" or something, and I would never categorize it as such. That's not just because I don't think of it as an album, but I honestly think it sews the seeds of the sound that would develop very well, and it places SY firmly in the Sonic context of the NYC no-wave scene, which they were certainly a part of.
Anyway, good shit. I don't listen to it often, but I probably listen to it more than Confusion is Sex.

Things didn't really fully gell until Bad Moon, but this is a necessary piece of the puzzle. I'm so glad they reissued it.

I found a mixtape of all the Kanye GOOD Friday tracks from 2009-2010. I've been listening to it a lot. I guess it's borderline "pirating," but all the tracks were released for free, and I just happened to locate it on DatPiff or something, listed right alongside the Freshman Adjustment and Graduate and Can't Buy Me Nothing mixtapes. So, I can assume the record company knows it's out there and doesn't care. Conscience clean.

I'm sort of shocked by the quality of some of these tracks. The standouts (aside from the tracks that would appear on later records) are "GOOD Friday," "Don't Stop," and "Christian Dior Denim Flow," and they're all album-quality. I'm not nuts about the Big Sean verses... it's almost like they were tacked on to the end of "Christian Dior..." and others just to act as a placeholder. It even sounds a bit like the production fades when Sean's verses kick in, as though he's doing it by himself after the fact. Not awesome. He's not great.
But still, "Don't Stop" is just an all-aces track with one of the best sample loops in Kanye production history. I sometimes wonder what might have been if Child Rebel Solider had actually released an album... but in this context it really feels more like a Kanye featuring Pharrell and Lupe track, which is fine with me. It's strong in every regard (use of the word "faggot" aside... that irks me a bit... who was that, Pharrell? Ugh. What a weird guy). I think it would have worked on MBDTF. It's the best of the bunch in terms of consistency and quality. And it probably ranks among my favorite Kanye tracks... at least in the top 20.

Anyway, it's cool to look at this testing-the-Waters period prior to MBDTF, when Kanye was just unleashing this tidal wave of free music to the world. And of course this is where "Devil in a new Dress" and the ungodly awesome "So Appalled" originated. Not to mention "Christmas in Harlem" which was later (wisely) trimmed down and officially released as a single and part of some sort of Xmas compilation... I forget which. It's a great Christmas song with an infectious, soulful vocal and a really warm and cheery atmosphere. The final version trimmed it back to just Kanye, Cyhi the Prince and Teyana Taylor, and it's a good 2 minutes shorter, but works better as a single and as a Christmas track.

It's funny that most of these amounted to throwaways, but the compiled Fridays tracks still sound better and more interesting than 90% of the world's hip-hop, then or now.

I had that mixtape years ago. Good stuff.

Why don't you consider Confusion to be their first album? It originally had 9 songs where Bad Moon originally had 8.

Yeah, I guess you're right. It's just really short (35 min.), and the modern packaging lumps it together with KYI, which gives it an EP feel. But yeah, I suppose Confusion is probably their first "album"-album.

I still don't think things helped until Bad Moon Rising, which is just, like, insane. Explosive and glorious and fucking violent and spooky and everything that SY was all about. It was the first time their sound was really, fully realized.

But yah. I mean, I guess if the band insists s/t is an album then it's an album. But it's never quite felt like one to me. S'all

And yeah, I've had the GOOD Fridays songs individually for years, but I never really was sure I had everything. So I downloaded the mixtape, and turns out all I was missing was "Runaway Love." But still, it's nice to hear everything back to back like that.

"Don't Stop!" Has been one of my favorite Kanye songs since I first got into Kanye. INSANE to me that that track didn't make MBDTF. It's, like, the best throwaway track ever.

I personally love Confusion. More so than Bad Moon by a hair.

Confusion is fine, but not even close to BMR in my book. BMR is up there with their absolute best. Took me a while to realize that, but once I did, it stuck the fuck with me.

BMR was one I loved instantly. Confusion took years to grow on me but then became one of my favs.

The beginning of it hooked me the first time I heard it. The intro and seque into "Brave Men Run" (an all-time favorite of mine) just blew my mind right away. As did "Society is a Hole." But other songs, like "Justice is Might," took longer to penetrate my psyche. Now I think it's probably the band's fourth best album at least. Maybe third.

Confusion is at the bottom for me.

But it's all SY, so I love it all. But if I had to pick a least favorite, it would likely be Confusion.

Wow. Pretty opposite me. Confusion is top tier for me. Up there with Evol and Murray Street.

My least favorite is Goodbye 20th Century haha.

Well, that's really not a proper studio album either. I guess it can be considered one, but it's more of a side project in my mind. I don't consider the Whitey album a proper SY album either.

And yes we are opposite. My favorites are Sister (emotional/personal fave), Daydream Nation (which I feel is the best all around album, even though that opinion is totally out of style), Bad Moon for previously noted reasons, and Murray Street because I think it's their most perfect latter day work. Really love Evol, ATL, Goo and Washing Machine, so those probably rotate for the #5 spot.
But my list changes every couple of years. I can't make up my damn mind. But #1 and #2 are almost always Sister and Daydream.

Where The Red Fern Grows is like one of my fav. SY tracks! epic track in every way.

Yah, another jam. I def. prefer this to CIY, as crazy as that may sound.

It's not crazy. I mean even my least favorite sy albums are fucking great albums. Y'know?

Yup. I certainly do know.

"I Dreamed I Dream" is one of my favourite SY tracks, and I've always wondered why they never did more harmony / duet vocals. Not that it's really missed, but it could have been nice. Like CSNY with SY guitars.

All along the Lee shore
Shells lie scattered in the sand
Winking up like shining eyes, at me
From the sea

:-)

Anyway, I'm on a Smog diet, nothing but smog for me for the past two days and today all day long on repeat while I was at home. Tomorrow probably some more Smog while I'm in the car for most of the day on a business trip. Or maybe some Bill Callahan for a change.
His first two albums are way too lo-fi for me, but the rest is pure magic. Haven't listened to him for a while, now I'm hooked again.

Knock Knock is my shit. And Julius Caesar. And The Doctor Came At Dawn.

RUSH- Vapor Trails

Not bad. Two or three songs really stand out. A "pop" album, I guess, because there's very little Rush-y wankery. Might dig into their more recent stuff a little more. Maybe I can squeeze out a decent compilation.

As for the discussion a couple posts back I LOVE Confusion Is Sex, although it took me a long time to get into it. It's got that dark, shivery, anxious vibe to it that's really powerful. One of my top SY albums. Bad Moon Rising has a similar vibe, love "Society Is a Hole" and stuff, but then a lot of the rest feels only half-formed to me.
The SY EP is awesome and is on my wishlist.

I'm listening to "Burns Inside" by Puressence

totally. There's really creepy stuff on there.

Actually it just started raining really hard here... I think I'll throw that on in a bit.

Oh man, I really need to complete my Smog collection. What's easier to rob, a drugstore or a liquor store? Eh, I'll just rob both.

Also on a constant smog diet: people in Beijing.

Pearl Jam
No Code
1996, When I first heard No Code it really surprised me. See, I had been a Pearl Jam since day one. But this album was like... wow. Vitalogy is actually a favorite of mine now, but back then it was pretty weird to me. No Code was immediately gratifying. It felt like the best parts of Vitalogy condensed. It was just more straight-forward I guess. Nowadays I probably prefer Vitalogy, but I still love this album. It opens with the short and sweet "Sometimes" which feels at moments like PJ performing as softly as they're capable of. And THEN... "Hail Hail" which just rocks your speakers off. This album is no bullshit. It has its quiet moments, and it rocks. And that's about it. I mean there's the kind of 'world music' influence on "Who You Are," I guess but this isn't the kind of experimentalism that we heard on "Bugs," y'know? "Off He Goes" is this crushing narrative about bad friends. "Red Mosquito" is this intense scorcher about a visit from the devil... or maybe just a symbol of temptation? I don't know. Most Pearl Jam albums that I really love are ones that stand out in their gigantic discography as being somehow unique. But this one I think I love because it just kind of encapsulates stereotypical Pearl Jam. In a good way.



Sonic Youth
Confusion Is Sex
1983, The first time I heard Confusion Is Sex it actually kind of scared me. Or at least I found it off-putting. It was so dense and atonal. Even the title and artwork seems like its meant to confront. It was easily the SY album that took me the longest to get into. But once I did, I loved it hard. It's now in my top tier. "She's In A Bad Mood" starts off with what sounds like just open strings ringing out, as if the musicians had no idea how to play. And I love it. "Protect Me You" is horrifying. It's so slow and creepy and written from the perspective of a ten year old. "Freezer Burn" is just guitar feedback drone and then it bursts into "I Wanna Be Yr Dog" MID-SONG and taken from a particularly incredible live recording. "Shaking Hell" repeats "I'll take off your dress/shake off your flesh." I mean, c'mon. "Inhuman" is amazing. Truly amazing. The closest they come to hardcore here on an album that sounds like a hardcore tape played at a too-slow speed. "The World Looks Red" is a Swans throwaway, and I'm fine with that. It just fits here. "Making The Nature Scene" is like quasi-rap. There's just so much going on here in such a dark place. It's impressive how well it all hangs together thematically. You know music is good if it can still make you anxious after almost two decades of listening to it. Since 1995 the CD has also included the Kill Your Idols EP which works really well as a counterpoint to the slow sludginess of most of Confusion. "Kill Your Idols" and "Brother James" are both fantastic and hang well alongside "Inhuman." This is really an amazing beginning for the band. One that was recorded amidst drummer changes and supposedly master tapes with soda spilled on them. And perhaps that's all part of the magic.

Was "The World Looks Red" really a Swans throwaway? I forget the specifics, but I thought Gira just wrote some of the lyrics, then repurposed the title in 2015.

He wrote all the lyrics tho I don't recall why Swans didn't record it.

I think he may have written the lyrics for SY though, which makes me think of it annoy a Swans throwaway. I could be wrong though. I forget.

That may be the case. Yeah. I'm really not sure now.

Here's the answer

younggodrecords.com/products/the-glowing-man

Gira wrote it, Thurston wanted to use it.