i don't get paid nearly enough for this
― snarl self own (Karl Malone), Saturday, 12 February 2022 22:02 (two years ago) link
i love the new one and the band has grown by leaps and bounds but i still think capacity has the best songs
― roflrofl fight (voodoo chili), Saturday, 12 February 2022 22:08 (two years ago) link
Re: "Wake Me Up to Drive" sounding like a Springsteen / Magnetic Fields hybrid: a friend reminded me that Springsteen actually recorded a very Mag Fields–sounding song (...it doesn't sound much like "Drive," though):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8AukvoNJRNQ
― a beneficial mulch (morrisp), Saturday, 12 February 2022 23:19 (two years ago) link
sing for you sing for you sing for you sing for you sing for you
― diamonddeva85 (diamonddave85), Saturday, 12 February 2022 23:25 (two years ago) link
i didn't listen to that, but yeah that does sound like bruce covering magnetic fields! the universes are converging
― snarl self own (Karl Malone), Saturday, 12 February 2022 23:27 (two years ago) link
whoa that bruce thing is uncanny
― Clay, Saturday, 12 February 2022 23:44 (two years ago) link
Y'all have made excellent cases for this song or that song with an unearthly arrangement; but my favorite, now, is the acoustic trad "The Only Place."
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 12 February 2022 23:53 (two years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJMwa0Jb2Dc
rehearsal footage from instagram
― ufo, Sunday, 13 February 2022 01:23 (two years ago) link
'Hope' comparisons spot on, very specific in the Palace canon but correct
― PaulTMA, Sunday, 13 February 2022 01:41 (two years ago) link
“Flower of Blood” sounds to me almost like something that could have been on KROQ or 120 Minutes in the pre-grunge era… like played next to “So Alive” by Love and Rockets.I’m getting into the new songs by listening to them in batches. They definitely released the most “impactful” songs ahead of time (other than “Red Moon”), which I think does make it a little challenging to wade thru the others.
― a beneficial mulch (morrisp), Sunday, 13 February 2022 02:27 (two years ago) link
Yeah “Flower of Blood” has a very shoegaze/alt feel going on in the background. I can’t move forward in the album because I’m obsessed with that run I mentioned earlier.
The hype is real, if only for those 3 songs this is the best I’ve heard from them.
― ✖✖✖ (Moka), Sunday, 13 February 2022 04:22 (two years ago) link
Still absorbing a lot of this but it seems like the comparisons to Tusk and the more jarring style jumps all come in the first half. Most of the second half of the album feels like a more typical Big Thief album. Like, if they’d just released an album from “Red Moon” to the end, we might still call this more country but overall it wouldn’t feel like a major departure.
― sctttnnnt (pgwp), Sunday, 13 February 2022 04:41 (two years ago) link
i don't think it's a much of a departure at all, just a comfortable, natural expansion of what they're capable of. there are plenty of new sounds - the country tracks, "time escaping", "little things", the drum machine on "wake me up to drive" - but they're mostly not too radical shifts from what came before. wouldn't complain at all if we got a whole album like "time escaping" though.
the boldest part of the sequencing is just "time escaping" into "spud infinity" and they pull that off fine
― ufo, Sunday, 13 February 2022 05:03 (two years ago) link
the tusk comparisons are mostly about it being a 20 track folk/country/rock double album that's great the whole way through, with some textural similarities at times.
― ufo, Sunday, 13 February 2022 05:05 (two years ago) link
capacity was such a jump forward I understand attachment to it ... I do think they've continued to evolve though in a way that is essential to me really loving them! like I totally buy into them in a pretentious auteurist way LOL...but I dont think I ignore other female fronted acts (except in the sense i ignore 99% of indie)
Lenker's solo stuff doesn't totally click for me, even though shes like THE key to the band 'working' -- but I just like the stuff they do as a group more
― xheugy eddy (D-40), Sunday, 13 February 2022 05:38 (two years ago) link
I recently revisited Hours Were the Birds, which I was heavily into a few years back (I even bought my dad a copy, ha ha)… it didn’t really hold up, not sure why. (Abysskiss and Songs never clicked for me in the first place, even though the songs are obviously really good.)
― a beneficial mulch (morrisp), Sunday, 13 February 2022 05:58 (two years ago) link
abysskiss & songs are both excellent singer-songwriter albums but being that they're not really as exciting as what they're capable of as a whole band
― ufo, Sunday, 13 February 2022 07:59 (two years ago) link
I can't believe I didn't like Spud Infinity that much at first. now it just seems brilliant, perfect
― snarl self own (Karl Malone), Sunday, 13 February 2022 16:54 (two years ago) link
10.9
if i ever see them live i am going to have to be that annoying as hell guy who sings along at the TOP of his lungs, on that song at least. it's one of the best songs i've ever heard, and the lyrics are a 10.8
― snarl self own (Karl Malone), Sunday, 13 February 2022 16:58 (two years ago) link
https://i.imgur.com/pFB1NoA.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/bO4Qs15.png
― snarl self own (Karl Malone), Sunday, 13 February 2022 17:26 (two years ago) link
post of the year
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 13 February 2022 17:29 (two years ago) link
it's the song of the century
― snarl self own (Karl Malone), Sunday, 13 February 2022 17:30 (two years ago) link
Listened to this on vinyl a half dozen times this weekend. It doesn't feel overstuffed or anything to me, though listening to it on four physical sides maybe helps break it up and compartmentalize in a way that would be lost in other mediums. I also appreciate how they printed the lyrics in a manner that clearly aims for them to be read instead of cramming them on the sleeves in size 5 font.
I don't know Tusk well enough to get the comparisons, but for me I was reminded of the "tight" double album feel of Exile on Main St, which is diverse but never departs from what I consider the Stones' core sounds/styles. The country songs are some of the best here! "Spud Infinity" has been lodged in my head for the last two days.
― Indexed, Monday, 14 February 2022 15:42 (two years ago) link
Releasing a third of it between November and January has helped my assimilation.
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 14 February 2022 15:43 (two years ago) link
Exile is an interesting call. I was clearly off-base with my Physical Graffiti prediction
― a beneficial mulch (morrisp), Monday, 14 February 2022 16:10 (two years ago) link
it's funny exile is a double album and a really iconic album, but i don't feel like it ever comes up when ppl talk about iconic double albums, maybe because people usually expect the more white album type thing, really diverse stylistically
― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Monday, 14 February 2022 16:18 (two years ago) link
I think they're more thematically akin. The thing that unites stuff like White Album and Tusk and Exile and Sandinista! even is essentially a band literally not or at least often sounding like it's not working together as a band, per se. A few people there, a few people here, some tracks just one person, some two, different sessions cobbled together, a product of divergent individual interests and distractions, and so on. What's more unique about this album is it kind of *sounds* like some of those shambling, shaggy records, but it still very much sounds like a product of a band working together closely as a band (which is in part why it sometimes recalls the particular Americana alchemy of the Band).
― Josh in Chicago, Monday, 14 February 2022 16:54 (two years ago) link
They actually sound -- or at least create the impression that -- like they're having the most fun they've ever had.
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 14 February 2022 16:56 (two years ago) link
Yeah, those other aforementioned albums are the end-product of bands you couldn't get to be in the same room together. This one sounds more like the end-product of a band you can't get to *leave.*
― Josh in Chicago, Monday, 14 February 2022 16:58 (two years ago) link
wow this is an interesting nugget from lenker's wikipedia:
attended the Berklee College of Music on a scholarship provided by Susan Tedeschi of the Tedeschi Trucks Band.[3]
― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Monday, 14 February 2022 17:00 (two years ago) link
Good call, Josh.
― Indexed, Monday, 14 February 2022 17:07 (two years ago) link
Releasing a third of it between November and January has helped my assimilation.― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, February 14, 2022 7:43 AM (two hours ago)
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, February 14, 2022 7:43 AM (two hours ago)
i was thinking this last night. agree 100%. if i hadn't already absorbed those 8 (was it 8?) songs, this album would feel overwhelming and i don't know that i'd ever give any of it the time it deserves. as it is, i feel like i can set those 8 aside and focus on the rest of it now.
― alpine static, Monday, 14 February 2022 18:44 (two years ago) link
On the other hand, I'd not knowingly listened to any Big Thief before Friday but have been spinning it ever since - I did initially have an "oh. it's a double album" moment but have been very impressed with its repeat-playability
― PaulTMA, Monday, 14 February 2022 19:18 (two years ago) link
"Love Love Love" is SO loose-limbed & groovy... the "feel" reminds of me of some other artist or song that I can't at all put my finger on... maybe a Dylan thing(?)
― a beneficial mulch (morrisp), Monday, 14 February 2022 21:30 (two years ago) link
I'm stuck on "Flower of Blood," a Ride song played at Cocteau Twins speed.
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 14 February 2022 21:33 (two years ago) link
"Blue Lightning" is such a great closer... placing it at the end reminds me of "After Hours" (VU) a lil bit.
― a beneficial mulch (morrisp), Monday, 14 February 2022 21:40 (two years ago) link
Gotta love an album that kicks off with, "Would you live forever, never die / While everything around passes? / Would you smile forever, never cry?"; and ends with, "I wanna live forever 'til I die / Yeah, I wanna live forever 'til I die..."
― a beneficial mulch (morrisp), Monday, 14 February 2022 21:43 (two years ago) link
Been pulling throughSince the last time I touched youMaking do with an internet signalCalling for the delivery to the front door
There is no reason to believeNo reason at allCome together for a momentLook around and dissolveLike a feeling, like a flashLike a fallin' eyelash on your sweaterThreading future through the pas
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 14 February 2022 21:48 (two years ago) link
"blue lightning" as a closer kinda reminds me of "last orders please" by the faces, as done by workingman-era dead
― roflrofl fight (voodoo chili), Monday, 14 February 2022 21:54 (two years ago) link
yeah, that stretch caught my ear, too. (xpost)
she good
― alpine static, Monday, 14 February 2022 21:55 (two years ago) link
this band is just so generous
― ufo, Monday, 14 February 2022 22:43 (two years ago) link
The Japanese bonus tracks are now on YouTube (sadly, "Dragon" is not the rocking version).
― a beneficial mulch (morrisp), Monday, 14 February 2022 23:38 (two years ago) link
(...or maybe "happily," if that means there's a chance it may appear on the follow-up album!)
― a beneficial mulch (morrisp), Monday, 14 February 2022 23:47 (two years ago) link
buck confirmed in a recent interview that the rock version they've been playing live was recorded in topanga canyon with shawn everett, hopefully it'll see the light of day soon enough. i think there's a decent chance it's on the follow-up
― ufo, Monday, 14 February 2022 23:53 (two years ago) link
tucson version is fascinating but clearly not as compelling as the other two, a bonus track for a reason. there's also another version recorded in upstate new york we don't know anything about.
― ufo, Tuesday, 15 February 2022 00:01 (two years ago) link
and "light is as is" is just fine
― ufo, Tuesday, 15 February 2022 00:19 (two years ago) link
Just listened to this straight through twice, wow it's good. So many good songs!
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Tuesday, 15 February 2022 06:46 (two years ago) link
and then they post pics like this in their IG Stories, hahahttps://i.imgur.com/rwJCmVJ_d.webp?maxwidth=640&shape=thumb&fidelity=medium
― a beneficial mulch (morrisp), Tuesday, 15 February 2022 07:19 (two years ago) link
Their persona as a band feels very late '60s in the way a lot of bands seemed like goofy weirdos at the time. Thinking of the San Francisco scene in particular.
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Tuesday, 15 February 2022 13:55 (two years ago) link