Listen to an album you've never heard by an artist you never listen to and then tell us about it!

Grateful Dead - Workingman's Dead
Honestly I'd never really heard them. They're not so much of a UK thing so they were hardly turning up on the radio. Anyway this was completely tedious, I was skipping through to the next track by side 2. People who haven't heard The Band think they sound like this, and are pleasantly surprised to find they don't. This is why I always avoided drugs. Maybe it's not a good album to start with? Therefore I moved on to...

Aoxomoxoa
Not much better, this band is not for me I now realise. Too much dum-diddle-dum-dum-diddle-dum-dum. And the 8-minute droney vocal thing would have worked better in the hands of Yoko Ono. No doubt I should be listening to Dick's Pick's Vol. 137 or whatever instead, but you know what I think I'll pass.

I tried listening to Aoxomoxoa once and had much the same reaction.

It's not fair to drugs to blame them for Grateful Dead

Everywhere I've lived in the US there has been a weekly Grateful Dead radio show being broadcast -- either the syndicated "Grateful Dead Hour" or something similar but locally-produced. Catching one of these shows is the only time I've ever heard the band and it always seems to me like the worst music. I understand they have a huge cult following but it's mystifying that these radio shows exist, and have done so for decades.

I have literally never heard the Grateful Dead played on the radio. I've also never had a conversation about the Grateful Dead with anyone. Never known anyone to own one of their albums. Yes, US and UK, chalk and cheese basically.

I'll just keep playing this new Playboi Carti/Camila Cabello track over and over again. Gives a lot more than it asks. Alphonse Pierre called it "some good ol’ fashioned expensive nonsense" and that sounds about right.

― mr.raffles, Friday, March 29, 2024 8:03 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

mr raffles listen to whole lotta red challenge

^^ I keep meaning to do that but have been very busy w/other listening/ripping

It's not fair to drugs to blame them for Grateful Dead

― Muad'Doob (Moodles), Sunday, 31 March 2024 20:18 bookmarkflaglink

lol I thought the same

I'd never heard the Grateful Dead anywhere before although I knew someone who liked them at uni, but he was also the only British person I've ever met who liked Phish, tbf he was quite into drugs. he did play me some Phish once which I did not enjoy although no memory of what it actually sounded like. I listened to a double CD best of once and I did like a few songs on it but not that many out of 2 CDs worth so never bothered to follow up on them

i like the grateful dead! here is their first trip to England!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3H-CW12fBNA

I'll just keep playing this new Playboi Carti/Camila Cabello track over and over again. Gives a lot more than it asks. Alphonse Pierre called it "some good ol’ fashioned expensive nonsense" and that sounds about right.

― mr.raffles, Friday, March 29, 2024 8:03 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

mr raffles listen to whole lotta red challenge

Been listening to Carti since Magnolia.
WLR was good, as was Die Lit. I kinda never really get the album I'm hoping for from him though. Which is fine.

Thanks for pointing me to this Carti/Cabello new song.

Ahh... enjoy!

El Guincho has really made a lot of nice records at this point. Maybe there should be a thread or something?

there is!

oh nice!

Wild. It's all super old stuff, predating the work w/ Rosalia.
Ok. I'll stop hijacking the thread now.

I’ve been sampling some Django Reinhardt / Stephane Grapelli tunes. Never listened to them before. They cook. What’s the place to start? (I think this fits the thread though any album by them is likely to be an after the fact comp)

All of Reinhard's recordings are from the pre-album era (he died in 1953), and there are a fucking ton of them, so try The Essential Django Reinhardt as an entry point. It's a two-CD set that should cover all the bases.

^hey thanks 2 discs is perfect

yep that one is great

i owe this thread for helping me get over my jane siberry fear. i'm listening to her last album Ulysses' Purse from 2016 and its lovely! not typical. dreamy. in some ways she reminds me of a lost Mcgarrigle sister. my favorite Mcgarrigle Sisters album is Matapedia and i can only imagine that Jane Siberry is a fan of it as well. i like the meandering qualities of these songs. not stream-of-consciousness exactly but conversational while still poetic. she isn't all about rhyme which i appreciate. i think i'm going to go backwards and listen to her Three Queens Trilogy next. Three albums from 2008/2009/2011.

Ulysses' Purse was revamped and re-released as an album called Angels Bend Closer which I only heard last year. My main complaint was that she hires a small army of musicians who she somehow manages to make vanish behind walls of synth pads. I didn't think much of the "conversational" lyrics either.
I would recommend her debut though that might strike some listeners as standard 1981 art-folk.

the walking will change your life scott. or it won't!

someone should listen to one of those 70s Dory Previn records on here. talk about unloved art pop. i can't give those records away and they're cool!

okay i don't know if i can handle the trilogy. its a lot and a lot of spoken word so i am skipping those and the xian song cycle and the xmas stuff and going all the way back to the album Teenager from 1996 which so far seems about right for me.

I thought I would maybe do Astral Weeks for this, since I've never listened to a Van Morrison album and it has Richard Davis and Connie Kay on it. But I bailed halfway into the first song, just wasn't feeling the vibe (despite the great bass playing) but will take a shot some other time.

I have tried and failed with Astral Weeks on a number of occasions now.

yeah you have to sink into it. its a beauty if you are in the right frame of mind.

Moondance is the (mega-normie, I know) Van album I was into as a youth... I never go into any of his others.

i can get not being into his voice though. and it hits you straight out the gate on the title track. i honestly believe - and i know i'm gonna sound like a big chill guy here - that that album is a...work of art. in the same way that What's Going On is a work of art. like, as much as any painting or poem is a work of art. and he was, what, 22 or 23 when he made Astral Weeks? that's insane to me. I could barely get out of bed when I was 22.

Wow, Van Morrison is, and always has been, an insufferable douchebag, but Astral Weeks is, to me, an unquestionable classic. Very interesting.

Honestly I'd never really heard them. They're not so much of a UK thing so they were hardly turning up on the radio. Anyway this was completely tedious, I was skipping through to the next track by side 2. People who haven't heard The Band think they sound like this, and are pleasantly surprised to find they don't. This is why I always avoided drugs. Maybe it's not a good album to start with? Therefore I moved on to...

Aoxomoxoa
Not much better, this band is not for me I now realise. Too much dum-diddle-dum-dum-diddle-dum-dum. And the 8-minute droney vocal thing would have worked better in the hands of Yoko Ono. No doubt I should be listening to Dick's Pick's Vol. 137 or whatever instead, but you know what I think I'll pass.

― continue without dissembling (Matt #2), Sunday, March 31, 2024 12:28 PM (four days ago) bookmarkflaglink

If I were going to try to get someone to Give The Dead A Chance with an album, I'd probably give them either American Beauty, Europe 72 (live comp but official album), or maybe Blues for Allah. Or maybe Wake of the Flood. But I get it. I hated the Dead for years and I'm still pretty hot and cold on them.

American Beauty is precisely the one that was "completely tedious" though!

I'm so glad you're digging the Siberry, scott. Debut through Maria is basically unimpeachable, lots of moments of brilliance on subsequent releases.

El Guincho also did a lot of the production work on the imo excellent Sampha album from last year

xp wrong, iirc the post referred to Workingman's Dead, which to be fair is the weaker of the two

i agree that dory previn is due for a critical overhaul. she's as clever lyrically as nilsson or zevon. coldwater canyon is a slam jam.

I've never heard her!

Since live Dead seems a better bet I will possibly flick through Europe 72 (not listening to all 2 hours of it) and report back. Don't expect anything much different though!

I could not get into those Previn records at all, but I definitely know fans

One of Andre Previn's . . . five wives lol

xxp Matt just jam "Truckin" from Europe '72, I played it just the other day and it's really an ur-Dead template imho, if it doesn't work for you then they are prob not for you

American Beauty is precisely the one that was "completely tedious" though!

― The Prime of the Ancient Minister (Tom D.), Thursday, April 4, 2024 3:28 PM (ten minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

no, workingman's

Morning Dew from '72 - I feel like that would move anyone

(xp) Ah, you're right, my mistake.

I have never listened to Grayfolded, despite knowing about it forever, should I?

"I'm so glad you're digging the Siberry, scott"

we put on a vinyl copy of Bound By The Beauty in the store today and it sounded awesome. "Everything Reminds Me Of My Dog"!

i've given up on trying to get people to like the Dead. it will either happen or it won't. i totally get people being turned off though. they can sound lethargic to people in a way that just screams boredom. but if you hear one of those great songs like "stella blue" in the right mood...they can be so lovely to hear. they can sound very unexciting to people who first hear them. its weird. they can not hit you and then...something changes. it happens to diehard haters. my pal ilxor tarfumes is one example.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKsWDyvWaL4

xxp OMG YES

Grayfolded rules, all Oswald rules

https://i0.wp.com/collector.schothans.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/IMG_001-10.jpg?fit=680%2C302&ssl=1

xp I mean I'm a big fan of Plunderphonics, I revisit it pretty frequently, and regularly see the dude around town and with CCMC etc. etc. etc. I feel like I've done the guy a disservice by not listening to it

it's one of his finest works imo, lol local connections noted, I thought abt that after I posted