Emeralds-Classic or Dud?

interviewing them sometimes this week. any pressing questions?

i'm trying to find a way to frame it, especially since i saw them during their beginnings in 06-07, then ignored them for a few years, and then started up again after 'What Happened' came out..

how do they decide what goes on the solo albums and what goes on the Emeralds albums? is there a specific "sound" that they look for under the main name? what processes distinguish the group efforts?

http://i149.photobucket.com/albums/s45/Al_English/EMERALDSFLYER.png

I'm really bummed I missed that show; I wish they were playing another London date. I really like that Dean McPhee "Brown Bear" EP as well (it's arguably closer to the recent MacGuire solo stuff; just pretty clean guitar work - it's £2 for MP3s on Amazon, too (as opposed to 12 credits on eMusic and £10 on iTunes). I have heard that Camp Basement venue is a drag - has anyone else been there?

mcguire's living with yourself is beyond gorgeous, instant record of the year shortlist here

I need to hear that! I recently picked up the Tidings/Amethyst Waves reissue and have really been loving it. So lovely.

just out on mego, should be pretty easy to track down. and yeah, the weird forest reissue of tidings/amethyst is beautiful. at this point, i think i like mcguire better than emeralds (but don't tell anyone).

just noticed (thanks google) that it got 8.2 @ pfork just two days ago. lol bandwagon jumping [/prr].

I headed down the the show at Camp...doors didn't open till 9 so I bailed. Was it good?

fell asleep to 'what happened' for countless nights this year, if theres anything to be remembered from this past decade it's those tracks

going to see them in december too HLLYH

Is the new McGuire better than the last Emeralds?

seems almost inconceivable to me, but maybe someone who has heard both can weigh in?

i usually listen to anything on Mego, but what little i heard of McGuire sounded like chillwave and i turned it offskis

^Completely unjustifiable and just sad, really^

Is the new McGuire better than the last Emeralds?

i wouldn't say it's better, but i like it more. it's prettier and more emotionally direct. "accessible," let's say.

I only listened to the mcguire on mego once but it didn't do too much for me. I go to the guy for extended krautrockin' in an a.r. & machines style and the scattershot vibe kinda put me off. the off in the distance tape that chondritic sound just re-issued on lp was much more to my liking.

should prob give it another go sometime

"living with yourself" is really doin it for me right now. as someone who has spent countless hours by myself w a guitar plugged into a delay pedal, i can feel exactly where mcguire's expression is coming from. plus i am a sucker for nostalgic samples (ie. efdemin - bergwein). i dont think its quite as good as the emeralds album but theyre both in the top 5 of 2010 for me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-GUSF-Y6As
anyone who complains that its too noodly or wanky needs to realize that emeralds might not be the band for them

anyone who complains that its too noodly or wanky needs to realize that emeralds might not be the band for them

...not sure anyone is making that complaint? (at least in this thread.)

... really not digging the second half of the last track on "Living With Yourself" where it breaks down into some mid-90s smashing pumpkins alt rock thing. Good album, though, and "Brain Storm (for Erin)" is amazing.

... really not digging the second half of the last track on "Living With Yourself" where it breaks down into some mid-90s smashing pumpkins alt rock thing.

this is the sort of complaint i'd more likely expect. works for me though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTU1hFT2Uj8

some of these songs -- "brain storm" and "clear the cobwebs" especially -- remind me of the second harmonia album

...not sure anyone is making that complaint? (at least in this thread.)

yea after i wrote that i realized that mr strawman was a paranoid delusion heh

lol whiney mcguire solo album wld sound soooo much better if it sounded more like chillwave

i mean it has it moments but it sounds like k records jams or something to me

as a heads-up to my fellow Emeralds bros with more money than sense, Imaginary Softwoods either (a) was recently reissued or (b) is about to be rereleased; it was a tiny pressing so I honestly can't tell which one.

meanwhile my copy of the Wha Happened? on Editions Mego showed up today and hell the fuck yeah @ this album. I bought it blind on the strength of my abiding enthusiasm for Does It Look Like I'm Here and I like it almost as much after one play.

it sounds like k records jams or something to me

uh, you mean pell mell? cuz hell yeah. otherwise, wtf?

(listens to it) plus fuck you, cuz shit sound way more like classic dino jr. than fuggin k recs anything, like "freak scene" forever. and the tune is called fucking "brothers" besides, so why ain't it oughtta be bro jams unto thee three suns forever? one of my favorite songs of the year, no competition. those with hearts will understand.

the point being "FOREVER" (apparently)

the mist album is so good. "taking the mist" splits the difference between early tangerine dream and the cosmic jokers. 10.0 bongloads

just got remastered by Plotkin & issued on vinyl too!

lol @ shit upthread: contedo i just think theres something in the space-y meandering nature of 'living with yourself' that recalled k records stuff but a 'jams' version. maybe its the evocation of nature's grandeur and scope but its there in the jags and swirls of 'the vast structure...' for e.g.

also the guitar tone + stupid kids at a party shit that opens it is vintage k

i will look out for 'taking the mist' tho

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5Bnu_1vpxo&feature=related

i mean cmon

was super drunk for what it's worth, lamp. kinda cringe reading back. but i still don't hear the k-rex vibes you're pointing at. i mean, "space-y and meandering" music evoking "nature's grandeur and scope" isn't how i'd describe the label's core sound. like to me, k = beat happening, pastels, stuff that grew out of that. intimate, childlike, distinctly in the here and now. never followed the likes of mount eerie, and maybe that's what you're linking living with yourself to?

funny that you call it "stupid kids at a party shit", though, cause to me it's like family snapshots: an expression of affection for one's own family & history, an acceptance of the domestic. again, i don't really associate this with k, who always seemed kinda aloof & hipster snide, despite the twee kidstuff affectations.

guitar tone business may be OTM, but i'm so far removed from those beat happening records, i dunno. there's some interesting effects on the guitar on LWY, but you don't notice them much unless it's loud or on headphones.

like, i'm listening to the LP (youtubes sound like ass), and the guitar tone seems much richer and druggier than anything i associate with classic K. their sounds were always so sharp and cheap, like little insects banging against my ears.

the closest k records vibe to this stuff is yume bitsu and that's way more maximal i think

yeah i was thinking of stuff like mount eerie or mirah more than beat happening or lois or w/e, although there is a beat happening song 'our secrets' that reminds me of 'for erin' where the guitar is fairly 'rich' and 'druggy' although its faster and theres less space in the composition

im not wedded to this comparison really but it forced me to relisten to the record

i mean its a bad analogy from the start because its like 'x reminds me of y but really an imaginary only in my head version of y' so

yeah, and by the same token, it's lame of me to be all, "i don't hear it the way you do, so you must be wrong." ears are funny things, like little cabbage leafs on your head, and they tell you things. but they are not always to be trusted, again like cabbages. petit chou.

i like ilxor because i can read it during college and it's so text heavy that it looks like i am doing research.

I read all of you saying there is other stuff that sounds similar but better or whatever, but I think "Does It Look Like I'm Here?" is my favorite record of this year anyway. I really like this band!

Holy fucking shit @ Brothers (For Matt)

(kinda sounds like the Bevis Frond though)

just put on Does It Look Like I'm Here? in the living room -- before i knew it my wife was passed out asleep on the couch an hour earlier than usual bedtime within 20 min (track 6 or so). coincidence?

awesome record btw

Incredible album, that ^. I never would've thought for a 1000yrs that acoustic strumming and entirely irrelevant 1950's computer terminal beep-boops could work so utterly well together, especially considering separated they could be 2 entirely different melodies/songs.

thankyou to all emeralds voters in the ilm poll. am just concluding my first listen to this album and it's beautiful. the pastoral guitar-led closers were a surprise, in a good way!

hurrah!!