Best Verlaines Album

there's a brilliant slice of music at 6.05 in last will...

even on pot boiler - a track like "don't leave" has a lot of patented Downes moves that're just great. but the performances are uninspired, and the recording doesn't really serve the song, which is something an interested & engaged songwriter would notice. their older stuff was "lo fi" or whatever but the aesthetic gelled with the performances and with their moment. whereas on "don't leave" - record this song in a more interesting way, the outro especially, say, and tell people it's an outtake from the old days & they'd believe it.

i liked it better when graeme was more interested in the politics of the personal versus politics in general. he comes off as a cranky old dude without the gifts of his youth that would obscure his lameness. has anyone seen him live recently? is he capable of the spleen busting wails of the past any more? last time i saw them was in 96 around the release of 'over the moon' and they were amazing, his hat was ridiculous, but the recent three records are all dreary and blah. it's probably all still well orchestrated and composed but it just doesn't hit me the same. the bats made one of their best albums ever last year, sure they were never at the verlaines level but robert scott is still the robert scott i remember, forever boyish, graeme sounds broken down.

Here's the broken old bastard himself about 4 months ago.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vyyad_u7W7A

Sharing that

Don't Leave kinda sounds to me like what it is - a song about someone that did themselves in.

I think these are really good. One from each.

It's easier to harden a broken heart, paratai drive, a call from decades past.

Thanks, 40years, I listened to these tracks and I think you nailed it. Now my compilation has proper representation from his recent albums!

it's absolutely true that recent verlaines albums aren't like the 80's stuff. but take lou reed's ectasy and compare it with the velvets. totally different. in fact take berlin and compare it to velvets.... people hated that record and it's now considered a classic. he didn't want to be pigeonholed. on the liner notes for metal machine music he said "my week is your year" which is one of the best lines ever. in other words 'if you don't like it, i don't care". i respect him for that. he wanted to keep moving forward.

I got really sick of them, I feel bad about that. They were creative and original at a time when, you know, American bands were kind of stagnant, but by Ready to Fly I was sick of them.

you were probably sick of yourself, and everybody else.

From what I can tell, these videos have not been posted. For me, they're both bittersweet (passing of time etc) and also a reminder of how great they were:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vyyad_u7W7A&feature=related

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8bZN_FBrUc&feature=relmfu

And for posterity:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eeuy8PD0bFM&feature=related

man that "in session" version of joed out sounds AMAZING. so much better than the original.

guitar tone is so great and it's allowed to breathe and ~reverberate~ properly.

his voice is in fine form, too. solid.

wait the verlaines released an album in feb 2012?
"dark riff" sounds pretty good but maybe i'm being influenced by the title
kinda sounds like ian curtis singing ?!

Yes, the new(ish) album is actually rather great! Which is something of a relief, because the last one (Corporate Moronic) was sort of awful and so I had feared that he had totally lost "it". But it appears he does, in fact, still have at least a bit of "it."

Wow @ the new album being called Dunedin Spleen. I'm excited.

Didn't vote but impossible to choose between the 2 winners so glad I didn't.

new album

https://verlainesband.bandcamp.com/

Not to mention, old album. Or rather, collection:

https://verlainesband.bandcamp.com/album/juvenilia

Ah from 1987...I remember liking that comp

i always thought that was an album! did not know it was a comp

Wishing Graeme all the best.

https://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/%E2%80%98it-what-it-%E2%80%99-downes-philosophical-about-diagnosis

:(

Some positive news:
https://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/downes-keen-be-back

Good to hear!

Anyone heard "Dunedin Spleen"?

The poll results have inspired me to listen to Bird-Dog for the first time. It's the only LP up there I never got around to in the 90s! Boy is my face red, etc.