Counting Crows--C/D

Not as good as the Cutting Crew.

The new one isn't half bad, if you're into the mopey, dreaded rock star thing. Certainly the best thing they've done since This Desert Life and almost makes me forgive that atrocious Shrek song and horrid Joni Mitchell cover.

I love "A Long December" so much. It's so sad and pretty. I remember once I was driving around on a gray, snowy day in Minneapolis and I was all bummed out and it came on the radio and it was perfect.

"A Long December" is all I know or need to know. I somehow missed it when it was new, then discovered it while shopping (!) a couple years back. I'm inside my brain looking at my feet in the soup aisle or whatever, and all of a sudden I realize how sad and beautiful the muzak raining down on me is this day, and it was "ALD."

I downloaded a few more tracks that were kind of dopey and sucky, so that was that, but man, I can still listen to "A Long December" five times in a row, no problem. It's one of my favorite songs ever, punches me in the gut and gives me the prettiest heartached every time, and I have no issue saying it either.

A separate discussion might be "was the sheer plaintive melancholic beauty of this song an accident?" and to that colloquy I would have nothing at all to contribute.

Still think they're classic. Something really special about that middle period. Was watching CRUEL INTENTIONS a few weeks ago, and "Colorblind" really hit me. Also, this one:

Counting Crows fans to thread plz

I used to like them and I have a fondness for certain songs, but I find the ballads unbearable, sorry.

ayo these dudes had some jams.

The first record came out when I was at the absolute zenith of my early-teen indie snobbery and yet if I happen to hear a single from that album over the speakers at a bar I get a small whiff of that nostalgic feeling I thought I would be above. Perhaps that makes them slightly superior to their contemporaries, or perhaps it is just the alcohol. A non-mean-spirited dud.

one of my bros is in a minimal-electronica band with the guitarist... sounds NOTHING like CCrows...

the acoustic half of across a wire is really really tight.

http://26.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m1yts9uZ3m1qc3wjlo1_500.jpg

"Long December" playing in the hotel restaurant where I'm trying to eat breakfast. Truly, this is the worst music of all fucking time.

So this is a pretty glowing review. I've never been into this band, but that write up is very enticing.

Any thoughts?

new record is pretty nice!, he announced to no one

"cover up the sun" really sweetly harnesses the vibes of folksy grateful dead

it's possible this is the least insufferable crows record bc almost none of the lyrics are about how duritz is an abandoned dreadlocked baby no one likes

justifying my continued affection for this band to someone the other day i said "it's a dude who desperately wants to be van morrison fronting a band who desperately wants to be the band and i think these are noble pursuits. it's just unfortunate that frontdude wants to invest the pursuit with his broetry"

and i say that still loving a lot of his lyrics. anyway this is my fifth post in a row in the counting crows c/d thread

I secretly like this band way more than I should

oh good, someone else

my favorite counting crows record is still hard candy which imo is at least 70 percent an album about insomnia and relentlessly traveling the country within the shifting center of that insomnia, 20 percent an album about memory, 5 percent an album about richard manuel dying, 5 percent an abominable big yellow taxi cover

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QRjZE-_8BsM

if you don't come through, i wouldn't wait for you
i understand that everyone goes disappearing
into the greater gray that covers over everyday
and hovers in the distance

is a pretty good lyric imo

i liked that Potter's Lullaby one

I like most of the first album and a few things on the second.

duritz was a total dick to me right when the first album came out and I ran into him on the street and congratulated him on it. he looked at me like I was an alien. granted I was probably high.

I revived the other thread last year
POLL: Counting Crows - August & Everything After
also worth reading that Grantland piece I linked in there.

I have much love for this band. They are the band my big sis and I bonded over in the 90s and still text each other about every other month or so (she lives on the other side of the US). We've both been to CC gigs within the last year by ourselves and live texted each other throughout.

Brad and Spottie talking such a strong game that it makes me almost wanna do one of my periodic "check out music you used to really hate and see if you like it now" things

give it a shot!

I still love the first two records, the second one especially. I heard a song from the new one and it was pretty good! Will have to give the whole thing a listen.

I used to like them and have fondness for a few songs but aero your long post on another thread about your utter contempt for this band is some beautiful hating and I would be sad to see you renege on it.

ha those posts are great it's true! I will never feel the need to defend this band, tbf. Just one of those bands I like that I expect everyone else hates and I'm comfortable with that. Would be interested in hearing aero's thoughts on a re-listen tho, see if the hatred is too deep to approach this from a different angle.

Basically Spottie feels about Counting Crows the way I feel about Styx.

I will never feel the need to defend this band

yep

count me in. i actually liked large chunks of that covers record from a few years back. didn't even know a new one was due.

Recovering The Satellites is a wonderful album imo

http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/02539/duritz_2539013b.jpg

"Long December" playing in the hotel restaurant where I'm trying to eat breakfast. Truly, this is the worst music of all fucking time.

too many encores (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned) wrote this at 2012-12-17 17:13:11.000

I totally get how this is not breakfast music.

I totally get how this is not breakfast music.

and the feeling that it's all a lot of egg whites with no yolks

spottie what do you think of the new one

Bout to fire it up, will report back!

think "earthquake driver" is his best lyric overall in a while (saturday nights & sunday mornings was oddly both restrained and unhinged lyrically, duritz endlessly musing on "everything" and "nothing" which was pretty boring). think "dislocation" is my favorite song. think this is way better than saturday nights in general and really enjoy the expansive qualities of "palisades park" and "johnny appleseed's lament"

Listened a couple times.

God of the Ocean Tides (aka Dust in the Wind?) is really nice, as well as Possiblity Days. I think they do ballads as good as anyone. Palisades Park and John Appleseed's Lament are def standouts. The hook on Dislocation kinda grates but the rest is good, might grow on me. Kinda love the final third of this lp straight up. Even into the ragtime stomper 'cover up the sun'.

been spending a lot of time with the most recent one and it's better than I even gave it credit for at the time (I am weirdly, unnecessarily bet-hedging in this thread idk why)

been preaching to the already-converted for a while that hard candy is their best record if you delete the big yellow taxi cover from every layer of existence

I've always had a soft spot for their tune "Perfect Blue Buildings" as when I was in school I remember being dirty and dead tired washing dishes about 3am in the back of a restaurant/bar alone hearing it on this sad radio that was zip tied up above the 3 sink.

i associate those first albums really strongly with dirty teenage restaurant work, too. that stuff is probably too intertwined with certain memories for me to even really hear what it sounds like.

What I hate about them, much like Rob Thomas, is that Duritz's voice MAKES them MOR. He's like the anti-Fagen, whose voice IMO contrasts/complements nicely with all that Steely Dan sheen.

Duritz, instead, grounds everything in this horrible 'tastefulness' that is completely repellent IMO

I got basically no critical perspective, but whataya mean by tastefulness

I too am wondering

holiday in spain song is hitting me today
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJatv7CUhys

its a real damn shame the album didnt end with this song

#1 hit in Holland:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkErDMj1TW8

its a real damn shame the album didnt end with this song

― big city slam (Spottie), Thursday, July 11, 2019 12:27 PM (twenty-four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

afaic big ol taxi is a bonus track from hell