Where can I get those almonds?

Zulya. Great voice, great music, great everything.

An addendum to yesterday's review. Something terrible I just discovered about this song in the lyrics department of the Enoweb site.

Here are the lyrics:

And here is the interpretation which makes a lot of sense if you read the lyrics carefully:

This also fits with the calm mood of the song. How could I wish to be there? Eno lured me in with Julie's open blouse. I feel betrayed now. On second thoughts that serves me quite well, actually.

I hesitated to choose the third Eno album in this series (1973 may yield a 4th one though the second Roxy Music will be a tough contender) but I realised that what I like about Bowie's Low is its strong Eno touch on the mainly instrumental second atmospheric side. Eno on his own (plus guest musicians) in 1977 to my ears still sounds more adventurous and timeless than the dark and brooding Low. Which additionally hasn't got such a classy black and white cover.

Like Low Before and after Science has two totally different sides as the title already suggests. No. 1 is more rhythmic, no.2 is more like a soundscape. An album which stands in-between his earlier avant pop output and his later ambient releases. Two music worlds are juxtaposed and I find the result of this approach still as thrilling as in the late seventies when I listened to it for the first time. To be honest this is the only album I bought in that mostly dreadful decade for me which I still love today. Kiss, Manfred Mann's Earth Band, Supertramp, Pink Floyd, Alan Parsons, Genesis and Eloy were the bands I cherished in the first half of my teenage years. None of them stood the test of time. I can date back my obsession with music to the purchase of this Eno record which I bought in a record shop in Duisburg about 15 kilometers from my home town. I think I went there by bicycle after having read a review in Die Zeit which still is the only newspaper (a weekly) I read regularly.

It starts with the wonderful groovy piece No One Receiving. One of the greatest moments of Phil Collins. His reverberating drums give this track a light and almost ballet-like quality. A simple bassline dominates the song which is uncategorisable. Somewhere in between world, jazz, dance and pop. Weird and enchanting.

Backwater is even weirder. The piano is part of the rhythm section. Eno sings surreal lyrics about god knows what. The melody is in the singing, the instruments are following later. And then there is this handclapping. I hear some irony there and it sounds bloody good.

More bass wizardry on Kurt's Rejoinder which features Kurt Schwitters recitating one of his dada poems. Clever collaging.

On Energy Fools the Magician we enter soundscape land. Phil Collins hi-hat sounds like a triangle, Eno's "vibes" like a synthie, his keyboards like a piano, his chorus like a women background choir, Fred Frith's modified guitar (?) like a glockenspiel, only Percy Jones fretless bass sounds like a bass. Around 80 seconds in the bass seems to fall over like when you walk too fast and you lose the equilibrium. But then the music does not turn around, it goes on in its majestic calm way. Disappointed expectations. Altogether only two minutes but in those 125 seconds there is more happening than in the entire output of many musicians.

The next song seems to be the turning point. King Lead's Hat. An anagramm of Talking Heads with whom Eno worked later on, I think. More handclapping accompanies a trashy rhythm. This used to be my least favourite track on the album. It feels a little out of place here sandwiched in between two slow atmospheric pieces as it is very upbeat. When Robert Fripp's guitar solo comes just before the two minute mark my love for this song starts to grow though. This beautiful warm and fuzzy King Crimson sound is so perfect in small doses. Paul Rudolph provides some sudden bass chords which seem to act like a stopper but it goes on. Finally it all goes kind of electronic. Eno doing his "metallics". I hear the sound of champagne bubbles and I get very thirsty.

Side two shoots off (not really ;-)) with Here He Comes. As so often Eno offers us an earcatcher as the first song on a side. A languishing beautiful melody about a boy who "was seven feet high". After a minute the song intensifies itself by getting melancholic and even more beautiful when Eno holds his breath for a second and elongates the syllables by singing "coooomes" and then "bloohoohoohoo". What always astounds me about his voice that on one hand it has this totally asexual almost robotic tinge and then it can get so sentimental.

Julie with... ("her open blouse is gazing up into the empty sky") is the longest song on the album. Six minutes and twenty seconds starting slowly in a dreamy way. We are drifting on a calm sea. The first resolution (or dénouement) comes after two minutes. More drifting and a second resolution after four minutes. The gorgeous cruise resumes. I wish I had been there.

Piano time. A tiny theme. By this River is tenderness pure. The proof that beauty is simple. Eno's singing inevitably turns into humming. Words fail. The song was used in the German movie on RAF terrorism Die innere Sicherheit by Christian Petzold whenever the daughter of the terrorist couple left the doomed family to find herself. In Portugal on the beach for example. A young, innocent girl dreaming of a normal world outside of the hiding and the lying. It's a great film and an even greater song.

Through Hollow Lands is the track of this record that haunted me most in the late 70s. An instrumental which I taped in a loop on a C90 cassette. I listened to it for meditation purposes. Impossible to ever get bored by it. As there is hardly anything happening in it. No highs, no lows, just an incredible serenity. I never arrived to the point where my thoughts stopped. Patience has never been my stronghold.

Eno closes the album with Spider and I. Synthie plains going slightly towards the heavy. It's not bad but by far not the best on this stunning album. Which probably would be my island disc if I had to choose one Eno record. As it comprises the Eno before and after the accident. A watershed album with the watershed right in the middle.

Here is the overview of the series 40 years, 40 albums of which part XXXV was this post.

I have surprised myself again. This wonderful guitar album proves that there are still hidden treasures in my CD collection which needed to be rediscovered. The 40 years, 40 albums project fulfills its original purpose again.

The Feelies only released four records during their lifetime. This one, their second, was produced by REM's Peter Buck and is easily their most consistent and most accomplished effort.

Like another major American East coast indie band, I mean Yo La Tengo which must have been inspired by them, they come from New Jersey. Soundwise they point into the direction of Galaxie 500 and Luna (their drummer Stam Demeski was a member of the latter). Dreamy guitar pop with folkish roots. I hear something like the Velvet Underground tunes of around Loaded in a lighter, breezier way. There is also a West coast Paisley underground feel to the Feelies. More clear-sighted, juvenile and playful than psychedelic though. On The Good Earth we have wistful hymns which evoke the lost glories of youth, an amazing sense for melody coupled with tight drums grounding the music into mother earth. Glenn Mercer, the lead guitarist, has got the perfect unobtrusive voice providing an extra shyness and tenderness.

When I hear the dog barking in the beginning of When Company Comes I want to be there. Nature captured on record. Lovely is the word. Green pastures of bliss.

A forgotten gem of intricate simplicity going straight to the heart. If you like the sound of acoustic guitars this is for you. The last two songs should have been left off the record. They cannot sustain the quality of the first eight tracks. Still, almost thirty minutes of heaven are more than 99.9% of what all records offer. Have a taste of the opener On the Roof and tell me if you can resist. Or not.

Here is the overview of the series 40 years, 40 albums of which part XXXIV was this post.

This was my first full Sonic Youth album. Someone on ILM said that your favourite SY release usually is the first one you got exposed to. That is totally on the money concerning me. I knew them before though and had listened to some of their songs during my studies around 1987. I remember some improvised sounding distorted guitar music which had made them a kind of mythic band for me in 1992 when I was seriously getting into indie rock. After Dirty I slowly purchased most of their back catalogue and all new records coming out except NYC Ghosts & Flowers. I even got the four experimental SYR releases I never listen to. Nothing ever hit me as hard as Dirty.

Dirty was produced by Butch Vig who was the man responsible for a lot of the grunge sound when it got big. Among others he produced Nirvana's Nevermind, the Smashing Pumpkins Gish, many Gumball and Die Kreuzen records. Dirty is a rather untypical album for SY as many songs are quite short and to the point (Goo is similar but more pop). There are no songs in the Grateful Dead jamming vein which go on and on and often lose me after a while like on most other SY releases. Dirty is pretty hard rocking sophisticated guitar rock full of restrained power.

The album starts with 100% where SY make a bed of noisy guitars into which Thurston Moore's straight cool voice fits perfectly. The mood of the whole album is condensed into two and a half minutes of fierce ravage.

Swimsuit Issue starts with a stubborn, abrasive primitive "riff" underlined by the cymbals and almost halts in the last minute when they put on the brakes in full speed. Listen to Kim Gordon whose timbre changes totally from riot girrl delivery to pussy cat purr at the end when she says in her most dreamiest voice

On Theresa's Sound-world they weave a thick carpet of guitar noise after a slow harmonic start. Accelarating, decelarating back and accelerating again. And then finishing in calm beauty. How I love these silent-loud dynamics. I really like how varied the tracks are in themselves.

Drunken Butterfly is the perfect example of holding back the energy when Kim sings smoothly and plays this earth-shattering bass line. The eruption in noise is inevitable.

Shoot is a slow song building up with Kim singing in her sexy but determined voice. It only shoots off for a minute or so in the middle. The tension is never completely relieved.

Wish Fulfillment with Lee Ranaldo singing starts otherworldly and turns into a guitar wall fest with a weird end full of electronic effects. The tempo and volume changes make this album so dear to me.

Sugar Kane has got a great floating riff. The drums beat hard and the guitar effects are awesome. After four minutes it slacks off only to get back to the hard core. It's the longest song with almost 6 minutes but it never gets boring.

Orange Rolls, Angel's Spit is a typical Kim Gordon freak-out track where at times she sounds like a pig been slaughtered but there are these lala-lala-lala-lala background vocals which counterbalance her shrieking delivery perfectly. The guitars are running havoc in the beginning but everything is under control.

Youth against Fascism is accelerating slowly. The pounding bass and the squeaky guitar sounds are so huge. Tight as hell. Thurston kicks us in the ass.

Nic Fit is a one minute speed punk wonder. Thurston summarises this song fittingly when barking

The epic On the Strip sung by Kim Gordon follows. Sexy would be an understating epithet for her voice here. If God was a woman interested in propagation she would sound like this.

On the seemingly sweet Chapel Hill Thurston sings

and it morphs into a 200 miles per hour guitar chaos.

JC is an atmospheric, textured track where Kim speaks the lyrics. Post-rock in a The Gift way or something like that.

On Purr SY have the psychobilly blues. Back to the roots. Thurston admits

The album ends with the ballad Crème Brulée. Kim says these hilarious lines

and finishes with

Someone on this site interpreted the song nicely:

Dirty is Sonic Youth's White Album. It is all there. They had reached their creative peak.

No mp3 yet, everything is great. Tell me in the comments what you'd like me to upload if you are still with me.

Here is the overview of the series 40 years, 40 albums of which part XXXIII was this post.

P.S. Jetzt bin ich ja mal gespannt, was diese Verfassungsrechtler zu Köhlers Entscheidung sagen werden.