Marc Fagel's Blog: Jittery White Guy Music: The Blog, page 160

10,000 Maniacs: The Wishing Chair (1985)

Used to play this one a lot back in the college radio days, just another excellent mid-80s album full of jangly guitar pop that sounded great alongside R.E.M., the Reivers, etc. Yet I didn't spend much time with the band in the years that followed. I dunno; maybe their growing mainstream success scared me off (though listening to their subsequent albums lately reminds me that, while increasingly commercial, they were still perfectly enjoyable).

But Wishing Chair, their major label debut (some ear...

The Copyright Infringement Mix

No time today for an album pick of the day, so I'm sharing an old mix. This one pairs songs that resulted in actual or threatened litigation for copyright infringement (though I tacked a few on at the end that surprisingly did not). The mix/playlist includes songs allegedly (or arguably) borrowing a little too heavily from another song; I did not include examples of unauthorized sampling, which is a different animal entirely.

I think there's a good debate to be had here on whether the courts have...

Help Yourself: Strange Affair (1972)

Reaching back into the catacombs of my collection, here's Help Yourself, a '70s band out of London that's kinda tough to pigeonhole. They came out of the same British pub rock scene as Brinsley Schwarz, and share some commonalities with the early Brinsley sound -- an odd blend of Americana (part circa-1970 Grateful Dead, part Laurel Canyon singer-songwriters/CSN) and R&B-tinged rock and a bit of prog. Kind of a British Little Feat, thinking generously.

This, their second album, shines when they s...

The Bears: The Bears (1987)

Recently dusted this little baby off for the first time in years, and was reminded what an odd (yet delightfully entertaining) curio it is.

The Bears were an on-again/off-again alternative pop band co-fronted by Adrian Belew. And this, their debut, is certainly not what one would have expected at the time from a Belew-related project. Belew was best known initially as the wickedly inventive guitarist who supported acts like Frank Zappa, Talking Heads, and David Bowie, before joining with Robert F...

Yo La Tengo: May I Sing With Me (1992)

I think there's a general consensus among Yo La Tengo fans that they became a truly great band with their mid-90s trio of insanely great indie albums -- Painful, Electr-o-pura , and I Can Hear the Heart Beating As One . But it was their preceding record that really kicked the band into high gear, where they established the blueprint for much of their later work (at least in part heralded by the arrival of bassist James McNew, who, after several albums of revolving bassists, would complete up the b...

Music For Insomniacs (A Mix)

No album pick today, tied up with other things. But thought I'd share one of my favorite mixes instead.

I've had chronic insomnia all my life. Not surprisingly, I've often turned to music to help, either to (sometimes) lull me to sleep, or (more frequently) to give me some quiet comfort as I restlessly lie there staring at the ceiling.

My go-to is generally Brian Eno, both his instrumental ambient works and his quieter vocal work (particularly on Another Green World and side two of Before and Afte...

The Sugarcubes: Life's Too Good (1988)

Here's one that just totally blew me away on first listen. I mean, damn, that voice!

I've never been a fan of Bjork's solo work (though, to be fair, I've never really listened to much of it). And even the Sugarcubes albums don't get a ton of playtime from me these days. But this one will always hold a special place for me. I think that's largely because of the pairing of Bjork's unique and wondrous vocals, so novel at the time, with a fascinating set of tunes, something the Sugarcubes themselves ...

Band Of Horses: Everything All The Time (2006)

So, I guess these guys got kinda popular? I mean, even my kids seem somewhat familiar with some of their music, which doesn't happen very often. I'm assuming their songs have shown up in tv shows or commercials or whatever? It just seems a bit odd; while their sound is often alt.rock adjacent, there's still enough idiosyncrasy to their music that I hadn't pictured them getting a ton of traction.

Their 2006 debut remains my favorite, though all of their albums have enough solid material to make th...

Utopia: Deface The Music (1980)

I know, we were just talking about a different Todd Rundgren project the other day, but I happened to take this one out for a spin this week, so here we are. Gotta say up front, I'm not a fan of Utopia, Rundgren's long-running side band, which saw him playing both prog (mid-70s) and somewhat generic hard rock and new wave-tinged pop (late 70s and 80s) -- like he alternately felt like sounding like Yes or Foreigner or Jefferson Starship. (Though they managed the occasional decent song, like class...

Lazy Smoke: Corridor of Faces (1968)

I could probably fill a few weeks of blog entries here just by calling out long-forgotten late 60s psychedelic bands that tried their best to sound like the Beatles. (Go back and check out my entry for the wonderful Aerovons for one of the better examples.)

So, yeah, Massachusetts' Lazy Smoke are another one of those, releasing a single album of Beatles-tinged psyche rock, aided largely by a lead singer whose vocals conjure John Lennon. Not a lot of information out there about the band; apparentl...