2.3.14
Downloaded U2's "Invisible", which Bank of America was sponsoring free downloads of for 24 hours after the Super Bowl to support the RED AIDS awareness initiative. This is probably the best song that they've written in the last ten years, and in that way it's a bit of a surprise——this would have held its own on 2000's All That You Can't Leave Behind, which has held up pretty well as the album that marked their return to a more classic sound after the Zooropa and Pop detours.

This is apparently going to be released sometime soon as part of a new album that was produced by Danger Mouse, which is pretty encouraging——I've generally enjoyed his collaborations with alt/indie rock musicians in the past, and if there's a producer who can get this band excited about really getting back to their roots, it just might be him. This song is s good preview; if we can get a whole album of this quality, this will be the first U2 album worth buying in a long time.

2.4.14
Three weeks ago I owned one Elvis Costello album, his mid-to-late career When I Was Cruel that was released back in 2002. Now I own seven, and the six new ones are from his early years, including his first four releases. There's a lot of good stuff in there, but it's going to take a while to absorb it all.

2.5.14
St. Vincent shared a third track from her upcoming album, "Prince Johnny":

This is probably my favorite of the three so far, and I liked the other two pretty well, so I'm getting pretty excited about this album. It's not as uptempo as the other two, which is kind of what I've been waiting for——it's these kinds of St. Vincent songs that tend to be my favorites after I really get to know the whole record.

2.6.14
This might at least partially be due to my contrarian nature, but I'm really liking Pearl Jam's No Code, the album that is generally recognized by fans and critics alike as the record when they stopped making worthwhile music. Even the Indian-inspired, somewhat drone-y "Who Are You", which is usually called out as the track demonstrating the album's weaknesses, is becoming a real favorite.

I will concede, however, that the spoken-word intro to the dreamlike "I'm Open" is completely superfluous and a tiny bit embarrassing.

2.7.14
The Amazon monthly 100 MP3 albums for $5 deal has reset to its typical number (last month is was raised to 1000), and here are my picks for this round.

Must-haves: U2's The Joshua Tree and Waxahatchee's Cerulean Salt (this is a seriously great album that I've only discovered in the last few weeks).

Recommended: Beck's Sea Change and Soundgarden's Superunknown,

I'm buying: Nothing.

T here was so much good stuff last month (and I bought so much stuff last month myself) that the slim pickings this month probably should have been expected. You should really buy that Waxahatchee record though.

2.10.14
Animal Collective's Avery Tare has a new band, Slasher Flicks, which also includes a former member of Dirty Projectors. Today they shared "Little Fang", a track from their upcoming debut, Enter the Slasher House:

I'm not actually sure how I feel about this one yet, and I've listened to it a few times. There's a weird 70s Adult Contemporary vibe, but Tare's vocals are processed the same way they usually are in Animal Collective, so you can't help thinking about that band. Plus it's got a creepy vibe that's hard to reconcile with the other two impressions it leaves. I think I'm going to have to hear a few more songs before I know whether this album is right for me.

2.11.14
Conor Oberst has shared "Hundreds of Ways" from his just-announced solo album, Upside Down Mountain:

Based on this track, I'm more open to listening to the rest of this album than I have been any of his other solo/non-Bright Eyes releases, but that being said, there's nothing outstandingly brilliant or new in this song. It has a little bit of an island (and Islands) vibe that I haven't heard from him before, and that peps things up a bit, but not enough for me to fall in love.

I guess, though, that if I had to imagine the kind of song that is undeniably from Conor Oberst that also might have some appeal for people who are not already Oberst fans, this song would be one of the few potential outcomes. I'm always curious to see what he does, becuase he was so brilliant when he was so young, and I still have to believe that he has a few good records left in him (I mean, the peak of his creativity was with 2002's Lifted, well over a decade ago, and he's still only in his early 30s today). But this song, while decent, does not lead me to believe that this album is going to come anywhere close to his glory days.

2.12.14
I'm having a hard time keeping away from the 80s. I keep looking to see if Amazon is ever going to put Flock of Seagulls or OMD on sale, but really, it's the price tag alone that's kept me from gorging on even more bands like this over the past year.

2.13.14
Little Dragon announced a new album, Nabuma Rubberband, and shared a track, "Klapp Klapp":

I generally enjoy Little Dragon more when she's in collaboraitve mode with artists like Gorillaz, but I did buy the last Little Dragon album, Ritutal Union, and was pretty happy with it. This song doesn't really speak to me, though, and I'm always concerned when a lead single doesn't do anything for me, so I'm curious to hear more before I decide whether to purchase or not.

Update: There's a video now too:

2.14.14
There's really not as much fluff/filler on Magnetic Fields' 69 Love Songs as you would think, but still, there's enough to make you wonder if this collection of songs would have a bigger cultural imprint now if Stephin Merritt had boiled this down to the best third of the songs.

As it is, the tastiest tracks are scattered somewhat evenly throughout the three discs (slightly weighted towards disc one), but if they had all been put on a single relese and sequenced properly, that album could well have been remembered as the best indie pop release of the 90s.

I would hate to obscure the sheer magnitude and impressiveness of putting together a three disc release with 69 tracks, but a curated re-release of the strongest songs might be in order to keep the best of these songs known and relevant to the next generation of musicians and fans.

2.17.14
Amazon is back to it's normal twice-a-month schedule of updating its 100 MP3 albums for $5 deal, and here are the ones I'm calling out from the most recent round:

Must-haves: Green Day's Dookie, Nine Inch Nails' The Downward Spiral, Rage Against the Machine's The Battle of Los Angeles, A Tribe Called Quest's Midnight Marauders, and the Flaming Lips' The Soft Bulletin.

Recommended: Death Cab for Cutie's Plans, Massive Attack's Mezzanine, Built to Spill's Keep It Like a Secret, and Yeah Yeah Yeahs' Fever to Tell.

I'm buying: Nothing. There were a couple I considered, but nothing I'm serious enough about that I think I'll actually purchase them, even at $5.

2.18.14
As excited as I am about the idea of a new Cibo Matto album, I'm not sure I'm really digging the songs I've heard so far from Hotel Valentine. This is a tough call...

2.19.14
One of the bad things about living in a town with so many music venues is that you can't always be aware of all the acts coming to town. In Baltimore, the bands I liked played one or two venues in Baltimore itself and either the Black Cat or the 9:30 Club in DC (or a venue associated with the 9:30 Club, which meant that those shows were covered in their email updates)——and most of the bands skipped Baltimore and went straight for DC, so I very rarely saw shows in Baltimore itself.

Here in Atlanta, you've got (that I know of) the Tabernacle, the Variety Playhouse, the Fox Theatre, the Cobb Center, the Masquerade, the Drunken Unicorn, Aaron's Amphitheatre at Lakewood, Terminal West, the Earl, Eddie's Attic, and, not too far away in Athens, the famous 40 Watt Club.

Anyway. I bring this up because I just found out that The World Is A Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid To Die, a band whose album Whenever, If Ever, was one of my favorite releases from 2013, played in Atlanta just last week, and that if there was any kind of comprehensive listing of shows in the area, it's likely I would have been able to attend. And that kind of bums me out. It's bad enough when a band you like doesn't even make a stop in your town; it's somehow worse when they come and you don't find out about it until too late.

2.20.14
I haven't been to a concert in a while——I think my last show was just under a year ago when I went with a friend to see the Cowboy Junkies on the tour where they played the complete Trinity Session album in order——but today I bought tickets for a show in June: Morrissey at the Cobb Center.

The Smiths were the first band that I was really obsessed with, and they remain my favorite band of all time, but I never got to see them live while they were still together. I have, however, seen the two principals, Morrissey and Johnny Marr, separately over the years: Morrissey in a solo show sometime in the early 90s (I've tried to research this online, and he played in Atlanta once in 1991 and once in 1992 but the date doesn't feel right for one and the venue doesn't feel right for the other, so I can't pinpoint exactly when I saw him), and Marr as part of Modest Mouse a few years ago at Merriweather Post Pavillion in Columbia, Maryland.

I have only the vaguest memories of the Morrissey concert——I wasn't really into the music he was making as a solo artist after the first two or three records, but he was still a personal hero of mine, and even though I knew my chances I hearing a Smiths song were slim (it didn't happen), I still was in a place where it was going to be special just to be in his presence. I remember a person named Phranc who played aggressive folk music opened the show, and that the sound for both Phranc and Morrissey wasn't all that great. I left the concert disappointed with the content, but pleased with the experience: I had gotten to see Morrissey live, and I also was lucky enough to see him with a friend who had gotten obsessed with the Smiths as a result of his friendship with me.

I'm hoping for a more engaging concert experience this time, but I'm again expecting that I won't hear any Smiths songs, and that I also won't know many of the songs——the last Morrissey album I bought was 2004's You Are the Quarry, and before that it was 1991's Kill Uncle (although he's supposedly putting out a new album this year in advance of the tour, and I imagine that I'll pick that up simply because I know I'm going to this show). But I'm still expecting that the experience will be worth it, even if the show itself doesn't turn out to be that great.

2.21.14
I'm still swooning over Lou Reed's Transformer, which I just purchased last month. Not only is this turning into my favorite Lou Reed album, I'm starting to think this might be better than some of the records in the Velvet Underground catalogue.

2.24.14
I bought Blood Orange's Cupid Deluxe on a whim today (and partially because it was only $5 for the MP3 album). I think this may have been a mistake...

2.25.14
I preordered a bunch of stuff last week, and today the first of those orders started to arrive: Beck's Morning Phase and St. Vincent's self-titled new album.

I've already heard several songs from St. Vincent, so I was pretty sure I was going to like it, and so far I'm not disappointed. I think as a whole record it might not be as strong a piece as Strange Mercy, but almost every individual song is strong, and many show the (mostly positive) effects of her recent collaboration with David Byrne. This could become my album of the year pick for 2014, and it's definitely highly recommended.

2.26.14
I am so far less impressed with Beck's Morning Phase, which he explicitly links to 2002's Sea Change. And while Morning Phase shares the mellow, mostly depressed feel of that record, there's something about the songs on the later release that just don't resonate as much. I can't quite put my finger on it, but it's more like these songs are just really slow rather than really sad, and it's that missing emotional component that makes the glacial pace hard to stomach.

This one is worth a few more listens, especially if I can work one in late at night when I'm in a contemplative mood, but it didn't take long for me to love Sea Change's best songs, and after a couple of listens, I still haven't heard anything that really sticks with me.

2.27.14
Damon Albarn has released a video for "Lonely Press Play", the second song he's shared from his upcoming solo album Everyday Robots:

I don't think there's much he could do to harm my opinion of his genius at this point, and I love the title of this record, but the two songs I've heard so far are a little too cold, too distant, and lack the engagement that I feel with his best stuff. This has turned from a near-guaranteed pre-order to an album that I'm going to have to hear a couple of times before I decide whether or not I'm going to buy it, so I guess in this case the strategy of sharing tracks in advance may have had the opposite effect of what was intended.

2.28.14
Sky Ferreira is streaming a previoulsy unreleased song to Soundcloud, this one titled "Rancid Girl":

This is a quiet, acoustic number that isn't bad for what it is but which is a far cry from the more dance-oriented sound of her breakthrough, 2013's Night Time, My Time. The most interesting thing about it to me is that Jon Brion is credited as a co-writer——I'm still waiting for him to find his next Fiona Apple, and I can see her voice going well with the lush orchestration that he's known for.