11.2.09
I'm kind of glad that the reviews for the New Moon soundtrack have been kind of mediocre. There are several acts that have tracks on the record that I'm a fan of, most notably Death Cab and Thom Yorke, but I fucking hate all this recent vampire stuff, and I have the Twilight phenomenon most of all because 1) it's shit writing and 2) it's what kicked off this latest cultural obsession with vampires.

I guess I might eventually persuade myself to download the individual tracks I'm interested in if I listen to the clips and they sound worth it, but even that kind of disgusts me. And I can get Death Cab jumping on this, because they're this close to the mainstream already and this album should sell bucketloads, but Thom Yorke doesn't need to do this for monetary or exposure reasons, and it's scares me to think he might be doing it because he actually likes the books.

11.3.09
Although I fully intend to buy the Beatles' remastered stereo box set at some point, I'm dying to hear them now, but I don't have the $220 to spend given that we just bought a Wii and Rock Band and The Beatles: Rock Band (which is one of the big reasons I'm dying to get the actual records). So I was intriqued when a site called BlueBeat started selling the entire remastered catalog online in MP3 format for only 25 cents a track, which means I could get every track on all 13 albums for just over $50.

The catch (and you knew there was going to be a catch): the Beatles have not authorized anyone to sell their songs online, especially not a little-known download site, so the odds that this is legal are pretty slim. A lot of people on the message boards that are talking about the site think it's a scam to get your credit card number, but there's one big problem with that: they only accept PayPal, so they never have access to your credit card or bank account number.

I registered on the site and thought seriously about it, but in the end decided not to for a variety of reasons (and even if I had paid the $50 now, I still would have bought the CD versions eventually). I'm kind of bummed that my Beatles purchases will have to wait, but I think it was the right thing to do.

11.4.09
I've all but given up on the local record store. I didn't even wait to see whether or not they would stock Julian Casablanca's solo release and just ordered it from Amazon, along with several other albums I've been waiting for the independent record store to stock for a while: YACHT's See Mystery Lights, Kid Cudi's Man on the Moon, Rural Alberta Advantage's Hometowns, Japandroids' Post-Nothing, and Thao's Know Better Learn Faster.

Honestly, a couple of those have been out for a while now and are pretty major releases in the indie world, and I don't know why I should continue to give money to a record store that hasn't had them in stock once since they've been released.

11.5.09
The only good thing about Batman Forever, the first sequel after Tim Burton's reboot that wasn't directed by Tim Burton himself, is the sequence where the about-to-become-the-Riddler mad scientist character goes back to his tiny apartment for the first time after having his invention rejected by Bruce Wayne. The director of this movie shows little finesse in his treatment of the script, but his use of the Flaming Lips' "Bad Days" is about as good as you could hope for in a sequence featuring Jim Carrey playing an over-the-top comic book villain directed by Joel Schumacher. It's scary and vulnerable and demented and a little sad, just like the song, and it's completely unexpected in the midst of the rest of this mess of a film.

11.6.09
All my Amazon CDs got here today, much sooner than I expected. I must live near a distribution center or something. Anyway, happy to have some new stuff to listen to over the weekend. There's probably not a whole lot more coming out this year that I'm going to buy, so I'm hoping that there are some good records in this batch. It's been a pretty mediocre year so far, and it would be nice to finish strong.

11.9.09
From me to you: a free live EP of the Pixies from their just-started Doolittle 20th anniversary tour.

11.10.09
Caught the end of Ferris Bueller's Day Off on cable, and it put me in the mood to go back and listen to Dream Academy's eponymous debut album for the first time in a while. It's not a bad record overall, and I'd forgotten how much I like some of the songs in addition to the big hit, "Life in a Northern Town". "The Edge of Forever" is the song that they use in the movie (there's also a great instrumental cover of the Smiths' "Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want", but that track is just on the soundtrack to the movie), and it's just about as good as "Northern Town".

I remember loving this album when I was younger, and like a lot of albums from that time, there are elements of it that don't hold up as well, but all in all it's a solid four star record. It reminds me a little of Tears for Fears' Songs from the Big Chair——an album of left-of-center pop that was huge when it was released that's kind of hard to describe to someone who hasn't heard it before and is mostly forgotten now. But both those records are worth remembering, and not just for their hit singles.

11.11.09
Kanye West's proteges (Lupe Fiasco, Kid Cudi) are never as good as the hype makes them out to be, but they're still pretty good. I've been listening to Kid Cudi's Man on the Moon quite a bit since I got it last week, and while there are a couple of weak tracks, there are a ton of strong ones that are only marred by his habit of tacking on 30 seconds or so of stuff that's not really connected to the main song that I guess he intends to serve as a transitional element.

It's not annoying as the skits that used to be so popular among rappers, but when you're listening to the songs in the context of a mix instead of listening to the album sequentially, it drags down a few of his better tunes——they just kind of fade into nothing and it really blunts the impact.

11.12.09
I enjoyed Thao's last album, We Brave Bee Stings and All, but it was a little thin in places. Her newest, Know Better Learn Faster, seems more solid througout, and still has a few killer songs to go along with "Bag of Hammers" and "Swimming Pools" (the two standouts from Bee Stings), most notably "Cool Yourself" and the irresistable "When We Swarm".

I still get irritated with a lot of the hipper-than-thou trumpeting of obscure records on Pitchfork, but if it wasn't for them, I don't know how I would have ever heard of Thao. Her music is uncomplicated without being simple, and familiar without being cliched. This would have been a great summer record, and you can bet it will be part of the mix for my cookouts next year.

11.13.09
Listening to the first few songs from Julian Casablanca's solo debut, Phrazes for the Young, you might start to believe that this is the strongest side project/solo outing from a Strokes member yet. But you'll probably disabuse yourself of that notion if you listen to the album all the way through.

11.16.09
So Universal Music, the parent company for Dirty Projectors' record label, has requested that Solange Knowles take down a free MP3 cover of Dirty Projectors' "Stillness Is the Move". Now, we all know that the corporate record labels can hardly make a move without reminding us all of how boneheaded they are, but this is one of the worst things they've done in a while. A well-known mainstream R&B artist tries to give free publicity to a little-known indie band by covering the most accessible song on their most recent release and you tell her to stop? It boggles the mind, especially when you consider that the band was aware of the cover and were apparently happy with the attention it was receiving.

On a related note, I'm glad I didn't know about the cover before I got to know Bitte Orca, the album that the original version is featured on, because despite the great title, "Stillness Is the Move" is one of my least favorite tracks, and if I had known that this was the song that had been covered by an mainstream artist I'm not particularly fond of, I probably never would have known whether I really didn't like the song or just didn't like that it had a seal of approval from Solange Knowles.

And having said that, I've listened to her cover version a few times now, and it's a great balance between understanding and being respectful of the original song and making it much more soulful. It reminds me of the difference between the Cure's original version of "Close to Me" and the dreamy underwater mix that appeared on Mixed Up: both are great versions of the song, and it's hard to pick one over the other. In fact, given my original lukewarm response to the song, I might actually like Knowles' version better.

11.17.09
Japandroids' Post-Nothing isn't really doing much for me yet. It's not bad, but I'm having a hard time getting into it after spending the last few months listening to Wavves and No Age, who both cover similar ground but who keep their songs a lot shorter. I have a feeling I'll grow to love this record eventually, but right now it's just not as distinctive as I need it to be to spend some serious time focusing on it.

11.18.09
Despite the obvious catchiness of the songs Apple chooses for its iPod ads, has there been any band that has had a hit as a result of being featured in one? It's probably not terrible for them in terms of exposure, but I sure hope they get paid decently for allowing their tracks to be used, because it almost seems to be a kiss of death for the chart success of the songs themselves.

11.19.09
The Kid Cudi record is really growing on me. This is definitely a stronger album as a whole than either of Lupe Fiasco's two discs, although it doesn't have a killer single like "Kick, Push". There are some great individual tracks, though, like "Simple As" and "Up Up & Away". And you can definitely hear how Kanye has been influenced by this protege——half of his last record, 808s & Heartbreak, sounds like it's ripping off "Sky Might Fall".

The best way I've found to describe this record is to think about it as the record that TV on the Radio would have made if they had decided to make a straight hip hop record, and I mean that as a high compliment. It has a great flow to it, inventive beats, and a good use of piano and keyboard loops. Definitely worth picking up if anything about Kanye's recent work interests you, or if you like artists like Lupe Fiasco or Common.

11.20.09
Karen O's Where the Wild Things Are soundtrack is probably only going to be well-loved by people who already love Karen O and her Yeah Yeah Yeahs, but if you don't love her cover of Daniel Johnston's "Worried Shoes", it's probably time for some serious self-examination.

11.30.09
Pixies tonight. I almost forgot about this show——it came at a pretty inconvient time given that we just got back into town on Saturday night from our Thanksgiving travels and we both have a ton to do at work this week. But I'm looking forward to it, even though we're likely going to be pretty exhausted by the time we get back home from the show tonight.