Thomas Frank featuring Airplane Mode, “Burn the Sails”
I don’t usually pay attention to singles, and Thomas Frank is more known for his YouTube videos about productivity and the web app Notion than for music. But Frank, who previously released guitar instrumentals, took singing lessons and applied them to this single. And it’s impressive. I hope he has the gumption for an EP, at least.
Eluvium, (whirring marvels in) Consensus Reality
The last few Eluvium albums felt like they could be interchangeable, but this one? Not so much. Matthew Cooper has expanded his sonic vocabulary to include bona fide string arrangements. This albums feels uncharacteristic of the Eluvium M.O., but in very welcome ways.
SYML, The Day My Father Died
When I was younger, I would spend more time with albums, playing them weeks on end, even the ones for which I felt ambivalence. I don’t do that any more. So it’s rare that an album dominates my media devices the way this album has. Brian Fennell has a gorgeous voice, but he also knows how to tailor his songs for his voice. And they’re really good songs. They kept playing in my head long after the playback stopped. I can’t remember the last time an artist did that for me.
Natalie Merchant, Keep Your Courage
I think Merchant took her own advice with this album title because I don’t think I’ve heard her so confident.
NUMBER GIRL, Mujo no Hi
I didn’t realize NUMBER GIRL’s influence would have enough staying power to bring the band back together for fans who never saw them live in the first place. It was weird enough coming across a video of ASIAN KUNG-FU GENERATION covering “Toumei Shoujo,” which NUMBER GIRL played four times on this final concert of their reunion tour. And they sound every bit as fierce as they did nearly 20 years ago. Paint me a little disappointed that a new album didn’t result from this reunion, but I’m glad the newer generations of fans got to see NUMBER GIRL in their element.
Kesha, Gag Order
Good on Kesha. Drag them.
Danish String Quartet, Prism V
Danish String Quartet’s Prism series paired works of Beethoven and Bach with composers who came in their wake, ranging from Felix Mendelssohn to Alfred Schnittke. Do I totally buy the connections Danish sees between the two B’s and Bartok or Shostakovich? I like the fact the Danish even tried to forge one. The final installment of this series pairs an early string quartet by Anton Webern with Beethoven’s String Quartet No. 16, Op. 135. The Webern quartet is a post-Romantic work with an unstable tonality but still fairly lush compared to the austerity his later works took on. Here, the connection with Beethoven is much more apparent.
Sufjan Stevens / Timo Andres / Conor Hanick, Reflections
I read user reviews complaining this album as nothing but modern classical garbage, so I took a listen myself, and no, it’s not garbage. But it is definitely modern classical, perhaps even post-modern. I have a few of Stevens’ indie rock albums, and I find them unoffensive. But this side of Stevens? I can get behind it.
Jake Shears, Last Man Dancing
Shears’ solo debut left not a single impression with me. But this follow-up is — what is that term the youngs use today? Oh, yes: FIRE.
Sugababes, Angels with Dirty Faces
I remember not having enough savvy about pop music to give this album an ambivalent review when it came out. Now that I’ve had a number of decades to reflect on this album and its predecessor One Touch, I have to say it’s a solid work. And it’s an essential album for anyone who wants to get a sense of Sugababes at their finest.
The Donnas, Early Singles 1995-1999
I learned of the Donnas right on the cusp of their signing to Atlantic Records, so I was unaware of their punk bonafides, which these early singles definitively establish.
Duran Duran makes it a point to make each album sound distinctive, but that’s often meant the band would run away from the fundamentals which made them famous. FUTURE PAST, as the title indicates, finds the band embracing its past while still facing forward. Generations of bands in their wake is proof enough they were onto something enduring.
sungazer, Perihelion
Adam Neely said his goal was to be the Neil deGrasse Tyson of music theory education, and I say, he already is. But he can also write. If you had to file Perihelion in a section of a record store, jazz would be as a good a fit as any, but it wouldn’t be a complete descriptor of what Neely and drummer Shawn Crowder do.
Sugababes, One Touch (Deluxe Edition)
One Touch has grown on me over the last year, and the previously unreleased demos on this deluxe edition would have fit well on the album proper. I didn’t even mind the remixes on the second disc.
Spandau Ballet, True
I picked up this album on vinyl a long time ago, but I hadn’t really listened to it since. So I gave it a few plays on Spotify and grew to like it enough to want it on CD.
ZARD, BEST ~Request Memorial~
ZARD has always existed on the periphery of my Japanese music fandom. I had a sense they would be too mainstream J-Pop for me. This compilation showed up in the thrift store, and yes, it’s quite mainstream J-pop but not cloyingly so.
FINNEAS, Optimist
I couldn’t really get into Billie Eilish’s second album, but I really like the one her brother made.
The Flaming Lips, The Soft Bulletin Companion, July 21
The vinyl version of this early promotional compilation was released as part of Record Store Day Drops in June 2021.
Drive-By Truckers, Plan 9 Records, July 13, 2006, Aug. 6
This live set is a scorcher. The full performance was released as part of Record Store Day Black Friday 2020.
Art of Noise, Noise in the City: Live in Tokyo 1986, Aug. 13
When the Art of Noise visited Japan in 2017 for a series of concerts, they discovered a concert from 1986 had been recorded for a radio broadcast. That concert is getting a limited release on vinyl and CD.
Emmylou Harris and the Nash Ramblers, Ramble in Music City: The Lost Concert, Sept. 3
Unlike the shows recorded at the Ryman Auditorium, the set list for this lost concert consists mostly of Emmylou Harris’ long time hits.
Metallica, Metallica (Deluxe Edition), Sept. 10
For the longest time, the self-titled Metallica album was the only Metallica album I owned. While I have filled out my collection with the albums leading up to the black album, I have nothing beyond S&M.
Jeremy Denk, Mozart: Piano Concertos, Sept. 17
Sure, I’ll listen to Denk perform the K. 482, i.e. Concerto No. 22 in D Minor.
Sugababes, One Love (Deluxe Edition), Oct. 1
I’m not sure if the album on the whole is really that great, but “Overload” is one of the finest singles to come out of the early 2000s.
Vinyl
Enigma, MCMXC a.D., June 23
If you missed out on the colored vinyl reissues from 2018, Universal Music Germany is repressing this album and 7 others, remastered audio and all.
Rewind takes a look at past Musicwhore.org reviews to see how they hold up today. The albums featured on Rewind were part of my collection, then sold for cash only to be reacquired later.
What happens when you want to write about mainstream pop music without knowing anything about mainstream pop music? You get something that looks like my review of Sugababes’ One Touch.
The then-teenaged trio hooked me in with “Overload”, a single as infectious today as it was back in 2000. I picked up the album on the strength of that song alone, and I ended up liking it.
And as any good music blogging cheerleader should do, I wanted to share that enthusiasm. Just one problem: I was a raging rock snob back then. I knew of Destiny’s Child and TLC only indirectly — I owned nothing by either group, but it didn’t stop me from using them as straw women.
Back then, Disney pop from the likes of Britney Spears, ‘NSync and Backstreet Boys shoved aside alternative rock, which had devolved to Creed and Nickelback. In retrospect, that may have been a blessing. Still, it was tough covering music at the turn of the century when most of what flew off shelves held little to no interest for me.
So I sought refuge in Japanese indie rock and rock en Español.
Nearly two decades later, I’m merely a rock snob instead of a raging rock snob, and my collection now includes TLC and En Vogue. I don’t have any Destiny’s Child, but I do have Beyoncé’s Lemonade. After listening to these groups, the folly of my earlier comparison is writ large.
Sugababes come from a different club culture than En Vogue and TLC. Comparing them would have been as helpful as pitting Perfume against Adele. I do stand by the assessment that the rougher production on One Touch is a softer sell. It’s probably why I preferred Sugababes over American pop acts.
Of course, that reveals a deeper problem. If I knew nothing of American pop music, I would know even less about UK pop music. So I wrote the review I’ve got, not the one I want.
Two months after publishing that review, I lost my job, and Sugababes went on the chopping block when cash got tight. But every so often, I would find myself humming the opening bass line of “Overload”. It reached a point where I found a cutout of One Touch on Amazon and welcomed the album back in my collection.
![[SYML - Infinity]](https://musicwhore.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/a4121247855_65-300x300.jpeg)
![[The Drums - Jonny]](https://musicwhore.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/TheDrumsJonny.jpg)
![[Thomas Frank - Burn the Sails]](https://musicwhore.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/ThomasFrankAirplaneMode311716F3GX_f.jpg)
![[Jason Isbell - Weathervanes]](https://musicwhore.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/JasonIsbellWeathervanes2315254CSSW_f.jpg)
![[Spandau Ballet - True]](https://musicwhore.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/SpandauBalletTrue1983175416_f.jpeg)
![[Res - How I Do]](https://musicwhore.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/ResHowIDo2001276622_f.jpg)
![[CZARFACE / MF DOOM - Super What?]](https://musicwhore.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/CZARFACEMFDOOMSuperWhat273446R8IU_f.jpg)
![[Art of Noise - Noise in the City]](https://musicwhore.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/ArtOfNoiseNoiseInTheCityLiveInTokyo1986.jpg)
![[Sugababes - One Touch]](https://musicwhore.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/SugababesOneTouch2001103779_f.jpeg)