nothing but the truth (no painting! no cutscenes! no speeches!)
Continuing with my trend of betting on the horse that got put down, behind the stable, at least three years ago, here’s another post about an album that came out a whole bunch of years ago. To counteract it, here’s a list of some albums i’ve bought recently which I am enjoying enough to hopefully devote as much time and energy to them as I am to this moldy oldie:
KatJonBand- Self Titled
Little Joy- Seltf Titled
Subtle- Exiting Arm
Comet Gain are a band who drink nostalgia by the shot; they care deeply about rock music, which really isn’t supposed to even care about itself. Their goddamn great album Realistes is as genuine and heartfelt an ode to the power of rock music as i’ve ever heard. The lyrics act as collages, “Moments in the Snow” prays with the words of The Velvet Underground, “Why I Try To Look So Bad” grinds in The Stooges, and “Don’t Fall In Love If You Want To Die in Peace” sits down for a talk with Dylan . But it is so much more than specific references: its when David Fink chants “the look on a girl’s face when she gets her first record player. I want that. I need that” on “My Defiance” and the song rips the bolts off bridges 50 miles away.
Of course, lyrics, no matters, how genuine, are just poetry without music. This album has music. It has electric guitar that sounds like it was recorded through a clock radio, that has tamborine and handclaps that drown out the drumset. I don’t care whether this was meant to sound like it was recorded on the cheap, or whether it actually was recorded on the cheap, this album is the anti-studio album. Which makes sense; if it were a big rock and roll album, it would sound self congratulatory, the fury and trash that compose this album’s sound make it sound like the work of fans.
It’s a lesson plan in why rock and roll matters in a world so much louder and more difficult than a Marshal Stack. If there was even an ounce less passion in this project it would have failed, because the concept, even as i’m writing it to you seems so trite: something so goddamn western and so image based, so milked and rehashed, so stale its almost become quiet, and you’re trying to tell me this album will convince me that it matters? Yes, that is exactly what i’m saying. If this blog needed a themesong, it’s “My Defiance.”
this is a band you can come to care deeply about.
“My Defiance”, “Moments in the Snow” “She Never Understood” and “Don’t Fall In Love If You Want To Die In Peace” are from Comet Gain’s stellar 2002 album Realistes!
(oh, and because a few people are reading it this year, i’m going to start posting my end of the year lists soon, rather than waiting until 12 hours before new years. The rundown is as such: Best Concerts, Unfortunately overlooked: the best releases from 2007 I didn’t listen to ’till 08, Biggest Disappointments of 08, and then, of course, the best albums of ’08)
Songs Save Lives 