My RIYLmusic Top 30 list [where I get to pretend I'm a program director at my very own hip radio station (full story here)] - for the week beginning July 17, 2006.
Bruce Cockburn Life Short Call Now Earlier this year Neil Young came out with an anti-war album and he was loud and pissed. Now, fellow Canadian Bruce Cockburn has put out his anti-war disc and, as always, Bruce is quiet and pissed. Maybe even more pissed sounding than Neil, what with Cockburn's trademark don't make me angry, you won't like me when I'm angry clinched-teeth delivery forcing you to listen closely.
And if you do listen closely (and don't get too distracted by his exception guitar work) you'll see that his lyrics hit their mark. Wonder what the rest of the world thinks of macho unilateralism that eventually ends up impacting the whole world? Just take a listen to "Tell the Universe" (ironically, the chorus include one of Dubya's new favorite words): "You've been projecting your shit at the world/Self-hatred tarted up as payback time/You can self destruct-that's your right/But keep it to yourself if you don't mind."
At Bruce's amazingly generous website you can listen to every single one of his twenty-four albums... except this one. For that you have to go to AOL's new release page.
Golden Smog Another Fine Day It's been eight years since this alt-county supergroup put anything out, but I wonder how many people (other than Wilco completists) were actually eagerly anticipating this new release.
Golden Smog, lead by Wilco's Jeff Tweety and the Jayhawk's Gary Louris, has always had the sound of friends getting together and just having some fun. No problem there, but the band never seems to add up to the sum of its musical parts - somehow, putting these fine musicians together rarely produces anything near as good as what they do with their own bands. Of course, I'll still end up buying it.
While past Smog albums seemed to lean more to the Jayhawk's sound, this one seems (at least from my few listens) more varied and less country than the older discs - sounds that Tweety's been taking Wilco towards for the last few years. AOL is streaming it, the band's got a few songs here, and their record company is playing long-ish samples of all the songs here.
Now, the list:
- THE RACONTEURS Broken Boy Soldiers
- CAMERA OBSCURA Let’s Get Out of This Country
- THE HEAVY BLINKERS The Night and I Are Still So Young
- GOLDEN SMOG Another Fine Day
- BETH ORTON The Kindness Of Strangers
- FLAMING LIPS At War With The Mystics
- SNOW PATROL Eyes Open
- BRUCE COCKBURN Life Short Call Now
- LOS LOBOS Ride This
- BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions
- MY MORNING JACKET Z
- KEANE Under the Iron Sea
- MATES OF STATE Bring It Back
- MASON JENNINGS Boneclouds
- DAVE ALVIN West of the West
- JOHNNY CASH Personal File
- ALEJANDRO ESCOVEDO The Boxing Mirror
- STEVE WYNN & THE MIRACLE 3 ...Tick...Tick...Tick
- ELVIS COSTELLO & ALLEN TOUSSAINT The River In Reverse
- DR. JOHN Mercernary
- DAN ZANES Catch That Train!
- GRANT LEE PHILLIPS Nineteeneighties
- NEIL YOUNG Living With War
- THE REPLACEMENTS Don't You Know Who I Think I Was?
- LOOSE FUR Born Again In The USA
- THE SILVER JEWS Tanglewood Numbers
- NEKO CASE Fox Confessor Brings the Flood
- JENNY LEWIS WITH THE WATSON TWINS Rabbit Fur Coat
- PAUL SIMON Surprise
- CAT POWER The Greatest
Dropping off the list this week:
- GRAM PARSONS The Complete Reprise Sessions
- ALLISON MOORER Getting Somewhere
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