What are you listening to and WHY might anyone be interested? (Vol. XI)
Posted by: Richard Dane on 31 December 2014
On the cusp of 2015, we start a new thread...
Anyway, links:
Volume X: https://forums.naimaudio.com/to...-be-interested-vol-x
Volume IX: https://forums.naimaudio.com/to...16#22826037054683416
Volume VIII: https://forums.naimaudio.com/di...nt/12970396056050819
Volume VII: https://forums.naimaudio.com/di...6878604287751/page/1
Volume VI: https://forums.naimaudio.com/di...ent/1566878604097229
Volume V: https://forums.naimaudio.com/di...ent/1566878605140495
Volume IV: https://forums.naimaudio.com/di...ent/1566878605795042
Volume III: https://forums.naimaudio.com/di...ent/1566878607309474
Volume II: https://forums.naimaudio.com/di...ent/1566878606245043
Volume I: https://forums.naimaudio.com/di...ent/1566878607464290
On CD:-
Shelby Lynne - Temptation
On CD:-
Suzanne Vega. Solitude Standing. Original vinyl from 1987. A great follow up to her first album. Reminds me I need to sample her most recent release.
Excellent album. I enjoy my CD version. If you haven't already got it, Joerand, try SV's Close Up series which contains a number of songs from Solitude Standing and her other albums but in a different style. Fabulous.
Enjoying this superb album. Two great singers working in a complementary style, good songs, and excellent reproduction quality. I can't quite believe I paid less than £3 for it!
Original vinyl copy, still in excellent condition.
Enjoying this superb album. Two great singers working in a complementary style, good songs, and excellent reproduction quality. I can't quite believe I paid less than £3 for it!
That was a true bargain. Great album.
Suzanne Vega. Solitude Standing. Original vinyl from 1987. A great follow up to her first album. Reminds me I need to sample her most recent release.
Excellent album. I enjoy my CD version. If you haven't already got it, Joerand, try SV's Close Up series which contains a number of songs from Solitude Standing and her other albums but in a different style. Fabulous.
By coincidence I was listening to this one tonight. And I seriously endorse the Close Up series (of which I have all four!).
On cd.
Suzanne Vega. Solitude Standing. Original vinyl from 1987. A great follow up to her first album. Reminds me I need to sample her most recent release.
Excellent album. I enjoy my CD version. If you haven't already got it, Joerand, try SV's Close Up series which contains a number of songs from Solitude Standing and her other albums but in a different style. Fabulous.
By coincidence I was listening to this one tonight. And I seriously endorse the Close Up series (of which I have all four!).
+1 on the Close Up records. Very well done.
Yes, but don't ever try this one. You might need a lobotomy afterwards, I heard!
Love that album Tony.
That might explain a lot... 
R3. Where else would you hear a word like eponymous at this time in the morning?!
Chris
R4?
TalkSport? 
Quite an album. I still like Raw Power a bit more though.
Yes, but don't ever try this one. You might need a lobotomy afterwards, I heard!
Still think to this day that Metal Machine Music was one of THE worst albums ever made.
MMM was surely just a throwaway. An artistic statement, perhaps, but unlistenable and with no musical merit whatsoever. The number of people who have listened to it all the way through could probably be counted on one hand.
I believe Lou made it a) as a two-fingered gesture to his record company RCA; and b) as an act of monumental perversity designed to alienate his fans and critics.
Rolling Stone memorably described it as "the tubular groaning of a galactic refrigerator... as much fun as a night spent in a bus terminal" - and that was one of the more favourable reviews it received! One critic described it as "a two-disc set consisting of nothing more than ear-wrecking electronic sludge, guaranteed to clear any room of humans in record time".
That said, the late great Lester Bangs loved it: "as classical music it adds nothing to a genre that may well be depleted. As rock 'n' roll it's interesting garage electronic rock 'n' roll. As a statement it's great, as a giant **** YOU it shows integrity—a sick, twisted, dunced-out, malevolent, perverted, psychopathic integrity, but integrity nevertheless." Perhaps not entirely seriously, he said on a number of occasions that he thought it was the greatest album ever made.
Bob Ludwig, the cutting engineer, has been on record a number of times as saying he was into it. It also had a number of celebrity fans, including Ian Curtis, Eno, Sonic Youth and many within the post-punk and punk movements and was actually very influential in helping establish the "industrial" music scene inaugurated by Throbbing Gristle in 1976.
Although it was withdrawn from sale by RCA (interestingly, Lou managed to convinced them to put it on the Red seal label, hitherto reserved for serious classical music) after a couple of weeks, it sold 100,000 copies (although how many of those ended up in the second-hand shops is anybody's guess).
It is rather like the avant-garde work of Yoko Ono - derided or ignored at the time, but hugely influential later on.
Although it's a, er, challenging listen, I think it's an important part of Lou's legacy and I do listen to it occasionally. But only when no-one's in. 
Enjoying this superb album. Two great singers working in a complementary style, good songs, and excellent reproduction quality. I can't quite believe I paid less than £3 for it!
If you got it on vinyl for £3 it is an unbelievable bargain!
With so many other members on here buying and playing Sinatra, I couldn't resist taking a small risk (it's cheap) on this Masterworks box set, despite not really being a Sinatra fan.
Set arrived yesterday and first play of disc 1 - Swing Easy! + Songs For Young Lovers - this evening. Goodness me, the reproduction quality is much better than I expected, Sinatra's distinctive voice has wonderful presence, and the supporting band music is delightfully detailed. Think I going to enjoy dipping into this from time to time. £16 well spent.
I agree MDS, at that price it is an extremely compelling offer. I have a couple of 1980s Capitol CDs, and these are to my mind (and ears) far better sounding.
This is where TIDAL comes into its own, did take me a moment to get the title was sevens not scvcns!
there is a certain timeless quality to good reggae.
SJB
This is where TIDAL comes into its own, did take me a moment to get the title was sevens not scvcns!
there is a certain timeless quality to good reggae.
SJB
Agreed SJB. Hard to believe I have had this LP for decades now.
On purple vinyl.
Ben E. King: Supernatural 1975 release.
Groovier and funkier. This original US Atlantic record sounds great, too.
SJB
Agreed SJB. Hard to believe I have had this LP for decades now.
Matt
Why hard to believe - the album is LEGENDARY.
FYI ask Jay- I have a fairly large Reggae collection - 300+ started listening and seeing many shows back in the late 70's.
I have turned Jay onto some of the classics. He has spent many a session listening to "the Steppin Razor" man aka The Bush Doctor