14 May 2013 (Day 134) – Recent Purchase Update

Like yesterday, today doesn’t afford much time for listening other than two recent albums by some of my favourite acts.

(# 358) Patti Smith - Banga (2012)

I know that so many people idolise Patti’s early albums such as Horses and Easter.  I do too but also maintain that the albums she has released since her comeback, especially Gone Again and Gung Ho, are just as strong.  Banga might very well prove to be the best of any album save for Horses.  It is an immaculately produced and sounding album; her voice in particular has never sounded better and the rough edges smoothed to no detrimental effect.  Amerigo is an intriguing opener which gives way to the wonderful April Fool.  The next two tracks are laments for the victims for the Japanese tsumanui (Fuji-San) and Amy Winehouse (This Is The Girl) and the remainder ploughs familiar themes.  I’m not sure everything works (especially the 10 minute Constantine’s Dream, which appears to lack something I just can’t just seem to put my finger on) and it ends on an odd note with a cover of Neil Young’s After The Gold Rush dominated by the voices of her children.  But these do not detract from what is a major work.

(# 359) Boris – New Album (2011)

Boris is a Japanese three piece that usually plays a loud, brutal and uncompromising form of droney rock that resulted in their being signed up by US label Southern Lord, the home of supreme noise merchants Sun O))).  This might be the closest thing the band will ever release to a commercial album.  That is, of course, depends on your definition of commercial as on this album, the band appears to put away most of their own inspiration in favour of tracks that seemingly borrow from other acts.  These include Dinosaur Jr (the seeming inspiration for opening track Flare), Smashing Pumpkins (Luna) and a sped up Depeche Mode (Jackson Head).  Pardon? vaguely hints at Funkadelic’s Maggot Brain.

At home, and with very little on offer on TV, I opt for another DVD, this time going with:

(Audio Visual 9) Drive-By Truckers – The Dirty South Tour. Live At The 40 Watt (2005)

This is a fairly straight forward rendering of the first two shows that started their Dirt South Tour on 27 & 28 August 2004.  One of the attractions of the DVD is that it allows me to look inside one of America’s mythical band rooms, The 40 Watt Club in Athens, Georgia, a venue often associated with the early years of R.E.M. (Once again, all the DVD reveals is just how similar are most of these venues.)  Naturally a fair chunk of the then new album is played.  Indeed, the first five tracks from that album are the first five tracks on this.  Given the band’s reputation as a fearsome live act, it comes as little surprise to find that the power behind these performances renders the studio album irrelevant.  The only drawbacks to the DVD are the insertion of talking pieces to band members between a number of tracks which disrupts the natural flow.  In addition, the encore portion is separate from the main set and even the Play All feature doesn’t link them together.