Pyramids, “The Echo of Something Lovely”

Experimental post-rock band Pyramids released their first record on Hydra Head Records, which is how I ended up being exposed to them. They’re honestly pretty all over the map on this record, which kind of lurches around between various styles. I’ve only got this and their last record, 2015’s A Northern Meadow, and that’s similarly a restless record. I don’t really love it, but I think it’s at least interesting, so that’s a good thing.

Pinkwash, “No Real Witness”

I feel like every time Pinkwash comes up, I say something equivalent to “hey, this is neat, I keep forgetting about this!” I wish I could say that I’d grown past that, but no, I do still keep forgetting about this. It’s a fun record! But, I can report some growth: I checked to see if they have another record. No, they do not. Still!

Firewater, “The Beat Goes On”

Across a discography that stretches across seven albums ranging from incredible to great, there’s one that stands out. Mostly by being kind of superfluous. This is from that record, 2003’s Songs We Should Have Written. It’s a covers record, and it’s not bad, but it just doesn’t rise to their original records.

Do I still remember how to do this? I guess I’ll find out!

I took a break from the grind of daily music blogging last October, because it was starting to wear me out. Needing to figure out something to say about these songs each day felt like I was really straining, and it wasn’t serving the purpose of a creative outlet nor a reminder of songs I’d forgotten about it. It was a slog, unfun, and I had proven to myself that I was capable of blogging every single day but I no longer wanted to do so. This project is, in the end, for myself. There are no ads, no monetization, and frankly, no audience. If I’m not having fun, there’s no point.

I wanted to write about music, and thought about writing about some 2022 albums I liked. I started typing it up for a private Discord and then remembered, duh, I actually have a music blog. So let’s blow the dust off this thing and post about some music I liked. “Best” is meaningless here, as any of these albums might strike my fancy on any particular day, and ranking them seems extremely iffy. Will any of these albums be in regular rotation next year? Five years? I have no idea. So, this is just a list of some releases you might have missed that I liked, and maybe you should check them out.

It’s a big day here on Five Songs. Exactly two years ago, I started updating this thing every day. Through vacations, work getting busy, moving twice, dealing with the fallout of a pandemic, I kept hitting my updates. I’m not sure why exactly I decided to do so. More than anything, it was to convince myself that I could commit to a grind like this and keep on top of it. Could I be a daily blogger? Could I keep a creative project going even when it got tough?

The Staple Singers, “I’ll Take You There”

This is such a majestic tune, absolutely irresistable.

De La Soul, “Thru Ya City”

I mostly think of the two AOI albums (this is from Art Official Intelligence: Mosaic Thump) as kind of lost albums for De La, but that’s not really a fair characterization. They’re uneven to be sure, soft spots in their catalog, but even a soft spot for them is going to have plenty of pleasures. This is a fun track, with the rubbery bass synth and bouncy rhyming from the boys.

They Might Be Giants, “Can’t Keep Jonny Down”

John Linnell is probably my favorite songwriter ever, and so it means a lot when I say that “Some dude / Hitting golf balls on the moon / Bathroom in his pants / And he thinks he’s better than me” might be my favorite lyric he’s ever written.

johnboy, “Chair”

I miss the heyday of noise rock. There were so many bands doing cool shit in the early 90s, and you could just find new stuff all the time. I suppose it might still be happening somewhere still, and I’m just not plugged in enough to find out about it. Is anybody doing a noise rock blog?

Kraftwerk, “Franz Schubert”

So hypnotic and pleasant.

Jamire Williams, “Wash Me Over Pollock’s Pulse”

Goddamn, this rules. I need to find more experimental drummers. I’m sure there are others. Listen to all that brushing! So exciting!

Maggot Heart, “Sex Breath”

One, “Sex Breath” is an incredible song name. Two, a band named Maggot Heart should really be a lot more discordant. It should be filthy, squalid, with the kind of skronks from a guitar that I can’t really describe.

Screeching Weasel, “My Brain Hurts”

I poke fun at Screeching Weasel pretty often when they come up here, mostly because their formula most didn’t change over the course of a zillion albums. But their early albums are still a lot of fun - just cheerful, energetic punk. There’s nothing at all wrong with this formula when it’s hitting.

Mission of Burma, “That’s When I Reach For My Revolver”

This song is one of the pillars of post-punk, a template for so many following bands. That’s the reason this still sounds fresh more than 40 years later, because it was groundbreaking at the time, and bands still try and sound like this.

Frisk Frugt, “Solhyldest 1. del”

No, I don’t know what’s wrong with me.

Constantines, “Shine a Light”

A thing that’s cool about this song is how restless it is. They’ve gone through multiple ideas in the first minute of the tune, which is nice to see. This is a very fun album.

Atmosphere, “The Future is Disgusting”

Kind of a throwback here, off of 2020’s The Day Before Halloween. Those sawtooth synths there are very primitive but nice.