John Coltrane

John Coltrane, “Naima”

I often feel inadequate on this blog. My words are woefully insufficient to describe so many of the beautiful songs we get on here. Writing about music is hard, even for somebody good at it. Writing about it for an idiot like me is basically impossible. I’m just banging rocks together here and ooking at the moon.

And then something like Coltrane comes up, and I really vanish. What can I possibly say that’s going to add to one of the true artistic triumphs any of us are likely to encounter? You either feel this in your heart, or you don’t, but it’s not like I’m going to be able to awaken your soul with my typing.

The Reindeer Section, “If Everything Fell Quiet”

The Reindeer Section is a Scottish supergroup, featuring members of Belle & Sebastian, Snow Patrol, Arab Strap, Mogwai, and others. The resulting album actually sounds a lot more coherent than what you normally expect from a supergroup, primarily because the songs were all written by Gary Lightbody (of Snow Patrol). The rest of the folks here fill out the roster, and they do it quite ably.

Autoclave, “Bulls Eye”

Before Mary Timony formed the brilliant Helium (and Wild Flag and Ex Hex!), she was in Autoclave, who put out a couple of EPs for Dischord Records which were later collected on a single comp. It’s an interesting piece of history, and for Timony fans, I do think it’s worth picking up, but it’s not on the same level as her later work. It IS extremely early 90s Dischord, though.

Pretty good one today.

John Coltrane, “Mr. P.C.”

I’ll have you know that I tried to insert a big ASCII barphic here saying “Josh is not qualified to talk about jazz”, but this stupid editor kept mangling it, and I’ll only go so far for a throwaway joke.

The Black Keys, “Sinister Kid”

Is this the first Black Keys we’ve had? Brothers is the last Black Keys album I’ll have anything to do with. It’s a little strange - I like it quite a bit, there’s a lot of fun stuff on it, and I nevertheless didn’t even glance at the follow up to it. I’m not really sure why, exactly, but from reading reviews, it doesn’t seem like I’m missing much.

Does it seem like I’m getting flakier with this things? I think I’m getting flakier. Whatever. I’m back!

Floor, “The Key”

This song is only 46 seconds. I really wish it were longer.

Crimpshrine, “Rearranged”

Crimpshrine didn’t last long as a band, producing only one album and a smattering of EPs, singles, and compilation appearances. All of that latter material got collected into a single comp, The Sound Of A New World Being Born, which is an excellent document of the early Bay Area punk scene. As that scene would end up being hugely influential over rock, and Crimpshrine would be one of the key bands to help form that scene, this album is kind of like a glimpse into the future. Well, the past now. Whatever.

As certain part of me wonders what I’m doing with these descriptions. Should I ramble about whatever? Talk about the artists? Historical context? Recommendations? I have no idea. Well, here’s some more dancing about architecture.

We just dodged a super long rap skit, by the way.

R.L. Burnside, “Alice Mae”

Longtime blues guitarist Burnside didn’t really start getting much attention until the early 90s, when his albums first started appearing on Fat Possum Records, despite playing since the 60s. I first noticed him when he worked with Jon Spencer for A Ass Pocket O’ Whiskey, which is where this track comes from. If you like Jon Spencer, then this is an easy buy.