via//chicago

np: "Disorder (live @ The Factory 07/13/79)" - Joy Division

I've been immersing myself in plenty of Joy Division over the past couple of weeks, even more so than usual, mostly thanks to my wonderful girlfriend giving me the Heart and Soul box set for Christmas. I'd been drooling over that thing for years now, but for one reason or another I had always managed to talk myself out of dropping the cash for it. It took me about 30 seconds of perusing the amazing packaging and liner notes to see how amazing this set was, to say absolutely nothing of the music within. I'm still plowing my way through all the tracks that I hadn't already heard, but I'm completely enthralled by this band all over again. If you've ever even briefly considered picking up this set, by all means do so immediately - you won't regret it in the least. The only downside of all this great material comes when you realize how tragically short Ian Curtis' recording career was and you start to wonder what direction they would have gone had things turned out just a bit differently. But at least we have this wonderful document to console us.

I've also managed to find some spare time to give the new Strokes album a few spins, and I have to say I'm really liking what I've heard. First Impressions of Earth isn't as concise and hard-hitting as the previous two albums, it runs about 2-3 songs too long, but there really is some wonderful stuff going on throughout. I like Julian's decision to expose his natural vocals a little more, he actually sounds pretty damn good with all of the distortion peeled away. "You Only Live Once", "Ize of the World", "Razorblade", and "Heart In A Cage" are among my early favorites and all as stong as anything else in their catalog. I'm bummed that I missed the special show they played at Park West last week, but I'm really hoping to catch them when they hit Chicago for a full-fledged tour later this spring.

In other news, I've been cranking out a few more reviews over the past couple of weeks. My take on the interesting new Rasputina live album is up over at Static and I should have a several more coming up within the next couple of weeks.