Apr 4, 2011

Music Diary Project: Day 1
As I mentioned last night, I will be taking part in Nick Southall's Music Diary Project for the next seven days. Here is what I listened to throughout today:

The first music I heard this morning was the radio as I rode to the train station with my wife. I'm not a huge fan of morning talk radio, so we usually jump around the presets to find a station playing actual music. Today we wound up on the local classic rock station and I heard:
Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - "The Waiting"
Aerosmith - "Dream On"

Then I was off to catch my train, where I was able to take a little more control over what I heard. After wrapping up the latest episode of The Tobolowsky Files that I had started before bed the previous night, I switched my iPod to shuffle mode:
Deerhoof - "Almost Everyone, Almost Always"
J.S. Bach - "Brandenburg Concerto #2 in F Major: Allegro Assai"
Dum Dum Girls - "Take Care of My Baby"
Public Image Ltd. - "Memories"
Blue Oyster Cult - "Teen Archer"

After settling in at the office, I switched over to album mode while I reviewed some drawings:
Omar Rodriguez-Lopez - Mantra Hiroshima
This was my first time playing this record, a surprisingly solid improvisational record featuring Zach Hill on drums. Sometimes Omar's non-Mars Volta work can be really spotty, so I was glad to hear this one.

Pearl Jam - Vs. [Expanded Edition]
I swore the allure of three loosely-defined "bonus tracks" wasn't going to be enough to get me to pick up these new reissues, but I found them for an incredibly low price over the weekend. This has never been my favorite Pearl Jam album, but it sounded pretty good today and I love finally having a high quality studio version of their excellent "Crazy Mary" cover.

After that I was having some trouble deciding what to listen to, so I switched back over to shuffle:
PJ Harvey - "The Last Living Rose"
Frank Ocean - "There Will Be Tears"
Gatekeeper - "Mirage"
Cut Copy - "Alisa"
Broadcast - "I Found the F"

Then it was time for lunch and I headed over to a nice little pizza place a couple blocks away from the office, they had a local pop station on:
Lady Gaga - "Born This Way" (last half)
Rihanna - "S&M"
Britney Spears - "Till the World Ends"
Bruno Mars - "Grenade"

Back to the office for a slow-moving afternoon:
Velocity Girl - Copacetic
Outside of the few videos I remember from 120 Minutes back in the day, I never really investigated this band until recently. Wishing I would have gotten around to them sooner.

Tennis - Cape Dory (2x)
Listened to this twice this afternoon to better firm up my thoughts before that previous post.

Wrapped up the work day with a little more shuffling:
Captain Beefheart - "Safe As Milk (Take 5)"
The Beets - "Dead"
Akron/Family - "Another Sky"

With that, back to the train for the ride home. I've been rereading Game of Thrones prior to the premiere of the new HBO series, so I wanted something that wasn't too vocal-oriented:
The Soft Moon - The Soft Moon
A really great 2010 album from Captured Tracks, more of a post-punk vibe than the label's acts usually have.

Then my eyes got tired from staring at drawings all day, so I finished off the train ride with:
The Mountain Goats - All Eternals Deck
At least the first seven tracks anyway. Still absorbing this one, but early reports have it sounding like another winner from Darnielle.

My wife picked me up from the train station tonight and she still had the classic rock station on in the car:
Alice Cooper - "I'm Eighteen"
J. Geils Band - "Centerfold"
Cream - "White Room"

After dinner and watching a few shows with my wife, I spent the last few hours of my evening surfing around and catching up with some blogs, my musical ADD kicked in and I was all over the place:
Thee Oh Sees - "Enemy Destruct"
Them Crooked Vultures - "Elephants"
The Pains of Being Pure at Heart - "Belong"
The Pains of Being Pure at Heart - "Anne with an E"
The Pains of Being Pure at Heart - "My Terrible Friend"
Kate Bush - "How to Be Invisible"
Kate Bush - "An Architect's Dream"
Muse - "Undisclosed Desires"
Rush - "Red Sector A"
Shellac - "Song Against Itself"

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