i've written online before, for almost three years, but have taken a two year break since closing that site up. i've found that all i miss is writing about records that i listen to, and music that i happen to hear through the day. i obsess about documenting it for myself, and have lately been feeling the need to document it outside my head. these are the records i listen to, preserved for posterity.

tonight i listened to curve's doppelganger, an album often derided for sounding like the same song on repeat for 40 minutes. of course, the autoresponse is that if that song is half-decent, who's to complain at its repetition. who indeed! i'll think that when i reach for doppelganger, though. 'why put that on; it all sounds the same!'. i'll put it back. tonight i put it on, and it does all sound the same, but that's fine. it's a solid sound, thick and midrange. it sounds as if the guitars(all 20 tracks of them) are consistently behind the beat, making for a woozy fluid counterpart for the always-on-target drum tracks.

this evening, at dinner, i heard both saint etienne's only love can break your heart and an odd remix of lambchop's up with people. perhaps being able to document these notes here will save my friends and co-workers from my verbal commentary, which i don't doubt is unwelcome. i've tried very hard to like lambchop, and while i do love the nixon album, the rest of what i've heard has kept me at a distance. there's invariably a song that sounds gimmicky, tacky, or corny. oddly, i still don't have a legitimate copy of nixon, but hearing the mangled up with people tonight reminded me of what a lovely song it is, and i expect that i'll try once again to love lambchop. listening to the original version of that song again now, i can pick out a moment when it all comes together. it's about 2:30 into the song, when the bassline finally changes, breaking the ice, leading to a bit of gorgeous noise and the careful, tentative gospel. it's almost eerie, for which i blame the the underlying radio feedback and guitar vibrations. the trumpets hit just after 4 minutes, but the song never climaxes, gliding out on warm but very mannered optimism.