Board 8 > The Board 8 Song of the Week Club - Week 9

(+) Yeah! (+)

currently:

Honor Thy Father 3
He Said He Has a Story 2
The Magician
Eye for an Eye
A Portrait Of
NO one To kNOW one
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Gin Wigmore - Kill of the Night
A cougar anthem with a touch of wickedness. And by cougar I mean I just googled her and she's actually about my age so I guess the song just sounds much more vintage than it is and has a predatory motif and her delivery has a strange feline quality that makes me think she's constantly doing the cat claws gesture in the recording booth, so that's fun. I dig the organ stuff in the last third especially.

Mobb Deep (ft. Nas and Raekwon) - Eye for an Eye (Your Beef is Mines)
Been a long time since I listened to this album. I liked Prodigy's verse the most, though Raekwon's random cornea wordplay was a highlight. The old school production is something I have a soft spot for, if it were just a beat then I would be aching for more chord changes but under four emcees it functions well as a neutral platform to compare the performer's talents. Shook/10

Andy Akiho - NO one To kNOW one
Breaks the rules of capitalization. There's so much percussion in a tight little space there! Some of the xylo/vibes/flute stuff reminds me of Einstein on the Beach with the arpeggiations and rhythmic variants. The second half picks up with a more solid backbeat and really pulls everything together but the best part of the song is the random single word that everyone sings in unison at 1:54. That was so out of nowhere I was cracking up, had to keep scrolling back to it.

Sorority Noise - A Portrait Of
That wall of distortion was a pleasant surprise for what I thought was going to be a clean-cut track. It's so expansive and textural without being too muddy! I really like how it combos with that final spoken word verse, really builds up the steam. Reminds me of that Nada Surf song, "Popular".

N-Qia - Shootingstar
The densely layered beat has a cutesy Postal Service vibe and the singer sounds like she was recorded on a different song from down the hallway. The music sounds happy but she sounds haunted, and now I'm emotionally confused. Maybe it's just the reverb. There's a lot of minutae to appreciate here regardless, bunches of cool patches and samples blended into the mix.

The White Stripes - Jolene (Dolly Parton)
It's easy for me to forget how good The White stripes are, I tend to think of them in the abstract as "that band I loved back in middle school" but when I actually hear them again I'm reminded my taste wasn't half-bad in middle school. You gotta love the duo's shtick of being the protagonists from a stop-animation Tim Burton movie, makes it easy to root for them. Maybe Meg is just kind of there outlining the barest skeleton of a beat but it gives Jack a lot of room to bring the heat with his playing/singing. Never heard the Parton song so the performance is the draw for me here, especially since it's live.

The Dear Hunter - He Said He Had A Story
I've never listened to these guys intently but my brother's always playing them so I feel like I've heard this peripherally. The vocal is the highlight, he sounds indignant and operatic in the way that makes Muse appealing. To match, the band tries to constantly bowl you over in the way that makes Muse fatiguing. So in that respect it'd be a "great in small doses" type of thing for me because I can't always sustain the mood to engage with that kind of dramatic intensity for an album's worth. I wasn't sold on the first half but the climax is pretty convincing.

Dream Theater - Honor Thy Father
Chuggity chuggity whaaaat son. This sounds more 'normal' than what I expected from Dream Theater, although I legit haven't listened to them in about twelve years. It's actually pretty catchy in the riff department. Keyboard solo is sick and makes me turn the volume up, which is a good sign at the seven minute mark of a ten minute ditty. Pinched harmonics always make me smile, it's like the shaka gesture of metal music to me. Hang loose, thy father.

The Move - I Can Hear the Grass Grow
Is it about that loud weed? It's a quaint piece and emblematic of its time but I'm not aching to hear more, if this tune is any indication it's no mystery to me why The Move never caught the same wave as its contemporaries - in a year that saw the release of Revolver and Pet Sounds this just feels a step behind.

Joey Bada$$ - Y U DON'T LOVE ME
Excellent production (loved the synth strings that come in about halfway through) helps me take the sadfreshprince.jpg mood seriously, the lyrics are so $orrowful on this one. His flow is nice though and that always makes moping more forgivable. Ain't nobody praying for Joey. Solid track but nothing spectacular and I'm still not convinced of this guy's supossed Bada$$ery.

Mastodon - Blue Walsh
It's exactly what I want out of Mastodon: psychedelic twang-metal with hooks, vocal variety, colorful drumming, lead guitar at the right balance of cerebral and visceral. Why it'd almost fit right onto Crack the damn Skye and we all know how important that record is. Glad you picked this because otherwise I would have probably never listened to the EP which flew completely under my radar.

Blue Walsh - Jolene - Eye For an Eye - A Portrait Of - Kill of the Night - He Said he Had a Story - Honor Thy Father - Y U DON'T LOVE ME - Shootingstar - NO one To kNOW one - I Can Hear the Grass Grow