Like the previous set, the albums ranked 40-31 in this decade overview are bit unstable. Even after I started writing these entries, I was still shuffling albums around. The list gets more stable with the next set.
By the way, I’m linking to each previous and next entry, regardless of their publication status. If I don’t include the links now, I won’t remember to add them later.
UPDATE, 12/15/2009, 10:03 a.m.: I realized Onitsuka Chihiro’s Insomnia didn’t make it on this list, and NUMBER GIRL’s NUM-HEAVYMETALLIC had a pretty precarious spot on it anyway. So I bumped NUMBER GIRL off to make way for Onitsuka. Sorry, Mukai.
MASS OF THE FERMENTING DREGS returns with a new single, "Hikizuru Beat/Made.", on Feb. 10, reports Bounce.com. The double A-side single features drummer Yoshino Kou, who became a full-time member of the group after serving as a support musician. The single, to be released on EMI Japan, marks the major label debut for the newly-minted trio, which will embark on a tour in March.
Music writers geeks love their lists, as the characters of Nick Hornby’s High Fidelity would have you believe.
All the fashionable online pundits are throwing together decade retrospectives, and there’s no reason my little dog and pony show shouldn’t get in on some of that action.
I’ll count backward, instead of using the traditional Desert Island Disc format (which reminds me …), and I’m splitting this list of 50 up by tens. That should really pad my Holidailies output.
This first set is probably the most unstable. I have to admit I was padding these lower ranks, and 10 years from now, I may change my mind about these albums. I’m far more certain about the first 20, maybe the first 25.
Tokyo Jihen’s next album, titled Sports, comes out on Feb. 24, reports Bounce.com. It’s been 2 1/2 years since the band released its previous album, Goraku (Variety). The 13-track Sports includes the pre-release single, "Noudouteki Sanpunkan", as well as "Senkou Shoujo", the title song a 2007 DVD release. A tour to support the album begins in March.
(Is it sick of me to wish this album were a track-by-track cover of the Huey Lewis and the News album of the same name?)
When was the last time I looked ahead to new releases? April? You mean to say I have not previewed upcoming releases in eight months?
I guess I ought to fix that, but the first quarter of any year is going to be slow, and 2010 is so far shaping up to be no exception. There’s not much to report.
It took a few albums, but Shiina Ringo eventually distinguished her early solo work from her latter-day efforts with Tokyo Jihen. 2007’s Goraku even found her abdicating songwriting duties to her bandmates.
So when Shiina announced the release of her first new original solo album in six years, it was plausible to think the border between Ringo-chan and Tokyo Jihen would be maintained.
The pre-release single "Ariamaru Tomi," a tender rock ballad, hinted as much. It was a shock, then, when Sanmon Gossip turned out to be … a Tokyo Jihen album.
I’m hesitant to call the Favorite Edition 2009 list because I haven’t really listened to very many new releases, and the numbers bear that out. According to the Music Collector database I use to keep track of my music purchases, 2009 saw a huge drop in new release consumption.
The number of titles I consumed from 2008, spanning three formats (CDs, downloads and paid streams), was 76. In 2009, that number is 46, a 30 percent drop.
Those numbers are bit deceptive, because three of those 2008 titles weren’t discovered till 2009. Still, 46 titles is paltry next to 76 in 2008, 86 in 2007, 71 in 2006 and 67 in 2005. Also, some of the stream and CD titles are duplicates — when I like a stream well enough, I’ll buy the CD.
Most of that shift in purchasing habits can be attributed to saving for my Japan trip, but my changing preference for catalog titles didn’t help either.
So 2009 is getting the short shrift. Perhaps later I can revise history, should the new releases of this year become catalog discoveries of coming years. I doubt it.
Back when I worked at Waterloo Records, I would stock Neutral Milk Hotel’s In the Aeroplane, Over the Sea and think, "This album looks really precious."
The ornate cover art struck me as indier-than-thou, and the mouthy title all but screamed pretension — and that may very well be the case.
In an attempt to burn through some eMusic credits, I downloaded the album in late 2008, and I haven’t stopped playing it since. I loaded it into my iPod, and I’ve not deleted it. It’s still in my CD wallet, and I always cycle out newer acquisitions with older ones.
Sometimes I’m skeptical of near unanimous critical praise. In this instance, I was wrong.
(Holidailies Ed. note: "On the playlist" is a repeating column that gives brief reviews of what has been in rotation on my media player.)
In all honesty, everything I bought in Japan was something I previewed through the Evil Sharing Networks. I wanted to make sure if I were going to live with an album during my daily commutes, it would be something worth 3,000 or so yen.
In the months preceding the trip itself, I pretty much stopped buying CDs. Waterloo Records even had their pre-holiday season storewide sale, and the only thing I bought was a Kate Bush album. I have, however, been milking my eMusic quotas for all their worth.