A habit i occasionally fall into is the lunch break cd purchase. Outside of the lunch break purchases i try to stick to buying cd's that I've heard some of the tracks from, or know previously, or have read a fair bit about. The lunch time purchase doesn't usually follow these rules. And i've ended up with a fair amount of guff this way. For some reason, probably because i've had a stressy day, i tend to grab any old cd - something i might have vaguely heard about in music magazines but which i generally know nothing about. I have an angel and devil whispering in my ear about this habit. One is welsh and says 'you don need it butttt, put it back on the shelf', the other (herefordian) influence is more along the lines of 'you know you want, buy it buy it buy it'.
So a recent double whammy lunch time cd purchase was Mr. M by Lambchop and Sleigh Bells' Reign of Terror. Now the Lambchop is very pleasant plinky plonky middle aged mumbling. Loungey crooning with some nice strings (and to be fair i had heard a bit of their previous music). The Sleigh Bells however is something I am still not sure what to make of. Its the sort of music that for the first 30 seconds you think it is some kind of awful art school joke. Whereas some musicians in the quest for being original go as far out as they can with beats/samples/politics, Sleigh Bells have gone for a wierd mix of 80s hair guitar and 90s indie girl emoting. It's Metallica crossed with Saint Etienne! It's Van Halen crossed with Lush! It's Poison crossed with Dubstar! And yet. And yet... Something about it stops you from turning it off, and after listening to it all the way through you kind of get into its way of thinking. In as much as i am still not sure if i could commit to saying i actually like it, i am glad i heard it. And it confirms to me that its always good to take the plunge and check out things outside of my comfort zone (ref. the choral society shizzle i mentioned a few posts ago).
And who wants to be buying Bright Eyes and R.E.M. for the rest of their lives?
Yesterday i found a music mag in smiths with the 'bells on the cover, so i will explore further...
No comments:
Post a Comment