Inhale, relax, repeat

So I was just poking about last.fm and stumbled across a journal on it where a guy had picked his favorite albums for every year he has been alive during. I thought this was a pretty interesting idea, so I’m gonna do the same. I’d post it on my last.fm, but even less people will read it, and I prefer my journals on there to be reviews of shows anyway. I don’t know how much depth I’m gonna be able to put into this, but here we go, a list of my favorite albums from 1987 until 2009!

1987:
Sonic Youth – Sister

Uh…according to RYM I only own one record from 1987, aha. GOOD START. That record is Sonic Youth’s Sister, so I guess that’s got to be it. -_- I gave it a 3.5/5 rating on there. I like it but if I had more than one record from 1987, I doubt it’d be on this list. >_< I prefer other Sonic Youth albums to this one...it's definatly not my favorite, but it is better than the ughish Daydream Nation (which no, is not gonna be my 1988 album, thank you), which is at least something.

1988:
Bad Religion - Suffer

Kind of a hard choice! I felt like I was gonna pick The Pixies' Surfer Rosa before I realised Suffer was released in 1988. Suffer is Bad Religion’s most well-rated record, and is adored by the fans. It’s one of the biggest punk rock records ever and always ends up in those “best punk rock albums” lists you see about the place. It’s fast paced, powerful and incredibly short (less than half an hour). It’s so surprise it’s so well-loved, and anyone who knows me could never expect me to not pick it above everything else for this year.

1989:
Pixies – Doolittle
Bad Religion – No Control

OK so I put two here. THAT’S CHEATING I hear you squeal. Well yes, yes it is…but I just couldn’t decide. I adore the Bad Religion record, but I don’t wanna put BR in every year they have a release for. No Control was totally the perfect carry-on from Suffer, and held the tone of the previous release. Doolittle is like…one of the biggest albums ever, and it keeps you totally fixated the whole way through. I’m not leaving it out because I’m obsessed with BR. That’d be unfair.

1990:
Bad Religion – Against the Grain

STFU. Not my favorite BR album, but 1990 seems to have been an unimpressive year for music, and nothing seemed better to pick for it. Against the Grain didn’t have the standard of Suffer and No Control, but it was still respectable, and still a BR classic.

1991:
Del Tha Funkee Homosapien – I Wish My Brother George Was Here

Kinda weird, someone like me actually putting a hip-hop album in here…but it definitely stood out among my other 1991 albums. I don’t ADORE it or dance along to it or anything, but I do find myself turning it up as loud as possible, appreciating the sound of hip-hop from the early 90s.

1992:
The Church – Preist = Aura
Sonic Youth – Dirty

Very hard choice. The Church’s album is EPIC (and I hate saying that word…Goddamn internet nerds) and Sonic Youth’s Dirty is my favorite of their records. It AMAZED me. I didn’t even first hear it long ago.

1993:
Bad Religion – Recipe for Hate

This is getting STUPID now, huh? The fans don’t adore Recipe for Hate as much as the other BR records I’ve put on here, but it was the first of their albums I bought, and the different sound to their other releases really gets to me. It captures me. American Jesus is on here, which may be BR’s most well-known song. It is one of my favorite BR records, so of course, naturally, I have to put it on this list. Incredible stuff.

1994:
The Offspring – Smash
Bad Religion – Stranger Than Fiction

The Offspring’s best album, without a doubt, and the record with the best sweary/angry line ever (“you stupid, dumbshit, Goddamn motherfucker”). This was The Offspring at their peak, and regardless of what you think of their images, Smash is worth checking out. You WILL be impressed. The BR record is probably one of their most hated (they released it on a major label…it’s their only major label release). It’s very poppy…but that appeals to me. Like Recipe for Hate, it’s different.

1995:
Rancid – …And Out Come the Wolves

Another album that gets into those “greatest punk records ever” lists. …And Out Come the Wolves is classic. One of my first punk records, and something that got me really into the genre. You have to listen to this!

1996:
Bad Religion – The Gray Race
Katatonia – Brave Murder Day

Ugh yes, another Goddamn Bad Religion album on the list. HOW BORING. We’ll ignore them from now on, yes? Brave Murder Day is one of the most depressing and painful doom metal records you’ll ever have the joy (or lack of joy) of listening to. This is when the band were still pretty hardcore, with screaming vocals. I like their later stuff, but I’d say this album was them at their peak. They’ll never beat it.

1997:
Mustard Plug – Evildoers Beware!
Ween – The Mollusk
The Offspring – Ixnay on the Hombre

So yeah…I put another Offspring album on here. Not as good as Smash, but damn fun! It reminds me greatly of my childhood, specifically of obsessing over Crazy Taxi. Mustard Plug is in there because it’s damn fun, catchy PERFECT ska-punk, and Ween is there because The Mollusk is a constantly exciting alternative rock album, filled with great ideas, catchy melodies and more variation than uh…a varied…thing.

1998:
Mad Caddies – Duck and Cover

…And the Mad Caddies are now born! After the not-very-impressive debut record, Duck and Cover was released, and it contains exactly what makes the band so strong; an awesome horn section. One of their best albums, and one of my damn favoriest ever.

1999:
Gogol Bordello – Voi-La Intruder
Blink 182 – Enema of the State

Not an easy pick to name. It seems 1999 was a bit shit. Blink 182 I picked because they were quite a big deal back in the day, and Enema of the State was their most fun, most typically pop-punk and most popular release. Gogol Bordello are here because, well, this was their introduction to the world. They did something a bit different to most, and their debut album is also my favorite. Listen to Sex Spider, folks. LISTEN NOW.

2000:
Green Day – Warning

My favorite Green Day album. They had gotten pretty poppy by this point, but not to the point 12 year old kids were screaming “SELL OUTS” at them.

2001:
Spooks – S.I.O.S.O.S.
Mad Caddies – Rock the Plank
Muse – Origon of Symmetry
Pennywise – Land of the Free?
Rx Bandits – Progress

BIG LIST. I can’t be fucked cutting it down. The Spooks album is my favorite hip-hop record EVER (if you’re not into hip-hop I swear you’ll still love it), the Mad Caddies album is my favorite of theirs, the Muse album I pretty much obsessed over for years (definitely their best. Makes me wish they weren’t trying to be Queen), The Pennywise album is about as heavy as punk rock gets before becoming hardcore, filled with emotive, political lyrics and the Rx bandits record is, well, Goddamn nice highly-influenced-by-reggae ska-punk.

2002:
Idlewild – The Remote Part
The Coral – The Coral

So we’ve got two records here of bands that changed from AWESOME into OK but a little boring after both of these records. Idlewild were heavy(ish) and The Coral had great psychedelic influences. If only both bands has stayed that way (especially The Coral. Idlewild as a folk band is at least still pretty good stuff).

2003:
Catch 22 – Dinosaur Sounds
NOFX – The War of Errorism
Damian Rice – O
Dropkick Murphys – Blackout
Streetlight Manifesto – Everything Goes Numb

Selection is getting VERY hard now. I’ve left out a load of stuff I adore to make this list. Catch 22’s Dinosaur Sounds is…different from all the other third wave ska about (IMO), NOFX, (again, IMO) created an awesome sound when they got all serious and angry, Damian Rice’s O is, well, FUCKING BEAUTIFUL and so so painful, and the Dropkick Murphys and Streetlight Manifesto records are just massive amounts of fun.

2004:
The Roots – The Tipping Point
Death From Above 1979 – You’re a Woman, I’m a Machine
The Faint – Wet From Birth
Flogging Molly – Within a Mile of Home

I’m getting bored. No more yabbling. I’m just posting the albums themselves for the best of this. ; (

2005:
Against Me! – Searching for a Former Clarity
Trivium – Ascendancy
4th Avenue Jones – Stereo: The Evolution of Hiprocksoul
Buck 65 – Secret House Against the World
Hard-Fi – Stars of CCTV

2006:
The King Blues – Under the Fog
Engerica – There Are No Happy Endings
I Would Set Myself On Fire For You – Believes in Patterns

2007:
Bad Religion – New Maps of Hell
Streetlight Manifesto – Somewhere in the Between

2008:
Millencolin – Machine 15
Firewater – The Golder Hour

2009:
Fake Problems – It’s Great to be Alive

And thank God that’s over!

So today I got a package delivered to me. I had a couple of CDs I bought off Amazon still to come, so I assumed it was one of them…

Alas, it wasn’t. It was this. I’ve never even heard of the band before, and there was no receipt with it!

Maybe someone sent it to me as a gift? Who knows! Free CD anyway. YAY.

BEST LIVE BAND EVER.

This is a post dedicated to their live performances. I wish my overpriced phone hadn’t had no memory on the night of this gig, because I’d have loved to have captured some of it for myself, but I didn’t, so here are a selection of random live performances. I hope at least someone watches a few of them…you will be impressed.

Carrying on with the big posts of Youtube music videos…

Rock/Alternative Rock/classic rock

I’m lumping rock and alternative rock together because people will always bitch about the “alternative” classification, and I’ve thrown “classic” rock in there because a) I’m lazy and b) it’s not an actual genre anyway.

Muse – Hysteria (live)

So this is the only track I’m posting a live version of. Why? Because Muse are so amazing live! When I saw them some stupid big clutz of a guy whacked me on the nose and it went snappyby, but that didn’t ruin the night and I had an awesome time anyway, because the show was incredible. This is my favorite of their songs.

ELO – Mr Blue Sky

SO HAPPY. Sadly it’s someone I quite deeply dislike’s favorite song, which spoils it slightly for me, but I try to ignore that…DON’T YOU RUIN GOOD MUSIC FOR ME, BITCH >: (

Meatloaf – I’d Lie for You and That’s the Truth

NO MOCKING PLEASE. This is one of my favorite (if not complete favorite) songs of all time. I would love to sing it to someone one day, to sing it with passion. That sounds pretty lame, I know, but it’d feel awesome. I guess deep down I am all sappy and romantic, huh. : (

Say Anything – The Church Channel

Carrying on the lameness, yes this is music than 14 year old girls adore, but I don’t care. It’s a great song, dammit! Video is entertaining enough too.

Sick Puppies – Anywhere But Here

I find this track to be beautiful. There have been parts of my life where I have been able to relate to it immensly (I’m not gonna expand on that, though the lyrics really do strike a chord with me).

The World/Inferno Friendship Society – Addicted to Bad Ideas

This particular “genre section” is getting too big, so this is my last in it. I dunno what to class this band as, but they’re interesting, so take a listen!

This time the genre is indie. Indie is a horribly vague and argued about genre, but this is my interpretation, k? Feel free to argue with me if you’re that way inclined, however. (Yes I am desperate for comments, thanks).

To start of with a very well known band…

The Coral – Bill McCai

My favorite Coral song. Catchy and horribly depressing!

The Dears – Warm and Sunny Days

SO PAINFUL. This song makes me ache. It is so beautiful, but urgh, it’s gut-wrenching. The guy’s voice is incredible and you can hear the anguish so clearly in his voice. The Dears are amazing, and they’re way underappreciated. I dunno how stuff like Bright Eyes gets so popular when these guys seem to be unheard of by most.

…and for something cheerier

Dogs Die In Hot Cars – I Love You ‘Cause I Have To

Pretty much unknown Scottish band. This is happy and fun stuff, and their album is awesome.

Timid Tiger – Combat Songs and Traffic Lights

I demand you listen to this and try not to smile. IT’S IMPOSSIBLE I TELL YOU. Electro-indie goodness.

Frank Turner was the lead singer of Million Dead and has gone on to a solo project very different from what his now defunct band was. I class him as indie, and this is a nice song.

The Thermals are probably my favorite indie band of the moment. I’ve known of them for ages but suddenly a few weeks ago something clicked and I decided they are awesome. I’m not sure how this happened, but this track is my favorite of theirs.

Very similar to the subways, both in sound and the fact they have the whole guy+girl thing going on. V good. CHECK THEM OUT.

Every time I hear these lyrics I cry. :”(

I held onto you for as long as I could but today
You fell away
Now what I hold are the memories we barely made
I stood on the edge of your bridge until I felt the rain
Wash me away
My confusion left me fast as the vertigo came

What I believed to be true it was only a dream
Believed in me
I just projected it over your beautiful screen
I self medicated my way through this mess that we made
So I could stay
There was nothing, but I waited
I waited

This was my mistake
Broken are plans we made
So I will be traveling any place
Cause anywhere’s better than
Here we rest in peace
Rubble beneath the feet

I shouldn’t have followed you anywhere
Cause anywhere’s better than here

Where is the space I could move, where could I rest my head
There’s nothing left for me here
It’s hard to leave behind
The one thing that made me feel alive
So I slide
From paranoid to paralyzed

This was my mistake
Broken are plans we made
So I will be traveling any place
Cause anywhere’s better than here

This was my mistake
Broken are plans we made
Here we rest in peace
Rubble beneath the feet
I shouldn’t have followed you anywhere
Cause anywhere’s better than here

This is Sick Puppies – Anywhere But Here. I don’t adore the band, but this song…GODDAMN it affects me massively.

STAY TUNED FOR MORE SONGS THAT MAKE ME CRY.

On my previous blog I had started posting a load of videos of some of my favorite songs from each genre of music that I enjoy. Each post was dedicated to one genre and I tried to be as thorough as possible. I wanted to post them all at once, but it screwed up CERTAIN PEOPLE’S net…so I felt slightly guilty and chopped it down.

So my first installment will be all about punk music. Modern stuff, that is. If you dislike what I post, have no fear! Folk-punk, post-punk, dance-punk, pop-punk, celtic-punk and ska-punk are all still to come.

To start off, my favorite song by my favorite band. BAD RELIGION…

This song is slightly different from your average punk track. Why? BECAUSE IT’S NOT POLITICAL. Descendents sing about personal stuff rather than political, and as much as I like the political, a break from it every now and then is refreshing. I find this to be their most touching song. It’s nice and bitter.

Moving on from a non-political song is one which is argubly political. On a level it probably is, but on the level I read it on it’s got meaning that I think we all can relate to to an extent. Everyone feels there’s something wrong with them…or a lot of people do, and that’s what makes this song so powerful. It feels applyable to so many different situations. I adore it and it’s one of those few songs I have never sickened of after hundreds of listens.

OK so that covers the most well-known punk, with regard to some less-known (no no I’m not saying these are all small bands…they’re just not so popular) punk, HERE WE GO…

Smoke Or Fire and Ducky Boys, both from Boston.

Catchy. I really can’t say anything more than that. Typing out this post again is making me lose the will to live. -_-

A BLACK PUNK BAND. There aren’t enough of these really, are there? Whole Wheat Bread are as catchy as they come, and this track seems to be about going on about a stupid, drunk old man…which is never a bad thing!

This band is called Tat and are from London. I saw them a couple of years ago at Glasgow’s worst venue (Cathouse – never go there, the staff ruin the atmosphere) and instantly loved them. The lead singer’s appearance sort of bothers me these days since she reminds me of someone I hate, but putting that aside, they’re a great band and need some attention!

Last but not least, Guns On The Roof and another modern British punk band, proving punk in the UK is definitely not dead. They are nothing extraordinary, but they’re catchy as hell and fun, which is enough for me.