In My Earbuds Lately

i-0c8dd41d1a2d0c4a0c844957d10a50f7-creative-earbuds.jpg

The increasing number of podcasts I subscribe to has tended to crowd music out a bit from my earbuds in recent months. But I do have some good albums to recommend. Here's what's on my smartphone right now.

  • Fleet Foxes. Fleet Foxes. 2008. Folky guitars and complex vocal harmonies.
  • Heavy Blinkers. Better Weather. 2002. Bacharach-obsessed orchestral pop.
  • Jet. Shaka Rock. 2009. It rocks. And shakes.
  • MGMT. Congratulations. 2010. Psychedelic New Wave.
  • Midlake. The Courage of Others. 2010. More folky guitars and complex vocal harmonies.

I've run similar lists before in 2008 and 2009.

Then there's a long list of recent albums that I need to get but haven't yet, in some cases because the bands haven't finished recording them.

  • Apples in Stereo. Travellers in Space and Time.
  • Big Elf. Cheat the Gallows.
  • Brimstone Solar Radiation Band. Smorgasbord.
  • Cathedral. The Guessing Game.
  • Coral. Butterfly House.
  • Dozer. Beyond Colossal.
  • Electric Soft Parade. No Need to Be Downhearted.
  • Fiery Furnaces. Widow City.
  • Howlin' Rain. Howlin' Rain and Magnificent Fiend.
  • Introduction. Santa Sets Sail for Saturn.
  • Mars Volta. Octahedron.
  • Nashville Pussy. From Hell to Texas.
  • of Montreal. False Priest.
  • Starlight Mints. Change Remains.

Dear Reader, given the line-up above, what other bands should I check out?

For more about music from Aard, just check out the music archive tag.

[More blog entries about , , ; , , .]

Tags

More like this

I'd suggest Califone. Start with Roomsound.

I can recommend Oh My God Charlie Darwin by The Low Anthem (American folk, rock). Absolutely one of my best buys last year.

I'm a bit surprised by the Big Elf and the Cathedral. How are you with the dronier end of things? I have lots of recommendations out that way. But irrespective of that, I need to make sure you know Kyuss, the oldest and bestest heavy blasted-desert stoner band there has ever been. If you don't, get Blues for the Red Sun and see. Also, if you can find it I expect you would rather like Sensilla by the Flyte Reaction, old-school British psych-pop.

For a while Amazon, whose recommendation engine I try to confuse as much as possible, were trying to sell me on that Fleet Foxes album. I am going to have to get it at this rate just to see what it is so many people seem to agree about...

A Living Soundtrack.

Thanks guys, very interesting suggestings that I look forward to pursuing!

Jon, I don't have comprehensive knowledge of drone or stoner rock, but I love Sleep and there are certainly some fine tracks on Blues for the Red Sun. People keep recommending me Saint Vitus. QotSA is post-stoner, I guess, but they're among my faves too.

I don't really get St Vitus myself, a bit too old-school metal, though one of the guitarist's subsequent bands, Spirit Caravan, are definitely worth a listen. I think my current favourite live band is Litmus, whose Planetfall is a genuinely awesome album, really high-octane apocalytpic space-rock, like Hawkwind but louder and with a sense of headlong flight from imminent doom about it. So maybe I'll leave the recommendations there for a bit, but believe me, I could go on...

Roll the Dice (they're Swedish!)

By tryptamine (not verified) on 20 May 2010 #permalink

you should also check out Department of Eagles - "In Ear Park" ...it is a side project for one or two of the Grizzly Bear guys, loosly-folky and really good.