Thank you, Marco. It seems many Agoners are quite tolerant of stupid questions.
Charlie
Charlie
Album of the Week - Opinion/Samples
Okay - a thread along the lines of "What are You Listening to Lately". Hopefully this won't get out of hand, but - my thoughts are for thread participants to recommend (on a weekly basis) a single album/CD from their stacks, make a few personal comments, and add a link so people can hear some of the album. Keeping it to a once a week basis should let the pleasure extend indefinitely...
To link - add a mark-up tag to an Amazon page that has a "Listen to Samples" selection.
I'm sure everyone here has GREAT musical taste, and probably know quite a few hidden gems/personal treasures that have yet to hit mainstream consciousness ...
Starting out from my collection, I'm going to dust off the jacket and select:
The Blue Nile - Hats
The Blue Nile puts out an album about once every six years, and god knows I wish they were more prolific. Their first two albums - A Walk In the Rain and Hats from the mid-late 80's - are tone poems more than anything. I'd probably describe these two as "Impressionistic rock" or "smoky cabaret rock". It's sort of haunting and uplifting at the same time, with mournful horns - synthesized beats/keyboards - yearning vocals with a Scots burr. And the lyrics are poetry of an everyman ...
Last heard from with 1996's "Peace at Last". A little less atmospheric than the other two - but still great.
Hoping they release at least once more in my lifetime, because they are so damned good. I assume they were bigger in the UK - but are little known over here. Unfortunately "Hats" and "A Walk In The Rain" only appear to be on import labels now, but they are worth forking over the dough for...
To link - add a mark-up tag to an Amazon page that has a "Listen to Samples" selection.
I'm sure everyone here has GREAT musical taste, and probably know quite a few hidden gems/personal treasures that have yet to hit mainstream consciousness ...
Starting out from my collection, I'm going to dust off the jacket and select:
The Blue Nile - Hats
The Blue Nile puts out an album about once every six years, and god knows I wish they were more prolific. Their first two albums - A Walk In the Rain and Hats from the mid-late 80's - are tone poems more than anything. I'd probably describe these two as "Impressionistic rock" or "smoky cabaret rock". It's sort of haunting and uplifting at the same time, with mournful horns - synthesized beats/keyboards - yearning vocals with a Scots burr. And the lyrics are poetry of an everyman ...
Last heard from with 1996's "Peace at Last". A little less atmospheric than the other two - but still great.
Hoping they release at least once more in my lifetime, because they are so damned good. I assume they were bigger in the UK - but are little known over here. Unfortunately "Hats" and "A Walk In The Rain" only appear to be on import labels now, but they are worth forking over the dough for...
- ...
- 48 posts total
Second vote for a worthy purchase - especially their debut "Cake" (listen to the snippets of Obscurity Knocks and Thruppeny Tears). Somehow, the middle half of "I've Seen Everything" loses its impetus for me, although I love both "Orange Fell" and "The Earlies" (at the end). I don't have "A Happy Pocket" - but may buy it sometime. Of course, I'm partial to this brand of britpop - YTMV. Another Scots band that I enjoy a lot is the Del Amitris. |
Dr John - Duke Elegant |
- 48 posts total