Towards a General Theory of Everything: Review: 'This Album Will Make You Kill Yourself', Glasvegas

What It Is We're Doing Here

This is a place where I post anything my friends and I feel is relevant to the music we like. The kind of music in question can be seen pretty easily by checking out the playlists posted. I post a playlist every month and regular record reviews. By regular I mean 'when I get the chance'.

It is my sincere hope that any reviews or commentary you read here will not remind you at all of reviews you can read in Rolling Stone or Pitchfork or NME or any number of other professional music reviewers.

Why? Because for the most part, those reviews are just really, really boring and they kill the fun of music. No one (aside from guys who write those reviews) sits around with their friends and mentions how 'the deeply melodic tempo shifts emanating from the counter-intuitive and soulfully rhythmic jazz fusion guitar lifts us to incomparable ...'

Incomparable heights of bullshit, maybe. Not gonna happen here. (I didn't tell you this, but I still visit Pitchfork every day, but only for the articles, yeah.)

It would be a lie if I said there will be respect for a variety of musical tastes here, there will be no such thing. Some music, no matter how popular it is, just sucks. That doesn't mean this is a haven of indie rock snobbery by any means. There's plenty of well-regarded indie shit out there that is just fucking awful. Grizzly Bear, I'm pointing at you and nodding my head.

Really there are no limits to the kind of music we'll listen to, so anything goes. Forward on anything worthy that has not been discussed in enough detail.

If we miss something newsworthy or get something wrong, let us know. If you agree or disagree with an opinion here, let us know. It will not change said opinion, but you will probably feel better than if you kept it in. So go ahead.

How I Rate Music

When I post my thoughts on a record, I use the standard 1-5 stars format for a couple of reasons: 1) It works just as well as anything else and 2) Most people use an iPod, I rate my songs on my iPod, the iPod has a 1-5 star ratings system and therefore it's a common language to both of us.

Here is how I define my ratings:

5 Stars: Totally awesome. A great song. Permanent favorite. Think 'Fans' by Kings of Leon (before the hairstylists), 'Mahgeeta' by MMJ, 'Fight Test' by the Flaming Lips, that sort of thing. A rare rating, though.

4 Stars: Very good. I'll listen to this song again and again, I'm happy I bought it, I will refer to it in conversation as 'one of the songs I like on that album'.

3 Stars: Just OK. Nothing wrong here, it's just not that memorable and maybe if I listened to it three or four times I'd like it, but if it was really that good, I shouldn't have to, so that brings us full circle and therefore it is 'Just OK'.

2 Stars: Irritating. A bad song. This rating means something is really wrong here, and perhaps we should sit down.

1 Star: A sin against music. Why did you record this? Do you not have any friends who listened to this with you and said 'Wow, this is incredibly, incredibly bad'? This is the kind of song that totally pisses me off when I hear it.

A few songs almost automatically fall into 1 or 2 star category, in particular the trend gaining popularity with bands to once again put one minute snippets of music or horrible noise on an album. Spiritualized, I am talking to YOU. 'Harmony 6 (Glockenspiel)'? I mean, fuck you.

How I Make Playlists

Any 4 or 5 star song usually ends up on a monthly playlist. If an album is so good that it has more than three or four songs that warrant being added to a playlist (ie Windmill, Deer Tick), I'll space the songs out and put them on a subsequent month's playlist.

Playlists are generally 35 songs or so. Any more than that and you'll just never listen to some of them, any less and you'll just get bored because there's not enough music. I realize this makes no sense, I really just needed an arbitrary cutoff, so 35 it is.

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Review: 'This Album Will Make You Kill Yourself', Glasvegas

That's not the real title of this album, but listen to this and tell me you're not Googling 'noose tying lessons' by the time you get halfway through. This album is just so insanely embarrassing, it gives indie music a horrible name, it is an affront to manhood, and it made me consider slashing my wrists with my own iPod.

These guys are actually popular. They were on David Letterman. They're Scottish. Usually this could add up to something. This adds up to nothing.

Honestly, not since Bright Eyes' recording of 'Silent Night' have you been more easily able to picture a guy sitting in a hotel room with a loaded gun and a bottle of whiskey, trying to decide which to put in his mouth next. Visualize this scenario when you listen these guys sing 'Flowers and Football Tops', about the cops telling a mom her son is dead ... OH MY. They actually sing 'You Are My Sunshine' at the end of this song. I am not kidding. I am still stunned. I am so embarrassed for them. They do not care.

Consider the song 'Stabbed'. The guy repeats over and over 'I'm gonna get stabbed'. Over and over. Until you are rooting for the people coming to get him, like the stupid people in horror movies running around a house screaming so they give the killer a perfect idea of where they are.

You almost have to wonder if you're listening to a parody album put out to mock mopey emo guys. I am going to throw this out there: This band is a joke, not figuratively (although that is also true), but literally. This is a group of guys who are literally trying to see how much melodramatic, over-emotive crap people will buy before anyone calls Bullshit.

I could go on. I can't go on. I will go on. I'm not even rating these songs. They're all bad. I wish iTunes had some sort of reverse billing where bands like this could pay me money for the time wasted listening to them (Grizzly Bear, yes you, Grizzly Bear). Don't buy this. Especially if you've had a bad day and keep sharp things around the house.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...: Will definitely avoid this. Though your review was so scathing that I now want to hear it so I can experience the awfulness for myself.; January 23, 2009 at 6:14 AM

Towards a General Theory of Everything