Music Rant

My top desert island album of all time is probably Days Like This by Van Morrison. Great stuff, all the way through, and I've yet to tire of it.

Runners up in the desert island album list:
Frank Zappa, The Best Band You Never Heard In Your Life
Pat Metheny Group, Pat Metheny Group
Steely Dan, Aja
The Clash, Sandinista
Jamiroquai, Funk Odyssey
Talking Heads, Fear of Music
Elvis Costello, Goodbye Cruel World
Michael Franks, The Art of Tea
Kansas, Song For America
Various artists, original movie soundtrack for Snatch
King Crimson, Beat
The The, Soul Mining
Warren Zevon, The Wind
Zappa, Sleep Dirt/Waka Jawaka
Devo, Duty Now For the Future and Are We Not Men?

The new "Jack" radio format is about as cynical and ugly a thing I've ever seen. They expect us to believe that they're cool and hip and have this shallow bad-boy attitude because they play anything and everything? First of all, they don't play anything and everything. I've yet to hear Iggy Pop on a Jack formatted station. I've yet to hear Black Flag or X or the Plasmatics. I've yet to hear soundtrack music. There is a lot they've never touched. And the lack of DJ's? Well that's because they've been replaced by a computer, and what the idiots are listening to is actually a gigantic MP3 playlist on the massive computer they've got at the stations. And the commercial I heard the other day tried to play off as cool and hip the fact that there was no DJ, as if letting them all go was the ultimate in listener revenge. Revenge against what, I'm not too sure. I'd like to hear some revenge against the advertisers. Where is the "Jork" station that fires all of the sponsors, and plays nothing but music? Oh, yeah, that's called XM, or Sirius. And that's where my subscription dollars go, and happily, too.

Rap just doesn't do it for me, not in general. There are a few that I enjoy, but I find most of them are novelty, or non-mainstream raps. I love "The Magnificent Seven" by The Clash, and loved "Rappin' Duke" when it came out way back in 1985 or thereabouts. But Eminem and the rest just aren't working for me. Sorry.

I've fallen in love with "Pina Colada Mix" by Digby Jones, available on the Cafe Del Mar Volume 8 disc. Some of the best new music I've heard in a long time, absolutely fantastic stuff.

I'm liking what I'm hearing from The Cardigans and Royksopp.

Moby has lost me. Does he play music, or sell energy drink? STick with your core competency, cue ball.