Tag: Camera Obscura

Categories
Albums

Best albums of 2024: Greetings & honourable mentions

Well, hello and happy hump day!

It’s been a while. Three months since my last post, to be exact.

I didn’t intend to be away so long and definitely wasn’t expecting the piece on Beck to be my last post. However, life… well… it happened.

Without getting into all the gory details, let’s just say I had some unexpected health issues, some of them quite scary, involving an extended gig in the hospital. I have had to make a number of lifestyle changes, including slowing things down quite a bit. And though not all yet resolved, things have been improving and I am slowly on the mend, hopefully on track to a full recovery. I am grateful for the love of my life and partner in all things, close friends, and professional support, all of which have kept me going.

Of late, I’ve been slowly trying to get back to doing some of the things I used to enjoy and, of course, one of the first things that helped bring some solace was listening to music. Limited reading followed, and I’m just now returning to some writing, intending to slowly get back to this regular blogging fun.

While in the hospital, I had lots of time to think about the greats of 2024. So let’s begin with a sampling of great albums from last year worthy of honourable mention, followed by my next post, the first handful of those ten favourite albums for the year. Enjoy.

Camera Obscura “Look to the east, look to the west”:  The Scottish indie pop band’s sixth studio album and first since the death of keyboardist, Carey Lander in 2015, shows the group in fine form and chock full of that twee magic.
Check out: “Big love”

The Decemberists “As it ever was, so it will be again”:  The Portland-based quintet keeps on doing things in their own particular way – esoteric subject matter dressed up in indie folk, informed by a myriad of world musical styles – on their 9th studio album and we continue to love them for it.
Check out: “Burial ground”

Desperate Journalist “No hero”:  To my ears, these post punk revivalists from London, England have firmly grasped the torch let drop by Canada’s The Organ when that band split after only one great album back in the early 2000s.
Check out: “Unsympathetic parts 1 & 2”

Elephant Stone “Back into the dream”: The sixth album by the Montreal-based psych-rock quartet fronted by bass and sitar player Rishi Dhir, is more Beatlesque, jangle pop that is as equally relevant on a Saturday night, as it is on a Sunday morning.
Check out: “Going underground”

James “Yummy”: One of my favourite all-time bands celebrated their 40th anniversary year in 2023 with a compilation of orchestral reworkings of many of their much-loved classics and followed it up in 2024 with their 18th (!) studio album – future classics that feature the Manchester group’s signature “big”
sound and frontman Tim Booth’s inimitable lyric work and vocal style.
Check out: “Is this love”

Linn Koch-Emmery “Borderline iconic”: Unlike her 2021 debut, “Borderline iconic“, the Sweden born and bred singer-songwriter didn’t quite crack my top ten with her sophomore effort… but it was darned close – just over 30 more minutes of spiky and catchy, power pop attitude.
Check out: “Ebay armour”

The Vaccines “Pick-up full of pink carnations”: London, England’s The Vaccines are sadly one of those bands that I tend to forget about* – until of course, they release a new album, like this, their 6th LP offering, and I am immediately caught back up in the wave of their angular, fun, and anthemic indie-pop.
Check out: “Heartbreak kid”

*Not because they deserve to be forgotten- they just fall victim to my too much music, too little time” syndrome.

I’ll be back very soon with albums #10 through #6 for my Best albums of 2024 list. In the meantime, you can check out my Best Albums page here if you’re interested in my other favourite albums lists.

Categories
Tunes

Best tunes of 2003: #15 Camera Obscura “Suspended from class”

<< #16    |    #14 >>

Well here we are, four days into the new year: 2024. New years bring new hopes and positivity and of course, the promise of new music. Of all the new albums that are hotly anticipated, the long awaited return of Glasgow, Scotland’s Camera Obscura is one of those that will be the most welcome in my books. They had originally hinted at a full return back in 2019, after a hiatus that began with the death of their long-time keyboardist, Carey Lander, in 2015, but then the pandemic pushed things back a few years.

So it’s almost too perfect that this song should come up in my Best tunes of 2003 list, given that Camera Obscura’s sophomore record, “Underachievers please try harder”, was my introduction to band and still one of my favourites of their works. I had picked this one up after reading comparisons to and affiliations with Belle & Sebastian, another Scottish group with whom I was already a fan. And I found myself really digging the twee-heavy indie pop, especially of those sung by Tracyanne Campbell, who would eventually take over all vocal duties with the departure of founding member John Henderson after this album.

“Suspended from class” is the opening number on said album and a perfect mood-setter. It’s a jangly and peppy piece of sunshine pop but if you listen closer and on repeat listens, you’ll realize that there’s a lot more going on here than meets the eye.

“I should be suspended from class
I don’t know my elbow from my arse”

This couplet is more than just a cheeky turn of phrase. It is a play upon words and hearkens back to a time when being “suspended” was the worst thing possible that we could think of to happen to us. It is the punishment for stepping out of line, for doing something that doesn’t follow the heavily regimented rules of the educational system. And here, it is a metaphorical kick in the pants for crossing the friend zone boundary, for taking a chance at something more, and being shrunk back down to size when those feelings go unreciprocated. The morning after, that eternal and timeless moment when regrets are enlarged to colossal catastrophes, tear-soaked pillows and mascara smears are all spelled out in Campbell’s delicate vocals and are felt in each tug on the guitar strings and accentuated by horn flourishes.

This is the kind of thing we’ve been missing for these last eight years. Such great storytelling and musicianship.

For the rest of the Best tunes of 2003 list, click here.

Categories
Playlists

Playlist: In the summertime

Earlier this year, I had this brilliant idea to make a series of seasonal-themed playlists and post each on these pages on the first day of Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter. The idea was inspired by my friend Andrew Rodriguez, who has posited in the past that there are certain songs and albums that just scream out a particular season to him. I think there’s something to his idea and wanted to shared the love and expand upon it.

My playlist for Spring, the aptly titled “The first day of spring”, went off without a hitch. It was predictably full of the hope and pent-up excitement that the season brings and I posted it right on time. Of course, and incidentally, my summer playlist wasn’t as punctual. I had it made in time for the turning of the season on the calendar date but perhaps something in me felt that the time wasn’t quite right. Indeed, if you listen to these twenty-five tracks, it just screams out from the depths and the heights of mid-summer, wavering between the hazy and languid, and the all out beach and patio party.

Yes, I know August is more than half over and the kids are heading back to school soon but that doesn’t mean we have to let the summer end. As long as the sun beats down on us and the patios remain open, we can stretch this thing out and enjoy it to the fullest. So I suggest we put this playlist on repeat, turn it up, and get ready to “Lay back in the sun” and hit as many “Happy hour”s as we can.

Other highlights on this mix include:

    • “In the summertime”, the title track and opening number sets the tone with love
    • Camera Obscura’s “Lloyd, I’m ready to be heartbroken” isn’t necessarily linked to the season lyrically but it definitely has the feel that we wished all summers had
    • “Island in the sun” is Weezer as The Beach Boys and resulted in one of their biggest ever hits
    • I remember first hearing Smash Mouth’s retro fling, “Walkin’ on the sun” in the summer of 1997, falling for it, and then, falling all over myself trying to find their album in the stores
    • Black Box Recorder’s lovely cover of the wistful “Seasons in the sun”, a song originally made famous by Canadian Terry Jacks

For those who don’t use Spotify or if the embedded playlist below doesn’t work for you, here is the entire playlist (complete with YouTube links) as I’ve created it:

1. The Rural Alberta Advantage “In the summertime”
2. The Housemartins “Happy hour”
3. Primal Scream “Higher than the sun”
4. Young Galaxy “New summer”
5. Doves “Catch the sun”
6. Camera Obscura “Lloyd, I’m ready to be heartbroken”
7. Galaxy 500 “Fourth of July”
8. The Airborne Toxic Event “The girls in their summer dresses”
9. Weezer “Island in the sun”
10. Pink Mountaintops “The second summer of love”
11. Violent Femmes “Blister in the sun”
12. The Polyphonic Spree “Light & day / Reach for the sun”
13. The Pogues “Summer in Siam”
14. Spiritualized “Lay back in the sun”
15. The Sundays “Summertime”
16. Rachel Goswell “Warm summer sun”
17. Munroe “Summer”
18. Belle and Sebastian “Another sunny day”
19. Shannon Lay “August”
20. Vampire Weekend “Cape Cod kwassa Bkwassa”
21. Smash Mouth “Walkin’ on the sun”
22. Dodgy “Staying out for the summer”
23. Black Box Recorder “Seasons in the sun”
24. The Jezabels “Endless summer”
25. The Decemberists “Anti-summersong”

And as I’ve said before, I’ll say again: Wherever you are in the world, I hope you are safe and continue to be well. Until next time, enjoy the tunes.

For those of you who are on Spotify, feel free to look me up. My user name is “jprobichaud911”.