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Vinyl

Vinyl love: Coldplay “Parachutes”

(Vinyl Love is a series of posts that quite simply lists, describes, and displays the pieces in my growing vinyl collection. You can bet that each record was given a spin during the drafting of each corresponding post.)

Artist: Coldplay
Album Title: Parachutes
Year released: 2000
Year reissued: 2020
Details: 20th anniversary, reissue, 180 gram, yellow translucent

The skinny: I’ve already written on these pages about how excited I became when I first heard the single “Yellow”. Given how big that song became and how much commercial radio overplayed it, you’d think (and normally I would’ve thought the same) that I might have gotten sick of the tune by now but somehow this never happened. Indeed, “Yellow” is still my favourite single tune from the year 2000. And the rest of “Parachutes” is hardly a slouch. I bought the album on CD on the back of the aforementioned single and quickly fell for the other nine tracks. And none of this admiration has faded at all despite repeat listens for over two decades*. So when a 20th anniversary reissue of the album on (of course, yellow) 180 gram vinyl was announced last year, I did not hesitate to pull the pre-order trigger. It arrived months later, looking and sounding just as sweet.

Standout track: “Yellow”

*I’ve got the album ranked as number four on my favourites for the year in a series that I am still in the process of working out.

Categories
Vinyl

Vinyl love: Suede “Coming up”

(Vinyl Love is a series of posts that quite simply lists, describes, and displays the pieces in my growing vinyl collection. You can bet that each record was given a spin during the drafting of each corresponding post.)

Artist: Suede
Album Title: Coming up
Year released: 1996
Year reissued: 2016
Details: Gatefold sleeve, Limited edition, 20th anniversary, 180 gram, Double LP, translucent yellow vinyl, numbered 324/1000

The skinny: Suede and their lead guitarist Bernard Butler parted ways in acrimony before the recording of their sophomore album, “Dog man star”, was completed. The band soldiered on, however, and had a new lineup and new sound for their third album, “Coming up”. The guitars were still present without Butler but they were just another layer of support for Brett Anderson’s vocals and lecherous lyrics. The album as a whole was glam-infused and club-worthy, and in the end, is now considered a britpop classic. This 20th anniversary reissue was the template upon which the 25th anniversary edition of the self-titled debut was based: coloured vinyl double LP, the second disc featuring the era’s B-sides.

Standout track: “Beautiful ones”