Tag: Alternative Rock

Categories
Albums

Best albums of 2025: Honourable mentions

I know most people are not a fan of Mondays, given that it’s the start of a new work week and all that that entails, but I like the idea of new starts and all of the potential they bring. And what better day than a Monday to start a new series… and one that celebrates another year of great music at that.

Yes, indeed, it is that time again.

And though I’m not one to want to wish the days away, I gotta say I won’t be sad to kiss 2025 goodbye. It’s been, for the most part, an uneventful year, but also one that I won’t ever forget. I’ve spent the lion’s share of it in recovery mode. Health concerns that I don’t really want to get too deep into here but ones that, at many times this year, have had me worried that I’d never fully recover from. I am only now just returning to work after a long period away and that in itself is its own challenge.

All this to say, there were but a few bright spots to point out from 2025. I can include all the precious time I was able to spend with my lovely wife as one, of course, and all the quality time whiled away listening to great music as another. Yes, I devoted as much time as I could spinning records and exploring new music and old favourites on the streaming sites on the old Internet. The pure joy of music was almost as much a part of my recovery as the balance of rest and calm and fresh air.

So, yeah, by my quick glance at the calendar, I see we’ve got just over five weeks left of 2025 and my plan is to share, interspersed with my regular blog programming, some of my favourite albums that the year has offered. I’m starting today with some honourable mentions, albums that didn’t quite crack my top ten but that are definitely worth your time, and I’ll be back soon with a start to the countdown of my ten faves. Enjoy.

bdrmm “Microtonic”:  Hull, England based outfit imbues electronic dreams into their shoegaze arsenal for their third outing with brilliant results.
Check out: “John on the ceiling”

Ezra Furman “Goodbye small head”:  Always raw and immediate, the American singer/songwriter’s 10th album is filled with personal tales that at the same time feel quite universal.
Check out: “Grand mal”

Just Mustard “We were just here”:  The Irish quintet’s third album smacks equal parts of the haunting goth of Cranes and the noisy experimentation of Sonic Youth.
Check out: “We were just here”

Amy Millan “I went to find you”:  The Stars’ co-frontwoman’s* third solo album moves away from the folk/country of her first two releases and into an indie pop sound that feels like a warm comforter on a cold Canadian winter morning.
Check out: “The overpass”

Pale Blue Eyes “New place”: More beautiful and danceable dream pop ecstasy from the trio originally from Sheffield, songs that feel blissfully eternal.
Check out: “Scrolling”

Sloan “Based on the best seller”: The Canadian alt-rock icons doing what they do best on their fourteenth studio LP – just keeping on keeping on bringing the rock.
Check out: “Dream destroyer”

The Veils “Asphodels”: The latest by Finn Andrews’ musical vehicle is typically dramatic and epic, and worthy of another David Lynch soundtrack.
Check out: “The ladder”

*Whose last name I learned this year that I’ve been mispronouncing for two decades.

I’ll be back very soon with albums #10 through #6 for my Best albums of 2025 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 1994: #25 Frank Black “Headache”

<< #26   |   #24 >>

Back in the early 90s, Toronto alternative radio station CFNY collaborated with music retailer extraordinaire HMV on a series of alternative music compilations. Fittingly titled “Free at last”, the radio station would hand them out as promotional items at events and the store would give them out free with purchases of music by at least one of the artists appearing on the compilation. There were five of them made (that I know of) from 1991 to 1995 and I’m pretty sure they were available both on cassette tape and compact disc, though the art work differed between the two.

I must have had friends that had a few of the volumes because I still have a couple of copies dubbed to cassette packed away in the basement. I also have stowed with them a legit one that I got myself from HMV: Volume 4, from 1994. Looking at the track listing, I figure I probably got a copy with Lush’s second album “Split”. Other artists that appeared on this volume included The Breeders, The Charlatans, Meat Puppets, The Tindersticks, and yes, you guessed it, Frank Black. The very track of focus today, the only single off his sophomore solo long player.

I had only just gotten into his band, the Pixies, a year or two before they announced their break up in 1993 and almost immediately, the frontman* appeared with his debut solo album. In truth, Black had been working on solo material for some time, recording some covers for a planned album as early as during the sessions for Pixies 1991 long player, “Trompe le monde”. The eventual self-titled debut only ended up with one cover on it** when it came out but had a banger of a single on it called “Los Angeles”, whose video I recorded one night from CityLimits and watched and rewatched and rewatched. The sophomore release, “Teenager of the year”, appeared the following year, including twenty two tracks, mostly of typical Pixie length, in and around the two to two and a half minute mark. I never really got into that album as a whole but man, did I love “Headache”, and this was mostly due to the compilation I spoke about above.

“This wrinkle in time, I can’t give it no credit
I thought about my space and I really got me down
Got me so down, I got me a headache
My heart is crammed in my cranium and it still knows how to pound”

Economical as ever, Black packs it all into three minutes. There’s no running start here, going from zero to a hundred, right from the get-go. Crashing drums and slacker guitars, feeling so free and loose. But it’s Black’s vocals and melody that are the star. There ain’t no time to sit and ponder one’s place in the universe and in history. You just gotta go for it. Live it and sing along with Frank. Back him up, screaming all the way. You’ll never be sorry.

*Adjusting his assumed moniker slightly from Black Francis to Frank Black.

**Which I loved.

For the rest of the Best tunes of 1994 list, click here.

Categories
Vinyl

Vinyl love: Concrete Blonde “Bloodletting”

(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: Concrete Blonde
Album Title: Bloodletting
Year released: 1990
Year reissued: 2017
Details: standard black

The skinny: Well, it’s All Hallow’s Eve again and though it’s been years since I’ve celebrated it in any traditional sense and double that since I dressed up in costume as the holiday warrants, I know it’s an important one to many people and I do try to observe it every year in my own way. This year, as I often do, I’ll spin some gothic rock tunes, perhaps some Sisters, some Joy Division, or this album by Concrete Blonde. “Bloodletting” took the alt rock trio from California into gothic rock territory, their frontwoman Johnette Napolitano having been reportedly inspired by Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles novels, and scoring the group their best-selling album* in the process. I purchased this bare bones reissue when I saw it come up for sale on Amazon back in 2017 because it’s one of those albums** that I knew I needed in my collection, a total mood record that is playable front to back and to front again. And every time I do spin it, I get the urge to light some black candles and crack a bottle of full bodied red wine. Happy Hallowe’en everybody!

Standout track: “Tomorrow Wendy”

*This mostly on the back of their huge radio-friendly hit “Joey“.

**It ranked number six on my best albums of 1990 list when I counted it down earlier this year.