Echo and the Bunnymen- Ocean Rain

DSCN1155This was $5.00 .  I knew this album already but thought it was a great chance to post something modern that people would like as well as lighten the critical listening load for myself. If by chance, you are unfamiliar with this record, the album cover is pretty beat.  It was not designed that way.DSCN1156

Echo’s Webpage

This album, released in 1984,  was the band’s fourth. Many consider it to be the band’s landmark release.  So I was surprised to see the number of mixed reviews it got upon its release. For example, Rolling Stone described the album as “too often a monochromatic dirge of banal existential imagery cloaked around the mere skeleton of a musical idea”. Man, I thought I used too many words.  Anyway, 120 Minutes did not feel the same way, giving “The Killing Moon” video a good amount of play.   “Silver” and “Seven Seas” also were big hits for the band.  This album was a commercial success despite mixed reviews. In 2008, the band would play a series of concerts, performing the album in whole with a 16 piece orchestra.

It is Saturday.  I am not going too much further into this.  Here is “The Killing Moon” .  Easy way out?  Maybe but if you don’t like it, I have a Mitch Miller album I could have put in its place. So there.

Wire- Play Pop

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I bought this record for $5 back around the mid 90’s. I thought I bought this in Canada, but there is a Sound Exchange price tag on this. It would seem I would remember if I got this from Sound Exchange, which I don’t but price tag don’t lie. So, if I seem distant in this post, it is because I am going thru a mini-existential crisis. I bought it because it is Wire. I went back to purchases from the 90’s to find something slightly more contemporary for Monday to post without compromising my journalistic standards.

Wire influenced everybody. They are covered by many ( fIREHOSE covered “Mannequin” and Minor Threat covered “1-2-X-U”for example, both on this album). Imitated by many more. You remember Elastica in 1995? I always thought their “Connection” blatantly ripped off “Three Girl Rhumba”. Turns out Wire thought the same as they as they received an out of court settlement.

 

In the 80’s, they went electronic, and not in a good way, at least not in my opinion. It should be noted that during this time, when they refused to play their older songs, they booked a Wire cover band to open for them to perform this task.

http://pinkflag.com/

Apparently, three of the original members still tour and will be in the US this summer, but not Texas. I do not know what part of their catalog they are playing. They also have their 13th studio album due out today.DSCN0981

This is a collection of some of their better known early singles. I chose “Outdoor Miner” as the sample this week. As this is the single version, I like the piano break in the middle, which I believe is not on the album version , 154. I thought this was posted recently on another music blog but I cannot find it. I apologize for jumping that train, if I did.

This has been a high rated record for me and I play it all the time despite being just a collection of seven singles. And one more thing….. You’re Welcome!