So, at the ripe old age of forty fucking four, I had a hip replacement. Two days into being a cyborg, I can tell you two things:
– Modern hip replacement surgeries are medical marvels. It took the doc less than two hours to shut me down, use a BONE SAW, slap some titanium in me, sew me up, and reboot my system. Two hours after that, I fucking WALKED OUT of the surgery center. Surreal.
– I am a painkiller lightweight. Apparently the medical term is “medication-naive” or “drug-naive,” which is a badass band name. I discovered these are the fancy terms for “absolute lightweight. “We might have given him too much” was mentioned when I had been given two oxys and eating my first meal have looked like David Hasslehoff eating a burger.
What a mess. I have been alternating between Tramadol and Oxycontin since the doctor ripped out my chunk o’ femur and jammed a titanium spike in my femur (BR00TAL) and WHOO BOYYYY. I am VERY MUCH drug-naive.
So, now I am drugged up and homebound, with my doctor saying that “sick tricks” with my walker and “drag races” with the grocery store electric carts are strictly off-limits. So, alas, let’s review some albums instead. I’m sure this can only go well.
Aesop Rock
I Heard It’s a Mess There Too
Rhymesayers Entertainment
9/10
This dude’s so fucking rad. Do I understand 40% of what he’s talking about? Not a chance. But do I believe every word? Absolutely. He says everything with such conviction and such an expansive lexicon that you have no choice. He’ll say some shit like:
Jalapeño halos spin — green fire on the rim,
Static from the corn-chip choir starts to hymn.
I’m soldering the cosmos with a queso-born oath,
Stargazing through the lattice where the corn ghosts loathe.
And I’ll be like, “That’s the most poetic nachos recipe I have ever heard.”
Is it more of the same ol’ Aesop? Yes and no. His cadence and wordplay remain top-notch, beats funky as fuck, but somehow this sounds like nothing I’ve ever heard and I’ve listened to it no less than 20 times. That’s what’s up.
The Blasting Company
The Crooked Moon: Hungry Woods
Avantris Entertainment
8/10
From the downtuned, off-key geniuses behind the soundtrack to Over the Garden Wall comes The Crooked Moon: Hungry Woods. These folks are undeniably talented. That’s a rock fact.
Sultry jazz trumpets, slinking basslines, and staccato plucks of detuned strings give you the same eerie vibes, but upscaled. More murder mystery than foreboding fantasy danger. More Gomez and Morticia than the rest of the Addams clan.
Overall, it’s a great album to listen to if you like to listen to clever arrangements, unexpected instrumentations, ostentatious organ usage, and angelic choruses. You can feel the scene setting throughout. Like, Drained of Fear gives strong “Batman at a church” vibes while A Place to Unwind is far more a scene at the local western bar before the bandits show up to scare off the townsfolk.
But, on a cocktail of prescription drugs that make me drowsy as hell, I can NOT listen to this for too long. I started FREAKING OUT. What the hell, guys?
City and Colour
Sometimes Lullaby
Dine Alone
8/10
I have listened to this on repeat while sleeping. Did I dream about the absolute weirdest shit two nights ago? Yea, but I also just had a chonk o’ bone cut out and, as the nurse that I don’t remember said, “probably had too much Oxy.” Do I remember her? Nope. I probably had too much Oxy.
Do I remember waking up to these weird xylophone/synth pad versions of City and Colour’s 2005 album and thinking, “man, this is great?” Hell yea. It reminds me of OG The Album Leaf, but more introspective, more personal. I am reminded of the emotions Dalla Green shared on “Sometimes,” but the lullaby version is somehow more hopeful.
The cadences and chords glow with a renewed optimism that I am able to share with my own kid.
The Mountain Goats
Through This Fire Across from Peter Balkan
Thirty Tigers
6/10
Look, I love The Mountain Goats, but I listened to the album twice while doing my dumb little physical therapy moves (I look like a baby giraffe learning to walk), and I am just not interested in it. It’s a concept album, but I don’t know why. Maybe I just don’t get it, and that’s fine. Maybe the last dose of Tramadol kicked in and I’m more zonked than I thought. This is a serious possibility. It’s fine, sounds good, but it gets a blinky-eyed shrug from me.
Apparat
A Slow Collision
Mute Records
6/10
Shit’s freaking me out. It’s frantic and making me tighten my jaw. The synths are going bonkers, the melodies are too bleepy and bloopy, and the vocals seem like a surreal siren song, like they are yearning for me to disappear into my headphones. OK, maybe the opiates HAVE hit. It’s good, but this isn’t casual listening. This is for the REAL music nerds to try to decipher. I’m gonna have heart palpitations if I listen to this anymore. WTF. THERE’S LASER SOUNDS NOW? I’m out.
Oh. What. Fun.
OST
8/10
Mutant
I missed a good soundtrack comp. I remember playing them a lot when I was a snotty music store clerk at Tower Records. A bunch of loosely genre-related bands that could have easily been a sampler compilation from an indie magazine (do y’all REMEMBER those?).
The Not Another Teen Movie soundtrack was rad (and has a LOOSE tie-in, with Jason Schwartzman playing on the cover of Somebody’s Baby cover and starring in Oh. What. Fun). I also used to blare the Road Rules soundtrack from 2002. Dashboard, AFI, Coheed, Brand New, Jimmy Eat World, and more on a compilation CD? Hell yea.
Anyway, this is a Christmas version of that. St. Vincent, Sharon Von Etten, Fleet Foxes, Jeff Tweedy, and… Gwen Stefani(?) all come together for versions of Christmas songs that don’t suck. This is the shit you can put on while you clean the house, prep a meal, or do what I’m doing: sitting around keeping your leg elevated to reduce the swelling. To each their own and to all a good night or whatever.
Teenage Bottlerocket
Mission to Shred
Pirates Press Records
8/10
Oh, hell yes. I messaged one of the dudes from Nekrogoblikon yesterday that they were the last band that my left femur got to mosh to, but TBR was the first band I was moshing to when realizing something was wrong. 2009, Chain Reaction in Anaheim, rocking out in the pit was all well and good. Coming out of the pit, I remember rubbing my lower back like “Ugh, did someone kick me in the hip? No, jackass, you had a bone spur. Not a “presidential” one, like, a real one. Music therapy is cool as shit.
Yea, so this record, and every other Teenage Bottlerock record fucking slays. Power chords and four on the floors, aside, it rules that they are on Pirates Press Records, a record pressing factory that knows how to press some rad fucking records. I guess now they know how to put out some rad fucking records, too.
While it’s only four songs, it’s so fucking fun. Eleven minutes of dicking around, great for those of us with short attention spans.
Of Mice and Men
Another Miracle
Century Media
8/10
OK, fellas, go off. Racket last reviewed Of Mice and Men in 2011 and “didn’t get it.” Well, I get it now. Shit slaps. Do I know what half the lyrics are? No, but I am on a LOT of meds, so that could easily be a me problem.
The track opens up with A Waltz, a title I didn’t bother looking at until I had the realization that this was in ¾ and thought, “is this a metal waltz?” Looked at the title and laughed to myself. Troubled Water is a bit different, with some late 90’s goth metal vibes. The tracks oscillate between heavy screaming and more croony OG emo tracks. I get why these dudes are still around, but I am less sure of why the me of a decade ago wasn’t vibing with this.
Note to self: don’t try to act out the double bass pedals when you just got a metal bone, you stupid idiot. Anyway, the drums on Flowers sound fucking great.
BRB, putting a shitload of distortion pedals on my Christmas list.
Ov Sulfur
Vast Eternal – EP
Century Media
9/10 if you like metal, 666/10 if you don’t
The second-to-last band my left femur moshed to in it’s entirety. This shit’s so fucking metal. When your creepy, pastel-wearing, Bible-thumping neighbor Trudy is talking about the “demons tempting kids through metal music,” this is 1,000% what she is worried about.
Machine-gun fast blast beats on the title track followed by some good ol’ CHUGGA CHUGGA riffs on Wither, the second track, gives metalheads some variety to play while they try to freak out said Aunt Trudy.
Maaaaaaaaaan, I’m so fucking into this, but so bummed I didn’t get to see Wither live when I saw them in Pittsburgh earlier this year. Cradle of Filth level of symphonic crescendos is phenomenal when you are half-narcoleptic from prescription painkillers.
And another switchup! BR00TAL OVERLOAD! God, what I wouldn’t give to see a Beavis and Butthead segment with any of these songs. I feel like only they would truly convey how much this kicks ass.
Oh, son of a bitch, this is just a tease for a new record? FUUUUUCK. Jan. 15? LET’S GOOOOOO!!!
Smashing Pumpkins
Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness 30th Anniversary Edition
Capitol Records
10/10
This is where I leave you, fine reader. This has been a great experience, but this next step is some much-needed catharsis. I got my dumb legs elevated, my body in a cocoon of fuzzy blankets, and a my eyes already disinterested in looking at what the other is seeing.
Now Pumpkins comes up with a remaster and I have headphones that aren’t covered in disintegrating foam I got for $5 at fucking Radioshack? This is already going to be a new experience, even though I listened to this album nonstop in fucking middle school.
I know this is going to rule, and there’s nothing new to say about such a classic record, so just go read my Smashing Pumpkins show review instead
Edit: I woke up and looked this shit up. $325? Maybe if I didn’t just spend some scratch on a fucking hip replacement. MAYBE. But also, yea, it sounds great.