Matilda started disappearing in front of everyone - no-one noticed how translucent she become
Continuing my trip up #album-of-the-day...
20.08.12 : This Years Model - Elvis Costello And The Attractions (1978)
The first one in a while that I've already written about - I didn't mind it, but couldn't see why I'd bother with it above his greatest hits. Nice to see an older album on this list though.
The channel liked this and there were a lot of "I should listen to more Elvis Costello, shouldn't I?" comments.
20.08.13 : Fights And Numbers - Polly Paulusma (2007)
Never heard of her, but she sounds like a medical condition - "Yes doctor, I agree it's the worst case of polipaulusma I've seen in a long time". I was hoping for a female singer-songwriter type because we've not had one of them for a while (if at all?). And yes, that's exactly what we got - it's right up my street. I enjoyed it - I'm not convinced she's quite in the premier league of female singer-songwriters, but it's certainly very listenable. "Godgrudge" and "Where I'm Coming From" jumped out at me as the best tracks. I spent quite some time wondering who she reminded me of, but managed to drag it out of the outer reaches of my brain - she's like a British Waxahatchee (who could also be a medical condition - and a painful one at that, I suspect).
The channel didn't exactly go overboard for it - just the one thumbs up and a "not my usual thing, but I like it" comment. Wikipedia doesn't have an entry for the album, but does have an entry for her and I was most entertained to see that her first two albums were called Scissors In My Pocket and Cosmic Rosy Spine Kites - which, as any fool knows, are anagrams, so I'll obviously have to check them out.
"Customers also listened to" "no similar recommendations" - which is a shame. It doesn't feel like it would have been impossible to list some other lesser known female singer-songwriters - I liked this and will attempt to remember to investigate some of her other stuff.
20.08.14 : And The Anonymous Nobody - De La Soul (2016)
I like Three Feet High And Rising, but didn't go such great guns for their somewhat less jolly follow up so was interested to see where this lay on their musical spectrum. And it's somewhere else again - it's just kinda mellow really which was OK, but it didn't feel like they'd tried too hard for a lot of it. I didn't mind it, but think it unlikely I'll be rushing back to it.
The channel had a couple of thumbs up, but exactly zero comments on the album. The nominator mentions that he would have gone for Three Feet High And Rising, but it's not available online due to licensing issues - but that's not strictly the case. It was originally the case, but (allegedly) the samples have now been cleared but the catalogue owners want 90% of the revenue from streaming, so De La Soul have told them where to stick it. And the drama rumbles on...
Wikipedia has a few facts of interest about the album - it was crowdfunded, raising the $110k in less than 10 hours which suggests there's a great deal of affection for them out there. It was well received both critically and commercially (#12 in the US, #16 in the UK). And it features a lot of guest artists - "The album has guest features from 2 Chainz, Damon Albarn, David Byrne, Estelle, Little Dragon, Snoop Dogg, Jill Scott, Justin Hawkins, Pete Rock, and Roc Marciano". I did find myself thinking one track sounded very Talking Heads and now I guess I understand why...
"Customers also listened to" A Tribe Called Quest, Arrested Development and Pharcyde - no surprises there. I thought this was quite an interesting listen but it's not a classic like TFHAR, I'm afraid.
Female singer-songwriters are right up my street, so Polly was in with a strong shout here before we started - and whilst I like the general output of the other two artists, they didn't really put up much of a fight for me with these efforts, so she waltzes off with the round.
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