Music in Review

I can't help it. I soak up music like a sponge. I'm still not sure what it is, but even time spent with friends is often filled with the exchange of music, both new and old, that we find particularly good or interesting.

In that vein I've been exposed to a few things I'd like to share with you.

• Sufjan Stevens Invites You to Come On Feel The Illinoise by Sufjan Stevens: Much has been made of Sufjan's religous beliefs (he's christian). I just want to point out that if you decide not to listen to this album because you heard he was christian your doing youself a huge disfavor. Conversely, if you go buy this album because you heard he was christian you'll probably be disappointed. This is not Micheal W. Smith or Carmen. His musical content more closely follows Sunny Day Real Estate in that regard. In other words, while his christianity definitely filters into his music, his music is not christian in the typical sense. But on too the music. One thing is for sure, Sufjan spends serious time constructing his music. The layers and complexity are immediately evident and follow through the length of the album. At a meaty length of 75 minutes, it can be a bit hard to take it all in at once, but the rewards are great. His voice I would put in the same musical category as Elliott Smith, Nick Drake, or Mr. Oberst from Bright Eyes. Musically, in some ways he would again fall into this category, however he also breaks out into his own unique folk-pop mixture of joy and sadness. Lyrically the songs are intelligent and intriging. My only complaint is that it can sometimes be hard to hear exactly what he is saying. Finally, if you haven't read any reviews elsewhere I'll add that this is the second album in what is supposedly going to be a 50 album set: one for each state. One last thing. If you decide to buy it the only place in town I could find that carried the album was Independent Records and I think my friend said Borders has it. Either way don't bother with Best Buy or Media Play.
• Jazzmatazz Vol 1. by Guru: Switching from folk-pop to hip-hop we have Jazzmatazz by Guru. This album originally was released in 1993 and is generally considered one of the first to truely meld Jazz and Hip-Hop into one head bopping, mellow yellow, groove-fest. The beats are good, the rhymes are smart, and the jazz doesn't get lost in the mix. Guru brought in some excellent jazz artists to assist with the album. No samples here, and you can hear the benfits on each and every track. It is not without its imperfections, but overall a really good album to relax to but not put you to sleep. Think A Tribe Called Quest, Digable Planets, or early De La Soul and you'll be heading in the right direction.
• La Foret by Xiu Xiu: Saved the best for the last. This album has just blown me away. A word of caution though, this album is not for the faint of heart. If Dave Matthews is your idea of experimental you probably will want to stay or away, or maybe being exposed to something like this is just the thing you need. The album is not one you listen to on your way to work, or something you throw on at the party before you try and impress the girl by eating the whole cake in 25 seconds - no, no my friends, this album is meant to be listened to alone, possibly in the dark, with headphones on and eyes closed. As each song slowly rips into your very being and begins to cascade in waves across your brain, then you will have experienced Xiu Xiu. Jamie Stewart is the vocalist of the band and he tends to alternate between soft, subtle, mumbles and cathartic explosions of emotional therapy. The music itself also tends to toe the line between being soft and understated to a cacophony of musical expression. It's almost as if Xiu Xiu has released the musical pandora's box. Ultimately I could go on for a long while, but words won't do this album justice. You can actually listen to samples here: www.xiuxiu.org although the samples are not high quality and you lose a lot of the texture that makes this album so wonderful.

Well that concludes my musical thoughts for the weekend. One last little sidenote: Is it just me or does the musical buying options in this town just totally suck? It gets really old reading reviews of music I want to check out only to find that no store in this city carries the album. I suppose that's what Amazon is for, but I'd much rather give my business to a local business than the corporate etherworld.