I really do fear music

[AlohaDawg]

Like that old guy that shakes his cane at you and tells you to get off his lawn.

I have a crippling inability to find, discover, hear and love new music. I don't know why this is. I read the Fear of Music thread with some interest because Its fun to be a fly on the wall while you all discuss the latest raw beats, and then I say to myself "I should try some of this" and then I find myself at tower records still filling in my Cd case with U2. Hardly edgy.

John Allison is filling this week with a top 20 albiums of 2005 reviewed by Shelley Winters of Scary Go Round. it's funny writing but I have no idea if these are even real bands (with the excepton of Aimee Mann). That's the link from Monday, click forward to vew the rest of the week.

Comments on the comments solicited. Heard of any these? Heard any of these?

[misterqueue]

Quick glance.

The Decemberists are dog-damned amazing and wonderful.   Mind you I lived in Portland OR for some time, so it may be flavouring my statement a bit there but Picaresque is good... good good. 

Sigur Ros is also highly suggested.  Caribou is okay.. I wasn't crazy crazy about it.

Ben Folds bores me.

Um... that's just my .02 quick review (in rhyme because I am at work and only had a minute to glance over that list)

[jough]

I'm pretty sure they're all real albums.

I've heard of most of them, but have only heard a few of the albums.  I've been meaning to check out Sigur Ros and The Decemberists, so maybe now I will.

The new Ben Folds album is really good.  Not as good as the Ben Folds Five stuff, but better than his first solo album, or Fear of Pop, etc.

The new Aimee Mann album sounds like someone of lesser talents trying to write an Aimee Mann album.  I'm not going to say it's her worst album (that was two albums ago) but it's down there.

[V-Adore]

I've heard of a lot of those but have heard relatively few. I haven't gotten Songs for Silverman yet, but Ben Folds is reasonably fairly represented by the "extremely skilled bus driver" analogy, except that he really is very, very good. If you enjoy conventional piano-based rock, you might well like him, and his work with Ben Folds Five was consistently fantastic.

The only other two albums on this list I've actually experienced are Stars' Set Yourself On Fire and Sufjan Stevens's Illinois(e). Stars is very much in the "technically adept, soft, twinkly music about melancholy" indie-rock genre, so if you like that sort of thing, you'll like them. Sufjan... well, I would advise that you seek out some MP3s first. I find him an extremely interesting artist, but his stuff is quite strange.

[CortJstr]

That Architecture in Helsinki album is really fun and upbeat. It's one of those things that you can't not be happy listening to. Wishbone and It'5! in particular stand out.

CYHSY is okay. I think they're mainly popular because Pitchfork said so. Last I checked they had a couple free mp3's on their site.

Spoon I like on the whole but some of their songs just aren't my style. I like almost all of Gimme Fiction though and I think it's a good album to start on. The track I Turn My Camara On has been getting a decent amount of play so you may have heard it already.

[wombat]

I have the same problem as AD.  At one point I tried to find some of the stuff people had talked about on this board on-line but the thing is, even if you can find a whole song instead of a sample, it's so hard to know.  I think you mostly don't begin to like music until it's a little familiar.  The reason radio was good was that you hear something in the background a few times and then at some point you begin to notice that you like it.  But nowadays it seems that radio pretty much sucks.

I can only think of one time in my life where I heard a song I'd never heard before, and I had to run to someone and ask what it was so I could go right out and buy the album.  So what are the chances that I'll hear a song once on-line and decide I like the band?  But if the song doesn't grab me once, why listen again?  I can't figure out a way out of the dilemma.  What do You Kids Today do, anyway?

[misterqueue]

As far as "Kids Today" goes it's a vicious circle.  Radio started sucking and thus people were driven online to download and "try things out" and so radio started sucking more.

I think eventually a lot of it is driven nowadays by downloading, testing out a couple songs and (Maybe in some instances) buying the album to support the artist.

However, I do have one really good station here in town that's completely public and runs an "Underground" show that's good.  I listen in the car on the way home from work sometimes and take mental notes of the songs I liked and check those out.  Other than that it's pretty much Osmosis.

There are however sites out there like this.  The downside is you have to know of one you like first and the results are sort of limited.  For example, I put in "Pinback" let's say and I get Neutral Milk Hotel, Grandaddy, Decemberists, The Postal Service, etc as results; which, though are also all bands I like are not nearly the full spectrum of what I enjoy.

So... I hope I've confused you more or rambled completely uselessly.   In conclusion, I am clearly no help at all!

[V-Adore]

But if the song doesn't grab me once, why listen again?  I can't figure out a way out of the dilemma.  What do You Kids Today do, anyway?

Here's my technique in a nutshell:

1) Find an MP3. This could be from an MP3 blog, a friend who likes to post music... anywhere I can get a freely-playable song. (Mixtapes are also good; I know it was the Acheboard mixes that first got me interested in the New Pornographers.)

2) Listen to it a while. You may need to give it a few spins before you really get a feeling for it.

3) If you like it, investigate! That's what the Internet is for. Read the press on the band online, and if you can find more MP3s, do it. Maybe read the Pitchfork review, but only if you don't take it too seriously.

4) Once you've listened to a few different songs and like them well enough, and you've checked out the band's press, treat yourself to a CD.

[Hobot]

I've listened to a bit of Architecture in Helsinki, and it's too loud and intrusive for my taste (I'm an Ambient Slut). 

Sigur Rós is truly excellent, but I haven't listened to much of "Takk".  My favourite album of theirs is "( )". 

I cannot say enough good things about The Decemberists.  Colin Meloy (lead singer) was a creative writing major in college, and it shows.  The lyrics are witty and leave you longing for the days of yore, when real men harpooned whales to make ends meet.

I got the same impression from Clap Your Hands Say Yeah that I got from Architecture in Helsinki -- too directionless, too noisy.

Stars make some of the best indie pop out there, and "Set Yourself on Fire" is the pinnacle of their musical achievements.

Sufjan Stevens creates very enjoyable soft and pretty music.  "To Be Alone with You" is a great song.

Broken Social Scene is hell of awesome.  I haven't had the chance to listen to their self-titled release, but both "You Forget It in People" and "Feel Good Lost" are incredible.  If you haven't heard the song "Anthems for a Seventeen Year-Old Girl," you should remedy that post haste.

And here are a few of my recommendations:
1.) Mogwai (Favourite band of Jeph Jacques of http://www.questionablecontent.net.)
2.) Denali (A band from my hometown of Richmond, VA that broke up some time ago, Denali nevertheless continues to be my third-favourite band of all time.)
3.) Boards of Canada (Creepy electronic noises from remote Scotland.)
4.) Forget Cassettes (They broke up for a while, but they're back in the studio!)
5.) Hammock (Good luck finding their music, very few people have heard of them.)
6.) Iron & Wine (Don't let Sam Beam's cover of that song by The Postal Service fool you, he's a powerful musician of his own right.)
7.) Múm (From Iceland, like Sigur Rós.)
8.) Portishead
9.) Neutral Milk Hotel (An acquired taste, but very good.)
10.) The Album Leaf
11.) The Arcade Fire
12.) RJD2 (Is it hip-hop? Is it rap? Even if it is, it must be good for an indie kid like me to so thoroughly enjoy it!)

If anyone is interested in obtaining music by any of the above-mentioned artists (including those listed by John Allison), feel free to IM me, and I'll send 'em your way.

[JorgeFabregas]

In regards to radio sucking, there are plenty of good radio stations that one can access online such as KCRW (especially morning becomes eclectic) http://www.kcrwmusic.com/, KEXP http://www.kexp.org, and WOXY http://www.woxy.com/

[wombat]

Here's my technique in a nutshell:

This sounds so much like work.  Where do I find the time, when I'm so busy, um, posting on an internet messageboard about a comic, and stuff?

I tried some online radio stations a while back but maybe they were just the wrong ones.  I'll try again.

Or maybe I am too old and it's hopeless and there's nothing I can do but wait for the next Bruce Springsteen record...

[miles]

I guess I make little effort to find new music.  If I hear or read about something that seems interesting, I'll go download it or listen to a sample.  If I like it enough, I'll eventually buy it.  There are relatively few artists that I'll follow throughout a large portion of their career, and I tend to get obsessed with a handful of them (like Built to Spill, Bob Dylan, or Low), and that takes a lot of my time and money, so little is left to devote to finding newer artists.  My top 10 favorite record list this year is only three or four records long (or so), and I think there is only one record that I discovered from a band or artist that I didn't previously know very well:  Twin Cinema by The New Pornographers.

[JorgeFabregas]

Here's another idea that might work, though I can't say with any certainty. Go to a site like pandora.com, put in some of your favorite artists, and see what it comes up with.

Also, you could post some of your favorite artists here and people could make recommendations based on said artists.

[V-Adore]

This sounds so much like work.  Where do I find the time, when I'm so busy, um, posting on an internet messageboard about a comic, and stuff?

I think the secret, as pretentious as this is going to sound, is reading the right blogs. If you read blogs already that tend to post MP3s and such, that's a natural starting-off point...

[miles]

On that list the only album I've listened to entirely is "Anniemal" by Annie.  I like it, but I thought it came out last year?  Oh wait, I did listen to the Hold Steady album.  It's OK.  On the first listen I was really into it, but lost interest on subsequent listens, and have no interest in it at all now.  I've heard parts of the Stars record, and I think it's boring, parts of the Sufjan Stevens album, and like V, think it's interesting and strange, and quite good, and haven't heard the new Broken Social Scene record at all, but I really liked their last album.

My favorite album that was released this year was "Superwolf" by Bonnie 'Prince' Billy and Matt Sweeney.