Albums for Eternity with Bottle, the Curmudgeon

Speaking of New Wave, I just listened to the penultimate J. Geils Band album, Feeze Frame, and it is awesome. You know the title track and Centerfold, but i highly doubt you know the album closer, Piss On The Wall.  It's not even really reviewable, to be honest, it's Freeze Frame, couple songs, Centerfold, couple more songs, and Piss On The Wall. I guess i could rehash what Post-Punk/New Wave New Wave was all about (actual dance club Rock & Roll with quirkily expensive synth leads), but you know The Cars and The Motels and Talking Heads. Believe it or not, the Ramones were considered New Wave rather than Punk in the beginning. Now we'd call them Pop Punk, but the point is that Rock in the late 70s existed on a spectrum from Corporate Cock to Nerdly Neurotic Pocket Protector, and in 1980/81 J. Geils Band said hold my beer, I gotta take a leak, how's this for "radio-friendly, twitchy nerd Rock with huge sing-along choruses?" Freakin' awesome, dude, freak

I'm told Secret Treaties by Blue Öyster Cult is one of the best proto-metal albums of all time, but my ears are like "whaaaa?" Agree or not, this is Punk. Original, old-school, impossible to differentiate from New Wave, undeniably evolved from Psych/Garage Rock Punk, with a splash of Glam. This has way more in common with The Tube's or Boomtown Rats or New York Dolls or the Stooges than Uriah Heep or Black Sabbath or Deep Purple. If you wanted to call Steppenwolf or Iron Butterfly Proto Heavy Metal i wouldn't bat an eyelash, but not this. I'm batting all of them with my "do critics even listen to albums before deciding what to write about them" face. I will give you the fact that it's a stellar album that delves into the darker side of human mundanity, but not really in a metal way. For starters, it's too intentionally weird. Less horror and evil, more really bad acid trip. No monsters or psychopaths or demons, just standard people suck stuff

Damn, how do you even begin to describe the awesomeness that is Enforcer?  Ok, I guess you start with a Mötley Crüe riff, play it 40bmp faster, then add some Iron Maiden style dueling leads, and have King Diamond sing a Judas Priest song on top of it. Yeah, just the best parts of Speed, Thrash, Glam, and NWOBHM all at the same time like you're actively trying to have a heart attack by the end of the album. Death By Fire, go check it out and rush over to bottlesmusic to buy my copy before someone else does.

She didn't intend to, but my sister Tabby Brown suggested we listen to "the BEST of SAM COOKE" tonight. By all means click here  for my humorous review, if you want. Otherwise, keep reading for the princess bride version. Sam Cooke's "best of" album came out in '62, he recorded A Change Is Gonna Come in '63, and got shot by a hotel night manager in '64. I don't know much biology, and i only took French for reading because i had to in Grad school, but I do know that I love Sam Cooke and A Change Is Gonna Come is one criminally obscure song inspired by Bob Dylan's Blowin' In The Wind. I'd bet money you don't even know the Otis Reading, Seal, or Greta Van Fleet versions. Shame on you, you non mentally ill music afficionado wannabes [eye roll]. Luckily, I'm mentally ill enough for all of us, so play it again, Sam.  Fun fact, if you zoom way in on the photo, you might just be able to see my dad made sure to let everyone know th

Where did we leave off? Oh, right, the narrator (who we've chosen to think is a fictional version of lead singer Brandon) was telling us about the aftermath of a fight he had with Jenny. Then I got tired and put him on the backburner like he specifically asked me not to do. Sorry. We'll listen to side b next, but notice that side a is essentially a self-contained cycle, where the conversation in the first song can logically follow the "help me out" of the last song. Instead, we physically flip the album over and meet Andy. 6) Is Andy a new 4th character, or are we (the 3rd character Brandon was already talking to) Andy? Well, we know that Andy is a high school athlete, and the narrator feels like they are the only one who truly loves him, but beyond that everything is up for interpretation. There is no indication that this is the same narrator, but also no indication that we aren't Andy. Logically, then, we should assume that this is all still the same conversatio

Target splurged on some anniversary editions, huh? Ok, eventually I'll get real pretentious and a/b the 55th anniversary remix of the posthumous Beatles album Abbey Road with my original, but tonight I just want to enjoy the debut album Hot Fuss by The Killers. The Killers of course have the distinction of hands down lifetime winner of best Christmas album, building a complete concept album about Santa trying to kill Brandon one holiday single/video per year, but who doesn't like Mr. Brightside? No lyric sheet, but you can easily understand all the words, so that doesn't really matter. What does matter are those quacking bass lines and synth leads. Fabulous. Fun fact, the album actually contains multiple demo recordings because they literally scrapped every song they were working on except Mr. Brightside after hearing Is This It by The Strokes. I already told you how that album completely changed the world of Alternative Rock, and this album is literal proof. I'd actual