Albums for Eternity with Bottle, the Curmudgeon

Chapter 5  Styx is an institution. No, not the mythical river (which by the way is only 1 of the 5 rivers of the underworld, the Hatred one, the others being Lethe (Oblivion), Archeron (Woe), Phlegethon (Fire), and Cocytus (Wailing); it's full on functional logistics down there), the Prog-Rock band from Chicago. They opened for Kansas one time and immediately decided they should also try not to generically suck any more. Now, the obvious litmus test (sorry, the Acid House from yesterday hasn't quite worn off yet) of objective fame is having Weird Al parody one of your songs, but only slightly less official while statistically much more significant is Cartman just doing a straight up cover of your commercial breakthrough hit about your boat turning into a spaceship (i knew there was a clairvoyant reason Skip went fishing hiding in here somewhere). I don't think anyone will be surprised that Dennis DeYoung was depressed about how crummy their couple previous albums were selli...

Chapter 4  Last night i think we were all a little surprised by how much Fastball rocked us. Today i have the nagging feeling The KLF was supposed to do that particular job. Did they? Too far back to remember, so instead of redecorating Chriscrosstopher Robbins' apothecary with suitably ominous black curtains, we'll instead go full THX-1138, drop some mandatory mood stabilizers and hang out in The White Room by The KLF. If none of that makes any sense, you can read more about it in my second book, Bottle of Beef: The Media Empore of Doom. Go ahead, we'll wait.  Quick, while they're gone! Technically their last studio album, The White Room also features several of the 9,000 different versions of their most popular tracks, 3 AM Eternal probably being the only one any surface dwellers have ever heard. I know i'm not a huge Acid House aficionado, but i assume this will be a lot like Chemical Brothers, Daftpunk, Orbital, EMF, or any other 90s DJ-tronica outing. Sample he...

Wowzers. Sight C-er wasn't fooling around. This is some serious stuff. No clue where to begin, though, so we'll just let the old subconscious compass guide us.  Where were they going without ever knowing the way?  Welp, that was easy. No curve balls or knucklers or underarms or balked pick-off attempts, Fastball right down the middle.  All The Pain Money Can Buy is their sophomore album from my senior year, and it took only 6 months to go platinum. 3 hit singles and they never saw the mainstream again. They kept putting out albums, though, and they finance it all through Patreon. Kudos to youdos, i like it. Now let's get some actual nostalgia brewing in my brain. I can listen to The Way any time i want because it has a permanent brain cell, but i've never heard the full album. Erlewine says it sounds way better today than it did back then because back then it was just another face in the post-grunge crowd, but now it stands out as extremely well-written Guitar Pop. I sh...

C: Redecorating? Hate what you've done with the place, Bottle.  B: Me casa es su dilapidated shack. How's Garbage Lady?  C: Lovely. Why'd it take you so long to unbury me?  B: Straight to the not pulling punches, huh? Well, i short circuited everything to smithereens, like i'm wont to do. Then i got all mopey, but in the unmopifying process i accidentally lured Skip and Sandra back from their vacations and tried to sell people stuff, and bits and pieces were all falling down around us, so they got mad and stopped talking to me. I just wasn't in the mood to restart all over again, so instead it snowballed and i started answering random questions from the strangest of scantily clad strangers, and now Bridbrad's cranky 'cause i interrupted his porch nap and made him narrate the minion making episode to dig you out. It's all napalm in a netti pot at this point, and i need to be wrangled.  C: K, that all sounds like normal you. How bad we actually talking her...

Bottle paced. From an observational perspective it probably looked more like he was constantly remembering to go get something he forgot in a different direction, but we'll go with pacing. "I need therapy," he said out loud to no one in particular.  Finally, after a couple more false starts, he wound his way over to Skip's office. He got as far as "Shave and a hair" before he saw the crayon scribbled note on the door.  "Not here. Gone fishing. Skip, the Editor."  "Didn't know we had a lake around here," Bottle said to the door. "Sandra! You up there?!"  "If you have to ask, then no," came the distant reply.  "Fair enough. I guess it's back to the bakery to cook up a batch of imaginary minions to do all the heavy lifting."  Several hours of crashes, disturbingly gloopy sounds, and the occasional half-hearted swear word later, there came the tiniest of meeps. Then another. Then a few more. Like a kettle...

Dave Lewis was a highly notable teenage Rock & Roller in the 50s, and somewhat unintentionally responsible for uniting the two segregated musician's unions in Seattle. The story goes, local club owner Dick Parker said if you're gonna make me choose between Dave Lewis and the entire Local 76 white roster, i'm gonna book Lewis. On Jan. 14, 1958 the two locals merged and Seattle's music scene became a little less terrible, at least on paper.  Lewis's various bands opened for all sorts of famous acts on tour in the Pacific Northwest, but regular club gigs were his main career throughout the 60s and 70s. Jimi Hendrix even jammed with them a few times, but audiences wouldn't exactly call Hendrix "danceable." That's fair. Lewis had some arrestworthy drug problems later in life and died in 1998.  None of that matters much, tonight we're hearing his jazz organ covers of Herb Alpert tunes. I'm told it's an all the stars album, so i expect it...

I don't have a positive nostalgic image of the early 80s in my mind. I just don't. Everybody's all coked up and sweaty, wearing neon leotards and headbands, everything looks grimy and chaotic, car horns blaring, crying dumpster babies, it's horrible. Doesn't matter that i was born in 1980, it all just looks like the combined cityscapes from Star Trek IV, Police Academy, and Short Circuit. Olivia Newton John feeling up bodybuilders in the YMCA weight room doesn't help much either. Nothing about any of that do i consider sexy.  But can i just bottle all that up, shelve it, and approach Physical with fresh ears? Yoda might scold me, but i can at least try. Did you know Olivia Newton-John was basically responsible for the industry-wide shift from time-based contracts to quantity-based contracts? See, the way it happened was that she agreed to record 4 albums in 2 years, while MCA retained the option to extend the time frame as penalty for a late album and more recor...

Now that Olivia Rodrigo has a second album out, i toyed with the notion of actually listening to the first one. While i was waffling about the certainty of not doing that, though, i saw a thing that made me do a thing i said i wasn't going to do. You know how me and coincidence like to get physical, so it's the other Olivia.  Why am i taking one for the team? Well, for one tiny little detail in the fine print. Primary (goddamned) Wave. I hate them so much. I want to drive to corporate HQ in Satan's Taint, Nebraska (or wherever they're located) and take a dump in their lobby.  "The leading Independent publisher of iconic music in the world." That might be the most vomitous sentence i've ever read or said out loud. Think about it for a moment. What could possibly be the business model for publishing "iconic music" at a global level other than buying high profile artist catalogues for as little as possible and republishing things from them for profi...

Roy Orbison liked Don Gibson so much he recorded an entire album called Roy Orbison Sings Don Gibson. I don't have that record. One of the few covers Neil Young ever recorded was Don Gibson's "Oh, Lonesome Me." I don't have that one either. Don Gibson got his start in Nashville with Chet Atkins producing his two songs. All of which of course begs the question, can Bottle crap on Don Gibson for 5 paragraphs?  I'm kidding. His nickname is "The Sad Poet." I like sad songs a lot, or at least as long as they aren't secretly mysogynistic garbage about women being terrible, so i could end up liking this. Don't give me that look, it's not either of the other Boots Randolph albums i have. Ok fine, no promises either way. We'll just stream of consciousness this thing like i do when i'm tired of all the hot garbage the world served up on today's pu pu platter.  Sure, it might be a bit jarring to go from Jack White's surprise Country ...

Alright, so here's the thing, my record collection is getting ridiculous. Proper shelving for this monstrous amalgamation of insanity has to move up to the top of the to do list. That's my problem, though, you have other things to worry about. Like what tonight's album review will be. It could be anything. Well, great news, we're gonna go back to one i sorta glossed over at the time. Took me ages to find it because chronological doesn't mean one-dimensional around here. I have to find the adjacent albums first so i know which non-chronogical crate i shoved that particular batch in. Found it though, now we just have to slog through why.  So last night i plugged Kid Cudi's album into discogs, and out of nowhere they were like When We Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? is a Trap album. I said whaaaaa? Just like that, whaaaaa? Ok, i guess, yeah, sure, why not? Billie Eilish's sophomore album is Trap. I can squint with the best of 'em.  I feel like some of you migh...

Hey Compy! Be a deer and headlight your way over to the middle of the concentric circles. The Jeneninator needs new ear-make-it-happeners. Oh yeah, trapped in a cave. I'm just not with it today, am i? Gotta get around to writing the undigging episode so i don't have to keep pulling out that "forget my own head next" cliche. Nope, nothing for it, guess i'll go do it myself.  And we're targeting some sketch pads for the Marker-Mural Maniac. Spare the funiture, spoil the artist.  Aforementioned noisy ear muffs with attached talky stick and a USB aglet, check.  What's we got in the place you all know i'm really here to look in? A Kid Cudi Concept Contraption? Cool, 'cause the alternatives are neither noteworthy nor going for a ride in the Bottlemobile. I take that back, one noteworthy alternative is to pre-order the posthumous final album of Piano-Hop tracks from Shock G, but that's $100 double album pre-order. Let that sink in... yeah, no, above 3...

I'm a huge fan of coincidence. Some people call it luck, or fate, or a miracle, some people freak the hell out and hang witches from trees. I just giggle on the inside and savor the flavor of structural serendipity.  Truth is there're millions of albums i could review. It's number 900, though. Obviously any analogy to a virgin reverse-nostalgizing not being one any more is off the table, but i'd still like whatever stress test we give said table for this umpteenth go-round to be special.  I thought about waiting for the thing all the postal workers between Texas are here are fondling, but that might set off the "too much innuendo" alarm, so i needed another plan. Luckily, it's number 900 and i'm about to not go to work for 9 days, surely our old pal Target has a new album from some 00s Rock Star with a title that fulfills the setup i just wrote. Ask and ye shall receive, we're about to enter 9 days of staycation with my 900th review, Jack White...

The 1993 self-titled debut from Candlebox was instantly popular. And i mean instant. And for good reason. They blended what at the time seemed like completely incompatible worlds in the form of the new, grungier Alternative Rock and late 80s Hard Rock. Mopey, introverted songs with squiggly wailing lead guitar all over them. Innovatively nostalgic, you might say. Unlike their big name peers Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Smashing Pumpkins, the year old infant gazelle that was Silverchair, or Dinosaur Jr., Candlebox felt like they had way more in common with Ugly Kid Joe and Soundgarden, only without the intentional obnoxiousness of the former. The whole album was jukebox worthy Hard Rock, and it got played.  I still say grunge isn't a genre, and critics at the time didn't consider it one either. Alternative and "pop-metal" seemed to be the most prominent labels in use, but they also refused to let stuff like this stand too close to "mainstream" in their minds. It was a...