The Mars Volta - Live at The Electric Ballroom

I remember being pretty excited when I found this record. I was in London for a night before going to the airport. In a lot of ways, it was a bad time to go record shopping - I was going away for nearly two weeks, going to Heidelburg, Vienna and Lancaster before going back to my parents' house for just three nights before going back to Australia for another six months. Not only did I have to lug this, a couple of other records I bought in London (and the ones I bought on my travels) on a number of flights and trains, I also had only three days to enjoy it (I frantically recorded all the records I bought that fortnight onto tape before going back to Canberra, but somehow missed off a whole side of the Murder City Devils live LP, something I was annoyed to find out when I tried to play it in Oz). After buying this, I stayed at my friend Jo's house and we watched the Johnny Depp version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and had an early night ahead of my flight; there's a detail no one cares about.

Anyway, I was really into The Mars Volta at the time. I'd enjoyed Deloused in the Comatorium but really got into them on Frances the Mute (an album I'd still argue is their finest). During my first six months in Australia, they released Scab Dates which contained some incredible live recordings along with some frustratingly long field recordings of bollocks. This record - a straight-forward live recording from the sound-desk at a London show in 2003 - was then right up my street. The tracklisting is basically all of Deloused (in order) along with Concertina from the Tremulant EP (which I bought about six months later, just before I left Australia for good). On top of that, the sleeve stated that it was for promotional use only (but probably actually a bootleg) as well as singing the praise of being a purely analog recording, something I was pleased to see other people consider important, having had frequent and irritating conversations with my friend Tom about whether digital could be better than analog - see the last picture for the full text. I also bought the 12" single of Frances the Mute that day.

The quality of this recording is perfectly fine - you couldn't call it outstanding, but it does the job. What is perfect is the band, who are on incredible form. The thing that amazes me is that I saw them just two months after this recorded and they were terrible. I remember being really excited to see them at Reading Festival and they played what felt like two songs over a 45-minute set - two elongated jam-fests (which I might enjoy now to be honest, but wasn't in the mood for at the time). I can't have been the only person in the audience who was hoping to hear Inertiatic ESP. In hindsight, we were probably being treated to some early versions of songs from Frances the Mute, but we weren't to know. I saw them a handful of other times over the years and had far better experiences after that - their set at Southside Festival in 2009 was particularly brilliant. The version of Cicatriz ESP is far more enjoyable than the version on Scab Dates because you don't have to fast-forward ten-minutes of bollocks to get the huge climax. The recording of Televators is pretty breath-taking too - Cedric's voice on top form - and Take the Veil Cerpin Taxt is a superb closer. I think for a long time they'd take the stage and introduce themselves as a different band - on this particular show they came on stage with the line "Hello, we're Mudvayne", a nu-metal band that I'm sure most people have long forgotten. It's a strange blast from the past whenever I play this album.

Despite being a bootleg/promo/"unofficial release", copies of this album seem to be about two or three times more than I paid for it, which is always nice (although peanuts compared to how much the reissue of Deloused is now going for - and to think I complained about my copy costing £27, an annoyingly common price for an LP these days). A nice bonus was that the two records are on coloured vinyl - transparent yellow and blue. Whilst not strictly an official release, I'm very glad this is sat in my collection and that I decided to lug it around Europe rather than leave it in Selectadisc that rainy January day. I miss The Mars Volta, so it's nice to have a live recording of some of their best songs.

Format: Double 12", plain sleeve, insert, promo-only
Tracks: 9
Cost: £20 new
Bought: Selectadisc, London
When: 13/01/06
Colour: Transparent yellow and transparent blue
Etching: none
mp3s: no

Max Richter - The Congress OST

I have a number of Max Richter's soundtracks on vinyl, but The Congress is one of my favourites. It might be in part because it was the first I heard, but could also be because it came with mp3s, so actually got a fair amount of play. I've not seen the film, The Congress, nor do I have any idea what it's about. I really should check it out. The artwork certainly looks interesting.

The soundtrack is mostly quite a gentle affair, but does get going at times, which makes me more curious about the film itself (although clearly not curious enough to seek it out and watch it at any point in the last five years). It also makes it much more listenable as an album than a lot of soundtracks. The inclusion of two sung covers feels like it should ruin that flow a bit, but actually they fit in perfectly - Dylan's Forever Young never sounded so sparse as against Robin Wright's clear vocals and the distorted drums and Leonard Cohen's If It Be Your Will a nice closer. I was familiar with the first, but I've never spent much time listening to Leonard Cohen (except that time at Glastonbury when he was on before The Verve and seemed to play for literally years). There are also a couple of classical pieces included - one by Schubert and another by Chopin. Whilst I know nothing about classical music, I do at least recognise those names. Do people call it a cover when it's a classical piece?

Anyway, it's a nice little record. I remember it had been out a while before I found this copy - I remember thinking "I should probably get a copy of that". When I did find it I felt quite lucky to get the chance to buy it, since it was limited to 500 copies, although I might have over-estimated the popularity; Max Richter has done about a billion soundtracks and even I've stopped buying them. The sleeve still has the hype sticker Rough Trade applied to it on the front (because I've never got round to removing it) and it's on a nice, heavy white vinyl.

Format: 12", picture sleeve, insert
Tracks: 15
Cost: £25 new
Bought: Specialist Subject Records
When: 25/10/14
Colour: White
Etching: none
mp3s: Download code

Deftones - Adrenaline

This is where it all began - the first Deftones record I heard. You can't ask for a better introduction than that chugging riff on Bored, the way it changes down perfectly for the chorus, and Chino's screams of the simple sentiment "I get bored". I've sung this song to myself a million times and I can hold that note a fraction of the the amount of time Chino can.

I've told this story a bunch of times before, so I'll keep it short: when my sister and I were just getting into music, we'd been on holiday with my parents to America and discovered the wonder of cheap music and a favourable exchange rate. She bought six cds, all of which I eventually bought from her - three Silverchair albums, two Marilyn Manson albums and Adrenaline by Deftones. She was big into Manson at the time, and one of her friends had got her into Silverchair, particularly Neon Ballroom. Quite how Deftones fit into this I don't know - possibly she'd heard one of the two big singles from Around the Fur. For whatever reason she bought Adrenaline, and at some point in the trip, I popped the cd into her Walkman and gave it a listen. Like I said, what an introduction I had. I can remember it quite lividly; it was an important moment.

That was just over 20 years ago, but it was the beginning of a lot of things. The following summer Deftones released White Pony and I rushed out to buy a copy the day it came out (I'd pre-ordered the limited edition with the bonus track). I've bought every Deftones album the week it's come out since and I suspect I'll continue to do so as long as they put them out.

You can't fault Adrenaline as a debut album. As a band they upped their game a huge amount for Around the Fur in terms of writing huge singles, and then White Pony was just another level entirely. Remove those comparison points and you still have a great album - Bored, Lifter (with it's outro of "A part of me gets sick / A part of me gets sore"), every single moment of 7 Words (the first time I saw Deftones they broke into Weezer's Say it Ain't So in the break, which was brilliant), Birthmark and the closing duo of Fireal / Fist are all incredible. Fist was particularly exciting because it was so far from the sound they'd established over the previous 40 minutes - almost post-rock - but is criminally missing from the vinyl pressing.

Right now I'm playing this to my three-week-old daughter (her third album so far). I'm not convinced she's getting as much from it as I did on that first listen, but she's much younger than I was when I first heard it.

Format: 12", insert (not photographed)
Tracks: 11
Cost: £13 new
Bought: Bear Tree Records website
When: 09/04/18
Colour: Black
Etching: none
mp3s: none

Public Service Broadcasting - Live at Brixton

Similarly to what I said in my last post about Max Richter, I've also fallen into a trap of mindlessly buying new Public Service Broadcasting records. I loved the first album, albeit less than how impressed I was by seeing them support the Manics in 2013. Since then, I've become increasingly wary of them as they commit even harder to each album having a theme, often at the expense of the album itself. I still enjoy seeing them live, but I do think my record collection probably only needs the actual albums. Even then, I kinda wish I'd started buying them on cd rather than vinyl; I wouldn't feel so bad about being in this trap if I was spending £10 a time instead of £20+.

This live album was recorded after they'd released two albums - it's an early point in a band's career to be releasing a live album, but they'd had a pretty fast rise so I guess that's worth celebrating. On top of that, they were clearly quite pleased with the dancing astronauts they'd taken out on tour and wanted to capture it. I first saw them do that bit at a very crowded show at Greenman festival, and it was a crowd-pleaser for sure. As a result of only having two proper albums, they play most of their songs. The constant change back and forth between the two works against it a bit, as the songs from The Race For Space are so heavily themed that they stand out. But I can see that separating them would feel too forced too. On the plus side, the last side of vinyl contains the highlights from both and ends the set brilliantly (although Tomorrow feels like a strange inclusion, given it doesn't really go anywhere or do anything).

I didn't buy Live at Brixton when it first came out, but did give in to my urges and buy it a few months later after not finding much else I fancied in Truck one day. The part of me that knew I wasn't a massive fan knew I probably didn't need it, but the part of me that remembered how great they were that first time wanted a live album to bring back some of those memories. After a slow start, Signal 30 hits billion times harder than the album version and is exactly what I wanted. The other older songs are just so much more to my liking - heavier guitars, louder drums and a lot more going on in general. But I have come to terms that they're not the band I wanted them to be (that is, early Therapy?) and can enjoy these for what they are.

Format: Double 12", gatefold sleeve, picture sleeves, dvd
Tracks: 17
Cost: £25 new
Bought: Truck Store, Oxford
When: 17/03/17
Colour: Blue
Etching: none
mp3s: Download code

Various Artists - Behind the Counter with Max Richter

I've fallen into something of trap - I buy Max Richter records without really considering if I really need to. His output is prolific and it is impossible to keep up. His albums themselves are consistently excellent and I'll keep up with them for sure. His soundtrack work is, however, probably where I need to hold back. By the nature of the work, they vary in how exciting they are and I should probably take the film/series into consideration before buying them. But there was a period in which I was trying to keep on top of what he was releasing, and this record came out in that time. It was the first step in the realisation that I should take a more considered approach to his output, solidified by a couple of soundtracks that did little for me. I think I'm now out of the trap, but time will tell.

This record is, undoubtably, a strange one. The first in series that I'm not sure has continued, Max picked a bunch of songs for a compilation. In theory, they were all from records in Rough Trade, but I've never paid enough attention to their classical section to know if it's as deep as this record suggests that it is. The majority of the songs here are what I (a layperson) would call classical, with a spattering of post-rock and electronica thrown in. Based on Max Richter's style of music, this feels like it's probably pretty representative of his record collection.

It's important to remember that I know next to nothing about classical music. Are the classical songs here that Max has picked "good" classical songs? I don't know. If I showed this to my in-laws (big classical music fans) would they find it to be an interesting mix, or look down their noses at it (is it the equivalent of them showing me a Now That's What I Call Music comp and asking my opinion)? Again, I don't know. I suspect Max has reasonable taste in classical music, but there are probably countless sub-genres that I know nothing about. Strip away the classical songs, and you've certainly got a perfectly reasonable ATP line-up, so I can only imagine the classical songs are equally highly-respected. Maybe I will ask my in-laws next time they're here.

Anyway, there were a few reasons I bought this album. One was that it had a Max Richter song that I wasn't familiar with (Mercy); secondly, it came with a bonus 7" of more unreleased Max Richter songs; thirdly, based on the songs I knew, I figured there'd be some interesting discoveries; and finally, I was just buying too many Max Richter records. On the first point, Mercy is an excellent song - powerful violins over a sombre piano. It grabs your attention the best possible way. On the second point, The Young Mariner is a really nice piano-led piece with gently swelling strings but Whale Window Hotel / Farewell Threshold Laudanum is disappointingly unremarkable. These two songs aren't included on the cd or in the download, sadly.

As for discovering music I didn't really know about, Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith and Rachel's were both winners. I'd heard of Rachel's some years ago when one of them played at All Tomorrow's Parties, but never listened to any. Last Things Last is haunting and brilliant and I really need to spend more time with them as a band. As for the songs I know, I like that he picked a Mogwai song from their excellent Atomic soundtrack and Low are a welcome inclusion to literally anything. I love Godspeed as much as the next person, but dedicating an entire side of vinyl to Rockets Fall on Rocket Falls feels a bit lazy (or perhaps a sign of fatigue after curating five sides on vinyl). I imagine most people buying this record are like me - noobs to classical music, and knowledgable of post-rock, etc - but I do like the idea that somewhere there's a classical music fan hearing GYBE for the first time on this album and being blown away by it.

In terms of the classical music itself, I don't feel I'm any more knowledgable or into it than I was before I played this record. Starry Sky Cycle by Urmas Sisask is pretty nice, and the sleeve notes tell me that must be a fairly modern piece. Kronos Quartet provide an interesting and very maximal piece, but they're an easy one for people like me after their work on the incredible soundtrack to Requiem For a Dream with Clint Mansell. I think the biggest realisation is that what I enjoy about "neo-classical" music isn't so much the "classical" part as much as the "neo" part - it's the way it straddles post-rock and electronica that excites me, the fact it's usual classical instruments and ideas to get there is only a part of it. (As a separate side note, I feel that the genre name "neo-classical" is probably going to age as badly as "nu-metal" did). There's a strange vocal harmony piece on the first side of vinyl which really isn't my thing.

As well as three LPs and a 7", there's a download for two continuous mixes (following the tracklisting of the double cd version and featuring a much edited version of the Godspeed song) and a bonus cd of ten songs from the compilation, mostly featuring the newer songs/artists. Every now and again, I play one of these on my computer at work, but all of them feel a bit too sprawling and I never play more than one of the three hours they cover. Overall, it's a fairly lavish release for something that is ultimately the sort of cd you might get free as a sampler or on a magazine. It's nice, but I don't think it was the best way to spend the £31 I spent on it. I couldn't put a number on how much value I've gotten from it, but it's certainly less than £31; the remainder can be chalked up the cost of trying to keep up a collection of an artist who is releasing more records than I can try to remain on top of. I've learnt my lesson now though.

Format: triple 12", 7", cd, gatefold sleeve
Tracks: 45
Cost: £31 new
Bought: Rough Trade website
When: 08/06/17
Colour: Transparent green (LPs) and black (7")
Etching: none
mp3s: download code

Mogwai - Come On Die Young

Some years ago I was explaining to a friend why I can never move away from having an iPod Classic (or another equally large capacity mp3 player, but I don't think there are any of note). The argument I gave was that there are days when you just really want to listen to some obscure Mogwai b-side, and that's exactly the music that wouldn't make the cut if you were worrying about capacity. At the time, I had The Hawk is Howling and the double cd re-release of Young Team, and it was precisely those bonus tracks I was thinking about. I got Young Team just before I started my PhD and those years were heavily soundtracked by post-rock on my trusty iPod in whatever library I found myself working in.

With that in mind, I was very keen to pick up this fancy boxset re-issue of Mogwai's second album Come On Die Young when it came out; 17 bonus songs was right up my alley. I ordered it from Norman Records because they offered free postage on orders over £50 - before that point I'd never heard of them, but I've since spent more money with them than I care to mention - as I've often said before, they cover almost everything I'm after outside of the Banquet Records and Truck Store remit (in fact, I'd say they're more in line with my musical tastes in terms of what they stock than either of the other two are, but these things always change in subtle ways). It's a lovely boxset, as can be seen in the pictures below, and well worth the money.

As for Come On Die Young itself, it wasn't an album I instantly loved. One entirely unnecessary anecdote first though - at some point in my early twenties I was in Cambridge with my friend Tom and his friends Caz, Jim and Luch. Luch was studying there and for some reason I'd gone up with Tom to get drunk there one night. I have absolutely no idea why we'd gone out in Cambridge - it wasn't easy to get to and I don't think I had any other business there at the time. I can't even remember how we got up there, or where I'd come from (Winchester, Cardiff?). It definitely did happen though, and I remember more about the drunken night that followed than the days around it, it seems. Anyway, Luch was a Mogwai fan and had a poster of the cover of CODY on the wall. As we were drinking, he was getting routined harassed with the line "Come on Luch, die young". I will never be able to think about this album without thinking about his close friends telling him to die young.

About a year after getting Young Team, I bought a cheap, second-hand copy of CODY on cd in one of the records stores on Berwick Street in London. I was excited to hear it since I'd heard that it was considered one of their best albums. I didn't get it straight away, like I had with the other two albums I owned, and it took a long time for me to give it another chance (I also bought Funcrusher Plus that day, and that got a lot of play). If it wasn't that I knew it was so highly regarded, I might have disregarded it entirely.

To me, CODY is a very strangely sequenced album. Despite being sandwiched between two perfect bookends (Punk Rock and Punk Rock/Puff Daddy/Antichrist), it feels a bit like it's on shuffle for the most part. What is certainly true is that the best songs, and the most traditionally Mogwai songs are all at the end. It's rare that "classic" albums are so back-heavy, with most being the opposite (meaning people often forget to notice that the back-half is a bit weak). In this case though, it works against the album - there's about half an hour of music before you get to a song that sounds like what I want from a Mogwai song (May Nothing But Happiness Come Through Your Door). Ex-Cowboy is the first really incredible song on the album, and that's track nine. It's important to note though that Ex-Cowboy is really incredible. Of course, Christmas Steps is the real highlight, with it's slow start and bass-lead build up. It's almost as scary as the haunting face on the cover, and you want Mogwai to be scary, really.

At the other extreme, at the very start you have the title-track (of sorts) Cody which does nothing for me at all and couldn't be further from what I was expecting (which, I strongly suspect, is intentional). Sung vocals with an actual chorus and no big crescendos or heavy guitars. You can't help but believe they wanted that to feel a bit antagonistic. After the success of Young Team I imagine they took some pleasure in starting the album that way.

The third and fourth discs cover the 17 bonus tracks and we get a good mixture of demos, session and live tracks, as well as the Travels in Constants EP (from Temporary Residence Records excellent series of releases) and two rare songs, Nick Drake and Hugh Dallas. Of particular note are the shortened version of Christmas Steps, 7-25 with the fuzzed-out guitar thrashing, their cover of Papa M's Arundel (which took me ages to work out why it was familiar when I finally got a copy of Live From a Shark Cage), Spoon Test and Hugh Dallas which is pure Slint, but great for it. As expected, the bonus disc has had a good amount of play.

Format: 4x 12" boxset, double gatefold sleeves, inserts, poster, dvd
Tracks: 29
Cost: £54.50 new
Bought: Norman Records website
When: 06/08/14
Colour: Black
Etching: none
mp3s: dvd included

Manic Street Preachers - International Blue

To get a copy of this 7", I had to buy a copy of the white vinyl pressing of Resistance is Futile from an independent record shop. I'm all for spending money with independent record shops, but did have some trouble finding a shop with enough stock - it seemed to run out as soon as shops said they had stock and some shops had certain rules, like only over-the-counter orders. In the end I got it from Jumbo Records in Leeds, who I may have visited in the past, but can't say for sure. Looking at Discogs now, it wouldn't have been too hard to pick one up after the fact, but I wanted to make sure I got a copy.

I'd already ordered the "collectors" package for the new Manics album the day they announced it, which included the album on black and red vinyl (that's one on black vinyl, and another copy on red vinyl, not "black and red" vinyl), as well as the album on double cd, regular cd and cassette. I probably would have bought all the variants over time, so it's just easier to buy them all up front. What is one extra copy after all those (I sincerely hope they got to count that as five separate album sales)? Some might say it's strange to have a copy released that isn't in the "collectors" bundle, but after buying nearly 200 different Manics releases I really can't be bothered splitting hairs about this.

Anyway, I was pleased to have a 7" of the only single from the album that got a physical release. Digital-only singles are basically pointless, except from a streaming-sales-on-chart-position point of view. But the bigger concern is the lack of b-sides, which is most of the reason I have a Manics collection in the first place. There exists one b-side from Resistance is Futile, which is a terrible shame (there are some Japanese bonus tracks I'm yet to get, so I guess they count). That b-side is called Holding Patterns. It's a nice song, Christmassy somehow with an unexpected guitar solo. It would have been a fine song on the album, but not essential.

The a-side however is worth dwelling on. International Blue is an instant classic with a huge riff and a great reminder of why they're such a good band - the fact that they can drop a song like this after 30 years and it just does everything you want a Manics song to do is really incredible. Comparing it to Motorcycle Emptiness, as they did when it came is a bit of stretch but only a bit, which says a lot (I can see why they made the comparison too). It is soaring and triumphant, and makes me so happy to be a fan.

Format: 7"
Tracks: 2
Cost: £5 new
Bought: Jumbo Records website
When: 13/03/18
Colour: Transparent blue
Etching: none
mp3s: none