Lots of bad vibes on the internet today. Here’s a little cat action to boost your mood.
Monday fluffs
The Looney Tunes purge, and the difficulty of collecting them all
Slate has a post about HBO Max pulling Looney Tunes cartoons from the service unexpectedly. Specifically they cut more than 250 cartoons from the service, from 1950 to 2004, including the classic “What’s Opera, Doc?” The thread on Hacker News led me down the rabbit hole (heh) to a great post about trying to find all of the Looney Tunes episodes on disc.
I have a great love of classic Looney Tunes cartoons and snapped up the “Golden Collection” discs as soon as they came out. It was disappointing to find out, in the end, the six box sets didn’t actually constitute the entire collection.
It’s frustrating that Warner Bros. won’t just release an “everything” collection, in release order. The “Golden Collection” is a pain to navigate, so I was really happy with the access to Looney Tunes on HBO Max. Naturally, nothing good lasts forever. Given the way HBO Max is being managed right now, I doubt we’d continue subscribing if we weren’t getting access for free as part of our AT&T bundle.
And entertainment companies wonder why people torrent things…
“The Olympians” – The Olympians
The Olympians by The Olympians was released on October 28, 2016. If it’d been released a year or two earlier, there’s a better than even chance it’d have made my Top 100 list the first time around.
The Olympians is something of a throwback record, with a strong nod to 70s funk and soul. You’ve got generous helpings of horns, slick guitar, and sweet, sweet strings to soothe your mind. At the same time, there’s plenty of groove that is virtually guaranteed to put some swing in your step.
The Olympians’ 11 tracks are all instrumentals with titles that evoke Greek gods and myths, like “Sirens of Jupiter,” “Apollo’s Mood,” and “Europa and the Bull.” It’s left as an exercise to the listener to piece together a narrative that goes along with the song title.
Given the album’s cinematic feel, that’s not hard at all. You can close your eyes and just imagine some of the myths (if you’re like me) you read in middle school and summon epic action scenes on a cosmic scale. One of these days I want to sync up The Olympians with the original Clash of the Titans and see how well some of the tracks mesh with Ray Harryhausen’s stop-motion animation creatures.
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Every track on this album is pure gold. I don’t know that the album breaks any new ground, but it really doesn’t need to. It brings players from The Budos Band, The Dap Kings, El Michels Affair, The Arcs and more under the direction of Toby Pazner to cook up a “temple of sound.” Sign me up for the Church of The Olympians, because I’m ready to convert!
The only bummer about this album? Since 2016, the band hasn’t convened again to produce a full follow-up. (At least as far as I know.) Since its release, there’ve been two singles released via Bandcamp but still holding out hope we’ll see a full length LP sometime soon.
“With Birds” – The Coconut Monkeyrocket
When describing an album, one might start with a familiar genre or reference point to help the uninitiated prepare for the experience. This approach isn’t possible with The Coconut Monkeyrocket’s only full album, With Birds.
With Birds is a one-off album by a band (or perhaps one person project) called The Coconut Monkeyrocket with very little online presence and pretty much zero backstory and damn little follow-up since its release. While I’d really love more music like this, it may be impossible to replicate. It may be that the band or artist nailed it on the first try and decided to just pack it up.
One comment on Bandcamp calls the album “uptempo cartoon funk.” I’ve also seen it connected with “loungecore” and it’s tagged with “electrokitsch” as a genre on Bandcamp. I think of it as the sound a Chuck Jones cartoon would make if it grew up and started a band.
It’s aggressively uptempo with driving funk undertones, loops, vocal samples, and a bombastic feel. Plenty of horn samples, upbeat rhythms, and goofy sounds. From the intro track “Juicy Jungle” to the closer, “Thank You” it’s an unpredictable ride. Hints of disco, polka, spoken word, 50s strings and horns, and electronic beats all co-mingle into an album that sounds effortless but is intricate and deeply weird. Whatever it is, genre-wise, it’s 100% earworm.
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It’s a great album to put on while you’re making dinner or doing some housework, or as a soundtrack to a party. It’s like candy for your ears.
“Photographs and Memories: His Greatest Hits” – Jim Croce
The annals of music history are full of artists cut down in their prime. John Lennon, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Andrew Wood, the list is entirely too long, and the world is poorer for the music they never got to make. One can only imagine what Jim Croce might have written if he hadn’t died at 30 in a plane crash, heading from one university gig to another. Continue reading ““Photographs and Memories: His Greatest Hits” – Jim Croce”
Revisiting my top 100 albums: The 24 that didn’t make the cut
In 2016 I wanted to take on a 100-day blogging project and decided I’d do a top 100 list of my favorite albums, at the time. Looking over the list, it’s a good point-in-time snapshot, but a lot has changed in seven years or so. Continue reading “Revisiting my top 100 albums: The 24 that didn’t make the cut”
Murdercat at rest
Having a relaxing Caturday with Lilah, aka Murdercat, giving me the hairy eyeball.
Bonus shot of Bubby and Willow.
“Close (To The Edit)” – Art of Noise
A discussion on Metafilter today about interviews with J.J. Jeczalik from Art of Noise tickled my brain and put this song back in heavy rotation. Continue reading ““Close (To The Edit)” – Art of Noise”
Remember what’s important
Six years ago a good friend of mine passed away due to cancer. She was just shy of her 65th birthday and deserved so much more time. Continue reading “Remember what’s important”
“The Dispatcher” by John Scalzi
Took me a while to get around to it, but I finally picked up John Scalzi’s The Dispatcher yesterday morning and polished it off before bed. Some mild spoilers (depending on your definition of “spoiler”) below.