Pazartesi 16 Oca 2006, 18:50

I've noticed some people are doing journal entries on their weekly charts to discuss what they're listening to and why. I thought it was a decent idea (at least way better than that A-Z bullshit) so I thought I'd give it a try. Of course, if this sort of thing becomes a trend it will without doubt turn into another listing game thing (the first A-Z journals I saw actually had descriptions and stuff on them, but now most of them are just lists). I'm not going to make an artist connection to artists I don't have anything to say about.

1. Fluxion (+14, 270 plays)
Fluxion definitely dominated the charts this week, and the reason is that I received two of his albums in the mail – I found Vibrant Forms on Half.com for about $13.00 and Vibrant Forms II (which is a 2-CD set) on Amazon Marketplace for $15.00 on the same day and ordered them both immediately since they're pretty hard to find. Classic Chain Reaction ambient techno, perfect for driving at night, slowly drifting into sleep, or just listening. Not very good for reading though; it's far to difficult to concentrate.

2. Bangkok Impact (new, 89 plays)
I bought three albums at the Electric Fetus this week: Thomas Brinkmann's "Rosa", "Harnessed The Storm" by Drexciya, and this one, "Traveller" by Bangkok Impact, which is my favorite of the lot. It's just fun electro-disco-funk-whatever music. How could anyone not like "Crowdpleaser", unless they're some sort of elitist fun-hater.

3. Thomas Brinkmann (+114, 50 plays)
Minimal techno. I actually bought "Rosa" new and paid full price on a whim (something I hardly ever do), and I'm still not sure if it was worth it. I need to listen more, but right now nothing reaches the same level of awesomeness for me as Ester Brinkmann's (who is the same person) "Maschine". I'm probably going to order Ester's "Der Übersetzer" (used) online later today.

4. Drexciya (new, 24 plays)
The cover has a sticker that says "Detroit Elektro". I have to admit I was a little disappointed by this album ("Harnessed The Storm") for most of this week because of a lack of memorable melodies, but a few days ago I was listening to it in the car and I finally began to "get" it. It's weird how "delicate" sounds are used to make up the songs, most of which I think of as pretty "hard".

5. Aphex Twin (+10, 23 plays)
Aphex makes a showing on the top 10 this week because I listened to Selected Ambient Works II. I spent some time this week tagging some songs as "underwater music", a sound which I'm having trouble coming up with more examples of. The big three, in my mind, are Aphex's "Matchsticks" (the last track from SAWII), Matrix's "Red Film #2", and Tim Hecker's "7000 Miles". A lot of Mr. Hecker's music could be put under this category I guess, but none do it as well as "7000 Miles". It's the sound of dark and unknown underwater areas. I associate it with this place called Underwater Adventures (formerly Underwater World) in the Mall of America, if anyone reading this has ever been there.

6. I Am Robot And Proud (new, 19 plays)
At the end of 2005 I ordered "You Make Me This Happy", which is a album of remixes I Am Robot and Proud did of other artists, from Piehead Records (a CDR label that has now ceased to exist). My favorite is a remix of a song called "Osaka" by an artist/group (?) called "Girls are Short". Robot and Proud got on the list because I also listened to his other albums ("The Catch" and "Grace Days") this week.

7. Spencer Nilsen (new, 15 plays)
Who is Spencer Nilsen? He's the guy who did the music for Ecco the Dolphin on Sega CD, a game whose music I've also associated with the "underwater music" I mentioned above. I ripped the tracks directly off the game CD and listened to them on my computer, but a lot them seem sort of cheesy like Tangerine Dream. I guess you don't notice it as much when you're playing the game.

8. Loscil (+60, 14 plays)
Loscil is on the list because of his recent release "Stases" on a netlabel called one. It's really, really ambient music and I like it a lot. If you like ambient music (the press-release calls it "drone" but I'm not exactly sure of the definition of that genre) you should check it out here.

9. Autechre (+6, 12 plays)
Not much to say here, I think they just got on the list from shuffle mode.

10. Sistol (-7, 8 plays)
Sistol is Vladislav Delay, but a bit more straightforward minimal techno than his work under different names. You can still hear the strange clicks and echoes that seem to fill the background of most of Ripatti's work. I got the self-titled (and only) album for Christmas.