Albums That I Liked (in 2000): Myths, Legends, and Other Amazing Adventures, Vol. 2

Well kids, I'm home alone on a Saturday night, and I have an assload of work that I don't want to do. You know what that means! It's time for another exciting edition of Albums That I Liked!

I thought it would be cool to follow up my Aquabats concert post with another Aquabats-themed post, so tonight we're going to be looking at their B-sides album, Myths, Legends, and Other Amazing Adventures, Vol. 2 (before you ask, no, there is no volume 1).


As I said above, Myths, Legends, and Other Amazing Adventures (which from here on out will be referred to as Myths. Or I'll abbreviate it to MLOA! because that's an hilariously awesome exclamation) is a B-sides album. For those not "in" with the music lingo, that means that essentially it's a collection of songs that were cut from other albums for not fitting with an album's sound, not being up to the band's usual par, or just being plain friggin' weird. Myths definitely focuses on the WEIRD. While it is the band's most inconsistent (given the B-side thing) and possibly worst album, it still has tons of great moments, including two of their most well-known songs, and is weird enough to warrant a listen. In fact, it's a testament to The Aquabats' skill that most of these songs are still pretty damn good.

One thing that is notable in Myths is the general lack of horns. This album came right on the heels of Vs. The Floating Eye of Death!!, which is basically the album where they stopped being a ska band, and morphed into a punk band with horns (it also happens to my favourite album by them). Still, the horns were way more prominent on that album than on Myths; whether this is because the songs are a tad unfinished or simply because The Aquabats were in the process of changing their sound is up for debate, but it's an interesting thing to note after seeing their transformation for their latest album Charge!!.

MLOA! contains possibly the two most popular Aquabats songs (well, as popular as they could get anyways), Pizza Day and Pool Party, and for good reason too; both of the songs have infectious, sing-alongable choruses, silly, nostalgic lyrics, and some damn fine hooks: in short, everything great about The Aquabats.

About halfway through the album, it gets a little more inconsistent and a whole lot stranger. This trend starts with I Fell Asleep On My Arm, which is an absolutely hilarious send-up of Korn, Limp Bizkit, and nu-metal in general about....well, a dude being really angry about falling asleep on his arm. Some sample lyrics:

"Corporate America makes pencils
For the man with the left hand
They make pencils for the man with the right hand
But what about the man with the numb hand?
Four hundred grand to see The Rage
From back here I can't see the stage
It's time to start my own parade
So lift up your arm and wave"

Awesome.

As the album goes on, strangeness abounds: a bubbly jazz tune about a bunch of creatures mutated by radiation (including an interlude with Billy, the Tap-dancing Mutant Boy!); a waltz about the toils of a baker; and an educational song about earthworms and their function in the ecosystem. There are also some seriously wicked, more normal songs; Danger Woman in particular is a blast of punk-y goodness. And the album ends with a very cool song called The Wild Sea which was the original version of Chemical Bomb from Floating Eye of Death; interesting to see how the same main melody can be used in two very different songs!

Basically, if you like The Aquabats, give this album a listen. If you haven't heard them yet, this probably isn't the best place to start, but it's a hell of a lot of fun! If you're into quirky weirdness, this album is for you.

Suggested Songs:
-Pizza Day
-Pool Party
-Danger Woman
-Radiation Song
-I Fell Asleep On My Arm

Coming up next: who knows?

Have some feedback? Disagree with me and wanna bash my head in? Agree with me and want to feed me grapes whilst giving me a a sensual massage? Comment!

-Daniel

Albums That I Liked (in 2000): Kid A

Ahoy! This is the start of a music feature (finally!) that will be ongoing. Essentially, it's a sort of "best-of the last decade" thing, but instead of doing a list or anything I'm just going to go through each year and talk about whichever albums I want. So I'll be on the year 2000 for a bit, then 2001, and so on and so forth.




The year is 1997. Radiohead have just released their revolutionary album OK Computer to deafening critical praise. The album is an extremely complicated piece of music, mixing their previous mainstream alt-rock appeal with thick, experimental soundscapes, and trading in teen angst and heartbreak for complex lyrical themes of consumerism, social corruption, and alienation. In the public eye, they have finally reached their full potential, and have established themselves as a band important to the present and future of rock music.

The question, of course, remained: Now what? Well, for Radiohead, the answer was to take away anything resembling an electric guitar and create one of the best electronic albums of all-time. Kid A is a huge stylistic change from their earlier work; one that, in my opinion, payed off in spades. From the opening descending synth run in Everything in It's Right Place to the organ and harp fade-out of Motion Picture Soundtrack, this album grips you with a feeling of oppressiveness and paranoia. The world of Kid A is cold and emotionless; everything seems eerily sterile and programmed to perfection.

Most of the music perfectly exemplifies this feeling with tons of synthesizers and strange sound effects, but what's great about the album is that almost every song stands out on its own while still working perfectly with the overall feel of the album. Only two of the ten songs here don't immediately stand by themselves; the ambient interlude Treefingers is really just that, and the OK Computer-esque Optimistic (the only track where the guitar is the dominant instrument), while actually a really nice, well-written song, doesn't really fit with the rest of the album. Regardless, these are still good songs, and serve to break up the oppressive nature of the album.

Something else pretty neat about Kid A is that it was one of the first largely-pirated albums ever, debuting on Napster a month before it's release - and yet, it debuted at number one on the album charts in the UK, US, France, Ireland, New Zealand, and Canada. Just sayin'.

I've always said that, as a real ALBUM, as in a cohesive musical work and not just a collection of songs, Kid A is maybe my favourite album ever. You need to be in a specific mood to listen to it, but there just aren't any other albums that can so totally express such a feeling of dread and paranoia of the surrounding world. It's a breathtaking piece of music and one that should not be missed by anyone who consider themselves fans of music in general.



Suggested Songs:
- Everything In Its Right Place
- How To Disappear Completely
- Idioteque

Agree? Disagree? Questions? Comment!

-Daniel