omnibus entertainment systems / music

sleeves of records by New Order, Pet Shop Boys, Autechre

The unhappiest people I know, romantically speaking, are the ones who like pop music the most; and I don't know whether pop music has caused this unhappiness, but I do know that they've been listening to the sad songs longer than they've been living the unhappy lives. -- from High Fidelity by Nick Hornby

Strange how potent cheap music is.-- Noel Coward

t's certainly one of the few good reason to live. Disastrous relationships may come and go, but music has always been there for many of us. It's how I define myself, and perhaps judge others. I'm absolutely crazy about pop music, or most music for that matter. Reckon I'm a music nerd, and I've got the shelving to prove it. It's the continuous soundtrack to my life. That's why I spend an inordinate amount of time and resources in collecting music. More often than not, most monetary figures and prices I relate to in terms of their equivalents in units of the average price of a compact disc at Amoeba Music, or about fourteen American dollars. ("Hey, the meal at this restaurant would cost me two CDs! Let's eat elsewhere.") Even though I listen mostly to British dance, pop, and rock, I also enjoy ambient, bluegrass, British folk music, Celtic, classical, country (mostly traditional, roots, or alt.country, but some mainstream Nashville stuff as well), early and medieval music, folk and roots music from around the world, powerpop, punk, techno, trance, and catchy pop music in general. I tend to be very partial to tight, well-crafted, and unpretentious pop tunes with strong melodies as well as a clear, definite structure: verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge (or instrumental solo), and chorus again. Content of lyrics aren't as important as how the words themselves sound and the melody of the tune itself. In fact, good lyrics should only be incidental. Usually if the melody is truly good, it will survive the onslaught of loud guitars or whatever you heap on top of it. Even the style or the genre seem unimportant. In the end, I love what most people would consider as superficial, disposal, or even trashy pop music. Whether the genre is punk, jazz, standards, rock, hiNRG, soul, folk, country, roots, or whatever, as long as the song is characterised by superb pop-craftsmanship, I'll appreciate it.

eedless to say, I also have an avid interest in cover art. Each week I spend a few hours just going through the bins of used CD and record stores since I enjoy merely looking at the packaging, sleeves, and liner notes. That's one of the most cool things about living in Berkeley. Unlike any other locales I can think of, record stores (often with a lot of cheap vinyl) are just awesome and uniquely in abundance here. If you have turntables, it's even cooler. It allows poor students to build extensive musical libraries. Anyway, this page intends to reflect that enthusiasm. Musical tastes can change week-to-week, and evolve month-to-month, so this website is not an entirely an accurate reflection of what I'm listening to at the moment. However, it's more like a hi-res snapshot of where I am musically as a early-to-mid twentysome year-old grad student. Even though many of the following artists have several sites dedicated to them, the links included here are what I believe to be the best points of departure to the resources available. Here's what you can find in this section:

Desert island dics.
Pop gods and goddesses.
Lesser pop gods and goddesses.
Classical resources, with early music focus.
Cool links.
Playlists.
Annual pop survey compilations.

STAN GETZ/ JOÃO GILBERTO featuring ANTONIO CARLOS JOBIM- Getz/ Gilberto (1964)
THE BEATLES- Revolver (1966)
THE BEATLES- The Beatles (1968)
TALKING HEADS- Remain in Light (1980)
BRIAN ENO- On Land (1982)
ROXY MUSIC- Avalon (1982)
BEASTIE BOYS- Paul's Boutique (1989)
PET SHOP BOYS- Behaviour (1990)
R.E.M.- Automatic for the People (1992)
RADIOHEAD- OK Computer (1997)

n annotated version of this list is available here. You can also discover my next ten favourite records, as well as the following ten.

ABBA the Site. Gracias por la musica indeed. Their output was so infectious and addictive, kinda like musical crack. As a non-sequitor, here's a classic Anthony Lane quote from his review of the film version of Mamma Mia: "There is no delicate way of putting this, but anyone watching Brosnan in mid-delivery will conclude that he has recently suffered from a series of complex digestive problems, and that the camera has, with unfortunate timing, caught him at the exact moment when he is finally working them out."

The Beatles. It's where it all began. Before the Beatles, pop music was pretty much confined to vague but real, conceivable parameters. After the Beatles, everything was possible. While there have been hundreds of websites devoted to them over the years, this unofficial site is a nice place to explore their discography, graphically speaking.

Beastie Boys
. This official site is as awesome as the boys themselves. After all these years and with constant revisions and updates, it's still one of the best on the net.

The world's favourite munchkin pixie chanteuse from outer space (with a funky Icelandic accent too). One of the highlights of my life so far was hearing her otherworldly voice addressing the audience at the Tibet Freedom Concert in Golden Gate Park.

David Bowie. First of all, he was the first (even before Roxy) to bring glamour to rock in a big way. He's all about changing (no pun intended), and that's a good thing too. I've always admired the fact that he doesn't seem to ever look back. He keeps moving forward artistically.

Brian Eno, through his music, productions, performances, liner notes, lectures, writings, interviews, and installations has changed the way I listen to music. More than any other individual, he has shaped the way I listen to music. There's so much I can write about him, but I'm not going to right now. By the way, was "Dead Finks Don't Talk" really about Bryan Ferry?

Emmylou Harris has always been a source of inspiration since I was in high school. Here's how much I love her music. Once while I was doing my shift as a radio DJ, I virtually played the entire side two of her record Last Date, a live recording from 1982 with her legendary Hot Band. I wasn't being a lazy ass DJ who wanted to go to the can and take a dump during his on-air shift. I did it because I simply couldn't help it. It's that awesome. I originally had only intended to play one track, but the music felt so good that it would seem to be sacrilegious to stop the record after that track had ended. Along with Gram Parsons and Will the Circle Be Unbroken, she ushered in the era of alt.country.

Madonna. Hmm, what can we say about Madonna? I know that she’s been a source of inspiration and fascination ever since I was a little virgin. A lot of it has to do with the fact that she’s always been a chameleon with countless manifestations (Dita from Sex / Erotica / Girlie Show era is my favourite). Her incarnations never fails to comment on or reflect the zeitgeist. What would she become next? Bruce Mau noted:

Madonna, however, continues to pull herself constantly out of the background; indeed, her gestures are so effective that she convinces us that this act of reinvention is what life’s all about. From the moll on the run in Desperately Seeking Susan to the hard-body diva of the Blond Ambition to the yogic rave-mother of Ray of Light, Madonna stages exaggeration, ceaselessly and with great finesse. She is a life-form that shifts its shape, and more important, makes those shifts resonate and matter.

Joni Mitchell. Alas, I got into her back catalogue rather late (i.e., after Travis and Janet Jackson, actually), but I'm glad that I finally got there. As I grow older and ever more disenchanted with our world, her music becomes increasingly relevant to me almost week-by-week. Like David Sedaris, I too was addicted to Hejira at one point; I couldn't go to sleep without it. I needed to dream upon its music; I needed to be reassured by its lyrics. It was lodged in my bedroom CD player for more than nine months. I still play it at least once a week before I go to bed.

Bill Monroe and his Blue Grass Boys are here because he virtually invented bluegrass.

New Order. As you can clearly tell, I'm still obsessed with them, and my life would be rather different without them. You can see it all over this website, and almost anything else I put out there. New Order Online is another good place to visit. There's also an old mothballed website with its own official Factory catalogue number fac 411 that has various odds and bits. The ancient fan website that catalogues the Factory Records catalogue is also still available.

Also be sure to check out Discografica, a site featuring perhaps the most extensive collection of record sleeves. Pet Shop Boys Online, an unofficial site in the Netherlands, provides useful information in a well-organised manner. Pet Shop Boys, peripherally is a fun article about their prolific collaborative efforts. Last but not least, always remember Virtually by Mats Björkman, a great European fan site that has been around forever. As you might have noticed, they are a significant aspect of my life. As embarrassing as it may be, the New Republic's Andrew Sullivan and I do share more than one thing in common. There are countless reasons why I'm obsessed with them. It's about their uncanny ability to create perfectly-crafted pop masterpieces. It's about their immaculate and meticulous production values. It's about their unabashed love of Pop Music. It's about the incredible range of styles of music found in their output. It's about an even wider range of emotions expressed in their work. It's about dance and disco and electro and techno and drum-and-bass and whatever that comes along. It's about good, clean, and thoroughly modern design (Chris was an architect; Neil studied history in the university; sound like someone familiar?) It's about their close collaboration with photographer and filmmaker Eric Watson and graphic designer Mark Farrow. It's about the PSB Partnership office being featured in Architectural Review. It's about their subtly subversive (or self-willed) attitude, their unique and carefully-articulated public image, the precise and always elegant ways they want to be marketed and presented. It's about the astonishing details of consistently beautiful packaging and layouts (each UK release is a beautiful object to cherish, hold, examine, and ultimately possess forever). It's about the range subjects they write about: the towering dilemmas of Dmitri Shostakovich, base passions and consuming jealousies, obscure Eastern European monarchs, headmasters and examinations, cricket pavilions and bicycle sheds, Catholic guilt, identity crises, existential crises, Italian youth subcultures, riots of May 1968, Parisian dissidents, financial deregulation and privatisation frenzy of the Thatcher years, King's Cross and the migration south to London, references to Samuel Beckett, to Harold Pinter, to Tony Benn, inclusion of passages by Shakespeare, the concept of miserablism, AIDS, coming-out, suburban unrest, rented rooms in faraway places, pet ownership, West End girls, rent boys (well, actually not), and lots of boy-boy love (but always with strings attached and/or all-too-real complications and complexities to make these matters difficult and ultimately strange). It's about being perhaps the most literate band in the world. Who else would include the Soviet historically significant phrase "Finland Station" in a pop song? Better yet, which musical act can incorporate as much Soviet and Leninist imagery as much as they do? Who else would write a pop song called "Love is a bourgeois construct"? Who would have a string quartet as an opening act for their concerts? Who would have trendy architects' architect Zaha Hadid design the staging of their concert tour? Who would wear an Issey Miyake blow-up suit on the telly? Which contemporary pop group would cover Noel Coward songs? Which pop group would cover Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill and not seem out of the ordinary for them? Who would cover a U2 song and then use a cheesy Vegas lounge standard as its new bridge? Which pop band would have Pentagram design one of their CD package? Which pop band had been a subject on the South Bank Show? What about their collaborators? It's Electronic, New Order, Johnny Marr, Dusty Springfield, Ennio Morricone, Angelo Badalementi, the Balanescu Quartet, Anne Dudley, Courtney Pine, Bruce Weber, Derek Jarman, David Fielding, Liza, Boy, Blur, Cicero, Kylie, Michael Nyman, Patsy Kensit, Pasty and Edina, Tina Turner, David Bowie, Yoko Ono, Example, Robbie, and their very own Spaghetti Records. It's about their uniquely contemporary British sensibilities. It's about their being British. Very British.

r a d i o h e a d has such a large following now that an exhaustive collection of personal sites has appeared recently. Most of these unofficial sites are unusually well-designed for fan pages, but the best is probably Airbag, which utilises the band's thematic graphic imagery quite well. Another cool site is Lift. The most important and useful site is probably the O (2) kiosk, which serves as a well-designed clearinghouse site that provides descriptions of and links to the unmanageably large number of Radiohead sites out on the net. Planet Telex is good place to begin exploring, and it's frequently updated with latest news of the band. At Ease is an informative Dutch site with pics of sleeves of most singles.

Roxy Music and Bryan Ferry. Like all the greatest achievements in pop music, Roxy was about much more than that. Roxy was a movement, an art one, and perhaps even a lifestyle one. The band was another great example of a phenomenon that could only have happened in Britain. It must have been awesome to be a pop music fan when Roxy came out of nowhere in 1972 and astonished the world with their combination of glamour and utter weirdness. According to Peter Saville, immersing himself in Roxy style formed the basis for his education. "They’re my art college. I learned more from Roxy than I did from college." In a 1995 interview, he summed up, "From hairdressing to fine art, all points were covered." Incidentally, have you ever noticed that almost all Bryan Ferry records have titles which seem very apt for fragrances? (e.g., Avalon, Bete Noire, Mamouna, etc.) Of course, it's all so Bryan.

R.E.M. The greatest American band ever! Yes, they're worth the $80 million. Like the space shuttles, they make me proud to be an American. The official site seems decent as well. Anyway, Michael Stipe, the always stylishly dressed, sexy pile 'o bones, once said in the January 1996 issue of Us, "If I slept with everyone I was supposed to have, I wouldn't have the energy to eat." (Hey, Mike Mills, we think you're sexy too!)

Saint Etienne. Do you remember the first time you fell in love? Strolls along the Camden locks? Waiting for the bus on Kentish Town Road? Or was it when she first "wears her jeans, torn at the waistband?" Do you believe in magic? It's heavenly future retro pop music served cool and delicious from Primrose Hill, Staten Island, Chalk Farm, Massif Central, Gospel Oak, Sao Paulo, Boston Manor, Costa Rica, Arnos Grove, San Clemente, Tufnell Park, Gracetown, Clerkenwell, Portobello, Maida Vale, Old Ford, Valencia, Kennington, Galveston, Holland Park, Studamer, Dollis Hill, Fougeres, London Fields, Bratislava, Haggerston, Livonia, Canonbury, Alice Springs, Tooting Graveney, Baffin Island, Pollard's Hill, Winnepeg, Plumstead Common, Hyderabad, Silvertown, Buffalo.

The Smiths (and Morrissey too!) at Cemetry Gates. So fucking obvious for someone like me, eh? The almighty Johnny Marr also has a cool fan site of his own here. No, Morrissey is not really musically relevant anymore, but I can still identify with most of his lyrics after all these years. While growing up in San Gabriel Valley , quite many kids like me somehow didn’t become cha-chas and biscuits, or Goths, or wiggas, or stoners. Instead, our impressionable heads incongruously but firmly resided in dark and rainy Rusholme, Strangeways, Salford, or perhaps even glamorous Sloane Square down in London. Our cultural forbearers were not coventional teen heroes like Salinger, John Kennedy Toole, or Bret Easton Ellis, but Oscar Wilde, Sandie Shaw, Shelagh Delaney, English kitchen sink dramas, and other old Rank movies. Some of us even became vegetarians, or at least aspired to have tea in lonely chip shops. We have Morrissey to thank for all this.

808 State. Simple and well-designed (one of the earliest examples of good design on the web), the official Webstate site features a neat layout as well as cool graphics. Pump yer fist!

AC/DC. Official site. First of all, the 'DC makes the greatest pole-dancing / stripping / 'exotic' dancing music in the world, ever. Any of their songs would do just fine. It's also the best of adolescent dorm room rock. In honour of their greatness, here's an old review for Stiff Upper Lip which appeared on NME that perfectly explains why these guys are so important after all these years:

Let's not piss about. You can debate this and argue that, but certain things we hold to be self-evident, and one of those things is that AC/DC are the fuckin' greatest. Chuck away everything ever broadly produced in the name of rock'n'roll except AC/DC, and I dunno, maybe James Brown and Muddy Waters, and you've still got all you'll ever need, when the only thing to get you through is one let-loose shot of leering stomp. The 'DC are elemental. Every other band in the world should bow before them. The 'DC bring The Rock. All you really need to know at this point is that Stiff Upper Lip is more of that good ol' 'DC stuff. Highway To Hell, Back In Black, Let There Be Rock, Stiff Upper Lip... their 17th album, business as usual, no ballsing about. If you know what's good for you, you'll go out and buy it. Now! If they were a lesser band, making music of a lesser magnitude, one might surmise that the 'DC's guiding career principle was: if it ain't broke, don't fix it. But we're talking about the 'DC here - a band whose shit riffs other bands can only dream of, a band with a sound as pure as science-- so we must elevate that principle to take into account that we are discussing genius. So, just so you know, the correct way to address the question of all 'DC sounding roughly THE SAME is to react the way Keith Cameron so memorably did when the last 'DC album, Ballbreaker, prowled forth from the office stereo some five years ago. The esteemed journalist countered the saminess question raised by some upstart cub reporter with the disdain it deserved. He raised a quizzical eyebrow and snarled, "Why fuck with magic?"

Why indeed? That's the thing with the 'DC. They're immovable. Every song is like architecture. And every song rocks absolutely because its sole purpose in existing is to... rock. Absolutely. There are no pretensions above, below or beyond that one single-minded, unashamed aim. To rock. Why the fuck would a rock band wanna do anything else? They never ask that question, by the way. They don't have to. They just do it, and it is we, listening to the stunning simplicity of Stiff Upper Lip, who are moved to wonder why on earth anyone would be daft enough to aim for anything else. And you can take your self-parody and stick it up yer arse because the 'DC's power actually derives from their utter inevitability. You know what's coming, and when it comes, it's always great. Each song starts at the start. With a riff. An Angus riff. Cool. Clean. Heavy. It repeats and builds and then Brian comes in. He screeches. His voice is like a metal shrew. It is absurd. So are his words. "Picking up the sleaze in my car / Sucking up the juice in the bar...". Words on a par with the last album's mighty chorus, "Hard as a rock / Harder than a rock", or the legendary, "She had the body of Venus with arms", and "Knocking me out with her American thighs"!

These are words of dumb beauty. Words created for the way they sound. Words of cartoon machismo. Words that prove they are kings of the leer. These words are the language of rock, noble words, the missing link back to the blues. They know no shame and they know no irony. They live for the double entendre. They are nudge-nudge Neanderthal. They crawl the kerb and cruise the bars. And they make us laugh out loud. Then the rest of the band crash in and go to work. Simon Wright drums like he's building a shed. Then comes the solo. The Angus solo. So the guitar gets louder. Then Brian comes back in. Then there's a crescendo like they're all falling downstairs. Or fighting. Then it ends with a thud. Or a whack. Either way, it ends. For a second or two. Then the next one starts. "Meltdown", "House Of Jazz", "Hold Me Back", "All Screwed Up"... Rock. Unabashed and unrelenting.

People once said that the Ramones were rock stripped down to its bare, brilliant essentials. Fuck me, but the Ramones are like Emerson, Lake and Palmer compared to the 'DC. If folks way back had accepted the fact that the 'DC ruled, there would have been no call for punk. You can't pinch an inch on any of these songs. There's no additives. No wastage. No fancy trimmings. No pianos or violins or concepts or anything progressive like that. Everything has been planed down, everything jettisoned that doesn't just... ROCK. I trust you get it by now. But just in case you're totally thick, here's a couple more things that should be self-evident: Stiff Upper Lip would be a 10 out of 10 if it had cannons on it. And, hey, Angus, everyone else is now wearing shorts. What the fuck took them so long? Rumour is the 'DC are playing live in the UK this summer. Lock up yer mothers and bring on the rock. C'mon, let's be 'aving it. 9/10

Lily Allen, 'cause it's not me, it's you.

alt-J.

Laurie Anderson. Let X=X.

Aphex Twin. Richard D. James creates beautiful mind-fuck music.

Autechre. Crispy, chewy, and crunchy music.

Burt Bacharach. "A House Is Not A Homepage." ... ha, ha, ha.

Big Star didn't sound like an American band in 1972, or any other band really for that matter, but they issued the prototypical blueprint for what American (and later British) indie melodic power pop should sound like.

James Blake.

Blur.

Bon Iver is the music of Justin Vernon.

Billy Bragg. Simple, straightforward, and totally awesome.

Brothers Osborne.

Junior Brown plays an enormous guitar invented by himself.

Willi Carlisle.

Mary-Chapin Carpenter. Although popular on mainstream country radio, she's actually a great songwriter with impeccable pop and folk sensibilities. I don't usually care about lyrics, but hers are so poignant and evocative that you can contemplate them ceaselessly. She also has a wonderful taste in selecting other people's material. Like Emmylou in the 1970s, she's one of the few with artistic integrity who manages to find success in radio without compromises. Also check out this cool site at AOL.

Chemical Brothers.

Tyler Childers.

Chixdiggit. Calgary's finest powerpop!

Chvrches makes Scottish electro-pop. Like Scandinavia, Scotland punches way above its weight in terms of producing great pop music.

The Clash. I still can't belive Joe Strummer is no longer with us. They were so fucking cool that not only did they name an album Sandinista!, but their record catalogue numbers began with 'FMLN.'

Cocteau Twins. This is the offcial page of the band that once made infinitely and intriguingly beautiful music with even more beautiful record sleeves. Unfortunately, if you do the same things after more than a decade without getting ostensibly better, people tend to lose interest and you eventually lose relevance. You become boring and predictable despite good work. What a loss.

Luke Combs.

Elvis Costello. I just got my first album of his relatively recently, and now I'm a big fan with several of his records. My reluctance to get into his stuff was the same as that with jazz: there's just so much stuff out there and so much to learn. It seemed a bit daunting to me.

Dead Can Dance. It's an official site. I like Lisa, but I can't stand what's his name.

Decemberists.

Iris DeMent is an incredible singer-songwriter.

Depeche Mode, the band that I love to hate (but still have some affection for deep-down inside). I can't help it since I grew up in So Cal. There was a point in my life when I was attending junior high when it seemed that Depeche Mode was the only thing that mattered in this miserable world. Although still somewhat musically intriguing, the band somehow gets dumber and dumber each year (e.g., annoying lyrics only junior high girls can take seriously). This is also a clear case where my loathing of the zealous (and often mentally-challenged) fans overwhelms my disposition for the band's well-crafted pop. However, the laughable lyrics notwithstanding, the band's musical sensibilities have always been quite good and at times, brilliant. During the years 1981-1987, Depeche Mode's music evolved at an incredible rate. This fast-paced sort of change was something that bands like the Beatles used to go through, but now unfortunately it's essentially unheard of.

Nick Drake.

Drive-by Truckers.

Eminem. What's the appeal? For a start, he's funny and smart. He doesn't rap ad nauseum about how much cash money he has, drug deals, bitches and ho's. Instead, he rhymes about "homosexuals and Vicodin," massacres, and his ex-wife Kim. Shady has created his own universe.

Enya makes heavenly music perhaps perfect for mineral water commercials... Her music feels so clean and refreshing. Actually, her music feels much more like getting a colonic, and I mean that in a good way. I like feeling clean. Incidentally, did you know that Enya/ Roma Ryan dedicated a track to Ridley Scott on Enya's first album? Cool, eh? Anyway, David Allum excellent unofficial Enya website (started way back in July 1994 and one of the earliest but best music sites on the web) has now evolved after all these years into its latest incarnation here.

Everything but the Girl.

Fairport Convention.

The Feeling.

Fleet Foxes.

Fountains of Wayne are hardcore by-the-book pop craftsmen who specialise in catchy and memorable melodies in songs under three and half minutes.

Fugazi. There are so many reasons to like these guys (e.g., playing only all-ages shows, keeping their records and shows dirt cheap so kids of all ages can afford 'em, etc.), and the quality of the design and packaging of their releases are incredible for an American band, indie or major.

Robbie Fulks plays some of the best alternacountry/ leftfield pop rock out there. He's darkly funny on record and in print. Great site too!

Peter Gabriel. A lot has been said of his music, but I was initially sucked into his secret world through his intriguing record sleeves and reliably beautiful packaging, some designed by our old friend, Peter Saville. I'm such a sucker for well-designed things, and naturally, I love to be surrounded by Peter Gabriel records.

Dick Gaughan. Official site. Great, unabashedly leftist celtic folksinger who continues to uphold the radical heritage of Clydeside.

Daughn Gibson ... where do we even start? Perhaps Johnny Cash meets Human League as produced by Calexico? Or Junior Brown trying to do Nick Cave?

John Gorka is a great Minnesota singer-songwriter whom I followed since I was in my teens.

John Grant.

Nanci Griffith never ceases to produce great folk and country music.

Groove Armada est sexy et très funky, non?

Hole. Just like Courtney, I wanna be the girl with the most cake. If you've been around this site for awhile, you've probably noticed that I'm obsessed with Courtney Love. One of the reasons I love her is that she tells it like it is on just about everything. Her brand of feminism is angry, ironic, eloquent, funny, low-fi, trashy, and glamourous as hell. She manages to always reinvent herself without denying who she was or where she comes from (cf. "Celebrity Skin"). Who can beat that? Finally, it seems like every dickhead with media access has a take on Kurt Cobain. Here's mine: he has got to be the most overrated figure in the entire history of music. I'm not trying to knock the guy when he's already dead, but Courtney's a million times more talented than he ever was. He died after making only one decent record, but Courtney already has made two, with perhaps more to come. Yet who's being elevated to deity, and who's getting all the notoriety?! I don't have anything against Kurt. I think his music is no better or worse than that of Britney Spears or Backstreet Boys. However, I do have problems with his fans and the cultural elites of America. (How many cultural elites out there are willing to defend Britney?) Kurt's worshippers are powerful people in powerful places. The most troubling aspect about Cobain is that his canonisation in mainstream American society reflects who wields power in America, and we all know who controls America. In the end, what it all comes down to is the inherent inequity in our society and racism. In America, white males control the media, and for the most part, its contributors and editors are white males. I don't have a particular gripe against the hegemony of white male power over America. I accept it as a fact of life, just like I acknowledge the existence of racism, or the force of gravity. We can all agree that we all should do whatever we can to mitigate the negative effects of the aforementioned establishment, but you also have to concede that these are permanent aspects of life in America that's not going to go away anytime soon (certainly in my lifetime) no matter what we do. In the meantime, however, I vehemently resent the fact that white males have the power to determine what is of importance in certain aspects of American culture, especially when what or whom they choose to prioritise, or even canonise, is of suspect artistic merit. I do resent the fact that mainstream America, particularly MTV and magazines like Spin and Rolling Stone, is essentially programmed and marketed for white heterosexual males. Critics like Greil Marcus have gone on and on about how important Kurt was. Over the year we’ve been getting a relentless barrage of testimonials about how he changed the face of music. He may have affected the lives of many musicians and fans, but the reality is that the rest of America couldn’t care less. He didn’t change my life, nor the lives of anybody I know. He didn't change that lives of millions of young girls around the entire fucking world screaming for Britney, Christina, and Justin. He certainly didn’t change the lives of Nixon’s so-called “silent majority.” Over seven years of living in an academic architectural studio, I don't ever recall anybody playing Nirvana (except perhaps me, but only one). I don’t remember anybody playing Nirvana even during my stint as a college radio DJ. Our lives were perfectly oblivious to Kurt’s existence until we were told by the American media that he deserved being worshipped. However, you never hear that kind of pathetic bullshit about how Kurt has affected their lives from black folks or other minorities. You don’t hear this crap coming from the projects and barrios, because in America, these people’s opinions don’t matter. I can name countless artists who have much more talent and whose works affected me more profoundly than Kurt could’ve ever imagined, but unlike the cultural elite of America, I have never felt compelled to be proselytize about the importance of the music I enjoy (except perhaps to list them on my site here). Unfortunately, this crap gets shoved down our throats over and over again because in America, only the opinions of white heterosexual males really matter. In American, only these people get heard.

Hot Chip.

Jason Isbell.

Alan Jackson straightforward, formulaic but still traditional-based, mainstream country never sounded so good.

Jamie xx.

George Jones. Find out what the old Possum is up to these days. His emotional voice just melts anything, and he's still fucking awesome!

Nic Jones, a great English folk artist who stopped performing in 1982 due to a debilitating car accident. However, his incredible recordings are still being (re)discovered by people like me.

Kraftwerk has a cool site, needless to say.

Alison Krauss, justifiably the bluegrass megastar.

Daniel Lanois.

Leftfield. Wow, great music to dance to!

Loretta Lynn. She'll always be the coal miner's daughter.

Kirsty MacColl. Thoroughly British pop by a great songwriter with fine English popcraftsmanship.
Madness. In addition to visiting the official site, be sure to also explore the wonderfully designed Madstock site.
Major Lazer. Diplo is everywhere these days.
Massive Attack's official site is just as impressive as one of the unofficial sites.
GEORGE MICHÆL. Notice the pretentious but tres cool spelling, eh? Albeit a little older, he's still simply too funky for us. Yeah, life can be pretty darn hard for a such serious artist who can't help being unbearably sexy and beautiful. But seriously, it's only a matter of time that he'll end up on the the list above with his brand of air-conditioned and well-upholstered soul. Anyway, don't forget to visit him at his suitably posh new official residence at Ægean. C'est le chez official de M. GEORGE MICHÆL. Like his person and everything surrounding him, it's elegant, lush, and absolutely gorgeous.
Moby. Strangely enough, I don't have much to say about him other than I think he's incredibly talented.
Bob Mould. Find all of his eclectic and legendary output here.
Alexi Murdoch.
Sinéad O'Connor. Well-behaved women rarely make history, and her life is a clear example. Her music and persona remain intruiging due partly to the fact that somehow we are always aware of seeing her as a provocative work-in-progress: talented, intelligent, and articulate young woman who can be careless, naive, volatile, misguided, stubborn, annoying, and relentlessly difficult. We see her as an angry woman who's trying deperately to make sense of the world. Some of us can identify with her because often she's so clearly like one of us. She's reckless, but she can't help getting herself into trouble. She's never afraid to express herself, no matter how unpopular her views. She doesn't give a fuck because what she thinks is truth is most important to her. In the end, she pays dearly for her youthful indiscretions, and we see how she can be hurt from the backlash. Most importantly, she's also never afraid to expose her pain and vehement anger. Her naked honesty and her recklessness make her body of work poignant reflections of a troubled young person learning and growing up, making way too many mistakes along the way. We identify with her vulnerbility. She's one of us.
Oasis makes big, bombastic, loud, and dumb but addictive cocaine rock.
The Offspring has amazingly great pop craftsmen working in the punk medium.
Old Blind Dogs are perhaps the most awesome contemporary traditional Scottish band. They're ferocious live. Plus, they've got rhythm too. What a concept!
OMD. Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark used to have incredible Vision... they once bravely wrote beautiful, unusually-themed but catchy electro-pop songs about, among other things, the telegraph, electricity, genetic engineering, Hiroshima, mysticism, the industrial world, the technological world, Teutonic/ Kraftwerk-type themes, and even the 'romance of the telescope.' Now they (Andy) just do mostly pedestrian boy-girl type songs. Ahh, those were the good old days... but the packaging and layouts are still great though.
Yoko Ono, official. I reckon that I may be of the generation (which may yet to be actualised), who consider her to be more influential in the arts, perhaps even in music, than her famous husband. While I may be a Beatles fanatic just like every other person, I consider her work, in a wide variety of media, to be certainly more thought-provoking and intriguing. Confession: one of my most embarrassing moments in life happened when she graciously autographed my LA Festival John Cage programme in 1987. I commented that I didn't realise that she was also a John Cage fan (she was hanging out with him after the concert). She just smiled and said "of course." I was 14 and did not know any better.
Beth Orton's folky, ambient indie pop is rather hard to classify, but somehow it's very appropriate for cold and wet climates.
Brad Paisley.
Pan sonic. Finnish ambient music from hell.
Dolly Parton, courtesy of Dollymania. Who doesn't love Dolly?
Pavement. A lot of cool sites about the band out there, but this is the official one. Stockton does have a redeemable value after all.
Pernice Brothers play beautiful American music.
Pixies. Official site of one of the greatest pop bands ever. Somehow their stuff never sounds dated. The longer they have been dead, the more awesome they seem to be. KALX anectode: Frank Black's people told the station beforehand that the interview's over if his weight was ever mentioned.
The Pogues.
Portishead's well-designed official site. Be sure to also visit the best unofficial one. Beth is like the female Tom Yorke-- she just needs a hug too.
Post Malone. How can anybody not love Posty?
The Pretenders. What’s so fucking cool about Chrissie Hynde is that she had managed to fulfil a fantasy that many of us have as Americans: to go to Britain, to write for NME, to actually sound British on record, to become a real British rock star, and to kick ass!
Pulp. I must admit that I don't know much about them, but I did see their San Francisco show (21.5.96) which launched their North American tour. Although he always seems like he's on the verge of fainting, Jarvis has got to be one of the coolest guys on the planet. He's "the ice of fashion."
Rancid. Another Berkeley's own, playing great punk pop and ska for ages.
Nathaniel Rateliff makes great American soul roots music.
Stan Rogers. What a tremendous loss. He was a Canadian folk singer-songwriter who died in 1983 in a fire on an Air Canada flight.
Alasdair Roberts.
The Rolling Stones. Everybody knows that they were untouchable between 1968's Beggars Banquet and 1972's Exile, perhaps the greatest run of albums by any band that ever existed. However, they remained gods right until 1978's Some Girls, one of my all-time favourites.
Scritti Politti. They are here not only because they've produced some well-crafted pop songs and possess literate design sensibilities, but also because Green can write songs about Jacques Derrida.
Nina Simone. Don't fuck with her. There's something about her performances that just leaves you devastated.
Social Distortion has been around forever.
Son Volt. Why did we ever feel compelled to choose between Tweedy and Farrar?
Dusty Springfield.
Ralph Stanley and the Clinch Mountain Boys. Ralph Stanley is the last surviving founder / forefather of bluegrass music, and considering that Bill Monroe, Flatt & Scruggs, and Ralph's own brother Carter of the Stanley Brothers have all sadly passed away, his departure would be an unspeakable loss.
Chris Stapleton.
The Streets. Mike Skinner asks whether geezers need excitement? Hell, yeah!
Sturgill Simpson. DDSS, yeah!
Suede. Darkly decadent glamour never sounded so catchy.
Taylor Swift.
Talking Heads, guided by Eno in the late 1970s and early 1980s, really took pop music to some rather strange places. BTW, there's also an interesting David Byrne page here.
Tannahill Weavers. Pipes galore. This is the official site of the greatest current traditional Scottish band.
Teenage Fanclub produces intoxicatingly sweet pop confections. Another band with impeccable British pop craftsmanship.
Texas. Sleek luxury pop, eh? Well, I'm in love. The fansite In Demand is also quite worth a look.
Richard Thompson is the greatest British guitarist / lyricist I can think of.
Travis has a very well-designed official site befitting a great Scottish band. And here's my take on their concert when they performed in Seattle. Incidentally, the band got its name from the Harry Dean Stanton character in the 1984 Wim Wenders film, Paris, Texas.
Randy Travis has an awesome voice, but sometimes he needs to pick his material more carefully, needless to say.
U2. Official site. They're here on this list not because of their unbearably pretentious and oppressively self-righteous old attitude (essentially anything before Rattle and Hum), but because of their current willingness to experiment and try new things out (including their current profile as an ironic, campy, decadent, trendy, Euro-dance / techno / trance outfit with a sense of humour). Having Eno and Lanois as collaborators doesn't hurt either.
Underworld.
Velvet Underground becomes an integral part of your psyche once you reach a certain age, which for me came fairly late strangely enough.
Colter Wall, wow, that voice coming from a wee cowboy lad!
Weezer. There's been a sudden proliferation of sites dedicated to them and to the Rentals. This is one of the better places to start.
Gillian Welch. David Rawlings and Gillian somehow are able to make timeless music. Think Carter Family making a dark turn into leftfield. I almost cried when I first heard her on "Orphan Girl." No small feat.
Wilco.
Amy Winehouse.
Wire.
Kate Wolf. The late, great, almighty songwriter. In addition to being quintessentially, uncannily Northern Californian (if that's ever possible), her intimate music feels so hauntingly beautiful and poignant that I feel strangely possessed everytime I hear it.
Windy Hill, based right here in the Bay Area, plays terrific bluegrass.
Donovan Woods. Canada somehow still manages to produce great singer-songwriter-folksingers. He's one of the best in the business now.
Tammy Wynette. You can hear that little tear at the back of her throat in almost very note she ever sang. It still breaks me up.
XTC. Superb English pop craftsmenship is celebrated and examined at this great fansite.
Yo La Tengo plays beautiful, lonely music.
Yola.
Dwight Yoakam has released increasingly strange records the past few years, and you don't really know what to make of him, which is nice.
Neil Young.
ZZ Top, ending this list on a high note.

Academy of Ancient Music is still led by Christopher Hogwood.
Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin.
Alia-vox is Jordi Savall, Montserrat Figueras, and Hespèrion XXI's own label.
Archiv Produktion is DG's early music label.
Berliner Philharmonker.
Johann Sebastian Bach, courtesy of David Grossman.
Johann Sebastian Bach, courtesy of Jan Hanford. He was the greatest composer, ever. I get instant visceral reactions from listening to Bach. Just a few notes would send shivers of ecstasy.
Bach-Archiv Leipzig is now led by John Eliot Gardiner.
Barbican Centre. You can book seats for performances by all of its residents here.
BBC Radio3 is one of the greatest joys in life.
Berkeley Festival & Exhibition, a biennial orgy of early music at the University of California.
Berkeley Symphony.
John Cage. Ask me about my years as a teenaged new music groupie who got a chance to hang out with the master.
Cal Performances, the always excellent performing arts series at the University of California at Berkeley.
William Christie et son Les Arts Florissants.
Classical Net is an enormous resource that's a good place to begin for almost anything. Its extensive list of links to early music sites is very helpful.
Collegium Vocale Gent as led by Philippe Herreweghe.
Het Concertgebouw in Amsterdam.
Deutsche Grammophon.
De Doelen in Rotterdam.
EMI Classics.
Early music, guided by Todd McComb. You can spend days here, as well as some of his other music sites.
Early Music in America.
Early Music Vancouver.
Early Music Show on Radio 3.
English Baroque Soloists and Monteverdi Choir, essentially John Eliot Gardiner's empire.
The English Concert, the always reliable but not very sexy ensemble led by Trevor Pinnock, was the first baroque concert I have ever attended.
Gewandhausorchester, Leipzig.
Goldberg 'the early-musica portal.'
Glenn Gould.
Georg Friedrich Händel.
Harmonia. "Early music on public radio."
Harmonia Mundi, home of the great Philippe Herreweghe, as well as countless other great early music artists.
Hilliard Ensemble actually gets an unofficial fan site... wow.
Late Junction on Radio 3 features plenty of New Music and unconventional sounds from distant lands and times.
Gustav Leonhardt.
Lorraine Hunt Lieberson... what a loss.
Los Angeles Philharmonic performed the first concerts I ever attended.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. As a general rule of thumb, I tend to be more intrigued by music that came before him than after him. There are tons and tons of exceptions to this rule, of course.
The Musical Offering is a nice little record shop (specialising in early music) and café across from campus. Yet another cool reason to live in Berkeley. Note their clever phone number.
Jessye Norman is the ultimate diva. Nobody even comes close.
Michael Nyman.
Orchestra of the Age of Enlightment is a mouthful.
Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra is the Bay Area's primary early music ensemble.
RIAS Kammerchor, Berlin. It stands for 'Rundfunk im amerikanischen Sektor.'
Royal Opera, Covent Garden.
Jordi Savall is a god.
Seattle Opera is here because I literally gave my blood, sweat, and tears when I worked on its building as a very young architect.
South Bank Centre, which includes the Royal Festival Hall, the Queen Elizabeth Hall, the Purcell Room, and the Hayward Gallery, has a beautifully designed site with a friendly and informative interface. You can book seats for performances by all of its residents here, and you can even preview the sightlines of each seat that you're interested in. I'm quite amazed at how easy the whole process was.
Staatsoper, Berlin.
Staatsoper, Wien.
The Tallis Scholars.
Taverner Choir, Consort & Players.
Virgin Classics. Ever since its debut in 1988, I've always been quite impressed by its repertoire and by the high graphic design standards of its packaging.
Wiener Philharmoniker.

120 years Of Electronic Music: Electronic Musical Instrument 1870 - 1990.
Amoeba Music is one of the reasons why I never have any money left. It amazes me how fast it grew in the 1990s, and it's even more fucking amazing that Amoeba has now opened a branch in Hollywood next to the ArcLight.
Anti- Records is a great American indie with an eclectic roster.
Aquarium Drunkard is a well-curated blog produced by Justin Gage of current and past music topics.
Astralwerks.
Austin City Limits is one of my favourite shows on the telly.
Here's an example of the new flexible BBC logo at work. Cool, eh? Speaking of Radio 1, my favourite presenter easily is Chris Moyles, who actually has his own unofficial fan site, where all of the buzz on/buzz off, song parodies, interviews, jingles, highlights of funny highlights, and countless random bits and selections are archived. Moyles is so funny that he can get a laugh out of me merely by breathing. I simply can't live without this bloke.

Last but not least and Moyles notwithstanding, I’d like to think that I’m listening to Radio 2 more often than Radio 1 these days has to do with the fact that they simply play quality, eclectic music (as opposed to strictly sticking to A/B/C playlists). This change in listening habits is sort of like switching from Smash Hits, NME, and TOTP to reading Uncut, Wire, or Q. Perhaps I’m getting older and a wee stodgier, but where else are you going to hear the latest from the likes of Will Young, the Streets, and Badly Drawn Boy, a classic from Lulu or Kate Bush, a rocker from the Stones, followed by something from R.E.M. or a contemporary American folkie singer-songwriter, all within the space of an hour or so? Where else am I going to hear Pet Shop Boys (or countless other first-rate pop craftsmen neglected by today's teens) on the radio these days? Or blues, jazz, standards, folk, country, celtic, bluegrass sharing the same frequency as old stand-bys like Wogan and Parkie? I may be slightly delusional, but I sincerely don’t think it’s just for mums anymore.
Bear Family. This German label does wonderful reissues of American roots music.
Bluegrass artist profiles. Great place to start exploring the genre.
BPM Culture.
Ceolas: artist profiles. Great place to start exploring the world of Celtic music.
Dirty Linen. This covers the folk music scene.
Down Home Music Store. Roots record store in El Cerrito.
ECM Records. Founded by Manfred Eicher in 1969, Edition of Contemporary Music has the most gorgeously designed sleeves in the world (which how they caught my eye), with music inside to match. "The Most Beautiful Sound Next To Silence", is a very apt motto indeed.
Epitaph. Home of the legendary SoCal indie.
Etoile Polaire is a cool resource for cool Icelandic pop?!
Eyesore. The indispensible 4AD database.
. Yeah, I'm one of those geeks who tries to keep track of all those numbers. This is the ultimate Factory Communications Discography, and it includes not only the musical output, but all output that had been designated with a Factory number. There's also an old mothballed website with its own official Factory catalogue number fac 411 that has various odds and bits.
Fat Wreck Chords.
Folk Scene. Longtime radio programme heard on LA Pacifica station KPFK 90.7 FM. Produced by Roz and Howard Larman, this programme changed my life. Ever since I started listening to the programme back in high school, it has introduced me to so much music (particularly Kate Wolf, Stan Rogers, Nanci Griffith, Steve Goodman, John Gorka, Richatd Thompson, and countless others) that have become a part of my life.
Freestyle Music.Com. This is another cool resource on freestyle.
Freight & Salvage Coffeehouse, a great Berkeley institution, is the McCabe's Guitar Shop of the Bay Area; it's a mandatory stop for renowned bluegrass / folk / roots artists whenever they're in this part of the country.
924 Gilman Street.
Go! Discs.
Greentrax Recordings is a fine label that focuses on traditional Scottish folk music.
Hearts of Space. Ambient, "space music" programme on public radio stations.
HEAVENLY Records. Indie pop kids do believe in magic.
Hopeless Records. Kind of like SoCal's version of Lookout!
House of the Rising Punk has useful links galore.
Hyperreal. Rave on!
Internet Underground Music Archive has been around since the beginning of time.
Interpunk has loads of stuff to sell.
Kill Rock Stars.
KROQ was a big part of my childhood, and this site contains tons of documentation on its history, programming, personalities, and minutiae.
Lookout! Records. Berkeley's own. Fun power pop/ punk label whose bands tend to have a sense of humour.
Luaka Bop. David Byrne's wonderful world music record label is still going strong after more than 20 years, and thank goodness!
Matador Records. Be sure to check out their hilarious e-zine.
metacritic.com. It's a useful clearinghouse site to access the staggering amount of online music and film reviews.
Mod Lang of Berkeley is perhaps the best Anglophile pop music store where you can even get U.K. singles on the same release date as in Britain. Their buyers are simply amazing. This store is very much part of being an ardent music fan in the East Bay. You would come in every other day just to check out new import singles releases or bug the clerks about getting more 7"s or CD2s that you absolutely must have.
Mo' Wax Recordings has a flashy and entertaining site.
Much Music is Canada's music video channel that actually plays music videos. Novel concept, eh?
New Musical Express. It's partly why pop music is so fun and addictive.
New Red Archives. Cool SF punk label.
No Depression.
Oh Boy Records. John Prine and the late Steve Goodman's label.
Parlophone. The illustrious and generally terrific EMI flagship label.
Phat Mix. This site is a cool intro to freestyle.
Popped is a fun collection of articles featuring everyone from Fugazi to Pet Shop Boys. Definitely stop here if you really, really love pop music.
Punk Rock 101.
Real World is Peter Gabriel's highly-regarded organisation dedicating to music from around the world. Needless to say, I'm floored by how beautifully designed the packaging of some releases are.
Record Surplus on Pico is a place I go only once every three years or so, but I still love this store. While it's now much better organised and cleaner, the selections are perhaps not as cool. They used to have mountains of trash with plenty of treaures to find, if you decide to dig. Now the mountains are gone, and perhaps some of the store's low-fi appeal. For some people, the hunt is as worthwhile as the kill. They've really reduced the amount of time you need to dig through the trash to find your treasure, but the adolescent thrill of digging is completely gone. However, the prices are still cool, and it is, after all, one of the last places in L.A. to have a considerable amount of vinyl to sell.
Rounder Records is the current American folk and roots music giant.
Stiff Records. "Everything you wanted to know about Stiff Records but were afraid to ask!" This site is dedicated to one of the best (as well as one of the most British) labels ever.
Sub Pop.
The Supersonic Guide. Very useful comprehensive links to British bands.
Sugar Hill, the great American roots music label.
Techno Online.
The Thistle & Shamrock. I've been listening to this NPR programme for as long as I can remember, and needless to say, it has had a tremendous affect on my musical preferences over the years.
Thrill Jockey is my favourite American indie.
Topic Records. The catalogue of this British folkie indie is astonishing, especially from the 70s and early 80s.
Top of the Pops.
UK charts. Ed Sheeran and streaming broke the charts a few years ago. Before then, the anticipation and excitement of singles coming and going, and their moving up and down the charts provided a leitmotif for my life, and weekly expert commentary and guidance by the great James Masterton supplied the perspective to the continuous drama. Alas, when you have seven or eight tracks by the same artist in the 'singles' chart, what's the point of it all?
Warped Tour. No sensory deprivation here.
The incredibly cool home of Warp Records.
World Wide Punk!. Internet Punk Directory. Punk links galore.
Yep Roc Records is a great American indie with an eclectic roster.
ZTT Records, Trevor Horn's label.

he following programmes were originally aired on KALX Berkeley 90.7 FM. They are usually a good indicator of what I'm currently listening to. I can usually be heard on Sunday nights / Monday mornings from 01.00 to 03.30 A.M.

19 July 1997

hese are links devoted to the infamous annual pop survey compilations we make each year at Christmastime for friends and family. More content will be forthcoming here whenever we have some time to delve back into the archives for some research. Here they are, in chronological order, starting from the earliest compilations: