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The Way We Listen Now

Okay, read this: The Decade in Music: The Way We Listen Now, from NPR’s “All Things Considered.”

I know what Sasha Frere-Jones means when he says, “There are days where I don’t know what to do.”

The limitless exposure to new music offered by the Internet is staggering, can be paralyzing, painfully overwhelming. It's as if we can have anything we want. And, of course, we want it all. The decline of physical media has changed our relationship with music. As Maura Johnston says, we no longer struggle to find space for it all; we now struggle to make time.

But,…

The Way We Listened Then

Have you read that, yet? Okay, now read this: “Reconsidering the Revival of Cassette Tape Culture,” by PopMatters’ Calum Marsh.

If the idea of a “cassette tape revival” completely freaks you out, then think back to our July 2009 interview with Thurston Moore, guitarist of Sonic Youth. When the conversation turned to preferred music formats, Moore, a fan of the vinyl LP, admitted to finding the most new music via cassette tape:

I’m really into bands who put out stuff on cassette only. There’s still a cassette underground that puts out a lot of the best music I hear…

The Labor of Love

I wonder if Karen, over at Other Music, has gotten around to listening to Sex Worker’s The Labor of Love. I’d like to tell her about it. I probably wouldn’t tell her like this:

“PTSD” (for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, perhaps?) begins with scintillating and warbling minimalist electronics and subtle washes of restrained feedback, all gradually building and building into a cacophony of maniacal screams, demented moans, and horror movie organ. It sounds like the sort of stuff that would be trapped within the deranged mind. (I’m imagining.) A horrifying howl grows from the…

Intermission

A few things:

1. January issues are in. Woo! We’ve been shipping our February issue. We’ll still be shipping our February issue next week. At the same time, we’ve already started work on the March issue.

What month is this, really? I’m confused.

2. For a brief, wondrous moment earlier today, the number of people following the Stereophile Twitter page reached 100. My heart soared! Immediately after, however, we dropped back down to 99. What the? My heart broke a little bit. It’s weird, this Internet. But no worries: The number of followers has been…

Number Three

Oh yeah: Matador's having a holiday sale.

The label has released some of the best new music of the year: Sonic Youth, Times New Viking, Girls, Cold Cave, Yo La Tengo. And don't forget past years: Cat Power, Fucked Up, Pavement, Mogwai, Belle and Sebastian. And, really, so much more.

Do it!

Iris Records Closes

Where did I hide that Replacements record, dammit?

A message from Steve Gritzan of Jersey City’s Iris Records:

yes folks, the time has come. i've decided to pack in the retail side of the business. the reasons are numerous: slumping sales (the recession?), the onslaught of technology, the endless brunswick street blues (most other businesses have shuttered), but the primary reason is that i am looking to shift things around in my own life. i'm not leaving the record and cd business at all (or this space), but the pressure of running a retail store (even just two or…

Best Jazz of the Year (and the Decade)

My annual piece on the Best Jazz Albums of the Year appears in today’s edition of Slate (for which I write a regular column, though usually on foreign and military policy). This time, I also drew up two lists of the Best Jazz Albums of the Decade—one for new recordings, the other for previously unreleased historical recordings (treasure troves of which were excavated this past 10 years). Readers of this blog may recall reading about most of these albums in this space.

In the Slate piece (see the External Link below), I included 30-second sound clips for each of the best albums of 2009.…

Why Cassettes?

I was introduced to Scotch Tapes, “the worst hi-tech music label ever,” on December 9, by a Twitter post from Jagjaguwar. Oneida would be releasing a limited-edition cassette through Scotch Tapes. This was interesting news to me, first because I’ve been fascinated with the idea of a “cassette tape revival,” and second because Oneida is a well-established name in the world of underground rock bands. Why would Oneida release work on a format that had been all but forgotten by the music industry? Why cassettes?

As soon as I had asked myself the stupid question, the obvious answer…

White Man's Blues

John Hammond has always been a strange case. Son of the legendary record producer and scout John Hammond Sr. who worked with Billie Holiday, Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen, young John who sang and played guitar staked out a difficult piece of musical turf when he decided to make playing acoustic Delta–styled blues on the National Steel guitar his signature move.

Because acoustic blues only appeals to a fairly limited crowd—the old beer and biker bar crowd like their blues electrified—Hammond’s career has been low key. Larger success has alluded him which is not a…

The Jazz Book of the Year

The jazz book of the year is called, simply,Jazz. Written by Gary Giddins, the best living jazz critic, and Scott DeVeaux, one of the most astute jazz historians, it’s a vital reference for those well versed in the subject and an essential guide for those who get lost in its thickets and want to know how to listen to the music so that it at least makes sense.

There are plenty of jazz encyclopedias and histories out there. What’s distinctive about this book is that it takes you through the century’s sweep of jazz—its soloists, singers, and sidemen, its innovators and embellishers, its…