Depeche Mode: The Singles 81>85

I saw Depeche Mode on the 86>98 tour, despite the fact that I'd never been a fan of the band. But my friend Mitch was going, and my friend Zanna was going, and they were bouncing off the walls at the prospect, so I invented some enthusiasm and went along. (As a side note, I bought my tickets the same day that I went to attend an Asian music festival in Hermann Park, which is why I ended up walking all the way back home from there to the University of Houston dorms.)

Much later, Zanna and Mitch got engaged, but broke it off before the wedding. Maybe that's what happens when you go to see Depeche Mode, as opposed to, say, The Captain & Tennille.

The show ended up being the beginning of a very real interest in the group, one that continues more than a decade later. And 81>85 is one I've come back to often. As a synth player, I love the squiggly keyboards of "Dreaming of Me" and the Some Bizarre version of "Photographic." "Somebody," on the other hand, brings back the memories of discussing with my friend πρ whether or not the final line, "in a case like this, I'll get away with it," meant that the whole song was in fact an expression of a deep and bitter sarcasm, which would make the fact that many girls we knew thought it was the BEST. LOVE SONG. EVER. pleasurably ironic.

Release year: 1998
Acquired in: 1999?
Favorite tracks: Dreaming of Me, Photographic [Some Bizarre Version], Just Can't Get Enough.

Primal Scream, Screamadelica

Before I was 14 or so (which would be 1994), I didn't listen to anything except oldies radio and classical, spiced with the occasional country cut when my mom was in that sort of mood. As such, I don't have any "at the time" memories of music before that, and so I can only explain coming upon it later.

Screamadelica was one of those records that by 2004 or so I eventually felt like I had to buy -- I love dance and dance-rock, and this album is widely regarded as a seminal dance-rock album. That said, while I admire Primal Scream's work on this one, it's never really caught my ear, and I rarely listen to any of it outside of "Movin' on Up" and sometimes "Loaded." It's historically important, and I'm happy to have it in my collection for that reason if nothing else, but that in and of itself doesn't bring it to the front of my queue very often.

Release year: 1991
Purchased in: 2004?
Favorite tracks: Movin' on Up

That Obligatory Post o' Introduction

The whole reason I'm writing this blog, I suppose, is that I'm both a music fan and (at least in the technical sense of the word) a writer. Among my projects was writing album reviews for Superstarcastic, and I really enjoy working in that format. But lately, I've been having a hard time writing, and generally just not feeling very inspired. I'm hoping that a new project based on something I love might help break me out of my rut.

So, in this space, I've decided to try and write a brief piece about each disc in my CD collection. (Yes, I still buy CDs -- I never listen to them after I upload them to my computer and iPod, but I do like how they look on my shelves.) The goal is for me not to just write a review of the album, but to talk a little about how I found it, where I got it, and what it's meant to me (which is sometimes everything, and sometimes almost nothing). In order to keep things at least somewhat varied, I'm using a random number generator to determine what order the albums will go in.

I have no idea whether this project will be of any interest to anyone but me, but if you somehow find this blog and find it of value to you, feel free to comment, or look me up at my last.fm page.