how to lose all your $$$

look through Latitudes releases and think hey i wonder how that band would sound doing a 'sessions' record, ya know, more, like, spontaneous or whatever and then get excited about that thought and buy all of the Latitudes releases ever

Latitudes 'sessions' are honest and snapshot like or document like. The appeal is the immediacy of the artists' ideas, songs, and performances, free from the conceptual drag of the 'album'

I'm gonna buy them all (ever). These are the three I've got so far:

Mount Eerie - Black Wooden (2010)

Because intimacy and stuff. I'm not the biggest fan of Phil Elverum and I don't mean that in the way that actually means I do not like Phil Elverum. What I mean is, I like what I like by him and haven't heard most of his output. I read the reviews on this just before and could copy+paste+reword what they say about certain songs being performed or reworded themselves in different ways for the Latitudes 'sessions', but like nah, Black Wooden is stripped-down folksy renditions of songs born of isolation, appealing to the folk-fan's want for stripped-down folksiness. In light of last year's two fantastic epics, Black Wooden appeals all the more in its folksy simplicity, humanizing the musician and his songs

B+

try / buy

Grails - Interpretations of Three Psychedelic Rock Songs From Around the World (2005)

Because I have an OH SO HARD relationship with postrock that is to say i think it's stupid most of the time as stupid as the name and the idea of being able to group all that under the name postrock which is what i'm doing but what i mean is if it can be called postrock then it's stupid or i just don't like it it's because of that HARD relationship that Grails occasionally blow my dick off how stupid by the way to say that by the way but Grails have never done a great album because they either don't think about the album as a whole and then they rock out inconsistently or they think about it too much and subsequently don't make good songs which is a shame because they make Sun City Girls and weed and metal all make sense in one go and here it's like they don't have the chance to reflect or overthink because it's a sessions so all they have to do is react to the request for a "document a moment in time" which for them musically is a nonsense time somewhere in space but is a document of a time where they think in a nonsense time somewhere in space chilling with Flower Travellin' Band, Gong, and The Byrds high as fuck Dirty Three Sun City record features a cool etching on the b side

A

try / buy

Magik Markers - The Voldoror Dance (2006)

As tempting as it is to pick out the the individual components and influences running through a Magik Markers record, the fact seems to be that we are dealing with a whirlwind and all else is redundant:

“I don’t give two splats of an old negro junkie’s vomit for your politico-philosophical treatises, kiddies. I like noise. I like big-ass vicious noise that makes my head spin. I wanna feel it whipping through me like a fucking jolt. We’re so dilapidated and crushed by our pathetic existence we need it like a fix.” - Steve Albini

A-

try / buy