Category — guitar

It was cool that Simon mentioned Jeff Buckley’s Hallelujah rendition on American Idol.

It’s really hard to believe that Jeff’s been gone for almost 11 years … what a great loss … so much potential. Well, at least we’ve got Grace and the other great recordings that he did around that time.
Jeff Buckley

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Five CD box set comprising EPs released around the world at the time of the Grace album & subsequent tour, 2 of these have never been released commercially & are real collector’s items selling for high prices on internet auction sites. They feature alternative versions from the album plus many non-album tracks, live versions & remixes. Mary Guilbert, Jeff’s mother, is providing liner notes, together with contributions from the other 3 band members. There are also rare or unseen photos included on the inner slipcase. 19 tracks - 14 non-album tracks/versions, over 2.5 hours of playing time. The titles are - Live From The Bataclan, the Grace EP (Australian Tour), Last Goodbye (Japanese EP), So Real (Dutch Promo) & Peyote Radio Theatre (Promo). Paper sleeves housed in an elegant slipcase. Columbia. 2002.

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And the original near-perfect record in it’s original form. At many points in this record you’d swear he’s calling for his untimely demise that would unfortunately happen only three years later

Jeff Buckley

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Resembling at times a soft-sung Robert Plant, Buckley was an intuitive vocalist capable of dizzying arabesques and choir-boy sweetness. He is joined here by a tight band for 10 tracks highlighting his stylistic range–Pearl Jam bluesy on “Eternal Life,” impossibly serene on Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah,” art-school noisy on “So Real,” Led Zep daring on “Mojo Pin.” Unorthodox, this was the debut of ‘94. –Jeff Bateman

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Joni Mitchell

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45tunes.com says: Joni’s Blue is an absolute masterpiece. Alanis, Tori, and a lot of other great artists owe a lot to this nearly perfect record …

Joni Mitchell would go on from this ‘71 recording to make more popular, more ambitious, and more challenging albums, but she’s never made a better one. Working with minimal accompaniment (Stephen Stills and James Taylor are two of the four sidemen), the Canadian thrush summoned an involving song cycle of romance found and lost. Though Blue is an uncommonly intimate representation, it’s also astonishingly open and gracious. Songs such as “All I Want,” “Carey,” “California,” and “A Case of You” work equally well as poetry and pop music. –Steve Stolder

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Gorillaz

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45tunes.com says: “Demon Days” is one of the funnest records of the 2000’s.

Gorillaz Photos

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Gorillaz	G-Sides	Spacemonkeyz Vs. Gorillaz: Laika Come Home
Gorillaz - Phase One - Celebrity Take Down	Gorillaz - Phase Two - Slowboat to Hades	Demon Days Live

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Buckethead

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45tunes.com says: Buckethead records can be hit or miss, there are great ones and there are other ones that are “not so much”. But the song “Pin Bones and Poultry” from “Somewhere Over the Slaughterhouse” is one of the funkiest, whackiest grooves ever. I’ve never really head much buzz about this tune, I don’t know if it is universally loved, but it should be.

If you don’t have anything by Buckethead, make sure you check out the sorta-supergroup album Praxis: Transmutation (Mutatis Mutandis)

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Nick Drake

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The options where Nick Drake is concerned are limited, but wholly appealing. The downhearted singer-songwriter released only three albums in his 26 years; the posthumous rarities collection, Time of No Reply, rounds out his abbreviated oeuvre. The whole lot is contained in the exemplary four-disc Fruit Tree box set. Way to Blue is a scaled-back option for those who are enchanted by Drake’s intricate yet cozy lamentations, but feel no need to join the ever-growing legion of Drake completists. But while the 16 songs included here provide a fine introduction to the ill-fated Englishman’s work (which seems to fit together no matter how it’s sequenced), Drake is one of those rare artists whose entire catalog is worth owning due to its excellence and, sadly, its brevity. –Steven Stolder

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Beck

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45tunes.com says: This is not like any of the other Beck records. Clearly this one finds Beck serious, mellow and pretty depressed. But it is great. Just great. Great for a cold rainy day while you’re sipping coffee and gazing out the window.

Beck is bummed. Really bummed. And if song titles such as “Lost Cause,” “Lonesome Tears,” “Already Dead,” and “Nothing I Haven’t Seen” don’t make the point, his achingly sad lyrics and Sea Change’s unerringly downcast sound do. While 1998’s Mutations–arguably the singer-songwriter’s masterwork and Sea Change’s spiritual cousin–was filled with unflinching self-examination, moments of levity were found in songs like “Tropicalia.” Not so on Sea Change. Beck’s woozy, almost narcoleptic delivery seems to amplify the set’s sense of ennui. But sad isn’t necessarily bad, and despite the somber tone, there’s much to praise, not the least of which is the return of producer Nigel Goderich (Mutations, Radiohead), who wraps Beck’s gloom in a dreamy, warm blanket of soft strings and floating bleeps and gurgles. Like Daniel Lanois, Goderich is all about vibe, and even Beck’s most bare-bones songs benefit from billowy atmospherics. That’s especially true of “Paper Tiger,” a restless, slowly building epic improbably propelled by a languid orchestra and Beck’s expressionless drone. The inky black feel of “Round the Bend”–a glacially slow dirge with muffled vocals–may be the darkest thing Beck’s ever written, not counting the very grim “Already Dead.” Whatever’s going on in Beck’s world, at least we know he’s purging, which, all things considered, may be better for his soul than ours. –Kim Hughes

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Radiohead

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45tunes.com says:
“The Bends” is Radiohead’s first GREAT record (and they’ve had several more since then). Newer fans who’ve never heard “The Bends”, you’ve GOTTA get it!

amazon.com editorial review:
While Radiohead saw its stock rising in 1994, it wasn’t until 1995’s The Bends that it really became a blue chip band. And for good reason. The quintet honed its talent for bombastic Brit Rock, yet still preserved an edge of unpredictability. Even singles like the title track didn’t give in to the kind of swooning guitar clichés usually embraced by commercial radio. If the CD proved anything, it was that Radiohead could find solid ground between pop experimentation and the tradition of born-in-the-bone, balls-out rock. –Nick Heil

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While Neon Bible was pretty good, it’s impossible to top their deservedly over-hyped debut Funeral. My vote for the best of the 2000’s (so far).
Arcade Fire

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Montreal’s Arcade Fire brings a theatricality, an intensity, an insanity, and a penchant for amazing hooks to their debut full-length. You’ve never heard such energy, beauty, and emotion from such a young band. Fans of Neutral Milk Hotel, Broken Social Scene, and Roxy Music’s first two albums will have a new favorite band.

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My Bloody Valentine

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My Bloody Valentine’s entire career has been aiming toward the perfect guitar noise that Kevin Shields has in his head: a pure, warm, androgynous but deeply sexual rush of sound. Loveless is overwhelming, with Shields and Bilinda Butcher’s guitars and voices blending into each other until they become a distant orchestra, the rhythm section striding in majestic lockstep, and occasional bursts of dance rhythms (as on the single “Soon”) buoying the live instruments’ warp and drift. Furiously loud but seductive rather than aggressive, the album flows like a lava stream from one track into another, subsuming everything in the mix into its blissful roar, and pulsing like a lover’s body. –Douglas Wolk

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Prince

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45tunes.com says: My favorite Prince record. Crazy great pop and rock variety from “Starfish and Coffee” to “Housequake” to “The Cross” to “Forever in My Life” to “I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man” to “It” to U Got the Look”; Sign O’ The Times has got it all. Prince is firing on all cylinders.

amazon.com editorial review:
It begins with the insistent drip-drop of a sequencer and ends with some old school R&B. In between, the artist who was still calling himself Prince unfurls an encyclopedia of moods, genres, and grooves. Widely heralded as a groundbreaker in 1987, when it was released, some of the music in oh-so-’80s synths sounds a bit dated. Yet this two-CD set is clearly the sound of a performer at the height of his power. On songs like the title track, “If I Was Your Girlfriend,” and the thunderous “The Cross,” Prince proves why the hype was justified. –Amy Linden

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