New direction/experiment/motivation.

I miss music. I used to listen to it a lot.

I mean music with some aspect of concrete nature. Not just the sound associated with and representing it, but with the physical manifestation of it. The disc, be it shiny and silver or matte black; or the cassette or whatever. Jewel cases and sleeves and liner notes with useful contents and sometimes empty pages.

I miss that, which is more ironic than disingenuous.

All that physical music I acquired I took shit care of, even before Compu-Tor the destroyer came along. I got my shit scratched fast because I was prone to stacking and spilling and drinking and smoking near.

I also miss writing about music.

So here I sit, freshly returned from the Electric Fetus. I decided that I would buy a new album a week and write at least 500 words regarding whatever the hell it was.

I actually bought three: two used that I knew well but never owned, and the one new to fulfill my new forced hobby.

Trans Am's Future World and Lungfish's Talking Songs For Walking are known quantities to me, representative of that '90s indie realm that I hold so dear.

Unfortunately, my selection for a new record to go over was tough.

Everything there looked like crap. I suppose listening to the new Liars at a listening post in a record store is not the ideal exposure, but I was just as bored with that one as I was with their first one while driving around Sioux City with Scott when it first came out.

I wasn't feeling the new Gorillaz, and though I was tempted by the new Quasi record since they're playing St. Paul soon, it just didn't feel right either.

I figured I had a better chance striking gold with a wholly unknown quantity.

I ended up grabbing an album called Big Echo by some band called the Morning Benders. The art was kinda neat, and given that I can like a morning nip or two, I thought I might get along with them.

A passive absorption of the first five songs is not wholly promising.

Let me absorb it and I'll tell you what it is and what I think.