Friday Playlist 3

It's been a while since I did one of these - a list of the albums I am listening to at the moment. (Earlier ones are here and here).

The music which is forming the soundtrack for my life at the moment is:

1. Nine Horses - Money for all

I bought the original album 'Snow Borne Sorrow' a while back when it came out. This new release is a mixture of new tracks (3 of them) and remixes of tracks from the album. David Sylvian works well in the mix with Steve Jansen and Burnt Friedman. It's a CD which slowly burns into your memory banks and demands replays.

2. Tom Waits - Orphans

This had such amazing reviews, that I couldn't wait to get hold of a copy. I got it for Christmas, and have been dipping into it ever since. Three hours of Tom Waits, meandering all over his various muscial styles, voices and topics. The third CD is probably the weirdest (saying something where Waits is concerned!) as it mixes stories, poems and soundtrack outtakes. The whole CD set is a mammoth thing which surprisingly hangs together.

3. Ketil Bjornstad /David Darling - Epigraphs

This is a stunning album of improvisations between piano and cello. It shifts from modern ambient, cool jazz to echoes of Bach and Mozart. Great music for thinking and creating.

4. Joanna Newsom - Ys

It's an epic album, full of stories and threads of ideas. The orchestration by Van Dyke Parks is amazing and the whole thing is a labryinth which reveals new secrets on each listen.

5. Joanna Newsom - The Milk Eyed Mender

Well, the new album took me into the first one. This is a much starker arrangement. Her voice is somewhere between Bjork, Kate Bush and Tori Amos. But it has its own unique territory too! I love the lyrics, and I love the arrangements for each song.

6. Badly Drawn Boy - About a Boy

I know he has a new album out - and no, I haven't heard it yet. But I saw the film of which this is the soundtrack again recently, and was drawn back to this album. Damon Gough carves out his own furrow. But above all else, he writes great melodies. I absolutely love the song 'Silent Sigh', used at a particularly painful moment in the film.

7. Fennesz - Endless Summer

I came to Fennesz's work through a collaboration he did with David Sylvian. He is a guitarist and laptop improviser from Austria. This album is truly beautiful - it rises gently out of a backround of noise and captures you like a stunning sunrise on a crisp morning.

8. John Cale - Black Acetate

An eclectic mix of styles, some killer riffs and a giant bag of seething energy. And the production is stunning. I'm not particularly precious about production values - but this one just reaches out of the speakers and grabs you by the throat.

9. Paul Weller - Stanley Road

I'm not sure how I missed this when it first came out. Last year I bought the anniversary edition and have listened to it so many times since. What a classic album!

10. Sigur Ros - Takk

I know I have chosen this album before on this blog, but it really does tease out new things on each listen. Earlier this week I spent an evening listening really carefully to it through headphones and there is so much going on in the mix that I hadn't heard before.