söndag 14 Aug 2011, 12:46
1. How did you get into 31? (UVERworld)
D-tecnoLife was the second opening theme to Bleach. I loved the song and sought out more of their music, which at the time was very little (on a major label and thus available, that is). They've kinda disappointed me since but still have lots of great songs, and come up with new great ones every now and then too.
2. What was the first song you ever heard by 22? (Czesław Śpiewa)
That would have been either Ucieczka z wesołego miasteczka or Maszynka do świerkania, depending on whether I listened to the lead single before getting the album; I forget. Either one would have been enough to completely win me over, though.
3. What is your favorite lyric by 29? (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
Hah, tough one: no matter what, it'd be off of Stadium Arcadium, though. There's "you're talking like a lady but you're walking like a sauerkraut" from Storm in a Teacup, or "I saw you there so unaware / those hummingbirds all in your hair" or "right on the verge, just one more dose / I'm traveling from coast to coast / my theory isn't perfect but it's close," both from Wet Sand. Then there's also "read me your scripture and I will twist it / show me your wrist and I'll kiss it, kiss it" (21st Century), and "I've got a brother making trouble in the state of California / I wish I knew other way but I'm gonna have to clone ya" (Readymade). So many great lines on that record!
4. What is your favorite album by 49? (Brand New)
Daisy, far and away. The others don't compare (although The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me is amazing, too! I just like Daisy that much better yet).
5. How many albums by 13 do you own? (Big D and the Kids Table)
No hard copies, actually, though I should at some point pick up Strictly Rude and Fluent in Stroll.
6. What is your favorite song by 50? (Roger Waters)
Each Small Candle, no question. That one's right up there with the best Pink Floyd songs.
7. Is there a song by 39 that makes you sad? (Dispatch)
Oh, hm… Broken American is sort of bittersweet, but its awesomeness/badass-factor keeps it from being sad per se. In a solo Chadwick Stokes rendition, no doubt it would be. As for the old stuff, I don't listen to it anymore, so I can't recall.
8. What is your favorite album by 15? (Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young)
Well, Déjà Vu is the only one I know, but it's impossible that either of their later two efforts will hold a candle to it. Same with just Crosby, Stills & Nash, for that matter; I definitely prefer album artist=Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young]Déjà Vu to CSN's debut.
9. What is your favorite song by 5? (菅野よう子)
Now that's really hard. My readymade answer is hounds, but some close runner-ups include ELM, MYUNG Theme, Lily - 月を見ても咲かない百合, strangers, Blend in… I could go on.
10. Is there a song by 6 that makes you happy? (Buffalo Springfield)
Lots! They're a pretty upbeat group, with some Neil Young melancholia shot through… but one that always puts a smile on my face is Kahuna Sunset. A Child's Claim to Fame is another surefire one.
11. What is your favorite album by 40? (The Decemberists)
The Hazards of Love is the only album of theirs that I would consider truly great, so of course it's my favorite too.
12. What is your favorite song by 10? (Pink Floyd)
Echoes: it's my favorite song by any artist anywhere, in fact.
13. What is a good memory you have involving 30? (Animal Collective)
Listening to Feels while driving through the North Country and stopping to buy milkshakes for C. and me. There's also that amazing, stormy night I was driving back from Newark International Airport with Strawberry Jam on. Both from the summer of 2009, which saw the height of my Animal Collective phase.
14. What is your favorite song by 38? (Denny Laine)
Only just started getting into his solo stuff… Japanese Tears is great once you tune out the atrocious lyrics. As for his work with Wings, that'd be No Words or Deliver Your Children.
15. Is there a song by 19 that makes you happy? (Grateful Dead)
Oh yes, just about all of them, really! Althea and Sugar Magnolia, perhaps, top the list in terms of the how-happy-they-make-me factor. This question reminds me how absurd it is that the Dead are only 19 on my charts, though, seeing as they're actually my favorite band.
16. How many times have you seen 25 live? (Poco)
Hahaha, funny that… once, but long before I knew of them. They were (co?)headlining the first Conifer Music Festival out in Colorado, back in 2008 I suppose. I was busy playing frisbee, but remember really digging the music—and no wonder, eh? Would've loved to see them back in their prime, though, when both Richie Furay and Jim Messina (two of the founders, after all) were in the group. Deliverin' is a good indicator of how incredible that would have been!
17. What is the first song you ever heard by 23? (Cloud Cult)
No One Said It Would Be Easy, followed by The Tornado Lessons and When Water Comes to Life. I remember driving somewhere with Zaya one night, after he'd already told me about them, and he played me these three tracks to show me how awesome of a band they are. I found all three stunning.
18. What is your favorite album by 11? (Ringo Starr)
Ringo, from 1973. His only flawless album, of those I've heard so far anyway. Incredibly charming record! Also the first full album I ever listened to by a solo Beatle.
19. Who is a favorite member of 1? (Wings)
Why, Paul McCartney, of course. But every single one of Denny Laine's contributions to the band, be they songwriting or vocals or guitar, is also gold.
20. Have you ever seen 14 live? (Stephen Stills)
I was born too late for that, I'm afraid—the man's voice is pretty much gone. Still, when I saw the venues he will be playing in October, I was almost convinced to buy a ticket and try to find a way down to Baltimore or up to Burlington; but no can do. Too bad his New York date is expensive and in some big theatre.
21. What is a good memory involving 27? (Radiohead)
The ten-day anticipation period of In Rainbows was pretty magical, what with its being their first new album since I became a fan, and a big deal in its own right. Then there's the time a thunderstorm outside matched all the ebbs and flows of OK Computer, as I listened… or, most recently, listening to The King of Limbs the morning it came out and realizing that it was easily one of the most beautiful albums I ever heard. Or that one afternoon, late August of 2007, when I was strung out on days without sleep and listening to Cuttooth on repeat, and it felt like the song was morphing its way into new dimensions with every listen.
22. What is your favorite song by 16? (ASIAN KUNG-FU GENERATION)
Not sure, but definitely in the top five, and the first one that comes to mind, is ブルートレイン.
23. What is the first song you ever heard by 47? (久石譲)
Oh, wow. Who knows… would've been the main theme either to Nausicaa or to Laputa, though, probably. I still remember the shock of recognition I had when I first watched Laputa, all those years after I first got into Studio Ghibli, which means that Pete must have either watched that movie around me or had the soundtrack, or something.
24. What is your favorite lyric by 12? (Arctic Monkeys)
Lots of good ones! Alex Turner was an excellent lyricist from the get-go. A few of my most recent favorites are "now, it's getting dark and the sky looks sticky / more like black treacle than tar / black treacle, somebody told the stars "you're not coming out tonight" / and so they found a place to hide" (Black Treacle), "home sweet home, home sweet home, home sweet booby trap" (The Hellcat Spangled Shalalala), and "that's not a skirt, girl, that's a sawn-off shotgun / and I can only hope you're pointing it at me" (Suck It and See). Then there's the entirety of Cornerstone, as well as "my propeller won't spin / and I can't get it started it on my own / when are you arriving?" from My Propeller, with all its amusing implications… a lot of it is in the delivery too, such as the uber-dramatic "and I've seen him / talking with your lady friend" in Catapult. Obviously all this is to say that I don't have a single favorite lyric.
25. What is a good memory involving 3? (Neil Young)
Well how about just this morning, getting up at 6AM to a beautiful gray & rainy day, still murky outside, and listening to the magnificent Harvest for the first time. I've only been listening to this guy's music for, what, three months? but there's already lots of great memories: driving around Tulsa listening to Live at the Fillmore East, or After the Gold Rush as I was driving across South Park in Colorado and it was getting dark, or listening to Flying on the Ground is Wrong with Terry in New Mexico one late summer night. Lots more memories yet to be formed, too, no doubt.
26. What is your favorite song by 26? (The Beach Boys)
Of those I've heard, Good Vibrations is definitely the best, but Vegetables is my favorite.
27. What was the first song you ever heard by 20? (植松伸夫)
Probably Opening Theme from FF6, as it played over the game's opening sequence. I imagine I would've been sitting & watching with Pete while that was going down for the first time… but I can't be sure of that, either. Some early FF6 track, anyway.
28. Who is a favorite member of 44? (Goo Goo Dolls)
Robby Takac, for sure! The man never lost touch. I would so love a solo album from him; too many Johnny Rzeznik clunkers are crowding out great Robby songs on Goo Goo Dolls album these days (this has only happened on the last two, but unfortunately it doesn't look like they're going to return to the old mode).
29. What is your favorite lyric by 48? (Wild Beasts)
I don't listen to these guys for their lyrics, nor have I listened to them enough to pick up on any, either good or bad, so I can't say.
30. Is there a song by 2 that makes you sad? (The Beatles)
Well, there are lots that make me happy! I don't think there are any that have made me explicitly sad, but they certainly have several excellent tracks that are kinda melancholy, or bittersweet: Long, Long, Long, Something, Across the Universe, Because.
31. Is there a song by 32 that makes you happy? (The Byrds)
Not explicitly. They're more of a mellow, even downer band if anything, at least based on the songs of theirs I know (those that in some way involve David Crosby as songwriter—and goodness knows he's not prone to writing happy songs).
32. What is the worst song by 18? Gov't Mule
I like all of the ones I know well, but there were several on the two volumes of The Deep End that didn't catch my fancy; but I've only listened to those once or twice, so they may grow on me yet. There may be some early stuff I dislike too, but I don't know. Do the throwaway remixes on Mighty High count?
33. What is your favorite album by 8? (John Lennon)
Plastic Ono Band, with all its competition far away. Mind Games and Imagine are both great, too, as is Walls and Bridges aside from that terribly confused track listing, but none of them hold a candle to the transcendent excellence & power of Plastic Ono Band.
34. What is your favorite song by 21? (The John Butler Trio)
Better Than is just amazing, pretty much a perfect pop song. The banjo makes it.
35. What is a good memory involving 45? (菊田裕樹)
Every single time I've played Secret of Mana and Seiken Densetsu 3! But one of my favorites is listening to selected tracks off of the SD3 soundtrack with Pete, before we'd played (or gotten) the game, and agreeing that Powell would be perfect for a Rabite Forest-type area, and envisioning the way they'd be bouncing back and forth to the beat… we were mistaken as far as actual placement of the track, but it totally would have worked our way too!
36. What is your favorite lyric by 34? (Syd Barrett)
All of 'em? But to cite a single exemplary line, perhaps the king of them all: "please leave us here / close our eyes for the octopus ride" (Octopus). And another, since I can't help myself: "I've got a bike, you can ride it if you like / It's got a basket, a bell that rings, and things to make it look good / I'd give it to you if I could but I borrowed it" (Bike.
37. How many times have you seen 42 live? (Sufjan Stevens)
Never, nor do I expect to in the future. Too expensive, plus there's too much of his catalogue that I'm not really a fan of.
38. What is your favorite song by 36? (Among Criminals)
I think it'd be War, with Memories and Chapter: Nothing, Verse: Nothing right up there too.
39. What was the first song you ever heard by 28? (光田康典)
A Premonition, presumably, but that's not at all certain. Whatever the background music the first time I saw my brother playing Chrono Trigger, which may have been the opening screen, but may have also been any other tune from relatively early on.
40. What is your favorite album by 7? (George Harrison)
All Things Must Pass, without question. The truly perfect double album is a rare thing, but George pulls it off here. At the moment it ranks as my #5 favorite album overall!
41. Is there a song by 33 that makes you happy? (Metallica)
Happy isn't exactly an emotion associate with Metallica, so not exactly. But many are the songs of theirs that it makes me happy to hear, since I like the band a lot… I don't think that's quite what the question is after, though.
42. What is your favorite album by 41? (John Frusciante)
Don't know most of them yet, but of those I do, DC EP and A Sphere in the Heart of Silence are both very good. Neither is an album proper, though: both are EPs.
43. What is your favorite song by 24? (Crosby, Stills & Nash)
Ahh, a very easy "favorite song" question: Helplessly Hoping. Runner-ups include Suite: Judy Blue Eyes, Marrakesh Express (especially the version on the Demos album), and You Don't Have to Cry. The one that has most recently grown on me a lot is 49 Bye-Byes. The prevalence of Stephen Stills as my favorite CSN songwriter is no coincidence!
44. What is a good memory you have involving 46? (The Cribs)
Attending their concert when Johnny Marr was in the band! Man, that was so much fun. Great crowd at Bowery Ballroom that night.
45. What is your favorite song by 35? (Kings of Leon)
Oh… Knocked Up, but I can't really listen to that one nowadays, so that would make it Pickup Truck.
46. Is there a song by 9 that makes you happy? (Paul McCartney)
Absolutely! None more than Check My Machine. Just such a cool, cool track. Especially the version that's nine minutes long, 'cause then there's just more of it. Lots of his songs with Wings and The Beatles do the trick, too: say, Waterspout and Rocky Raccoon, to name just two.
47. What is your favorite album by 4? (State Radio)
Flag of the Shiners and Let It Go, although the former is an EP, so I suppose the more technical answer is just Let It Go. Flag of the Shiners is note-for-note perfect, and has a consistent feel, but that's much easier to do with an EP than a full-length; and Let It Go, though really excellent, doesn't have that album feel thoroughly down. I'm still holding out for a record of theirs that will be both perfect song-by-song and an excellent album (since Year of the Crow, which is indeed an album unified in sound & tone, has a couple notably weak takes).
48. Who is a favorite member of 37? (Alice in Chains)
Layne Staley, rest in peace. That voice is nearly unmatched in terms of emotive capacity… but Jerry Cantrell is amazing too, of course.
49. What is the first song you ever heard by 43? (Grin)
Like Rain, although the first Nils Lofgren songs I ever heard are Beggar's Day and Nobody, as performed & recorded by Crazy Horse.
50. How many albums do you own by 17? (The Hollies)
None in hard copies, and in fact the only full album I have in digital is Butterfly, which I'm not even quite convinced is worth having in full. It's quite obvious to me that Graham Nash was the only really capable member of that band; as far as the facets of 'em that I like, anyway.