2010 Stuff

It seems to be crazier than ever this year with the "best of" lists. I bought more albums this year than the last few but not much of it seemed to come from 2010, just over 20. I also spend a lot of time writing music and preferring to listen to podcasts while working so I didn't have much appetite for new music. So here's a sample of what got me through the year.

Best Show Gems (podcast): 30 minutes - 1 hour every fortnight of classic Scharpling & Wurster from the Best Show On WFMU.

The Best Show On WFMU (podcast): 2.5 - 6hrs! weekly, the big daddy of Best Show Gems.

The Sound Of Young America (podcast): Really good interviews with anyone and everyone. Even if you've never heard of the guest it's interesting.

Talking Metal (podcast): weekly. Brilliant metal show, they'll talk about Poison with the same enthusiasm as Candlemass. These guys love all types of metal and is a joy to listen to.

This American Life (podcast): Weekly. Always excellent radio documentaries.

Savage Love Podcast (podcast): Weekly. "There's nothing you can't ask.." Dan Savage gives advice.

Devo - Something For Everybody (album): Starts great and stays great til the end.

Ted Leo & The Pharmacists - The Brutalist Bricks (album): What's not to love about this. Some really fantastic songs on this. Haven't seen it in any lists so far. That's a crime against rock.

Weezer - Hurley (album): One of my favourite bands. I love what they do and how they do it. 4 albums in 3 years!

If you like these type of lists have a look at this one.

Ted Leo (again!)

Big push at the moment to get Ted Leo to win the music section of the Shorty Awards. At the moment he's at no. 2, right behind Britney Spears. "A battle for the ages" as Scharpling said. If you're on Twitter, vote Ted!

I've posted the A3 version of this one before but here is the billboard version. It's from 2008 and it's the only one of my posters I have up in my office.

Aimee Mann (2)

Aimee Mann back in Dublin last year. Here is the colour billboard poster. This was a double bill with Irish musician Sharon Shannon. October 2008 and recession was kicking in, this and a few other gigs got moved around and this show ended up in Tripod.

Reminded of this because Aimee is going to be on The Best Show On WFMU tonight.

Yo La Tengo (again)

Yo La Tengo gig in Dublin last night was fantastic. A real joy. The place was packed and the crowed just loved them. Their set was long and relaxed but also extremely well planned and executed. Instruments being swapped without any interruption. Ira even tuning and swapping his guitar during songs. Anyway, above is a photo of them onstage. After the gig some dude pulled down one of the billboard posters I had done and was getting James to sign it. I thought this would make a cool addition to the blog. Afterwards I had a brief chat with James, what did we talk about? The Best Show.

Yo La Tengo

Here's another poster that's actually live at the moment. Yo La Tengo are coming to Dublin next month. I'm not posting this because of some outstanding contribution to graphic design, it's a pretty standard 'album tour' based poster. It's here because I'm looking forward to the gig, especially after this from Tom Scharpling on The Best Show a few weeks ago; "On Friday night I got to the Roseland Ballroom to see Yo La Tengo. It's awesome! They're doing it. As good as I've EVER seen them. they've got the new album, they're all fired up, they're rocking out, they're doing this they're doing that, they're covering all the bases. Three people up there doing everything. It's shocking when you see them in their element like that. They bounce from this instrument to that instrument. James McNew, he's the most talented dude going. Watch this guy, oh, play bass, oh play keyboards, oh play 12 string guitar, oh play drums, do whatever you want, this guy does it. They were on fire."