THE DANMAN CAN

1.   Mew Visuals ****1/2 2.   Fujiya & Miyagi Fujiya & Miyagi  ****1/2 3.   Rainer Maria S/T ****1/2 ( Review ) 4.   Fever Ray Plunge  **** ( Review ) 5.   Quicksand Interiors  **** ( Review) 6.   Spoon Hot Thoughts **** 7.   The Life And Times The Life And Times   **** 8.   Daniele Luppi & Parquet Courts Milano  **** ( Review) 9.   Goldfrapp Silver Eye **** ( Review ) 10. St. Vincent Masseduction   **** ( Review ) 11. Charlotte Gainsbourg   Rest  **** ( Review )   12. UNKLE The Road: Part 1   **** 13. Failure Fantastic Planet Live  **** 14.  Beck   Colors  ***1/2 ( Review ) 15. Queens Of The Stone Age Villains   ***1/2 ( Review ) 16. Primus The Desaturating Seven ***1/2 ( Review ) 17. Electric Six How Dare You  ***1/2 18. The Octopus Project   Memory Mirror  ***   19. John Carpenter Anthology (Mov...

Well,  Colors   (2017) doesn't sound much like Beck   at all, but I like it regardless. Maybe I'm not cool anymore. Maybe I need my Music Card revoked. Who knows? There's doesn't seem to be a theme or connecting tissue that I can spot on the first few listens, just a collection of catchy "single" songs. And I don't see anything wrong with that, if done well. I dig the House stylings of the title track. "Seventh Heaven" reminds me of a more dancy Mew . "I'm So Free" and "Dear Life" are solid songs that move the album along. "No Distraction" veers into Bruno Mars territory but I still don't mind it. "Dreams" is a nice little slice of pop that was released as a single back in 2015 and works well in the context of Colors .   The safe Hip Hop of "Wow" somehow doesn't offend me and it's actually one of my favorite tracks on the album. "Up All Night" sounds more like those b...

Marketed as a companion piece to his previous album Sea Change , which makes sense as it sounds a lot like that one. I would say that Morning Phase is less "depressing" sounding, but it's still very mellow. A friend of mine described it as a good "before bed" album. That description is accurate, but is slightly unfortunate in my opinion as it typically means it's a mood album and not one that I can just throw on any time. Sea Change  happens to be the only Beck album I don't own (besides Golden Feelings , but I think even he disowned that one) and the one I listen to the least (I do have MP3s), so this one may befall the same fate. I do think the production is gorgeous and there are some nice melodies and instrumentation, but the songs are painfully simple at times and the lyrics very obvious. Many moments border on and even cross into "adult contemporary" and that's always a danger zone. When it comes to "acoustic" Beck L...