Every Record I Own: John Carpenter – Anthology

It was John Carpenters 75th Birthday the other day and if I realised that in advance I may have written this for that occasion, but instead here it is now.

My fave guy, Tom Breihan, who I have already mentioned once in this blog and will come up again. Used to write a column for the AV Club called A History of Violence, where he wrote about the best action film of each year from 1968 (Bullit) to 2021 (F9). And John Carpenter’s Assault on Precinct 13 is 1976’s best Action film.

Before reading this column, the only John Carpenter film I had seen was Halloween. I was aware that he made the soundtrack to most of his films and people were really into them, but I’d never really explored that. Now a couple of years on, I have still not watched any more John Carpenter films, but I have gotten very into his music.

It has become regular writing/study/working music for me. It’s the right mix of atmospheric which still propulsive. It can sit in the background or come to the center of my attention and it feels like it makes my brain think differently.

It has also been quite influential in my own music making. I have a musical instrument called a Deluge, which is a sequencer/synthesizer/drum machine/sampler which feels like it was made to make John Carpenter-esque music.

Here’s a track I made for Josiah Morgan’s Show Ponies performance in Dunedin which was pretty heavily influenced by John Carpenter.

This is one of my most recent records. I bought it over summer from the Flying Out sale. This anthology is rerecorded versions of his tracks by his current band. Sometimes I feel like it’s really well done and effective and other times it feels a bit overproduced. The synths are a bit cleaner and the drums sound much more highly produced, which leaves me missing the cheaper drum machine sounds of the originals. However it does make the album as a whole a lot more cohesive, which works when you’re listening to the record.

My new goal of 2023 is to watch Assault on Precinct 13.

Fave tracks: The Fog, Assault on Precinct 13, Halloween.

Every Record I Own: Pup – The Dream is Over

Put this on when I was making dinner and then when it was over i put it on again cos I wasn’t done.

I first listened to Pup after seeing the boy from Stranger Things in a music video of theirs, which was about pets dying. It is a great video and an even better song. Then I listened to the rest of the album and I couldn’t stop listening. This album spent months on near constant rotation on streaming. It’s probably one of my all time fave albums.

Every single part of this band is catchy. Every riff, every drum fill, all the shouts. The songs have a bit of a formula but over the course of the album it feels like there is movement through the album where the songs grow in complexity and emotionally (but not completely linearly)

I soundtracked my life with this record for years. My Life is Over and I Couldn’t be Happier was the intro song to my 2018 Comedy Festival show Dignity. Can’t Win had a prime spot in my emotions 2019 playlist. Sleep in the Heat was my most played song in 2017. It’s all sort of self loathing but not in a bad way, in a fun way which was perfect for me.

I don’t listen to this band anywhere near as much as I used to. But every time I do I wonder why I don’t listen much. Feels so cathartic listening to it loudly. I can’t shout but pretending to shout along feels so good. I love owning this record because it means I will keep coming back to it and I’ll keep having this rediscovery.

Alex G – Trick

I unsubscribed from Spotify in January, so I didn’t get the 2022 wrapped. Tidal does a monthly thing but not yearly and I haven’t added them up together, but I’m fairly sure Alex G would have been my top artist for 2022.

I got quite obsessed with the early singles for God Saves the Animals which sent me on a massive Alex G binge. I don’t think I have been as excited for a new album since Mitski’s Be The Cowboy. Anyway I don’t own God Save the Animals. It’s always been sold out or too expensive when I’ve looked for it.

But the Alex G binge sent me back to his earlier releases. I have owned DSU for many years, and it’s remained on pretty high rotation, but I haven’t got into any of his other albums quite in the same way. Sometimes I’ll go through a House of Sugar or Rocket phase, but hadn’t listened to Trick much. But it ended up being a fave, so was happy when I stumbled across a reissue for sale on his bandcamp.

(I was given a bandcamp voucher when I left Good Books, which was a really nice present, but because of some sort of currency and technology thing, you’re only able to spend bandcamp vouchers on certain currencies, not including NZD. I generally only buy things from NZ on bandcamp, especially physical releases which cost a lot to ship, so was very annoyed but ended up with two cool Alex G records so wasn’t all bad.)

His first 4-5 albums stick to the same formula pretty closely, similar guitar sounds. The melodies aren’t too different. All sort of mid tempo. Very similar bedroom production. But the songs are just really good. There are so many incredible moments in this album which capture my attention no matter what I’m doing at the time.

This version comes with a 7″ with both Adam and Sarah on it, which are not on the album proper but are some of his most popular songs, so counting them with this one.

Fave Tracks: Adam, Sarah, Mary, Animals

Mitski – Puberty 2

Mitski was such a huge part of my life from 2016-2019ish. In the editing of my Masters (which became my book) I listened to this album non stop on the university computers on bandcamp. Soon after that I bought the record. In my spotify end of decade wrap up Mitski was my number one artist (I think I only got Spotify in 2017).

When I did my reading of 2000ft Above Worry Level in the 2018 Fringe Festival I used a Mitski song as the closer (Townie). Mitksi has an incredible gift for making music which feels personal to every person listening, which has contributed to a really creepy response from her fans who seem to think Mitski’s experiences belong to them. They don’t. They belong to me 2016-2018. I haven’t listened to Mitski much in the past few years and now when I do it takes me back to the feelings from those years, which feel a bit foreign to me now. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to separate this record from that era of my life, which in some ways is good for nostalgia purposes but also makes me not really able to appreciate it without bringing up all this other stuff.

Mitski released a new album last year and I just couldn’t get into it. I’m sure it’s just as good as everything she’s done but I guess my Mitski era is over.

On a side note, this is maybe one of the worst pressings of records I own. I can’t start the record properly, it always slips as it’s starting a few seconds in, and it also slides into the label at the end of side 1. It also feels like it has less dynamics than the digital version and quite a lot of noise. Looking at the discogs page for the pressing it seems like there are quite commonly a lot of faults with it.

Fave tracks: A Loving Feeling, Happy

Sinead O’Connor – The Lion and the Cobra

Sinead O’Connor has spent most of my life being a joke. I didn’t remember any of the controversy first hand, only from cultural references to her. I never really questioned whether or not she deserved it. Eventually it felt like she was reevalutated and (in the media I was consuming) it was accepted that she was incredibly unfairly treated. She was right about the catholic church and had her career and name destroyed and we just let it happen and turned her into a joke.

Even when I read about all the terrible things that happened to her I didn’t once consider to listen to her music.

The first time I actually listened to her was when I read The Number Ones column about Nothing Compares 2 U. I was kind of aware of the song and had probably heard it but had never actually considered listening to it as if it could be good. Anyway that song rules. I found the CD of I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got at an op shop and listened to it quite a bit, but it wasn’t until I found a copy of The Lion and The Cobra at an opshop that I really got into her.

Anyway this album is incredible. Big studio sounds and uses the pop sounds of the era, but uses them to make music that doesn’t fit neatly into pop music. It feels really angry without losing control or beauty.

Listening to this is what I love about records. I doubt that if I hadn’t picked this up I would have properly given it the time of day. I might have put it on streaming in the background while I browsed the internet but after that was done it would just get lost in a sea of things I had listened to. It also really benefits from being played through a stereo and taking up the room rather than headphones.

Fave tracks: Just Call Me Joe, Mandinka, Drink Before the War