Regrets and mistakes

This is simple: I went through all the music I've paid for, and I'm going to list all the duds.

Actually, it's a little more complex. My music is dispersed around my house, car, lent to others, and so on. However, I only looked in one location to list my 'lapse of judgement'. In one corner of my house lives my CD albums in a bookshelf, in alphabetical order. The problem is that it is apart from any CD player. So, if I want to listen to something, I have to move it. And it usually doesn't find its way back. Now, this is important. If I like something, I will listen to it more and it will live near my CD players. If I don't like something, it will remain in the bookshelf, in proper alphabetical order. That isn't to say that all the CDs in alphabetical order in this bookshelf are bad. I might not be in the mood to listen to OK Computer [because, really, everyone is almost sick of it after overplaying it in the late-nineties].

But there are some really bad ones. Ones you or I will never touch.

So, I looked there.

I've bought bad singles along the way, but they're not really representative of me. I don't like singles anymore. And, I'd go through my vinyl albums, but, thinking of one off-the-top-of-my-head, I just don't think I could list Cheap Trick — Dream Police as a regret or mistake when I paid only two dollars for it.

I will save my apologia for later discussion. One does not go and buy Metallica without reason.

In the order I came across them:

• Atari Teenage Riot — 60 Second Wipeout
  
• Bjork — Vespertine
  
• Cocteau Twins — Stars and Topsoil
  
• Dinosaur Jr — Hand It Over
  
• Faith No More — We Care a Lot
  
• Nelly Furtado — Whoa, Nelly!
  
• Lavish — Paranoid
  
• Mansun — Attack of the Green Lantern
  
• Mansun — Six
  
• Metallica — Metallica
  
• Moloko — I Am Not a Doctor
  
• New Order — Get Ready
  
• Soul Asylum — Let Your Dim Light Shine
  
• Supreme Beings of Leisure — Supreme Beings of Leisure
  
• U2 — All That You Can't Leave Behind
  
• U2 — How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb
  
• Propellerheads — Decksanddrumsandrockandroll
  
• Queen — Greatest Hits II
  
• Waikiki — I'm Already Home

This is by no means definitive.

Quickly – distracted

I wonder if you've heard that Grant McLennan passed away over the weekend.

This isn't a tribute. This is a diary entry. It's about me.

There I was, years ago, reading about the Go-Betweens, with somebody telling me, without the Go-Betweens, there would be no Pavement.

So, for about two-and-a-half years [most probably more than that], I've been meaning to get into this band. I only just downloaded Before Hollywood yesterday. I know, I should pay some respect and buy their albums – I'll bet you my Stutter white label 7" that their albums will walk out the door at the next record fair.

You've heard the reports now, they were never a popular band. They were, however, a critics' band, and a musicians' band. I wonder how music snobs will react.

Look at me, mum, I'm reacting!

I mean, it's pop music. I have an expectation of myself to care about this stuff.