Rolling through the F's

Thanks to two days working from home I'm making some serious progress on the challenge.

Yesterday I finished off Fiona Apple and am about to finish the Flaming Lips.

Quick analysis on Fiona Apple...
Listening to 5+ albums of Fiona in a row is dangerous. I felt depressed and sad but at the same time like an empowered independent young woman. Ranking Fiona's albums:

1. Tidal- Her first and best album. You can't beat an album with Criminal, Sleep to Dream, Showdowboxer and Never is a Promise.
2. When the Pawn... - Her second album which matches the ranking as well. Best songs include Fast as You Can (my favorite Fi song), Paper Bag and Limp
3. Extraordinary Machine- Her third album which I had to listen to about 3 times in a row. We have the internet leaked version, the album version and then the iTunes exclusive live version that has the bulk of this albums songs on it. Best songs include Extraordinary Machine, Not about Love (try to find the video for this, it's hilarious), Better Version of Me and Parting Gift.

After Fiona was The Flaming Lips. They are such a strange band and it amazes me that a guy with such a horrible voice can pull off leading a great band for so many years. I only have 2.5 Flaming Lips albums including War With The Mystics, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots and Fight Test (EP from Yoshimi).

Yoshimi is one of the most complete albums of all time. If you don't like The Flaming Lips check out this album anyway. It plays like a movie soundtrack and is really amazing. I'm not sure how to describe it other than it tells a tale of how little Yoshimi saves the country by destroying these giant pink robots. Sounds accessible huh? I would actually say its a mix of electronic and rock with great story teller like lyrics.

At War With The Mystics is OK overall but the major highlight is "The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song" download this immediately. I guarantee you'll love it regardless of what type of music you like. It's a great up beat pop type song with hilarious lyrics such as "If you could make everybody poor just so that you could be rich, would you do it?...yeah yeah yeah"

Now onto Flight of the Conchords because it's Business Time!

The challenge continues

Even though I haven't been actively blogging I'm still listening to lots of music.

Since my last post (Djavan on Dec 11th) I've finished off the D's and E's and am now listening to Fiona Apple.

I need to do a more detailed post but lets just say there were some rough times with two albums of Enya and three albums of Eminem. I immediately discovered as a new father I'm a little concerned about my 6 month old getting onto the computer and listening to songs like "Bitch I'm gonna kill you" and "Cum on everyone" by Eminem.

More to come.

Nothing beats Brazilian Adult Contemporary in the morning

Rocking out to Djavan, my favorite Brazailian Adult Contemporary singer. I have his album Ao Vivo which as you can guess is a live album. I'll saw him on TV in Brazilian in 2003 and was amazed at how talented he was. I bought the album and gave it to my Dad (who grew up in Brazil) and then he later gave me a copy.

Portuguese is a language like Italian that when it's sung it's incredibly beautiful. Djavan plays an acoustic guitar and then sings about what I think is probably typical love songs. On the album I have the crowd is constantly singing along and it sounds awesome. I have no idea what any of them are about but they are great and perfect background music for a lazy afternoon or reading a magazine or doing work.

Best songs from Ao Vivo (hunt for them if you are interested)..
Samaurai
Azul
Nem Um Dia (amazing)
Flor de Lis

Happy Friday.

Dixie Chicks

Just finished listening to about 2.5 albums worth of the Dixie Chicks. It was rough for me but luckily I was doing work so it wasn't too big of a deal. I'm not a country fan but I couldn't delete anything since it's the wife's stuff. Country fan or not you gotta love "Wide Open Spaces"

But my night ends on a high note with DJ Kool and "Let Me Clear My Throat" followed by "Groovejet" by DJ Spiller (techno fans will know it).

Procrastinating

So I'm still procrastinating on the DMB review as well as a Death Cab for Cutie review. But in the interim here is what I've been listening to lately.

David Gray - Babylon and Sail Away are great songs

De La Soul - Baby Phat is a fun recent De La song

Dean Martin - lots of Christmas music so this was timely

The Decemberists - 16 Military Wives is an amazing song, so catchy

Depeche Mode - other than their huge hits I can't stand them. A lot of deletes were done here

Destiny's Child - Sure they had some hits but they are horrible otherwise. The best thing Beyonce ever did was leave that group.

Dido- unfortunately I got the bulk of Dido while working out at the gym. This made it very difficult to lift what was obviously huge amounts of pounds for me as well as run on the treadmill. Eventually I just had to turn her off and rock out to the UK techno playing the in gym.

But my favorite random songs from the last few days...

"Groove is in the Heart" by Dee Lite- I feel like getting pulling out crazy ass disco moves anytime I hear this song. If you've seen "I Know Pronounce You Chuck and Larry" it reminds me of the Halloween party and the gay brother dancing. Amazing.

"Say Hello" by Deep Dish - This is considered techno but I would put it in the easy listening techno category. Give it a listen on iTunes and let me know what you think.

"Return of the Tres" by The Delinquent Habits - Monica and I discovered this song in a Nike (Joga Bonita) online podcast about how "football is like fencing, a noble art". The podcast has Rinaldo and Kaka (I think) doing a juggling battle. It's insane some of the moves the pull out and the song is the perfect background for it. It took months for us to find the song until Monica's brother Carlos heard it and knew immediately it was Delinquent Habits. So check it out, it's an incredible song.

"Rebirth of Slick (Cool Like Dat)" by Digable Planets - you know you loved this song back in the day.

Day 67- Stats Update

So I have been officially attacking this challenge for 67 days now! Here are some stats just in case you were wondering where I am on this epic journey.

As of the completion of Day 66...

1832 songs listened to

127.2 hours listened

~27% complete in terms of hours of listening

Approximate completion date... June 4th, 2009. Which amazingly enough is my daughter's first birthday.

If you recall previous posts I was targeting finishing in April or early May. With recent travels for work my pace has slowed dramatically. I don't think I'll be able to catch up with more travel coming up in the holidays as well.

I promise more reviews to come, I've just had a tough time getting on line at night in the UK.

Lastly for the record Monica and I know own 6 iPods- 3 Nanos (2 1st gen, 1 3rd gen), 1 60 gb Video iPod, 1 16gb iPod Touch (2nd gen) and 1 16gb iPhone (1st gen). We also previously owned a 1gb shuffle (1st gen) and a 10gb iPod (2nd gen) that we sold. We love gadgets.

Shouldn't Have To

Per a comment yesterday from Archer I will attempt to make as many Ricky Gervais references as well as other odd ball English references in my posts from jolly ol' England.

I'm currently listening to my last DMB song, "#34" off of Under the Table and Dreaming. Great album and is the leading candidate for #1 album. The mp3s do have some skips so that has been disappointing.

Also my parents hooked me up with an early Christmas present since I would be traveling back and forth to the UK constantly over the next few months. The gift... a 16gb iPod Touch. It's awesome and I am so glad I got the 2nd generation version. The speaker makes a huge difference.

I've watched Iron Man on it and listened to lots of DMB. I haven't gotten into any applications or anything else because wireless is so rare and spotty over here.

I'm hoping to start several days of DMB summary tomorrow. Hopefully it won't be too boring for you.

I still Blog for you

Sorry I have been absent from blogging lately. I'm in the UK in all day meetings until December 17th and rarely have internet access at night. This little foray is costing me 15 pounds or probably about $22.

I continue to listen to as much music as possible but thanks to Dave Matthews I'm about to jump off my hotel room balcony. The DMB studio albums are great and so easy to get through but the live albums are exhausting. I have 7 total live albums and because many are named "Live at..." I get to listen to them all in a row. Holy sh*t balls a person can only listen to "All Along the Watchtower" a few times before going crazy. I know officially hate that song and never want to hear it again. Now that I'm old that will work out well if I go to a DMB concert again because then I can leave early and beat the traffic.

DMB is great live, all their albums sound amazing but they are so similar. My favorite live album is "Listener Supported" followed by "The Gorge". I also liked "Live at Red Rocks" but only because it was a really short concert and I was glad it ended quickly.

"Live in Central Park" and "Live at Red Rocks" are way too long when you have to listen 4 live albums in a row.

I'm now on "Stand Up" which as my Dad would say "is nothing to write home about". I can't wait to get to "Under the Table and Dreaming" and finally get away from DMB.

For the record I have only skipped/deleted two songs out of all 24 hours of DMB. The only reason for deleting them was because they were horrible copies that had skips in them.

Lastly, I plan on doing a DMB wrap up post Wednesday/Thursday of this week. I was hoping to do a post on each album but I don't think I'll be able to. I need to make a clean break with Dave and move onto something new like David Gray. DMB it's not you it's me.