A to Z - E

I gotta be honest, I've not been liking these posts. I do love my music posts but these ones ? They tend to be over long (massively) and rather too compressed at the same time.

That said though ... I'm through the E's ! Actual stats : 12500 tracks in the library, 4647 still to listen to. That's since moving over to the Macbook in mid October. How about the E's ?

First up - good one and bad one. David Bowie has done some amazing stuff but not everything he does is up to that standard. When he digs, it's really awful. You can tell I'm not a fan of Earthling can't you ? Haha.

The good one is the Edge Of Darkness soundtrack by Eric Clapton. That would be the proper Edge of Darkness made by BBC in 1985. The soundtrack is amazing and perfectly complements a moody, dark and compelling thriller about people doing naughty things with nuclear reprocessing.

We have an Edie Brickell album in here, "Edie Brickell - Ultimate Collection". This was bought for me by a very good friend. It's a bit more than the average Greatest Hits (she's made I think 5 albums since and is still going), it has the best of her first 3 albums plus a bunch of fantastic bonus tracks too.

A little bit of Mansun comes in, courtesy of the sister's cd singles. Hurrah for a group that does proper B-sides !

The White Stripes burst on to the scene a few years ago. You might recognise Seven Nation Army from Elephant. Best I have of their's so far. I like 'em. Raw vocals fronting great work by the band.

A bit of classical from Elgar - I'll always try and catch the Last Night Of The Proms and the Elgar variations are the highlight.

Cardigans ! With Emmerdale. This is a funny album, half of it is on their Life album as well. It's a great start to their works and is in happier mode too. A lot of their later stuff is pretty dark.

A couple from Kasabian and Kaiser Chiefs. Empire and Employment have their moments but I'm not that big a fan of them. Good for an occasional listen but I'll never line them up for a deliberate listen in the car.

I have some Lionel Richie ... His Encore album has hits greatest hits mostly sung live. There's some amazing stuff here, the reason I got it was to cheaply pick up a copy of Hello and All Night Long. Guaranteed smiley songs. Yes it's cheesy. But that don't matter if it makes you feel good.

My second Don Henley album is The End Of The Innocence. Again, not a favourite album but there's the occasional highlight.

Soundtracks - can't get away from them ;-)
Endless Space was a very tedious game but the music was outstanding.
Eve ended up being tedious for different reasons but the atmospheric music was also amazing.
Escape From New York is John Carpenter's best so far
And Jan Hammer's Escape From TV has the highlights from Miami Vice

Duffy didn't last long enough. She has a characteristic, distinctive voice that doesn't really work with songs written for other people. But when something like My Boy comes along ? There's me singing along too with the infectious rhythm. Just like Mercy :-)

Gabrielle Aplin's English Rain shows a lot of promise. Still a little work to do though and hopefully she'll stay unique instead of polished into oblivion.

Jean Michel Jarre has always made amazing instrumental music, Equinoxe is no exception. See Track 5 for the highlight. There's an "Essentials" aka Greatest Hits here too.

I have a couple of Bob Dylan albums, the other will come up really late (U for Ultimate). His Essential album slots in here. He's good but doesn't quite ring my bell in the same way as a Nina Persson or Natasha Khan.

Or even a Blondie ! Another "Essential" collection with some of their best.

I like heavier stuff too, with Evanescence's third album slotting in here. Not as good as their first, see that "polished to oblivion" comment ...

Last few ! The Bangles were amazing in their early days. Eternal Flame was a massive hit from their Everything album. There's amazing song after amazing song here, Glitter Years is one of my highlights.

KT Tunstall also exploded on to the scene with Eye To The Telescope. Check out the wholly acoustic one woman band version of Black Horse and the Cherry Tree. Love it. Something special emerged on the stage on that day.

Last one for today. Possibly their best, it's Eyes Open by Snow Patrol. (Can't decided between this and Final Straw). It has the immortal Set The Fire To The Third Bar and a bunch of other great songs.

There's another 450 tracks before I'm through F, that'll take a while !