apparently this blog is an alcoholic pogo stick written by a drudgery-fighting microwave. what are you?

maximo park – a certain trigger – 4 stars

the two cd’s i’ve listened to the most so far in september have coincided with the two shows i’ve seen most recently, the first being maximo park. as the show approached, i listened to my pirated copy of their album a bit more, trying to get into their music a little further for sing-along purposes. then last friday we showed up at the troubadour and i was suitably corrected in my evaluation from earlier this year that they were ‘just another okay british rock group like all the rest’. as i had begun to suspect on further listens, they are british, yes. and okay not entirely unlike all the rest. but they are a lot more fun to see and listen to than i thought. the songs are short and frantic, the keyboarding is a nice touch in place of a second guitar, and the lyrics are a bit smart-alecky to go with their sharp delivery. it wasn’t until i bought the album at the show (see, i’m an ethical pirate) and started listening to it every day in my car that i crossed the line into loving it though. although there’s not a lot of variation musically, almost every track on the album has a great line and a great little guitar stop that i find myself repeating the whole rest of the day. my other complaint is that i can’t for the life of me see why ‘graffitti’ was the first single, when i personally skip that track more often than not for catchier tunes like ‘once, a glimpse’ and ‘the coast is always changing’. then there’s my other favorite and this week’s pay day song, apply some pressure, which has the coolest circular verses that begin and end with the same punchy lines i am still working on being able to scream them effectively as i commute. damn enjoyable album.

the decemberists – picaresque – 5 stars

this is an even better story. i finally picked this album up a few weeks ago after several rounds of ‘have you heard this yet? it’s fucking good’ from friends and blogs all across the spectrum, and fell instantly in love. listened to it five times a day. read the lyrics and realized what the songs were about and their beautiful tragic stories and loved them more. i wanted so badly to get tickets to their show this week but found myself a bit short to spring for a concert that jumped up to 30 dollars with the help of my good friends at ticketmaster. so i contented myself with the cd and listened it into the ground.

then i get the flavorpill newsletter for this week and voila! a chance at salvation! i answer an easily google-able trivia question lickety split and BAM, within moments i am on a guest list and suddenly have a free date for me and a lady of my choice. the show was wonderful even if they only played about 4 songs from this album (their old shit is all so good too, i see an amoeba trip in my future), ‘sixteen military wives’ doesn’t sound as good without a trumpet, and i didn’t have 20 bucks to get their ‘flight of the mistle thrushes’ poster… damn, it was beautiful. but they did get everyone to sit on the floor for an accordion duel against a guy from the pogues whose name escapes me, and they did do ‘the mariner’s revenge song’ for an encore with giant whale jaw props, so overall it was still outstanding. plus it was free and i’m a winner.

and oh yeah, that album… so well written and richly arranged and full of theatricality. it’s not tough to imagine why this and the mountain goats will probably be my top picks for the year, because their storytelling is terrific.