I haven’t done one of these in quite a while. The new home of this blog seems like a good excuse to start again.

1. Adrien Belew, “Troubles”: Adrien Belew did an absolutely fantastic set of three solo albums of divinely weird music, called Side One, Side Two, and Side Three. This is the first track off of the third: Belew playing funky blues. Pure fun.
2. Genesis, “Afterglow”: Old Genesis; is there anything better to an old proghead? I love Wind and Wuthering – it’s the best of the post-Gabriel Genesis.
3. Marillion, “The Hollow Man”: and we transition from a sad old Genesis song, to a sad old Marillion song. Hollow Man is a beautiful, simple track, which really shows off Hogarth’s vocals, and Rothery’s guitar.
4. Gogol Bordello, “Harem in Tuscany”: After two sad songs, this is a wonderful change. Eastern European Gypsy Punk!
5. Do Make Say Think, “You, you’re a history in rust”: Great post-rock. Very dense, atmospheric. Perfect music to work to – grabs you, draws you in, engages you, but doesn’t distract you..
6. Reddy, “Hamster Theatre”: This one, I struggle to describe. I’ve been told that genre-wise, they’re “Rock in Opposition” – but the only other group I know that anyone calls RiO is Thinking Plague, which shares members. This is mostly instrumental, with elements of rock, jazz, and European folk. Played on band featuring sax and accordion. I don’t know what the heck it is. It’s definitely not something I want to listen to frequently, but when I’m in the mood, it’s terrific.
7. Djam Karet, “The Great Plains of North Dakota”: Anyone who knows me – especially anyone who’s read any of my past FRTs, knows that I’m a big old proghead. Instrumental prog, though, is frequently a bit of a tough sell for me. Too often, far too often, listening to instrumental prog is rather like watching someone masturbate – content free, emotion free, done solely for the gratification of the performer. Djam Karet is one of the instrumental bands that is not like that all: they’re absolutely brilliant.
8. Sylvan, “The Fountain of Glow, Pt. 2”: More prog. For some reason, I just can’t get into Sylvan. I can’t say what it is about them, but even though they seem like they should be right in my musical territory, they just don’t work for me.
9. NOW Ensemble, “Waiting in the Rain for Snow”: One of my more recent musical loves is post-classical music. There’s a wonderful little label based out of NY called “New Amsterdam”, and I’ve learned to pretty much buy all of their albums, sight unseen, as soon as they come out. They’re hard to describe – but 20th century classical chamber music blended with rock is enough to give you a sense. NOW is one of New Amsterdam’s house ensembles. They’re towards the more classical end of the NA spectrum, with a mimimalist feel. Absolutely brilliant stuff.
10. William Brittelle, “Powaballad”: After NOW, I had to listed to another New Amsterdam artist. And this is amazingly weird in comparison to NOW. It’s still that same basic family – very much the rock/classical chamber fusion, but much of the rock side mixed in, with a much less traditional classical structure.