Classic albums I haven't heard.

Kimono My House by Sparks ∗
Curtis by Curtis Mayfield
Scott 3 by Scott Walker
The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill_ ∗∗
Symbolic by Death
Blue by Joni Mitchell
Maxinquaye by Tricky ∗∗∗
Roots by Sepultura
Kim Wilde
Pet Sounds by the Beach Boys ∗∗∗∗
Meat Puppets II
Actually by the Pet Shop Boys ∗∗∗∗∗
Pink Flag by Wire
Funeral by The Arcade Fire ∗∗∗∗∗∗
Midnite Marauders by A Tribe Called Quest
Bummed by the Happy Mondays
All Saints & _Saints & Sinners by All Saints ∗∗∗∗∗∗∗
Reign In Blood by Slayer
FLM by Mel & Kim.

∗ I have no idea why I hold off on this: I finally drank the Sparks Kool-Aid earlier this year with #1 Song In Heaven, and this one has "This Town...", which I've loved since I was about eight years old.

∗∗ No excuse, really, for not having brought this into my home: everything I've ever heard about the premise of the record makes me salivate.

∗∗∗ Nor this. Surely this is a full-blooded, reptilian parent to those Burial albums, saying what they cannot, going where they dare not? I mean, what the fuck is wrong with me?

∗∗∗∗ Whereas this is so much of a quote classic unquote that the prospect of it actually listening to it fills me with a kind of dread. 'Perfect pop' or whatever this is supposed to be bores me rigid: I'd rather listen to pop that's been knocked out in an afternoon. I want to like things because I like them, not because someone says I should.

∗∗∗∗∗ There's a point where the squeaky-voiced me certainly went off the Pet Shop Boys, after liking them throughout my childhood. It might have been when they started getting more housey (I seem to remember "Go West" as a tipping point), but from a speculative eye all the songs on this record are mint, and I should hear them at once. And then go and listen to the rest (the implications of #1 Song In Heaven at work again.)

∗∗∗∗∗∗ Just about everyone I know has repeatedly assured me how profound, great, meaningful, etc, this record / band is, and that's arguably the thing that now puts me off. Moral: I'm a miserable bastard.

∗∗∗∗∗∗∗ When I eventually realise that this group's slight body of work constitute some of my favourite songs by anyone anywhere, with the sort of dynamic, utterly self-possessed singing and productions that aren't afraid to leave       great           big     spaces     for the listener to crawl inside, and when I eventually realise that this group pretty much invented Röyksopp et al about five years ahead of schedule and did it better, well, then I suppose I'll just have to finally buy both of these records.