solace

it had a few good songs on it, but overall it was just way too dull for my taste. i still prefer their first record by far, much more interesting sound than they've evolved into. i also loved Jonathan Fire*eater too tho, so not surprising i guess.

there's not much on it i dislike, but by the same token, there's no song on here i'd consider in say Beck's top 20 songs either... very solid record though, and after a few weeks i can definitely safely say it kicks the crap out of the last 2

yeah, there's definitely tracks i like more than others, but there's not any very big or memorable hooks that are sticking in my head unfortunately. definitely a HUGE huge step up from that last piece of crap though, thank god hey got rid of the calypso vibe, White Rabbits do that better than them anyway.

you think? i like it way more than the last one, that's for sure, and it is a very consistent record, but there's no standout tracks really at all, whereas the first 2 records had 3-4.

their major strength is their live show

you could ask this about millions of bands, it's a pretty obvious answer...

seeing them w/ Jay Reatard next week!

absolutely FANTASTIC show last night in Mpls...

what? Let's Love is f'n HOOK CITY

this is pretty great so far... especially compared to his last couple Let's Love is the best song he's released in over a decade, no question

yeah, me either... i mean if it's the more elaborate (it's still pretty minimal compared to many acts) arrangements that turned people off, i could somewhat understand (if disagree fully), but songwriting & lyrically i think he's only improved throughout the years. when i first heard Woman King, i realized that Sam was going to take a different direction on his next album than those first 2, but for quite a while Woman King was my favorite thing he had done.

awesome record but i still miss Mclusky greatly

i dunno if i'd say it's his best, but i'm failing to see the difference in quality between his 3 proper studio records and various EP's... maybe i'm just a fanboy, but there's 3-4 songs on Shepherd's Dog that are up there with Sam's best work (Carousel especially)

Pfork's review was actually pretty dead on today i thought

according to Tim O, it definitely is

correct answer

fwiw, that's not the actual artwork for that, this is: picked it up on vinyl today, comes w/ the Sun Giant as a 2nd LP too

indeed... i've seen them around 10x now since '98, and i just saw them a couple weeks ago at an outdoor charity gig and it was one of the best i've ever seen them too, so they totally still have it live.

musically, YIR is amazing, and definitely their best album in that aspect, but songwriting wise it just doesn't have as great of songs or hooks as those other 3 i mentioned (other than Conventional Wisdom). but after the mad disappointing Ancient Melodies (even Dough thinks that record was poor), YIR was a great come back of sorts. hoping their new one comes out by the end of the year, but i'm guessing very early '09 (i've heard January thrown around)

oh yeah! by far... screw the PFNO lovers... (amazing album, but it's my 3rd fave after KILAS and TNWWL) if the production on Love was better, it might be my fave, it's got so many amazing BTS songs

sure, but that record defines the word gorgeous and heartwrenching

true, true.

yeah, was certainly hoping that'd be the case definitely not the summer Beck album i'd normally hope for, but doesn't surprise me really

it's not bad, i'm on my 3rd listen and some of it is starting to reveal itself, but it's not very exciting, that's for sure. 2nd half is definitely better for me honestly, i didn't even care THAT much for either of the last 2. if you combined the two albums i could prolly come up with a pretty solid single album though.