With the ten-year anniversary of deep cuts just a month away, I’ve been working on a way to mark the occasion. After years of talking in front of a camera about myriad genres, landmark artists, and essential records, it felt like there was only one possible answer.
The one I’ve always dreaded.
My favourite records of all time.
Those of you who have been subscribed to the YouTube channel for a long time might remember a couple of the cop-out videos I did back in the early days: Ten of my favourite records, or ten more of my favourite records.
Never my favourite records. Because after all this time, I’m not sure how I can possibly reduce my love for music into a single list. I’ve never done a chart of my all-time favourites, so at this point I’m genuinely not sure how it will shake out.
As I’ve gotten older, it’s been easy to move myself further away from the idea of “objective greatness.” We’ve all read ‘greatest records of all time’ lists which follow a familiar script: ensure The Velvet Underground and Nico is in there, must include at least one Beatles record, and a sprinkle of Pet Sounds for good measure.
It’s the reason I have no interest in doing my own ‘greatest records of all time’ feature, because I’d be obliged to include all those well-worn cornerstones of cultural importance.
Instead, it’ll be highly personal to my tastes, my experiences, and my history.
Apropos of nothing: if you happen to see a dishevelled figure in a coffee shop hunched over a notepad, furiously scribbling and crossing everything out, approach with caution.
I will readily admit that eccentricity often grates on me. I wrote about it during my review of the latest Dry Cleaning record, where Florence Shaw’s perplexing lyricism was delivered in what I described as a “listless spoken-word drawl”. The sardonic wit left me cold, shutting me out from the music.
From a glance at the liner notes, the poetry of Aldous Harding’s fifth record was poised to have a similar effect: across the album, it runs the gamut for outlandish imagery. We get naked owls, a meeting with John Cale, and a face covered in béchamel sauce during ‘What Am I Gonna Do?’ What helps it land on the right side of my acceptable eccentricity line is the compelling dreamlike quality it’s presented with.
There’s something indefinable about the New Zealander’s music – genuinely not all that useful when trying to write about it, but that’s what makes it enthralling. I found myself breezing through Train on the Island only to start again from the beginning, tempted to try and unlock something more from Harding’s lyrical obtuseness.
The soft indie-rock palette of these songs goes a long way, too – the unhurried collaboration of gentle overdrive, dry drums and rounded bass encourages you to lie back and let Harding’s imagery seep into your skull.
Taste test:
🟢 ‘Train on the Island’ – When Harding croons ‘reflections steal my mind’, what does she mean?
🟢 ‘Coats’ – In which we finally get to meet the figure adorning the cover, as she sings ‘What do you say when you meet blue women?’
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