{"id":1054,"date":"2015-12-28T10:51:23","date_gmt":"2015-12-28T16:51:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/?p=1054"},"modified":"2024-07-07T20:26:07","modified_gmt":"2024-07-08T02:26:07","slug":"regression-analysis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/regression-analysis\/","title":{"rendered":"Regression Analysis"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"2015_Albums\"
2015 Music Purchases<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For the past few years I’ve been running my ‘One-CD-a-Week’ campaign. It started out as a way to limit<\/em> my music purchases, which were threatening to get out of hand, thanks to all the great music that was being released. But then some weeks last year (2014) I found myself desperately trying to find something<\/em> that I wanted to buy, when nothing really grabbed my fancy. So in 2015 I decided to just abandon that philosophy and go back to buying what<\/em> I wanted when<\/em> I wanted it.<\/p>\n

Now it’s the end of the year, I’m looking back on what I have<\/em> bought – mainly so that I can compare my purchases against the inevitable ‘best of’ lists, and feel all smug that my choices were more eclectic than the mainstream media’s. Surprisingly, it turns out that I only bought 38 albums last year – some 14 under my prior self-imposed annual limit of 52 (I choose to ignore the fact that one of these ‘albums’ was an 18-CD boxed set that should really have qualified as 18 week’s worth of purchases…). So at first blush, it looks as though my ‘limit’ was actually forcing me to buy more<\/em> than I would otherwise have done.<\/p>\n

But it’s even worse than that. Looking through the list, I only bought 17 ‘new releases’ in 2015 (excluding several 2015 reissues of older material, and the Dylan set which is from ’65\/’66). And on top of that, several of my purchases have been very<\/em> back-catalog that I only bought to plug holes in my collection (The Cure<\/strong>, Siouxsie and the Banshees<\/strong>, Sebadoh<\/strong>, Swervedriver<\/strong>…). So either there has been a dearth of good music this year, or I am getting a bit too picky in my old age.<\/p>\n

Actually, there has<\/em> been some good music released in 2015. \u00c2\u00a0I really like Dying Surfer Meets His Maker<\/em> by All Them Witches<\/strong>, and Deafheaven<\/strong>‘s Sunbather<\/em> would be on much heavier rotation if it weren’t for the faux-‘screamcore’ vocals (seriously, it’s 2015, and no-one takes death metal seriously any more). The Lower Dens<\/strong> album was solid, and What Went Down<\/em> by Foals<\/strong> is excellent throughout. But honestly, what I have probably been playing more than anything else is the Drive By Truckers<\/strong> live album It’s Great To Be Alive<\/em>. This would normally be a bit too ‘folky\/country’ for me, but for the blistering guitar over several of the tracks, and some socio-political commentary that outdoes even the much heralded return of Desaperacidos<\/strong>. It’s a 3-CD set, and if I skip all of the stuff that’s a little too country for my rock’n’roll heart I’m sill left with almost a couple of hours of great live music. Come at it from a Neil Young<\/strong>, Steve Earle<\/strong>, and (even) Lynyrd Skynyrd<\/strong> angle and you’ll find a lot to enjoy.<\/p>\n

So given that there clearly is<\/em> some good music out there, I’m thinking that maybe my reduced purchasing really is just because I am getting ‘more selective’ in my choices. Or maybe I’m just less willing to take a risk. Out of all my purchases, there are very few that are really outliers<\/em> – albums that I was taking a chance on. With the exception of Deafheaven<\/strong> (which I bought unheard, on the basis of reviews alone) and The Amazing<\/strong> which I heard on 3WK<\/a>, they were all pretty much ‘known entities’. At least when I was forcing myself to buy a CD every week I was ‘forced’ to discover new (to me) music. So in 2016 I’m going to go back to reinstate my One-CD-a-Week approach, and see where it takes me this time…<\/p>\n

The full list of purchases is below, in rough order of acquisition (I did consider ranking them, but you can’t compare, say, Deafhaven against Bob Dylan…)<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Kevin Drew – Spirit If… (2007)<\/li>\n
  2. Brendan Canning – Something for All Of Us (2008)<\/li>\n
  3. The Decemberists – What A Beautiful World, What A Terrible World (2015) [Vinyl]<\/li>\n
  4. Sleater-Kinney – No Cities To Love (Deluxe Edition)<\/a>\u00a0(2015) [Vinyl]<\/li>\n
  5. The High Violets – To Where You Are<\/a>\u00a0(2006)<\/li>\n
  6. Mogwai – Music Industry 3 : Fitness Industry 1<\/a>\u00a0(2015)<\/li>\n
  7. Death Cab for Cutie – Kintsugi<\/a>\u00a0(2015)<\/li>\n
  8. The Amazing – Picture You<\/a>\u00a0(2015)<\/li>\n
  9. Little People – Mickey Mouse Operation (2006) [MP3 only]<\/li>\n
  10. Swervedriver – Mezcal Head<\/a>\u00a0(1993)<\/li>\n
  11. Godspeed You! Black Emperor – Asunder, Sweet and Other Distress<\/a>\u00a0(2015)<\/li>\n
  12. Butterfly Explosion – Lost Trails<\/a>\u00a0(2010)<\/li>\n
  13. Ride – Waves: The BBC Sessions<\/a>\u00a02012)<\/li>\n
  14. God Is An Astronaut – All Is Violent, All Is Bright<\/a>\u00a0(2011)<\/li>\n
  15. Built To Spill – Untethered Moon (2015)<\/li>\n
  16. Ride – Leave Them All Behind (EP)<\/a>\u00a0(1992)<\/li>\n
  17. Gus Gus – Polydistortion (1997)<\/li>\n
  18. Caravan – In The Land of Grey and Pink<\/a>\u00a0(2015 Reissue)<\/li>\n
  19. Lower Dens – Escape From Evil<\/a>\u00a0(2015)<\/li>\n
  20. M83 – Before The Dawn Heals Us<\/a>\u00a0(2014)<\/li>\n
  21. Frank Marino – The Power Of Rock And Roll<\/a>\u00a0(2015 Reissue)<\/li>\n
  22. Queens Of The Stone Age – …Like Clockwork<\/a>\u00a0(2013) [Vinyl]<\/li>\n
  23. Desaperacidos – Payola<\/a>\u00a0(2015) [Vinyl]<\/li>\n
  24. Mew – + –<\/a>\u00a0(2015) [Vinyl]<\/li>\n
  25. Foals – What Went Down<\/a>\u00a0(2015) [Vinyl]<\/li>\n
  26. Sebadoh – Bakesale (Deluxe Edition)<\/a>\u00a0(2011 Reissue)<\/li>\n
  27. Love Amongst Ruin – Lose Your Way<\/a>\u00a0(2015)<\/li>\n
  28. The Cure – Concert<\/a>\u00a0(1984)<\/li>\n
  29. Siouxsie & The Banshees – Nocturne (2009) [MP3 only – already have the original vinyl]<\/li>\n
  30. Miles Kane – Colour of the Trap<\/a>\u00a0(2011)<\/li>\n
  31. Deafhaven – Sunbather<\/a>\u00a0(2015)<\/li>\n
  32. Built To Spill – There’s Nothing Wrong with Love<\/a>\u00a0(2015 Reissue) [Vinyl]<\/li>\n
  33. Bob Dylan – Bootleg Series Vol 12 (The Cutting Edge) Collector’s Edition (2015)<\/li>\n
  34. Drive-By Truckers – It’s Great To Be Alive! [Explicit]<\/a>\u00a0(2015)<\/li>\n
  35. The Postal Service – Give UP (Deluxe 10th Anniversary Edition) (2013 Reissue) [Vinyl]<\/li>\n
  36. All Them Witches – Dying Surfer Meets His Maker<\/a>\u00a0(2015) [Vinyl]<\/li>\n
  37. Spoon – Gimme Fiction<\/a>\u00a0(2015 Reissue)<\/li>\n
  38. Ought – Sun Coming Down<\/a>\u00a0(2015)<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    There’s also a few one-off MP3s that I picked up either because the album hasn’t been released yet, or because I really didn’t fancy the whole album. For the sake of completeness, these are:<\/p>\n

      \n
    • Pumarosa – Priestess<\/li>\n
    • Ryan Adams – Style (Taylor Swift cover)<\/li>\n
    • Cloud Cult – No Hell<\/li>\n
    • Le Galaxie – Put The Chain On<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      For the past few years I’ve been running my ‘One-CD-a-Week’ campaign. It started out as a way to limit my music purchases, which […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[42],"class_list":["post-1054","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music","tag-music-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1054","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1054"}],"version-history":[{"count":30,"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1054\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1768,"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1054\/revisions\/1768"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1054"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1054"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1054"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}