Sorry.
My Year End Pure Pop Top Ten List
Well, that was a weird year.
10. Reservoir Dogs, Original Motion Picture Soundtrack
I just started working at a movie theater, Loews Nickelodeon, downtown. It’s across the street from Pure Pop. The movies are free, I sweep up a lot of crap (the house music is fucking ENYA), and I hate the smell of wet popcorn. But on my first day I noticed that Reservoir Dogs was playing. I caught a few glimpses but didn’t get my mind blown until the next day, when I wasn’t working. Then I saw it eight times. Someone walked out during the ear scene at every showing. Then it was gone. Then I bought the soundtrack. “Little Green Bag” is the shit. Can’t wait to see this guy’s next movie.
9. Catherine Wheel, Ferment
I like this “shoegazer” stuff. The songs are noisy and pretty at the same time and everybody wears striped t-shirts in Raygun. “Black Metallic” is an awesome song with some pretty clumsy lyrics. I saw them play it last month on 120 Minutes. Dave Kendall sucks, but at least he plays Drop Nineteens.
8. Helmet, Meantime
Holy shit, a metal band with short hair. This record is pretty amazing. And it has one of those new see-through CD cases. The song “In The Meantime” has one of the coolest openings ever, where it repeats and then stumbles for a second (on purpose).
7. Sugar, Copper Blue
Bob Mould’s last album Black Sheets Of Rain was fucking great. This is even better. For some reason Rykodisc’s cassettes sound as good as CDs. My favorite song is “A Good Idea”, mainly because it sounds like the Pixies.
6. Singles, soundtrack
I bought the CD, but when I got in line for the movie I decided to see Bob Roberts instead. My favorite songs are “Seasons” by Chris Cornell and “Breath” by Pearl Jam. Alice In Chains are overrated.
5. The Lemonheads, It’s A Shame About Ray
I’m not supposed to like this Dippy Dando sort of thing, but I do. I especially like “Rudderless” and Juliana Hatfield’s backing vocals. It’s at least better than that Soul Asylum “Somebody To Shove The Runaway Black Gold Up My Ass-train” crap. Should I check out this Pavement band?
4. Lou Reed, The Blue Mask
I know it came out more than ten years ago, but this one’s a wowser. The title track is out of this fucking world. I didn’t realize how angry I was about not finishing high school until I heard this.
3. Dinosaur Jr., Whatever’s Cool With Me
As if Green Mind wasn’t awesome enough, Dinosaur Jr. comes out with this cheapie EP thing. It has “Sideways” and a great cover of Bowie’s “Quicksand” on it, along with a bulldog on the front.
2. Sonic Youth, Dirty
My friend Ben Scaccia gave me a surprise birthday present by taking me to NYC for the first time to see Sonic Youth (also for the first time) for free in Central Park on the fourth of July. He doesn’t even like Sonic Youth, that’s how nice he is. They played a whole bunch from this album that wasn’t out yet. Thurston Moore threw a banana at me and I stupidly put it in my pocket. MTV News was there and I swear you can see my head bobbing around in the video of it.
1. Beastie Boys, Check Your Head
Well, damn. They aren’t going away, are they? I’m glad. Paul’s Boutique may have bombed but they’re still cool in my book. And now they’re playing punk. Everybody who was in 8th grade when Licensed To Ill came out is now in college. When I bought the tape at Pure Pop the guy behind me was buying it on record. Vinyl. It was $11.99. I instantly asked if they had any more. They didn’t. I decided to start buying records again.