Ack! I came to this thread expressly to recommend Songs: Ohia. I was so confident I was going to be the first/only person to mention them, too. The disc I was going to recommend was 2002’s Didn’t It Rain, which only gets better each time I listen to it. Jason Molina has one of the most beautiful voices I have ever heard.
I also totally second Germ Free Adolescents by X-Ray Spex and In the Aeroplane Over the Sea by Neutral Milk Hotel – both of those are in my top 5 albums of all time. As Belle and Sebastian are my favorite band, I’ll also second If You’re Feeling Sinister.
And so I can bring something new to the discussion, I’ll recommend Throwing Muses’ self-titled first album, now found on the In a Doghouse comp. Kristin Hersh and Tanya Donnelly went on to have reasonably successful solo careers, but this defines their work for me. Bipolar, eccentric punk-rockabilly-country-rock-pop.
The U.K. band Candidate is really on a roll. I love their last album of acoustic folk-pop Nuada, which was inspired by the cult 1973 British horror flick The Wicker Man and featured Pentangle’s legendary Bert Jansch. But they also have a more regular pop album coming out April 5th that’s beginning to garner some stellar notices, so… if you liked the movie or English folk music, get Nuada.
Bedhead are amazing, this is my favorite.
Richard and Linda Thompson - I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight
How come nobody has Richard and Linda Thompson cds? This and Shoot Out the Lights are their masterpieces, but they are all good.
Luna - Penthouse
Galaxie 500 is great, but I like this album better than anything by them. “Bonnie and Clyde”, a duet with Laetitia Sadier, is especially good.
Pale Saints - The Comforts of Madness
The forgotten forerunners of “shoegaze”. Better than pretty much anything that followed in that genre.
That’s them! Thanks for the link! I followed a few links from there and found a track listing of the Circle C album I have, and that’s the one. It was released in 1991. A previous incarnation of the band called Slow released an EP in 1985 called “Against The Glass”.
After Circle C, they became Copyright, and released “Love Story” in 1997 (with videos for the songs “Transfiguration” and “Radio”), and “The Hidden World” in 2001 (with a video for the song “Rock Machine”). Unfortunately for their fans, they’ve just called it quits.
I’d never heard of Copyright, and only knew of Circle C from the cassette I found in a dollar bin. But I really like the Circle C album, and really need to get it on CD. I’ll probably end up copying it from cassette to my laptop, then burning it onto disc. (Then the music police will come and get me.
And that sir is one of the best bands I’ve ever seen, and one of my all-time favorite albums. Unfortunately my copy was stolen… I doubt I’ll be able to find it again.
You probably should copy your tape to disk before it gets eaten.
