Big Calm - Morcheeba

Track list:

1. The Sea
2. Shoulder Holster
3. Part Of The Process
4. Blindfold
5. Let Me See
6. Bullet Proof
7. Over and Over
8. Friction
9. Diggin' A Watery Grave
10. Fear & Love
11. Big Calm

Running time: 46 minutes
Released: 1998

Now this takes me back to university. Pretty sure I got into this album through my flatmate in my second year. I cannot really imagine it holding up well as a rule, but I suspect the stand out tracks are still the stand outs now, and that I will easily slip back into chill mode for some of them.

It stats strongly. The opening refrains of The Sea immediately throw me back 15 years. A sort of quiet swell to begin with, before the pattern that will dominate the track enters the picture. I am relatively certain that it was this song that convinced me to pick up my own copy of the album, though later I would come to like Blindfold more. Listening to it now, my god the lyrics are awful, I always knew they were bad but blimey. Thankfully they are by far the lesser part of the whole, the sonic bubble created, gently pulsing with the beat progression is a warm and comfortable space - though in all honesty it speaks more to a cosy room on a dark evening than it does to the seaside. The lead-out is too long, I realise; not a flaw I recall.

I can pull something to mind, tune-wise, for all of the names in the caption but they are foggy memories. I haven't listened to this in a decade I reckon. Shoulder Holster is a darker sound, though the lightness of the vocal is at odds with the incessant beats, as too is the sitar or whatever jangly strings that are used to create what little passes for a melody. This tune is quite bad really, whilst not being unpleasant. The repetitive nature of the rhythm is a turn off though. Whilst as the track goes by, we get more variation over the beat pattern, the percussion itself is simply looped over and over and it does my head in. I could be mistaken, but I think repetitive loops are a big feature on this disc and if that gets to me too much I could be cutting a lot, nostalgia or not.

Part of the Process opens by relying on a looped hook, it backs pretty much all of the verse but melts away (or rather is replaced) during the chorus. In its defense, there's a nice twee country vibe to the tune and the beat is catchy. It feels like pure unadulterated cheese through the lens of history and much more musical exposure now though. That's OK. There is room in my life for cheese now and again, but am I just getting attached to the memory of what was, by and large, three good years in Bristol? I was back there a couple of weeks ago, meeting up with old university friends. We're all mid 30s now and wondering where life has gone to a degree. Kicked it old school that day though, regressing to our teenage selves and consoles and games of the time.

Blindfold is groovier, a bit darker and more reminiscent in tone of Morcheeba's first album Who Can You Trust which I recall preferring to this when I picked it up. The string sample is essential, the rhythm is well suited, it leaves space - a sense of emptiness that the vocals float through, and the guitar adds a necessary edge from time to time, a snap and antidote to what could otherwise allow you to tune out. It devolves into wordlessness as it closes, and there is often a touch of laziness about that approach in my mind, but more than anything else in these first four tracks it holds up to the memory, and is still something I can enjoy.

The album definitely has a sense of contrast going for it. The top end - vocal and melodies both - is often very airy, whilst the lower registers and percussion are anything but. It keeps things interestingly open and means that whilst a lot of the shine has gone along with my youth since this album was released, it doesn't feel like a rehash of the same tired old themes. Bullet Proof is a funky instrumental, harking back to the 70s in some senses. As soon as it starts I remember it well, though not before. I really rather like the core loops here, and find that in this instance it is more the variation - particularly the scratching and sampled vocal - that lets it down. That said, the track absolutely needs some pattern breakers but it could have done with better. The loops though - both top end and rhythm - are mesmeric, producing a structure that has me subconsciously nodding along before I realise I am doing it and force myself to stop. Can't prevent the slight sway in time though.

Over and Over changes up the dominant tone. This is left to strings and an acoustic guitar loop to create the playground for the singer. I am not a fan, I think it ditches the bits that Morcheeba are best at, the big loopy rhythmic soundscapes. Yes, the rhythms aren't always massively interesting, but the layering of other sounds often makes up for this. I want to like Friction for bringing those loops back, but frankly the whole track just falls flat for me, something not quite right about the muted horns, a little too canned. I do have fond memories of the last couple of tracks though so once we're past what is practically an interlude the wind down might be better. Or as a 30 something I might just find it trite.

Fear and Love turns out to be schmaltzier than I remember, but the tune is crafted pretty well, and I find it has a dream-like quality to it that means I can forgive the mass-market chill-out repeat-driven blahness of the lyric. The closer, the title track though? I love the swirling sounds in this - another classic loopy roll. The rapping over it I could quite happily leave, but the musical themes are incredibly good and stand up to my recollection of them really well. I wouldn't want a whole album of it, but as a single track the waves, the layering comes together in a way I find very pleasing indeed and its 6 minute length rolls by in no time.

Overall? A nice easy start to life after John Lee Hooker then. A couple of duff tracks to get rid of but mostly a pleasing enough return to a simpler time. In no way would I claim that this band were masters, but they got pretty good at doing one thing rather well.

Big Box of John Lee Hooker (Disc 6) - John Lee Hooker

Track list:

1. Who's Been Jiving You
2. Prison Bound
3. Little Wheel
4. Goin' Mad Blues
5. Mean Old Train
6. Baby Lee
7. Howlin' Wolf
8. Me and My Woman
9. Miss Rosie Mae
10. Canal Street Blues
11. You Can Lead Me Baby
12. Miss Eloise
13. She Left Me By Myself
14. Run On
15. Don't Go Baby
16. Crying All Night
17. Miss Sadie Mae
18. Mad Man Blues
19. Burnin' Hell
20. Talkin' Boogie
21. Grievin' Blues
22. Please Have Mercy
23. Twister Blues
24. Give Me Your Phone Number

Running time: 70 minutes
Released: 2013

So we reach the last, and longest, of the discs in the Big Box anthology of late Blues legend John Lee Hooker. I have it in my sights.

An odd thing to be choosing to start this at quarter past 9 on a Monday evening, but whilst I worked late-ish today and didn't have the energy to cook (takeout to the rescue, as I failed to get shopping on the way home too) I am actually rather relaxed. The relatively high pace of our opening number is a good thing and makes me immediately feel positive about starting this exercise. I am sure doubts will follow but for now we are good.

Prison Bound starts as if it is going to just be guitar, before a very off-tone piano is crammed into action. This produces a really striking sound. Either it is all the recording equipment leaving a lot to be desired, or the tuning is bloody awful. However its off in a really quirky way. Thinking about it, it could have been a particular characteristic of pianos of a certain origin and era; I have only ever heard this kind of shonky tune carried on pianos in westerns or similar golden age films. Whatever the cause, I celebrate it, because the track is enjoyable as a result.

Little Wheel sees Hooker's voice taking on some depth and (I would guess) age. The recording sounds more recent too, better sound quality, more depth of support. I would guess at 70s or 80s for this cut, where the earlier provenance of many tunes was obvious. I don't have a practiced ear for these things but the cleanliness of the recording stood out a mile. It means (I think for the first time) I am keeping 3 in a row from one of these discs. It's been the strongest opening so far, and I wonder if it can keep that up. Hiding away all the best stuff on disc 6 of six? For shame. I recognise a couple of the song titles here as repeats from the prior discs but I don't expect to remember the tunes themselves when I get to them just through the sheer volume of John Lee Hooker songs I have listened to in the past few weeks, throwing a serious curveball at my LastFM artist tracking for the next 3 months!

Its not a serious complaint, but is does jokingly illustrate that this is a rather sharp divergence from my normal and varied diet of different musical foods. After the strong start, the next two tunes do nothing for me and I feel my eyes drooping. Was this a mistake? Nah, what else would I be doing at this time eh... getting frustrated by something, I'm sure. Just occasionally, when I know that no-one I know is around, living on my own gets to be a burden. Of course, were I not alone here I wouldn't have got away with giving in to my lethargy on the way home so... chalk up the wins, and overlook the loss! Baby Lee has a nice little roll to it, a very simple rhythmic hook but it's melodic rather than percussive and even though it repeats a lot it is light and sparse enough to just about pass the interest test for the first two minutes. The third minute though... no, it is just grating on me too much by now with the novelty worn off and nothing of interest structured around it to give the track any craft. Such a shame when something like that feels fresh up front but goes stale so fast through lack of any help. Alas the tribute to Howlin' Wolf also fails to deliver anything noteworthy, and so from three in the bank, we have 4 in the bin. It threatens five as the opening to the 8th track is low key and my fears are realised as this devolves to formulaic patterns that I am long tired of now. To be fair there is a little more playing around the central theme here than there has been in discs past but the whole presentation of the track fails to excite me.

The first (to my immediate knowledge) of the repeats now raises its head... or maybe not. I assumed that Miss Rosie May was a repeat of Rosie Mae from disc 5 but the slight change of title leaves that open to uncertainty. What I can say for sure is that it fails my interest test this time, even as I kept its cousin... for my own sanity that sways me against them being the same song. Canal Street Blues must be, though - that's not a title that gets replicated by accident, right? I am pretty sure I rather liked the other version though, and this falls flat, hard.

Finally a little more life. Its a simple little number but You Can Leave Me strikes a good note immediately, and only improves as an economically used piano joins in, soft and quiet over the structure. The vocal here, too, is key. Whilst the music is patterned to a fault the variety comes from the stresses and strains in the singing and those light touches that almost sound faint enough to have been captured from the studio next door. It all adds up to a nice little song, and one to break a long run of binned tracks. I am approaching half way through and my feel is that this disc generally is later recordings than the others. Maybe that's why it was organised this way, I don't know, but there are (I think) more electrified numbers, more bite to the guitar as a result. It doesn't always make for better tunes, alas. I thought it was going to be a write-off when it started, but She Left Me By Myself actually catches me sweet as the body of the track comes in and the sense of joy from playing is carried through the recording. The song isn't fantastic, and the playing probably not his best, but there is energy in this tune and a sense of fun that is often missing. That's not a massive surprise, it is the Blues after all, but with it injected here the tone is improved and that improvement carries straight through to Run On. This is another electrified track with a clear recording and decent backing. Energy and pace are once again slightly lifted and there are moments here and there where Hooker's voice sounds almost as good as Terry Callier used to.

Huh, a classic track. That snuck up on me. Mind you, as played here it has none of the snap of the properly classic renditions and Don't Go Baby is going out the digital door into the trash. The playing is almost not there, the majority of the track is carried over just by what sounds like stomping. Its all very disappointing as with a bit more life the song can fly. It's almost as if the disc is mocking my assertion that these are later recordings with a couple of these that surface now. I feel my foot tapping along to Crying All Night even as my head is thinking nothing of it. Its an odd dichotomy but I think at this point I am going to go with my head; the foot could be a side-effect of sitting cross-legged on a squashy sofa and typing on a coffee table.

Regardless of what happens with the rest of this disc, I have probably just about saved enough of the tracks from across the Big Box of John Lee Hooker to have justified the purchase. I am less enamoured of the whole working day (or near enough) I have effectively spent ploughing through it but I do think that my library will be better for it, and I feel a little more enlightened than I was before I started, having exposed myself to a large corpus of work that had essentially been boiled down to one song that does not appear on this collection in my mind. I suppose the a small annoyance is that the Big Box followed so close on the heels of The Best of Friends thus concentrating my exposure to Hooker further than the collection alone would manage. I would be astonished if the back-to-back nature of these listens hasn't coloured my impressions of the music some - the vitriol I spewed at one aspect in particular would probably have been much reduced if I hadn't been exposed so often in such a short time. Incidentally whilst it has reared its head on this disc, it is conspicuously absent for the most part so I have had to find other reasons to justify my dumping songs from my hard drive. It's not hard to find a justification that stands up, mind; flimsy is fine.

Into the last 5 tracks now and is it wrong that I have a palpable sense of excitement about the prospect of listening to something else? I haven't looked ahead since this marathon started, and I'm sure the capricious nature of the universe means I have a couple of old stinkers just around the corner to sour the thought but... no. No negativity please. That no negativity rule has kept my fingers still over the last few tracks as the Big Box comes to a conclusion with a quiet slide off stage rather than a bang. It would be too much to expect a crescendo over 6 hour-plus long albums though so I'll forgive the curators that.

All that remains to do is say farewell to John Lee. He goes out asking for our phone number - demanding really. Alas the demand, like much that came before it, is not one I feel any obligation to entertain. There is no doubt that the man was very, very good at what he did, but there is also o doubt that most of it was simply not up my street.

Big Box of John Lee Hooker (Disc 5) - John Lee Hooker

Track list:

1. Stomp Boogie
2. My Daddy Was a Jockey
3. Helpless Blues
4. Streets Is Filled With Women
5. Time Is Marching
6. Hobo Blues
7. Wednesday Evening
8. We Gonna Make Everything Alright
9. The Moon Above
10. Rosie Mae
11. I Love to Boogie
12. Rock N Roll
13. Canal Street Blues
14. Wandering Blues
15. The Story of a Married Woman
16. Weeping Willow
17. I Don't Be Welcome Here
18. Goin' to California
19. Miss Lorraine
20. Tennessee Blues
21. Moon Is Rising
22. Nobody Talk to Me

Running time: 65 minutes
Released: 2013

Back to the box to draw out more John Lee Hooker tracks. After finding the time and desire to write an interlude earlier I feel even guiltier for not managing this sooner.

Truth is, my weeks have been hellish of late, so finding time when my mind is in the right place to write up anything (I am now 2 weeks behind with the Albion write-ups) has been a challenge and finding the space to listen to something I am not 100% keen on for an hour was beyond me. Here I am though, and there is Hooker stomping his feet over and over to the point where it must be reallly achey! The Stomp Boogie is kinda nice for the stomping and a very different approach to the guitar than evidenced on previous discs in the Big Box. With the strings freed from percussive duty, and honestly that is my biggest problem with that one form of hook I keep railing against without ever adequately describing, the guitar line can sing and provide interest. Interesting rather than structural. A stomp forward, so to speak.

The same freedom is available on My Daddy Was a Jockey and though less immediately appealing the track comes together alright and these two back to back make it the most interesting start to one of these discs. I know that cannot last - either I'll get bored with the repetition of the freedom or old patterns that I decry will re-emerge, and whilst Helpless Blues does not annoy, neither does it intrigue. This disc's first casualty.

It is a Sunday evening here and on the one hand I have an itch to be playing games online with friends as half-arranged. On the other, I have only just started to feel properly human. Pity about going back to work tomorrow, but at least there's no US working tomorrow - a situation that should make my day quieter, left alone to get on with my own deal - and I have a lot on my plate to handle. The best thing I can say about the fourth track on this disc is that it maintains a difference between tracks, alas like the song that preceded it there is no interest in its chords. The same is not true for Time is Marching though - this has a really classic structure, a nice supporting sound and crackly enchantment, mouth organ and all. It slips into the form of the Blues to which I am instinctively drawn rather than, as much of this collection has been, relying on an interpretation of the term that is actively uninteresting. Hell, lets be fair. The patterns here aren't interesting; they are familiar, warm and innate, but brilliantly performed and so I can overlook the repetition.

Ah, Hobo Blues is the first track that comes close to using that hook. So, really I should try to describe what I mean. One, the guitar forms percussion rather than melody. Two, it often (but not here) is accompanied by a barely sung "yeah" drawn out beyond pleasantries. Three the hook relies on the same note hammered over and over, normally four times or so, then a different note to end and a pause. Four, it is repeated over and over with perhaps some minor embellishments to differentiate but often no change of tone or feel. It's really difficult to construe just what the form is and why it irks me so and to be honest by now I am as sick of typing it as any poor person reading these pages is of reading it. So I am going to resolve not to mention it further unless it really is pertinent.

Huh. We Gonna Make Everything Alright starts more like an impromptu jam. Its an awful recording but feels like they were just pissing about a little. That feeling drops a little when Hooker starts singing but the poor clarity of sound and the unengaged air of the playing makes it a no-go for me and the same goes for the track that follows. An uncharacteristically strong start, then has been followed up by more of the same old sounds, not quite interesting enough to be kept. The distant qualities to Hooker's singing give me a sorta "One More Kiss" feel (from Blade Runner) which is nice, but at the present time puts me to sleep more than it enchants me.

More comfort blues follows, before the recording artefacts rear their head again and give I Love to Boogie a wonderful muted undertone. It is a pity that there isn't a bit more going on in the track itself because this is one of those cases where old recordings really do have more character than the uber-clean and perfect sounds we get these days. Don't get me wrong, most of the time I would take the cleaner sound every time but it is nice to have examples of both approaches and it does add character.

Oh now, that is a different sound, dirtier, sexier blues around Canal Street apparently. It's a slower number and the snatched sounds from the guitar give it a sense of impropriety that makes it much more accessible than a couple of tracks that I have basically just ignored, and then the Wandering Blues introduces a whispering style of lyricism that is a nice switch up but alas the song is plagued and not something I can bear. A real pity that, because I love the hushed tones used for the vocal and find myself wishing the style had been applied a little more over the course of the box set. That said, I have definitely remarked before that I was taken aback by the vocal range of the man, having really only been familiar with one approach from the work that I knew, so it's not like he was static vocally.

The next couple of songs are both kinda alright, but not quite good. Pleasant, enjoyable, but not stand out enough to keep. This frustrates me as each of them has something to recommend it and neither are dismissed for old sins but somehow they never quite grab me. It makes me feel, though, that were the stars to align and all my favourite characteristics of John Lee Hooker tracks ended up in the same song it would be mighty fine. Alas, not to be I suspect. There is, however a bright point; I Don't Be Welcome Here has a great groove to it, a grungy guitar and an atmosphere that holds it together stupendously. It ends a tad disappointingly but otherwise I love it.

More comfort blues follows, but this time despite the band I am not really feeling it as it all just feels a little too distant and not something I want to be any closer to. A bit like California in real terms, then. Into the final stretch of the penultimate disc. This time next week I may be shot of John Lee Hooker on these pages, a few tracks (likely repeats of things I have already heard) contributed to compilations aside. I won't lie, I am looking forward to hearing something a bit more different and varied and ideally presented in more bite-size bundles. Much as these discs have flown by when I actually engage with them, packed as they are with short songs, the 60 minute plus for the listen alone is a mental barrier. 45 minutes is just so much easier to find somehow!

Tennessee sounds fun. Whilst staid, this track has a light touch to it, a positivity not often associated with the Blues, that makes it nice and digestible. The last two tracks don't offer that though, and form a run-of-the-mill lead out and I am relieved when the final chord falls silent. I have observed my duty, not let it fall below 1 a week, and pushed through almost to the close of the big box. Just one more marathon left to manage somehow before the future brightens, at least in a musical sense.

Interlude: Life is Strange

Whilst not quite a first in talking about things outside of music, this post goes further than when I spoke about playlisting for the RPG I'm running. Incidentally the playlist doesn't make it to sessions anymore as I can't be arsed heaving the laptop over, or pissing about with an MP3 player that probably won't be compatible with the outputs at my friend's house (no Apple for me).

I suppose technically, since I own the game, the Life is Strange soundtrack is part of my library. Since a licensed soundtrack is not available to purchase it is not included in the digital library that I am actually progressing through, only within the game itself, which I am playing on PS4. There is a YouTube playlist which I am listening to whilst writing this piece. Whilst I will chat a little bit about the use of music in the game (generally excellent), this post is an interlude more because I feel a need to write about the game proper and I don't want to revive a long-dead blog to do it. I have mentioned Life is Strange a few times in passing during recent posts, as a competing demand on my time, as something that I have been enjoying and thinking about in the wider sphere of my life. The goal with this project has never been to focus, laser-like, on the music and nothing else. It is, rather, a stream of consciousness merely directed by the music and where the primary purpose is to get me listening to things I have overlooked and trim out material I would not want to listen to again. Stepping away from that to talk about a videogame is a bit of a departure and, suffice to say, not one I was expecting to make. However for better or worse this is now my platform.

For those that don't know, Life is Strange is an episodic game (to date 4 of 5 are out, and I have just completed the 4th) from Dontnod Entertainment and published by Square Enix. It is an interactive story-slash-adventure game set in the Pacific northwest and focusing around events in one hick town and, particularly, the "prestigious" school institution there. Quotes, because it doesn't really feel like the school is, or should be, so rated. The game is mostly notable for a few things:

1. It does Telltale better than Telltale
2. It has a female protagonist and a majority of the major cast are female
3. Time travel and other magical weirdness, including nods to several genre properties to have trodden similar ground before.

There is a lot more to it than that, but it is the intersection of points 1 and 3 that really makes the game tick, whilst point 2 gives it a distinct flavour to many adventure games. The time travel, or rewind, mechanic means that you can explore different paths for your choices before deciding on which one to go with. These choices are also generally more weighty, with no clear cut right/wrong outcomes, and have more impact on what is to come than in Telltale games, too - or at least, that has been my experience. Judging from the breakdown of choices at the end of each episode I am probably not alone in that view. It also means that there isn't a timer on the decision points the way that Telltale tend to do. There are some time-based events, but the magical time travel girl uses her power to rewind to solve those puzzles and it's not a question of "didn't choose in time, so we'll pick for you".

Before I verge into spoiler territory and talk about the content of the game I want to tenuously justify this post with the music discussion. Put simply, Life is Strange uses music fantastically well. Rather than going down the route of hiring composers to generate them bespoke music, the majority of the LiS soundtrack is compiled from tunes put out by artists or groups you may well have heard of (e.g. Alt-J, Mogwai, José González; the Alt-J track being one of the few that I kept from the disappointing An Awesome Wave), integrated in much the same way that you find licensed music used in TV. Not to do videogame composition down (I bloody love the Bastion soundtrack after all), but this feels like a step forward in two ways. First, to secure the licenses in the first instance by having a product that labels and artists are happy to associate themselves with. In other words the continued movement of gaming towards mainstream entertainment and everything that means - including a more diverse audience. Secondly the seamless integration with the content alongside original scoring, like in film.

All of this builds a really strong sense of place and atmosphere. Some of the nicest moments in the game are found where Max, our protagonist, can simply sit somewhere in her environment and muse upon the events. You can even have her sit down with her guitar and noodle out one or two of the tracks herself. The pieces chosen are often quite soothing despite the game itself not necessarily following suit. In text this presents like dissonance, in context the musical support provides the relief and mental break that you can imagine our protagonist needing to deal with the week that she is having. Also, whilst often soothing, they are not placid tracks, a distinction which is important to the generation of that atmosphere. The Mogwai track Kids Will Be Skeletons is my go-to example there; the title implies something darker than the light and airy guitar melodies actually deliver but there is a murkiness in the bass and percussive structure that provides a tension in the track which stops it just rocking you to relaxation. Or at least in my case. The song is used for the lead up to a particularly sad/shocking moment, a cliffhanger to end an episode. It just works so well and implies that the studio really put some effort in to identify exactly what they wanted to do and how to do it. This is something that always impresses me; as someone who listens to a fair bit of music (I have actually had a chance this week, albeit shuffles whilst working from home more than dedicated listens for this blog!) from across several spheres my mind boggles as to how perfect tracks are identified to accompany visuals. Its something that usually impresses me about BBC documentaries as much as anything else.

Worryingly, this may turn out to be the single longest post here and it's technically off topic. Still, on to the game itself. Here be spoilers, perhaps.

Given this post, it will surprise no-one to find out I love Life is Strange. As a whole it is the best thing I have played in a very long time, despite ostensibly covering US teen/college drama, which I loathe. I think I enjoy Telltale's Tales from the Borderlands more because the humour is fantastically on the button, but I don't think it is a better game. Not by a long chalk.

Episode 1 was a so-so introduction. You get to learn about Max's power and deal with teen wangst and slice of life drama as it starts, but it escalates pretty quickly into saving the life of Max's estranged BFF from her early teens, Chloe. Chloe is a real love her or hate her character, I suspect. I fall squarely on the second side of that, finding her willful stupidity hard to relate to and harder to like. Max I found almost as hard to like to begin with but she grew on me with later episodes, becoming a bit more assertive and less self-pitying. The episode as a whole is pretty much all setup - people, places and the events you will investigate as the plot thickens. I was enticed enough, but not wholly sold.

Episode 2 changed that completely. Whilst navigating around Chloe's epicentre of drama and crazy, which is driven by one of the main plot threads, the disappearance of her friend Rachel that you are investigating, you are also dealing with the deep depression of one of Max's college friends, brought on by bullying and, it turns out later, much, much worse. Kate Marsh is by far the most sympathetic character in the game, and set up to be so really well. The "Jesus waits" type is often the butt of the jokes in college-set media and Kate is positioned in that role. However the game starts with Max as an outsider of sorts too, meaning Kate is by far her most relate-able classmate which sucks the player in. The inevitable progression of the bullying is really powerful over the two episodes and it had me standing up for Kate at every turn, seeing where it was going.  There's a moment in the episode where Chloe rants at Max if you choose to take a call from Kate instead of being all about her (Chloe and Max having fully reconciled not speaking for 5 years during ep. 1) which is, above every other stupid or crappy thing Chloe does, the moment that defines her character for me. I took the call in my playthrough, of course, and didn't even consider rewinding to see the other path.

That right there? An example of how good the game is. It gives you all the tools to fully explore every decision you could make, but then is written in such a way as to produce strong emotional "fuck yous!" to the idea of doing so in places.

The episode progresses and has, thus far, the stand-out ending. No matter what Max does to be good to Kate over two episodes, the rest of the cast outweigh that with their dickishness and Kate, having been the victim of being drugged, has some out of character actions filmed and exposed. She's suicidal and there is an incredibly powerful scene where you - sans rewind having blown your limit to stop time and reach Kate - have to talk her down from the rooftop before she jumps. It can, apparently, go both ways. I got the better result here and would have been pretty emotionally devastated if I had not managed to, more praise for the writing.

See the thing is: the main cast is used really well. This may be an adventure game, but all the most important choices relate directly to other characters or conversations, not objects or investigations. The focus is on navigating the social maze more than the puzzle of what happened to Rachel or what is going on. At least early, anyway. Yes - there are more puzzle-like sections, and these are my least favourite pieces of the game. In episode 4 you are pulling together clues and it's just dull gameplay... its a fair bit of a letdown after the conversational choices earlier. The majority female cast is well realised and most of the time talking to people is fun and interesting. You can, it seems, change a lot of lives in a few conversations. Which, obviously, is OTT for real life, but adds weight to the interactions in the game and focusing on this is a really neat change in tack from most games.

Kate is not the only character who can live or die in different story paths; apparently there's a thread where one of the less savory characters (and note, none of the main cast are nearly as two-dimensional in the good/bad person sense as they first appear) can die as a result of Chloe's actions (which are guided by you as Max with her rewind or "don't do that it sucks!" power). These characters aren't central to the primary plot strand then, but thus far I have seen enough to suggest that, unlike my experience with Telltale games, the paths are truly divergent with several different end states. The main plot might conclude similarly every time (or not, but I would guess it does) but the surrounding details feel substantially more weighty.

Anyhow, after the excellence of episode 2, the third installment was just about able to keep pace. Its crowning moment was Max learning a new use for her power, rewinding to when she and Chloe were kids and saving Chloe's dad from the traffic accident that killed him, predictably establishing a completely different timeline. Whilst there is some weirdness about original timeline Max suddenly then "waking up" in the present day of an alternate timeline with only memories from the original sequence of events, this was a completely unexpected shift in the game. It is made poignant in the extreme by finding out, at the end of the episode, how the change played out for Chloe. The game gets really good at emotional gut punches, and holds that over twice for the start of episode 4. I almost had to put down the controller and walk away when the (now paraplegic and getting worse) Chloe asks Max to overdose her with morphine, despite the fallback of a rewind power. I almost had to do it again when, knowing she has to go back to her own timeline you have to sit through Max experiencing the scene where Chloe sees her dad for the last time once more.

Hell, the writing in this game is so good, that reading a synopsis of certain scenes is enough to produce a strong emotional response. 

Episode 4 ratchets up the tension and the creepiness of what is going on. Real human ugliness, not just magical oddity. This move was not unexpected - after all, someone driven to suicide by having been drugged and abducted, and a young woman missing both point to some very nasty goings on. My problem with the game comes right as the final cliffhanger where that darkness is now applied directly to your protagonist in a way that strongly suggests a very limited way to avoid it. The final cutscene has an antagonist spike Max with a needle and her fall down woozy. This is followed by shots of the scene where you found out just how dark things were earlier in the episode. I hope its just appearances because, well... torture horror is not my thing, y'know. Whilst I am fairly certain Max gets out of it somehow, I'd rather not have to go through it first.

Anyhow - I have written far too much in this piece already, and I still need to find time today to listen to more John Lee Hooker to not stall the library run through too far, so I'll draw it to a close there and simply suggest people do themselves a favour and look up episode 1 on whichever platform they prefer, then plough on with the others if taken by it.

Big Box of John Lee Hooker (Disc 4) - John Lee Hooker

Track list:

1. She Was in Chicago
2. Goin' On Highway 51
3. I Love You Honey
4. Boogie Woogie
5. Boogie Chillen No. 2
6. Drifting from Door to Door
7. Every Night
8. Must I Wait Till Your Man Is Gone
9.Whistlin' and Moanin' Blues
10. I Can See You When You're Weak
11. Late Last Night
12. I Wanna Walk
13. The Numbers
14. Slim's Stomp
15. Sunny Land
16. Never Satisfied
17. I Can't Believe
18. If You Need My Lovin' Baby
19. Little Boy Blues
20. You've Taken My Woman
21. Tease Me Baby
22. Crawlin' Back Spider
23. No Friend Around

Running time: 66 minutes
Released: 2013

This one starts a little different, if only a bit muted in tone and grubbier in sound from the guitar. We are immediately in to the same style of hook that has annoyed me on the previous three discs of this set - and there are two more hours of Hooker still to come after this which compounds my feelings of discontent. Hopefully it is not representative, but I think I have heard enough by now to think it probably is.

It has been a week since I made time for the last listen. I had wanted to fit this in during the working week, as I didn't have many social evenings lined up last week. In the event though, work took over and robbed me of the energy or will to concentrate for a solid stretch to deliver a post on a disc that runs over an hour.

Goin' On Highway 51 is a little more interesting as a starting point, a tinnier guitar used more sparingly means that although there are patterns similar to that one form of riff that has annoyed me so, they aren't so constant and the structure of the piece gives you more of a rest from it. I still don't like it enough to keep but its not painful in the way the repetition was becoming elsewhere. When I Love You Honey turns out to be a piano-driven melody in addition to the foundation provided by the guitar, I feel a bit more positive again.

As I said before, long week. Working into the evenings, and 100 miles an hour during the time spent in the office. Then yesterday I nipped over to Bristol to see a couple of old friends for the day and it too turned into a long one as I didn't get home until 2am. Better than a longer drive in worse conditions this morning though!

Boogie Woogie has none of the brightness or constant gentle roll that I would expect from the title. Not because it isn't there, but because I feel that the guitar cannot provide it, much as Hooker tries. Or rather, it can but if it does then there is nothing else going on, and that just seems to me to be no way to build a track. I have said on prior discs that the tunes are better when there is more of a band in play and that is really the nub of the issue here. As good as John Lee Hooker might be at playing blues guitar, limiting the pieces to just the guitar and some rudimentary tapping percussion really shows up the over-reliance on a couple of specific patterns and forms.

Thinking about this more,  it is the rhythms specifically that repeat and that is what I find myself objecting to. The fact that is effected by hammering the same note several times in a pattern that shifts little between tracks is an annoyance but if the rhythms were more different piece to piece it would not hammer into my skull like a red hot nail each time. Having said that, it does definitely make me appreciate the tracks that don't use the same trick more. Every Night being a good example.

As I say that though track 8 starts. This has both a backing band and a less annoying rhythm but it fails to enthrall on any level. In part this is because the recording is awful, the crackle here doesn't add warmth or a sense of place, it simply obliterates the keyboard part and distorts the rest too. I then get a shock as track 9 puts John Lee Hooker up with Andrew Bird as a user of whistling - albeit only briefly. I saw that the song was titled Whistlin' and Moaning Blues but I did not expect whistles to actually be employed. Unfortunately the track is a bit dull, underwhelming.

That is less true of the song that follows. Whilst it is slow, it hangs together well, and does not fall into the traps that I have come to be wary of around Hooker's songs. I Can See You When You're Weak is a nice inclusion here, warming my view towards the current task, and I like it enough that it puts a positive spin on what comes next. Late Last Night does rely on a very similar rhythm as a lot of those tracks I have bemoaned thus far but crucially it manages to put more into the guitar part so that rather than rote repetition there is a bit more craft and guile about it and I come away happy with it. Shockingly I then find myself keeping three in a row as the next track is a decent, if short, ditty too.

Numbers takes us back into don't want to be here territory though, and highlights another point about the repetition that speaks to why it bugs me so much - it's not just with the rhythm and the playing. These songs often have a very very similar vocal pattern too and overlaying two components with so little variance makes it feel much more like the same tune with different words each time, and after 70 plus tracks of JLH that is simply getting a bit too much for me now. Part of me is hoping to get a second listen in today, but if that is going to happen then it will definitely be playing with the order of things because I can't take 2 solid hours of blues from the same man in 24 hours!

The current track is called "Never Satisfied" and I feel like that applies to me listening to this late, great legend's work. Even when it is interesting I feel like it is tainted by the limitations of when it is not. I suppose, really, that I am not really evaluating this in the best way. I am complaining about similarities in the music and "same song, different words" in a context where I cannot really concentrate and take in the quality or otherwise of those words. Having said that, I do not consider it likely that I would listen in depth to the words of these songs in future even were I to keep them and it bears mentioning that if one aspect of what you are listening to is not very enjoyable (to put it mildly) then it is likely to detract from the overall experience. Thus whilst I am definitely not being fair to Hooker's songwriting ability, I feel happy with the decisions that I am making on the basis of his composition.

It is always a pleasant surprise when these listens where most of the disc douses my interest throw up little gems of surprise. You've Taken My Woman snaps me out of the self justification with a really fun little number, again full band to add the uplift it seems Hooker needs to go from interminable to enjoyable. There are still tracks to go at this point, but this really is the highlight, and probably the best point to consider this post closed. For all my cynicism there really is some genius here.

Big Box of John Lee Hooker (Disc 3) - John Lee Hooker

Track list:

1. See See Baby
2. I'm So Excited
3. Real Gone Gal
4. Good Business
5. Morning Blues
6. You've Got Another Man
7. Cotton Pickin' Blues
8. I'm Going Away
9. I'm So Worried Baby
10. Graveyard Blues
11. I'm in the Mood
12. No Shoes
13. Nightmare Blues
14. Let Your Daddy Ride
15. Moaning Blues
16. Decoration Day Blues
17. Solid Sender
18. Heart Trouble Blues
19. Welfare Blues
20. Unfriendly Woman
21. Notoriety Woman
22. Thinking Blues
23. Don't You Remember Me

Running time: 69 minutes
Released: 2013

All of these discs start the same! Yeah, that's a bit flippant, but in doing the setup for this series of posts all in one go the opening chords are remarkably similar.

So I predicted it would be the weekend before I got in another listen and I was right. Not only that it is the end of the weekend. Sunday night. Back to work tomorrow and all that. It has been a crazy week. Today, though, has been good; got just enough done to be satisfied with, had some fun and a good meal and now have managed (more accurately decided) to find time for this listen.

See See Baby does start with a riff remarkably similar to that which begins disc 2. That riff forms 90% of the tune and it is rather boring, hence the extended intro. I'm So Excited has a little more depth of sound and strikes a better chord with me. Hooker's voice is clearer, fuller, here and that also adds something to the mix that elevates it a little. I think, again, this has a more traditional wider Blues structure and somehow adherence to this kind of format is more pleasing to me than the specific substructures he often uses. Who knows, I'm just typing out of my backside.

It's too hot for this time of night - funny how heat is always more oppressive after dark - and I am hoping that concentrating on these tunes will take my mind of both that and the ridiculous level of noise coming from my neighbour's place. Real Gone Gal is back to sparse and crackly but there is an immediacy to it, a faster whip, that keeps it appealing, right up to the point it ends as abruptly as.

Yes, bad joke!

Huh, I just found a monkey nut husk containing 3 nuts. I've seen the single pods before but not a trio before now. That little anecdote is probably about as interesting as Good Business which is like Real Gone Girl with all the good bits sucked out and replaced with plod. I find the range of our performer's vocal interesting in the sense that range is not something that I associate with the archetypal John Lee Hooker that I held in my mind before tackling these listens. I wonder if, as he got older, he only played the most successful tunes (quite a natural reaction if so, in some ways) and so some of these tracks where he is more articulate or displaying more vocal muscle went by the wayside. We're in a run, three in a row now, of tunes that I find ponderous, slow and repetitive. Each has had some element of greater interest embedded within it, be it a nice vocal, an interesting bit of noodling or whatever, but overall fall into that stereotypical limited pattern that has turned me off before and, frankly, with 6 discs of this there are songs in this collection that have those elements without the downsides.

Cotton Pickin' Blues breaks the chain a little - the tune is very different - but not by being something I want to keep. Here the recording is awful, the keyboard (or keyboards, I suspect) are recording at very different volumes to everything else around them and the distant effect is not engaging me on this occasion. Thankfully I'm Going Away brings interest back and, more than anything else, reinforces my impression that I prefer Hooker when he raises the tempo and injects a little more into his hooks and riffs. Maybe, as someone once said about me, I don't appreciate the Blues really - just some facsimile of them. It is a view I took umbrage with at the time but it has grown on me in the years since. I like my downbeat, depressing music - I turn to sad stuff when I am down, not lively things to get me out of a hole - but Blues does not feature in my choice of wallowing companions. I wonder what determines whether a tune will work for me in those circumstances; pretty much everything I turn to has more depth of sound than this. Incidentally I am not surprised when I find myself marking Graveyard Blues for removal to the song burial zone that is my recycle bin.

I'm In the Mood is the first song that I recognise as appearing for a second time (it featured on disc 1). There is nothing about this particular recording that makes me feel that I need to hang on to it, unlike the last time I heard it. No Shoes is nice, though; whilst slow it again exhibits a more vocally ambitious Hooker, warbling up and down, a nice vulnerability in the voice to go with the slow, but relatively rich sound. Pity about a skip in the recording near the end, but you can't have everything, eh?

Yeeaaaah! No. Sorry, that does not work for me. The wailed affirmative in Nightmare Blues is coupled with a return to a very low effort riff and, despite the fact there is a bit of a lick to this in pace compared to some of the songs in the Big Box I find myself switching off to this one. I am facing the prospect of traveling into London for the first time in a couple of years next week, on the day a tube strike starts, to boot - just my luck; finally get to travel for work and it's not anywhere interesting and on a day which might mean a horrible squash getting home too. Ah well, shouldn't grumble - should be interesting to be elsewhere for the day, and if I do get delayed, at least the next day is a work from home job. Alas the travel probably means no roleplaying this week. Whilst that is no bad thing in some ways - I have not had enough time to contemplate what happens next in Out Amongst the Ruins - it is also a blow to lose my regular social outlet. Still, seeing old uni friends next weekend so its not like everything is barren. I digress because we have hit another dry section where not much happening in the music is worth a mention at all. I was about to comment that at least next door have quietened down but then the laughter that pierces my walls worse than any lawnmower kicked up again. Oh well.

My monkey nuts are almost gone... sigh. Still peckish - those things are moreish. There is something primal, satisfying about cracking the husks open, shelling them, removing the coating and getting at the nut inside. Even if they do make a terrible mess!

What I cannot tell is whether Hooker is literally reusing the exact hook or riff between songs here or whether it is just the supporting structure of it that is repeated. I suspect a mix of the two depending on the tracks you compare but there is a pattern that I am very sick of by now and it keeps rearing its head - as in Heart Trouble Blues. It has been six tracks already since the last one I plan to keep, and the seventh is soon heading for the can too as the another variation - and here it is clearly a variation, showing me up! - on the same annoying riff appears. I am trying to evaluate whether it would be so unwelcome if I was hearing it in just one tune instead of many and in all honesty I think my answer is  yes. It just does nothing for me, repetitive for repetition's sake and it is there in place of any other instrumentation (just some tapping for rhythm) which highlights the over-reliance.

Ah! Finally something more interesting, complete with mouth organ, recording fuzz and more life in general. Pity it is on a song called Unfriendly Woman; the name makes me roll my eyes but the sounds make me tap my foot. Notoriety Woman does not make with the foot tapping but alas does keep the eye rolling going, not least from that same structure again. I admire anyone who can go on stage unsupported and perform to a crowd, but at the same time... sometimes getting support in is just better for everyone. From where I sit that sums up JLH to a T.

The summation may be past, but I still have two tracks to hear before I am free of him for tonight. I don't think I have much more left to add though, and unless the final track on the disc is a change up, neither does Hooker. It isn't, and he doesn't, so we close there, with me having butchered my holdings of all but 5 of the 23 tracks.

Big Box of John Lee Hooker (Disc 2) - John Lee Hooker

Track list:

1. Sally Mae
2. Hobo Blues
3. Poor Joe
4. Maudie
5. Landing Blues
6. Huckle Up Baby
7. She Ain't Good for Nothin'
8. The Road Is So Rough
9. Hoogie Boogie
10. Love Blues
11. I Had a Dream
12. I'm Gonna Kill That Woman
13. Whiskey and Wimmen
14. Forgive Me
15. Dusty Road
16. 609 Boogie
17. Queen Bee
18. Union Station Blues
19. Questionnaire Blues
20. My Baby's Got Somethin'
21. It's My Own Fault
22. Louise
23. How Can You Do It

Running time: 68 minutes
Released: 2013

Part 2 of the Hooker marathon, and no blow.

Crappy joke out of the way, on with the show. Sally Mae is sung in a way that does not sound like John Lee Hooker to me. There were hints at variation on the first disc, and this song reminds me of some amalgam of bluesmen rather than any particular individual. Something in the communication of the lyrics is lighter, more open than I would have expected. The recording is also quite clear - no crackle, which I would expect to be there (on evidence of disc 1) for very early stuff.

Hobo Blues follows a similar pattern, the voice perhaps a shade back towards the familiar, before the imperfect recordings show up - there is a hiss and wheeze about Poor Joe, a sense that the guitar is perhaps slightly out of tune; the latter is likely an illusion created by the former. All three of these first few tracks are failing to set my ears on fire. I am off work today - planned leave to recover from the 500 mile round trip at the weekend for which I was behind the wheel - and it has taken me until gone 17.00 to get around to doing anything productive. Well, aside from shopping that is. 

I am hoping that, as with disc 1, the breezy nature of the disc with short songs coming thick and fast, will override my apathy and inure against the boredom of the long player. That might require some more interesting tracks though. Maudie is the first to show promise but it ends too soon, fading out whilst it seems to continue on. Unsatisfying; as is the number following it. Despite a nice muting distance between the voice and its support and the recording - giving an impression of 50's radio - the song itself makes me feel more like sleep.

Whilst not being productive, I have played through episode 2 of Life is Strange and hot damn that has one great scene that justifies the season purchase price on its own. Could any of the tracks here do similar for this disc (if not the whole set)? 

Huckle Up Baby and She Ain't Good for Nothin' appear to share a very similar approach to the guitar and structuring the support for the words, albeit at very different tempos. They are a strange pair to put back-to-back like this as the similarities are so strong. In a random link, it reminds me of two tracks from disc 1 of the Microdisney anthology Daunt Square to Elsewhere (Michael Murphy and Love Your Enemies) which also evoke very similar patterns in two consecutive tracks. Similarity like that is the last thing I need when I am still failing to fully engage with a listen, so I am glad when the next tune in sequence is more distinct. The Road is So Rough is also the first track on this collection that has me thinking I will hold on to it. Not sure what works here - the slightly deeper sound (a bit of additional support?), the positive bias because of the change-up, or something else? 

It doesn't really matter but it seems to have been a watershed. The intro to Hoogie Boogie already sounds better for following on and despite the fact the pattern of play feels like it was employed earlier on the disc it maintains that freshness. High tempo, low volume guitar, the air is as much formed by the tapping or clapping as by the guitar and very distant voice that occasionally mumbles something. Yet as quickly as the interest zipped in, it rushes out with the arrival of Love Blues which returns to a plodding approach which sounds a little stale. Hooker's vocal here is warm, though and again has a timbre that I would not associate with him. It is not enough to save the song for me but there we go.

Most of the journey back yesterday was taken up with discussion of music tastes, favourites and sharing influences - it probably accounted for two thirds of the total on the road time, discovering interesting touch-points and much-expected divergences. After two tracks of engagement, I find myself again diverging from the contents of this disc. I find too many of the tracks over-repetitive, a fault which becomes less excusable when that repetition is in evidence between tracks as well as within them. This sort of sameness was bound to be a problem for me at some point over the Big Box and I am not surprised to run into it here.

Of course, no sooner have I mentioned that, than a track that steps away from the themes that have repeated comes on. Whiskey and Wimmin seems to be more a classic 12-bar structure to my untrained ear, or at least identifies easily with that form of the Blues. This constitutes a bit of a change-up for Hooker though, and it is a welcome little insertion. The problem is again the fact it seems to end mid-stream, fading out whilst continuing unheard as the next song plays. Worse, it is a one-song interlude as Forgive Me immediately returns to as good as the exact same pattern to the guitar as was present on the tracks preceding W&W. As soon as I hear the little riff I switch off out of the over-familiarity born from boredom rather than knowledge.

These tracks generally come across better when there is more obvious band support. Dusty Road is a case in point, as the clear presence of drums and some form of treble (the fuzzy recording and the background noise of a washing cycle finishing up prevent any attempt at identification) immediately elevate the track. It is gone before it begins, but I am fine with that, and welcome its brief and bright burn along with the fact the follow up has a better tempo. The recording really is terrible for clarity, but the buzz and crackle and enforced softness on certain elements give a sense of place and context to 609 Boogie that I rather like. There is also a familiarity to the scale-based keyboards here that gives me a nostalgia for when I used to learn.

After a couple of enjoyable tracks we return to the predictable and over-used hook structure. It is not the same hook each time - there are differences in the precise notation from track to track - but the overall form is the same. Burst of playing, tapping out a rhythm, emphasised downbeat. I lack the words to really describe the nature of these things but I am positive that most would know what I mean if they heard these particular tracks back-to-back, side to side like I am - even if they appreciated the result more.

I suspect that this response of mine hits, again, upon an oft-mentioned limitation of the format I am using: lack of lyrical focus. I suspect that what differentiates Blues songs like these are the images they conjure lyrically, layering different stories over a common base to create pieces that feel more different than they do from a solely musical standpoint. There isn't a lot to be done about that. Listening without typing and writing up afterwards wouldn't work and wouldn't set what I am doing out from reviews. I would lose any real specificity that way, not to mention take twice as long over posts. I do wonder, though, what difference actually being able to interpret and comment on words might make. Alas - as came up in the car-based discussion when it turned to music to work to - it is difficult to concentrate on more than one stream of words at once.

In some ways the most interesting thing about these last two discs in combination has been the impact of the different recordings - massive differences from track to track really throwing up some discussion points. On Its My Own Fault for instance there is a really striking echo effect that hits the vocal in particular, and the guitar a little, but the keys are untouched. They are also really distant and quiet in comparison, and it is hard to know whether the soft sound is intentional, or whether they just messed up the vocal takes or what. I rather like the result, not because it is a pleasant contrast to hear, but because it is so very different to the flawless leveling of more modern music.

Either the end of this disc is much better than the start, or I have adjusted to the Blues and am being more forgiving now. The final 4 tracks are all engaging and enjoyable in different ways and as the listen winds up I am feeling far more positive about it than I was at half way. Yes, I am jettisoning over half these tracks, but retaining a nucleus of short bluesy numbers that might crop up in my future listening plans too. I am one third through the Big Box now and unlikely to manage another listen until the weekend, so I should make it half way through without breaking the order at least.

Big Box of John Lee Hooker (Disc 1) - John Lee Hooker

Track list:

1. Dimples
2. Sometime
3. No Mortgage On My Soul
4. Boogie Chillen
5. I'm in the Mood
6. Road Trouble
7. Black Man Blues
8. Mambo Chillum
9. Low Down Midnite Boogie
10. John L's House Rent Boogie
11. Walkin' the Boogie
12. Crawling King Snake
13. I'm a Stranger
14. Highway Blues
15. Catfish
16. I'll Know Tonight
17. Whistle Done Blown
18. Burning Hell
19. Tupelo
20. Playin' the Races
21. Devil's Jump
22. One More Time
23. Boogie Now

Running time: 68 minutes
Released: 2013

So now we come to a real test, a 6 disc box set. Six discs of one man. John Lee Hooker. I said before, on The Best of Friends, that I wasn't sure why I had so much of Hooker's stuff - well it's just this box and that one album but... 6 discs, not one with fewer than 22 tracks. That's a lot all right and I seriously doubt that I will do them all back to back in order without going insane or dropping my post frequency through the floor, and I only just got back above ground as it is. 

The real answer for why I have this? The price. It was dirt cheap considering the amount of content, and there are bound to be some good ones in here to make it worthwhile. I just have to put the work in to find them!

It starts with a satisfyingly grainy rendition of Dimples - clearly much closer to the original recording. The plodding nature of the play is unfortunate - it could do with a bit more pzazz or snap about it - but the tone of the audio evokes the era in which the song was first cut, which is rather pleasing. It's also happily short.

Oh lord. Sometime has Hooker crooning. That is... unfortunate. On the one hand it is good to see that earlier in his career there was perhaps more variation than in the latter years (i.e. any time after I was born). On the other, I just don't find that either the singing style here, or the sparse melodic accompaniment - slightly off key at that - sits well. The verses are ditch-dull and the song just falls flat. I am relieved to hear a more recognisable Blues tilt to the follow up, including some keys that sound like they have been pounded far too hard for far too long prior to recording. This also has a plodding hook that fails to engage, but the low-fi piano has a real charm that makes the deficiencies of the guitar part more acceptable.

This really does feel like stepping back in time. Often older recordings are cleaned up when released in the modern era and it is really noticeable that these have not been treated that way. I think it really adds something. I don't want to say "an authenticity" because that's just up-one's-own-behind smug tosh. No, I think what it adds is a sense of the time that has passed since these tunes were laid down, and a warmth to the sound, a fuzzy edge that creates a different approach and appreciation. The recording of I'm in the Mood (this first disc seems to have all the tracks whose titles I recognise) is particularly strong, the flattening of the sounds that I guess is a recording artefact makes the song sound earthy, a grounding that the re-recorded version lacked.

The crackle on Road Trouble though goes too far. This song is almost hidden there is so much disturbance in the opening bars. Here it is a big shame and not a plus point; I think I would like this track, with its heavy leaning on a keyboard, were it recorded without the fuzz, but alas it fails to inspire with that aura disturbing the composition. Despite that, thus far this listen has flown, a benefit of short tracks; each is built and gone in a blink. There is one really bum note in Black Man Blues - a sung note that the crackles and pops transform into an ear-busting awfulness. It comes up often as Hooker gives us prolonged "Yeah"s. Its a shame because elsewhere on this track the guitar line is a bit more interesting than many of his pieces, breaking up the standard structure with embellishments that would maintain interest but for the allergy of my cochlea to reverb-afflicted affirmation.

The introduction of the mouth organ and a little more pace to the hooks that typify Hooker's basis enliven what would otherwise be a dull track before we return to what, by modern standards, feels like a horribly formulaic and (for the first half at least) largely instrumental piece. The main problem is that much of the structure is so soft it isn't there, and the strumming you can hear is so repetitive it could hypnotise. Hooker mutters bits and pieces over the second half, I can't make out much of it. This feels like a low point, so I digress. Off to Cornwall for a long weekend of friends and gaming tomorrow morning, and I am squeezing this in tonight in lieu of paying more attention to packing. I will likely not manage any over the weekend and it would be good to try to maintain a bit more pace about these posts. The project has been going a year now and, I won't lie, I am less well advanced that I might have expected. Through until about January I kept up a reasonable pace but 2015 has not seen the same level of application as I managed last year. I need to do better if I am going to keep it running for the duration!

Ah, something that pricks up my ears. There is a different tone to Walkin' the Boogie. An echo or something on the vocal recording is really effective. It may be a recording artefact but it works and there is a thinness to the guitar sound, a tinniness, snatched sound that sets the tune apart. There definitely are gold nuggets to be found amidst the mass, but as soon as it appears it recedes, replaced by a very conservative number. Crawling King Snake just has no life to it and - I admit this seems a very odd thing to say given the age of the recording - no originality. Structurally formulaic, it bores me; easily the worst number on the disc to date. I like the tone of the guitar on the follow-up, but the warmth and depth of the tone are undersold by the slow, methodical nature of the piece and it feels like it lasts a lifetime even though it is under 3 minutes.

These tunes could, I suggest, have done with a bit more in terms of arrangement. Many of them are just Hooker and his trusty guitar which perhaps limited his playing - requiring repetitive hooks to generate the blues structure, and restricting the freedom to introduce more interesting sounds. For me the tunes are more interesting when there is a little more going on. Whilst there is undeniably magic in the rawness of the Blues in pure form I find myself wanting a little more than that. Occasionally he delivers, generally by embracing tempo; simply cramming more notes in and around those required for the basic form lifts the output a notch. Other times there is more of a band in play and this helps.

Overall I find this very hit and miss. The hits are loosely compelling, the misses predictable and déjà entendu. Despite that I find the time slipping by pleasantly and - admittedly to my own surprise - I am not resenting the depth or length of the disc at all. Perhaps that is the benefit of engaging with it at the end of a long and busy day on the eve of a short break.

There is a bit more of a funky lick to Burning Hell, the harmonica bringing a lot of the love. It feels a touch more vital than recent tracks, more energy and urgency. As a change of pace it was much needed, breaking up a run of tunes that were all blending together from similarity. This one, in a rare statement from me, seems to end too early. It could have had a lot more life with another minute to play with. Really like it, though. Tupelo follows and having kept the recording from The Best of Friends, I don't need this one too.

Into the last stretch now, and we go round the formulaic Blues merry-go-round again. I suppose my biggest problem here is not that the song is bad, but that there are so many versions of what is basically the same song. That is going to sound horribly uninformed of me, isn't it? The point, though, is that one strict formulaic Blues track has real feeling and purpose. Several of them in quick succession just has similarity. Variation is important - and present here aplenty. However it occurs around a core of tracks that fall into the same repetitive category, which is why I find myself marking comfortably more than half of the tracks on this album for the recycle bin. There are enough numbers here that I have set aside to keep though. These tracks have somehow stood out from the others, avoided the pitfalls that an art form so reliant on standards can fall into so easily.

Blues is a wonderful and evocative medium at its best, but I am of the opinion that it is so easy to stray from that and that in this field the misstep from masterpiece to make-weight is a small one. When concentrated together like this, the criteria for judging that fall are harsh and fully two thirds of this disc are to be jettisoned. That said, if the attrition rate is similar over the other 5 discs in the Big Box, then I will still have a fair stash of Hooker tunes in the bag at the end of it - albeit just a drop in the ocean of his prolific output.

The Big Black and the Blue - First Aid Kit

Track list:

1. In the Morning
2. Hard Believer
3. Sailor Song
4. Waltz for Richard
5. Heavy Storm
6. Ghost Town
7. Josefin
8. A Window Opens
9. Winter Is All Over You
10. I Met Up With the King
11. Wills of the River

Running time: 38 minutes
Released: 2010

I cannot remember where I first heard about First Aid Kit, but something around the promotion of The Lion's Roar caught my interest and I picked that album up and liked it a lot. The two voices mesh nicely, the sounds supporting them are generally interesting. So eventually I picked up this earlier release too and whilst none of the tracks listed instinctively bring recollection I am hoping this will be a good one.

We start with a typical strummed guitar and then the vocal harmony that typifies First Aid Kit joins in. It sounds nothing like my mind's eye stereotype of Swedish folk. There is a yearning there that conjures images of big sky America more than trees and lakes. It also reverbs enough that my little speaker can't cope and I have to dial down the volume a lot - I didn't even have it that loud, it just seems to be the result of the two sisters (I think?) combining.

Hah - I find myself making the same mistake I have castigated others for in the past, and not for the first time. Perils of real time stream of thought typing I guess; some small amount of post-listen editing goes into these but not an awful lot. Hard Believer is a more melodic song, still playing on the harmonies - it will be a theme, since it is what sets this pair apart - and slower, more sombre, and still redolent of country in many ways (says I with no knowledge of real country music).

Musically there is nothing boundary-shoving here but the stylised vocals, accents and harmony really make First Aid Kit unique. Fast or slow, melancholy or bright, simple or more complex it all comes back to the singing. Some of their tunes are quite catchy but put less compelling vocals over them and they would be nothing of real interest, just diversionary. With the singing voices the two young women apply, however... much better. They must be aware that it is their selling point, because the compositions in places are so thin as to not exist, and often there is nothing more than a lightly played guitar to back them up. I don't think I have ever heard a harmony like it, there is compliment but also clash - the latter in a controlled way that enhances, rather than as a detraction. It almost sounds like one or other of them are out of tune deliberately, as they sing in different ranges and stress slightly different syllables. It is mesmerising and enchanting.

Ghost Town introduces some form of organ or accordion to give a mournful edge, and the first verse is sung solo. It sounds lonely after five tracks of paired delivery. Even here though the vocal strengths and interest the pair generate is strong. There is a fragility, a wavering quality to the intonation that enraptures my ear and draws me along with the sad story eve whilst not really processing the words. I think I have mentioned before on these pages that absorbing lyrics whilst typing my own letters is nigh on impossible dual processing for my brain and I miss a lot. I have the same problem if trying to read whilst listening to podcasts, and it's a really annoying deficiency for life in the modern world.

I am somewhat glad that the next track is more upbeat, the vocal much more positive and warm, the backing simple but bright and spangly. Its a simplicity, and repetition that is wearying and in other contexts I would be decrying Josefin for its staidness. Were it not for harmony, harmony that this time has additional support beyond just the pair of stars. That missing lyrics thing? I get the impression it is a big deal here, but maybe I am inferring profoundness where none exists as a direct result of the gravity and weight that the vocal has on all of these pieces.

In truth, I think perhaps the full album gets a bit much, too reliant on the same trick. However good a trick that may be, over-reliance on a single point can get stale. I don't recall The Lion's Roar having the same problem, so maybe this is a reflection of a debut - there is less craft in the music, less variation and therefore more similarity between songs. I don't want to undersell this though, just because my ear is craving something else - the quality is present throughout and any one of these tracks would brighten up a shuffle.

As I say that, I run into the first one that isn't stellar. Winter is All Over You just lacks whatever it is that makes them magic, particularly as it draws to a close. It seems churlish to complain when the spark soon returns and when there is such an obvious gift here. I would seriously recommend this to anyone who adores interesting vocals.

Just like that I arrive at the end, Wills of the River. This has been a short one, short and sweet for the most part. It is a pity that there isn't more interest in the composition, but that said the tone, pace and content is varied so even if they are a little over-playing a very simple accompaniment there is at least some form of differetiation from track to track. Having said that, adding too much without forethought could seriously detract from their greatest strength. I guess they walk a fine line and if so, then it is hardly a surprise that they step the "wrong" side of that in places. Overall though? I like this a lot. I would like it more broken up with something meatier, but I think this album might have come a little early for that.

Beyond the Blue Horizon - George Benson

Track list:

1. So What
2. The Gentle Rain
3. All Clear
4. Ode To A Kudu
5. Somewhere In The East
6. All Clear (Alternate Take)
7. Ode To A Kudu (Alternate Take)
8. Somewhere In The East (Alternate Take)

Running time: 54 minutes
Released: 1971

What to say about this one? Well, it was part of the big box of 25 classic jazz albums that already spawned one of the first few posts on these pages.

For some reason I have long laboured under the misconception that George Benson played Matt 'Guitar' Murphy in The Blues Brothers (soundtrack listen here) but, true to form with the other band members in that film, that was... Matt Murphy. I don't, therefore, have any real frame of reference for Benson, so the introduction on this boils down to: almost an hour long in runtime, but actually only half that because of the repetition. First impressions, therefore, aren't that positive. Lets see what actual exposure makes of it.

We start, surprisingly with a bass/drums combo that reminds me of something specific that is on the tips of my fingers but not coming to mind; doh! Look at the track name. I was expecting it to be all straight in with the guitar lead. That takes a bit longer to show up, and arguably is secondary to the structure and even the melody provided by some form of organ for the first couple of minutes.  Frankly this is a really poor rendition of So What, but then anything would be. Miles Davis' piece is a masterwork; Benson's interpretation is a mugging. The majesty of the piece simply goes missing without the understatement of the original arrangement. The soft, perfectly timed interjections. None of that is present here and whilst the strains of the tune come through here and there the overall effect is more muddled and seems to prioritise the wrong things at the wrong time. The classic call/response is murdered by moving it to a fast pinging guitar and a harsh organ blast and the rest just fails to ignite. When if fades out after 9 minutes I am still shaking my head as to how that can happen.

We move onto the only other track that is on this album once. The Gentle Rain is also 9 minutes long, quite possibly also a cover, but at least is not a destruction of something I am familiar with. Its light twangy guitar and faux-tropical rhythms are pretty much a perfect encapsulation of a certain type of cheese and at least this feels like it fits together right. The guitar really is the star here, everything else fitting around it. Alas the mediocre swing and stereotyped approach wear thin before the track is half done, the constancy of the bongos boring its way into my brain in most unwelcome fashion. At least a keyboard comes along to rival the primacy of the guitar but it is all in the same vein and I think this sort of thing was out of style when it first arrived. I wonder to what extent this will be typical of the three repeated tracks; I suspect quite a large one.

I would go so far as to suggest that tracks like this are probably part of the reason that jazz was seriously uncool by the time I was born (the other part being the bonkers interpretation that all jazz is completely improvised atonal sonic mess). Its just so... uninspiring.

All Clear is a little brighter in sound but still unmistakably from the same school. There are no bongos (thank heavens!) and the percussion is less bad cruise movie music as a result, but in their place we have a cheese-laden organ part and some weird applications of strings or other backing sounds. I think these are employed with a similar effect - if not in mind, then in achievement. The whole desert island poolside cocktail bar image, crappy fake floral necklaces and bad Hawaiian shirts. I cannot take this seriously at all, and cannot enjoy it. The guitar is the epitome of playing with itself; and I have to listen to this track again?

I am seriously tempted to stop the listen before the retreads occur, but that would be against the spirit of the exercise; curse my sense of propriety, but who knows, maybe the alternate takes are genius.

Ode to a Kudu at least has the good sense to be short. It is a much softer number, more like a background hum to a quiet clinch, when the rest of the world ceases to matter for a few moments and almost fades out. Not that I would remember what that actually feels like. This track is bearable though and has a cadence that is remarkably pleasant given everything that I have typed in this post to date. Then it is past.

Oh no, the bongos are back evoking less of the east and more of Africa. A squirty, skew-whiff guitar is layered on top. It is a really odd combination that simply doesn't work. I think the worst offenders on these tracks are, in no sort of order, the bongo, the harshness of the organ sound, and the unnaturally bright sparkly air to the guitar. It's all too... clean and shiny. It just re-enforces that non-stick music for hallways, hangouts and elevators feel. There is nothing with any edge to get caught on. No roughness to rub up against - it all just slides right off, all sounding similar and leaving me feeling as though it only exists to fill time.

Time - today has been an odd one. Family time, solo time, time-rewinding magical girl time (Life is Strange starts... interestingly. Not sold on it story-wise yet as it reinforces a lot of my distaste for American High School stories, but characterisation has been improving and the central conceit is interesting enough). Now I feel like my life is on repeat as the alternate takes begin. I think All Clear is less objectionable second time around, but I still sense this is music for people who don't like music. I think I got that phrase from a friend who is no more who used it more pejoratively than is my intent here. I simply mean that it is so bland that there can be no objection, and so it must be perfect for soundtracking fondue parties with bad porn mustaches and flared suits. A child of its time, but perhaps out of step even then.

Yes, I'm talking out of my behind here, but crafting ridiculously stereotyped images of the reception of this disc in the 70s beats actually trying to describe the same things over again as reprises emerge from my speakers. To be fair, I think the alternate takes are better than the originals, significantly so. Almost listenably so. I may even like the redone Ode to a Kudu despite the extra minute added to its length. The guitar is still too spangly and self-congratulating but the subtleties of the percussion and strings in the background are handled really nicely and they draw my ear away from the central theme enough to appreciate the track.

The same cannot be said for Somewhere in the East. If anything the guitar feels more out of place here than before and, unforgivably, the track now pushes towards 10 minutes. Repeated organ chords join the hand-drums in providing elements that build up to my annoyance and everything that was wrong with the initial take of this track seems recaptured here in the only way that could move it from so plain it is bland to just plain bad. It is safe to say I am relieved as the piece finally reaches the (ghastly) conclusion it builds towards and the disc ends. Not a good one, this.