Vinyl Pickups 4/13/18 (Legion, The Flaming Lips, Solange, and more...)
In the future of this series, I plan on generally showcasing just one or two vinyl pickups per entry, but as this is the grand premiere, here's a nice handful of vinyl I've just added to my collection.
I picked up this awesome double-vinyl of the soundtrack for the first season of the FX/Marvel show, Legion, from Barnes & Noble. Barnes & Noble have been featuring some awesome exclusive vinyl versions, and this one in particular is a limited run of translucent purple.
The records themselves look awesome, as the purple is injected with some cloudy swirls of darker purple. They also sound great. Legion is a head-trip, pure psychedelia, and the soundtrack follows suit, with some beautiful blends of strings and electronics, and a little rock and several other genres tossed in. It's got a real 70's vibe, and the thick bass, feel of the music, and how it's mixed make it perfect for vinyl. The brilliant packaging, featuring trippily altered photos of key scenes, along with the gorgeous records, and brilliant music make this a must have for the LP-collecting fan of the show...or for people who just like to have cool stuff.
This was actually my second choice...I originally purchased a limited B&N edition of Marco Beltrami's soundtrack for Logan, However, when I opened it, it somehow had major water damage, the store didn't have another copy when I returned it...so I walked out with Legion. If you can't tell, I am not at all upset about the exchange of items.
Now that I think about it, Barnes&Noble has played heavily into my vinyl purchases lately, perhaps because it's a place I've received a lot of gift cards for...and also because of those delicious limited editions.
The next vinyl I want to display is also a gift card purchase...from Amazon. I bought White Moth Black Butterfly's Atone last year because it came with a free download, it was cheap, and I really wanted to hear the album immediately, considering I am a fan of several of the players' other bands.
The album on download is okay. It's an attempt at fusing modern prog rock with dual-vocalist medieval pop, if that makes any sense, and it actually works when the album is leaning into that sound. However, sometimes Atone more heavily focuses on more modern electronic sounds, which throws off the album's cohesion. I only listened to the vinyl version recently. I don't know why, but on vinyl, Dan Tomkins, the male vocalist, sounds far more vulnerable (female vocalist, Jordan Turner, still sounds incredible). The strings (there are a lot of them), somehow sound far more lush and full. I'm starting to feel like digital isn't a format that benefit's this band's sound...in fact, I am now having to reevaluate this entire album. As for packaging, it's simple, yet handsome, with a front and back cover that typifies the band's ancient, natural sound, a sleeve with the songs' full lyrics, and my favorite, a vinyl catalogue from the band's record label. That's going to be cool to leaf through in the future, if we don't get nuked, plagued, or downsized.
I used the rest of that Amazon gift card on a couple other records.
The first is a picture disc version of The Flaming Lips' classic album, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots.
Confession: Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots is the only Flaming Lips album I actually like. The limited run picture disc version comes in a clear plastic holder. That's all you get. I already have the CD version, which was also fairly minimally packaged, so that's okay with me. The album also doesn't sound any better on this particular version...the album art is fun, and it just looks cool. My fascination with picture discs (where the vinyl is literally a foil picture the grooves have been etched into) actually started with the Christian children's folk-rock record, Adventures in Agapeland. I'm sure this would be of interest to The Flaming Lips aggressively anti-Christian frontman, Wayne Coyne. Yep, Wayne, you only got my business on this one because of a record that helped indoctrinate me into the religion I still hold today. In fact, I still have that record 30-odd years later, and here's some pictures of it.
The final item I used to burn off my Amazon gift card balance is a red-clear limited run of Solange's A Seat at the Table, my favorite album from 2016.
In all honesty, A Seat at the Table sounds great on vinyl, but the digital version sounds great, too--there's not a huge difference here. It's more the cool factor of listening to it this way, as well as the foil numbered stamp on the back of the record. I got number 6242...not sure out of how many.
And finally, I'll bookend this with another Barnes &Noble special edition vinyl soundtrack. You might remember that I marathoned Game of Thones a few months back. When I was in the middle of the sixth season, I noticed the soundtrack for the seventh season at B&N in a limited edition "Dragon Fire" version. I literally could not pass up something described as a limited edition "Dragon Fire" version, and immediately purchased, even though I actually waited til I finished the seventh season to open it, so that I wouldn't spoil anything.
The records themselves look quite spectacular. I really enjoy the divergence between the two LP's, as the first is darker and more orange, while the second is a bit lighter and features a more reddish hue. The sleeves themselves are just generic white ones, and the inside of the gatefold is just the requisite character photos, but the back cover is super badass, and the overall package is pretty sweet. Plus, the vinyl sound great--I've heard this stuff digital, and the vinyl version sounds more full and ancient, the orchestrations more epic.
Plus, the crackle and pop is like dragon fire deep in the background. Keep the B&N special editions coming!
I picked up this awesome double-vinyl of the soundtrack for the first season of the FX/Marvel show, Legion, from Barnes & Noble. Barnes & Noble have been featuring some awesome exclusive vinyl versions, and this one in particular is a limited run of translucent purple.
The records themselves look awesome, as the purple is injected with some cloudy swirls of darker purple. They also sound great. Legion is a head-trip, pure psychedelia, and the soundtrack follows suit, with some beautiful blends of strings and electronics, and a little rock and several other genres tossed in. It's got a real 70's vibe, and the thick bass, feel of the music, and how it's mixed make it perfect for vinyl. The brilliant packaging, featuring trippily altered photos of key scenes, along with the gorgeous records, and brilliant music make this a must have for the LP-collecting fan of the show...or for people who just like to have cool stuff.
This was actually my second choice...I originally purchased a limited B&N edition of Marco Beltrami's soundtrack for Logan, However, when I opened it, it somehow had major water damage, the store didn't have another copy when I returned it...so I walked out with Legion. If you can't tell, I am not at all upset about the exchange of items.
Now that I think about it, Barnes&Noble has played heavily into my vinyl purchases lately, perhaps because it's a place I've received a lot of gift cards for...and also because of those delicious limited editions.
The next vinyl I want to display is also a gift card purchase...from Amazon. I bought White Moth Black Butterfly's Atone last year because it came with a free download, it was cheap, and I really wanted to hear the album immediately, considering I am a fan of several of the players' other bands.
The album on download is okay. It's an attempt at fusing modern prog rock with dual-vocalist medieval pop, if that makes any sense, and it actually works when the album is leaning into that sound. However, sometimes Atone more heavily focuses on more modern electronic sounds, which throws off the album's cohesion. I only listened to the vinyl version recently. I don't know why, but on vinyl, Dan Tomkins, the male vocalist, sounds far more vulnerable (female vocalist, Jordan Turner, still sounds incredible). The strings (there are a lot of them), somehow sound far more lush and full. I'm starting to feel like digital isn't a format that benefit's this band's sound...in fact, I am now having to reevaluate this entire album. As for packaging, it's simple, yet handsome, with a front and back cover that typifies the band's ancient, natural sound, a sleeve with the songs' full lyrics, and my favorite, a vinyl catalogue from the band's record label. That's going to be cool to leaf through in the future, if we don't get nuked, plagued, or downsized.
I used the rest of that Amazon gift card on a couple other records.
The first is a picture disc version of The Flaming Lips' classic album, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots.
Confession: Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots is the only Flaming Lips album I actually like. The limited run picture disc version comes in a clear plastic holder. That's all you get. I already have the CD version, which was also fairly minimally packaged, so that's okay with me. The album also doesn't sound any better on this particular version...the album art is fun, and it just looks cool. My fascination with picture discs (where the vinyl is literally a foil picture the grooves have been etched into) actually started with the Christian children's folk-rock record, Adventures in Agapeland. I'm sure this would be of interest to The Flaming Lips aggressively anti-Christian frontman, Wayne Coyne. Yep, Wayne, you only got my business on this one because of a record that helped indoctrinate me into the religion I still hold today. In fact, I still have that record 30-odd years later, and here's some pictures of it.
The final item I used to burn off my Amazon gift card balance is a red-clear limited run of Solange's A Seat at the Table, my favorite album from 2016.
In all honesty, A Seat at the Table sounds great on vinyl, but the digital version sounds great, too--there's not a huge difference here. It's more the cool factor of listening to it this way, as well as the foil numbered stamp on the back of the record. I got number 6242...not sure out of how many.
And finally, I'll bookend this with another Barnes &Noble special edition vinyl soundtrack. You might remember that I marathoned Game of Thones a few months back. When I was in the middle of the sixth season, I noticed the soundtrack for the seventh season at B&N in a limited edition "Dragon Fire" version. I literally could not pass up something described as a limited edition "Dragon Fire" version, and immediately purchased, even though I actually waited til I finished the seventh season to open it, so that I wouldn't spoil anything.
The records themselves look quite spectacular. I really enjoy the divergence between the two LP's, as the first is darker and more orange, while the second is a bit lighter and features a more reddish hue. The sleeves themselves are just generic white ones, and the inside of the gatefold is just the requisite character photos, but the back cover is super badass, and the overall package is pretty sweet. Plus, the vinyl sound great--I've heard this stuff digital, and the vinyl version sounds more full and ancient, the orchestrations more epic.
Plus, the crackle and pop is like dragon fire deep in the background. Keep the B&N special editions coming!
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