Top 5 “lazy train” / bottle of wine albums:

Okay, youre home alone, there isn’t anything going on, youre slightly apathetic to the world at the moment. You might open a bottle of wine (shiraz preferably) or just lay down and relax. This is what you should listen to. Note that the criteria for these selections is fairly harsh, as the entire album has to be good enough to require a complete listen.

1) Jeff Buckley – Live at Sine’
he pours through sadness, anger, devotion, love, heartbreak on the disc. It is still the best live album I have ever bought, and its just him and his guitar. I cant count how many times this album has landed on one of my lists, but when youre this good, its expected. Key moment on the album; listen to “sweet thing” , close your eyes, put your head in between the speakers.

2) Charlie Haden and Pat Metheny – Beyond the Missouri Sky
I picked this up because it has the best artwork on an album I have ever seen. Some of you might know that I have this thing about the Midwest, I don’t know, I just think its beautiful. The album cover catches that. musically, it is without question the best acoustic guitar playing I have ever heard. The tones, melodies, atmosphere, and taste of the album is nothing short of brilliant. Its like velvet.

3) Aretha Franklin – Chicago meets the Delta
Aretha. That voice. Maybe not so much now, but back in the 60’s? I dare you to find someone that was better connected to whatever it is that causes emotion like this. Call it mojo, call it God, call it bob, it doesn’t matter. The woman lays down some of the best blues singing ever recorded here. She gets jumpy, she gets down and dirty, but she never falters. And anytime someone can distort a microphone just with the volume of their voice….yeah.

4) kylie minogue
just kidding.

4) radiohead – kid a
somber enough for the wine, raucous enough to make you dive in and look for a way out…reluctantly. Find your way through the layers only to find out that you haven’t found your way out of anything, it just keeps going. Highlight: how to disappear completely. There is a spot in this song, towards the end, where Yorke just hangs on one note, all the other instrumentation, orchestral mostly, falls always, going from a major to a minor and it just sucks the breathe out of your lungs. Ive said it once and Ill say it again, radiohead is so good that it pisses me off.

5) Sigur Ros – ()
I know people who have said that this album saved their life. I can understand why. Its beautiful beyond description, but quiet enough to be accessible. Go find a live video of them playing track 1 (none of the songs have titles, at least not on the album) and watch his vein pop out of his neck at the end. Bravado. See them play 8 live and try not to make fists with your toes as they wind there way through the Appalachian crescendo at the end. Just listen to try to figure out how someone could write something this good.

Honorable mentions (a first for the top 5’s): nine inch nails – the fragile; sigur ros agaetheus bryjum; beck – sea changes; bela fleck – tales from the acoustic planet vol 1; pink floyd – dark side (I know I know, but ya know what? Its so good that everyone knows this, so it didn’t make the top 5.)