Speaking of messers Rundgren and Jackson ...

The Bristol Evening Post has an interview with the wonderful Jill Sobule who is in the UK for a handfull of gigs to promote new album 'Victorious Underdog' and both Todd and Joe get mentioned

Her first album [Things here are different'] was a critical success but this was not reflected in commercial sales.

"I think on that first album I hadn't really developed properly. I didn't really know who I was. It was a strange album. It was produced by Todd Rundgren. Todd's a great guy but he's crazy and he doesn't have many of the social graces.

"I mean, like it was the first time I had ever been in a studio and I would sing my first track and over the speaker you would hear 'Alright, that was adequate, let's move on to the next song'.

"So then I decided for my second record that Joe Jackson was going to produce me and that never came out."

I have mentioned this before, but 'Things here are Different' is a wonderful record, and one that should be in every music lover/singer songwriter lovers music collection.

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The Decemberists - 'The Hazards of Love'

Whilst the Decemberists have been around for a number of years, and a friend of mine is a big fan, I have to confess - a few tunes aside - they have never really made much of a splash with me. With their fifth album - 'The Hazards of Love' - a 17-track concept album that sort of tells a story about a fair maiden ravished by a shape-shifting demon (no, really) - however, I am suddenly find myself surprisingly won over. On some levels - like most concept albums - it is utter tosh, but with its repeating musical motifs and reprises, making you quickly think that actually there are only about five actual songs on the album - a clever trick. Like with all good concept albums this makes listening on shuffle not the ideal way to digest this album - especially as their are short 'interlude' pieces joining all the songs too. Added to all this the fact that the band seem to have a love for early 70's British folk/prog/heavy metal and this walks right up my street - and will ...

To be honest, I don’t think 2010 will be remembered as a ‘great’ year music-wise, although some good stuff did get released. It was a year when the hip and happening people told me I should be listening to Tame Impala, Gold Panda, Deerhunter, Beach House and others. And, I did. All were perfectly fine, but none really grabbed me, and I can’t help feeling that tame Impala sounded much better in the context of a Soundtrack album than they did on a full album of their own. So leaving those aside, was there one album that stood head and shoulders above all else this year? Not for me. There were several albums that held my attention at different parts of the year but only a few which didn’t fall away, and less still that made last gasp dashes to improve with time. So, what follows are 20 albums I have enjoyed for various reasons during 2010. If I were doing it another week, maybe O Children, She and Him, Warpaint, Pull in Emergency, Thea Gilmore, Mary Chapin Carpenter, and Liz Phair may hav...

Todd is God

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