Björk – Homogenic
Today continues the last post, in which I snatched up some hole-filling essentials at Richmond’s Deep Groove, a great record store you should visit when you’re in town. One of the best of the bunch is Björk’s third album (or fifth, depending on how you look at it), a stunning, orchestral electronica masterpiece. As long as I can remember, I’ve liked Björk’s music—I distinctly remember seeing the Michel Gondry-directed video for “Human Behavior” on MTV, with its surreal imagery and giant teddy bear. That song remains one of my favorites of hers, though she only got better from there. My overall favorite is Post, which I’ll write about soon, but the first Björk album I ever bought, if I’m remembering this right, was Homogenic.
When it was released in fall of 1997, there was something of a groundswell of interesting electronics-laden art-pop happening, much of it released on major labels (despite a lot of it not being that commercial—Björk maybe is the exception?). It came out around the same time as Stereolab’s Dots and Loops and Laika’s Sounds of the Satellites, two albums I also absolutely loved at the time, and still do (Laika’s album still needs a vinyl reissue), though Homogenic had the widest audience by a significant margin. The first single, “Joga,” captured my attention, but the song that absolutely blew my mind was “Bachelorette,” with its elaborate string arrangement and overflowing grandeur. Just masterful.
I think the song that probably had the most enduring legacy from this album is “All Is Full of Love,” directed by Chris Cunningham (who also did Aphex Twin’s batshit “Come to Daddy”), though it’s not my favorite, obviously. Still, there’s really no bad songs here, and most of them are great, even perfect. While the majestic beauty is what drew me in, there’s a lot of glitchy beat stuff happening all over this record, and it retains some of the playfulness of Post while exploring more ambitious arrangements.
I don’t think of myself as being particularly nostalgic, but there’s something about music from 1997 that’s just permanently embedded on my subconscious, and I still have a lot of fond feelings for records that struck a chord with me then. And this is one of them.
Rating: 9.5
Sound Quality: Great
Fugazi – Steady Diet of Nothing
I also picked up this Fugazi album, which I didn’t already own on vinyl. I don’t think anyone rates this as their best, but it’s far from their worst. Though now that I think about it, I’m not sure what consensus really is other than that everyone loves 13 Songs, Repeater and The Argument. Everything in the middle is solid to great, too, and this is not exception. Though my favorite will always be Red Medicine.
I always confuse this with In On the Kill Taker, because I think it’s the one that has “Smallpox Champion” on it. It isn’t. It’s the one with “Long Division” on it, which is a short, understated song that’s long been one of my favorites in the Fugazi catalog. But if you have at least a passing familiarity with Fugazi’s music, then what’s here won’t surprise you much: sharp-edged guitars, the contrasting barks of Ian Mackaye and sneers of Guy Picciotto, some deep grooves, one of the best rhythm sections to ever do it (and are still doing it as the Messthetics) etc. Rockin’ album, I’m not sure what else to say. Long live Fugazi!
Rating: 9.0
Sound Quality: Great
Kylesa – Time Will Fuse Its Worth
Kylesa’s one of my favorite metal bands, and I’ve seen them live several times, but for reasons I can’t really explain, for more than a decade I only owned one of their albums on vinyl: Spiral Shadow. That it’s my favorite album of theirs doesn’t hurt, but that’s somewhat beside the point. I love plenty of their other records, and when I saw them for the last time at Psycho California 2015, their set was so loaded with rippers that I couldn’t help but conclude that yes, they’ve got hits! (Or they did anyway—they broke up not long thereafter.)
Time Will Fuse Its Worth is one of their earlier records, and it’s considerably different than the psychedelic sludge they eventually made their signature sound. It’s essentially a Bolt Thrower album, big on thick noxious clouds of distortion, and it clobbers you pretty mercilessly. There’s still some groove and some melody, kinda, but it’s mostly about the dual-guitar and dual-drummer attack happening here (including a dueling drum outro). There’s not much point in highlighting individual tracks because it’s, much like Bolt Thrower’s Realm of Chaos, a nonstop assault of volume and overdrive. Absolute wrecker of an album.
Rating: 9.0
Sound Quality: Great
1000 Times Jeff 
Leave a comment