The Epic of Gilgamesh

Gilgamesh is two thirds god, one third man, king of Uruk. He beleaguers his people by forcing himself on all the new brides and besting all the young men at sporting challenges. The people ask the gods for help. The gods create Enkidu, a kind of Animal Man who at first has no interest in human affairs. He has to be seduced by a Prostitute, Shamhat.

After making love to her for a week he gains humanity but loses some of his wildness. The animals of the forest now fear him. He can no longer stay in the forest.
Gilgamesh experiences dreams that foretell the arrival of a beloved new companion.

Enkidu is incensed when he hears about Gilgamesh’s treatment of young brides. He blocks gilgamesh. They fight. He does not defeat Gilgamesh but the two immediately become great friends.
Gilgamesh wants to seek glory by slaying Humbaba, a leonine giant who guards the Cedar Forest, the realm of the gods.

On the way to the forest Gilgamesh experiences terrible nightmares about the upcoming battle but Enkidu interprets them all as good omens.
On the outskirts of the forest Enkidu loses his nerve and turns back. Gilgamesh attacks him. Humbaba hears their fighting and comes out of the forest to discover the source of the noise.
They fight Humbaba and eventually defeat him. Humbaba begs for his life. Gilgamesh cannot decide if he wants to kill Humbaba but Enkidu encourages Gilgamesh. In the instant before his head is struck off his soulders, Humbaba curses Enkidu.
The goddess Ishtar wishes to marry Gilgamesh but he rejects her offer on the grounds that her lovers always come to dismal ends.

In retribution for this slight she sends Gugalanna (Taurus) to kill Gilgamesh and Enkidu.

They slay Gugalanna and begin to butcher it. Enkidu throws the haunches of the bull at Ishtar and threatens to do the same to her if he ever catches her. That night, Enkidu dreams that Ishtar has persuaded the gods to kill him for his impiety. He becomes despondent and dies from an unspecified malady over the course of the next 12 days.

As Gilgamesh mourns the death of his friend he determines to learn the secret of eternal life. Utnapishtim, one of the survivors of the great flood, has been granted eternal life by the gods. Gilgamesh sets out to find Utnapishtim. He crosses a mountain where he kills a pride of lions. He reaches a tunnel guarded by two scorpion-men who let him pass when they discover that he is part-god. The tunnel leads him to the garden of the gods, where jewels grow on trees.

Gilgamesh encounters some stone giants whom he destroys.

He asks Urshanabi, a ferryman, to take him to Utnapishtim but Urshanabi reveals that Gilgamesh has just destroyed the only creatures that can cross the Waters of Death which are deadly to the touch. Now Gilgamesh must cut down hundreds of trees and build a boat. He does this and crosses the sea.
Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh the story of the great flood. The god Enlil decides to destroy humanity with a flood but the god Ea wishes to save Utnapishtim. He is instructed to build a boat and take his family and all animals onto the boat. The deluge comes and after a week the flood subsides. Enlil is furious that there are survivors but Ea persuades him that the flood was an excessive punishment. A penitent Enlil grants Utnapishtim and his wife eternal life.
Utnapishtim points out that his immortality was a special dispensation for a unique circumstance. He challenges Gilgamesh to remain awake for a week. Gilgamesh fails and when he wakes, Utnapishtim says “You wish to overcome death and yet you cannot even overcome sleep”.
However, Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh of an underwater plant that has the power to restore youth. Gilgamesh binds rocks to his feet and walks along the bottom of the sea.

He retrieves the plant but it is later stolen by a serpent. Gilgamesh admits defeat and returns to Uruk.

Top Ten Most Beautiful Actresses

10. Oona Chaplin

 

9. Gwyneth Paltrow

 

8. Famke Janssen

 

7. Kristin Kreuk

 

6. Audrey Tautou

 

5. Lea Seydoux

 

4. Morena Baccarin

 

3. Rachel McAdams

 

2. Jenna Coleman

 

1, Rosario Dawson

Keith lyrics

she’s in shadows on the rock and she makes her call
do you love me?
you can see her walking in the mall
do you love me?
shadows on the rock and she sets her stall
do you love me?
you can see her sifting her money for the rich
do you love me?
shadows on the rock and she hollers through the wall
do you love me?
it’s always raining in the fall
do you love me?
shadows on the rock and she sets her stall
do you love me?
you can see her walking in the mall
do you love me?
shadows on the rock and she makes her call
do you love me?
she sits home, married for the rich
do you love me?
shadows on the rock and she hollers through the wall
do you love me?
it’s always raining in the fall
do you love me?

Goodreads Best Books of the 00s

1. The Kite Runner byKhaled Hosseini

2. A Thousand Splendid Suns byKhaled Hosseini

3. Life of Pi byYann Martel

4. The Road byCormac McCarthy

5. Middlesex byJeffrey Eugenides

6. Atonement byIan McEwan

7. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close byJonathan Safran Foer

8. American Gods byNeil Gaiman

9. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society byAnnie Barrows

10. Bel Canto byAnn Patchett

11. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay byMichael Chabon

12. Never Let Me Go byKazuo Ishiguro

13. Everything is Illuminated byJonathan Safran Foer

14. The Namesake byJhumpa Lahiri

15. Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything bySteven D. Levitt

16. The History of Love byNicole Krauss

17. The Corrections byJonathan Franzen

18. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao byJunot Díaz

19. Kafka on the Shore byHaruki Murakami

20. Oryx and Crake byMargaret Atwood

Goodreads Top 100

1. Gone with the Wind byMargaret Mitchell 4.17 avg rating — 297,278 ratings

2. Animal Farm byGeorge Orwell 3.70 avg rating — 654,612 ratings

3. Wuthering Heights byEmily Brontë (Author) 3.72 avg rating — 219,301 ratings

4. The Count of Monte Cristo byAlexandre Dumas 4.03 avg rating — 264,834 ratings

5. Romeo and Juliet byWilliam Shakespeare 3.73 avg rating — 675,996 ratings

6. To Kill a Mockingbird byHarper Lee 4.19 avg rating — 981,767 ratings

7. Crime and Punishment byFyodor Dostoyevsky 4.09 avg rating — 104,878 ratings

8. Lord of the Flies byWilliam Golding 3.56 avg rating — 626,638 ratings

9. Les Misérables byVictor Hugo 3.94 avg rating — 222,531 ratings

10. The Grapes of Wrath byJohn Steinbeck 3.81 avg rating — 159,397 ratings

11. Pride and Prejudice byJane Austen 4.22 avg rating — 619,137 ratings

12. The Picture of Dorian Gray byOscar Wilde 3.96 avg rating — 129,822 ratings

13. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn byMark Twain 3.74 avg rating — 538,420 ratings

14. Hamlet byWilliam Shakespeare 3.99 avg rating — 153,386 ratings

15. One Hundred Years of Solitude byGabriel Garcí­a Márquez 3.88 avg rating — 249,123 ratings

16. Dracula byBram Stoker 3.88 avg rating — 133,725 ratings

17. Of Mice and Men byJohn Steinbeck 3.72 avg rating — 580,470 ratings

18. Brave New World byAldous Huxley 3.87 avg rating — 362,008 ratings

19. A Tale of Two Cities byCharles Dickens 3.66 avg rating — 309,048 ratings

20. Fahrenheit 451 byRay Bradbury 3.88 avg rating — 345,987 ratings

21. Sense and Sensibility byJane Austen 4.02 avg rating — 304,731 ratings

22. East of Eden byJohn Steinbeck 4.29 avg rating — 102,108 ratings

23. Lolita byVladimir Nabokov 3.79 avg rating — 214,881 ratings

24. Jane Eyre byCharlotte Brontë 4.03 avg rating — 424,637 ratings

25. The Odyssey byHomer 3.60 avg rating — 359,319 ratings

26. Night byElie Wiesel 4.22 avg rating — 181,298 ratings

27. Anna Karenina byLeo Tolstoy 3.96 avg rating — 89,959 ratings

28. Slaughterhouse-Five byKurt Vonnegut 3.91 avg rating — 337,265 ratings

29. Catch-22 byJoseph Heller 3.95 avg rating — 143,638 ratings

30. Dune (Dune Chronicles, #1) byFrank Herbert 3.99 avg rating — 195,717 ratings

31. Emma byJane Austen 3.95 avg rating — 127,809 ratings

32. The Lord of the Rings byJ.R.R. Tolkien 4.43 avg rating — 150,981 ratings

33. The Bell Jar bySylvia Plath 3.88 avg rating — 121,069 ratings

34. The Fountainhead byAyn Rand 3.81 avg rating — 91,672 ratings

35. The Iliad byHomer 3.72 avg rating — 69,954 ratings

36. Atlas Shrugged byAyn Rand 3.74 avg rating — 85,436 ratings

37. The Brothers Karamazov byFyodor Dostoyevsky 4.25 avg rating — 46,105 ratings

38. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes byArthur Conan Doyle 4.19 avg rating — 41,046 ratings

39. War and Peace byLeo Tolstoy 4.02 avg rating — 42,472 ratings

40. Frankenstein byMary Shelley 3.62 avg rating — 338,046 ratings

41. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest byKen Kesey 4.13 avg rating — 120,956 ratings

42. A Clockwork Orange byAnthony Burgess 3.92 avg rating — 105,566 ratings

43. Great Expectations byCharles Dickens 3.61 avg rating — 131,152 ratings

44. Siddhartha byHermann Hesse 3.86 avg rating — 99,855 ratings

45. Don Quixote byMiguel de Cervantes Saavedra 3.79 avg rating — 40,143 ratings

46. Rebecca byDaphne du Maurier 4.13 avg rating — 83,653 ratings

47. Moby-Dick byHerman Melville 3.31 avg rating — 210,844 ratings

48. 1984 byGeorge Orwell 4.02 avg rating — 582,063 ratings

49. Persuasion byJane Austen 4.11 avg rating — 99,571 ratings

50. On the Road byJack Kerouac 3.63 avg rating — 87,355 ratings

51. Macbeth byWilliam Shakespeare 3.83 avg rating — 136,515 ratings

52. Their Eyes Were Watching God byZora Neale Hurston 3.79 avg rating — 69,317 ratings

53. The Old Man and the Sea byErnest Hemingway 3.50 avg rating — 126,922 ratings

54. Complete Stories and Poems byEdgar Allan Poe 4.34 avg rating — 49,389 ratings

55. The Scarlet Letter byNathaniel Hawthorne 3.28 avg rating — 173,620 ratings

56. The Master and Margarita byMikhail Bulgakov 4.29 avg rating — 34,569 ratings

57. In Cold Blood byTruman Capote 3.94 avg rating — 174,303 ratings

58. All Quiet on the Western Front byErich Maria Remarque 3.74 avg rating — 62,693 ratings

59. Flowers for Algernon byDaniel Keyes 3.87 avg rating — 83,715 ratings

60. The Stranger byAlbert Camus 3.86 avg rating — 110,546 ratings

61. The Divine Comedy byDante Alighieri 3.98 avg rating — 23,157 ratings

62. The Good Earth byPearl S. Buck 3.87 avg rating — 68,131 ratings

63. The Diary of a Young Girl byAnne Frank 4.03 avg rating — 581,735 ratings

64. The Metamorphosis byFranz Kafka 3.68 avg rating — 89,341 ratings

65. Tess of the D’Urbervilles byThomas Hardy 3.60 avg rating — 46,742 ratings

66. Heart of Darkness byJoseph Conrad 3.34 avg rating — 90,481 ratings

67. The Great Gatsby byF. Scott Fitzgerald 3.72 avg rating — 737,512 ratings

68. The Godfather byMario Puzo 4.26 avg rating — 47,495 ratings

69. The Prophet byKhalil Gibran 4.12 avg rating — 43,925 ratings

70. The Importance of Being Earnest byOscar Wilde 4.14 avg rating — 52,309 ratings

71. Ulysses byJames Joyce 3.72 avg rating — 26,076 ratings

72. And Then There Were None byAgatha Christie 4.13 avg rating — 70,197 ratings

73. The Canterbury Tales byGeoffrey Chaucer 3.43 avg rating — 54,002 ratings

74. Madame Bovary byGustave Flaubert 3.55 avg rating — 45,895 ratings

75. The Three Musketeers byAlexandre Dumas 3.98 avg rating — 52,219 ratings

76. A Farewell to Arms byErnest Hemingway 3.67 avg rating — 62,565 ratings

77. A Midsummer Night’s Dream byWilliam Shakespeare 3.92 avg rating — 103,189 ratings

78. The Crucible byArthur Miller 3.47 avg rating — 76,916 ratings

79. The Sun Also Rises byErnest Hemingway 3.79 avg rating — 93,477 ratings

80. Man’s Search for Meaning byViktor E. Frankl 4.32 avg rating — 30,365 ratings

81. Cat’s Cradle byKurt Vonnegut 4.17 avg rating — 77,135 ratings

82. David Copperfield byCharles Dickens 3.88 avg rating — 38,877 ratings

83. Oliver Twist byCharles Dickens 3.71 avg rating — 55,526 ratings

84. The Sound and the Fury byWilliam Faulkner 3.82 avg rating — 47,067 ratings

85. Stranger in a Strange Land byRobert A. Heinlein 3.78 avg rating — 108,189 ratings

86. The Call of the Wild byJack London 3.65 avg rating — 62,101 ratings

87. The Awakening byKate Chopin 3.58 avg rating — 48,409 ratings

88. Invisible Man byRalph Ellison 3.79 avg rating — 42,219 ratings

89. King Lear byWilliam Shakespeare 3.85 avg rating — 47,432 ratings

90. Franny and Zooey byJ.D. Salinger 3.97 avg rating — 62,975 ratings

91. Leaves of Grass byWalt Whitman 4.09 avg rating — 24,692 ratings

92. Candide byVoltaire 3.72 avg rating — 44,291 ratings

93. For Whom the Bell Tolls byErnest Hemingway 3.86 avg rating — 52,677 ratings

94. Paradise Lost byJohn Milton (Author) 3.74 avg rating — 29,161 ratings

95. The Phantom of the Opera byGaston Leroux 3.87 avg rating — 33,084 ratings

96. Walden, or Life in the Woods byHenry David Thoreau 3.71 avg rating — 31,985 ratings

97. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man byJames Joyce 3.53 avg rating — 37,723 ratings

98. The Trial byFranz Kafka 3.94 avg rating — 33,410 ratings

99. Othello byWilliam Shakespeare 3.85 avg rating — 76,150 ratings

100. Middlemarch: A Study of Provincial Life byGeorge Eliot 3.89 avg rating — 25,231 ratings

List of Open Mic Nights in Birmingham UK

Last Updated: April 2012

There doesn’t seem to be much useful or up to date information online about Birmingham’s open mic scene, so i thought i’d publish my own list of open mic nights. Will try and keep this information as up to date as possible.

If you would like to suggest an OM not included here or correct any inaccuracies then feel free to leave a comment at the bottom of this post.

————————————————————-

————————————————————

Tuesday

—––————————————————————————————————-

Venue: The Patrick Kavanagh, Moseley, back room

When: Kicks off around 9
Run By: Iain Gough
Average number of songs: 3
Monitoring/sound: No Monitor. Generally not easy to hear yourself all that clearly.
Attendance: Generally pretty low
Audience Attitude: Pretty Good

What are the regulars/performers like?: Very varied. This night seems to attract some of the more eccentric members of the local scene.
Do Performers get a free drink?: Yes

Would you recommend it?: Yes. The low turnout and poor monitoring can be a bit of a drag  but it’s still usually an enjoyable night out.

—————————————————————————————————-

Wednesday

Venue: The Yardbird, City Centre, Next to central Library

When: I think this is some sort of gig that you have to pay a couple quid to get into which starts at about 7 but has free entry from about 8 and the guest acts are eventually followed by the open mic which tends to start at 9.30 or 10. Get there before 9 to get your name on the list.
Run By: Jason Pegg
Average number of songs: 2
Monitoring/sound: I always have trouble hearing myself, but i think that has more to do with the noisy audience than the sound system.
Attendance: Generally very good
Audience Attitude: Not great. People talk over you a lot and quite loudly too. As mentioned above, monitoring becomes problematic.
What are the regulars/performers like?: Trendy. Expect rappers, irritating young people and jazzed-up cover versions of 00s hits.
Do Performers get a free drink?: Don’t think so.

Would you recommend it?: Maybe. A two-song limit and a noisy audience can make this something of an alienating experience. On the plus side i often catch some of the guest acts (usually bands) and they’re often pretty entertaining.

Wednesday

————————————————————————————————

Venue: The Tower of Song, Cotteridge

When: Kicks off around 9.
Run By: Bill O’Brien
Average number of songs: 2
Monitoring/sound: No monitoring per se, there is a tiny sound system which sits behind the performer, but this works well and you can hear yourself well because the audience are so quiet.
Attendance: Generally pretty good. There are often 15 or so separate acts on in one night, so just with the other performers alone you can have a pretty decent sized audience. This place seems to have a pretty devoted following.
Audience Attitude: Excellent.
What are the regulars/performers like?: Middle aged folkies. Expect lots of bob dylan covers and A capella traditional folk. The audience likes to sing along too.
Do Performers get a free drink?: No
Notes: Very popular night, so you’ll probably have to contact Bill In advance to guarantee a slot. They have a band in the middle of the night that play for about 30 mins and a hat is passed round so the audience can make a contribution to the band if they like.

Would you recommend it?: Yes. Can’t beat a good audience and good sound.

—————————————————————————————————-

————————————————————————————————–

Thursday

————————————————————————————–

Venue: The Station, Kings Heath

When: 9ish?
Average number of songs: 3-5
Monitoring/sound: Not great. No Monitor and only 1 microphone.
Attendance: Good
Audience Attitude: Ok.

Would you recommend it?: Have only been there once. It was OK, not very well organised. Only having one microphone is a big disadvantage for anyone whose guitar doesn’t have a pickup.

———————————————————————————————————

Venue: The Island Bar, City Centre

When: about 8.30
Run By: Jason Pegg
Average number of songs: 3-5
Monitoring/sound: Excellent sound system but the noisy audience makes it impossible to hear yourself.
Attendance: Good
Audience Attitude: Terrible. No other OM has an audience that is so completely disinterested in listening to the music.
What are the regulars/performers like?: Expect cheesy pop and a few A capella X-factor Auditions.
Do Performers get a free drink?: Don’t think so

Would you recommend it?: Only if you like playing to a room full of noisy people who completely ignore you.

———————————————————————————————

Venue: The Roadhouse, Stirchley
When: Thursday, starts at 8.30, Get there for 8 to guarantee a good slot
Run By: Esther Turner or Nick Holmes and Helen Jones (alternate weeks)
Average number of songs: 3
Monitoring/sound: No monitor, sound is ok.
Attendance: Decent
Audience Attitude: Moderate.
What are the regulars/performers like?: Expect to hear lots of covers sung by harsh young voices. Some moderate beatboxing.
Do Performers get a free drink?: Don’t think so.

Would you recommend it?: Yes.

Website: http://www.facebook.com/#!/TheRoadhouseLiveLounge

Top ten Favourite films of all time

Me and my brother thought it would be fun to make a list of our 10 favourite films. We started with a long list and took it in turns to eliminate the films we each weren’t that crazy about until we had 10 films, so it’s not necessarily our individual 10 fave films, just a sort of venn diagram of our collective favourite films, the top 10 films, on whose status of awesomeness, we both agree. A definitive list would be impossible as our 10 favourite films will change a lot as time passes and be more influenced by stuff we’ve seen recently (7 of these 10 are films we’ve watched in the past 12 months) but as a snapshot of what we currently consider to be the coolest films ever made, this list is as close as we’ll get to a definitive one.

10. A Scanner Darkly, Richard Linklater, 2006

– – – – –

9. Point Break, Kathryn Bigelow, 1991

– – – – –

8. Rumble Fish, Francis Ford Coppola, 1983

– – – – –

7. Withnail & I, Bruce Robinson, 1987

– – – – –

6. Paper Moon, Peter Bogdanovich, 1973

– – – – –

5. The Hustler, Robert Rossen, 1961

– – – – –

4. The Fighter, David O. Russell, 2010

– – – – –

3. Sideways, Alexander Payne, 2004

– – – – –

2. The Apartment, Billy Wilder, 1960

– – – – –

1. Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, Nicholas Meyer, 1991

Yeah, that’s right, Star Trek VI is the greatest film ever made. Deal with it.

My Film Awards 2010

Best Visuals (runner up):

Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World.

. . .

Best Visuals:

True Grit (Cinematography by Roger Deakins).

. . .

Best Supporting Performance (Runner up):

John Hawkes in Winter’s Bone.

. . .

Best Supporting Performance:

Christian Bale in The Fighter.

. . .

Best Lead Performance (runner up):

Lesley Manville in Another Year.

. . .

Best Lead Performance:

Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams in Blue Valentine.

. . .

Best Screenplay (runner up):

The Fighter.

. . .

Best Screenplay:

The Social Network.

. . .

Best Director (runner up):

Danny Boyle for 127 Hours.

. . .

Best Director:

Mike Leigh for Another Year.

Missing child

Cool Stuff in ’09

Films

14. Up (2009) Dir: Pete Docter
Emotionally harrowing, structurally implausible drama. The 2nd best Pixar film.

 

13. Slumdog Millionaire (2008) Dir: Danny Boyle
The most "mutilationy" feelgood film of the year!!

 

12. Cloudy with a chance of meatballs, (2009), Dir: Phil Lord, Chris Miller
Superb Comedy-Fantasy.

 

11. The Fountain, (2006), Dir: Darren Aronofsky
Unintentional Comedy-Fantasy. I forgive this film its stupidity for the Jaw-dropping visuals and generally awesome bits e.g. a man turning into a flower bed.

Will YOU release spain from bondage?

 

10. Inglourious Basterds (2009) Dir: Quentin Tarrantino
The most exciting, boring film you’ll ever see. I can think of no other film that succeeds in making a few people having banal conversations in dimly lit rooms so nail-bitingly tense. When several characters start playing through an entire round of 20 questions in the middle of a suspensful life or death situation you’ll be like "OMG WTF!!!".

 

9. The Hidden Blade (2004) Dir: Yoji Yamada
Jidaigeki gets the Cranford treatment. It’s like someone introduced Akira Kurosawa to the word "quaint".

 

8. Say Anything… (1989) Dir: Cameron Crowe
Mature and surprisingly brilliant drama craftily disguised as some ‘fast times at ridgemont high’ bullshit.

 

7. A Scanner Darkly (2006) Dir: Richard Linklater
PKD’s all time greatest adaptation of probably his greatest novel. Superb mixture of cutting edge cinematography, tragedy, humour and big ideas.

 

6. Point Break (1991) Dir: Kathryn Bigelow
There is more to this film than the bits where Keanu Reeves dropkicks a terrier or jumps out of a plane without a parachute, but I’d be lying if i said it wasn’t the main appeal. The very best aspects of 90s action cheese combined with some surprisingly profound, epic moments.

 

5. Bend of the River (1952) Dir: Anthony Mann
Hardboiled Cowboy thriller.

 

4. Old Joy (2006) Dir: Kelly Reichardt
The most boring, boring film you’ll ever see. Seriously, why is this on this list? i don’t know what i was thinking.
Then again, sometimes you look back and realise the boring times were some of the best times. Jumping out of a plane without a parachute is awesome, but sometimes you just wanna go for a drive, listen to some Yo La Tengo and get creeped out by a sexually ambiguous, bearded songwriter, on the brink of a nervous breakdown. Oh well, at least he can piss like a powerful racehorse. He’ll always have that…

 

3. Mr Smith Goes to Washington (1939) Dir: Frank Capra
Good old Idealism. Can anyone remember Idealism? Ah, whatever happened to Idealism…

 

2. The Lion in Winter (1968) Dir: Anthony Harvey
This film is far too clever for me to do it justice with mere, poxy words.

 

1. What’s Eating Gilbert Grape? (1993) Dir: Lasse Hallstrom
Maybe retards are just really easy to play or somehting but this is an incredible performance from the young Leonardo DiCaprio. One of the most artery-cloggingly brilliant, unfiltered, home-brewed slices of americana ever filmed.

Books

I hardly read anything this year but wanted to mention Blankets by Craig Thompson, a super-beautiful masterpiece of memoir and also joint title holder (alongside watchmen) for best graphic novel ever.

Albums

5. American beauty by The Grateful Dead (1970)
Soothing is the word… Cleansing perhaps, although, that word just makes me think of infected Vaginas… Boring is perhaps another appropriate word…

 

4. Anthem of the sun by The Grateful Dead (1968)
One long, Jammin head trip, with touches of everything from Miles Davis to Stockhausen.

I got this from the discarded section my local library for just a pound. A POUND! I PAID A POUND!

 

3. Welcome to Sky Valley by Kyuss (1994)
MEKKIN LUURRRVVVVEEEEEE TO YOOOOOOOWAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!
If you’ve always thought Josh Homme was a pretty awesome dude who never really produced anything that brilliant, give this album a listen. It Rawks.

 

2. April by Sun Kil Moon (2008)
Not as consistent as Ghosts of the Great Highway but the songwriting is much stronger. A real underappreciated Gem of an album, far outshining anything by the likes of say Bonnie Prince Billy (who sings backing vox here).

 

1. Wowee Zowee by Pavement (1995)
The sound of one of the all time great bands at the height of their powers, being imaginative and having fun.