Wednesday, December 21, 2011

2011's Biggest Disappointment

At the end of the year, everyone makes lists of the best this and the greatest that of the last year.  Myself, I like to fly in the face of convention, so I'm going to tell you what I didn't like.  My biggest disappointment of 2011 wasn't even an album that was released in 2011.  Quite the contrary, it was released in 1993.  I waited 18 years to own this album - so you can imagine what a huge letdown it was when I finally came to possess it and it turns out I don't like it!

So here it is:

Mazzy Star: So Tonight That I Might See

I found it at used at Half Price Books a couple weeks ago, but I was loading up on Smashing Pumpkins and Violent Femmes and I left it there.  Well, we went back last weekend and lo and behold, it was still there.  So I snagged it, hoping for 9 more songs with the same magic that "Fade Into You" has. 

Well...no.  There are nine more songs, that much is true.  And you can tell the same people are performing them (mostly because they all sound the same), but the magic that exists in "Fade Into You" is sorely lacking.  I have no idea when I first heard that song, it has just been there on my play lists forever.  I even had it on an actual mixed tape that I recorded off the radio in probably '93 or '94.  I fucking love it - it's all dreamy and moody.  Listening to it is like laying under the stars on a warm night, just existing.  But the rest of the album?  Noise.  That's all, just noise. 

Perhaps this is a fine example of a song that isn't all that great, but I still love it because of all the years I have spent with it.  Either way, I'm pretty attached to it; it even made #2 on the top one-hit wonders of my ipod.  So the build up to So Tonight That I Might See over the years has been huge.  Which made the letdown huge too.  What a bummer.

So I've learned from this is that if I've had a song in my collection for 15-20 years and have never bought the album it came on, perhaps I should leave well enough alone and just stick to that one song.

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