Soul Coughing - El Oso: 9 (A)

Soul Coughing - Irresistible Bliss: 8 (A-)

Various - Now That's What I Call Party Hits!: 8 (A-)

Kim Gordon/Ikue Mori/DJ Olive - SYR5: 7 (B+)

Not worth the prices being asked for 7 (B+) material. # [noise/experimental] anyway. Yes, we all love Kim, I know.

Clint Ruin/Lydia Lunch w/Thurston Moore - Stinkfist/The Crumb [EP]: 7.5 (high B+)

I would probably get this even though #experimental, just because Thurston Moore is on it, and it's Lydia Lunch, and I like the cover, and I love EPs, but physicals are ridiculously expensive. I also listened thrice to both other songs on The Crumb EP or single or whatever it was ("Done Dun" and "Dead River"), and I would give that a 7 (B+) but also #experimental, and no desire to buy that one regardless.

Rosie Tucker - Lowlight [honorable mention]

:-)

Black Uhuru - The Best of Black Uhuru: 20th Century Masters: The Millennium Collection: 9.5 (high A)

Christgau is right that this is an exceptional collection. Short and sweet, hard-hitting. Surprisingly difficult to find for a reasonable price, but with a little patience I finally did. When it came out, I'm sure it retailed for $7 like these all did and was a steal.

Mdou Moctar - Funeral for Justice [honorable mention]

:-)

Rail Band with Mory Kante & Salif Keita - Rail Band [Sono Africa, 2000]: notation

Only track not on other albums posted on or to be posted on is “Tiedioucouya,” which happens to be a pretty great track. Might be on something else spelled a little differently, as sometimes happens with African releases. Obviously, I would not get this for one track. Man, do I need to add some Salif posts. Only two as of this date, lol.

Ghostface Killah - Ghostdini: Wizard of Poetry in Emerald City: 7 (B+)

Didn’t get this when it came out, because I was finally able to stream before buying, and I pegged this as #r&b rather than hip-hop.

Crack Cloud - Red Mile: liked

Six plays

Matthew Sweet - Earth: liked

Some good Lloyd guitar solos, atop super-cheesy 1980s keybs and behind Sweet singing in a strangely affected voice that, quite frankly, irritates. Quine has all of 2 solos as far as I can hear: one at the very end of track 6 -- “Vertigo” -- and one on track 11 -- “Having a Bad Dream.” Even as a huge fan of Quine, it doesn’t justify it for me. Also, Gary Lucas on a couple tracks. Lloyd is on about a third of the tracks.

Louis Armstrong - The California Concerts: X stars

# [live; jazz]

AC/DC - Back in Black: 9 (A)

AC/DC - Highway to Hell: 8.5 (high A-)

AC/DC - Let There Be Rock: 8 (A-)

Angry Samoans - Return to Samoa (out-takes/lost tapes): 7.5 (high B+)

Upped from honorable mention after several additional listens and realizing that this isn't truly the # [odds and ends] it appears to be, so much as 10 studio tracks from 1982, around the time of Back From Samoa, followed by 15 live tracks recorded at "the 700 Club" in the East Village on June 14, 1981. The playing is much tighter (if you can call it that) than at the Live at Rhino Records show recorded a few years earlier, not surprisingly, and the audio is not that bad. I vaguely remember being outside the door of the club, tripping on acid, and not being able to get in, at 15 years old one night in the spring of 1981. Was it this show? Who knows? And they mean the A7 club, right? Another reason for buying this anyway. (My copy actually has two inserts, one with a black background instead of pink.)

The Flaming Lips - Embryonic: 8 (A-)

Bombino - Nomad: 8 (A-)

[Presumed. On shelf awaiting final grading.]

Group Bombino - Guitars from Agadez, Vol. 2: 8 (A-)

Bombino - Agadez: 8 (A-)

[Presumed. On shelf awaiting final grading.]

Richard Hell - Go Now [EP]: notation

See review of Hell/Quine for more info. But the bottom line is that I would buy this if it were in a slim case or digipack or something like that, especially because it's on Tim/Kerr. Not in a standard jewel box though for only ~10 minutes of Quine noodling around in the background.

Richard Hell/Robert Quine - Hell/Quine [EP]: notation

I wish I had known about this at the time it was released. I would have snagged a copy. It's basically three tracks on a one-sided LP and now sells for way too much money. Here are the 3 tracks:

(1) Hell singing "Time" with Ivan Julian on guitar at Quine's memorial.

(2) The guitar pieces composed and played by Quine as background music for Hell's 1995 essentially spoken-word release Go Now, while Hell reads from his novel of the same name. I've listened to that single-track EP basically 3 times (really twice and once fast-forwarding through the parts without the guitar "mood" tracks). The guitar parts are nice and I'd like to have them in their pure form as on this release. 

(3) Hell reading from his journals at and around the time Quine ended his own life.

So, I don't need to hear the plain readings on track 3, and the version of "Time" that is track 1 on this is included on Destiny Street Complete, which I have, so that leaves track 2. The running time on that track is almost exactly the same as the snippets of guitar background on Go Now if you add them up (I actually timed them), so I assume I have heard track 2. Anyway, I would love to have a digital file of it. Maybe someone will send me a link one day.

Richard Hell - Time: 8 (A-)

Contains all of R.I.P., the ROIR cassette-only compilation, plus more.

Richard Hell - Spurts: The Richard Hell Story: 8 (A-)