White Noise

You can put the numbers in alphabetical order, but you can't put the alphabet in chronological order.

Someone can. Someone who knows about the origins of characters can.

But you can't.

I spent a lot of time travelling this weekend. I travelled to a football match, I travelled to my childhood home, I travelled to Devon, I travelled back to Oxford.

There was a tree on the line; that's why I had to do so much travelling.

A tree on the line.

What century are we living in? Do saws and cranes not exist?

The trees are laughing at us. They can bring us down like *that* (picture a branch snapping its twigfingers).

I was listening to music during a lot of the travelling. To make it more exciting, I tried to come up with my top ten favourite albums.

It was difficult. Those lists always are. How can you make a definitive order of preference, when your preferences change depending on the time of day, the weather, or the pH level of your Sony Discman.

But I had a go anyway. Albums are easier than songs, at least. Especially if you restrict yourself to one album per artist. And no compilations.

I think I got about eight.

In chronological order, they are:

1. Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band - Safe as Milk [1967]
   
2. Phil Ochs - Pleasures of the Harbor [1967]
   
3. Scott Walker - Scott 3 [1969]
4. The Beatles - Abbey Road [1969]
5. The Fall - Grotesque (After the Gramme) [1980]
6. Frank Black and the Catholics - Frank Black and the Catholics [1998]
7. Ben Folds Five - The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner [1999]
   
8. The Wrens - The Meadowlands [2003]

Yes, that is eight.

I'm not 100% sure about any of these, but I wrote them down, so I must have some confidence in them.

The depressing thing about this list is how universally male and white they all are.

I like to think I have eclectic musical tastes, covering various genres and countries. My regular playlists are diverse and challenging. But when it comes down to it, I'm as parochial and staid as the average dullard indie fan in his thirties.

Oh, that reminds me! OK Computer should probably be on there.

1. Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band - Safe as Milk [1967]
   
2. Phil Ochs - Pleasures of the Harbor [1967]
   
3. Scott Walker - Scott 3 [1969]
4. The Beatles - Abbey Road [1969]
5. The Fall - Grotesque (After the Gramme) [1980]
6. Radiohead - OK Computer [1997]
7. Frank Black and the Catholics - Frank Black and the Catholics [1998]
8. Ben Folds Five - The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner [1999]
   
9. The Wrens - The Meadowlands [2003]

Where are the women? I like women. And women artists. I'm a big fan of Nina Simone and Dusty Springfield, but I only really have best-ofs. Maybe I only like women from an era before the album became a thing. It was all singles back then.

What about modern women? I have lots of them on my playlists. But they seem to mostly be for individual tracks.

Where are the people of different races? You'd at least expect me to have some hip-hop on there. And I could certainly decide to add Run Come Save Me by Roots Manuva or the first Jurassic 5 album. But would they be there on merit? I should have The Low End Theory on there, but I don't even own a copy. What about a D'Angelo record? I like him, right? Am I just listing these choices because I like them, or because it makes my tastes sound more broad?

The trouble is that I got to a point in the list where I was thinking too much about my choices. I don't think I have ten clear choices. I listened to What's Going On to shake myself from my thinking, but - as always - I started to get annoyed by the overt religiousness of the later tracks.

What kind of eclectic man am I? A terrible kind. Where's the impenetrable electronica? Where's the Japanese buzzsaw punk? Where's The Lighthouse Family?

This whole thing has made me lose confidence in myself.

But then, maybe questioning my choices is the real mistake. All nine of those albums are genuinely great! I shouldn't be ashamed of them, just because of the artists' backgrounds! I should celebrate the music that I enjoy. I shouldn't overthink things.

I am who I am. I love the music that I love. And there's nothing wrong with that.

1. Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band - Safe as Milk [1967]
   
2. Phil Ochs - Pleasures of the Harbor [1967]
   
3. Scott Walker - Scott 3 [1969]
4. The Beatles - Abbey Road [1969]
5. The Fall - Grotesque (After the Gramme) [1980]
6. Radiohead - OK Computer [1997]
7. Frank Black and the Catholics - Frank Black and the Catholics [1998]
8. Ben Folds Five - The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner [1999]
   
9. The Wrens - The Meadowlands [2003]
10. Nick Griffin - Birds and Darkies Are Worse (Than Us) [2013]

 Ka-boom. That was the sound of an ironic satire-bomb at number ten there.

I hope none of this gets taken out of context.

The phrase "bomb at number ten" might get me in trouble.

But of course, my blog posts are taken neither in, nor out of, context. They are not taken at all. They are left, like a yoghurt on a windowsill: part creamy rebuke, and part reminder of humanity's potential.