#viinyl

Came home from work really stressed and decided I needed some art therapy

Ben Folds Five: Whatever and Ever Amen (1997)

Revenge of the Nerds, Part II.

Sometimes the sequel is as good as the original item -- even better! -- and I certainly wouldn’t blame you for choosing 1997’s all-in-all superb sophomore album, Whatever and Ever Amen, over Ben Folds Five’s fantastic debut from two years earlier.

Just like its predecessor, this effort epitomized the alternative rock decade ...

It was stubbornly contrarian, painfully earnest, and sonically stripped-down, as the essentially “live” production (*) here illustrates, by capturing Ben Folds’ untamed, virtuoso piano, Robert Sledge’s growling electric bass, and Darren Jesses’s untreated, unrestrained drum kit.

Lyrically, too, the Five ... three ... whatever were on fire: churning out, not one, but two, simultaneously defiant and self-effacing loser anthems in the autobiographical “One Angry Dwarf and 200 Solemn Faces” (“Kiss my ass goodbye!”) and the brilliant “Song for the Dumped” (“Fuck you too! Give me my money back, you bitch!”).

Then, on “Battle of Who Could Care Less,” Ben insightfully takes his own Generation X to task for their fabricated detachment, before repping them well on the career highlight “Brick” -- one of the most sensitive depictions of a teenage abortion’s trauma and confusion ever recorded.

And so it goes, as the trio maneuvers confidently between the Beatles-esque three-part harmonies of “Fair,” to the giddy love letter of “Kate,” to the melancholy polka of “Smoke,” to the jazzy last call hilarity of “Steven's Last Night in Town.”

Only the presence of a few too many ballads (“Selfless, Cold, and Composed,” “Missing the War,” “Evaporated”), beautiful as they are, drop Whatever and Ever Amen down a peg in my own estimation vs. the group’s take-no-prisoners first album.

But I couldn’t imagine living without either one of them and, hopefully, neither can you.

* Indeed, the album was recorded with producer/engineer Caleb Southern in the front room of a house in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. 

Looks awesome, doesn’t it?

I’ve been working on completing my Whipped Cream backdrop for the past 5 years, picking up a copy whenever I saw one.  Today, I received a package containing 9 Whipped Cream album covers, enough to complete my monument to perhaps the most iconic album cover of all time. Best part? Many of these 19 album jackets were sent to me by other Vinyl Junkies who dug the idea and wanted to do something nice.  Thanks to everyone who helped me build the only wall that matters.  Stu “Black Crowe” McArthur, thanks for helping me with the final 9 pieces, you rule! Now Spinning: Whipped Cream And Other Delights, by Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass (1966)

No Fucker Conquer The Innocent test pressing 7″ (2008)

No Fucker became one of the first artists I discovered through Last.fm after settling from Lindenhurst to Ronkonkoma one summer. It made us realize that we could do a lot better and gritter if we took our punk shows to another higher level, and so we did the following summer. That’s when he hit a new standard. We returned the favor playing No Fucker’s “Another…” (2006) and “Peace…They Hate The Very Word” (2002) on that show. Not too long ago we changed it up to do a bonus all-e.p. and demo broadcast of punk, crust, thrash, oi, and d-beat with this e.p. included. We then realized “fuck, we forgot to play G.L.O.S.S. We will never be forgiven until we do so.” (Hold us to this.) We also realized “hey, hardcore works in the same release nature as punk. We’ll do the same for that as we did for punk.” Rest assured it will happen in the very near future.

A couple years ago I adopted a Homestuck fan character from @chrystallink because I instantly fell in love with the outfit design and personality vibe. I kept the name, Viinyl Kratzer, and most of the original design. But I’ve changed Viinyl into a character from one of my stories. (She’s no longer a homestuck troll)

Viinyl is still a humanoid alien, and she comes from the world of ET. Her species (currently unnamed) has ears that are elf-like, their noses are more like that of a cat, their eyes are large and almond shaped in a variety of colors, and their skintone is a range of slate gray colors. The rest of their anatomy, hair growth, emotional spectrum, intelligence capabilities, etc. are like those of a human.