All The Records I've Ever Owned

Year Released: 2004 Label: Reprise Year Bought: 2012 Yes it's been a while but fear not, I am back on my odyssey to listen to all the records I own. Today it's a hit of emo from one of the titans of the genre. 'Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge' is the second album by My Chemical Romance, and reached my ears when it was released via my younger sister, who was massively into all this. Back in 2004 I acted all aloof about this whole genre, which seemed to me to be the aural equivalent of throwing a teenager tantrum after your mum had told you to clean your room. Yet there were some good tunes. 'I'm Not OK (I Promise)' was the big radio/video hit, and I did like it even back then — even if I kept that to myself. I really got into MCR when they released the follow-up to this - 'The Black Parade' - but never got round to getting this album until 2012. It kicks off with 'Helena', which is an absolutely rollocking, ridiculous, over-the-top start to an ...

Year Released: 1997 Label: Epic Year Bought: 1997 (cassette) - not sure about this CD  This album is so 90s. I had it on cassette when it came out and played it to death. Literally, it broke. I loved it. It reminds me of playing football in the park, Euro 96, hours on Championship Manager. Glorious youth. I'm not sure when I bought the CD but I do know that when my car was broken into in Colchester in 2010 the thieves took the CD player but removed this from it first and left it on the seat. Everyone's a critic, aren't they. It's a collection I still listen to and it takes me back to my early teenage years every time.  'Life of Riley' will always be the Goal of the Month soundtrack, 'Sugar Coated Iceberg' is still delightful, and 'Three Lions' is the best football song ever made. Ok, some of it is a bit too candy floss. 'Brain Drain' has nursery rhyme-level lyrics in the chorus, and the extra long intro to 'Marvellous' kills the p...

Year Released: 2000 Label: EMI, Virgin Year Bought: 2002  Bought in February 2002 as my Bowie obsession was in full swing, this double CD of his BBC sessions from 1968 to 1972 is one for the purists. CD1 CD1 is full of songs that never entered the public consciousness, and you can see why. They are perfectly fine, but nothing memorable, and show that Bowie was still very much working out his art at the end of the 1960s. That's not to say it's not worth a listen though. "In The Heat of the Morning" is pure 60s pop, while "Silly Boy Blue" and "Let Me Sleep Beside You" are decent. Bowie's only 60s hit, "Space Oddity", is missing from these sessions, with Bowie explaining in one of the interview clips you'd need three orchestras to pull it off. What you do get though is Bowie bringing together some of his most important future collaborators.  Frequent producer Tony Visconti pops up with the Tony Visconti Orchestra for the first sessio...

Year Released: 2021 Label: Appetite Year Bought: 2024 My ambition of picking up weird vinyl really came true with this record.  'Nice Try, Sunshine!' is a collection of Swedish indiepop from the 00s, put together by Gothenberg-based record label Appetite. An A5 note inside the sleeve sets out the thinking behind the record: "How do you make a coherent compilation of a scene that you just barely missed out on, know nothing about or that maybe never even exists in the sense that you could even call it a scene?" The tunes are apparently based on songs shared between friends over MSN, and has been mastered from those mp3s. I picked it up in Flashback Records in Shoreditch, attracted by its cover and the fact that even though I had never heard of any of these songs or bands, someone clearly loved them enough to put them out on vinyl. It's all very jangly, twee, and lo fi, but it just works perfectly. It's pure indiepop. Just look at the titles: 'No One Goes For...

Year Released: 2004 Label: Relentless Year Bought: No Idea I'm not sure why I have this record. I have no record of buying it. I've never listened to it. But then I do own two Dido albums so it's not exactly out of character of me to have it. I've always thought KT Tunstall was a pretty cool person. She's clearly talented. But this album, I just can't really connect with it. There's some good tunes on here. 'Black Horse and the Cherry Tree' is great, as is 'Suddenly I See'. 'Another Place To Fall' hints at some darker tones, and 'Under The Weather' builds nicely. But overall it's just all a bit safe. I vaguely remember reading an interview with Tunstall a few years after this came out in which she said the original mix was a lot more rough and bluesy, but the label wanted it more polished. You can definitely hear how this album could have been scuffed up. 'Stopping The Love' is a good example of that. It's a mi...

Year Released: 1997 Label: EMI Year Bought: 1999 My love of Bowie started as a wind up. There was a rumour round our school that one of the French teachers used to go out with Bowie, so as part of my ambition to be a cocky little shit I decided to try to sneak some Bowie song titles into our lessons. "I don't understand how this verb ch-ch-ch-changes, Miss" – that sort of thing. It turned out that not only had she dated him, she was still friends with him, and even had side-of-the-stage tickets when he played Glastonbury in 2000. She might still be the coolest person I've ever known. In my bid to learn some more Bowie tunes I dug out my mum's old vinyls and fell in love with 'Hunky Dory'. For Christmas 1999, my mum got me 2 CDs, this one, which covers 1969/74, and the next one which goes up to 1979.  That Christmas, I had them both on repeat as I played FIFA 2000 on the PC (which had a picture of pre-Judas Sol Campbell on the cover). This compilation reall...