This Weeks Faves: 9/05

Been a strange feeling week, so favorite tunes are pretty much standard for me. I've been playing alot of Stevie Ray Vaughan; mostly In the Beginning. I just love that album. (I guess that's obvious ... since it is a favorite!) Released in '92, two years after his death, the album is a recording of a broadcast from Austin, Texas, April 1, 1980. It's raw, partially because it's taken from a two-track tape, but it's really incredible to listen to SRV at the beginning of his career. You'd swear that he was already very established. And this was recorded three years before his debut album, "Texas Flood," was released. Truly an outstanding album!
Some of the best tracks: In The Open, Slide Thing, and Shake For Me. There's others, but today anyway, those are my faves. Definitely worth checking out if you haven't already!

While SRV was the mainstay of the week, I spent all day Saturday listening to Rammstein's Mutter, and most of Sunday with Squirrel Nut Zippers' Hot. Two very different, but very good, albums!

Faves on the Rammstein: Links 2 3 4, Ich Will, and Feuer Frei. I got a media sampler when the album came out, and it includes videos for Links, Ich Will, and Sonne. Very cool.

Faves from the Squirrels would include, but are not limited to: Memphis Exorcism, Hell, Bad Businessman, and Got My Own Thing Now. I just love their sound. Reminds me of Sunday's when I was a wee little man, and we'd be listening to music from the 40's on the way to church. Always enjoyed listening to that music!

Occasional commentor and insulter, Mr. Maltby has lent me Breaking Benjamin, so I'm going to check that out this week. Listened to a little, and it's sounds like it's going to be a good one.

On the literary front, I'd finished reading Adams' Long Dark Tea Time Of The Soul, got started on John Sandford's Hidden Prey. If you haven't read any of the Prey series from him, and you like good detective stories, you've got to check them out. I mean it! They aren't whodunnits, but the way he weaves the story just keeps you riveted! This book was hard to put down. Basically, I read it over three days. I do have to say, the ending was just a little lacking. I think that I may know why, but that's for readers to figure out.

I finished that book yesterday (Sunday), so I when I hit the hay last night (around 11:30), I figured I'd start the new Koontz, The Taking. If I said that I put it down at 3:00 this morning (finished), would you believe that it's a good great book?! I will say that there were a couple of spots where I was going to put it down because it started to drop off, but it picked up everytime. He does a great job painting up a scare! I live in an older house that has lots of creaks, snaps, and thuds. I'm used to it. Well, I was. Last night, I swear I jumped out of my hide twice, and startled myself on innumerable occasions! Are you familiar with Stephen King's novella The Mist? The Taking is kind of similar, but it's .... thicker? It's not the right word, but it comes fairly close. A strange silverish rain falls heavily on the world. A harbinger of some very strange things to come. I'm not going to go into the story and possibly ruin it for someone, but it's a good'un!

In the Great Beer Extermination Project, the flavor is still Amber Bock. Damn stuff just keeps reproducing! I'm thinking I may stop and pick up a double bock today. I'll let you know how the hunt goes!

One last note about SRV; August 27 was the fourteenth anniversary of his death. I wish like hell that I had gone to see him that day. He was only forty miles away, but I didn't want to go to the show by myself. Dumb.