[ann ashtray]

I can appreciate someone like Merzbow, and I like some of his stuff (Merzbeat is my favorite)...but with so much output I highly doubt much is going into each individual release. Thus, I find most of it boring. He certainly talks more about quantity than he does quality. I don't dig that, no matter how influential he may be. I forget how many thousands of albums he hopes to do before he calls it quits....but really, why not just a few really good ones? I get it, I just don't relate.

I dig Dinosaur, aside from the fact that most of their material (or should I say J.'s material...) goes in the same exact direction. Sloppy Asheton meets metal soloing over whiney/slacker vocals (and I DO like J.'s vocals). I just don't want to hear the same thing from album to album...kinda like with the Ramones. The Ramones were great, but really, if you've heard the first three albums, you've more or less heard everything.

Deer Hunter used to be good. I caught some of their earlier shows (saw 'em open for Afrirampo once, fantastic show). I liked their avant-garage meets Joy Division sound...and while I can appreciate them moving away from that (evolution is always good), the newer ambient/drone/shit-gaze/what-the-fuck-ever doesn't do much for me. There's just so much of that going on already. I thought they sounded pretty neat + unique as a rock band...definitely not something easy to pull off.

Modest Mouse...kinda the same thing as Dinosaur. I liked some of their earlier stuff (esp. "The Fruit That Ate Itself"), and a few other random tunes...but for the most part it's been the same thing over and over. And most aspects of them I do like, I already got out of the Meat Puppets and Pixies ages before I was exposed to Modest Mouse (roughly nine years ago). (and oh, I should have added "Most Pixies" to my list as well...some of the worst albums I've ever been forced to sit through, and damned sure one of the worst shows I've ever had the misfortune of attending).