Indie music has hit another one of those annoying lulls where I'm pretty unimpressed with what's going on. Established bands are fading into obscurity, and the newer groups aren't providing fans with much to grab onto (Fuck Buttons?)
So instead of getting into anything new, I've been dipping back into the recent past to collect downbeat records (Zero 7, Morcheeba, Air, etc.). Music that's good for chilling out and relaxing. Music that you can work to. Music that's good when you're sitting at a computer for 9 or 10 hours a day.
In other words, it's easy listening music.
It's smooth jazz. It's yacht rock. But unlike those boomerish vices, it is at least music with history and ideas and a sense of urban(e) coolness, so I can rationalize it. A little.
(Unlike my recent fondness for Estelle and Kanye West, and Madonna with JT and Timbaland which I find impossible to rationalize, but I digress).
And hey, I probably should have seen this coming.
Unlike the rest of the hipster world I actually like Yacht Rock and have enjoyed it unironically for years - probably because my parents' record collection inexplicably stopped sometime around the break-up of the Beatles so I have no nightmarish memories of drunken boomers drinking pina coladas and singing along to What a Fool Believes. Besides, you can start making fun of Steely Dan when you've mastered those freaking jazz chords, so there.
Anyway, with my recent un/employment adventures, all I want is a little peace. Something smooth. That doesn't suck.
And a glass of wine.
OK?
