...for me. It's gonna take 20 awesome albums to supplant this from my Top 20. I can't stop listening to it.

2005 is shaping up to be an fabulous year for music. Can't wait.

I respectfully disagree. If Low makes it above 15 on my list, I'll be very disappointed with this year.

What's up with your avatar, anti-semite?

Dang... I've gotta get this still and I've been a fan of Low since first hearing Shame on a CMJ comp in '95.

Its not doing much for me.

It's doing quite a bit for me.

After many more listens, I stick by my initial opinion. Very good, but no Things We Lost...

Ive only heard a few songs, but I love what I've heard. My first must-buy of 2005.

Hmm, I should check this out because both you & I agreed about Blonde Redhead being our #1.

you said fabulous, tehehehe

Keep in mind, this is my first ever experience with Low. I haven't heard anything they've done before. I say this cause a lot of Low fans are disappointed by this album.

Well, neither have I. I keep seeing them mentioned around here, so it doesn't hurt to check it out- I always love discovering something new.

Oh, god, please check out everything that you possibly can by this band - it was the best thing I've ever done for myself (I remember that time of my life very vividly). They are arguably my favourite, even with the stain of The Great Destroyer.

I too know nothing about Low.

Blonde Redhead was decent on the first listen. I could see potential, but I was listening to it here at work so I could not focus on it.

I take in an album best when in the car.

Yes, master.

If you're a new listener- I would recommend starting with
The Curtain hits the Cast

move on to

Songs for a Dead Pilot

then

Things we lost in the fire


I'm not a fan of the new direction, but people here who have good taste are. Those three records make the band for me. Avoid "Trust" at all costs.

Actually if someone likes The Great Destroyer, I would venture to guess that same someone would like Trust.

For anyone that's interested I think 'The Great Destroyer' is merely OK.

I started with the Transmission EP and then went on to I could live in hope and the Curtain Hits the Cast.

I just recently got Trust.

I like everything i have but prefer the first three. Trust has some good singles but hasn't grabbed me.

I'll eventually end up getting most everything by them.

I guess i should remedy not owning Things We Lost in the Fire.

Some of the new singles i've heard from the Great Destroyer are quite good.

Oy. Do not avoid 'Trust'. There are many redeeming quals about that record that took me a while to discover for myself, but it's really fucking good.

I'd recommend following the following order:
Things We Lost in the Fire
Secret Name
Long Division
Bombscare EP (sooooo gooooood, and perhaps the sort of direction that Low should actually now be pursuing)
The Curtain Hits the Cast
Trust
I Could Live in Hope
The Great Destroyer (which is good, fine, but not essential by any means)

Yea, it was my favorite album that year it came out. Definitely get it.

I'm so excited. The same thing happened to me last year with Blonde Redhead. I loved Misery Is A Butterfly so much, I bought their whole back catalog. I still need a couple of EPs though. Low will be my next project. I guess I'll go ahead and get Things We Lost In The Fire next.

The new Low is just alright... I can't get excited about it, even after 5 listens or so...

I'm the same way. I've heard a couple of Low tunes before, and just found it boring, but I really dig this new one.

I said it in another thread. This record will be hated by Low loyalists and loved by new fans of the band.

Jonathan, is The Great Destoyer a big of a disappointment as Medulla was? Seems like a comparable situation.

Hmm. Good question. Medulla was, in my opinion, her first miss throughout a career typified by taking chances and making leaps between records. Through all her experimentation, Bjork has always (up to this point) maintained a prevailing infectiousness in her music that has rendered it more pop than "alternative", I guess, or a-commercial. I found her latest to be alienating and burdened by its conceptual bent. While Low maintains that this is a logical progression of their sound, one that they've forewarned of since Things ... , (and, fine, it is), it sounds just as forced and recycled as Medulla does: the best ideas on The Great Destroyer are ideas we've heard before: eg. "On The Edge" recalling the Low of old and "When I Go Deaf" recalling fricking Crazy Horse. On both concerned records, the songwriting is inarguably weaker, and this is only pronounced by the concept/production, respectively. Yes, I do think these are parallel disappointments (to me!), but Low's (while I still enjoy it somewhat) is more personally devastating, because I find it a little bland even in its boldness and bombast; Bjork's album was just an objective miss on the whole.

Is this the same departure for them that Open was for Cowboy Junkies? Because that's like the only thing I like by them.

Well, maybe perhaps Trinity Sessions.