Category: 2018NE

38 Equip: Synthetic Core 88

~ Lex Leeson ~ 3 Comments

I think we can say that we are now living in the post-truth era. If we’re not, we should still say it. That would make the statement untrue, which would actually prove that we are living in the post-truth era, Which would make the statement true. Though, since we’re living in the post-truth era, the usefulness of saying that we’re living in the ‘post-truth era’ is debatable, as the truth is no longer what we deal in. However, if I say WE’RE LIVING IN THE POST TRUTH ERA really loudly and marry it with whatever’s trending on Twitter right now (Josh Gordon, whoever he is) then perhaps you’ll decide this post is worthy of note.

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Eugh, he’s an American football player?? I thought he was a real person

But when did we enter the era of post-truth? When were we pre-truth, when were we resolutely amid truth, and at what point did truth become a rapidly shrinking figure in our rear view mirror. Some say that the era started with that last paragraph I wrote. This is definitely a minority view however, as at time of writing I am the only person who’s seen that paragraph, and I certainly don’t believe that. Me stating that, however, is another good example of the post-truth age. What do you think of when you think of post-truth? Donald Trump and Brexit? Was 2016 the end of our often fractious relationship with reality?

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39 Ariana Grande: Sweetener

~ Lex Leeson ~ 9 Comments

“Once I have you, I will never let you, never let you”

I feel quite sorry for Ariana Grande. ‘Sweetener’ is an absolutely brilliant album, and the jokes about my ‘TDE’ (Tiny Di… yeah, you got that joke, didn’t you?) would write themselves. It sees Grande finally locate an identity for herself, and honestly contains some of the best and most subtly experimental mainstream pop music released this year. I’m just going to use this review to talk about Hejjy again though. First ISIS, now this: poor girl just can’t catch a break.

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Buckle up!

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40 Chris Al3x: Sonicwave

~ Lex Leeson ~ Leave a comment

Ho-ho! Remember a while back when I joked about fake Vaporwave subgenres? Yeah, I know, it was fucking hilarious, wasn’t it? Absolute, first class satire, sending up the entire Vaporwave industry so mercilessly that it no doubt sent shivers throughout Ilidža*. The genre will likely never be the same again.

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(*yeah, I’ve decided that Ilidža, a small municipality near Sarajevo in Bosnia, is the cultural capital of Vaporwave. It probably isn’t, but I’ve not really got time to do much research. If you’re reading this, Chris Al3x, feel free to correct me. Ashton-under-Lyne hasn’t got much going for it, can we be the capital of Vaporwave?)

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41 The Men: Drift [CANCELLED DUE TO JOSE MOURINHO]

~ Lex Leeson ~ 5 Comments

I’m really sorry, Men, and I really do honestly love your album. I’d probably hypothetically put it as forty second or maybe fortieth best album of the year, if I was into stuff as bizarrely obsessive compulsive as only even enjoying art in order to list it at year’s end. And- ho-ho!- I had a straight fire bang up the elephant entry planned! It would have been so funny it would have literally blow all your collective arses out through your collective eyeballs. Literally. Literally. It’s unfortunately had to be shelved, much like my editor told me that it ‘wasn’t a good time’ to publish my ‘Top 100 Boeing Aircrafts’ on September 11th 2001. Especially as I’d planned to hold the launch party in Times Square. While dressed as Osama Bin Laden. It’s really hard to judge the mood at times like that.

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Besides, let’s face it, I’ll just write the exact same piece I was planning later on an album I’m struggling to think of what to say about. I’m looking at you, El Perro del Mar!! Erm… ‘spoiler’… I guess…

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42 Ash Koosha: Aktual

~ Lex Leeson ~ 3 Comments

“Ooooh! Oooooh! Two albums on one list! Ooooh! Ooooh! This has only happened once before! Ooooh! Ooooooh! This is historic! Oooooh! Ooooo….!”

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Is it historic, though? Is it? When Prince had two albums on the 2014 best albums list, he did actually write and perform both of the records, whereas Ash Koosha’s other entry on the list was largely written and composed by artificial intelligence, sooooooooooooooo… 1.5 albums on this year’s list?

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44 JPEGMAFIA: Veteran

~ Lex Leeson ~ 7 Comments

Hmmm, this album presents a bit of a problem for me in respect to me writing any sort of a coherent piece on it. I mean, sure, I haven’t really written a coherent piece yet in 386* blog posts, but this one is, like, far less likely to be coherent than most, yeah?

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(…)

(*actual number, fact fans! Maybe the thousandth post is the one where I live stream my suicide? Considering it’s taken me three years to reach 384, it should take me, what, about six more to reach 1000? I’ll be in my forties by that point, and as a result almost definitely praying for death. Only if I get enough readers though. Make sure you all hit subscribe)

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45 Marissa Nadler: For My Crimes

~ Lex Leeson ~ 3 Comments

I got a phone call from BT on Thursday that said my internet would have to be shut off later that day because of irregular activity on my account, unless I took immediate action by pressing ‘one’. This, understandably, through me into a nervous frenzy. Cut off my internet!! I would literally be able to do nothing! My entire life, my work , my leisure and whatever the fuck this blog is*, is only rendered possible by being online! If you take me offline, I’d have to read a stinking book or something, like this was freaking 1970! No thanks! Plus, I keep a dangerously low amount of pornography in the house, barely a dozen DVDs and 700 or so pencil pictures of Rashida Jones, so I was worried where my next fifty or so wanks were going to come (pun!) from.

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The fuck is that?

(*it doesn’t earn me any money, I don’t really get any pleasure writing it, I have no idea what the purpose of this fucking piece of shit is. Apart from, of course, leading up to me live steaming my own suicide, but I don’t get nearly enough readers to do that at the moment! Plus, I’m actually quite enjoying life as Alex Palmer: Trainee Immigration Lawyer at the moment, so suicide isn’t really on the agenda. I am so grateful for anyone who reads this nonsense though, and a freaking comment would make me more happy than you could possibly understand. About 90% of the comments on this blog so far have been from my ‘ex'(it’s really, really complicated)-girlfriend, and I would really appreciate comments from people I haven’t had sex with. I will, obviously, have sex with you after you leave a comment)

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46 Laurie Anderson & Kronos Quartet: Landfall

~ Lex Leeson ~ 4 Comments

“You know the reason I really love the stars? It’s that we cannot hurt
Them. We can’t burn them. We can’t melt them or make them overflow
We can’t flood them or blow them up or turn them out
But we are reaching for them. We are reaching for them”

In a strange way, the influential 2006 documentary An Inconvenient Truth might have unintentionally and semi-ironically doomed us all. It has had very inconvenient consequences, you could say. But absolutely don’t, because that’s a rotten line.

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Now, I’m not arguing that An Inconvenient Truth didn’t do a lot of good. I was.. younger… when it came out, and I have to say that, while maybe not a climate change denier, I was probably sceptical of the threat based on my own scientific research uncovering statistics like the fact it snowed a couple of years back and it was sometimes really cold. The film actually convinced me of the facts, using simple statistics and arguments that, if I’m being honest, I was probably too lazy to read for myself. I was a child, I decided that believing that climate change was at least overstated would mean I needn’t change anything about my behaviour, and so only searched out articles and columns that supported the theory I had chosen to believe. I was a child. I saw An Inconvenient Truth and realised what a child I was being. And how stupid I was. I imagine many people had similar epiphanies upon watching it. I was a child, and I still can’t believe how stupid I was. A child,

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47 Superorganism: Superorganism

~ Lex Leeson ~ 3 Comments

We have to stop talking about ‘The Internet’ like it’s a distinct and separate thing, a place somehow separate to everything else. We need to stop talking about ‘The Internet’  in the same way we talk about that time I wet my pants ‘at the zoo’ or that time I wet my pants ‘at Kew Gardens’ or that time I wet my pants ‘at the UN National Assembly’. Also, we need to stop talking about the times I wet my pants, can we not talk about your day for a change??

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‘The Internet’ is no longer this curious and hidden alternative to reality used only by weirdos to secretly find what other depraved people near them also believe that Star Wars was never really that fucking good in the first place*. ‘The Internet’ is now just ‘Everything’. It has no unique facets or distinctive characteristics, it’s just ‘The World’.

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