villains

As I sit here and begin to write, I take note of all the detritus on this desk. On the left side of my screen is an iPad POS terminal for my box office, next to that there's some hardware that used to be attached to a closet door I brought to work from my house to modify and ended up not taking back. Anything past that is blurred by being out of the visual range of my glasses, so while it's there I can't tell exactly what it is. I'm hoping that no one sneaks up on me from that side.

The other side of my desk, the right hand side/the side that is much larger, is beset with so much crap that most of the desktop is not visible. There's a water bottle, desk phone, coffee pot, key lock box, a safe, stacks of papers, pens and pencils, and a bag of cough drops to help with the sore throat I'm feeling. The average human has approximately 120º of vision, but most of that is out on the periphery. You can see it, but you can't really see it. That's where you miss things.

Obviously there are so many albums that fly across my peripheral vision during the year. Sometimes I try them and find that they're just not for me (perfect example: LCD Soundsystem's American Dream. I think it's a cheap knock-off of Talking Heads). Sometimes I work and work at writing about them, only to discover that I either only like one song or the whole thing just doesn't work (I've tried to write about Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit's The Nashville Sound a number of times). Other times I just keep listening to a record every once in a while and it finally hits me - I should write about this.

Many of my friends have gushed about the newest release from Queens of the Stone Age. To be perfectly honest, they hadn't really put anything on my radar since "No One Knows" hit alternative rock radio in 2002 (where it's been a staple since). They released their seventh studio album, Villains, this past August, and from what I understand it's their most accessible album since 2002's Songs For The Deaf. I wish I had time to dive head first into fifteen years of back catalogue, but in the interest of getting this written sometime this year...

The first thing to note is that Villains is produced by Mark Ronson. You should know that name, but if you don't you should take a moment and listen to this little ditty he did (that you thought was someone else's song). Ronson takes frontman Josh Homme's solid hard rock foundations and gives them a glam rock polish. The heavy riffs make you want to shake your moneymaker, but not so much it hurts - it's still a rock record after all. The arpeggiated guitar reminds me of something Led Zeppelin would do, but admittedly this is no Zep record. It's a good and fun listen, and a nice reset for the band stylistically. Where they go from here is the next big question.

Recommended tracks: "Feet Don't Fail Me Now," "The Way You Used to Do," "Domesticated Animals," "The Evil Has Landed," "Head Like a Haunted House"