Tuesday, June 20, 2006

Ray Redux

Due to the much appreciated thoughtfulness of a friend, I'm now in possession of something I didn't even know was being planned -- Ray LaMontagne's second album, Till the Sun Turns Black, which will be released August 29. You can't even pre-order it on Amazon, people. You need to find friends as in-the-know and as generous as mine, stat.

As long as I've been a music geek, I've been especially geeky about release dates, because the one thing I love almost as much as music is anticipation. I admit that even at my advanced age, I semi-frequently visit the web sites of bands I love to see when something new is coming out. (I'll spare you the maniacal feats of reconnaissance that I executed when I was younger.) To sum up, it's hard to catch me unawares, which means that when the LaMontagne CD was handed to me, I nearly went apoplectic (though, in fairness, this could also be chalked up to lack of exercise).

The longer the anticipation, of course, the more likely the build-up of expectations that are unreasonable, and my impressions upon first listen often suffer as a result. (This phenomenon also adversely affected my experience with, among other things, college and working.) So it's nice to have LaMontagne fall into my lap like this, along with a chance to judge it fairly. So far, it sounds even quieter than his debut, but no less soulful and moving. I've only been through it one and a half times. More reaction TK, as they say in my biz.

1 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Good lord - this will date us - but I remember scouring the bins at Best Buy the day the new Live album was to be released only to find out that the release date had been delayed. I never knew such crushing blows before or since.

1:43 AM  

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