Albums that remind you of stuff

Good reading that, I'll think about some myself

I didn't have you pinned as an Alkaline Trio fan tucks

I'm not really but I do enjoy that particular album from time to time. Call it a guilty pleasure.

Origional pirate material / a grand dont come for free

Remember this was in my nme buying days and there was a free cd with 'the irony of it all' on. I loved that and then 'fit but you know it'. I then split up with my first proper girlfriend and was wounded so obviously 'dry your eyes' was huge but this was before it was released as a single and I always hated the way it blew up, coz before that it just felt like my song....but anyway around then me and a few mates would get stoned night after night. I worked p/t in a petrol station so had ample access to ciggies, skins and munchy type food and we'd have these 2 on and could basically relate to every lyric. Brilliant records, 2 of the best ever imo and I quite like the fact there very much of their time....in fact that's probably the reason they remind me so much of that specific time

That song is very easy to relate to for a lot of people which is why it go so huge.  I was in a similar position myself when I first heard that song and it pretty much broke me.  The lyrics are just so poignant and raw, and Skinner delivers them with so much sincerity.

Was shuffling some stuff on Spotify and (Just Like) Starting Over by Lennon came on and I was instantly transported back to 2003, laying on the bottom bunk of my bed on a Sunday afternoon. I say bottom bunk, but it didn't really have 2 bunks. The bottom part was a couch that folded out into a bed. I guess it was a sofa bed, really. Anyway, I don't want to get lost in unimportant details here.

So I was laying on the sofa bed or whatever it was, on an absolutely massive comedown. We'd been out on the Friday and Saturday night, and as was the norm round about that time, we'd done a load of pills across the 2 nights. I was still living at home at this point and my parents house wasn't too far away from town, perhaps a 20 minute walk. The Friday night, walking home with my mate, we saw some lass across the road getting hassled by a group of lads. Being the upstanding citizens that we were back then, we went over to see if everything was alright. After a bit of a heated back and forth, the lads soon moved on.

Now the lass in question here wasn't particularly attractive or anything, that was clearer than ever when we got up close. But that wasn't the motivation behind trying to help out. Anyway, she was very friendly and said she was heading back to her place where there was a bit of an afters going on, and did we want to go. We flagged a taxi down and off the 3 of us went.

I was in the front and my mate and the lass in the back. There was some fumbling and giggling and whatnot so I assume stuff was happening. To this day, my mate says nothing did happen but I'm not convinced. From the route we're taking, I was starting to suspect that this lass was from a bit of a ropey area. That was confirmed when we pulled upto to her house. But in we went.

It wasn't much of an afters, maybe 7 or 8 people? But there was no seating available so I perched down on the floor and drank whatever I could get my hands on. Didn't really speak to anyone, just sort of observed the room. I noticed that my mate had managed to make himself comfortable on the windowsill of the bay window and was laid asleep. I got pretty bored and told my mate I was leaving. He woke up and off we went but not before the lass said bye to use, and thanks for helping her out. And that was that.

The Saturday night, we were out again, and I think it was probably a bigger night in terms of drinking and pills because I don't remember everything quite as clearly as the Friday. We were in our local nightclub, The Wesley, and who should I bump into but the lass from the night before. Now remember she's not particularly attractive but somehow, we end up with our faces stuck together in a little booth in the corner of the nightclub. The next memory I have is being back at hers, just the 2 of us, and her feeding me a tangerine but trying to do it quite seductively. Then it's all a bit of a blur again until early Sunday morning. It's here where I established that she wasn't a "lass" but actually a woman of 28 years old. Not just this, but she's even harder on the eyes. Still, I was there so we spent a couple of hours going at it which came to an end when I almost experienced a fully snapped banjo. There was blood but it wasn't a complete snap so I was alright.

She asks if I want a cuppa or anything and I request water. So there I am laid in this woman's bed, dick bleeding, hungover, coming down. I'm alone and looking round the room thinking what a shit hole the place is. Only I'm not alone because a kid, must've been 2 years old, comes running into the room. It stops in it's tracks when it seems me there. Then 2 more run in, older, perhaps 5 or 6? And we're all just froze. The woman comes back up and proclaims: "Oh, these are my little ones" then tells them to say hello to me. I'm pretty sure at this point that I heard one of the older ones mutter: "Homewrecker" but I can't be certain because it may just be that I was still fucked off the drink and drugs.

I stayed in her room while she got her kids ready and stuff and eventually someone came and picked her kids up. We went downstairs where I continued to try my hardest not to fucking die. Eventually, it was time for me to go home, it must have been early afternoon. As I walked outside to get in my taxi, one of her neighbors was on the step and shouted over: "Better get yourself tested tomorrow mate" so that made my exit pretty awkward. The 28 year old woman laughed it off and told the neighbor to fuck off.

I got home, went straight to my room, and collapsed on the thing that might've been some sort of sofa bed. I leaned over to my CD player and hit play, and it was Lennon Legend that came on. I spent the rest of the day, and night, listening to it while experiencing probably the worst comedown I've ever had and thinking about how mad everything that had happened was. And now every time I hear that compilation, or songs from it, I'm taken back to that afternoon.

But did you get yourself tested?

I like the way you write, and all those little details you add, it feels completed and quite effortless too. Have you ever thought about writing? Like short stories or something? Don't get me wrong, not saying you have a sensational talent or anything, who knows, but maybe some fiction talkes could come from that place.

Thinking about this though thread though "by the way" by the red hot chilli peppers always reminds me of getting stoned in my mates car/s around 2003/4. I used to work part time in a petrol station, someone would pick me up about 10 mins before my shift ended and we'd get a fivers petty, skins, biftas and enough munch to last the night and ring it through as about 6 quid on the till then go and get a fivers worth of rocky and chat shit in the car all night, parked up in some shady sit off, where the police where unlikely to go by. Great days.

Oasis / Heathen Chemistry - I can remember being super jacked up over this. I can remember requesting the Hindu Times on every radio channel here and it not ever being played. I went and bought the CD as soon as the shop opened and when I went out to my car to pull the plastic off of it and getting blasted I noticed a fit bird next to mine was doing the same thing. Sadly we just gave each other a nod and went our ways.

The Strokes / First Impression of The Earth - This was honestly maybe one of the last CD's I ever bought. I got heavily into stealing music around this time but I can remember going into the shop and buying this and they gave me a free Strokes t-shirt with the purchase. I played the shit out of this album and I can hardly listen to it now.

MORE TO COME AS I THINK.

GREAT THREAD

I was working away that summer in kavos and having been impressed with a bits of it id heard - live versions of Hindu times and hiabp- I was looking forward to it coming out and reading the reviews etc. In fact it was that time that I first joined the masterplan forum as I used to go to an internet cafe and pay a couple of euros for half an hour so I could keep up with the hype train. Anyway I remember picking up a copy of q magazine and reading the review in the shop - there was no chance I was buying it, it was about 10€ and I was only only earning 25€ A night- but remember being gutted. They decimated it! (2/5 I think).

Cloud Nothings - Attack On Memory -> The wife and I (gf at the time) were house sitting for her brother and I remember we'd get large every weekend. I'd play this almost every weekend before anybody came as nobody else really liked it that I hung around with. It was the easy days back then.. nothing to worry about just getting smashed and sleeping in on the weekends.

Oasis - Be Here Now -> I can still picture being dropped off at the mall to run into the record shop and buy thing this on release day. I can still see the large cardboard cut out of the band with the CD's housed in it. The album was super expensive it was about 30-35 CAD - We didn't have a cd system in the car so when I got home in ran into my room and blasted. I always loved Don't Go Away and would play that one a lot. I remember one time my mom coming in and asking me if what I bought was just a single because it's the only song she ever heard.

I've always fancied trying my hand at writing something tbh.

Bob Dylan - Bringing it All Back Home
I bought this during my first ever trip to TCOTU, summer 2002, for 5 quid in Camden. My first trip abroad, in an unfamiliar place with different style of food, you know...long story short, I didn't go to the loo for the entirety of the trip (like, 5 days). I vividly remember listening to this back home, while I was taking the biggest, hardest, saddest shit ever in my (then young) life, thinking the first song was massive.

The Vines - Highly Evolved
I remember the NME streamed the entire album as a preview way before it came out (I think early 2002). I was going to an internet cafe to post on the Oasisforum at the time (I didn't have internet at home) and listened to this at the internet cafe with borrowed headphones and thought it was the greatest album since Definitely Maybe. Yeah, sure.

The Stands - All Years Leaving
Not an album but one song. I think it was David Rubbersoulman who first mentioned them on the old Oasis board (spring 2003 possibly?) and we all got so curious and excited because based on his description they sounded like a dream come true, basically all the best things in the universe rolled into one band: The La's, The Beatles, The Byrds, Bob Dylan etc. The only problem was, they didn't have a record out and the only way to actually hear them was to go see them live, which I obviously couldn't do at the time (but later did). Then Noel Gallagher mentioned them and the interest literally exploded. Still, they wouldn't have a record out until Aug.2003 and I was desperate to get my hands on a live recording (which David later posted...and I still have it). I installed Kazaa (remember that?) and religiously typed "The Stands" in the search bar every day, but I always found other songs.
The one day I found the first song. The Stands - All Years Leaving.mp3
It was absolutely glorious. One of the single best moments in my life.
The track was everything I read about it, and more, and it filled me with joy.
I still have the mp3.

I remember listening Kasabian's debut in a special futuristic web (for the times) created or linked by the NME. Black background and songs connected by colourful lines, like a subway map from the space. At that point in time they had a lot of mystery behind them and although I didn't really enjoy the first listen as much as I would later, it felt like the next big thing and a natural progression on mixing lad rock and electronic music.

EDIT: And for what it's worth, I still think that debut is quite underrated. Really different to what they've done since, I've always wondered how important was that guy that left afterwards.

Ryan Adams & The Cardinals - Cold Roses -> I dearly love this album but it always reminds me of the era/period in my life where I was most lonely. My longtime girlfriend has broken up with me a month after the album dropped and I was starting a new course at university and I just felt I didn't fit in with anyone at the time. I can remember having the CD in my car and listening to it over and over again on the drive to school and also I would play it quite a bit when I was home in my room. Also at the time I would put headphones on and listen to music falling asleep and this was my go to music. Looking back at it, it probably wasn't the best music choice to try and uplift me.

I haven't really listened to it much since - I start rate it highly as I previously mentioned maybe someday soon i'll try and give it another go.

The Killers - Sam's Town / Everytime I listen to a track or see the artwork it always reminds me of the time Alan Mcgee said The Killers will be the biggest band in the world and be the next U2. I always chuckle at that.

Supergrass - road to rouen. I was sure I'd written this on this thread before, but I guess my memory isn't what it used to be.

Back in 2007, I made one of my semi-annual pilgrimmages to TCOTU to visit friends and see shows (on this trip: OCS at the hard rock cafe, ricky gervais in brighton, City-Charlton in Manchester, and Dylan in amsterdam.) Me and a couple of friends flew over to Amsterdam to catch Bob on easter sunday, and I was then off on my own to Vimy Ridge in France for a big ceremony for the 90th anniversary of the battle and to re-dedicate the monument there. I was then headed off to Normandy to visit the D-day beaches and do some sightseeing for a day or two. Now this was in 2007, before smart phones etc, so I had printed out directions from mapquest to get from Vimy to Rouen where I was staying the night. Only problem was, the directions started from the highway, and when I was driving in, I noticed the car in front of me had Canadian plates, so I figured they were obviously going to the ceremony, so I just followed them in on the side roads to the monument. Which of course meant that as soon as I got back in my car around 6pm, I had literally no idea how to get back to the highway, so that led to about 45 minutes of me frantically driving around country roads in the middle of fucking NOWHERE in france trying to find the exit to the highway (I eventually could see the highway, but the road I went down led to me going the WRONG WAY.) 20 minutes later, I gave up and went back the same way and did a quick u-turn on the highway when space opened up, and I was off.

By that point, it had gotten dark, and I had 2 hours to kill on....the road to Rouen. So naturally, I dug through my backpack to find my CD case, and threw that onto the car's CD player. I don't recall ever hearing an album that fit so perfectly the mood I was in. Contemplative, mellow, chill...it was absolute perfection. I played it twice that night before pulling into the hotel in Rouen. It's still in my top-10 albums by anyone ever, but every time I listen to it or even see the cover, I'm transported back to that night.