(new series)...

...as re-activated journals describe themselves. So, I've decided that I'm going to try, between now and the end of the year, to write 365 brief notes on albums, old or new, that I haven't heard before. Mostly older, I suspect, both because I have a virtual and physical backlog of such items, and because, as Jane is only the most dogged in noting, there's increasingly little point in trying to grasp the year's music by making "the album" one's critical focus. (It would make as much or more sense, if I were at this point really attempting to be a well-versed professional, to drop notes on 1000 or so individual songs/tracks. Maybe next year.) I really do intend to keep these and other posts brief -- if I generate more than 250 words or so on a particular cultural artifact or performance, that's probably a good sign I should be trying to write something more substantial elsewhere. Music reviewed elsewhere will count in the total, and be will linked where possible. I'm sure that there will be peaks and valleys in activity, especially while I am teaching -- some catch-up will inevitably be played over summer. We start tomorrow.