After The Noise
Everything Is Equal
Tuesday 20 January 2026
Bruce Springsteen – Lonely Town (2025)
I don’t know what’s going on with the shuffle. Two Bruce Springsteen tracks back to back?
Not a bad thing.
If you’re here for Born In The USA, you should probably walk away now.
This is the other Bruce.
The stuff he thought wasn’t good enough.
The work he was too unsure to release at the time.
Years later – like all true geniuses – he gained the confidence to let it out anyway, quietly bundling them into two collections, Tracks and Tracks II.
I know enough about Bruce Springsteen to know the quality shines through even though this, in my opinion, is one of his weaker efforts and I understand why it stayed in the vaults so long.
Inferior?
Only in a Bruce Springsteen kind of way.
It’s still beautiful. Still heartfelt. Still unmistakably him.
No coal mines. No hard hats. No slogans.
Just Bruce being Bruce.
And that’s more than enough.
Charles Bukowski – The World’s Greatest Loser (1975)
Manchester rain again.
Bowie (the labrador, not the singer of Tin Machine) leads, as always, convinced he knows where we’re going, even when neither of us does.
Charles Bukowski is talking in my ear.
I don’t really know what he’s talking about.
Nobody ever really does.
That’s not the point.
It’s words.
Sounds.
Patterns rubbing up against footsteps and puddles.
In the unlikely event, I ever listen to this again. I might listen closer.
Or I might not.
Depends what I’m doing.
Bukowski works best like this.
Not studied.
Not decoded.
Just present.
A voice walking alongside you while life carries on. Bowie stops to sniff something important. I wait.
Rain on the hood.
Bukowski muttering.
No need to understand any of it.
That feels enough.
Lauryn Hill, D’Angelo – Nothing Even Matters (1998)
Lauryn Hill was always on my hitlist. I blame The Fugees and their ‘one time, two time’ nonsense which was all the rage in the mid-90’s. One of those artists I’d decided before I’d even begun to loathe with a passion. (There’s plenty more where that came from!).
Listening properly changed things.
She’s not spectacular.
She’s not demanding attention.
She’s soothing. Calm.
And she only released one studio album (at time of writing).
I’ve always thought there is something quietly right about that.
One album. Say what you need to say. Stop.
Circumstances don’t really matter here. Restraint does.
I’ve always liked one-album artists. One anything artists. They are rare.
No chasing. No dilution. No need to explain yourself later.
Of course, should she ever release a second album then the above is utter bollocks.
Not sure what D’Angelo’s role in all this is. Since it’s Listening Log policy to not go back and listen to the song after the song has played, I’ll never know. Probably singing I would imagine. I’ve no idea who D’Angelo is. Man? Woman? Trans? Dog? I know the name but nothing else.
The absurd side of my personality thinks he/she/it made tea and popped to 7-Eleven for supplies. Some days cigarettes and alcohol. Other days digestives. Depending on the mood.
So, if you think Lauryn Hill is rubbish. Think again.
You don’t have to love it.
You just have to listen without the noise.
Nothing even matters – until it does.
Olivia Rodrigo – The Grudge (2023)
By Jove – I didn’t think this would happen.
The playlist is 4500 songs and rising. There’s little chance the same song will play twice but it has. And I had the same argument. Taylor Swift or Olivia Rodrigo?
And just like the first time, I knew it wasn’t Rodrigo straight away but there was something comforting about the song. Familiarity.
I hesitated between Rodrigo and Swift – and I recognized it without checking.
That’s a new for me.
Being able to tell the difference between Swift and Rodrigo could become heavy ammunition in a music quiz. Knowing the odd song title or two is the sort of thing that turns up on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire.
There’s no way Clarkson is going to know that.
I’m listening more deeply now.
More carefully.
Less judgement, fewer reflexes.
It’s easy to bash artists like Rodrigo, Swift and Marillion,
especially when you’re half listening.
Much harder when you’re paying attention.
She’s damn successful because she is talented. You can hear the talent when you listen in an All Music Is Equal capacity. She’ll more successful than most.
But, success isn’t always measured in sales.
A point which irked Roger Waters. And he was correct.
Tin Machine – Heaven’s In Here (1989)
Uninteresting fact. First artist to get two entries into The Listening Log.
1989.
What a year. What a party.
Nineteen years old.
Not caring.
Not planning.
Just being.
I truly discovered David Bowie (and Reeves Gabrels) through Tin Machine. It was impossible not to dabble in the thin white duke back then even most his 80’s output has been universally dismissed (not by me. I do not dismiss anything). I smug politely when I lie that I got into David Bowie purely through Tin Machine.
Not the obvious route.
Not the approved one.
Tin Machine – the misunderstood project. Only ever met one person (Hi Niall!) who approved to similar levels. The one which barely gets mentioned when Bowie is talked about now, as if it didn’t fit the story people prefer to tell.
But it mattered.
The second album wasn’t as strong, admittedly. Still better than what most people manage. If you’re listening without hierarchies (which you probably are).
That was the point of Tin Machine.
Strip it back.
Level everything out.
Make the noise equal again.
Gene Vincent & His Blue Caps – Summertime (1958)
One of the real pleasures of listening on the go – especially getting drenched in Manchester rain – is how many ideas seem to arrive uninvited.
This playlist helps because I have no idea what’s coming next.
No anticipation.
No hunting.
Instead, I hear familiar voices and play a quiet game of recognition.
Who is this?
I know that voice.
Gene Vincent (& His Blue Caps. Don’t forget his blue caps) came up a couple of times already. I recognised him immediately – the sound, the phrasing, the presence –
but I couldn’t quite place him.
Not without cheating and checking on Spotify who I am listening to.
A voice you know even when the name won’t surface.
Another misunderstood maverick who died too young.
End Of The Listening Log.
The Listening Log 