Music Library: EDO, E/Eels, El-P, Electric Eels, Electric Six, Electric Wizard, Eleventh Dream Day, Elf Power, Eliot Fisk, Elis Regina

EDO - Walking With The Dogs (1988), "I Love Marijuana," and "Looking for Bob." EDO is a Philly-based Beefheartian spaz-rock experience led by the irrepressible Eliot Duhan. Why don't I have the rest of the EDO albums? I don't know.

Eels/E - Broken Toy Shop (1993), "Everything's Gonna Be Cool This Christmas," Blinking Lights And Other Revelations (2005), and "I Could Never Take The Place Of Your Man." I had the first of these, a solo album by Mark Oliver "E" Everett, classified incorrectly in my library. But it doesn't matter, because I dislike that album and am going to delete it. The Xmas track and Prince cover are decent, though. And the Blinking Lights album has some definite high points.

El-P - High Water (2004) and "EMG." The first is a collaboration between the producer El-P and the avant-jazz pianist Matthew Shipp. It's actually pretty great. The single track is on El-P's 2007 hip-hop album I'll Sleep When You're Dead, and I've been meaning to pick that up since I heard this track, which was a free offering by eMusic back in the day.

electric eels - "You're Full Of Shit" and "Jaguar Ride." A ridiculously influential Cleveland protopunk band, the electric eels would - ah, heck. Just read the Wikipedia article. I've had these two singles forever, and keep meaning to pick up the compilation that came out a few years ago.

Electric Six - Fire (2003). The single "Danger! High Voltage" is the highlight and guiding force behind this album, which is sleazy in the extreme, blending disco and AC/DC-ish power rock with entendres that are barely even double.

Electric Wizard - Supercoven (1998) and Dopethrone (2000). How do you know that Dopethrone is one of the greatest doom metal albums of all time? Because the cover art has Satan hitting a bong, that's how! Absurdly heavy psychedelic metal designed and executed for the primary intentions of melting your brain. Because that's what Satan wants. When he's high.

Eleventh Dream Day - Ursa Major (1994). Great indie rock album that walks carefully between Neil Young and Sonic Youth. I used to have a copy of the even-better next one, Eighth, too, but I can't seem to find it now. Oh, well. Oh, and Janet Beveridge Bean rules.

Elf Power - When The Red King Comes (1997), A Dream In Sound (1999), Live In Michigan 2001, and Nothing's Going To Happen (2002). There's some lousy-named bands outta the Elephant Six Collective, but none with a moniker worse than Elf Power. And yet Elf Power is one of the better E6 bands, with a great sense of glam rock running through their trippy/fuzzy/poppy psychedelic rock. The first of these is a concept album about the Red King, which has to be some sort of oblique King Crimson reference, although I don't get it. It includes a straightforward cover of Brian Eno's "Needles in the Camel's Eye." A Dream In Sound has an even more psychedelic sound, although the lyrics don't appear to be as wacky as the prior album. The Live In Michigan album is a bootleg I ganked from an E6 tribute website some years ago. Nothing's Going To Happen is an all-cover album with Elf Power doing songs by the Tall Dwarfs, Roky Erickson, Bad Brains, T. Rex, Sonic Youth, and Husker Du, among others. The most amusing cover is a poppy version of the Misfits' "Hybrid Moments."

Eliot Fisk - Niccolo Paganini: 24 Caprices (1992). Classical guitar with speed and precision enough to make Yngwie (Fucking) Malmsteen befoul his trousers.

Elis Regina - The Somewhat Essential Elis Regina. Elis Regina is the bossanova legend who recorded the sublime "Águas de Março" with Tom Jobim, a track that never fails to elicit a smile, especially when she cracks up towards the end. This is a compilation made by my pal Don Slutes with tracks from four or five of Elis Regina's great albums, especially the ones with Tom Jobim and Toots Thielemans.