I have been listening to vol. 1 and 2 a lot lately. great songwriting.

They are great.

Utterly not crap.

Stephin Merritt is an obnoxious, difficult, sulky primadonna, and 69 Love Songs is a collection of marked melodic genius. I used to think there were half-a-dozen ropey ones, but I'm not even sure of that now.

I supported the Magnetic Fields once. That was fun, and fairly mad. Also, it made me realise the records would probably not exist, and Merritt would frankly not be much without (manager & bandmate) Claudia Gonson to run his show/life.

I have vol 1, and have enjoyed it extensively. I've listened to vol 2 a bunch, and liked it as well. I haven't heard the thrid one, but those two alone are great.

not crap.



Faiz

As sincere as satire can be. And the inverse. So so excellent.

edit: shit, cuz of this thread, i looked at the track list, immediately got two songs stuck in my head, and now i have to go listen to it. thanks a lot. (no really, i mean that)

I hate how much i love these records. Not Crap.

The new album is quite a good one too. "I"

Listening to the silver jews right now, 69 love songs is next. thanx.

A fine boxset. A few of the songs are really, really irritating, but a good 2/3 of them are just damned great. I know I've posted about this elsewhere on this board, but as much as I usually love Stephin Merritt's songwriting, it always annoys me when he tries to be too "clever." It seems hack-y to me. Still, 69 Love Songs is easily, easily NOT CRAP.

garbage.

total crap.

i can't stand magnetic fields - that record drives me completely insane.

I bought this really wanting to like it as I thought the idea was great, but after a million (ok, maybe 20) listens, I just couldn't get into it. It bored the hell out of me. It is the only Magnetic Fields record I've heard though.

Crap.

i posted crap just to play devil's advocate. i love magnetic fields but i think this collection is only half good. to me doing the schticky concept album (69 love songs! lame! how bout 420 weed songs?) was just a critic baiting technique. for me this album also marks the downfall of stephen merritt because everything he has done since and including this has been totally spotty. everything he did before it including future bible heroes, the 6ths and gothic archies i totally loved.

that said, i think half of 69 love songs is amazing.