Things I Found Out About in 2010 I Should Have Loved Years Ago

This goes Artist, Title (year of creation): year I should have found out about it

Joanna Newsom, "Milk Eyed Mender"(2004): 2004

If I'd heard this in 2004, it could have gone hand in hand with "Rejoicing in the Hands" as one of those lo-fi records I couldn't stop listening to then. Some tried to tell me to listen, and I heard bits, but nobody handed me the whole thing, so I never heard the whole. Now, being the third record of hers I've gotten to know, it sounds like a lesser work. She still was trying to figure out what she could be doing, though stretches of it are wonderful.

Faust, "Faust IV" (1973): 2003

I would have loved to roam campus to this as a freshman. It's way better than the "Sea Change" slump I was in fact roaming about in. A brilliant record that goes hand in hand with what Frank Zappa was doing in the early '70s, that whole jazz fusion in 11/8 thing with titles like "Cletus Awreetus-Awrightus," as well as the ambient Eno stuff and all the usual Krautrock suspects.

Fugazi, "13 Songs," "Repeater" (1989, 1990): 1997

I don't love this stuff. I probably would have in 1997, in that "finding out about hard rock" middle school music phase a lot of boys have, and it could have done well in my collection. Now it just feels too late.

Hall & Oates (1973-): 2003

This stuff, on the other hand, I love. Again, happy music is what my life needed around 2003, and "Kiss on my List" would have changed my world. And my karaoke world. I spent too long ignoring these white poppers.

Paul Verhoeven, "Total Recall"(1990): 1996

A batshit insane, disfunctional sci-fi action thriller with Schwarzenegger, you know, "acting" when he isn't beating up Sharon Stone. This would have ruled in middle school and could have been watched as much as we watched Face/Off.

Ken Russell, "Altered States" (1980): 2003

This one should have gone in with "2001: A Space Odyssey" in that early-college bug-out movie space. Having now seen it, I am way into it. If you like weird science exploration fantasy freak outs like I do, go seek this out.

Fashion: 2002

While I've been gradually improving my fashion sense since around 2006, it was only this year that I think I really "got it." I didn't even know what size I was. I have this regret about this discovery only happening now: I could have been breaking in nice jeans and nice bags all this time, as well as collecting well-fitting--or just wearable--garments. Or at least I could have looked weird in college, where it's socially acceptable to look weird.