feeling listless

Travels with Matsui Q Best of 2001
What? Every year, Q, the music magazine have a covermount which is supposed to collect together the best music from a particular year -- a sort of anti-NOW album. This year it's been backed up by a large fly-poster marketing campaign.
First impressions The cover is great, a riff of 'The Sims' game featuring prominant music stars and other miscreants (The Hamiltons, Jamie Oliver, Bin Laden). The album begins with a statement, The Strokes 'The Modern Age' -- its big, its loud and it woke me up at 8:50 this morning.
Moved? Oh there is a lot of stirring music on here. The disappointing factor is a lack of familiarity. In the past these CDs have literally included many of the best singles from the stars involved. In the world of this CD, REM are represented by an album track which isn't 'Imitations of Life'. And wither 'Clint Eastwood' from the Gorillaz? But the biggest omission is feminity. The actual magazine makes much sport of women in pop music with interviews with musicians as diverse as Gwen Steffani, Kate Bush and Goldfrappe. Nothing on this this disc. The only woman involved is the guitarist from Ash. The only female voice we hear is a computerised repost at the end of Air's 'How Does It Make You Feel?' It's almost as though this silly rock music isn't something girls would do. Q, what were you thinking?
Lasting impressions? The afformentioned Air track in which a whispering version of Stephen Hawking's computerised voice attempts to come to terms with reality. Worth playing over and over.
Keep, sell or dump? Worth keeping for the Air track. Under normal circumstances, sell....