So, a year ago, I decided to start keeping track of every full album I listened to. I did this in part as justification for my still-insatiable desire to acquire new music decades after my first purchase, and in part to simply help me to see if my actual listening was as broad as my self-image indicates.

The results were interesting. Over the course of an entire year, I listened to 732 full albums. That equates to 61 a month, or almost exactly two per day. That last figure is a bit misleading, as I would often go a day or two without listening to anything all the way through, while other days spent chained to the computer at work would find me spinning five or six.

I set ground rules: These needed to be albums, not EPs or singles. I needed to listen to them in whole. And once something was heard, it couldn’t be listed again, no matter how many repeat plays. So, while I listened to well over 8,000 songs in this exercise, the total is likely double that or more, as hours and hours spent with the iPod on shuffle, repeat listens of favorite discs and partial spins all were omitted from the total.

The most interesting thing I found is that I changed my listening habits because of this exercise. I’m often chided for not listening to things all the way through, often surprised when listening to old discs while distracted by other things to find an uncredited bonus track at the end or some other unknown treasure toward the end of the tracklist. Because I couldn’t record the album on the list unless I heard the whole thing, I forced myself to hear every last note.

I also listened to a lot more new music than I might have otherwise. There were few albums in the past year that earned a rave review anywhere (and that sounded like they would remotely fall in my musical wheelhouse) that I didn’t track down some way and hear. That expanded my palette, as I found myself embracing much more electronic music than ever before, but also led me to confirm the long-held belief that while an awful lot of of well-reviewed music might offer immediate visceral pleasure, they are lacking in the long run and rarely demand a repeat spin.

I set a goal at the beginning of this calendar year to listen to more classical music, hoping to move from completely ignorant to marginally knowledgeable of the genre’s best works. I did better given that concerted effort than I have in the past, but with only 18 classical collections having been played (though, in my defense, some were multi-disc sets), I have a long way to go.

A look at what I listened to the most meshes pretty well with a list of my favorite artists. Push comes to shove, a list of what I would have expected to listen to the most created at the beginning of this exercise would look a lot like the actual result… with a couple of exceptions. First the list:

That’s the top 10. I keep a blog about Robert Pollard’s music, and that coupled with the fact that he puts out 5 or 6 albums a year means he’ll probably always top this list. I’m a huge fan of Crowded House, R.E.M., Teenage Fanclub and Big Star, so those make sense. I got on a serious Steve Wynn kick last year that continues unabated. The Beatles boxed set accounts for their presence here, while reading the 33 1/3 series book on the Minutemen’s Double Nickels on the Dime helps explain their spot. Devo and Richard Thompson were both driven by live shows. However, I hadn’t listened to Devo in years before pulling them out in July, so their strong showing is pretty remarkable. I’m always listening to Thompson, so that’s no surprise.

My year came to a close on July 31. When Aug. 1 rolled around, I listened to a CD and then headed to the computer to record it. A funny thing happened, however; I decided to let it go. I have been listening to things at pretty much the same pace I did before, but in just a few days, I find I’m already more willing to listen to a handful of songs and then swap something out if it’s not working for me. If I can maintain the adventurousness and patience afforded by the exercise while injecting some much-needed flexibility, my listening experience is sure to improve.

If only they had been this popular in the early 1970s, maybe the radio airwaves would be filled with the sound of Big Star clones rather than the watered-down sub-BTO and Foghat that the likes of Nickelback use to pollute our ears. Impossible, of course, but a fella can dream. Soon, it seems, a fella can also share his love of Big Star thanks to the forthcoming film, “Nothing Can Hurt Me.”

The producers issued a call through Kickstarter.com asking for pledges of support, and in less than 24 hours, they had raised the modest sum of $6,000 and more. At the moment, the total stands at $9,480 from 100 people, including some pledges as high as $2,000.

If you want proof of the validity and value of the project, a 9-minute trailer at the site offers it. While the movie is billed as “the Big Star story that will trace the origins and history of the legendary band,” the clip on Kickstarter.com deals more with rehearsals for the impromptu tribute show put together at South by Southwest in Austin, Texas, in the wake of Alex Chilton’s death. That alone is compelling, so the rest of the film ought to be quite a treat for fans.

Most impressive: the filmmakers have enlisted John Fry, the Ardent Studios founder who oversaw the recording of Big Star’s three albums, as music supervisor and executive producer.

It’s fitting, of course, that Chilton isn’t around for any of this. He never seemed interested in revisiting Big Star unless there was a paycheck involved, as it was clear that music didn’t do much for him any more. So, just when interest in the band has reached a relative fever pitch, he doesn’t need to fend it off any more. A movie, tribute concerts, a boxed set… I’m sure it would have all been too much.

But for fans, there has never been a better time. It is bittersweet — there is no more Big Star music to be discovered, but perhaps those who have been missing out will finally discover what the rest of us have long known.

I haven’t looked at Spin magazine on a consistent basis for years, but there was a short time when it was the most-reliable voice on music in my life. Sometime between discovering Rolling Stone back in high school and discovering music ‘zines at the hip record store in college, Spin delivered what I couldn’t get anywhere else. Remember, kids, this was before blogs, Internet radio and e-mail, so short of talking with friends or watching Kurt Loder on MTV news, outlets like Spin were it when it came to learning about bands and records.

Spin has been on an inexorable slide toward irrelevance, but for a while, it was sort of the Pitchfork of its day. That’s why its 25th anniversary coverage is so illuminating. Looking only at its new list of the 125 best albums of the past 25 years, one sees how silly it is to offer qualitative judgments about fresh work.

Consider the album reviews found in the Dec. 1991 issue. The lead review goes to U2′s Achtung, Baby, arguably the biggest album released at that time. It was a somewhat middling review (in Spin’s then taxonomy, it was given a yellow light, defined as “whoa, slow down pal. This record is pretty good, but you can’t buy everything in the store. Can you?”) in which Jim Greer calls it “an ambitious failure and by almost any standard an excellent record.” In the same issue, Teenage Fanclub’s Bandwagonesque is given a green light (“Go directly to your record store. Buy this record. Kill if you must.”) in a review where Greer writes, “Bandwagonesque is a movable feast. Jump on it.” Nirvana’s Nevermind (wow, that was a stacked month) also is covered. It, too, earns a green light, the short review toward the end of that section calling it “a little bit punk, a little bit metal, a little bit country, a little bit rock ‘n’ roll. What the hell more do you want?”

Fast forward 19 years, and the album that earned the yellow-light review, Achtung, Baby, is named the best of the past 25 years, while Nevermind comes in at #3.  Bandwagonesque, meanwhile, which Spin named the best album of 1991 (Nevermind was #3, behind R.E.M.’s Out of Time) is #111.

Somewhere in the cauldron of context, history and critical hindsight one can likely find the true value of any of these albums. In 1991, Nevermind was a shocking step forward for a decent grunge band, Bandwagonesque was a perhaps even more shocking step forward for a grungy pop band and Achtung, Baby was an interesting evolution for the biggest band in the world. Today, it’s impossible to hear Nevermind without all of its baggage getting in the way, Bandwagonesque is an early indication of future achievement that has too much filler and Achtung, Baby is the last great album from a still-entertaining but no-longer vital band.

Does all of this mean Spin got it wrong in 1991? Yeah, probably. Does that mean the new list is wrong, too? Sure, in spots. The Breeders’ Last Splash isn’t the 79th best album of the past 25 years (though “Cannonball” is probably one of the 125 best singles of that era), and it’s surprising that given the critical distance afforded this exercise that anyone would think otherwise. But that critical distance allows for a more clear-eyed view, and thus the analysis in general is more spot-on than the understandably over-exuberant reviews afforded the bright, shiny objects released in any given month.

Music and Spin are not the only relevant tags here, of course. Any criticism of something new almost without exception is going to be different (and usually, more shallow) than what comes after. Without context, without the ability to see how something stacks up when compared to its peers and the career of the artist in question — let alone how it weathers repeat listens/views/experiences — a review can only scratch the surface. That won’t keep me from reading reviews, or writing them. It just means that as time passes, the merit of anything and everything evolves.

2009 was a very good year to be a Big Star fan. Rhino graced us with a boxed set that gathered up seemingly every stray sound recorded by the band, while a limited-edition two-CD version of Chris Bell’s lone solo album (the posthumous I Am the Cosmos) rescued every scrap he laid down.

But, strangely enough, the best Big Star-related thing wasn’t something you could listen to, but rather something you read. Bruce Eaton’s entry in Continuum’s excellent 33 1/3 book series dealt with Big Star’s Radio City, the band’s sophomore outing. In the book, Eaton offers not only the most complete history of Big Star during that period, but he actually gets the notoriously difficult Alex Chilton to talk about that era. He places the album in its proper context both in terms of the work of the musicians involved and its place on the music continuum in general. In doing so, he does what the best 33 1/3 books do: He gives new life to an album that rabid fans likely thought they had completely absorbed. I came away with a much better understanding and appreciation of a favorite album, hearing it in a completely different — and superior — way.

Eaton knows of what he writes. He backed Chilton on some concert dates in 1979, has promoted concerts and written about music. All of this experience is brought to bear on his subject. Any Big Star fan worthy of the name has or soon will acquire the boxed set and the Bell release. But to really appreciate what you’re hearing, getting a copy of Eaton’s book is essential.

By the way, that’s Eaton in the photo above, performing with Chilton on June 23, 1979, at McVan’s nightclub in Buffalo, N.Y. Eaton keeps a great blog where he writes about the book, the band and his other experiences in the world of music.

TIRBD: Why Radio City and not #1 Record or Third?

BE: A few reasons. It’s the Big Star record I heard first and spent about six months absorbing it before I could track down a copy of #1 Record. Also, given that I could only write about one record, Radio City encompasses the range of Big Star the most of the three records. You can relate #1 Record to Radio City and Radio City to Third, but Third doesn’t really connect to #1 Record unless you’re familiar with Radio City. I thought it would provide the broadest platform for the living central members to discuss. It would be hard to write about #1 Record without Chris, and Third wouldn’t include John Fry much, let alone Andy Hummel (or even promo man John King). So it was the best of the three to explore Big Star and tell a good tale in the process.

You spend a lot of time with John Fry, which was illuminating. Why do you think other analyses of Big Star’s sound have given him short shrift, and how important is he to that sound?

John was everything to the classic power pop Big Star sound. He built the studio, chose the equipment, taught everyone how to use it, gave them the time and space to experiment, and laid down the standards for how things were recorded at Ardent. And he by all accounts was an exacting genius at recording and mixing. Listen to a Raspberries album back to back with Radio City. The difference is 99% Fry. And as Richard Rosebrough said, Radio City was his zenith.

I think John has been overlooked for a few reasons. First off, he retired from working behind the board fairly soon after Big Star so he didn’t really build up a significant body of work over decades. A lot of what he did wasn’t really high profile in terms of big credits on albums (Stax) or big hit records. You really have to read the fine print on albums to pull together his resume. It happened over a relatively short period of time over 35 years ago. Also, John doesn’t fit the image of a rock and roll guy. He looks and dresses like an engineer working in the business world. He’s a fascinating, down-to-earth guy. I thought his personal story was really fascinating. Those teens in the 50s doing all those grown-up things — recording, broadcasting, setting up businesses, flying planes… really amazing. Getting to know him a bit was for me a major highlight in writing the book.

Listening to #1 Record, Radio City, Third and some early Chilton albums, I’m struck by how clear the evolutionary line of his sound is. Why is the common story that he radically changed, and why is Radio City seen as being of a piece with #1 Record when it’s clearly a transitional record between chiming power pop and atmospheric oddity?

I think the main reason for this is the change in producer/engineer from Radio City to Third. I’ve sometimes tried to listen to Third imagining what it would have sounded like with Fry behind the board and doing the mix I think then that the three albums would have seemed more to be part of continuum rather than Third being a sharp left turn.

You got more out of Chilton than anyone else in a long time. Do you think you understand his motivations and goals for Radio City now in a way you perhaps didn’t before?

Great question and, yes, I do see it all a bit differently. I think that Radio City represented at the time a natural progression for him. He had been in the Box Tops, a band over which he had little creative control, if any. He had fooled around with solo material and recordings but probably realized he had a way to go. He had joined Big Star as an already existing artistic platform and a step up from the Box Tops as they were a “real rock band” and he would be allowed to contribute freely. So when the suggestion was made to make another record (Radio City), my guess would be it seemed like a n
atural and easy progression. When he joined Big Star, he was a co-pilot to Chris’s vision. Now he would be the pilot more or less and free to follow his muse in terms of experimenting with song structures and recording. I think he probably saw it as yet another way to grow as an artist within a band and environment that he felt comfortable with. He liked all the people involved, it’s all right around the corner from where you live: why not give it another try?

I also think it was probably the last time he allowed himself to be optimistic about the commercial potential for a project in any serious way. After the failure of Radio City, I think he makes records as musical statements and moves on. I doubt he’s ever looked at a copy of Billboard or any sales chart for any record he’s made since then.

There have been a lot of bands over the past couple of decades that are compared to Big Star or cite the band as an influence. Is there anyone who really captures Big Star, either in sound, attitude, songwriting or in some other way?

I think there are bands who are reminiscent of Big Star (or obviously imitative) but, as with any great band or artist, there isn’t anyone who really captures them because that’s really close to impossible. Everyone has influences. But the great bands are able to transcend their influences and become something unique, usually fairly early in their careers. When someone tells me that a band sounds like “X meets Y with a little bit of Z” I’m not really that intrigued. I’m far more interested in bands that sound totally like themselves (if that makes any sense). Think of any number of great bands from the 60s or early 70s. Whether it’s the Stooges or Santana (and you could spend all evening making a list), they started almost right off with a fully formed sound that transcended their influences. So while there are a number of really good bands that are influenced by Big Star that I can appreciate and who can even make for enjoyable listen or night out hearing live music, in the end I don’t think anyone captures the band. And I think that’s sort of the nature of the beast…