These Are the Things I Listened To This Year
These Are the Things I Listened To This Year: Several Honestly Loved Albums of 2004, In No Particular Order
The Hold Steady, The Hold Steady Almost Killed Me
I call it intelligent bar rock, and that's not an oxymoron. Former Lifter Puller frontman Craig Finn plays it straight up, and draws upon the awesome power of AC/DC in the process. Finn's verbal tics, wordplay, and speak-sing vocals may delight you or annoy you, but there's no denying that he's the poet laureate of PBR, coming-at-you-from-Brooklyn-via-the-Midwest. He's been to places you've never even dreamed of, and wants you to know all about it: the bar brawls, broken noses, manic pill popping, sniveling indie kids, and a motley cast of freaks. To put it shortly: this album shreds. You only wish you were this clever.
Augie March, Strange Bird
Although released in their home country of Australia two years ago, Strange Bird only made it stateside on SpinArt this year. It is probably the most conventional pop album I've loved in a long time. Sporting some of the finest songwriting you'll find anywhere, I can only place it on my bookshelf next to my Go-Betweens albums. Augie March is a band that dreams pastoral melodies like none other, aided by gorgeous harmonies and complex instrumentation. The more I listen, the more of its charms are slowly revealed. Go ahead and swoon all over The Frames if you want, but I'll be in the corner sipping tea and listening to Augie March instead.
The Mountain Goats, We Shall All Be Healed
The schtick of the Mountain Goats has always been a slightly-deranged guy, an acoustic guitar, and some harrowing tales to tell, but John Darnielle is unlike any sensitive male singer-songwriter you've ever heard. This album paints a portrait of tweakers with surprising humanity and gentleness. The unexpected intensity of "Palmcorder Yajna" and fighting catchiness "Pigs that Ran Straightaway into the Water, Triumph of" caught me by the throat, and refused to let go. This is the ups, the downs, the hospital waiting rooms, the orange jumpsuits, and, yes, the light at the end of the tunnel.
Ted Leo/Pharmacists, Shake the Sheets
While not as nuanced as Tyranny of Distance, and lacking a galvanizing anthem like "Ballad of the Sin Eater," on Hearts of Oak, once again our dear Mr. Leo channels Billy Bragg and the Clash. He lays it down like he sees it: damning the current administration six ways to Sunday, and you'll only love him more for it. It's the pop perfection of "Me & Mia," the pharmecutical recitation winding down "Heart Problems," and the breathlessness of "Bleeding Powers." Shake the Sheets is relentlessly smart, engaging, and, of course, political. Its polished rock songs make a fitting soundtrack to the November 2nd that was, and the November 3rd that wasn't.
The Arcade Fire, Funeral
From seemingly out of nowhere, The Arcade Fire arrived in the fall, capturing the hearts and minds of the indie rock elite. For an album named Funeral, the layered and oft-obtuse songs secretly burst full of the joy of living, singing, breathing, bleeding, and crying. Merry trickster Win Bulter ties together his band of misfits with sometimes incomprehensible vocals, orchestral flourishes, propelling basslines, insistent keyboards, and a resounding chorus of voices you are unlikely to forget any time soon. This band doesn't sound like anyone else in indie rock and thank God for that. Forget the hype. Funeral is a grower of an album that stands on its own. Dig deep, and hold on tight, because these songs sparkle like nothing else on this earth.
The Walkmen, Bows and Arrows
It's last call, and Hamilton Leithauser has been beaten, bruised, ignored, snubbed, passed over, and kicked while he's down. He's the weary, cynical regular in the corner booth; he's nursing his wounds, sharing secret looks, and compelling us to listen as he's damning those who have wronged him, with an unmistakeable gravelly plea. In an increasingly "me me me" world where the flavor of the month prevails over all, the Walkmen follow their instincts and make a real rock'n'roll record, Shakespearean in its grandiose plans. They are marvelous at utilizing the large, atmospheric rock sounds when needed--you won't find any unnecessarily bombast here--but also at crafting their ballads with just as much loving attention. Charismatic the whole way through, Bows and Arrows shakes up the plastic shiny New York scene, and then pawns it off onto someone else with a wink and a practiced, knowing nod.
Shearwater, Winged Life
Shearwater are moody, lush pop. Will Sheff and Jonathan Meiburg, both of another band named Okkervil River, took all of the songs that did not fit under that banner, and turned them Shearwater, now a creature with a life of its own. Meiburg's angelic vocals raise the otherworldy sound of Shearwater to greater and greater heights, while the cracks in the veneer of Sheff's melodies underscore a quiet catharsis. The rest of the Shearwaters flesh out the songs perfectly with upright bass, melancholy vibraphone, resilient keyboards, and bittersweet violin. Grounded in the spirit of American folk, it's the memory of crying on a frozen January afternoon on the beach, compressed into a capsule.
The Mendoza Line, Fortune
The French have a phrase that means, literally, "the wit of the staircase," referring to all of the witty retorts and sarcastic remarks one thinks up on the way down the stairs from a heated argument or repartee. The Mendoza Line must be experts at this. Their way with words, combined with an abundance of hooks and an alt-country sensibility, result in the messy, sprawling, but ultimately charming Fortune. Filled with handclaps, pedal guitar, and tambourines, as well as the interplay of Shannon McArdle's and Timothy Bracy's suprisingly Bob Dylan-like vocals, the songs beg to be sung along to. But it's Peter Hoffman's deceptively sweet songs that seal the deal; the gently disarming "Will You Be Here Tomorrow?" stops me in my tracks every time.
John Vanderslice, Cellar Door
Two things you should know about John Vanderslice: 1. He runs Tiny Telephone studios in San Francisco, CA and; 2. He loves movies. By which I mean, it's no surprise that he's a genius in the studio, and his songs encompass vast soundscapes, moving in unexpected directions, drawing inspiration from Donnie Darko, Ingmar Bergman, and William Blake. The magic of Scott Solter (Vanderslice's right hand man, and sound engineer extraordinare) get the blood flowing, and Vanderslice takes it from there. In Cellar Door, JV has created cinematic, tiny, complex masterpieces that worm into your brain, leaving behind a trail of eerie chimes, crashing effects, and haunting words in their wake.
Honorable mentions to:
A.C. Newman - The Slow Wonder
The Futureheads - The Futureheads
dios - dios (band is now known as "dios malos")
The Good Life - Album of the Year
Wolf Parade - Wolf Parade.
Photographs on this site are © Kathryn Yu. Don't steal.
