Pretty Goes with Pretty

2009: Portrait of a Listener

As I mentioned yesterday, my attention this year, as far as music goes, has been diverted in a variety of ways. Doing a 2009 playlist seemed to miss the thrust of what my year was all about (and probably redundant with every other blog out there); doing a collection of old yet new-to-me stuff would have missed all the music that wasn't new to me that I spent so much time with. So instead I offer this: a 75-track playlist that comes as close as I can to giving some impression of what my listening year has really been like.

The playlist is really meant to speak for itself—though I can't resist tossing in a few comments here and there, if you want to read a few scattered thoughts as you scroll down the list. This adds up to a bit more than four hours of music, so I recommend you click on the play button (it's down in the lower-left corner),  minimize this screen, and let me be your soundtrack as you go about your day today. I can promise it's going to go in a lot of different directions, some of which you may or may not expect, so despite my rambling I'm sort of hoping you'll ignore all this talk and just let the music play.

The way I see it there were about five different narratives driving my listening time this year:

1. The Slint book. I spent a lot of time hunting down albums from the 80s that I knew the guys I'm writing about were into at the time (based on various interviews I'd read), or that were just in the air in that era. In an effort to get into the proper headspace, I sought out a bunch of old punk and classic indie stuff--some of it I'd never heard, most of it I knew but just didn't own. So, Hüsker Dü, Bad Brains, Big Black, Meat Puppets, Dinosaur Jr. Other stuff. Also stuff that happened concurrently or not long after, like Bastro, Bitch Magnet, Galaxie 500; and post-Slint stuff like the For Carnation and Papa M.
2. Nostalgia. Overlapping but not exactly the same, my revisiting Slint so intensely sparked a nostalgia in me for all the shit I was listening to around the time of my discovery of Spiderland, which I found accidentally back in 1994. This put me on a big ol' 90s kick, taking me back to high school and college and working in a indie record store and booking shows and all that. So, Jesus Lizard. Karp. Fugazi. Other stuff.
3. 2009! Yes, I still tried to keep up.
4. Filling in more musical blind spots. My continued desire to fill in my krautrock collection, to buy more Byrds and Byrds-related stuff, to simply continue educating myself about the many great albums that I've yet to hear.
5. Country music. Midway through the year a little angel dropped about 500 classic country songs (circa 1925–1985) into my inbox, and I've been trying to process them ever since. It's been a treasure trove of amazingness; many songs I've always known, many that were totally new to me.

So, what does that all add up to? Brand new shit. 80s and 90s punk/indie. Classic country. Krautrock. And a handful of other things sprinkled throughout. Somehow that all made perfect sense to me this year. (As I've said many times: there's a reason this blog is called Pretty Goes with Pretty.) This playlist is intended to be listened to in the order I've presented, in hopes that you'll hear some of the resonances that I have even when jumping from Seefeel to Big Black or from George Jones to the 13th Floor Elevators. Enjoy.   

• Slint: Ron (1989)
• Amon Düül II: Wolf City (1972)
• Tortoise: Yinxianghechengqi (2009)
• Harlem Shakes: Strictly Game (2009)
  If I were making a strict list of favorite songs from 2009, this would definitely be in there, along with the John Vanderslice track below.
• Dr. Dog: Uncovering The Old (2008)
  Dr. Dog's Fate was one of my favorite albums of 08, but I think I listened to it even more this year than last. If I were remaking last year's list today, this would probably be #1.  
• John Vanderslice: Too Much Time (2009)
• Kraftwerk: The Model (1978)
• Seefeel: Starethrough (1994)
• Big Black: Steelworker (1982)
• Akron/Family: River (2009)
• Animal Collective: What Would I Want? Sky (2009)
• Engineers: Sometimes I Realise (2009)
• Neu!: Neuschnee (1973)
• Scratch Acid: Owner's Lament (1984)
• The Fall: Jawbone and the Air-Rifle (1982)
• Wavves: No Hope Kids (2009)
• GodheadSilo: Multiple Organic (1995)
  I've mentioned it before but when I first heard Wavves earlier this year I immediately heard a kinship with GodheadSilo. There's a kind of suburban punk mentality that permeates both bands' material. Making a lot of noise—a lot of noise—about important issues like the ability to drive. Compare, for instance, "Got no car / Got no money" vs "Under 18 and I just got my permit / I need a licensed driver on the passenger side!" 
• Milkmine: Breathe (1994)
• Jesus Lizard: Gladiator (1992)
• Jaks: Dumbwaiter (1994)
  The above four tracks—from GodheadSilo to Jaks—are a good representation of my intense bout of nostalgia for the days when I first fell into the bottomless pit that is my love of indie. My conversion took place some time in 1994, and all of these bands were among the first I stumbled into. Revisiting them now, I just wanna say I think Jaks especially is due a little revisionism. Their complete discography is available on eMusic and is worth discovering.
• Del Shannon: The Swiss Maid (1962)
• Karp: We Ate Sand (1997)
• Faust: Giggy Smile (1973)
• Moon Mullican: I'll Sail My Ship Alone (1950)
• The Shelton Brothers: Just Because (1935)
• Iron & Wine: Each Coming Night (2004)
• Papa M: Napoleon (1995)
• The National: Green Gloves (2007)
• Andrew Bird: Oh No (2009)
• Kings Of Convenience: Boat Behind (2009)
• Hank Snow: I Don't Hurt Anymore (1954)
• Ernest Tubb: Thanks A Lot (1963)
• Bad Brains: Big Takeover (1982)
• Hüsker Dü: The Girl Who Lives On Heaven Hill (1985)
  Generally speaking I'm really not a big fan of Hüsker Dü. This song, though, is pretty great.
• Squirrel Bait: Tape From California (1986)
  Man did I listen to a lot of Squirrel Bait this year. More than is healthy, I think. This is the last song from their second album (and a Phil Ochs cover, no less!). I dig it though overall I prefer their first, self-titled album. 
• La Düsseldorf: White Overalls (1978)
• Minutemen: Do You Want New Wave Or Do You Want The Truth (1984)
• Slint: Nosferatu Man (1991)
• Fugazi: Fell, Destroyed (1995)
• Bitch Magnet: Douglas Leader (1989)
  Bands sounded "Slinty" before Slint did. Minutemen did for one song, at least. And Bitch Magnet's first full length, Umber, pre-dates Spiderland by a couple years (though what really came first is a bit more complicated than looking at an album's release date... something I may touch on very briefly in the book.) Also, I've always been a little amused by how much "Fell, Destroyed" went for that sound.
• Mission of Burma: Dead Pool (1982)
• Wye Oak: Tattoo (2009)
  I feel like I'm the only guy who listened to Wye Oak this year and thought "Motherfucking 90s!" Seriously, put this band on a mixtape full of bands like Rex and June of 44 and Victory at Sea and I swear you won't think it came out in 2009. 
• Grateful Dead: High Time (1970)
• Emitt Rhodes: With My Face On The Floor (1970)
• Glen Campbell: Gentle On My Mind (1967)
• The Byrds: Ballad Of Easy Rider (1969)
• Meat Puppets: We're Here (1983)
• US Maple: Breeze, It's Your High School (1999)
• Animal Collective: Winters Love (2004)
• Karen Dalton: Something On Your Mind (1971)
• Neko Case: Magpie To The Morning (2009)
  No one dropped an F-bomb better this year than Neko, on this song. 
• Brightblack Morning Light: Everybody Daylight (2006)
  I had dismissed this band when I heard them back in 2006, but some time this year my brilliant wife brought their self-titled album home and we've been under its spell ever since. I can't say I'm very familiar with the album's second half; we tend to put the album on at night and we're both out cold by about the third or fourth track. But I mean that in an incredibly positive way.
• Low: Laser Beam (2001)
  Probably my favorite thing I wrote all year was my weeklong series on Low, most of which was posted at my short-lived Do You Compute blog. Now that that blog is kaput I've been meaning to gather all those posts and re-compose them here, if for no other reason than posterity. In the meantime, this post is a good place to start if you missed them. 
• Big Mama Thornton: Guide Me Home (2004)
• Ray Charles: Busted (1963)
• Yo La Tengo: If It's True (2009)
• Margaret Whiting & Jimmy Wakely: The Gods Were Angry With Me (1950)
• George Jones and Brenda Carter: Milwaukee Here I Come (1968)
• 13th Floor Elevators: Levitation (1967)
• The Seeds: No Escape (1966)
• Bedhead: More Than Ever (1998)
• Cass McCombs: Lionkiller Got Married (2009)
• The For Carnation: I Wear The Gold (1996)
• The Sea & Cake: Parasol (1995)
  I hadn't listened to "Parasol" in I don't know how many years, though it's always been in my mind as Sam Prekop's best moment. Hearing it again all these years later, I still hold that opinion. This song is just beautiful.
  
• R.E.M.: Aftermath (2004)
  Earlier this year when I did a post that presumed to make one great album from the good songs on the last two R.E.M. albums, this is the number that I think benefited the most. Somehow I'd just never really heard "Aftermath" before. It's a great tune.
  
• The Wooden Birds: Sugar (2009)
• Bastro: Recidivist II (1990)
• Fugazi: Smallpox Champion (1993)
• Bastro: Recidivist I (1990)
• The Feelies: Crazy Rhythms (1980)
• Galaxie 500: Temperature's Rising (1988)
• Fennesz: Year in a Minute (2006)
• Phoenix: Love Like a Sunset (2009)
• Animal Collective: Also Frightened (2009)
• The Blue Sky Boys: Down On The Banks Of The Ohio (1936)

My Listening Year: My Favorite Albums of the Year

My priorities this year were so far from keeping up with new releases that I've totally failed at coming up with a respectable best-of list—one comprised of actual 2009 releases, that is. I probably could have come up with eight or ten new albums I heard this year that I liked, or that were solid (see last week's post for recommendations of that nature.) But I can't bring myself to make that kind of list. This is something I went on about last year, but my simple stance is that an end-of-year list should be as long as the quality of records dictates it should be. So, if I were to do a list that only included 09 albums, I'd have a top two, maybe a top three. That seemed insufficient as far as a worthwhile blog post goes. So this year I'll dispense with the 09 list and the rundown of favorite old stuff and just jump straight to my own personal favorite acquisitions of the year. I've neglected to include mp3s this time around because all of these acts are going to show up in my playlist post tomorrow (75 songs!). If you're especially eager to hear any of these bands, however, I encourage you to click on the categories at the end of this post; somewhere or other on this blog I have done mp3s for all of these before.

Animal Collective: Merriweather Post Pavilion
Merriweather Post Pavilion is such a transcendent success because it works on the two most essential levels: one, it's a riveting album if for no other reason than its sound—the samples, the harmonies, the songs' cohesiveness, all adding up to something greater than the sum. But two, it's also just a straight-up jam. It's just a fucking fun record to play! "My Girls," "Summertime Clothes," "Brothersport" (especially the big instrumental ravey moment toward the end)... these songs appeal to the head-nodder, the car-dancer, the occasional funky boss that I am. Avey Tare and Panda Bear's voices blend with each other and with the music itself, creating a kind of sonic morass with a shining pop core—it's like the aural equivalent of looking at a searchlight in deep fog: ominous yet comforting. MPP weaves its thread through foreboding numbers like "Almost Frightened," through romantic sentiments like "Bluish," through flirtations with the abstract in "Daily Routine," yet remains compelling and, again, simply pleasurable, throughout. At this point I'm exhausted by talking about this band at all—praising them, defending them, parsing them, dissecting them. Then again this album isn't really for talking about—at its core, no classic album is. It's just for putting on and feeling in your gut that it's incredible.

Faust: Faust IV
Did I really only pick this album up this year? I guess I did—I bought it right around Christmas 2008. But man, it feels like I've known this album forever. I prefer that lie; otherwise I'd have to feel the ache of knowing that I'd made it to my third decade without this in my life. (Confidential to all Animal Collective fans: I've said this before but will reiterate that I find Faust to be a kind of spiritual ancestor to AC—they have a similar blend of seriousness and playfulness, of accessibility and experimentation, of genre jumping and genre defining. You owe it to yourself to dig up at least one of AC's roots by getting this album.)

Dr. Dog: Fate
Wait: Fate was on my 2008 list! I know. It was my fifth favorite album of last year. But it deserves a second shout-out because I think I wound up listening to it more this year than last. If I were to remake last year's list, this would be #1. Unlike the top two on the present list there is nothing remotely experimental about Fate; it happily, confidently blends an adoration for the Band and other classic rock acts, all of whom you've heard of before. The album is also structured like a conversation, with main songwriters Toby Leaman and Scott McMicken trading tunes back and forth, each grappling with themes of religion, free will, and yes, fate. By the end of the album you almost feel like they might have even reached a healthy conclusion. Fate is a smart, compelling album—and it's become an essential part of any road trip or pick-me-up playlist.

Neko Case: Middle Cyclone
Neko Case made the best record of her career. It can be hard to settle in with—most of the tracks on Middle Cyclone are aching ballads, and it can feel monotonous during the first few times through—but once the record clicks, those aches are your aches. As with the Dr. Dog record, Middle Cyclone mostly sinks its teeth into a lyrical theme—bad romance—in which each song adds a level of depth to all of the others. You hurt for the woman in "Pharoahs" in part because you already felt for the narrator of "Middle Cyclone." You worry for the person behind "This Tornado Loves You" after you meet the protagonist of "The Next Time You Say Forever." And so on. It's not all like this: "Prison Girls" is some hot noir; "Never Turn Your Back on Mother Earth" is just a powerhouse (and a little nuts); and I'm not going to say no to a Harry Nilsson cover ("Don't Forget Me"). Neko Case made the best record of her career—did I say that already?

The Byrds: Ballad of Easy Rider
Dillard & Clark: The Fantastic Expedition of Dillard & Clark
These two albums came out in the same year, 1969, and they make a good pair. Easy Rider is the second Byrds album to feature Roger McGuinn and a bunch of guys who weren't original members (and it's also an excellent country record that is as good as Sweetheart of the Rodeo, maybe better). Fantastic Expedition, meanwhile, features three ex-Byrds in Gene Clark, Chris Hillman, and Michael Clarke (and is also an excellent country record that is as good as Sweetheart of the Rodeo, maybe better).

Animal Collective: Sung Tongs
What can I say? This one was new to me this year. (Richard, after so many conversations in my comments about the merits of Sung Tongs, I hope you feel vindicated that this album has risen in my esteem with every passing month.) Yeah, I still like MPP more, but the allure of this record is so different it's difficult to compare. MPP is immediate; the melodies of Sung Tongs burrow. The rhythms of Sung Tongs waft past you if you let them, but they're not aimless. (And to my surprise it was produced by a kid I knew in high school!)

The Feelies: Crazy Rhythms
See last week. I still love it.

Tomorrow: 75 songs. Portrait of a listening year.

My Listening Year: 2009

Here before you is every album I acquired this year. That's 56 albums in twelve months, down from 89 last year. And just to illustrate how much my consumption has slowed over the course of the year—thanks to book writing, moving, preparing for a baby, and, I guess, working—almost 50% of these albums were acquired between January and March.

Here's another way of breaking things down, to give some sense of where my head has been at this year: 20 of these albums were released this year (compared to 24 new releases last year); 13 were from this decade (compared to 19 last year); and 21 were from the 90s or earlier (compared to 46 last year). Of those older albums, 7 were from the 60s, 10 from the 70s, 3 from the 80s, and 2 from the 90s.

This last bit of statistical breakdown feels totally false to me, because what goes unseen here are the number of albums I picked up that were essentially re-purchases of albums I owned many years ago or was otherwise familiar with already. These were acquired mainly for the sake of putting my head in the sphere of the 80s and early 90s for the purposes of writing my book; I haven't been blogging (too much) about those albums because they are, in a way, "work" related. I like the idea of this blog being pure pleasure. That said, I've got a post planned for tomorrow that will get at a lot of the above and a lot of these 80s/90s albums. 

Of course, it wouldn't be a Pretty Goes with Pretty recap if I didn't go further into statistical analysis!

• Number of artists for whom I purchased at least two albums in 2009: 9
• Number of artists for whom I purchased three albums in 2009: 1 (Animal Collective)
• Number of albums purchased, broken down by anal-compulsive iTunes genre tagging:
• • Indie Rock: 25
  • Electronic: 7
  • Krautrock: 5
  • 60s Rock, Country: 4 each
  • Alternative: 3
  • 70s Rock, Classic Indie: 2 each
  • Brasilia, Folk, Oldies, Punk: 1 each

What's kinda interesting to me is that if you compare those stats to last year, the ratio is almost exactly the same, despite buying far more albums last year. If you were to do both years as a pie chart, they'd look roughly identical. In one sense I guess that shouldn't be surprising. However when I do a similar breakdown of what I listened to—not what I bought—I think the statistics will look wildly different. I feel like my listening habits shifted dramatically from 60s/70s to 80s/90s in the last year. (I'll look at those numbers around the New Year. I can hear you uncapping your sharpies to mark your calendars.)

A bit later today: I'll have a rundown of my favorite albums of the year—not just those released in 2009, but instead culled from the albums above. Tomorrow I'll have one last post before the holiday—a massive mix of my listening year. Stay tuned.

My Listening Hours: October–December

It's been a slow three months for new-to-me music consumption, capping what feels like a low-consumption year. I'll have a little more on my personal year in review soon, but in the meantime I thought I'd wrap up my quarterly MLH post so as not to obscure these eight albums amidst a longer list.

In a year where I didn't spend a whole lot of time keeping up with the newest releases, I tried my best to catch up on at least a few 09 albums I'd been meaning to get. The good news is that most of these records delivered! More or less! If I were giving letter grades, most here would receive a B or B+. I'm going to dispense with the week-long MLH post this time around since I have more year-in-review posts in the works. Without further ado, here's the rundown, in the order they were acquired:

The Feelies: Crazy Rhythms
Earlier this year I fell into a small Galaxie 500 hole, re-buying both Today and On Fire, reminding myself how great that band is after many, many years of forgetting about them. As part of that revival I bought and devoured Dean Wareham's memoir, Black Postcards, in which he spent a lot of time waxing on the Feelies as a big influence on him in his teen and college years. In a nice confluence of events, the Feelies catalogue was reissued at the exact same time, so I took it as the sign that I should finally put these guys at the top of my priority list. Glad I did.

Like Galaxie 500's albums, it takes a number of listens before the songs on Crazy Rhythms begin to differentiate themselves from one another. Each track features an airtight rhythm section and the same kind of raw unadorned guitar tone that was favored by many other late-70s bands. It reminds me of a less dancey Talking Heads or less syncopated Devo—it's hard not to think of Devo's "Satisfaction" when hearing the Feelies' "Everybody's Got Something to Hide (Except for Me and My Monkey)." A further distinction from those two bands might be that Glenn Mercer's vocals are far less dynamic than David Byrne or Mark Mothersbaugh. No matter: the songs on Crazy Rhythms are so hypnotic—yet so fun—that a manic vocalist might just get in the way.

• The Feelies: Everybody's Got Something to Hide (Except for Me and My Monkey)

John Vanderslice: Romanian Names
I met John Vanderslice a long time ago, back when his first album, Time Travel is Lonely, came out. At the time I booked shows in Arizona. He was a nice guy, the album was great, and the show was great! Yet, eight years later, I never really did keep up with his output (though I'd heard raves from a few different quarters). On the recommendation of Rawkblog I checked out "Too Much Time," a melancholy bit of electroni-pop that has since become one of my favorite songs of the year. Though the electronics crop up here and there on Romanian Names, for the most part the rest of the album is much more guitar-oriented; the first half of the record is full of great indie pop—"Fetal Horses," and "D.I.A.L.O.," for instance. Moving into the second half things start to slow down, delving into more atmospheric and fragmented material. I appreciate the move into a different territory, though it never quite gets me in the gut. At any rate the album is solid overall. And I must admit a strange affinity to "Fetal Horses" after many weeks of feeling baby pgwp doing somersaults in my brilliant wife's belly. If it's true that fetal horses gallop in the womb, let's all be glad baby boys just kick a little.

• John Vanderslice: Fetal Horses

Phoenix: Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix
Who expected Phoenix to make the best album of their career this year? Not me. It's not a perfect album—a few of the tracks on the second half feel a little too similar to "Lisztomenia" and "1901," as if the band decided to just start over on side two—but for those two singles and the apex that is the two-part "Love Like a Sunset," Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix has been a great antidote to my recent listening slump. It's actually that latter track, the mostly instrumental centerpiece to the album, that has become the highlight for me. It spins WAP into a different place—somewhere more expansive, less pop-oriented. In fact, its epic quality is what sabotages the album's second half. When the band starts up again with "Lasso," featuring a vocal melody we've already heard a couple times in the first part of the record, you start to wonder if Phoenix only has two tricks up their sleeves and "Sunset" was just a fortunate case of lightning in a bottle. I like all the songs on the second half of the record, it's just that I want them to deliver more. The band hints at an escalation but then fails to escalate.

• Phoenix: Love Like a Sunset

Kings of Convenience: Declaration of Dependence
If I have to wait five years for every Kings of Convenience album, only to discover with each release that the duo basically refuses to develop their sound beyond that of their debut, 1999's Quiet is the New Loud... well, that's actually totally okay with me. With their third record, Kings of Convenience have turned in something about as surprising as Thanksgiving dinner. And I don't really have a problem with that; I'll take Erland Oye and Eirik Glambek Boe's eerily similar harmonizing voices and simply strummed acoustic guitars about as readily as I'll take a turkey breast and mashed potatoes. The first half of Declaration in particular—"Mrs. Cold," "Me in You," "Boat Behind"—is as good as the best material on either of their other albums. As of now I still find myself distracted by the time I get to the album's second half; the songs get quieter, darker, and a little less distinct. But the first half is so enjoyable that I continue to return to the record in hopes that the later songs' pleasures will reveal themselves in time.

(I'll be the first to note the vaguely positive reaction to this record vs the vaguely negative reaction to Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix, despite that I feel both records have incredibly strong first halves and somewhat indistinct second halves... I think it comes back to that idea of "hinting at escalation"; Phoenix points toward a more varied record and then backs away, while the Kings of Convenience rather staunchly remain in a single musical domain. Heck, you might even say they spell it out in their album title.)

• Kings of Convenience: Boat Behind

The Fiery Furnaces: I'm Going Away
Had I segmented this quarter's haul into my usual best/rest categories, I'm Going Away might have been the only record to wind up on the "rest" side of things. There are other records here that are more predictable than the Fiery Furnaces' latest, but that's not the same as saying they're more disappointing. I give this band a lot of credit for refusing to stagnate, to constantly needle their audience; but with their premeditated irritation comes the risk that fans (or I, at least) won't always want to stay on board. Widow City, their last album and my first exposure them, is one of my favorite albums of recent years—it's confrontational, idiosyncratic, funny, and smart. I'm Going Away is all of those things as well, just less fun to listen to. The new record depends more on piano, less on guitar; more on blues progressions, less on the proggy compositions that fired up so much of Widow City. That's not to say I'm Going Away is without its merits—songs like "Even in the Rain" still burrow into my head whether I want them to or not—it's just not, overall, quite the flavor I was hoping to taste. 

Dillard & Clark: The Fantastic Expedition of Dillard & Clark
After a couple false starts with getting into Gene Clark's solo material, I've finally hit upon the excellence I knew he was capable of. For his first of two collaborations with Doug Dillard, Clark hit on a modest but wonderful country/rock hybrid. There is something almost ego-less about the material here; the songs are simply good, aspiring to nothing more or less pure than that goal. Opener "Out on the Side" is one of the best songs Clark has ever written; his lead vocal aches while the backing harmonies, supplied by Dillard and former Byrd bandmate Chris Hillman, buoy the song beautifully. Those same harmonies—they're not as otherworldly as David Crosby's contributions to the Byrds, nor as steady as the Gosdin Brothers' contributions to Clark's first solo effort—lift many of the other tracks, like the gospel of "Git it on Brother" or the skillful "Train Leaves Here This Morning" and "With Care from Someone." Fantastic Expedition is just that—a fantastic expedition—and belongs in any collection that already includes records like The Notorious Byrd Brothers, The Gilded Palace of Sin, or American Beauty.

• Dillard & Clark: Out on the Side

Animal Collective: Fall Be Kind
Between Merriweather Post Pavilion—my favorite album of the year—and Sung Tongs, which was new to me this year, 2009 could be characterized as my year of Animal Collective (if it weren't already my year of Slint). It's fitting that one of the last new releases I'll pick up this year is this EP—sort of a little bow to tie it all up. And that's really how I perceive Fall Be Kind: not the latest statement from the almighty Animal Collective, but a nice capper, a stocking stuffer. The EP holds together as a cohesive, twenty-something-minute piece. It's spacier, less rhythmic than MPP, yet less playful than something like Sung Tongs and less meandering than parts of Feels. Have I placed it on the Animal Collective Map yet? Anyway, you either already have this and hold your own opinions or you could give two shits. I like it.

• Animal Collective: Graze

Tortoise: Beacons of Ancestorship
The very fact of a new Tortoise album this year spurred me to revisit their whole catalogue earlier this year, though I didn't finally get to Beacons of Ancestorship until just a few weeks ago. After being away from Tortoise for most of this decade, it's been nice to welcome them back to rotation. All of their albums stand up to close listening—they're impeccably produced and impeccably played—and they also work well as non-distracting "work" music. That's slightly different from "background music" in that even as a Tortoise album can stay out of your way, it still finds a way to inspire—to subtly, perhaps subconsciously, spur you to concentrate and excel at whatever it is you're doing.

That's a nice way of talking around the quality of Beacons of Ancestorship. At this point I feel about Tortoise approximately the same way I feel about the Kings of Convenience: every few years this group is going to get together and make a record that sounds more or less like the last one. If your expectations are properly adjusted, everything's cool. Ever since solidifying their lineup around the time of TNT, Tortoise has consistently created their trademarked brand of electronica/jazz/film score hybrid. I don't really have any complaint with adding such an album to my collection every few years, so if that's what Tortoise wants to do then that's what I'll take. I can't say there isn't a part of me that wishes they'd take more risks, push themselves as composers and/or improvisers, just be more adventurous. Do people remember or realize that fifteen years ago people talked about Tortoise the way people talk about Animal Collective now? The exuberance—the expectation—that surrounded a Tortoise or Tortoise-related release was pretty fucking high. For whatever reason the group settled into a comfortable place and, starting around the time of Standards, have tempered all of those expectations. It's sort of a bummer, but it also doesn't suck completely. Tortoise have become dependable, for all the good and bad that goes with that word.

• Tortoise: Monument Six One Thousand

My Listening Hours: Statistical Analysis, July-September

I know this is fascinating to no one but myself, but here goes: I listened to 103 unique albums from beginning to end during the last three months. Those albums broken down by the year and/or decade of their release:

2009: 11
2008: 6
2000–07: 25
1990s: 16
1980s: 19
1970s: 8
1960s: 14
1950s: 3

Continuing the trend seen the last time I did this, I’m listening to albums from the 80s and 90s far more than the 70s and earlier, due to research for the Slint book. Albums from the current decade, but not the last year or two, also seem to have jumped up a bit—this because I caught the end-of-decade bug instigated by Pitchfork. Here are the same albums broken down by super-anal iTunes genre tagging:

Indie Rock: 36
Classic Indie: 16
Alternative: 9
Punk: 8
Jazz/Dinner Music: 7
60s Rock and Electronic: 5 each
70s Rock, Country, and Folk: 3 each
Avant-Garde, Metal, and Oldies: 2 each
Krautrock and R&B: 1 each

As mentioned yesterday, the low placing of country music is misleading, as I’ve been listening to a ton of it, just not in album format. Other than that, no surprise that indie/alt/punk dominate the top of the list, again mostly thanks to me getting my head into that era as I write the book.

In the past twelve weeks, nine albums spent three or more weeks in rotation:

Five Weeks
The Byrds, Ballad of Easy Rider

Four Weeks
Cass McCombs, Catacombs
Slint, Tweez
Yo La Tengo, Popular Songs

Three Weeks
Dr. Dog, Fate
Engineers, Three Fact Finder
Galaxie 500, Today
Harlem Shakes, Technicolor Health
Harry Nilsson, Nilsson Schmilsson

Most of these are new acquisitions. The Slint is obvious (can you tell what part of the book I’m on?), and no, I still haven’t gotten tired of the Dr. Dog album. Not much of a difference in the list when you break it down by records with the most individual spins in the last twelve weeks:

The Byrds, Ballad of Easy Rider: 11
Slint, Tweez: 8
Cass McCombs, Catacombs: 7
Harry Nilsson, Nilsson Schmilsson: 6

Country Playlist

Since my weekly soundtrack posts only reflect full-length albums I've listened to, the amount of country music I've been listening to for the last few months has been invisible among all my stat keeping. The truth is I received from a friend the equivalent of three or four box sets worth of country music spanning, more or less, the 1920s–80s. I've thus been immersing myself in a country music education, though I've only scratched the surface of all those songs. Here are fifteen songs that have so far jumped out and grabbed me.

• Bob Willis & His Texas Playboys: Stay a Little Longer (1947)
• Pee Wee King & His Golden West Cowboys: Slow Poke (1951)
• Jimmy Martin: 20/20 Vision (1954)
• Gene Pitney: (The Man Who Shot) Liberty Valance (1962)
• Jimmy Wakely:  One Has My Name (The Other Has My Heart) (1948)
• Marty Robbins: El Paso (1959)
• Bing Crosby & The Andrews Sisters: Pistol Packin' Mama (1943)
• The Blue Sky Boys: Down on the Banks of the Ohio (1936)
• The Carter Family: Worried Man Blues (1930)
• Floyd Tillman: I Love You So Much It Hurts (1948)
• Hank Snow: (Now and Then, There's) A Fool Such As I (1952)
• Leon Payne: I Love You Because (1949)
• Patsy Montana: I Wanna Be a Cowboy's Sweetheart (1935)
• Webb Pierce: Slowly (1954)
• Chuck Wagon Gang: After the Sunrise (1940)

My Listening Hours: Favorite Downloads, July–September

I must admit I bookmarked a ton of good-looking blog posts with every intention of going back to listen and/or download the mp3s, but I utterly failed to follow through. Still, I did manage to find eleven new-to-me songs that really knocked me out. Many of these tracks came from the Cargo Culte and For the Sake of the Song. I recommend you follow them if you're not already.

Don't forget, there's a convenient little mp3 player down in the lower-left corner. just press play and kill forty-five minutes. The songs might look a little random but I actually think this makes a pretty cohesive playlist.

• Wooden Shjips: I Hear the Vibrations (2009)
• Steve Young: One Car Funeral Procession (1981)
• Theoretical Girls: You Got Me (1978)
• Phoenix: 1901 (2009)
• John Vanderslice: Too Much Time (2009)
• Guru Guru: Next Time See You at the Dalai Lhama (1970)
• The Delmore Brothers: I'm Lonesome Without You (1946)
• Cowboy Junkies: Working On A Building (1988)
• Cluster: Caramel (1974)
• Harmonia: Watussi (1974)
• The Modern Lovers: Government Center (1976)

My Listening Hours: Rest of July–September

Andrew Bird, Weather Systems
An Andrew Bird album that doesn't fall in the "best" category? It's hard for me to believe too. I bought Weather Systems while in a bit of a listening funk—wanting something new but not wanting anything in particular. So my ambivalent state of mind might have had something to do with my failure to really latch onto the record. Or maybe it's because I've been listening to Bird pretty consistently since early 2007 and that's just a lot of Bird to listen to. Or maybe it's because Weather Systems feel largely like a sketchbook. Bird has claimed that he made this record as a repository for the overflow of ideas he had while making The Mysterious Production of Eggs (which came out one or two years after Weather Systems), which means even when it was released it wasn't the album he was most concerned with. It shows, especially in retrospect, that much of this album might have been released into the world prematurely. Both "I" and "Skin" would turn up again on subsequent albums much more fleshed out ("Imitosis" on Armchair Apocrypha and "Skin Is My" on Eggs). Here they feel unfinished, both in terms of their composition and Bird's lyrics and vocals ("Skin" is instrumental here and "I" finds Bird repeating the same four lines over and over). Though there are a handful of fully completed songs that match up against the best of Bird's other albums ("Lull" and "First Song" especially), others are more ponderous exercises that seem like they'd be fun to play, maybe even fun to see live, but not as compelling to listen to on record. 

• Andrew Bird: Lull

Gene Clark, Echoes
The first Gene Clark solo album I ever bought was No Other, from 1974. It had a few nice spots but for my tastes was a little too bloated, too MOR, and not at all close to his work with the Byrds ten years earlier. Not giving up on Clark's solo material, I told myself I just needed to start from the beginning, with Gene Clark with the Gosdin Brothers. At least a year has gone by since that decision. I've checked the bin at the record store with some frequency but the album has never been in stock. Then I realized Echoes (available on eMusic) is the first album plus a mini-album's worth of bonus tracks. I downloaded it! Then I found out it's actually not quite the same as the original album; it's a different mix, largely the same as the original but pushing Clark's voice a little further up in the mix so he feels like the leader and not equal to the Godsins. I'm always a little suspicious of people messing with the original versions of albums, and hearing the original mix of "Keep on Pushin'" bears this out. It's a subtle enough difference but the Echoes version is the lesser version. So now I have a hard time listening to Echoes at all because I feel like I'm hearing the wrong album. It is perhaps an overreaction but it's how I feel.

• Gene Clark: Keep On Pushin' (from Gene Clark with the Gosdin Brothers)
• Gene Clark: Keep On Pushin' (from Echoes)
  

Engineers, Three Fact Fader
I have no idea who Engineers are—where they’re from, whether this is their debut or not, how many people are in the band, etc. Nothing. My wife just brought the album home one day, on loan from a friend. So, with zero expectations going in I can say I enjoy Three Fact Finder. It’s vaguely My Bloody Valentine-y—not as warped or dense but it is hazy and at times ethereal. I hear shoegaze, I hear a little electronica in there, a little modern-day indie. All that is great and it adds up to an album I like putting on and never feel the urge to skip through. That said, four or five listens in and I still only really notice maybe two songs. So Three Fact Finder falls into that dastardly category of “great background music.” I love writing or otherwise working to it; just don’t really feel compelled to listen to it. Recommended with caveat.

• Engineers: Clean Coloured Wire

Joel Alme, A Master of Ceremonies
Purchasing this album was a direct result of my brilliant wife wanting the Ida Maria record. We started talking about the water up there in Sweden, and how those who drink it magically gain the utmost pop songwriting skills. This reminded me that I'd been meaning to hear more from Swede Joel Alme. His song "The Seven Islands," from this album, was one of my favorite songs of 2008, but I'd never gotten around to picking up the full length until recently. While I haven't had the album for too long, I do find that the rest of the record is not as good as that song. Alme's got a bit of a Will Sheff thing going—moany, not much of an indoor voice—which is fine, though at times it makes me just want to listen to Okkervil River. That might be too harsh, too reductive—A Master of Ceremonies is still a good album, still growing on me.

• Joel Alme: In Your Arms

Ida Maria: Fortress 'round My Heart
Due to details too mundane to enumerate, I can only listen to this album in the car, and I'm rarely in the car long enough to hear an album all the way through. It seems to work for Ida Maria, though. This album feels very single-oriented—every song great fun, hanging its hat on each chorus. It doesn't feel to me like an album I'd normally buy, but it is fun. 

• Ida Maria: Oh My God

Wye Oak: The Knot
Once I wrote about this record I pretty much stopped listening to it. It’s not bad—and I like many of the songs when they come up on shuffle—but as I said in my original post, I just get antsy to hear the records The Knot reminds me of rather than The Knot itself (though "Tattoo" is still pretty terrific).

• Wye Oak: Tattoo

My Listening Hours: The Best of July–September

The Byrds: Ballad of Easy Rider
This album has only grown in my estimation since I last wrote about it, to the point that it just might be among my three or four all-time favorite Byrds albums. Of their overtly country albums, I like this more than Sweetheart of the Rodeo. That said, it only ranks that high when I do a little re-jiggering to the track list—not exactly re-ordering things, but substituting here and there. Here’s my recommendation to you should you pick up the version of this album that comes with bonus tracks:

Ballad of Easy Rider
Fido Oil in My Lamp [alternate take]
Tulsa County [alternate take]
Mae Jean Goes to Hollywood [bonus track]
Jack Tarr the Sailor
Jesus is Just Alright
It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue
There Must Be Someone I Can Turn To
Gunga Din
Way Behind the Sun [bonus track]
Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos)
Armstrong, Aldrin, and Collins

• The Byrds: Ballad Of Easy Rider

The Fall, Hex Enduction Hour
My first Fall album! I’ve always meant to dig into the Fall but have never really understood where to begin with their fairly impenetrable discography. This turned out to be an excellent recommendation and now I’ve got four more Fall records saved at eMusic for future consumption.

• The Fall: Hip Priest

Harlem Shakes, Technicolor Health
I think every six months or so I need one new catchy indie guitar pop album. Last year it was Vampire Weekend and Dr. Dog; the year before that it was Peter Bjorn & John and the New Pornographers; and before that the Little Ones and I can't remember who else. But the thing is, I can't have too many of these kind of bands at once. I just want to sink my teeth into one and revel in all the melodies and harmonies and bouncey rhythms. So right now it's the Harlem Shakes (who, unfortunately, just broke up). Technicolor Health is one of those albums that had, on one listen, one outstanding song and the rest solid but hard to discern from each other. And with each listen that ratio shifts in the other direction. As of today I think it's about 50/50, and I feel optimistic that it'll continue to turn since there are no out and out duds to be found. It's just a terrific little record.

• Harlem Shakes: Strictly Game

Yo La Tengo, Popular Songs
Despite thinking And Then Nothing Turned Inside Out is one of the best albums of the decade, Yo La Tengo is not a band I typically get excited about. I'm not totally sure why that's the case. At any rate, Popular Songs magically came into my house through no effort on my part. What was I to do but put it on? It's not on the same level as And Then Nothing... (not even close, really), but it's good. Good enough to underline how irrational my relationship to Yo La Tengo has been all these years. All of the shorter songs—the first two thirds of the record—are great, with at least a couple of truly fantastic tracks (like the opener, "Here to Fall" or the fun duet "If It's True"). Things kind of drift off the rails with the last three tracks, each around ten minutes or longer. Any of them would've made a good closer, but all three feel like overkill, especially in light of how effervescent the preceding tracks are. I'd imagine that Popular Songs might work better on vinyl, where each side of the record could show off its own personality. Played straight through, it puts a drag on an otherwise pretty solid album. But the first nine songs are enough to make this an album I continue to return to.

• Yo La Tengo: If It's True

Cass McCombs, Catacombs
Though I still stand by everything I said in my original review of the album, Catacombs has stalled for me. I don’t know if I just wrote it out of my system or if I simply acquired too many new albums since then, but it’s fallen out of rotation. When I consider putting it on I reflexively think “that record’s a bit of a slog,” but if I do put it on, or if the songs come up on shuffle, I get way into it. So, mixed feelings but a good record nonetheless.When I bring my self to listen to it, I remember that it's one of the better 09 albums I've heard thus far.

• Cass McCombs: Harmonia

My Listening Hours: July–September

The trend of the year seems to be "not really keeping up." At least half of my time spent listening to music this year has been listening to albums that put me in mind of the 80s and early 90s for purposes of being the proper headspace for the book I'm writing. That's putting a crimp in my new-to-me purchases, especially those not considered "work" in some way. So, here are the albums I bought in the last three months that I purchased purely for the pleasure of hearing music I haven't heard before. Five albums from 2009, one album from 2008, one from 2003, and three from the 60s or 70s. Though the ratio skews toward new releases, my listening time hasn't really followed. There's some good stuff here—come back a bit later today and I'll write up my favorites of the bunch—but in truth I haven't had a 2009 album really sink its teeth into me since March. Fingers crossed that the year is going to end strong. (Recommendations for new releases I might have missed are welcome in the comments.)

As just mentioned, I'll have a write-up of the best of this bunch later today; tomorrow I'll finish up with the rest; and I'll fill out the week with a couple of mixes of favorite random new-to-me downloads.

Summer Soundtrack

Every album I listened to in full during the last three months, week by week.

My Listening Hours: Statistical Analysis, April–June

Continuing with the obsessive documentation of my listening habits as begun here, this post is meant to serve as a more analytical look at the more visually compelling post that kicked off this week's posts. I listened to 126 individual albums from beginning to end during the last three months. Those albums broken down by the year and/or decade of their release:

2009: 7
2008: 10
2000–07: 29
1990s: 31
1980s: 28
1970s: 9
1960s: 10
1950s: 1

Compared to the last couple of years, my listening habits have swung pretty dramatically away from the 60s and 70s and into the 80s and 90s. This is due almost entirely to the book I'm writing. You can see evidence again when I break those same albums down by super-anal iTunes genre tagging:

Indie: 38
Classic Indie: 34
Alternative: 17
Electronic: 10
Folk, Punk: 5 each
60s Rock, Brasilia: 3 each
70s Rock, Metal: 2 each
Avant-Garde, Country, French, Garage, Jazz, Oldies: 1 each

Country and 60s and 70s Rock have gone way down—and krautrock is totally absent!—while Alternative and Classic Indie have both increased a lot. Not surprising.

In the past twelve weeks, six albums spent three or more weeks in rotation:

Six Weeks
Neko Case, Middle Cyclone (that makes ten weeks for the year so far)

Four Weeks
Akron/Family, Set ’em Wild, Set ’em Free
Peter Bjorn and John, Living Thing

Three Weeks
Dr. Dog, Fate (eight weeks for the year)
Fennesz, Endless Summer
Little Joy, s/t (eight weeks for the year)

The Neko Case isn't surprising, nor is the Dr. Dog and Little Joy albums—both of which have become a kind of musical comfort food (high praise, I promise) since I bought them last year. When you break all my listens down by individual plays—full album, from beginning to end—rather than by week, you see some of the newer acquisitions jump up. That's me trying to get to know a record in a short amount of time. Records with the most individual spins in the the last twelve weeks:

Akron/Family, Set ’em Wild, Set ’em Free: 9
Neko Case, Middle Cyclone: 9 (19 plays for the year so far)
Fennesz, Endless Summer: 7
Peter Bjorn & John, Living Thing: 6

It's a little surprising to see the Fennesz and the Peter Bjorn & John albums show up hear. The Fennesz I think I kept putting on while I was at work, hence my memory of listening to it doesn't match up with the reality of how many times I put it on. And Peter Bjorn & John—I think I was trying to force myself (unsuccessfully) to like that record more than I did.

My Listening Hours: Favorite Downloads

In three months, I only downloaded about a dozen new-to-me songs from various corners of the internet—a shockingly low number, but that seems to be the way it's been ever since starting up with eMusic and just generally being busier in my real life. Nevertheless, here are six great songs I've come across in the last few months:

• Scratch Acid: Owner's Lament (via eMusic)
  Technically not new to me, but it's been probably fifteen years since I last heard this album and I'd completely forgotten about this song and how awesome it is—almost entirely due to Rey Washam's drumming.

• Brian Eno: Baby's On Fire

• Gene Clark: Elevator Operator (via Groover's Paradise)
  It's a little strange that one of the original Byrds would turn out a song that seems like it owes a debt to the Monkees—but then again, so what?

• 13th Floor Elevators: Levitation (via For the Sake of the Song)
  Why don't I own Easter Everywhere yet?

• The Seeds: No Escape (via For the Sake of the Song)

• Sonic Youth (with Lydia Lunch): Death Valley 69 (via eMusic)
  I've got my share of Sonic Youth in my collection, but it's spottier than you might think. So I'm going back to the beginning and moving forward—downloaded this single a month back and also picked up Evol just a couple days ago. This song though... ugly, dirty, pretty rad.

My Listening Hours: Looking Forward

Taking a look at MBV's list of upcoming releases in the next quarter, summer looks to be pretty quiet. A few albums out this week or in the next couple of weeks, but beyond that not a lot that has me saving my pennies. Anything on the list that has you excited?

Wilco, Wilco (The Album) (June 30)
Haven't heard a single track off this record yet. I was scared off of Sky Blue Sky by a few tepid reviews when it came out in 07, only to pick it up in early 08 and be pleasantly surprised by about half of it. It hasn't proved to last in my ongoing rotation—I still prefer Summerteeth whenever I'm in a Wilco mood—but if anything it reminded me never to second-guess Tweedy & Co.

Spoon, Got Nuffin' EP (June 30)
Just announced last week and just released yesterday, this quickie EP will likely wind up in my collection though perhaps not right away. Despite finding Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga to be, arguably, the best album Spoon has done to date, I'm just not one to get excited for singles and EPs, comp appearances, or any other sort of non-album miscellanea. If I'm missing out, let me know.

The Fiery Furnaces, I'm Going Away (July 21)
I heard a track off of this album about a month ago and then decided to lay off until the record itself comes out. The Fiery Furnaces are a band of such detail that I find listening to anything other than a full album may miss the point. I've heard enough to know that it's not going to sound like Widow City, which is fine with me—another Widow City would be tiring right out of the gate. I trust that whatever they do, it'll be worth hearing. The Fiery Furnaces are one of the most interesting bands of this decade and I'm happy to follow them wherever they go.

Joe Pernice, It Feels So Good When I Stop (August 6)
I'll always have a place in my heart for Joe Pernice. Though I haven't been too keen on his last couple albums, there was a time when I preached the genius of Joe the way I've lately done for Andrew Bird. The guy, for a good five or six records in a row, could do no wrong. Since 2003's Yours, Mine and Ours I've felt that most of the Pernice Brothers' albums have been redundant, even if they do each contain one or two A+ tracks. It Feels So Good When I Stop looks to be an odd one, and I don't know if that will be a good thing or a bad thing. For one, it's a solo album—a good thing! Part of why the last couple Pernice Brothers albums have bored me is because the instrumentation, composition, and orchestration has become rote. The idea of Pernice keeping things stripped down is attractive, if indeed that's what he's done. On the other hand these are all covers and the album is meant as a "soundtrack" to the novel Pernice will be dropping on the same day. The novel is clearly the thing he's thrown the weight of his mind into, and this record seems more like a publicity stunt than an album to be taken seriously. Again, though, a tossed-off record might actually be a refreshing change of pace if it's a little rougher around the edges. (More good news: there's a couple of old-school country songs on the track list; does that mean we'll get a couple throwbacks to Pine Box-era Scud Mountain Boys? I hope so.)

Kings of Convenience, TBA (late September)
The Kings of Convenience made a brief announcement a week or two back letting people know their third album is finally done and is slated for release at the end of September. This excites me. I still listen to both of their other albums with some regularity and there will always be room for more of their Nordic Simon & Garfunkelisms. These guys take forever to make an album, but whenever one comes along I'll welcome it into my collection.

My Listening Hours: The Rest of April-June

Dirty Projectors, Bitte Orca
I'm not familiar with any of the Dirty Projectors' other albums, but on the strength of so much positive word of mouth I downloaded Bitte Orca from eMusic without hearing more than a snippet of the opening track. And... it's good! Not the pinnacle of brilliance, but good. As with a band like Grizzly Bear, I can sort of see why some people might regard this album or the band as a high-water mark of contemporary indie—it's certainly an ambitious record—though it ultimately doesn't get me in my gut, sorry. The band has a strong aesthetic—the skeletal songs are propelled more by the vocalizations of David Longstreth and his female co-horts than by the music itself. But as with other acts that have honed their overall sound to such a unique degree, the album itself starts to feel samey after awhile. I had a similar beef with Panda Bear's Person Pitch or Deerhunter's Microcastle; sure, one or two songs here are pretty outstanding, but what am I getting out of the album that I'm not getting out of those songs on their own? Then again I haven't owned the record for very long, and in Bitte Orca's favor I will say that different songs are still revealing themselves to me with each listen.

(A couple of other small peeves: Longstreth's vocals are at times too mannered—which might be why I feel like my good-not-amazing reaction to this album reminds me of how I felt about Shearwater's Rook last year; second, the sequencing of the album is a little jarring, as Amber Coffman and Angel Deradoorian take lead vocals for a few songs in the middle before returning the reins to Longstreth. Not major complaints, but these things to prick me a little when I put the record on.)

• Dirty Projectors: Cannibal Resource

Tortoise, It's All Around You
Wait—this isn't the Tortoise album everyone is talking about! I know. I haven't got that one yet. Meanwhile, I did add their last album to my collection partly in anticipation of the new one. Like I mentioned in my Tortoise post a little while back, I skipped this one when it came out five years ago. My verdict today? It's good, it's fine, it's nice. I don't really hear anything here that justifies some critics' complaints that Tortoise lost the plot, though at the same time it's not as adventurous as their first two or three albums. As someone who likes having a stockpile of instrumental jams I can put on while I'm writing or editing, this is a worthy addition to my collection.

• Tortoise: The Lithium Stiffs

Fennesz, Endless Summer
Likewise, so is Endless Summer, which I like about the same as It's All Around You. As an album it hangs together well and is a nice listening experience. I've never listened to Fennesz before, though have always been meaning to ever since hearing a lot of buzz around Venice and this album. I was expecting something a little more groundbreaking that what I found, but that doesn't mean I don't like it.

• Fennesz: Caecilia

Echo & the Bunnymen, Songs to Learn and Sing
Like the Morrissey album I talked about yesterday—actually acquired on the same day—Echo & the Bunnymen are just one of those bands I never spent much time with. Really the whole Brit Pop universe is something I've never had more than a casual relationship with. When these guys were at their height of popularity I was listening to metal. When I got into grunge and alternative and decided to get into older stuff I went to older American punk and indie. So I'm playing catch-up. This is a great collection of songs, no question. In the horse race that is all of my new acquisitions competing for my attention, I can't say Echo won a whole lot, but I do like everything here.

• Echo & the Bunnymen: Seven Seas

Grateful Dead, Workingman's Dead
Some of these acquisitions, like the Morrissey and the Echo & the Bunnymen, were piked up at the Beverly Hills library. Whenever I find myself there I always rifle through the selection and simply pick up any blindspots I've never heard or owned before, often regardless of exactly where my head is at. So it was with Workingman's Dead. I had a pretty heavy phase of 60s/70s country-influenced rock in the last few years and this disc follows on that taste trend. And while I do like this more than American Beauty—the only other Dead album I've heard—I just can't say this is the kind of music I've been craving lately. Like the Echo record, I'm just glad to have it in my collection.

• Grateful Dead: Uncle John's Band

Peter Bjorn & John, Living Thing
Sadly, the more records Peter Bjorn & John put out--last year's instrumental Seaside Rock, Peter Moren's solo album, and now Living Thing—the more Writer's Block seems to have been a fluke. Peter Bjorn & John have willfully avoided replicating the guitar pop sound of that excellent record, for better or (more accurately) for worse; perhaps if they did they might regain some of that magic. In the meantime, we're stuck with Living Thing, the trio's attempt, I guess, at a dance record. Guitars, bass, and live drums are not altogether absent but they have been pushed back in the mix in favor of programmed beats and synthesizers. A handful of the resulting tracks—"Lay It Down," "Stay This Way," "Nothing to Worry About"—are fun, but overall the twelve songs here are boring and repetitive. Living Thing lacks the depth that made Writer's Block so wonderful, so surprisingly rewarding beyond the hook of "Young Folks." There's comparatively little variation on this album; just simple beats, bloodless music, and mostly uninspired melodies. Both Peter and Bjorn, who share lead vocals, have somewhat lazy deliveries. Writer's Block's music somehow serviced Peter's sandy, laid-back drawl and Bjorn's laconic monotone perfectly. Here the cold music is dragged even further down by their mostly unenthusiastic vocals. Save a couple of bright spots (though nothing as bright as Writer's Block's best bits), Living Thing mostly disappoints.

• Peter Bjorn & John: Lay It Down

My Listening Hours: The Best of April-June

Scott Walker: Scott 2 and Scott Walker Sings Jacques Brel
After seeing the documentary 30th Century Man a few months back, my brilliant wife and I were both hankering to get a proper Scott Walker album or two, no longer content with the six or seven miscellaneous downloads we've accumulated over the years. These two were used at Amoeba, so these two we brought home. Both are pretty much outstanding. Scott Walker Sings Jacques Brel might have the edge, since Scott 2's three best tracks also appear on this compilation. Like the Byrds and Dylan, Brel's songs somehow bring out the best in Walker. Songs like "Mathilde" and "Jackie" bristle with energy and drama, while "Next" is just gloriously ugly in its description of a young soldier losing his virginity in a whorehouse. Scott 2, meanwhile, has a slightly less bustling vibe when Walker isn't channeling Brel ("Jackie," "Next," and "The Girls and the Dogs" are the three overlapping tracks). But it does include the stellar "Black Sheep Boy"—not an Okkervil River original, I was surprised to learn (official credit goes to Tim Hardin). And while at times Walker can come off on Scott 2 like a syrupy crooner, his songs draped in orchestration, a quick scan of the lyrics demolishes that interpretation. Even before his late-career experimentation, Walker was clearly operating on a different level—I swear on the wet head of my first case of gonorrhea!

• Scott Walker: Next
• Scott Walker: Black Sheep Boy

Akron/Family, Set 'em Wild, Set 'em Free
I flip back and forth between whether I want to include this album on the "best" or the "rest" side of the line. Set 'em Wild is a cohesive, well-composed, well-executed album. It's got great melodies, dynamic highs and lows, and its share of curveballs. I like it! If you told me it was one of your favorite albums of the year, I'd believe you! That said, it is missing that special something, for me, that takes it to that classic-of-the-year level. It's really good, but I'm not doing somersaults for it. Most of the record flips back and forth between songs that seem to throw in all but the kitchen sink—opener "Everyone is Guilty" or the massive "Gravelly Mountains of the Moon"—or really simple tunes like the title track or the They Might Be Giants-ish "River." I like the simple tunes more, though; there tends to be one ingredient in the stew of the headier songs that tastes funny to me—the jam-band feel of "Guilty," the cliche "Auld Lang Syne" outro of "Sun Will Shine." But at the same time I recognize the album would suffer if it were all kept simple. The quiet songs are all the better as an antidote to the woolier moments.

Whereas I give Set 'em Wild an A for effort and a B, B+ for overall quality, my brilliant wife us less forgiving. She finds the band wearing two too many hats—jacks of all trades, masters of none. It's true that nothing here excels to that song-of-the-year, jam-of-the-season level. There's a certain level of mastery that Akron/Family falls just short of hitting. Almost, but not quite. Still, it's a solid, quality record that I haven't grown weary of. As I continue to return to it, I could see myself a few months down the line recanting on some of what I've said here. Time will tell.

• Akron/Family: River

Morrissey, Bona Drag
I know! I know! For whatever it's worth I feel like I've had this album forever, as I knew almost every song here before finally adding a little Morrissey to my collection. What can I say? I've always had the slightest aversion to the guy. He always seems so self-satisfied. And so many Morrissey fans give off the sense of being privy to some special joke that apparently is going over the rest of our heads. But in the last few years I've finally come around on the guy and his songs, both with and without the Smiths. I still think his songs can get a little samey after a time, but when he hits just the the right lyric and just the right melody, it's pretty inarguable.

• Morrissey: Interesting Drug

Mates of State, Re-arrange Us
I don't have a lot to add to my post from a couple weeks back. There's a fine line separating an average Mates of State song from an outstanding Mates of State song, and Re-arrange Us certainly walks back and forth across that line, but there are enough fun ones here--the ratio is about the same as on Bring It Back—that I keep getting drawn back to this record.

• Mates of State: The Re-arranger

Brightblack Morning Light: s/t
All credit goes to my brilliant wife for bringing this one into the house. In fact it might have come into the house well before the period this post is supposed to cover, but I stubbornly didn't pay it any mind. (I tried getting into these guys back when this album originally came out and quickly stamped them overrated.) Then we took a trip to Palm Springs and on the way home—a night drive, no less—my brilliant wife put this album on. Dangers of listening to Brightblack Morning Light while driving at night aside, I was finally pulled into their aesthetic. And you do need to be on board with it to enjoy them: every song is a long, slow, almost tortuously hypnotic blues jam with harmonizing vocals wafting over the top. Over the course of one album the sound goes from being pretty cool to seriously monotonous to nearly brilliant. It's like the slow-core equivalent to David Letterman's "Oprah/Uma" joke. I actually bought their second album at the same time as this one but I've barely put it on. Two albums at once seems like overkill, so I'm soaking in this one until I get pruny; eventually I'll move on to the other.

• Brightblack Morning Light: Everybody Daylight

My Listening Hours: April–June

Since April 1 I've picked up just twelve new-to-me albums. Actually that's a slight lie; I've also picked up a bunch of albums—some new to me, some re-purchases from years past—as part of my research for my book. But as those albums are, in a way, work, I've left them out of this roundup. (I will address them in a future post, however.) They're still a huge part of my listening hours—the biggest part, it sometimes seems—but writing about them in this forum is not quite right.

Anyway: of the twelve above albums, three are from 2009, one is from 2008, three are from 2000-07, and the other five are musical blindspots. As far the new releases go, I'm a little disappointed to see the quality set by some of the releases in the first three months of the year drop off, at least as far as what I'm purchasing goes. I have to admit that I've been terrible at keeping up with new music in the last few months. Between the book, a long-overdue vacation, my job, and other outside concerns, my mind has been pretty far removed from music circa 2009. I'd like to say that's going to change as the year progresses but I don't really think it will. I honestly have no idea where my attentions are going to be as far as music goes for the rest of this year. My recentish dalliances with krautrock and 60s/70s country rock have nearly evaporated, though that has more to do with my time and purchasing power than my changing tastes.

But I digress: what about these twelve records? As always I'll be breaking this week's posts into the best and the rest, starting with the best a little later today. I can't think of a period since I've started doing these MLH posts, though, where the line separating the two categories has been so fine, so take the division with a big grain of salt. There are a few albums here that are undeniably outstanding; but at the same time nothing grabbed hold of me out of this bunch the way, say, Middle Cyclone, Merriweather Post Pavilion, or Faust IV did in the last go-around. So I ask you: you can see what I heard above; what did I miss out in the last three months? What recent new releases have you sharpening your pencil for your best-of-the-year-so-far lists? What old album did you recently discover that knocked you on your ass? 

Spring Soundtrack

Every album I listened to, week by week, from April 1 through yesterday.

My Listening Hours: Looking Forward

Loads of stuff coming out in the next few months—including two that came out just a couple days ago—though only a handful have my ears perked up at the moment. Hopefully there'll be a never-heard-before surprise in the coming months. How about you? What's got you excited in the next three months? (And will Midlake and the Radio Dept. ever release their new albums?)

Peter Bjorn and John: Living Thing (March 31)
In 2007 I was way up on Peter Bjorn and John’s Writer’s Block, an album that offered loads more than its single, “Young Folks,” might have you believe. But PB&J’s 2008 output—an instrumental record and Peter Morén’s lackluster solo album—left me cold. I’ve heard two songs off of Living Thing, out this week, and my anticipation has returned to Writer’s Block-level expectations. I hope this is what I’ve been waiting for: great pop with just the right amount of curveballs tossed in for good measure.

• Peter Bjorn and John: Nothing to Worry About

Yeah Yeah Yeahs: It’s Blitz! (March 31)
Speaking of previous output that left me cold: the Yeah Yeah Yeah’s last album, 2006’s Show Your Bones, had a handful of terrific tracks (“Gold Lion” being the best of the bunch) but otherwise fell flat. I put it on a couple weeks ago just to remind myself whether I liked it or not; midway through I was skipping tracks before they got even a minute through. Yet I remain interested in hearing where they go next. I’ve heard talk that It’s Blitz! is more synth-heavy and splits down the middle between rockers and ballads. Honestly I don’t know if that means it might be interesting or a trainwreck. I find the opening track, “Zero,” a little annoying. But I remain curious.

• Yeah Yeah Yeahs: Zero

Tortoise: Beacons of Ancestorship (April 21)
After being an obsessive fan for five or six years—all the albums, all the 7”s, all the 12” remixes—I got off the Tortoise train shortly after Standards came out. Never heard It’s All Around You, nor anything else since around 2002 (if there’s been anything else). Yet for some reason I feel like now might be a good time to check back in.

Wooden Birds: Magnolia (May 12)
Another group I’ve been meaning to check back with is the American Analog Set. They apparently broke up when I wasn’t looking, but primary songwriter Andrew Kenny’s got a new act, the Wooden Birds. "Sugar" begins with an Iron & Wine feel but it eventually takes on that subtle, stubborn repetition that makes Kenny's songs so great.

• Wooden Birds: Sugar

Phoenix: Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix (May 26)
Another one like Tortoise, I took a break from Phoenix on their last album; just completely missed it. I liked a lot of their first two albums, though they each have their spotty moments. Now for whatever reason I'm re-intrigued. I've heard a couple of tracks from the new album and both tell me Wolfgang's got some potential.

• Phoenix: Lisztomania

Grizzly Bear: Veckatamist (May 26)
Yes, despite still running cold on Yellow House, my nagging feeling that Grizzly Bear are supposed to click with me continues. If they can tone down some of their more dramatique inclinations, I think Grizzly Bear could put out a record that would knock me out. We'll see if this is it.

• Grizzly Bear: Cheerleader

My Listening Hours: Statistical Analysis, January–March

As a complement to this post, here's a little statistical breakdown. This is super-anal, I don't even really know what I intend to glean from this, if anything. Nevertheless I find it interesting to look over. In the first twelve weeks of 2009, I listened to 88 different albums at least once from beginning to end.

Those albums' release dates broken down by year and/or decade:

2009: 5
2008: 10
2000–07: 20
1990s: 17
1980s: 5
1970s: 16
1960s: 12
1950s: 3

The same albums broken down by anal-compulsive iTunes genre tags:

Indie Rock: 26
Classic Indie (i.e., indie rock c. 1985–95): 9
60s Rock, Electronic: 7 each
Krautrock: 6
Alternative, Avant-Garde, Metal, Jazz/Dinner Music: 4 each
70s Rock, Brasilia, Country, Oldies, Punk: 3 each
Folk: 2

11 albums spent three or more weeks in rotation:

Five Weeks
Andrew Bird, Noble Beast
Animal Collective, Merriweather Post Pavilion
Dr. Dog, Fate
Faust, Faust IV

Four Weeks
Neko Case, Middle Cyclone
Little Joy, s/t
Wavves, Wavvves

Three Weeks
Andrew Bird, Useless Creatures
David Bowie, Low
Mission of Burma, Signals, Calls, and Marches and Vs.

This year I also began noting the number of times I listened to an album all the way through from beginning to end:

Andrew Bird, Noble Beast: 18
Animal Collective, Merriweather Post Pavilion: 12
Neko Case, Middle Cyclone: 10
Wavves, Wavvves: 7
Dr. Dog, Fate; Faust, Faust IV; Little Joy,  s/t; Mission of Burma, Vs.: 5 each

My Listening Hours: Missed Connections

Usually I follow up "the rest" with a brief rundown of "the worst"—albums I picked up that I wound up actively disliking. Happily for me, that didn't really happen in the last three months. That said, there were plenty of albums that I just didn't connect with. Maybe it's their fault, maybe it's mine. Maybe they're actually mediocre; maybe I just need to hear them in another mindset, some other month or year. I'd still recommend most or all of these albums, with reservations and/or personal caveats that may not apply to you.

David Bowie: Low
For whatever reason, I seem only to connect with Low—supposedly Bowie's apex—on an intellectual level. It's certainly a daring record, thanks to the Eno-aided second, instrumental half. But I'm just not connecting. The first, more "pop" side, has a couple of high points (most notably "Sound and Vision"—a song no Of Montreal fan should hear, lest their illusions be shattered), but there are just as many tracks that are kinda ho-hum. The instrumental half, too, has its peaks, though I don't think it ever rises above Eno's best work. Low isn't a bad record—actually, it's a good record!—but it fell flat in the face of the expectations I'd built up for it.

• David Bowie: Sound and Vision

Emitt Rhodes: s/t
I stumbled across Emitt Rhodes with no prior awareness of him whatsoever. The album was recorded in 1970, apparently in Rhodes' own garage with Rhodes playing every single instrument and backing vocal. The blog I picked the record up from claimed the result was something as transcendent as Oddessey and Oracle or Pet Sounds, which it clearly isn't. Rather, Rhodes sounds like Paul McCartney's star pupil. The pop craft at work here is near-flawless, though I think the record lacks that intangible quality that takes it to the next level. I can't hear any soul behind Rhodes' lyrics or in his delivery. When he sings "live til you die," I kind of want to slap him. It gives you a renewed appreciation for how much feeling McCartney could eke out of a platitude. But! At his best, as on the opener, "With My Face on the Floor," Rhodes' songs can sound like perfect little McCartney b-sides, which I mean as a compliment. 

• Emitt Rhodes: With My Face on the Floor

Karen Dalton: In My Own Time
Karen Dalton, on the other hand, has the opposite problem from Rhodes. On her second album, 1971's In My Own Time, Dalton's voice is nearly all ache and emotion—to the point that it often overwhelms the song itself. Like Rhodes, Dalton is able to hit a few unquestionable home runs, but her album becomes a bit tedious by the end.

• Karen Dalton: Something on Your Mind

Josh Ritter: The Animal Years
I picked up The Animal Years at the same time as The Historical Conquests of Josh Ritter, and for that reason this album might have suffered a little. It's a slower, less fun—almost turgid—record compared to its followup. There are no real low points, and a number of high points—the first four songs are solid pop songs, and the epic "Thin Blue Flame" shows an ambition not seen on the later record. But somewhere around the midpoint the whole thing starts to feel, not exactly boring, but inessential. Still, when Ritter is at his best he can really knock it out.

• Josh Ritter: Wolves

The National: Alligator and Boxer
The National are one of those bands that I just never dove for. I've had a handful of mp3s for a few years, and I like them, but I always had the sneaking suspicion that they were... boring. Hearing both Alligator and Boxer, that sense is somehow dispelled and reinforced at the same time. On the one hand—especially with Boxer—each time I put it on I get the sense that everything is about to click. I hear something new, lock in on a lyric I hadn't heard before, pick up on some musical detail (by the way, the drummer for the National? Secret weapon). But by album's end I invariably feel deadened by Matt Berringer's insistence on using the same four notes for every single melody. I think it didn't help, too, that I got these albums at the exact same time (in fact, through the generosity of a friend, I got everything by the National at once—these two plus Sad Songs for Dirty Lovers, Cherry Tree, and Virginia, the latter two I still haven't even listened to yet). The National strikes me as a group you need to take slow, song by song, over the course of many focused listenings for many days or weeks or even months. I haven't given them that kind of attention. Each time I listen to Boxer, or a song from either album pops up on shuffle, I think this will be the week that I give it that attention. But it hasn't happened yet.

• The National: Secret Meeting (from Alligator)
• The National: Mistaken for Strangers (from Boxer)

Jorge Ben: África Brasil
I've got a song by Jorge Ben, "Pais Tropical," that is absolutely one of my favorite songs ever. It's like Os Mutantes, only better than just about anything Os Mutantes did. But I didn't have an album by Ben. I'd heard this was one of his classics, so when I saw it a couple months ago I snapped it up. For what it is—tropicalia with an afrofunk edge—it's good. But it's not what I wanted. This album comes from 1976, about seven or eight years later, I think, than the era of Ben I'd most like to investigate. 

• Jorge Ben: Camisa 10 da Gávea

Amon Düül II: Phallus Dei
My previous review of this record pretty much said it all. Phallus Dei has its moments, but most the time the band finds a way to irritate in the middle of what might otherwise be a great track. Yeti, the only other album I've heard by them, tempers the irritating moments better than here (though it doesn't eradicate them).

• Amon Düül II: Luzifers Ghilom

Grizzly Bear: Yellow House
Grizzly Bear is one of those bands I feel I'm supposed to love. People I know whose tastes run similar to mine flip for this band, and this album in particular. But I just can't feel it. I've had a handful of songs by the band for a long time—I like them, don't love them. But I was told they were an "album band," so when their discography showed up on eMusic I finally took the plunge. Nothing has really changed: I still think they're okay but not game-changing. I'm curious to hear the new album when it comes out, to see where they go next—so I'm told, it might be a direction I'll like more.

• Grizzly Bear: Knife

My Listening Hours: The Rest of January–March

Neu!: Neu! 2
La Düsseldorf: s/t and Viva
I've already said my share about Neu! 2—probably my favorite Neu! album, so long as you delete the four tape-speed experiments sprinkled throughout. In fact something similar can be said for all three Neu! albums; none are perfect, none the quintessential, if-you-only-get-one-make-it-this-one record. There's always one or two tracks that see Klaus Dinger and Michael Rother slipping off the experimental ledge. So I made a little customized greatest hits from all three records that feels, to me, more satisfying.

For all intents and purposes you can add the best of La Düsseldorf's output to that playlist. La Düsseldorf was Dinger's band following his split with Rother (who went on to Harmonia—a group I haven't checked out yet). I expected a more pronounced break from the Neu! sound with La Düsseldorf, but much of both La Düsseldorf and Viva follow fairly naturally. The synths are still there (along with other instruments), Dinger's "navajo beat" is still in effect, and there's still that balance of prog-ambient and, well, goofiness. La Düsseldorf's opening track, "Düsseldorf," features a single lyric, "Düsseldorf," repeated off and on for thirteen minutes. Track two, "La Düsseldorf," features the same lyric over different but similar music for five more minutes. This is a four-track album, so we're already halfway through. Each song by itself is great, but the repetition does get monotonous. So like Neu! 2, we've got Dinger once again making something that is almost terrific but is hampered, ultimately, by its nuttiness. Viva, the band's second album, fares better—due in large part to the twenty-minute masterpiece that is "Cha Cha  2000." It's easily one of the best songs Dinger has ever had a hand in.

• Neu: Neuschnee
• La Düsseldorf: Düesseldorf (from La Düsseldorf)
• La Düsseldorf: Geld (from Viva)

Animal Collective: Sung Tongs
I'm coming at Animal Collective all out of order. First Campfire Songs, then Strawberry Jam, then Feels, then Merriweather Post Pavilion. Now Sung Tongs. It's kind of a strange way to go about it. On the one hand I can piece together the evolution of the band—Feels seems like an explicit bridge between Sung Tongs and Strawberry Jam, and echoes of every record lurk somewhere in Merriweather—but on the other, some of these earlier albums don't feel like the revelation that they seem to have been for the fans of AC that have been on board longer than I have. That said, my brilliant wife is way into this album. It's her favorite next to Merriweather (which I'd bet she'd declare her favorite album of the year so far); she also loves Panda Bear's Person Pitch but runs hot and cold on Strawberry Jam and Feels—both of which I like more than the Panda Bear record. Clearly there are a number of Animal Collective debates in the PGWP household. Anyway: Sung Tongs. This is a strong record. I had complaints about portions of Feels that found the band going off on these spacey, drifting indulgences. They seemed to walk the line between genius ("Banshee Beat") and wankery ("Bees" or "Daffy Duck") like a drunk taking a DUI test. Sung Tongs sees the band more fully immersed in that sound, and for the better. Perhaps by dint of being more cohesive overall—there are no rhythm section–driven rockers like Feels' "Grass" or "Turn Into Something"—Sung Tongs becomes an album you can sink into. It can drift past you, yes, but at times that seems to be the intent. I dig this record, though I need to spend a lot more time with it. It probably wasn't wise of me to pick this up so close on the heels of Merriweather, an album so utterly different but also so much more fun.

• Animal Collective: Leaf House

Wavves: Wavvves
Wavvves doesn't really feel like a full-length album. The brief record is technically twelve tracks long, but it feels more like six or seven suites, as instrumental fragments buffer many of the more pop-oriented tracks. ("Pop-oriented" because there are melodies buried under all that distortion.) I hesitate to say they're "filler"—they're more than that, though also less than standalone works. The whole record does add up to something; there is an aesthetic at work here—a kind of raucous experimentation, unpretentious and un-self-conscious. Also, juvenile and naive. Does that mean it's good? Yeah, it's good. It's fun to listen to. I wrote about Wavves a little while back over at Do You Compute, in the context of GodheadSilo—a band who I feel is a kind of ancestor to Wavves. I don't think Wavves takes themselves (himself, I guess) very seriously, and that's okay—though it has the effect of making Wavvves good but not essential. 

• Wavves: Surf Goth

Seefeel: Quique and Starethrough EP
It's funny: ten or twelve or fifteen years ago, when labels like Kranky and Warp were releasing record after record of genius space rock (the former) and heady electronica (the latter), I was lapping all of it up like Pavlov's dog. So how or why did I skip Seefeel, whose 1993 album Quique—guitar-based electronica—was like a bridge between Bowery Electric and Aphex Twin? I heard them back then, but for whatever reason I just didn't consider them seriously. Oh well: better late than never. There's no mistaking which decade Seefeel hail from, but still, Quique holds up pretty well. Their followup EP, Starethrough, I like even more. Perhaps by dint of being shorter it has the luxury of seeming more concentrated, more distilled.

• Seefeel: Through You (from Quique)
• Seefeel: Spangle (from Starethrough)

Air France: No Way Down EP
On the other hand, Seefeel seems positively current compared to Air France, whose 2008 EP No Way Down sounds straight out of a Euro dance club circa 1992. It's a style of music I only liked in small doses back then and only like in small doses now. "Collapsing at Your Doorstep" is the highlight here—hence the track deservedly made the rounds of numerous mp3 blogs last year. The rest of the EP's quality depends on your tolerance level for airy, light techno. I personally liked their 2006 EP, On Trade Winds, a little more than No Way Down (the two are now available as a single disc, by the way), though "Collapsing" is probably the high point of either. Most of No Way Down is pleasant, but it drifts into background music whenever I put it on.

• Air France: Collapsing At Your Doorstep

That's it for the today. Come back tomorrow for some Bowie, Jorge Ben, and the rest of the rest.

My Listening Hours: The Best of January–March

Neko Case: Middle Cyclone
I can't think of another record that made a better second impression than Middle Cyclone. on first listen I thought the album was too long, too ballad-heavy, to monotonous. Midway through my second listen a couple days later, my ears hooked into the lyrics of the title track—a sparse number comprised of Neko Case's voice and guitar, accentuated by angelic backing vocals and a tentative music box. Suddenly I was tuned into Middle Cyclone—an album I've quickly realized is the best of Case's career so far.

Much of Middle Cyclone seems to detail fundamentally flawed relationships—lovers who love passionately but without ever hearing each other. "Just because you don't believe it / doesn't mean I didn't mean it," she sings in "The Next Time You Say Forever"; "I'm a man-eater," she says in "People Got a Lot of Nerve"—"but still you're surprised when I eat you." Later a character in another song admits "I'm not the man you think I am." In "The Pharoahs," Case details a sixteen-year-old who falls for and marries a man who "said you like girls in white leather jackets... that was good enough for me." These are songs about men and women hurtling through affairs—the opener is called "This Tornado Loves You," if you need more evidence. Perhaps this is why the album overcomes that initial feeling of being too long and too slow: Middle Cyclone is full of passionate people—blindly, stupidly, violently passionate—caught in quiet moments of lucidity. The line from the title track that first caught my ear distilled this to four lines:

Can't give up acting tough
It's all that I'm made of
Can't scrape together quite enough
To ride the bus to the outskirts of the fact that I need love

The song is one of many flawless moments—"Magpie to the Morning," "Never Turn Your Back on Mother Earth," and "Prison Girls" are a few others. It's too early in the year to talk best of 2009 (though that hasn't stopped others from claiming same for Animal Collective). At any rate, this is a contender.

• Neko Case: Middle Cyclone

Andrew Bird: Noble Beast
My review of the record probably says it all. In short: I love the record, though not as much as the previous two. Bird is still my favorite musician working today, hands down, though I have burned out a little on the record; I think it's less to do with the album itself and more to do with listening to Bird, period, for the better part of the last two-plus years straight.

• Andrew Bird: Oh No

Animal Collective: Merriweather Post Pavilion
Merriweather Post Pavilion and Noble Beast came out on the same day, January 20, and together the two albums have taken up the bulk of my listening concentration. Maybe it was the competition for my time between the two records that resulted in my hot-and-cold relationship to this record, but I started white hot—loved this record—for the first week or two; then the glow wore off in a big way, not to be rekindled until I saw them live. Now I'm right there with most the rest of the bloggers and fanboys out there who think this is the best album of Animal Collective's career.  

• Animal Collective: Bluish

Faust: Faust IV
Is there a better feeling than buying an album by a new-to-you artist and being blown away by it, then buying another album by the same artist and finding it even better? Such was my experience with Faust. I went on about Faust's first two albums last year—Faust So Far, their second album, was particularly terrific. I picked up Faust IV in January, expecting it to be as good as what I'd come to expect, but this album shattered those expectations. From the opening head-expander that is "Krautrock" to the subdued masterpiece "Jennifer" to the So Far-reprising "Picnic On A Frozen River, Deuxieme Tableux." everything about Faust IV is more focused, more muscular, more cohesive than their other albums. Yes, that means it's also a little more accessible, though no less daring. This is a must-own album.

• Faust: Jennifer  

Mission of Burma: Vs.
I summed up my feelings on this record already, so I'll just quote the last line: "Still, it burns me a little each time I hear the records: a little voice inside me nags, 'This record should be old news to you. It should have long been part of your vocabulary. You should have listened to everyone who ever recommended them to you.'"

• Mission of Burma: Trem Two

Josh Ritter: The Historical Conquests of Josh Ritter
In a way, The Historical Conquests of Josh Ritter doesn't feel like a new acquisition for me. Back at the end of 2007, when the album was popping up on a number of best-of-the-year lists, I managed to pick up six or seven mp3s—about half the album—without really trying. I liked what I had, either despite or because it was incredibly straightforward—Ritter is a song-crafter in the most traditional sense, content with a good turn of phrase built into a clear melody with a satisfying level of structure and repetition. Really great pop songs, in other words, without the unnecessary clutter of experimentalism or epic scope. Ritter has a sandy voice with a tinge of southern charm, and his songs are colored by strings, horns, or subtle electronics as often as they are stripped of everything but his voice and guitar. The album—easily the best of his ouevre—is pure twenty-first-century Americana; but for all his traditionalism, he's also refreshingly confident. I was satisfied for the last year with what I had, but I'm much more glad to finally have the whole record now. 

• Josh Ritter: Mind's Eye

Del Shannon: Greatest Hits
I feel like I've talked about this before but I can't recall: I have an "awesome" playlist in my iTunes library, which I update every time I do one of these quarterly posts. The playlist currently stands at 910 songs strong, and is made up of anything in my library that is five stars and upbeat and fun and happy and basically any song, regardless of era or genre, that makes me or my brilliant wife go YES when it comes on. In this post-Indie 103 era in Los Angeles, the playlist is more essential than ever as it's pretty much become my radio station. Some artists are almost custom-made for this playlist: Harry Nilsson, for instance. Spoon. The Lovin' Spoonful. When he's joyous, Cat Stevens. The Beatles, duh. Not long ago my brilliant wife picked up Del Shannon's greatest hits for $2.99 and one listen in, we pretty much just shoved the whole record into the Awesome Mix. "Runaway," of course—who doesn't sing along full-tilt when Shannon Wa-wa-wa-wa-wonders why, why-why-why-why-why? But there's so much more: "Little Town Flirt," "Two Kinds of Teardrops," "Hats Off to Larry," "The Swiss Maid"... the list goes on. Probably the funnest record I've picked up all year.

• Del Shannon: Little Town Flirt

My Listening Hours: January–March

 

I picked up twenty-four album in the last twelve weeks. Four of them were new releases; thirteen were musical blindspots, and the remaining seven were albums released in the last few years that I only just got around to getting. (I'll have much more of this kind of breakdown in the next few days.) 

I'd say my listening habits of the last three months could be broken down into three segments: krautrock (Neu!, Faust, La Düsseldorf); stellar new releases (Bird, Case, Animal Collective); and, not reflected in the new-to-me images above, 90s indie (thanks to my newish project Do You Compute). I won't go too much into the latter right here and right now—if you're into it, then hopefully you're subscribed to DYC—and I'll get into the kraut stuff later today and tomorrow. But I do need to note that three months in, 2009 is kicking 2008's ass in terms of great new music. Three albums released in the last three months are already better than pretty much every 2008 release I heard last year. If I could remake my 08 list and factor in Noble Beast, Middle Cyclone, and Merriweather Post Pavilion, they'd easily be in my top four of the year, if not my top three. More on all three of those records, plus a few others, a little bit later this morning.

My Listening Hours: Winter Soundtrack

 

Every album I listened to, week by week, since January 1. Starting Monday, the next installment of My Listening Hours: three or four days of 20+ mp3s and words on everything that was new to me in the last three months. 

My Listening Year: Final Tally

Taking this post and putting it down in terms of numbers rather than pictures, here’s a few more stats about how and what I listened to in 2008.

Number of unique full-length albums I listened to in 2008: 225

Those albums' release dates broken down by year and/or decade:

2008: 24
2007: 24
2000–06: 55
1990s: 22
1980s: 21
1970s: 40
1960s: 30
1940s-50s: 9

Broken down by anal-compulsive iTunes genre tags:

Indie: 74
Alternative: 25
Classic Indie: 18
Electronic: 16
70s Rock: 15
60s Rock: 14
Punk: 12
Dinner Music/Jazz: 11
Folk: 10
Country, Krautrock: 6 each 
Avant-Garde: 5
Brasilia: 4
Reggae: 3
Psychedelic: 2
French, Garage, Metal, R&B: 1 each

Through my regular “This Week’s Soundtrack” posts, I tracked any and all albums I played from beginning to end at least once during any given week. So a true picture of my listening hours are slightly skewed. For instance, on this week I listened to the Walkmen’s You & Me every day at least once, sometimes twice; everything else I only listened to one time during that week. On the other hand, the list below still feels roughly correct in terms of what I listened to most overall. These are the albums that popped up the most over the course of 2008:

16 weeks
Andrew Bird & the Mysterious Production of Eggs

11 weeks
Fleet Foxes, s/t
Vampire Weekend, s/t

10 weeks
The Ruby Suns, Sea Lion

9 weeks
Andrew Bird, Armchair Apocrypha

8 weeks
Animal Collective, Strawberry Jam
Okkervil River, The Stage Names

7 weeks
Shearwater, Rook
Dr. Dog, Fate

6 weeks
Beach House, Devotion
Neil Young, Everybody Knows This is Nowhere

5 Weeks
Antonio Carlos Jobim and Elis Regina, Elis & Tom
Brian Eno, Another Green World
The Fiery Furnaces, Widow City
The Flatlanders, More a Legend Than a Band
Philip Glass, Glassworks
Holy Fuck, s/t
The Radio Dept., Lesser Matters
Paul Simon, Graceland
The United States of America, s/t

Of these twenty albums, sixteen were purchased in 2008. Armchair Apocrypha was purchased in 2007; Elis & Tom was purchased 2005 or 2006;  Lesser Matters was purchased in 2003; and Graceland was purchased in 1986. 

This isn’t exactly a proper way to use the numbers, but if you added the “# of weeks played” by artist (e.g., adding Mysterious Production and Armchair Apocrypha together), you get a somewhat better idea of artists I keep returning to, if not specific albums. This version of the list feels more intuitively right to me when I think about what I listened to this year.

Andrew Bird: 25
Okkervil River: 14
R.E.M.: 13
Fleet Foxes, Vampire Weekend: 11
Animal Collective, Paul Simon/Simon & Garfunkel, the Ruby Suns, Neil Young: 10
Elvis Costello, Faust, Four Tet, Philip Glass: 8
The Byrds, Dr. Dog, Brian Eno, Fiery Furnaces, Shearwater: 7
Beach House, My Morning Jacket, Radio Dept., Secret Machines, Spoon: 6

Cat Stevens, the Lovin' Spoonful, and Harry Nilsson all still feel curiously absent. Those are all greatest hits collections + random downloads that I tend to listen to on shuffle; their songs tend to crop up on multiple customized playlists I've made. Those three artists, and probably a few others I'm forgetting, are woven into the fabric of my everyday listening, yet somehow escaped my anal analysis.

This is the last of my exhaustive review of 08. Happy New Year everyone. 

Every Album I Listened To, Week by Week, in 2008

 


 
 











 







































 

Looking Forward

If we could do a cage match between all of the music released in 2008 and the music released in the first three months of 2009, which side would you put your bets on? Looking at MBV’s list of upcoming releases, there are at least two, maybe three or four or five albums that are contenders for best of the year status. Mind you, I’ve heard none of them—it’s just conjecture based on past pleasures. But what else is the internet for? Here’s a rundown of a handful of albums I’m keeping an ear out for.

Andrew Bird, Noble Beast + Useless Creatures (Jan. 20)
Me, excited for an Andrew Bird album? Shocker, I know. My only fear surrounding this album is that it will render my blog redundant. How many years in a row can I wax rhapsodic about Andrew Bird? Let’s try for three, shall we? By the way, don’t sleep on the limited-edition double-disc version. Usually I’d say an album’s worth of bonus instrumentals is not essential—Spoon’s Get Nice! addition to Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga springs to mind as a mildly entertaining but forgettable treat—but Andrew Bird plus a couple guys from Wilco sounds like it could be good. Not to mention all the instrumental tracks coloring the last two Bird albums have been as good as the proper songs.

• Stream the opening track, Oh No

Animal Collective, Merriweather Post Pavilion (Jan. 20)
I’m a latecomer to Animal Collective, having found pleasure in the band via Strawberry Jam and working my way backward through their catalog. Of everything I’ve heard, I still find Strawberry Jam their most compelling work, so I look forward to MPP as an outgrowth from that. I haven’t heard a lick of this record yet but it’s definitely the most exciting and unpredictable prospect of everything listed here.

A.C. Newman, Get Guilty (Jan. 20)
On the one hand, pretty much everything Carl Newman has done through the New Pornographers has been golden—yes, including Challengers. On the other, Newman’s other solo album, The Slow Wonder, is good but not great. It’s so close to, but not, the New Pornographers. Like coffee without the caffeine. So I’m intrigued enough for the new record and will probably check it out, though I’m not losing my shit in anticipation.

• A.C. Newman: There Are Maybe Ten Or Twelve

Polvo, Cor Crane Secret (Jan. 27)
Volcano Suns, All Night Lotus Party and The Bright Orange Years (Jan. 27)
I’ve had 90s indie rock on the brain for the last couple of months, particularly groups that didn’t seem to make as lasting an impression as one might have predicted back in the day. Polvo and the Volcano Suns both fall into this category, so I’m glad to see these reissues hitting shelves. I feel like there’s a lot of fifteen- or twenty-year-old indie rock just waiting to be rediscovered. Maybe it’s these bands, maybe it’s others, but I do predict a collective revisiting of the 90s canon soon.

• Polvo: Can I Ride
• Volcano Suns: Jak

Beirut, March of the Zapotec (Feb. 17)
Though I liked The Flying Cup Club, arguably even more than Beirut’s debut, I was still left lukewarm on Zach Condon the songwriter. I summarized that feeling in this post. Part of me feels that Zapotec will be a kind of final test for my tolerance of Beirut. He’s gone to Mexico for inspiration this time around! It feels like too much of a shtick. If his overall prowess as a crafter of great songs has improved, then it won’t matter. Good is good. But that remains to be seen.

Neko Case, Middle Cyclone (Mar. 3)
Unlike Carl Newman, Neko Case’s solo material is a world apart from her contributions to the New Pornographers, so I’m considerably more excited for Middle Cyclone than I am for Get Guilty. 2006’s Fox Confessor Brings the Flood was an incredibly slow burner for me. Despite buying it when it came out, it wasn’t until earlier this year that the album truly revealed itself to me. I appreciate that Case has grown beyond her Patsy Cline croon into a more mature songwriter. Hopefully she’s continuing on that trajectory (though I wouldn’t mind a few more uptempo numbers this time around).

Midlake, Courage of Others (TBA)
Peter Bjorn & John, TBA (TBA)
Not sure if these will come out by the end of March or not, but they're right up there with Andrew Bird and Animal Collective for most-anticipated album of the year. I spent most of 2007 listening to The Trials of Van Occupanther and Writer's Block. Unlike Bird and Animal Collective, I’m more anxious about this record—that is, less confident that the follow-up will equal or surpass the previous peak. I want these albums to blow my mind (especially the Midlake). Will they?

There's plenty of other albums on MBV's list; what's got you excited?

My Listening Year: Favorite Downloads V

Here it is, the fifth and final mix of the week. If you missed them, here are parts one, two, three, and four. Happy holidays!

• The Dukes of Stratosphear: Vanishing Girl (1987)
• The Balancing Act: Red Umbrella (1988)
• Dylan Mondegreen: Wishing Well (2007)
• The Who: I'm a Boy (1966)
• Annuals: Sore (2008)
• The Rosewood Thieves: Lonesome Road (2006)
• Louie & the Lovers: I Know You Know (1970)
• William Bell: You Don't Miss Your Water (1961)
• 13th Floor Elevators: Slip Inside This House (1967)
• Buffalo Springfield: Expecting to Fly (1967)

Favorite Downloads IV

If you've been listening to Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday's mixes, you've heard a little country mixing in with the rest. That was the tip of the iceberg: I was introduced to so much great country music this year (almost entirely thanks to Setting the Woods on Fire), I had to dedicate an entire day's mix to it. If I had to pick just one or two tracks to urge you listen to... I'd have a really fucking hard time. But the Hank Willams, Buck Owens, and Lefty Frizzell tracks are all great fun. The John Hartford song is wonderful. If you liked the Dillard & Clark song on Monday or the Hearts & Flowers song yesterday, then be sure to check the Gene Clark & the Gosdin Brothers track today.

• Jimmie Rodgers: In The Jailhouse Now (1928)
• Lefty Frizzell: Always Late with Your Kisses (1951)
• Hank Williams: Long Gone Lonesome Blues (1952)
• The Louvin Brothers: If I Could Only Win Your Love (1959)
• George Jones: A Girl I Used To Know (1962)
• Buck Owens: I've Got a Tiger by the Tail (1964)
• Gene Clark & the Gosdin Brothers, Keep on Pushin' (1966)
• The International Submarine Band: Luxury Liner (1968)
• Bob Wills & His Texas Playboys: That's What I Like About the South (1973)
• John Hartford: In Tall Buildings (1976)

My Listening Year: Favorite Downloads III

Another day, another ten songs. Here's part one and part two if you missed them. Part four will come tomorrow, part five on Friday.

Today's batch includes my biggest earworm of the year ("Carrie-Ann"), the cruelest lyric of the year ("I've had her; she's nothing"), and the brilliantly arranged "My World Fell Down." Finally, I don't usually even pay attention when I see blogs throw up some contemporary indie act covering a well-known song, but after seeing Jens Lekman do "You Can Call Me Al," one of my all-time sentimental favorites, I had to hunt down an mp3 version of the song. (Anyone paying attention to the lyrics may notice the inspiration for my doings elseweb.)

• The Hollies: Carrie-Anne (1967)
• Them: I Can Only Give You Everything (1966)
• Simply Saucer: Instant Pleasure (1974)
• Harry Nilsson: The Beehive State (1970)
• Jens Lekman: You Can Call Me Al (2008)
• Phil Ochs: I've Had Her (1967)
• Young Killer: The Wrestler (1958)
• Adam & the Amethysts: Bumble Bee (2008)
• Sagittarius: My World Fell Down (1968)
• The Monkees: Porpoise Song (1971)

My Listening Year: Favorite Downloads II

Here's round two. I stumbled into a kind of weather theme today, for no good reason. Especially since this week has been the kind of shitty weather I thought was illegal in Southern California. Special shout-out to the Michael Nesmith track (2009 will hopefully see me pick up one/some of his solo material) and the beautiful Hearts & Flowers song. Enjoy! See you tomorrow with ten more.

• Michael Nesmith: Roll with the Flow (1972)
• The One AM Radio: Wayward Wind (2008)
• Margo Guryan: Sun (1968)
• Hearts & Flowers: Try for the Sun (1968)
• The Sunrays: I Live For The Sun (1966)
• The Explorers Club: Last Kiss (2008)
• Joe Jackson: Friday (1979)
• Gilberto Gil: O Canto da Ema (1972)
• Nouvelle Vague: In a Manner of Speaking (2004)
• The Limeliters: Take My True Love by the Hand (1960)

My Listening Year: Favorite Downloads I

No annual recap is complete in this day and age without a look at all the random singles you downloaded all year long. This week I offer you fifty songs, ten per day, that I discovered in 2008. The tracks range from the 50s through 2008—and one from 1928—from country to psychedelia to tropicalia to calypso to indie, and probably a few things in between. I should also take a moment to thank Paul at Setting the Woods on Fire and Brendan at the Rising Storm, who were easily the source of most of the songs you'll find here this week. Hopefully you're already reading their blogs regularly.

If you're reading this post in your RSS reader, I'm obliged to point out that I do have a convenient little mp3 player on my site—just press play, minimize the window, and go about your business. Let me soundtrack the next hour or two of your day. (The player will hit every mp3 on the site—this post and every post from last week too.)

Here are the first ten. Enjoy and keep coming back all week. Thanks. 

• The Millennium: Prelude/To Claudia on Thursday (1968)
• The Eloise Trio: Island Woman (1956)
• Fugiya & Miyagi: Knickerbocker (2008)
• Silver Apples: Lovefingers (1968)
• The Clean: Tally Ho (1981)
  
• Jose Gonzalez: How Low (2007)
• Scott Walker: Mathilde (1967)
• Dillard & Clark: Out On The Side (1969)
• Joel Alme: The Seven Islands (2008)
• JP Haynie: Wyoming (2008)
    

A More Accurate Best of 08

Okay, so the requisite best 08 release list is behind us, as well as a rundown of some of my favorite discoveries of the year, plus my post on my most beloved record, personally, this year. Still, none are totally accurate. Lost in the cracks are the more recent albums that don't really fit into either category. In this year's case, that means adding three albums from 2007 that I didn't get to until 2008. Here's my list of my personal favorite albums of the year. (Again, the logic of the ranking gets a little fluid around number six or so.) Links go to any long-form posts I might have written about the albums in the last year.

1. Andrew Bird & the Mysterious Production of Eggs (2005)

• Andrew Bird: Sovay

2. Okkervil River, The Stage Names (2007)

• Okkervil River: The Plus Ones

3. Animal Collective, Strawberry Jam (2007)

• Animal Collective: For Reverand Green

4. Brian Eno, Another Green World (1975)

• Brian Eno: The Big Ship

5. Fleet Foxes, s/t (2008)
See also my original review.

6. Fiery Furnaces, Widow City (2007)

• Fiery Furnaces: The Philadelphia Grand Jury

7. Monks, Black Monk Time (1966)
See also this post featuring five videos from a Monks performance in '68.

8. The Lovin' Spoonful, Anthology (1965-69)

• The Lovin' Spoonful: Nashville Cats

9. The Ruby Suns, Sea Lion (2008)

• The Ruby Suns: There Are Birds

10. Vampire Weekend, s/t (2008)
See also this post, in which I lament the missed opportunity for New England synergy in pop culture.

11. Little Joy, s/t (2008)

12. United States of America, s/t (1968)

• The United States of America: I Won't Leave My Wooden Wife for You, Sugar

My Actual Favorite Record of the Year

I knew when I discovered Armchair Apocrypha last year that I’d found something special in Andrew Bird. This was an artist I wanted to savor. So I let my obsession with that album play out before I sought out another one of his records. It took about a year. By March of this year I felt I was ready to dive into another: Andrew Bird & the Mysterious Production of Eggs, from 2005. Like Armchair, it went on to become my most listened-to album of the year. Not only that, I was astonished to find a Bird album that was better than Armchair. Eggs is a masterpiece.

It’s a more melancholy album than Armchair. Although it has its moments of humor, it rarely gets as upbeat as the first half of that album. That turned out to be just fine for me: 2008 turned out to be melancholy year, to understate.

Part of why Eggs became so important to me, besides its more tangible qualities—great songs, stellar musicianship, etc.—is that it happened to enter my life just when I needed it to. I owned it for maybe one or two weeks before I was called to my childhood home to be with my dad for the last few weeks of his life. It was an ordeal, to say the least. a time of communal grief shared with aunts, uncles, sister, brother, wife, stepmother, mixed with a kind of simultaneous loneliness and introversion that can’t be articulated. Music, as with any other event in life, is there to be one’s psychological wallpaper. I’ve written about that already, the music I went to before, during, and after.

Eggs held a unique place at that time because it was mine. It wasn’t an album my entire family could find comfort in, like Graceland; it wasn’t identifiably my dad’s, like the O Brother soundtrack or Dire Straits’ Brothers in Arms. It wasn’t even an album to be shared with my wife, despite the amount of time we’d later spend listening to Eggs for the rest of the year. At that point, only I knew the record. I would eject myself from the house occasionally, off on a walk through my old neighborhood, sometimes venturing further from home than I’d intended. It was me, my headphones, and Andrew Bird. Because of Armchair, Eggs was familiar enough to embrace—to be embraced by—without reservation, yet strange enough that it gave my mind something to focus on. I had a conversation with Eggs for two or three weeks straight. We still talk sometimes.

Bird’s lyrics can be like a game, as you listen to how the sounds of the words melt into each other. “You took my hand and led me down to watch a papillon parade / and we let the kittens lick our hair and drink our chalky lemonade”—the words beg to be mouthed. The more familiar the songs become, the more meaning reveals itself—Bird is a wordsmith, not a gibberish peddler. In those early, difficult weeks of listening to the album, those meanings had yet to come through to me. Stray lines from each song wafted through my head, crystallizing into something that, combined with the wistful tone of so many of the songs, felt custom designed to my situation. “I was getting ready to be a threat,” Bird sings in the opening track, “Sovay”—as if to say that something had been cut short. The next song begins with a question posed to a panel of experts: “'Why are we alive?' / Here was their reply: / 'You’re what happens when two substances collide / When by all accounts you really should have died.'” That existential wonder manifests again in the gorgeous “Masterfade” as a child gazes into the sky “full of zeros and ones” before “you took my hand and said I shouldn’t be afraid.” The next song, “Opposite Day,” cries over and over, “Today was supposed to be just another day”—a cry I repeated to myself, attaching my own moribund meaning, over and over. Throughout the album there was a lyric or musical motif (“Sovay,” “Measuring Cups,” “The Naming of Things”) that seemed to comfort or commiserate.

Of course, the album in fact was not that literal. If anything it is an album about adolescence, not death. For a son watching is father die over a period of a few weeks, an album about adolescence presses the emotional buttons better than anything else. At any rate Eggs is not that sad of a record. It’s certainly not a stereotypical wallowing record. And that’s just it: Eggs helped me not wallow (not too deeply, at least). As melancholy as it could be in some places, it was also quite optimistic in others, if not downright humorous. That might be why it has managed to become more than just the soundtrack to one of my life’s lowest points. My personal story aside, it is an undeniably outstanding album, perfect from beginning to end. In Pitchfork parlance, this is a 10.0.

As I’ve been saying in a few posts here and there, I think 2008 turned out to be noteworthy for a lot of albums—sure, they’re good—that sit pretty comfortably inside larger trends of the last few years. I’m thankful for Andrew Bird, whether last year, 2005, this year, or next (Noble Beast comes out in a matter of weeks), because he is truly an individual voice in music right now. His strengths—lyricism, composition, musicianship, whistling!—are singularly his own. He’s got at least two stellar records to his name already (I’ll let you know when I get to the rest), and likely one more to come in less than a month. Happily, almost a year since I bought Eggs. I think I’m ready for it.

• Andrew Bird, Masterfade

My Listening Year: Blind Spot Edition

In 2007 my blind spot interests were fairly monogamous: my love of the Byrds morphed into a fascination with the Laurel Canyon scene, opening basically into a lot of 60s and 70s folk and rock. (Also, Elvis Costello.) That interest continued in 2008, though moving into a more country-rock direction—the Lovin' Spoonful's Anthology, for instance, was on of my favorite records of the year. I didn't listen to it a lot on its own, but nearly every track made its way into one iTunes playlist or another. I need to start picking up their proper full lengths.

• The Lovin' Spoonful: Me About You

Unlike last year, however, my interests diverged in a few directions in 2008. I started moving toward more experimental and/or less pop music: I resparked my interest in krautrock, finallybegan dipping my toes into contemporary composers, and enjoyed one or two more psychedelic albums. Toward the end of the year, mostly inspired by Michael Azerrad's book Our Band Could Be Your Life, I also filled in a few blanks from punk and early indie bands. (Also, Elvis Costello.)

I didn't have any major obsession-sparking experiences with my purchases this year, the way I did with Big Star's #1 Record and Elvis's Imperial Bedroom. Still, there were pleny of great finds. I finally filled in the gaping blind spot that was Brian Eno. Another Green World was partly what I expected and partly a total surprise--highlighting, if nothing else, how clueless I actually was about why Eno is so great. I knew he was an ambient pioneer, but I sorely underestimated him as a pop auteur. This was reinforced when I picked up Before and After Science, which sounds like a proto-Talking Heads record.

• Brian Eno: I'll Come Running (from Another Green World)

My understanding of krautrock, previously defined mostly by Can, one or two Neu! songs, and the vague "motorik" sense of the word as it applies to bands of the last decade, also came in for reconsideration. Neu!'s warm but desolate electronics, Amon Duul II's ramshod improv, and—best of all—Faust's brilliant deconstruction of rock have me eager to find more, to really get deeper inside this genre.

• Faust: It's a Rainy Day, Sunshine Girl (from So Far)

Part of that journey through krautrock led me to the Monks, who really aren't remotely kraut; they're garage, or proto-punk. Black Monk Time easily ranks as one of my favorite purchases of the year.

• Monks: Complications

One of my prized acquisitions of the year the United States of America's sole album, from 1968—an early example of rock incorporating electronica elements such as tape splicing and other studio-as-instrument techniques. Absolutely worth seeking out.

• The United States of America: The American Metaphysical Circus

It wasn't all experimental shit for me in 08, though. Les Paul & Mary Ford's Best of the Capitol Masters has fully ingratiated itself into numerous playlists in my iTunes. I have a soft spot for music from the 40s and 50s that evokes a real sense of G-rated optimism; Les Paul & Mary Ford fit right in alongside my Doris Day and Fred Astaire albums.

• Les Paul & Mary Ford: The World is Waiting for the Sunrise

I also continued to fill in holes for artists I've been developing a listening relationship with over the last couple of years: two albums each by Elvis Costello (Armed Forces and Get Happy!!), Neil Young (Everybody Knows This is Nowhere and Rust Never Sleeps), and David Bowie. The Bowies I picked up weren't too hot (the dreadful Young Americans and the good but not mindblowing Station to Station), but Costello and Young both were predictably terrific. 2009 will likely see more purchases of albums by all three of these guys, including albums that I know are among their best but which I've still never heard.

• Elvis Costello: Oliver's Army (from Armed Forces)

At the tail end of the year I went headlong into a punk and classic indie rock spell, picking up a bunch of never-heards by the Minutemen, Mission of Burma, and Buzzcocks along with a bunch of re-buys, returning to albums I sold many years ago on some destitute afternoon trying to pay rent and eat a burrito while I was in college. Mission of Burma is great—I've got Vs. on hold for a future eMusic purchase. And the Buzzcocks—one of those bands, like the Lovin' Spoonful, who I realize I've heard many times over the course of my life but never understood "this is the Buzzcocks." I was expecting something a little more snarly, a little more Sex Pistolsy, but I was pleased to find an album full of pop songs about love (okay, and also orgasms).

• Buzzcocks: Ever Fallen In Love?

Later today, my real favorite album of the year. Tomorrow, my official "top ten new-to-me albums discovered in 2008"—which will somehow manage to include still more albums I haven't even touched on this week so far.

My Listening Year: The Rest of the Best of 08

So here's the full list. Beyond the first two or three or four, don't take the ranking too seriously. 9 could be 5, 6 and 7 could swap, and 8 could be 9. And 10 is like a ninja; it could spring into action at any moment, wreaking havoc on the list.

1. Fleet Foxes, s/t

2. The Ruby Suns, Sea Lion

3. Vampire Weekend, s/t
Last time I wrote about Vampire Weekend—not counting my Gilmore Girls fan fiction—I advised that everyone stop reading about Vampire Weekend, stop writing about Vampire Weekend, and just listen to Vampire Weekend. Many months removed, it's sort of amusing to think about how riled everyone got about this record. Inflated issues of privilege or colonialism aside, Vampire Weekend is just a really fun album to sing along to, to dance to, to smile with. It's a pleasure from beginning to end. I do wonder if the boys will be able to find a subject matter for their next record that isn't New England coeds, but for the time being this is remains a wonderful, light, fun album.

• Vampire Weekend: The Kids Don't Stand A Chance

4. Little Joy, s/t
This is a late addition to the list—I've only had it for about three weeks. When the album came out it went right over my radar since it was marketed as a "Strokes side project"—three words that don't really generate much enthusiasm over here. Happily my wife took the time to listen. Now Little Joy has made itself nice and comfy around the house. We put it on while we cook, while we drive, while we read the paper, whatever. It's a relaxing, lighthearted record clearly made by a relaxed, lighthearted band. This short album is eleven simple songs that don't overstay their welcome—in the case of many, you wish they'd stay longer! These are pop songs made by friends looking for nothing more than the pleasure of each others' company.

• Little Joy: No One's Better Sake

5. Dr. Dog, Fate
Like Little Joy, Fate required someone intervening in my life and telling me I had to listen to it (in this case a good friend—one without a blog! crazy!—rather than my brilliant wife). It's such a rock record, so straightforward, so classic, so Beatlesy, so Bandy, so easily digestible indie-y. But six months since buying it, Fate has continued to grow on me. I originally thought it had two or three really fantastic songs and the rest good but not great. I'd go a month without listening to it, then I'd put it on again. I'd reconsider: like, four or five really fantastic songs and the rest good but not great. By now I'm up to about nine or ten really fantastic songs and the other three pretty good. By March this ought to be a masterpiece.

• Dr. Dog: Uncovering The Old

6. Beach House, Devotion
Devotion turned out to have more longevity than I originally expected it to. The same caveat still applies: you have to like the song this duo does, because they keep doing it over and over again. Maybe it just suited my mood this year, but I kept coming back. Victoria Legrand's voice is one of the best in indie rock at the moment, and Alex Scally does an exceptional job of adding just enough guitar to each track—coloring the song in without overtaking it. The whole of Devotion is like walking through a dense fog, with just enough light to lead you further in.

• Beach House: Home Again

7. Okkervil River, The Stand Ins
The Stand Ins was the third of three Okkervil albums I purchased this year, which really was a kind of overdose. If I could rank The Stage Names in this list, it would probably be number one—but that was 2007. This year's album is still really terrific, thanks mostly to three or four songs as good as anything Sheff has ever done—among them "Singer Songwriter," and "Pop Lie." It took a little distance from my Okkervil Obsession, however, to notice that the rest of The Stand Ins is solid, but not consistently top-notch. A more than worthy album, though I'll still take The Stage Names for the best and most cohesive album Sheff's done so far.

• Okkervil River: Pop Lie

8. Shearwater, Rook
I feel about Shearwater the way I feel about mushrooms: they are both delectable and detestable, awesome and awful, simultaneously. When I listen to Rook I hold my nose with one hand and make dramatic, swooping, Ronnie James Dio-like arm movements with the other. Yes, Rook can be overwrought at times, but it can also be captivating and powerful.

• Shearwater: Century Eyes

9. The Walkmen, You & Me
The nice thing about doing your end-of-year list in December is you get to read up on all the giddier bloggers' premature lists. I've had You & Me for about six days now, thanks to seeing it on a few different lists and checking out an mp3. Hearing "In the New Year" reminded me that I like the Walkmen. I dug Bows + Arrows when it came out a few years back but was scared off by all the tepid reviews for A Hundred Miles Off in 2006. After all, Bows + Arrows did demonstrate that the Walkmen had a specific sound they were going for; it could, conceivably, get old. That sound—a total absence of low end; the way the drummer seems to be hanging on by a thread; Hamilton Leithauser's disassociative lounge act—is still in place here, but that's okay. You & Me is far superior to Bows + Arrows. It's a more cohesive album, a more emotionally resonant album.

• The Walkmen: In The New Year

10. To Be Announced
Within days of posting my list last year, I discovered at least two albums that in retrospect belonged on the list. So, rather than toss on MGMT (which has four outstanding tracks—you've heard all of them—and a lot of okay songs) or some other album I'm lukewarm on just so I can round the list out, I'm going to leave this space open for now. I'll let you know if and when I fill it. 

My Listening Year: The Ruby Suns, Sea Lion

 
Using different criteria, you could as easily call the Ruby Suns’ Sea Lion my top album of 2008 as Fleet Foxes. I questioned in my Fleet Foxes post whether that album had actually broken into that nebulous group of permanent collection albums that are always on hand. Elis & Tom, Air’s first two albums, the Radio Dept.’s Lesser Matters, Tied & Tickled Trio’s Observing Systems—these are albums that, years after buying them, have yet to wear out their welcome. These are the albums you want to play when you’re getting ready to go out, when you’re tired from being out, when you’re writing or cooking or driving or working or just being.

Sea Lion, I already know, has made it into this category. Though the album never had the play-it-’til-you-puke period that Fleet Foxes and Vampire Weekend enjoyed, it’s nevertheless remained in consistent rotation for the last nine months. All these spins later, I still don’t feel like I’ve fully discovered everything it has to offer.

The best quality of Sea Lion is that it’s varied without sounding unnecessarily eclectic, Ryan McPhun has crafted ten songs that blend contemporary indie rock—yes, reverbed vocals and space-out ambient rock—with a dash of 80s new wave, 60s surf pop, tropicalia, and African rhythms. The end result is something not too dissimilar from, yet far more unique than, a lot of other indie du jour records out there right now. You guys can keep Deerhunter; I'll take the Ruby Suns.

It’s an atmospheric record, filled with dreamy vocal harmonies and sound effects that filter in and out of each track. But unlike, say, Person Pitch, Sea Lion isn’t content to sit in one place for too long. Just look at the first half of the record: opener “Blue Penguin” is a laconic song, moving at a turtle’s pace, followed by the Latin-influenced (with a tinge of Avery Island-era Neutral Milk Hotel) quick-strummed “Oh Mojave.” From there, “Tane Mahuta” gets fully into a Os Mutantes-like jam before segueing into the 80s-esque “There Are Birds” and finally falling into the structureless “It's Mwangi in Front of Me.” Yet the whole thing coheres. Vocal melodies in one song show up as musical motifs in another; songs melt into each other track by track. Sea Lion is a journey. It's easily the most underrated record of the year.

• The Ruby Suns: Kenya Dig It

My Listening Year: Fleet Foxes

Until this weekend, when I set out to remind myself of some of my favorite new releases of the year, I hadn't listened to Fleet Foxes for a while. I'd burned out. But that's because I listened to their debut intensely for about three months out of the year. I wonder—I can't guess—if I'll return to this album again and again in the future or if it will forever and always just remind me of 2008—that era of my life when my brilliant wife and I lived in West Hollywood, when we didn't have kids yet, back when I worked for a museum, that year we vacationed in Hawaii, the same year my dad passed away.

Did Fleet Foxes crack that permanent rotation barrier the way 07 picks like Andrew Bird's Armchair Apocrypha or Jens Lekman's Night Falls Over Kortedala did? Hard to say just yet. But even if it doesn't, that doesn't take anything away from the band or the record. It's a powerful album that managed to wrap itself around my life like a blanket. What better purpose should music serve?

And it is a powerful record. The big knock from its dissenters—and there are many, including pretty much every single one of my favorite fellow bloggers—is that it is somehow free of substance. Assuming you first discount the fact that this band is incredibly skilled—those harmonies ain't easy, buddy—the critique still only carries any weight with two tracks. My suggestion to the detractors is to try playing the record straight through, without the instrumental "Heard them Stirring" (which sounds too similar to Pet Sounds' instrumental title track) or the mantra-like "Quiet Houses."

Fleet Foxes has an aesthetic that is hard to get past, like a woman wearing too much perfume. You have to at least like the scent—er, sound—before you'll consider getting closer. If you don't like the current trend in indie rock of 70s-influenced folk rock (see also: Midlake, Feist), or if you don't like the current trend of lead singers obscuring their voices with some effect (reverb, fuzz, autotune, whatever), then your patience is going to run out with Fleet Foxes, and fast. Let's face it: the band breaks no new ground, sonically speaking. You have to find their ingredients compelling—the influences the band wears on its sleeve have to be pleasing and not irritating—before you can spend the time enjoying the album's finer points. For many, the journey with Fleet Foxes ends here.

For those of us that are beguiled by the sound, we get the added bonus of discovering the record's more subtle charms. Robin Pecknold is, in fact, a great songwriter: you can hear it in the details. I love the way "Sun it Rises" and "Ragged Wood" are held together by a thin thread of song structure. I love the way Pecknold breaks his phrasing in "Your Protector":

Tell your bro-
ther to be good
Tell your sis-
ter not to go
Tell your mo-
ther not to wait
Tell your fa-
ther I was good

I love the imagery of "White Winter Hymnal," which feels like a nursery rhyme. The nostalgic lyrics are about nothing so innocent as children walking in winter. But like any good nursery rhyme, the song is deceptively violent—the sole verse ends with a child bleeding in the snow, turning it "red like strawberries in the summertime."  That last line makes the song borderline psychopathic: the narrator is an adult, watching over the children to ensure they don't hurt themselves. When one child does, the injury reminds the adult of another, faraway innocent season. Hey asshole—call 911! It reminds me of the "oh well" tone of the last line of "Rock-a-bye Baby."

I love the structure of the album's closer, "Oliver James": the first verse is a capella; the second finds Pecknold's acoustic guitar harmonizing with his vocal melody; then the final chorus returns to a capella. I know it's a small detail, but I love that the guitar is playing a harmony to the vocal rather than simply doubling the melody as so many indie guitarists do (off the top of my head: Elliott Smith, Death Cab, the Shins, Deerhunter, Nirvana).

I could go on. Fleet Foxes, if you let it, is full of small, well-thought details. For that reason—added of course to the band simply sounding beautiful—it is an outstanding album. Add to that their phenomenal live show—even better than the album—which says to me that this is a band that can and will top itself. What a start, though.

• Fleet Foxes: Your Protector

Tomorrow, my #2 pick as well as the rest of my 08 favorites.

My Listening Year

There they are: the 89 albums I acquired in 2008 (up from 57 in 2007!). As you may or may not have surmised from this post (actually I think a lot of people missed my point), I enjoyed what indie rock had to offer in 08, but I didn't depend on it: almost exactly 50% of my purchases—46 albums—were musical blind spots. 24 albums acquired this year were 2008 releases; rounding things out, 12 albums were from 2007 and 7 were from 2000–06.

For the rest of the week I'll be highlighting my favorite albums of the year, kicking of with a few posts on 08 albums and then moving into the blind spots, and ending on my "real" top ten of the year—a list that throws release dates out the window. Come back in a little bit and I'll have my favorite 08 album of the year. Tomorrow I'll have my #2 and the rest of the list; I'll round the week out with thoughts on some of the older albums. Oh, the fun we're going to have.

Jut for the hell of it, here are a few more statistics about my listening habits this year.

• Number of bands for whom I bought two albums in 2008: 13
• Number of bands for whom I bought three albums in 2008: 1 (Okkervil River)
• Number of albums purchased, broken down by anal-compulsive iTunes genre tagging:

• Indie rock: 29
• Electronic: 9
• 70s Rock: 8
• Alternative: 7
• 60s Rock: 6
• Punk, Krautrock: 5 each
• Avant-Garde, Folk: 4 each
• Dinner Music, Classic Indie: 2 each
• Brasilia, Country, French, Garage, Psychedelic, R&B: 1 each

If you were to factor in the many one-off downloads I picked up all year long, the country and the 60s rock would both see a heavier representation of what's been occupying my headphones for much of 08. Next week will see a series of mixes dedicated to those songs, so stay tuned.

Come back in a couple hours and you'll see my favorite of the year. (Hint: it's way fucking boring.)

My Listening Hours: Looking Forward

Pitchfork has a pretty exhaustive list of what's coming down the pike in the next three months. Here are a handful that are piquing my interest in one way or another.

Margot & the Nuclear So & So's, Animal and Not Animal (Oct. 7)
Yeah, I just finished saying that Margot's only other album was a disappointment. Why do I hold out hope? For one, I think Richard Edwards is a good song-crafter, and the record sounds good; its flaw is in its delivery. That's something that could, conceivably, be fixed. Then I heard about the band's travails with their major label—such a 90s throwback narrative for a band that itself sounds a bit like a 90s throwback. Anyway, the little trick of releasing the album they "wanted" (Animal) on vinyl and digital only, while referring to the album endorsed by the label (Not Animal) as "a collection of songs our label likes"—what can I say, it appeals to me. My expectations are properly adjusted, but I am a little curious.

• Margot & the Nuclear So & So's, As Tall as Cliffs

The Little Ones, Morning Tide (Oct. 7)
The Little Ones' EP from earlier this year, Terry Tales and Fallen Gates, was good, though in truth it didn't really stick. If only because I so loved their first EP, I'm inclined to give them another shot. I know these guys are capable of a great pop record. We'll see if this is it or not.

• The Little Ones, Morning Tide

The Spinto Band, Moonwink (Oct. 7)
The Spinto Band were kind of like my Dr. Dog of two years ago—a totally straightforward indie rock band that I enjoyed probably more than they deserved. Mostly that was due to "Oh Mandy," one of the most perfectly executed pop songs of the last few years. The rest of Nice and Nicely Done didn't really measure up to that song, but I've held out hope that it was a sign of where they were going. "Pumpkins & Paisely" doesn't exactly bear that out, but hey, if there's even one more of the level of "Oh Mandy," then the record will be worth it.

• The Spinto Band, Pumpkins & Paisley

Secret Machines, s/t (Oct. 14)
I felt like some kind of junior high outcast in 2006, when everyone else was slobbering over TV on the Radio's mess of a record Return to Cookie Mountain and I was in the corner obsessing over Secret Machines' Ten Silver Drops. That album didn't get much critical praise. Since then, their guitarist quit and the band parted ways with their label. So, a lot of question marks surround their self-titled third album. Will they return to the more experimental structures of Now Here is Nowhere? How will a new guitarist replace Brandon Curtis' unique style? All I've heard thus far is "Atomic Heels," which is shiiiiiiiiity. Like, really disappointing. I do feel a certain kind of stubborn loyalty to the band, enough that I'll probably pick up the album.

• Secret Machines, Atomic Heels

Of Montreal, Skeletal Lamping (Oct. 21)
A lot of people thought Hissing Fauna was an ascension to the next level for Of Montreal. I thought it was a mixed bag, a noble effort but ultimately an ambitious failure. Ambition is no bad habit though. I do think Kevin Barnes is capable of a masterpiece. Hopefully Skeletal Lamping is it.

• Of Montreal, Nonpareil of Favor

School of Seven Bells, Alpinisms (Oct. 28)
Speaking of Brandon Curtis leaving Secret Machines, here's his new band. Based on this, the one song I've heard, School of Seven Bells at least seems to be more interesting than the current incarnation of Secret Machines. I'm not expecting a life changing album in Alpinisms, but I am curious.

• School of Seven Bells, Connjur

Beyond October, nothing much is really ringing my bell. How about you? What's on your radar? What's got you excited?

My Listening Hours: The Disappointments

When you pick up twenty-five albums in three months, it's inevitable that some percentage of them will disappoint, if not outright suck. For me, these six albums let me down, and/or have almost completely evaporated from my memory.

Most disappointing were My Morning Jacket and Pas/Cal, both albums I was looking forward to and had high hopes for. MMJ seemed to get slagged for taking too many risks on Evil Urges, but in fact it was all the risky songs—essentially, the first three or four tracks and the album closer—that succeeded for me;  everything in between was boring, trite, and in spots completely insipid. Evil Urges is easily the band's most uneven album to date. As for Pas/Cal, I think I summed it up in my review of the record. In short, they tried way too hard to be interesting, sacrificing nearly all of the enjoyment.

Tied & Tickled Trio's 2007 album Aelita was another record I'd been waiting on for a while. Their previous full-length, 2003's Observing Systems, has proven to have surprising longevity in my rotation. I find the group's seamless blend of electronica and jazz to outdo just about everyone else who I've heard attempt it. So why, after all these years, would they choose to remove all the jazz elements? There are no horns to speak of on Aelita, nor any noticeably acoustic instruments. The joke of the T&TT has always been that they are a septet, not a trio; here, they sound like a solo project. It's a mediocre electronica record.

Beck: I can't say much more than I already have about Modern Guilt. I'll just offer this: I've never counted myself a great fan of his—I like him, but I also don't typically give much of a shit about what he's up to—and I don't even really recall how this album made it into my household. I also don't recall the last time I listened to it. Trying to psyche myself up for his appearance at Hollywood Bowl last week, along with Spoon and MGMT, I put all three bands' albums in a playlist and hit shuffle. Every time something from Modern Guilt came on, I reflexively hit the skip button. (P.S.: his Bowl performance was fairly boring as well.)

Margot & the Nuclear So & So's: based on one outstanding song downloaded years ago, "Skeleton Key," I picked up this album which more often than not doesn't hold up against that track's quality. As I've said before about this record: it's all earnestness, no authenticity.

Finally, Coldplay. To tell the truth I didn't even really care about buying this album, so to call it a disappointment is unfair. Somehow, despite not caring about Coldplay since some time around A Rush of Blood to the Head, I still own all of their records. In Viva la Vida's case, my brilliant wife and I were vacationing in Hawaii, where we'd rented a convertible (for the record: Hawaii is sooo much better with a convertible). But we had no music and our only selection of CDs to choose from came from a slashing-its-music-section Starbucks. Viva la Vida it was. The only real standout is the title track. There are a couple other earworms (notably "Lost!"), but it is otherwise a pretty uninspired album. There were times, driving on the road to Hana, that I found myself wishing I had X+Y instead. So that's saying something.

My listening Hours: The Rest of July–September

So we come to "the rest." These are albums that aren't bad; in fact many of them are quite good. They just, for whatever reason, didn't force their way into that part of my brain that compelled me play them over and over and over. Nevertheless I still recommend everything here. Sometimes the albums in this category are slow burners, either melting into a bunch of my playlists or just consistently sneaking their way into rotation.

The Flatlanders, More a Legend Than a Band
Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings, 100 Days, 100 Nights
Perfect example of albums that I don't really crave in full but am still ingesting song by song through playlists and shuffles: the Flatlanders and Sharon Jones. Back in July I placed both in the "best" category; I haven't changed my feeling on the quality of the albums, but I will admit that their sameness makes me less inclined to keep putting them on. Each album contains maybe four songs that are really, utterly fantastic, and a lot of other songs that are good, solid, but less identifiable.

• The Flatlanders, Keeper of the Mountain
• Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings, When the Other Foot Drops, Uncle

R.E.M., Reckoning
Neil Young, Rust Never Sleeps
Likewise, here are two records that are great, but I find myself listening to them more when I just put on my "Everything by R.E.M." or "Everything by Neil Young" mixes. Until July, Reckoning had the distinction of being the only R.E.M. album I'd yet to hear in full, from beginning to end, despite knowing most of the songs from isolated circumstances and despite R.E.M. being among my favorite bands of all time. I have to admit that I had assumptions about how I'd feel about the record, based in part on how I felt about Murmur and Fables of the Reconstruction; that is, I'm less of a fan of the early stuff, mostly due to how it's produced and how willfully muddled the records are. (That's not to say I don't like it... I just have a pretty firm personal perspective on the band.)

Rust Never Sleeps also boasts/suffers from intentionally poor production: it was recorded as a live album, with the audience subsequently pulled out of the mix. Additionally, the first half of the record is Neil and his acoustic guitar, and the second half Neil and Crazy Horse rocking out. The first half fares a lot better; not only are the songs better, but they handle the production limitations better too. The rockers just aren't that enjoyable to listen to, especially in comparison with the clarity of the epic jams of Everybody Knows This is Nowhere, which I can't help but compare it to since I bought that one fairly recently too.

• R.E.M., (Don't Go Back to) Rockville
• Neil Young, Pocahontas

Amon Düül II, Yeti
Neu!, s/t
Like I said on Monday, I'm having a krautrock moment. And I think I'm especially having a krautrock moment because Amon Düül II was so unlike what I expected. There's nothing "motorik" about them; I don't think it would even occur to me to put them in the same genre as Neu! or Can if I were taking the Pepsi Challenge. While not entirely without structure, Yeti is very freeform, and not really influenced by minimalism at all, in the way those other bands are. It's much closer in spirit to psychedelia than what I previously understood krautrock to be. And that's a good thing: it makes me want to seek out more of their records, to hear a few more Can records which I've never gotten to, to finally pick up some Faust (which I just did, yesterday), La Dusseldorf, Harmonia, Cluster, and others. That's not to say that Yeti is a perfect album, though. At nearly seventy minutes, it loses all focus in the last third, mostly due to the eighteen-minute title track, an improvised jam with occasional howling vocals. Like any improvised exercise by any band with aspirations toward the epic, the song flits between genius and tedium. More reined-in songs, like "Eye Shaking King," are wonderful, though.

Neu!, meanwhile, are the other end of the spectrum. Crisp, spacious, repetitive. I bought Neu! 75 a few months ago—and I liked it—but I like this more. I long had an impression of what Neu! was supposed to sound like, and Neu! 75 wasn't really it; this is. Neu! 2 is on my immediate horizon.

• Amon Düül II, Eye Shaking King
• Neu!, Weissensee

Okkervil River, Black Sheep Boy
By now, I've exhausted myself as far as writing about Okkervil River goes. Newsflash: I like this band. Double-newsflash: I like the slow songs less than the fast songs. News analysis: The ratio of slow songs to fast songs on Black Sheep Boy (and the Appendix) is lower than on the later two albums, therefore I enjoy this one somewhat less. That said, "Black" may be the best song the band has ever done. Top two or three, at least.

• Okkervil River, Black

Spoon, Girls Can Tell
Girls Can Tell was one of two Spoon albums I'd yet to pick up (the other is the recent Telephono reissue). I've heard others describe this as the acme of the band's output. It's a great record, but either it hasn't sunk in enough with me or I've just heard too many other Spoon albums prior to this one for it to feel revelatory. Me, I'll take Kill the Moonlight and Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga before this one. Of course, when you're talking Spoon, "better" and "worse" is all a matter of degree. These guys are like peanut butter to me—I'll take 'em any way you wanna give 'em to me; I know they'll be good.

• Spoon, The Fitted Shirt

Air France, On Trade Winds
Nancy Sinatra & Lee Hazlewood, Nancy & Lee
Both of these albums, while good, pretty much slipped right past me. I devoted very little time to listening to them, though when I did put them on I enjoyed them. Hey, you pick up the equivalent of a new album every three days, some of those albums are going to get lost in the shuffle. On Trade Winds is just four songs, adding up to less than half an hour; every time I put it on it was over before I started paying attention. I had a few songs from Nancy & Lee via Nancy's greatest hits album and a few stray downloads; from those I was expecting something a little darker—"Some Velvet Morning," for instance, is so creepy good—but a lot of the record is kinda goofy. That's not a bad thing, just not what I was expecting. I think the fact that it didn't match up to what I was expecting explains at least in part why I was less inclined to put it on. It is a good album, though, for what it is.

• Air France, Beach Party
• Nancy & Lee, Some Velvet Morning

Later today: the disappointments.

My Listening Hours: The Best of July–September

Fleet Foxes, s/t
I'll stick with what I said in my original review—namely that this is the only 2008 release I've heard so far that took my breath away from note one. One of my qualifiers for a great album is noting how many songs become "my favorite" the more I listen. Thus far I think I've declared four or five different tracks here as my favorite. Most recently, "He Doesn't Know Why."

I look forward to Fleet Foxes' next album, whenever it may come, for two reasons. Now that they've got J. Tillman in the band, I'm curious to see whether his songwriting has any influence. More importantly, I saw Fleet Foxes live a week or so back and they were phenomenal, in a way that clearly shows that they have become better than what is currently on record.

• Fleet Foxes,  He Doesn't Know Why

Brian Eno: Another Green World
Carrie Brownstein at Monitor Mix had a post a while back about playing a classic album for virgin ears, wondering whether it could hold up on its own merits, cannonization aside. her example was Patti Smith's Horses, but she could just have easily used Another Green World as her example. Eno is someone I'm shamefully unschooled in, considering my soft spot for the quietly abstract. He's surely a primary influence for plenty of artists in my collection, yet I've never heard any of his albums, other than an early Roxy Music album which I can't stomach. I always understood his solo material to be the starting point for ambient, so I was (pleasantly) surprised to hear how pop-oriented much of Another Green World is. It didn't start well, though: I was taken aback by "Sky Saw," which is almost comically dated, with its flanged-out guitars and fretless bass noodling. The fretless bass continues into the second track, too, so on first listen I was beginning to think all the uber-music nerds were playing a joke on me. Happily from there things get on track. All of the pop-oriented tracks—those with vocals, choruses, pop structures, like "St. Elmo's Fire" or "I'll Come Running"—are catchy yet complex. Then there are the instrumental tracks, which, aside from the first two, achieve a kind of timelessness. "The Big Ship" could have been produced last year. This is one of my favorite acquisitions of the year by a few yards.

• Brian Eno, The Big Ship

Okkervil River, The Stand Ins
2008 could arguably be described as my year of Okkervil River. The Stage Names, Black Sheep Boy, and now The Stand Ins (in that order) were all new to me this year. Taken together, Will Sheff and co. have occupied a substantial chunk of my listening hours (rivaled only by Andrew Bird, I'd guess). The Stage Names remains my favorite, but its companion holds its own pretty well. I'm especially pleased to see OR continue to bring the rock. The band's bouncy and propulsive rhythms complement Sheff's cascade of vivid lyrics better than the more morose, plodding ballads (compare highlights "Lost Coastline," "Singer Songwriter," and "Pop Lie" to the good-but-tiring "Blue Tulip" for evidence). Anyone can moan out a dramatic turn of phrase in a ballad, but it takes real skill to paint a nuanced lyrical portrait in a rocker, where so often simple chants about sex or nonsense suffice for all the rump shakers. Taking Sheff's many references to film as my cue: anyone can over-emote in their Oscar Monologue, but the true talent lies in sharp satire.

• Okkervil River, Pop Lie

Dr. Dog, Fate
I wasn't expecting much from Dr. Dog. For one, how much stock can you put in a band dumb enough to call themselves Dr. Dog? Too, my brilliant wife downloaded a sampling of tracks from all their early albums, most of which I found workmanlike at best. But upon the urging of a friend who couldn't stop listening to Fate, I took a chance. Though I still wouldn't take the "workmanlike" tag away from them completely—it's straightforward indie rock no matter how you slice it—I nevertheless grant big points to a band that has a true sense of craft when it comes to pop songs. Just about everything here, especially in the first half, is a total earworm, not to mention played with confidence by all members. The second half gets to feel a little samey—it could probably have lost at least two songs and been a stronger record for it—but then again the more I listen to it the more some of the later tracks reveal their quality. One more thing in Dr. Dog's defense: the Beatles comparisons made in nearly every mention of the band I've come across have got to stop. Yes, you can hear a little late-period Beatles in their songs, but the band is hardly ripping them off wholesale. I hear the Band in there too, not to mention the singer's voice resembles Wayne Coyne's more than anyone from the 60s, never mind Lennon or McCartney. They're contemporary indie more than they are some kind of throwback band.

• Dr. Dog, The Breeze

Holy Fuck, LP
Nearly two-thirds of the way into 2008, it is really dawning on my how great of year 2007 truly was for music. By the close of last year, I already had a top ten list I was pretty confident about. By the spring of this year I'd picked up a few more albums—The Stage Names, Strawberry Jam, and others—that would've placed high on that list as well. Still, I figured my 2007 purchases would taper off by April or so, but they didn't: I added Fiery Furnaces' Widow City to my list some time in May. Now, Holy Fuck. This album gets off to a so-so start—the music can feel a little faceless, so it really needs a strong melody or an unbreakable backbone to rise above Workout Mix caliber. Once "Lovely Allen" kicks in, segueing fluidly into album highlight "The Pulse," the entire rest of the record quite simply kicks ass.

• Holy Fuck, The Pulse

Four Tet, Ringer
After a Fridge reunion and three records with Steve Reid, I was beginning to wonder if Kieren Hebden was ever going to return to his Four Tet moniker. Looks like he has, if only for a quick four-song EP. Don't let the name on the album cover fool you, though: Ringer is a departure from Hebden's previous work. Most of the songs here remind me more of Orbital than Four Tet. That's not a bad thing by any means, unless the incessant 4/4 beat drives you up the wall. At thirty minutes, it doesn't get to me. In fact, it's encouraging to hear Hebden continue to branch out.

• Four Tet, Ribbons

MGMT, Oracular Spectacular
My love for MGMT has waned slightly since the last time I talked about them, mostly due to overexposure and their pitiful live show, which I caught when they opened for Beck and Spoon at Hollywood Bowl. Putting that aside, though, Oracular Spectacular is still a solid album and still great fun.

• MGMT, Weekend Wars
  

Philip Glass, Solo Piano
Steve Reich, Different Trains
This year I've begun to pick up more and more contemporary composers, finally wading a little deeper into a pool which I'd previously only dipped a toe or two. Earlier this year I picked up Glassworks, which I enjoyed immensely (though I know there is a lot out there more ambitious in intent). I like Solo Piano for the same reason: it's relaxing, it's not a single hour-long piece (so I don't feel obligated to concentrate on it from beginning to end when I put it on). I wouldn't go so far as to call it background music, though I do default into a relaxed mood whenever I put it on.

Different Trains is another beast, though. Far from relaxing, I've actually found it to be a great workout album! About thirty minutes long, steady and repetitive rhythm, and a narrative arc to keep you engaged as you go. As for the composition itself, the strings follow melodies dictated by voice samples of people talking about trains—first about travel in the U.S., then morphing into discussions of trains used during the Holocaust. It's affecting, if heavy-handed. I found it quite powerful on first listen, and still feel that power (though slightly less so) with repeated listens. Like a movie with tough subject matter, I can't say I'll reach for it over and over—unless I'm on a treadmill!

• Philip Glass, Metamorphosis One
• Steve Reich, Different Trains I: America - Before the War

Later this week, the rest and the worst of the last three months.

My Listening Hours: July–September

 

I thought for a second there I was going to start doing these My Listening Hours posts monthly instead of quarterly, since they're so gargantuan. Well, I only managed to get through July before realizing that just wasn't going to work. Aside from it being more work rather than less, I think it also doesn't give the albums proper time to sink in. So, back to quarterly.

I acquired twenty-five albums in the last three months, thanks to the local library, eMusic, and Amoeba. Nine albums were from 2008; three from 2007; four more from the last few years; and nine musical blind spots. A fairly even ratio. If anything really defined the last few months for me, I'd say it was a move toward more instrumental music and a move away, for the time being at least, from all the country and Laurel Canyon-y stuff I've been listening to for most of this year and last. Nine of the albums here are mostly or entirely instrumental. Related, I think I'm re-entering a krautrock phase. I flirted with krautrock back when I was in college—when Tortoise and Stereolab were everywhere and the genre was being namedropped in every zine. But really "flirting" meant getting into Can. I never could find any Neu! records at the time, nor Amon Düül; I was always a little hesitant with Faust for some reason, and I was flat-out unaware of most everything beyond that. Enter emusic in 2008: a lot of this stuff is available there, so I'm restarting the journey down that road. You'll be seeing more of these albums enter my sphere in the future.

But I digress. Come back in a few and I'll begin my rundown of the last three months, starting with my favorite acquisitions.

Summer Soundtrack

Every album I listened to, week by week, since June. Stay tuned next week: lots more thoughts on everything I've been listening to in the last few months.
 

Recent Awesome Downloads

God, looking down my recent posts list, it's a little sad. Six weeks nothing but those soundtrack posts. And August came and went without a My Listening Hours post, which back in July I said would start coming monthly instead of quarterly. Well, I'm rethinking that. I'm rethinking a lot of things. I think I'm spreading myself too thin, with the many blogs thing (not ready to kill anything yet, though). Related, I think I've fooled myself into thinking only a certain kind of post belongs on pgwp. Well, that's all gonna change, I think. Though the last thing you should ever believe is a blogger making promises. Something between the gargantuan multi-part posts here and the no-thought-required posts at I&A will start happening in these parts, soon. This week maybe. Meantime, here are some of my favorite downloads of the last 30 days. Just press play on the media player below and let the mix run while you go about your important business and/or time-wasting.

• Jose Gonzalez, How Low
  Here's yet another album from last year I sorely need to get. I've downloaded probably half of it as I've come across mp3s in the last ten months or so, and it's all excellent. Hearing this one, though, I've finally kicked In Our Nature to the top of my priority list.
• Benji Hughes, Waiting for an Invitation
  Hughes owes a lot to Beck for his slacker delivery and indie rock/mainstream pop–straddling sound. I've heard a few songs from his double-album debut and most of them are good but not essential. I do like this one a lot though, as well as the first song I heard by him (don't even know the title!).
• The Eloise Trio, Island Woman
  My brilliant wife brought this into our collection when she went on a calypso spree right before our trip to Hawaii. I don't know much about the Eloise Trio but every track we have is as good as this one.
• Fugiya & Miyagi, Knickerbocker
  I'll say this first: I love this song. I can't stop singing it to myself. I'm definitely interested in hearing Lightbulbs when it comes out (or did it come out already?). But—I don't know how I'll feel about hearing a full length by F&M. They need to be more than krautrock impersonators.
• Gene Clark & the Gosdin Brothers, Keep on Pushin'
• Hearts & Flowers, Try for the Sun
  I made a gargantuan iTunes playlist—nearly 800 songs—modestly called the "Awesome Mix"; it's all five-star songs that are hopelessly fun and impossible not to sing along with and enjoy. It's perfect. Well, I think it's perfect. My brilliant wife loves about 90% of it, but she complained that I put too many band in there that sound like the Byrds but aren't the Byrds. Tough shit for her: I just added two more tracks to the mix.
• Pete and the Pirates, Ill Love
• Joel Alme, The Seven Islands
  Finally, a couple more contemporary indie rockers. The Joel Alme track in particular is really sticking with me, though maybe it's just more Hawaiian vacation glow. Assuming there are seven islands making up Hawaii and that's what he's singing with. Don't tell me if I'm wrong.

My Listening Month: Favorite Downloads of July

• Hank Williams, Long Gone Lonesome Blues (1952) [via Setting the Woods on Fire]
  Why oh why did I resist Hank Williams for so long? Probably it was Hank Williams Jr. and Hank III’s fault. But wow is the OG insanely fantastic. Thank God Setting the Woods on Fire insists on preaching the gospel of Hank. I finally listened. This one is the earworm of the month.
• Buck Owens, I've Got a Tiger by the Tail (1964) [via Setting the Woods on Fire]
  I have got to get me a full Buck Owens album. This is the third or fourth Owens tune I’ve come across in the last couple of months and they have all been huge fun.
• Gilberto Gil, O Canto da Ema (1972) [via Hype Machine]
  My brilliant wife and I saw Gil at the Hollywood Bowl a few weeks ago, with Devendra Banhart opening. We were really ready to be blown away by Gil, but unfortunately he’s pretty much become smoothed out world music. The sound was pristine and the players were technically flawless, but there was no edge to any of it. Nothing like the outstanding work he was doing on record in the 60s and 70s.
• Desmond Dekker, Beautiful & Dangerous (1969) [via Snuhthing/Anything]
  See above about Buck Owens; repeat with Desmond Dekker. Anytime you see early (late 60s/early 70s) Desmond Dekker, grab it.
• Bob Wills & His Texas Playboys, That's What I Like About the South (1973) [via Setting the Woods on Fire]
  My favorite thing about this song is the fact that there is a hype man on a country tune. Did Flava Flav and Chuck D steal their schtick from Bob Wills?
• The Limeliters, Take My True Love by the Hand (1960) [no idea where this came from]
  Not a lot to say about this one other than that I think it’s lovely and innocent and just about perfect.
• Buffalo Springfield, Expecting to Fly (1967) [no idea where this came from]
  I bought the first Buffalo Springfield album a few months ago and liked it, though I’ve yet to feel compelled to buy up the rest of their small catalog. Hearing this Neil Young-penned track from their second album though—wow. I need to get this right away. Indie kids who think all the reverbed-out harmonizing bands of now are doing something new: sorry, Neil did it first.
• Holy Fuck, They're Going to Take My Thumbs (2007) [via This Recording]
  I’ve yet to pick up a full album by these guys, but everything I’ve heard has been pretty excellent.
• Spiritualized, Borrowed Your Gun (2008) [via This Recording]
  Haven’t heard all of Songs in A&E yet, though what I’ve heard thus far has been a little spotty. This is one of the better tracks I’ve heard yet.
• JP Haynie, Wyoming (2008)
  I don’t know much about Haynie. Friend and frequent commenter Jeremy just emailed me a few tracks and said this is what was occupying his ears. I believe Haynie is just toiling away in a bedroom somewhere without a record label, so if any of you bloggers out there want to prove your power of breaking an artist without the aid of some publicist emailing you a press release, throw a little support Haynie’s way. Really simple but heartfelt folk, free of trend-hopping. It’s been a while since I’ve heard someone new doing something so pure and free of pretense. More here.

My Listening Month: July

For the last couple years I've been doing these My Listening Hours posts every three months, which seemed like a good amount of time to let albums fully digest. But the last round, with twentysomething albums to go over, was far too time-consuming a post. When I saw I'd already picked up nine albums this month—and I subscribed to eMusic, so that number is going to stay consistently high—I decided to try doing this monthly instead. I may still do a quarterly report as well, as some albums may rise or lower in my esteem with time. Usually I break these posts into a week's worth of posts, but let's just get right to it.

(Don't forget that you can use the media player down in the lower left corner—just press play once and all the mp3s on this blog will automatically start playing in a row, like a mixtape.)

In the first six months of the year I only picked up a handful of actual 2008 releases; I think that trend is going to change going forward, if only because it seems like a lot of great albums are slated to come once the fall rolls around. This month, five of my nine purchases were 2008 releases; one from 2007; two from the last few years; and one from 1972 (though not released until the '90s). Here's how things broke down:

The Best

Fleet Foxes, s/t
This is definitely the highlight of the month, and as I said before, one of the best of the year. A few songs have diminished slightly since my original review—behind the lush harmonies, “Quiet Houses” lacks substance—but the strong songs are only burrowing further into my brain.

• Fleet Foxes, Ragged Wood

The Flatlanders, More a Legend Than a Band
Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings, 100 Days, 100 Nights
Both of these albums simultaneously thrive and suffer for the same reason: beginning to end, they’re just about perfectly executed, if wed to a template. For the Flatlanders, it’s rootsy acoustic numbers with Jimmie Dale Gilmore’s near-warbly vocals and Butch Hancock’s lovely harmonies, and a little singing saw thrown in for good measure; for Jones, it’s classic, throwback soul, with kicking horns, a fantastic rhythm section, and Jones pushing and pulling the Dap-Kings in every direction as a commanding frontwoman should. In both cases, the quality of each individual song is way up there, though they begin to blend together by the middle of the records. A few songs rise above the others as truly outstanding, while the rest are merely… really fucking good.

• The Flatlanders, Keeper of the Mountain
• Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings, When the Other Foot Drops, Uncle

MGMT, Oracular Spectacular
As is pretty obvious to anyone who reads this blog regularly, in the  last couple years my head has been drawn mostly to country, 60s and 70s rock, and new stuff that... sounds like country or 60s and 70s rock. But my brilliant wife isn't exactly traveling down that road with me. She keeps buying/downloading this... what is called, dance music? "Blog house," I heard someone call it recently? Tough Alliance, Hot Chip, Crystal Castles, Air France... it's all pretty good but just not what I'm digging right now. So then MGMT comes along. "Time to Pretend" and "Kids" have been all over the blogs and local radio; I like them both a lot—I think the lyrics to "Time to Pretend" are hilarious and genius (favorite line: "The models will have babies / we'll get a divorce / find some more models / everything must run its course"). But I was really expecting the rest of the album to lag well behind the singles. To my delight, the album is more varied and more interesting than I'd imagined. It's part Bowie, part Flaming Lips; and the ratio of dance beats to rock instrumentation is well balanced. I was surprised to see just how often I wanted to put this album on.

• MGMT, Weekend Wars

Okkervil River, Black Sheep Boy
It took me a long time to get my engine started with Okkervil River. When Black Sheep Boy came out in 2005 it got nothing but raves, but whenever I heard a track from it I thought it was good but not mindblowing. So I never bought the album. After falling in sloppy love with The Stage Names, though, I went back to Black Sheep Boy. Listening to this album has made me realize how much more I like Will Sheff's songs when he goes for the upbeat tracks—"Unless it's Kicks" and "The Plus Ones" from The Stage Names, "The Latest Toughs" and especially "Black" on this album. When Sheff picks up the pace, his songs get into this real driving, full-momentum rhythm. I told my wife I needed to compile an Okkervil River workout mix, which she thought sounded like the most hilarious thing ever—but I made it and it works! Sheff's high-energy songs don't depend on their chorus the way a typical pop song does; they thrive on the lyrics cascading out of his mouth, and that makes for a real ride. As for his slower songs, they're not bad and are often outstanding, but there's something more predictable about the ballads; the rockers feel like rarer animals.

...Or I’d call, some black midnight,
fuck up his new life where they don’t know what he did,
tell his brand-new wife and his second kid.
And I tell you, like before,
You should wreck his life the way that he wrecked yours
You want no part of his life anymore.

Heavy!

• Okkervil River, Black

The Rest

Margot & the Nuclear So & So’s, The Dust of Retreat
After putting off purchase of this album for two years, I finally decided to pick it up, partly in anticipation of the new Margot album coming out later this year. I downloaded "Skeleton Key" back when this album first came out and was mildly put off by it because of a Gin Blossomy undercurrent to the sound. But two years later I still play that song all the time. Hearing the whole album, my suspicions turned out to be correct: The Dust of Retreat is chock-a-block with mid/late-90s radio rockisms. There are bright spots, but mostly the album is indie MOR; I can see why they got picked up by a major for the next album. I like a lot of the arrangements and melodies here, but Richard Edwards's delivery is all earnestness, no authenticity. Overall this is an album that has 99% of the ingredients I like in a good songwriter-pop record, but it's missing that rare, magical 1% that would really thrill me. I like this enough that I'm curious to hear the new one—and I'll listen to it this year, even!—but I don't feel the urge to return to Dust.

• Margot & the Nuclear So & So's, Talking in Code

Air France, On Trade Winds
At three songs plus an introduction, On Trade Winds barely counts as a release; it’s less an EP than a maxi-single. The four track pass you right by before you realize you put it on. It’s airy electronica, vaguely (sometimes shamefully) reminding me of my raver moment somewhere around 1996. Anyway, it’s okay. Recommended if you like fellow Swedes the Tough Alliance, whom I was similarly ambivalent about.

• Air France, Beach Party

Beck, Modern Guilt
My opinion of this album hasn’t really changed since my review. I don’t think poorly of the album, nor do I feel compelled to continue listening to it.

• Beck, Modern Guilt

My Morning Jacket, Evil Urges
I have a My Morning Jacket playlist set up in iTunes that collects all my four- and five-star favorites from each of their five albums. Six of the thirteen tracks from Evil Urges made their way into that playlist, which pretty much sums up how I feel about the album. While there are a few really strong points, the overall album becomes a less and less pleasurable listening experience as time goes on.

• My Morning Jacket, Touch Me, I'm Going to Scream pt. 1

And that's my month in albums. Come back tomorrow and I'll have ten of my favorite finds on the blogs in the last month.

Favorite Downloads, April–June

I'll wrap the week up with some of my favorite songs discovered (or re-discovered, in a couple cases) via rampant downloading in the last three months. As you may know I also began contributing to Star Maker Machine recently, and not only do four of the eleven tracks below come from SMM, but another four come from my fellow contributors' own blogs. Apparently my current tastes are being shaped by an elite group.

• The Hollies, Carrie-Anne (from Epic Anthology: From the Original  Master Tapes!, 1967) [via Star Maker Machine]
  The chorus is my earworm of the year. It plays on perpetual loop in my head all day long. 
• Silver Apples, Lovefingers (from Silver Apples, 1968) [via The Rising Storm]
  The Silver Apples are one of those groups that I've had opportunities hear at various periods in my life and I just... didn't. So, the kicking myself thing has begun. This shit is brilliant, all the more so for coming from '68. Here I'm saying the United States of America were ahead of their time? Check the Silver Apples.  
• Annuals, Sore (from Wet Zoo, 2008) [via Speed of Dark]
  The reverbed acoustic, the strings, the emo vocals in the second verse: there is a lot about this song that is transparently calculated to push some emotional buttons. But what can I say? It came along at a time when I was susceptible to having my buttons pushed.
• Them, I Can Only Give You Everything (from Them Again, 1966) [via Star Maker Machine]
  I feel like someone snuck vegetables into my dinner: I've finally found a way to take Van Morrisson!
• John Hartford, Back in the Goodle Days (from Aereo-Plain, 1971) [via Setting the Woods on Fire]
  I mentioned a month or so back that I was hitting a country music phase, and this just scratches the surface of all the twangy tunes I've downloaded in the last few months. I just love the easy nature of this one.  
• Michael Nesmith, Roll with the Flow (from And the Hits Just Keep On Comin', 1972) [via Jesse Jarnow]
  After hearing Nesmith's name thrown around as someone who might be up my alley, I finally heard some of his solo material just recently. If the rest of it is like this then I'll be picking up a full length soon enough.
• The Flatlanders, Dallas (from More a Legend Than a Band, 1972) [via For the Sake of the Song]
  More country; it was a binge, I tell ya. Take a poke around FTSOTS and you might find yourself a couple more Flatlanders tunes.
• The Rosewood Thieves, Lonesome Road (from From the Decker House, 2006) [via Setting the Woods on Fire]
  Paul wrote up a rare twenty-first-century post for the Rosewood Thieves, and I'm glad he did. Apparently these guys are from New York, though they hardly sound like it. They also have an album out this year, which Paul points to (along with a couple other mp3s)—I just liked this one the most.
• Gerry and the Pacemakers, Ferry Cross the Mersey [via Star Maker Machine]
  I've heard this song a million times in my life—it's one of those hits that's just perpetually in the air—but I've never truly sat down and honed in on it. What a classic.
• Scott Walker, Mathilde (from Scott, 1967) [via Star Maker Machine]
  I love the cinematic drama of this song. It feels like something out a bawdy French musical—I can see the narrator careening through the bar, pointing to the bartender and slapping his fellow drunks on the back as he prepares to see his awful shrew of an ex, whom of course he loves desperately against his better judgement.
• Phil Ochs, I've Had Her (from Pleasures Of The Harbor, 1967) [via The Rising Storm]
  This song could probably be just as good (better?) at half the length, but whatever. It's the chorus that gets me: "I've had her, she's nothing." Has there ever been a crueler line written in a pop song?