Among the 62 albums I acquired in 2011, many were old albums I'm only now catching up on. Some stuck with me better than others. Here are my (unranked) favorite new-to-me albums of the year.
Harmonia: Musik von Harmonia and Cluster: Zuckerzeit
2011 was kind of a Clustery year for me. I acquired Zuckerzeit as well as an earlier Kluster album (terrible), two solo albums from Hans Joachim Roedelius (both not bad), and Harmonia's debut (Harmonia is Cluster + Neu's Michael Rother). Of them all, Musik von Harmonia and Zuckerzeit are far and away the best. Musik von Harmonia starts with the excellent "Watussi"—one of the group's best tracks and perhaps the clearest krautrock progenitor to modern techno outside of Kraftwerk. Overall that record is a seamless integration of the sounds of the two groups its members hailed from—"Sonneschein" and "Dino" contain the steady, train-like rhythms of Neu! while much of the rest of the record is immersed in the more meditative electronics Roedelius and Dieter Moebius traffic in with their main gig. Zuckerzeit was released the same year as Musik von Harmonia (1974), and I guess it shows: I bought both records on the same day and have found myself playing them back to back ever since.
Talk Talk: Laughing Stock
Talk Talk's last two albums (this, and before it, Spirit of Eden) are so perfectly realized that it's hard for me to find a way of even articulating what's so great about them. Both were reissued this year, along with Mark Hollis's one and only solo album (at the top of my to-buy list right now). I like Spirit of Eden just a hair more, but I think it has more to do with hearing it first—the two albums are of a piece. Both are spacious, emotive, tightly wound yet sounding loose and easy at the same time. No single song excels apart from the records as wholes—they are just ripples in a larger, perfectly evocative sea of music.
Harry Belafonte: Calypso
In sharp contrast to all the moody ambient I listened to this year, one of my very favorite acquisitions of 2011 was Harry Belafonte's debut album from 1956. "Day-O" is the recognizable hit, and perhaps therefore the least compelling song on the record due to its oversaturation of the last 65 years. It's really all about the rest of the record—folky numbers that, for the most part, lack the boisterousnous you might associate with Belafonte due to a song like "Jump in the Line" (not on this album). The songs are all jams, in any case, including the ones that have a socially conscious undertone. I return to this album over and over, the same way I do my Les Paul or Doris Day greatest hits, Elis & Tom, or anything by Harry Nilsson—not because it shares anything specific in common with those albums, but because it is a pure joy to listen to.
Caetano Veloso and Gal Costa: Domingo
Recorded before the tropicalia movement really took off, Domingo is a straightforward bossa nova album much more in line with Antonio Carlos Jobim and Elis Regina's Elis & Tom than with the more adventurous material Veloso and Costa would tackle just a year or so later. I give you that preamble so I can follow up with this: who cares? Domingo is a lovely album, perfect for quiet evenings and early mornings. No single song rises above or falls below the others—it's a consistently pleasurable 30 minutes of wonderful bossa nova.
Dillard & Clark: Through the Morning, Through the Night
A couple of years ago I picked up Dillard & Clark's 1968 debut, The Fantastic Expedition of Dillard & Clark, and it has stood up as one of my favorite albums ever since. Their one and only follow-up is quite good, though perhaps not quite as good as the first. The band feels less focused—maybe it's all the covers, or the addition of Doug Dillard's girlfriend, Donna Washburn, who takes lead vocals on a fine cover of "Rocky Top." Regardless, Gene Clark's songcraft, overlaid by Dillard's bluegrass wizardry, shines through.
Brian Eno: Ambient 1: Music for Airports
After finally getting into Brian Eno a few years ago and realizing I'd discovered an artist who I knew would have rewarding record after rewarding record, I made the decision to take it slow going deeper into his discography (and to try, more or less, to take it chronologically). Thus I've spent the last few years digging on his earlier rock albums (for what it's worth: Here Come the Warm Jets > Another Green World > Before and After Science >> Taking Tiger Mountain by Strategy). Just this month I finally bought my first ambient Eno album. Guess what: it's awesome. One more thing: I'm such an idiot for waiting until my 30s to get into Brian Eno.
Cat Stevens: Tea for the Tillerman
I wrestled with whether or not to count this as "new to me," since much of it was already familiar. Oh well—it's a great record. I talked more about it here.
As Cooper's second birthday looms, he's finally aged to the point where he has developed some bona fide opinions about music—or at least latched onto a few favorite songs. Being that this is a household that emphasizes songs the whole family can enjoy (while not wholly outlawing outright kids' music), the majority of the songs on this list are simply oldies for young'uns. These are the songs (especially of late) that Coop asks for by name, and/or can "sing" on request.
Honorable mentions:
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.)
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.
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.
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.
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 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.
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.
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.
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.
Ballad of Easy Rider was the Byrds’ eighth album, though released only four years after their first. It's shocking to really grasp how far they’d traveled in just four years! Not only was the band onto its fifth lineup iteration—Roger McGuinn being the sole original member—they had also progressed through nearly as many genres: folk rock, psychedelia, country.
Easy Rider was the second album in the Byrds’ “late” period, in which the band was made up of McGuinn, Clarence White, Gene Parsons, and John York. Their first foray was the (self-admitted) uneven Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde, which was hurriedly put together and saw the band aiming in too many musical directions—an especially interesting thing to note considering McGuinn wrote, co-wrote, or arranged seven of Dr. Byrds’ ten songs and was the sole lead singer (unlike every other Byrds album).
Easy Rider is a far superior record, perhaps due to the band’s return to the fundamentals of how the old Byrds functioned: everybody wrote, everybody sang, and Bob Dylan’s name pops up in the songwriting credits a couple times. Though McGuinn took lead vocals on many of the tracks, he only wrote one song (with a little help from Dylan)—the stellar title track. And while none of the new Byrds were as distinct songwriters as Gene Clark, David Crosby, or Chris Hillman—nor as extraordinary at harmonizing as Crosby or Hillman—they still brought strong material. The album’s second half turns into a straight-up country record highlighted by a string of great tunes: “There Must Be Someone I Can Turn To,” “Gunga Din”—both featuring drummer Gene Parsons’s smooth tenor up front—and McGuinn’s other standout track, a cover of Woody Guthrie's “Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos).”
It’s these two Parsons tracks that really announce that this is a “new” Byrds—not a bunch of charlatans merely trying to cash in on other people's legacy. Much the same as when Gram Parsons (no relation) joined for Sweetheart of the Rodeo, Gene's is a voice that does not sound like “the Byrds.” It’s too deep, too smooth, too serene. The Byrdsian harmonies are not there to cushion it; you wouldn’t know it was the Byrds if I didn’t tell you. When Gram joined up for Sweetheart, the resulting sound rubbed me the wrong way. Though I love the record, it doesn’t feel like a “Byrds” album to me. The country sound there feels more like a costume—“We’re country!”—rather than an influence they absorbed into their own aesthetic, as on the more subtly layered Notorious Byrd Brothers or some of Hillman’s contributions to Younger than Yesterday. Yet when Gene takes the lead on Easy Rider, it doesn’t bother me the same way. Perhaps it’s simply due to the fact that by now I’m used to the idea of someone coming into the band and making them sound entirely different.
Of course, with Hillman now out of the band and McGuinn the only original member left, there’s nothing to do but expect something entirely different! I wonder how this lineup’s critical legacy would have been received if they had shed the Byrds moniker and branded themselves something else. While you can hear a few connections to the Byrds of the past—it feels like a more natural follow up to The Notorious Byrd Brothers than the two records in between—they really are a whole other beast. The twelve-string is by now long absent, the harmonies are still there but they’re no longer the defining element, and Clarence White’s clean country picking is all over the record, shifting a dynamic of the band’s sound to a totally different place. It's funny to think that this album outsold both Notorious and Sweetheart, yet today gets lumped in with the "late, no good stuff" that anyone other than hardcore fans pass right over. It's actually a pretty terrific album.
It’s worth noting, too, that the bonus tracks on the reissue make it even better. I’m usually not a big fan of extras like live cuts, studio outtakes, etc. I like processing a record for what it was, for what the band wanted you to hear. Most bonus tracks are at best interesting to hear a couple times, at worst a lot of clutter that muddles an album’s greatness. On Easy Rider, though, I’m glad to have the alternate takes. The non-album versions of “Oil in My Lamp” and “Tulsa County” are both better than the versions that wound up on the official release. Had these versions gotten in, Easy Rider would have been a far more “country” album—and an excellent one at that!—which would have made the transition into the album’s second half, when Parsons makes his appearance, slightly less jarring. Also included is a great Jackson Browne cover, “Mae Jean Goes to Hollywood,” an instrumental that really shows off White’s virtuosic playing, and the country jam “Way Behind the Sun.” Had any of these tracks made it on instead of the cloying sea shanty “Jack Tarr the Sailor” or the Fifth Dimension-y “Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins” that awkwardly closes the album, Easy Rider might have been regarded as one of the all-time great Byrds albums, if not all-time great country albums.
A couple related posts: the Rising Storm just did its own Easy Rider post not too long ago, and here's the Easy Rider-era post from the Adios Lounge's exhaustive multi-part look at the career of Clarence White.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.'"
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
Later today: the disappointments.