Continuing today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right)*, we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
* Okay, maybe it will take a little longer.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
Joining:
25. Kurt Vile - Smoke Ring for my Halo (Matador)
24. Fountains of Wayne - Sky Full of Holes (Yep Roc)
23. Bass Drum of Death - GB City (Fat Possum)
22. Coathangers - Larceny and Old Lace (Suicide Squeeze)
21. Meg Baird - Seasons on Earth (Drag City)
20. White Fence - Is Growing Faith (Woodsist)
19. Dum Dum Girls - Only in Dreams (Sub Pop)
18. Steve Cropper - Dedicated (429 Records)
17. Thee Oh Sees - carrion crawler/the dream ep (In the Red)
16. Sonny and the Sunsets - Hit After Hit (Fat Possum)
15. Tom Waits - Bad as Me (Anti)
14. Laura Marling - A Creature I Don't Know (Ribbon)
13. Pete and the Pirates - One Thousand Pictures (Stolen Recordings/U.K.)
12. Jolie Holland - A Pint of Blood (Anti)
11. Wild Flag - s/t (Merge)
At No. 10, it's the Vaccines and What Did You Expect from the Vaccines (Columbia). Here's the Reverberations review from earlier this year:
Continuing today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right)*, we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
* Okay, maybe it will take a little longer.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
Joining:
25. Kurt Vile - Smoke Ring for my Halo (Matador)
24. Fountains of Wayne - Sky Full of Holes (Yep Roc)
23. Bass Drum of Death - GB City (Fat Possum)
22. Coathangers - Larceny and Old Lace (Suicide Squeeze)
21. Meg Baird - Seasons on Earth (Drag City)
20. White Fence - Is Growing Faith (Woodsist)
19. Dum Dum Girls - Only in Dreams (Sub Pop)
18. Steve Cropper - Dedicated (429 Records)
17. Thee Oh Sees - carrion crawler/the dream ep (In the Red)
16. Sonny and the Sunsets - Hit After Hit (Fat Possum)
15. Tom Waits - Bad as Me (Anti)
14. Laura Marling - A Creature I Don't Know (Ribbon)
13. Pete and the Pirates - One Thousand Pictures (Stolen Recordings/U.K.)
12. Jolie Holland - A Pint of Blood (Anti)
In a year of very good releases by women artists, here's one more (and it's not the end) - Wild Flag - s/t (Merge). The link is from REVERBERATIONS September review:
Continuing today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right)*, we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
* Okay, maybe it will take a little longer.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
Joining:
25. Kurt Vile - Smoke Ring for my Halo (Matador)
24. Fountains of Wayne - Sky Full of Holes (Yep Roc)
23. Bass Drum of Death - GB City (Fat Possum)
22. Coathangers - Larceny and Old Lace (Suicide Squeeze)
21. Meg Baird - Seasons on Earth (Drag City)
20. White Fence - Is Growing Faith (Woodsist)
19. Dum Dum Girls - Only in Dreams (Sub Pop)
18. Steve Cropper - Dedicated (429 Records)
17. Thee Oh Sees - carrion crawler/the dream ep (In the Red)
16. Sonny and the Sunsets - Hit After Hit (Fat Possum)
15. Tom Waits - Bad as Me (Anti)
14. Laura Marling - A Creature I Don't Know (Ribbon)
13. Pete and the Pirates - One Thousand Pictures (Stolen Recordings/U.K.)
A link to REVERBERATIONS review of Jolie Holland's excellent release Pint of Blood (Anti) from July of this year:
Continuing today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right)*, we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
* Okay, maybe it will take a little longer.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
Joining:
25. Kurt Vile - Smoke Ring for my Halo (Matador)
24. Fountains of Wayne - Sky Full of Holes (Yep Roc)
23. Bass Drum of Death - GB City (Fat Possum)
22. Coathangers - Larceny and Old Lace (Suicide Squeeze)
21. Meg Baird - Seasons on Earth (Drag City)
20. White Fence - Is Growing Faith (Woodsist)
19. Dum Dum Girls - Only in Dreams (Sub Pop)
18. Steve Cropper - Dedicated (429 Records)
17. Thee Oh Sees - carrion crawler/the dream ep (In the Red)
16. Sonny and the Sunsets - Hit After Hit (Fat Possum)
15. Tom Waits - Bad as Me (Anti)
14. Laura Marling - A Creature I Don't Know (Ribbon)
At No. 13 we have a release that never found U.S. release, but I found the British issue of Pete and the Pirates One Thousand Pictures on Stolen Recordings immensely entertaining.
Here's a link to the REVERBERATIONS review from June ...
Continuing today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right)*, we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
* Okay, maybe it will take a little longer.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
Joining:
25. Kurt Vile - Smoke Ring for my Halo (Matador)
24. Fountains of Wayne - Sky Full of Holes (Yep Roc)
23. Bass Drum of Death - GB City (Fat Possum)
22. Coathangers - Larceny and Old Lace (Suicide Squeeze)
21. Meg Baird - Seasons on Earth (Drag City)
20. White Fence - Is Growing Faith (Woodsist)
19. Dum Dum Girls - Only in Dreams (Sub Pop)
18. Steve Cropper - Dedicated (429 Records)
17. Thee Oh Sees - carrion crawler/the dream ep (In the Red)
16. Sonny and the Sunsets - Hit After Hit (Fat Possum)
15. Tom Waits - Bad as Me (Anti)
At No. 14, a new review of a tremendous record by Laura Marling called A Creature I Don't Know (Ribbon Records):
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In 2011, at age 21, Laura Marling released her third album. Take note of that, you slackers. They’re all pretty damn good, too. And her most recent collection A Creature I Don’t Know is exceptionally so.
Now, this isn’t going to be one of my more expansive reviews. It’s Christmas, for … sake. And at 6:27 I’m full of wine. But darn it anyway, I listened to Creature a lot over the last several weeks, since its release in September, and with special scrutiny in the last two days. You know it’s a good sign when such scrutiny is only rewarded with continued, even enhanced pleasure.
Creature, at various points, reminds of the following:
Van Morrison – Astral Weeks
Nick Drake – Five Leaves Left
PJ Harvey – Dry
The Waterboys – Fisherman’s Blues
And a whole bunch of shit by Joni Mitchell.
Well now, it’s that last that shocks and disturbs me. Sorta. I admire Ms. Mitchell’s talent, but I’m not a fan. But damn it anyway, Laura Marling is clearly touched by Joni; and Marling is great. Live and freakin’ learn. Some of the resemblance is in composition, some of it in their shared jazz affinity, but mostly it’s that break in a certain place in their range. Oh well, maybe I gotta go back and cut Mitchell some slack. Never the Eagles. That’s sacred territory, the Dude’s and mine.
Marling is associated with Brit-folk, but outside the prominent use of non-amplified instruments, there’s not a lot to it. Sure, she leans sensibly on the some of the Jansch/Renbourn sensitivity that pervades all of British nu-folk, but Marling has learned as much from Led Zeppelin as Bert, John and company. Think I’m kidding? You can hear it in the “Going to California” flow of “Sophia,” with its lyric that echoes Dylan’s “Fourth Time Around,” and on Marling’s Percy-esque phrasing on “Rest in the Bed,” a song also suffused with Jansch (and Paul Simon) guitar phrasings. The tune also features her flattest, most direct declaration of love, love that withstands challenge (“the sirens come, they always will).
Typically, in Marling’s world, love is more complicated thing. In “Night After Night,” it’s “driven by rage.” The most consistent theme/persona throughout Creature is that of the “beast.” Well, it’s not as heavy as the beast of Christian lore, but it’s a cousin. It makes its first appearance in the very first track. “The Muse” speaks of the singer’s “hunger for abuse.” The muse is love, the muse is artistic inspiration, the muse it everything that eats the soul. And Marling sings about it like some Alison Krauss of darkness as banjo plucks away against cello strains (part of the Drake connection). The beast and the banjo pop up again in “Salinas,” a John Steinbeck inspired song with a bluesy tinge and a lyric for fallen angels and heavenly aspirants.
The best laid plans of mice and men oft go ... whatever. My goal of ticking off the "Twenty-Five Faves" for 2011 on a clockwork, daily basis has been compromised. And boy, it's going to get more compromised. So be it. Life intervenes. Business, Art (others and my own),travel, family, all good ... all distracting from the task at hand. Plus, damn it, I found myself selecting plenty of records that I'd not reviewed previously, and feeling motivated/obligated to discuss them I found myself with w-o-r-k to do. Not complaining, mind. I love this stuff, but sometimes it gets pretty consuming. As does the life going on outside (and inside) all around me (to paraphrase his Bobness).
Some of the upcoming selections will require more, new reviews. Mostly though, once we hit the home stretch the selections will be things I've already covered. Easy.
Lists like this are silly. And I know it. Trying to create hierarchies of pleasure is fun sometimes, but if you think it means much, think again. What I enjoy about this is that crafting a list forces me to think about music I love and respect, music I want to share with my friends. The real difference between No. 8, say, and No. 23 may be jack-shit. So, it's all in fun, all intended primarily, if not solely, to stimulate curiosity and passion about music that moves me. If anything I write is provocative in that simple way I haven't wasted my time.
No. 14 will be posted on December 25th, because by end of Christmas day I will need a distraction from the joys and absurdities of family life in Mahwah, New Jersey.
Continuing today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right)*, we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
Joining:
25. Kurt Vile - Smoke Ring for my Halo (Matador) 24. Fountains of Wayne - Sky Full of Holes (Yep Roc) 23. Bass Drum of Death - GB City (Fat Possum) 22. Coathangers - Larceny and Old Lace (Suicide Squeeze) 21. Meg Baird - Seasons on Earth (Drag City)
20. White Fence - Is Growing Faith (Woodsist)
19. Dum Dum Girls - Only in Dreams (Sub Pop)
18. Steve Cropper - Dedicated (429 Records)
17. Thee Oh Sees - carrion crawler/the dream ep (In the Red)
16. Sonny and the Sunsets - Hit After Hit (Fat Possum)
Here's a brand spankin' new review of Tom Waits "Bad as Me" (Anti Records):
Tom Waits. When he’s good, he’s very good. When he’s … well, he’s never really bad, but sometimes he relies on shtick. Let’s face it; when your vocal persona is distinctive enough that it’s imitated (ripped off) for a television commercial it’s either preternatural or affect. Okay, it’s a little of both, but nobody’s born with that voice. And sometimes it serves him brilliantly, other times it’s sui generis, but empty. On Bad as Me, Waits first studio album since 2004’s Real Gone, and the first entirely successful collection since the excellent Mule Variations in 1998, Waits engages the full range of his vocal personae, intuitively matching them to the individual songs.
Waits’ career has certainly gone through phases. In his early years he was a bedraggled, barfly balladeer, long on equal parts cynicism and sentiment. By the Eighties he’d engaged his inner Captain Beefheart and Howlin’ Wolf. Not a bad move, given that vocally he was never going to be Tim Buckley. With Swordfish Trombones he took cues from Harry Partsch’s school-of-the-home-made-instrument, and his lyrics dropped some sentimentality in favor of noir. Waits moved into territory that sounded like Lord Buckley narrating Jim Thompson. And it worked. Leavened with a dash of commercial sensibility for Rain Dogs, he made an album that combined the best of his worlds. The introduction of Marc Ribot on guitar was pivotal to this slight shift. Ribot has remained a consistent collaborator, who has helped shape Waits music since the early Eighties. He remains a vital contributor to Bad as Me.
Continuing today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right)*, we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
Joining:
25. Kurt Vile - Smoke Ring for my Halo (Matador) 24. Fountains of Wayne - Sky Full of Holes (Yep Roc) 23. Bass Drum of Death - GB City (Fat Possum) 22. Coathangers - Larceny and Old Lace (Suicide Squeeze) 21. Meg Baird - Seasons on Earth (Drag City)
20. White Fence - Is Growing Faith (Woodsist)
19. Dum Dum Girls - Only in Dreams (Sub Pop)
18. Steve Cropper - Dedicated (429 Records)
17. Thee Oh Sees - carrion crawler/the dream ep (In the Red)
Here's a brand spankin' new look at Hit after Hit from Sonny Smith and the Sunsets (Fat Possum Records):
Sonny Smith writes songs. Lots of songs - by way of example, he wrote two-hundred for an art installation called 100 Records, all attributed to fictional artists, all deriving heavily from Fifties and Sixties pop, rock and rhythm ‘n’ blues sounds. His songs are flatly, frankly derivative, but with his retro-sensibility and easy, laconic vocal delivery he puts his own stamp on such idiomatic material. Nowhere is this exemplified better than on the new Sonny and the Sunsets release Hit after Hit.
Top 40-radio in the Sixties purveyed plenty of garbage, just as it does now. But not only was the overall quality of hit radio better in that halcyon era, but the sheer variety of styles and sounds was breathtaking. It’s hard for anyone younger than fifty-five to imagine a time when you might hear Count Five, the Who, Martha and the Vandellas and Buck Owens, all in one set, in between commercial breaks. Smith isn’t old enough to remember this himself. But he’s still nostalgic for it. Like many of his San Francisco garage-rock brethren he’s a rag picker, running a shop full of dusty treasures. Many of those peers assist on Hit after Hit, including John Dwyer from Thee Oh Sees and scene mainstay Kelley Stoltz, who plays drums on the album. It’s an insular, but cooperative crew, all of them somehow stuck on retro sounds, yet pushing the envelope of same.
Continuing today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right)*, we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
Today, at No. 17 we have the "carrion crawler/the dream ep" album from Thee Oh Sees. The review from REVERBERATIONS in November is linked here:
25. Kurt Vile - Smoke Ring for my Halo (Matador) 24. Fountains of Wayne - Sky Full of Holes (Yep Roc) 23. Bass Drum of Death - GB City (Fat Possum) 22. Coathangers - Larceny and Old Lace (Suicide Squeeze) 21. Meg Baird - Seasons on Earth (Drag City)
Continuing today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right), we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
Since Steve Cropper's Dedicated (429 Records)isn't an album I've reviewed previously, here's a new review:
That the 5 Royales have yet to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is silliness bordering on the shameful. Instead, they are principally remembered by true rhythm ‘n’ blues aficionados. Oh, people know their songs – “Dedicated to the One I Love,” covered by the Shirelles and the Mamas and Papas; “Think,” reworked by James Brown; “Tell the Truth” popularized by Ray Charles are but a few examples. And they were their songs; the majority of them composed by Lowman “Pete” Pauling, somewhat unusual for rhythm ‘n’ blues artists of their time. Not just a fine songwriter, Pauling was an innovative guitarist, whose seamless switching between steady, staccato rhythm comps and sharp blues leads was an inspiration to many younger players. Among them was Steve Cropper.
Continuing today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right), we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
Here's a link to my previous review of the Dum Dum Girls Only in Dreams:
25. Kurt Vile - Smoke Ring for my Halo (Matador) 24. Fountains of Wayne - Sky Full of Holes (Yep Roc) 23. Bass Drum of Death - GB City (Fat Possum) 22. Coathangers - Larceny and Old Lace (Suicide Squeeze) 21. Meg Baird - Seasons on Earth (Drag City)
Continuing today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right), we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
Here's a link to my previous review of White Fence's Is Growing Faith:
25. Kurt Vile - Smoke Ring for my Halo (Matador) 24. Fountains of Wayne - Sky Full of Holes (Yep Roc) 23. Bass Drum of Death - GB City (Fat Possum) 22. Coathangers - Larceny and Old Lace (Suicide Squeeze) 21. Meg Baird - Seasons on Earth (Drag City)
Fans of music bubbling up from the indie-folk underground first became acquainted with Meg Baird as primary vocalist for the Espers. The Philadelphia ensemble is one of those bands that critics twist themselves in knots trying to categorize. While their sources are traditional, they put their own distinct spin, just as some of their inspirations – The Incredible String Band, Fairport Convention and Pentangle - did in the late Sixties and early Seventies. Of course writers and listeners struggled then to categorize the music of those bands; and they didn’t even have psych-folk or freak-folk to throw around yet.
The Espers cover a lot of ground (psychedelia, shoegaze and Middle Eastern influences, as well as the full range of folk idioms). As a solo artist, Meg Baird steers a little narrower course on her new, second album Seasons on Earth. Conceptually, she betrays the sensibility of her generation when it comes to vocals and their place in the mix; where Joni Mitchell or other singers of her generation might have given pop prominence to vocals, Baird gives her guitar equal value. The results can vary from mesmerizing (it does lend a trance-like, live performance presence to these tracks) to maddening (sometimes it’s really hard to discern the lyrics).
Continuing today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right), we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
At No. 22 it's the Coathangers. Here's a link to my review of Larceny and Old Lace:
Continuing today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right), we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
This year, like most in recent memory, saw the release of several scraggly-ass garage-grunge-punk-pop records (hyphens, no charge) - new releases from mainstays like Ty Segall, newcomers like Hanni El Khatib, download only entries from fixtures such as Reigning Sound and King Khan (a sign, albeit an ironic one, of the times) – heck, the admittedly loosely construed genre even spew forth reissues and anthologies from the Reatards, Lost Sounds and the aforesaid Mr. Segall, a sure sign of, uh, maturity.
All of them were pretty good, but none resonated from bang one to final decay as records like Reigning Sounds’ Time Bomb High School or King Khan and BBQ Show’s debut had in years past. For me the best representatives of the idiom are those records that have an appeal that preaches beyond the converted. In 2011, one album has kept insinuating itself, despite my initial dismissal; that album is GB City the distortion-saturated opus from Oxford, Mississippi’s Bass Drum of Death on Fat Possum Records.
Continuing today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right), we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
Here's a link to my review of "Sky Full of Holes" by Fountains of Wayne:
Starting today, and culminating with REVERBERATIONS number one album of the year on December 31st (if my math is right), we’ll be counting down the top twenty-five records of 2011. I’m referring to this countdown as Twenty-five Faves because I have no pretenses about telling you what’s “best.” Sure, I think my taste is better than yours. But nobody died and made me Lester Bangs. And Lester could be arrogant, but I kind of think he would come down on the favorite side of the fave/best dichotomy. His criticism was nothing if not personal.
I've reviewed the majority of these selections. In the event that I have I'll simply recycle the original reviews, sometimes with a little new commentary. If it's a selection I haven't reviewed previously, I will dash off a new, brief, introductory review just for perspective.
My introduction to Kurt Vile was as Adam Granduciel’s chief cohort on Wagonwheel Blues a quietly mesmerizing album by Granduciel’s band War on Drugs. With lush guitar atmospheres that straddled genres and generations, Wagonwheel Blues had vocals that sounded like a mixture of Neil Young and Jason Pierce (Spaceman 3). The songs were good enough to emerge from the fog of the music, but sometimes you didn’t care if they did.
A broad critical consensus has emerged that 1978’s Some Girls was the last great Rolling Stones album. A case can be made. Sure, the Stones have done spotty work for the last, oh, thirty-five years. But Tattoo You – that was pretty good. Personally, I thought Undercover was underrated. And their last record A Bigger Bang from 2005 was about 2/3 great. But back to Some Girls. Yeah, it’s really good. The relative mediocrity of the three studio releases between the venerated Exile on Main Street and Some Girls (Goat’s Head Soup, It’s Only Rock ‘n’ Roll, and Black and Blue) left a still sizeable and devout Stones fan base ready for love. Some of those fans could have given a rat’s ass about punk rock. Others, however, moved by the racket that had blown out of New York and London during the (Sucking in the) Seventies, had a sense that the back to basics blood and guts of punk had thrown down to the Rolling Stones.
The Stones knew it. Mick Jagger in particular has always been, for better or worse, extremely sensitive to trends. Central to the energy behind the hard, fast and rockin’ tracks on Some Girls was Jagger’s own rhythm guitar playing. More square, less syncopated than Keith Richard’s playing, Jagger’s assertive guitar gave the album much of its foursquare thrust.
But wait, I don’t really want to review Some Girls. Been done. In summary, I think it’s terrific, but maybe rated too highly, and primarily by a lot of the same folks who have an unnecessarily dim view of the Stones’ subsequent output. What I really want to talk about is disc two of the deluxe edition of Some Girls.
Ah, it’s sweet really. The noise generation is meeting me half-way. I remember back in 2003 when a young pal tried to introduce me to Pink & Brown. I try to keep an open mind. Really, I do. My shelves are full of records and discs with music that the average listener would call noise. But I always viewed noise as something that best served as energy and expression tools for … I dunno, songs? From the MC5 to Sonic Youth the racket was seasoning and juicing to rock ‘n’ roll. So, all this Pink & Brown, Lightning Bolt shit left me perplexed. I love a racket, but this was a new kind of racket – primitive, artless, tuneless. Meh. Was I missing something?
Well, the answer is: a) not really and b) maybe a little something.
Which leads us to our man John Dwyer, he’s the prolific force behind Pink & Brown, the Coachwhips, Hospitals, and most recently Thee Oh Sees (among others). The Coachwhips wanted to be the Oblivians but were without the limited skills and lyric sensibility required for such homage. But they were better than Pink & Brown. The Hospitals? I never listened to them enough to have much of an opinion. When I heard Dwyer had yet another band - this one called Thee Oh Sees, I approached them with trepidation.
But from the beginning I kinda liked what I heard. In addition to the annals of noise racket, Dwyer seemed to have absorbed lessons from psychedelia (the kind with spaces between the noises) as well as the urgent, fuzz-toned rhythms of the bands that were featured on Crypt Records Back from the Grave compilations. Thee Oh Sees release something new every four months (okay, close to it). Seriously, they’ve put out about thirteen records in seven years (under various monikers, relying on TOS for the last four or so years), depending on what you count and who’s counting. The band’s latest offering carrion crawler/the dream EP (lower case is theirs’) is an arresting synthesis of the various strains that run through the band’s music, especially a combination of Help’s psycho-trips and Castlemania’s Cali-garage-pop, music that sounded touched by San Francisco garage peers like Ty Segall and the Fresh and Onlys.
