For those who don’t know, I have been a writer, contributor and staff member for New York City’s esteemed The Big Takeover, a punk/alternative fanzine boasting 20,000 subscribers, for ten years. In addition, I have amassed a ridiculous bounty of records, cds and tapes that occupies nearly two rooms in our Chicago bungalow. When asked why and/or how I have compiled so many, I typically explain that I am perpetually in search of great records; great songs; music that not merely defines me but inspires me … lifts me toward greater heights. As any other great aficionado of art, let alone music, will confess, most art, including music, does not ever attain such lofty aspirations. But if the pleasure lies in the pursuit above the destination, then I am pleasure’s victim.
The following represents my top picks for new records released in 2004. I am not including reissues, live albums, or albums, such as the excellent No Cities Left by THE DEARS, that was released in the U.S. in 2004 but actually first saw the light of day, in The Dears’ instance, in Canada in 2003. So, here they are….
1) WOVEN HAND Consider The Birds (Sounds Familyre)
Grandson of a Nazarene preacher man, Woven Hand/16 HORSEPOWER protagonist DAVID EUGENE EDWARDS invokes a fire and brimstone, spirited and interventionist god throughout his canon of records. However, he does so resplendent with an increasingly mesmerizing and relentlessly affecting sense of purpose, as well as music. Presenting his most consistently challenging and focused work since 16 Horsepower’s masterpiece, Folklore, Edwards refuses on Consider The Birds to pardon the listener with two profoundly lighter songs as he did on Folklore. Here, “judgement will not be avoided by your unbelief, by your lack of fear, nor by your prayers to any little idol here,” and “the world will bow, the knees will be broken for those who don’t know how, He takes no pleasure not in the legs of men.” Years ago, the great Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds likewise disquietingly levied threats of damnation. But whereas Cave often lurched over and even into his audience as though he knew the only way people would ever understand him was if he grabbed each and every one of them by the throats and beseeched them to change their ways, Edwards croons almost underneath his sublimely dark, sparse folk music as if through a victrola; as if he knows no one out there will ever get it and gehenna itself is inevitable. Still, Edwards’ mission appears not to be one of self-preservation (“I don’t have the courage to carve my splinters out, no”), but rather … for salvation; deliverance (“I pray him come, I pray him soon.”). At times frightening, at times utterly beautiful (especially the unbelievable “Oil on Canvas”), this is ever fascinating and a truly remarkable achievement by an awfully serious man.
2) RICHMOND FONTAINE Post To Wire (El Cortez)
Much has been made of how WILLY VLAUTIN is ceaselessly drawn to writing and singing of losers, the downtrodden, and their affinity for liquor and violence, but what is often missed is how sympathetic are his characters; how often times beautifully realized are his songs. Indeed, love and hope and wishing for better times are really the essence of his songs. The “losers” and good-for-nothings result from their love, hopes and wishes undermined by the nature of the other; by the nature of life itself. Post To Wire is Richmond Fontaine’s fifth record, and it is by far their best one. It is “alt/country” at its finest, replete with sumptuous pedal steel guitar, real life songs about real life people (the way “country” was always supposed to be), a strong sense of melody and conciseness, and some musical muscle that sufficiently harkens back to their earlier days in which they more closely resembled The Replacements or, even more, Uncle Tupelo.
3) WILCO A Ghost Is Born (Nonesuch)
This is a natural extension or, as is sometimes the case here, subtraction in the wake of what most critics agree was an unequivocal masterpiece, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. But although JEFF TWEEDY & company sometimes appear to deface the beauty seemingly effortlessly composed in the uber-head of Wilco with random Crazy Horse guitar histrionics, redundant loops and that frightening, interminable noise to conclude “Less Than You Think,” a horse is still, after all, a horse, and true beauty is impervious to derogation because it already accepts that which is less than perfect. The subtle magnificence of this record is not obvious, but is rather a wonder revealed after diligence and study. Silence is employed where most songwriters think noise, and vice versa. Tweedy invokes his revolving door of band members to help challenge him to make better and even more interesting music, and together they generally succeed. “Wishful Thinking” is a dazzling achievement, and Tweedy’s thoughtful lyrics, born of recurring battles with demons of one color or the next, are completed works unto themselves.
4) MATTHEW GOOD White Light Rock & Roll Review (Universal)
It is easier to destroy than to create, I often tell my two year-old son. Watching the glee on his face when he knocks down his tower of building blocks, however, it is manifest that there is a joy for joy’s sake in getting out one’s ya-ya’s. On the heels of 2003’s ambitious, artful Avalanche, Vancouver’s sociopolitical activist extraordinaire and musical prime mover Good has now opted to tear down the facades around which we live, rather than construct edifices within them as on most of Avalanche. Stripping the process of this recording down, or back to early to middle-era The Who or Kinks propels these musical performances so as to augment Good’s super-charged, at times vitriolic sentiments concerning our times, which seemingly grow uglier by the day. WLR&RR is a breathtaking tour de force conveyed at breakneck speed. Though most of these songs are not conducive to the kind of awe and reflection prevalent on Avalanche, this record seizes one’s attention from the first chord of “Put Out Your Lights.” And one wild, bending roller coaster ride later, one is left stammering to reassemble head to neck, stomach to midsection, heart and thoughts to daily living. Along this amazing journey, Good has crafted among his best ever songs in “Empty Road,” boasting gorgeous pedal steel enhancements and his perpetual wish for solace and understanding in the face of so much danger and hypocrisy (“This empty road, it keeps me looking for a place in your heart, it’s all I know.”), and one of his most uncompromising, jarring songs in the great single, “Alert Status Red” (“You know I’m jealous of how you can just turn them off, those bad ideas that seem so soft”).
5) DAVID KILGOUR Frozen Orange (Merge)
I have casually tracked Kilgour’s long and diverse career dating back to his earliest days fronting New Zealand’s THE CLEAN, but Frozen Orange is so far and away his most consistently tuneful, affecting and, moreover, challenging record. Kilgour artfully and ostensibly effortlessly invokes the wonders of youth (“You lost that summer feeling, long ago”) on this record without reveling in such days gone by. Sure, there are those jangly, chiming guitars and generally conversational vocals, but there is such a breezy, reflective spirit and warm atmosphere wrapped around these songs like a windbreaker over the shoulders of a child. This is a songwriting sensation; a splendid, song-based record amenable to any setting or mood.
6) BARK PSYCHOSIS Codename://Dustsucker (Phantom UK)
A record as susceptible of profound inspiration as much as, if you’re listening alone at night and contemplating existence, profound sadness. Like the great, latter day TALK TALK, GRAHAM SUTTON’s Bark Psychosis imbues its music with subtlety, silence and space more commonly found in skillfully constructed, wide-open jazz. Likewise, they both feature prominently redundant but highly affecting, trance-inducing tapped and feather-brushed drums played in an array of time patterns, no doubt resultant of the fact that Talk Talk drummer LEE HARRIS applies his mettle here. But on this new album, Bark Psychosis paints conventional melody in all the right places, bringing into relief the ultimate affect and mood of these sublime proceedings to dramatic, soul-edifying effect. Beautiful, terrifying, pacifying … but unequivocally inspiring. By the time the bleakly beautiful “Rope” subsides, you’ll be speechless, if not breathless.
7) ELLIOTT SMITH From A Basement On The Hill (Anti)
Smith’s posthumous swansong record appears to adequately convey the myriad moods, impulses and psychological struggles with which he was combating before his death. But like a flower in the desert, there are numerous beautiful pieces and images juxtaposed against the harsh restlessness that was ostensibly Smith’s life to live … until he no longer did. And such beauty (“Twilight,” “A Fond Farewell,” “Let’s Get Lost”) sure is necessary to help tone down Smith’s naked honesty, self-deprecation and, at least in hindsight, his threats of suicide (“I took my own insides out; give me one reason not to do it”). If “King’s Crossing” is Smith’s most daring chef d’oeuvre, then “Pretty (Ugly Before)” should be the theme song for anyone who has ever awakened only to ask: What the fuck is the point? Regardless of the occasional forays beyond objective harmony, this record shows Smith at his most ambitious; his record most impervious to caring what listeners would think. He is dearly missed.
8) THE FUTUREHEADS The Futureheads (Sire)
Here is pop punk at its finest. Infusing the snappy, aggressive rhythmic to and fro surges and exciting backing and alternating vocals of middle-period The Jam, the punchy melodic sense of early XTC and the quirkiness of Devo, The Futureheads inject a kickass jolt of harmony, muscle and humor with their debut record. The dizzying heights attained on “Decent Days and Nights” and “Robot” are complimented well by their remarkably respectful and yet explosive take on mega-talented KATE BUSH’s haunting “Hounds of Love” – indeed, the two songs barely resemble each other and yet The Futureheads’ version is no less stirring. The likewise excellent Franz Ferdinand may sell more records and grace more magazine covers courtesy of their skillful intertwining of dance with post-punk music, but The Futureheads’ sense of melody with balls is the real thing.
9) AMERICAN MUSIC CLUB Love Songs For Patriots (Merge)
San Francisco’s American Music Club’s first record after a 10 year exile in Splitsville reveals in spades why they should never have split in the first place: People need to hear MARK EITZEL’s confessional, image-laden lyrics augmented and, yes, tempered by the dynamic musical performances of his longtime AMC compatriots. Eitzel’s several solo records always reminded how great a writer he is, but without AMC to offset his sometimes excessive over-singing, the results were too often ordinary, if not irksome. If only for the desperately satirical and yet compassionate “Patriot’s Heart” (“remind me what we’re celebrating, that your heart finally dried up or that it finally stopped working”), which served as a veritable bugle wake-up call to arms for this writer, as well as the dramatically moving “Home,” this reunion would have been necessary, let alone welcome.
10) THE CARDIGANS Long Gone Before Daylight (Koch)
A friend put a song from this record, “Feathers and Down,” on a compilation made for me some months ago. I was slackjawed by its depth, warmth and sincerity … this couldn’t possibly be the same Swedish Cardigans that sang that atrociously insidious “Lovefool” a few years back. But it is, and “Feathers and Down” is just one of several rich, moving and wonderful songs that stand up awfully well within the singer/songwriter tradition. The Cardigans have somehow, gratefully transformed into a band that paints, tickles and lulls rather than blindly resorts to simple verse-chorus-verse and unoriginal songwriting, and have made a memorable record in the process.
Honorable Mention
I likewise enjoyed the following ten records a good deal, in alphabetical order: Arcade Fire Funeral (Merge); Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds The Lyre of Orpheus/Abattoir Blues (Anti); Dogs Die in Hot Cars Please Describe Yourself (V2/BMG); Franz Ferdinand (Sony); Doug Gillard Salamander (Pink Frost);Interpol Antics (Matador); Kings of Convenience Riot On An Empty Street (Astral Works); The Libertines (Sanctuary); The Open Silent Hours (Universal); Snow Patrol Final Straw (A & M) The Trash Can Sinatras Weightlifting (Spin Art)
