When I finally found the time to start writing again, I realized how close we were to the end of the year. The end of the year at MM (and at pretty much all other music blogs) means choosing our Top Ten lists, and while 2011 had some great records to offer, the theme for this post is going to be, "Challenging". If nothing else, many of the records on this list (I'll note the exceptions) were at first markedly imposing -they were tough to get through the first spin. They're innovative, creative, and in a lot of ways unique, but none of them have the same easy groove of some of last year's picks (see Ray LaMontagne, Tallest Man on Earth, and others). So, without further ado, my top ten albums of 2011.
I take a lot of pleasure in including this record up here. The boys of this Baltimore outfit would probably call me a tool for doing it. Tremors II (alright fine, I know the band, get over it) may have started in a dorm room, but they've since clobbered their way out into the Baltimore punk scene. The fact that this EP was recorded in a Charles Village basement may add some (literally) underground cachet, but I'm continually impressed with the quality of what they'e done.
It's a tight wall of sound, it's raw emotion, and a band doing whatever the f*ck they want to do...in this case it's a damn good job with a formidable punk EP. Getting back to my theme, listeners will quickly recognize why this record isn't exactly easy listening. For a downloadable copy of the EP, check out Quinn's review.
Let's stay local for the moment. Future Islands have garnered quite a following in our fair city, especially after the artfully done In Evening Air busted itself all over the national indie-music scene last year. On the Water is at times quieter and more subtle, but the roots of their sound are still present in songs like "Before the Bridge". They're a band that formed on pulsing dance beats, and you can still hear them -just masked a bit more in wider, airier tracks. Singer Samuel T. Herring's voice has a haunting quality, and as the band has matured, they've managed to sync themselves around a ghostly, airy sound that impresses the emotion of Herring's lyrics even further. On the Water may not be their best outing yet, but it's demonstrative evidence that the band has a lot further to grow into this very original and spectral sound.
Ok, first exception to the theme. If there's anyone out there that's kept up with the kind of commentary I do, they'll know I have a lot more to say about aesthetics, arrangements, and pacing than I do about lyrics. The funny thing about the theme is that I've mostly picked music that challenges the boundaries of what I usually like. So, there have got to be exceptions, and Real Estate is a great one. I'm going to give this New Jersey band credit for something that some of my friends have really disliked about the album: its apparent lack of dynamics.
I'd like to challenge (ha, there it is again!) anyone who thinks this a sonically flat record to give it a few extra spins before you write it off. Songs like "Green Aisles" are what show the band's real talent. Drums (Jackson Pollis) and Bass (Alex Bleeker, also vocals) are so tightly woven together here that it gives us head nodding freedom to close our eyes and drift away with subdued little guitar melodies and simple harmonies. In a lot of ways Days is a record full of cute little hooks, but it's the tightness of the band members (five, in all) that bring this record to the next level. Real Estate demonstrate impeccable timing and great attention to detail. Perhaps the, ahem, challenge is to investigate the nooks and crannies of each tune. There's a lot more to this than meets the ears on first listen.
7. The Roots - Undun
Without repeating my buzzword, I'm just going to say that The Roots always do it. Undun is a concept album, a loose life and times exploration of the character Redford Stevens. It's a new subgenre for them to explore, and I've had a lot of fun accompanying them on this outing.
This was kind of a no-brainer inclusion for me, given that I'm a huge fan of the band in general. Even so, Undun, paired with last year's How I Got Over, has brought an interestingly poppy and melody-heavy attention to some of ?uestlove's arrangements. There are coy guitar/keyboard lines (see "Make My" and "Otherside"). Black Thought's mindfulness has been obscured by musical experimentation on other records (see Game Theory and Phrenology), and what I like so much about this record is that his observations and musings (along with those of Dice Raw and P.O.R.N.) can take center stage here.
It's a short outing for the Roots (a little less than 40 minutes), but the life of Redford Stevens, as existentially as it is presented here, offers up some beautifully musical moments ("I drew a two of hears from my deck of cards/ a stock trick from my empty repertoire" from "I remember" is a favorite). It's all capped off by a mini-suite from Sufjan Stevens, who lends his strings to a contemplative last four tracks. Undun is a signal to the Roots discovering another corner of the versatility.
I'm just going to go ahead and hope that Nitty Scott, MC is a harbinger of the next generation of Hip Hop. After my first listen to Doobies (a recent mixtape), the 20-something artist had blown my mind lyrically ("I bend the track over/beat it like a drum/finger-f*ck the english language 'til she come"). Nitty has a lot to talk about when it comes to the state of the genre. She clearly wants to make some statements (listen to the end of "Auntie Maria's Crib" where she talks about why the MC is critical to her name).
I say let her do it. If Doobies is just a mixtape, there's no telling what she's going to be able to offer us on a full-length LP with increased production value. For now, this will certainly do. She simultaneously one of the most impressive talents out in the genre right now, and also one of it's most brazen critics. Rappers beware, this is only the beginning of Nitty Scott.
Exception to the theme. The only thing challenged here is Girls' roots in the garage. I've come to respect Father as hell of a rock record, and tracks like "Vomit" express a ballad-like quality that spans the last 40 years in music...we start in what seems like a windowless car-park filling with Carbon Monoxide and end up in some acid-rock studio in the 70s. It's the versatility of this band, bending the decades of rock at their will (album opener "Honey Bunny" coud've easily topped the charts when rock was still young). The reason I say this record isn't necessarily challenging like the others is because it was such an immediate pleasure for me to listen too. I'm all praise for this one, and it has spun uninterrupted numerous times this year. It's rock at it's finest, and it's nice to see new bands exploring that a bit.
4. Bon Iver - Bon Iver
Well, this is one sure to be on a lot of Top Ten lists. Justin Vernon crooned his way into some Grammy nominations this year, and while I'm a bit sick and tired all the different of awards shows, Bon Iver certainly deserve the recognition. Their self-titled sophomore album is a huge leap in maturity from For Emma, Forever Ago (itself a measure of beauty), with some greater exploration of dynamics and arrangements. Electric guitar has a greater preference on Bon Iver than on Emma, and drummer S. Carey gets some spotlighting that is also well deserved (the rolls in the beginning of "Perth" are the definition of anthemic, somehow without being altogether loud).
Vernon's exploration of harmony here is also massively impressive. I'm inclined to think that while I still don't really get what this record is about, it's lyrical vagaries (to me at least) may be a function of Vernon being equally interested in his melodies and harmonies as he is in talking about something of substance. It's "Holocene" that's garnered some real Grammy attention, and while it's certainly a powerful tune, it may be the most straightforward. When the album came out early this past summer, it was the following track "Towers" that really took hold of my mind and and wouldn't leave. "Towers" is certainly illustrative of Bon Iver's new appreciation of multiple themes in one song, and again the dynamics at play here are the kind that bring us in and out of trances whiles listening. Bon Iver is a masterful work, but let's hope Vernon and Co. have yet to create their "masterpiece".
I've been giddy to write about this record, and now that I've finally got the chance, I just don't know where to start. Alright, let's start with that c-word I've used to excess here.
Ocean, who's the 23 year-old R&B man of teenage rap-freak group Odd Future of Wolfgang Kill Them All, is a fountain of talent. I'll make a list: a) He challenges the ranks of Odd Future when he decides to give us some poppy tracks and covers (see "Songs for Women" and "Nature Feels"), b) there's an off-kilter beauty to the way he treats the genre of R&B, see "Swim Good", and c) he released Nostalgia for free after getting fed up with his deal on Island Def Jam.
Ocean finds time to croon on the record during "Stawberry Swings" and single "Novacane", but the whole time I get the feeling that he's purposely holding back. This has perhaps the (desired?) effect of making me just want to re-listen to songs more and more and here him exercise his voice even more...but at the same time I'm perfectly content with what he offers us. He ranks at #3 here because of this sense that he has incredible control, and has chosen not to show us his entire range yet.
Let's talk genre-defying acts. Shabazz Palaces (the brainchild of Ishmael Butler aka Palaceer Lazaro aka Butterfly from the group Digable Planets) released this debut in late June, and it challenged and changed the way I thought about hip-hop. For me, A Tribe Called Quest and De La Soul have always represented some kind of poetic and lyrical distance above other acts, and while Shabazz Palaces doesn't rank above, it's clear that this mystifying graduation from Digable Planets is a lateral move.
There just ins't much out there in the world of rap or hip hop that can compare to the record-rewinding, loopy, and sparse beats that populate Black Up. To be fair, when you listen to Digable Planets and compare them with the more popular releases at the time (any of the Zulu Nation crew in the early 90s), it presents a common thread. There's a lyric indicative of the Shabazz Palaces mission, perhaps something we could label their unofficial M.O.: "I find the diamonds underneath the subtlest inflections". Deep into the middle of "Are you...Can you...Were you (Felt?)", this lyrics probably gives us the best hint we get. A gem itself, Lazaro and label Sub-Pop seem perfectly happy to hide the rest in a whirling and tilting world somewhere off in obscurity...but it's a trip worth taking.
-cue the drumroll-
Fun fact, I grew up with Merrill Garbus' cousin (what up Rachel! if you're out there). That's totally not why her album tops out my year's list though. On the contrary, since I'm all about dynamics, it's only fitting that the most versatile, genre-less record I've listened to in years takes the annual cake. From slow grooving "Powa" to masterful and groovy single "Bizness" and then off into oblivion with tracks like "Gangsta", tUne-yArDs is the kind of versatility that just astounds me. Musically speaking, there aren't too many instruments at work here, but Garbus is so skilled at layering her voice, we end up with really thick tracks.
Besides all the different influences at work here (we all heard Dirty Projectors to start, but there's a lot more here), it's the looping that Garbus does with her voice that is both the most impressive part of her arrangements and also the most multifaceted instrument at work. I could wax poetic about all the other albums on this, but this is pretty much the only one where I'd actually yell if you didn't at least try to give it a spin. It really is something, I just don't know how else to say it.
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