Music: 2005
Brendan Benson
The Alternative To Love
2005, pop rock
The album - particularly the title track - 'Alternative to Love' is head-
bopping, bouncy joyous pop rock. It is everything pop rock should be, but
nothing more.
The Fall
The Real New Fall
2003, cockney rock
The Real is great cockney rock. A delightful surprise from some crusty
old punks, this LP proves the elderly and the cynical-at-heart can still
innovate and captivate.
One Be Lo
S.O.N.O.G.R.A.M.
2005, rap
Sonogram is powerful, personal, and fresh. After all my failed attempts to
'get into' rap, One Be Lo's album comes to me like a light at the end of the
tunnel. By the sound of his lyrics, he too sees himself as a savior of his art
form. Instead of bitches, money, and hoes, One sings about betrayal,
oppression, and faith. He's a big picture person with a poetic pen and a
soaring bird's eye view of his people. The underground never looked so
bright.
TV On The Radio
New Health Rock (EP)
2004, alt
In small, focused doses, TV are a potent psychedelic drug, sure to inspire
beautiful visions. The full-length was a disappointment, but this follow-up
reasserts their promise. Glorious.
Colleen
Everybody Alive Wants Answers
2003, ambient
Femininity permeates this atmospheric auditory dreamscape. Beautiful and
haunting whispers and wind and string instruments flow into one's ear.
Everybody serves as proof great things can still come from Paris (for
those of us who were in doubt).
The Books
The Lemon Of Pink
2003, ambient
A lukewarm attempt at Lost and Safe. Sparce and experimental like Lost,
but not as cohesive or sophisticated an expression. Pretty.
Feist
Let It Die
2005, folk pop
Leslie Feist's opening track 'Gateways' makes me see hummingbirds and taste
peppermint. Her voice flits and flutters over what sounds like a soft
ukulele. It's gorgeous. Beyond that, she plugs in, but instead of a kind
of Ivy meets Postal Service electronic backing, like the brilliant work of
Inara George's producer/songwriter/guru Michael Andrews, we get a kind of
oddball hodgepodge ranging from disco to doo-wop. It's organic, but it just
doesn't swoon me like Inara. By track 9, she's doing a cover of the BeeGee's
'Inside and Out'. Listening to their arrangements/lyrics puts the rest of the
album into context and damn near to shame. Despite my banal criticisms of her
arrangements, Leslie is a very talented singer and song writer and a joy to
listen to. (Side note: I acquired a bonus track on my copy of the CD which
contains the demo version of her song 'Mushaboom'. Stripped down and
unplugged, she's far more powerful.)
Inara George
All Rise
2005, folk pop
Inara, daughter of Little Feat's Lowell George, makes music (as my co-worker
put it) 'for young girls'. Whatever. I guess that makes me a young woman
because I like the lilting poetic sadness with pop sensibilities stuffed in an
electro-folk carriage. Bring it. Go ahead. Make me cry. This is good, good
stuff. Think Jolie Holland plugged in. A solid album.
Shelby Lynne
Suit Yourself
2005, pop country
That's three disappointing albums in a row from three artists I fell in love
with during the past couple years. Shelby apparently thought it was a good
idea to trade in winsome love for disfunctional howling blues. Someone needs
to send her a telegram stating: "You are not STOP Reverend Gary Davis STOP."
White Stripes
Get Behind Me Satan
2005, alt country
Jack needs to have a priest exorcise the hick retard from his soul so that
he may resurrect his career and rock out. This album blows.
Coldplay
X & Y
2005, pop rock
What a bland disappointment.
Tegan and Sara
So Jealous
2005, power pop rock
Head bopping Canuck power pop rock from sexy black-haired twin rocker chicks.
Their unique voices overlap and round over jangly guitar and simple lyrics.
A great thing in small packages. (Their video for 'Speak Slow' is a must-see.)
Jack Johnson
In Between Dreams
2005, folk rock pop
Surfer-turned-folk indie star, Jack Johnson, puts Jewel sweetness into a John
Mayer vocal vehicle touched with Hawaiian sunshine. It's easy listening with
a cool, cool sensibility. Great, great stuff. Perfect summer music.
Ayano Tsuji
Cover Girl
2004, j-pop
One honey-sweet voice + One ukelele = One awesome summer album.
Fiona Apple
Extraordinary Machine
2003, alternative
Genius. Beautiful jilted, heart broken genius. None of the elements of the
largely diverse and expansive use of instrumentation is without some sort of
qualitative contribution to the overall expression of her music. She bends
the instruments to her sorrowful will. She sounds on the verge of a break-
down as she tears through her vocals, sometimes like a light pitter-patter of
rain, and sometimes as a raging lightning storm - exercising her vocal range
to properly express her emotional range. Worthy of admiration, and possibly
even adoration.
The Books
Lost and Safe
2005, Tomlab Records, atmospheric folk/ambient
A brilliant, beautiful soundscape. Sweeps me away like Richter's Blue
Notebooks. Poetic recital, radio journalism, and lyrics are softly sung
over electonic hums and gentle folk instrumentation. An aptly named project
with an aptly named album.
Electric Six
Senor Smoke
2005, electro-disco-rock
ES is back with one crazy-ass album. It will shake your ass
and then kick it raw. Sample lines include:
Back street's back, alright.
Mr. President I don't like you! You don't know how to ROCK!!
It's not how you dance, it's who you know!!
I have no idea what they're talking about, but it's great.
The Decemberists
Picaresque
2005, alt folk rock
Picaresque opens with some sort of ancient sounding Scottish war horn. It's as
if they're making a grand announcement: Here comes something a bit off kilter.
Evocative, sweet, brilliant. 'Sporting Life' reminds of the The New Pornograph-
ers (when they are in true toe-tapping form). 'The Bagman's Gambit' grips me.
Strings! I love it. Good, good stuff. Only a few soft spots.
The Damnwells
Bastards of the Beat
2003, folk rock
As near as I can tell, Alex Dezen is a swell guy, and the album has a slick
production quality to it, but ... Alex sounds a lot like Jeff Tweedy. There
are a few bright spots of sincere gloom. The rest feels manufactured.
The Go! Team
Thunder Lightning Strike
2005, alt rock
Shit kicking, cheerleading alt rock. Man alive, I dig this album. It makes
me want to invest in a set of pom-poms, a grass skirt, and steel-tipped boots,
eat a dozen pixie sticks, and dance on the hood of my car.
And I don't know why.
Tori Amos
Beekeeper
2005
Adulterated, watered-down Tori. A few beautiful gems, but mostly seemingly
uninspired. It feels like a failed exercise in turning art into popularly
accessible garbage. A disappointment.
Adam Green
Gemstones
2005
Rarely funny. Polished, juvenile, and lame.
And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead
Worlds Apart
2005
Fascinating, eclectic, bold, beautiful. Question: Who has a better band name?
Answer: NO ONE. Despite its multiple personality disorder, the entire album is
a gem, end-to-end.
Ani DiFranco
Knuckle Down
2005
What she *should* sound like: brilliant, bluesy, and unbridled New Woman. Ani
is aging like a folk rock goddess. This is the best I've heard her sound.
A must have, IMHO.
Annie
Anniemal
2004
Cute and catchy. Comparable to Minogue's Fever. Dance Groove City.
Autechre
Untitled
2005
AFX, but not nearly as good as.
Badly Drawn Boy
One Plus One Is One
2005
A painful disappointment.
Beck
Guero
2005
Great. A mad amalgamation of Odelay and Vultures.
Black Mountain
self-titled
2005
Maybe I'd like it if I was stoned.
Bloc Party
Silent Alarm
2005
Ass crashing unclean post-punk. Smashing, masterful. Bloc Party are at the
forefront of a growing trend of break-neck rock.
Bonnie 'Prince' Billy and Matt Sweeney
Superwolf
2005
Not my cup of tea. Drunken paced folk rock. America's uninteresting answer to
Arab Strap.
Max Richter
The Blue Notebooks
2004, classical/electronic
Franz Kafka's Blue Notebooks are recited by Tildon Swinton as segue ways between
piano, strings, and electronic hums. Delicate, refined, sweeping, beautiful.
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