Year End Best Of

I wrote an article about Fucked Up's David Comes To Life for Blogcritics. And with that I am officially done writing about that album. P.S. it's awesome.

I also did my best hip hopalbums of 2011  for RapReviews. 

1. Danny Brown XXX
2. Death Grips Ex Military
3. Has-Lo In Case I Don't Make It .
4. Random Axe
5. Pusha T Fear of God II
6. J Rocc Some Cold Rock Stuf
7. Tanya Morgan You and What Army?

My honorable mentions were:
Deadverse Massive The Takeover
Oyoshe Bring Da Noise 2
Serge Severe Back On My Rhymes Greneberg, S/T
The Aztext: Who Cares If We're Dope? 1-4

If I was going to list my non-hip-hop favorite albums of the year, the list would include:

Jessica Lee Mayfield Tell Me
The Babies S/T
Little Scream The Golden Record
TV On the Radio 9 Types of Light
Sugar Minott Hard Time Pressure
Iceage New Brigade
The Field Looping State of Mind

Some random thoughts:
I was incredibly busy this year, and most of the albums that resonated with me were either mellow or really aggro. Something to either smooth out the stress or match my hectic mood.
There is so much more amazing music made each year than is humanely possible to listen to that it is discouraging.
One of the most popular albums of the year, the Adele record, was actually pretty good.
The Bon Iver record is so boring it makes me angry.
I've gone from not caring about Kanye West to actively disliking him.
I started listening to electronic music again.
Happy New Year.

My Ten Favorite Songs of 2011

Here are ten songs I loved in 2011.

Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks, "Senator"
In a year of total political disfunction, the chorus of "I know what the senator wants/what the senator wants is a blowjob" was the greatest thing ever.



tUnE-yArDs, "Gangsta" Merril Garbus moved to Oakland right around the time Oscar Grant got killed, and saw the aftermath of that as well as Oakland's high black-on-black homicide rate. "Gangsta" is a reaction to that, with lines like "If you move into my neighborhood you'll never make a sound." Ironically, there are no black people in the terrible video she made for it.

Fucked Up, "Queen Of Hearts" I love this band, I love this album, I love this song. It manages to be both uplifting and tortured at the same time, and is surprisingly poetic underneath its harsh exterior. "All we needed was something to give/the dam is broken, we suddenly live."

Jessica Lee Mayfield, "Our Hearts Were Wrong" This album was world-weary, heartbroken roots music done with production by Dan Auerbach of the Black Keys. This song sums it all up. "I know how you work/I am just like you/No matter what you say our hearts are wrong."

Danny Brown, "30" Danny Brown sounds on the edge of losing switching between clowning and getting scary real as he raps about turning thirty over a drunken Skywlkr beat. "Came a long way from extension cords in the window/borrowing neighbor's power just to plug in the Nintendo"

TV On the Radio, "You" I was too sick to see them live. I asked my wife how the show was, and she said "noisy." I really wish I could have seen them play this live.

Spank Rock with Santigold, "Car Song"  Way bitchin' 80s, yo.

Waters, "For the One" One half of Port O'Brien channels Neil Young and Kurt Cobain as Waters. I'm pretty sure drugs were involved in the making of the video.

My Morning Jacket, "Outta My System" I wasn't in love with this album, but this Beach Boys-ey song about getting your wild days out of your system stuck with me.

Has-Lo "Everything Is"  This is a devastating song about doing the accounts on your life and realize you are coming up short.


 "When your money ain’t right it seems like everything’s wrong 
‘cause everything is 
When your love ain’t life it feels like everything’s gone 
‘cause everything is 
And you search for it, and you hurt for it 
And you promise each other you’ll work on it 
And you might have to let it go free ‘cause it never was yours But that’s everything. 

Tanya Morgan and Spank Rock Reviews

I reviewed two albums last week for RapReviews. First up is Tanya Morgan's new EP, You and What Army?
I'm a fan of TM, and this is another solid release by the group, who are now down to just Von Pea and Donwill. Ilyas saw God and went off on his own.

Then I reviewed Spank Rock's Everything Is Boring and Everyone Is A Fucking Liar. There are some great songs, but the whole thing is merely ok. I love "Nasty," with Big Freedia.

The Field Review

Swedish musician Alex Willner has been recording as the Field since 2005. The Field’s 2007

debut, From Here We Go Sublime, was built upon loops and repetition of electronic elements that burbled along pleasantly. His 2009 follow-up, Yesterday and Today, followed the same template but got a little funkier. He’s perfected his formula for his new album, Looping State of Mind.

This record works on several levels. First of all, it works as a dance record. The beats are bigger and heavier than on the previous albums, the synths louder, and the overall feel is of trance done really, really well. However, Willner’s goal is not to blow MDMA-addled ravers minds, but to experiment with sound.

For this reason, Looping State of Mind works as a piece of avant-garde composition. Willner obviously owes at least some debt to Steve Reich; The Field’s music is built on the same principle of repeating and slightly shifting patterns as Reich’s Music for 18 Musicians. A prime example of this is “Arpeggiated Love.” It starts off with a clacking beat not unlike a train. Slowly another pattern is built on top of it, and then another, and another, until all of the patterns are interacting and intermingling with each other. The song shifts subtly with the addition or subtraction of various instrumentation and elements. What seems like the beat at one point becomes something else entirely over the course of the song's 10 minutes. Despite the fact that it takes so long to build, the song is consistently rewarding and never boring. The beat is hypnotic, and each new pattern or shift opens the song up in a new and unexpected way. It is like viewing a painting from an extreme close-up and then slowly panning out, realizing as you do that what you thought was the image was something else entirely.

Looping State of MInd is most importantly a beautiful record. Its songs are gorgeous, and despite the head-nodding beats, this is soothing and relaxing music. I listen to it on my commute home in the evenings and it never fails to make my crowded bus ride bearable. A wall of calming sound that is as calming as it is electrifying, Looping State of Mind is the Field’s strongest record yet, and one of my favorite albums of the year.

Article first published as Music Review: The Field - Looping State of Mind on Blogcritics.

Nocturnals and Strictly the Best Reviews

I did several reviews for RapReviews this week. First, I reviewed the Nocturnals ....To Be Continued album. It's available for free at their website. Left-field hip-hop on an Aesop Rock/Anticon kick.

I also reviewed the reggae compilations Strictly the Best 44 and Strictly the Best 45.

I'm working on a few more, and starting to catch up on albums I missed for my year-end list.

Scott Solter - One River

As a producer and mixer, Scott Solter has worked with Superchunk, Okkervil River, the Mountain Goats, Pattern Is Movement, and the Court and Spark. One River is a re-release of an ambient album he made in 2005.

Ambient music is by nature intangible, meant to evoke sensations and feelings rather than the structure and explicitness of most music. I started listening to One River after visiting the Rothko Chapel in Houston, and I immediately saw the connection between Rothko’s monochromatic paintings and Solter’s washes of sound. Neither is meant to be appreciated in the same way as traditional art. There is no subject matter in Rothko’s paintings just as there is no verse-bridge-chorus structure in Solter’s piece. Instead, both artists are concerned with creating emotions in more subtle ways than does traditional art. What ambient music and abstract art offer is an opportunity to experience art that isn’t trying to define the listener/viewer experience. You aren’t distracted by the form, and so can better experience the sensation that the art evokes in you.

One River is meant to be listened to as one piece, and it slowly ebbs and flows over its 33-minute running time. There are processed guitars, synthesizers, and subtle percussive elements. It pulses and runs like the river it is named after, and the end result feels natural and organic despite the digital tools used to produce it. The overall mood is peaceful and reflective. It never veers into new age cheesiness, and doesn’t contain any unsettling or dissonant moments. I love Aphex Twin’s Selected Ambient Works Volume 2, but there are several tracks on that collection that are truly unsettling; and I was happy that One River avoids getting creepy.

Mark and Laura Solter created a film called Twins and Wives to accompany the re-release. While it is an interesting visualization of the music, I prefer to listen to One River without the visuals. Part of my enjoyment of the album is what images and feelings it brings up. It taps into an area of the brain that most music doesn’t touch.

I really enjoy this album, and I’m thankful that Perth-based Hidden Shoal Recording chose to reissue it. It’s gotten me to explore more ambient music, and has been a wonderful contrast to the majority of music that I listen to. One River is an excellent album that fans of ambient music won’t want to miss.

Article first published as Music Review: Scott Solter - One River on Blogcritics.

Twin Perils Review

I reviewed Twin Perils new album, Speak and Destroy, this week on RapReviews. So not my bag.

I'm more excited about the new Tanya Morgan EP, "You and What Army?" which I may or may not review this coming week.

I've also been meaning to review the Beat Street soundtrack for months. I have the review half-written and everything. The problem is, it's sort of a terrible album. The only real highlight is the Treacherous Three's "Christmas Rap," which is amazing.



In totally unrelated news, there are stencils going up all over Haight Street that feature a sad-looking emo kid and the words "you can't kill me because I'm already dead." This is probably proof of what an old man I am, but it drives me fucking crazy. You are already dead? Really? You are a middle class kid from a good home in one of the wealthiest cities in one of the wealthiest states in the wealthiest country in the world. Quit feeling sorry for yourself and your pathetic first world problems and start living life and doing something positive. Jesus fucking christ.

Kandy Korn Rituals

This is why the internet is ridiculous and amazing.

I've been extremely busy at work. The other day I was jamming, trying to get a handle on the mountain of work I needed to finish, and I suddenly decided that what I really needed to do was find out what that Unwound song was that my old housemate Shannon had on vinyl.

I soon figured out it was "Kandy Korn Rituals" EP. That song is a minute and  a half blast of chaos, with the band sounding like a hardcore band who listened to too much Sonic Youth. It's not sung so much as screamed, and has an unhinged quality that they toned down for later releases.



The song I REALLY love from that EP, however, is "Against," another burst of hardcore noise. Amidst squealing feedback, singer Justin Troper screams "Against all time/against all space/against all matter/what's the matter?" It's a gorgeously ugly song.



I finally found it online, only to realize that I have a copy of it on a collection Honeybear records put out a while ago, when they were still around. That's why the internet is magic.

Aphex Twin

I've been listening to Aphex Twin lately. His Selected Ambient Works Vol. II has been my go-to chillout album since I bought it in 1999. To this day, when I am stressed out or overwhelmed I put it on.


Aphex Twin is an Irishman by the name of Richard D. James. He went to music school, so his take on electronica has more theory and talent behind it than your average e'd out 90s producer. As a result, his music is less groovy and more disturbing than other producers of the same era. His music falls into the irritatingly-named category IDM, or intelligent dance music. In general I haven't been impressed with the few IDM artists I've come across, but Aphex Twin is a different story. He's a little like a drug-addled 90s Brian Eno, using electronic instruments and studio engineering to take music in directions that few other people have dared to go.

I've been getting through his 1995 Richard D. James album. There are a lot of glitchy drum'n'bass beats, but it is tempered with interesting and often beautiful compositions. I've listened to it a few times and so far enjoyed what I've heard. I also bought his last album, 2001's Drukqs. 



 His videos are always incredibly weird. He did several in the late nineties with Chris Cunningham where his face is prominently featured. In the 10 minute long video for "Window Licker" there are a whole series of video hoochies with his face. It's the stuff of nightmares.



Chris Cunningham later did a video called "Monkey Drummer" set to Aphex Twin's "Mt Saint Michel + Saint Michaels Mount," off of Drukqs.



It's not the kind of music you can just sit down and listen to, but when I'm in the mood for something that pushes the envelope and is a little disturbing, I turn to good old Richard D.

MC Zulu and Pusha T Review

Two weeks ago I reviewed Chicago dancehall artist MC Zulu's new album, Electro Track Therapy.

Last week I reviewed Pusha T's new album, Fear of God II.

I really liked the Pusha T album. One of my favorite songs was "Alone In Vegas," and the video captures the loneliness and creepiness of the song. It's Pusha kicking it in Vegas alone after killing a dude in the desert.

Sugar Minott and 3:33 Reviews

Between work, school, and life, I haven't had a lot of time to think or write about music. I did manage to write two reviews last week for RapReviews. The first was for a Sugar Minott box set, which I really enjoyed. He was a reggae singer in the line of Horace Andy, who did soulful roots stuff.



The other was 3:33's Live from the Grove, best described as horror soundtrack hip-hop instrumentals. Creepy as hell. I can't decide if it was also good or not. Here's the trailer.


I'm currently excited about listening to the Field's new album, A Looping State of Mind. I liked their 2007 debut, missed the album they put out a year ago, and I love this. It's built on loops and repetition, and is really hipnotic.



The other thing I've been listening to a lot of ion Spotify is Southern rap. It's a genre that seems super ignorant and simplistic at first glance, but there are some interesting things going on if you scratch the surface.
Like Paul Wall's "Sittin' Sidewayz." On the surface it's a mediocre song about being the king of the parking lot. But it has a wicked beat, and Wall peels of the inconsequential verses with ease. When I was in Houston last weekend, this was the song that was in my head.

Gregory Isaacs, Backburner, and Blastah Beatz Reviews

Been busy, hence the lack of posting. Still busy, so here's a meager collection of links.

A review of the Backburner album from two weeks ago.

A review of the new Gregory Isaacs box set.

A review of Blastah Beatz Graduate Studies.

That's all I got for now.

Black Soul and I Wayne

I reviewed Madlib's Medicine Show #10: Black Soul this week at RapReviews. An 80 minute disco mix. Good stuff.


I also reviewed I Wayne's new album Life Teachings, a solid reggae album.

Yesterday I went to the opening of Richard Serra's drawing retrospective at the SF Moma. I had seen the same show at the Metropolitan Museum in New York (my sister in law curated the show), but it is even better at the Moma. The pieces are better placed, there is more light, and they've included some of his sculptures. It is very sparse, minimal stuff, but interesting. I particularly like the piece below. Sort of punk rock.

Tenement

Tenement, Napalm Dreams

Appleton, Wisconsin band Tenement are unapologetically anachronistic. In interviews, singer/guitarist Amos Pitsch admits that he doesn’t have Internet access, and is more likely to listen to music on cassette than MP3. The cover art of their album recalls the collages that Winston Smith used to make for the Dead Kennedys, right down to the ironic use of images of happy 1950s families. The music is vintage 1991: chunky guitars, punk distortion hiding 70s-influenced pop, and ironic, sarcastic lyrics.
The album opens with a squeal of feedback before the sloppy, distorted chords of “Stupid Werld” begin. The drummer pounds his set like Dave Grohl, the bass emits a sinister rumble, and Pitsch's strained vocals are somewhere between singing and yelling. Beneath all of the noise lie strong hooks and strong songwriting. Like Superchunk, Tenement write pop songs disguised as punk songs.

The drunken swagger of the vocals disguise an unexpected sensitivity in the lyrics. A lot of the songs deal with love in an oblique way. On “Dreaming Out Loud,” Pitsch sings “I’m retracing all my steps/ Falling in love again/ Break my knuckles open/Glue them back in place.” There are also several references to broken homes, like “Father pissing on the Christmas tree,” in “Spitting in the Wind.” There’s a more damning line in “Earwig,” where Pitsch sings “Two parents who didn’t care/ And a life they could never live/ Even if they would have dared/ ’Cause nothing ever works out.”

Listening to this album gave me the same feeling I got watching Superchunk play last year: rather than dated, the songs seemed timeless, and proved that the decades-old formula still had value and relevance. Alt-rock’s good name was besmirched by the legions of half-assed copycat bands that followed in Nirvana’s wake. Bad rock with distorted guitars is still bad rock, and there were hundreds of forgettable albums released by labels hoping to cash in on the success of Nevermind. Napalm Dream points to an alternate universe, where bands keep true to sound and ethos of bands like Husker Dü and the Replacements, rather than going the way of Nickelback. It doesn’t break any new ground, but it does prove that punk pop has legs.

Article first published as Album Review: Tenement - Napalm Dream on Blogcritics.

Veronica Falls

Veronica Falls:

I’m a cynical person by nature, so most happy music makes me skeptical. How can you possibly sing about everything being all sunshine and rainbows when there is so much trouble and strife in the world? By the same token, the older I get, the less interested I am in listening to music that simply wallows in misery. It seems like a waste to spend so much time on feeling bad. Veronica Falls ride the line between optimism and pessimism, making happy music with heavy hearts.

Veronica Falls are a co-ed foursome from Glasgow via London. The band consists of singers/guitarists Roxanne Clifford and James Hoare, bassist Marion Herbain, and drummer Patrick Doyle. Their self-titled debut collects several of the well-received singles they’ve released since forming in 2009, as well as new material.

The band mixes punk chords, sixties pop, and dark lyrics into a concoction that is gloomy and peppy at the same time. Album opener “Found Love In A Graveyard” is a nice summary of their sound. Elements of surf rock, garage rock, and Elizabethan folk songs combine into a melancholy jangle, the morbid lyrics contrasting with the gorgeous male and female vocals. “I’m broken-hearted/ Dearly departed,” they sing, mourning a lost love.

On songs like “Right Side of the Brain,” they recall Tiger Trap’s masterful take on feminine pop punk, but there is little twee about Veronica Falls. The competing male/female vocals are reminiscent of the Mamas and the Papas, although Roxanne Clifford sounds more like Lush’s Miki Berenyi than Michelle Phillips.

Despite the depressing nature of most of their lyrics, there is more joy than ennui in Veronica Falls' music. They capture the delicious pain of young love. On the upbeat “Misery,” they sing “misery’s got a hold on me,” as if it were the best thing in the world. These juxtapositions between optimism and sadness, between punk and pop, and between male and female vocals are what make Veronica Falls such a strong act. From the surf punk of “Beach Head” to the pop shimmer of “The Box,” Veronica Falls is a wonderful bummer, guaranteed to make your worst moments bearable.

Article first published as Music Review: Veronica Falls - Veronica Falls on Blogcritics.

Cymarshall Law and Ragga Reviews

I reviewed Cymarshall Law's Hip Hop In the Soul II last week for Rapreviews

And the Biggest Ragga Dancehall comp.


But mostly what I've been listening to is mellow ambient and classical music. Part of being stressed out. Maybe the change of seasons. Including Aphex Twin's Selected Ambient Works Vol. II, which has some very mellow moments balanced with some really disturbing ones.
Mellow:


Disturbing:



This all got started because I am working on a review for Scott Solter's One River, an ambient album from a few years ago that is getting a rerelease. It came at a time when I was super stressed out with work and school, and it was the perfect music to get my mellow on.



Which led me to Hauschka, a German composer who makes interesting stuff. I downloaded two albums by him, one called Snowflakes and Carwrecks that is mostly piano, and one called Foreign Landscapes that incorporates some cello.


Another similar artist I stumbled upon is Max Richter, who makes similar music. He has several interesting albums that I want to check out.



I don't know if I'm at the point in my life where all I want to listen to is avant-garde classical and ambient music, but it is nice to explore music that I am relatively unfamiliar with, and that is totally different to the stuff I normally listen to. Plus, it fits with the colder, darker days.

Finally, a ridiculous videos for one of my favorite songs ever, if only for the line "You're wack, you're twisted, your girl's a ho, tha kid ain't yours an' errybody know!"

Aztext and Ghostpoet Reviews

I reviewed the fourth installment in the Aztext Who Cares If We're Dope? EP series on RapReviews this week.

I also reviewed Ghostpoet's new album. He's a British artist who could be compared to Tricky.



Nice.

Oh well, whatever, nevermind

Twenty years ago Nirvana's Nevermind came out. The album sold less than Creed, N'Sync, and a lot of other shitty albums, but it changed so much. Pre-Nevermind, rock was dominated by hair bands like Skid Row and Warrant. Mainstream, middle America didn't listen to cool or edgy music. We were still coming out of the Reagan 80s hangover.

Nirvana took the angst and ferocity and sincerity of punk and married it to chunky riffs and strong melodies. It was punk music your dad could listen to, Minor Threat by way of Fleetwood Mac.

"Smells Like Teen Spirit" was their first big hit, and it perfectly captured the zietgeist of the era. Teenage boredom and frustration. An entire generation of kids grossed out by the materialism and commercialism of the times, not content to be mere customers anymore. As Fugazi howled on a song released at the same time, "You are not what you own."

I listened to "Smells Like Teen Spirit" over and over and over, until I could no longer listen to it. I still can't That song hasn't held up very well. The rest of the album has. "Lithium" is the perfect distillation of teen boredom and dissatisfaction. "Come As You Are" is a creepy pop song with ominous lyrics. My favorite track, and one of my favorite songs period, is "Drain You." Here Nirvana nails their melody, rage, noise, and  suggestive but obtuse lyrics.



After Nevermind, everything was different. You could no longer tell the hip kids by their record collection. All the effort I had put into defining myself by the music I listened to was negated. Jocks were rocking out to Fugazi and Nirvana. Punk became cool.

Cobain managed to last three years before he crashed and burned. "Grunge" lasted a little longer. Soon there were waves of shitty rock bands with distorted guitars riding the wave that Nirvana started. The sincerity and realness of Nirvana was cynically coopted by record execs and business men eager to sell gen x an identity. By 95, I was tired of being bummed out and started listening to Britpop. But from 91 to 94, grunge was kind and Nirvana were the rulers. I'm not sure any artist could shake things up so much in this fragmented media landscape, where even kids in the stix have access to everything ever made.

Ed Sheeran Review, aka I'm Sorry I Compared You to Justin Bieber

I reviewed Ed Sheeran's + for RapReviews this week. I compared him to Justin Bieber, which may be a little unfair. What I meant was that he did pop R&B in a style not too different from the Beebs. It wasn't meant as a harsh dis. There are a couple songs on the album I liked ok. Including "A Team."



I also reviewed Reggae Gone Country, which is covers of country songs by reggae singers. An odd but interesting CD.

Review Wrap Up

I did a few reviews in the past couple weeks that I forgot to post, including

The Ultimate Soca Gold Collection, which I liked more than I thought I would.

I also reviewed a reissue of one of the first dub albums, Java Java Java Java.

And Greneberg, a project between Oh No, the Alchemist, and Rocky Marciano.

Also bought No Age's last album, mostly on the strength of "Fever Dreaming."

The album so far is pretty incredible. Noisy but melodic at the same time.