2021 Year in Review – Top Albums

Here’s an Apple music playlist, containing these albums, along with a bunch of others I enjoyed in 2021:

Top of 2021 – Top Albums

Top of 2021 – Top Albums – Ambient

1. Low – Hey What

No, you’re never gonna feel complete
No, you’re never gonna be released
Maybe never even see, believe
That’s why we’re living in days like these again
Days Like These

2. The Notwist – Vertigo Days

Telephone brings it back
With rings and rings and lonely calls
As it all was nothing
It’s where you find me now
It’s where you find me now
Again and again
Where You Find Me

3. DARKSIDE – Spiral

The red glow in his face
Making him look like the son of God
His teeth are glistening
His hair is wild
His feet are stomping on the ground
He’s wearing the doctor’s coat
But in his hand in the ring of a lawmaker
Lawmaker

4. Lightning Bug – A Color of the Sky

The skies vault higher in September
Till the end of our days, I’ll remember
How colors feel stronger, and feelings so true
That even the flowers smell more like you
September Song, pt. ii

5. Helado Negro – Far In

Warm, dreaming yellow sky
Endless open sigh
People move their life
Night eats the sky
There Must be a Song Like You

6. Richard Dawson & Circle – Henki

to Ikarios taught the secret of wine-making
but the drunk shepherds thought poisoned they had been
so they stoned him to death
in plain view of his daughter
who threw her dog down a well
and hung herself from a tree
Ivy

7. The War on Drugs – I Don’t Live Here Anymore

I feel the storm coming on
I feel the darkness at your gate
Live the loneliness of life
Keep on moving at your pace
Ain’t the sky just shades of gray
Until you’ve seen it from the other side?
Oh, if loving you’s the same
It’s only some occasional rain
Occasional Rain

8. Bodies of Water – Is This What It’s Like

I’m saying “Yes” to everything
And life itself, “Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes”
Women in Love

9. The Weather Station – Ignorance

No, the robber don’t hate you, the robber don’t hate you.
He had permission – permission by words, permission of thanks,
permission of laws, permission of banks,
white table cloth dinners, convention centres,
it was all done real carefully.
Robber

10. White Ring – Show me Heaven

Guess the lyrics?
Every Song

Top of 2020* ~ Top Albums & Songs

*every swear word in every language.

Apple Music Playlists:

Top of 2020 – Top Songs

Top of 2020 – Albums

Impeachment. Pandemic. Isolation. Death. Here’s my list of the top albums of the year 2020.

15. Haim – Women in Music Pt. III

I don’t wanna give, I don’t wanna give too much
I don’t wanna feel, I don’t wanna feel at all

P.T. Anderson directs their music videos. A wide-ranging and deeply-considered album from a trio of very talented musicians. Blessedly, they’re self-assured enough to follow their own arc.

14. Kelly Lee Owens – Inner Song

The rain, the rain, the rain
Thank God, the rain

Brain music, Thoughtful and introspective electronic compositions that unfold with unhurried deliberation. John Cale makes a guest appearance!

13. SALEM – Fires in Heaven

I would never claim no prophesy
‘Cause I know man too small for it
These vultures circle round the dead
And want a crown for it

It’s been 10 years since King Night, SALEM’s one and only LP was released. Since that time, the band that has been widely considered to be be the pioneers of the musical subgenre, “Witch House” have released one EP (I’m Still in the Night) a few mixtapes, and lost vocalist Heather Marlatt. Also during this time, a resilient online fan community has traded “rare” mp3s along with rumors of a return to the studio. In lat 2020, those expectations were brought to fruition with the announcement and release of Fires in Heaven, a leaner, somehow sadder, but also weirdly hopeful, collection of songs. Marlatt’s absense is a disappointment, nevertheless, Jack Donoghue and John Holland manage to conjure up a palette of sounds that is at-once recognizable as pure-SALEM, while also taking some confident steps in a new direction.

12. Jon McKiel – Bobby Joe Hope

In tempered glass is a sleight of hand and a look of the eye
How in spoken light I believe in a colour of another kind
I can see a deeper shade, I know there’s a deeper shade in you

Allegedly, Jon bought an old Teac A-2340 reel-to-reel tape recorder online from a seller he never actually met a few years ago, and the sale included several tapes. The first time he tested out the machine at home he discovered that one of the tapes already contained samples from an unknown source. He nicknamed it the Royal Sampler. He decided he would jam with the tape and thus was born the seeds of Bobby Joe Hope. A charming, meandering album of lo-fi found objects, it was one of my happier discoveries in a generally stupid and rotten year.

11. Kevin Morby – Sundowner

God bless and pray for American daughters and sons
Try as they might to take flight with clipped wings but some won’t
Do what they want and say what they will
Nothing will cover the faith that’s been spilled
God bless and pray our American waters and suns

Kevin Morby’s latest album is essentially a treatise on his hometown of Kansas City. He paints a vision of the country that is at times intimate and also sweeping.

10. Oneohtrix Point Never – Magic Oneohtrix Point Never

Doesn’t the sky look like maps to our house?
Doesn’t the sea look so empty?
Even my dreams kissed in digital gloss
It’s my reality

Daniel Lopatin has maintained a healthy pace producing new material. I was surprised and delighted to find out that he had another entire full length release in store for us in 2020. Magic Oneohtrix Point Never is a play on the station call sign for one of his childhood radio stations. Designed to mimic a single day in programming schedule for a radio station, the album has a novel structure that is held together by a number of interstitial elements derived from a trove of sampled material.

9. Sufjan Stevens – The Ascension

And now it frightens me, the thought against my chest
To think I was asking for a reason
Explaining why everything’s a total mess
And now it frightens me, the dreams that I possess
To think I was acting like a believer
When I was just angry and depressed
And to everything there is no meaning
A season of pain and hopelessness
I shouldn’t have looked for revelation
I should have resigned myself to this

I thought I could change the world around me
I thought I could change the world for best
I thought I was called in convocation
I thought I was sanctified and blessed

But now it strengthens me to know the truth at last
That everything comes from consummation
And everything comes with consequence
And I did it all with exultation
While you did it all with hopelessness
Yes, I did it all with adoration
While you killed it off with all of your holy mess

Sufjan Stevens’ 1 hour and 21 minute LP The Ascension is not a frequently upbeat record. If anything, it’s something of a punishing ordeal to attempt to listen through the entirety without taking a break. Even while distracting oneself with other activities. The record projects an air of despondency, as though a master builder just put the finishing touches on a cathedral he’d been supervising construction of for generations, only to walk inside and find out that God doesn’t live there. There is a very, book-of-Ecclesiastes vibe going on, here. Sufjan’s despair is palpable, and his scorn, while spare and withering, is tempered by his gentle spirit breaking apart like a dandelion in the wind.

8. Soccer Mommy – color theory

I can’t help this feeling
That irks me, that I’m falling down
From Heaven through the Earth
To Hellfire, to wear his crown

Sophie Allison’s 2018 album Clean was No. 3 on my year-end best-of albums list the same year. Her follow-up, 2020’s color theory, finds her taking a decidedly darker path. Having “arrived” as it were, at success in the music industry, she unleashed a record brimming with cold-eyed clarity about the world, oddly well-timed to coincide with the pandemic that descended and promptly caused the cancellation of all of her tour dates.

7. Moses Sumney – græ

Are you dancin’ with me?
Or just merely dancin’?
Polly Polly Polly

Moses Sumney released græ in the very beginning of 2020, before the coronavirus pandemic swept the land. Coming in behind Dylan’s Rough and Rowdy Ways, and Sufjan’s The Ascension, this double-LP clocks in at 58 minutes. Sumney’s unadorned voice is really the star of this record. Haunting.

6. The Mountain Goats – Getting Into Knives

Light up the sky like a comet
Make yourself want to vomit
Shine like a cursed star
Show everybody exactly who you are

I had failed to take note of The Mountain Goats’ proper 2020 release, after their Bandcamp drop of Songs for Pierre Chuvin (also excellent, and only missing from this top list because of my general apathy about putting it together). Getting Into Knives is another terrific album from the Goats. John Darnielle’s inimitable singsong style of vocals and his literary writing style continue to offer up that rare alchemy of catchy melodies and deep, spiritual musings.

5. Adrianne Lenker – songs / instrumentals

weren’t we the stars in heaven
weren’t we the salt in the sea
dragon in the new warm mountain
didn’t you believe in me?
You held me the whole way through
but I couldn’t see the words like you

Adrianne Lenker is the lead vocalist for Big Thief, a band that released two albums in 2019 that both wound up on my year-end best-of list. A prolific songwriter, she released songs and instrumentals as a double-album on 4AD in 2020. One is an album of songs (of course) and the other is a pair of lengthy guitar improvisations. A spare and elegiac album with a sense of immediacy.

4. Ben Seretan – Youth Pastoral

Everything’s gonna be all right
you shine a little light for me
Shine a light.
They’re holding up the sun.

An artist I had never listened to, prior to the dumpster fire that of 2020, that is. Ben Seretan’s lilting voice and avant-garde folk sensibilities conjure sun-soaked country vistas, outdoor wedding vibes, and millennial lumberjack camps. His effortless vacillation between crooning on a hilltop and filling an arena with anthemic aplomb. An artist I’ll be following with great interest from hereon out.

3. Bob Dylan – Rough and Rowdy Ways

Well, I’m the enemy of treason
An enemy of strife
I’m the enemy of the unlived meaningless life
I ain’t no false prophet
I just know what I know
I go where only the lonely can go

A new Bob Dylan album is always cause for celebration. Ever since 2006’s excellent Modern Times, I have paid extra special attention to to the prodigious output of one, Robert Allen Zimmerman. On Rough and Rowdy Ways, the 79-year-old singer-songwriter’s talents are on full display in a laconic and effortless fashion. Clocking in at 1 hour, 11 minutes in length, it truly is an LP.

2. Charli XCX – how i’m feeling now

All I’m thinkin’, all I know is
That I hope you knock on my door
Nervous energy, my heart rate rises higher, higher up
I wish you’d get here, kiss my face
Instead, you’re somewhere far away
My nervous energy will stay
I hope you realize one day
Come to my party
Come to my party

I’ve been listening to Charlotte Emma Aitchison (Charli XCX) off and on for a decade, now. She has a superb knack for crafting agile ear-worms, repeatedly bottling lighting in the form of energetic, streetwise, electronic pop. Recorded during a pandemic, this album showcases a raw talent and production prowess that she’s been honing for years. Wall to wall jams. All bangers.

1. Fleet Foxes – Shore

And with love and hate in the balance
One last way past the malice
One warm day is all I really need

Fleet Foxes are impossible to dismiss, they’ve been on my Top Album lists back in 2017 and 2011. This is the very first time they’ve taken my number 1 spot. Shore released rather late in the year in 2020, and initially, I kind of ignored it. But man, it’s such a grower, as I should have expected. Not a particularly happy album. Not a particularly sad one, either. Road trip music for a year without travel.

Bonus: Karl Blau – Children of All Ages

Doorways come in all shapes and size
As they greet you with their delight
Some that swing, some that sigh, some doors are locked up tight
Some doors you would never think would open…

You won’t find this album on Apple Music, sadly. But you can get it on Bandcamp! Just click on the name of the album, above. A lighthearted, joyous album of “children’s music” that falls much more squarely in the camp of Squiggleman than it does TMBG or Donovan, Karl’s gentle vocal delivery and novel lyrics reward many repeat listens. A sleepy-time album, if you fancy that.

0. Jeffrey Lewis – 2019 Tapes (Cowardly & Brave & Stupid & Smart & Happy-Ever-After & Doomed) & 2020 Tapes (Shelter-at-Homerecordings & Pandemos)

And now here we stand and who could have guessed?
We ran out of chances and we failed our own test
Cuz all illusions have to end, let’s laugh and wake up and admit we failed to break up

Jeffrey Lewis & The Voltage made my favorite album of 2019. No one does existential dread and philosophical introspection like Jeffrey does. In both of these collections, he assembles a kind of scrapbook of a psychological road trip through 2019 and into 2020, comprised of songs that touch on everything from confusion about sexual identity, to an obsession with washing one’s hands, to a plea for world peace on the heels of a worldwide pandemic. Lewis’ songwriting is all at once sardonic, incisive, filled with wit, soul, catharsis and wry social commentary without ever once sounding confident. It’s his incredibly insecure pathos that gets me every time.

Well, I screamed my way through one more dead-end day
In the tortures of the starving arts
I trashed the fifteenth song
I bashed away too long into the dustbin of discarded starts
And my programmer friend invites me out again
But I got nothing all month to be proud of
He said, ‘My friend it seems art is a sweat shop of dreams,
‘cuz art’s an office that you can’t clock out of.’
‘But that’s nice work, if you can get it.
That’s a noble occupation.
It’s a career I would have led if the main office hadn’t lost my application.’

Honorable Mentions:

Tame Impala, Yves Tumor, Bessie Jones, Blake Mills, Damien Jurado, Grimes, Waxahatchee, Spirit Fest, The Killers, 박혜진 Park Hye Jin, Dirty Projectors, Woods, Jessie Ware, Run the Jewels, 100 gecs, Destroyer, Matt Berninger, Jess Williamson, Cut Copy, The War on Drugs, Purity Ring & Nada Surf.

Full list of 2020 albums (yes, I listened to *all* of these – it still is a worldwide pandemic, and also it was a leap year) :

The 1975 – Notes on a Conditional Form
Adrienne Lenker – songs / instrumentals
Against All Logic – 2017-2019
Aleksi Perälä – Oscillation Part 1
Aleksi Perälä – Spectrum 1
Aleksi Perälä – Spectrum 2
Aleksi Perälä – Spectrum 3
Aleksi Perälä – Spectrum 4
Aleksi Perälä – Spectrum 5
Aleksi Perälä – Spectrum 6
Amaarae – THE ANGEL YOU DON’T KNOW
Amnesia Scanner – Tearless
Andre Bratten – Silvester
Arca – KiCk i
Autechre – PLUS
Autechre – SIGN
Baauer – PLANET’S MAD
Bartees Strange – Live Forever
Baths – Pop Music / False B-Sides (2020 Remaster)
Beatrice Dillon – Workaround
Becky and the Birds – Tresslig
Ben Seretan – Youth Pastoral
Bessie Jones – Get in Union
Best Coast – Always Tomorrow
Bibio – Sleep on the Wing
Bill Fay – Countless Branches
Bing & Ruth – Specie
Blake Mills – Mutable Set
Blitzen Trapper – Holy Smokes Future Jokes
Bob Dylan – Rough and Rowdy Ways
Bob Mould – Blue Hearts
“Bonnie” Prince Billy – I Made a Place
Brian Eno – Brian Eno (Film Music, 1976-2020)
Brian Eno & John Cale – Wrong Way Up (1990)
Califone – Echo Mine
Caribou – Suddenly
Carlos Niño & Miguel Atwood-Ferguson – Chicago Waves
Carmen Piazzini – Mozart: The Complete Piano Sonatas
Charles Webster – Decision Time
Charli XCX – how i’m feeling now
The Chicks – Gaslighter
Chip Tanaka – Domingo
Christopher Tin & Royal Philharmonic Orchestra – To Shiver the Sky
Chromatics – Closer to Grey (Deluxe Edition)
Cold War Kids – New Age Norms 2
Com Truise – In Decay, Too
Courtney Marie Andrews – Old Flowers
Cremation Lily – The Processes and Instrumentals of Normal People (2020 Remaster)
Cucina Provera – Tyyni
Cut Copy – Freeze, Melt
Cut Worms – Nobody Lives Here Anymore
Damien Jurado – What’s New, Tomboy?
Dan Deacon – Mystic Familiar
Daniel Lopatin – Uncut Gems (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) (2019)
Darkstar – Civic Jams
Dehd – Flower of Devotion
Denison Witmer – American Foursquare
Destroyer – Have We Met
Diplo – Diplo Presents, Thomas Wesley, Chapter One: Snake Oil
Diplo – MMXX
Dirty Projectors – Ring Road EP
Dirty Projectors – Super João EP
Dirty Projectors – Windows Open EP
The Districts – You Know I’m Not Going Anywhere
Dogleg – Melee
Eartheater – Phoenix: Flames are Dew Upon My Skin
Elrichmen – Heaven’s Mayor
Ezra Feinberg – Recumbent Speech
Fiona Apple – Fetch the Bolt Cutters
The Flaming Lips – American Head
Fleet Foxes – Shore
Fontaines D.C. – A Hero’s Death
Four Tet – Sixteen Oceans
Future Islands – As Long As You Are
Galcher Lustwerk – Proof EP
Glok – Dissident Remixed
Grandaddy – The Sophtware Slump… on a wooden piano
Greg Dulli – Random Desire
Grimes – Miss Anthropocene
Guided by Voices – Surrender Your Poppy Field
Hailey Whitters – The Dream
HAIM – Women in Music Pt. III
Hamilton Leithauser – The Loves of Your Life
HEALTH – DISCO4 :: PART 1
Heathered Pearls – Cast
Hiroshi Yoshimura – Green (1987)
Hildur Guðnadóttir – Joker (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) (2019)
His Name is Alive – Return to Never (Home Recordings 1979-1986), Vol. 2
Ital Tek – Outland
Jeffrey Lewis – 2019 Tapes (Cowardly & Brave & Stupid & Smart & Happy-Ever-After & Doomed)
Jeffrey Lewis – 2020 Tapes (Shelter-at-Homerecordings & Pandemos)
Jaga Jazzist – Pyramid
Jeff Parker – Suite for Max Brown
Jehnny Beth – TO LOVE IS TO LIVE
Jess Williamson – Sorceress
Jessie Ware – What’s Your Pleasure?
Jim Guthrie – Below Volume II
Jim Guthrie – Below Volume III
Joanna Warren – Chaotic Good
John Hassell – Vernal Equinox (1978)
Jon McKiel – Bobby Joe Hope
Jónsi – Shiver
Julianna Barwick – Healing Is a Miracle
Julianna Barwick – Healing is a Miracle (Extended Editions)
Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith – The Mosaic of Transformation
KALEO – Surface Sounds
Karl Blau – Children of All Ages
Kate NV – Room for the Moon
Kelly Lee Owens – Inner Song
Kevin Morby – Sundowner
Khruangbin – Mordechai
The Killers – Imploding the Mirage
Kurt Vile – Speed, Sound, Lonely KV – EP
LAKE – Roundelay
Laraaji – Moon Piano
Laraaji – Sun Piano
Laraaji – Through Luminous Eyes
Laurel Halo – Possessed
Le Ren – Morning & Melancholia EP
The Lemon Twigs – Songs for the General Public
LF58 – Alterazione EP
Lomelda – Hannah
Lucretia Dalt – No Era Sólida
Lucy Gooch – Rushing EP
Lyra Pramuk – Fountain
Machinedrum – A View of U
Marc Scibilia – Versions EP
Mark Langegan – Straight Songs of Sorrow
Mary Lattimore – Silver Ladders
Matt Berninger – Serpentine Prison
Max Richter – Voices
Max Richter & Lorne Balfe – Ad Astra (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) (2019)
MinaeMinae – Gestrüpp
Mort Garson – Music from Patch Cord Productions
Moses Sumney – græ
The Mountain Goats – Getting Into Knives
The Mountain Goats – Songs for Pierre Chuvin
Nada Surf – Never Not Together
Nicolas Jaar – Cenizas
Nicholas Lens – L.I.T.A.N.I.E.S.
Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds – Idiot Prayer
Nils Frahm – Empty
Nils Frahm – Tripping with Nils Frahm
Nine Inch Nails – Ghosts V: Together
Nine Inch Nails – Ghosts VI: Locusts
No Age – Goons Be Gone
Nordvest – Grøndal
Oneohtrix Point Never – Magic Oneohtrix Point Never
PAINT – Spiritual Vegas
Patricia – Maxyboy
Pauline Oliveros, Stuart Dempster & Panaiotis – Deep Listening (1989)
Peter Bjorn and John – Endless Dream
Phew – Vertical Jamming (2020)
Phoebe Bridgers – Punisher
PLONE – Puzzlewood
Porridge Radio – Every Bad
Portable – The Transit of Mercury
Psychic Temple – Houses of the Holy
Purity Ring – WOMB
Real Estate – The Main Thing
Rina Sawayama – SAWAYAMA
Roger Eno & Brian Eno – Mixing Colors
Roger Eno & Brian Eno – Mixing Colors (Expanded Edition)
Roly Porter – Kistvaen
Roy Montgomery – Scenes from the South Island (1995)
RUBIO – La Pérdida EP
Run the Jewels – RTJ4
SALEM – Fires in Heaven
Sarah Davachi – Cantus, Descant
Sigur Rós, Hilmar Orn Hilmarsson, Maria Huld Markan Sigfusdottir, Steindór Andersen, Schola Cantorum Choir, Arni Hardarson, Pall Gudmundsson & Conservatoire de Paris Orchestra – Odin’s Raven Magic
Skullcrusher – Skullcrusher EP
Slow Reels – Farewell Islands
Soccer Mommy – color theory
Sofia Kourtesis – Sarita Colonia EP
The Soft Pink Truth – Shall We Go On Sinning So That Grace May Increase?
Special Interest – The Passion Of
Spirit Fest – Mirage Mirage
Stephen Malkmus – Traditional Techniques
Sufjan Stevens – America EP
Sufjan Stevens – The Ascension
Sufjan Stevens & Lowell Brams – Aporia
Sylvan Esso – Free Love
Tame Impala – The Slow Rush
Tara Clerkin Trio – Tara Clerkin Trio
Taylor Swift – folklore
Thundercat – It Is What It Is
Tim Heidecker – Fear of Death
Touché Amoré – Lament
Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross – Mank (Original Musical Score)
Trevor Powers – Capricorn
Tycho – Simulcast
U.S. Girls – Heavy Light
Ulla – Tumbling Towards a Wall***
Ultraísta – Sister
Various Artists – Bill & Ted Face the Music (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
Various Artists – Field Works: Ultrasonic
Various Artists – Ghostly Swim 3
Various Artists – Unbroken Dreams of Light
The War on Drugs – LIVE DRUGS
Waxahatchee – Saint Cloud
Whitney – Candid
A Winged Victory for the Sullen – The Undivided Five (2019)
Woods – Strange to Explain
Yves Tumor – Heaven to a Tortured Mind
박혜진 Park Hye Jin – How Can I – EP
100 gecs – 1000 gecs and The Tree of Clues

2019 – The Year in Review – Top Albums & Songs

Yes, I managed to listen to over 120 albums in 2019. Streaming music subscription services can be a wonderful thing (for consumers, at least). Believe it or not, I still actually purchase music in physical formats, as well. At any rate, distilling those 120+ albums down to a serviceable “list” of favorites was no mean feat. Behold, my Top Albums of 2019:

15. Peter Caws & Parkington Sisters – The Book of Hylas

Sometimes, through weariness or discouragement, no new thing arises.
Sometimes, through pressure and anxiety, many old things overwhelm.
Learn to wait, for the stirring or for the subsiding.
Learn to wait, for the turmoil to be still, for the stillness to speak.
Let memory recall times of taking refuge, times of setting forth anew.
Bring to mind times of comfort or times of purpose.
You have passed this way before.
You have left markers along the way – look for them.

Peter Caws is University Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at The George Washington University. Fun fact: he is the father of Nada Surf’s Matthew Caws. The Book of Hylas is a set of meditations on life and how to live it, recited by the elder Caws, and set to music by Boston-based Parkington Sisters. Clocking in at 13 minutes, this is surely the shortest “album” I have ever short-listed for a Year In Review.

14. Vampire Weekend – Father of the Bride

Baby, I know pain is as natural as the rain
I just thought it didn’t rain in California

After a lengthy six year gap, Vampire Weekend returned with their long-awaited fourth LP, Father of the Bride. P4K says it showcases them embracing a full-on jam band vibe. I can’t disagree. Plenty of hooks and ear-worms are here to be pulled out of context, but the album works quite well as a whole. At once cheerful and lamentable.

13. The Get Up Kids – Problems

It’s not about hopeless
Not a song of despair
Just about choices and making them fair

Their first album in 8 years, and second since “breaking up” in 2005 and then reforming in 2008, Problems finds The Get Up Kids right back at the height of their considerable powers. They haven’t lost the energy and creativity, although they may have lost one member. Another album that benefits from being experienced whole.

12. Sharon Van Etten – Remind Me Tomorrow

Turning the wheel on my street
My heart still skips a beat

Sharon Van Etten has long been a hardworking supporting act and a talented and proficient solo artist. With Remind Me Tomorrow, she embraces a much broader palette than she employed in the past with her singer-songwriter chops. Production values are up, nostalgia and retro-electronic flourishes feature heavily, and her songwriting is ornamented and adorned in ways both unexpected and refreshing.

11. Bon Iver – i,i

When we were children we were hell bent
Or oblivious at least
But now it comes to mind, we are terrified
So we run and hide for a verified little peace

Bon Iver has always been a superbly singular artist and his falsetto-whisper-croon lilt delivery a vehicle for inscrutable pathos and lonesome heartache. Justin Vernon has worked with some of the industry’s biggest names and yet has managed to carve a channel all his own. i,i in many ways feels like the natural continuation of his sonic odyssey, thus far. Lush and idiosyncratic, this is another album that benefits from whole immersion.

10. Angel Olsen – All Mirrors

You know best, don’t you, now?
Don’t you, now? Don’t you, now?

Angel Olsen’s sweeping epic All Mirrors has aplomb and grandeur aplenty. Widescreen cinema balladry. Olsen delivers the goods.

9. Efterklang – Altid Sammen

My soul in that case, at times
Min sjæl i det bIå, til tider

We are in love now, we are in love
Vi er forelsket nu, vi er forelsket

Always us, together to share us
Altid os, sammen om at dele os

We are infinite
Vi er uendelig

The Danish outfit’s fifth proper album, the first in seven years, is an ornate and densely-layered work. Altid Sammen (meaning “always together”) is replete with orchestral arrangements and exiguous sonic experimentation. The album is sonorous and rewards total immersion. The vocals are entirely in Danish. I have no idea what they’re singing about.

8. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – Ghosteen

And if we rise my love
Before the daylight comes
A thousand galleon ships will sail
Ghostly around the morning sun

Without a doubt the most emotionally gut-wrenching release of the year. A 2xLP exegesis on grief and mortality. Nick Cave’s most personal work, ever. Simply devastating.

7. Bibio – Ribbons

Pretty ribbons
And lovely flowers

Stephen Wilkinson is back with his signature blend of acoustic instrumentation and digital warble, creating arrangements in much the same fashion I imagine a skilled florist does. Exceedingly chill and carefree, Ribbons is an album that practically begs to be the soundtrack to your next nature hike.

6. The Mountain Goats – In League with Dragons

I’m gonna burn it all down today
And sweep all the ashes away

The Mountain Goats play D&D. That’s it. That’s the review.

5. Townes Van Zandt – Sky Blue

Oh but when good times
Come fallin’ over me
Breath turns to melody
All I need’s gonna fall
Away like dreams

A collection of new material, old material, and a few covers originally recorded with Bill Hedgepeth in 1973, Sky Blue is a welcome addition to the prolific troubadour’s back catalogue. An artist I first came to hear and revere by way of T Bone Burnett and the Coen Brothers, Townes Van Zandt remains a legend of American Country Western music. His writing is poetry that exists on another plane of existence, and yet remains as weary and grizzled as the most down-to-earth Texas troubadour, busking his way across the American Southwest.

4. Big Thief – U.F.O.F.

And you don’t need to know why when you cry
You don’t need to know why
You don’t need to know why when you cry

The first of two albums they would release in 2019, U.F.O.F. finds Adrienne Lenker not letting off the gas, ever traveling forward. This album was recorded in a large, cabin-like room. This is a band to watch over… watch over and marvel.

3. Bombadil – Beautiful Country

Suzy don’t forget
Forget to move on

Bombadil have previously featured on my Year in Review lists on more than a few occasions. This year they dropped a brand spanking new album without too much fanfare. It’s exquisite. By degrees, the band is leaving the boondocks behind.

2. Big Thief – Two Hands

It’s not the room
Not beginning
Not the crowd
Not winning
Not the planet
That’s spinning

Well, darn. Big Thief released two magnum opus records in 2019. I will not be sorry for including both of them on my list, here. Jesus Christ how do they do it?

1. Jeffrey Lewis & The Voltage – Bad Wiring

Were you going somewhere sooner or later
Or just pushing all the buttons on the elevator
You gotta’ have free will to live your pre-planned life
You gotta’ pay the bill or you get unsubscribed

Admittedly, I had no idea that this was going to be my favorite record of the year. But it is. And I have absolutely no reservations about saying so. Jeffrey Lewis has long been a musician I follow. He’s… what do you want to call it, “Anti-Folk” or some such? His songwriting is biting and incisive, the auditory equivalent of an erudite Reddit thread piercing your brain. He’s done entire albums covering obscure punk rock bands, also entire records covering Jewish counterculture poets, and don’t forget the songs about LSD and sexual legends of the Chelsea Hotel. He’s very much borne of a New York City mythology spanning decades including the years when I am not yet alive. The existential pathos of his work cannot be replicated. This album is like a Rick & Morty episode that flies above the heads of the show’s misogynistic fanbase and yet they still applaud. Brutal, crushing, existential self-awareness seems to be a hallmark of Lewis’ work.

Well I guess we’re not supposed to be wise
If everything that learns also dies

Honorable Mentions: Andrew Bird, Kevin Morby, Bruce Springsteen, Angelo de Augustine, Jessica Pratt, Weyes Blood, Jade Bird, HEALTH, FKA Twigs, Whitney, Holly Herndon, American Football, Lana Del Rey, Why?, Over the Rhine, Pedro the Lion, Helado Negro, Clairo, Josh Ritter, Purple Mountains, Vagabon, Ssion, Chromatics, and Beirut.

Apple Music Playlists:

Top of 2019 – Albums

Top of 2019 – Top Songs

Complete List of 2019 Albums:

!!! – Wallop
A.A. Bondy – Enderness
American Football: American Football (LP3)
Andrew Bird – My Finest Work Yet
Andy Stott – It Should Be Us
Anemone – Beat My Distance
Angel Olsen – All Mirrors
Angelo de Augustine – Tomb
Apparat – LP5
Bat for Lashes – Lost Girls
Battles – Juice B Crypts
Beirut – Gallipoli
Beth Gibbons, The Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra & Krzysztof Penderecki – Henryk Górecki: Symphony No. 3 (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs)
Bibio – Ribbons
Big Thief – Two Hands
Big Thief – U.F.O.F.
Bill Evans – Smile With Your Heart: The Best of Bill Evans on Resonance Records
Bombadil – Beautiful Country
Bon Iver – i,i
Bonobo – fabric presents Bonobo
Bruce Springsteen – Western Stars
Cate Le Bon – Reward
CHAI – PUNK
Cherry Glazerr – Stuffed & Ready
Chromatics – Closer to Grey
Ciara – Beauty Marks
The Cinematic Orchestra – To Believe
Clairo – Immunity
Com Truise – Persuasion System
Danger – Origins
Deerhunter – Why Hasn’t Everything Already Disappeared?
Drugdealer – Raw Honey
Ernest Hood – Neighborhoods (Reissue)
Efterklang – Altid Sammen
Ex:Re – Ex:Re
Faye Webster – Atlanta Millionaire’s Club
Fennesz – Agora
Fever Ray – Live at Troxy
FKA Twigs – MAGDALENE
Floating Points – Crush
Floating Points – Late Night Tales: Floating Points
Flying Lotus – Flamagra
George Winston – Restless Wind
The Get Up Kids – Problems
Glok – Dissident
Guided by Voices – Zeppelin over China
Guided by Voices – Warp and Woof
Hand Habits – placeholder
Hauschka – A Different Forest
HEALTH – VOL. 4 :: SLAVES OF FEAR
Helado Negro – This is How You Smile
Holly Herndon – PROTO
Hoshina Anniversary – Nihon No Ongaku / 日本の音楽」
Insanlar – Demedim Mi
Jacques Greene – Dawn Chorus
Jade Bird – Jade Bird
Jeffrey Lewis & The Voltage – Bad Wiring
Jessica Pratt – Quiet Signs
John Vanderslice – The Cedars
Josh Garrels – Chrysaline
Josh Ritter – Fever Breaks
Joy Orbison – Slipping – EP
Kacy & Clayton – Carrying On
Kanye West – Jesus is King
Karen O & Danger Mouse – Lux Prima
Kelly Moran – Origin EP
Kevin Morby – Oh My God
Kim Gordon – No Home Record
Lali Puna – Being Water EP
Lana del Rey – Norman Fucking Rockwell
Lightbath – Selected Public Works, Vol. 3
Lily & Madeleine – Canterbury Girls
Mira Calix – Utopia EP
Mount Eerie – Lost Wisdom, Pt. 2 (feat. Julie Doiron)
The Mountain Goats – In League with Dragons
Mort Garson – Mother Earth’s Plantasia (Reissue)
The National – I Am Easy to Find
The New Pornographers – In the Morse Code of Brake Lights
Nick Cave & the Bad Seesds – Ghosteen
Nils Frahm – All Encores
Nilüfer Yanya – Miss Universe
Nivhek – After its own death / Walking in a spiral towards the house
North Mississippi Allstars – Up and Rolling
Oso Oso – Basking in the Glow
Over the Rhine – Love & Revelation
Panda Bear – Buoys
Pedro the Lion – Phoenix
Peter Caws – The Book of Hylas (featuring Parkington Sisters)
Purple Mountains – Purple Mountains
Robert Ellis – Texas Piano Man
(Sandy) Alex G – House of Sugar
SASAMI – SASAMI
Sharon Van Etten – Remind Me Tomorrow
ShitKid – [Detention]
Sigur Rós – 22° Lunar Halo
Sigur Rós – Variations on Darkness
Solange – When I Get Home
Ssion – o
Stella Donnelly – Beware the Dogs
Steve Hauschildt – Nonlin
Switchfoot – Native Tongue
Tamaryn – Dreaming in the Dark
Tegan and Sara – Hey, I’m Just Like You
Temples – Hot Motion
Tim Heidecker – Another Year in Hell EP
Tim Hecker – Anoyo
Timo Andres & Sufjan Stevens – The Decalogue
Titus Andronicus – An Obelisk
Toro y Moi – Outer Peace
Townes Van Zandt – Sky Blue
Tycho – Weather
Vagabon – Vagabon
Vampire Weekend – Father of the Bride
Vangelis – Nocturne
Various Artists – For the Throne (Music Inspired by Game of Thrones)
Various Artists – Kankyō Ongaku: Japanese Ambient, Environmental & New Age Music 1980-1990
Weezer – Weezer (Black Album)
Weezer – Weezer (Teal Album)
Weyes Blood – Titanic Rising
Whitney – Forever Turned Around
Why? – AOKOHIO
Yeasayer – Erotic Reruns
Ziúr – Atø

2019 – The Year in Review – Top Albums (Ambient)

A 2019 Year in Review list of albums that primarily skew towards the ambient, electronic, experimental and instrumental. I created a separate list for 2019 because I found myself increasingly turning to such records throughout the year. Part of the allure would definitely have to be the meditative, relaxing quality of many such recordings. Another might have been simply a kick I got on, after years of only occasionally listening to the odd Brian Eno ambient masterwork. Behold, the list:

15. Ernest Hood – Neighborhoods

A re-issue of an album originally released in 1974, assembled from a mesmerizing array of found sounds, field recordings and proto-ambient electronic music, Neighborhoods truly evokes a memory of times past. The auditory equivalent of being teleported back to a time without the internet, cellular phones and a myriad of digital devices with screens. Unencumbered by such modern niceties, the album streams past at a laconic pace, and, not unlike Midnight Cowboy, one of my favorite films first viewed in 2019 (and celebrating its 50th anniversary), it possesses the distinct quality of being a coherent slice of life, perfectly captured in the moment.

14. Sigur Rós – Variations on Darkness

Consisting of two, 20+ minute long tracks, Variations on Darkness is assembled from unreleased Sigur Rós material, as well as various multitracks of songs culled from the band’s back catalogue. The music was premiered at the Nordur og nidur festival, and utilized as a soundtrack to choreographed performances from the Iceland Dance Company. Cavernous and shot through with a palpable sense of foreboding, Variations on Darkness made for a terrific soundtrack to any daily news dump from 2019.

13. Beth Gibbons, The Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra & Krzysztof Penderecki – Henryk Górecki: Symphony No. 3 (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs)

Beth Gibbons is the lead vocalist for Portishead. Krzysztof Penderecki is a Polish composer whose work has been featured in films, most notably The Exorcist and The Shining. Here, they take on Polish composer Henryk Górecki’s famous Symphony No. 3. A sprawling, mournful piece of composition, the Symphony of Sorrowful Songs plays like the score to the denouement of a Sam Mendes picture.

12. Various Artists – Kankyō Ongaku: Japanese Ambient, Environmental & New Age Music 1980-1990

Perhaps it is indeed emblematic of what Pitchfork deemed, “the growth of functional listening,” that I happened to compile this particular album list for the first time this year. The ubiquity of supermassive streaming libraries now virtually at our fingertips and always available for our thirsty eardrums means we can find ways to soundtrack our lives at any and every moment we wish. Kankyō Ongaku is such a soundtrack*, culled from a number of Japanese ambient electronic artists from the 1980s. This compilation is curated by Spencer Doran, of Visible Cloaks, and released on Light in the Attic Records (the very same responsible for the Lewis reissues and subsequent solution to the decades-old mystery of their provenance). Highly recommended. *The vinyl release of this album is a 3 x LP and features 25 tracks, while the streaming version is limited to only 10.

11. Steve Hauschildt – Nonlin

Steve Hauschildt, formerly of Emeralds, released Nonlin, his latest LP on Ghostly International, in late 2019. I hitherto had only a dim awareness of his work. Much like another of my favorite albums from 2019 (Floating Points’ “Crush”), Nonlin offers up a hybrid cross-section of thoughtfully-composed electronic music, leaning rather heavily on the synthesizers. An art-house Stranger Things soundtrack, if you will.

10. Nils Frahm – All Encores

All Encores is a collection of the contents of 3 Encores EPs released over the course of 2019 on the heels of Frahm’s excellent 2018 LP, All Melody. Representing a selection of works that are far more spare and unassuming than the baroque, multifaceted splendor of All Melody, the collection of EPs would be a fitting accompaniment to any sort of weather, be it fair or frightful.

9. Lightbath – Selected Public Works, Vol. 3

A brand new discovery for me in 2019, Lightbath is the brainchild of composer/improviser Bryan Noll. Selected Public Works, Vol. 3 collects various of his modular synthesizer performances from the past 4 years. Volumes 1 and 2 have been released only on cassette tape thus far, while Vol. 3 is available to stream online. Another EP, Vol. 4, was also released in late 2019. His work is reminiscent of Brian Eno, SURVIVE, CFCF and Oneohtrix Point Never. The soundtrack to a celestial zen garden.

8. Glok – Dissident

Another brand new discovery for me in 2019. Glok is the electronic alias of Andy Bell, guitarist and vocalist of the English shoegaze band Ride. A sprawling record, Dissident fuses, “synth wave and Detroit techno via a love of John Carpenter soundtracks with dissonant atmospherics and an acid throb,” and rewards many repeat spins.

7. Floating Points – Crush

Floatings Points is Sam Shepard, a DJ, musician and producer from the UK. Crush is a record I have been looking forward to ever since his debut, Elaenia, was released back in 2015. A deep and exacting record, Crush is something of a Rube Goldberg machine in album form. A musical sub-genre called ‘Braindance’ supposedly applies here. The album offers up tasty morsels in a precisely-constructed presentation format, and you can pluck any one out to enjoy. A virtual buffet that has been thoughtfully arranged and pared back to showcase a number of unique tastes.

6. Hauschka – A Different Forest

Volker Bertelmann is the name of the experimental “prepared” pianist who goes by Hauschka. Once upon a time, he was a member of a German hip-hop group. Nowadays, he has undergone an extended metamorphosis to become, more or less, a bonafide neoclassical pianist. A Different Forest is very much a straightforward affair, and requires nothing more than a simple appreciation of the unprepared ivories to enjoy. His playing on this album is expressive and warm.

5. Kelly Moran – Origin EP

Kelly Moran’s follow-up to her excellent Ultraviolet, released in 2018. Like Hauschka, she is a specialist of the “prepared piano,” which is a piano that has had its sound altered by the placement of various objects on or between the strings. Origin is a no slouch for an EP, clocking in at over 36 minutes in length. Here we find some brand new material, along with improvisational, proto-versions of pieces from Ultraviolet. The tapestry of mesmerizing sounds she conjures from the piano is at once both ostentatious and austere.

4. Tim Hecker – Anoyo

Tim Hecker followed up 2018’s Konoyo (this world) with companion piece Anoyo (the world over there). The tracks on the latter come from the same sessions that produced the tracks on the former. Drawing upon Japanese court music style gagaku, Hecker recorded Anoyo with the ensemble Tokyo Gakuso. A voyage into the vacuum of space. Boundless and immense.

3. Fennesz – Agora

The first LP from Austrian composer Christian Fennesz in 5 years, Agora is an album of layers. Despite being recorded largely indoors with guitars, the four tracks comprising its 48 minute runtime manage to evoke an eerie spaciousness. Unlike Anoyo, Agora feels like a voyage among the stars that turns out to have actually been a descent into the Mariana Trench.

2. Mort Garson – Plantasia

Another reissue, this one from Mort Garson, a pioneer of discrete music and electronic composition. Originally released in 1976, Plantasia is a wonderful cornucopia of Moog synthesizer music, surprisingly organic and warm, and absolutely on-point as far as its central conceit is concerned (music for plants and the people who love them). 40-plus years later, thanks to projects such as the MIDI Sprout, music for and by plants feels more timely than ever.

1. Nivhek – After its own death / Walking in a spiral towards the house

Nivhek is a new moniker for Liz Harris, otherwise known as Grouper. This record is comprised of two long-form performances, each broken into two pieces, and originally performed as a part of two different artistic residencies: one in Murmansk, Russia, the other in the Azores, in Portugal. Taken together as a full release, now, in 2019, and clocking in at just about one hour, the cumulative result packs a mighty wallop. From glossolalia to drone to faraway bells and chimes, found sounds and malfunctioning equipment, distant footsteps and funereal abysms of sound, the album plays like a long stroll deep into the desolation of winter’s grasp. As with many of the albums I’ve selected for this new Year in Review list, it rewards patience and many repeat spins.

Apple Music Playlists:

Top of 2019 – Albums (Ambient)

Top of 2019 – Top Songs (Ambient)

“Wanderin’ Star” as performed by Lee Marvin in Paint Your Wagon

Without a doubt, Paint Your Wagon (1969) has got to be the most bizarre movie musical I have ever watched. Adapted for the big screen by Paddy Chayefsky from Alan Jay Lerner’s original 1951 stage production, the film stars Lee Marvin, Clint Eastwood (his one and only appearance in a musical) and Jean Seberg. Although I have never seen a performance of the musical on stage, I read up on it after viewing the film. There are… rather quite a number of differences between the two.

Far and away my favorite performance in the film is Marvin’s wordly, gristly Forty-Niner character, name of Ben Rumson. He also performs my favorite musical number, Wanderin’ Star. Marvin famously insisted on performing all of the singing parts himself, even though he had no real training as a vocalist. His rendition of this song actually became a chart-topping hit in the UK, beating out The Beatles’ Let it Be.

My second favorite musical performance in the film has got to be Harve Presnell’s rendition of, They Call the Wind Mariah. Fun fact, Harve Presnell also famously played the part of Wade Gustafson, father of Jean Lundegaard, in the Coen Brothers’ inimitable classic Fargo.

Anyhow, if you have 3 hours to kill, and you like show tunes about mining for gold, and if you’re any kind of Paddy Chayefsky fan, Paint Your Wagon is well worth watching.

2018 – The Year in Review – Music – Top Songs

Love in the Time of Lexapro

I’ve put together an Apple Music playlist, distilling over 140 songs I culled from 2018 (and a couple that are technically from 2017, if you wanna split hairs) and assembled a *short* 3 hour long playlist. Slap on a pair of headphones or fire up the HomePod or off-brand Bluetooth speaker and have a listen!

Top of 2018 – Apple Music – Joel’s Top Songs

Babylon – Oneohtrix Point Never
Duration Meditation – Reto A Ichi
Mongolia (The Ancient Era) [Pastor Song; Khoomii Improvisation] – Nature Ganganbaigal of Tengger Cavalry
Time – Angelo De Augustine
Eyes Wide Awake – Calexico
Moon Bog – Oh Sees
Camera (On Film) – Chromatics
Angie – Shame
Wildflowers – Soccer Mommy
Shades of Blue – Yo La Tengo
The Last Great Washington State – Damien Jurado
Driving – Grouper
Helix (Edit) – Kelly Moran
I Shall Love 2 – Julia Holter
Poor Sucker – Low
In My View – Young Fathers
Empty Vessels – DeVotchKa
When You’re Small – MGMT
Woo – Beach House
Chasing Stars – Postiljonen
When I’m with Him – Empress Of
The Whole Universe Wants to Be Touched – Nils Frahm
Come Wayward Souls – The Blasting Company
Potatus Et Molassus – The Blasting Company
Time Adventure (feat. Niki Yang, Sean Giambrone, Steve Little, Hynden Walch, Olivia Olson, John DiMaggio, Pendleton Ward, Justin Roiland, Maria Bamford, Jessica DiCiccu & Tom Kenny) – Adventure Time, Rebecca Sugar & Tim Kiefer
When a Cowboy Trades His Spurs For Wings – Willie Watson & Tim Blake Nelson
At Least the Sky Is Blue (feat. Ariel Pink) – Ssion
Hang On Me (Piano Version) – St. Vincent
Suspirium – Thom Yorke
Dancing and Fire – Low
Percy Faith – Damien Jurado
Slow Burn – Kacey Musgraves
Venice Bitch – Lana Del Rey
Two Slow Dancers – Mitski
Always Up – Low
last piece – Lykke Li
Heaven in Farsi – PAINT
Tenderness – Parquet Courts
The and Song – Jeffrey Lewis
Fear The Future (Piano Version) – St. Vincent
Last Wave – They Might Be Giants
Disarray – Low
Babylon – Oneohtrix Point Never & (Sandy) Alex G

2018 – The Year in Review – Music – Top Albums

Wait, is 2018 over already? I managed to squeeze in a whole bunch of music listening this year, soundtracking every waking minute of my life with some fresh tunes streaming off the world wide webbings, passing through some algorithms harvesting my every play, skip and replay, traversing the atmosphere, finally emitting from whatever untethered speaker setup is handy at the moment. What a world.

Without further ado, here are my top ten albums of 2018:

10. Kacey Musgraves – Golden Hour

Darlin’, you take the high horse, and I’ll take the high road
If you’re too good for us, you’ll be good ridin’ solo

~ “High Horse”

Instantly wonderful. Front-loaded with catchy melodies and concepts ranging from the mundane to the holy, every touch is illuminated by Musgraves’ beautiful singing voice and distinct East-Texas twang. Hailing from Mineola, Texas, she represents a bright future both musically and with regard to the shifting, growing worldview of this generation, who must inherit the legacy of their damaged forebears.

9. Anenon – Tongue

Musician and composer Brian Allen Simon has delivered, “A jazz album, an electronic album, an ambient album, a classical album, an agnostic spiritual” in Tongue.

8. Oneohtrix Point Never – Age Of

And a tower casts a shadow
Fairest when you speak
I love it when I see you
In a state of disbelief

~ “Babylon”

Daniel Lopatin returns to his Oneohtrix Point Never alias to release one of the year’s most inscrutable albums. The auditory equivalent of stirring together every medium of analog and digital recording from the past 35 years, along with a light sauté of auto-tuned vocals. Age Of rewards many repeat listens.

7. They Might Be Giants – I Like Fun

We die alone, we die afraid
We live in error, we’re naked and alone
We die (Afraid)

~ “Last Wave”

Taking the highlights of their Dial-A-Song club and compiling them into a proper studio album, TMBG released a tightly-wound, anthemic album that functions just as well as a distracting and cerebral pop medley as it does as a polemic about America’s current political landscape. Death, despair and various forms of outrage fueled the Johns and propel the resulting material into the rarified air of a foot-tapping, hilarious album that is staring into the abyss the entire time.

6. Mountain Man – Magic Ship

Amelia Meath, Molly Sarle and Alexandra Sauser-Monnig comprise the vocal trio Mountain Man. If the sirens from O Brother, Where Art Thou? went into a remote studio to record an album with only their beguiling voices and a dusty songbook from an Appalachian cabin, I imagine that the result might resemble Magic Ship.

5. Mitski – Be the Cowboy

But as it is, and it is
We’re just two slow dancers
Last ones out

~ “Two Slow Dancers”

Mitski Miyawaki’s tour-de-force followup to 2016’s excellent Puberty 2 ups the ante in every possible way. Wall-to-wall hooks, incisive songwriting chops and a preternatural prowess for expressing complex and nuanced thoughts within a head-banger make this album a huge standout for me. Approachable, warm, and yet filled with hard edges.

4. Damien Jurado – The Horizon Just Laughed

What good is living if you can’t write your ending?
You’re always in doubt of the truths you’re defending
Seeing yourself in others’ ideas, I’ll write you from somewhere
And call you from later on

~ “The Last Great Washington State”

Damien Jurado is an artist who consistently shows up in my Year-End lists of best music. His songwriting sensibilities, soft, crooning voice, and laconic, gently bouncing tempo put me in a groove that I seldom want to get out of. His latest album, and the first produced without the aid of the late Richard Swift in a number of years, finds Jurado continuing to write short stories to cut his protagonists adrift in. But it’s a pleasure cruise as much as a spiritual journey.

3. Soccer Mommy – Clean

You’re made from the stars
That we watch from your car
And I’m just a victim of changing planets
My Scorpio rising and my parents

~ “Scorpio Rising”

A brand-new artist, to me, in 2018, Soccer Mommy is the solo project of Sophie Allison, currently based in Nashville, TN. Clean is a wistful, sad record that is constantly searching for the twinkle of light emanating from the heavens to chart a course by. Like every other album I’ve chosen for this list, it’s one that is rewards full, repeat listens. Pulling just one song or composition out of the whole seems do diminish the overall effect.

2. Beach House – 7

And I know you like it
So you try to hide it
And I know you like it
So I dive to find it

~ “Dive”

A number of years ago I wrote of Spoon’s album Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga, in essence that, like JS Bach’s Goldberg Variations, they had created a body of work that so fully established their sonic fingerprint as at once recognizable and that seems so blatantly obvious when you hear it, that it almost makes you wonder if they have to try anymore. Repeat listens will reveal that, yes, they do try very hard indeed.

On Beach Houses’s 7th LP, aptly named 7, they’ve attained this same level of mastery. As though an entire planet was just finished being terraformed by only Victoria Legrand and Alex Scally, and now you can go live on it. The production values have gone up, the palette has evolved from a rural hamlet to a glittering metropolis with a full-on nightlife club scene.

1. Low – Double Negative

Saw you dancing when the fire went out
Before your breathe and barely audible
It’s more of let it out than let it go
It’s not the end it’s just the end of hope

~ “Dancing and Fire”

Low are the last musical act I ever expected to unleash the jangling, sonic avalanche of existential dread that is Double Negative. If ever there was a group whose sound seems to have cut the wagon tracks too deep to leave their path, they’d be it, in my book. Now, it seems to me that there is no group better-suited to deliver the harrowing message this one does.

Alan Sparkhawk & Mimi Parker have here repeatedly torn apart an entire album and then reconstructed it from salvage, eventually delivering the result that falls like the wrath of the gods, a thunderclap, visited with the same sudden violence and irresistible force as the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, blanketing your eardrums like Pompeii. Thoughts wink out, frozen inside your mind under a layer of ash that will preserve their shape for millennia

Double Negative is a harbinger of spiritual cataclysm; invective and paean disassembled to the atomic level and then bashed against each other to create an elemental reaction. Amidst the self-immolating bonfire of ‘christendom,’ Low is conducts the cacophonous orchestra unfolding its Requiem. A shattering achievement.

2018 Albums (a complete-ish list)

The 1975 – A Brief Inquiry Into Online Relationships
Adrienne Lenker – abysskiss
Adventure Time – Adventure Time: Come Along With Me (Music from the Original TV Series)
A.A.L. (Against All Logic) – 2012-2017
Albert Hammond Jr. – Francis Trouble
Alejandro Escovedo – The Crossing
Alias – Forever is Orchestra
Alias & Doseone – Less is Orchestra
All Them Witches – ATW
Alexandre Desplat – The Shape of Water
Amen Dunes – Freedom
Anenon – Tongue
Arp – ZEBRA
Arctic Monkeys – Tranquility Base Hotel + Casino
Ashley McBryde – Girl Going Nowhere
Beach House – 7
Beacon – Gravity Pairs
The Beths – Future Me Hates Me
Betty LaVette – Things Have Changed
Big Red Machine – Big Red Machine
boygeniuis – boygenius EP
Buffalo Tom – Quiet and Peace
Calexico – The Thread that Keeps Us
Camp Cope – How to Socialise & Make Friends
Carter Burwell – The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
Chaos Chaos – Chaos Chaos
Christina Vantzou – No. 4
Chromatics – Black Walls EP
Chromatics – Blue Girl EP
Chromatics – Camera
Chromatics – Shadow (12 Inch Remixes)
CHVRCHES – Love is Dead
Cloud Nothings – Last Building Burning
Cobra Man – New Driveway Soundtrack
Cocteau Twins – Head Over Heels (Reissue)
Cocteau Twins – Treasure (Reissue)
Connan Mockasin – Jassbusters
Courtney Marie Andrews – May Your Kindness Remain
Damien Jurado – The Horizon Just Laughed
David Byrne – American Utopia
Dead Can Dance – Dionysus
Death Cab for Cutie – Thank You For Today
The Decemberists – I’ll Be Your Girl
Devotchka – This Night Falls Forever
Dirty Projectors – Lamp Lit Prose
David Byrne – American Utopia
Dungen & Woods – Myths 003
Empress Of – Us
Father John Misty – God’s Favorite Customer
Field Report – Summertime Songs
Flasher – Constant Image
Frankel – The Future
Geoff Knorr – Sid Meier’s Civilization VI: Rise & Fall (Original Game Soundtrack)
Geotic – Traversa
Goldfrapp – Silver Eye
Goth Babe – Pacific II – Single
Goth Babe – Point Mugu – EP
Grouper – Grid of Points
The Golden Filter – Still // Alone
Haley Heynderickx – I Need to Start a Garden
Hovvdy – Cranberrys
How to Dress Well – The Anteroom
I’m With Her – See You Around
Janelle Monáe – Dirty Computer
Jeff Tweedy – WARM
Jeffrey Lewis – Works by Tuli Kupferberg (1923-2010)
Jess Williamson – Cosmic Wink
Jim James – Uniform Distortion
Joey Dosik – Inside Voice
Jóhann Jóhannsson – Mandy (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
John Hiatt – The Eclipse Sessions
Jon Hopkins – Singularity
Johnny Jewel – Digital Rain
Johnny Jewel – Themes for Television
Johnny Jewel – Vapor
Jonny Greenwood – Phantom Thread (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
Josh Rouse – Love in the Modern Age
JPEGMAFIA – Veteran
Julia Holter – Aviary
Kacey Musgraves – Golden Hour
Karl Blau – Out Her Space
Kelly Moran – Ultraviolet
Kilchhofer – The Book Room
Kurt Vile – Bottle It In
Lala Lala – The Lamb
The Lemon Twigs – Go to School
Let’s Eat Grandma – I’m All Ears
Lord Huron – Vide Noir
Low – Double Negative
Lucy Dacus – Historian
Lykke Li – so sad so sexy
Max Richter – Sleep
Martyn – Voids
MGMT – Little Dark Age
Mitski – Be the Cowboy
Mount Eerie – Now Only
Mountain Man – Magic Ship
The National – Boxer (Live in Brussels)
Neko Case – Hell On
Nils Frahm – All Melody
Okkervil River – In the Rainbow Rain
Oneohtrix Point Never – Age Of
Oneohtrix Point Never – The Station EP
Oneohtrix Point Never – Love in the Time of Lexapro EP
Ought – Room Inside the World
PAINT – PAINT
Parquet Courts – Wide Awake!
Paul Kelly – Nature
Paul Simon – In the Blue Light
Peggy Gou – Once EP
Phosphorescent – C’est la Vie
Pick a Piper – Distance
Porches – The House
Ramin Djawadi – Westworld: Season 2
Ramp – Come Into Knowledge (1977)
Rick and Morty – The Rick and Morty Soundtrack
Richard Swift – The Hex
Richard Thompson – 13 Rivers
Robyn – Honey
Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever – Hope Downs
Roosevelt – Young Romance
S U R V I V E – RR7400: LA041717
S. Carey – Hundred Acres
Say Lou Lou – Immortelle
Sam Evian – Premium
Shame – Songs of Praise
Sigur Rós – Route One
The Shins – Heartworms
sir Was – Digging a Tunnel
Snail Mail – Lush
Soccer Mommy – Clean
SOPHIE – OIL OF EVERY PEARL’S UN-INSIDES
Spirit Award – Muted Crowd
Spirit Fest – Anohito
Spiritualized – And Nothing Hurt
St. Vincent – MassEductation
Stryper – God Damn Evil
Sufjan Stevens – Lonely Man of Winter – Single
Sunflower Bean – Twentytwo in Blue
Superorganism – Superorganisms
System – Plus
Taraval – Aardvark – Single
Thee Oh Sees – Smote Reverser
They Might Be Giants – I Like Fun
Tim Hecker – Konoyo
Thom Yorke – Suspiria (Music from the Luca Guadagnino Film)
Thor Rixson – Songs from the Bath
U.S. Girls – In a Poem Unlimited
Wild Nothing – Indigo
Yo La Tengo – There’s a Riot Going On
Young Fathers – Cocoa Sugar
Yves Tumor – Safe in the Hands of Love
Zola Jesus & Johnny Jewel – Wiseblood (Johnny Jewel Remixes)

Ten Years on: Alopecia by Why?

Here, we got the razor-sharp lines Wolf had been penning for years focused and condensed into the setting of a band firing on all cylinders, creating a record that’s catchy, memorable, challenging, inventive, playful and very, very dark. All the energy and innovation the Anticon members had shown in their past came together on Alopecia, and it remains just as vital some ten years on.

Source: The Fangasm: Alopecia by Why? / In Depth // Drowned In Sound

Swan Songs: Music for Your Final Exit – Apple Music Playlist

NPR’s All Songs Considrered compiled a user-generated list of 100 songs that people would like to have played at their memorial service / funeral / wake / what-have-you… you know… when you’re dead.

Swan Songs: Music For Your Final Exit

I recreated NPR’s Spotify playlist in Apple Music:

https://embed.music.apple.com/us/playlist/swan-songs-nprs-all-songs-considered/pl.u-JNLGsl6G6l

Some great songs on this list. Also a few head-scratchers (at least in my mind).

I also compiled a few of the songs which I think personally are most fitting for such an occasion. Apple Music Playlist (much much shorter than 100 songs) below:

https://embed.music.apple.com/us/playlist/swan-songs-joels-apple-music-playlist/pl.u-a9q0SRGoGR

2017 – The Year in Review – Music

2017 was a great year for music – as many musicians took up the mandate to go forth and create art that speaks to the mind, heart and soul in the face of a geo-political landscape being haphazardly ripped up by an infantile narcissist.

There were much-balleyhooed releases from Arcade Fire, Beck, Chad VanGaalen, Cold War Kids, David Bazan, Destroyer, The Drums, Fever Ray, Frankie Rose, girlpool, Guided by Voices, Jeremy Enigk, Johnny Jewel, Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith, Kelly Lee Owens, King Krule, Lali Puna, LCD Soundsystem, Lorde, The National, Nick Hakim, Pallbearer, Phoebe Bridgers, Rostam, ShitKid, St. Vincent, Sweet Baboo, Thundercat, Vagabon, The War on Drugs, Why?, The xx, and Zola Jesus… but none of those are in my personal list of the top 15 albums of the year.

I listened to 119 albums in 2017 from almost as many different artists. Here, then, is my short list of the top 15 albums of the year:

15. Hand Habits – Wildly Idle (Humble Before the Void)

I’ll sing it to you softly, it’s so terrifying
When I hold you like a flower
I hold you like an hour glass
I hold you like you’re the only thing I love

~ Flower Glass

Hand Habits is Meg Duffy. Wildly Idle (Humble Before the Void) is her first studio album.

14. Ariel Pink – Dedicated to Bobby Jameson

Pop up goes the weasel
Bobby’s mind has thinned
And I’m the best dressed and they’re not
That sorry ’cause I never came out

~ Do Yourself a Favor

This album is named after Bobby Jameson, whose stage name was Chris Lucey. He was briefly a fixture of the protest music scene in the 1960s. His origins remained mysterious for many years, as he faded from the scene and became an alcoholic homeless bum. Eventually, he overcame the alcoholism and lived for the better part of 20 years in obscurity with his mother in San Luis Obispo County, CA, before launching a series of autobiographical YouTube posts, which he kept up until his death in 2015.

Ariel Pink is Ariel Marcus Rosenberg. Dedicated to Bobby Jameson is his 11th studio album.

13. Sufjan Stevens – The Greatest Gift

As the mystery of the cross
Asa Lovejoy lost the toss
And the fountain in the rain
Where my sorrow still remains
So I run to my friends and lovers
I lay down my life for my brothers
As I abide in peace
So will my delight increase

~ The Greatest Gift

Sufjan Stevens’ devastating Carrie & Lowell was my top album of 2015. Here, he presents a series of outtakes, demos and remixes of songs from that album, along with one or two b-sides.

The Greatest Gift could be considered to be his 13th studio album.

12. Waxahatchee – Out in the Storm

I hoped howling out all this truth
Would be liberating
But all the pity spills from the seams
And everyone questions the unseen

~ No Question

Waxahatchee is Katie Crutchfield. Out in the Storm is her fourth studio album.

11. Big Thief – Capacity

What did you tell me Mary
When you were there so sweet and very
Full of field and stars you carried all of time
Oh and heavens when you looked at me
Your eyes were like machinery
Your hands were making artifacts in the corner of my mind

~ Mary

Big Thief are Adrianne Lenker (guitar, vocals), Buck Meek (guitar), Max Oleartchik (bass), and James Krivchenia (drums). Capacity is their second studio album.

10. Fleet Foxes – Crack-Up

White oceans roar
A frightened fool stokes heatless fire
But if you need to, keep time on me
If you need to, keep time on me

~ If You Need to, Keep Time on Me

Fleet Foxes are Robin Pecknold, Skyler Skjelset, Casey Wescott, Christian Wargo, and Morgan Henderson. Crack-Up is their third studio album, and first full-length since 2011.

9. Father John Misty – Pure Comedy

There’s no one old on Magic Mountain

~ Magic Mountain

Perhaps the most politically-charged album on my top-list. Father John Misty seems to have a lot to say about the worldviews which dominate our headlines today… only trouble is, it’s pretty nigh impossible to discern his own worldview from the content of his lyrics. Ah well, music can be largely subjective and I’m not too concerned with deriving meaning from it at every turn… but when the whole point of a record seems to be to make a kind of statement, perhaps it would help to be a little more concise. In any case, this is a record which captured and held my attention.

Father John Misty is Joshua Michael Tillman. Pure Comedy is his third studio album under the moniker.

8. Fletcher Tucker – Cold Spring

The world I long for stays hidden
Clouds shroud the gates

~ Buried on the Wind

Fletcher Tucker’s haunting, psychedelic-drone-folk album Cold Spring was assembled over the course of four years in Big Sur, CA. It is a beautiful record. See him in the album art, above? You may have to squint. Don’t take my word for it; instead, go and read Aquarium Drunkard’s excellent write-up.

7. Kevin Morby – City Music

Joey, Johnny, Dee Dee, Tommy
They were all my friends… and they died.

~ 1234

Kevin Morby was the bassist for Woods and the frontman for The Babies before embarking upon a solo singer/songwriter career. City Music is his fourth solo studio album.

6. Trevor Sensor – Andy Warhol’s Dream

I’m gonna be someone tonight

~ The Money Gets Bigger

When consistency is pitted against talent, consistency is usually going to win. Happily, in the case of Trevor Sensor, we have someone with a consistent penchant for belting out raucous, crowd-pleasing power ballads AND the talent to assemble something new from the potholes and well-worn ruts of this road-most-traveled: rock music. His gravely, muppet-esque singing voice makes every song so much more world-weary and enjoyable.

Trevor Sensor is… Trevor Sensor? Andy Warhol’s Dream is his debut album.

5. Temples – Volcano

Standing up like a wild impala
Standing down like a weekend martyr

~ Oh the Savior

The U.K. has been the source for many of the world’s most storied and influential bands: The Zombies, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Hollies, The Kinks, The Who, The Sex Pistols, Joy Division, The Clash, The The, U2, Radiohead, Coldplay (gasp!), Elbow, Keane, Klaxons, Wild Beasts, Harry Styles- the list goes on! Temples should be added to that pantheon, ’nuff said.

Temples are James Bagshaw, Tom Walmsley, Sam Toms, and Adam Smith (not the Wealth of Nations guy). Volcano is their second studio album.

4. Sufjan Stevens, Bryce Dessner, Nico Muhly & James McAlister – Planetarium

Tell me I’m evil
Tell me I’m not the name of love
Tell me I’m evil
Tell me I’m not the face of God

~ Saturn

Step aside, Gustav Holst, there are some new kids on the “music of the spheres” block. And they pray for us.

3. Julien Baker – Turn Out the Lights

Cause if you swear that it’s true then I have to believe
What I hear Evangelicals say on TV
And if there’s enough left after everyone else
Then why, then why, then why not me?

~ Happy to be Here

Julien Baker’s spare arrangements, coupled with her Sunday-morning-service vocals and raw, deeply-personal lyrics, make Turn out the Lights a powerful record.

Turn out the Lights is Julien Baker’s second studio album. She is merely 22 years old.

2. Radiohead – OK Computer OKNOTOK 1997 2017

I won’t run away no more, I promise

~ I Promise

20 years ago, Radiohead released OK Computer. 20 years later, the album still stands as a massively influential artistic achievement. The entire extra album’s-worth of b-sides solidifies its reputation as a legend.

Radiohead are Thom Yorke, Jonny Greenwood, Colin Greenwood, Ed O’Brien, and Philip Selway (and also- shhhh- Nigel Godrich). OK Computer was their third studio album when it was originally released in 1997. Since then, they have released 6 more proper studio albums.

1. Bombadil – Fences

I raise up my binoculars and
I see everything everywhere
I see detail, of that, I’m sure
But I don’t see me, and that hurts the most

~ Binoculars

Bombadil previously topped my list of albums in 2013 with their 4th studio album, Metrics of Affection. I went to see them perform at the Casbah in San Diego on June 19, 2016, prior to the recording of Fences. There, they performed many of the songs that would end up on the album. They even performed with a brand-new microphone all of the band members were pretty stoked on. Each one of them took turns on various instruments and all of them lent vocals by clustering around their shiny new mic. After the show, I chatted for a bit with band-member Daniel Michalak, who is a super-pleasant dude. Fences came out in March of 2017 and has been playing non-stop in my car, my house and my headphones ever since.

From tender love ballads about the mysterious mathematics of love, to excoriating an American Evangelical Christian base who bought into a campaign of hatred, bigotry, naked avarice and plainspoken evil, Bombadil’s sixth full-length has it all. Laden with pleasant arrangements and plenty of hooks, the subject matter of each song can range from adorable sentimentality to withering criticism. For me, Fences is an album that never gets old.

Bombadil are Daniel Michalak, James Phillips, and Stacy Harden. Fences is their sixth studio album. It was recorded at Tiny Telephone with John Vanderslice in San Francisco.

…

Listen to a playlist of some of Joel’s favorite songs from 2017 on Apple Music:

https://tools.applemusic.com/embed/v1/playlist/pl.u-Vk1dtj868j?country=us

Full list of music Joel listened to in 2017:

Actress – AZD
The Afghan Whigs – In Spades
Aimee Mann – Mental Illness
Aldous Harding – Party
Algiers – The Underside of Power
Alex Lahey – I Love You Like a Brother
Angel Olsen – Phases
Arcade Fire – Everything Now
Ariel Pink – Dedicated to Bobby Jameson
Baths – Romaplasm
Beach House – B-Sides and Rarities
Beck – Colors
Big Black Delta – Whoru812
Big Thief – Capacity
Bill Benzel & Jim Earp – Mainland Style
Bing & Ruth – No Home of the Mind
Biosphere – The Petrified Forest EP
Bob Dylan – Triplicate
The Bob’s Burgers Music Album
Bodies of Water – Spear in the City
Bombadil – Fences
Bonobo – Migration
Briana Marela – Call It Love
Chad VanGaalen – Light Information
Chuck Johnson – Balsams
Cold War Kids – LA DIVINE
Cut Copy – Haku From Zero
Cut Worms – Alien Sunset EP
David Bazan – Care
David Bowie – No Plan EP
Derek Webb – Fingers Crossed
Destroyer – ken
Dirty Projectors – Dirty Projectors
Don Bryant – Don’t Give Up On Love
The Drums – Abysmal Thoughts
Elbow – Little Fictions
Father John Misty – Pure Comedy
Feist – Pleasure
Fever Ray – Plunge
Fleet Foxes – Crack-Up
Fletcher Tucker – Cold Spring
Floating Points – Reflections – Mojave Desert
Four Tet – New Energy
Frankie Rose – Cage Tropical
Future Islands – The Far Field
Gas – Narkopop
Gaussian Curve – The Distance
girlpool – Powerplant
Gordi – Reservoir
Grandaddy – Last Place
Grizzly Bear – Painted Ruins
Guided by Voices – August by Cake
Hand Habits – Wildly Idle (Humble Before the Void)
Hello Shark – Break Arms
Hoops – Routines
Jean-Michel Blais & CFCF – Cascades
Jens Lekman – Life Will See You Now
Jeremy Enigk – Ghosts
Jlin – Black Origami
Johnny Jewel – Windswept***
Josh Ritter – Gathering
Julien Baker – Turn Out the Lights
Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith – The Kid
Kathryn Kluge & Kim Allen Kluge – Silence (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
Kelly Lee Owens – Kelly Lee Owens
Kevin Morby – City Music
King Krule – The OOZ
Kraus – End Tomorrow (2016)
Kyle Dixon & Michael Stein – Stranger Things 2 (Original Series Soundtrack)
Lali Puna – Two Windows
LCD Soundsystem – american dream
Liars – TFCF
Lo Tom – Lo Tom
Lorde – Melodrama
Miya Folick – Give It To Me EP
The National – Sleep Well Beast
Nick Hakim – Green Twins
Nightlands – I Can Feel the Night Around Me
Pallbearer – Heartless
Perfume Genius – No Shape
Phoebe Bridgers – Stranger in the Alps
Psychic Temple – IV
Radiohead – OK Computer OKNOTOK 1997 2017
Real Estate – In Mind
Rostam – Half-Light
Run The Jewels – RTJ3
San Fermin – Belong
ShitKid – Fish
Silver Fleet – Demo
Slothrust – Show Me How You Want It to Be
Soley, Sin Fang & Örvar Smárason – Singles 2017
Spoon – Hot Thoughts
St. Vincent – MASSEDUCTION
Steady Holiday – Terror EP
Sudan Archives – Sudan Archives EP
Sufjan Stevens – Carrie & Lowell Live
Sufjan Stevens – The Greatest Gift
Sufjan Stevens, Bryce Dessner, Nico Muhly & James McAlister – Planetarium
Sweet Baboo – Wild Imagination
Sylvan Esso – What Now
Temples – Volcano
Thundercat – “Drunk”
Tim Heidecker – Too Dumb for Suicide: Tim Heidecker’s Trump Songs
Timber Timbre – Sincerely, Future Pollution
Tom Rogerson & Brian Eno – Finding Shore
Toro y Moi – Boo Boo
TORRES – Three Futures
Trevor Sensor – Andy Warhol’s Dream
Vagabon – Infinite Worlds
The War on Drugs – A Deeper Understanding
Washed Out – Mister Mellow
Wavves – You’re Welcome
Waxahatchee – Out in the Storm
Why? – Moh Lhean
William Eggleston – Musik
Withered Hand & A Singer of Songs – Among Horses 1 – EP
Woods – Love Is Love EP
The xx – I See You
Zola Jesus – Okovi