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bedsitter23You should know the routine by now. These are what I tuned in to, in alphabetical order.
Belle and Sebastian- Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance (Matador)- If you know me, you know how much I love the first four (yes, even the fourth) albums of Belle and Sebastian. Although I don’t have a problem with any of those since, none have maintained that level to me. I have noted that it was around the time that Isobel Campbell left the band though we are told that Campbell’s artistic input on the band was minimal. Much has been made about this being a “dance” album and a “radical departure”. Ironically, for me this album is closer to the band’s first albums than their most recent. While seemingly “dance”, the fact that the band is putting melancholic lyrics to an electronic beat, it is not unlike what their artistic brethren like St Etienne and Pet Shop Boys do on a regular basis (and maybe it’s not so ridiculous when Johnny Marr suggested in 2015 that the Smiths’ next album would have been a ‘disco’ one). At 12 songs and over an hour, it is too long of an album to not have some filler, but the best songs (“The Party Line”, “Enter Sylvia Plath”, “Everlasting Muse”) are as good as anything the band has ever put to record.
Jello Biafra and the New Orleans Raunch and Soul All Stars- Walk on Jindal’s Splinters (Alternative Tentacles)- In 2011, some New Orleans based musicians with a pretty interesting CV (Dash Rip Rock & Mojo Nixon, Cowboy Mouth, Corrosion of Conformity & Down, Morning 40 Federation) convinced Jello to come to New Orleans and perform a set one night following Jazzfest. Apparently, this has been on YouTube for years, but my first knowledge was this AT Live release. Biafra rips through a collection of NOLA related songs (“House of the Rising Sun”, “Don’t Mess with My toot toot”, Dr John’s “Walk on Guilded Splinters”) and a collection of 50s/60s party rock (“Mother in Law”, “Judy in Disguise (with Glasses” “Land of 1000 Dances”) and fittingly an obscure 50s r&b/rock song called “Fannie Mae”. What does it sound like when Jello performs “golden oldies” and frat rock? You suspect it will sound like “My Own Private Idaho”. It doesn’t, but it’s a lot of fun. It’s certainly as odd as Dylan singing Sinatra. It was one of the records I listened to a lot in 2015, and good fun. I don’t know if Biafra loves these songs or is being ironic, but it illuminates the thing that made the Dead Kennedys best work just more than “punk rock” was Biafra’s deep understanding of musical history.
Car Seat Headrest – Teens of Style (Merge)- This is only a debut album in the terms that old middle aged college rockers like me understand. CSH is Will Toledo, a 20-something who has released 11 albums on Bandcamp. This is a ‘proper’ album which selects tunes from those previous albums and he has re-recorded them and released it through Merge. Toledo’s lo-fi got him a lot of play on Sirius’s College styled station (another concept us old fogies may have some trouble with- a corporate backed college station), where I heard him compared to Bright Eyes. His style and aesthetic gets him the comparisons to bands like Guided by Voices a lot, but also old standbys like Beck and Pavement. It is true that he makes me think of many lo-fi stars (and one that I don’t see mentioned, but reminds me of Magnetic Fields at many times). Rocking “Something Soon” (perhaps the best song of the year) with its modulated voice reminds of the Strokes to the point, Toledo went to social media to say he doesn’t sound like the Strokes. That song certainly does, but if you are expecting a dozen Julian Casablancas type screamers you will be disappointed. Toledo does seem to suffer from the curse of the overprolific that even here his quality varies. Still, it’s good enough him to put him strongly on the indie map.
Bob Dylan – Shadows in the Night (Columbia) – Given this was Dylan recording Sinatra covers and was given out as a giveaway to AARP members, it’s hard to say this year had a more talked about album, at least until Adele’s release. It isn’t Dylan picking the hits, but instead a collection of songs from all over that Sinatra at one point had recorded or performed. Dylan claims in interviews that he has always recorded music like this in his career, but for a fan, it’s hard to think of any time that he put so many songs like this in one place. It’s an unique sound- nocturnal and intimate. It’s hard to think of any album like this at all. Sure, there are somewhat similar artists covering similar territory- Cohen, Hiatt, Prine- but if this sounds like any album it might be Franks Wild Years by Tom Waits- that mix of Sinatra and Dylanesque prose. It’s hard to place this in the uppermost echelon of Dylan’s best records, but that’s hardly a slight. A very worthy addition to the canon.
Vince Eager – 75 Not Out –(Western Star)- Eager’s claim to fame was as of one of the many British rockers who rose to fame in the years Elvis was in the Army. He has spent recent years portraying Elvis on the London stage and as travel agent and in the travel industry. In modern rock circles, Eager is most well known as the artist of the song “The World’s Loneliest Man”, the song Morrissey says he most wants played at his funeral (You can look up the song and see why. Perhaps the most Morrisseyesque song ever written) and Moz signed into hotels under Eager’s name during his 90s tours. Though his career trajectory is probably more akin to Tom Jones, Eager’s rockabilly credibility is bonafide. He was best friends with Eddie Cochrane, roommates with Billy Fury and toured with Cliff Richard. Now 75 (hence the title) the excellent British Rockabilly label Western Star has convinced him to record now three albums with their bands as backup. The result is spectacular. While Eager’s voice is strong after decades of performing to large crowds, the real hero are those backing bands, particularly the Bullets (who more often than not are the backing band) who are just white hot. The more well known covers “Summertime Blues” “Don’t mess with my toot toot” are the weakest, but songs like the Secret Agent Man-ish “El Camino Real” and “Watch Yourself” will just blow your mind.
Steve Earle & the Dukes– Terraplane – (New West) – Earle follows 2013’s Low Highway with another solid group of songs. This one is Earle’s “blues” album, though Earle has always been influenced by country blues and traditional blues, so it’s not the noticeable departure like his bluegrass album “The Mountain”. The blues theme plays through and Earle does some self-mytholizing which wouldn’t work for most artists (drawing comparisons to Robert Johnson and Elvis among others), though given Earle’s backstory, he is probably worthy enough. A worthwhile addition to the discography that will please fans, and as Earle’s interesting artistic journey continues on, he stays relevant.
Editors- In Dream (Play it Again Sam)- The band’s 2005 debut The Back Room was a classic for its time and genre. It drew from obvious new wave guitar touchpoints like Joy Division, U2, Chameleons, and the Bunnymen, but was a great album. They did the rare achievement (I think, others disagree) of making a sophomore album as good as their first. Third albums of course by cliché are difficult (with the one in a million exceptions of U2, Radiohead, the Clash and select others) and Editors third album was just ok. Making what seems like a logical leap for a band of these influences (see: the Killers) Editors made a leap on album 4 for big arena rock u2ish sound. That album is not bad, but even the band will tell you it was a misstep. Which makes album #5 all the more surprising. The band has remade itself (there was a lineup change as well) as a new wave (in the artistic Gary Numan, Visage, Depeche Mode synth based sense as opposed to the “American 80s radio “pop term” of the word) band, including at its best moment “Our Love” which has a falsetto Jimmy Sommerville would be proud of. Unlikely, for a band to make a fifth album this good (or even to make it to album 5 in the first place), but credit to the band who did it.
Faith No More – Sol Invictus (Ipecac/Reclamation)- Faith No More’s history is well known but worth revisiting. When Mike Patton joined them and they released “The Real Thing” in 1989, they were a commercial and artistic success. Already unclassifiable, they toured with Guns N Roses and Metallica, and because they were “metal” were discussed in the same magazines that routinely featured Motley Crue and Dokken. 1992’s “Angel Dust” is a masterpiece of the band’s work, yet despite its genius is the kind of album that music snobs from Pitchfork to NME would never touch. That albnum’s followup “King for a Day” was such a disappointment, that I pretty much tuned out when swan song “Album of the Year” was released in 1997. Still the hype for a “reunion” has been off the charts. Patton’s 21st Century work with Fantomas, Peeping Tom, and Tomahawk (even going back to Mr Bungle) has been a mixture of the artistically esoteric yet catchy to rock ears. It’s hard to think of anyone since Zappa who has been able to do what he can from a commercial and artistic point of view. Expectations were as high as probably any other album since the last Queens of the Stone Age in regards to those hard rock crowds, and even then, the band did not disappoint. Truth be told, for the most part the album doesn’t quite live up to those initial listenings on repeated play. Still, some songs do – “Rise of the Fall”, “Motherf—er” do stand up and so it’s place on the Year End best of is justified.
Belle and Sebastian- Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance (Matador)- If you know me, you know how much I love the first four (yes, even the fourth) albums of Belle and Sebastian. Although I don’t have a problem with any of those since, none have maintained that level to me. I have noted that it was around the time that Isobel Campbell left the band though we are told that Campbell’s artistic input on the band was minimal. Much has been made about this being a “dance” album and a “radical departure”. Ironically, for me this album is closer to the band’s first albums than their most recent. While seemingly “dance”, the fact that the band is putting melancholic lyrics to an electronic beat, it is not unlike what their artistic brethren like St Etienne and Pet Shop Boys do on a regular basis (and maybe it’s not so ridiculous when Johnny Marr suggested in 2015 that the Smiths’ next album would have been a ‘disco’ one). At 12 songs and over an hour, it is too long of an album to not have some filler, but the best songs (“The Party Line”, “Enter Sylvia Plath”, “Everlasting Muse”) are as good as anything the band has ever put to record.
Jello Biafra and the New Orleans Raunch and Soul All Stars- Walk on Jindal’s Splinters (Alternative Tentacles)- In 2011, some New Orleans based musicians with a pretty interesting CV (Dash Rip Rock & Mojo Nixon, Cowboy Mouth, Corrosion of Conformity & Down, Morning 40 Federation) convinced Jello to come to New Orleans and perform a set one night following Jazzfest. Apparently, this has been on YouTube for years, but my first knowledge was this AT Live release. Biafra rips through a collection of NOLA related songs (“House of the Rising Sun”, “Don’t Mess with My toot toot”, Dr John’s “Walk on Guilded Splinters”) and a collection of 50s/60s party rock (“Mother in Law”, “Judy in Disguise (with Glasses” “Land of 1000 Dances”) and fittingly an obscure 50s r&b/rock song called “Fannie Mae”. What does it sound like when Jello performs “golden oldies” and frat rock? You suspect it will sound like “My Own Private Idaho”. It doesn’t, but it’s a lot of fun. It’s certainly as odd as Dylan singing Sinatra. It was one of the records I listened to a lot in 2015, and good fun. I don’t know if Biafra loves these songs or is being ironic, but it illuminates the thing that made the Dead Kennedys best work just more than “punk rock” was Biafra’s deep understanding of musical history.
Car Seat Headrest – Teens of Style (Merge)- This is only a debut album in the terms that old middle aged college rockers like me understand. CSH is Will Toledo, a 20-something who has released 11 albums on Bandcamp. This is a ‘proper’ album which selects tunes from those previous albums and he has re-recorded them and released it through Merge. Toledo’s lo-fi got him a lot of play on Sirius’s College styled station (another concept us old fogies may have some trouble with- a corporate backed college station), where I heard him compared to Bright Eyes. His style and aesthetic gets him the comparisons to bands like Guided by Voices a lot, but also old standbys like Beck and Pavement. It is true that he makes me think of many lo-fi stars (and one that I don’t see mentioned, but reminds me of Magnetic Fields at many times). Rocking “Something Soon” (perhaps the best song of the year) with its modulated voice reminds of the Strokes to the point, Toledo went to social media to say he doesn’t sound like the Strokes. That song certainly does, but if you are expecting a dozen Julian Casablancas type screamers you will be disappointed. Toledo does seem to suffer from the curse of the overprolific that even here his quality varies. Still, it’s good enough him to put him strongly on the indie map.
Bob Dylan – Shadows in the Night (Columbia) – Given this was Dylan recording Sinatra covers and was given out as a giveaway to AARP members, it’s hard to say this year had a more talked about album, at least until Adele’s release. It isn’t Dylan picking the hits, but instead a collection of songs from all over that Sinatra at one point had recorded or performed. Dylan claims in interviews that he has always recorded music like this in his career, but for a fan, it’s hard to think of any time that he put so many songs like this in one place. It’s an unique sound- nocturnal and intimate. It’s hard to think of any album like this at all. Sure, there are somewhat similar artists covering similar territory- Cohen, Hiatt, Prine- but if this sounds like any album it might be Franks Wild Years by Tom Waits- that mix of Sinatra and Dylanesque prose. It’s hard to place this in the uppermost echelon of Dylan’s best records, but that’s hardly a slight. A very worthy addition to the canon.
Vince Eager – 75 Not Out –(Western Star)- Eager’s claim to fame was as of one of the many British rockers who rose to fame in the years Elvis was in the Army. He has spent recent years portraying Elvis on the London stage and as travel agent and in the travel industry. In modern rock circles, Eager is most well known as the artist of the song “The World’s Loneliest Man”, the song Morrissey says he most wants played at his funeral (You can look up the song and see why. Perhaps the most Morrisseyesque song ever written) and Moz signed into hotels under Eager’s name during his 90s tours. Though his career trajectory is probably more akin to Tom Jones, Eager’s rockabilly credibility is bonafide. He was best friends with Eddie Cochrane, roommates with Billy Fury and toured with Cliff Richard. Now 75 (hence the title) the excellent British Rockabilly label Western Star has convinced him to record now three albums with their bands as backup. The result is spectacular. While Eager’s voice is strong after decades of performing to large crowds, the real hero are those backing bands, particularly the Bullets (who more often than not are the backing band) who are just white hot. The more well known covers “Summertime Blues” “Don’t mess with my toot toot” are the weakest, but songs like the Secret Agent Man-ish “El Camino Real” and “Watch Yourself” will just blow your mind.
Steve Earle & the Dukes– Terraplane – (New West) – Earle follows 2013’s Low Highway with another solid group of songs. This one is Earle’s “blues” album, though Earle has always been influenced by country blues and traditional blues, so it’s not the noticeable departure like his bluegrass album “The Mountain”. The blues theme plays through and Earle does some self-mytholizing which wouldn’t work for most artists (drawing comparisons to Robert Johnson and Elvis among others), though given Earle’s backstory, he is probably worthy enough. A worthwhile addition to the discography that will please fans, and as Earle’s interesting artistic journey continues on, he stays relevant.
Editors- In Dream (Play it Again Sam)- The band’s 2005 debut The Back Room was a classic for its time and genre. It drew from obvious new wave guitar touchpoints like Joy Division, U2, Chameleons, and the Bunnymen, but was a great album. They did the rare achievement (I think, others disagree) of making a sophomore album as good as their first. Third albums of course by cliché are difficult (with the one in a million exceptions of U2, Radiohead, the Clash and select others) and Editors third album was just ok. Making what seems like a logical leap for a band of these influences (see: the Killers) Editors made a leap on album 4 for big arena rock u2ish sound. That album is not bad, but even the band will tell you it was a misstep. Which makes album #5 all the more surprising. The band has remade itself (there was a lineup change as well) as a new wave (in the artistic Gary Numan, Visage, Depeche Mode synth based sense as opposed to the “American 80s radio “pop term” of the word) band, including at its best moment “Our Love” which has a falsetto Jimmy Sommerville would be proud of. Unlikely, for a band to make a fifth album this good (or even to make it to album 5 in the first place), but credit to the band who did it.
Faith No More – Sol Invictus (Ipecac/Reclamation)- Faith No More’s history is well known but worth revisiting. When Mike Patton joined them and they released “The Real Thing” in 1989, they were a commercial and artistic success. Already unclassifiable, they toured with Guns N Roses and Metallica, and because they were “metal” were discussed in the same magazines that routinely featured Motley Crue and Dokken. 1992’s “Angel Dust” is a masterpiece of the band’s work, yet despite its genius is the kind of album that music snobs from Pitchfork to NME would never touch. That albnum’s followup “King for a Day” was such a disappointment, that I pretty much tuned out when swan song “Album of the Year” was released in 1997. Still the hype for a “reunion” has been off the charts. Patton’s 21st Century work with Fantomas, Peeping Tom, and Tomahawk (even going back to Mr Bungle) has been a mixture of the artistically esoteric yet catchy to rock ears. It’s hard to think of anyone since Zappa who has been able to do what he can from a commercial and artistic point of view. Expectations were as high as probably any other album since the last Queens of the Stone Age in regards to those hard rock crowds, and even then, the band did not disappoint. Truth be told, for the most part the album doesn’t quite live up to those initial listenings on repeated play. Still, some songs do – “Rise of the Fall”, “Motherf—er” do stand up and so it’s place on the Year End best of is justified.
