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December 29, 2005
BEST ALBUMS OF 2005 - THREE TAKES - PART 3 - Keith O'Brien
1. Sufjan Stevens - Illinoise
Sufjan Stevens, via his Christian-tinged music, gives the 2005 music scene some much-needed heart. Even his speculative pieces about John Wayne Gacy, Jr. and predatory wasps are sincere, bold, and painfully empathic. His symphonic oeuvre to Illinois evokes a meticulous approach to music, which nicely counterbalances the less tight albums on this list. I'll leave it up the citizens of the "Land of Lincoln" to determine Stevens' research prowess, but even disgruntled fact junkies cannot justify hating on such a delicate balance between morose tracks like "Casimir Pulaski Day," the marching band meets swing jazz title track, the build up and break down of "The Tallest Man…," the languid crooning about zombies, and the life-affirmative sprawling "Chicago."
Quote of quotes: "Tuesday night, at the bible study, we lift our hands and pray over your body, but nothing ever happens."
2. Wolf Parade - Apologies to the Queen Mary
Much has been said (even here) about Wolf Parade's drunken show appearances. While it must affect the band's quality, the members' penchant for the drink is not surprising considering how apt "Apologies" is for the 3 am milieu. "You Are A Runner And I Am My Father's Son," is a woozy, foxtrot of a song, drums keeping pace, guitars checking in and out to catch drink breaks, and an almost subliminal distortion in the foreground (or is it background?). "Modern World" is more synth than rock, tired warble railing against the trappings of our mundo moderno, leading into a quick dance freak out, back to the leisurely crooning. But nothing tops "Dear Sons and Daughters of Hungry Ghosts," a boot-marching anthem replete with "La la la la" cadence. At a local bar priding itself on the best dance rock, I requested said song. The DJ said he didn't have it, but, as an afterthought, commented on how he liked the song. It's a case of the song not being obviously danceable; hopefully it will be there next time I'm back. That sums up the album. It's not completely obvious why it works so well, but it's so obvious that it does.
"You say it's in God's hands, but God doesn't always have the best god damn plans."
3. Sleater-Kinney - The Woods
Leave your half-baked ideas of SK approaching cock rock as being counterintuitive to its goals. First off, how do you know what its goals are? Secondly, doesn't this concern you more? Onto the music, "The Woods" is not S-K's most urgent, angry, or melodic album. But it's the album to best combine all three. Die-hard "Dig Me Out" fans would be deaf to not hear the unified guitar build-up, then divergence made popular on "DMO"'s title track running rampant on the joyous "Rollercoaster." Even the panned "Let's Call it Love" starts out brilliant, crushing guitars, stop-start thrashing, and proto-sneering. What Sleater-Kinney discovered and what "The Woods" wrought is that 2 ½ minute songs that are about to reach their conclusion can be extended through a well-placed bridge, if and only if, that bridge is not wankering or mindless noodling. If it snaps people out of the rhythm. Using different techniques, such as running down scales with lockstep drumming ("Wilderness"), a faint breeze, followed by a return to the opening chords ("Rollercoaster"), or a sudden, urgent build-up ("Jumpers"), a song begins anew by reintroduction.
"Sit down honey, let's kill some time. Rest your head on this heart of mine."
4. Kanye West - Late Registration
It's important to note that Kanye West is not the answer to cliché-driven rap. West is even a proponent and a guilty-party in those regards. Where West succeeds - and a litany of rappers (even ones I like) fail - is you can hear West's determination to be great in his work. You hear West's self-discovery on par with Nas' street description in "Illmatic." West frets, contemplates, queries; he is rap's Woody Allen. The fact that he's so off point so often is not to be dwelled on. The reasons why you might hate rap is why cats should care about 'Ye. "Roses" is poignant and one of the most thoughtful raps I've ever heard. "Gone" is the year's most buoyant pop track, pulsing piano plink and a great guest from Killer Cam. Dig this: rap is rarely a genre that find success in complexity. That is, except when Jon Brion is involved; his hand evident in the musical champagne that is "We Major." "Heard 'Em Say" delicately dances on. Find me another album where you have that, followed by "Gold Digger"'s bombast. Each track provides a great snippet of West's influence. He's tightened up his rhymes considerably, introduced us to some previously-unknown talent (Lupe Fiasco and Consequence). Side note: Nas, you're killing us. Shape up.
"You know the best medicine goes to people that's paid. If Magic Johnson got the cure for AIDS, and all the broke motherfuckers passed away. You tell me if my mother was in the NBA, right now, she'd be okay?"
5. Fiery Furnaces - EP
The FF's are probably only the second band that I give the Radiohead tag (defined as the desire to split into a group into two: one adventurous, one pop-sensible) to a band that does two things well (Radiohead, being the other). While this EP makes a strong case for the Friedbergers to remain on the straight and narrow hook-friendly path (combined, of course, with the guaranteed disastrous "Rehearsing My Choir"), I cannot live without the band pursuing more songs in the vein of "Chris Michaels" and "Inspector Blancheflower." Anyways, songs like "Here Comes the Summer" and "Tropical Ice-Land" (single version), with their breezy, uncomplicated nature resounded with nearly any environment. "Single Again" is wildly infectious. Eleanor Friedberger's voice commands attention; yes, I will listen rapt to you reading your shopping list.
"I been waiting since I don't know when and now it finally seems like it will start. I swear, I swear, that I will do my part."
6. New Pornographers - Twin Cinema
Someone, somewhere on the internets pointed out how it was difficult to get excited about a third New Pornographers album. But then he or she did. And, so did I. From the exalting "Use It," using NPG the trademark of piano, guitar, voices marching uphill to different tempos, only to have all collide and reach their harmony in the gulley, to "The Bleeding Heart Show," which sounds as if the NPG walked through Little Italy and picked up a violinist. As with pretty much every NPG song, you know it's only time before the pace picks up, and it does with a rapid build-up and, damn, if some teen movie doesn't pick this end part up for some graduation ceremony montage. And, when the band isolates Neko Case's voice like on "These are the Fables" and "The Bones of An Idol," you realize what a unique talent she is. Rivers Cuomo's passion to write the perfect pop song is oft quoted, so it seems, the torture will continue for our Weezer frontman, as A.C. Newman throw-aways have more pop sensibilities than anything the band has made in a long time.
"The cat calls, through the night, and the two chicks in the parking lot, crack wise about the price of fame, they stood to gain."
7. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah (s/t)
It is not as masterfully realized a first proper album as Arcade Fire's debut, but the unabashed emoting is quite on par with "Funeral." It is unimportant that while Alec Ounsworth's voice sometimes boarders on annoying and sometimes on abrasive, the striving to convey meaning shines ubiquitously. With lyrics like, "All those things we had salvaged from the fire, what a waste of time," over a song structure quite like Kitchens' of Distortion's "Drive That Fast," one would hope that the "emo" fetish trumped through the mainstream music glossies referred to CYHSY, not Ohio town-sounding groups that have all of the restraint of crank-fond dudes with emotional problems lugging sledgehammers. Songs like the metric-ticking "Over and Over Again" (with the famous Bowie line), the fuzzed out, Modest Mouse-linked "Skin of My Yellow Country Teeth," and the hastened anthem "Heavy Metal" show a group with promise.
"Now that I'm so sad and not quite right, I could dance all night. I could dance all night."
8. Danger Doom - The Mouse and the Mask
Had I not had the fortune of reviewing an mp3 player for my day job while my iPod took its extended nap, this work of art might not have made it. The most recent on the list, Danger Mouse continues to assert his knack for straddling the pop/old soul delineation and MF Doom continues to burnish the odd rhyme crown, vacated by Kool Keith. "Old School" is the neglected single of the year, where the habitually-overrated Talib Kwali and Doom shut down pretty much every talentless rapper that equates glocks and hoes with rapping cred. It's tiresome, boys. We all know that those cars, ladies, and Gs in the video are rented! Danger Doom's inclusion of "Adult Swim" characters might initially caution critics to assign the album novelty status, but it works incredibly well considering Doom often approaches rhymes as if a celluloid character. This is a musical graphic novel.
"Like in order to spit it dope, you got to have a criminal past similar to the cast of Different Strokes."
9. Low - Great Destroyer
The boys and girls plug in and, surprise, it works. Monkey leads off with the same dour (plus a drum beat above a coma patient) outlook Low has been bringing since 1994, but, (pay attention Strokes), it works. Without sacrificing the environment they've cultivated, Low's members have picked up the pace, even dropping some pop songs into the mix. Because otherwise, even the most devout fan could just live with "Things We Lost In the Fire." California that stab at the pop song: upbeat, but filled with beautiful real-life caveats unlike so much of the unquestioning pap out there. Optimism mixed with sarcasm, sprinkled with doubt and, ultimately, completely honest sentiments. "Broadway (so many people)" and "Silver Rider" provides the requisite Valium-ic slowcore that puts listeners on contemplative autopilot.
"Take me with you, you Silver Rider, sometimes your voice is not enough."
10. Dalek - Absence
(disclaimer: the producer's girlfriend was a former roommate)
If we want to be facile, think My Bloody Valentine meets the Def Jux crew. But make no mistake, this is not a novelty. No hip-hop out there sounds this urgent, raw, or confrontational. Those sing-song glock couplets out there mean fuck all. Dalek means what it says. The distortion mixes in with altering droning bass, soaring synthesizer, and thudding drums. Combined with a DJ who guards against overkill, the production gives off such a vivid impression. MC Dalek fits his voice snug between the towering soundscape. It's so rare today that a MC and his producer (and DJ) approach music as a team effort. Subtract one of the three parts and your left with something that wouldn't stand on its own. "Ever Somber" drones through as Dalek cuts in and out, quick tongue, excoriating lyrics. Each additional listen exposes another layer, another soundscape.
"Did missionaries wield swords or break bread? Your holy books only increase bloodshed"
Honorable mentions(alphabetical):
Antony and the Johnsons - I Am A Bird Now
While "Old School" is the single of the year, "Hope There's Someone" is my song of the year. A torch song to torch all torch songs, it's evident that Antony takes pains to ensure every element of the song is symbolic, adding a backup vocal right when he says "There's a ghost," as if he himself is the ghost.
Fiona Apple - Extraordinary Machine
Forget the supposed politics of the delay or her mainstream pop appeal, no one, not even Cat Power, touches Fiona on using a piano, voice, and intonation to convey such a range of emotions so successfully. Apple oscillates between excitement, dour, and coy without missing a beat. This line kills me so much, I have to repeat it: "I don't understand about diamonds and why men buy them. What's so impressive about a diamond, except the mining?"
Black Mountain - Black Mountain (s/t)
I have no problem liking psych-jams. But a song as bombastic as "Don't Run Our Hearts Around" makes it hard for those who do to justify their myopia.
Bloc Party - Silent Alarm
The album might have made the top ten if the year ended in June. Banquet will be played at indie-enthusiast banquets for decades (hopefully, overtaking Song 2, as the most popular of the "fuck yeah" genre. It's kind of funny that this Vice Records em, record, is the closest thing to an unofficial "OC" album. "So Here We Are," sailing on your boat Seth. "The Answer," is not punching people in the face, Ryan.
LCD Soundsystem - LCD Soundsystem (s/t)
I've heard and loved the best singles (Tribulations, Daft Punk, et. al.) for years. "Too Much Love" shows promise for the next act.
M.I.A. - Arular
This isn't about some Sri Lankan protest, Hombre is a party anthem that pleases. M.I.A. detached humming and sing-songs are party punctuation, not testaments for revolution.
Serena Maneesh - Serena Maneesh (s/t)
From the VU/Smashing Pumpkins opener "Drain Cosmetics" to the Goldfrappish "Her Name is Suicide," this good (if uneven) debut shows promise.
Sons and Daughters - Repulsion Box
So what if "Taste the Last Girl" sounds like a New Pornographers' b-side? Songs like that and "Dance Me In" make a car ride go much faster and with much more aplomb.
Stars - Set Yourself on Fire
Not as powerful and cohesive as the S/T debut, but songs like "Soft Revolution" and "Ageless Beauty" are classic pop gems.
White Stripes- Get Behind Me Satan
"My Doorbell…" Wildly infectious, preternaturally able to unify mainstream and indie spheres.
Tags: Best Albums 2005, Sufjan Stevens, Wolf Parade, Sleater-Kinney, Kanye West, Fiery Furnaces, New Pornographers, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Danger Doom, Low, dalek
Posted by Merry Swankster at December 29, 2005 08:00 AM
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Comments
I found your best albums of 2005 because we seem to be the only two tagging our picks on Technorati with "Best Albums." The fact that you were titling them "best albums of 2005 - part 1,2,3" caught my eye because I was doing the same!
Posted by: Jones at December 29, 2005 03:41 PM
