2011

                So I started this blog talking about how disappointing 2011 was, musically.  And 50-odd years of renewed perspective haven’t really changed that much.  I will say that my view of 2011 is somewhat more positive than it was back in January, driven I guess primarily by three factors.  First (and least), I’ve obtained a few more pretty good albums (chiefly the Noel Gallagher & Foo Fighters).  Secondly, I’ve had a bit more time to absorb some of these albums.  And thirdly, and most importantly, I’ve come to accept that the thoroughly mediocre 2011, while the worst year in my collection since at least the pre-punk nadir of 1974, doesn’t mean a) pop music is in a terminal decline or b) I’ve aged out of listening to it, but rather most probably c) that this is just a bad lull, but not unprecedented.  (although I’ll freely admit that, for reasons I’ll talk about more next time, you never can love new bands in your thirties as much as you can in your teens or twenties).  Still, this is not a good year.  A big year for roots-rock, but an uneven one, and not a particularly big year for any other genre.

                It’s the kind of year where one of my favorite albums of the year is actually a tribute-record, the Buddy Holly meets several generations of alt-rockers Rave On.  Tribute records are almost always uneven, but this one is at least more hits than misses, largely because almost all of these artists opt for the reinterpretation approach rather than the karaoke cover approach.  So it’s neat to hear Modest Mouse turn “That’ll Be The Day” into a Modest Mouse song, Cee-Lo turn “You’re So Square” into a Cee-Lo song, and (most surprisingly) Kid Rock turn “Well Alright” into a Memphis-soul song.  Still, while it’s fun, these projects are almost by definition non-essential.  Also non-essential (but pleasant enough) is AV Club Album of the Year 2011 Civilian by Wye Oak, an album that pretty much defines 2011.  It’s pleasant enough (in that ‘stately-indie’ sound that so dominated 2010), but hardly mind-blowingly great or anything (better than the National, worse than the Walkmen, if you’re keeping score, though the female vocals put me in the mind of old alt-rock favs Mazzy Star). 

                Also just solid but not blowing me away are the Roots, who of course are one of my favorite bands of the 21^st century, but kinda spend 2011 in an inferior echo of 2010.  Their proper album has conceptual ambition (being another of the surprisingly rare hip-hopera genre), but (like Fucked Up) they substitute lyrical/conceptual ambition for sonic innovation.  Not a bad album, but not a great one to my ears either.  (also that, plus some stuff from Talib Kweli is shockingly all the hip-hop I have from this year).  The Roots also collaborate/are the backing band for a soul act again this year, for veteran Betty White, which is fine, but just ok (sot of how a lot of stuff goes this year).

                Like I said in the intro, though, what 2011 really is for me is a big year for roots-rock/Americana.  Some of this is veteran stuff, like the extremely consistent Willie Nelson (who does have a very nice cover of Coldplay’s “The Scientist,” but otherwise doesn’t really stand out from his (admittedly high-quality) career to date.  You also get Steve Martin making a surprisingly straight bluegrass/banjo album (it’s not that it isn’t funny, because it can be (and there’s a remake of “King Tut”), but it’s primarily focused on the music, with lighthearted lyrics, rather than being a comedy album). 

                The indie-rockers too are largely playing it straight this year.  The Fleet Foxes have always been traditionalists at heart, and while they do expand their sound a little bit, there’s nothing radically new here (or anything that wouldn’t sound out-of-place in early 70s LA country-rock).  So more pleasant but unremarkable stuff.  The Decemberists do change up their sound considerably, abandoning their prog-rock ambitions (boo!) for a simpler folk-rock sound, but this isn’t a return to their theatrical early sound either.  Rather, this sounds like 80s R.E.M. at their folkiest, all jangly guitars and lilting melodies (and some Peter Buck guest appearances).  I like it better than their early sound (as it feels less arch, which I’m sure is why some people prefer the early stuff), but like the Fleet Foxes, they wouldn’t sound at all out of place in an earlier folk-rock scene (for the Decemberists, this means the 80s alt-rock folk, though).

                Blitzen Trapper, like the Fleet Foxes, are also looking back to the ‘70s, though they’re more interested in harder classic-rock sounds than the folk-rocking Foxes.  This has always been a part of their sound, as they started out with a Pavement-meets-Faces/Mountain hard rock sound, then moved toward being a modernist take on classic roots-rock.  By now, though, the ambition that made them compelling has largely disappeared, and this is basically just regressive Faces revivalism (and yes, by Faces-like, I do mean Stones-y but not as good).  This can be fun, and I’d probably judge it less harshly if I didn’t expect more from this band.  Still, they’re hardly the only ones working a 70s hard rock revival sound (not that there haven’t been some kind of 70s hard rock revivalists since at least the late 80s).  For a considerably better take on that kind of revivalism, though, the Black Keys continue to be one of the best rock bands active.  It’s almost a shame that one of the best rock bands active is so nakedly backward-looking, but their willingness to synthesize a lot of elements keeps this from being rote revivalism (esp. adding glam-rock swagger to organ-&-distorted guitar blues rock).  Plus, they’re one of the only active bands with any swagger at all this year, so I hold them in higher regard than I may have in other years. (so like the Ramones in 1976, when they were one of the few bands that remembered how to make really rockin’ rock & roll, and similarly backward-looking but modern, though unlikely to start a new punk-rock, primarily by virtue of having been doing this for too long to really spark a new movement).

                Amid all this 70s revivalism, though, is a return from a number of 90s roots-rockers, specifically the alt-country bands.  Roger Clyne & the Peacemakers aren’t strictly alt-country, but close enough, and have one of their more solid records this year, even if not breaking new ground.  The Old 97s similarly have been plying their alt-country wares for a while, but this year’s double album (released as two separate volumes) got them a bit more high-profile attention.  But in addition to these touring workhorses, the originators of alt-country are also back.  The Jayhawks reunite and basically split the difference between their early alt-country and later more pop sounds, so picking up without missing a beat.  Good, but really sounding like more of the same.  Wilco, on the other hand (not originators, but heirs to Uncle Tupelo), are probably the most exciting of this lot.  After 2-3 albums (counting the live one) of retreating into a mellow safe groove, Wilco have remembered how to push the envelope a little.  This isn’t a return to Yankee Hotel/Ghost heights, but they do seem to finally have regained a bit of their hunger to try something new.  This has the effect of making even the more traditionalist stuff sound a bit more lively.  We’ll see if this is a one-off, but hopefully means that Wilco are going to care again.

                But the most exciting of the alt-countriers are relative newcomers My Morning Jacket, who put out what to me is probably the album of their career to date.  The early stuff was more promising than good, Z dragged a bit, and Evil Urges was uneven at best, but Circuital sounds like a band that have figured out how to successfully press the envelope.  Even the radically non-roots stuff sounds much more natural (esp. the goofy but fun “Holding On to Black Metal”).  For some reason, no one else seemed all that impressed, though, suggesting the critics had stopped caring.  This confuses me, as this sounds to me like a band improving its sound, rather than just spinning its wheels.  A similar (to me inexplicable) lack of interest surrounded the new TV on the Radio, which is not so clearly their best, but nevertheless is at least as worthy as their last two (and similar in its art-soul direction).  Maybe the faddish interest of critics had simply passed them by, but this to me is one of the better albums of the year, being experimental, clever, and highly listenable.  Passé?  Perhaps, but better than a lot of what’s out there.

                I certainly don’t understand why TV on the Radio were slept on when other art-soul acts attracted so much attention.  Frank Ocean is understandable, since his debut clearly suggests a man with the potential to be a major talent.  Even his Hammer-sized sampling is tweaked enough to sound deliberate and innovative, rather than just lazy.  Overall, very much following from TV on the Radio, combining the experimental bent of modern art-rock with soul, but a soul far more grounded in contemporary stuff.  Similarly contemporary but far less interesting are the Weeknd, who like Frank Ocean made waves with free mixtapes rather than proper albums.  As freebies, I judge these Weeknd things more or less favorably, but I don’t understand why people love them so much.  Mildly forward-thinking contemporary R&B, but worth noting only because so much modern R&B is unlistenable, and not because this is especially worthy on its own terms.  Certainly I get people caring more about Ocean (who doesn’t have the best album, but certainly has the best debut of the year), but the Weeknd seem to be more hype than greatness (so the opposite of where TV on the Radio are at this point).

                Also not nearly as good as the waves of hype may suggest is the new Radiohead album.  They’ve been gone for awhile, and it’s always exciting to hear new stuff from them, plus this stuff is so obtuse and hard to immediately grok that it’s easy to see why first impulses would be to assume it’s a grower and future listening will show King of Limbs to be as great as their previous greats.  But a few months on, this sounds more and more like a stumble, not a grower.  There’s some interesting ideas here, and it’s certainly worth hearing, but I still think this might be their weakest since Pablo Honey (though admittedly, that Bends to In Rainbows run is one of the greatest in rock history).  Everyone stumbles, it’s just too bad that Radiohead make us wait years then stumble.

                Gorillaz are similarly less-than-inspired this year, but though it’s not  a b-sides comp, The Fall is probably more fairly considered a peer of G-Sides and D-Sides than the proper albums, as another follow-up piece of ephemera rather than a major statement (and anyway Plastic Beach’s b-sides were all remixes and no new originals).    What this really is is confirmation of my theory that Albarn, like Clapton, is the kind of artist who only rises to greatness when he’s got collaborators pushing him, as this basically Albarn-only Gorillaz album is far less interesting than the other, more collaborative stuff.  (though Albarn gets the edge over Clapton because he actively seeks out collaborators, while Clapton spent large portions of his career happily working in lazy isolation). 

                A much better beat-happy British act this year is Cornershop, who continue their return from exile with more stuff that sounds both experimental and somewhat out of time.  That they sound out of time this year is not surprising, as this album’s been many years in the making (first single “Topknot” debuted in 2004, after all).  But it’s the band returning to more ambitious sonics after the trad-rock groove of the last two; this one is much more a soul-based album, all horn charts & dance beats, topped off with a new Punjabi lead singer.  Colorful in that very late-90s kind of world-beat way. 

                And the alt-rock mini-revival continues apace elsewhere this year.  Oasis are done, but both Gallagher brothers have new solo albums.  I didn’t bother with Liam’s Beady Eye, but Noel’s solo debut is worthy enough, returning to the low-key craftsman mode of Don’t Believe the Truth, but a bit less rocking & swaggering without a proper band (though he’s at least as good a signer as his brother at this point).  Worth, solid trad/Kinksy songwriting, but like a lot of this year, good without being great.  Fellow alt-rock craftsmen the Foo Fighters do a bit better this year, abandoning their pleasant-but-somewhat-dull more acoustic ambitions to return to surging guitar-rock.  This is probably as energetic as the band’s sounded since at least One By One, at times sounding almost metallic, and it’s energizing even if lacking the effortless hooks that made 90s Foos so engaging.  If Noel has hooks without energy, the Foos have more energy & drive, but not quite the soaring Sugar-like hooks on which they made their name.  Fellow grunge-surivivors Pearl Jam are in a similar place, with their current live act.  They’ve got the energy & drive, but while they used to be the boundary-pushing experimentalists of grunge, they’ve decidedly settled into a more workhorse role in their long late period.

                And so to close out the yearly-listening portion of this project (next up is a retrospective/listening to the best-of-years), I’ll turn to the punk rockers.  The Gaslights make time with a mostly-covers EP, but while this is fun, it’s also not exactly exciting.  The covers sound like you’d expect, and there are no originals.  It’s fun, but not as exciting as this band can be.  On the other hand, Fucked UP manage to easily drop the best Important Album of the Year (like Arcade Fire last year).  Like the Roots, they’ve traded sonic ambition for lyrical ambition, with a twisty metatextual rock opera (i.e. the narrator becomes a character at some point).  So pretty dense intellectually, but they’ve traded their prog-core instrumental attack for something closer to straight-up hardcore.  Pretty powerful, like Zen Arcade with better production and a more coherent story.  Definitely a worthy way to close out the project, with a really solid album.

Song of the Year:  Trent Reznor & Karen O. – “Immigrant Song.”  I feel a little odd picking a cover as my song of the year, but 1) it really wasn’t a year with any other contenders for standout song, and 2) it’s really good.  Unlike the Beatles or Stones, Zeppelin (and the Who) are apparently mystifyingly hard to cover in a way that’s more than just karaoke.  I really can’t think of any other Zeppelin covers that come close (compare, for instance, the competent but achingly inessential & rote Stone Temple Pilots “Dancing Days.”)  But Reznor really finds a way to both keep the spirit & intensity of the song, and to update it in a way that sounds both fresh and respectful of the original.  Plus, it made the opening credits of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo a better James Bond opening credit sequence than any actual Bond opening credits sequence in years.

Album of the Year:  The Black Keys – El Camino.  Fucked Up’s David Comes to Life is the only other real contender, and while that one had more ambition, I’d be lying if I pretended any other album came close to El Camino in terms of how much I’ve played and cherished it.  Possibly just because they’re just about the only real rock & roll band in my collection this year.  But regardless, an excellent piece of glammy, grungy blues-rock.

Artist Most Benefiting from Reevaluation:  Probably Fucked Up, who have become one of my favorite bands of the last few years, and certainly one of the most consistently artistically ambitious.  TV on the Radio get a special mention, though, for being a band where I overlooked how good their last one was.

Artist Most Diminished in Reevaluation:  Hard to pick this close to the year itself.  Maybe the Fleet Foxes, who I listened to a lot last year, but in review are pretty solidly unremarkable. 

Album List

Andrew Mitchell - 2011

Andrew Mitchell - All Asia July 29 2011

Andrew Mitchell - Covers

Betty Wright & the Roots - Betty Wright: The Movie

Blitzen Trapper - American Goldwing

Cornershop - & The Double 'O' Groove Of

Fleet Foxes - Helplessness Blues

Foo Fighters - Wasting Light

Frank Ocean - Nostalgia, Ultra.

Fucked Up - David Comes To Life

Gang Of Four - Content

Gorillaz - The Fall

Movits! - Out Of My Head

My Morning Jacket - Circuital

Nine Inch Nails - The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

Noel Gallagher - High Flying Birds

Old 97's - The Grand Theatre, Vol. 1

Old 97's - The Grand Theatre, Vol. 2

Pearl Jam - Toronto 9.11.11

Radiohead - The Daily Mail & Staircase

Radiohead - The King Of Limbs

Roger Clyne & The Peacemakers - Unida Cantina

Steve Martin - Rare Bird Alert

Talib Kweli - Gutter Rainbows

The Baseball Project - Vol. 2: High And Inside

The Black Keys - El Camino

The Decemberists - Long Live The King

The Decemberists - The King Is Dead

The Gaslight Anthem - iTunes Session

The Jayhawks - Mockingbird Time

The Mountain Goats - All Eternals Deck

The Othership - Aug 11 2011

The Othership - August 18 2011

The Roots - Undun

The Self-Proclaimed Rockstars - Postcards From Purgatory

The Weeknd - House of Balloons

The Weeknd - Thursday

TV On The Radio - Nine Types of Light

V/A - Rave On Buddy Holly

Wilco - The Whole Love

Willie Nelson - Remember Me, Vol. 1

Willie Nelson - The Scientist - Single

Wye Oak - Civilian

2010

                A bit of a stumble this year.  After the last two years seemed positively alive with possibilities, in 2010, we’re back into more predictable ruts.  Some of this is worthy but not all that sonically exciting (a lot of indie rock), and there’s some interesting stuff mostly on the hip-hop frontier, but overall, this is a year we’re coming back down to earth, with the dominant sound being a kind of stately mid-tempo indie-rock.  This can be quite good if done well, but deadly dull in the wrong hands (and it falls into a few of the wrong hands this year.

                But let’s start with the more straight-ahead rock music.  The Japandroids have a follow-up single, but apart from covering X , it’s pretty unremarkable  Our two punk-Springsteen bands, the Hold Steady and the Gaslight Anthem, are both straining to move beyond the sound of their classic breakthrough album.  The Gaslights are decidedly the more successful of the two, expanding into elements of soul, doo-wop and a hint of U2, while the Hold Steady try to grow by subtraction, moving to a more stripped rock sound.  Neither launches a radical reinvention, but the Gaslights both have the better album this year, and sound more like a band moving into new territory rather than winding down.  Both also have some bands on their coattails this year.  For the Gaslights, it’s the rest of their Side One Dummy labelmates, who are mostly less remarkable straightahead punk rock in a post-Dropkicks mode.  Members of the Hold Steady, meanwhile, guest on Titus Andronicus’s ambitious but perplexing concept album about the (US) Civil War.  Nevertheless, while it combines elements I love (namely weird concept albums & members of the Hold Steady), Titus Andronicus regrettably sound more like the shouty/strummy generic indie sound shades of Bright Eyes or Neutral Milk Hotel.  *sigh* I thought we were done with that approach…

                Moving to indie-rock proper, as I noted in the intro, a stately mid-tempo sound dominates this year.  The exemplars of this style are the Arcade Fire, who are sounding far less rootsy this year, as the violin is buried in a much more synth-heavy mix.  The whole thing has the effect of downtempo New Wave, which is entirely appropriate for a contemplative album about growing up in the suburbs in the 1980s.  I can’t help but think that this music is made much more for the people who were teenagers in the 90s (or even earlier) than the teenagers/college kids of today, and wonder if we’re not in a point like the pre-punk late 70s, when music was dominated by 60s nostalgia.  Another successful example of this stately style is the Walkmen, who I’ve basically ignored prior to this year, but suggest that I should go back & check out their earlier stuff.  This isn’t especially exciting music (even less so than the Arcade Fire), but it does quite well on a somber (if slightly tipsy) atmosphere.  On the other hand, I’m not sure I could tell you why the Walkmen work for me and the National don’t.  They’re very similar in approach (both are more organic than the somewhat more sonically exploratory Arcade Fire), but the National just bore me to tears.

                Elsewhere among the downtempo indie rock, there’s a bit more variety.  Spoon are basically making their standard tight soul-rock, but they too are a bit dour and slower this year (though honestly, this is a band like Bad Religion or the Ramones: there are real differences in the albums, but only if you’re a superfan who listens closely).  More hazily, but no more uptempo, are Beach House, who swoon like the Walkmen, but with a bit more late-Beach Boys (or possibly George Harrison) arrangement ambition.

                Of course, there is more uptempo stuff out there as well.  Blur have a comeback single which proves that the Good, the Bad, & the Queen really were Albarn’s attempt to do what he considered Blur-style music.  Not revolutionary, but not an embarrassment.  Lighter on the electronics than Think Tank, but otherwise pretty similar.  (also about this point, Blur have a reunion live album, but they were no great shakes live when they were an active band, so I’m not keen to bother with the comeback tour version).  Belle & Sebastian never really went away, but did vanish from my collection for awhile.  In the gap, they’ve become no less twee, but a lot more colorful sonically, sounding even more like a classic AM pop band.  Another band that recalls big colorful AM gold (though always more uptempo) are the New Pornographers, who return with probably their best album since Electric Version.  At last they find a way to combine the more synthy stuff of their last two with the high-energy sound of their first pair.  Easily the happiest-sounding record in my collection this year.

                Oh, and a pair of distortion-happy SoCal beach brats have records this year.  Best Coast are (is, as I think it’s just the one gal) a whole lot of fun, like a sun-bleached version of the Breeders (which is to say a highly-distorted take on surf music, but less energetic (and less inventive) than the Boston band).  If Best Coast make lazy distortion-heavy pop-rock sound compelling, though, Wavves are pretty much every way that same approach can go wrong.  The laziness isn’t charming, the distortion just sounds like its covering up for lack of talent, and (most importantly) there’s nothing resembling a proper hook here. 

                Also more energetic than mainline indie-rock is the frequently-worthy beats & rock frontier, though there's less to get excited about this year.  This year James Mercer of the Shins follows Gruff Rhys & Neon Neon by attempting his own Gorillaz-style project (even partnering with former Gorillaz producer Danger Mouse).  If this were the new Shins album, I’d praise it for being a step forward into new sonic territory (though it’s missing some of the hooks that were the Shins’ defining characteristic).  But as a wholly new project, it can’t help but pale next to the likes of Gorillaz, as it’s not exactly a radical transformation from Mercer’s earlier melodic folk-pop.  Gorillaz themselves have a new album, and manage to once again mine the same basic template without repeating themselves.  This one might be their most conceptually unified album, even as it’s their most sonically diverse.  Ultimately, this plays like a various artists comp, but a very good one, bouncing from hip-hop to UK indie.  And I appreciate that it's also a mini Clash reunion, as this kind of eclecticism is very much in the Clash spirit.

                Elsewhere, though, among the dance-inflected acts, it's a bit rougher going.  LCD Soundsystem's last is easily their weakest; they've never been the most original band, but here they're borrowing entire songs rather than just sounds.  And "Heroes" is a bad one to swipe (or cover), as you can't help but pale dramatically against the original.  Also, Murphy's lyrics are getting a bit too clever & on-the-nose.  The single "Drunk Girls" is dumb in the way late Black Flag was dumb, where the self-awareness tries but fails to make up for the stupidity.  LCD's least, though, is still better than most bands' best, and the rest of this album is the clever, energetic stuff you come to expect.  The victory-lap live album is a bit of a waste, though, not changing the arrangements or energy level enough to make it worthwhile.  Phoenix, another dance-rock band with a live album this year, suffers from a similar lack of reason for theirs to exist (though giving it away makes up for a lot).

                Daft Punk also disappoints.  I had high hopes that the film soundtrack format would inspire them, but it just leads them into a more generic orchestral film music sound.  A couple of tracks remind me why I care, but this is a band that's lost the plot.  On the other hand, drifting into film scoring has worked very well for Trent Reznor, who also seems to be trying to vary his rock-group approach.  This means replacing Nine Inch Nails with the Mrs. Reznor-fronted How To Destroy Angels.  They unsurprisingly sound like NIN with a new vocalist, but continue with the looser, improved sound of The Slip.  We'll see if they follow up with a proper album, as Reznor has gradually become an artist worth following again for me.

                Whiplash-turning from techno-rock to roots rock, it's again a mixed bag, with a couple of excellent albums and a bunch of more middling quality.  Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan, who form a classic sweetness & grit partnership, are one of these bright spots.  Nothing too sonically radical, but excellent moody atmospheric country-rock, not too far off from what Robert Plant and Allison Krauss were up to recently.  Also both excellent and rootsy are the Black Keys.  They break into the mainstream deservedly with Brothers, an album that combines the tight songcraft of Rubber Factory with the deeper sonic palette of Attack & Release.  The Black Keys had been searching for a new way forward for a couple of albums now, and find it in a big way.

On the other hand, the White Stripes bow out with a final live album.  A few rearrangements and a different energy makes it worthy for the die-hards, but overall this is a disappointing way for a major band to fade out.  Also disappointing are Blitzen Trapper, who just seem uninspired after two albums fairly spilling over with ideas.  Their muse seems more acoustic-style Neil Young than Bob Dylan, but they’ve dramatically scaled back their sonic adventurousness.  Band of Horses, although never as bold as Blitzen Trapper, are in a similarly sonically conservative place.

                Once again, though, the roots rock vets do at least as well as the younger pups.  The most seasoned vet this year is probably Mavis Staples, who's backed by Wilco at their most Stonesy.  Not only a great record for Staples, but as compelling instrumentally as Wilco's been since A Ghost is Born.  If they're going to be a straightahead roots rock band, it suits Wilco to kick up the rock a bit.  Elsewhere among the vets, both Merle Haggard and Willie Nelson are looking back to old school country, while Tom Petty continues his roots trip.  Crucially, though, this time Petty is less interested in roots generally (country, blues, Americana) and more interested in his roots, the blues-rock of the 1960s.  He still hasn't returned to the pop-rock that's his real forte, but he, like Wilco (or, for that matter, the Black Keys) is interested in kicking up a ruckus again.

                Somewhat oddly, the most forward-thinking artists in roots-rock are veterans as well.  Robert Plant continues his remarkable comeback, once again changing up his sound.  This time he's interested in a Low/Cowboy Junkies style slowcore sound, which once again has nothing to do with the Zep sound of yore.  I don't know that I'd recommend it unreservedly to Zep fans, as he's almost an entirely different artist, but it's pretty great to hear an artist of his stature showing such sonic restlessness.  Neil Young, of course, has long been such an artist, and this year he's back to sonic experimentation, as opposed to musically straightforward concept albums.  Like Plant, Young takes a minimalist approach, stripping his sound down to just solo electric guitar (with some overdubs & (very) light electronica).  This practically screams "interesting in theory," but somehow works at kicking up a compelling racket.

                Another vet kicking up a compelling racket, though far from roots rock, is Ozzy Osborne, who almost makes me take back last year's musings on Dio-Sabbath.  Not quite, though.  This is surprisingly effective thrash-revival, if not as compelling as Metallica's take.  Still, this is also a year when I get one of the better new metal bands.  Kylesa aren't mindblowingly great, but they do have a compelling psychedelic metal sound that recalls the like of Mastodon, but spacier, and (thankfully) devoid of the death-metal growl.

                Over in more pure psych revival, things are a bit of a step down from last year's high.  The Black Angels continue their 13th Floor Elevators homage, but are basically revivalism.  MGMT show more of a Syd Barrett influence, but are otherwise still pretty modern-sounding.  Still, the Angels have songs but not originality, while MGMT are more original, but lack the songs that lifted them last time.  There's also the psychedelic hip-hop of Flying Lotus, which is innovative, but also doesn't really hold my attention the way, say, DJ Shadow could back in the day.  Plus, there's plenty of more hooky experimental hip-hop out there this year.

                First of all, let me give credit where credit is due.  I still don’t like Kanye West – he’s too self-absorbed and humorless – but I do respect his ambition on My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.  This is a legitimate attempt at some kind of prog-hop; too bad it fails, but I respect the attempt (though he’s really gotta stop committing the cardinal sin of sampling: using samples that make you want to listen to the original song instead of the repurposed one….).  But there are also more successful experimental hip-hop acts out there.  Erykah Badu continues her Funkadelic-style psychedelic soul approach, though I find it more compelling in theory than in practice, as while there are interesting things going on, the songs are usually pretty hookless.  Much better at psychedelic soul is Janelle Monáe, who sounds not a lot like Stevie Wonder, but like what I’d suspect a modern version of ’70s Stevie Wonder would sound like (if that makes sense).  In other words, progressive/cutting edge soul with a keen melodic sense.  Big Boi did well when he discovered her.

                Big Boi also did well himself with his first proper solo album (not counting Speakerboxx).  Like Speakerboxx, it’s a cutting edge banger of a record, but while that one was heavily indebted to Parliament, on Sir Lucious Left-Foot he’s casting a much broader sonic net.  I can’t say whether or not it sounds much like mainstream hip-hop anymore (having stopped listening to the mainstream about the time I moved to DC, with its crushingly mediocre hip-hop radio), but it sounds both fantastically experimental and capable of packing the dancefloor (you know, kinda like Outkast at their peak…).  Another Atlanta veteran, Cee-Lo, emphatically did make it big in the mainstream, with his effervescently obscene summer jam “Fuck You.”  The album, like the song, is pretty throwbacky to the classic 60s soul sound, a mix of Motown and Stax.  So this is by far Cee-Lo’s most conventional album since the Goodie Mob days (and probably ever).  Certainly more conventional than either his prior solo albums or Gnarls Barkley, but a whole lot of fun, with an energy (and a splash of more modern experimentation) that makes this more than just revivalism.  Really, this one and Big Boi’s kinda blur in my mind as energetic bangers from Atlanta vets this year…

                Finally, the Roots are also back this year, showing that their new steady gig with Jimmy Fallon is actually increasing their ability to produce records.  First up is their collaboration with John Legend, which is basically a Legend album with the Roots as a backing band (with occasional rapping).  Judged as a Legend album, it’s his best by far, with the Roots (obviously) providing a phenomenal and fluid backing band, but also pushing Legend into more contemporary sounds (i.e. moving past straight revivalism) despite the almost-all-70s-soul-covers tracklist.  It’s a bit harder to judge it as a Roots album, of course, since Legend so dominates.  For what it’s worth, though, Legend’s guest vocal on “The Flame” helps make that song one of the highlights of the Roots’ second album this year, which definitely is a proper Roots album.  How I Got Over very much continues in the moody/angry soul sound of Game Theory, and while it’s not quite as good as that one (the band’s masterpiece), it’s still quite good (if short).

Song of the Year:  Surprisingly it’s not “Fuck You,” which is still a lot of fun, but once the thrill of hearing Motown on the radio again diminishes, it’s just pretty good, not great.  So I’ll go with Gorillaz’ “Stylo,” which very much follows on guest vocalist Mos Def’s latest synth-heavy direction, and conjures an entertainingly apocalyptic vibe. 

Album of the Year:  This one I agonized over.  Arcade Fire’s The Suburbs is the best Important Album, though it’s not my favorite record.  Among the more modest records, Big Boi’s is a gem, as is the New Pornographers’ Together, but if I’m being honest, the record I’ve enjoyed the most from 2010 is easily Gorillaz’s Plastic Beach.  I don’t think it’s their best, but it covers so much stylistic ground (all well), and manages to get Mark E. Smith, half the Clash, Mos Def, and the Super Furry Animals all on the same album, and is just chock full of memorable songs besides.

Artist Most Benefiting from Reevaluation:  This one, on the other hand, was an easy pick.  The overhype around Neon Bible led me to dismiss The Suburbs and Arcade Fire generally as hype, but it’s a fantastic album from a band really evolving.  I love their early rootsier sound, but the way the faded New Wave of The Suburbs perfectly fits the mood they seek to capture, and the way Arcade Fire really bring a series of catchy & melodic anthems mean this is an album I’ve come to really love since relistening for this project.  Caveat Emptor: the loudness war has hurt this band more than just about any I’ve heard.  The Suburbs is mixed loud, and although there’s a lot going on musically, that mixing makes the whole thing sound flatter than it should.  Maybe in 10-20 years, we can get a proper post-loudness remix…

Artist Most Diminished in Reevaluation:  Titus Andronicus.  I never loved this band, but I was surprised at how much I hated them when they’d come up on shuffle.  The music isn’t terrible, but it’s just OK, and can’t make up for how much I’ve come to hear that post-Neutral Milk Hotel terrible ‘naturalistic emoting’ singing technique, where it’s all shouty & cracked vocals.  The amateurism is supposed to signify genuine emotion, I’m sure, but it just sounds calculated and phony to me, and far less interesting than the emotion a genuinely competent singer can conjure.  You can’t all be Otis Redding, but you can at least, you know, try a little…

Album List

Andrew Mitchell - 2010

Andrew Mitchell - Guitar & Vocal

Arcade Fire - The Suburbs

Band Of Horses - Infinite Arms

Beach House - Teen Dream

Belle & Sebastian - Write About Love

Best Coast - Crazy For You

Big Boi - Sir Lucious Left Foot...The Son Of Chico Dusty

Blitzen Trapper - Destroyer of the Void

Blur - Misc.

Broken Bells - Broken Bells

Broken Social Scene - Forgiveness Rock Record

Bruce Springsteen - City Of Night

Cash Is King - King Of The Summer

Cee-Lo Green - The Lady Killer

Daft Punk - Tron: Legacy

Erykah Badu - New Amerykah Part Two: Return Of The Ankh

Flying Lotus - Cosmogramma

Fucked Up - Year of the Ox

Gorillaz - Plastic Beach

How to Destroy Angels - How to Destroy Angels

Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan - Hawk

Janelle Monáe - The ArchAndroid

Japandroids - Younger Us b/w Sex and Dying in High Society

Kanye West - My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy

Kylesa - Spiral Shadow

LCD Soundsystem - London Sessions

LCD Soundsystem - This Is Happening

Mavis Staples - You Are Not Alone

Merle Haggard - I Am What I Am

MGMT - Congratulations

Murder By Death - Good Morning, Magpie

Neil Young - Le Noise

Ozzy Osbourne - Scream

Paul Weller - Wake Up the Nation

Paul Zim - Wedding Songs

Phoenix - Live In Sydney

Radiohead - Misc.

Robert Plant - Band Of Joy

Soulive - Rubber Soulive

Spoon - Transference

Sufjan Stevens - The Age of Adz

Superchunk - Majesty Shredding

The Apples (In Stereo) - Travellers in Space and Time

The Black Angels - Phosphene Dream

The Black Keys - Brothers

The Gaslight Anthem - American Slang

The Gaslight Anthem - Real Covers Caught On Tape

The Hold Steady - Heaven Is Whenever

The National - High Violet

The New Pornographers - Together

The Roots - How I Got Over

The Roots - Misc.

The Roots - Wake Up! (with John Legend)

The Walkmen - Lisbon

The White Stripes - Under Great White Northern Lights [Live]

Titus Andronicus - The Monitor

Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - Bad Girl Boogie

Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - Mojo

V/A - 2010 SideOneDummy Records Summer Sampler

Vieux Farka Touré - Live

Willie Nelson - Country Music