The Best Albums You've (Maybe) Never Heard Of

Lewis - Even So

Deep Elm Records did a promotion a while back where for one dollar, they'll send you a random CD from their catalogue. This is the one I got, and I love it. I've never been able to find anything about this band, but the album is filled with great Wurlitzer driven jams, jangly guitar songs, and lyrical gropings after spiritual truths.

Standout track: Returning to the Scene of the Crime

The Shedding - what god doesn't bless, you won't love. what you won't love, the children won't know

I found this in a record store in Chicago, and all I know of it is what's written on the sleeve, and that's that this record is the product of one guy with a lot of horns and too much time trying to replicate birdsongs. The result: half an hour of terrifying noise-jazz. If you're into that sort of thing, you'll love it.

(no standout, as the entire record is more of a continuous experiment)

Adam Arcuragi - Soldiers For Feet

There are plenty of singer-songwriters out there that aren't getting the recognition they deserve. Mr. Arcuragi here is one of them. Soldiers For Feet is a five track EP that continues the old country tradition just as well as Phosphorescent does, complete with religious and historical references a la Sufjan Stevens and harmonies lush enough to make the Fleet Foxes get a little jealous.

Standout track: The Belgian

Efterklang - Parades

The most recent full length from a Danish band that hasn't quite made it across the pond yet. The orchestration is absolutely beautiful, with melodies and counter melodies and percussion fading in and out of an atmosphere of gorgeous melancholy. At times incredibly epic, and other times, incredibly hushed. And they have complete mastery of both extremes.

Standout track: Maison De Reflexion

The Good, The Bad, And the Queen

If you were let down by the most recent Gorillaz record, maybe you'd prefer mastermind Damon Albarn's other side project, a colaboration with former members of the Clash and the Verve, as well as one of the most admired afrobeat drummers of all time. While it lacks the variety and genre-mashing that marks Gorillaz' records, you'll find plenty of Albarn's trademark detached, aloof vocals, and a great chill record.

(admittedly, I haven't listened to this record enough yet to notice a standout track, but the opener, History Song, and the single, Herculean, are both good places to start)

Loney, Dear - Loney, Noir

While not entirely unnoticed (you may have already heard plenty about Loney, Dear...he is on SubPop Records), I'm really surprised that, in this musical atmosphere that loves polyphonic chamber pop AND do-it-yourself one man bands, Loney, Dear isn't getting more recognition. While he's gone more toward an indie/house direction since this, his debut, record, he's the most charming here, and the instrumentation is more interesting (I don't think I've heard a bassoon on too many pop record besides this one). The real great thing about this record is just how many melodies are going on all at once in just about every song. Simply fantastic. Sidenote. Does Sweden even allow its musicians to not be super talented?

Standout track: Saturday Waits

Until next time.

David Bazan - Curse Your Branches

Let me start this review with one important point: I am not sure that anything David Bazan does will ever, ever exceed his work with/as Pedro the Lion on the album "Control." Also, on a similar note, I've always he works best in the context of midtempo, minor key songs. And when I read some of the reviews of "Curse Your Branches" (which I just heard for the first time), I expected to hear the same tense, heartbreaking melodies. What I ended up getting was something a little more...let's just say "complicated."

As far lyrics go, this album is completely crushing. In recent interviews, David Bazan has admitted to losing a great deal of faith in the Bible and God. For someone who's songwriting career has been filled with musings on those two things, this brings an impact that's a little difficult to swallow. Don't worry--God is still in the songs. In fact, I think every song brings Him up. Except Bazan is much more suspicious of Him now, and asking challenging, arrogant questions ("did You push us when we fell?"), which he admits he has no right to ask, which only makes the sting that more painful. He criticizes himself in a number of ways too--his alcoholism, his shortcomings as a father and husband, and, sometimes, all around bastard. The last song, "In Stitches", he confesses that his drinking is an attempt to escape his acknowledgment of God, and mentions walks with his daughter, 'who is lately full of questions about You.' Your heart just broke a little, didn't it?

Musically, this record isn't what I'd expected. The opener, "Hard To Be" is a great, midtempo, minor key ditty with a synth line running through the breaks between choruses and verses. "Bless the Mess" is next; a song about drinking and doubting and daddying. Let me clarify: a pop song about drinking and doubting and daddying. Major key, uptempo. With terribly depressing lyrics. And for as much as it caught me off guard, it works. Darn it, it works. This is a good thing, considering that most of the record follows in this sort of pattern, pairing almost dancy pop songs with uncomfortably honest lyrics about David Bazan and all the crap he's been dealing with lately. There are a few exceptions, though, where he pulls the metronome down and returns to the minor key melodies he's spoiled many of us on--notably, "Hard To Be," "Curse Your Branches," "Harmless Sparks" (the only song somewhat in the tradition of Bazan's brilliant acoustic ballads with early Pedro) "Lost My Shape," and "In Stitches."

All in all, a startlingly naked and vulnerable record from a songwriter who's discography I've been largely ignorant of since 2004.

Something Old, Something New

Alright, upon further reflection, I guess it was only inevitable that I'd miss some essential albums from my top list. Albums like...

Neutral Milk Hotel - In the Aeroplane Over the Sea

What could possibly be said of this record that hasn't been already? It's a masterpiece. Every lyric is deliberate and every sound intentional, and the sum is way more than its parts. This album often restores my interest in folk music.

Anathallo - Canopy Glow

I've been a fan of Anathallo for about four years now, and have heard everything they've recorded. While it doesn't have the same kinetic energy of some of the songs on Sparrows, it also doesn't have some of the chaos. This album is much more cohesive and really shows their maturing mastery of songwriting and instrumentation.

Prince and the Revolution - Purple Rain

How many films have a soundtrack better than the film? And how many nine-track albums have FIVE singles that all break the top 25? And while I'm not much of one for charts, these singles deserved it. Prince is incredibly talented, and this represents him at the very top of his game. It's a pop album that borrows liberally from funk, disco, motown, and - yes - metal. Santana once said that Prince was the most underrated guitar player on earth, and the title track proves it: it has one of the most epic guitar solos of all time.

The Postal Service - Give Up

When I arrived at college, I was listening to things like Mae, Underoath, Norma Jean, etc; just about anything under the punk/emo/hardcore umbrella. Give Up was the album that introduced me to electronica (and further, to DNTEL, whose album 'Dumb Luck' is absolutely fantastic). This album pairs the innovative 16-bit noodlings of Jimmy Tamborello with the wit and detached-yet-intimate lyrics of Ben Gibbard, and the results are NOTHING like that fool Owl City. Shut up about Fireflies.

Fugazi - The Argument

Fugazi is a hard band to choose a favorite album, because their catalogue is so rich with incredible punk rock. But, the one thing I'll always mention about Fugazi is that their rhythm section is one of the best to grace punk, or any subgenre of rock. The Argument is really where this shines. It's a bit chiller and more jazz influenced than the rest, and so the drums and bass get a lot more room to play around. Mix in the free-ranging vocals and guitars of Ian McKaye and Guy Picciotto, and you have a true punk masterpiece.

As Cities Burn - Son, I Loved You At Your Darkest

This is the only screamo/hardcore/whatevercore album I still keep in a pretty regular rotation on my stereo, and that's saying an awful lot. And while my current tastes align much more with their newest (Hell or High Water, a just plain good indie rock record), this release has a very special place in my heart that nothing else can replace. When I first heard this record, I was in a stage of learning what sacrifice really is: I had thrown out all of my 'secular' CDs (I no longer believe in a distinction between secular and Christian music, only lyrics, and even that's iffy). And there was a line in one of the songs that said, 'At my word, would you bring your Isaac?' and the first time I heard that line, I was so convicted that I had made music an idol that I almost returned this to the store. And this album is filled with the questions we dread answering and the answers we dread giving (i.e., 'I once was blind, but now I just look away'), and each song affected me in a profound and personal way. But, sentimentality aside, this is just a great record. Rarely are releases from Christian labels (Tooth and Nail) so blisteringly honest without being overdramatic. And the musicianship is FANTASTIC. The twin guitar lines are reminiscent of early Further Seems Forever, weaving in and out of one another without any of the drop D JIGGYJIGGAJUG (pause) jugWEEWEE that so dominates the ___-core scene. The drumming is free of the Tourettic double bass pedal runs, and instead is free ranging and cohesive, bringing the basslines and the guitar lines together. And, where most screamo frontmen seem like their screaming is merely a convention of the genre, TJ Bonnette is actually desperate and crying out, supported by his brother, lead guitarist Cody's vocal melodies. Cody's vocals are strong enough that when he became the lead singer after TJ left, the band didn't seem like it lost too terribly much. And to top it all off, there's the closing track, 'Of Want and Misery: The Nothing that Kills,' a seven minute song of despair that ends with the only major key in the entire album, finally finding a light in the darkness that the band admittedly willingly hides in. There's so much more I can say about this record, but for now, I'll merely restate that this is, deservingly so, the only screamo record I still listen to.

Alright, and what have I been listening to lately?

The xx - xx

Like many people, I'm sure, I first got into The xx from the AT&T commercial featuring Apolo Ohno. Michelle (my bride to be, if you don't know me personally) looked it up and found out the band, and I recently got the album, and what a record it is. It mixes the best elements of indie, trip-hop, and dub, all without jamming the songs with too many instruments. Most of the songs are just bass, single-string guitar lines, background synths, drum machines, a male and female vocalist (the guy singer sounds like a male Lykke Li, who is one of my favorites). But even with this minimalism, the production on this album is incredible. The drum machine is thick, thick, thick, and the guitar line is soaked in reverb, making it sound about three times wider than it would. And it works.

MGMT - Congratulations

Like Radiohead before them, MGMT shot to superstardom with the support of a couple singles that they wrote years before that no longer represented who they were as artists. Personally, I can relate, having been asked by friends and family and fans to play two or three songs in particular that I had outgrown by leaps and bounds, so I know the kind of artistic frustration that can come from being identified by your artistic past. And that frustration can lead to a violent recoil that polarizes fans and critics alike. Radiohead responded with Kid A. Wilco, with Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. And now, MGMT offer up the rebellious fist that is Congratulations, a nine track album intended to be listened to as a whole. Some fans may say the record sounds nothing like anything they've done before. My guess is that these fans have only heard "Time to Pretend," "Kids," and "Electric Feel." While excellent tracks in their own right, these singles had very little in common with the remainder of the tracks on the record they represented. Congratulations finds them diving further into the psychedelic reaches they explored with tracks like '4th Dimensional Transition,' 'The Handshake,' and 'Future Reflections.' Anyone who's missed the early sixties psychedelic brought forward by Pink Floyd's Piper at the Gates of Dawn might find some of what they're looking for here. The songs flow in and out of cohesion, often turning around in the middle of a track (especially in 'Siberian Breaks'). That's not to say it's entirely strange: some of the songs are downright gorgeous, like the instrumental 'Lady Dada's Nightmare' and the title track, which feels like a Neil Young song was dropped into a digital China town. Listen if you like experimental, nostalgic psychedelic pop. Don't even try it if you're looking for great dance hits like 'Kids' or 'Electric Feel.' You'll be sorely disappointed.

Most Definitely

I need to step out in like two seconds, so I can't say much about this record.

The Ecstatic by Mos Def. Yes, I know it was on EVERYONE'S best of 2009 lists, but I just got around to hearing it a couple days ago. And I know now that it deserves the hype it got. It may not be the best sounding hip hop record you'll ever hear...in fact, it kind of sounds like Mos Def just mixed up these tracks in his basement and rapped over them real fast, but that's the genius of it. I'm definitely looking forward to giving this one more listens.

Outlet

So why am I starting a music blog? I know it's unnecessary, but sometimes I keep myself from writing full out reviews of albums on my personal blog, because I know not everyone that reads it wants to read that. And there are people who might want to read a music blog that wouldn't want to read anything else about my life.

So there.

To start out, I should probably give a rough summary of my preferences...

Favorite Band: Weezer. This only refers to their first two albums. This is a ceremonial title only.

I have a bias toward (almost) any sort of experimentation and songs of great length. However, I am often stricken dumb by a perfect pop song (i.e., Mr. Blue Sky by E.L.O.). As a songwriter, I also have an incredible respect for folk music and can pretty readily dismiss a less-than-great singer. I love the idea of hip-hop, but often can't stand the thematic material (especially bein' up in da club). But, I love alternative hip-hop and trip-hop. And if you want to make sure I'll love something, drench in it dub reggae influence. Introspection is incredibly important to me, and lyrically, I find nothing more heart shatteringly beautiful than a declaration of weakness. Admittedly, emo* still has a place in my heart.

Favorite musicians/favorite records (at the moment; in no order):

mewithoutYou - Brother, Sister

Radiohead - Amnesiac (their record with the most obvious Charles Mingus influence)

Sigur Ros - ( )

Flaming Lips - Embryonic

The Beatles - Abbey Road

Charles Mingus - any. Who can choose?

Miles Davis - Live Evil

The Doors - Strange Days

The Who - Quadrophenia

Bob Dylan - Bringing It All Back Home

Portishead - 3 (honestly their only release I've heard)

Pedro the Lion - Control

Santogold - s/t

Gorillaz - Demon Days

Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here

Grizzly Bear - Vecktimest

St. Vincent - Actor

Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong - Ella & Louis

Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago

Fleet Foxes - s/t

Efterklang - Parades

Scientist Rids the World of the Curse of the Vampire

Brand New - The Devil And God Are Raging Inside Me

Beck - Modern Guilt (yes, his most and arguably least Beck-esque, but I've always liked his more melodic side more, and Chemtrails is one of my favorite tracks ever)

Newest discoveries:

Flaming Lips - Soft Bulletin, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, At War with the Mystics

I can't believe it took me so long after hearing Embryonic to listen to any of the rest of their catalogue. Honestly, I like Soft Bulletin and Embryonic more than Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, but that's just me. They have that spacey, ambient airiness and superaggressive drum fills that made me fall in love with Flaming Lips in the first place. But, Embryonic is the only one where I feel like the basslines are coming for me, so that record holds the advantage.

Gorillaz - Plastic Beach

I'm convinced the Gorillaz can't release a bad album. They may be cartoon characters, but there's nothing gimmicky about the level of musicianship that goes into these records. I got it a couple days ago and haven't but it down.

Broken Bells - s/t

The Shins' James Mercer with the mighty Danger Mouse? This is one supergroup I can get behind. And the debut is so fantastic--the same great hooks we get from the Shins paired with the ceaseless daring of Danger Mouse. Sign me up.

The Clash - London Calling

I'll admit. I JUST put this album on for the first time. I've only heard the first half of the first track, but there's such a mythos surrounding this record, and the title track lets the listener know they're in for something special. I can't wait for the rest of it.

So that's that. Wait for more. And as these go on, I'll probably post some virtual mixtapes, or maybe even complete albums. Oh, goody!

*real emo, like Sunny Day Real Estate, Further Seems Forever's "The Moon is Down," the Promise Ring, and early Weezer.