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November 8, 2009

BEST ALBUMS OF THE DECADE: 50-41

(The pictures and songs for these are subject to removal; hopefully they won't be eradicated. I apologize if the format is shaky - I did the best I could)

50. Josh Ritter, THE GOLDEN AGE OF RADIO (2001)

Ritter's first album at times sounds like it was recorded in his basement. Two of its ingredients may well have been love and sweat, but it introduced the world to one of the few singer/songwriters who doesn't seem like he's stealing all his pages from someone else's songbook. I discovered Ritter on Pandora, and finding him is pretty much the only reason I hold out hope that a computer knows how I think. While never aping his influence, in "Me & Jiggs" he wears his influences on his sleeve. Much like Townes Van Zandt, his songs capture and romanticize an aimlessness that needs to be escaped, but no one wants to. "Harrisburg" is a ballad without ever reaching to the dated ambitions of balladeers. It showed a lot of promise that has (in my opinion) since been fulfilled, even if he isn't showing up on the radio alongside people who he is much, much better than.

Best track: "Harrisburg"

49. Raconteurs, BROKEN BOY SOLDIERS (2006)

The genius of Jack White, while obvious in principle, has always eluded me. I can see why the Stripes represent so many things to so many people, and why a few of their songs are exciting, but I tend to find White to be the kind of polarizing artist who announces his own brilliance, where every song is a statement. But I love his less ambitious side-project, which seems to be the kind of music White would make if no one knew who he was, if he had never played Renee Zelwegger's boyfriend in COLD MOUNTAIN. On BROKEN, "Hands," "Steady As She Goes" and "Broken Boy Soldiers" resemble a power-pop that no one seems dedicated to making any more, as each song seems uncalculated and loud - befitting more of an 8-track than described on the pages of the Village Voice. I've never gotten into Benson's solo stuff, but he seems to channel White's obvious creativity and energy into a format that deserves to be listened to, not analyzed.

Best track: "Hands"

48. A.C. Newman, THE SLOW WONDER (2004)

Those who "follow" me will be surprised to find this so low. As much as I love on Newman and have recommended this album, I'm really only drawn to the first three songs - "Miracle Drug," "Drink To Me Babe, Then," and "On The Table." These songs are bit less coy than most New Pornographer efforts; breezy, light, and fun - if the Pornographers are Newman's attempt to do late period Beach Boys/Beatles, his solo career shows him trying to do their early stuff. Newman is the svengali of the NPs, and I have a weird relationship with him - I prefer all of the solo work of Bejar, Case, and Newman to anything they do alone. But this album at once enhances the supergroup and the individual behind it.

Best Track: "On The Table"

47. Beck, THE INFORMATION (2006)

Almost ignored among the heroic output of the little guy this decade, THE INFORMATION brings together the sarcastic kid who was literally throwing instruments against the wall in his studio with the mellow, reflective guy on SEA CHANGE. The result is some truly memorable tracks - "Think I'm In Love" brings together the focused doubt of SEA CHANGE with the wandering noise of ODELAY. Like everyone else who got excited about Beck in the 90s, I've picked up every album and found that it doesn't meet my expectations. With artists like Beck, that always tends to be a critical indicator that he's failing to live up to that early promise. Or it represents an iconoclastic spirit that can't be contained. You could argue that THE INFORMATION is Beck's contribution to the house music industry, a scene he had some leg in starting. But I prefer to think of it as a thoroughly listenable album that finds him doing what he does best.

Best Track: "Think I'm In Love"

46. Bruce Springsteen, DEVILS & DUST (2005)

After the stellar THE GHOST OF TOM JOAD in 1995, Bruce Springsteen has continued to consistently exist without doing anything superlative. Which is fine, even if his top his five for me (NEBRASKA, DARKNESS ON THE EDGE OF TOWN, TUNNEL OF LOVE, BORN TO RUN, THE WILD, THE INNOCENT, THE E STREET SHUFFLE) happened before 1987. A guy with such an expansive catalog and shining star that can be sorted neatly into two groups (E Street Boss and Nebraska Boss) really doesn't have time to reinvent himself. MAGIC proved he could still do the E Street thing and make an album you can tap your foot to. But I prefer DEVILS to its other 2000+ NEBRASKA-like effort THE RISING. It's unusually low-key and yet somehow incendiary enough to make Starbucks refuse to sell it in their stores. It isn't so much an anti-war album (the way it was covertly marketed) as a typical rumination on loss, love, good people in bad places, and - yes - war.

Best Song: Reno

45. Elf Power, BACK TO THE WEB (2006)

Elf Power has been making something like folk music albums for quite a while - some pretty awesome, some merely okay. BACK TO THE WEB is my suggestion for an entry into the goofy mysticality. It threatens to be prog rock at every juncture - and no one wants to listen to Rush lyrics when Rush isn't playing behind them. But WEB works because of some pretty excellent melodies and haunting choruses. Not all their songs hearken to the depths of the fairies of Mordor. "An Old Familiar Scene" could exist outside on an album that didn't also include a song called "Peel Back the Moon, Beware!" There's something symbolic in their work that I've never bothered to decipher and thankfully - unlike the Prog - I don't need to in order to enjoy it.

(I saw them live at the Hi-Tone in Memphis in 2006 with about twenty other people in the audience. They put on a great show; no spiders and flies onstage, I promise)

Best Song: "The Whole World is Waiting"

44. The Strokes, ROOM ON FIRE (2003)

When I first heard ROOM ON FIRE, I decreed that the Strokes had bought too much into their own hype and produced a mediocre follow-up to their breakthrough. Now I think the opposite. We needed some remove from Julian Casablancas trying to nail all the good looking girls in his audience. This was the transition to them becoming the disgusting house act that made it and a band who likes to try new things (are you listening to this model, The Killers?). There aren't as many memorable tracks on ROOM as their debut, but the album holds up rather well. "You Talk Way Too Much" seems like the lost track from that first album, while "The End Has No End" and "12:51" are odd departures that transcends anything on THIS IS IT. It showed that The Strokes refused to fall into the one-hit wonder narrative we all secretly hoped they would.

(I saw them in 2006 and it was one of the best shows I've ever seen; I was expecting them to be cutesy and stupid to the audience but they just rocked and rocked hard. Well done, guys)

Best Song: "12:51"

43. The Decemberists, PICARESQUE (2005)

If you had talked to me in 2005, I would have told you how much I loved this album and the band; how it was refreshing to hear a group dedicated to using their songs for stories, how their vocabulary was inventive and inspiring, how much I thought the line "I am writer, a writer of fictions" seemed to be an imperative not only for this band but a whole new direction of Indie Pop.

And now I'm just lukewarm on the Decemberists and I'm not sure totally why. Overexposure? Possibly. That when I saw them live they led a sing-along? Perhaps. That Colin Meloy's precociousness seems like the kind of thing you grow out of after your first creative writing class? Probably. In any case, it's been a situation of diminishing returns . . . THE CRANE WIFE and THE HAZARDS OF LOVE were more of the same, and each time it's less moving, and each time they don't smack you in the face with their creativity - or if they do, it's annoying instead of interesting.

None of the allusions they have are particularly interesting, they all thrive on what Tracy Jordan calls "wordplay!" "The Sporting Life" is the best - it takes an incident of youth sports clumsiness/awkwardness through the eye of an absurd objective reserve. It's funny, catchy, and inventive - Meloy at his best. At his worst, he sings about "coquettes" and uses adjectives like "gadabout." But I still find myself wanting to listen to PICARESQUE quite a bit, despite its indulgences, despite its put-upon fancy. I still really like this album.

Best Song: "The Sporting Life."

(Kudos to this fan-video! This is proof of the quirky following the Decemberists have.)

42. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, DIG! LAZARUS DIG!

Cave's most recent album with his Bad, Bad Seeds is a mélange of everything he's ever done. Here's his thoughts on literature ("We Call Upon the Author to Complain"); here's his use of allusion to bring out something seedy ("Night of the Lotus Eaters"); here's his mix of nihilism and hopefulness ("More News from Nowhere"); here's his rumination on God ("Jesus of the Moon"). The contemporaneous side-project of Grinderman gave him an excuse to be a angry, sex-crazed old man, and that guy is a collaborator on this album. I tend to think about the Grinderman album as one of a piece with DIG! - but while keeping similar themes, Cave tones down the poetry and ratchets up the guitars for what many are seeing as a revival. I disagree; I think this is Cave doing what Cave has always done: playing around with a bunch of different genres in his own distinct voice.

Best Song: "Lie Down Here (And Be My Girl)."

41. The Hold Steady, STAY POSITIVE

The Hold Steady has been making awesome bar-music throughout the decade. Their songs about drinking, going outside to smoke, and realizing you'll wake up hungover are a near-perfect match of form and theme. I tend to think of these any time it's 2 AM and it will take another hour to get home (fewer and further between these days, but still). Craig Finn has been called a "troubadoor," which I think is a pretty stupid description. His songs compete with emptiness and meaning - being "Sequestered in Memphis" is both a good memory and a regrettable situation. Which is why the music suggests pure awesome while the lyrics describe total depravity. This is my favorite of all their albums, and I'm really excited that they show no signs of stopping.

"In bar-light, she looked all right;
In daylight, she looked desperate
That's all right, I was desperate, too"

Best Song: "Slapped Actress"

Scroll down for my honorable mention

| By Andytown | 12:16 PM

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Posted by: bethan at November 18, 2009 9:38 AM

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