Part 5
20. Kaiser Chiefs - Yours Truly, Angry Mob
My favorite debut album of 2005 was the Kaiser Chiefs' Employment so I was greatly anticipating what they had up next. So then Yours Truly, Angry Mob came out, and It's really awesome. Is it better then Employment? I don't know, but they are both great. I'll just leave it at that. The first single off the album "Ruby" is one of my favorite songs of the whole year. It's just insanely catchy, addictive, and just a fun song. I've been trying to figure out why I love the group so much, and I think the reasoning is they sound a whole lot like Blur. So much so that Damon Albarn himself criticized this album for sounding a lot like Blur's album The Great Escape. Both albums, btw, were produced by Stephen Street who produced a lot of albums for Blur and also produced Employment for the Kaisers'. I don't see the problem in it though. I think it's kinda cool for a sort of Blur: The Next Generation to be around making great fun music while Blur is on hiatus. Of course, do any of the Kaisers' songs stack up with Blur's very best? **** no!
According to Wikipedia (ha!), the Kaiser Chiefs are planning on releasing another album in 2008. I, for one, can't wait to hear it. I also hear a new Blur album could be happening in 2008 too. They should come out on the same day. would be funny.
Best Songs:
1.Ruby
2.The Angry Mob
3.Love's Not a Competition (But I'm Winning)
19. Justice - †
The best Daft Punk record that Daft Punk didn't make. Justice sure had a big year, and for good reason. I would say † is probably one of the most influential electronic albums to come out since Daft Punk's Homework. Yes, i'll quit the Daft Punk comparisons now. Electronic albums rarely breakout in the mainstream, but when they do they should hope to be as good as †. It's really a party in an album. The wide range of styles of music on here including the Michael Jackson tribute "D.A.N.C.E." (you know, **** will.i.am. get Justice to produce the MJ comeback album. Just a sidepoint, but how the **** is Pharrell not producing anything on the MJ comeback album? he's been working up to that **** for his whole career. woops for going off topic) to the face-scrunching beauty of "Stress". If you haven't heard of Justice or † yet somehow, then please get on it. For Your Health /drstevebrule.
Best Songs:
1.D.A.N.C.E.
2.DVNO
3.Stress
18. Common - Finding Forever
It's great to see Common finally get success in the mainstream. Has he slightly dumbed down his lyrics to get that to happen? yeah, kinda. His pop culture references throughout Finding Forever are slightly annoying (OK GO, Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaugnn, etc), but Common is still in his heart Common Sense from 1992's Can I Borrow A Dollar? Common once again works heavily with Kanye West, and Kanye does some of his darkest production to date. It's great to hear Kanye try new things out with his production. Common also works with will.i.am who continues his streak of somehow being a great producer, and Devo Springsteen, an up-and-coming producer who worked on Kanye's "Diamonds" (For Sierra Leone).
There is one song on the album that was previously released in "So Far To Go" which was originally on J Dilla's posthumous 2006 album The Shining. The only thing that sucks about it is that Common completely changes the lyrics he did on The Shining version and does all new lyrics which don't even come close to stacking up to what he previously said. If he wanted to do new lyrics he should of put the angle of it more on Dilla, since that song has taken a whole other meaning since he passed away on February 10th, 2006. If he kept the original lyrics or made new lyrics that fit the song it would easily be my favorite song on the album. In it's The Shining form it was one of my top 3 favorite hip-hop songs of last year.
Kanye West really promoted the fact that Finding Forever was inspired a lot from J Dilla and comparing it to Steven Spielberg following Stanley Kubrick doing A.I. Honestly, I don't see much of a J Dilla influence besides the fact that Kanye has somehow taken the Mountain "Long Red" break that Dilla used on a lot of songs. btw, Kanye should really quit using it so often. He uses it on "Wouldn't Get Far", "The People", "Barry Bonds", etc, and it really serves no point now. It's not his signature, and he's just thieving from Dilla. But I digress. This writeup may seem kinda negative, but it isn't #18 for no reason. It's still a very strong album from one of hip-hop's elder statesmen. As much as Common has changed, it ends the same way all his other albums have ended: Pops speaking some knowledge. As it should be.
Best Songs:
1.Southside feat. Kanye West
2.So Far to Go feat. D'angelo
3.The Game feat. DJ Premier
17. Marrdest Mouse - We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank
how do you make Modest Mouse even better? how about adding one of the best guitar players ever in Johnny Marr (formally of The Smiths) to form the new superband of Marrdest Mouse. Now i've only heard this album and Good News For People Who Love Bad News, so i'm not going to pretend I've heard all their prior work, but this new album I feel is much better then Good News. The songs are awesome, and the addition of Johnny Marr has made the group unstoppable. also very awesome is that James Mercer, lead singer of The Shins, does backing vocals on "Florida", "Missed The Boat", and "We've Got Everything" and makes those songs even better then they already are. With the band now being comfortable to be in the same group as a ****in' rock legend their next album should be mindblowing.
Best Songs:
1.Fire It Up
2.Florida
3.We've Got Everything
16. Nine Inch Nails - Year Zero
This album really is fantastic, obviously. A bunch of people on ATRL will do (and have done) a better job then I ever will at describing what is so great about this album, and what makes it Trent's best album in a while. Hell, even my Mom enjoys Year Zero! No joke. She really likes "Capitol G". I bought this CD used over the summer for like $6. Best $6 I spent in a while. and as I mention the CD, how great is the artwork? So awesome. The cover is really different, and inside the CD with one hand with a gun and another with a Bible is pretty smart idea that fits in with the Year Zero concept. So, yeah. The point of this paragraph if you don't grab anything from it is that Year Zero = superawesome.
Best Songs
1.In This Twilight
2.Vessel
3.God Given
So, there's Part 5. A music related sidelist will be headed your way tomorrow so look out for that.
comment please! it's appreciated.
