TOP 40 ALBUMS OF 2011 RECAP:
40. Coldplay – Mylo Xyloto
39. Red Hot Chilli Peppers - I'm With You
38. Raphael Saadiq - Stone Rollin'
37. Kendrick Lamar - Section.80
36. Jessica Lea Mayfield - Tell Me
35. Dum Dum Girls – Only in Dreams
34 The Lonely Island - Turtleneck & Chain
33 Phonte – Charity Starts at Home
32 The Stepkids – The Stepkids
31 Boston Spaceships - Let It Beard
30. Danger Mouse and Daniele Luppi – ROME (Starring Jack White and Norah Jones)
29. Beastie Boys – Hot Sauce Committee Part Two
28. Adele – 21
27. Paul Simon – So Beautiful or So What
26. The Mountain Goats – All Eternals Deck
25. Foo Fighters – Wasting Light
24. Cass McCombs – Humor Risk
23. Patrick Stump – Soul Punk
22. Bill Callahan – Apocalypse
21. Heidecker & Wood – Starting from Nowhere
20. Nick Lowe – The Old Magic
19. Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks – Mirror Traffic
18. E-40 – Revenue Retrievin’: Overtime Shift/Graveyard Shift
17. My Morning Jacket – Circuital
16. Black Lips – Arabia Mountain
15. The Ettes – Wicked Will
14. DJ Quik – The Book of David
13. Wye Oak – Civilian
12. The Decemberists – The King is Dead
11. Ty Segall – Goodbye Bread
10. Drake – Take Care
09. Pistol Annies – Hell on Heels
08. Wilco – The Whole Love
07. Jay-Z/Kanye West - Watch the Throne
06. EMA – Past Life Martyred Saints
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05. Thee Oh Sees – Carrion Crawler/The Dream
There’s a very good chance you don’t know who Thee Oh Sees are. If you do, that’s awesome, and please let me know. We could talk about them! But anyway, Thee Oh Sees are an San Francisco-based (I told you it has one of the best music scenes!) garage rock band, formed in 1997 by John Dwyer, one of the great mad men in rock today (not to be confused with the Mad Men of rock). He gives it his all and is just such a fiery presence. Thee Oh Sees are very prolific, releasing at least one album a year. 2011 was the year I finally got into the band, so 2012 will very likely be the year I get into their back catalog.
Speaking of prolific, like Cass McCombs and E-40 (talk about a weird group) before them on this Top 40 albums list, Thee Oh Sees released two albums in 2011! Castlemania, which was released in the spring of 2011, was more of the gonzo-weird album. It’s very good (check out
I Need Seed,” one of the most delightfully weird songs of 2011), but it probably wouldn’t have made the top 40.
November’s Carrion Crawler/The Dream on the other hand.... Holy **** this thing is the greatest. This is the full band album, and it’s just
roaring music. It’s the type of fast-paced garage rock that makes you want to punch holes in walls, and flip over cars. I hear they are one of the best live bands out there, and I can only imagine. To see some of these songs performed live.... I think I would jump up and down so much I would end up burrowing my own tunnel of Rock.
Half of the album has songs that are in the 5 minute-6 minute range, and don’t think it’s because these are the slow songs that have a build-up. These are the heaviest/most rocking songs on the entire album! I mean, listen to “Contraption/Soul Desert,” which has this hypnotic bass line that runs for the entire song, as every member of the band gets their time to demolish your eardrums, in the most pleasing way. AND OH MY GOSH “The Dream”!!!!!!! The first time I heard this song I had the sudden urge to rob a bank! I have never done such things in my life! But this song puts in my mind, and turns me into a John Dwyer-esque madman. He alters his singing style for this song, and ****.... This is not my best write-up, because i’m relistening to these songs as I am writing this write-up, and I just want to say LISTEN TO THIS ALBUM. Because maybe i’m not describing it well, but if you listened to it, and have similar fondness for retro-inspired garage rock, that is very fast-paced, you would feel the same way.
Also, if you are looking to lose weight, and need some music on the treadmill/running/whatever, if you listened to Carrion Crawler/The Dream...... Holy ****. This is not proven (IE: complete ******** I am making up), but in the 40 minute running time, I bet you would lose 5 pounds in an instant. This is music that motivates you and makes you want to live out all your greatest dreams. There’s one instrumental track on the album, called “Chem-Farmer,’ that sounds like The MC5 (first album MC5, not “Tutti-Frutti” MC5) took over as James Brown’s band. Funk, with a hard-edge.
The point: Of all the five albums listed here, this one is likely the least known. I hope this write-up, in all its lunatic ways, convinces you to give it a listen. Because after 2011, i’m an Oh Sees fan forever. I look forward to whatever release they have in store for 2012.
Oh, and one more thing:
This is how John Dwyer holds his guitar. The most badass thing you have ever seen in your life.
Best Songs:
01. The Dream
02. Heavy Doctor
03. Contraption/Soul Desert
THE WHOLE ALBUM
04. Sloan – The Double Cross
Here’s what I love about Sloan: They are lifers. The reason their album The Double Cross, their tenth album, is named that is because it refers to 2011 being their 20th anniversary as a band. Not many bands make it to 20 years, and especially not many bands record one of their finest albums this deep into their career.
Sloan are one of those weird bands, despite making incredible albums and songs for two decades, they have yet to crossover in the U.S. and other parts of the world. Even weirder: Despite being huge in Canada for many years (“Money City Maniacs” is a Canadian rock radio staple/beer commercial song, “The Other Man” is played on AC radio, and many other big songs from the mid ‘90s to early ‘00s), it feels like they have gone back to being an indie Canadian band, even in their own home country. I don’t think it was done out of choice, as the music on The Double Cross is as accessible as anything they have done, but maybe more in the sense that the trends in rock radio are changing, that even some of Canada’s rock vets can’t get airtime. It’s a sad situation.
I think they are maybe in that weird “Being Taken for Granted” stage in their career, that U.S. acts such as Ted Leo and The Pharmacists and Yo La Tengo are also currently in. But, I don’t think that’s such a bad place to be in, really. As, sure, you maybe don’t see Sloan on MuchMusic anymore, but they are still out there, recording new, great music for the people who want them. Flavour of the week after flavour of the week pass by over the years, but Sloan will still be there, making well-written, concise pop-rock that’s timeless.
Hey! What about the album itself? It’s 12 songs over 33 minutes, in a true all killer no filler way. The first three songs, “Follow the Leader,” “The Answer Was You,” and “Unkind” are seamlessly blended together as one sort of MegaSong (which is a tradition that dates back to some of their earlier albums such as Between the Bridges). One of my favourite aspects of Sloan is that all four band members get equal time to sing and write songs. They have gotten many Beatles comparisons over the years, and this is certainly one of the reasons why (though to my knowledge, I don’t think Chris Murphy is redoing Andrew Scott’s drumparts). Speaking of Andrew Scott, his song on the album “Traces,” (the one over 4 minute song on the album) is one of his best songs to date, which has Scott doing his great faux-Bob Dylan thing talking about “another steady dose of awful TV shows crowning brand new has-beeners,” and has the band joining in on the chorus singing “Life goes on and on, appreciate it, ‘cause when we’re gone you can’t question a trace of how you made it. When you’re down and out, disintegrated, just keep in mind all of the times that you’ve dedicated.” Over a rocking, organ-based groove, the song is a lot more upbeat than the dry lyrics may sell it as.
From top to bottom, this is just a perfect album. Whether you’re a long-time Sloan fan, or haven’t heard a single song by them before, The Double Cross stands amongst their finest work. Let’s hope they are still around to make The Quadruple Cross someday.
Best Songs:
01. Follow the Leader/The Answer was You/Unkind (yes, these are three separate songs, but they play as one continuous song on the album)
02. Shadow of Love
03. Traces
THE WHOLE ALBUM
03. Kurt Vile – Smoke Ring for My Halo
The last time Kurt Vile made my list, it was by mistake.
I had listed his Matador Records 2009 debut Childish Prodigy at #33 on my Top 40 Albums of 2010 list. I obviously felt really stupid about the mistake, as listed in the post. Even with that ****-up, I knew Kurt Vile wasn't going to be a one-and-done artist on my Top 40 Albums chart, as he proved himself to be the real deal with Childish Prodigy, and I looked forward to whatever he had coming up, and hopefully I could end up righting that wrong in a future edition of my year-end.
Even with all that preface, I never would have imagined how
much he would make the jump-up between the two albums. Now, again, Childish Prodigy is a great album, but Smoke Ring for My Halo is definitely a more confident and more assured KV. That this album, released March 8th, charts this high, despite the early release date shows how great the album truly is. Ever since the release date, it has always been in heavy rotation in my playlist, and it works beautifully in many different circumstances, whether it's a breakfast album, as you have your coffee, or a car trip album (it's a GREAT car trip album), it's one I pick very often.
So, OK, if you haven't heard a second of Smoke Ring for My Halo (or KV in general), what is so good about it? Let's start at track one, "Baby's Arms," one second in and this
wave of music runs over you, of acoustic guitar, percussion, and synths. It's a tough combination to describe it, but you rarely hear anything quite like it. It's maybe a group of sounds that you didn't know that you loved, until you heard it, and then once you do, you want to bathe in KV's orchestra of grungey-splendor for the rest of your life. Second track, "Jesus Fever," (which is off-and-on my favourite song on the album), is KV's take on writing the summer driving song to end all summer driving songs, with its beautiful jangly guitar (that is maybe the most warm guitar playing you will ever hear). The highlight of that song, I think, is once KV sings "If it wasn't taped, you could escape this song, but i'm already gone," which is followed by KV holding going "onnnnnne," and is followed by this wonderful guitar burst. If there was a Smithsonian for moments of music, i'd nominate that part of "Jesus Fever," for sure.
I could go track-by-track on this album, but I won't. Just know that I love every single song on the album, and it (like a good amount of my Top 10) is an album I have to play beginning-to-end if I put it on. KV's laconic-stoner drawl draws you in, and it's so mesmerizing, in the best ways. In many ways, he's like the Philly-stoner mash-up of Brian Wilson (for his sequencing of music) and Bruce Springsteen (for his songwriting). But in doing that, that's also saying he's like someone that has came before. While there are similarities, a KV song is truly unique, and there's nothing quite like it. If you are new to him, please do Smoke Ring for My Halo, as it's really so freaking great. As is the case for every artist on my Top 40 albums list, I really can't wait for whatever new material he has next.
Best Songs:
01. Jesus Fever
02. Society is My Friend
03. Smoke Ring for My Halo
THE WHOLE ALBUM
02. Wild Flag – Wild Flag
As stated in my write-up for "Romance," (my #1 single of 2011), I never listened to Sleater-Kinney before Wild Flag. I don't really know why (i've since listened to The Woods, and holy **** is that a great album), but yeah. As weird as it is, my first exposure to Carrie Brownstein was the first season of Portlandia in January 2011. I'm a huge fan of the show (how great has season 2 been?? TAT'S ALL FOLKS! AY-OH RIVER!), so I was very interested in listening to Brownstein's own music. Luckily for me, Wild Flag was just starting up, and I felt even dumber for not listening to her music prior, especially as I am a huge Janet Weiss fan (she is maybe the best drummer in rock, as I originally grew to love her from her work with The Jicks). From hearing the world premiere of "Romance" on WFMU's The Cherry Blossom Clinic with Terre T (and also hearing "Glass Tambourine," when its 7 inch was released in the spring), the anticipation for their album grew even crazier for me.
In terms of the actual album, I mean. I truly can not put into words how incredible this album is. To me, one of the great things about the album is that, in many ways, the album is about the joy of music itself (as first illustrated in "Romance" and featured on quite a few other songs on the album). Which in a lesser bands hands would come off as either cheesy or self-important, but when you hear the four women of Wild Flag sing and play about it, you can just hear the pure joy coming from them. It's truly infectious, and it's one of most likable albums I have heard in some time. I can not imagine anyone listening to this album, and not liking it. You would be a fool!
Now, let me talk about the song "Racehorse" for a second. I dare you to find a song, released in 2011 or any year prior, that just rocks as hard as this song does. I was talking in my Thee Oh Sees write-up about how songs on that album made me want to punch holes through walls. It's a slightly different feeling with "Racehorse," (though, if you played Thee Oh Sees' "The Dream," and "Racehorse" back-to-back, I think it would be equivalent to having a Four Loko) as "Racehorse" (maybe due to the Race part of the title) makes me want to run five marathons. All four of these women are very accomplished and celebrated musicians, but there's also a point where, this is their first album, and a first album shouldn't have a song, with a band that sounds
this cohesive as this one does. This is a third or fourth album song, where they have toured for a while, and are well-aware of all of their strengths (I guess it helps that Brownstein and Weiss were in Sleater-Kinney together, and the others were in various other side-projects over the years, but still). How Brownstein snarls "PONY UP PONY UP! YOU BETTER RIIIIIIIIIDE," as Janet Weiss just POUNDS THE LIVING **** OUT OF THE DRUMS ALL CAPS. Like, oh my gosh, this song is the ****ing greatest. No shiny production, just four people who rock harder than you could ever do in your entire life. And the insane thing is, this song runs 6:39 on the album, and I hear live they do 8-9 minute versions of the song [ED. NOTE: Since writing this write-up, I have gone on YouTube and have found versions in the 15 minute range, and one as long as 18 minutes!!! HOLY ****]! ****ing hell, that's just unreal! They came to Calgary this year, in June to play the Sled Island music fest, but I sadly missed them. I kicked myself in June, and I am still kicking myself now for missing them.
So yeah, Wild Flag. This is how all rock music should be. If you haven't listened to the album, you really should. I think it's a really accessible album, for people of all ages. I think kids would, no joke, really enjoy this album, as it's very upbeat and they could jump around, as Carrie Brownstein snarls better than anyone has snarled. You could get kids to learn how to snarl! How awesome would that be? So yeah, the bottom line is: WILD FLAG 4 LIFE.
Best Songs:
01. Romance
02. Racehorse
03. Boom
THE WHOLE ALBUM
01. ****ed Up – David Comes to Life
“ .. With David Comes to Life coming out and everything, the market for overly ambitious punk albums is pretty much closed now.” – Patrick Stickles, lead singer/guitarist/songwriter of Titus Andronicus
That quote posted above is significant, as that isn't said by some dumb music critic. It's said by Patrick Stickles of Titus Andronicus, who just two years ago released a punk-epic of his own with The Monitor
(which listed at #2 on my Top 40 Albums of 2010 list) When the guy who made the last great "overly ambitious punk album" says that the market is closed, then the market is definitely closed. And he's right, as I can't see any band topping what The Monitor did, and especially what David Comes to Life did.
Toronto's ****ed Up have always had ambition. I mean, what other band, punk or otherwise, would decide to release a series of 12 inches about the Zodiac signs? (they started with 2006's Year of the Dog, and have released Year of the Pig, Year of the Rat, Year of the Ox, and plan to release Year of the Tiger on February 7th, and will release Year of the Hare also in 2012). Releasing a full-blown rock opera, at 77 minutes long, though? No one could have expected that. And it says a lot about ****ed Up's genius that, their 77-minute rock opera is the most accessible thing they have ever done. Weird, right? As the story goes, you can't get things that are more polar opposite from each other than "rock operas" and "hardcore punk." The whole genre of punk was basically created as a way to move away from the bloated nature of late '70s mainstream rock. So that ****ed Up decided to face that head-on was a bold move on their part.
Before getting into the album itself, I want to talk about the album that David Comes to Life most reminds me of: The Who's Quadrophenia. An 81 minute rock-opera, with a slightly-confused narrative, that is as muscular as the band ever got. It's funny how that happened, as 2011 was the year I also heavily got into Quadrophenia, so the parallels started to become more and more obvious to me, especially as I played songs from both albums back-to-back to test out my theory. As while both albums have a narrative, you can also get your enjoyment out of both albums purely on an superficial level.
David Comes to Life is just such a massive album, not just in length, but in sound. It's such a dense album, with the amount of guitar-tracks present on this thing must be a humungous number. It certainly sounds it, as the album sounds like its 500 feet tall, going higher and higher, as it reaches for the moon. Damian "Pink Eyes" (host of Much Music's The Wedge, and maybe the nicest dude in punk) acts as a sort of bull in a china-shop with his growly vocals obliterating everything in its path. When beautiful female vocalists join in on the album, such as Madeline Follin of Cults on "Queen of Hearts," and Jennifer Castle on "The Other Shoe," "One More Night," and Lights Go Up," it turns into the Beauty and The Beast of hardcore punk, and it's such a thrilling thing to listen to (sidebar: while not a female, #3 artist Kurt Vile also makes a vocal appearance on "Lights Go Up").
The ambition for David Comes to Life doesn't just end at the album, but it extends to side-albums. One, titled David's Town (released on Record Store Day), is a fake compilation of songs set at the fictional town David Comes to Life is set in (Byrdesdale Spa). It's ****ed Up backed by many different great vocalists including A.C. Newman of The New ****ographers, Danko Jones, Cloud Nothings, Dan Romano, as well as every member from ****ed Up itself. It's a great album, in its own right. Damian has recently stated that he doesn't want the saga of David Comes to Life to end here. What he's in the beginning stages of planning is the Veronica EP, an EP about the female lead character from the story, where ****ed Up would be backing a bunch of female singers singing from the perspective of Veronica, filling out her back-story (Damian, ever the modest guy, has his goals sky-high in which artists he wants to nab for it, such as Adele, and Feist).
Most years, when I make this list, its sometimes difficult to figure out which album will be #1. Not the case this year, as while it may be the best top five I have ever had, the #1 was set in stone back in May, when I pre-ordered the album via Matador's Buy Early Get Now program. I got a free download of the album early, and listened to it at midnight of some night in mid May. I had high expectations going in, but I was hands-on-my-face throughout most of it. In shock, but also jumping up and down, at how great it was. If it wasn't so late, and I wasn't by myself, I would be yelling about how great it was as I listened to it with someone. It's probably my favourite music experience of 2011, and the album only got better in following listens. If you aren't a hardcore punk fan, and are scared to listen to it, seriously, just give it a shot. Like I said, the album that this album most reminds me of is a Who album from the '70s. Any classic rock fan, who isn't an frozen caveman with their music taste, could very likely appreciate what ****ed Up were trying to do with David Comes to Life. It's just that exciting to listen to.
Best Songs:
01. Queen of Hearts
02. Running on Nothing
03. A Little Death
for the last time, THE WHOLE ALBUM (and especially this one)
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Well, it took me a while, but I feel really proud of what I did with this list. I truly hope everyone reading this got something out of it, as I put a lot of work into making it exciting and interesting to read. If you get at least one new artist or album recommendation from my list, then I could not be more excited. That's what makes it worth it to me. Because I know the amount of cool songs and artists and albums that I have learned from all of your lists from over the years, which is why Year-End time truly is The Most Wonderful Time of the Year.
Once again, thank you so much for the comments. They are the reason why I put the extra time and effort into making this list worth-reading and worth your time.
I hope to see you all later this year, for Best of 2012! Until then: