Narrow things still further down to personal picks for "best" albums of the year and that becomes a very subjective filter for quality we're talking about! And when it's me? I'm picky! I like what I like. For my own reasons, usually. And? I didn't like as much as I'd hoped to this year. Plus, I'm judging whole albums. This was a good year for singles, yet the albums behind some of them - those that had albums - didn't always have the depth one might hope for.
Could be my crappy-end-of-the-year perspective, I suppose. My #1 album did come out early on... but I thought it was a sign of a great year ahead. I was hopeful! And then? Well, it remains at #1, so certainly nothing better came along. Ahem. Still, here are ten very good albums! Best of the year, I say! And that #1 album is an AMAZING album, it is a bit unfair to the others to judge them by it.
These ten albums managed to cut through my jaded, less-than-welcoming exterior and entertained me. Made me feel something. Rocked my world a little. Best I came across. But it's just what I say - this list is purely subjective, with no pretense towards qualitative or objective assessment. These are simply the ones I liked. Hope you like 'em, too.
10. Low Cut Connie - Dirty Pictures (part 1) - Sometimes you need a little down n' dirty, straight ahead, piano driven, guitar thumpin' rock n' roll! In a tradition echoing back through the J. Geils Band to Jerry Lee Lewis, Low Cut Connie delivers a fresh new take on a "killer" sound, with charismatic frontman Adam Weiner pounding the keys and wailing about heartbreak. Or Revolution. Or "Controversy" - yeah, they take on the Prince tune...
It may be a cliche, but? You gotta see them live! I was already a fan and grooving on "Revolution Rock and Roll" a bunch when Low Cut Connie came to town as part of Grace Potter's Grand Point North Festival. Had to go see them. Live, Adam Weiner is a dynamo, radiating pure energy as the band rips through the tunes. He's on his piano! He's over his piano! He's diving into the crowd! He's hugging me! Yeah, he was hugging folks in the crowd as he made a circle through us, and I got hugged! You remember something like that.
9. Conor Oberst - Salutations - had to check to be sure this album came out this year - seems like such a long time ago. Suppose some of that has to do with the fact we got solo demo-ish versions of some of these on Ruminations last year. And maybe because, in some ways, this year has felt so damn long. For a long time now, Oberst has been touring with The Felice Brothers as his backing band (a killer live show, see it!), and they appear on Salutations, too. With one amazing exception...
I've never gotten into The Felice Brothers alone because they sound kind of loose and sloppy to me. And maybe not just me, because the amazing exception, the addition to the "band" for this album, is the most amazing timekeeper in rock, the best studio drummer of the last 50 or so years, the great Jim Keltner - who also serves with Oberst as the album's co-producer! This creates a fierce, barely checked alchemy, an urgent spontaneity under the light reigns of a master handler, all led by the vision of Conor Oberst.
I loved "A Little Uncanny" solo, and the band version rocks, "Tachycardia" comes off well, too. Some songs, I still prefer the early versions, like "You All Loved Him Once". But "Mamah Borthwick (A Sketch)" is the rare gem that sounds beautiful on Ruminations, and then, with the addition of sweet background vocals from Gillian Welch, even more amazing on Salutations - some of the best both albums have to offer!
8. Various - Thank You, Friends - Big Star's Third Live ...And More - I love it when an awesome project appears in front of you out of left field! Had no idea this release was even in the works and then the CD landed on my desk in the mail from the fine folks at Concord. They followed up with the CD/DVD combo pack so I could watch the show, too. This is a live recording of a special night in a traveling tribute to Big Star with a focus on their third album, a night when many special guests sat in with a tribute paying band line-up that was already stellar.
There was something special about the late Alex Chilton and his band Big Star, something quirky, melodic, pop-driven but fractured, charming but menacing, too. And though they never had huge pop success, the band's influence on the next couple of generations of musicians who followed in their wake was so widespread and impactful it was almost astonishing - as evidenced most overtly on songs like "Alex Chilton" by The Replacements, for example.
Jody Stephens, only surviving member of the band, sits in here on the drums. I've met Jody, and he's really nice, a humble, very gracious man - even when your complimenting him on being in such an influential band! He gives the project a grounding in the band and the work itself. Ken Stringfellow and Jon Auer of The Posies played with Stephens and Chilton in the most recent, reconstituted version of Big Star. Their presence also ties the project into Big Star itself.
Mike Mills of R.E.M., Jeff Tweedy of Wilco, Robyn Hitchcock, Chris Stamey of the dBs - there are a lot of cool musicians taking their turns at singing Chilton's tunes. Loved when his old band Trip Shakespeare covered it on their final release, the Volt EP, so it's great hearing Dan Wilson of Semisonic cover "The Ballad of El Goodo" here. A great tribute, nicely presented.
7. Paul Weller - A Kind Revolution - I'm a big Paul Weller fan. Well, a big fan of some of what he does. Do believe he's brilliant. He's the kind of original artist who feels the need to sometimes push boundaries and get really experimental, angular or noisey, and I can't always follow him there. I love Weller's early, loud work with The Jam, don't get me wrong, it's more recent stuff like Wake Up the Nation (2010) or Saturn's Pattern (2015) that leave me cold. I like Weller's R&B side, certainly at its most indulgent in The Style Council, but it's Weller's pastoral British folk-rock side I like the most, as displayed most prominently on the classic, Traffic-influenced Wild Wood (1993).
A Kind Revolution touches on a little of each aspect of Weller. Lead track "Long Long Road" has the R&B flavor of Stanley Road (1995) - made me curious what sort of album was on the way this time! Second single "Woo Se Mama" kicks up the energy level to an almost ideal level:
There are tunes on the album I can do without, which is why this album isn't higher up the list, I suppose. Never been a Boy George fan, so I skip his guest spot on the Style Council-ish "One Tear". But rather than dwell on the negative, let's accentuate the clever musings on realist painter Edward in "Hopper", or the way "She Moves With the Fayre" brings many of Weller's worlds together. The jazzy R& B-flavored jam is rooted in the pastoral British sounds of Canterbury with help from vocals and trumpet work from Canterbury scene stalwart Robert Wyatt.
Overall a satisfying album from Weller - even if it does occasionally feel like a crowd-pleaser, as if sometimes he tries a little too hard, or nods and winks when you wish he wouldn't. But it's mostly good stuff for Weller fans - if you like his sort of thing, you're going to like it. More than likely.
6. BNQT - Volume 1 - Take four members of Texas band Midlake (Eric Pulido, Jesse Chandler, Joey McClellan, McKenzie Smith), add the lead singers from Travis (Fran Healy), Band of Horses (Ben Bridwell), Grandaddy (Jason Lytle) and Franz Ferdinand (Alex Kapranos), and you've got yourself what Pulido calls a "poor man's Travelling Wilburys"- BNQT!
Given the mix of talents and sensibilities involved, the album is a bit uneven. The Midlake guys together and each lead singer contribute two songs apiece to the project, for ten somewhat curious tunes. My favorites are those written by Pulido and company - "Real Love" features all of the "Supergroup's" members together on vocals, a la Wilburys. Jeff Lynne would recognize the beat, and George Harrison would, I'm sure, be humbled by the flattery inherent in the slide on the guitar. Add in a Beatle-esque brass section with a lilting piccolo and you get one of my favorite songs of the year:
Maybe it's because I'm into Midlake but not a huge fan of any of the other singer's bands, but it's the other Midlake-penned song that stands out for me as well, "Restart". Okay, I do kind of like Travis. But - funny story - I went to see an acoustic Midlake open for Band of Horses. Didn't stay through much of Band of Horses' set after Midlake opened. Sorry, Ben. Ben has a bit of a potty mouth, too. Wow - the lyrics on his second tune, Tara - lots of F bombs!
There's a "shit storm" in Fran Healy's L.A. On My Mind, too - so no worries on the lyric content. Kapranos' "Hey Banana" is fun, yet also slightly menacing. There's a sense these guys would not have done these songs with their usual bands. Obviously, this was a fun, relaxed project where the creators felt free to let go and create. Which makes it kind of awesome!
That's my 2017 Ten to Six... we'll do the Top Five in my next installment!
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