02: 20-16

20. Girls - Father, Son, Holy Ghost

They love their mothers, boy, ohhh they love their mothers. It's mama this, mama that. Oh my Irish mother!

I don’t know if Christopher Owens, the brains behind Girls, is actually Irish. But when I sat down to write about Father, Son, Holy Ghost that John Belushi line was the first thing that came to mind. (shitty video here http://tinyurl.com/c3s8da skip to 3:05 for applicable quote). And given how much else I’ve felt in common with Owens as I listened to the record this year, I’m just going to go ahead and assume he is in fact Irish. And man does he love his mother.

His unconventional upbringing (in a cult) and evolving relationship with his mother who raised him there have been well documented, so I won’t bore you with information a simple google search can provide. Instead I’m gonna get personal and tell you about my year and why this was one of those right place/right time albums. Personal mainly because I don’t know how else to write about music. Sure, I can regurgitate lines about the album’s retro charms and infectious guitar licks. And if you’re a fan of well-crafted aw shucks pop songs (Magic, Honey Bunny) or sprawling epics (Vomit, Forgiveness) I can tell you this record has something for everyone. But if that’s what you’re looking for you can go any number of places (here http://tinyurl.com/6v34sq6, here http://tinyurl.com/3mpyrdg, or here http://tinyurl.com/6so5nrn).

So let’s get real.

So I had this ex. Okay, not an ex-girlfriend but THE ex-girlfriend. Classic on-again, off-again ordeal spanning many years. We broke up awhile back and I was doing fine, wading through the murky world of online dating. OKcupid of course; fuck paying for that shit. I had some fun and met some decent people but I was just getting tired of it. Honestly it’s kind of soul crushing to play that game.

I’ve been messin with so many girls who could give a damn about who I am. They don’t like my boney body, they don’t like my dirty hair.

And I started to entertain thoughts about maybe the off-again could become on-again with the ex. I hyped it up pretty well in my head and made my lame pitch to her. Sometimes something known and comfortable just sounds good. Turns out she met someone new and fell in love. This was entirely understandable because it had been some time, and I’d been attempting to do the same, but it still manged to stir up a bunch of old crap I had just swiftly swept under the rug after our breakup.

How can I say I love you, now that you’ve said I love you? How can I say I need you, now that you’ve said I need you? How can I say I want you, now that you’ve said I want you? Now that you’ve said everything I said to you to somebody new.

So I dealt with it, not always ceremoniously. Eventually I found a good place, put everything in perspective, and realized the ex was a good friend and that was for the best. Different arcs that happened to overlap for awhile is the way I like to put it.

At some point after figuring all that out I got bored and waded back into the emotional abyss of online dating because I was lonely and thought I’d exhausted any real life options. It was just as futile as I remembered. I met nice women with seemingly aligned interests and attractions, but again came to realize that I’m never going to be the type of person who could forge a serious connection with someone over a series of drinks with the expressed motive of looking for someone to date. It all just seemed so phony to me, like I was a regular fucking Holden Caufield. I was fed up but still going through the motions.

Nights I spend alone, I spend them running round looking for you baby. Looking for love, looking for love, looking for love, looking for love.

Truth be told there was actually someone from real life (not the internet) that I’d been interested in all along. We’d been friends for years and I had a thing for her for a long time, all the way back to the penultimate breakup with the ex. But the timing was never right; I was dating someone, or she was, or we were both trying to move on.

All anyone wants is someone they can be themselves with and vice versa, and have both people enjoy the hell out of it. I knew it was out there for me, but wasn’t sure where or how I’d find it.

I need a woman who loves me, me me me me me. I know you’re out there. You might be right around the corner and you’ll be the girl that I love. You’ll be the girl that I love.

I’d actually asked out the real life girl before ever venturing into the online dating maelstrom. She let me down easy; wrong place wrong time; and we remained good friends through it all. Almost a year later, after I was fed up and ready to broach the subject with her again, she came to me and said she was in. I was taken aback but not surprised. We’ve been seeing each other for a month, and it’s going even better than my wildest expectations. There’s a lot up in the air. It’s still really new and there’s a chance she’s going to move across the country soon. I don’t know what’s going to happen, but it’s entirely okay because I have a new appreciation for what’s possible.

Just a look was all it took, suddenly I’m on the hook, it’s magic.

And that’s why I liked this album.

by Kzoo

19. Wye - Oak Civilian

In a world full of music fans long sick of seeing Pitchfork Spider-Man-ing its stale jism all over whatever flash-in-the-pan indie outfit has been deemed hot for the month, it's sometimes hard to sort through the madness and find the acts that are actually worthy of the praise heaped upon them. The indie rock duo, especially, is a sub-genre riddled with the carcasses of those once briefly loved by the blogosphere. Luckily, Wye Oak's Jenn Wasner and Andy Stack have managed to ride the Wade... er, wave.

Those familiar with 2009's the Knot will find that Wye Oak has kept the successful formula built around Wasner's versatile and dynamic guitar playing--she should be a guitar hero for aspiring rocker girls everywhere. Tight, distorted solos and whisper-to-explosion blasts litter the record, with Stack keeping time with his feet and his right hand, and adding atmosphere with his left. Live, he most resembles Def Leppard's Rick Allen, as the left hand moves minimally to cover organ chords or bass lines while the right arm moves ferociously to make up for the lack of the other. It's incredible that it even works.

Civilian's sequencing is masterful--opening slowly and allowing some tension to build. By the end of the second track, "the Altar," Wasner lets the vocals soar for just a few seconds before pulling back, only to punch you in the chest with the beginning of "Holy Holy," which is a standout track even on an album full of them. Live, the song picks up about ten beats per minute, but I think the pacing of the album version is a smarter choice, allowing the guitar bend a little more time. "Dog Eyes" recalls the Knot's "For Prayer," with quiet verses giving way to massive blasts of guitar and drums in place of a traditional chorus (Stack even pulls out a drum stick for his left hand on this one).

The title track is unequivocally my song of the year. While none of these songs are particularly cheery, there is a darkness in this track that seeps from every note, and the way that the guitar builds through the song until the maxed out solo at the end is perfect. This track in particular shows off the excellent mixing and mastering job done on this record. I don't know from where in Wasner this song came from, but I hope she continues to mine it. Following the peak of "Civilian," things begin to descend. "Fish" is plods along smartly, and "Plains" manages to get a few more solid punches in. Everything wraps up with "Doubt," a drum-less closer that shows more versatility from Wasner, who will hopefully become one of the indie realm's go-to girls following this record's success (though it might have already began with her appearance on Titus Andronicus' "To Old Friends and New" last year).

So that's it. Listen to the fucking record. Actually, go see them live. It's too hard to explain to you what they sound like, anyway. I've seen people call this shit slow-core and down-tempo, but that isn't really right. It's certainly dark sounding, but it can also be a little face-melty.

by amnesiac

18. M83 - Hurry Up, We're Dreaming

You know a show is good when you’re staring at the stage with a shit-eating grin like you’re high as fuck. Except you’re not high as fuck, or even a little bit high (or maybe you are). Unfortunately for me, or so I thought, I was barely even buzzed from the few beers I was able to consume before the early 7pm start time of M83’s first set in DC. The driving bass drum, the synth and visual arpeggio created by horizontal flashing lights. “Intro” welcomed the feeling of being “high” without drugs or excessive booze, one that has become far too rare in recent years.

And, really, what’s the difference between being high and dreaming? No real consequences til the buzz ends. Or the dream ends. Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming is a call to dreams, or to being high, or to the 80’s. And it’s not that I don’t recall the 80’s fondly, I just don’t recall them at all, due to the short amount of time I spent alive in that decade., so I can’t speak to that.

What I can speak to, however, is: just like dreams, being high and life in general, this album has its ups and downs. Sometimes downs are enjoyable as they are in “Wait” and “Soon, My Friend”. Sometimes they are not, as we hear in the excessive interludes including the too-close-to-“My Girls”-sounding “Train to Pluton”.

But the reason I chose Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming as my favorite album of 2011 are the uppers. “Midnight City”, perhaps the best song of the year, is the incomparable dream. The one where, within the dream, you actually realize you’re dreaming and know there are no consequences to your actions. You can fly. You can have sex with any chick (or dude) you want. You can rock out to saxophone solos.

You sort through the interludes and the double album length because the highs are worth it. It’s easy to snort, swallow, sleep or drink in the moment with songs like “Midnight City”, “Reunion”, “Claudia Lewis”, “Ok Pal”, “Steve Mcqueen”, etc. They may even force you to dance, or fight back a few shit-eating grins.

by slympbizkit626

17. St. Vincent - Strange Mercy

Let’s just be honest with each other from the outset: part of St. Vincent’s appeal is that Annie Clark is really fucking hot. Just like one is more willing to listen to a beautiful person say, well, just about anything, one is more inclined to appreciate music made by a beautiful person. The converse, I think, is also true. Don’t try telling me that your enjoyment of w h o k i l l didn’t wane just a bit when you saw exactly who was, um, behind lyrics like “My man likes me from behind.”

Annie Clark’s beauty isn’t just a superficial concern, though, and before you write this off as the ramblings of some Hipster Runoff Bro, consider what a pivotal role it plays in the success of St. Vincent, particularly on her latest—and best—record, Strange Mercy. Juxtaposed against Clark's frail features and delicate voice are angry, sometimes rabid guitar lines (see, e.g., “Surgeon;” “Northern Lights”). Underneath the elegant surface is anger, and darkness, and maybe even pain (see, e.g., “Strange Mercy;” “Cruel”). This shadier element might not always be as explicitly conveyed, at least lyrically, as it was on, say, the Marry Me standout “Your Lips Are Red” (“your skin’s so fair it’s not fair!”), but there’s still a vulnerability there. A contradiction between Clark’s apparent serenity and whatever is lurking below—that something that just isn’t “right”—which is, ultimately, what makes her more human and less, I don’t know, fairy-like.

This duality is essential to St. Vincent because, at least intellectually, it gives Clark’s songs an emotional element; it adds texture and grit to what could otherwise justifiably be called sterile. This gets to the main criticism of St. Vincent’s music, which is that it’s cold and calculated, and that’s not necessarily untrue. Clark’s songs sound meticulously constructed and her voice often a bit too perfect. But, to me at least, that coldness is secondary to how damn good the songs are on Strange Mercy. There might not be a bluesy soul in any of them, but it’s hard to imagine not getting lost in “Dilettante,” or “Strange Mercy,” or “Surgeon,” or “Cruel,” to name just a few.

And oh yea, have you seen her shred live? Fucking hot.

by Hani Hani

16. Fucked Up - David Comes To Life

I don't include hip hop albums on my lists. It's not that I have anything against the genre. In fact, most years I can easily identify a rap disc that is, objectively speaking, one of my absolute favorite releases from January to January. But I leave them off, because it's a genre I feel that I can't discuss with any authority, as if the slight restructuring of expectations is enough to render my understanding of the music completely flawed.

And the thing that you notice about Fucked Up are the vocals. This is rock music, yeah and until the dude starts making noises with his mouth it fits right in the pocket of all that safe stuff we listen to on ufck. Then the screaming starts, the growling and the other tricks angsty dudes who aren't confident in their voice employ to avoid singing. And then you decide Fucked Up isn't for you, and listen to something else. Probably a reasonable reaction, really.

But David Comes to Life is a hell of a record. Rock opera trappings and interconnected lyrics and just guitars guitars and guitars. And yeah, the dude is screaming, so maybe this isn't something that I should include on my list because i'm not sure what to think when a guy is rapping, and this is kind of the same thing, another vocal mechanic that I don't know how to parse. But since it's rock music: oh what the hell, I'm always safe to list rock music.

My wife and I bought a house two days before these blurbs were due. Something we've been meaning to do for ages. We've got careers and all that. Life's pretty alright. Maybe this youthful angst stuff shouldn't resonate. But it does. Vocal stylings be damned.

by Mark Uses Parentheses