Top Ten Albums of 2008

{Yes, yes - I realize it's March, 2009 and I'm just now posting best albums of the year that ended three months ago. Cut me some slack already...}



Number Ten
Artist: Vampire Weekend
Album: Vampire Weekend
Label: Xl Recordings
Release Date: January 29, 2008

Once the hype died down and the buzzing dimmed, what remained was a truly enjoyable pop album with real staying power (despite the unfortunate genre title of "Yacht Rock" that accompanied its success). Few albums, let alone debut albums, are as consistently solid from song to song as this. Brief though it may be, clocking in at just around 35 minutes, Vampire Weekend is timeless and immediate, accessible to the masses for now and of high enough quality that the rock snobs will come back around later.


Number Nine
Artist: Portishead
Album: Third
Label: Mercury
Release Date: April 29, 2008

With a full decade's gap between releases, Portishead had all sorts of expectations to live up to. Third did not disappoint. Ultimately gratifying because the band simultaneously sounds like the Portishead we remember and what we hoped the progression of their sound would result in, Third presents a mature collection building on the acid jazz, cabaret vocals, and spy movie synesthesia that defined their sound. Beth Gibbons and company have weathered the same past eight years (and era-defining administration) as us, despite being across the pond, and the tracks here reflect the subsequent scars of that maturity the way Dummy perfectly contained all the angst of youth.


Number Eight
Artist: Cut Copy
Album: In Ghost Colours
Label: Modular Interscope
Release Date: April 8, 2008

Without question the best indie dance music album of 2008, In Ghost Colours just wouldn't go away all year. The upbeat jams ("Lights and Music", "Hearts on Fire") that made so much sense in Spring and Summer gave way to the bittersweet pop ("So Haunted", "Unforgettable Season") that perfectly scored a blustery Autumn and Winter. In Ghost Colours lifts Cut Copy to the next level where that capital-A Artist label is justified.


Number Seven
Artist: M83
Album: Saturdays = Youth
Label: Mute U.S.
Release Date: April 1, 2008

Somewhere between Air, My Bloody Valentine (or at least Kevin Shields, circa Lost in Translation) and a John Hughes soundtrack falls M83. Deftly framing pop rock sentimentality within sprawling, sonic layers of electronic compositions, Saturdays = Youth is well-crafted and remarkable. "Kim & Jessie" and "Graveyard Girl" quite literally made us check to make sure M83 wasn't around during the Sixteen Candles and License to Drive days. And yet many of the digital beats and rhythms could just as easily have been laid down on Kanye's 808's and Heartbreaks (see: "Couleurs", "Up!"). As impressive an album as we heard all year.


Number Six
Artist: Dr. Dog
Album: Fate
Label: Park the Van
Release Date: July 22, 2008

No one's going to accuse Dr. Dog of being the most original band on the planet. On almost every song the influence of Paul McCartney or John Lennon or Jerry Garcia or Levon Helm is quite blatantly obvious. Like finding a bunch of lost b-sides: "From" could easily have been a Lennon throw-away; "100 Years" wouldn't sound out of place on a Dead album; "The Ark" may actually be a McCartney cover. To be honest, it borders on imitation. To be brutally honest, I don't give a shit if it is imitation - these songs are great and this album is wholly enjoyable.


Number Five
Artist: Santogold (aka, Santigold)
Album: Santogold
Label: Downtown
Release Date: April 29, 2008

Santogold released a bunch of tracks on her full-length debut that were almost too good. Snatched up by advertisers, it would have been easy to make the mistake of overlooking these tracks as just catchy jingles or dance club singles. But with the aid of Diplo, Mark Ronson, and Spank Rock, Santogold is complex and shrewd, some culmination of what those producers had been working towards. Like a less jarring MIA, Santogold satisfies the teeny-bopper, the stoner, and the yuppie all at the same time. No easy feat.


Number Four
Artist: The Dutchess & The Duke
Album: She's the Dutchess, He's the Duke
Label: Hardly Art
Release Date: July 8, 2008

Sparse and simple, tragic and intimate, She's the Dutchess, He's the Duke could easily be Number One on this list. The brief but potent 31 minutes of vintage bluesy folk/gypsy rock recalls Leonard Cohen, The Animals, or early Rolling Stones, tunes with despair-riddled lyrics over a production full of crackles and pops that transport the listener to a wholly different time and place. The stomp and swagger of "Reservoir Park" remains one of the best tracks of the year, while the intimate pleas and apologies of sincere experience are almost too much to bear on "I Am Just a Ghost". With one of the best live performances of the year as well, The Dutchess & The Duke are a most promising duo.


Number Three
Artist: TV on the Radio
Album: Dear Science
Label: Interscope
Release Date: September 23, 2008

It's getting to the point where it's almost not even fair. TVOTR has become one of the most consistent bands on the planet, and they're just getting started. Hard to believe, as the Brooklynites seem like such industry vets now, but Dear Science is just their third official full-length. They have most definitely honed their craft, having built upon the ambitious experiments of Cookie Mountain, and Science is their most cohesive and focused album to date. Losing none of their lavish orchestrations or complex harmonies, though, TVOTR has more specifically learned how to work their sonic arrangements into structured and polished pop songs.


Number Two
Artist: The Walkmen
Album: You & Me
Label: Gigantic
Release Date: August 19, 2008

With You & Me, The Walkmen established themselves as a premiere Indie Rock outfit with the same sort of woozy, whiskey-soaked jangle and thump that The National perfected with last year's Boxer. You & Me meanders through sandy beaches and foreign towns like postcards from Hemingway, stumbling out of jazz clubs at 3am with the locals, keeping upright solely by leaning on the shoulders of new friends who happen to be singing at the tops of their lungs. With a most distinct voice, Hamilton Leithauser has hit his stride with this organic, wandering sound, punctuated by drummer Matt Barrick's masterful percussion. Wistful and rousing, You & Me is quite simply beautiful.


Number One
Artist: Fleet Foxes
Album: Fleet Foxes/Sun Giant (EP)
Label: Sub Pop
Release Date: June 3, 2008

Fleet Foxes truly set themselves apart in 2008, and their eponymous full-length debut followed by the simply-too-good-for-just-an-EP, Sun Giant, combine for the most lush and gorgeous music of the year. By no means the only indie rockers exploring the folk side of rock, the Seattle quintet distinguished themselves quickly with their pitch-perfect harmonizing, led by Robin Pecknold. The warmth and richness in the vocals stands in stark contrast to a vast majority of indie bands that get by on earnesty and sincerity alone. The voice - and more specifically here, the remarkably pleasing combination of voices - emerges as the most gratifying instrument to the human ear. As the opening and title track to Sun Giant begins, what we hear is a capella, but it isn't affectation, it's an expression of freedom as they do what comes so naturally. Both albums present a sophistication well beyond their years that commands attention. Hello world, we're the Fleet Foxes.


-j2

Wilco & Fleet Foxes - "I Shall Be Released"

Bob Dylan wrote it. The Band, Joan Baez, and Nina Simone all performed it, made it what it is. And now Wilco bring Fleet Foxes up onto stage to revive it. They do just that.



-J2

Under the Radar: The Acorn

While we at The middleCoast pride ourselves on staying current with the best new music, we frequently miss remarkably talented acts, failing to bring you, the reader, necessary knowledge. Of course, if you really wanted to stay completely current with the best new music, you'd be reading Pitchfork right now instead of The middleCoast. Nevertheless, we present a new feature for the times artists slip through the cracks: Under the Radar.

The Acorn make music best described as: Of the Earth. Or, Earthy. Organic, if you will (but not in the annoying marketing-ploy version of the term). Their brand of Americana is admittedly eschew, as they hail from Ottawa, but like their Canuck compatriots - Broken Social Scene, Arcade Fire, Wolf Parade - their sound is small-scale epic, focusing on the specific to signify the universal. Simple melodies over chants, stomps, and dense (but balanced) arrangements featuring instruments from various regions, as well as field recordings, give them an all-natural vibe. The Acorn likely fit into whatever box you'd also categorize Fleet Foxes or Firewater or Beirut, but in the end they just happen to be really great indie rock.

Glory Hope Mountain is the latest release, out through Paper Bag Records. At heart it is a concept album from singer/songwriter Rolf Klausener about his mother, Gloria Esperanza Montoya (hence the album title). In a stunningly intimate portrait, Klausener tells of how Gloria was orphaned in her native Honduras - her mother's death in childbirth and her father's abuse - and her subsequent journey to Montreal in the '70s. Klausener's rendering of her life, however, is a subtle weave, and there is no heavy-handedness in the dealing of the material.

Check out the beautifully crafted video by director Christopher Mills for "Flood Pt. 1":


Unfortunately, The Acorn made their way through Chicago earlier this year, so it may be a spell before we get another chance to see them live. And if these tracks on HearYa.com are any indication, they give a masterful performance.

Make friends @ http://www.myspace.com/theacorn.

-J2

Can't Get Enough of the Fleet Foxes

Way back in March, we told you all about how Fleet Foxes were poised to become the next great indie darlings. Their EP, Sun Giant, was absolutely beautiful, and their eponymous debut LP is rightly regarded as one of the best releases of the year. In the UK, this Seattle quintet has blown up beyond your blogospherical atmosphere and into the real world, competing with Coldplay for tops o' the charts. Just the other day Chicago's WXRT fit the Foxes into a rush hour lineup (somehow, breaking into F.M. radio seems like a measure of success, assuming you're an indie band and not a Disney-backed starlet).

Here they are with a startling claymation video for "White Winter Hymnal":


And a Black Cab Session performance from Robin Pecknold of a deep track - Judee Sill's "Crayon Angels":











Go get the album.


Make friends @ www.myspace.com/fleetfoxes.

-J2

The Inexorable Influences of Fleetwood Mac & Steely Dan

This morning alone I have encountered enough music by myriad artists to fully comprehend the undeniable and inexorable influences of Fleetwood Mac and Steely Dan upon modern-day musicians. Though it may have begun with a sense of irony, there exists now an entire sub-genre of indie rock that can trace its roots directly to these two pioneering acts. The resurgence of late in this style of jazzy rock saturated with multiple vocals harmonizing effortlessly is a bit puzzling. My question is whether this is simply a passing trend (shall we call it The Fleetwood Dan Influence? The Steely Mac Influence? No, I've got it...), or if The Steelwood Man Influence is here to stay.

I'm not sure who to hold responsible for originally utilizing the sounds of Fleetwood Mac or Steely Dan. Given their own profound influence in the past decade, however, I'm going with Pharrell Williams and his cohorts in The Neptunes and N.E.R.D. - specifically Chad Hugo. With the latest N.E.R.D. album, Seeing Sounds, dropping yesterday, this seems as good a place as any to start. Even though the vast majority of Neptunes' work in the mainstream is known for its minimalist beats (think Clipse, pre-Timbaland JT), the side project of N.E.R.D. has always incorporated a strong Steelwood Man Influence in addition to soulful Motown sounds. More Steely Dan than Fleetwood Mac, check out 2002's "Run to the Sun":

It's practically a remake of "Ricky Don't Lose My Number". Maybe not exactly, but you get the idea. Seeing Sounds gives us plenty of beat-filled dance-jams, but it also gives us the vibraphonic, "You Know What", another undeniable Steely Dan throwback:

Following along the same lineage are Next Big Thing, Chin Chin. The band's own Myspace page describes their sounds as "Brass Construction doing New Edition covers arranged by Steely Dan for Dick James Enterprises". In case the Dan influence wasn't obvious on "You Can't Hold Her":

Clearly Steely Dan have left their mark. Before moving on to Fleetwood Mac, let's first enjoy this classic from The Royal Scam:

Now, the Fleetwood Mac influence upon modern artists is confounding, as their soft rock sound is so iconic to a very specific time period. Female vocalists have been attempting to mimic Stevie Nicks for years (a couple of them recently - Neko Case & Rose - getting very close). But the artists I've heard this morning alone, as I mentioned at the start, are all young up-and-coming indie acts spanning the country, yet all integrating complex harmonizing into their songs.

From Texas, Midlake:

From Washington state, Next Big Thing Fleet Foxes:

From Brooklyn, mC fave Yeasayer:

What's most interesting is that these are modern bands making new music that sounds new, but The Steelwood Man Influence is unequivocal. As these artists continue to make music, and as they continue to garner press and media attention, their own influence will propagate. As a result, the jazz-infused neo-psychedelic blues-rock of the late 70s is poised to stick around. Let's just hope the accompanying fashion statements of the epoch aren't resurrected as well.

-J2

Next Big Thing Alert: Fleet Foxes

Another Seattle band poised to take the indie scene by storm is Fleet Foxes, recently signed to Sub Pop Records. The quintet's five-song EP, Sun Giant (available here), is remarkably promising and cohesive in and of itself. Self-described as baroque pop, there are obvious comparisons to My Morning Jacket (in a good way - a very good way), both musically and in Robin Pecknold's vocals that are reminiscent of Jim James, to be sure. But Fleet Foxes are most assuredly their own band with their own sound, despite any inevitable comparisons to MMJ, label-mates Band of Horses, or the tinges of Fleetwood Mac that make themselves more apparent in the harmonizing of "Mykonos".

Still digging for more info about these fellas, but this quote from Pecknold is lovely:

"I don’t really know what I’m trying to say with this. It’s not good to romanticize a time of great hardship, hardship I’ve never known and am not conditioned to understand. I’m also not interested in a ‘back to nature’ thing, as nature as it was is gone for the time being and it would take a very big leap of faith and common sense to ignore that. But, music to me is just as awe-bringing as the world maybe once was, and I just love it a lot.”

Couldn't agree more.

On tour now, they'll make their way through Chicago April 6th at Schubas. A full-length LP is due out on Sub Pop this summer. In the meantime, we'll be listening to the 19 minutes of Sun Giant over and over and over...

Here are a couple tracks to entice:

"Drops in the River"



"Mykonos"



Make friends @ http://www.myspace.com/fleetfoxes.

-J2