Sky Saxon of the Seeds, who died in 2009

So the 00’s come to an end with a whimper, not a bang. These 25 albums were all great but I’d be lying if I told you that there was another 25 I was anguished about leaving off the list. Even so Dylan, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Raekwon, Monsters of Folk, Talbot Tagora and M. Ward all just missed the cut – to name a few. It was a dismal year for hip-hop but the likes of Wale and Kid Cudi give hope to the future. Merge records celebrated their twentieth anniversary while venerable Touch and Go announced their imminent closing.

Here without further ado, were my favorite 25 albums of the year:

1. Girls – Album
Get over the disappointment that Girls doesn’t even have any girls in the band and you’ll find that the duo of JR White and Christopher Owens have crafted an exquisitely detailed album that slides comfortably into the slot marked “Indie Rock” without becoming a slave to the genre’s tropes. It’s like Pavement’s Slanted and Enchanted run through a gloriously filter of Smiths sensibility.

2. Neko Case – Middle Cyclone
It may seem like Neko Case has been wrapping her considerable lungpower around the same seam of country tinged alt-Americana for several albums now. She’s so consistent and subtle in the ways she moves her craft forward from record-to-record that it can be heard to realize how much she’s progressed until you compare this to her earliest works. Her country twang has been leavened into a sweeping epic atmospheric sensibility underpinned by a sly sense of humor. Little flourishes color each song and her cover of Spark’s “Never Turn Your Back on Mother Earth” shows how unique her sound has become.

3. Thermals - Now We Can See
A concept album about death? Major bummer dude, and pretentious as hell. Yet The Thermals pull it off with the best album of their career, a considerable feat considering the breakthrough that was 2006’s The Body, The Blood, The Machine. This is the kind of melodic, intelligent, heartfelt punk that Green Day wishes they could write.

4. Future of The Left – Travels With Myself and Another
When the perpetually cross Welshmen in McLusky decided to call it a day, few thought that they would return in all but name and bassist but plus two members from the equally defunct Jarcrew. Yet return they have, with a brace of abrasively melodic post punk on this, their second album. All the snarkiness remains, abetted by pogo-worthy choruses and clever wordplay.

5. The Flaming Lips – Embryonic
After spending most of the decade perfecting their neo-psych chops and expanding their audience Flaming Lips take a hard left into Krautrock territory with Can in particular serving as a touchstone for a sprawling bass heavy album. There are moments that recall PiL’s classic Metal Box/Second Edition as well, minus Johnny Rotten.

6. Japandroids – Post-Nothing

Japandroids are the best kind of bubblegum lo-fi – chiming squalling guitars plus killer songs recorded with punch and definition enough to not obscure the fun. Anthems abound from “Wet Hair” to the magnificent “The Boys are Leaving Town.”

7. Grizzly Bear – Veckatimest
Grizzly Bear’s debut was praised (perhaps overly) for it’s Brooklynite take on the pastoral sound sweeping indie circles so it’s a treat to find the follow-up bettering it’s predecessor in every way. The influences du jour are still there – as with Animal Collective a Beach Boys streak tempered by a touch of freak folk and out-and-out experimentation. The arrangements are less dry than before, with a marvelous command of build and release all of which sets off a remarkable set of songs. A triumph.

8. Surf City – Surf City (EP)
As their name implies Surf City has a touch of classic surf rock to them, but it’s by way of The Pixies, spiked with the Cure’s romantic melodicism and a dash of good old fashioned fuzz. The sheer enthusiasm of the songs and the performances is infectious – just try not to bop along.

9. Abe Vigoda – Reviver
Not the aged actor from Barney Miller, these art punks have flown under the radar successfully enough to avoid a lawsuit – so far. That may not last because as cool as last year’s Skeleton full-length was, this EP is better – song after great song. Like No Age this isn’t quite lo-fi enough to count as the mannered sludge passed off by Times New Viking but it has a raw immediate quality with songs that can come off like Grizzly Bear’s hard-rocking little brothers.

10. Sonic Youth – The Eternal
Sonic Youth’s return to indiedom may be a tad less satisfying than their last Geffen album, Rather Ripped, but it’s their rockingest album since 1992’s Dirty. It’s chock full of Johnny Thunders asides and nods to The Stooges as well as the bands trademarked sideways riffs and alternate tunings. Of course it’s the tight, focused songs that elevate this to the top tier of their ever-growing canon, plus the novelty of hearing them attempt something like vocal harmony and interplay on many songs, another new wrinkle for these vets.

11. Dan Deacon – Bromst
As interesting as Dan Deacon has been in the past, he’s always undercut his songs with skronky dissonance and over-syncopation that make listening a challenge for many (me included). On Bromst he lightens the stew just enough to still be distinctive but also highlight his rhythmic inventiveness and control of texture and pacing resulting in his best record yet.

12. Animal Collective – Merriweather Post Pavillion
Animal Collective keeps edging closer and closer to melody while always underpinning what they do with a sense of playfulness and anything-goes studio arrangements. Their off-kilter sensibility gets it’s fullest expression to date here on a record that finds room for paeans to fatherhood and family life amongst the close-knit harmonies, circular rhythmic pulsing, and unexpected side turns. The Beach Boys are a touchstone but only if Brain Wilson had been able to channel his madness completely and musically, had embraced the chaos equally with the melody. A true stunner.

13. AC Newman - Get Guilty
While New Porngraphers have begun to sound a bit overstuffed on recent releases bandleader Carl Newman brings things back down to the basics on Get Guilty, his best work since the Porno’s Twin Cinema. It’s not that he does anything new here, it’s that he does his schtick with expertise. If powerpop full of big meaty choruses and thundering drums is your deal then sign right up.

14. Jarvis Cocker – Further Complications
The louche former Pulp frontman gets in touch with his guitar-heavy side and brings noisemeister Steve Albini to man the control board. The result is lean and mean and full of horny tongue-in-cheek single-entendres like “Caucasian Blues” (in which he laments being hung like a white man) and the utterly brilliant “I Never said I Was Deep.”

15. Atlas Sound - Logos

Nealy shelved after an early version leaked last year, the latest album from Deerhunter’s Bradford Cox has thankfully seen the light of day and it’s as good as anything by his increasingly notable day band. Noah Lennox from Animal Collective guests on the awesome “Walkabout” and there is a certain shared sensibility but Atlas Sound is skewed less towards rhythm circularity and more towards chewy hooks and strumming guitars.

16. St. Vincent – Actor
Like Neko Case and Spoon’s Britt Daniel, Annie Clark (who is St. Vincent for all intents and purposes) is a thinking person’s pin-up, as glorious for their art as for their looks. Her background in Glenn Branca’s guitar orchestra, The Polyphonic Spree, and Sufjan Steven’s band give a pretty good idea of her take on music – a sort of Kate Bush as guitar slinger. On Actor she has the songs to pull it off, sounding like early solo Peter Gabriel if he had roped Thurston Moore into playing guitar for him.

17. Mos Def – The Ecstatic
In a lousy year for hip-hop it was good to welcome Mos Def back with a first-rate album after years of tossed off efforts. Sounding more vital than he has in years over a set of clever engrossing beats and soundscapes it’s a reminder of how great rap can be when it’s not subject to rote rhyming and mega-sales expectations. The cherry on top is a great guest verse by Slick Rick.

18. The Pains of Being Pure At Heart – The Pains of Being Pure At Heart
The Jesus and Mary Chain have much to answer for in the last few years but inspiring a band as fun and freewheeling as this one is nothing to feel bad about. To be fair The Smiths and a fair sampling of other late 80s British indie rock can also be detected here but the attack is as fresh as a naughty schoolkid. It all sounds new to them and they write and play their damn bleeding hearts out, which almost is enough to forgive their unfortunate band moniker.

19. Bill Callahan – Sometimes I Wish We Were an Eagle
Callahan may no longer operate under the name Smog but he still has the same laconic delivery, insinuatingly dry songwriting, and command of melody. This time he’s backed with the richest instrumentation of his career with pianos and french horns and the likes standing ready to aid and abet but never overwhelm. In fact his use of space is more strategic than ever letting every violin or bell register like a thunderclap.

20. Polvo - In Prism
An unexpected comeback, Polvo was saddled during their early 90s heyday with the mathrock label and while their riffing is angular and their song structures can be architectural they have always had a warmth and humor that transcended the genre. They’ve also had Ash Bowie (who went on to play guitar in Helium) as a secret weapon, a guitarist with a knack for wringing melody out of sometimes dissonant patterns. Welcome back.

21. Franz Ferdinand – Tonight: Franz Ferdinand
For all the initial talk about this being a departure for the band it came as a bit of a letdown to hear that they actually sounded like… Franz Ferdinand. Repeated listens proved that the band had moved the game forward subtly, primarily by centering every song around the rhythm section. This is no bad thing as Franz bassist Bob Hardy and drummer Paul Thomson are one of the best in rock. On “Lucid Dreams” they do extend past the 8-minute mark (though the earlier, tighter version may be superior) and hints of T. Rex and Bowie still surface through the dancefloor. Undeniably catchy ass-shaking.

22. Kurt Vile – Childish Prodigy
The name is a tip-off that that Vile is a throwback to the theatrical self-mythologizing of 70s punk as it edged into glam. Ballads jostle with fuzzed out Iggy-esque rockers but there is always a twist instrumentally or lyrically to make it sound fresh rather than a guy living in the sounds of the past. Each successive song cements that Vile is a talent to watch.

23. Mika Miko – We Be Xuxa
The world surely needs more femme punk and Mika Miko are as good as it gets. Synthesizing sources as varied as The Raincoats, The Descendents, and Agent Orange makes for an album that pogos as much as it thrashes and that’s a damn good thing. It’s a short sharp shock of an album with room for detours like the mid-period Replacements-like jape “Turkey Sandwich.”

24. The Very Best – Warm Heart of Africa
While the band name The Very Best makes this sound like a compilation of some sort, what’s being sampled here by the production team Radioclit and singer Esau Mwamwaya is the very essence of music from around the world. Appropriately they are joined by a member of Vampire Weekend and M.I.A., a handy guide to the globe spanning beats and melodies found within. An audacious follow-up to last year’s jawdropping mixtape.

25. Wilco – Wilco (The Album)
Wilco studiously avoid making the same album twice, so it’s not surprising that the new one was met with a mixed reception. They also vary their approach from song to song to the extent that “Bull Black Nova”, a droning drama that I love, has been denounced by several friends as the worst track on the album. Whereas the last record served up gloriously tangled guitar lines in the guise of classic LA rock, this one puts the screws to triple AAA radio but still finds time for a straight ahead ballad like “You and I”.

Tucked amongst the advertising folderol and nude Freaky Friday pics of this week’s New York magazine fashion issue was a piece on precious New Yorkers who only wear one color. And in no case was that color black.

Turns out Magnetic Fields maestro Stephin Merritt has a wardrobe entirely made up of variations on brown. He has some fairly compelling reasons for this:
“Brown shows absolutely nothing. You’d have to spill some fuchsia paint. If you wear black, dandruff is horrific and lint is a nightmare—and dog hair, in my case, is a particular problem.”
Or, if you are conservative sacred cow and dead President Ronald Reagan, you wear a brown suit to match the hair goop and to pay tribute to Harold Bell Wright’s Christian themed novel That Printer of Udell…

Awesomely cool all-femme brit band Electrelane has decided to call it quits for now. In a statement on their website they write: “We have decided that the upcoming gigs will be our last for the foreseeable future. After ten years of much fun and hard work, we have realised that we all need a break and time to do other things. This was a tough decision for us to make, but ultimately a positive one.”

One of the most interesting purveyors of Krautrock influenced indie rock, Electrelane married hypnotic rhythms with endearing vocals and imaginative arrangements over the course of four albums, two of which were recorded by legendary engineer Steve Albini. No Shouts No Calls, which was released earlier this year, may be their best and most accessible.

Here they are live kicking the stuffing out of Bruce Springsteen’s classic “I’m on Fire” :

And here’s “To The East” from their latest album:

The article that’s been heating up the musical parts of Blogachusetts this week is Sasha Frere-Jones’ New Yorker piece entitled “A Paler Shade of White”. On the surface the argument appears to be a bold attack on a very early nineties music-crit trope: white people stole rock from black people (see Public Enemy’s “Who Stole the Soul”, Living Colour’s “Elvis is Dead” etc., ) While carefully acknowledging the material and profile disparities between white and black artists Frere-Jones posits that this sort of musical mixing is a Good Thing (though terming it miscegenation is the sort of attention grabbing move that hints at the real purpose of the piece).

Whether or not you think cultural mixing is a Good Thing (I do), the argument that he puts forth goes further by suggesting that “indie rock” has undergone a racial purification that has systematically cleansed “black” music from the musical melting pot. Leave aside the lack of black musicians in indie rock, is this true? And how does one prove it? Brian Wilson, an acknowledged latter-day indie touchstone, is invoked as a touchstone of all things white, but how white can a guy be when his band steals their first hit from Chuck Berry? Arcade Fire is exhibit A in the articles first paragraph but can’t the argument be made that “My Body is a Cage” is a descendant of blues dirges from the 20’s and 30’s.

No, says Frere-Jones, the beat isn’t right. And here we come to the real nub of this piece: He doesn’t like the way indie rockers drum. They don’t swing, the bass players don’t groove, etc. Which may be true (though not in the case of Spoon say, or Afghan Whigs) but so what? Is this a racial thing or just a mode of expression? Even one of Frere-Jones chosen whipping boys (to trade in another charged term) Pavement, fail to hold up under close examination. While pointlessly mocking the lyrics to “Grave Architecture” he fails to note the very swinging section of the song that occurs right before the final rave-up — a section that could be described as jazzy.

Really what the article strives for is to make a splash and that it has done. Frere-Jones does a bit of extra-credit overreaching on his own blog, where he links the article to Lester Bangs incendiary piece on white supremacy and punk , which is a bit like appending an article on Grizzly Man to a piece on Winnie The Pooh.

There are a load of great/funny/stupid comments on this here at I Love Music’s thread.

The White Stripes have cancelled their fall tour. It seems drummer / fake-sibling Meg is suffering from “acute anxiety”. No word yet on whether or how they will deal with this situation moving forward. Ticketholders are being offered full refunds for these shows in support of their excellent album Icky Thump.

Al Queda aren’t the only ones banking on September 11th to get some attention with a new release. This week sees a plethora, headlined by the much hyped Blur Versus Oasis 1995-esque matchup that is 50 Cent Vs. Kanye West (in this scenario 50 is the more popular but inevitably less interesting Oasis and Kanye is the bold, artsy, riding for a fall Blur — see this Wikipedia entry for more info).

Sensitive folks who spell women with a “y” and those who love them will appreciate the double disc Ani DiFranco retrospective Canon.

The inimitable Frank Black reverts back to his Pixies moniker Black Francis for the rocking Bluefinger , a semi-concept album about Dutch artist and musician Herman Brood.

Shout Out Louds and Hot Hot Heat have new albums as well.

Cursive’s Tim Kasher weighs in with his other band, The Good Life and their new album, the suggestively titled Help Wanted Nights.

Black Lips quote the heavenly Shangri-La’s for the title of their new one, Good Bad but Not Evil, which has been getting good pre-release buzz.

Finally the Go! Team follow-up their infectious debut with Proof of Youth.

The Canadian band Stars had a major artistic breakthrough with 2004’s Set Yourself on Fire. For their follow-up, In Our Bedroom after the War they have come down with a major case of Summer sequel-itis. Like something out of the Die Hard franchise they have taken all the things that were hallmarks of Fire, even down to the portentous literary referenced album title being spoken at the outset, and made them bigger, bolder and brighter. There are more strings, slicker production, brighter vocals, bolder arrangements. This isn’t a disaster but it makes for an album that feels more distanced and less inviting than it’s predecessor.
That’s not to say that there is nothing to like here. Sometime Broken Social Scene-ster Amy Millan still has a heart-tugging yearning in her voice, which goes nicely with co-singer Torquil Cambell’s detached iciness. Many of the songs are top-notch — first single “The Night Starts Here” pulses along on an insistent groove, “The Ghost of Genova Heights” comes over as 1985 era Scritti Politti new wave, and “Window Bird” rides an outro of furiously solo-ing David Gilmour-esque guitars. Still, Campbell amps up his Morissey-isms a bit too much at times, and it’s hard to recommend this to newcomers to the band even though by all measures it’s more “accessible” than it’s predecessor. For the already initiated, there are pleasure here that unlock over repeated listenings, but Set Yourself on Fire remains the high-water mark by which all other Stars albums must be judged. Stars gets…er..three out of five stars: