The band might be tight and stripped down to the essentials--a guitar, drum set, and analog recording equipment--but The Black Keys have a sound that is rich & compelling & full of compassion, especially in the relaxed setting of this EP. The soft opening drew me in with wavering slide guitar and the hum of an overdriven amplifier, and the whiskey-and-smoke grooves made me stay.
Laidback pop genius. A sinuous rhythm section--bass, sax, and drums--back a red-wine voice singing songs about a city where everything happens at night except sleep.
Apocalyptic math rock or machine-made punk rock? Steve Albini's evil program to destroy pop music or Rob Weston's night out on the town? This is power-trio metal without any theatrics, slowed down to a sterile and horrifying groove--and I mean that as a recommendation. Shellac is three prominent and talented record engineers, so the sound is gorgeous--clean and weighty and organic--even when the band is screeching its way to the end of a song like "My Black Ass."
Miles Davis -- A Tribute To Jack Johnson
A while back, I said on the air that Captain Beefheart's Trout Mask Replica might be the best album, ever. Somebody called up and said that Miles Davis's "Jack Johnson!" was the best, ever. So I grabbed it and listened to it, over and over again. I still haven't found anything wrong with it. So groovy and wonderful and sideways, I could listen to it for days.
Neutral Milk Hotel -- In the Aeroplane Over the Sea
Fuzz folk! Imagine
an emphatic, high-voiced singer/songwriter leading a marching band of freaks down a Savannah boardwalk (I don't know if they have
boardwalks there, but it's a metaphor, fucking go with it). Brass sections, musical saws, and beautifully phased & distorted guitar
highlight ridiculously singable songs. A genuinely lovely album with a streak of existential dread (required, I believe, for good
art).
Shipping News -- Save Everything
Not only do these three (their newest member didn't show up until a couple years ago) guys drag their guitar rock through the wet Kentucky night in search of a port, they've got crisp and deliberate percussion, tight playing, mellow instrumental sections, sparse arrangements, the occasional lunatic math-rock run, and in the song "Steerage" they use field recordings of the Kentucky Derby Pegasus Parade. Oh, man, I'm in love.
Jazz, rock, and symphonic music have a fist-fight over six tracks and this is what you get: three great jams and three elegant pieces. A wonderful train-wreck of styles and sounds; saxophone and electric guitar swapping solos, backed by violins and clarinet. Big band freak-out! Fuzz rock shennanigans! Hammond organ epics and piano abuse! Cap'n Beefheart even growls out a number, talking about how he's a little pimp with his hair gassed back. This is the good stuff.
Ah, Queen, you're my favorite guilty pleasure. This is their third album and the one that put them on the map. Long before Bohemian Rhapsody or We Will Rock You, they charted a path between hard rock and skiffle, doo-wop and prog rock, and created a record that works as a minor symphony of pristine harmonies, sharp electric guitar, and arena-rock flamboyance that is too earnest and well-done to dislike. If I'm alone when I listen, yeah, I sing along and air-guitar like a fool.
31 Knots : prog rock :: Fugazi : punk and it makes me so happy. Listening to this album is like remembering a foreign language you learned a long time ago.
The Constantines -- Tournament
of Hearts
Very loud, very powerful, very Canadian. If you liked Peter Gabriel's middle solo stuff (III, Security, and So) and you dig big fat guitar rock (you know, multitracked guitars, power chords, wall of sound, Pete Townsend windmill), you should check these guys out. Makes me want to stand on my roof with my arms wide and my eyes closed with the volume up to 11.
Red Red Meat -- Jimmywine Majestic
An unpolished gem from Chicago: fuzzy, shambling, improvisational rock with a little Appalachia mixed in. Haunting and beautiful like being lost in the woods at dusk.
The White Stripes -- Get
Behind Me Satan
I think this might be the best White Stripes record yet. For all the banging, crashing, yelling, and piano-stomping, the songs are beautiful. Do not be fooled by bad reviews written by folks who wish there was more guitar on the album.
The Desert Sessions -- Volumes
9 & 10
A wonderful mess of styles and songwriters, all crammed in a house studio in the desert, organized by one of my favorite musicians, Josh Homme. I love the nasty, thrashy goodness of "Covered in Punks Blood," the groovy, sexy "I Want to Make It Wit Chu" (my new favorite make-out song), and everything in between. Take special note: three songs have PJ Harvey singing her heart out.
Queens of the Stone Age -- Rated R
Loud, fast, fuzzy, layered, textured guitar rock made for people who like Judas Priest as much as they like the Ramones. Especially if they're stoned.
Pop music, like pornography, can sometimes transcend the base nature of its purpose and become trashy genius. The Cars did it in 1978 by mashing together country, The Beatles, art-rock punk, and David Bowie, pre-emptively kicking the shit out of every eighties keyboard pop band. This album has nine tunes, and they're all so fucking catchy that I want to stick my head in the oven to make it stop, make it stop, dontcha stop dontcha stop!
In a smarter, darker, alternate dimension, arena rock doesn't sound like U2 or Metallica or Oasis. It sounds just like this album: ginormous swaggering cock rock with texture, wit, and care. The second half of this album is as epic as a Beethoven symphony, and has tons more guitars.
The Lounge Lizards
-- The
Lounge Lizards
Punk jazz that still sounds relevant twenty-something years after it was recorded. Charles Mingus, Miles Davis Quintet, Ornette Coleman, and CBGBs in equal parts. Sometimes I get so jealous of people who spent their early twenties in New York during the late seventies.
Is it Cake's younger, punk-ass brother? A whitebread Fishbone? Disco-punk-funk? It doesn't matter. This album is a carnival of fast, catchy, bizarre songs that make even my lazy white ass get up and dance. Emo sucks and you should be listening to Pain!
The Jon Spencer Blues
Explosion
-- Xtra-Acme
Wow. Wow, wow, wow. Do you like rock and roll? Do you like big-talking, chunk-grooving, big-back-beat howling rock'n'rollers? Yeah, me too. Jon Spencer's got a little Elvis Presley, a little James Brown, a little Screamin' Jay Hawkins, and he will kick your ass. The only problem with this record is the disjointed nature of a collection of b-sides, singles, and remixes. But after you hear "Heavy" you won't care.
She sings like a champ and plays the shit out of her guitar. Her songs go from delicate gothic chamber music to full-blown, arm-swinging guitar rock. She loves Howlin' Wolf and I think she has sex with girls. Do you need anything else? What else could you possibly need?
William
Carlos Williams -- White
Women
Sounds like a cage match between King Crimson and The Lounge Lizards, and that's a good thing. Electric guitars and saxophones make me happy. Sadly, Shoestring Records doesn't seem to be fully functioning anymore, so you'll have to track down a copy in the used bins or online merchants. It'll be worth it.
Pop music for grumpy people. Songs about the death, heartbreak, sadness, indignity, dishonor, and apathy, all wrapped up in sprightly sequencer riffs, white-funk bass lines, strange bends of folk-music standards, and the occasional brilliant trumpet solo. If you've only heard Cake on the radio, then you've never heard Cake.
Huge drums, fuzzy guitars, no voice. Don Caballero takes all those little instrumental breaks that metal bands play between the last chorus and the ride-out, and play the living shit out of them. Turn it up!
Eagles of Death Metal -- Peace Love Death Metal
I said shit, goddamn! This is a stompin' gutbucket rock-n-roll album. Sounds like Sticky-Fingers-era Keith Richards and Charlie Watts got together with James-Gang Joe Walsh and did guitar/drums covers of Alice in Chains songs. Or, if that doesn't do it for you, maybe if The White Stripes started listening to a shitload of T-Rex and AC/DC.
Screaming Trees -- Sweet Oblivion
I am a lumberjack-rock fan, and Screaming Trees are the pinnacle of flannel-wearing, knew Kurt Cobain when he was a young'n, low-growl rumbling, songs about rivers and cheating girls, upstate Washington lumberjack rock. The best driving music I own.
Eleven years ago, this album revealed that producer Rusty Weston and the Louisville sound were going to change the world. Well, we thought so at the time. The only LP record by Rodan is a guitar symphony that begins with a lulling, classical-sounding piece and ends with "Tooth Fairy Retribution Manifesto" which manages to sound like heavy metal played by angels in Heaven after a long week at the meat-packing plant.
Forget all the songs you heard on the radio, all that Bullet with Butterfly Wings or Disarm bullshit--Gish is the first full-length by the band and it's perfect. Smashing Pumpkins isn't heavy metal or progressive rock and kicks the shit out of both. Beautiful guitar tone, wicked riffs, the best rock drummer ever (yeah, better than Bonham), and guitar solos you can sing.
The man calls it "cubist funk." The odd arrangements, traditional instruments, and raw-sounding production of his previous four albums are all in place, plus a new technique--most of the songs are backed by vocal rhythm tracks that Waits recorded in real time, on a tape recorder, in his bathroom at night. This album's noisy beauty reminds me of cowboys, pirates, preachers, and trains.
TV on the Radio -- Young Liars
Music from the moment before you fall asleep. A couple of painters from Brooklyn built this EP with layers of acoustic and electronic instruments and harmonies, without a bit of emo-posturing or loser's pride.
Tomahawk : math rock :: Screamin' Jay Hawkins : Motown. The album sounds as if The Jesus Lizard, The Melvins, and Mike Patton were trapped in a sinking ship and amusing themselves the best they can.
