GROUP I
Notes: The biggest surprise here is probably that Phosphorescent record. It's all Willie Nelson covers, and covers records usually warrant an immediate dismissal for me. However, I like it just too much. I mean, it's miles better than Carla Bozulich trying to cover "Red Headed Stranger". But yeah, Tommy Keene... I'm a closet power pop dork at heart, and this is probably his best in several years.
| Tommy Keene - In the Late Bright |
| Misty Lyn And The Big Beautiful - For The Dead |
| Wussy - Wussy |
| Eleni Mandell - Artificial Fire |
| Matt Jones - The Black Path |
| Dead Man's Bones - Dead Man's Bones |
| Weinland - Breaks in the Sun |
| Phosphorescent - To Willie |
| The Thermals - Now We Can See |
| The Broken Family Band - Please and Thank You |
GROUP II
Notes: Sometimes how much I like a record might be heightened by great live shows that I see. Son Volt, Chuck Prophet, and Norfolk & Western definitely fit that bill. And sometimes I see a terrible show and don't want to listen to a band ever again (See Dolorean, Magnolia Electric Co., Centro-matic, etc.)
| Son Volt - American Central Dust |
| Chuck Prophet - ¡Let Freedom Ring! |
| Sonic Youth - The Eternal |
| Rachel Grimes - Book of Leaves |
| Mulatu Astatke & The Heliocentrics - Inspiration Information |
| The Pains of Being Pure at Heart - The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart |
| Matthew Ryan - Dear Lover |
| Various Artists - Dark Was The Night |
| Norfolk & Western - Dinero Severo |
| Neko Case - Middle Cyclone |
GROUP III
Notes: It's funny that Patterson Hood would release a solo album that is, IMO, better than anything since "A Blessing & A Curse" (which despite the unpoplar choice, is probably my favorite DBT record). At any rate, I'm not truthfully sure how meaningful it is to include anything beyond this point... but I will, just so you can see where your favorites fall for me.
| Bill Callahan - Sometimes I Wish We Were An Eagle |
| Burnt Sugar The Arkestra Chamber - Making Love to the Dark Ages |
| Casiotone For The Painfully Alone - Vs. Children |
| Finale - A Pipe Dream and A Promise |
| Lowlights - Further / Free |
| Nadia Sirota - First Things First |
| Patterson Hood - Murdering Oscar (and Other Love Songs) |
| So Cow - So Cow |
| Sunset Rubdown - Dragonslayer |
| Tom Brosseau - Posthumous Success |
GROUP IV
Notes: Nice job Wilco... but I'll never see you play a show ever again, because I've seen you do the same show one too many times. I also should never say never. Same probably goes for D Jr. only because they were a major letdown live, which is pretty unusual. They first few reunion shows they did in A2 were all pretty great.
| Cotton Jones - Paranoid Cocoon |
| Dinosaur Jr. - Farm |
| Guy Clark - Somedays The Song Writes You |
| Jenny Owen Youngs - Transmitter Failure |
| Lily Allen - It's Not Me, It's You |
| Starlight Mints - Change Remains |
| The Flaming Lips - Embryonic |
| The Love Language - The Love Language |
| Various Artists - Legends of Benin |
| Wilco - Wilco (The Album) |
GROUP V
Notes: I expect a little better from a lot of these folks, but still some good stuff.
| Akron/Family - Set 'Em Wild, Set 'Em Free |
| Bonnie "Prince" Billy - Beware |
| Built To Spill - There Is No Enemy |
| Hurray for the Riff Raff - It Don't Mean I Don't Love You |
| Joe Henry - Blood from Stars |
| Paul Burch - Still Your Man |
| Richard Swift - Atlantic Ocean |
| Richmond Fontaine - We Used to Think the Freeway Sounded Like a River |
| Tiye Phoenix - Half Woman | Half Amazin' |
| Viva Voce - Rose City |
GROUP VI
| A.C. Newman - Get Guilty |
| Björk - Voltaic |
| Camera Obscura - My Maudlin Career |
| Coconut Records - Davy |
| Joe Pernice - It Feels So Good When I Stop |
| Julie Doiron - I Can Wonder What You Did With Your Day |
| Octoberman - Fortresses |
| Rhett Miller - Rhett Miller |
| Robyn Hitchcock - Goodnight Oslo |
| The Hidden Cameras - Origin: Orphan |
GROUP VII
| Gossip - Music For Men |
| Grant-Lee Phillips - Little Moon |
| Ha Ha Tonka - Novel Sounds of the Nouveau South |
| Harlem - Free Drugs LP |
| Moderat - Moderat |
| Molina and Johnson - Molina and Johnson |
| Pearl Jam - Backspacer |
| The Features - Some Kind of Salvation |
| The Mary Onettes - Islands |
| Wye Oak - The Knot |
GROUP VIII
Notes: This is really just absurd at this point. Anything from this point on is more or less meaningless, and will likely not make it on to any mixed CD's from me in the future.
| Atlas Sound - Logos |
| Blank Dogs - Under And Under |
| David S. Ware - SHAKTI |
| Foreign Born - Person To Person |
| God Help The Girl - God Help The Girl |
| Hope Sandoval and The Warm Inventions - Through The Devil Softly |
| Julianna Barwick - Florine |
| Mount Eerie - Wind's Poem |
| The Gourds - Haymaker! |
GROUP IX
| Wayne Hancock - Viper of Melody |
| Heartless Bastards - The Mountain |
| Karl Blau - Zebra |
| Loney Dear - Citadel Band |
| Mayer Hawthorne - A Strange Arrangement |
| Pomegranates - Everybody, Come Outside! |
| Rosanne Cash - The List |
| The Cave Singers - Welcome Joy |
| The Mountain Goats - The Life of the World to Come |
| The Pink Mountaintops - Outside Love |
| The Raveonettes - In And Out Of Control |
GROUP X
Notes: The Maldives are an interesting choice. I want to hate them... the lyrics and the songwriting just isn't very good... but they have the sound that I crave. I call that sound CRAVY HORSE. Get it? Haha.
| Andrew Bird - Noble Beast |
| Brendan Benson - My Old, Familiar Friend |
| Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros - Up From Below |
| Elvis Perkins In Dearland - Elvis Perkins In Dearland |
| Imaad Wasif - The Voidist |
| Malcolm Middleton - Waxing Gibbous |
| The Big Pink - A Brief History of Love |
| The High Strung - Ode to the Inverse of the Dude |
| The Maldives - Listen to the Thunder |
| The Minus 5 - Killingsworth |
GROUP XI
| Arctic Monkeys - Humbug |
| Barzin - Notes To An Absent Lover |
| Bat for Lashes - Two Suns |
| Echo & The Bunnymen - The Fountain |
| Elvis Costello - Secret, Profane And Sugarcane |
| Iron & Wine - Around The Well |
| John Doe and The Sadies - Country Club |
| King Khan & BBQ Show - Invisible Girl |
| Nosaj Thing - Drift |
| The Hard Lessons - Arms Forest |
GROUP XII
| Bowerbirds - Upper Air |
| Califone - All My Friends Are Funeral Singers |
| Dave Douglas - Spirit Moves |
| DJ Quik And Kurupt - Blaqkout |
| Hot Club Of Cowtown - Wishful Thinking |
| Jay Farrar & Benjamin Gibbard - One Fast Move Or I'm Gone |
| Lightning Dust - Infinite Light |
| Pocahaunted - Island Diamonds |
| Vic Chesnutt - At The Cut |
| Yo La Tengo - Popular Songs |
GROUP XIII
| Here We Go Magic - Here We Go Magic |
| Jason Isbell And The 400 Unit - Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit |
| Magnolia Electric Co. - Josephine |
| Matthew Shipp Trio - Harmonic Disorder |
| Paleface - The Show Is On The Road |
| Peter Bjorn & John - Living Things |
| Skygreen Leopards - Gorgeous Johnny |
| Tanya Morgan - Brooklynati |
| The Black Heart Procession - six |
| The Decemberists - The Hazards Of Love |
GROUP XIV
Notes: It's true. I like a Decemberists record more than I liked a Cheap Trick record. The end of the world must be near. I blame it all on the TRANSFORMERS.
| Cheap Trick - The Latest |
| Doves - Kingdom Of Rust |
| Girls - Album |
| Jenny Wilson - Hardships! |
| Lady Sovereign - Jigsaw |
| Madeleine Peyroux - Bare Bones |
| Meat Puppets - Sewn Together |
| My Brightest Diamond - A Thousand Shark's Teeth |
| Royal City - Royal City |
| Sin Fang Bous - Clangour |
GROUP XV
Notes: If you've read this far, then you, my friend, are a super music nerd... not as big as a music nerd as me, but pretty damn nerdy, nonetheless.
| Broken Records - Until The Earth Begins To Part |
| Danny Barnes - Pizza Box |
| Deer Tick - Born On Flag Day |
| Lindstrom and Prins Thomas - II |
| Lyle Lovett - Natural Forces |
| The Antlers - Hospice |
| The Clientele - Bonfires on the Heath |
| The Strange Boys - And Girls Club |
| Woods - Songs of Shame |
| Zero 7 - Yeah Ghost |
Chad -- I'm interested in which Magnolia show you saw that made you never want to see us again. I'm in the band and I *know* we've played shows like that, a bunch. But I wonder if ours match?
ReplyDeleteAnn Arbor, MI @ The Blind Pig, either with Destroyer or Of Montreal... one of those bands. MEC sounded like your standard bar band to me, and just revving things up where it took away from the impact of the song. For instance, "Hammer Down" was played just way too fast and loud. I felt the song deserved better treatment. Considering the personal connection I felt to the tune, it was a bit of a letdown.
ReplyDeleteUntil that point, I was fairly avid MEC fan, but that show changed the way I hear the songs. These things just happen, and fairly often for me.