the year in whining (also, music)

Jeff has commanded that year-end lists be produced; let it be so.

Actually, though, I can’t recommend too much. There were a lot of albums that I wanted to like but ultimately found disappointing. Okkervil River never grabbed me after the single; neither did The National. Patrick Wolf wears out his welcome after the first three songs. Le Loup’s album is more of a one-trick pony than was initially apparent. And although I love a number of tracks on Dan Deacon’s album (mostly the ones where he keeps his mouth shut), I found “Wham City” and its ilk to be really grating. Jens Lekman’s too precious, Polyphonic Spree evolved one album too late, Los Campesinos couldn’t seal the deal and Of Montreal proved to be astoundingly irritating. Man, there’s no pleasing me! It seemed like a year of singles, with precious few full-lengths worth listening to end-to-end.

But there were a few albums I couldn’t help playing over and over. This list isn’t going to blow any minds, but I enjoyed writing it out. Y’know, for posterity.

Arcade Fire — Neon Bible

Predictable, I know. Well, so’s the rest of my list. I’m putting this first, though, because it’s the one I feel most lukewarm toward. It’s full of good music, but it’s fundamentally a betrayal. AF’s first album was all about their fear of growing old, growing callous, feeling less. They howled and screamed and swore that they’d figure a way out of it. Then they didn’t. Thanks a fucking lot, guys. That the only track recapturing their original manifesto — “No Cars Go” — was a new version of a song from their debut EP only added insult to injury. Still, they make some awfully pretty sounds.

Feist – The Reminder

It’s really good. C’mon, you’ve seen the ad. Who are you to resist?

The Cribs – Men’s Needs, Women’s Needs, Whatever

It’s just a consistently good rock album. If you ask me, an inability to say more than that makes for a relatively rare sort of endorsement.

Stars – Up In Our Bedroom After The War

Maybe I just didn’t understand Stars when I listened to their last album. Or, more likely, maybe I was just clinging to the pretension that I’m not the sort of guy who listens to musical theater voluntarily. Well, I’m over it. This album isn’t uniformly great, but it has enough standout pop songs that the rest can be considered pleasant-enough glue. After all, you’ve got to have some quiet solo pieces to kill time while the stagehands move the set around.

The Wombats – Girls, Boys and Marsupials

Alright, so this technically came out in 2006. But their stuff is just now trickling out in US releases, so I feel alright about mentioning it. This is what I was hoping to hear as I diligently listened to the Arctic Monkeys and Cold War Kids. Between The Wombats and The Cribs I guess this year found me in the mood for bratty English vocals. The songs are funny and clever and dumb, and awfully good.


And yes, I’m still mourning the Unicorns.

Spoon – Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga

Far and away the best album of the year — for me, it’s really not even close. I think I once drunkenly described this album as “economical”, and I may as well stand by that. Everything is so well-constructed, every gesture placed with such casual perfection that it’s tempting to conclude that it couldn’t be more than a cold architectural exercise. But when faced with the opening Motown chimes of “You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb”, that idea melts away. Also: points for brevity.

This year was also the first in which I listened to much electronic (or at least non-rock, non-rap) music. I’m not straying too far from my familiar pop pastures — RJD2, Ratatat, Diplo, the aforementioned Mr. Deacon, that sort of thing. I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t know very much about the genres contained under the electronic umbrella, and probably need to spend some more time listening diligently and uncritically. But I’m trying, at least a little. I realize that millions of club kids can’t be wrong. I’m the one who’s wrong.

With that said, Pitchfork’s list of the year’s best songs still baffles me. “All My Friends” sounds to me like a not-that-good Franz Ferdinand song and little more. And somewhere around the fifth minute of Battles’ “Atlas” I get real sick of hearing plodding repetitions of melodies that could be ably picked out on a keyboard with two fingers. I’m of the opinion that Daft Punk made their point a while ago and should now be polite enough to leave me alone.

My lack of patience is probably to blame. If you set up a melodic pattern I want my expectations of how it’s going to progress to be promptly defied. Going through the motions for an extra measure or two earns my boredom (and ill will) very quickly. Perhaps this consigns me to a life of listening to variations on the same tired three minute pop song — I realize that a very limited bag of tricks is being used over and over again to surprise and delight me. But so far I’m not sick of it.

Finally, one last bit of carping: I’m really surprised that the M.I.A. juggernaut continues to roll along. It seems like a transparent case of style over substance to me, but people really seem to dig her stuff. So I’ll say that I think I must be missing something and hope that my half-earnestness counts as personal growth.

This entry was posted on Monday, December 17th, 2007 at 3:14 pm and is filed under music. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.