There’s been a flurry of solid writeups from the Stereogum staff lately on some excellent albums celebrating their birthdays, so thought I’d share before they stack up any further and give folks something to read with the morning paper tomorrow. First up, appropriately, is this one on the 10 year anniversary of Kanye’s masterful monolith, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. The ‘meds are on fire right now with the news that he’s getting a divorce from Kim Kardashian, so it’s only fitting to start here, looking back on an album that was a chaotic mix of love and hubris that was (and still is) his crowning achievement.
The article does a good job walking through both the music and the surrounding context — always a knotty affair with Mr West — and speaks nicely about the album’s importance (particularly in light of the subsequent decline). It was an absolute beast, landing at #4 on my 2010 list, and it’s held up well in the intervening years. As I wrote then, “In other hands such a variety of thoughts and styles could come off as cluttered, cloying, or catastrophic — every song has numerous guest stars, from rappers, to pop stars, to comedians, spoken word rebels, and indie boner-inducers like Bon Iver. Each song could have failed multiple times over their 5-9 minute lengths from all the dissonant styles packed in, let alone the album as a whole. And yet with Kanye they are a delight — a flawed, over-reaching affair at times, but one that’s quickly and consistently redeemed. In a word, pure genius.”
In light of the pair’s unfortunate separation, pop on the beautiful “Blame Game” as a soundtrack while you read:
Next comes this writeup on the 20 year anniversary of the New Pornographers’ classic debut, Mass Romantic. The article does a fantastic job trying to capture the utter joy and revelation that this album was. For me it’s always been the epitome of delirium, the equivalent of that unwieldy shot of adrenaline from Pulp Fiction, only being driven straight into your brain this time. It’s that instantaneous, that irresistible — the second you hear some of the songs, you bolt upright gasping like Uma off the floor.
“My Slow Descent into Alcoholism,” “Jackie,” “Letter From an Occupant,” the title track — there’s so much goodness here I defy people to listen and not succumb to their powers. I used to listen to this album religiously back in college, driving around with the songs blaring from my windows, singing like I was trying to be heard from space (which is where I’m sure most of the pedestrians I passed wished they were to be out of range of all the noise). I just didn’t care — the songs were (are) so good, you couldn’t be unhappy when listening to them and didn’t feel like hiding it (or trying). The band has never come close to recapturing the pure joy of this album and I’ve subsequently lost the bead on them as an act, but I’ll always have this to go back to and revel in, daring the neighbors to call the cops. Try “The Body Says No” for a taste and see what I mean:
Next comes another 10 year anniversary, this of Radiohead’s ninth album, King of Limbs. The article makes this out to be a more divisive album than I knew it to be (or think it is now), but agree it has aged even better since its release. As I wrote then, when the album landed at #11 on that year’s wrapup, “[the band] sent forth their ninth disc in a similar vein to their previous two albums, In Rainbows (I & II). Those albums built upon the elements of their predecessors — lots of nervous energy and twitchy electro beats intermingling with Thom Yorke’s ethereal moan — while cutting in a new-found warmth and sexiness. This album continues the trend, combining that sensuality with an ever-intensifying complexity as the band piles layers upon layers to their songs, leading you incrementally towards that glorious moment where it all snaps into place.”
Interestingly, when we did the fan favorite “WHO’S ON TOP!” segment for these guys I had this album towards the bottom of the list, just above the disappointing A Moon Shaped Pool and their middling debut. When I think of this album, though, I always do so in positive terms — I like this album, while disliking those other two — and am always reminded of the aforementioned moment when it finally made sense. For me that came while watching the Live from the Basement DVD of the sessions, which absolutely blew my mind — it was the first time I fully appreciated how much went into these songs and how important it was to really listen to them, as I watched them quietly layer instrument over instrument until that lightning striking the clocktower moment when they all line up and ignite. It was (and is) one of my favorite music DVDs and one of the times I’ve been most impressed watching a band. Check out one such example from the Colbert performance I referenced back then, “Little by Little:”
We’ll keep the indie stalwart trend going and shift to Spoon’s fantastic third album, Girls Can Tell, which recently turned 20. This has forever been my favorite album of the band — and I’ve had a number of them show up on year-end lists over the years — but there’s just something about this one that keeps it arm’s length from the rest. As the article says, it just SOUNDS cool. The attitude is palpable, Britt’s voice sounds wonderfully weathered and worn, and the playing is surgically precise — guitars growl, drums pop, but not a single note is wasted. To paraphrase the previous band, everything is in its right place.
Thanks to this and Britt’s lyrics, the album feels almost cinematic, more a collection of evocative short films than a series of “rock” songs. This isn’t a surprise — Spoon songs regularly show up in TV and movies (hell, sleeper fave Stranger than Fiction has almost nothing BUT Spoon songs — but that vibe began here. Songs like the opening “Everything Hits at Once,” “Me and the Bean,” “Lines in the Suit,” and “The Fitted Shirt” are all excellent examples, cramming a lifetime into 3 or 4 brisk minutes. Even the album cover rules, just a blue-green photo of a spinning record with the name and title marching single-file — it could be the poster for any self-respecting indie flick, then or now. Besides the above songs, one of my perennial faves is the penultimate “Take the Fifth,” which grabs you by the ears before the album rolls credits with the aptly named instrumental “This Book is a Movie.” Give it a listen here:
We’ll close with a couple quick notes to balance all the reading — first, Atlanta faves Manchester Orchestra recently did a livestream of their excellent 2017 album, A Black Mile to the Surface (which landed at #8 on that year’s list). They went back to the church they recorded at in Carolina for the performance and played the album start to finish, sounding great as always. (They also teased a new album dropping in April — yippee!) Give it a watch/listen here:
Lastly, we started a new segment this week at the behest of my social media manager, Fuddge. In a fiery series of text messages she told me, “Sunshine, everybody loves your insightful and engaging posts, but there’s not enough of em — people need more of you, only with less words and less time required.” Thus were born Fuddge Pops — daily (or near daily) posts on the official Sunshine ‘Gram account where I’ll throw up the song of the day. Some of them might end up meriting fuller engagement here on the site, others will just be random passing thoughts or jams to get (or keep) the day going. We’ll experiment with other material on there in the coming months — she’s got a very expansive campaign in mind — but for now figure a few songs should keep things going in between posts. So check it out and see what you think — in the meantime, stay safe, stay sane, and stay separate.
Until next time, amici…
–BS