LET'S MAKE A LIST RESULTS JAN 2012

[Rex Kickass]

18 (tie) TuNe-YaRdS - w h o k i l l (highest rank: #3 Rex Kickass)

 

Merrill Garbus, Tune-Yards founder and frontwoman, recorded her 2009 debut, Bird-Brains, in her bedroom with a Dictaphone. The record won acclaim for its ukulele and loop-pedal pop, and Garbus was praised for her skills as a one-woman DIY band....

 

whokill has its roots in Garbus's adoptive home of Oakland, California, charged with her own personal politics and the wider turbulence of that community's recent years, from police brutality to the fatal shooting of Oscar Grant and the riots that followed. whokill has all the impact of that first brick thrown at a windowpane, in violent protest or jubilant celebration. Its conception had a specific locale, but whokill's sweltering, shimmering mix of sirens, Mardi Gras saxophones, shattering glass, big Caribbean beats and anthem choruses heralded a year blotted with politicised unrest and worldwide protest, from Tahrir Square, to the London riots and the Occupy movement.

 

The album saw Garbus expanding and amplifying her raw pop vision into vibrant, rhythm-soaked compositions of melody and noise, brimming with everything from dub and folk to soca and jazz. She matched her capability for sub Saharan-style singing with huge, genre-mashing aplomb, and produced a record that set spring on fire and continued to burn bright across the rest of 2011.

 

Review courtesy of Guardian's Best of 2011 list. http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/...e-yards-whokill

 

[Rex Kickass]

20. (tie) Tom Waits - Bad As Me (highest rank: #3 BigEdWalsh)

 

Bad as Me is Waits' first proper collection of studio material since 2004's Real Gone (in 2006, he released Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers & Bastards, a 3xCD mélange of lost-and-found tracks). He's backed by a cabal of familiar, gnarly-faced noisemakers (David Hildalgo, longtime bandleader Marc Ribot, Keith Richards, Flea), and again shares writing and producing credit with his wife and frequent collaborator Kathleen Brennan. Waits' jerky grandpa bark, which he'd honed and perfected by his mid-twenties, was reverse-engineered to age well. Now, perhaps freed from the burden of approximation, he sounds especially wild and gleeful, hollering with deranged aplomb. Bad as Me is as essential-- and as essentially weird-- as anything he's done before.

 

As with any Tom Waits album, there are a few absurd affectations at work, both on record and off (in a recent New York Times profile, Waits is caught driving a black Suburban with a newspaper announcing the inauguration of John F. Kennedy spread across the passenger seat) but there's enough variation here that all that oldness and weirdness-- all those frantic, busted melodies, all that carnie growl, all those sarsaparilla bottles banging around the backseat-- never gets tiresome. For all his indulgences, Waits never lingers too long; these tracks are concise and expertly edited, and Bad as Me feels as new as it does ancient.

 

Pitchfork Review http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/15961-bad-as-me/

 

[Rex Kickass]

18. (tie) Toby Keith - Clancy's Tavern (highest rank: #3 TheGooch)

Few songs affect an entire album quite like the title track of Toby Keith‘s ‘Clancy’s Tavern.’ The rolling, Irish pub-inspired country ditty plays conductor to a group of artistically satisfying songs that would otherwise be lost in a chaotic mess of converging styles. The project works from start to finish because of this one song.

 

‘Clancy’s Tavern’ is as humble a Toby Keith album as one can remember. There isn’t a moment to be found where it feels like the singer is standing over you thumping his chest. This is a welcome change of pace from a man who at age 50 shows no signs of losing touch with what’s hot.

 

Review from Taste of Country http://tasteofcountry.com/toby-keith-clancys-tavern/

 

[Rex Kickass]

20. (tie) Raekwon - Shaolin v. Wu Tang (highest rank #3 by BigSqwert)

 

Shaolin vs. Wu Tang is neither as ambitious nor as dark as Cuban Linx II. It's leaner than both Linx records-- many of the tracks clock in under three minutes-- which also frees it from the weighty expectations game that dogged Rae since Immobilarity critically bombed. The production from a slate of lesser-known names caused some fans to balk, but it's a strong choice; the beats seem selected for their function rather than the producer's reputation. It's definitely a reverent record created for Wu fans, with all the requisite cinema samples and minor-key melodies. The freewheeling novelty of last year's Cocainism Vol. 2 mixtape, which even included Rae spitting over the Blackbyrd's classic ode to public sex, is scaled back. But there is enough variation in the production and craft-conscious rhyme construction to make it a worthwhile project, one that unexpectedly stands out in Raekwon's catalog.

 

The production largely sticks to the RZA's overall approach. Bronze Nazareth's turn on "Butter Knives" hews especially closely to the RZA's more cinematic Cuban Linx moments. But there are twists throughout to keep things interesting. The best beats build on the typical Wu track by adding some new ideas. Evidence's "The Scroll" and Scram Jones' "Crane Style", for example, play with some unusual drum loops, which provides a good counterpoint to Rae's choppy, rhythmic approach to rap. "Crane Style" and Selasi's "Snake Pond" also use some great melodic samples that expand on the Wu's co-opting of "Oriental" cinematic tropes.

 

Raekwon, though, is on point throughout, and in the end it's his rapping that carries the LP. From his reinterpretation of the "Broken Language" rap style for the title track to the densely detailed reminiscence "From the Hills", his verses never seem underwritten, interlock in interesting ways and convey moods and concepts with gripping style. Few rappers could bring such an engaging sense of energy to a project so focused on preaching to the converted.

 

Review from Pitchfork http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/15210-...lin-vs-wu-tang/

 

[Rex Kickass]

20. (tie) George Strait - Here For A Good Time (highest rank #3 Tex)

 

‘Here for a Good Time’ is a sneaky name for George Strait‘s new album (which is in stores and available for download today, September 6) because most of the 11 songs are anything but a good time. This is the legendary country singer’s darkest album in recent memory, with no fewer than five tracks feeling like punches to the kidney. A number of cuts feel unusually personal, giving fans a rare glimpse into the quiet life Strait lives offstage.

 

‘Drinkin’ Man’ is the song everyone will be talking about. It’s one of the seven Strait co-wrote with his son Bubba Strait and frequent collaborator Dean Dillon. The first verse unwraps all the feel-good cheer built up from the opening cut. “I fought it like the devil but you know that you’re in trouble / When you’re 14 and drunk by 10AM,” Strait sings. It’s one of two heartbreaking songs about addiction on the album — the other being ‘Poison,’ not written by Strait’s team. One finds themselves playing the song again and again to forever sew Strait’s hopelessness and desperation into the fabric of the mind.

 

Strait turns 60-years-old next year. His career has crossed three decades because he never gets complacent and is never afraid to take chances. Granted, when you’re George Strait you can afford to take a few chances, but other seasoned country artists choose to play it safe in their gray years. ‘Here For a Good Time’ proves he still belongs amongst the upper crust of male country singers. No one can accuse him of living off a legacy.

 

Review from Taste of Country http://tasteofcountry.com/george-strait-he...ood-time-album/

 

 

20. (tie) Cage the Elephant - Thank You Happy Birthday (Highest rank: #3 knightni)

“Sell yourself, don’t be a fool!” gurgles Matt Shultz, the wiggly frontman for Cage the Elephant, midway through the young Kentucky-bred band’s second album. He’s yelling at the hipsters and fakes whose convolutions confuse and upset him, but he’s surely also offering himself a warning.

 

Having gained notoriety a couple of years back for intense live shows and memorable singles like 2008’s slouchy, sexy “Ain’t No Rest for the Wicked,” Shultz and his pals, including brother Brad on guitar and secret weapon Daniel Tichenor on bass, stand at a crucial juncture. Can Cage the Elephant survive the scrutiny of jaded aficionados who call its drum kit-toppling yet sweet-toothed approach to guitar bashery nothing but a rehash of flannel rock? This set of ripping rave-ups and effortlessly tasty singalongs answers YES, in all caps.

 

 

 

[Rex Kickass]

15. (tie) Toro Y Moi - Underneath the Pine (highest rank #2 Rex Kickass)

 

Following up a beloved debut LP is all about striking a difficult balance: a matter of changing but not too much, both remaining faithful to a sound whilst departing from it. Chaz Bundick ably turns such a trick on his second Toro y Moi album, Underneath the Pine, which ably furthers what his project is 'allowed' to be, whilst delivering plenty to keep first-album fans happy.

 

Bundick's Toro y Moi debut, Causers of This, was embraced as an early landmark of the chillwave sound, but his second record pushes beyond its sound; and, in a way, shifts the parameters of what the brand-new, blog-bubble 'genre' may end up entailing.

 

True to the chillwave MO, Causers of This had a wonky, wobbly, worked-over feeling; a self-consciously 'dated' haze that, really, spoke of a home-recording artist at his computer, clocking up hours of toil. That washed-out (so to speak) feeling of the first record is gone; there's no smoothed-down, surface-waxed productions, no strung-together transitions stitching separate tracks into a single, unbroken whole.

 

Here, Bundick takes a more traditional tack; something signaled by the fact that, after a sample-busy debut, he's taken to playing all the instruments himself. Delivering a second record, Bundick presents a set of songs that stand alone as single compositions, yet have the feeling of 'hanging' together by some shared spirit. Compared to his debut, Underneath the Pine wanders a bit: dabbling in disco rhythms, unironic funk, Beach Boysy pop, incidental mood-music pieces, and an organ sound, throughout, that has a distinctive jazz feeling.

 

About.com review http://altmusic.about.com/od/reviews/fr/To...th-The-Pine.htm

 

[Rex Kickass]

15. (tie) Chickenfoot - III (Highest rank #2 - The Gooch)

Beyond the obvious, however, something more important happened during Chickenfoots rise to the top of the rock: They became a band. A real band. We went from being a weekend fun-time thing to making a record and touring the world, says Sammy Hagar. Our learning curve was fast even for us. But we went out every night to kick ass and prove that we weren t resting on our laurels. We earned everything we got, and along the way, we established a trust in one another that happens very rarely in bands. To me, it s magical.

 

It was that very trust factor that allowed Joe Satriani to approach Hagar during the demoing stage of the new album and express this wish: I want to hear you sing differently, he told the vocalist. You have light and shades to your voice that have never been on record. I want to hear you do new things. Hagar accepted Satrianis words as a challenge, and then he threw down the gauntlet: Fine. But you ve got to bring it too, Joe. I want to hear you play guitar like you never have. We shook hands on that.

 

And so it was that Chickenfoot set about making the heart-pounding and high-minded Chickenfoot III. And they did it at the perfect time, too. In an era when the relevance of the album as an art form is under close scrutiny, Chickenfoot III is a superlative, rip-roaring rock n roll disc that simply must be experienced from start to finish. Tough yet full of intricate textures, played by musicians at the top of their game, this is the kind of record that bands both young and old dream of making.

 

Amazon Review http://www.amazon.com/Chickenfoot-III/dp/B005ELZKWS

 

[Rex Kickass]

15. (Tie) Iron and Wine - Kiss Each Other Clean (Highest rank #2 - Cali)

 

On 2007's The Shepherd's Dog, Sam Beam reinvented Iron & Wine, building out the whisper-quiet acoustic songs he'd made his name on into a strange and mysterious soundworld, using a full band and mastering the art of multitracking his own voice. It's tempting to think that the hard work was done there-- Beam established a new approach and made a great album in the process-- but Kiss Each Other Clean, the full-band follow-up, is in some ways even more ambitious than its predecessor. He's reaching in a few new directions here, pushing himself hard as a singer, and taking risks, some of which pan out and a few of which don't.

 

Broadly, Beam at this point is writing by far the most assertive melodies of his career. Not the best, necessarily, but the boldest and most forcefully phrased. Even the song that most clearly ties back to The Shepherd's Dog, album centerpiece "Rabbit Will Run", has a melody that's quite different from anything he's done before. "Rabbit Will Run" is an easy highlight-- the arrangement is fantastically detailed, driven by a heavily layered rhythm track that bubbles with hypnotic thumb piano, and balanced by sections where the rhythm drops out, leaving Beam's voice hovering over a strange mix of sounds that might be a chopped-up pan flute arranged into a loop. The guitar sounds like an old-fashioned modem. It's a weirdly intoxicating mix that exemplifies the imagination Beam brings to bear on his fuller sound-- he's not just putting some drums and bass behind his guitar and voice.

 

From the Pitchfork review: http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/15033-...ch-other-clean/

 

[Rex Kickass]

15. (tie) Gui Borrato - III (Highest Rank: BigSqwert - 2)

 

Brazilian electronic producer Gui Boratto got his start working in advertising and making pop music, two worlds where superficial sheen and polish are of paramount importance. It's easy to see the connection from his earlier life to his current solo work, for Kompakt and other labels: His tracks are vibrant, ear-pleasing candy of the most licensable order, and his full-length albums have thus far stuck to a fairly simple formula: one or two big, dreamy, tastefully sun-kissed vocal house anthems selling the surrounding tangents into minimal techno.

 

Pitchfork Review - http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/15892-gui-boratto-iii/

 

[Rex Kickass]

15. (tie) Paul Simon - So Beautiful or So What (Highest Rank #2 Tex)

 

More bad news for the recently deceased: According to Paul Simon, the afterlife is a bureaucratic bummer as bad as the DMV.

 

The second song on his first solo album in five years, the deeply philosophical “So Beautiful or So What,” kicks off with one of the most memorably deadpan lines in Simon’s already-packed canon: “After I died and the make-up had dried, I went back to my place.”

 

To crack open a celestial beer? Not so much. From there, “The Afterlife,” with its zydeco-inflected shuffle, paints a picture of the freshly dead filling out forms and waiting in line to catch “a glimpse of the divine.” Ah, but the vast unknown is a slippery beast. “All that remains,” Simon sings, “when you try to explain is a fragment of song.”

 

LA Times Review - http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/music_blog...or-so-what.html

 

 

 

[Rex Kickass]

11. (tie) Gil Scot-Heron/Jamie xx - We're New Here (Highest Rank - #1 RexKickass)

Gil Scott-Heron's 2010 album, I'm New Here, was his first of original material in 16 years and best in three decades. But though it was a joyful return to the living for the once-homeless recovering addict and pivotal figure of pre-South Bronx talking blues, the album is defined by pallor. It's grim stuff, built around Scott-Heron's ashes-to-ashes baritone and XL founder Richard Russell's skeletal production, caked in grime and rust. It's essentially a podium for Scott-Heron's remarkable voice, ever-wheezing and cracking, that both supports and condemns his life choices with its grippingly dark magnitude.

 

Jamie Smith, percussionist and producer of the xx, has become a minor celebrity of the post-dubstep Brixton scene, earning a reputation as a DJ with his MPC mastery and as an ace remixer, crafting memorable, expansive edits of songs by Adele and Glasser in recent months. Smith, like many liners-scanning millennial sound nerds, is a massive Scott-Heron fan, and at Russell's suggestion has taken a stab at recontextualizing I'm New Here in service of changing sounds-- you can practically hear him cycling through subgenres track-to-track.

 

It's too dangerous to question either the necessity or the motivation behind such a project-- 22-year-old wunderkind cinches cred with resurgent iconoclast, perhaps?-- but it will come up. Do your best to ignore the impulse, because the residue of death that lingers on I'm New Here is wiped clean from We're New Here. It's replaced with brightness, an energy, and a historical milieu. Smith samples older Scott-Heron songs and works them into these newer songs. He takes a rare moment of singing, recorded for but not included on the initial album, and turns it into the Kieran Hebden-indebted "My Cloud", a gorgeous and redolent centerpiece. He turns a broken man into a recombinant diva.

 

[Rex Kickass]

11. (tie) Of Monsters and Men - My Head Is an Animal (Highest Rank: #1 BigEdWalsh)

 

Iceland is known for pumping out beautiful music. The music is usually soothing, but at the same time inspiring. Bands such as Jónsi & Alex, Sigur Rós, and Ólafur Arnalds are usually brought to mind when speaking of such music. Well it's time to add another extremely talented band to that list. Of Monsters and Men are a six-piece dual vocal led band from Reykjavík, Iceland and although they have been a band since 2007 they are now putting out their debut My Head Is An Animal. Their song" Little Talks" has garnished them a following outside of Iceland even reaching #1 at a radio station in Philadelphia. And although the wait for this album has been four years too long, it definitely delivered.

 

[Rex Kickass]

11. (tie) Bright Eyes - The People's Key (Highest Rank: #1 Cali)

 

It's been almost a decade since Bright Eyes' Lifted or The Story Is in the Soil, Keep Your Ear to the Ground, the epic 2002 album that established Conor Oberst as the pain-strumming poet of emo and the newest of the New Dylans. But the 22-year-old hadn't asked for either gig. So Oberst spent the 2000s abjuring big statements, choosing to scale down his sound, bum around North America and try to figure himself out. "I've taken some comfort . . . " he sings on Bright Eyes' first album in nearly four years, "knowing I don't have to be an exception."

 

The latest dispatch from Planet Conor weaves the weird knowledge he's accrued over the years into a rich, sprawling, fragmented record. It's got elements of the hazy synth rock of 2005's Digital Ash in a Digital Urn and echoes of his two recent, rootsy solo albums. But being Bright Eyes again mainly means a break from Solo Conor's rustic tranquility and a return to the bruised- angel indie rock of his earliest albums. Oberst brings it all back home by recording in his native Omaha with Bright Eyes' other two permanent members — multi-instrumentalist Nate Walcott and producer Mike Mogis — plus local pals from Cursive and the Faint.

 

Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/albumrev...1#ixzz1jDa6Ni2L

 

 

[Rex Kickass]

11. (tie) Metal Chocolates - III (Highest Rank - #1 BigSqwert)

 

In Seattle, high school students and recent grads apprentice themselves to OC Notes. MCs try and fail to freestyle alongside Rik. Metal Chocolates might fit next to the spaced-out vibe of locals Shabazz Palaces and THEESatisfaction, but is its own thing, starry-eyed while rooted to the anxiety of Pioneer Square and its bustling drug and alcohol casualties.

 

NPR - http://www.npr.org/blogs/therecord/2011/07...etal-chocolates

 

[Rex Kickass]

10. Death Cab for Cutie - Codes and Keys (Highest rank: #7 PlaySumFnJourney)

 

Seven albums in and nearly 15 years later, indie rock stalwarts Death Cab For Cutie are getting a little weird -- and doing it right. On "Codes and Keys," out today (May 31, Atlantic), listeners get a clear sense of where its members currently find themselves: in adulthood. And apparently it's been a long, laborious haul to get there.

 

Early reports suggested the album was not a guitar-based album -- a shift from 2008's singularly rock-focused "Narrow Stars." While "Codes and Keys" is less of a "they're trading in their guitars for synthesizers" moment than some might expect, the album's subtle experimentation makes all the difference, infusing darkness without maudlin emo-ness into one of Death Cab's best. And in consideration of Ben Gibbard's electronic Postal Service project, we have to wonder -- why didn't this synth love happen sooner?

 

(Billboard Review)

 

[Rex Kickass]

9. Beastie Boys - Hot Sauce Committee Part Two (Highest Rank: #7 knightni)

“Oh, my God –- just look at me / Grandpa been rapping since ’83”.

 

So goes a telling new rhyme from iconic hip-hoppers Beastie Boys off the New York City trio’s just-released eighth album, "Hot Sauce Committee Part Two." It’s factually correct: The group released its first rap single, “Cooky Puss,” nearly three decades ago -- more like three centuries in terms of hip-hop shelf life. None of the Beasties’ peers enjoy the contemporary relevance that Ad-Rock (Adam Horowitz) and his bandmates Mike D (Mike Diamond) and MCA (Adam Yauch) carry.

 

Most rap pioneers also aren’t known for making exciting new music, period -– including the Beasties. The group’s last non-instrumental effort, 2004’s "To the Five Boroughs," received a relatively tepid response. "Hot Sauce," however, is exactly the Beasties album that the public has been salivating for, and more -- not just a return to form, but a masterpiece on the level of '80s classics like their raucous debut "Licensed to Ill" and the staggering sample odyssey "Paul’s Boutique."

 

LA Times Review http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/music_blog...e-part-two.html

 

[Rex Kickass]

8. Wilco - The Whole Love (Highest Rank: #6 PlaySumFnJourney)

 

As a sheer sound experience, “The Whole Love” is rewarding, a tapestry of tiny details that invites close listening. On most of the songs, Tweedy indulges in lyrics that blur the line between nonsense and poetry, revelation and obfuscation. The words, it turns out, are really mostly about sound rather than sense. So it’s no surprise that he speaks through the band most clearly. As the album’s producer with keyboardist Patrick Sansone and engineer Tom Schick, Tweedy uses the band’s Northwest Side recording studio as another instrument to complement, enhance and distort the musicianship.

 

Stirratt, besides Tweedy the band’s sole constant since its inception in 1994, is an anchoring force, his bass playing consistently brilliant. The keyboards of Sansone and Mikael Jorgensen color in a wealth of detail, Glenn Kotche’s drumming adds orchestral flair, and Nels Cline gets a bit more room to roam on guitar.

 

Chicago Tribune review http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2011-09...w-john-stirratt

 

[Rex Kickass]

7. Fleet Foxes - Helplessness Blues (Highest rank: #2 BigEdWalsh)

 

Fleet Foxes' unpretentious, crowd-pleasing directness was the key to their rapid rise. Their Sun Giant EP and self-titled debut LP, both released in 2008, brimmed with inviting melodies, evocative lyrics, and open-armed harmonizing that seemed designed to reach a wide variety of listeners. Their bright folk-rock sound wasn't exactly "cool," but that was sort of the point-- it's familiar in the most pleasing way, lacking conceit or affectation. Their expression of their love for music (and making music) was refreshing three years ago, and that sort of thing never gets old.

 

But clouds inevitably roll in. On the band's follow-up, Helplessness Blues, the mood is darker and more uncertain, adding shade to their gold-hued sound. The change in tone reflects the tumultuous road Fleet Foxes traveled during the album's creation. In late 2009, Fleet Foxes had an album's worth of songs ready, but the tracks were mostly scrapped before mixing. The arduous creative process took a toll on the group members, particularly singer/songwriter Robin Pecknold, who told Pitchfork at the time, "The last year has been a really trying creative process where I've not been knowing what to write or how to write."

 

The group's persistence paid off, though: Helplessness Blues is comparatively deeper, more intricate, and more complex, a triumphant follow-up to a blockbuster debut.

 

Pitchfork Review: http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/15363-...lessness-blues/

 

[Rex Kickass]

6. Adele - 21 (Highest rank: #1 knightni)

"21" pulls no such punches.

 

From start to finish, it shows Adele in alpha mode, ready to outshout any big-mouth singer of the last two decades, from Celine to Christina to (sigh) Whitney.

 

Adele bests them all by having at least one feature they lack: taste. Listening to most modern divas requires an act of aural surgery. You need to disregard much of the material, sensibility and production and focus on the power of their instruments. "21" needs no editing whatsoever.

 

NY Daily News Review http://articles.nydailynews.com/2011-02-22...-southern-blues

 

[Rex Kickass]

5. Foo Fighters - Wasting Light (Highest Rank: #1 PlaySumFnJourney)

 

And it’s something of a pleasure to report that ‘Wasting Light’ does not suck, not even a little bit – it’s both broad and focused enough to appeal to casuals and longhairs alike, and it’s doubtless their best record since ‘The Colour And The Shape’. And, because they’re answering to no-one except their own consciences, it makes perfect sense for the Foo Fighters to beat a partial retreat of sorts. That they committed it all to analogue tape in Grohl’s own garage in Virginia with Butch Vig producing, the first time the two had worked together since Vig produced ‘Nevermind’ in ’91, suggests a more casual, relaxed atmosphere (one imagines Grohl wandering around in a towel, scratching his balls and offering casual high fives while guitarists Chris Shiflett and Pat Smear lay down takes).

 

NME Review http://www.nme.com/reviews/foo-fighters/11966

 

[Rex Kickass]

4. Black Keys - El Camino (Highest Rank: #2 PlaySumFnJourney)

 

And now we greet El Camino, their best and (not coincidentally) goofiest album, a veritable frat-worthy "Pimp 'n' Ho" party in which T. Rex has somehow been tricked into serving as house band. The riffs are glam-nasty, the lyrics sublimely knuckleheaded, the basslines nimble and bombastic, the mood frivolous and fun and unabashedly corny. It's way shorter than Brothers, too. Sweet cars, witchy women, "Gold on the Ceiling." A bizarre attempt to philosophically combine the videos for "Sabotage" and "Legs". The fine line between a tricked-out GTO and "GTFO."

 

http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/16098-el-camino/

 

[Rex Kickass]

3. My Morning Jacket - Circuital (Highest Rank: 2 - knightni)

 

There are a few tracks here where producer Tucker Martine captures it in all its intoxicating splendor-- the acoustic lament "Wonderful (The Way I Feel)" especially-- but most only hint at what James is capable of delivering in person. His falsetto (contentious since the days of "Highly Suspicious") comes back for "Holdin on to Black Metal", a bizarre bit of jam-funk that alternates between pleasantly spirited and genuinely stupid (it's a cautionary tale about not growing out of black metal fandom, and ends with a shout of "Let's rock!"). On "Slow Slow Tune", James sounds remarkably vulnerable, singing to his future progeny over a barely there, bubblegum guitar figure that recalls the Everly Brothers before transitioning into a Flaming Lips-style burnout.

 

Like nearly all of their studio albums, Circuital may not reach the heights of the band's live show-- a good MMJ concert can recalibrate your gut, it can change you-- but it’s a remarkably solid step for a band that's never stopped evolving.

 

Pitchfork Review http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/15471-circuital/

 

 

 

[Rex Kickass]

Kanye West/Jay-Z - Watch the Throne (Highest Rank: #1 Gooch)

 

Eventually, one makes friends who work in nightlife that aren't parasitic status feeders, and going out becomes palatable. When it comes to listening to hip hop, West and Jay-Z are those friends -- bringing you the bravado, but knowing when to turn it off and let you in on the fact that they too just want to be appreciated and respected. They live in that space between "yes this is as fun as it looks" and "but nothing in life is free." Neither rapper beats their all-time best performances here, but as messy as putting these two careers on the same disc could have been, it's hard to be anything but impressed. They're hard guys to dislike, and the album gets our stamp of approval. Today, the sons of Brooklyn and Chicago did us all proud.

 

Huffington Post Review - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/08/w...z_n_921182.html

 

[Rex Kickass]

1. The Decemberists - The King Is Dead (highest rank #1 Tex)

 

Ten crisp roots-rock tunes in a mere 40 minutes, The King Is Dead finds the Decemberists in serious course-correction mode -- which is a relief, if also kind of sad. Hazards sorta sucked, it's true, but you had to admire the band's chutzpah; here they seem a little chastened, and the result is an relatively unweighty effort from these career overachievers. That may in fact have been what they were after: "Let the yoke fall from our shoulders," Meloy sings in opener "Don't Carry It All," before urging us to "raise a glass to turnings of the season." Welcome to Fun-uary, everybody!

 

Though the album's title makes you think of the Smiths' The Queen Is Dead -- Meloy is an avowed fan, and even released a solo EP of Morrissey covers in 2005 -- King pays more obvious tribute to R.E.M., whose Peter Buck contributes mandolin and 12-string guitar to a handful of tracks.

 

As rustic as some of this music is, though, Meloy still can't resist flexing his rarefied vocabulary, throwing in a "plinth" here and a "trillium" there.

 

But he also reveals a knowing sense of humor about it all. After extravagantly describing a turn-of-the-century financier as the "queen of supply-side bonhomie bone-drab" in "Calamity Song," he stage-whispers slyly, "Know what I mean?" And the singer appears most deeply engaged with The King Is Dead's more direct, plainspoken moments; on "Rise to Me," he simply addresses his real-life son Henry by name, and "January Hymn" begins with this lovely image: "On a winter's Sunday I go / To clear away the snow / And green the ground below." No allegory, no fairies, no fortress. Nice, right?

 

Spin Review - http://www.spin.com/reviews/decemberists-king-dead-capitol