2006 toplists, pt 2
I've made a rough attempt at numbering here, but I'm not going to tweak the list until it's perfect... so this is by no means definitive. I think I got the top 5 pretty well ordered though.

10: Ratatat - Classics
I'm a fan of Ratat's... um, post-metal sound, so that bumped this one up a few points, but I'll admit this is far from great. It's inconsistent, and Ratatat have some trouble with song strucutre, particularly developing into - and out of - those musical crescendos they're good at - no, really good at. And that's why this album is here... the good moments were really fucking good.

9: Various - The World Is Gone
Remember those punk bands from the high school era who called themselves "TBD" just to confuse people when they got on a bill? Various isn't quite that bad (though Amazon even lists the import version as "various artists"), but a name like that just begs for people to write them off for being douches... which may be the case, but the album's definitely worth a listen. Pitchfork compared them to Portishead - aptly so, as far as the genre/stylism goes, if you replace trip-hop (or its influencing genres) with grunge/garage/dubstep/etc. My main complaint with the album, though, is that - for the majority of songs here - they stay within the same musical mode, relying on minor-key melodies throughout. In fact, four out of the five last tracks are in the exact same key; these tracks really blur together quickly - I've started skipping them after the fourth or fifth time through the album.

8: Tim Hecker - Harmony in Ultraviolet
I mentioned this in a recent post... rather than rehash here, I'll just link to it.

7: Sparklehorse - Dreamt for Light Years in the Belly of a Mountain
You know, this isn't all that great of an album either. But Sparklehorse has always* had unique production, and I'm kind of a whore for good production work. The songs, though not great, are pretty consistently good though.

*Ok, I'm really not familiar with any of his work other than this album and "It's a Wonderful Life", but the production stays interesting through both albums, so I'll make an assumption based on that...

6: Junior Boys - So This Is Goodbye
It wasn't Last Exit, but that'd be hard to match by any standards. Some people I've talked to have issues with their old-but-new take on electronica, but I enjoy it - and, really, you'd have to forgive them anyway when there are bangers (ok, ok, poor word choice) like "In The Morning" (which receives the hastily-conceived "best four-note melody of the year" award - you know, the keyboard thing that comes in just before 2:10) and the title track. Good stuff.

5: Clipse - Hell Hath No Fury
What it do. (Yes, that is a statement, for the uninitiated). Amid more hype than, say, oh, TV on the Radio, Clipse managed to deliver a solid sophomore effort. (Finally.) Although... it doesn't live up to what I was hoping for based on We Got It 4 Cheap v.2. If Lil' Wayne disappoints this year with his new full-length, I'm going to have to forego buying rap albums altogether and just go for mixtapes instead. And speaking of Lil' Wayne and mixtapes...

4: Lil' Wayne - Dedication 2 (mixtape)
Some might take issue with putting a mixtape on a year-end list, as the production work isn't really attributable to the artist - but fuck 'em. I enjoyed this one a lot. At 25 tracks and nearly 80 minutes, there's a lot of room for mediocre stuff to slip in, but lil' wayne and guests manage to keep this one pretty compelling throughout. After as many listens as I've given this, I'm skipping around to the highlights a lot, but when an album has a handful of spectacular stuff like "They Still Like Me", "Cannon", and "Sportscenter", you can't go wrong. Cannon, in particular, is my pick for best rap track of the year - only one of the (five!) guest rappers delivers a less-than-stellar performance.

While I'm on the topic, I should mention there's yet another lil' wayne mixtape recently relased - Lil' Weezyana. I'm not sure it warrants inclusion on a year-end list since I haven't been through all the tracks yet, but his version of Jay-Z's "Show Me What You Got" is pretty incredible. Check it out here as a free download.

3: Brothers Quetico - Quid Bro Quo
"Who the fuck are the Brothers Quetico,*" you ask? Let's just say they're a little-known local band without enough people paying attention to them. Genre? Well... with a broad range of influences I don't know well enough to go into, I'll just risk pigeonholing them as indie-folk - though once, while somewhat intoxicated, I called them "indie-barbershop-folk-prog" - but... hmm, actually that's a better description. I'll go with that.

Being a huge audio geek, I took issue by the fact this wasn't "professionally" mastered (mastering on the same monitors as the mix is kind of missing the point)... and went ahead and remastered it myself; toned down some of the huge dynamic range (originally, this had more dynamic range than some classical albums I've heard) and reshaped the tonal balance to be more suitable to non-studio monitors. This remastered version is now my preferred version of the album, which has - despite listening ad nauseum during the remastering process - seen a lot of play time in a more normal environment as well.

Regardless of the audio qualities of the non-remastered album you'd be more likely to hear, there's a lot to love here. Vocal melodies that just work, skillful use of dynamic range, well-crafted song structures, and song sequencing/album flow most albums could only hope to achieve. Live, they're equally impressive, if not more so. They occasionally do some fantastic covers, too - Tom Waits, Portishead, Morphine - watch for live shows on their myspace page.

*No, I'm not actually comparing them to the rolling stones. I just felt like throwing in a random link.

2: The Knife - Silent Shout
Does this make me a pitchfork whore? I have to argue no... but the proof shall be in my yet-to-be-published "bottom 100 of 2006" list, consisting of bands/artists/major label tools who I thought sucked in 2006, which has actually been easier to come up with so far than my top 10...

I'm off topic, though. The Knife caught my attention through...well, ok, a stellar Pitchfork review, but I'm not so much of a whore as to buy anything they tell me to. (Risk Mitigation Through Illegal Downloading™) In this case, however, immediate purchase would have been warranted. Dedidedly techno-inspired (but not in a bad way, I just have trouble with keeping all the subgenres of electronic music straight), they manage to keep things sounding fresh despite some arguably derivative musical elements. But that's beside the point when the songwriting is this solid... bottom line, if you haven't heard it, you need to give it a chance.

1. Grizzly Bear - Yellow House
Not that consensus really matters to me - my list is kind of all over the place - but everybody who reviewed this seemed to like it, yet it barely makes it onto any kind of aggregate list (here, or here for example). I shouldn't complain, though - this is my list, bitches, and critical consensus can go fuck itself.

I'm not going to bother describing the music in detail... go read some music journalist who is better at writing about that sort of thing than I. Let's just say their particular blend of electronic experimentalism, dense instrumentation, and fantastic songwriting all combined to bring this to the top of my list. I'm also really impressed by the fact that the whole recording process was done entirely by the band - they only had some assistance with mixing. Everything sounds extremely professionally done - even the mastering, which can be incredibly difficult to get right without a lot of experience (Brothers Quetico serving as a prime example - and that was mastered by a professional recording engineer). I'll just point to it as evidence of the power of DIY...


- posted by vcmc @  1/01/2007 02:17:00 PM