Wrapping up '07 mini-reviews

Yep, it's 2008 and I'm still sitting on a pile of recent purchases I haven't reviewed yet. Plus I've been compiling my year-end lists. It's a shitty rainy day here in San Francisco and I'm going to see if I can get '07 all wrapped up!

Animal Collective - Strawberry Jam
Rating: 8

Dear Animal Collective: I apologize. Up to this point I've hated everything I heard by you, likening it to a bunch of 5-year olds beating on various objects and screaming. I'm not going to take that impression back... but boy was I ever stupid to assume all your output would sound like that. So, it wasn't until the end of the year - months after this album was actually released - that I happened to give "Fireworks" and "Peacebone" a listen... and immediately fell in love. The five-year-olds have grown up on Strawberry Jam. The overall template now is a buzzing, droning wall of sound which contains endless sonic delights and diversions. And Avey Tare is no longer pretending to be a kitty cat. I still have no idea what he's carrying on about, but the vocals on Strawberry Jam are the sweetest part of the mix. Like Carey Mercer, Tare can go from sweetly crooning to screeching - and back - in two seconds. His vocal melodies are immediate, unpredictable, gorgeous. I don't quite think I'm ready to re-evaluate your back catalog, but I'll never wait almost a year to check out whatever new madness you drop upon the world from this point forward.

Burial - Untrue
Rating: 6

I just don't get it. Metacritic reports that this is the best reviewed album of the year; it made plenty of critics' year-end lists. My friend Russ gets digitally weepy whenever the subject of this album comes up in our correspondence. Everyone talks about how it's so emotional, so evocative. Interestingly, most of these reactions are very personal - specific images or feelings or memories that the album creates or evokes. So I guess I'm just weird or somehow emotionally unavailable, or maybe I just haven't had those same seemingly-universal experiences.... because I find Untrue only mildly interesting. Listen to the first minute of any of these songs - and you've heard the song. The beats are strangely static and nowhere near as intense or creative as so many other similar artists have given us. The emotionalism of the vocals feels calculated to me - but unlike mid-90s rave, who used the same tools in a knowingly ironic way (beneath every helium diva a sly wink), Burial seems to genuinely want to connect with his listeners. Come to think of it, I hate romantic comedies for this exact same reason - and of course those are popularly (if not critically) loved also. Oh fine, I'll give it a 6 because I admit that "Archangel," "Untrue," and "Raver" are all catchy. But this is still the new Exhibit A in my response to anyone who says I'm a blind follower of critics.

Yeasayer - All Hour Cymbals
Rating: 7

OK, here's a guilty pleasure. Yeasayer have a knack for vocal harmonies and "foreign"-sounding instrumental melodies that will catch your ear and have you coming back for a second listen. They also score points for filling their songs with enough twists and turns to keep them interesting. All that said - scratch below the surface of this one and what you have is a lot of very simple musicianship. There's a surprising lack of depth to most of these tunes; like a Monet, they're best appreciated from a distance. I like the album, it made my 20-faves list for the year, and it's accessibility makes it an easy one to recommend to friends... but it's always going to be a qualified endorsement.

Dizzee Rascal - Maths + English
Rating: 7

I avoided buying this for months and months. Everything I read about it - in sum, this was Dizzee's "American rap" album (and never mind the irony that it wasn't even released in this country except as a download!) - left me convinced that nothing less than Boy in Da Corner's cherished status as my favorite album of the 21st Century so far was at stake.

Well... this isn't even the first time today that I have to acknowledge my preconceptions stupidly interfered with me hearing a pretty good album. Yes, it's the least "grime" of Dizzee's releases - but he made it clear with Showtime that he's not one to repeat past glories. For all that the sonic architecture has changed, Maths + English is still undeniably Dizzee's. "Sirens" is among his best tracks, as cinematic and hard-hiting as anything from the debut. "Hardback (Industry)", which finds Dizzee posing as a sage elder offering (surprisingly grounded) advice, would be hilarious if the music wasn't so enticingly sinister. "Da Feelin" finds Dizzee reclaiming mid-90s drum n' bass (Omni Trio could probably sue for royalties) momentum as, of all things, an airy summertime jam. Around these highlights are plenty more solid tunes, as well as the expected couple of missteps (notably the insipid Lily Allen duet). I'm not excited about Maths + English the same way I was about either of his two previous albums, but it's still a respectable addition to his catalog.

HEALTH - HEALTH
Rating: 8

I'm resolutely NOT going to drop the name of a certain other band whose name begins with an "L" in this review. Sure, they're older, better-known, and also released a self-titled album in 2007. This one is better: more raw, less calculated, and (most importantly) joyous. So let's think of HEALTH as that other band's snotty younger brothers, making up for their lack of experience with an utter lack of reserve. "Girl Attorney" is 36 seconds of skronk, boom, and bluster... who is she and what did she do that pissed the band off this much? They follow that song with the one-two sucker punch of "Triceratops" and "Crimewave", easily the most intense and uncompromising five minutes of noise anyone hit us with in 2007. Chalk it up to youthful enthusiasm (or ADD), but HEALTH is also endlessly restless... dabbling in a bit of electronic ambience here, dancepunk sneer and syncopation there, and the required ambient noise piece or two. Not all of it works, but then the entire album rushes by in just over a half hour, so you never have time to get bored. (Unlike, say, Be Your Own Pet's album from '06, which was just too damn long and uniform). Boris went all pastoral in '07, and that "L" band seems to have no rough edges left... which left a big void in my musical universe that HEALTH have gleefully and noisly filled.

Pinch - Underwater Dancehall
Rating: 7

After my disappointment with the Burial album, I decided to shell out $22 for an import copy of this one in the hopes that somebody had put out a beat-driven electronic album in '07 that would blow me away. Well, Underwater Dancehall fails to live up to that lofty expectation, but it is a decent release in its own right. The beats are inventive and when the vocals work ("Get Up," "Battered," "Brighter Day" being the standouts) they provide some fascinating counter-rhythms. "Airlock" is a satisfyingly creepy instrumental - like Source Direct without the punishing BPMs. But there's a same-iness about the album that starts interfering with my enjoyment of the songs, and nothing on here hits with the same force as Various' tracks "Sir" or "Soho" from '06, or (for that matter) classic mid-90s Photek.

Prinzhorn Dance School - Prinzhorn Dance School
Rating: 5

I hate to be this reductive... but PDH are basically a post-ironic Fall for the jaded 21st Century. They're even more minimal and monoton(ous), and just as strangely self-congratulatory about their obtuseness. In this, they've got more in common with LCD Soundsystem than a record label. Thirty years later, the "punk" ideal that technical skills aren't required to create affecting music is just another commodified product. I wish I could talk about this album in less meta- terms, but (much like their loathesome album label owner) with music this bald-facedly unaccomplished, the meta-narrative is the narrative. The overall formula: dry male/female chants; simple rhythms on drums and guitar, and post-post-Entertainment basslines that are nearly indistinguishable between songs. The most successful tunes tweak that recipe minimally, say with more interesting percussion ("Crackerjack Doctor," You Are the Space Invader"), or a bit of call-and-response interaction between the vocals ("Don't Talk to Strangers"). Attempts to be sinister ("Do You Know Your Butcher") or commentative (the inexplicable "Hamworthy Sports and Leisure Center") fall flat in the face of the band's deadpan delivery. This one doesn't piss me off as much as Sound of Silver, but it has strengthened my resolve not to give the DFA any more of my money.

Beirut - The Flying Club Cup
Rating: 6

The Flying Club Cup isn't a bad album; if anything it's more lushly instrumented than Beirut's great debut Gulag Orkester. I think I'm just over the novelty of it all. The jejune calliope/reggae rhythms on "Nantes" and "Cherbourg" annoy me to the point of interfering with my enjoyment of everything else that's happening in them. The way Zach brings a stomping multi-percussive rhythm section in around the one-minute mark isn't as effective or surprising considering he used the same trick a number of times on Gulag Orkester. Don't get me wrong - this is still an extremely pleasant album, and accessible enough to be an easy recommendation. I just don't find the overall formula as impressive or innovative this second time around. All that said - standout tracks "Guyama Sonora", the epic title tune, and especially "In the Mausoleum" (probably his best song to date) will likely be gracing my playlists for awhile.

Clockcleaner - Babylon Rules
Rating: 4

Well, Cokemachineglow had to steer me seriously wrong at some point. This is mostly a torpid sludgy mess, devoid of any humor or sense of a larger perspective that could redeem its commitment to ugliness. Which bums me out because I wanted to like this album - awesome band name, great cover art, and all. Instead, after wading through it the least number of necessary times, I'm suspicous of the band's motives for putting their female member on the cover considering the unrelenting misogyny of the thing. A woman's control of her reproductive capabilities is something to lament or even hold against her on Babylon Rules; that is, when the singer even acknowledges her right to any choices over her sexuality in general ("Caliente Queen," "Daddy Issues"). A comparison to Big Black's Songs About Fucking seems inevitable... but that album got by first of all for being musically astounding, and second because Steve Albini was smart (and funny) enough to present himself as once-removed from the ugliness he spewed; a war reporter or a storyteller rather than an active participant. "Precious Thing" made objectification sound fun, or at least never precluded it as a choice one could make (and it also rather smatly left the identity of the objectified unspecified). Conversely, Clockcleaner's "Caliente Queen" just leaves me hoping the girl's got a knife in her belt. And musically, this album is just tired, laying a veneer of echoey surf guitar over standard Jesus Lizard sludge. "Vomiting Mirrors" and "Human Pigeon" are twisty enough (and have indistinct enough lyrics) to be interesting to me, but the rest of Babylon Rules won't be cluttering up my hard drive.

Shapes and Sizes - Split Lips, Winning Hips, A Shiner
Rating: 4

Another huge disappointment, even if in retrospect I probably should have known better. Folk music for the Ritalin generation, Shapes and Sizes initially caught my ear with "Head Movin'", three and a half minutes of quirky jangle pop with a serious case of restlessness. That song and fantastic opener "Alone/Alive" are the two times on Split Lips that the band strikes a proper balance between their instincts for tunefulness and chaos. On the rest of the album, their inability to stay focused or maintain momentum derails every interesting idea they churn out. On top of which, Caila Thompson-Hannant lapses into twee distressingly often. "Highlife (I Had Been Duped)" and "Can't Stop that (Sinking) Feeling" both start out strong and then meander into long, nearly a capella interludes that turn out not to be interludes but the rest of the song. It's frustrating to listen to such a creative and talented group shoot themselves in the foot repeatedly; their occasional moments of brilliance suggest it's all a matter of conscious choice rather than an attempt to hide something.

Pantha du Prince - This Bliss
Rating: 5

Why oh why do I keep buying techno albums? I'll admit that "Saturn Strobe" hooked me immediately, with its brittle bells and constantly-shifting roster of elements. But taken over an entire album, it becomes clear that Pantha du Prince's toolbox is fairly small. When the same four or five beats are switched up a couple times within any given song over the course of an entire album, the overall experience still becomes (for me at least) mind-numbing. Every time I try to give This Bliss a serious listen, I discover that the entire thing has flashed by and failed to leave any impression. None of this is an implicit statement about the album; within the rules by which techno operates, I believe what all the reviewers I've read have to say about its affect. So I should probably just finally learn my lesson about my relationship to the overall genre and move on.

The last three '07 albums I've bought and not yet reviewed were: Aesop Rock - None Shall Pass; Dan Deacon - Spiderman of the Rings; and, Okkervil River - The Stage Names. I haven't listened to any of them enough to write credible reviews, but have listened to them enough to know they aren't going to make my year-end lists. None Shall Pass is dense and a bit intimidating, it will fall around a 7 rating. Dan Deacon is fun and fluffy but sort of substanceless - let's call his album a 6. Finally, The Stage Names has me cursing Pitchfork. If I wanted to listen to straightforward "roots" rock, I'd buy Bruce Springsteen albums. I'll admit first single "Our Life is Not a Movie or Maybe" hooked me with its vocal tics, but as a whole the album feels like I've tuned into a self-serious classic rock station. In the final wash it'll get a 5 from me at best.

Phew! My New Year's resolutions for '08 are to try and stay more current with albums - both buying them and reviewing them - as they come out. Thanks to anyone who's still reading!