Top 50 Albums of the 00s - #18: Fleet Foxes - Fleet Foxes

Yep, we're counting down the top 50. Click here for overview and criteria.

Of course it starts off a capella. Anything else would simply be wrong. But it's the most rustic thing you've ever heard. Like a moment from the O Brother Where Art Thou? soundtrack that didn't make the cut because it sounded a generation too early. That initial tease only lasts 20 seconds, and as we really get into that first track, the band patiently adds layers throughout its three minutes. At this point, they are simply a bird showing its plumage - a display of capabilities. If the rest of the songs were to continue this way, we would say "this is a group of extremely talented singers who harmonize as well as anyone in the history of music" and leave it at that. But by the time we get just one minute into "White Winter Hymnal" it's clear that we're here for something amazing.

Fleet Foxes certainly fit into the neo-folk movement that became a fixture of the indie circuit in the second half of the decade. Bands like Grizzly Bear, Beach House, and The Shins each put out their version of modern harmonized beauty, and though they came close, weren't quite compelling enough make the Top 50 list here. Fleet Foxes' take is not as revolutionary, and maybe it's because they stayed more true to their roots that they achieved so much in their debut self-titled album. Or maybe they're just that freaking talented.

"Ragged Wood" is perfectly named, a light, rambling piece of music that builds on what the first two tracks started. It may not be conceptually profound, but the sonic teamwork calmly soars above the slight guitar notes. "Tell me anything you want. Any old lie will do. Call me back to, back to you." It's the way they say it. Despite all the praise I've doled out, the second half of the record is even better. "He Doesn't Know Why" (video here) has all the potential energy of a building tilting ever closer to the ground but never quite collapsing.

"Your Protector" uses a driving rhythm and vocals peaking to set up the bombastic harmonies in the chorus: "You ruuuuuun with the devil." The record climaxes with the absolutely shimmering brilliance of "Blue Ridge Mountains," a song befitting the landscape it deals with. Listening to the record as a whole, I can't help be struck by two things. The first is just how incredibly together the band is, and everyone who saw them at 2008's Pitchfork Music Festival witnessed how well they can pull it off in concert. The second is that the band (and production team) clearly put in a ton of attention and effort in making this record. This is not garage rock. Each note seems cared for like a child.

I have no idea where the band will go from here. If they put out the same kind of record again, I will not be upset, but it seems hard to imagine they can outdo themselves while keeping the exact same style. All I know is that every time I play this album I find myself singing its songs out loud for about two weeks, especially in any place with a decent echo. I suppose it's not for everyone, but I wouldn't have thought it was for me, either. The music is too good not to adore it. But you can judge for yourself.






Previous Entries:
#19 - Band of Horses - Everything All the Time
#20 - The Lawrence Arms - Oh! Calcutta!
#21 - Amy Winehouse - Back to Black
#22 - Mission of Burma - The Obliterati
#23 - Don Caballero - World Class Listening Problem
#24 - The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots
#25 - Tapes 'n Tapes - The Loon
#26 - Kings of Leon - Aha Shake Heartbreak
#27 - Idlewild - 100 Broken Windows
#28 - Common - Be

The Alternative 90s: The AV Club's Retrospective: 1993

Here we continue to react to the Steven Hyden's take on the Alternative 90s. Click over yonder to review Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.

Hyden ventures away from Seattle in his review of 1993, focusing on the acts that made it big from his closest metropolis as a teenager and my hometown: Chicago.

My expectations for this segment were far too lofty. But that's understandable. Of all my musical passions in life, this "moment" was the most inextricable from my own existence. I graduated high school and found the profound liberation that is college life. Those events were inextricably linked with the development of my passion as a music fan. Plus, it certainly didn't hurt that 18-and-over shows were suddenly events available to me. It was the first real awakening of my life; the music couldn't have mattered more. And the Smashing Pumpkins' Siamese Dream was the album that it all centered around. It was the first record I truly connected with. I even believed with great certainty that Billy Corgan and I had nearly everything in common. Perish the thought...

But I had very little to do with the other two albums Hyden covers. Liz Phair was undoubtedly important, giving an indie voice to women that hadn't existed. If mainstream trends are founded on grassroots movements that comprise the initial foundation, then Phair opened the door for Tori Amos, Fiona Apple, and every Lilith Fair. Hyden's take on the album is awfully cogent:

"I found Guyville titillating and unnerving, which is essentially how I felt at the time about every girl I had ever met. In my world, women had all of the power, which created a not-quite-healthy mix of worship and resentment of femininity that’s common to a lot of boys that age."

That's my soul up there, man. Or at least it definitely was in 1993.

He then gets into Urge Overkill, a band that held my interest for all of twelve minutes or so. The rock world didn't stick around a whole lot longer. This is all backdrop to tackle the concept of "selling out" - tremendously important in 1993. And Hyden provides great context here, quoting the gleefully dickish Steve Albini. Albini raised the torch of the true underground.

"To Albini, indie-ness was both a science and an evangelical religion; he could be persuasively pragmatic about how bands were better off personally and creatively treating music as a pastime rather than a job, and then land patently insulting roundhouse blows against anyone dumb, silly, or unlucky enough to disagree with his fiercely held views."

It never struck me that there were so many levels to the notion of selling out to the mainstream and being true underground. Without a doubt, I would have been declared a poseur by many. I must admit that in my life, I used people's taste in music to judge them. But this was never more true than in 1993. Let's put it into context. Despite the success of Nirvana and Pearl Jam, most people were still into some pretty terrible music and pop culture in general. Zubaz pants were only one year past their peak, for instance. Most of my high school class was into the Grateful Dead or classic rock. To be with the kids that gravitated toward something new was to refute the status quo.

It took me years and years to stop judging people based on their personal tastes. Today it is totally irrelevant to me, but perhaps at the time taste was a clearer indicator of character than anything. There was, for those brief couple of years, a difference between people who liked Pegboy and those who liked The Beatles. There was something reliable about each group. So while Albini may have been tilting at windmills, he at least did so with a worthy point.

Meanwhile, at the very same time, something was starting in alternative music that would never be stopped. That something was perfectly embodied by the Spin Doctors. A crappy band with a crappy name and crappy songs packaged to appeal to the Alternative generation. Perhaps Hyden is leaving them alone for now to lump them in with Candlebox and Collective Soul when we get to 1994. But the hijacking of the movement had already begun. I mention this now because it is central to the issue. If someone said they were a fan of "alternative music", yet hit the town wearing a Spin Doctors t-shirt, you could immediately tell that they weren't part of any scene.

Back to the band at hand - Smashing Pumpkins. As I said, at 18 this album was one of the most important things I'd ever owned. I went to two of their warm-up gigs at Metro, assuming the next time they came through Chicago it would be at the Aragon, then the UIC Pavilion, then Soldier Field. In a way, those were the last shows I saw as an impressionable youth. Just a couple months later, the band was taking the world by storm, and I had to play up the fact that I had the EPs, not just the albums. I was still trying to show how cool I was by talking up a band everybody already knew.

We all know what Billy Corgan became. And I was one of the last people to acknowledge it. Hyden sums up what happened to the band thusly:

"Like Klaus Kinski in Werner Herzog’s masterpiece of megalomania, Aguirre, The Wrath Of God, Corgan kept the band together to satisfy his maniacal pursuit of endless power and riches. In Aguirre, Kinski ends up adrift on a lonely stretch of the Amazon with a raft full of corpses and wild monkeys; Corgan had better transportation, riding the stainless steel perfection of Siamese Dream’s impeccably conceived guitar-rock hymns straight to the promised land."

The point here is that he was selling out from day one. Whether Corgan was always a nutty egomaniacal asshole could probably be easily determined. But I don't care to make that determination. For me, 1993 will always be the year that I broke out and it wouldn't have happened without this music. By the next year, the alternative scene ship had wrecked. At the very least, I had to start choosing friends on a more substantive basis. All part of growing up.

But let's make sure we end on a high note. 18-year-old me is somewhere in this mosh pit. See if you can find me. I'm the one going crazy...



Part 5 was posted today, which means I'm behind (as usual). Feel free to dig into that one here.

It will make you shake a turkey

Overheard this track on EdWord's latest podcast. It was far too compelling not to share with the rest of you. Play it loud.

Top 50 Albums of the 00s - #19: Band of Horses - Everything All The Time

Yep, we're counting down the top 50. Click here for overview and criteria.

The album sets out floating on dreamy waves that have no real business on a rock record. Ben Bridwell's vocals are so high pitched they border on whining. But the track is really just there to set the scene. It's by contrasting with the opener that the record finds its groove. Hell, they couldn't even think of a good name, calling it "The First Song." Might as well have just used "Amuse-bouche." When "Wicked Gil" kicks in with its pulsing riffs, it sounds like Swervedriver by comparison.

Band of Horses was founded by Bridwell and Mat Brooke in Seattle when their previous group, Carissa's Wierd fell apart. I knew very little about that band, but must say I'm not sad to hear that they are no more. The obvious highlight on the record is the catchy single, "The Funeral." The song did so well on the indie circuit that the band had problems dealing with the success. Leveraging off the rampup of the first three tracks, "The Funeral" is meant to be ironically positive, and the music is downright triumphant. You can't ignore this song. It would have been fine if they had made that the record's centerpiece and left it at that. But every tune that follows brings its own importance. These are songs with some weight. Despite the ambiguous lyrics, they somehow matter. Well, maybe not "Weed Party" but it's fun enough that you can forgive its levity.

The ebbs and flows of the album pass quickly (it's only 36 minutes long) and we arrive at the end way before we're ready to be done listening. I have always been a sucker for harmonies, perhaps because I can sing along with my mediocre voice. In quiet moments, the vocals resemble echoes of one another. It's a unique sound that gets deep into my head every time I hear it. "St. Augustine" in particular will stay with me for days on end. Unfortunately after this release, Brooke left the band and even though the subsequent records are solid in their own ways, they haven't captured that subtle soul since. Everything All The Time remains both a testament to their collaboration and in heavy rotation on my stereo. I don't expect that to change anytime soon.

Please enjoy some lo-fi videos...

The Funeral


I Go To the Barn Because I Like The


Monsters



Previous Entries:
#20 - The Lawrence Arms - Oh! Calcutta!
#21 - Amy Winehouse - Back to Black
#22 - Mission of Burma - The Obliterati
#23 - Don Caballero - World Class Listening Problem
#24 - The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots
#25 - Tapes 'n Tapes - The Loon
#26 - Kings of Leon - Aha Shake Heartbreak
#27 - Idlewild - 100 Broken Windows
#28 - Common - Be
#29 - The Futureheads - News and Tributes

The Alternative 90s: The AV Club's Retrospective: 1992

Here we continue to react to the Steven Hyden's take on the Alternative 90s. We started with Part 1 here.

In covering 1992, Hyden focuses almost exclusively on Pearl Jam, using them to highlight the double-edged sword that is massive mainstream popularity. Hyden does excellent research here and has penned what is so far the best column in the series. The backstory on Pearl Jam is far more fascinating than I realized.

Honestly, the band never interested me that much. By the end of my freshman year of college, they were by far the most popular band in the world (of college freshmen) to the point where there had to be a painstaking explanation prepared for every guy wearing a dirty white baseball cap that couldn't understand where I was coming from. And this is really the whole point of Hyden's latest. How could a band that seemingly had no desire to be universally liked end up being the most popular band of its era? And what the hell are they supposed to do once they find themselves in that situation?

But first the setup. Hyden talks about how they arrived:

"I hated that the chorus didn’t tell you what 'even flow' was supposed to be, and the line about thoughts arriving like butterflies sounded like a bad Natalie Merchant lyric. Still, the video for 'Even Flow' succeeded in doing for Pearl Jam what the 'Pour Some Sugar On Me' video had done for Def Leppard four summers earlier: It made you wish really hard that Pearl Jam would come somewhere near your town very soon."

And that sounds about right. All of Ten is basically a series of riffs lifted from one Jimi Hendrix song - Voodoo Chile (Slight Return). That happens to be one of the greatest songs in the history of everything, so they certainly could have chosen worse. (Incidentally, hearing Even Flow can't help but remind me of Adam Sandler's caricature of Eddie Veder. That happen to you?)


There's no denying that Pearl Jam was the right place at the right time. No reasonable fan would consider them virtuosos in any respect. But to this day Eddie Vedder makes for a compelling frontman, the most accessible of the Alternative movement.

"As Vedder and his increasingly marginalized supporting cast distanced themselves from the record’s gauche chest-thumping by churning out progressively restrained, more 'mature,' and less expressive music, Ten was dusted off by other bands and recycled again and again. Today, Pearl Jam is a popular touring band and intermittently successful on the charts; Ten, meanwhile, is still all over modern-rock radio, though only a handful of the songs are actually by Pearl Jam."

The point is, it's nearly impossible to stay on top while doing something in earnest. I would add that it doesn't help if you're not a very talented band to begin with. As much as I am ragging on the band here, you have to give them credit. They could have gone the route that nearly every popular band from the 90s went. To "Jonas Brothers" it up. But they took another path.

"Pearl Jam isn’t the first veteran rock band to see a decrease in fans as it got older. But it’s the best example of a band deliberately expediting the process."

Hyden finishes by noting that with 20/20 hindsight we can easily identify that the band (and therefore the year 1992) represented a fulcrum for the direction of Alternative music.

"For three years, Vedder occupied a unique and important place in mainstream rock; that he allowed it to be taken over by people like Scott Stapp isn’t unforgivable, just unfortunate."

It's impossible to argue with that statement.

Part of me will forever associate Seattle with the early 90s grunge scene. My brother lived there for several years. I've visited twice. I've made many friends from that city. But even though it should have, my impression hasn't changed. Maybe because of the age I was and the way a person forms perspective. It's 2010, and I still view the Emerald City through flannel-colored glasses. That's not just unfair but ridiculous. And yet I'm sure that millions of people around the country think the same way.

Back to the topic at hand. Pearl Jam never meant very much to me, even as they were capturing all the hearts and minds surrounding me. Hence, I don't find myself caring that much about their story. In fact, I often forget they even exist. Futhermore, I forget that they were not only a part of the movement, but one of the two or three most important bands in it. But like I said, it's a fascinating story. This is a superb piece and you can tell Hyden is building to something even better. I can't wait for the next one. Good thing it comes out today.

One Word Review: Confessions of an American Bride

8: Childish

The Daily Show Ten Years ago

Been a while since we've done one of these, but since there's an election around the corner, let's reminisce a bit about, well, other problems we used to have...

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Indecision 2000 - Undecided
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Rally to Restore Sanity

The Alternative 90s: The AV Club's Retrospective: 1991

We kicked off by reaction to Part One earlier this week. Start there for background. Now we'll catch up with Part 2: 1991: What's so civil about war, anyway?.

Hyden devotes the majority of his 1991 column to the intense, public feud between Kurt Cobain and Axl Rose. It's an interesting place to move forward. Our collective memory doesn't recall a time when Hair Bands and Grunge Bands shared the same stage. We forget that Use Your Illusions I and II came out just a few months before Nevermind. For most people, these bands occupy times separated by years conceptually. Yet there was this tumultuous overlap. Hyden rightfully identifies the incongruity between reality and perception, and does some really solid research in providing key details. As Hyden points out, this was no mere battle of egos:

"Rose signified old-guard, cock-rock superstardom, and Cobain was never more deliberate in his desire to dismantle that institution than in his outspoken criticism of Guns N’ Roses."

That said, Hyden gives proper credit to GnR for transcending the other Hair Metal at the time (highlighting the Welcome to the Jungle video). There was a major difference between Guns n Roses and the rest of the Hair acts out there. They weren't singing "She's only seventeen" or about "Cherry Pie."

Hyden's main point is that there is a lot in more in common between these two iconic figures than people think. And he turns the column to the personal and how he interpreted all that was going on.

"In 'One In A Million,' Rose sings, 'It’s been such a long time since I knew right from wrong / It’s all a means to an end, I keep it movin’ along.' By the end of 1991, I chose Kurt Cobain over Axl Rose because I wanted someone who did know the difference between right and wrong."

For Hyden, this is the balancing point in his life as a music fan. And it was for many.

He touches on it briefly, but devotes so much time to the details that he misses what I believe is the interesting part about this moment in history. Nobody remembers that these were the two most popular American rock bands at the same time. And many people liked both. The stories he recants are crucial but don't really address the movement until that last line about knowing the difference. Not to go all Wesley Willis, but I saw Smashing Pumpkins open for Guns N Roses at the Rosemont Horizon in early 1992. Maybe such a bill didn't make any sense, but it happened. Some people booed and threw things during the Pumpkins set. Others appreciated the shredding taking place onstage. The booers would surely become enamored with Smashing Pumpkins two years later, and tell all their friends that they saw them when they were "nobody."

The thing is, both bands kicked ass on stage that night. And I didn't have to choose between them. In the moment it didn't feel like the end of anything. Only years later can we say that Grunge eliminated Hair Metal. I suppose that was Cobain's crusade and he was in tune with that goal. If that was a key objective for Cobain, he surely failed. Not because Axl's still here, but because of what became of Alternative Rock in the years to come (from Collective Soul to Matchbox 20 to Nickelback). In the end he didn't want Axl's throne, or really any more time in the spotlight. If this integrity issue was so important to him, then maybe it's for the best he didn't live past 1994. Then again, we only knew the glory days would be so short after the fact. But that's a topic yet to come.

Other comments:

Hyden says, "The dual release of the Use Your Illusion albums was an act of hubris so brazen in its arrogance and yet strangely admirable in its artistic stubbornness that nobody had been fucking crazy enough to try anything like it before, or attempt to copy it in the nearly two decades since." Perhaps it's not a perfect comparison because it's not like he's a huge star, but Tom Waits released both Blood Money and Alice on May 7, 2002.

I feel like Hyden missed an opportunity here. If this is really a retrospective look at the entire alternative movement, 1991 is the year where everything started to pivot. Obviously any movement takes years of gradual shifting to set up, but 1991 is the year everyone circles, and for good reason. Lollapalooza began that year. And all these are just some of the albums that were released:
Pearl Jam - Ten
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Blood Sugar Sex Magik
Smashing Pumpkins - Gish
Soundgarden - Badmotorfinger
Fishbone - The Reality of My Surroundings
Primus - Sailing the Seas of Cheese
Dinosaur Jr. - Green Mind
So he focused on a key story - a very important one, but I worry that we are losing the thread a bit. Still, another worthwhile read. Looking forward to 1992 which should be out tomorrow.

RIP Greg Giraldo

A long time ago Comedy Central aired a half-hour stand-up special by Greg Giraldo. I'd never head of him, but his act absolutely killed me. I think I watched it about 37 times. I could recite the whole thing for you right now. Over the years his routine progressed, becoming angrier, more incisive and manic. Hypocrisy was his most frequent target, but no conventional wisdom was safe. I caught his act at Zanies in Chicago a few years back, and he was so torqued up that even unexpected laughter from the audience threw him off his game a bit. But you got the feeling that he enjoyed those moments even more.

Giraldo graduated from Harvard Law School, but gave up on that career to try his hand at comedy. It's obviously one of the most challenging professions to attempt, and even harder to find true success. In the end, stand up comedy is a matter of taste. There are people who think Andrew Dice Clay was the best ever, and they have a right to their opinion. There are people who find Dane Cook better than tolerable. And they can be right, too. If you think it's funny, you laugh. I can say that there was never a comedian who fit my specific tastes better than Giraldo. If a scientist went into a lab to create a one just for me, he'd have a hell of a time doing any better than Mr. and Mrs. Giraldo already did. I'm really going to miss whatever he would have had to say about the news and our culture as they unfold in the future. I don't think we'll find another quite like him...

The Alternative 90s. The AV Club's Restrospective: 1990

In reviewing the Top 50 Albums of the 00's, even though I have clearly enjoyed the journey through the decade's best, I have found myself longing for a more prolific time. I turned 14 in 1989, the perfect age to receive the gift that was the ascension of Alternative Rock. My rock and roll formative years began right then. It was a tremendous time to care about music, and thanks to my own impulses and a series of friends who helped me connect to everything I was hearing, everything that happened during the entire decade had a profound effect on me. I wasn't a hipster savant who found the greatest unknown rawk discoveries way before anyone else. But I kind of felt like it anyway. Growing up just outside Chicago, we had unfettered access to some of the world's greatest record stores, random independent and college radio stations, and even some all-ages shows. In some ways, it was the first time I truly cared about something.

Over at the AV Club, Steven Hyden is reviewing the 1990s Grunge movement year by year. I happen to find this a totally worthy endeavor for the reasons above and many more. Much of what happened in those halcyon days has been lost because there was no internet to document them, or because nobody's made an iconic movie yet, or simply because we've all moved on.

What Hyden is doing is more important than it seems at first glance. If you're in your 30s, then I urge you to read the feature and find your own reaction. If you're younger, well, as Hyden says, I shouldn't say something like "you missed out!" But really, you did. And if you want to know why mainstream music sucks ass the way it does today, it's important to understand that it once sucked even more ass, and somehow that got fixed, but only for a couple of years before it rapidly eased its way back to sucking ass.

Because I have my own ideas and experience (and blog), I'm going to post my reaction to each of Hyden's ten segments. Up first, Part 1: 1990.

Hyden sets the table well. He gives his background, calling himself an "awkward adolescent from Appleton, Wisconsin." The context is important here. He doesn't completely explain quite how bad the music scene had been. He mentions some of the atrocities, but it's important to remember that by the end of 1989 we're only a year removed from New Kids on the Block. We were at the apex of Richard Marx, Bobby Brown, Paula Abdul, Milli Vanilli. "Rock" music offered Poison, Great White, Mike and the Mechanics, White Lion, and a duet between Cher and Peter Cetera. Vanilla Ice was yet to come. Hyden chooses to play a bit loose with the timeline here as the majority of the column deals with the mainstream arrival of Nirvana's "Nevermind," something that didn't really start happening until 1992 (the album was released at the end of September in 1991). Just so we're clear about the context, here are the top 12 singles from 1990:
1. Hold On, Wilson Phillips
2. It Must Have Been Love, Roxette
3. Nothing Compares 2 U, Sinead O'Connor
4. Poison, Bell Biv Devoe
5. Vogue, Madonna
6. Vision of Love, Mariah Carey
7. Another Day In Paradise, Phil Collins
8. Hold On, En Vogue
9. Cradle of Love, Billy Idol
10. Blaze of Glory, Jon Bon Jovi
11. Do Me!, Bell Biv Devoe
12. How Am I Supposed to Live Without You, Michael Bolton

So yes, apart from Billy Idol's death rattle, those were dark days indeed, especially in Appleton, Wisconsin.

But given that we're here to celebrate the past, perhaps it doesn't make sense to dwell too much on the bleak state of pop music entering the decade. Hyden jumps forward because if you're going to talk about rock in the 90s, the discussion must begin with Nevermind. And he couldn't be more on-point with the key issues:

"Kurt Cobain turned himself into a radio star at a time when somebody like him becoming a radio star seemed unfathomable."

"These guys were not supposed to be here, on MTV, sandwiched between Jane Child and Lisa Stanfield videos at 1 p.m. on a Tuesday."

The truly amazing thing that happened in the 1990s is that for a brief period of time, the inmates ran the asylum. Or at least that's the way it seemed. Bands that had no business becoming rock stars became the biggest rock stars in the world. And like any revolution, it happened seemingly without warning. After controlling which bands made it big throughout the 80s, the industry was caught by surprise. This never happens in mainstream music. I hope that we get into the details in the entries regarding subsequent years.

Eventually, Hyden steers away from the musical implications and arrives at the social ones, saying:

"I honestly wonder if the rise of grunge and alternative rock in the early ’90s will be the last time that a musical movement has that kind of impact on youth culture."

That topic, only touched upon, leaves a lot of room for exploration. Did youth culture actually change in ways it wouldn't have otherwise? Was the "Smells Like Teen Spirit" video the reason tattoos became mainstream? (I had always attributed this to Alan Iverson, but I now question that theory.) Did young Americans really start to think a different way? Is The Big Bang Theory in the here and now because of Nevermind? These questions deserve their own posting, and perhaps Hyden will go into more detail later. As someone who lived through it, it's impossible to answer. There's no "control sample" me.

To sum up, an excellent start to the series for Hyden, and I greatly look forward to the subsequent entries. 1991 is already up, and we'll take a look at it here as soon as possible.

Please share your thoughts. Where were you when your face first melted to something other than Hendrix or Hazel? And what do you think of Hyden's premises?