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Mac's Top 40 - Part 3

Posted at 2:38 PM on December 17, 2009 by Mac Wilson (1 Comments)

My top ten albums of the year:

10. Black Lips, 200 Million Thousand
Song for song, this is as good a "rock" album I've heard in 2009. Most "garage" bands either try to hard or don't have the chops to succeed. Are Black Lips geniuses who know how to brilliantly dumb down their music, or are they a bunch of knuckleheads who get by on raw talent? The answer is both: that's the joy of the band's mythos. Like the Nuggets box set rolled into a single album, with twice the vomit & sweat.

9. Yeah Yeah Yeahs, It's Blitz!
If you heard that the Yeah Yeah Yeahs were going down a dancier route, this is the best result you could have hoped for. Nick Zinner is still the MVP, his guitar cutting a bold figure throughout. This is their best album.

8. David Bazan, Curse Your Branches
Bazan, once known for instilling his indie rock songs with his own Christian values, has fallen off the religion wagon and now describes himself as an agnostic. I call shenanigans. I think Bazan knows exactly what he believes, whether he wants to admit it or not. He may as well have called this Confessions of an Atheist, as every song mourns the absence of God in our lives and his own. This isn't an album so much as it is a polemic, with its recurring images and metaphors. Even the radio-friendly songs have him begging his family for forgiveness in the wake of his alcoholism (which, presumably, flourished in the wake of his fall from religion). I'm amazed at his honesty and the strength it must have taken to make such a record; I hope he has been able to find some peace with his own convictions, as uneasy as they may make him feel.

7. St. Vincent, Actor
Winner of 2009's honorary Dear Science­ Museum Piece Award, an album that's so immaculately constructed that it's impossible to fall in love with. Actor is critic's bait in every sense, with top-notch musicianship, arrangements, and lyrics that play out like the Julianne Moore sequences of The Hours. It's also a bit distant, like the listener is watching one of the Disney movies from which Annie Clark supposedly drew inspiration. Impressive is the best word. It may be the Mark Ingram Jr. of this year's crop of albums: very impressive, not particularly flashy, and the safe bet in the awards races. Look for this to finish in the top ten at the Pazz & Jop poll. I'd vote for it.

6. The Mountain Goats, The Life of the World to Come
This is an example of when reading reviews can be a good thing. I was ready to write it off, convinced that this time around, John Darnielle's songs had no hidden layers and subsequent magic. I gradually became convinced, though, that the Bible verse theme allowed more shades and intepretations than I'd thought. Perhaps moreso than any other album in rock history (seriously now) the song titles become part of the essential rubric of the music. Each song is nice on its own, but once you take the corresponding Bible verse into account, they take on fractal-like dimensions. The melodies are only B-plus, but I won't complain. I feel foolish for having doubted in the first place.

5. various artists, Dark Was the Night
I toyed with the idea of putting this at number 1. In a way, this was the perfect way to cap the decade: in the era of MP3 blogs, Dark Was the Night feels like the mix tape of a lifetime. It isn't even really an album (although it is sequenced & packaged like one), more like a place for dozens of your favorite artists to get together and contribute their own little slice of history. Like if all the people in the "We Are the World" choir had contributed an song instead of just one line. It would be overwhelming, have us checking our watches after a while, but also providing countless moments of wonder. Jose Gonzalez channeling his idol Nick Drake, Sufjan's first brand new studio song since Illinois, Yeasayer stepping into the indie rock limelight with "Tightrope," and the National providing the flagship track, "So Far Around the Bend". Best of all might be Feist's duet with Ben Gibbard, covering Vashti Bunyan's "Train Song," wading through uncertainty with the hope that something great lies ahead. It's the song I associate with the quiet nights in the hospital after Theo was born. In a way, it will always be my song of 2009.

4. Bat for Lashes, Two Suns
The musical equivalent of the Renaissance Festival: a kitschy fiction that's a hell of a lot of fun to visit. Natasha Khan has apparently made a concept album about two warring personalities, even though the plot line is even harder to follow than The Hazards of Love. It's an album begging for descriptors (I considered half-a-dozen analogies while writing this just now) but in the end, I enjoy listening to this. It's bizarre music that I have no business falling for. But I do.

3. The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, The Pains of Being Pure at Heart
This feels like a bit of an upset, that this band ranks as high as it does. This is an absolutely airtight collection of songs; as one of my Twitter cohorts pointed out, it's all the attributes of early '90s music that don't suck. The guitar riffs are sharp and clearheaded, the hooks jump from every instrument, the epics rival M83 in their grandeur. The only thing wrong with this band is their name. Debut of the year.

2. Bill Callahan, Sometimes I Wish We Were an Eagle
Much like my #1 artist, Bill Callahan addresses the very essence of artistry, the struggle to find one's own artistic voice in light of others and of self. Callahan constructs elaborate metaphors about the construction of his own craft, delving into the artist's mind in "Jim Cain" and "All Thoughts Are Prey to Some Beast". "Eid Ma Clack Shaw" is its own punchline; I won't spoil it further, but suffice to say it's a twisted and ultimately hilarious slant on the songwriting process. I haven't yet mentioned "Too Many Birds," which is built around a particular lyrical conceit (again, I won't spoil it) that seems to work on paper but reaches an even more heartstopping peak in song. I haven't yet mentioned the Sam Harris-quoting "Faith/Void," which in a year ripe with singer-songwriters re-evaluating their relationships with God (hint: there's more of them to come on this list), may have struct the simplest, most comforting chord. Did I mention the arrangements? DID I?!? This is one of the most gorgeous albums of the year, with string arrangements that rise and fall in accordance with Callahan's own words. Sometimes I Wish We Were an Eagle is a masterpiece from all angles, one that deserves both scrutiny and appreciation.

1. Julian Casablancas, Phrazes for the Young
Character arcs in pop music are always fascinating. I enjoy tracing a musician's development, musically & lyrically, over time. This is one of the main reasons why Strokes frontman Julian Casablancas' solo debut, Phrazes for the Young, resonated with me in 2009. On the last Strokes record, First Impressions of Earth, he was morose & self-loathing, almost eagerly anticipating his own demise. I was in college when it was released, and I connected with his sentiments, for better or worse. By 2009, by observing Casablancas' own maturation, it may be possible to trace my own:

Somewhere along the way, my hopefulness turned to sadness,
Somewhere along the way, my sadness turned to bitterness,
Somewhere along the way, my bitterness turned to anger,
Somewhere along the way, my anger turned to vengeance.
Somewhere along the way, exacting vengeance gave excitement,
Somewhere along the way, that excitement turned to pleasure,
Somewhere along the way, that pleasure turned to madness,
Sooner or later that kind of madness turns into pain.

Forgive them, even if they are not sorry.

Casablancas paints his record with an enormous palette, as classic synth-rock meets 2000s indie rock. It is a barrage of instrumentation, seeming to spring from his "hands and feet and kisses" into our permanent memory. Is it the guitars, the Casio keyboards, or the drum machines that make songs like "Out of the Blue" and "River of Brakelights" stick to the wall? "11th Dimension" features one of the best faux-Peter Hook basslines ever, and yet it's only the 3rd or 4th most memorable hook in the song. Casablancas' vocal refrains are as memorable as always, even showcasing his falsetto on "Glass". This would be a fun record to sing karaoke to at 2am after a long night of partying. Which is probably a conscious attribute of the overall sound.

For being such a misanthrope, Casablancas has made an album that brings pure pleasure. I have yet to tire of it after listening to it virtually every day for the last 2 months. Do I need an excuse for putting it in the top spot other than 'I like listening to it more than anything else released this year'? I'm not going to overthink this. Phrazes for the Young is my #1 album of 2009.


Check out part one and part two if you missed it.

Comments (1)

yeah, i love this album

Posted by jon | December 17, 2009 7:04 PM

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