Seasons grettings, seasons gorgings. Alphabeticalville:
A-Trak - Dirty South Dance: Pretty great! Will make an excellent New Years mix. Like Ross said already, it's kind of this year's Night Ripper -- a cleaner mix (and technically a better one) but doesn't hit as many pleasure centers, which means it also doesn't have the side effect of feeling like it's "cheating" or taking cheap shots at said pleasure centers. Congrats, you set off my Pavlovian reaction to [insert 90s alt-rock song + rap verse] for thirty seconds.
Against Me! - New Wave: Falls uncomfortably between the Offspring and the Hold Steady. Nu-Green Day does this to me, too -- I recognize songs and hooks folded in there and just totally tune out anyway (there's even a meta-protest song: the awkward chant-along "Protest songs! In response to military aggression! Protest songs! Try and stop the soldier's guns!" is about as not-catchy as you'd expect it to be). The samey pseudo-angry voice only works when the hooks are hugely strong or the sound is a little more diverse. Generally it's pretty standard bread-n-butter rock-chug (there's an occasional foray into dance-rock-chug but that's about as stick-in-butt as everything else), and the stories being told (generally disillusioned lonely yung peoples making Serious Decisions) don't really spark my brain to visualize the narrator's world the way Hold Steady can when they're good. I guess I'd compare it in that respect to Boys and Girls in America. I also can't tell when the main dude is being sarcastic and/or knowingly ambivalent about some of the more overwrought sentiment about Love and War and Frustration. They don't seem to know whom they're putting on, so they hedge their bets by sneering "uh, everyone. Including us." in some gruff-voiced approximation of anger and end up sounding really wishy-washy.
Bat for Lashes - Fur and Gold: I liked this for a few songs, but it just about irrevocably dirges out around track 5. Gothic twee, with a cipher-songwriter lady at the center, lots of space between the jangles of various tingling treble strings (harpsichords, pianos...uh, lutes? Zither? What is that thing?) and a crawling bass. I like their rhythm section, spare, equal parts Phil Spector thump + tambourine and a sort of acoustic approximation of glitchy electrobeat. Good non-Nashian use of simple piano figures for atmospheric effect and weak melodic hooks. But at some point it stops creeping along and starts lurching along and I zone out. (Also, she's a total one-note cipher, no tangibly different productions to accommodate, so I lose track of her personality even in the course of a single song.)
Battles - Mirrored: It's not really my speed or style, as I can't find any practical use for listening to it that isn't what I'm doing right now -- thinking about it for the first time and bobbing my head while trying to capture first impressions. It's not walkable, it's not danceable, it's not really even backgroundable. But it's pretty good. Music for Blogspots -- I can imagine a lot of people out there in cyberspace bobbing their heads and writing what amount to first impressions; there's a big market for such music. I like how Gary Glitter will take over their rhythm section when he feels like it (in "Atlas," anyway), I like how they try to find ways around the fact that (presumably) none of them can sing. I like that they can swing in their own dorky, hulking sorta way. I like that their music reminds me of toy robots marching along w/ heads spinning around shooting off sparkler sparks. But I don't like the sinking suspicion that I will never ever listen to this again. Around track 6 or 7 it noodly-noodles off into boring-ass oblivion.
Vanilla Hudge - V: Pretty boring, with about five interesting tracks and maybe three or so good ones (four counting "Don't Talk" bonus track). "Say OK," the weirdass song about female empowerment that sounds more like a "Maneater" for boardrooms ("Never Underestimate a Girl," which would sound a lot better given the rhyme scheme as "Never Underestimate a MAN"...hmmmm), "Let's Dance" on a good day, and maybe "Rather Be with You," which is a nice big T-E-E-N-P-O-P number that isn't so J-Lo-Lite (which is probably one of the worst kinds of lite).
Low - Drums and Guns: Really beautiful, mournful -- I suspect lyrical bullshit here but I can't parse it enough to figure it out (yet) if it's there (which it just as well might not be, it's just a hunch) and meanwhile this is the best careful layering up from nothing-style production I've heard in this bunch, and there've been a lot of attempts at it. I'm not that familiar with Low, but the sound is certainly cleaner and more meticulous than the last one of theirs I heard, and the interplay between man/woman[-man? Is it all the lead singer?] vocals is pretty gorgeous. Seems righteous and sad, and if it sticks it might be my indie(ish) pick of the year. Sadder than LCD, more righteous than Arcade Fire. (Will also give it a few chances because it's Ross's #1 of the year.)
Lupe Fiasco - The Cool: I'm really not convinced at all that Lupe ain't DENSE AS FRUITCAKE. As usual the beats are cool but this time the lyrics really bug me (the groan-inducing prelude was probably fair warning). He's pretty smug for such a seeming dumbass. The beats-only version would be nice enough, but I keep getting mad at him.
Kate Nash - Made of Bricks: She's not kidding, this thing PLODS. But I don't hate it. I can't shake the feeling that I'm listening to a female equivalent of Ben Folds in the ham-fisted piano dept., and I can't tell when I think her bluntness is funny(ish) or just plain annoying. So I'm on the fence, but I kind of want to like her given how much the Brits hate her! Don't think it's really going to happen, but I also won't contribute to the campaign to have her blacklisted (I'm also a little sensitive to this because I just finished Roth's I Married a Communist).
Linda Thompson - Versatile Heart: A neutral guitar intro and quick nice tune fake-out on the second (title) track led me to believe this would be a pretty solid singer-songwriter country/folk sorta thing, a low-key rusty acoustic, pleasant-enough album. And then she starts in with the Chuck Berry-ish lyrics done drab w/ arched eyebrow, the Antony cameo, the song about how a lady shouldn't drive a Mercedes cuz it'll break her heart when it breaks down (HAW HAW) delivered dryly like she was telling the joke to an NPR interview. I turned it off during the Tom Waits cover ("Day After Tomorrow"), when she took a song I actually kindasorta like -- dubious distinction as Gorilla vs. Bear's "saddest song ever written"(!) notwithstanding (just found googling the lyrics) -- and pointlessly low-keyed it up (/down) even more to prove that it could be, uh...folkier? Yuck.
Yelle - Pop Up: Enjoyable, slightly hyper take on CSS-like dance/disco-pop that I like a lot better than CSS, except there's no big song for me to hang onto (just lots of little songs). I said to Jimmy Draper that it had a "dash of Bis" in there. (Turns out he'd already sent this to me and deleted it from his computer, but is keeping it around for its backgroundability.) Probably a sleeper favorite from the bunch, but don't think it would make my top 20. Gets monotonous past the halfway point.
Can't remember a note, but remember it being pretty good: Mary Weiss and Reigning Sound - Dangerous Game and Wu-Tang Clan - 8 Diagrams.
Can't remember a note, but remember it being not s'good: Manu Chao - La Radiolina, Les Savy Fav - Let's Stay Friends
Remember a few notes, liked: Vanessa Carlton - Heroes & Thieves, Charlotte Hatherley - The Deep Blue, Pleasure (Fred Ball) - Pleasure 2 [Really enjoy the big-single-type songs, could take or leave the rest], Melt-Banana - Bambi's Dilemma, Enrique - Insomniac
Remember a few notes, disliked: Bonde do Role - With Lasers, Stooges - The Weirdness
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