Nobody knows you and nobody gives a damn

The end of the year is ripe for music recaps. Everyone talking about the best of 2006. What I'm really missing this year is Pitchfork's Worst Of . But, despite my compulsive checking, that most humorous of lists from last year has not made a reapearance, and so I am left to my own devices. The only radio I really listen to is NPR, as mentioned in a previous post I rely mostly on friends, and sometimes the internet, to find new music. Since my friends who make it their business to have good taste in music generally don't post things on the internet, I can't point you their way. But here are a couple of other people, who I unfortunately don't know personally, who listen to good music:
Jeph Jacques of Questionable Content, in addition to writing the most kickass webcomic I've encountered, he has an awesome list of music under the RL tab at the top of the page.
Heather Armstrong aka Dooce. She doesn't do a lot with music anymore, but she also lists some quality stuff periodically (close observers will note that both Jeph and Heather mention Wolf Parade's "I'll Believe Anything").

And so, without further ado, my 2006 Music List. Compiled based on what I listened to obsessively this year, cause that's what's fun.

Stars: Set Yourself on Fire

I listened to this album compulsively after seeing it mentioned in an acquaintance's blog. It was something I had heard in the radio station and copied for further examination... but as with most things discovered during my last semester of college, it pretty much was forgotten until I had an excuse to look back at it. I went to their concert in Boulder in February, which was quite good. I don't know how the album will hold up over time, I find that I'm not able to listen to it all the way through any more. The stellar tracks, to my mind, are "Your Ex-Lover is Dead" and "One More Night" (I notice that on wikipedia this song is given the subtitle "your ex lover remains dead" I find this intriguing, but have never seen it listed as such before). I saw this concert with my friend Richard, who was my first boyfriend and my first ex lover.

Wilco: Yankee Hotel Foxtrot

It's classic. There are some things for which I am behind the curve. Wilco is unfortunately one of them. This album makes me think of one of my favorite people, of miscommunication, lost love, beauty, and irony. I don't have a whole lot else to say about it. I can't really listen to it all of the way through anymore, but I love all of the different pieces. I can listen to "I am Trying to Break Your Heart", "Jesus Etc." and "Poor Places" over and over. And some days I do.

Spoon:Kill the Moonlight

My friend Tim was preparing for a play when I went back and visited Guilford for the first, and so far only, time since graduating. At some point he asked my friend Leise to put this album on because it made him think about the play. I didn't see the play, and I don't remember which one it was anyway. However I really liked what I heard, and thanks to the infamous Aaron, I already had basically everything Brit Daniel ever looked at with creative intention, on my ipod. And so it may be hard to pick favorites, "The Way We Get By" sucked me in, "Stay Don't Go" hooked me, "Paper Tiger" snuck up on me.

I subsequently discovered Gimme Fiction.

It is also quite awesome. Harder to pick individual tracks. In April I saw a free Spoon show. While it is generally not something I am very happy thinking about (not the stuff of a music blog, not tonight... check back later though...), I went with Lynn, who hangs out with Maris the Great and once introduced me to him (though he probably doesn't remember it). It was awesome.

Tarkio:Omnibus


I started looking for this before I could even find rumors of it. I saw The Decemberists at the Paramount Theatre in Denver in October of 2005, and at one point during the show Colin Meloy came out and played "Save Yourself" alone. I scribbled the lyrics into my journal , and when I got home I searched for them. I was uber disappointed to learn that it was not from a forthcoming album, but in fact from Colin Meloy's first band. At that point it was one of those things where they were maybe sorta gonna re release the music, but no one really knew. And from my years of trying to get ahold of My So Called Life, I knew that while it might eventually happen, it could take awhile. So imagine my thrill when I discovered, on reading Pitchfork one day, that omnibus was set for release in late January. Review's aside, it's nice to know that even succesful geek rockers had their awkward college years.


The Dresden Dolls: Yes Virginia

Similarly to Spoon, the Dresden Dolls have some... unfortunate associations in my mind. Mostly that is with the first album, which, thankfully, I didn't listen to quite as compulsively as "Yes Virginia" I also met Meg at the Dresden Dolls show... which was magic (here was where I was going to link to my friend Amitai and how he and I saw Blood Diamond and he says he is going to start using "magic" to mean awesome the way Leonardo DiCaprio does in the flick... but he locked the post so you wouldn't be able to see it anyway). Anyway, I went to the show with very little knowledge of the band, and left the show in love with them. My love only grew after seeing their "F*ck the Back Row" burlesque and short film tour in July. I have since seen them in Wasington DC, and love them more each time. They are more than a musical artsists, they are true performers.

Sufjan Stevens: The Avalanche

I already have an entire post about this album, so I'm not going to say much more about it. Other than that there's a term, Viral Video, which refers to those short movies that people make and put on the internet, you know, the ones with dancing hamsters or squirrels or Harry Potters or kids lip- synching into their webcams on a loop that you can't help but watch over and over an over... "Bobby Got a Shadfly Stuck in His Hair" is a viral song for me.

TV on the Radio: Return to Cookie Mountain

Ah, the most anticipated, leaked, lauded album of the year. I was a sucker for "Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes", I have "Young Liars", "Ok Calculator" and "New Health Rock". I checked TVoTR's website compulsively from February to September waitng... by the way, I have never seen a website that takes 3 months to launch. But TV on the Radio are just that cool. Everyone has already said everything there is to say about this album. I didn't acquire as early as *some* people, but I did acquire it before it was readily available in the US. Not to worry, I paid my dues and bought it legally as soon as I was able. Cause I'ma sucker like that.

The Decemberists: The Crane Wife

Do you ever listen to an album at the same time as you're reading a book, and from that point on the two are inextricably linked in your mind? So it is for me with The Crane Wife and Isabelle Allende's Zorro. I listened to almost nothing but this album for about two weeks straight. As promised, it is closer to The Tain than Picaresque, but I love them both. Actually, I pretty much love everything the Decemberists do. Take that, Colbert.

The Mountain Goats: Get Lonely

As with The Avalanche, I already have an entire post devoted to this album so I'm not going to go into any sort of deep thoughts about it. It is quality and I liked it, but as one friend said "It's no Sunset Tree".

This was also the year I made a couple of awesome mixes:
Pleasant and Demure, I can See Your Undies
Unbirthday
Art May Imitate Life, but Life Imitates TV
26,000 Tons or More

And also received a couple of awesome mixes, to be uploaded soon.

And one day we will die, and our ashes will fly...

I once asked one of my very best friends, and my stalwart source for new music, what one album he would take with him if he were stuck on a desert island and could only listen to that album for the rest of his life. (Mine is Abbey Road, for the record)

He said "Well, I have a hard time going through a day without listening to In the Aeroplane Over the Sea," which doesn't quite answer the question, but mostly does.

At the time I had given the album only the most cursory of listenings. I liked the title track, but every time I sat down to listen to the full album all I really heard was noise. Given Aaron's response though, I pulled In the Aeroplane Over the Sea from the depths of my ipod during one of many drives from Denver to Greeley to visit a boy (of course) during the fall of 2005 when I had just moved back to Colorado from college.

It was late one evening, just before Halloween, and I had decided to be tricky, and take a different route into town than the one I normally used. And I got lost of course. My sense of direction tends to fail me in the dark. For those of you out there who might wonder, people who don't drive are pretty useless for getting directions when you're lost.

So there I was, in the dark driving, with Jeff Mangum in the background. And suddenly all of the pieces came together. The album made sense to me in a way I'd never heard before. It was like learning to read.

I've talked to a couple of people about their love of the album, and among almost all of them they think I am a freak. They loved it from the very beginning.

I love the album now. I understand what Aaron was saying when he said that he has a hard time getting through a day without listening to it. When I start In the Aeroplane Over the Sea I close my eyes and fall back in my seat like a junkie to her high (or at least the way it looks in the movies). It washes over me in waves, and I let it carry me.

In the Aeroplane Over the Sea was recorded in Denver during the summer I was between middle school and high school. I was busy listening to the Cranberries, Presidents of the United States of America, No Doubt and Smashing Pumpkins while Jeff Mangum and company were creating an album it would take me seven years to discover, within five miles of where I sat. There are things that make me sad in the world, and this is not really one of them, but there is something there. If I had been a different person ten years ago, would I have known how to find Neutral Milk Hotel? But if I had been a different person ten years ago I certainly wouldn't be the person I am today...

The Mountain Goats- Get Lonely

One of my co-workers gave me this album the week it came out and I listened to it almost non-stop. There are definitely some songs that are stronger than others, but it is a very raw, emotional album. I have a lot of respect for John Darniell's ability to actually have released these songs to the public. But then again, I'm writing about my life on the internet, so I guess I can relate to that level of wanting to share my life, my thoughts, my pain. I don't know why he does it, though I have some sense of why I do. It's like writing to a new person, sending a message in a bottle, or tying a note to a balloon and setting it into the air. The idea of reaching out to the humanity in another person, a complete stranger, and finding some sort of way to connect with them.

"I will find a crowd, and blend in for a minute, and I will try to find a little comfort in it, and I will get lonely and gasp for air, and send your name up from my lips like a signal flare"

About five years ago Ani DiFranco released a concert DVD called "Render". I bought it very shortly after it was released, being the loyal and rabid ani fan that I was at the time. That DVD marked the beginning of my pragmatism regarding ani. There is a moment in which ani scolds the audience for singing along with one of her songs, saying "you don't know this guy. you don't want to know this".

"Get Lonely" is voyeuristic, it feels like I'm reading someone's diary. When I saw the Mountain Goats perform songs from the album I almost wanted to hide my face. Imagine two people making out in front of an open window, they know they're doing it, and they know the window is open, and to some degree they know people will watch them, but still, you don't want them to look up and see you watching. But the analogy fails because the Mountain Goats charged admission.

No one at the Mountain Goats show scolded the audience for singing along, for finding their own meaning in someone else's description of their very personal experience. To me, that is one of the things that makes art so spectacular. I can create something that has specific and powerful meaning to me, and someone I don't even know can look at it and find their own meaning. And perhaps their meaning is similar to mine, and perhaps it is completely different, but the fact that they are able to create their own understanding of it amazes me. To have the audacity to believe that I could create something and then control it after setting it free from my brain... well, that is fallacy.

Copyright issues aside, and that is a discussion for a different time and probably a different forum... control is an illusion.

Sufjan Stevens, The Avalanche

I have a sort of mixed awe of Sufjan Stevens. He has an amazing ability to weave music in a way that makes me want to crawl under the covers and read on a snowy day, stare up at the stars late at night, and ride my bike through unfamiliar neighborhoods on summer evenings. He's found an amazing way to mix fact, fiction, narrative and music in a way that comes close to symphonic arrangement.

Reviews seem to be of two camps on The Avalanche. Those who say "This stuff is really good, and the best of this stuff would have been excellent on Illinois" and those who say "This stuff is not as good as Illinois and didn't really deserve to be put out simply because it exists."

Illinois, like Michigan, was a concept album. The songs on The Avalanche mostly fit within the theme of Illinois, obviously. I can see how the songs that didn't make the cut didn't make it though. While they fit in the theme, and they fit musically, they might have seemed redundant (John Wayne Gacy is a better song than Saul Bellow, and Adlai Stevenson, and really, it is important to limit the number of profile pieces you include on your concept album). Springfield is very good... but also very similar to Chicago.

This is a wonderful album for people who enjoyed Illinois and definitely for people who like Sufjan Stevens. If it had been released instead of Illinois, or prior to it, it would not stand up. Hearing The Avalanche I am only more awestruck by Sufjan Stevens ability to compile an amazing album faced with myriad musical, lyrical and factual gems. Illinois stands head and shoulders above Michigan, and I await Stevens' next album.