Year-End Critics' Polls '07

term out: arpeggiator
term in: herky-jerkiator!

That Skull Disco free mix linked to above was pleasant enough but it's not making me jump up and down or smile broadly--it's just standard dub meets art disco...

I reckon Skull Disco tracks work better in the mix with other stuff rather than as one big conglomerate.

Philip/Tim OTM re: The Field. I was actually just discussing this recently in an email. It's kind of frustrating when he hits a really great initial groove (e.g. "Everyday") and then the lack of development in drum programming/sound design really start to hinder things midway through.

Gosh, I think Everyday really kicks into gear at around the 2:00 mark, just after the chopped up female vocals. I actually thought one of The Field's strengths was how he shift gears so well during a song.

Of all people to have that touch a nerve with!

Whenever someone mentions P*7*$ B$@&* I get itchy.

Comin' down to the wire for my ballot OMG, four candidates for one spot. Or maybe two spots. Ugh.

http://sayhey.files.wordpress.com/2007/03/bwin.jpg

Haha I caved on Fefe Dobson after all!

http://pages.prodigy.net/davidson.fam/in.jpg

hey rev are you ready for THE BIG TAKEOVER?

http://cache.viewimages.com/xc/73131532.jpg?v=1&c=ViewImages&k=2&d=0A988CE895E095AA14B36490B36BBCB6A40A659CEC4C8CB6

i missed the jackin pop deadline. should i still submit

Yes (if you still can).

If not, email your ballot in.

(and comments)

emailed

Haha I caved on Fefe Dobson after all!

Dude?!? I just heard it for the first time yesterday--it's great!

In partial response to chuck's question above, Of Montreal wasn't on my list, but I was also surprised it wasn't making many lists given how much critical love I'd seen for it. Apparently that love was limited! It seemed like a whole bunch of people went "holy shit, Kevin Barnes" this year, but I guess it was all just people I knew.

I talked about Fefe's album plenty in my comments -- not that anyone reads them, but then again I figured it wasn't like anyone else was going to vote for that album, and the five or so poor sad souls who actually care about my list will read the comments anyway so it's all good.

Of Montreal was a last-minute addition to my list; sure it's indie and fey and precious and all that, but it's pretty astounding nonetheless. I was shocked at how much a lot of those songs stuck with me. I've got emotional problems but NOT THAT BAD, DUDE. Made me feel better.

In general this year I went with shiny surfaces over tasteful tuneage. That's just the way I feel right now.

Acts on zero out of four critics' Top 10 album lists in the NY Times: M.I.A., Miranda Lambert.

Act on four out of four critics' Top 10 album lists in the NY Times: Feist.

I wouldn't have predicted that.

Whoa, that's pretty freaky. What have they done with Jon Pareles?

I'm surprised (more disappointed, I guess) that A Place To Bury Strangers self-titled debut disc didn't make anyone's Best-Of lists. I had no idea I was going to like that nu-industrial sound so much, but I was hooked as soon as those undulating guitars roared into To Fix A Gash In Your Head.

<a href=http://www.musicomh.com/music/features/albums_review-2007_1207.htm>;<b>musicOMH</b></a>

01. LCD Soundsystem - Sound Of Silver
02. M.I.A. - Kala
03. Arctic Monkeys - Favourite Worst Nightmare
04. Radiohead - In Rainbows
05. !!! - Myth Takes
06. Arcade Fire - Neon Bible
07. Asobi Seksu - Citrus
08. The Good The Bad & The Queen - The Good The Bad & The Queen
09. Simian Mobile Disco - Attack Decay Sustain Release
10. The White Stripes - Icky Thump
11. Interpol - Our Love To Admire
12. Björk - Volta
13. Holy Fuck - LP
14. Edwyn Collins - Home Again
15. The National - Boxer
16. Justice - +
17. Rufus Wainwright - Release The Stars
18. Klaxons - Myths Of The Near Future
19. The Cribs - Men's Needs, Women's Needs, Whatever
20. Kings Of Leon - Because Of The Times

musicOMH

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/23/arts/music/23sann.html?ref=music

As Chuck noted, the NY Times critics lists are available. Here's a link to Kelefa Sanneh's. His album list includes rappers Turk Talk (from Vallejo, California; Whiney praised him over on the Snap Thread), UGK, and Project Pat; country singer Joe Nichols (the only country album listed by NY Times writers), RnR's The-Dream, plus Feist, Panda Bear, Marie Stern, and Jens Lekman.

Ben Ratliff includes Gilberto Gil's nice, mostly all acoustic effort "Gil Luminoso" that was just released in the US this year, but was actually recorded (and available elsewhere?) in 1999. Both he and Nate Chinen list Joshua Redman's "Back East." Ratliff and Pareles both list Robert Plant/Alison Krauss. Ratliff's top 5 song list includes Jesu, Spanish Harlem Orchestra, Von Sudenfed, Cafe Tacuba, and Rihanna.

Over at slate.com Fred Kaplan listed the following on his best jazz list:

Charles Mingus Sextet with Eric Dolphy, Cornell 1964 (Blue Note).
Maria Schneider Orchestra, Sky Blue (ArtistShare).
Erik Friedlander, Block Ice & Propane (SkipStone).
Anat Cohen, Poetica (Anzic).
Carla Bley, The Lost Chords Find Paolo Fresu (ECM).
Paul Bley, Solo in Mondsee (ECM).
Herbie Hancock, River: The Joni Letters (Verve).
Paul Motian, Bill Frisell, Joe Lovano, Time and Time Again (ECM).
Joe Lovano & Hank Jones, Kids: Live at Dizzy’s Coca-Cola (Blue Note).
Kendra Shank, A Spirit Free: Abbey Lincoln Songbook (Challenge

That should read "R'n'b's The-Dream"

I'm always mystified by the dash in The-Dream's name.

Me too. So Entertainment Weekly which usually lists 2 music critics top 10s just went with Chris Willman's this year. I think Chris posts some on the Rolling Country thread, although his top 10 just included one country cd--Miranda Lambert. He's got Springsteen at No. 1.

His list is excerpted on EW's website in a not easy to read fashion...
http://www.ew.com/ew/gallery/0,,20166853_9,00.html

Terius "The-Dash" Nash

Jim DeRogatis’ Best of 2007 list

1. Grinderman, Grinderman
2. Glenn Mercer, Wheels in Motion
3. Tim Fite, Over the Counter Culture
4. Modest Mouse, We Were Dead before the Ship Even Sank
5. Kanye West, Graduation
6. LCD Soundsystem, Sound of Silver
7. Spoon, Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
8. The Apples in Stereo, New Magnetic Wonder
9. Radiohead, In Rainbows
10. Air, Pocket Symphony

There was alot of love for the Grinderman thing in that slate.com discussion too. I've only seen the youtube videos. Awesome guitar and Cave still doing his melodramatic vocal schtick. Ah, I still remember seeing the Birthday Party and the Fall on successive nights at the small old 930 Club in DC. Good times.

National Public Rado station KEXP's best hiphop 2007 list has MIA at number 1 followed by: Wu-Tang Clan; Kanye;Jay-Z; Dyme Def (Seattle trio); Ghostface Killa; Pharoahe Monch; Blue Scholars (Seattle duo); LifeSavas (Portland); and Ratatat. Hmmmmm, 3 Northwest acts...

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=17519166

nothing wrong with local/regional favoritism, especially in radio where it's a dying phenomenon.

I'm not sure KEXP is an NPR station, per se--maybe it is, but I've never known of any explicit connection. At any rate, it's a Seattle station that plays a lot of local/regional stuff, so a lot of PNW stuff making it onto a list (even a rap list) isn't surprising at all.

Ok

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/display.php?id=34287

Washington City Paper lists

SOMB Top 100 Albums of 2007 - Results Thread - Sound Opinions Message Board

1 LCD Soundsystem - Sound Of Silver
2 Radiohead - In Rainbows
3 National, The - Boxer
4 Spoon - Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
5 Arcade Fire - Neon Bible
6 Panda Bear - Person Pitch
7 Jens Lekman - Night Falls Over Kortedala
8 Kanye West - Graduation
9 Animal Collective - Strawberry Jam
10 Burial - Untrue
11 M.I.A. - Kala
12 Of Montreal - Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer
13 Battles - Mirrored
14 Vampire Weekend - Blue CD-R
15 Feist - The Reminder
16 Caribou - Andorra
17 White Stripes, The - Icky Thump
18 Wilco - Sky Blue Sky
19 Dinosaur Jr. - Beyond
20 Field, The - From Here We Go Sublime
21 New Pornographers, The - Challengers
22 Akron/Family - Love Is Simple
23 Deerhunter - Crptograms
24 Modest Mouse - We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank
25 Stars Of The Lid - And Their Refinement Of The Decline
26 Josh Ritter - The Historical Consequences of Josh Ritter
27 Andrew Bird - Armchair Apocrypha
28 King Khan and the Shrines - What Is?!
29 Good, The Bad & The Queen, The - The Good, The Bad & The Queen
30 Iron & Wine - The Shepard's Dog
31 Liars - Liars
32 Les Savy Fav - Let's Stay Friends
33 Sunset Rubdown - Random Spirit Lover
34 Klaxons - Myths of The Near Future
35 Bright Eyes - Cassadaga
36 Besnard Lakes, The - The Besnard Lakes Are The Dark Horses
37 Okkervil River - The Stage Names
38 Alcest - Souvenirs d'un Autre Monde
39 Arctic Monkeys - Favourite Worst Nightmare
40 Shins, The - Wincing The Night Away
41 Kevin Drew - Spirit If…
42 Apples In Stereo - New Magnetic Wonder
43 Yeasayer - All Hour Cymbals
44 Blonde Redhead - 23
45 Menomena - Friend Or Foe
46 Justice - †
47 Deerhoof - Friend Opportunity
48 Super Furry Animals - Hey Venus!
49 Art Brut - It's A Bit Complicated
50 Explosions In The Sky - All Of A Sudden, I Miss Everyone
51 Beirut - The Flying Cup
52 High On Fire - Death Is This Communion
53 Witchcraft - The Alchemist
54 Field Music - Tones Of Town
55 Baroness - The Red Album
56 Wolves In The Throne Room - Two Hunters
57 Ted Leo & The Pharmacists - Living With The Living
58 Ween - La Cucaracha
59 Kings Of Leon - Because Of The Times
60 Jay-Z - American Gangster
61 Earthless - Rhythms From A Cosmic Sky
62 Studio - Yearbook 1
63 Patrick Wolf - The Magic Position
64 Sally Shapiro - Disco Romance
65 Pig Destroyer - Phantom Limb
66 Ryan Adams - Easy Tiger
67 Jesu - Conqueror
68 White Rainbow - Prism of Enternal Now
69 Thurston Moore - Trees Outside The Academy
70 Boxcutter - Glyphic
71 Band Of Horses - Cease To Begin
72 Eluvium - Copia
73 Clientele, The - God Save The Clientele
74 Blitzen Trapper - Wild Mountain
75 Fiery Furnaces, The - Window City
76 PJ Harvey - White Chalk
77 Neurosis - Given To The Rising
78 Twilight Sad, The - 14 Autumns & 15 Winters
79 Pantha Du Prince - This Bliss
80 Black Moth Super Rainbow - Dandelion Gum
81 Om - Pilgrimage
82 Queens Of The Stone Age - Era Vulgaris
83 Bill Callahan - Woke On A Whaleheart
84 Bloc Party - A Weekend In The City
85 Radical Face - Ghost
86 Durrty Goodz - Axiom EP
87 Dillinger Escape Plan - Ire Works
88 !!! - Myth Takes
89 Neil Young - Chrome Dreams II
90 Cloud Cult - The Meaning of 8
91 Stars - In Our Bedroom, After The War
92 Between The Buried And Me - Colors
93 Bruce Springsteen - Magic
94 Grinderman - Grinderman
95 Freeway - Free At Last
96 Mark Sultan - The Sultanic Verses
97 Melt-Banana - Bambi's Dilemma
98 UGK - Underground Kingz
99 Aliens, The - Astronomy For Dogs
100 Dungen - Tio Bitar

Ann Powers from that slate.com discussion with Christgau and Jody Rosen:

What Beam is chasing is pleasure—the blood rush that comes when some new wonder unfolds, whether it's a love thing, a previously unexplored backroad, or (this is pop, after all) a new commodity. Pleasure became a problem for indie rock in the 1990s; blame Kurt, blame heroin, blame political correctness, whatever, never mind. But it's totally back, from the silk-purse neo-hippiesms of freak folk (dudes, hippies get laid), to the roving house parties of CSS and Girl Talk (Paris Hilton jumped onstage during their Coachella sets—that's hot!), to the superstoner subcult that produced Pitchfork's 2007 No. 1, Panda Bear's "Person Pitch," an album that literally puts me to sleep.

And what values are expressed by the natty retro-soul scene that championed Amy Winehouse, if not the nightlife creed of boundaries crossed in the name of fun? At Winehouse producer/It Boy Mark Ronson's El Rey show last fall, Christina Aguilera and Nicole Richie hung in the VIP lounge as Ronson's interracial troupe laid down their rock-soul hybrids.

Let me get this straight. Ann wants us to believe that indie-rock in the '90s was never about "pleasure" and that now in 2007 "pleasure" is suddenly back thanks to bearded folk-rocker Iron & Wine, CSS, and Mark Ronson, and that Christina Aguilera and Nicole Richie hanging out at a Ronson gig makes a big political statement. I don't buy that overview.

I like the Dyme Def album.

It's better than the Wu & Ghost albums and maybe the Jay-Z, too.

DeRogatis and Kot both placed that Tim Fite album, which I downloaded at their behest and HATED. At least it was free!

Geoff Himes listed Skip James style bluesman Jimmy Duck Holmes (whom I had never previously heard of) and I see Holmes also made the top 10 blues list of WXPN along with Bobby Rush, James Blood Ulmer, Marie Knight (a gospel tribute to Rev. Gary Davis), Sugar Blue, Koko Taylor, T. Williams & Wesley Jefferson (from Clarksdale, MS), Harrison Kennedy, Franklin & Baytop, and Mem Shannon. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=17095982

Do people really like Residente o Residente that much? There has to have been a better reggaeton (or "reggaeton") album from this year, although I'm not saying I've heard it. (Maybe Tego's or Voltio's or Casa de Leones' or Nejo & Dalmata's.)

I shouldn't complain because I'm happy that people are noticing something coming from that general direction, but I'm sure not convinced it was one of the best albums of the year.

I still think it's amazing. The Casa de Leones album might well be better, but both are great albums, and it's kind of splitting hairs at that point. (fwiw, I put Calle 13 at #2 on my Idolator ballot and CdL at #9) The Voltio album sounds great, but I only just heard it a couple days ago. The Tego album isn't as good as it seems it is, if that makes sense. Right now, I'm listening to Fusssion Musik's unreleased Transfusssion, which is kind of disappointing me because I already heard all the best songs on Danny Fornaris' myspace. But the songs I was already familiar with are killer. This is kind of a weird thing to say, but Fornaris totally has the best sound design in reggaeton.

If you google "Transfusssion", a link to dl it is the first hit, btw. In spite of my disappointment, it's definitely worth hearing.

Actually, the Calle 13 album was very much a grower, I think a lot of which might have to do with the slow process of picking up on the lyrics, although there were songs which came together for me musically that I didn't like at first ("El Avion Se Cae", "Uiyi Guiye").

The Calle 13 cd has its share of cuts that don't work, but I really like the ones that do work. I continue to think that the ones that do work could appeal to folks who like electronic dance, or who like indie-rock in the LCD Soundsystem vein or even Battles math rockers.

x-post re Chicago reviewer's fave---
I don't hate Tim Fite's songs on his myspace site but they don't wow me. He's got an affected vocal style in his rapping--part alt-country Southern accent, part Springsteen trying to sound like a rapper trying to sound like Woodie Guthrie--that doesn't always work.

The only song that doesn't work for me at this point is the aggro one toward the end, mostly because Residente tends to ignore the beat on such songs. But your right, you could say it doesn't really work on the level of a reggaeton album per se (only three songs have dembows!), but that doesn't matter because they're pulling most of what they try off so well and it's a bit of a moot point because most reggaeton albums have their diversions, anyway.