ILM Top 100 2000-2004: ALBUMS

Points: 322
No. of votes: 13
No. of #1 votes: 4

Artist: THE CLIENTELE
Title: SUBURBAN LIGHT
Label: Pointy
Year: 2000

http://base58.com/ilx/ilm/top100/20002004/albums/suburbanlight.jpg

Comments: I love the Clientele's songs because they're like
looking at faded photos or grainy film stock, emerging
into the daylight following a matinee, trying to peer
through the fog or the rain, or walking into dusk
after a day inside artificial light. I love the
Clientele's songs because they're evocative and
drenched in reverb, they mark slight shifts in mood,
in time, in atmosphere, capturing moments of
transition or hope, lamenting loss, longing for that
which is just out of grasp, and cherishing flutters of
the heart. I love the Clientele's songs because they
ignore life's grand gestures; instead, they collect
ephemera and extract something unique, nourishing, and
lovely out of the everyday. Most importantly to me, I
love the Clientele's songs because they soundtracked
my falling in love. As I sat atop a Chicago roof
watching night get the better of day they coaxed me
into getting the nerve to phone long distance to a
woman I'd met only once, they held my hand on the
airplane when she wasn't there to do it, they were
among my first gifts to her, and they've made us both
smile, weep, and sigh ever since. Scott Pl

Recommended: Saturday, We Could Walk Together, Rain

Points: 364
No. of votes: 16
No. of #1 votes: 0

Artist: CANNIBAL OX
Title: THE COLD VEIN
Label: Def Jux
Year: 2001

http://base58.com/ilx/ilm/top100/20002004/albums/thecoldvein.jpg

Comments: Back in the summer of 2002 when I was temporarily insane (and imbibing a large quantity of gin every day), I disparaged Can Ox by asking why I needed this stuff when I already owned Organized Konfusion albums. This was pretty churlish of me (I ended up voting The Cold Vein number four here, chart watchers), but not entirely off the mark. Like OK, Can Ox fall between the twin towers of CIA encrypted Afro-mystical hoo hah and THAT REAL-ASS GRIMY-ASS STREET-ASS SHIT, which never really results in ducats and generally means you're too "underground" (in the Fat Beats sense) for the Juicy J fans and too "street" for the Edan novelty-hop guys. The only other
rap album to place in my top 10 was The Blueprint (I'm as surprised as you are...but I'm also working with a list of nominees that doesn't always reflect my personal top ten); my pal Nick once said that it's hard not to see The Cold Vein as the flipside of the Blueprint but actually they're complimentary opposites: Cold Vein is grainy and mottled with system dirt while the Blueprint is sleek, burnished poise, but both are triumphs of carefully constructed production. I've warmed to El-P's work for Company Flow over the years, but much of it still sounds thin and ugly and grating for no real reason other than being thin and ugly and grating. On The Cold Vein he wasn't any prettier but he fattened things up, riddled it with a thousand niggling details, unveiled a flair for melody. It sounds like he's using very expensive equipment (though in reality probably a fairly limited kit) to make something crude and lumbering and cold. (Though no matter how steely things get, most of it is positively WARM compared to the stuff on the radio these days.) (And I still chuckle at the "Mexican Radio" reference.) The reason Vast Aire outshines Vordul is not because he's "more mainstream" but because he's more DIRECT. He'll go off on flights of comic book geekery, but when he wants to hit home he's not afraid to use the blunt tools (or just be blunt: "my mother said 'you sucked my pussy when you came out'", wtf??), and like Jigga he shares a fondness for ripe Del Monte corn and mawkish sentiment that'd have even Bill Mauldin blushing. Still, as anyone who heard Vast's solo album knows, removed from the crucible of Can Ox (and El-P's production), he's not produced anything with half the power of the Cold Vein. Jess/Strongo

Recommended tracks: Iron Galaxy, Pidgeon, Ridiculoid

Can't help noticing that though The Clientele got a modest 13 votes, it got the greatest number (four) of #1 votes so far. Cheers to you other three.

It's weird how the Bubba has passed without comment thus far. My thoughts on it mirror a lot of Jess' too, which gives me cause to either smile or worry...

haha, yeah my anniversary is tomorrow, so I was all sentimental.

I voted for that and for Low, I'll try to write something.

The debut was good. But it wasn't, um ... big enough. It was gloomy, cinematic, and pretentious (duh). One year later, they returned with 641 new members and an ep that sounded like the end of the world. Certainly the only piece of pre-millenium tension worth listening to. Gotta go with the biblical script when you need to make your apocolyptic point.

Then came this album, which has it all. Tantalising, extended intros blasting into screeching strings playing "Amazing Grace" soundalikes, careening into caustic drones and twinkly ambience. And that's just the first track!

That's their pre-9/11 album. Afterward, the focus turned toward proving that Lockheed Martin are destroying the world. Listening to crazy old men ranting about the golden days of Coney Island is somehow far more harmless, and considerably more poignant.

Low were comfortably entrenched in their slow-and-quiet blueprint, and could have continued to duplicate it indefinitely without much protest from a majority of their fan base. They dip into whimisical pop ("Sunflower") and grim, sinister dirges ("Whitetail") but those styles turned out far better on the follow-up album, "Trust". But here, the less they do, the finer they sound. "Lazer Beam" is little more than four repeated twangs of a guitar and Mimi Rogers' haunting vocals. The other 90% of the song is blackened empty space. Overtop of drawling, pleading vocals, "Closer"'s lurching rhythms surge forward again and again, barely moving forward despite the greatest possible effort. And the sweet harmonies of album closer "In Metal" linger on the brain long after the CD stops spinning. A fine cap to an album that achieves maximalism through minimalism so very well.

This is funny because it's true.

GYBE makes me wonder if they were on anyone's top 15 and hated album -- simultaneously.

Points: 365
No. of votes: 21
No. of #1 votes: 1

Artist: CAT POWER
Title: YOU ARE FREE
Label: Matador
Year: 2003

http://base58.com/ilx/ilm/top100/20002004/albums/youarefree.jpg

Comments: It's the most confident Cat Power record thus far-- there's less frightened wailing and more straight-ahead, self-assured, fleshed-out compositions than on Moon Pix. The production is aces, too; it somehow sounds slick and sparse at the same time. "Accessable" has never been a word I'd associate with Chan, but in a better world, this could be a major-label debut. Joe Folladori

Recommended tracks: He War, Good Woman, Maybe Not

Points: 381
No. of votes: 18
No. of #1 votes: 2

Artist: THE SCISSOR SISTERS
Title: THE SCISSOR SISTERS
Label: Polydor
Year: 2004

http://base58.com/ilx/ilm/top100/20002004/albums/scissorsisters.jpg

Comments: And now on to the thing that really annoys me here. People that have decided the Scissors are all style over substance. Would you like me to scan my arse in so you can kiss it? Would you? Well I?m not going to, cos it?s my dad?s scanner and he?d get a bit narked. Yes, they tour incessantly (like Hundred Reasons and Feeder used to do, yeah), and they do get on the television rather a lot. And, as the boy Swales said, ?I couldn?t bear living with them.? However, the boy Swales did also say that he rather liked their tunes, AND THAT IS THE FUCKING THING - the songs are brilliant (mostly). And it ain?t about being fucking fashionable, god no. Take ?Laura?, wherein Jake Shears attempts to get himself some tail by ringing all the women he knows. And he fails. Christ, most of the stuff on the album is about being lonely (?Mary?), loveless (?Lovers In The Backseat?), crap with girls/blokes (?Better Luck Next Time? ? curiously titled ?Better Luck? on the album sleeve), in the closet (?Take Your Mama?), getting fucked over by the music industry (?Tits On The Radio?), finding the big city isn?t all it?s cracked up to be (?Return To Oz?)? Let?s contrast that shit with Franz Ferdinand, who write songs about attempting to pull girls, one song about attempting to pull a man (EDGE!), and just generally being a cool witty debonair Scots gadabout with perfect hair whilst only being able to make the one noise with your guitar + ironic reference to Terry Wogan. Do they cop this ?style over substance? bullshit? No, they get called the future of music.

Well, fuck that. ?Laura? fucking bosses things. The piano riff is, yes, familiar. And the ground-organ riff, yeah, probably. But that?s cos they?re good, it creaks and cranks its way along the line, then Mr Shears drawls his way in: ?Low-ra? can?t you give me some time? I got to give myself, one more chance? to be the man that I know I am?? And in the corr-roose, we get the theatrics: ?C?M AWWN! C?M AWWWN! WHERRRE IS YAW LUV? DON?T YOU GIVE ME YAW LUV? WON?T YOU GIVE ME YAW LUV?? It is fantastic, this huge overblown three-and-a-bit minute pop-opera in one act (with pause). He sings like Elton John? And? Yeah, it sounds like the seventies. What the hell is your problem? Much lesser bands get away with much worse. This is how they sound, that is how they dress, this shit is who they are, and you can moan about how fucking over-marketed and over-hyped and over-dressed the people are, and you?re ignoring that the Scissor Sisters are a bloody fantastic pop group with heartfelt lyrics (not in the irritating way), warm tunes, and an album that appeals right across the spectrum, instantly warm and accessible, not this aloof emperor?s-new-clothes fashionista shit everyone has the Scissors pegged down as being. These are some of the best songs this decade has seen, and the people, they write about the haircuts. Fuck the people. William Swygart

Recommended tracks: Laura (Simone), Tits On The Radio, Music Is The Victim, It Can't Come Quickly Enough

Points: 394
No. of votes: 17
No. of #1 votes: 1

Artist: FENNESZ
Title: ENDLESS SUMMER
Label: Mego
Year: 2001

ihttp://base58.com/ilx/ilm/top100/20002004/albums/endlesssummer.jpg

Comments: n/a (anybody?)

Recommended tracks: Endless Summer, Caecilia, Shisheido

Points: 398
No. of votes: 19
No. of #1 votes: 1

Artist: PRIMAL SCREAM
Title: XTRMNTR
Label: Creation
Year: 2000

http://base58.com/ilx/ilm/top100/20002004/albums/xtrmntr.jpg

Comments: XTRMNTR is angry as hell and noisy as a plane taking off. Sometimes it's a techno album, sometimes it's a guitar album, sometimes it's a hip-hop album with swearing and screaming on top. Sometimes it's a New Order album (with Barney Sumner on guitar for authenticity), sometimes it's an MBV album (with Kevin Shields on guitar for authenticity), and sometimes it's a David Holmes soundtrack album (with movie samples and er, David Holmes twiddling the knobs for authenticity). What more could you possibly want in an album??? Barry Bruner

Recommended tracks: Swastika Eyes, MBV Arkestra, Shoot Speed Kill Light

Points: 398
No. of votes: 24
No. of #1 votes: 1

Artist: LAMBCHOP
Title: NIXON
Label: City Slang
Year: 2000

http://base58.com/ilx/ilm/top100/20002004/albums/nixon.jpg

Comments: Lush, funny, aching... Play it while walking round through the city at night. C'mon progeny! Stewart Smith

Recommended tracks: Up With People, Nashville Parent, The Distance From Her To There