Hype and Slander: What are you voting for in ILM's 2021 End of Year Tracks and Albums Poll?

My intrepid jazz buddy John Wojtowicz has sent me the bandcamp link to Lucky Man, the recently released soundtrack/audiodoc version of the 2010 film, which tracks Vietnam War vet Billy Bang's return to the country, traveling all through it, playing and talking with local musicians and maybe others--- I gotta see the whole thing for context, but it all comes into focus right away, and in effect completes a trilogy, following his Vietnam: The Aftermath, which I think first came out in 2002, and is like it says here:
As a belated document of his traumatic experience as a soldier in Southeast Asia, Vietnam: The Aftermath was a painful but cathartic album for free jazz violin great Billy Bang to make. Joined by fellow Vietnam vets including tenor saxophonist Frank Lowe, trumpeter Ted Daniel, drummer Michael Carvin, and "conductionist" Butch Morris, Bang paints a harrowing picture of the conflict on "TET Offensive." But employing Asian folk melodies like rays of sunshine through the darkness and sturdy bop lines as friendly arrows pointing the way back home, he offsets visions of death and destruction with humane insight and saving humor (then and now, there's nothing like a little '60s-styled "Saigon Phunk" to prop a grunt up). Bolstered by some richly textured ensembles, Bang rips off some of his most impressive and stirring solos. The contributors also include pianist John Hicks and flutist Sonny Fortune. --Lloyd Sachs

Frank Lowe, Bang's frontline partner in the Jazz Doctors, died before Vietnam: Reflections (2005), but it has James Spaulding, with guest Henry Threadgill on flute, joining Daniels, Hicks, Carvin, Morris,Carmen Lundy, Rob Brown, plus Vietnamese singer Co Boi Nguyen and Nhan Thanh Ngo on the 16-string dan tranh. As with The Aftermath, we get an intersection of post or late bop and Asiatic asssociations (which John says he always though of Bang's violining as having, way before he knew about any of these albums; I think it has something to do with his bluesiness too). They also perform some Vietnamese melodies, and--not seeing the credit on "Doi Moi," but it's one on of my favorite ballad tracks by anybody ever, and a poignant countercurrent to the rest of Reflections's dance thus far.

On screen, Lucky Man climaxes with a new arrangement of "Mystery of the Mekong," from The Aftermath, now performed with the Hanoi Symphony Orchestra: it's rich, dark, profuse, surefooted, river delta music for sure---but here, it's not the grand finale, it's track 4, dig.

Along the way, Bang's flying strings get matched by marching folk bands, and "Jungle Lullaby" starts nighty-night and then everybody goes wild as dreams, for a while, also into two shots of "New Saigon Phunk," rippling and loping. "Song For Don Cherry" is another good 'un, and can Bang keep up with the stone lithophone of "Dan Da"? It rings like a bell, but not too often and not too chime-y, and so far I prefer it to vibes---come back and start over, Gary Burton.

Incisive speed burns incl. excerpts of a Vietnamese woman on how her father changed after the War (with music far in the background, and what I'd hoped was an tape artifact turning about to the kind of engine still associated with war footage), and Bang in little spills of his own lifelong coming to grips. (This particular project was three years before he died.)
https://bbemusic.bandcamp.com/album/billy-bang-lucky-man

Here's a reasonable take on the music, incl. in context of the movie, with backstory to it and relevant aspects of Bang's life: https://www.allaboutjazz.com/lucky-man-billy-bang-bbe-records

― dow, Tuesday, May 18, 2021

From Greg Tate thread---need to say more about these later:

...Meanwhile, archival 2021 release Making Love To The Dark Ages incl at very least an LP's-worth of instrumental goodness-to-greatness(good measure, in this vinyl-high, "post-album" age)---that is, my fave raves so far are the second half, at least impact-wise: "Dominata (the gabri ballad)"(15:47), and the two-part title work: https://burntsugarthearkestrachamber.bandcamp.com/album/making-love-to-the-dark-ages-livewired-2009

Now listening to yet another of their 2021 releases, younger contingent up front this time, Tate & other elders still along for the ride: https://burntsugarthearkestrachamber.bandcamp.com/album/the-darknuss Brides of Funkensteinoid for openers--

― dow, Friday, December 10, 2021 8:19 PM (three weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

"No culuds, no culuds allowwwed,"The Darknuss, by REBELLUM ~ Burnt Sugar Arkestra's Avant Funk & Roll Splinter Cell

― dow, Friday, December 10, 2021 and the set finds, mined and minds a deep sweetness, w/o ever going mushy (only disappointment, at least to non-prog-me, is that Vernon Reid shows up to play what sounds like guitar synthesizer, vintage if you want to say it politely---but may come around to this cameo, in such persuasive context).

julian lage - "quiet like a fuse" was a revelation from the playlist, so thank you to the nominator

Ooo, I just got to see Lage play live with Dave King and Jorge Roeder, he was great.

that one is mine! the live version is good too.
the sadness in the song is just so heavy to me.

I would like to rep for the Sam Gendel/Sam Wilkes album and particularly the THEEM PROTOTYPE track which is a certified banger and definitely going on my ballot.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CdSzWTx-f0

^i've listened to this like 50 times if i've listened to it once

Same, it's high on my ballot.

Dang, two Koreless tracks on the singles list but not my fave, 'Joy Squad'

Also forgot to nom James Blake feat. Monica Martin - 'Show Me'

Another nom, from RJ 2021 once again:
More Energy Fields, Current
by Carlos Niño & Friends
Tagged in label notes as 10 pristine gems of collaborative communication helmed by the Southern Californian sage, elegantly presented in his unique “Spiritual, Improvisational, Space Collage” style. And sounds like the improvisational part might feed and respond to the Space Collage: it's more jazz than set piece, like the tracks, never too long, might be scooping up something along the way, lighting in the bottle and vice-versa. Wonder if they play live, with loops, maybe? Seems like this approach could work well on right stage.

Listening on headphones, I keep getting aerial glimpses of the Pacific Coast Highway, interspersed w more time in little caves and coves: an intimate, though airy, small group sound, always incl. Niño (percussion, sound design, editing, mixing) and I think always Jamael Dean on keys, with others sometimes on drums, tenor and/or flute, synths, and voices (on one track: wordless ones, don't worry, of Laraaji and Sharada). Shabaka Hutchings, Dntel, Adam Rudolph, Aaron Shaw, a bunch of others, coming in and moving on, at least for a while, never too many at once.

First one to command my attention was "Nightswimming," then so many of the others that I gave up on linking a favorite in addition to the whole thing:
https://intlanthem.bandcamp.com/album/more-energy-fields-current

― dow, Monday, May 31, 2021 4:57 PM (seven months ago) bookmarkflaglink

Niño’s previous album on IA, Chicago Waves, is live if you’re curious! I think I described it as more like ambient/new age than jazz on the IA thread but I liked it a lot

― rob, Monday, May 31, 2021 5:08 PM (seven months ago) bookmarkflaglink

Will check, thanks! Ambient/New Age usually puts me right to sleep, but this got me more awake.
Also, this one has *kind* of a DePlume vibe, or related appeal,anyway, but maybe earlier in the day or evening, and a little more spare?
https://alabasterdeplume.bandcamp.com/

― dow, Monday, May 31, 2021

Could easily do a Top Ten of International Anthem releases, whether or not they ever put out that many in any given year.

holy shit, SHUM was a EUROVISION song?? i shoved it straight into my prospective ballot completely oblivious to this, lol

but anyway I was coming here to observe that emil.y's later batch of nominations are providing all sorts of difficult balloting decisions for me. especially Taraka. zero zero one zero one one zeroooo

Time to vote.

Also from RJ 2021:

Totally fun 2021 reissue from Downtown NYC '96,keeping me on my toes

Sleevenote 2
Working with Spanish Fly was an extraordinary experience for me as I most often work with classical music in my choreography. Their music, however, has the perfect pulse for a ballet. It's charged with an "in
Your face" attitude mixed with a sense of yearning. I began to see Images of characters right away. “Night Creatures” we called them.
Young people sliding up Avenue A, full of quirks and obsessions.We gave them names: the Snake Lady. the Sisters, the Lovers. These Characters became our guides. They lead us to Our themes and choices of style.
Lighting designer Mark Stanley created a set of massive Venetian Blinds which opened to reveal the dancers. This gave the work a
sense of spying, of voyeurism.
credits
released April 1, 2021

Steven Bernstein . trumpet, slide trumpet, cornet, crooning
Marcus Rojas : tuba, tubapercussion, tubasinging
Tronzo : slide guitar, cup guitar, prepared guitar
with Ben Perowsky : drums, percussion

FLY BY NIGHT" COMMISSIONED BY THE SAN FRANCISCO BALLET ASSOCIATION.
CHOREOGRAPHED BY CHRISTOPHER D'AMBOISE.

PREMIERED FEBRUARY 28,1996 AT CENTER FOR THE ARTS AT YERBA BUENA GARDENS.
BACKGROUND VOCALS ON TONGUE SANDWICH:
SPANISH FLY, HAL WILLNER, VICKI STANBURRY, LAURIE GALLUCCIO, AMANDA REISMAN
https://stevenbernstein.bandcamp.com/album/fly-by-night

― dow, Wednesday, 29 December 2021

This was too:

can't say it better than this guy does on Bandcamp:
Philip Graham---Oh how I do love this stately, swinging tumble of harmony and melody. The album seems like a slowed down, trippy echo of Duke Ellington’s “The Second Line” from New Orleans Suite. It's not really all that slow: every track has satisfying internal dynamics, which go with the mixing of emotions, rhythms, incidents, shades of this and that--yeah, Ellingtonia and NOLA and Downtown hipsters have come this far:

'Tinctures in Time' is the first original music Steven Bernstein has ever written for the Millennial Territory Orchestra, which prior to this recording had exclusively been a vehicle for his arrangements of other people's songs, from Count Basie to Prince. Most of the album was composed in 2019, a tough period for Bernstein: Henry Butler had recently passed, and there was a series of serious injuries and death in his immediate family. Like a lot of people do, Bernstein got through it by working. "I was spending a lot of time on planes, going to visit people in hospitals," he says. "So what else am I going to do with my time? I ended up with all this music."

"The tincture of time" is a phrase Bernstein's father, a doctor, uses for when there's nothing to be done but wait for something to heal; the relevance of time as healer for Bernstein himself is clear. He altered the phrase so it makes a little reference to a favorite Sly Stone tune. And "tinctures," Bernstein says, also refers to "things that people take to give feelings of euphoria." It's why he also calls this collection of compositions "cannabis music."But it's not some foggy notional bank of sands through the hourglass: everybody's very responsive, just never hyper (a tad outcat at times).Enough funk in there, also a soul anthem, not oversold, and sometimes I think Ben P. is playing a tabla?
Steven Bernstein - Trumpet, Slide Trumpet & Flugelhorn
Curtis Fowlkes - Trombone
Charlie Burnham - Violin
Doug Wieselman - Clarinet, Tenor Saxophone
Peter Apfelbaum - Tenor Saxophone
Erik Lawrence - Baritone Saxophone
Matt Munisteri - Guitar, Banjo
Ben Allison - Bass
Ben Perowsky - Drums
https://stevenbernstein.bandcamp.com/album/tinctures-in-time-community-music-vol-1

― dow, Thursday, 30 December 2021

Hype hype

Deafheaven - Infinite Granite - throw out everything you knew about Deafheaven, for the most part the black metal screams here serve as filigree and the sound owes more to Tears for Fears' "The Seeds of Love" than anything cooked up by Scandinavian Satan-worshippers

Ducks Ltd. - Modern Fiction - way above replacement-level jangle pop from Toronto, this is the perfect length to put on endless repeat, with nary a bad song, and expertly sequenced

i love infinite granite & the seeds of love but idk about that comparison

Wet Leg don't even have an album out yet and i have gotten adducted to this single of theirs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zd9jeJk2UHQ

Thanks for the DJ Sabrina stuff, I love it. I like the way it drifts and songforms kind of arise and subside.

think i'd have more interest in dj sabrina's whole thing if the albums weren't all 2-3 hours, i totally lose interest long before then

I've been enjoying it as quasi-background music. The endlessness just feels like it's a playlist or something.

If you want a break from difficult listening, may I recommend Cum Ovr (heirs to Thee Stallion throne), Fuck Him All Night (banger), and Seeing Green (Wayne's best in forever, and Drake better than anything on his album).

And then after that break, Moses Sumney's Live from Blackalachia is a hell of a thing. Would love to see this projected in a museum, played through crazy-nice speakers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LX47qMIw_2o

OK I'm sold on Wet Leg now

whoever nom'd this in the tracks RONDÉ - Hard To Say Goodbye ...

thank you? it's been ringing in my head for weeks

The song that got Bad Bunny and everyone else screaming along in clubs - Karol G & Mariah Angeliq - EL MAKINON

booty booty booty
booty booty booty booty

my kind of jam

whoever nom'd this in the tracks RONDÉ - Hard To Say Goodbye ...

thank you? it's been ringing in my head for weeks

― blue6ave, vrijdag 7 januari 2022 7:21 (eight hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

let’s get back to jehovah’s witnesses

wrong thread lol

dang i guess nobody nominated “american tterroristt”

They did actually!

you're right haha, i searched in the playlist for "rxk" and "nephew," but his name is listed on spotify as one word.

Whiney (and anyone else interested),I'll probably be getting mine together over the next week or so, need to listen to more tracks, tho I know where I stand with albums.

As for my AOTY, I've noted it before, but it's Anne Bourne's wave, which you can listen to and download here. You can read more about her music and life here.

Simply put, I'd often leave it on continuous replay for hours while working, reading, or doing any number of other activities. Bourne's looped cello drones encourage both active and passive listening, though Bourne was a student of Oliveros' and is very much in the Deep Listening tradition. The record's timbres have emotional heft without sounding cheesy or over-wrought, and it is an expansive record— affectively, it feels like calmly scanning a vast horizon. I played it a lot during our week on an island off the Maine coast, and all of us in the house became completely transfixed by it at one time or another, staring out at the sea as the reverberations of the cello sank into us. Sometimes I'll be listening and something will surprise me, even now, after more than half a year of listening to it. Not everyone's cuppa, sure, but I really think it's the most beautiful record to be released in 2021.

^that album isn't my usual thing, but I listened to it the other day after you posted about it table, and it is really lovely

I don't expect it to pick up any votes here, but since it's not on Spotify, I'll rep for Maestro Don & Jahvillani's "Dutty Money" produced by Teetimus, which is dancehall but also really lovely with surprisingly delicately arranged production:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ehV1q4IWpMs

Speaking of dancehall, African division, I love (and nommed) this Ugandan track.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUjPv94LOWo

sund4r, are you guitar friends with Bilal Nasser? I'm really taken with that album - hype description would be emotive, spacious classical guitar playing with just the right amount of production touches and occasional spoken (usually layed over screamed) vocals that actually work. I put it on my ballot in the spirit of this thread.

Yeah, kind of. We were both students of William Beauvais (albeit decades apart) and have been part of Beauvais Alumni video concerts during the pandemic. It's a nice album, with a pretty distinctive personal vision.

Cool!

Btw Aldous Harding became the official home listening choice in my household this year, we wore out Designer. But that's 2020, so I had to vote for 'Old Peel' on the singles.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1V7rHcvqDyY

Designer grew on me in a big way in the past year.

hype hype

Temperance - Diamanti - symphonic pop metal with co-ed co-lead vocals, energetic hard rockers with rowsing sing-along choruses and some massive power ballads that would make the Scorpions green with envy

Rosali - No Medium - strong contender for my aoty, an astounding collection of songs, emotionally vulnerable and rich, the fuzzed-out country-folk-rock accompaniment suits the mood perfectly, think Neko Case, Drive-By Truckers, Laura Marling

Have saved like 80% of fffv's noms. Especially 8485 and Eartheater - great stuff.

Another nom, Martha Wainwright, Love Will Be Reborn--thought I'd said more than this! She's learned from the great French balladeers, as well as her own life, incl. in American and Canadian music:

New album is wild, thematic and gooooing with the floooow, theme as raft, well-lashed, only comparable contemporary sonic experience coming to mynd is Maria McKee's Pre-Raphaelite shout out to Beatrice, La Vita Nuova.

good interview:https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2021/aug/07/this-much-i-know-martha-wainwright-my-divorce-has-given-me-wisdom
and concert review, w more quotes:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/oct/04/first-live-concert-masks-martha-wainwright-pandemic

― dow, Monday, October 4, 2021

First 25 tracks, alphabetically by artist. Faves in bold

10,000 Russos - Mexicali/Calexico: I like when this meanders and dubs out into a chasm and the later sections where it drops into a complete psych pit... but at fifteen minutes long and multiple listens later, I am wearing out before it does. I appreciate the intro to these guys though; could see this being a fun band to see live while properly dosed.

3YE - Stalker: Somehow missed 3ye's album last year but clearly I should remedy that mistake. This is a banger, loads of build to that absolutely killer anthemic HIGH HIGH HIGH chorus. Just a really nicely constructed bit of k-pop, sharp and well aimed.

42 Dugg - Maybach with Future, Free Merey: I gave this guy a try when it became clear I needed to be in the loop with him and just didn't connect with his heavily accented nasal voice, flat slurring flow and nihilistic lyrics. Maybach cements my sense he's just not for me but the moment Future steps on the track, I am all in. Good production there! The lament Free Merey missed me completely.

4s4ki - Sugar Junky: Happy-go-lucky hyper jpop of the Katamari b-side variety with an old-school ending; what's not to like?

8485 - hangar: That intersection between 80's retro desire and burbling overproduction, just a soupçon of "Jack and Diane" wistfulness and falling asleep in the back of the Greyhound when you really shouldn't. Nice confessional, surprisingly open given the heavy armor of nostalgia and desire for a flying car future.

A1xJ1 - Latest Trends: Shocked to see how young and raw these kids are, there's clearly a lot of longer term opportunity for growth creatively here. At the moment, this isn't setting the world on fire but there's an effortlessness to the rapping and a clarity of purpose throughout that is plenty positively astringent.

ABBA - I Still Have Faith in You, Don't Shut Me Down, Just a Notion: Hey I Don't Think I Like ABBA. I mean, I never really listened to them except when I've had to and with a few exceptions - Gimme Gimme Gimme and _maybe_ Take a Chance? - I've never really liked when we got stuck in the same room together. All three of these new songs are the flattest of sodas on my palate; I got through one listen and then haven't been able to get through them again. Just a Notion is likely the least of objectionable of the bunch for its sheer over-the-top razzamatazz but it's hardly anything I would seek out ever again.

Abi Ocia - LTWYLM: This was a slow burner: a bit too synthetic, androgyne and radio smooth to be taken without wariness... I note that it's a key track on the "Massage Erotique" playlist as Exhibit D. Even so, the third or fourth listen clicked as a 1988 junior high slow dance and I'm no longer mad at it.

ABISHA - If You Were Mine (DJ Paulette Remix): This remix definitely saves a fairly middle-of-the-road bit of pop house from insipidness with clanks, echos, glitches and Badalamenti atmospherics. The sugary climax becomes more of an intriguing message of longing in these grey shabby rags.

ABRA - Unlock It with Playboy Carti: I'm an avowed sucker for Aaliyah-core and this track was already on my very long list of faves for the year, though likely more in the top 250 than the top 40. Carti is kind of perfectly placed as an utterly unneeded guest rapper but the telephone tones and ABRA's voice are the real special effects.

Ada Lea - damn, my love 4 u is real: I have a limited amount of patience for the lofi monotone sad indie girl's weirdly scansioned monologue over moody guitars schtick but damn is sort of about as good an example of that niche as you could hope for. Once I've gotten through that though, I definitely don't need anything more of the same so the second track can tell its story walking.

Adana Twins - 1983: Talk about stating your intent in the title! Definite "take on me" vibes with the opening drums, leading into solid Outrun-style bass and synths. It's a fun drive and I look forward to taking this with me on a jog in the near future.

Adele - Easy On Me: This is Better Than Fine. Adele's singles have the hard to define quality of sounding instantly timeless and effortlessly crossoverable. Difficult for me to get excited about but I imagine I could hear this in 20 years and still think "oh yeah, she was good at this."

Ado - 踊: Overstuffed, Latin-inflected hyper-ish j-pop that would fit in on a video game or a spy movie. Can somebody tell me what this translates as? It's pretty solid stuff and I like her Bjork-y scream.

aespa - Savage: Enjoyably schizophrenic k-pop that might benefit from a bit more fishhook and less velvet. Still a fun and repeatable listen.

AG Cook - Xcxoplex with Charli XCX: Given what they're capable of this feels like a pretty minor entry from both parties... but not bad?

Agnes - 24 Hours, Here Comes the Night: Dua does the pastiche vibe better but that doesn't mean there aren't things to enjoy within the deeply ersatz. Frankly if you're going to take so much time coordinating and calibrating this sort of OTT disco, it would be a bit snotty to not appreciate the effort. Not sure it's anything I'd seek out but fine as filler. The fact that one is as good as the next speaks more to its status as product.

Aisha Noel - One Dance: Solid dancehall pop that I plucked as a fave off the ILX thread some months ago. Entirely enjoyable if maybe not exemplary.

Aldous Harding - Old Peel: Oooof, this is emphatically Not My Thing. Kept waiting for it to become anything and it mostly sat in its petri dish and gnawed on its flagella.

Alec Troniq - Dwight: Delightful oontz oontz of the techno albums that are doing it wrong variety. Another one that I'm looking forward to joining me on a trail jog.

Ola Kvernberg - Arpystarts off like a fairly typical although particularly lovely Norwegian post-jazz-prog exercise, then suddenly someone flicks a switch and we are RIDING A HORSE THROUGH SPACE

Lmao

The entire Ola Kvernberg album is super enjoyable btw. After Arpy & another slight neo-prog fantasia called The Vault, it switches gears almost entirely, into what I might call Geir Hongro's Platonic Ideal if a Fela Kuti album, riding interesting and surprising chords over afrobeat rhythms for much of the remainder of the album

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OvBOejHbmP4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMeDr5jzOBI

Controversial (and vmic) opinion: as extended compositions featuring a jazz soloist vs traditional classical ensemble go, Douglas Cuomo's Seven Limbs for Nels Cline and Azari Quartet is a much greater achievement than Floating Points's Promises for Pharoah Sanders and LSO.

*Aizuri Quartet

I never cared for the torch song stylings of his solo work but last year's Cathal Coughlan album "Song of Co-Aklan" is up there with his Microdisney/Fatima Mansions output. I think hes one of the great lyricists and he really shines here. Music is a mix of Sparksian theatricality, post-punk and world-weary balladry.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDBOHermCes