Vikings & Beekeepers

Village Voice blogger Tom Breihan does this little quarterly review at the end of every third month of the year. I like this idea. I’m going to steal it. Am I original? No. Do I give a shit? Do I ever?

Obviously these picks could in all likely change by the end of the year. Some albums will reveal themselves a little better over time while others may only yield temporary delights. But this is a snapshot of where I am right now.

Here’s my top five albums released in the last three months. Stay tuned for my stupid late best of 2007.

1. Fleet Foxes Sun Giant EP

This promises to be a very big year for this Pacific Northwest indie-chorale, starting first with this masterful, gorgeous EP and soon to be followed in the summer with their first full length. Vocally, comparisons to contemporaries Band Of Horses and My Morning Jacket will be apt, but Fleet Foxes play more with restraint, pushing the voices to the front and letting the harmonies tell the story. While BOH provide that perfect soundtrack to the rural indie fan’s summer and MMJ jam with reckless abandon, Fleet Foxes work their instruments like ocean waves at night, soothingly washing in and out of the mix, sometimes with subtle acoustic guitar figures, other time with more forceful crashes, but always existing to buoy the voices.

Melodically, Sun Giant is unparalleled. Songs like “Drops In The River” and “English House” contain those maddeningly untraceable familiarities that beg to be heard over and over again, while “Mykonos” sounds like an artifact from a particularly emotional Fleetwood Mac session (that’s a good thing…nay, a great thing). Their next step is a big one. I haven’t been this excited about a new album in quite a while.

2. Why? Alopecia

I have a friend who recently told me that while he enjoyed the new Why? album, he wasn’t really that into the Anticon style of hip hop, preferring the likes of Ghostface or Lil’ Wayne. And well I understand the sentiment, upon hearing Alopecia, the first Why? album I ever really paid any attention to despite years of prodding from others, I can’t equate the sound to hip hop. Sure, Why? frontman Yoni Wolf occasionally utilizes that speak-sing style that many white backpack rappers do and the topics can sometimes be jarring and abrasive (lyrically, “Good Friday” and “These Few Presidents” both make me a tad uncomfortable), but it’s all done sparingly, making room for polychromatic production and big hooks. Hip hop is a part of Wolf’s lexicon, but so is straight up indie (“Fatalist Palmistry”), stalker power ballades (“Simeon’s Dilemma”) and wobbly-wheel electro folk (“Brook & Waxing”). This guy does it all, and he does it all well.

3. Black Mountain In The Future

There’s a certain way to most effectively listen to In The Future – somewhere between active and passive, where you’re listening and totally engaged, but tuning out just a bit at the same time. Those big stoner riffs become a bit of a blur swirling around the ether, Amber Webber’s horror wails start to emanate from the halls and Steve McBean slacker yawn begins to melt into the mix along. Listen to carefully and the album may drag, stop paying attention and you won’t be able to re-penetrate the music. Find the balance and you’ll enter the intended world of Black Mountain, rolling you from dusk ‘til dawn, somewhere between lucidity and unconsciousness.

4. Vampire Weekend Vampire Weekend

First the good news, guys: Your band is hot, with tons of hype, magazine love and even MTV airplay. Everyone loves you. Now the bad news: Your band is hot, with tons of hype, magazine love and even MTV airplay. Everyone hates you. And there’s the story of Vampire Weekend, a band, like the Strokes before them, that co-opted a suddenly en vogue genre at just the right time (in this case, afro-pop), deliberately pushed a certain fashion aesthetic (bad 80’s frat slobs vs. snobs movie snob apparel) and got their pasty, pimply mugs all over music blogs. This shit is so easy to hate that it’s no longer fun.

I fortunately avoided the hype through sheer self-imposed ignorance, so when the album finally surfaced I could hear it without pretext. When I listen to this record I hear a peppy (and preppy) album full of smart, endlessly listenable indie-pop delights. Nothing more, nothing less. And that’s just great.

5. Disfear Live The Storm

Hyper-frenetic, turbo-charged, chuga-chuga metal at perhaps it’s all-time best. Every time I listen to the album I feel like I’m at an old Agnostic Front show, chanting out big group choruses and punching some sweaty shirtless dude in the ear. Most awesome!

6-10 (in no particular order) Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks Real Emotional Trash; Plants And Animals Parc Avenue; Evangelicals The Evening Descends; Thao And The Get Down Stay Down We Brave Bee Stings And All; and Fuck Buttons Street Horrrsing.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 31st, 2008 at 12:31 pm and is filed under Music. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.