The Best of 2007: Music

A few excellent albums from 2007, and my current favorites therein...

The National: Boxer (Fake Empire, Brainy, Slow Show, Blank Slate, Apartment Story)
Radiohead: In Rainbows (Jigsaw Falling Into Place*, Reckoner, Weird Fishes/Arpeggi, Bodysnatchers)
The Arcade Fire: Neon Bible (Keep the Car Running, Intervention, The Well and the Lighthouse, (Antichrist Television Blues))
Kevin Drew/Broken Social Scene: Spirit If... (Lucky Ones, Tbtf, Fucked Up Kid, Safety Bricks)
Spoon: Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga (The Ghost In You Lingers, Rhthm & Soul, Underdog, You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb, Black Like Me)
Kanye West: Graduation (Flashing Lights, Good Life, Homecoming, Can't Tell Me Nothing)


Other songs that, at one time or another during the past year, made it onto my on-the-go mixes day after day after day.... Yes, I know some of these weren't released in 2007.

Glenn Hansard/Markéta Irglová: Falling Slowly, Trying To Pull Myself Away
Peter Bjorn and John: Up Against the Wall, Objects of My Affection, The Chills
Thurston Moore: Fri/End, Honest James, The Shape Is in a Trance
Sufjan Stevens: The Predatory Wasp, Casimir Pulaski Day
M.I.A.: Paper Planes, Boyz, Jimmy
Rihanna: Don't Stop the Music, Umbrella
Okkervil River: Unless It's Kicks
Joy Division**: Transmission, She's Lost Control
Pinback: Prog
Bishop Allen: Bishop Allen Drive, Rain, Flight 180
Shout Out Louds: Tonight I Have to Leave It, Hard Rain, Normandie
Battles: Atlas
Frightened Rabbit: Square 9, Be Less Rude, Go-Go-Girls
White Rabbits: Kid on my Shoulders, While We Go Dancing, The Plot, Fort Nightly
Menomena: Weird, Wet and Rusting, Rotten Hell
The Chemical Brothers: The Pills Won't Help You Now
Radical Face: Welcome Home
The Sunshine Underground: I Ain't Losing Any Sleep, Put You In Your Place, Commercial Breakdown
Beirut: Nantes, In the Mausoleum, Elephant Gun
Devotchka: Til the End Of Time
Fergie: Glamorous
Elliot Smith: Pretty (Ugly Before), Pictures of Me
Tracey Thorn: It's All True, Grand Canyon
Nas: Hip Hop Is Dead
Brandi Carlile: The Story
Modest Mouse: Fly Trapped In a Jar
Anthony Hamilton: Comin' From Where I'm From
Andrew Bird: Scythian Empires, Fiery Crash, Imitosis
LCD Soundsystem: North American Scum, Someone Great, All My Friends
Black Kids***: I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance
The Killers: Read My Mind
Iron and Wine: Resurrection Fern
Morissey****: Everyday is Like Sunday
Cold War Kids: Hang Me Up to Dry
The View: Wasted Little DJs
The Coup: My Favorite Mutiny


* A strong contender for best song of the year. And have you seen the video? So simple. So cool.
** Thanks, Control, for reminding me about these.
*** Totally addicted to this tune right now (as is my younger daughter). You can download it free here.
**** Colin Meloy's solo acoustic cover at the Decemberists Jersey City show introduced me to this beautifully bleak song.

Broken Social Scene plays Kevin Drew's "Spirit If..." at Webster Hall

In a set as sprawling (and, occasionally, as awkward) as the show's title, Broken Social Scene's indefatigable frontman Kevin Drew outlasted a packed house at Webster Hall last night with two-plus hours of remarkably tight, bouncy rock-n-roll, as well as his trademark deadpan pranks and patter.

The band featured longtime members of Broken Social Scene proper, as well as guests from Metric, Pavement, American Analog Set and Dinosaur Jr. (no appearance by Feist, in case you were hoping). At one time or another it seemed like everyone played at least two or three completely different instruments, including Drew on drums. My favorite of Drew's bits (though it went on for too long) was when he talked 20 or so audience members to throw their coats, sweaters, hats, scarves, bags, etc., onstage, and he put everything on at once, and then staggered around and performed an entire song buried in what must have been an unbelievably sweaty mess.

Anyway, here's an incomplete set list: UPDATE: blanks filled in in the comments. Thanks.
1. Lucky Ones
2. Cause = Time
3. Fucked Up Kid
4. Safety Bricks
5. Tbtf
6.
7.
8. Frightening Lives
9. Backed Out On the...
10. Unknown American Analog Set song
11. Gangbang Suicide
12 Farewell to the Pressure Kids
13. Kennel District (Pavement song)
14. Almost Crimes
15. 7/4 (Shoreline)
16. Anthems For a Seventeen Year Old Girl
17.
18. It's All Going to Break
19. When It Begins (massive sing-a-long with everyone on stage)


At this point, Debbie and I left, Drew still up there trying to rouse the crowd, so it's possible we missed an encore. But I'm old (so's Debbie, but also gorgeous), and it was almost 12:30, and we were already more than satisfied with the night's entertainments. By the way, "Spirit If..." is an excellent CD, I think.

Shout Out Louds at the Music Hall of Williamsburg

Here's something I noticed throughout the Shout Out Louds's 18-song, hour-long set Friday night at the great Music Hall: the more Cure-ish the song, the better it translated live. So several of my favorites from Howl Howl Gaff Gaff fell kind of flat—notably The Comeback and Wish I Were Dead—while much of the stuff from their new (and quite good) disc Our Ill Wills really soared, especially, I thought, Impossible and Normandie.

Anyway, I arrived at about 10:45 and still managed to snag an excellent spot against the rail on the platform, stage right. The show was sold out, the crowd in the mood for dancing—particularly several large pockets of extremely enthusiastic Swedes—and the band energetic and in good spirits, if a little goofy, and sloppy in their execution.

The complete set list:
1. Time Left For Love
2. The Comeback
3. Suit Yourself
4. Oh, Sweetheart
5. Impossible
6. South America
7. Shut Your Eyes
8. Your Parent's Living Room
9. Normandie
10. Please Please Please
11. 100º
12. Wish I were Dead Part 1
13. Blue Headlights
14. Tonight I Have to Leave It
----
15 Hard Rain
16. Meat Is Murder
17. Very Loud (with an interlude of Train in Vain)

Film School at the Mercury Lounge

Not for the faint of ear, a show like this: the sonically-inclined Film School at the delightfully intimate Mercury Lounge. And, I must admit it, there were times during last night's mostly tight and reasonably rockin' hour-long set when I felt like the music drifted (and, thus, did my attention) into an almost headachey drone. But don't forget, I'm kind of an old man, and there were plenty of young'uns there who seemed to be loving every minute.


The set was a good mix of stuff from their newish CD, Hideout, as well as a few gems from their great self-titled disc of 2006, the one with the tulips on the cover (though personally I would have also really liked to hear Breet. And Harmed. And Like You Know). Anyway, here's the complete set list:

Plus two encores: Dear Me and Sick of Shame. Encores are so goofy at the Mercury Lounge because there's no backstage, so the band members just kind of milled around in the dark for a minute or two as we all clapped and screamed for more. When the stage lights came back on, Greg Bertens deadpanned: "We're back." The show ended a little after midnight.

The National at the Music Hall of Williamsburg

OK, so Friday night's The National show is officially the best concert of the year. Seriously, what an amazing show. I danced, I sang, I bounced, I geeked out, I got chills and goosebumps, I was so happy for the entire 19-song, 80-minute set. Matt Berninger and his mates were in top form—confident, tight, ready to rip it up—and had the crowd eating out of their hand. And the spanking-new venue, the Music Hall of Williamsburg, is terrific... like the Bowery Ballroom in size and quality of sound (that is to say: small, and high), but in Brooklyn, and smelling still of fresh paint, and with these two great "viewing platforms" on either side of the floor, and with what looked like bleachers in the balcony (possibly a lame spot, actually), and even sold out, not horribly, greedily over-packed.

I arrived at around 10:30, got a perfect spot on one of the platforms, and The National went on about an hour later, ending a little after 1:00. Here's the complete set list:

1. Brainy
2. Secret Meeting
3. Mistaken For Strangers
4. Baby We'll Be Fine
5. Slow Show
6. Squalor Victoria
7. Murder Me Rachel
8. City Middle
9. Ada
10 Racing Like a Pro
11. Apartment Story
12. Daughters of the Soho Riots
13. Fake Empire
14. Abel
15. About Today
16. Start a War
---
17. Cold Girl Fever
18. Green Gloves
19. Mr. November

So great. I'm tempted to head out there again tonight and see if I can scalp, but I don't think these old-man bones could take it. If you're going, you're lucky.

MyMix 10.10

I make a new On-The-Go mix just about every morning. Here's some of what I was listening to, shuffled, today.

Radiohead: Weird Fishes/Arpeggi*
The National: Brainy
Rihanna: Don't Stop the Music
John Lennon: Working Class Hero
The National: Blank Slate
Okkervil River: Unless It's Kicks
Spoon: Rhthm & Soul
Shout Out Louds: Tonight I Have to Leave It
Au Revoir Simone: Through the Backyards
Patrick Watson: The Great Escape**
Rancid: Dead Bodies
Sunny Day Real Estate: Red Elephant
The National: Racing Like a Pro
Suzanne Vega: Zephyr & I
The National: Daughters of the Soho Riots
Kanye West: Flashing Lights***
Bishop Allen: Rain
Broken Social Scene & Kevin Drew: Tbtf
The National: Baby We'll Be Fine
French Kicks: The Trial of the Century
R. Kelly: Ignition (Remix)
The National: Slow Show****

* I paid £4. How about you? If you don't know what I'm talking about, and you are a Radiohead fan, please proceed immediately to here.

** Very pretty. Thanks to an old friend for the tip.

*** My current favorite from the great Graduation. Love that throwback synth/keyboard riff!

**** Yes I'm a little The National obsessed recently (going to Friday's show at the new Music Hall of Williamsburg, which I hear is an excellent venue), but it's NOTHING compared to Co's current fandom! (What can I say, she's got good taste...) Anyway, as I've said before in another forum, I always get goosebumps during the last part of this song... when it's just the piano and percussion and Matt Berninger sings:
"You know I dreamed about you
For 29 years before I saw you.
You know I dreamed about you:
I missed you for 29 years."

Very romantic, Mr. Berninger.

Okkervil River at Webster Hall

You know what it's like, to have a band that you're kind of on the fence about. They have a few good songs, and maybe even a couple of great ones, and you definitely like certain things about them... but for whatever reason it doesn't ever fully click between you two. So you go see them live, just to settle the issue once and for all. Will you stay "just friends"... or will get into bed with them and fall in love—or, at least, in lust—for the long term?

Anyway, Okkervil River? We need to talk.

It's not you, it's me. Because, really, you put on a terrific, tightly-executed, high-energy show tonight, and the packed house at Webster Hall (not an insignificant number of people) were totally yours, singing along and swaying and dancing throughout your entire 90-minute set, which included:
A Stone
Unless It's Kicks
Our Life Is Not a Movie or Maybe
A Hand to Take Hold of the Scene
Plus Ones
John Allyn Smith Sails
For Real
and, I think,
Okkervil River Song
Black Sheep Boy #4
...and lots more that I didn't recognize.

Clearly, you have something special going on with a lot of fans. But although I'll definitely keep Our Life Is A Movie or Maybe and, especially, the excellent Unless It's Kicks in heavy rotation on my daily mixes, I'm afraid that's all I can give you for now.

Be well, Okkervil River. Stay in touch, OK?

Earlimart at Joe's Pub

About halfway through Tuesday night's Earlimart show at the intimate Joe's Pub I had an epiphany: I trick myself into thinking that I like this LA-based band more than I actually do. Sure, they've written some pretty melodies, and some rockers with decent hooks—The Movies, We Drink on the Job, Unintentional Tape Manipulation, The Hidden Track—so their stuff does get stuck in my head. But then when I actually sit down and listen to their music, it's all seems very elusive, and even their best songs are really more like half songs, either all hook, or all prettiness.

Anyway, personal revelations aside, the core Earlimart band was joined on this night by an underutilized string quartet, playing 14 songs—mostly from their new CD, Mentor Tormentor—in a charming and energetic, though ultimately uninspiring, hour-long set. Here's the mostly complete set list (little help on the first song, anyone?):
1. ?
2. Answers and Questions
3. Nevermind the Phonecalls
4. Heaven Adores You
5. Happy Alone
6. Gonna Break Into Your Heart
7. 700 > 100
8. Everybody Knows Everybody
9. Don't Think About Me
10. Bloody Nose
11. The Hidden Track
12. Lazy Feet 23
---
13. We Drink on the Job
14. Cold, Cold Heaven

We arrived about ten minutes before the doors opened at 9:00, and there was hardly any line. I had employed the usual Joe's Pub reserve-a-table strategy (don't worry about the posted drink/food minimum), and we had great seats.

The National at the South Street Seaport

The rain stopped just in time tonight, because I'm not sure I could have convinced my lovely daughters to stay for The National's entire 15-song, 50-minute set had it been pouring. But I got lucky, Bo and Co had fun watching me have fun, and though it was by no means a perfect show, to hear so much good music for free on a breezy summer's night, I'm definitely not complaining.

As often seems to be the case with these free outdoor concerts, the band had a little trouble gaining momentum early, but around about the sixth or seventh song the crowd really started dancing and singing along, and the show's last half hour or so was excellent... especially, I would say, the back-to-back-to-back pre-encore trio of Daughters of the Soho Riots, Fake Empires, and Mr. November.

Anyway, here's the (nearly) complete set list (little help on song eight?):
1. Start a War
2. Mistaken For Strangers
3. Secret Meeting
4. Brainy
5. Baby We'll Be Fine
6. Slow Show
7. Abel
8. ? UPDATE: Squalor Victoria (thanks anon...)
9. Racing Like a Pro
10. Apartment Story
11. Daughters of the Soho Riots
12. Fake Empire
13. Mr. November
---
14. Murder Me Rachel
15. About Today

There are two more free Seaport concerts this summer: Camera Obscura on August 24, and Battles (which could be amazing) on the 31st.

MyMix 7.25

I make a new On-The-Go mix just about every morning. Here's some of what I'll be listening to, shuffled—in fact, on my Shuffle, which is a great summertime supplement for the regular iPod—today.

Land of Talk: Magnetic Hill
Spoon: You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb*
Battles: Atlas
Nouvelle Vague: In a Manner of Speaking**
White Rabbits: Kid on my Shoulders
Bishop Allen: Bishop Allen Drive
Menomena: Rotten Hell
The Frames: Underglass
Fleetwood Mac: Landslide
Interpol: No I in Threesome
The Chemical Brothers: The Pills Won't Help You Now
Voxtrot: The Start of Something
Rihanna: Umbrella
The Decemberists: The Crane Wife 1 & 2
Straylight Run: How Do I Fix My Head
Project Jenny, Project Jan: Negative
Brandi Carlile: The Story***
Elliot Smith: Bottle Up and Explode!
Beirut: Mount Wroclai
Jem: Just a Ride
Joseph Arthur: Diamond Ring
Radical Face: Welcome Home****
The Sunshine Underground: I Ain't Losing Any Sleep


* I've never been a serious Spoon fanatic—sure, tunes like Jonathan Fisk and My Mathematical Mind rock, but I've always felt the band's albums lacked depth. However, I must say that their new disc, Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga, is one of my favorite CDs of the year. The Ghost of You Lingers, Underdog, Rhthm & Soul, Black Like Me... I can't seem to get enough. Oh and if you haven't seen the Underdog video, please do so now.

** Thank you, A Might Heart, for introducing me to this song over your end credits. I'm not as convinced by other Nouvelle Vague covers—they do bossa nova versions of 80s new wave and punk—but this take on the Tuxedomoon classic is so sultry and sad.

*** Totally corny, totally poppy, totally great for summer.

**** Thanks to Out the Other for this discovery. She did a great mid-year best-of, complete with mp3s, a few weeks back. Definitely worth a look. And listen.

Project Jenny, Project Jan at Pianos

Janet from the excellent Nashville-based indie music site out the other turned me on to Project Jenny, Project Jan... specifically to this insanely infectious dance-party video of their song H-J-I-H. The band—really a duo from Brooklyn; Jeremy Haines doing vocals, Sammy Rubin on laptop and keyboards—effortlessly slip in and out of sounds ranging from techno and pop and hip hop to salsa and big-band swing, but ultimately reside squarely in what Interpol frontman Paul Banks calls the "two dudes who make crazy shit from their home" genre. I've since downloaded several songs from their EP, at least one of which usually makes its way onto my daily on-the-go mixes. Their album XOXOXOXOXO is due to be released August 18, but you can hear a bunch of songs from it now on the band's MySpace page.

So that's the background. The story last night was Project Jenny, Project Jan playing a free show upstairs at Pianos, where I joined about 25 other people sort of dancing but mostly sitting and listening to their lean and exuberant, though often amateurish, 14-song, 30-minute set, which went something like this:

1. ?
2. Fight Song
3. Dia de los Ninos
4. Summertime
5. 320
6. Games
7. Zoo Bar
8. ?
9. Train Track
10. Marsupial
11. ?
12. ?
13. Negative
14. Brooklyn

Rubin's beats are pretty much irresistible, and Haines definitely knows how to belt out a song, but the snarky attitude can get tiresome, the sometimes sophomoric lyrics nearly insufferable. The song Negative, for example, about making homemade pornos, exemplifies all these PJ, PJ tendencies. That said, I look forward to downloading more of their stuff—especially the excellent 320 and Train Track—when it becomes available in August.

Pianos is on Ludlow Street, just South of Stanton. I believe the shows in the lounge upstairs are always free. They also serve food in addition to cheap beer and booze. If you're visiting New York from out of town and are curious as to what, exactly, the so-called "hipster" phenomenon is all about, this is a good place to start.

The Decemberists at SummerStage

I arrived in Central Park tonight with no ticket, planning on just sitting outside—maybe on the big rock across the way*; maybe up against that wire fencing closest to Rumsey Playfield**—and listening to the great triple bill playing at SummerStage.

The first thing that happened is this: I missed virtually all of Land of Talk because I'm lame.

The second thing: I stumbled across a way to get inside for only $20 (tickets were $36.75 with all the fees, plus it was sold out), and with a wrist band that gave me access to the special reserved seats. Nice, no?

So, the show. First I have to say that from where I was sitting, in the bleachers in the back, the sound was appalling. The guitars, the bass, the keyboard, the mandolin, the banjo, all unbelievably muddy, and constantly fading in and out. It was almost embarrassing how bad it was. By the show's second half it started to sound better, but maybe I was just getting used to it, with my ears filling in the gaps. Fortunately, that most powerful and important of all Decemberists instruments, Colin Meloy's voice, was miked perfectly, clear and strong. And these songs are all so good (and, to me, so familiar), that in the end it didn't really diminish my enthusiasm for being there. However, I am glad I only paid $20...

Anyway, Meloy and crew were their usual charming, energetic, charismatic selves, with less banter and shenanigans than usual, perhaps, because they wanted to get in the show before curfew, which was by no means a bad thing.

The 90-minute set list went as follows:
1. July, July
2. Billy Liar
3. Summersong
4. The Perfect Crime #2
5. The Sporting Life
6. From My Own True Love (Lost at Sea)
7. The Engine Driver
Meloy called this "sort of about being on tour, and sort of about being a mid-level worker in Northern Michigan... if you can handle the crushing paradox."
8. The Crane Wife 3
9. The Island: Come & See / The Landlord's Daughter / You'll Not Feel the Drowning
This was the best number when I saw them in March, and it might have been my favorite tonight as well. Really rocks live.
10. O Valencia!
11. Sons and Daughters
The crowd sing-along at the end of this ("Hear all the bombs fade away...") worked less well outdoors than I imagine it would in an enclosed space, where our voices could really ring out.
---
12. Red Right Ankle
13. Oceanside
14. Chimbly Sweep
Meloy put the band members to "sleep" one by one in the middle of this song, then got the entire general admission standing-room audience to also lie down and be quiet. Amazing.
15. The Mariner's Revenge Song


As far as the openers go, I mentioned that I missed Land of Talk, and though Grizzly Bear put a lot of heart into their performance, their's is a tough type of sound to win over a distracted crowd in a big outdoor space.


Tonight was one of SummerStage's "benefit" shows, which is why it wasn't free. For a look at the season's remaining concerts, free and otherwise, there's a schedule here. SummerStage is located in Central Park, at the Rumsey Playfield, just east of Sheep Meadow and the bandshell, at around 70th Street.

* From the big rock you can see... nothing.
















** Sitting near the fence you can also see... nothing.
















But you can hear quite well from either spot... I had a great time listening to Sonic Youth and Wilco a few years back at Option #2. Worth considering for the Beastie Boys on August 8.

Menomena at the South Street Seaport

Free concert season is blowing up all over town! Last night at the Seaport those "experimental-rockers" Menomena tore through an outstanding hour-long set in front of what sax/ bass/ guitar/ singer Justin Harris called "by far the largest crowd" they've ever played for.

I'm not so up on the band that I can give you a full set list, but I do know that they started with Weird, ended with My Monkey's Back, and the ten or so songs in between definitely included Rotten Hell and Wet and Rusting. I can also report that the audience was enormously enthusiastic (especially Matt Levy); that the band was tight and excited and worked hard from start to finish; that drummer/ singer Danny Seim was excellent on the kit; that I thought guitar/ keyboards/ electronics/ singer Brent Knopf's heart-ibook was cute (have I seen that before, somewhere else?); and that this would have been a great $25 show, but for free? Just one more amazing thing about living in this beautiful city.


By the way, freewheeling opening act Beat the Devil (below) was also terrific, I thought—I had never heard them before today—if maybe a little repetitious in their sound. Singer/ harmonium-ist Shilpa Ray can really belt it out, no?

The South Street Seaport is located at the eastern end of Fulton Street. I arrived last night at around 6:45 (for a supposed 7:00 start) and, especially being a single, probably could have stood as close to the stage as I wanted. The whole show ended around 9:30. Don't forget to come see The National, playing here on August 17.