coffee please, now.

Restorations LP3 Side One Dummy, 2014

This is the undisputed album of the year. With LP3, Restorations have taken their love of all things heavy, loud, soft, quiet, and everything in between to a new height. LP3 pretty much sets the bar for what bands should be reaching for. With layer upon layer of brilliant intricacies and humble movements, Restorations find balance in the most amazing ways. The dense instrumentation mixed with the worn comfort of Jon Loudon’s voice make for one demandingly enjoyable listen.

Jimmy Eat World Clarity Capitol, 1999

How do you begin something that made you who you are? Many people don’t fully understand how music teaches them to be a human being, those people are robots. Hearing unbridled emotion catching the air around and breaking you down to the core of what you really are all the while using someone else’s words as the thesaurus of daily life. That’s what important records do. That’s what important books and films do also, but there’s something that is only tactile about music to the true believer. That’s what Clarity did to me, it made me a believer.

On February 23, 1999 I bought this CD at a record store and immediately put it in my car CD player. It didn’t leave that player for six straight months. Jimmy Eat World’s previous records had been stellar also, but Clarity has a pulse. Clarity sits in an empty room alone with you and gives definition to the feelings of hopelessness and replaces them with something else, something comforting. The music is alternative/emo rock with a bit of college radio sprinkled in, but as a whole the piece defies total convention. 

Forgetters Forgetters Too Small To Fail, 2012

I’ll ignore the “supergroup” angle of this record, probably. Forgetters sounds like Jets to Brazil if Blake and company had no care in the world about selling records. Look, I realize how awful that sounds but it’s undeniably true. Forgetters is tangible proof that it’s absolutely okay to not give a shit about anything besides just creating. This is an LP that has maybe a small percentage of songs that could be considered “normal” by the baseline audience. It’s what I love about listening to it. I wouldn’t call it weird by any stretch, but some of the ideas on Forgetters reach a little far from what fans of their previous bands would have expected. 

Bush Man on the Run Zuma Rock Records, 2014

20 years. It’s been 20 years since Sixteen Stone was released. I had it, you had it, everyone owned that record. It’s obvious now that there wasn’t really much that ever was cool about Bush, and seriously deep down everyone knows it. They prove that bands late to the party can also be the ones who really outstay the rest of the pack. I don’t even know where to start with this abhorrent work of absolute garbage. What’s worse is that I’ve listened to it twice in its entirety. 

Man on the Run isn’t something that really resembles what is important about music. The album that was released a week or so ago already sounded dated before it was penned. It’s watered down lyrics and sad alternative pop song structure are dressed up in an ugly electronic fur coat and kicked out into the world. Seriously, I’ve spent enough time thinking about this record.

Weekend Nachos Worthless Relapse, 2011

In every aspect of life there are always the people who take things too far, and then there are those that swing the pendulum so far back the other way that it all seems laughable. Let’s be honest with ourselves here, there’s a hardcore band called Weekend Nachos and they’re great. That in itself proves a very valuable point: there’s nothing that can’t be made fun of and done well at the same time. It’s like have a doughnut shop called “The Sugar Bagel Store”, you’d laugh but you’d be laughing with powdered sugar all over your face.

Snapcase Progression Through Unlearning Victory Records, 1997

Of all the great lessons taught by punk bands I think self reliance is one of the most important. It’s not just the DIY aspect that seems the most important, there’s something deeper. There’s a core of humanity that strives to be a piece and not a lone whole. Not that being an island is the object, but seeing the value in self instead of seeking to be validate by others. I feel like I just described all of the lyrical content of Progression Through Unlearning.

This record is mad at you. It’s mad at itself. There are messages of uplifting hope and pride, but overall it feels like focused angry energy. This record was one of the first hardcore LP’s that I owned and instantly connected with. I also had a Snapcase basketball jersey, just so you know. What was unclear at the time (I had just gotten my wisdom teeth out) was that this record would send me on a trajectory into heavier bands that would define everything I think about music. Just this one record, really.

Of Montreal Coquelicot Asleep in the Poppies: A Variety of Whimsical Verse Kindercore, 2001

I know you’ve heard something being described as “______ on acid”, it’s pretty common to see psychedelic drugs used as a way of wild depiction. It’s funny, I usually assume that most of the people who use this description have never done a chemical drug or taken a step past the gateway. In some ways it’s accurate, visions and hallucinations are useful ways to illustrate a story, just look at any children's book. Seriously, almost all of them. C’mon, Curious George.

Using the children’s book intro is so appropriate for Of Montreal. Coquelicot Asleep in the Poppies: A Variety of Whimsical Verse is a collection of very loosely connected songs set to every imaginable instrument. I imagine that composer Kevin Barnes’ head is gooey bubblegum with bolts and aged wood, I know, me neither. Every isolated narrative about all of these characters is like a book of short stories that paint such vivid pictures using the most unbelievable vocabulary. 

Young Statues The Flatlands Are Your Friend Run For Cover, 2014

Some people are just made to be musicians. I realize that’s a very Highlights magazine thing to say, but it’s true. If you asked me to write you a song it would take forever and would most likely be all metaphors for Chipotle burritos. Some however can craft songs from seemingly nowhere with such focused accuracy that you’d think that it was commonplace. They may also write songs about burritos, you’d have to ask them.

Being a fan of your friends band is kind of a weird thing. I can’t say that there’s ever been a song that Carmen Cirignano penned that I’ve ever skipped. Maybe it’s the earnestness of his voice or the Ryan Adams meets The Shins way that the songs progress that make every note so important that make it so impossible to dislike. Of course I love Young Statues and the following EP, but The Flatlands Are Your Friend feels like a vastly different band. It’s slightly darker, but more important it has a very strong feeling of lost innocence, a complete loss of everything sometimes. It’s an almost eerie listen.

Planes Mistaken For Stars Fuck With Fire No Idea, 2001

Imagine for a second running headfirst into a wall, getting up, and doing it all over again. That’s pretty much what Fuck With Fire makes me feel like. Each verse and chorus seethe with so much unfocused anger that I feel like I’m sweating hate. There are a fair share of melodic parts, and the whole record isn’t necessarily “heavy”, but Planes Mistaken For Stars walk a very thin line here between chaotic punk textures and post-hardcore structure. Every song has its own personality. Fuck With Fire is a challenging listen.

Ex Hex Rips Merge, 2014

Maybe it’s just my perception of the facts, or history rather, but after the early 80s there are traceable parts of punk music in just about everything. To be honest, it’s not even the music itself, it’s the entire package. Things got shorter, more to the point, and besides the occasional mainstream backlash (hair metal ballads, most dance pop) there’s an indelible mark left on near everything. I often cite DIY with the popularity of “viral marketing”, to me it’s nothing different than handing out flyers and finding new ways to innovate using the road less travelled. 

Ex Hex is almost an 80s punk band cleaned up and 30 years late. While singer Mary Timony smoothly exhales phrase after phrase there are really great things happening all around her. Something that grabbed me about Rips right off the play was how unbelievably melodic it is.  There are some whoa oh’s and some Dead Kennedys riffs planted in the right places that really add an interesting depth to the pop songs, like nostalgia without completely ripping off The Cars.

The White Octave Style No. 6312 Deep Elm, 2000

It’s possible to have too many good ideas. I mean, it’s plausible that every good idea is just correctly timed while the bad ones just need some work, but there’s a limit in there somewhere. I think in terms of food a lot, which is pretty silly because I have garbage taste in the culinary arts, but things can get over done pretty quickly in the kitchen. Conversely, when a balance is achieved the result is absolute magic.

Style No. 6312 is the result of perfect execution. The White Octave, and more specifically Steve Pedersen, have a very kitchen sink approach to songwriting that has a tendency to get bands in trouble more often than not, but here it works like a clock. There are mechanics to Style No. 6312 that are undeniable. The White Octave seamlessly infuse the kind of indie-pop that put Chapel Hill on the map with the off kilter mathy dynamics of a totally different thought process. It’s like hearing Faraquet and Superchunk together within the same song.

Yo La Tengo Painful Matador, 1993

Ever get to work and wonder how you got there? Like, you know that at some point your alarm went off and your morning ritual began but next thing you know you’re standing upright with a cup of coffee in your hand before you had a chance to realize your consciousness. It happens to me a lot, probably more than it should. With a combination of late nights and very early morning shifts occasionally I feel like time travel, or better yet folding the space* between bed and job. You’re awake, but in the loosest sense possible.

Yo La Tengo, and band knows for huge jams and incredibly loud soundscapes broke their own mold on Painful. Whereas the band always used their instruments to create crisp layers, this record had a bigger focus on the dynamics of pushing sound. It’s obvious from the onset of the opener “Big Day Coming” that there’s something different about the band on this release. Painful swings from song to song with lots of attention paid to the grand scale of the LP as a whole, which in some ways reminds me of the way American Analog Set constructs their works. 

Helmet Meantime Interscope, 1992

Have you ever stood at the top of some steps and imagined falling down them? Like, you can in a few seconds envision almost every scenario of broken bones and shattered body that would leave you lifeless at the bottom. I do this every morning. It’s usually followed by picturing “Give It” as the songs that accompanies me to my end.

Helmet is one of those bands that everyone has decided is underrated, and not that I disagree, but you have to admit that you’ve heard it said before. Meantime, their second record, is a heavy, stuttered mess with everything great about heavy records. Every (sampled) snare hit feels like it destroys the air around it. Each riff strangles your ears and makes you feel real anger. It’s a record that has no remorse for how heavy each stampede feels.

The Evens Get Evens Dischord, 2006

Style, as an overall and all encompassing quality, is both constant and evolving at the same time. For some who are career music professionals, meaning on both sides of the machine, style is a complete branding tool. It’s one of the main reasons that popular music will always succeed. There are specific sounds that are branded and marketed in both tight and broad strokes. You can always change, but not really. I think I confused myself.

The Evens are like post hardcore for the adults that frequent Trader Joes, very conscious of age but none less aware of the world around them. It’s punk in the subject matter, and more art-indie rock in style. Fronted by both Ian MacKaye and Amy Farina, names that stand significantly on their own but together stand tall like a monument, the songs sound like Fugazi demos but with a warmer and more intimate feel. The lyrics are politically charged and delivered effectively. 

Stars  No One Is Lost ATO, 2014

I remember thinking that a 30-second rule was a good way to tell if a record was listenable. Like, for some reason if I could make it more than 30 seconds without an overwhelming desire to skip the song, or album completely for that matter, that there was something there for me. I don’t so much think that way anymore. A half minute isn’t enough time to make an informed decision, make it a full one.

Oh Stars. I really liked some of the previous material from Set Yourself on Fire so I assumed that this record would be on par. It’s amazing how time passes without even being realized. It’s been a full decade since that record now and their new effort No One Is Lost has almost none of the dark indie pop enthusiasm of their previous records. No One Is Lost sounds more like a full album of skating rink pop songs and ballads mixed in with some moody atmosphere. It’s pretty weird, not bad-weird exactly, just not what I expected.

Wilco Sky Blue Sky Nonesuch, 2007

I don’t say this often, but I really don’t care about what most music publications have to say. No one can expect to get it right all the time, or at all really, but at times it’s safer to rely on the imagination of the listener than half-forming an opinion based on a single biased listen. I mean, we all do it, but it’s one thing to criticize a record internally and another thing entirely to type impressions as fact. This is something I struggle with.

Wilco could be the best example of a true outlier in popular music and Sky Blue Sky is a great place to start when examining that thought. When this record was released Pitchfork called it ‘Dad music”, which is funny considering how highly it holds Real Estate, but that’s something else all together. Sky Blue Sky is greatly different in the Wilco catalog and represents a shift of sorts in their songwriting. Whereas a bulk of the Wilco sound had been focused on moods or studio manipulation, this LP makes use of the band themselves and brings their incredible playing and ear for great structure.

Godspeed You! Black Emperor Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven Constellation/Kranky, 2000

How do you say something without actually saying it? I’m sure this isn’t the first thought by an instrumental band or a visual artist but it’s probably up there. At what point does sound or images tell us a clear enough story with minimal narration? You could argue that there’s an inherent literate factor that mainly draws imaginative people who just need that spark to create a fully formed idea from a single non-tactile piece, or maybe it’s just those that can pretend the best.

Of course while listening to Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven today I had a few thoughts. I do some of my best thinking behind the wheel of a car and with loud music. Godspeed You! Black Emperor don’t exactly clash ideas or cultivate social unrest with music, but whether or not it’s the idea from the onset they reduce the cultural aspect of norms in music to a fine powder before blowing it away. Something I’ve always felt while listening to Skinny Fists is that, while the ebb and flow of texture rolls by there’s a serious unsettling nature to its calm. It’s like an avalanche that will cover a city but at the last minute just walls it off instead.