Nobody loves Ringo returns with this Best Albums for 2013. Here is the final top 10 list:
10. Dr. Dog – B-Room
“It’s coming down (the truth don’t stop) it’s really coming (the truth don’t stop) it’s falling hard (the truth don’t stop) another day (the truth don’t stop) thunder and lightning,” begins Dr. Dog’s B-Room. It’s a solemn introduction to an album that saw the band dig deeper than ever before. Dr. Dog decided to build their own studio, their own B-Room, and hash out their songs with no major deadlines or rush. The result is an introspective assortment of tracks focusing on the band’s years on the road, and what it means to be entering almost two decades playing music for a living. Over a soft acoustic guitar and with none of the usual (and always unique) Dr. Dog bells and whistles, lead-singer/bassist Toby Leaman sings, “I was a child when I left home I wandered blindly into unknown. While others have secrets I have none but I’m too weak, too weak, too weak to ramble.”
9. HAIM – Days Are Gone
HAIM have been hailed as the new saviors of rock and roll. Their album was almost universally hailed as an excellent product from the California sisters. It is true. HAIM put together a great album with Days Are Gone. I agreed most with NPR who called the collection of 80’s-esque synth rock songs the closest thing to a pure pop album we saw in 2013. The driving beats of the song “The Wire” along with the sisters’ solid vocal collaborations make this one of the most radio-ready albums on my list.
8. The Moondoggies – Adios I’m a Ghost
The Everett Washington Moondoogies have shown brief flashes of brilliance in their eight years as a band. Yet the quintet finally put it all together in releasing Adios I’m a Ghost. From start to finish the album tells the story of a band mired in apathy over the music industry. Times got so tough following the release of their last album that frontman Kevin Murphy considered shutting down the project altogether. The existential crises for the band led to the crafting of Adios. Using music I can only describe as blues-filled psyc rock to explain their history, The Moondoggies finally can add redemption to what we can hope will be a long lived career.
7. Jonathan Wilson – Fanfare
It’s pretty rare in music to find someone responsible for revitalizing an entire style of music. In the case of the Laurel Canyon sound, look no further than Jonathan Wilson. The psychedelic-folk singer began hosting a series of jam sessions in the hills of Los Angeles aimed at emulating the sound of artists such as Crosby Stills Nash and Young, Joni Mitchell, and the Doors. The sessions gained traction and sparked the onslaught of Los Angeles talents such as Dawes, Father John Misty, and Harriet. However, to all his credit for bringing musicians together, Wilson had yet to create an album that truly captured his vision of the modern Laurel Canyon. With Fanfare, Wilson delivers track after track of late 60’s goodness with guitar licks that would make Jackson Browne jealous.
6. Lucius – Wildewoman
The ladies of Lucius already appeared on this list with San Fermin at number 16. Jess Wolfe and Holly Laessig stand out in a crowded field of amazing female voices that made 2013 such a wonderful year for music. With poignant lyrics and simple guitar pushing them along, Wolfe and Laessig demand answers. The album speaks to experiencing love from a woman’s perspective. They ask a friend on one song “did you find love?” while on another they push away a lover saying, “I don’t need you anyway, go home.” I find it appropriate that the raucous album is titled Wildewoman. The title track belts out the story of a leading female. “Her eyes are light and clear and fearless like Chicago winds in the winter time. And her hair is never quite in place. And the knees in her jeans have seen better days. And she’s no beauty queen but you love her anyways. She’s a wildewoman.” The track ends, introducing you to the rest of the album saying, “We will only be bound by the things we choose.” In 2013, it was hard to find anyone in music as unbound as Lucius.
5. White Denim – Corsicana Lemonade
When Rolling Stone, Paste, and Consequence of Sound can’t agree on what the hell your album sounds like, you are probably doing something right up my alley. White Denim is a quasi-progressive rock quasi-southern rock group out of Austin. Corsicana Lemonade finds the band delving further into exploration of the electric guitar. With two tracks produced by super weird/super-hero Jeff Tweedy, it is not hard to see how the result of this album was one lacking any stand out radio-ready track. James Petralli and company continued to blaze forward as a genre-less, single-less outfit dedicated to melting your face one progressive riff at a time. Throw this album on, turn off the lights, warm up your lava-lamp, and enjoy the ride.
4. Daft Punk – Random Access Memories
I tried really hard to keep popular albums off this list if they didn’t deserve to be called one of the best of the year. You don’t see any Kanye or Arcade Fire and that’s largely because I didn’t enjoy those projects. You could say that they aren’t my cup of tea or type of music, or you could take my stance which is that both Kanye and Arcade Fire are hugely overrated musicians who generate a load of profits but not really anything worth writing home about this year. But there is no denying that Daft Punk made one of the most captivating albums of the year. Try and think back to this last summer. Daft Punks jams were as unavoidable as the D.C. heat and that’s largely because the group put together simple, well thought out jams that can be universally enjoyed (even by an indie-rocker like me).
3. Portugal. The Man – Evil Friends
Portugal. The Man + Danger Mouse = magic. Not that the band from Portland needed any help in writing fantastic songs, but the addition of a prolific producer seems to have taken the group to new heights. This album is captivating from the first track and doesn’t let you go until it has taken listeners on a ride through what seems like several genres. Throughout all the tempo and style changes is the constant of lead singer John Gourley’s high pitched voice. The band embraced a poppier sound on this album largely at the behest of Danger Mouse and it allowed them to explore further aspects of their prog-rock tendencies without getting too lost. For a band constantly trying out new sounds and pushing their own limits, Portugal. wrote what I believe to be their own band anthem on Evil Friends. The song “Modern Jesus” screams to the Portugal. faithful, “don’t pray for us, we don’t need no modern Jesus. To roll with us the only rule we need is never giving up. The only faith we have is faith in us.” For those who had faith in the band, this poppy chorus sounds like a battle cry, and for all those who give Evil Friends a few listens (you need to hear it a few times to digest what the hell is happening here), you most likely have been converted into followers of The Man.
2. Phosphorescent – Muchacho
Matthew Houck is Phosphorescent. It has been his moniker now for more than a decade. Houck has released 6 albums as Phosphorescent but none were anywhere close to as powerful as Muchacho. Houck grapples with the utter despair that comes with heartbreak throughout the album. Through well-crafted orchestral arrangements and reverb filled guitar riffs Houck sings out his lessons learned on the title track, “See I was slow to understand this river’s bigger than I am its running faster than I can. Though, Lord, I tried.” His acceptance of his own limitations pulses throughout the album with occasional punches of defiance. He sets out to conquer love through his lyrics and poignantly declares his opponent as “a burning thing, that (love) makes a fiery ring. Oh but I know love as a caging thing, just a killer come to call from some awful dream.” The album begins and ends with the same lyrics. Houck speaks to the sun saying, “dark as I been. Ease. Easy oh. Be easy oh.” Muchacho truly feels like a journey, a beautiful one, and one that I have taken time and again in 2013.
1. Jason Isbell – Southeastern
To call an album the greatest of the year is quite a difficult distinction for a music listener. Each album carries a unique place to the listener. Where did you first high pitched voice of Portugal. The Man? Who was the friend who dragged you to the Charles Bradley concert, expanding your taste into a new genre? We each carry our personal memories of music embedded within all of our favorite artists. Ranking how we each encounter those memories is tricky simply because “good music” is all in the eye of the beholder. And yet, at the same time, the universality of music can sometimes lead you to stand back in awe. Sometimes an album comes along that is from start to finish better written, both in musical fortitude and lyrical prowess, which truly impresses. That album for 2013 is Jason Isbell’s Southeastern. The former Drive by Trucker guitar player steps out from behind his former touring act to dig deep into his story-telling quiver. Out from it Isbell pulls stories of life, love, and death in such a seamless manner that you cannot help but feel, and I mean feel, his outpouring in every strum. Even hardened hip-hop lovers or hard rockers will find themselves feeling crippled by the beauty of the song “elephant”, a testament to a friend dying of cancer. That’s not to say the album is depressing. Isbell makes even the most mundane life activity, such as taking an airplane trip home seem like an inspiring feat that we can all achieve with gusto. In the track “flying over water” behind a cacophony of live drums Isbell sings, “take my hand baby we’re over land I know flying over water makes you cry. Where’s that liquor cart? Maybe we shouldn’t start, but I can’t for the life of me say why.” To digest Southeastern is akin to sitting before an engineering wonder, or staring at a skyscraper. Each of us interprets the work of the architects in our own way, each curve and reflection brings us to another realization. And yet it is clear that what is before is a true testament to the human spirit, that through the outpouring of the vision of someone else we all can experience something lasting.
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