Dean's List: 2024

The 74 best albums of the past year (or so)

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1. Louis Armstrong: Louis in London (Verve): Subscriber-only review. A
2. Wussy: Cincinnati Ohio (Shake It): Subscriber-only review. A
3. Phelimuncasi & Metal Preyers: Izigqinamba (Nyege Nyege Tapes): Subscriber-only review. A
4. Adrianne Lenker: Bright Future (4AD): There's a fragility to the 31-year-old Big Thief chief's solo album that seems to disorient admiring contemporaries who can't figure out how to reconcile her blatant genius with her sweet, thoughtful, unassuming meditations. "I don't feel strong," she whispers or murmurs or reflects as she recalls being a seven-year-old whose dream was to invent a portal that would enable her to soar "high over the crowd" while at the same time not really knowing "where I'd go without you." Which is to say that high among many other things this transcendent collection of poetic melodies is a breakup album. If you missed the point somehow, she acknowledges simply "I don't know what I'd do without you," because when it comes down to it "I wanna be your lover and I want to be your man"--or is it just "I wanted to be the one/That you could understand"? Truth is, in her insuperably melodic way, she wants it all. But she'd rather stick to being be lovely than make a big deal of it. A
5. Eminem: The Death of Slim Shady (Coup de Grâce) (Aftermath/Interscope): Subscriber-only review. A
6. Buck 65: Punk Rock B-Boy (self-released '23): The only rapper I can imagine dropping the lines "Tripping on the psilocybin/Listening to Phyllis Hyman," "Sycophants shit their pants better take Immodium," or "The dildo of consequence seldom arrives lubricated" is clearly excited about being back in the business. True--sweat like Aroldis Chapman though he may, he's not gonna serve up a home run every time, or so I reminded myself three-four plays into this one. But then a funny thing happened, and it was literally funny. By the time I got to six-seven I was liking it more all over again. A-
7. Tucker Zimmerman & Friends: Tucker Zimmerman & Friends Play Dance of Love (4AD): Subscriber-only review. A
8. Kampire Presents: A Dancefloor in Ndola (Strut): Subscriber-only review. A
9. Chappell Roan: The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess (Island '23): This is a shamelessly catchy album about the sexualization of a once devout Christian born Kayleigh Rose Amstutz who grew up--comfortably enough, I'm guessing, as the daughter of a veterinarian and a registered nurse--in a trailer park near Springfield, Missouri. At 17 she signed a record deal with Atlantic that went phffft, so at 20 she relocated to L.A. for to seek her fortune in show business full-time. Not that the foregoing bio is more than hinted at in these songs, all of them voiced by a thrill-seeking post-teen who gets around; even the seeking her fortune part has to be inferred. The sexualization, however, is explicit and thematic, there for the delectation of anyone with working genitalia--male or female, the songs go both ways, although the guys fade out and the gals are so much nicer in general. I mean, she's not reticent with the physical details. As the album goes on, her demonstrative soprano, captivating tunes, and runaway grooves come to seem inextricable from the encounters and relationships that occasioned them. "Phew," you almost want to say. "Slow down a little, girl!" A
10. Previous Industries: Service Merchandise (Merge): Subscriber-only review. A
11. Charli XCX: Brat (Atlantic): No matter what the gossip sheets are selling, this is not where Scottish-Gujarati-Ugandan beatmaker-in-spite-of-herself XCX buries the figurative hatchet with Irish-Croatian-Kiwi singer-songwriter-if-you-insist Ella Marija Lani Yelich-O'Connor d/b/a Lorde. That hatchet was imaginary, just for show. Instead this is where Charlotte Emma Aitchison d/b/a Charli XCX and also as the one-woman embodiment of everything we mean by "novelty act" arrays a bleeping nosegay of the kind of sound-effect hooks she's been known to apologize for when she was in a bad mood and put her own name or "name" on an album constructed from dance or "dance" tracks whose charm is a beaty artificiality that surpasseth understanding. After all, understanding is a bore. B+
12. Doechii: Alligator Bites Never Heal (TDE/Capitol): Subscriber-only review. A-
13. Buck 65, Doseone, Jel: North American Adonis (Handsmade '23): Initially brainstormed by injury-plagued Nova Scotian Yankee signee turned quick-lipped Anglophone rapper Richard Terfry a/k/a Buck 65 and Idaho-born Anticon cofounder Adam Drucker a/k/a Doseone, a version of this album was put aside by both principals circa 1998 as they focused on CBC talk radio and US alt-rap respectively. But now they've revived it decades later with beats that had to be reconceived because the originals got lost and lyrics that needed light refurbishing, like when Kendrick Lamar goes Anticon. For a while I winced at the congenial introductory "North America is where the United States of America is." Now I smile every time I hear it. Not just white but Canadian for Pete's sake, Buck 65's two-part hip-hop career makes him one of the most eloquent rappers ever. Of course hip-hop is quintessentially African-American, actively resisting the racism that remains such a poison in the land of the not so damn free. But these two prove it's also so adaptable it can make a fella hope if not always believe that we'll get on the other side before we all go down in infamy or up in smoke. A
14. Fake Fruit: Mucho Mistrust (Carpark): Subscriber-only review. A-
15. Billie Eilish: Hit Me Hard and Soft (Darkroom/Interscope): I prepped by listening with half an ear, a proven way to find out whether music has the power to grab you even when you've slanted your consciousness elsewhere. And somehow I came away nursing the all too vague conclusion that Finneas had convinced his sister to subjugate her uncanny pop hookiness to his home-schooled avant ambitions--to put their pop-tune hooks on hold and make an album where the musical gestalt was fundamentally textural. Closer listening, however, revealed that textures or no textures this missed the point. Tunefully enough and much more decisively, it's an album that explores in shifting detail both stardom and one's early twenties as hotbeds of erotic and existential turmoil--sometimes ecstatic, sometimes fraught, sometimes joined at the hip if stardom happens to be your achievement or fate, sometimes a web of mutually exclusive imponderables. So say it's a 22-year-old seeking true love and a superstar ditto. "I could eat that girl for lunch," a lip-smacking Billie tells the world. So "Pulling up a chair/And putting up my hair," she awaits a visit. "You say no one knows you so well/But every time you touch me/I just wonder how she felt," she frets. "Good things don't last," she concludes. "So you found her/Now go fall in love/Just like we were/If I ever was," she advises. "I'm trying my best," she avers. And at 82, I believe every word. A
16. Beyoncé: Cowboy Carter (Parkwood/Columbia): Not a country album--without too much fuss we've gotten that straight. Just a confidently eclectic pop album with countryish flavorings and countryish provocations that claims and indeed establishes that our greatest female pop singer, who we know is also a pretty darn good songwriter, has a fair claim on that fiefdom. Her songwriting does peter out slightly for the last five or so of 25 (CD!) tracks, but for the most part the impressive variety of these songs only strengthens her not so audacious claim. She sings as a mother, a daughter, a sister, a descendant, an inheritor, and a sexpot. She enlists ever-obliging 90-year-old Willie Nelson, outclassed 28-year-old Post Malone, a sexy Miley Cyrus, a delighted Dolly Parton, and Paul McCartney's "Blackbird" in her quest and gives ample room to 81-year-old special guest Linda Martel, who became the first Black woman to (briefly) crack the Grand Old Opry half a century ago. Epochal? Maybe, maybe not. But a hell of a good record. A
17. Jason Moran: From the Dancehall to the Battlefield (Yes '23): "Syncopation is about urgency, pushing the beat ahead to apply the anticapation of the oncoming downbeat, an outlook that is inherently futuristic" writes pianist-composer-entrepreneur Moran on what is fundamentally a through-composed tribute album to the Alabama-born Black bandleader-composer James Reese Europe, although Moran gives pretty much equal credit to fellow pianist Randy Weston, who died at 92 in 2018. Some of the 15 tracks have a pop tunefulness and/or groovefulness about them--"Darktown Strutters Ball" and "St Louis Blues" are classics most listeners will dimly recognize at least, "Memphis Blues" and "Ballin the Jack" kind of but not so much. But other passages cultivate an unkempt abstraction you'll enjoy more and more as you get used to how they presage a musical complexity Moran means to remind us is on its way. Europe died at 39, stabbed in the neck by a drummer he'd just taken to task. So be sure you go away humming the finale, called simply "For James." A
18. Rosie Tucker: Utopia Now! (Sentimental): At 26, Tucker has the lineaments of a mature young adult with a conscience that remains close at hand. Even the love songs, which pop up often if you keep your ears clean, come with the proviso "I'm writing in America, a country whose idea of freedom depends on the subjugation of the many." Following one called "All My Exes Live in Vortexes" with one called "Gil Scott Albatross" (cf. Gil Scott-Heron of The Revolution Will Not Be Televised fame), always ready for "a staring contest with the evil eye," Tucker tells us that "when there's pain you still got nerve," that "eternal life is the intersection of the line of time and the plane of now," that even "doing your best you regress to the mean," and that "For my enemies I want nothing but unending bliss." Some kind of universalist for sure, they have the right to plural pronouns if anymany does. A-
19. Heems/Lapgan: Lafandar (Veena Sounds): "How does my accent sound when I'm crying?/How does my accent sound when I'm dying?" the Flushing-raised Punjabi-American half of Wesleyan-spawned rap legends Das Racist wants to know. Aiming his first album in seven years at a novelty market so callow it "wasn't born when I saw those buildings vanish kid"--and to be clear, said buildings were the twin towers, their collapse all too visible from Stuyvesant High School, to this day one of the choicest public education venues in the five boroughs. His rhymes so smart and funny if not therefore so coherent, his flow making the most of its own race-specific New York accent, Heems remains a pleasure to hear. I doubt either Stuyvesant or Wesleyan can figure out what to make of him, and sometimes I'm not so sure what I make of him myself. But he was always fun and still is. A-
20. Unholy Modal Rounders: Unholier Than Thou 7/7/77 (Don Giovanni): Subscriber-only review. A
21. Fred Again..: 10 Days (Atlantic): Subscriber-only review. A-
22. Laurie Anderson: Amelia (Nonesuch): Subscriber-only review. A-
23. Tierra Whack: World Wide Whack (Interscope): Cheerfully compulsive 28-year-old Philadelphia-Atlanta rapper-singer-rhymer Whack made her big splash in 2018 with the 13-song but also 13-minute Whack World, where arithmetic whizzes will be less than shocked to learn she ended each of the 13 songs she showcased at precisely 60 seconds flat, an effect that proved disorienting and charming simultaneously. Her timbre soft, her enunciation impeccable anyway, her conversational, too-smart-for-cute flow is so engaged yet also so casual it's like she's hasn't ruled stardom out but is just too pleased with herself now to start getting pushy about it. A-
24. Kendrick Lamar: GNX (pgLang/Interscope): Subscriber-only review. A-
25. Carly Pearce: Hummingbird (Big Machine): No matter who wrote 'em, and this Nashville up-and-comer has her name on all but one of these 14 acerbic tales of romantic shortfall, it's my working assumption that a gal whose love affairs fall apart all the time has been dumped or at least dismayed by a po'-faced parade of cads, dogs, and bores. So I was surprised to learn that when her 2019 marriage to newer up-and-comer Michael Ray dissolved, it was Ray who regaled the gossip sheets with plaints claiming his heart got more broke than hers did. Then I listened to his breakthrough Dive Bars and Broken Hearts EP and was struck by how dull not to say corny the songs were compared to his ex's, so maybe it was his ego hurting. If you want to start with what sounds to me like Pearce's sure shots here, try "Truck on Fire" ("So I found a little gas in a small red can/Last strike match flying out of my hand"), or "Woman to Woman" ("Woman to woman take it from me/From Texarkana to Tennessee/Ain't a roadside motel he ain't seen"). Then just play the whole thing. A
26. Jon Langford & the Men of Gwent: Lost on Land & Sea (Country Mile '23): On melody alone these 12 boisterous songs enliven the most engaging and memorable of Langford's three Men of Gwent albums. But like democracy only even more so, modernization isn't all it's cracked up to be--much more is at stake. The town bustles even as the last murenger completes the last wall repair, with emotions pulled more literally than usual "from pillar to post." "Jitterburg jive and swing" or not, the now-bustling factory generates many broken bones. "Mrs. Hammer's Dream" fails to locate young Tommy on the ridge where she was sure she'd spied him--or was he just "Lost in the Wentwood"? The swimming can be tricky too: "There's a place let's take a peek/That's where they keep/The bodies of the drowned." Or if all this seems like too much dismaying detail, we can just keep the grim stuff down to "How dark is the night/How cold is the rain." A
27. Miranda Lambert: Postcards From Texas (Republic/Big Loud/Vanner): Subscriber-only review. A-
28. The Paranoid Style: The Paranoid Style Presents: The Interrogator (Bar/None): The only songwriter ever to rhyme "Savoy truffle" and "media kerfuffle," Elizabeth Nelson and sidemen who start with her husband Timothy Bracy and here include perfectly suited original dB Peter Holsapple have assembled a sizable catalogue of catchy yet also politically sapient three-minute songs that now fill up seven albums and an EP. Given how brainy Nelson's lyrics are, her light soprano may strike some as insufficiently forceful, but aesthetic force is one thing brains are for, and as Nelson reminds herself, "If you haven't got the temerity then you'd better turn around." Hence one about a charity event called "Are You Loathsome Tonight." Hence "The return of the Molly Maguires/From the '73 panic/To the children's choirs." Hence "Three credits short at Yokel State/She's gonna be a legal aide." Hence "I've spent time in education/I have spent time in jail/I've drunk from the river basin/I have skied in Vail." A
29. Bad Moves: Wearing Out the Refrain (Don Giovanni): Subscriber-only review. A-
30. Vampire Weekend: Only God Was Above Us (Columbia): The intricacy of both their music and their thematics are evidence of this NY-to-LA quartet's well-manicured skill set. Absolutely they rock; absolutely they think as well. About what they do so remains not so much murky as diplomatically inexplicit, pretty much unacknowledged when they get down to cases only somehow they never quite do. The first words Ezra Koenig utters here are "Fuck the world," but that's a feint. They've always assumed that their brief was to make said world a better place. Problem is, now it may just be falling apart instead and that worries them plenty. "Your consciousness is not my problem/And I hope you know your brain's not bulletproof," they declare intricately, not least because they're smart enough to be concerned about their own brains as well. Good luck to them, and to all of us. Here's hoping celebrations of musical intelligence will help a little, because that much and not a lot else they're clearly still good for. A-
31. Wimps: City Lights (Youth Riot '23): From Seattle, to quote their terse, comprehensive bio: "an imperfect, live, energetic, human statement made by 3 imperfect, mostly alive, yet rapidly deteriorating bit players of various Seattle whos and whats of a time long ago and soon to be forgotten." But these 13 songs in 27 minutes are so energetic and human that by track three they prove that forgetting that time would be a major waste. Not punk in any purist or formalist way but with a speed, economy, and drive rock and roll seldom got near before punk gestated and took hold, they never claim or even aspire to a youth that for them has clearly passed. "Gravity is feeling very heavy lately," they report. "I'm a mom I worked all day," they continue. "Even on the grayest day, morning always comes," they promise. Which is how they got to make this record. A-
32. África Negra: Antologia Vol. 2 (Bongo Joe): This band's home base is Sao Tomé and Principe, a tiny island nation of barely 200,000 situated 150 miles west of the African mainland that was only settled--with slaves, naturally--after the Portuguese discovered the islands in 1470. One might hope this isolated population managed to develop its own musical style, and in a sense it did, though it may be more accurate to label it a unique amalgam: a gentle genre mix that evokes and/or duplicates the fetching polyrhythms of related African dance musics from Nigeria down to the Congo and tops them off with the sometimes sweet, sometimes mellow vocals of Sergio Fonseca and João Seria, a figure so beloved his 2023 death occasioned nationwide mourning. A-
33. Azuka Moweta & Aniome Brothers Band: Nwanne Bu Ife (Palenque '23): Moweta's not so much distinctive as felt and textured and arresting baritone is what sells his devotion to the Nigerian highlife variant dubbed ekobe, which enlists such Igbo percussion devices as long gong, woodblock, and it says here pot. Six tracks ranging between six and 16 minutes, all of which deliver soul, groove, and an emotional authority imbued with both faith and tenderness--none of which, I'm obliged to acknowledge, would necessarily be as convincing if I understood the words. A-
34. Chris Smither: All About the Bones (Signature Sounds): Subscriber-only review. A-
35. Jon Langford & the Men of Gwent: The Legend of LL (Country Mile '15): Having mislaid my burn of this album, which I'd spun with pleasure multiple times by then, I streamed a 13-track Spotify version before gathering the gall to launch a review, a project foreordained when on April 14 I saw Langford perform for the first time in over a decade accompanied by calm, engaged old hand Sally Timms and wild, intense Texas guitar crazies the Sadies at Sony Hall on 46th Street. Without, how to say this, putting on a show, the longtime leader of the Leeds-spawned Mekons effortlessly combined John Anderson's pure country "Wild and Blue" and Eric von Schmidt's faux Caribbean "Joshua Gone Barbados" with songs of his own devising from the opening "It's Not Enough" through the turf-defining "Nashville Radio" to the climactic Mekons statement of principle "Hard to Be Human Again." What I found most engaging and indeed moving about his set was how into it he seemed--as if he was born to perform these songs and enthralled to to sing them in a Broadway nightclub half-full of old fans who are just as enthralled to be there. And this album partakes of the same kind of what I can only call magic. A-
36. Kathryn Williams & Withered Hand: Willson Williams (One Little Independent): In the early teens, when he enjoyed a spell as a gifted minor cult figure on the U.K. folk-rock circuit, Withered Hand, the Biblical professional name of Edinburgh-based lapsed Jehovah's Witness Dan Willson, put out a smatterring of albums that tried to pin down the meaning of a love he seemed to figure was as close to God as he'd ever get. On the 11 uncompromisingly tender and lovely songs he shares with 50-year-old veteran Williams here, how literally autobiographical I have no idea although they do make it sound that way, especially onthe one that includes the startling couplet "Like the first time that you blew me/I'm not hung like an elephant but I got agood memory." Autobiographical? For these two at this moment, that's not the point. In the very same song, "I can't think of anyone I'd rather spend my time with than you babe" is the point. A-
37. Jamila Woods: Water Made Us (Jagjaguwar '23): Turning 34, the poet, Brown grad, and Chicago community organizer finds herself old enough to ponder where her love life will end up on a thoughtful, sprightly, charming 45-minute 17-tracker that mixes sung and spoken reminiscences of a bunch of relationships that end up on one that might well last even though she once thought she'd given up on it. Sung or spoken, the girlish timbre of her practiced soprano adds a charm that makes you root for her as her hopes rise and fall and rise again. But the most striking track adds up to 35 spoken seconds by a gravel-voiced guy who sounds 75 or so: "Jamila, I was a scoundrel/And I advised my wife not to marry me/I was a scoundrel/She deserved better/Some years later she rescued me out of the doldrums/A newer doldrum/And we've been together for 50 years." A-
38. Jon Langford: Gubbins (self-released '23): "Songs that fell between the cracks, tunes too exuberant and twisted to hang with the popular crowd, stuff he just forgot about pleasantly surprised the old Welsh bugger when he rediscovered them in the basement." In other words, not rejects so much as stragglers or one-of-a-kinds that didn't make the cut. Vocals tend more reflective than forceful, but not unanimously. Be glad Sally Timms pitches in on two complementary finales. But don't miss "Drone Operator," "Election Day," "Brixton," "Grog." A-
39. M.J. Lenderman: Manning Fireworks (Anti-): Subscriber-only review. A-
40. David Murray: Francesca (Intakt): Eight tracks ranging between 6:09 and 10:54 featuring the greatest working tenor player and three sidepeople I'm not jazzed up enough to expatiate on. But they're all hyperactive and that's exciting not messy: Marta Sanchez on piano, Luke Stewart on bass, Russell Carter on drums. The music never stops moving around, and while I suppose it could be argued that Murray's virtuosity is too much an end in itself here, that kind of talk is for prigs. This kind of genuine ensemble is one of the things jazz is for. A-
41. Guy Davis: Be Ready When I Call You (M.C. '21): I've long been mildly impressed by Ossie and Ruby's blues-soaked son, who turns 71 in May. But as I listened harder to his 21st album I found there wasn't much mild about it. Yes there are fun songs here: the near-novelty "Badonkadonk Train," the hopeful "I Got a Job in the City," in its mean way the Trump-thumping bonus cut "It Was You." But it's the specificity and bite of the overt protest songs that had me listening harder, with three earning my full attention: the all too leaden "Flint River Blues," Davis's undiminished outrage at the 1921 Tulsa race massacre, and "Palestine, Oh Palestine," one of the rare responses to that horror to achieve something resembling felt balance without beginning to pretend that all evils are equal. A-
42. Les Amazones d'Afrique: Musow Danse (RealWorld): Although the four principals are somewhat less august in this third iteration and an actual trot would be nice, the four women who dominate this third iteration their protest music you'd better dance to are more militantly feminist meaning more proactive politically than either of its predecessors. And while as uptempo Afropop with an insistent tempo you can assume it's danceable, you should be aware that the title translates simply "women's dance." True, producer Jacknife Lee already has both Taylor Swift and the Killers on his dance card. But you should keep in mind that the refrain translates: "Hey womanhood! Hey womanhood! We're calling on women from around the world." A-
43. Margaret Glaspy: Echo the Diamond (ATO '23): A calm, declarative California-to-NYC singer-songwriter who kept auditing guitar classes after her Berklee grant ran out is determined not to give up on this love thing either. "Between a rock and a hard place/I'll be your lily pad," she vows, and if you personally are the beneficiary of that promise don't let the chance pass. There's sweetness here, but also thought and the kind of intelligence that values the lubricious without getting swamped by it. Thirty-five she may be; jaded she's not. A-
44. LL Cool J: The Force (Def Jam/Virgin/LL Cool J): Subscriber-only review. A-
45. Dolly Parton: Rockstar (Butterfly/Big Machine '23): In theory this is the 77-year-old Nashville auteur's admission application to a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame that in 2022 voted her in aware that it had more to gain from her than she did from it. Only then, hilariously, she claimed to feel obliged as a country artist to turn them down until she could make the grade by recording some "rock" herself, and this two-hours-plus double album is it--basically, although the concept has some give in it, a duet album where dozens of "rock" totems help her resuscitate their hits. Only problem is, its critical reception has been disgracefully snarky, especially in the U.K. but Stateside too. True, many of these tracks could be called schlocky, not least because the miraculously tolerant Parton is no disrespecter of schlock, not even in the form of Journey, REO Speedwagon, Judas Priest, Peter Frampton, and 4 Non Blondes. I'm not telling you I much enjoy any of these particular selections, although I do love how audaciously Parton stakes her claim on them. But many of the tracks that are more to my taste and probably yours range from good fun to genius. One called "I Dreamed About Elvis" features professional Elvis imitator Ronnie McDowell. Goddaughter Miley Cyrus steps up to pitch in on "Wrecking Ball." Lizzo mounts that mythic "Stairway to Heaven." "Heart of Glass" beats lissomely in a duet with Debbie Harry. Paul and Ringo join in on "Let It Be." With Mick Jagger beset by scheduling difficulties, poor guy, Pink and Brandi Carlile step up to take his place. And the eight-minute solo version of "Purple Rain" is something like spectacular. A-
46. Ren: Sick Boi (The Other Songs '23): Quick-lipped, self-taught Welsh beatmaker-frontman Ren Gill, whose good little Trick the Fox band was put on the injured list by his long battle with Lyme disease and the "constant wrestling with my mental health" that ensued, is "blessed with a silver tongue" as he "navigates the shadow of the valley of sickness," a rapper whose articulated singsong combines startling clarity with polysyllabic vernacularity. Whether he's rhyming "ready to kill" with "mentally ill," "mine," "minor" and "Simon," or Jesse Owens and Leonard Cohen, "helter skelter" with "Alka-Seltzer" or reminding us that "horses don't even have opposable thumbs," he's not so much fun as impressive or maybe just delightful. I don't recall ever hearing anything much like him.' A
47. Jack Harlow: Jackman (Atlantic '23): Since this white middle-class Louisville 25-year-old with humanistic impulses and hip-hop dreams seems comfortable comparing himself to Eminem, I have some advice for him. A) Forget comparing yourself to Eminem because while you have skills as both rapper and a rhymer, on a technical level Eminem is one of the most accomplished rappers ever. B) Don't compare yourself to Eminem because three decades in it's clear that he's a bigger dick than you'll ever be, not to mention than you want to be. That said, reviewers' tendency to condescend to him would be funny if it wasn't pathetic, 'cause he's smarter than they are. Me, I welcome rhymes about his father's budget-balancing problems, about not reminiscing with his older brother, about teen pals grown up into young-adult sex offenders, about having dinner with the newly elected Democratic governor of Kentucky, and about wishing you were sure God exists. A-
48. Rail Band: Buffet Hotel de la Gare (Mississippi): Discographically I'm somewhat hornswoggled by what would seem to be the fourth U.S.-available album by this government-supported or do I mean state-railroad-supported Malian band, not least because legendary lead vocalist Salif Keita, an albino not to be confused with the football star of the same name who died last September, is said to have retired decades ago. But I can responsibly report that there's a relaxed yet impassioned feel to this particular collection that achieves a simple sweetness I don't find on the Rail Band CDs I'm happy to have acquired over the years. For Afropop adepts only, you could say if so inclined. But also an excellent reason to get on board. A-
49. Megan Moroney: Am I Okay? (Columbia Nashville): Moroney has writing credit on all 13 of these varied and well-crafted songs about romantic bliss gone bad and nothing but romantic bliss gone bad, although an actual-count 15 song doctors, 10 of them male, also pitch in on between one and six of them. Key indicators include "I'd sound good with your last name," "Mama I lied he ain't a good guy," "When I lie down next to him/I'd rather be with you," "Bet you didn't think you'd wind up in a song," "two months deep in therapy," "another three-six-five have come and gone," "I see your truck and I don't give a," "I hope you're happy as can be/I hope it don't get back to me," and the magnificent and quite literal in its fanciful way "Yeah it hurt like hell/But hell it could have been worse/At least my whole world left me for Miss Universe." A-
50. Morgan Wade: Obsessed (RCA): Subscriber-only review. A-
51. Sonic Youth: Walls Have Ears (Goofin'): As a respectful-to-admiring skeptic as regards what steadily evolved into the quintessential NYC postpunk-as-"rock" band, I initially skipped this highly unofficial circa-1985 U.K.-performed and -released live bootleg. Little did I realize that it documented a crucial shift, from stalwart drummer Bob Bert to definitive drummer Steve Shelley, not as crucial a presence as Keith Richards, say, but as we look back at almost as essential as they evolved into the definitive band they remain even with Kim Gordon gone the separate way she had every right to. Now fully aware of what was to become of them, I find the very crudity that put me off slightly in the '80s a crucial part of their heritage. It's in my cart at Amazon as I write. A-
52. El Michels Affair & Black Thought: Glorious Game (Big Crown '23): Subscriber-only review. A-
53. Regina Spektor: Home, Before and After (Sire '22): "My mind is full of melodies/They search for homes inside of me," and although rhythm players are credited along with the strings and occasional fancy-pants brass that swell up quietly here and there, the dominant instrument on Spektor's first album since 2016 is her classically trained piano, which even so plays second fiddle to her sweet, modest, precise voice as crafted song follows crafted song and thoughtful lyric enriches thoughtful lyric. At 42 she's not getting any happier, her humanity touched with the kind of disquiet sure to make biographical fallacy fans nervous. So I guess I'm relieved to report that the finale brings her back to a home where the light is always on. And I also note that the standout "One Man's Prayer" sketches a guy who's timid till a gal shores up his confidence and what happens next is not pretty. I dare any male to cover it. A-
54. Charlotte Adigéry and Bolis Pupul: Topical Dancer (DeeWee '22): Light as a bag of popcorn with sea salt but no butter please, Martiniquan-Guadeloupan Adigéry and Belgian-Chinese Pupul split the hair's-breadth between witty and arch, funny and amusant, laugh-a-minute and gigglefritz. This is world-funk lite with a playful show of attitude and occasional touches of moral acuity albeit not quite political specificity. It's gone before you know it, but next time it comes out of the speakers you'll recognize it instantly--and dance to it too if that's your thing. B+
55. Waxahatchee: Tigers Blood (Anti-): At 35 going on 40 (when did that happen exactly?), Katie Crutchfield still can't catch a romantic break while continuing to nurture an untextured vocal affect that sounds not teen, too practiced and thought through for that, but direct, unvirtuosic. Even now, she reminds her male singing partner, "I imprint all your ideas on mine." Yet the guy remains "a wrangler keeping the pace/Hunting for open space," leaving Katie's heart "strung up like a flag" and she herself "too weak to just let you drown." Good metaphor, gal. Take it as literally as seems meet--you know very well that's what he deserves. A-
56. Kim Gordon: The Collective (Matador): Textural rather than hooky, midway between hard rock and cacophony hence closer sonically and conceptually to classic post-grunge Sonic Youth than not just 1990's major-label debut Goo or 2006's idiosyncratically tuneful Rather Ripped much less 1998's polemically if all too fleetingly connubial A Thousand Leaves. Those put off or feeling contrary have every right to slot this one as a noise album, but if so it's a striking and courageous one. When Gordon is so inclined she can be songful enough, and here "enough" stretches that parameter a little. But her natural avant-garde affinities not only dominate the musical gestalt her solo work tends toward, with melodies not to mention tunes given short shrift. And here, unlike so many avant-gardists, she achieves what is recognizably her own sound. A-
57. Old 97's: American Primitive (ATO): "From the barroom floor to the bardo," Rhett Miller and his longtime alt-country mates regroup to assemble yet another album of formally unremarkable, melodically indelible songs. I confess that my sentimental favorite is "Honeypie," which I prefer even to the opener suggesting that we "dance like the world is falling down around you/Because it is," or "Magic" complaining that "these cigarettes are lazy/They'e killing me so slow." And please note that "Legs that go all the way down to the floor" and all, "The one thing she don't like/Is when I call her my old lady." A-
58. Guy Davis: The Legend of Sugarbelly (M.C.): Subscriber-only review. A-
59. Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit: Weathervanes (Southeastern '23): Through an educational early run with the Drive-By Truckers, foreshortened marriages to two musicians of serious substance, struggling for sobriety, going solo, and overseeing the 2020 multi-artist voting-rights album Georgia Blue, this guitar-toting 45-year-old son of two Alabama teenagers has established himself as an ambitious, gifted, temperamental, very Southern rock and roller of undeniable talent and rare political heart. So the consistent acuity of the 15 songs here is hardly a surprise, with my special favorites the high-strung gun-violence reenactment "Save the World" and the OD tragedy "When We Were Close." How compellingly Isbell the singer can deliver these well-put words of wisdom, however, has yet to fully reveal itself. A-
60. Zach Bryan: The Great American Bar Scene (Warner): Subscriber-only review. A-
61. Serengeti: KDIV (Othar): Subscriber-only review. A-
62. Robert Finley: Black Bayou (Easy Eye Sound '23): This very late-breaking 70-year-old Louisiana bluesman, who I was amused as well as amazed to learn was an America's Got Talent also-ran at 65, made two predictable earlier albums with Black Keys good guy Dan Auerbach, so Auerbach's production presumably isn't decisive on this more striking one. Nor do openers called "Livin' Out a Suitcase" and "Sneakin' Around" harbinger many surprises. Grammy king Kingfish Ingram blows him away chopswise. Yet somehow he hits grooves both musical and narrative that old-timers whose appetite for blues is permanently unslaked will grab onto and hold. I was already caught up when he broke a mold with "Nobody Wants to Be Lonely," about not only visiting a friend in an old age home but swearing credibly and compassionately to come back soon, and two tracks later swears in one called "Lucky Day" to have finally met a woman he'll love for life. In pop music, that's very often an exaggeration if not a lie. But maybe not when the singer is pushing 70. A-
63. Thomas Anderson: Hello, I'm From the Future (Out There): If you've never checked out this longstanding postcollegiate singer-songwriter, I hope a stanza will solve that problem with no further ado: "I was asking Gilda Radner when I met her in a dream/Is this manna from heaven or is it just ice cream?/I try hard to believe but I'm failing every time/I woke up to my eight-track playin' 'Angel Number Nine.'/And the Devil's playing pinball and he's winning every game/And the bowling alley Baptists just ignore him all the same;/I did everything I knew but I tilted every time,/And I'm tired of breathing smoke so I think I'll step outside./And may God keep the faithful who search the interstates/For a girl in a Pacer with Oklahoma plates/Now I don't mind the wait 'cause you see we have a date/So don't be surprised if we're not home/Til very late." Got it? A-
64. The Cucumbers: Old Shoes (self-released '23): A couple and a band since 1983, so long ago their baby son Jamie Fried is now their drummer, Hoboken lifers Deena Shoshkes and Jon Fried report that they worked hard on their new although not therefore unfamiliar acoustic sound while spending the pandemic "drinking tequila and waiting for a little spark." Of course the seven songs that resulted are lightweight--that's been their sonic signature forever. They're also stalwart, as after three decades of marriage comes naturally. But their tunes are so fetching and distinct that designating them melodies would miss the point. A-
65. Hinds: Viva Hinds (Lucky175): Subscriber-only review. A-
66. Swamp Dogg: Blackgrass: From West Virginia to 125th Street (Oh Boy): The dauntless r&b pro christened Jerry Williams Jr. a few months after I was born has released more albums than I or perhaps even he can count. Of the dozen I've reviewed only his 1995 best-of and 1969's legendary Total Destruction to Your Mind sounded like down-and-out keepers to me. But on John Prine's label, with Margo Price, Jenny Lewis, and closet bluegrass adept/adaptor Vernon Reid contributing cameos, he revs up the songwriting. The Price feature "To The Other Woman" is a special standout, with "Your Best Friend" a made-to-order B side. As a fellow 82-year-old I can only envy his vocal vitality. And the racial charge of the "Murder Ballad" closer is more than a little eerie. A-
67. Rosali: Bite Down (Merge): Subscriber-only review. A-
68. Millie Jackson: On the Soul Country Side (Kent '14): A Georgia sharecropper's daughter who'll turn 80 in June and whose sole marriage lasted eight months, Jackson grew up in Newark, which like her thick power drawl may not strike newcomers as very country. But her specialty in marriage-cum-cheating songs cuts into their surprise factor even on the Kris Kristofferson copyright "Anybody That Don't Like Millie Jackson" (initially "Hank Williams") which is topped off on this belated best-of, her second, by a climactic challenge called "Black Bitch Crazy" (initially. "Redneck Crazy"). I listen carefully to marriage songs myself, including plenty with limited redeeming romantic value, which here means right down to the revenge fantasy "The angel in your arms this morning/Is gonna be the devil in someone else's arms tonight." But these lyrics do many different things with marital tropes, most of which Jackson is shrewd enough to exploit whether they reflect her own experience or make shit up. A-
69. Yard Act: Where's My Utopia? (Island): Designated post-punk for want of a more specific slot, this all-male U.K. s-g-b-d hail from Leeds, which in crucial respects says plenty about who they are or appear to be. True, there's no punky thrash or funky thwong to their four-four. But both their collective IQ and their acerbic politics are worthy of not only the Mekons and the Gang of Four, as is their unbowed "How about one last crack at it before we quit the biz?" There's an added attraction as well, namely that most of their songs are situated where they belong--in the day-to-day dilemmas and disappointments they outline. "Welcome to the future/The paranoia suits you," they beckon. "Are we born for nothing if we die alone?" they want to know. "If I leave here before you you'll see our baby through," they aver, and let's both assume and hope that they mean it. A-
70. Fox Green: Light Over Darkness (self-released): Easily the best-realized of this likable Little Rock quintet's three biggish-rock albums, smoother and more fetching musically and lyrically, with special kudos for "Sleepy John Estes" ("and my mom"), "6 Days Sober" (only every Saturday the same gal escorts him off the wagon), and "Jones Street Revisited" (which Little Rock or no Little Rock I like to imagine is about the Greenwich Village block where the Freewheelin' Bob Dylan cover was shot and my wife grew up). But the big door prize bears the unlikely title "Jesus Loves Us All," unlikely because that outsized "us" is far more inclusive than we have every right to doubt or fear as the case may be. "Here's to Little Richard," they peal, and in a world where what everyone wants is "some decent healthcare" they mean everything that implies. "One day I'll get back to Jesus," they pledge, and because they're so sure he'll be there for them they very nearly convince me--metaphorically, anyway. A-
71. Ciara Grace: Write It Down (self-released): Her father a record producer, her mother a singer-songwriter herself, this 21-year-old debuts with 11 songs inspired by the not so distant romantic and sexual byways of high school. These the title song reports she "weaponized" "pen to paper" so that even if she forgave she would never forget. And she doesn't. Their surface polished, their details sharp, their sound dreamy, they'll convince you that she was too smart for these guys even when they were basically OK, as a few were. "When I was 16 a boy tried to tell me how I felt," the title song begins. And then goes on to make sure we get the picture: "I might forgive but sure don't forget." Not all the lyrics are that sharp; in fact, some you might forget yourself. Nor is there anything forceful in their presentation. But there's plenty of clarity. So here's hoping the right young dweeb gives her the attention and respect she manifestly deserves. B+
72. Okuté: Okuté (Chulo '21): Shouted declaratively in Spanish by baritone Pedro Francisco Almeida Barriel, Tata to you, and named after the not exactly benign but culturally potent god or life-force former West Africans believed brought them to Cuba, this spare Havana-based ensemble is sometimes said to incorporate the legendary percussionist Machito. Since Machito died in 1984, I'm inclined to suspect this tale culminates a confused fusion between a compliment and a myth. But I guarantee that compared to, for instance, Congo Brazzaville's '80s/'90s Balka Sound, Okuté generates the kind of catchy momentum outsiders like me associate with soukous, albeit with its own unique, slightly choppier groove. A find. A-
73. Bill Orcutt: Music for Four Guitars (Palilalia '22): Now 62, guitarist Orcutt has his name on a discography of more than 60 titles including some 15 cassettes. So just because I happen to really like the cycling avant-minimalism of this 2022 entry doesn't mean I feel obliged to compare and contrast except insofar as this music in particular provides an excellent excuse to break out the Jon Hassell CDs I haven't heard in a while. And though you should feel free to talk minimalism all you like, Hassell is like Beethoven up against this guy, who tends to chime over more than cycle through. In other words: not background music, slightly hypnotic though it may be. A-
74. MC5: Heavy Lifting (Ear Music): Subscriber-only review. A-

And It Don't Stop, Feb. 3, 2025

2023

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