Board of Canada - Geogaddi (2002)
The sophomore release from Boards of Canada provides more of the same as their iconic debut, Music Has the Right to Children. The two records are mirror images, from sound, aesthetic, to even the roughly 70-minute run time. Music is the brighter of the two, the wholesome and optimistic twin. Geogaddi is earthen and doused in shadows. Fortunately, the quality of the music is similar. The gurgling beats and waving synths permeate every nook and cranny of Geogaddi, and the album is all the better for it.
Max Richter - From Sleep (2015)
As much as I love Max Richter's work, the only way I'm ever going to listen to the full 8.4 hour Sleep is if I'm asleep. Fortunately, he had the genius idea to release an hour-long selection of tracks from the full album. Featuring violinist Ben Russell (Sufjan Stevens, Arcade Fire) among others, From Sleep is collection of drowsy modern classical. One might even be tricked into thinking that they already are asleep, given that the music sounds like a vast, ethereal dream. If an album intended to make the listener fall asleep is so enjoyable that they stay awake, did it fail? I'm inclined to say no.
Mount Eerie - Now Only (2018)
The sister record to A Crow Looked At Me provides more of the same. Surprising, huh? Anyone who enjoyed that album will find a lot to love in Now Only. As more time passes since his wife's death, Phil Elverum is able to view things with a wider perspective. Instead of focusing on the immediacy of losing the one you love, Now Only addresses almost an entire lifetime. Spanning from seeing his great-grandfather's corpse as a child to meeting his wife for the first time to how he is going to care for his child, Elverum continues to cope with what feels like an entirely new existence. He has even reached a point where he can almost joke about it - "But people get cancer die" is the most morbid almost-pop hook of the year.
Many Rooms - Hollow Body EP (2015)
I always find myself drawn to music that addresses Christianity with a non-worshipful lens. There's nothing wrong with worship music, it just gets very plain and repetitive very quickly. Many Rooms is the singer/songwriter project of Houston musician Brianna Hunt. The first track from her Hollow Body EP, "The Father Complex," approaches the aforementioned topic in a haunting and wondrous way. "Do you talk to God?/Man, I wonder what he tells you" is one of the best couplets in recent memory. The remained of the EP covers lighthearted topics like loss, love, and praise in the face of adversity. Hollow Body is a fantastic little release, and only makes me more excited for Many Rooms' debut, There Is A Presence Here, out in April.
Modest Mouse - This Is a Long Drive for Someone with Nothing to Think About (1996)
Another selection from "famous album duos." Modest Mouse's first LP, and the first focused on being tired of a certain time and place and overall being disenchanted with existence (the second being The Lonesome Crowded West), sets the standard for all of the band's following releases. Despite the fact that Lonesome would expand on almost everything covered here, songs like "Dramamine" and "Exit Does Not Exist" are among the band's best. A fantastic start to a legendary career.
Jeremy Messersmith - Late Stage Capitalism (2018)
While I never got around to listening to Messersmith's micro-folk record from 2017, his next "legit" album, Late Stage Capitalism, was a can't-miss for me. He has consistently been one of the most creative and fun musicians in the Minneapolis scene and this record continues that trend. Eleven more tracks of wistful, smart pop-rock make Late Stage Capitalism sing with personality. It certainly doesn't reinvent the wheel in any way, but it's still another solid entry in his discography.
Albert Hammond, Jr. - Francis Trouble (2018)
The Strokes guitarist made an album that sounds like the Strokes! Surprise! Inspired by his stillborn brother, Hammond, Jr. has made front-to-back the best Strokes album of the last ten years. The hooks are everywhere, both vocally and instrumentally. "Muted Beatings" is one of the best songs of the year, flat out.
Preoccupations - Viet Cong (2015)/Preoccupations (2016)
Both of Preoccupation's (fka Viet Cong) self-titled albums are modern post-punk classics. Listening to these records is like shoving steel wool in your ears, if shoving steel wool in your ears felt really good. Viet Cong is my personal favorite of the two. "Continental Shelf," "Silhouettes," and "Death" are three of the best songs the group has ever recorded. Angular and sharp, the guitars on these tracks could shatter glass. The backing vocals on "Continental Shelf" are a rare moment of pure beauty on a track (and record) of primarily heaviness and violence. Preoccupations is an appropriate follow-up. They incorporate new elements, such as synths, without altering the core of their sound. Lead single "Anxiety" has an almost synth-pop hook, albeit put through a vicious, distorted filter. "Memory," clocking in at 11.5 minutes, is one of the band's most expansive (and outright longest) songs; it also features excellent guest vocals from Wolf Parade's Dan Boeckner. Both records are absolute must-listens for any fans of punk or guitar-based music in general.
Animal Collective - Strawberry Jam (2007)
This is basically an Avey Tare (Dave Portner) solo album, and that's not a bad thing. If it actually was, it would be his best release. He handles a majority of the lead vocal duties and the emotional and sonic range that he possesses is incredible. While Panda Bear (Noah Lennox) has an undoubtedly prettier voice, Tare's vocal chords can shred themselves one second and sing a smooth falsetto line the next. "For Revered Green" is the album's centerpiece. Continuing AnCo's trend of writing songs about childhood, "For Reverend Green" contrasts the gaiety and wonder of being a kid with the crushing reality of adulthood. Other highlights include lead-off track "Peacebone," "Fireworks," and Panda Bear's "Derek."
Daft Punk - Random Access Memories (2013)
This is pretty much the album that started the 70s throwback obsession of recent years. The production all over Random Access Memories is to die for: synth loops, disco guitars, slippery bass, and a ton of vocoder. Critics of Daft Punk argue against the band's "lyricism" and songwriting overall, but the focus of tracks like "Give Life Back to Music" or "Doin' it Right" isn't the words themselves. Both tracks use words to help convey the overall thematic ideas, which is almost always dance and the power of dancing. One could even say it's a concept record about dancing itself. In addition to Daft Punk's masterful productions and composition, the guest list is incredible. Juliana Casablancas and Animal Collective's Panda Bear give their respective best guest performances. Pharrell carries two songs almost entirely by himself (though not without the help of Nile Rodgers' iconic guitar riff on "Get Lucky"). Random Access Memories is one of the best electronic/pop albums of the millennium thus far.
William Basinski - The Disintegration Loops (2002/2003)
If someone recommended that you listen to an album where the "music" is just the sounds of tapes decaying, you would probably ignore them and maybe ever laugh. What might surprise the unassuming and curious listener is that those sounds, presented in The Disintegration Loops I-IV, is that they are impossibly gorgeous. Originally recorded in the 80s as a collection of synth loops, Basinski found that they had decayed in the early 2000s. The iconic story of these records is how Basinski sat on the roof of his home in Brooklyn and listened to them as he watched the skyline of New York City the day after 9/11. It is because of this (and the cover art) that the records are permanently attached to that date. The pulsing and oceanic soundscapes found over all five hours of The Disintegration Loops manage to convey the intense sorrow and grief of a city and nation in shock. The sound of literal decay captures a snapshot of the ambience present in the cover art. It presents a symbiotic relationship between stillness and waves of all sort.
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