The First Annual William James Viti Awards

I put this off, time after time I could not bring myself to "rank" what I held to be the best albums of the year. It seems to me a terribly indulgent process to create such a list, especially when lacking the critical eloquence to communicate the motivations for my selections. Some songs, some albums simply resonate in a manner which cannot be completely, or perhaps accurately, appraised with words. Therefore, I decided to categorize these albums and songs based on fictitious awards. Music or sports analogies, those are the two vehicles that I turn to most when confronted with the difficulty of articulating my thoughts to others. So here are the 2010 William James Viti awards (Wijavis for short, if you're keeping track at home), and the proud recipients:

THE AWARD FOR: AS CLOSE TO PERFECT AS HUMANLY POSSIBLE, OR ROY HALLADAY'S 2010 SEASON goes to -

Sufjan Stevens: The Age of Adz; Kanye West: My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy; The National: High Violet

THE AWARDS FOR: MODEL OF CONSISTENCY AND NEAR GREATNESS,OR "KING" FELIX HERNANDEZ'S 2010 SEASON (he of thirty quality starts, six complete games, and an era of 2.27) goes to -

Vampire Weekend: Contra; Frightened Rabbit: The Winter of Mixed Drinks; Cee-Lo Green: The Lady Killer; Josh Ritter: So the World Runs Away; The Tallest Man on Earth: The Wild Hunt; Phosphorescent: Here's to Taking it Easy

THE AWARD FOR: JUST PLAIN FUN/GUILTY PLEASURE OR MY ROOMMATES WATCHED ALL OF "THE SING OFF" goes to -

She & Him: Volume 2; Gayngs: Relayted; Best Coast: Crazy for You; Crystal Castles: Crystal Castles; Tokyo Police Club: Champ

THE AWARD FOR: BEST ROOKIE/SOPHOMORE EFFORT OR JAY BILAS LOVES THEIR UPSIDE goes to -

The Morning Benders: Big Echo; O'Death: Broken Hymns, Limbs, and Skin; Delta Spirit: History from Below; Local Natives: Gorilla Manor; Girls: Broken Dreams Club

THE AWARD FOR: SO MUCH HONEY OR SMOOTHER SOUNDING THAN RAY ALLEN'S JUMPER LOOKS goes to -

Horse Feathers: Thistled Spring; Junip: Fields; Beach House: Teen Dream

THE AWARD FOR: VETERAN PERFORMANCE OR THE SHAQUILLE O'NEAL REQUISITE ALL-STAR VOTE goes to -

The Black Keys: Brothers; Deerhunter: Halcyon Digest; Dr. Dog: Shame, Shame; LCD Soundsystem: This is Happening; Deer Tick: The Black Dirt Sessions

THE AWARD FOR: BIGGEST SURPRISE AS I DISCOVER HOW MUCH FUN CONTEMPORARY BLUEGRASS/GRASS-ROOTS MUSIC IS OR THE DANNY WOODHEAD APPRECIATION MEDAL goes to -

Trampled by Turtles: Palomino; Chatham County Line: Wildwood; Carolina Chocolate Drops: Genuine Negro Jig

THE AWARD FOR: MOST PLAYED, ACCORDING TO MY ITUNES OR GOSH BRETT FAVRE, I JUST CAN'T QUIT YOU goes to -

Chatham County Line: "Crops Come In;" TV Girl: "If You Want It;" Gayngs: "No Sweat;" Megafaun: "Volunteers;" Phosphorescent: "It's Hard to be Humble When You're From Alabama;" Horse Feathers: "This Bed;" Deer Tick: "Twenty Miles;" Frightened Rabbit: "Nothing Like You;" Cee-Lo Green: "No One's Gonna Love You;" Kanye West: "Dark Fantasy;" Trampled by Turtles: "Wait So Long;" Sufjan Stevens: "I Walked."

The Rural Alberta Advantage

A week or so ago, my brother and I had a lengthy conversation about current Scottish groups and their musical similarities. Frightened Rabbit, The Twilight Sad, We Were Promised Jetpacks, Glasvegas, and Meursault share components, exhibit musical or lyrical parallels that are undeniable. Despondent verse coupled with swelling, intricate orchestration exudes from each of these five bands in a variety of forms. A shared musical tradition is the first, and most obvious, component to garner attention, and appropriately so. The local popularity of Idlewild during the mid to late nineties illustrates the subsequent influence that Edinburgh-bred quintet unmistakably had amongst Scots maturing and exploring their own musical taste in the ensuing years. Yet, what is it about the Scottish climate that inclines many toward such themes, yearning to rent open chest and skull alike so the audience can peer at crestfallen, beating heart and melancholic introspective thoughts? It is a subject that would require further, and more expansive scrutiny.

Enter The Rural Alberta Advantage, a trio based in Toronto, whose 2009 debut release Hometowns exhibited, in my opinion, a high degree of similarities with that distinct Scottish sound. Hometowns represents a phenomenal premiere performance. It's thirteen tracks are executed with seasoned precision, and reveal deeply beautiful harmonies between male and female voices. The woefully demoralized nature of the verse initially drew my attention, soliciting comparisons with Scott Hutchinson's weary and fragile disposition. There are interior, shielded insecurities and doubts exposed with a fatigued frankness, whether lamenting the slow decay of love ("So wipe the sleep from your eyes / And I'll wipe 'em out of mine too / If we try to hold on, then I'll try to hold on to you / Well I shouldn't sleep all day / But it's half past noon / 'Cause I know we're taking a break / And I know you're leaving me soon") or the painful self-examination of withdrawal ("What'll I do if you never find me again / Sittin' in a province a million miles from my friends / What'll I do if you never want me again / Come with me, come back we'll live again / What if I'm only satisfied when I'm at home / Sittin' in a city that'll never let me go / What if I'm only satisfied when I'm alone). As those passions are articulated with increasing yearning and the shroud of stoicism is pulled back, the vocal influence of Jeff Magnum is eerily recognizable, and to a similar degree the musical motifs of Neutral Milk Hotel manifest themselves on Hometowns as well.

There is a uniqueness, however, in the trio's sound. In a majority of songs, percussion is dominant, or at least adopts a more decisive presence. Rapid or smoothly pouring like the soothing, constant crash of a waterfall, the synchronization of drums and cymbals can drive a track in a remarkably unique manner. We are so used to a guitar riff or piano chord planting itself in the foreground, that a reliance upon percussion to do the same is quite refreshing. "Don't Haunt This Place" and "In The Summertime" are indicative of this trend at its most successful, a manner in which, to my mind, only Maps & Atlases and Local Natives have achieved of late. It will be most fascinating to determine whether Rural Alberta Advantage's sound and verse mature on their sophomore album due in March.

Merry Christmas!

Christmas music can get a bit monotonous, some songs have been scientifically proven to turn your brain to mush if listened to repeatedly. Sufjan Stevens' Christmas catalog can only carry you so far in the holiday season, and here are a few tracks that make me think about Christmas. So, Merry Christmas and enjoy some songs that aren't Christmas songs but make me think of Christmas.

"Girl from the North Country"

"Four Strong Winds"

"Thirteen"

"To Be Alone With You"

Not Quite Friday Links

Magnificent Old 97's session at Daytrotter this week, their newest single "Every Night Is Friday Night (Without You)" illustrates how well this group has stood up over the years. You can also enter a contest via Daytrotter picking your favorite song of the year, with the chance to win some appetizing prizes.

Looking for something musically themed for your New Year's Eve celebration? Pitchfork has you covered.

Pitchfork also has you covered for your weekly does of Conor Oberst/Bright Eyes, with a new track entitled "Shell Games."

Of all the "Best of" lists that are circulating the blogosphere, Muzzle of Bees might have provided the most intriguing tastes of artists I had missed, especially the releases by Conrad Plymouth, Sat. Nite Duets, and Ben Sollee & Daniel Martin Moore.

On a vastly more personal note, during the tender years of my youth I had the opportunity to see Richie Havens perform, although I do not remember quite having understood the magnitude of his past. Nonetheless, here is a neat little interview with the Mr. Havens, from Owl and Bear.

The Replacements: "Unsatisfied"

Paul Westerberg may not be a household name, at least if you were born in the late eighties or early nineties. I was first introduced to Westerberg and The Replacements while riding around with my father during my teenage years. At the time, I was enrapt with bands like The Strokes and The Libertines. Ever the musical mentor, The Replacements were one of those bands that my father would load into the cd dock because he hoped I would find similar enjoyment from a band that had pioneered the sounds I currently delighted in. He would take those fifteen or twenty minutes while we skirted around town on various errands, times where he was in sole control of the radio, to give me a little lesson in rock’s fecund heritage.

Let It Be has been the recipient of more than a few listens in the past few weeks. It is a fantastic album, a perfect encapsulation of The Replacements and an obvious indicator to the depth of inspiration that many alt-rock groups owe Westerberg and company. In the twenty-five or so years since this album was first released, songs like “Unsatisfied” and “Androgynous” remain among the ultimate archetypes of American rock music. Robert Christgau, the famed rock critic, awarded Let It Be with a grade of A+. When the album was reissued in 2008, Pitchfork reaffirmed the album’s potency by stamping it with a 10.0 (just as a point of reference, the only album to receive such an accolade from Pitchfork in 2010 was Kanye West’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy).

“Unsatisfied” is set in motion by two intertwined guitar riffs, with the faint fingerprints of absentminded daydreams smudged across them. Westerberg’s yelp marshals the drums forth, securing a more regimented tempo, as he launches in to a verse that is so bare, yet so revealing: “Look me in the eye / Then, tell me that I’m satisfied / Was you satisfied? / Look me in the eye / Then, tell me that I’m satisfied / Hey, are you satisfied?” The palpable ache with which these queries are delivered is remarkably striking, given the simplicity of the lexicon. Furthering the weight of these loaded words is the uncertain direction in which they have been lobbed. Are they a probing introspection or the preamble to an argument littered with accusations and slanderous broadsides?

Within the orbit of “Unsatisfied,” never has bleak disillusionment sounded quite so beautiful. Whether it is the apprehension of desires slipping out of reach (“And it goes so slowly on / Everything I’ve ever wanted / Tell me what’s wrong”) or the reality that dreams so desperately craved are fiction (“Everything you dream of / Is right in front of you / And liberty is a lie”), Westerberg breathes out the odor of the shattering of naivete with each syllable. Such words are gently intertwined with the magnificent mourning pouring forth from the orchestration of guitars and percussion. Digging deeply with a gravelly strength, the track reaches its crescendo as the mantra of this splintered innocence is issued by Westerberg, repeating: “I’m so, I’m so unsatisfied / I’m so dissatisfied,” while a guitar weeps the highest of pitches against the backdrop. It is with that aching riff that “Unsatisfied” fades away, but the stain of the track’s echoing credo cannot be scrapped off quite so similarly.

Friday Links!

Fantastic Daytrotter session this week with Ryan Bingham and his backing band, The Dead Horses.

The Low Anthem sent my brain into an absolute state of shock and euphoria during their magically captivating set at this year's Newport Folk Festival. I am counting down the days until their album is released, but this track will have to sate my appetite until then.

A nice, little review of Johnny Cash's last American album from the No Depression family of blogs.

Pitchfork brings news of the first must-see concert of 2011, from my perspective. The calendar has been marked, and the anticipation can only grow from here.

Pitchfork counted down the year's best in songs and albums, ranking the best one hundred and fifty respectively, which has certainly provided some tracks and artists I had overlooked this year, great fodder for the last few weeks of 2010. Owl and Bear, on the other hand, composed a list of 2011's most anticipated records.

Week in Review

The first full week of December just came to a close, and I am sure that I am not alone in having my eyes and ears unjustly assaulted by countless "best of the year" lists. It seems as if every aspiring writer and every established critic becomes frenzied during the last month of the year, and what ensues is attempt after attempt at distilling the year's "best" into neat, compartmentalized hierarchies based on some preconceived, and often unfairly subjective, criterion. Admittedly, I had toyed with the idea of such a list, or better yet from my perspective, a grouping of awards, some comical in nature, that reflected my musical predilections over the past twelve months. That was until, I read this wonderfully written post via No Depression, one that I found myself sympathizing with greatly, entitled "This Was Going to be My End-of-the-Year Best of List, Until I Met Umberto Eco." I urge you to spend a few minutes reading this passage, and not just because Umberto Eco is perhaps one of the foremost authorities on medieval/classical philosophy and semiotics. Ever an author I have found myself drawn to, I won't delve too much into the specifics of the passage, but will only reiterate Eco's assertion that lists play a integral role in civilization: "And how, as a human being, does one face infinity? How does one attempt to grasp the incomprehensible?" I found myself thoroughly questioning, with more internal deliberation and indecisive reflection than I'd previously thought a simple "best of" list required, how to put a concrete capstone on 2010 and music. I am not sure that it is possible, or even warranted given the vast bulk of artists and albums that we are exposed to on a day by day basis.

Such musing was inspired to some degree by the albums I listened to most these past few days, two of which were not released in this calendar year, but were equally new and fascinating from my standpoint. Both Dawes' North Hills and Chatham County Line's IV carry a distinct flavor of americana, with a nod to having drawn inspiration from more traditional American folk, blended together with more modern fancies. I missed Dawes at this year's Newport Folk Festival, opting to take in other acts I was better acquainted with. Their debut album has led some to vault the group into the same stratosphere as other rising indie-folk acts such as The Low Anthem and Delta Spirit. But I find some of their songs lack an immediate, indescribable sincerity in the vocal delivery that an initial listen can easily confuse for an overlying and undesirable flatness. The much of album is marked with that even-tempered approach, which lends itself well to the flow of some songs, but strips the credibility of frontman Taylor Goldsmith when he sings "I live less like a workhorse, more like a slave" and claims that he is "howling at moons" on "When My Time Comes." The concluding track, "Peace in the Valley," was, for me, the furthest resonating on the album. Here, finally, was a track on which an earnest quality to Goldsmith's lyrical articulation broke through.

I became aware of Chatham County Line after reading a particularly tasty and informative post on Muzzle of Bees, and IV features the same beautiful acoustic arrangements as the key track "Crop Comes In" from the quartet's 2010 album Wildwood. Not to detract from their newer album, the range of lyrical ability and the corresponding harmonies on IV are one of its most distinctive attractions, at times chilling on "Birmingham Jail," which swells with the haunting fiddle during the bridge, and equally thrilling tales of past loves from "The Carolina," a sweet track, off which the influence of traditional folk rolls thickly. As I mentioned in my last bit, Clem Snide's The Meat of Life has also been on the pallet of late. Like Dawes and Chatham County Line, it is difficult to assign or singularly categorize Clem Snide as being of a particular genre, with the inclinations of a variety of musical styles heaped in conjunction. Additionally, I spoke about Eef Barzelay's songwriting ability, whose adeptness at illustrating acrid burning and helplessness of the deterioration of a relationship bares no better archetype than a verse from "Walmart Parking Lot:" "Punched in the brain, in the gut, in the tear ducts too / Feeling more than a little unsure I couldn't make it through / How I cried all day, my heart a twisted knot." Barzelay's skill and flare for remarkable descriptors of emotion may derive from being raised bilingual, a nugget that my brother offered up while we discussed some of the more unique and overlooked American songwriters of this generation.

Friday Links!

Here are just a few news bits to digest as the weekend looms only a few hours away:

The Delta Spirit have been touring and managed to release an EP on the heels of this year's History from Below, a magnificent sophomore album. The Waits Room EP features a few new songs and some recrafted versions of earlier ones, a review of the EP and of Delta Spirit's concert at Webster Hall in New York.

No Depression brings news that Dawes, Deer Tick, and Delta Spirit frontmen banded together as early as the fall of 2009 to record under the name Middle Brother. The album is due to be released in March of 2011.

A beautifully poignant posting about everything music-related in 2010, from Aquarium Drunkard.

And from Pitchfork, a chance to weigh in and rank your personal best and worst in 2010.

Clem Snide: "BFF"

My brother and I exchange music like many folks exchange sports factoids, well we do a bit of that as well. A few days ago, he hit me with a song that has become an instant favorite of mine. Clem Snide was probably one of the first bands I remember my brother feeling passionately drawn to, and with good reason. Frontman Eef Barzelay crafts wonderful, soul-bearing lyrics, with musical accompaniments that mirror the spouting of emotions exquisitely, whether feverishly hectic and haphazard or a slow-plodding stream of aches and doubt. After a few years devoting himself to solo projects, Barzelay turned in a 2010 album, The Meat of Life, with his bandmates that simply ranks among the very best work Clem Snide has produced to date.

The track "BFF" is a classic Clem Snide song, featuring Barzelay's frank and deep-reaching emotional lyricism fused with uptempo guitar work and furiously-paced crash of drums and cymbals. Amazingly, "BFF" runs just under two minutes in length, but is injected with such an expanse of feeling, both uncertainty and self-abhorring futility, that it demands the listener to play it back again and again. Barzelay vacillates between closeting his fears, with the opening line yearningly delivered: "Trust me you don't want to know how I really feel," and throwing the door wide open on persistent anxieties in the chorus: "What if what I want is, and what if what I need is / Just a little more than all your love / All your love, all your love." He covets a comfort and spiritual sanctuary from his counterpart that he knows he cannot garner. The track reeks of chord progressions that have become a staple of alt-country bands such as the Old 97's and Drive-By Truckers, which adds amicably both to the playability of the song and Barzelay's conflicting, dithering outbursts of the emotional. "BFF" is one of the core tracks from an album that has been vastly overlooked in 2010.

News to Make You Smile

A heartwarming little news bit from Pitchfork that Jeff Magnum performed live this weekend in Brooklyn. Neutral Milk Hotel has long been a favorite of mine, and their work has had a profound and sweeping influence on a generation of artists. Take for instance Meursault's "One Day This Will All Be Fields," a track off their recent All Creatures Will Make Merry album. The song features a verse that, coupled with the starkly stripped guitar work and somber, dreary delivery, can mistaken for nothing if not a nod to Magnum and his former band's most well-known song: "And we will descend from the sky / and we will bury you alive." There are dozens of similar examples littered throughout the past decade. Magnum's reclusive habits in the wake of Neutral Milk Hotel's success are well documented, and his hiatus from recording and performing have only heightened the legend of his genius. Too see Magnum taking even the smallest of steps back into the public light is heartening, not only for his fans but for the man himself. Such news does indeed make me smile, and turn up "Holland, 1945" or "Two-Headed Boy" just a little louder. Hell, I almost titled this post "Jeff Magnum Performs in Brooklyn, Will Viti's Heart Skips Beat in Boston."

How To: Begin a Rock Album

Grinderman is raw, razor-sharp, rock and roll. On their second studio album, Grinderman 2, Nick Cave’s stripped down quartet punishes their guitars with devilish zeal and thrashes drums and cymbals as if they have committed some atrocious offense, much like they did on their debut. The result is just over forty minutes of untamed, unfiltered, emotionally-charged music. In creating any album, the first tracks are always the most vital. They shape the path of the album, its atmosphere, in order to fashion a coherent vehicle of art these tracks must be its backbone. It has been a long time since I was gripped so by the start of an album the way I was when I first listened to Grinderman 2. A wolf, its teeth bared in a brutish snarl, adorns the cover, and the albums first two songs, “Mickey Mouse and the Goodbye Man” and “Worm Tamer” pull that strained snarl back further, unveiling a gritty sound.

“Mickey Mouse and the Goodbye Man” kicks off with an addictive bass loop and high-pitched, distorted screech of guitar. Cave’s voice rises above the grinding, grating guitars and churning percussion, with the roughness of a man who has seen it all: “I woke up this morning / I thought what am I doing here? / My brother he starts raging / Watch him rising / See him howling / And sucked her, and he sucked her, and he suck her dry / And he bit at me, and bit at me, and said goodbye / Up on the twenty-ninth floor.” The track barrels forward as Cave recounts the aftermath of a raucous night, his frank delivery in even play with a rapidity of percussion and crashing cymbals, only broken up by Cave’s own piercing yelp and the melting distortion of guitar.

There is hardly a moment to retrieve your breath or your senses as the music fades, and chuck-chuck-chuck of one garbled guitar exchanges twisted notes with another jagged axe in the lead up “Worm Tamer.” Backed by understated ascending harmonies and strewn with pating breaths that are barely human, Cave looses an aptly venomous string of words, charged with the most overt sexual allusions, each verses ending with the cutting phrase: “I guess that I’ve just loved you for too long.” In this second track amidst waves of buckling, distorted guitar strings, Cave loosens his grip over both his own insecurities (“She leaves me every night and who could blame her”) and his inability to detach himself from this nightmarish woman and find contentment elsewhere (“I cry a storm of tears till the rising dawn / You know I’m only happy when I’m inside her”). It is both a cyclical and finite piece, Cave could likely go on into the night about the deprave twists of this relationship, but track ends with Cave acknowledging the unmistakable: “I guess I’ve loved you for too long.”

Listen, this is how a rock album begins, unapologetic and feverish. And, after a complete listen it is undeniable that Nick Cave and Grinderman have no intentions of loosening the slack.

Song of the Day: "Kentucky Pill"

In a year during which the English folk-rock outfit Mumford & Sons have gained widespread play for their rousing choruses and nimbly-plucked banjo, their compatriot Johnny Flynn deserves equal recognition for his work, blending the spirit and arrangements of traditional English folk music with his personal predilections much the same way The Tallest Man on Earth has reinterpreted the likes of Dylan and Guthrie. A man who during interviews regularly references Shakespeare as a major influence, indeed before releasing his 2008 debut A Larum toured New York with a stage company performing Twelfth Night and Taming of the Shrew, recently played in Boston and I regret missing him, not knowing the quality of his catalog beforehand.

Flynn's most current release, this year's Been Listening, features the same blend of folk-inspired arrangements, with ample amounts of fiddle and banjo and horns interjected amongst an album that illustrates Flynn's growth, as well as his undeniable debt to previous acts who have straddled the same line between traditional folk music and more contemporary rock and roll. One of the key tracks off of Been Listening must be "Kentucky Pill," a beautifully arranged pieced, layered and yet straightforward, a track that demonstrates Flynn's lyrical abilities (other not-to-be-missed tracks include: "Churlish May," "Barnacled Warship," and "Sweet William pt.2" - who can resist a song with their name in the title, I ask?). To put it simply, if you've enjoyed what Mumford & Sons have brought to dinner with Sigh No More, then stay for dessert because what Johnny Flynn serves up on A Larum and Been Listening is more of the same, and it is a delicious sound indeed.

Links and Videos

First, Cee-Lo's hotly anticipated release The Lady Killer is now available. Here is a great review from Pitchfork. Admittedly, I have not yet listened to the album from start to finish. It is a matter of time and restraint, not intentional neglect, because, secondly, tonight and then Friday, I will be taking in first Deer Tick and then Sufjan Stevens. Playing the part of an anxious student, I am cramming in anticipation, refusing to listen to anything other than those two artists. As much as I admire Cee-Lo and his music, he is certainly one individual who could derail my plans, and end up monopolizing my musical listening for days, even weeks, with those soul-filled vocal chords of his. He will just have to wait until Saturday morning.

Below are four songs, all of which I desperately hope to hear in the next forty-eight hours.

Frightened Rabbit Concert Review: October 29, The Paradise

Two Fridays past, I headed over to the Paradise Club to see Frightened Rabbit in Boston. It was a show that I had been eagerly awaiting for several weeks, and it did not disappoint. An added bonus to the evening was arriving in time to see the first of the two opening acts, The Phantom Band. Like Frightened Rabbit they hail from Scotland, and like their countrymen they are a predisposition toward pounding drums, and a swelling, layered musical orchestration, their songs complete with extensive instrumental intros. Definitely a group to keep an eye on moving forward, you can find more of their work on iTunes.

Any apprehension that Frightened Rabbit would not live up to my lofty hopes and expectations, the kind you always have for your favorite bands, was quelled shortly before the band took the stage. Speaking with a couple who had driven up from Philadelphia, I was pleased to learn that they had seen the group some two years ago, and that they had put on a remarkable show, and that I would almost certainly enjoy the evening. They were not wrong.

Taking the stage, lead singer/guitarist Scott Hutchinson and the band were all smiles and seemed excited to get underway, launching into “Things” from their most recent release The Winter of Mixed Drinks. Set against the heavy pulsing of ambient keyboards and crashing percussion, Hutchinson’s voice strained as he therapeutically sung of moving on, letting go, of boxing up an old life: “I didn’t need these things / I didn’t need them, oh / Pointless artifacts from a mediocre past / So I shed my clothes, I shed my flesh / Down to the bone, and burned the rest.” Bared emotions of fragility and uncertainty are never lacking from the Scottish quintet, and it was something to behold to see how well the group’s studio work translated to the live stage. For all the extravagantly dark overtones that Frightened Rabbit’s lyrics possess, make no mistake they are heartfelt and sincere. Hutchinson seemed at times Atlas with a guitar in hand, a weight only he can feel threatening to crush him unless he tensed and strained and fought the emotions threatening to flatten him.

2007’s The Midnight Organ Fight tells of a ruptured love and the darkness that follows, and The Winter of Mixed Drinks is its sequel in all but name. The tracks from both albums meshed well upon the stage, the band pulling from one album and then the other. It is clear that The Winter of Mixed Drinks is embedded with a determination to move forward, a knowledge that while life is still scarred by the painful fracture of an old relationship, that it is something of an accomplishment to be “doing alright” when looking back to the abyss of emotional ache from which you climbed. Questions of vulnerability continue to arise, as in “Yes, I Would” (“Well, what if I am never thrown that bone / And what if this tear in my side just pours, and pours, and pours”), background vocal harmonies paralleling the narrator’s inner turmoils and doubt. Unlike the atmosphere of defeatism that entwined the spirit of The Midnight Organ Fight, the staccato of guitar melding with the nervous steps forward during “The Wrestle” (“Bare those teeth to me please, man eater / You can see of all me naked with fear / This is the test I left land for”), and the emotions spit rapidly, dueling with riff of guitars and jarring pound of Grant Hutchinson on drums, the uplifting anthems of “Nothing Like You” and “Living in Colour” illustrate a distinct resolution of spirit. For all their rousing spirit and orchestration, both songs are still yet marked with an insecure gloat, and tinge of incomplete rejuvenation.

It was not simply the words Scott Hutchinson yearningly delivered into the microphone, but how the rest of the band fed off his emotions, equal parts elation and distress, that made the performance memorable. Perhaps the best demonstration of this symbiosis came during “I Feel Better,” off Midnight Organ Fight. Speaking to the crowd, Hutchinson delved into the background of the song, saying that he had gone to New York City, “to win a girl back, like you always do.” It was a trip that ultimately ended in failure, and writing this song was a means of coping. With bass guitar plodding rampantly, Hutchinson calls out, “I’ll stow away my greys, in a padlocked case, in a padlocked room / Only to be released when I sing all the songs I wrote about you / This is the last one that I’ll do.” It is a naive attempt to bring closure, locking one’s troubled feelings away. Cymbals crashing, an echo of vocal harmonies rising and falling in the background, reflecting Hutchinson’s struggle to find balance: “I feel better, and better, and worse, and then better / Than ever, than ever, than ever, than ever / I feel much better, and better, and worse, and then better / Than ever, than ever, than ever, than ever.” It was a song that lifted the crowd, and a song from which the emotions all other songs that Frightened Rabbit played that night could be drawn: the loss of love is a lonely struggle, and packing the emotional hurt, not matter how deeply, leads only to further torment. Inverting the first verse, the track closes with an illustration of sentiments that refuse to die: “I’ll stow away my greys, in a padlocked case, in a padlocked room / Only to be released when I see you walking round with someone new / This is the last song I’ll write about you.”

It’s hard not to believe Hutchinson, as he strains with those finals words in “I Feel Better,” but you come to find they simply are not true. All the songs Frightened Rabbit played that night, before and afterwards, from “Be Less Rude” of their debut album Sing The Greys to “Good Arms vs. Bad Arms” to “My Backwards Walk” to “The Loneliness and The Scream” are colored in one shade or another with Hutchinson’s past. Everything about the show reiterated to me why I was, and continue to be, so drawn to Frightened Rabbit’s music.

And one more video, just for luck, and just because The National's "Fake Empire" is partially covered...

Song of the Day

I simply cannot play this track by TV Girl enough, it seems. Entitled "If You Want It," and catchy as anything heard so far this year, it's a poppy tune that will wrap itself inside your skull and refuse to leave. I am looking forward to whatever else this duo has in the works. Check out the link to the track at Pitchfork: http://pitchfork.com/reviews/tracks/12022-if-you-want-it/ and the band's myspace page.

The Streets of Laredo

My father’s birthday was this past week, and I thought a lot about how he had fostered and cultivated in me a love for music. It began when I was quite young, some of my earliest memories include sitting on the floor in the living room, and listening to records with these puffy, yellow headphones on. Being a librarian, my father loves a good story, and that extends to music as well. He played me “Up on Cripple Creek” and “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down” from The Band’s The Brown Album and “Guns of Brixton” and “Spanish Bombs” from The Clash’s London Calling. I love both those albums dearly, a poster of London Calling has adorned almost every room I have lived in since my sophomore year at Bates. Vividly, I recall how my father explained that the pinkish and green coloring of the cover's layout was chosen by The Clash in homage to Elvis Presley’s debut record.

Like many young children, I was often sung to sleep. One of my particular favorites was the country classic “The Streets of Laredo,” which was sung to me almost exclusively by my father. A sad, lonesome ballad about a dying, young cowboy, who relates his story of fast-living, gambling, and womanizing to a passer-by. Plodding along with a tempo very much like the death march that the song mentions, the rendition by an aging Johnny Cash is truly gripping (though that is not to snub the Willie Nelson version, which I quite enjoy too). The cowboy’s words drip with repent and a longing for comfort after his spirit has fled the earth: “Then beat the drum slowly, play the fife lowly / Play the dead march as you carry me along / Take me to the green valley, lay the sod o’er me / I’m a young cowboy and I know I’ve done wrong.” The song fascinated me when I was younger, trying to visualize how the cowboy would have been wrapped in linen, not quite understanding what exactly linen was. No matter the circumstance, it is a song that gives me calm and I emerge from listening to it breathing easier, my head cleared.

Album Review: Sufjan Stevens' The Age of Adz

Sufjan Stevens’ newest album, The Age of Adz, is a remarkable departure from his previous ventures, and is quite possibly the most magnificent musical piece of work this year as seen. Burgeoning electronics and sweeping percussion dominate the album’s landscape. The result is a mood that quite often envelopes the listener in a controlled cacophony, as Stevens espouses a dark variety of emotions and torments that his earlier, callow albums lack. “Futile Devices” provides a telling prologue to the journey, its sounds is more reminiscent of the tracks on Seven Swans, soothing and delicate. Yet there is something more deeply personal, immediately regretful taking place here, as Stevens softly sings “It’s been a long, long time / Since I’ve memorized your face / It’s been four hours now / Since I wandered through your place.” Nostalgic in the highest sense of the word, and embeded with pains of loss and words not spoken, the track closes with Stevens’ voice barely above a whisper, “Words are futile devices.”

Musically, the album builds and grows from that point, synthesizers and electronica supplant softly plucked guitars. Seemingly devoid of traditional arrangement at times, eyes close and ears force themselves to listen closely to the dissonance that paints a panorama of turmoil and uncertainty, but ultimately recognition of certainty and direction manifests. As he is wont to do, Stevens The Age of Adz is linked together under the umbrella of a unified concept. He draws a great deal of inspiration from the life of artist Royal Robertson, a paranoid schizophrenic, including the albums exquisite artwork. Paralleling Robertson’s struggles, the album is fraught with Stevens own brooding and emotional introspection. The orchestration and layered sounds that have become Stevens forte are present, albeit of a darker strain. On “Too Much,” he bemoans his own shortcomings, calling out: “If I had been a different man, if I had blood in my eyes / I could have read of your heart, I could have read of your mind,” as the trill of the arrangement climbs towards crescendo. “I Walked,” “Now That I’m Older,” and “Bad Communication” each further a focus on past relationships that have crumbled and Stevens’ own path toward maturity.

Taboo and uncomfortable are words that our society has placed on publicly discussing one’s grappling with personal spirituality. However, leaving no aspect of his conscience reticent, Stevens underlines his own struggles with embracing Christianity. He does not do so to propagate his beliefs loudly, nor to invoke sympathy, it serves only to further unveil and unravel the depths of his psyche. “Get Real Get Right” offers up Christianity as Stevens own path toward living well, “I know I’ve caused you trouble / I know I’ve caused you pain / But I must do the right thing / I must do myself a favor and get real / Get right with the Lord.” This inward contention to find peace is illustrated again on “Vesuvius,” as bubbling electronics swell about, Stevens and a chorus of voices call out: “Vesuvius / Fire of fire / Follow me now / As I favor the ghost.”

The separation between The Age of Adz and Stevens’ past albums is no more apparent that on the penultimate track “I Want to Be Well.” An admission of weighty personal struggles, and the inability to push himself away from the relationships that have scarred his past, Stevens echoes the sentiment that all he yearns for is peace, repeating over and again “I want to be well.” He comes to the precipice of losing all control of his emotions, crying out incessantly with determination: “I’m not fucking around / I’m not, I’m not, I’m not fucking around.” It is perhaps the greatest departure from past works where the better part of each step was well-calculated and heavily choreographed. The Age of Adz finds Sufjan Stevens struggling with his conscious, a depth of contemplative emotions, the good and the malicious, that inhabit every crevasse of his being, judging a life of relationships, and finding the strength to mature and inch himself forward. It is a place he has found himself confronted with before, “On the floor at the great divide / With my shirt tucked in and my shoes untied / I am crying in the bathroom,” but only at thirty-five do all the pieces begin to fit.