Monthly Listening Post - January/February 2010

The new year is off to a busy start as a number of favorite bands have already released or planning on releasing new material in the next couple of weeks. Here's what I'm listening to:

Spoon - Transference
Beach House - Teen Dream
Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros - Up From Below (there's always one album that never quite makes my best of the year list and 2009's would be this)
Sam Cooke - One Night Stand - Sam Cooke Live at the Harlem Square Club, 1963 (may be the best live Soul recording ever)
Lucinda Williams - Little Honey (I know it's from 2008 but I just recently got it)

On a music related note, tonight are the Grammys, which happen to be the most ridiculous and worthless awards in anything. The Grammys either award popularity over artistic achievement or act as some kind of lifetime achievement award for established acts. Going over the nominees in the major categories makes my head hurt. This steaming pile of shit is the best music of the year? I know the Grammys actually want people to watch and the music busyness has become so fractured and niche driven that it's hard to find anything good that appeals to everybody, but this is terrible. There's the worthless throwaway pop of Lady GaGa and the Black Eyed Peas. You have the Kings of Leon, a once promising band that threw away any credibility they had with me by wanting to be the next U2. The Dave Matthews Band is nominated and will probably win for Best Album even though they haven't made an album worth listening to since I was in high school ten years ago. That leaves the ubiquitous Taylor Swift, who is apparently a country act, even though none of her music actually sounds like country music. I don't begrudge the girl for having success and the amount of records she's sold in this age is astounding but her shtick has worn out its welcome. Playing the puppy dog, lovestruck teenage girl gets a little worn out after a while, especially when you have a flat, uninteresting singing voice. She is the musical equivalency of the teenage girl who makes a masturbation video and sends it to the boy she wants to like her.

Adam

Adam (Max Mayer, 2009) [4]

Dear Fox Searchlight and Mr. Mayer,

Please immediately stop releasing this schmaltzy pablum and passing it off as having an independent sensibility. Adam is nothing more than a standard romantic comedy with characters that just happen to be a little different than what is see in Hollywood pictures. This goes for all your films Fox Searchlight, which have fallen into an all too predictable formula that gives real independent cinema a bad name. This film in particular is full of cloying moments and dialogue, all under the guise that it's a little different because one of the main characters has Asperger's Syndrome. Mr. Mayer does his best to manipulate Adam's disability to garner sympathy not just from the female lead but from the audience also. Your film was nothing more than trite fluff that was almost redeemed at the end when you actually tried to seriously address the problems with your characters. Instead you wrapped it up a little too perfectly, mostly because it makes the audience feel good. That is the easy way out sir. It's seems all too simple and shallow that everything worked out for Adam and Beth when something as complex as Asperger's is used as a plot crutch. Mr. Mayer, you also deserve some shame for not making me able to hate this as much as I want because I can't direct that hate towards a character with Asperger's. Mr. Mayer, I expect better. As for Fox Searchlight, will you please stop making me so mad with your films. There's only so many films I can reluctantly like but deep down want to hate so much more. Choose one or the other.

Thank you,

Useless Film Snob Reviews

Up

Up (Pete Docter & Bob Peterson, 2009) [9]

While not quite leaning on the auteurist side of thing like Ratatouille and WALL*E, Up may be the most sincere, funniest, and most entertaining film Pixar has produced. It's really the first Pixar film to focus primarily on human characters, and yet the film has heavy elements of fantasy and adventure, which to say the least, test the waters of believability. That the film can move through its variety of action and adventure and still connect with an audience on a human emotional level is its greatest testament. Up focuses on Carl Fredrickson (voiced by Ed Asner), who we see from an adventure loving young boy to his long marriage to his wife, Ellie, to her death, to Fredrickson being alone, his home engulfed by commercial development. The first ten minutes of the film, which tell Carl and Ellie's backstory, is the best work Pixar has ever done and are the best moments of anything I've seen from a 2009 release. It's emotionally resonant and it does it all with a minimum of explanation. It's a bit of real life that feels a bit out of place with the rest of the film, the only reason I didn't give this a 10. The rest of the film follows Carl, his house, and an interloping child, Russell, head for Paradise Falls, Carl and Ellie's dream destination. There, they run into Carl's childhood explorer hero, who has been in the falls attempting to capture a bird that ruined his career. The story is a mix of old adventure serials, fantasy, and humor (the scenes with the dogs are sure to get laughs out of any dog lover). Through all of it, there's still real character development as Carl starts to become a father figure to Russell, and while their relationship may be nothing that couldn't come out of a Spielberg picture, it still roped me in. The animation may have a lot to do with it. The vibrant color scheme as well numerous sequences where the action looked like live action show how advanced Pixar has become in making superb animation. That they consistently put out quality stories to go with that animation (this will be the 3rd consecutive Pixar film to make a top ten list for a particular year), only makes this as well as all they do so remarkable.

In the Loop

In the Loop (Armando Iannuci, 2009) [8]

Good political satire is a difficult accomplishment, and In the Loop succeeds because of its verbal fireworks. Following the path of a partially incompetent British cabinet minister (Tom Hollander) as he continually sticks his foot in his mouth in the run up to war with a certain Middle Eastern country, the film borders on sharp satire and vulgar absurdity. The film is filled with big talkers and cutthroat political opportunism and is big on profanity and laughs. Peter Capaldi steals just about every scene as the extremely foul-mouthed Scottish press officer attempting to wrangle the minister's gaffes. Often it feels that a lot of the political action of the film gets taken over by the mesmerizing profanities, but since they are the funniest moments of the film, it's hard to say they aren't the best part. The seemingly useless scenes with Steve Coogan as a near-crackpot concerned about the minister's constituency's crumbling wall offer some of the funniest moments. When the film does get the political points right, from David Rasche's arrogant neo-con to the nuts and bolts of fudging the intelligence to get to war, it reveals the chilling cynicism behind its colorful characters and language. The best satire reveals an uncomfortable truth behind its humor and in its simplest execution, In the Loop does just that.

The Limits of Control

The Limits of Control (Jim Jarmusch, 2009) [6]

The Limits of Control is certainly a film to be examined on its surface. It's a character study that never really delves into its character. The story is filled with quite a bit of existential discussion on seemingly nothing and a lot of repetitive actions and dialogue but never moves anywhere with any immediacy. Lone Man (Issach De Bankole) is a perpetually suited hitman planted in Spain to carry out a job, the pieces revealed by a series of eccentric characters. Lone Man' activities are structured round a series of repetitive actions, drinking two espressos in seperate cups or exchanging match books with his auxiliaries. The repetition suits the style of the film to a T, as it blends effortlessly with Jarmusch's minimalist style. Christopher Doyle's cinematography adds a vibrancy of color and a tone of coolness to the proceedings. But the real question is what comes out of the film? Outside of its impressive structure and images, there is a void of anything substantial in the film. Lone Man gets his instructions and carries out his mission and nothing seems that important about it. If it was Jarmusch's intention or not, the film ends up feeling completely void of any lingering sentiment about what was just seen. Even though it looks good, The Limits of Control vanishes almost as quickly as the credits roll.

Taking Woodstock

Taking Woodstock (Ange Lee, 2009) [5]

It's near ridiculous to make a film about Woodstock. Michael Wadleigh's documentary is such a landmark piece of cinema, essentially creating the Woodstock mythology, that anything else is going to pale in comparison. Lee has the right idea in Taking Woodstock, in that he goes into a specific person's interesting story of how Woodstock came to Bethel, New York. The problem with the film is that it can never decide if it wants to be a dysfunctional family comedy or a larger, more profound coming-of-age story with the biggest musical event of the 60s as the backdrop. Demetri Martin plays Elliot Teichberg, an interior designer who has packed up and headed back to help his parents run a dilapidated Catskills motel. Elliot lucks into finding that the Woodstock festival needs a new location and he just happens to have a permit and knows of available land. The film plays out as partly the telling of how Woodstock took shape and the happening at the motel, with Elliot trying to get his stereotypical Jewish parents to lighten up and accept these Hippies. There's just too much going on in the story with too many minor characters that no aspect is that effective. Lee is smart to keep the action on the periphery of the festival, showing no concert footage, to differentiate Elliot's story from the festival. The problem is I never found his story that interesting. His story arc follows the standard coming of age storyline with his homosexuality tossed in at times but never examined deeply. Martin is o.k. in the role but his comedic background interferes with seeing him ingrained in the character. Lee does his best I guess, and his re-enactment of certain iconic images in the Woodstock film are intriguing one level but serve no real purpose in his film. The air of nostalgia and near sickening idealism hangs over everything involving Woodstock, making it hard for anything involving it to escape from its large shadow. Taking Woodstock definitely got swallowed up in that cloud.

Film Decade List #1: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Michel Gondry, USA, 2004)

2004 was a pretty good year, wasn't it? Both my music and film choices happen to come from the same year, which I didn't realize until to preparing to write them. Anyway, I may claim to be a film snob but the films that really get my attention are the ones that still can tell a good story with some feeling to it. Through all its visual gee-wizardry by Gondry, ESOTSM has a really authentic story at the heart of it. Charlie Kaufman's script still has its outlandish and mind-bending moments but at its core, the film is really a simple love story well told. Joel (Jim Carrey) and Clementine (Kate Winslet) have gone through a devastating breakup. Joel finds a company that has the technology for the user to have painful moments removed from their memory. This leads to the unspooling of Joel and Clementine's relationship and the realization in Joel that perhaps those memories aren't better off erased. Both Winslet and Carrey give career best performances in roles that seem almost opposite their know screen persona: Winslet as a outre spirit, and Carrey as a brooding sad-sack. Gondry's visual flair add that something to the film that make it jangled last half work extremely well. Both of those only go to enhance what is again, the hear of the film, Kaufman's screenplay. It carries the offbeat elements that can be expected out of a Kaufman script but underneath its uniqueness are some fairly good points about love and memory. The nature of wanting to banish painful memories is something familiar in just about everybody but they can also be beneficial, to help live out what's ahead. That Joel comes to a recognition of this and realizes that the bad memories will take out a lot of the good ones is important. It could have been told in a flat, cynical way with a lot of Gondry fireworks and been a complete bomb. Eternal Sunshine succeeds because no one in it was afraid of being sincere with the material. That it told its fairly standard love story with a exuberance and inventiveness not really seen in mainstream cinema, it deserves to be the best of the decade.

Music Decade List #1: Ray LaMontagne - Trouble (2004)

Ray LaMontagne doesn't deviate that far from the singer-songwriter norm. There are elements of and a familiarity with classic artists all over Trouble. Yet, none of it sounds tired and stale, mostly due to the emotion LaMontagne pours into his songs and his belief in what he's doing, whether it's original or not. That, his voice, and the material itself all make Trouble the album I've spent more time listening to than any other this decade. A lot of initial comparisons of LaMontagne were to Van Morrison vocally but musically, the album has a lot of similar elements to Morrison's early 70s output. These are folk songs accented subtlety, as strings on the title track and 'Shelter' demonstrate. Producer Ethan Johns does a great job in knowing where the power of the songs lies in LaMontange's emotional delivery, highlighted by 'Burn' and 'Jolene'. It is in these more intimate songs that the power of the album really comes through and not just because of Ray's voice. I have no real good way of describing it but it creates a visceral reaction that very few albums of this decade have. I really, really like every song here That's pretty much it. If I was going to pick my favorite album of the decade, it would be an album where every song's good. Trouble is that album.

Blogger's aside: No matter how many people want to shit on him, Zach Braff gets some credit on this one. Around Garden State time, I was following Braff's blog and he wrote a little blurb about Trouble. I went and checked it out and here we are. Some of Braff's musical choices I couldn't disagree fast enough with but thanks on this one. Give the guy a break.

Film Decade List #2: No Country For Old Men

No Country For Old Men (Joel Coen, USA, 2007)

Up until seeing No Country For Old Men, I had preferred the wackier Coen Brothers to the serious ones. I would much rather watch The Big Lebowski or even The Hudsucker Proxy over Fargo or Miller's Crossing. I always felt the brothers rigid, insular world always lent itself better to comedy than to drama. No Country For Old Men blows that idea completely away, as the two have crafted a taut, near flawless thriller out of Corman McCarthy's novel. Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin) is out hunting one day and comes across a drug deal gone bad. He finds a suitcase full of money, takes off, and a set of violent circumstances follow, most of them carried out by a man named Anton Chigurgh, played with menacing intensity by Javier Bardem. Working as a meditation on the greediness and evil of man, the film is helped by the Coen's meticulous, exacting style. The chaos of the story is reigned in to a serie of memorable moments, especially the Chigurgh coin toss at the end. At the the center of the story is the local sheriff (Tommy Lee Jones), increasingly perplexed and horrified by the trail of destruction left in the wake of Llewelyn and Anton. He's a man who can't see himself being able to contain men such as Chrigurgh. That the world seems to be descending into more violence and humanity is doing nothing to stop it is a key point of McCarthy's novel and the film. The film works as a perfect allegory for that idea. The film gets every other detail right, from the West Texas landscape to the pitch-perfect performances. That it still has some black humor is a nice Coen brothers touch, but this isn't a comedy. It proved me wrong on all grounds about the Coen's films but in a good way.

Music Decade List #2: Bob Dylan - Love and Theft (2001)

Love & Theft is Bob Dylan's best album since Blood on the Tracks, and in that middle 25 years, he tried a lot of different styles but never found one that fit as well as here. Taking a variety of styles, from blues, bluegrass, jazz, and swing, these are a set of retro sounding songs that fit the croaky rasp of his that has defined his current years. I prefer the bluesier or more upbeat numbers on the album, songs like 'Summer Days' and 'Lonesome Day Blues' with Dylan and his crack touring band tearing out propulsive rhythms. The albums sounds much more vibrant and punchy compared to more rueful, swampy Daniel Lanois production of Time Out of Mind. Above it all, Dylan's songwriting is at the fore but here it takes on a different vein. These aren't "important" folk songs nor are they the dense, imagisitc works of his mid-60s heyday. The material is more direct here, with humor and an adaptation of styles that make everything sound authentic. There's a joke about every stanza in 'Summer Days' and for those who think the man can't write a great song, check out 'Mississippi'. Everything about Love & Theft has a easiness about it, that Dylan could toss out a couple of sessions and the results are this, another great record that sums up the history of the man and his influences.

Film Decade List #3: Songs From the Second Floor

Songs From the Second Floor (Roy Andersson, Sweden, 2000 (festival) or 2002(U.S. theatrical) )

Bleakly comic, absurdist, and visually captivating, Songs From the Second Floor is like no other film I've seen this decade. Andersson's film has the dark sensibilities of Bergman filtered through the absurdist storytelling of Bunuel. Not operating as a whole story but more as a series of vignettes, the film shows a modern capitalist society as dour people operating in a ugly city with a constant traffic backlog and almost everybody failing at doing anything. The film uses its dark humor to mask a bit of the serious critique that is behind what Andersson is doing. Like Bunuel, often the best way to criticize society is to make it completely absurd. Still, no message of the film can hold up to its amazingly rigid structure. Andersson films with a maximum amount of minimalism, holding the camera in place and never filming anything closer than a medium shot. It creates a bit of a distance between the viewer and film, never allowing to really feel drawn in. That could be a hindrance but since the world and characters of the film are a bit alien to begin with, the detachment of the camera in addition to the emotionless, sterile world of the film actually strengthen it. Andersson has created such a unique visual experience that I've never seen before or since here. It exists as almost something completely different than every other film on this list. Yet, it intrigues me as much as any film this decade.

Music Decade List #3: Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (2002)

For all the publicity surrounding the turmoil in releasing it, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot's execution pretty much lives up to all the hype. Throwing away just about any semblance of their alt-country beginnings, Wilco move in a direction dealing heavily with sonic experimentation, creating sprawling, dense songs that have no basis in any genre. 'I Am Trying to Break Your Heart' and 'Ashes of American Flags' are bleak songs only helped by a background of ominous ambient noise. 'Kamera' and 'Heavy Metal Drummer' are more propulsive, straight ahead rockers but there are little flourishes in each, notably the end of the latter, that still keep it from being something expected out of the group. The input of Jay Bennett seems to be a point of issue, as Sam Jones' film I Am Trying to Break Your Heart: A Film About Wilco documents. There's no doubt Bennett played a role along with Jim O'Rourke in creating the new sonic textures of the album. It also appears true that the new direction ultimately led him out the door in an acrimonious break up. It doesn't diminish the fact that at the time, Wilco was one of the few established bands willing to try an entirely new direction and be able to pull it off and make them even more popular in the process.

Film Decade List #4: The Royal Tenenbaums

The Royal Tenenbaums (Wes Anderson, USA, 2001)

For all its visual and plot quirks, The Royal Tenenbaums is Wes Anderson's best at getting real emotion out of his story and characters. A lot of criticism of Anderson has been he places his visual world above reliable storytelling but here, I don't feel that argument can be made. In telling of the dysfunctional Tenenbaum family, he creates characters and situations that are grounded in backstory and are a true function of their characters' experiences. Gene Hackman is great as patriarch Royal Tenenbaum, back into his family's life, telling them he's dying but just in need of a place to stay after getting booted from his hotel. Royal interjects a lifeblood into the family that had apparently been missing for some time, and at the same time bringing back old wounds. It's a work of melancholy disguised as comedy but the lighter moments make the darker moments more poignant and the funny one funnier. Anderson set this all this in a highly fabricated world that seems to turn off as many cineastes as it appeals to the average moviegoer of my age. His visual quirks and use of rock music definitely appeal to a certain audience and I happen to be one. I find the film to be a sweetly portrayed dark comedy that has an auteurist flair that prevents it from being twee or artificial.

Music Decade List #4: Drive-By Truckers - The Dirty South (2004)

More than any other band of these times, no one is more tied to a sense of place than the Drive-By Truckers. They've made a career out of crafting songs on just what it means to be from the South, and The Dirty South is a series of songs about those on the bottom end of life down in Alabama and points surrounding. Whether it be about Sherriff Buford Pusser ('The Buford Stick'), the moonshine gangs he tried to stamp out ('The Boys From Alabama') or people just down and out ('Puttin' People on the Moon'), Patterson Hood crafts expert songs that convey what life is like in a certain area for people like myself who view it as an alien world. Why The Dirty South rises above the output of the group's earlier albums are the songs contributed by Mike Cooley and Jason Isbell, who match Hood in effectiveness and melody. Cooley offers a handful of very good selections, especially 'Carl Perkins' Cadillac' and 'Cottonseed.' Isbell's songs don't quite fit the story structure of the rest of the album but they may the standout tracks for the album; a re imaging of Johny Henry ('The Day of John Henry Died'), or a somber reflection on The Band ('Danko/Manuel'). Sadly, this would be his last output with the Truckers as he left to pursue a solo career. With the solid contributions of all three, on top of the powerful sound the band can produce, The Dirty South may sum up best what the Drive-By Truckers have been striving for over the last decade.

Film Decade List #5: In the Mood For Love

In the Mood For Love (Wong Kar-Wai, Hong Kong, 2001)

Almost completely sublime in its atmosphere and look, ITMFL exists almost in the ether, in a dreamlike state that make the images here feel otherworldly. A lot of credit has to do with Christopher Doyle's cinematography, which only enhances the scenes and characters Wong creates. Tony Leung and Maggie Cheung play neighbors in Hong Kong who come to realize that their spouses are having an affair with each other. Since their significant others are away for quite a while the two bond, but being sure never to become like their spouses. What Wong really achieves through these two characters is how unkind unrequited love can be. Leung's Mr. Chow clearly has feelings for Cheung's character but can't resolve it with the stand both have taken following their spouse's affair. The yearning of the characters is only enhanced through the gorgeous images and colors the film is bathed in, creating a dream world where the key point is the only element not matching. This is just such a fantastic film to look at that it is a bit easy to forget how bittersweet the actual story turns out. Leung and Cheung are both phenomenal in their roles, locking into the insecurity and yearning that lies beneath their friendship. No film this decade so accurately portrayed the bittersweet nature of love, all the while looking so good.

Music Decade List #5: Damien Rice - O (2003)

With O, Damien Rice made a standard singer-songwriter album with a little something extra. The songs here are fairly standard folk tunes, yet Rice adds additional instrumentation and a wide spectrum of emotion that raises them above being just average. 'Delicate' starts off as it says, but has an added orchestral sweep thanks to a cello. 'Volcano' and 'The Blower's Daughter' are enhanced by the vocal of Lisa Hannigan. 'Amie', 'I Remember' and 'Eskimo' venture out of folk territory and experiment with various sounds, whether they be opera or ambient noise. Still, at its essence the basic song structure has to be good or no amount of bells and whistles would make it worth a listen. That the songs cover such a wide range of emotions, whether it be downbeat and reflective or into full-blown earnestness, there's a level of sincerity in Rice's lyrics and vocals that can draw the listener into the material. Rice has never quite reached the level he achieved on O, whether it be the loss of Lisa Hannigan, whose contribution cannot be overstated or perhaps the material here is something that can never be reached in scope or in execution.

Useless Film Snob's 25 Best Albums of 2009

Once again, we can get into this discussion of best vs. favorite. I realize that musical taste is extremely subjective; someone might think Mastadon's Crack the Skye is the year's best album, I would rather get hit in the head with a hammer. So, I guess what I'm saying is what I call the best may be someone else's worst. We'll go ahead and call this the best purely superficial reasons: I just want to be put on those lists with all the other egotistical music snobs. Here are my choices for the best (favorite) of 2009:

25) Magnolia Electric Co. - Josephine
A somber, semi-concept album for Jason Molina & company, about what I'm not to sure.
Choice tracks: 'The Rock of Ages', 'Whip-Poor-Will'

24) Phosphorescent - To Willie
A spirited interpretation of Willie Nelson's catalog by Matthew Houck. Houck's vocals have the same wavering timbre of Nelson's which keep the material firmly grounded in its original sound.
Choice tracks: 'I Gotta Get Drunk', 'Can I Sleep In Your Arms'

23) Woods - Songs of Shame
Songs that border on oddball sonic experiments, psychedelic jams, and quirky vocals.
Choice tracks: 'To Clean', 'Rain On'

22) Ryan Bingham & the Dead Horses - Roadhouse Son
Bingham's brand of alt-country has been done before but his ragged vocals and Marc Ford's production give the feeling of Bingham living what he writes.
Choice tracks: 'Tell My Mother I Miss He So', 'Wishing Well'

21) Mark Olson & Gary Louris - Ready For the Flood
A welcome return to the former Jayhawks frontmen that shows they still can make some great songs and harmonies.
Choice tracks: 'Bloody Hands', 'The Trap's Been Set'

20) Built to Spill - There Is No Enemy
A rejuvenated sounding Doug Martsch leads Built to Spill a group of more energetic and concise set of songs from their previous album.
Choice tracks: 'Nowhere Lullaby', 'Tomorrow'

19) The Black Crowes - Before the Frost...Until the Freeze
Recorded in front of a live audience, the album captures the band in their best element but the double album format could have been pared to one really good one.
Choice tracks: 'Good Morning Captain', 'Last Place Where Love Lives'

18) Bowerbirds - Upper Air
Delicate acoustic material with some simple yet catchy melodies.
Choice tracks: 'House of Diamonds', 'Northern Lights'

17) Wilco - Wilco (The Album)
The second straight record of pretty straight-ahead material could be seen as treading water but Jeff Tweedy and company seem content in a simplified direction.
Choice tracks: 'You Never Know', 'I'll Fight'

16) Diane Birch - Bible Belt
Completely retro in its early 70s AM Radio influence, there are elements of soul, gospel and Brill Building pop mixed in, all led by Birch's fantastic voice. The out of left field choice of 2009.
Choice tracks: 'Valentino', 'Rise Up'

15) Langhorne Slim - Be Set Free
Like Bowerbirds and the Avett Brothers, Langhorne Slim is taking acoustic styles in idiosyncratic ways. An album that harkens back to the singer-songwriter heydey of the mid 70s.
Choice tracks: 'I Love You But Goodbye', 'Cinderella'

14) Derek Trucks Band - Already Free
Derek Trucks continually makes albums that should find a bigger audience outside of the jam band universe. Truly fantastic band interplay with perhaps the strongest set of original material on a Derek Trucks Band release.
Choice tracks: 'Sweet Inspiration', 'Down Don't Bother Me'

13) Great Lake Swimmers - Lost Channels
More ethereal music from this Canadian outfit. A bit more in the way of uptempo songs but the slow, somber ones are still their best.
Choice tracks: 'Pulling On a Line', 'Stealing Tomorrow'

12) Dawes - North Hills
A band from California who made the best blue-eyed soul/classic rock album I've heard in quite a while. It is uniquely Californian, sweeping and cinematic in its sun-drenched Americana.
Choice tracks: 'When My Time Comes', 'God Rest My Soul'

11) The Felice Brothers - Yonder Is the Clock
My upstate brethren continue to make music sounding straight out of Big Pink, this one with a bit more of studio polish.
Choice tracks: 'Run Chicken Run', 'All When We Were Young'

10) Bob Dylan - Together Through Life
Sprinkled with Tex-Mex accordion and Chess covers, Dylan continues to re-interpret various genres to a consistent degree of success almost 50 years into his career.
Choice tracks: 'Beyond Here Lies Nothing', 'It's All Good'

9) The Low Anthem - Oh My God, Charlie Darwin
Another band, this one from Rhode Island, based in roots styles but adding their own touch. They can handle up tempo material just as well as their expertly crafted quieter ones.
Choice tracks: 'The Horizon is a Beltway', 'Ticket Taker'

8) Roadside Graves - My Son's Home
A band from New Jersey that makes surprisingly good roots based rock. Notice a trend through this list yet?
Choice tracks: 'Far and Wide', 'Take a Train'

7) Grant-Lee Phillips - Little Moon
Criminally under appreciated as a solo act or with Grant Lee Buffalo, Phillips has made another album of unassuming yet great songs.
Choice tracks: 'It's Not the Same Old Cold War, Harry', 'One Morning'

6) Grizzly Bear - Veckatimest
A band that can take a variety of styles and create some challenging, densely layered yet enjoyable music.
Choice tracks: 'Two Weeks', 'Cheerleader'

5) The Cave Singers - Welcome Joy
A band that greatly enhanced their songwriting with their second album. Still with a unique voice, this time the Cave Singers have stronger songs to go with it.
Choice tracks: 'Leap', 'Beach House'

4) Todd Snider - The Excitement Plan
Snider may be the best storyteller out there and this album shows it off, whether it be songs about pitching no-hitters on LSD, from the perspective of a tree, or a seemingly toss-off about the benefits of fame.
Choice tracks: 'America's Favorite Pastime', 'Money, Compliments, Publicity (Song Number Ten)'

3) Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavillion
A much more accessible record than their last one, they may be the modern day, post-irony version of the Beach Boys. At its core, these songs have a vitality and a expression of joy that can be overshadowed by their technical and sonic achievements.
Choice tracks: 'Summertime Clothes', 'My Girls'

2) The Avett Brothers - I and Love and You
Working with Rick Rubin had cries of selling out coming from their hardcore fans. I happen to think it's their best album to date, and the move away from their established sound actually help in their songwriting. Less shouting and more nuanced song craft created an album that still has traits of the old Avetts but shows them going in a broader direction.
Choice tracks: 'Ten Thousand Words', 'Incomplete and Insecure'

1) Neko Case - Middle Cyclone
The most consistent, strongest set of songs Case has put to record. An album that shows off more than her great voice, it puts the songs themselves right up there too. 'People Gotta Lot of Nerve' is my choice for choice track of 2009.
Choice tracks: 'This Tornado Loves You, 'People Gotta Lot of Nerve', 'I'm an Animal'

Film Decade List #6: Wonder Boys

Wonder Boys (Curtis Hanson, USA, 2000)

Wonder Boys is the type of picture that Hollywood studios have all but abandoned, an intelligent, somewhat offbeat film that appeals to people don't want to see special effects and a shitload of explosions. That the film's marketing was completely fucked up is an understatement as Paramount opened it up in the pre-Oscars dead season, and attempted to re-release it in a last ditch attempt to garner awards. Plus, it didn't find an audience of anybody but critics and myself, who saw it in a theatre with eight other people. It really was a shame because this may be the most underrated film of the decade, based on Michael Chabon's novel, with great performances. Michael Douglas gives a great performance as a shaggy, pot-addled professor/author stuck on a massive follow-up to his acclaimed first novel. The film centers around a weekend where Grady (Douglas) gets sucked into a series of events that strain his clandestine relationship with his boss's wife (Frances MacDormand) and get him involved with one of his talented yet troubled students (Tobey Maguire). The film makes intelligent and keen observations about the world of writers and addresses it audience with an expectation of intelligence, now almost absent in studio pictures. The plot isn't much more than a loose series tied together by the character's presence but it succeeds because everyone, from Douglas and Maguire, to bit parts, are so good. Hanson gives a workmanlike directing job, keeping things moving, never being flashy, and preserving a lot of Chabon's novel. That the humor has a level of sophistication probably means it won't appeal to everybody, but this film should have found a much bigger audience than it did.

Music Decade List #6: The Hold Steady - Boys and Girls In America (2006)

Boys and Girls In America has everything you could want in a Hold Steady album but has the added benefit of an expanded, well-rounded sound. Craig Finn's story songs about fuck ups, children of suburbia, and addicts are still there, whether it be about compulsive gambling ('Chips Ahoy') or hooking up with other drug causalities ('Chillout Tent'). Here they have the added benefit of Franz Nicolay's keyboards, which cannot be understated, that give the record much more of a Springsteen feel. The piano on the opener, 'Stuck Between Stations' and the organ on 'Chips Ahoy' gives those songs an anthemic quality that would have gone missing without them. The reason for this, whether it be the keyboards, the sing along choruses, or the Thin Lizzy-esque riffs and solos carry these songs beyond anything that was on the band's first two albums. 'Massive Night' and 'Hot Soft Light' have catchy riffs and chorus that really propel Finn's lyrics being just stream of consciousness. The songs here don't have the same depth and intertwined nature of Separation Sunday but they make up for in their new musical power. That isn't to say the album is all hooks and choruses, as 'Citrus' and 'First Night' show a more contemplative side with the band knowing where to reign it in. It's an album that sums up everything good about what The Hold Steady are doing and it shows a band that truly loves what they do.

Music Decade List #7: Josh Ritter - The Animal Years (2006)

I was completely blown away the first time I heard The Animal Years. Ritter's literate singer-songwriting style is completely in my wheelhouse. There's nothing that drastically different that Ritter is doing but his command of lyrics and songcraft carry his work beyond most of what passes for male songwriters these days (Matt Kearney, Joshua Radin, and James Morrison being main examples). Ritter has a lyrical command and complexity much more advanced than these guys and his experimenting with different sonic textures, more than likely thanks to producer Brian Deck. 'Thin Blue Flame' is the apex of the album, a culmination of everything Ritter seemingly wanted to accomplish with the album (and Stephen King's #1 song of 2006 for what it's worth). There are other great songs on the album also, whether it be the propulsive 'Wolves', the lighthearted and silent film allegory 'Lillian, Egypt', or the moody minimalist 'One More Mouth'. With this album, Ritter really separated himself from the singer-songwriter pack as someone worth taking notice of. That his live shows are fantastic, showing a love of performing for an audience, don't hurt either. I saw Josh open for Gomez at the Haunt in Ithaca, and the majority of the crowd was there to see him and not Gomez. I think that goes to show that if you put your heart into your craft, people will come around. The Animal Years shows this perfectly and while Ritter may not have planned it that way, it certainly worked on me.