Harper’s Top 40 of 2004 – God kept me
living, and music kept me alive one more year.
Smells like silver-haired spirit.
1.
P.J. Harvey – Uh Huh Her
Bile
is both sexy and timeless. Head banging
is the same gesture as nodding out, only with a little more overt anger and
purpose. Probably a quirky choice for
number one, but after all the nu-folk and ambient cerebral electronics and
sappy vegan rock and Ibiza- pop in my music
this year, I needed red meat and PJ always
has delivered the raw flesh. Thank you PJ,
thank you rock and roll. Pour that
fucking salt of the earth in my natal wound. “Mommy put your needle down.”
2.
Animal Collective – Sung Tongs
Short
sweet and sour songs. Sometimes
throwaway sketches, lazy or ephemeral ideas for music. Psychic placeholders. Vocals as calm and friendly as your favorite
vacation. On the beach after the
destruction of commercial music… ambitious post-apocalypse beach boys with
secret strains of Nino Rota. La Dolce
Vita as Baghdad
glows in suicidal bomb light and the Dow flatlines.
3.
The Arcade
– Funeral
Kitchen
rock. A compendium of pop skills-sets. You name the favorite, and you’ll hear
it “quoted” within three tracks. A dash of Bowie and a splash of Pavement., though just
using the language they grew up with…refreshingly unassuming while being
derivative . A brilliant work,
irresistible, cagey, classic pop sensibilities and drive. I lose interest 2/3 of the way through every
song. Astonishingly promising music that
teases and turns itself off like an iron left on. So gifted at re-creating the past of my
favorite music, the songs tire me. A
spectacular debut. A pot begging to be
watched .
4.
Blithe Sons – Arm of the Starfish
Analog
ambient. Californian as Mendocino
fog. Heads bent over guitars,
shoe-gazing in reverence more than method.
Strumming to synchronize your pulse.
Continually and earnestly seeking some kind of recognizable musical
structure mostly without success.
Repetitive to no purpose.
Playable late at night or in crises… sonic laudanum conjured in the
Eternal VW bus once again stalled in the underpass. I smell sage.
5.
Dungen – Ta Det Lugnt
Scandanavian
psychedelic and unkempt. Lots of layers
for varied weather. Everytime you listen
you hear a wholly different kind of music being put on. Adolescent and stoned, collegiate and
studious, obsessed and inevitable. I
sense I am probably lucky I can’t
understand Swedish, the mystery of the singer’s stories are best left there. Best
tribute to the adenoids ever. I
don’t know whether it is a soundtrack to a silly Roger Corman goth horror flick or Danzig’s
garage tapes or re-discovered studio masters to a long lost Arthur Lee trip to
and in Oslo.
6.
Wilco – A Ghost is Born
I
had a measurably adverse reaction at first… seemed a little wimpy, and baroque
for one of my favorite bands of all time.
Saw it performed live and it straightened out for me. Too clever by half, though with a redeeming the
love of what’s left of rock and roll. Handshake drugs all gone. The ashtray still has tales to tell though. Still cigarette smoke hanging in the drapes.
7.
Sufjan Stevens – Seven Swans
Art
songs. Who can follow the lieder? Wish he had a bit more of a sense of humor,
but his stark voice is a sharpening edge, his lyrics are Big Picture serious,
and I think he probably really does pray to Jehovah-God on a daily basis. Emo Dylan…. The smooth folk ilsounds of the
21st century. God bless his abstemious little heart of
darkness. Count the bible verses. Count your blessings in any and all
cases. Maybe seven? Burning offerings,
silly boy.
8.
Califone – Heron King Blues
Rootsy
brew of danceable, trance-like folk rock.
Make-out music with bittersweet banjos greasing the seductive
wheels. An aural salve treated with
clanging sounds collected from dives into Nashville’s
dumpster or Kid A. Corn-pone dreamy lap
pop with Blonde-on-Blonde era vocals.
Calculated and calming. Drum
circles on coastal bluffs, drive back in the brand new truck. World music for the busy residents of the
Potomac, Portland, and Jackson
Hole. I smell Patagonia.
9.
Sonic Youth – Sonic Nurse
Not
only back in form, but now they’ve outlasted all those they influenced to sound
again unique and important. Real rock
art. Their best since the 80’s.
10.
Riot on an Empty Street – Kings of Convenience
Absurdly
spot-on knock-offs, maybe even channeling, of Simon and Garfunkel by barely post-adolescent
Norwegian wunderkind. Production sparkly
clean and a love for pop music so deep that it overwhelms the necessary irony
that this kind of sublime pap inescapably invokes.
11.
Lanterna – Highways
The
work I played more often than any this year.
I let it repeat in the car for weeks at a time. Embarrassingly
Starbucks-compilation aromatherapy or soundtrack for a road movie placed in the
New Mexico
high desert. The Edge –clone noodles
heroically with the scent of pinon.
Peaceful dinner music for the marriage supper of the lamb held in
redwood forests and santa fe
nouvelle cafes. I can’t help being who I
am. Can you? High volume or low, the
malleable feast my days have become. Why
does this supple pretty music ready my heart?
For what?
12.
Junior Boys – Last Exit
I
wonder when I started liking dance music, when it started sounding like
Eno? Chilly lap-pop for the après-club,
crisply spacious, the classic combination of enervation and tense need. These boys werk their kraft with little sense
of humor which actually means the joke doesn’t stale. They’re Canadian but sing in a faux-german
accent the way Mick sings in a faux –Mississippi
drawl, with similar intent and to similar good effect.
13.
Karate – Pockets
The
only thing I liked this year that could be compared to Steely Dan. Jazzy music with a voice of a singer who
swings in the syncopated swing of someone’s misspent youth. Young hippie girls spinning on the summer
lawns, boys with muttonchops bopping their heads with hands in their
pockets. Jamming to the smell of
armpits, patchouli, and an afternoon cocktail in Sausalito. Seventh chord prophecy for the very, very
young. Let’s trade partners and solos. Includes an homage to Pennsylvania and a caution about credit card
debt.
14.
Architecture in Helsinki – Fingers Crossed
A
little goes a long way and this Aussie group enamored of Europop hedges on twee. Fortunately this is more a list of possible
pop ideas than pop songs with cuts lasting not more than 90 seconds. Chill tubas and retro-marimbas
cover the Claudine Longet vocals with simple ease.
15.
Blue Nile
– High
In
the tradition. High rock culture in the
progressive-Scottish style that never disappoints. The third release in the last 25 years by the
greatest unknown band in Brit-pop history.
Classic sounding just a bit dusty, if this were only 1987….
16.
Sun Kil Moon – Ghosts of the Great Highway
Mark
Koselek is a better songwriter than just about anyone and dips deep into a
singer-songwriter tradition of broken-hearted troubadours (Hank Williams,
Jackson Browne, Jeff Tweedy). One of the
most beautiful voices in american pop.
Value-added Neil Young crunchy power chording. Hmmm, why isn’t this better.
17.
Savath and Savalas – Apro’pt
SF
DJ type moves to Barcelona. Mature southern-euro-pop results with a dash
of Buckley’s grace. Sexy woman can sing anything and soothing
castellano self-assurance is good for late nights and wine bars. OK, I admit, I’d love a month in Ibiza, is that so wrong?
I smell hash and brie.
18.
Interpol – Antics
Urbane
and energetic and very, very white.
Strummy guitars, style, and 80’s sonic structure, they deserve to be the
rock stars they pose as.
19.
Hayden – Elk Lake Serenade
Earnest
nu-folk Americana
(as only Canadians can do). Pedal-steel
emo. Waltzes and harmonicas. Lost loves
and the smell of vegan cookies baking (although there is a lyric that
references creme brulee).
20.
A.C. Newman – Slow Wonder
Seamless,
faultless pop music, with polished up Nuggets from the garages of Van Nuys
(1969), Boston
(1981), Seattle
(1997). Wins the Grad Student of Pop
Music. Comfort food.
21. The Delays – Faded Seaside Glamor
22. Tres Cosas – Juana Molina
23. Erlend Oye – D.J. Kicks
24. Modest Mouse - Good News For People
Who Love Bad News
25. Fennesz – Venice
26. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – Abbatoir Blues
27. Futureheads – Futureheads
28. !!! – Louden up Now
29. Pinback – Summer in Abbaddon
30. Xiu xiu – Fabulous Muscles
31. Kinski - Don’t Climb on and Take the
Holy Water – Kinski
32. The Libertines – The Libertines
33. The Walkmen – bows and Arrows
34. cLOUDDEAD – Ten
35. Los Lobos - Ride
36. Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes -
TV On The Radio
37. When it Falls – Zero 7
38. Guided by Voices – Half Smiles of the
Decomposed
39. Jóhann Jóhannsson’s Virthulegu forsetar
40. Max Richter – The Blue notebooks
41. Snow Patrol – Final Straw
