Backspacer was Pearl Jam's Who's Next, a restatement of purpose, a rock album that wasn't afraid to turn it to 11 ("Supersonic") or be kinda funny ("Johnny Guitar"). But it wasn't the best album the band put out this year. No, that was the "official bootleg" of the Toronto show, a concert that reminded you that passion is no ordinary word in rock. Being there also drove home a very valid point: You can keep your multiple stages, bridges, fiberoptic screen, expensive videos and costume changes - Pearl Jam does more with a simple light set up and a backdrop than all those bands combined.
Album I so wanted to love, I really did...
I had been hearing about Glasvegas on BBC 6Music for about a year, and finally got their album right before they were nominated for the Mercury Award. "Flowers and Football Tops" sounded good...as did the song after it....and after it...but then I noticed that they were sounding good because they were almost indistinguishable from each other. It was just the bridge of most Jesus and Mary Chain songs over and over again. It might yet grow on me, but as of right now it feels very unessential.
The Horrors, on the other hand, do the same thing but blow the doors off the joint. Get that one instead.
Oh she wore a funny costume and that makes he an artist? Yawn!
He doesn't just look like a skinny Elvis Costello: Jarvis Cocker has had a long career where he's flitted from style to style, genre to genre, and been an astute observer of Britain's class system. He's also got an encyclopedic knowledge and appreciation of pop style and is so damn smart he doesn't even have to tell you he is. His appearances which have included lectures, and performances as part of spinning classes have puts the boots to a certain someone's concept of "pop art" without even trying. Also, Further Complications is the best album you probably didn't buy, or even know existed, this year.
Daniel Kessler of Interpol also put on a personality this year for Julian Plenti is...Skyscraper. The difference between him and her lady the con artist: Kessler actually likes music and uses this personality to explore different styles that he can't really do in Interpol. Also, he's not in love with his reflection.
Even I didn't think I'd like this album this much
I go bonkers every year when the Mercury nominations come out, and one of the first I bought was the self-titled release by The Invisible. Because they are led by a black guy with a beard and have a white guy, people call them Britain's TV on The Radio. The Invisible are arty, but they're much more jazzy. On the first few listens the album faded a little in the background. Around the third listen I suddenly noticed something: This album is fracking amazing.
Canada has them too!
We've been trying our own version of the Mercury here in the Polaris Prize. Sadly, they haven't learnt that nominating Broken Social Scene members will just encourage them to keep making records as opposed to getting more productive jobs as meter maids. But this year the Polaris Prize did something that not even the Mercury has done: Give the top prize to a band as uncompromising as F*cked Up (ed note: I'm trying to keep things a little clean....). F*cked Up takes hardcore and actually ramps it up, but the dudes can play! It hits that sweet spot between punk, heavy metal, and progressive rock that's always been hardcore's crazy aunt in the attic.
The second big surprise from the Polaris Prize was Hey Rosetta!, a band from Newfoundland which is basically Arcade Fire light. But, it's nice to see a band from the rock not feel the need to do overplayed, sound-alike "Hey nanny nanny, Hey nanny hey" music.
Hey, there's a pop song I like!
Most pop has become as formulaic now as it was in the mid 70s. Not making it any better is the overuse of autotune and processed guitars. However, in the middle of this, "Fireflies" by Owl City came out. Sure, it's a Postal Service rip off, but it's a good one, and is actually, you know, structured like a song, unlike pretty much every other song that hit #1 this year. (I'm look at you, Wil.I.Am.)
They're growing up, those little boys of ours
If you're not taking Arctic Monkey seriously yet, get Humbug. Then take your socks off, you're just cutting out the middle man.
Also, Wilco: The Album proves that Wilco the band is so good that they can release an amazing album that gets overlooked because, well, we've come to expect amazing from them.
A non-Pearl Jam concert I loved
I think if I had to relive any concerts from this year, I'd be hard pressed to choose between The National (spotty, but gained strength) or Yeah Yeah Yeahs (total revelation). I think I give it to Yeah Yeah Yeahs if only because It's Blitz is the best album to come out of NYC since CBGB's closed.
Believing your own press
Editors have always had "21st Century Joy Division" hung about their neck. On In This Light and In the Evening they pretty much tried to wonder what would happen if Joy Division could have recorded a reunion album in 2009. The result: something that just has a lot of good parts, but sadly is a bit of a letdown from a band that I feel is capable of a lot more, as The Back Room suggested, and no really subsequent album has proved (although "Smokers Outside the Hospital Doors" off of An End Has a Start is simply awesome - Chris Martin would give his right arm for that image and hook)
My hope for next couple of years
Kings of Leon should pull an In Utero or Tusk and release an album so daring that we can get rid of the bandwagon jumpers, and so that the band can regain that immediacy with the fans and its music that made the first three albums totally essential. I don't resent them getting famous, I just hate that it's for such a bland album.
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