| YET ANOTHER YEAR IN THE EAR
In this everything all the time over and over
era in which we live, there’s so much stuff that’s available
that I’ll still be trawling 2007 for years to come finding
the nuggets that I’ve missed, but there have been a couple
of discs already that I will carry with me into the years to come.
There is no centre, the energy has devolved to the periphery, I
look to the edges for the excitement, where it’s stoned immaculate.
Here’s what I found.
BURIAL / UNTRUE
Downcast euphoric electro noir from the otherwise UK anonymous producer,
deep dub without the reggae, cinematic and melodramatic, it’s
a totally immersive experience, another imagined world of sound
and emotion. His self titled 2006 debut was also on the top of my
list, get him while he’s hot.
TINARIWEN / AMAN INMAN
/ WATER IS LIFE
The Saharan guitar boogie shufflers enlisted Justin Adams, Robert
Plant’s band member as producer and upgraded their string
magic to another level of complexity and groove, taking the blues
from where it came from and sending it to a whole other place. No
summer barbeque will be complete without it.
GRINDERMAN / GRINDERMAN
Nick, Jim and Warren have fun as they kick the shit out of their
blues noise blurt, with the wittiest lyrics of the year and exuberant
performances all round, a great disc for dangerous parties.
THE HOLD STEADY / BOYS
AND GIRLS IN AMERICA
My new favourite American band look as daggy as The Smithereens
and rock twice as hard, this is their third winner album in a row,
a sound that mixes Thin Lizzy and early E Street Band with singer
Craig Finn’s suburban streetwise hipster lyrics essaying a
recurring cast of lost and lonely characters stumbling their way
through his demi-world of song. This is the Big Sound.
LCD SOUNDSYSTEM / SOUND
OF SILVER
James Murphy released two albums, a mixtape disc and numerous singles
and mixes this year, all of which are worthy of your attention but
here the new smart-alec on the block and his rockin’ band
breathes in 20 years of his favourite bands and exhales them across
a set of propulsive pop punk funk moments that includes “North
American Scum’ and “All My Friends”, two of the
singles of the year. If this isn’t on at the party, leave!
STEVE REID ENSEMBLE /
DAXAAR
Veteran jazz drummer Steve , as a teenager he played on Martha and
The Vandella’s “ Dancing In The Street” and with
Fela Kuti and Sun Ra, has had a recent renaissance hooking up with
young laptop electronicist Four Tet and this time goes to Senegal,
enlists some local musicians and jams with carefree abandon across
nine tracks, sounding occasionally like an African Santana, always
hitting the groove and communicating joy and celebration wherever
it takes them. If it’s not playing in your house over summer,
leave!
AKRON/FAMILY / LOVE IS
SIMPLE
Their third great album features the usual ecstatic post-rock folk
sprawl interlinked by universal haiku-like lyrics, full throated
communal sing-a-long vocals and shifting multi-instrumental soundscape.
In spirit they remind me of the early Band albums, they’re
angel headed hipsters looking for a holy fix. Pure joy.
JAMES BLOOD ULMER / BAD
BLOOD IN THE CITY: THE PIETY STREET SESSIONS
I bought my first Ulmer album in 1980 and the veteran jazz blues
guitar/vocalist just keeps getting deeper and better with each of
his recent albums, solo and with a band that includes Vernon Reid.
There’s a big cast of players on this disc but the man’s
presence and feel dominates proceedings, his voice is now even deeper
and more blues burred and his gutbucket guitar cutting even deeper
on this series of laments for New Orleans that incorporates his
heartfelt originals and blues covers that conjure up an atmosphere
of sepia aged snapshots from a bygone era.
GOGOL BORDELLO/ SUPER
BORDELLO
A colourful riot of Balkan gypsy music, punk rock, dub, flamenco
and more, a hodge- podge of high energy Pogues-like exuberance and
lyrical
larrikinism from this multi nationality New Jersey based group of
manic minstrels. This is the party!
SLY AND THE FAMILY STONE
/ THERE’S A RIOT GOING ON
Even for those people familiar with the Sly catalogue the re-mastered
re-packages of the albums this year were a revelation, never have
they sounded so clear and spacious, with the fat bass restored to
it’s rightful place in the mix and the psychedelic layers
reborn, this album has always been touted as a classic but I found
it’s murky blur impenetrable until now. There’s a bounce
and a groove revealed that was always there but never heard on the
shoddy CD transfers that have been previously available, Prince,
Tricky and so many others owe him a musical debt of gratitude.
To be honest, that’s about all that I’d
recommend to someone who has to reach into his hard earned cash
to buy a record, a patchy year with few colossuses towering over
the rest of the field and lots of okay stuff flooding the world
at every moment. It makes keeping up impossible, so why try? Surrender
to those rare musical moments. They are buried treasure.
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