Top Music Albums of 2017, Part 2
View Part 1 here
21. Courtney Barnett + Kurt Vile — Lotta Sea Lice
I was initially quite prepared to dismiss this record as a predictable cash grab for the record companies, given (particularly) Courtney’s immense popularity of late. But I’m glad I gave this record a chance — it has the feel of a jam session between two good friends who’ve developed their own rock vocabulary while doing Mazzy Star covers. While the co-written tracks are full of the tongue-in-cheek, laconic attitude that alt-rock lends itself so easily to, it’s when they cover each other’s songs that things really get interesting, particularly Kurt’s ‘Peeping Tomboy’ (renamed ‘Peepin’ Tom’ here) — which takes on a completely different meaning when sung by Courtney. Definitely one of the year’s most straightforward, easy listens.
20. Perfume Genius — No Shape
Breath of fresh air. Embarrassingly I didn’t know about Perfume Genius till reading about him in gay magazine Hello Mr. two years ago — but I’m ever so glad to have discovered his music. There’s been a gradual stylistic shift from the piano-centred singer-songwriter balladry of his early material to a full-fledged, studio-tinkered sound — No Shape is a three-dimensional, monumental beast. Hit single ‘Queen’ from his last album, Too Bright, seems to have been a precursor to much of the material here, which has similarly confessional, unapologetically queer lyrics with largely synth-pop textures. The mood here is not so much confrontational, the way Too Bright was full of anxious, introspective torch anthems, but an observational one, almost like an up-to-date autobiographical account of his personal relationships. Songs like ‘Choir’ (dramatic strings galore), ‘Die 4 You’ (the dirge of the album) and the Zero 7-esque ‘Run Me Through’ are classic Perfume Genius despondence — but there are numerous uplifting, hopeful moments, too. These, ‘Slip Away’, ‘Just Like Love’ and ‘Wreath’, see Perfume Genius even crack a smile, celebrating his status as a mainstream queer artist within the path he’s bravely forged throughout his career.
19. Zola Jesus — Okovi
Zola Jesus is an artist I’ve been trying to get my head around for years, but have never been able to really grasp. I often felt that the music she composed (which tended to be too abrasive and lightweight all at once) didn’t quite match her soaring, operatic vocals. With Okovi (meaning ‘shackles’, in the Slavic languages), she’s brought in some ambitious string work, cleverly turned the dial up on ‘reverb’ to accentuate her vocals, while using less industrial-sounding beats. It feels effortless, organic, and hits a gorgeous sweet spot, the way other orchestral-backed records like Sarah Blasko’s I Awake or Goldfrapp’s Tales Of Us do. Zola Jesus is also remarkable in that she produces all her own work — and those efforts on her last albums have paid off tremendously. Certainly one of this year’s most soul-stirring albums.
18. Mac DeMarco — This Old Dog
Mac DeMarco’s monster appeal has always eluded me. I’m not sure if it’s his ridiculous stage antics (seriously, look them up) or if it’s because he’s the poster boy for ‘hippie-dip man-child’. He does write some very catchy, upbeat music — while it also seemed to me that his popularity stemmed partly from the indie world’s fixation on lo-fi guitar pop the last few years. Mac DeMarco’s music, nonetheless, captures a specific (nonchalant) vibe very well. This album sees him sharpen his production tools to create a much warmer, smoother piece of work. The songwriting here is less structurally/aesthetically homogenous — a characteristic of this album which will have undoubtedly surprised fans and detractors alike. This results in a listening experience that sounds multidimensional, well-rounded and complete, a radical departure from the EP-like, unpolished quality of his previous albums. Strikingly, Mac DeMarco’s decision not to half-arse the production here doesn’t detract from his ‘loose-cannon goofball’ image (which has somehow become a signifier for ‘authentic’), but adds a layer of craftsmanship to what he’s already done before. This was one of the most surprising releases of the year for me, and I’m interested to see what he does next.
17. Tennis — Yours Conditionally
Yours Conditionally is the first of two releases by Tennis this year. It seems that with each release (this being their fourth LP), Tennis gets more lo-fi and more pop-sounding. I would not be surprised if the goal in recording sessions was to strictly recreate a specific 70s pop sound, past the point of caricature to a sort of sonic period drama. It’s not a bad schtick — some of the songs on Yours Conditionally could easily be ABBA b-sides. There are some interesting songs incorporating a feminist ethos: ‘Ladies Don’t Play Guitar’ or ‘Modern Woman’ for instance, which makes me love the band more — but the slick, ear-wormy guitar lines here are really the album’s winning characteristic. Also…omg the visuals.
16. Washed Out — Mister Mellow
Washed Out is responsible for that Portlandia theme song. His Life of Leisure and High Times EPs (the latter released only on cassette tape) captured a powerful, nostalgic sound: lo-fi, high-distortion psychedelic pop, with the slick production of early 2000s trip-hop. His first two LPs, closer to the house/disco vein (albeit with mostly analog instruments) but marketed as ‘chillwave’, seemed like identity crises. Mister Mellow has no such delusions. This is what Bonobo’s new album could have sounded like! The vibe here is a wonderful amalgamation of styles that would not be out of place either at an Ibiza dance party next to a Nicolas Jaar set, or in a low-key house party where the DJ is a friend of someone you know. Clocking at a short 29 minutes, the album still manages to pack a whole range of nuance and detail into the journey without going into a tangent — the sort of magic carpet ride a record should be.
15. London Grammar — Truth Is A Beautiful Thing
London Grammar’s first album, If You Wait, got me through a very difficult period of my life when I first moved to Melbourne to start a masters program, and got both physically and mentally ill. I remember plenty of lonely evenings sobbing to those songs. I normally enjoy it when bands choose to experiment with their sound from one album to the next and switch things up, but with London Grammar I actually hoped they wouldn’t — I was too in love with their existing formula. Truth Is A Beautiful Thing retains their signature, minimalist pop to summon up another batch of beautifully-crafted songs with the same doe-eyed innocence and quiet optimism. As with the first album, Hannah Reid’s vocals are breathtaking as ever — flanked by Dan Rothman’s atmospheric guitar lines/effects, and Dot’s artfully sparse soundscapes/beats. While the themes explored in this album are similar to their debut, this is clearly not ‘bedroom pop’ — the music here is better suited those big arenas they’ve been selling out on their last tour. This is London Grammar on the front foot: no longer the timid, adolescent trio we easily related to on the last album yet hoped would blossom. I’m envious of all the teenagers who get to grow up with London Grammar’s music — they get it.
14. Cults — Offering
Cults is what you get when you cross ’60s pop with the shoegaze movement. Their glockenspiel-heavy first album interspersed this with sound clips of cult leaders’ speeches, as a humourously dark contrast to their summery, breezy music. (Essential listening: ‘Go Outside’, their breakthrough hit.) Their second album saw the vocals move to the forefront, with lots of analog keyboards and organ layers — for a breakup album it was remarkably upbeat, edgy and effortless. Offering is a calculated stylistic curveball, seeing Cults almost take on the dream-pop style of Beach House, yet retaining their signature sound of heavy vocal overdubs awash with an avalanche of distorted guitar/keyboard tones. Tracks like ‘Good Religion’, ‘Gilded Lily’ and ‘Right Words’ are particular highlights. While I still haven’t quite put my finger on what makes this such an enjoyable record for me, I’m heartened that they’ve taken a step sideways from their usual formula and took a bit of a risk here. It’s clear they’ve moved on from the hype of their early internet fame, and are still having a bloody good time.
13. Charlotte Gainsbourg — Rest
Charlotte Gainbourg’s last two albums, IRM and Stage Whisper, were both produced by Beck and showed her at her most experimental, with forays into folk, rock and electro. They were the sort of thing you are glad an artist does but hope doesn’t keep doing for long, especially when Beck’s influence seemed to really overpower and dominate Charlotte’s musical presence. With Rest, Charlotte returns to the chamber-pop sound of 5:55, which she is still able to do with unbelievable finesse. As usual, her breathy vocals are the centre of her appeal — though in this case, she mostly sings in French rather than English. The deaths of her father, Serge Gainsbourg (an unmitigated genius), and half-sister, Kate Barry, were key influences here, and Charlotte’s determination to pay tribute to them gives the music a sombre, heavy tone. That being said, Rest also features some of her most energetic yet emotionally impactful work, like ‘Deadly Valentine’ or ‘Sylvia Says’. Dripping with lyrical gorgeousness and expansive cinematic flourishes, this album is the arthouse film of the lot.
12. The xx — I See You
Since The xx’s last album, it’s mostly been Jamie xx who’s been keeping up with the solo projects and remixes, busy staying in the limelight. I See You feels largely like a continuation of those projects, incorporating plenty more club/disco beats than the soundscapes of the band’s previous efforts. This is not the minimal, introspective pop we know The xx for — this time they’re inviting you to have a boogie or two (see ‘Dangerous’, ‘I Dare You’ or ‘Lips’). The lyrics are less self-effacing and more hopeful, still retaining The xx’s youthful romanticism. This album is, overall, a welcome stylistic evolution and a refreshing change of pace.
11. alt-J — Relaxer
If there’s a vibe that Alt-J succeed in capturing really well: it’s ennui. While they’ve managed to attract plenty of derisive labels on their ‘hipster appeal’ and the overall strangeness of the band’s lyrics, vocals and playing styles, their fanbase is by no means a tiny, or casual, one. This is also all in spite of Pitchfork consistently rating their albums 4/10 — which begs the question: if the very music journalists/cultural gatekeepers who’d ostensibly support a band like Alt-J don’t, is the band still one of their kind? There’s a song on Relaxer, ‘Hit Me Like That Snare’, which might have an answer with these lyrics: ‘fuck you!/I’ll do/what I wanna do!”. A noise-rock/spoken word hybrid, it’s easily the band’s most divisive song in their entire catalogue (one of my favourites, for its unfiltered crassness). Relaxer contains some of the loudest songs of the band’s career (‘In Cold Blood’/’Deadcrush’), but its other half is interspersed with quiet, meandering ballads, including a cover of ‘House of the Rising Sun’. This sharp dynamic contrast feels deliberate, like an inside joke; it makes for a weird, bumpy album, but it’s a goddamn memorable one.
10. St. Vincent — MASSEDUCTION
So sue me, but before this, my favourite St. Vincent album was the one she did with David Byrne, Love This Giant (David Byrne & St. Vincent). I’ve always enjoyed her place in pop culture, but her albums often leave me feeling a bit lukewarm, feeling more math than rock — save for a handful of songs where she really nails it, like ‘Surgeon’ or ‘I Prefer Your Love’. With MASSEDUCTION, she’s serving all the chutzpah, dishing out cultural critiques in the same damning vein as ‘Digital Witness’ from her last album (this becomes very apparent on the press kit videos, where she responds to a slew of banal interview questions, dripping with deadpan sarcasm). This takes the form of her most pop-forward statement to date, with a slight dominatrix twist: leather outfits, latex tights and catsuits are in. Here we have songs about ‘pills to fuck’, ‘sugarboys’/’sugargirls’, and the declaration “I can’t turn off what turns me on” on the title track. The strong thematic focus of this album means that St. Vincent’s virtuosic guitar-playing and typically labyrinthine compositional structures are largely toned down. Just like her musings on love/attraction in the closer ‘Smoking Section’, it may be that’s she’s trying to make a point in less uncertain terms, while “hopin’ one rogue spark will land in [her] direction”.
9. Fleet Foxes — Crack-Up
Crack-Up is not what we expected the new Fleet Foxes record to sound like, but this new sound isn’t a surprising evolution, either. This is still folk-rock, front and centre, with some heavy jazz, pentatonic overtones. Helplessness Blues (their previous album before a long hiatus which threatened to drag on indefinitely) just seemed more in line with Sisyphean existential dread, while this album comes from a place of insouciant fatalism, embracing a wabi-sabi approach to the fracturing experience of fame. Largely influenced by “The Crack-Up” essays by F. Scott Fitzgerald, lead singer Robin Pecknold’s humpty-dumpty state of despair became the genesis for a sonic collage of contentment and excitement — occasionally disjointed but all intentionally sequenced to a T. The rock grooves here aren’t as immediate and simplistic as their earlier baroque-pop-leaning efforts, but each listen uncovers more and more gems and layers. This is a rewarding, captivating listening experience that demands one’s full attention.
8. Björk — Utopia
This is a challenging album, even for Björk fans. Nine studio albums on, nothing is really too left-field for her anymore — and she always brings it while continuing to blow expectations out of the water. As usual, there are the in-your-face musical accents that albums like the all-acapella Medúlla and the tribal, brassy Volta are known for — here the flute ensemble is Utopia’s unmissable, take-it-or-leave-it musical trademark. (As a lapsed flautist, I’m reminded of all the flute concertos I grew up listening to, particularly from Gluck and Bach.) Arca steps up from his beat-making role on Vulnicura to becoming a full-fledged co-writer on this album: something remarkable for a Björk project, which has always been singularly her at the helm. This is her longest album to date, where the melodic structures are ethereal, meandering, and often don’t resolve conventionally. It can make for an unwieldy (at times disorienting) listening experience, though this in turn only serves to intrigue the listener, even if it’s sustained in dribs and drabs. It’s hard not to think of Joanna Newsom’s writing style being evoked here (particularly with the liberal use of the harp on songs like ‘Blissing Me’). There is a lot of raw energy in this work, and a real joyfulness and optimism embedded in Björk’s vocal performances, even on some of the darker material like ‘Body Memory’. Here’s a utopia to get lost in, many times over.
7. Laura Marling — Semper Femina
One of the really admirable things about Laura Marling is how she’s managed to stay relevant with very little use of gimmicks — it’s always been about her songwriting craft. For a long time, I had dismissed her as a generic singer-songwriter too much in the same league as Mumford and Sons or Noah and the Whale (two bands she’s been involved with). I sat up and took notice when she released the magnificent stream-of-consciousness song cycle, Once I Was an Eagle (her fourth LP), which I still regard as her magnum opus. Laura’s prolific yet highly-technical output calls to mind other folk music greats like Joni Mitchell or Joan Baez, even though she would probably cite Dolly Parton as more of an influence. (The opening guitar riff on ‘Wild Once’ even sounds hauntingly similar to Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Landslide’.) Adapted from Virgil’s ‘Aeneid’, the album’s title gets a mention in the penultimate track, ‘Nouel’, where the quote “A woman is an ever fickle and changeable thing” is referenced equal parts dotingly, equal parts sardonically. Semper Femina’s songs discuss varying aspects of the female psyche, particularly to do with personal relationships — this has meant that generally every review of the album has involved some level of theoretical discussion on feminist literature (well done, Laura!). The sense of restlessness which was so apparent on her last album, Short Movie, has completely evaporated, giving way to a steadfast collection of songs to mull over, and to look squarely in the eye.
6. Tori Amos — Native Invader
Tori’s an acquired taste. Vocally, she’s a self-described “fairy on crack”; artistically, she wants to tell stories that empower women and their sexuality, but harbouring all the cynicism of monotheistic traditions, being a minister’s daughter. She’s sung about sexual assault, Lucifer, being a MILF, being a suicidal parent, masturbation, murder, a porn star, and even a “giant’s rolling pin” as a Hobbesian metaphor for ironing out societal inequality. Just when you think you’ve gotten the hang of what she’s about, she runs and switches her style from baroque pop, to electronica, to lite-funk, to classic rock, and even to classical. While no longer the alt-pop heroine she was in the 90s, she’s still continued to break new ground in the last decade, such as evoking the Greek Pantheon’s goddess archetypes on the tour de force that was American Doll Posse, or simultaneously topping the Billboard Rock, Classical and Pop charts with Night of Hunters. Not to be outdone by the gargantuan success of Armand Van Helden’s Professional Widow remix in 1996 (originally written on the harpsichord), the late Peter Rauhofer took the 2012 Metropole Orkest remake of 2009’s Flavor (her Massive Attack trip-hop moment) and turned it into another #1 dance hit. There’s never a dull moment in Tori’s career — and fans will squabble ad nauseam about the dud moves she’s made in her post-2002 artistic choices, but her legacy continues.
Native Invader, which Tori describes as “a sonic wildwood”, was influenced by the Trump election and her mother’s debilitating stroke (the latter event influencing ‘Mary’s Eyes’, the sonic lovechild of Philip Glass, George Winston and Ryuichi Sakamoto), which Tori sees as allegories for how humanity holds Earth hostage by not acting on climate change. This is one of her most political albums to date, though with a subtler shade of protest (unlike 2007’s call-to-arms, ‘Yo George’). She’s continued the same DIY-protools approach as on her last album, Unrepentant Geraldines, focusing on the melodic midrange with her partner/sound engineer Mark Hawley without the help of other session musicians. While the previous album had more of a pared-down, demo-tape feel, Native Invader is lush and meticulously arranged — clear examples being the 80s synth-pop confection, ‘Wings’ (inspired by Midge Ure), the Sheryl Crow-like ‘Broken Arrow’, or the Celtic-folk pop of the album’s CP-80 number, ‘Bats’. There’s never really a ‘return to form’ when it comes to Tori, given her predilection to experiment stylistically — but this album seems less cryptic and more urgent than a lot of her work in recent years. As an artist whose goal has always been to chronicle the cultural zeitgeist, she really kinda nails it here.
5. Fever Ray — Plunge
8 years after the seminal self-titled debut by Fever Ray (solo project of Karin Dreijer from The Knife), she proceeds to stealth-drop a follow-up album on the heels of a few mysterious trailers. Not so much as a press release whisper!
There’s a real (industrial-dub) abrasiveness and manic energy to the sound on Plunge that is very much The Knife territory, unlike the trip-hop/chillout, Röyksopp-influenced debut. There’s also a strong, somewhat edgy, concept driving the lyrical material: queer sex and kink, and its attendant desires and politics. It may seem like this is too much of a Peaches thing to sing about, but instead of that IDGAF attitude Peaches is known for, Fever Ray’s approach is more of an urgent plea. She’s desperate for acceptance, while celebrating and verbalising her desires. The vocals here aren’t even obscured by the pitch-shifting modulations that coloured her debut: this time they’re high in the mix — piercingly so, even. Take the track ‘This Country’, for example, which may seem like it’s loaded with tacky, sloganeered non-sequiturs (“free abortions! destroy nuclear!”), but when the lyrics “this country makes it hard to fuck” begin, in almost a sort of rally cry, it’s difficult not to think of how it couldn’t be an anthem for queer folk who live in places where homosexuality is still illegal and socially frowned-upon. (She also exclaims “destroy boring!”, which in the context of the song, is a cheeky incitation for the listener to dismantle the status quo.) Is the album a way of detailing the descent into Fever Ray’s kink dungeon? You might have to do a bit of role play to find out.
For the traditionalists, there are still hints of the early Fever Ray in ‘Mustn’t Hurry’ or ‘Red Trails’…but I think it’s really the off-kilter club stompers like the opener ‘Wanna Sip’ that make Plunge such a thrilling comeback album. This is an intentionally aggressive and confronting album that’s not for the faint of heart, but if you’re game, buried amongst all the frenetic instrumentation is a record brimming with crazy, wonderful ideas. Don’t say I didn’t warn ya.
4. Grizzly Bear — Painted Ruins
One of Grizzly Bear’s biggest strengths is their inventive, colourful songwriting, which is jam-packed with interesting key changes, unusual chord progressions and varying, surprising tempo shifts. It’s evident that all four members of this band are virtuosos at what they do. There’s Chris Bear, who is one of indie’s most talented drummers with a deft jazz sensibility. Daniel Rossen (also of Department of Eagles fame) is the lead guitarist, and has such a remarkable knack for incorporating sonically disparate textures (esp blues/jazz) into the band’s art-rock sound, he singlehandedly leaves most other bands in the dust (his Silent Hour/Golden Mile EP is one of my favourite recordings ever). Chris Taylor (CANT) is the band’s producer, bassist, and multi-instrumentalist who also has a killer falsetto. Ed Droste, who founded the band and does a large chunk of the vocals — is often Grizzly Bear’s link to the pop world, the other members tending to have more of a technical, specialised view of their musical influences. Seeing this band live several years ago threw me into a bit of an existential crisis: their combined talents just struck me as awe-inducingly superhuman.
If Grizzly Bear’s albums were places, based on where they were recorded/inspired/conceived, Yellow House and Veckatimest would be Cape Cod/coastal Massachussetts, and Shields, an artist commune in Marfa, Texas. Painted Ruins would probably be their Southwest desert/West Coast statement. There’s some of that LA grunge in songs like ‘Mourning Sound’ or ‘Aquarian’, but also plenty of dusty, atmospheric textures like on ‘Three Rings’ or ‘Glass Hillside’ (which has roots in Daniel Rossen’s time living in Vermont; also the first track written for the album). There’s some similarity here with Fleet Foxes’ Crack-Up on the wabi-sabi aesthetic, but in Grizzly Bear’s case, every detail is impeccably polished, unlike of the deliberately unfinished sound of the former — or even Grizzly Bear’s earlier work, which had a lot of free-form, chaotic improv elements.
It may help to switch to yet another metaphor of sorts, which is their album art. These album covers have tended to provide good imaginative cues to understand the structures and moods contained in each Grizzly Bear record: Shields, a rough set of blueprints, and Veckatimest, an extended cubism experiment — which make sense in tandem with the looser musical arrangements on these albums, as alluded to earlier. Painted Ruins, seen from this lens, is a varnished, bas-relief sculpture set before a technicolour tapestry, offering lots to savour.
3. Saint Etienne — Home Counties
Oh, Saint Etienne, my heart! They’re one of those musical outfits (pop music veterans, really) that you don’t hear of too often, but the bands you listen to will have wanted to be them at some stage. Their claim to fame was a cover of Neil Young’s ‘Only Love Can Break Your Heart’, on an eclectic, sample-heavy indie-dance album called Foxbase Alpha. Being the ever-discerning aesthetes they are, their music has explored the complete gamut of styles: folk, trip-hop, disco, 60s-pop, spoken word, and even a bit of hip-hop/rap. Their music can come across as a little bit overwrought, performed with the fussiness of an architect, but the joy in Saint Etienne is how much narrative is crammed into each song. The epitome of this was their 2005 album detailing the quotidian goings-on in an English block of flats, Tales of Turnpike House. Their latest album, Home Counties, circles back to this idea of writing about the ordinary in the everyday.
This is a bold, subversive theme, considering the baggage that comes with the term, ‘home counties’ — which is met with the same derision that cosmopolitan circles have for suburban/rural heartlanders and working-class folk. This album does an outstanding job reclaiming the beauty and simplicity of these parts of outer London (its effortlessness perhaps to do with all three band members having grown up in these very home counties), painting a fresh coat of charm and warm nostalgia on the iconography of these locales. The instrumentation, notably, employs ample use of vintage keyboards and synths — a nod to the 60s chamber-pop sound of Good Humor, but the incorporation of film/radio samples here also hearkens back to the stylistic constructs of Finisterre or So Tough. There’s even a dig at the band’s Sound of Water ambient phase in the song ‘Breakneck Hill’. Many of the songs sound self-assured, unhurried — like this was the album Sarah, Pete and Bob had been writing their entire lives, despite having recorded the album in a few short weeks! There are some surprising moments, like the cheeky ‘Train Drivers in Eyeliner’, and the spoken word masterpiece, ‘Sweet Arcadia’, which even has a bone-chilling reference to colonialism (‘we took your land, and we made it our land’) before it launches into a sprawling prog-jam on the Hammond organ. This is, overall, an exceptionally pleasing listening experience that doesn’t scrimp on the delight factor — Saint Etienne have managed to immerse the listener in a world that is alive with sounds, sights and stories…I wasn’t sure I wanted to leave the home counties by the end.
2. Aimee Mann — Mental Illness
Aimee’s come a long way since her ’Til Tuesday grunge-punk days, carving out a solo career for herself which is quietly celebrated and revered. She’s often an unofficial poster woman for all things ‘MOR-Americana’ (probably due to her contributions to the film ‘Magnolia’) which can relegate her music to a reputation of ordinariness. Here’s the thing about Aimee, though: her basslines are incredible, as are her lyrics. She’s got a knack for being an exceptional storyteller. Take the album The Forgotten Arm, for example, which nailed what it is for a concept album to have a sophisticated, fascinating narrative focusing intently on the intentions, dilemmas and feelings of the characters involved, and also doubles as a pulsing, upbeat road trip record. Aimee also has this wonderfully sardonic sense of humour which can often be hard to pick up if you aren’t listening too closely to the words, though the music videos for ‘Charmer’ and ‘Labrador’ (from her last album) really exhibit this in an unexpectedly creative way. Her fantastic cameo on Portlandia as a cleaner? That’s the same level of humour you’ll get at stage banter in one of her concerts.
On Mental Illness, she’s gone for an evergreen, easy-listening ’70s folk sound, creating a collection of music that is faultless and measured. The songs here are simple, stripped-down, and straightforward, with a strong pop sensibility that works to balance out the sombre nature of the album’s theme. This is a sound that hasn’t really been attempted so successfully in recent pop history, besides perhaps artists such as Laura Veirs, or Gillian Welch! Mental Illness was the album that made me question what I was doing with my life, then decide, in mid-air whilst on a plane ride interstate, that moving to another city was what I had to do to be happier. There’s a line from ‘Goose Snow Cone’ (written about a friend’s sick cat whom she was reminded of on Instagram, triggering a big bout of homesickness): “gotta keep it together when your friends come by/always checkin’ the weather but they wanna know why” — that really spoke to my unbalanced social life, and how it was spreading me so thin I was losing track of what mattered to me. It’s powerful how music transforms your life in that way, when it does. There are other examples, like the Andrew Garfield-inspired ‘Patient Zero’, which describes the disconcerting, isolating experience of fame and the disappointing friendships within; or ‘Good For Me’, where Aimee sings about how someone is good for her, when they really aren’t — and she understands how she needs to tell herself that lie “to soothe the appetite [she] can’t feed”. Mental Illness is an ostensibly soft record, but Aimee’s new-wave rocker-chick spirit and morose form of angst are still very much alive and kicking.
1.Feist — Pleasure
Feist’s music has taken a trajectory that exemplifies what can be so problematic about the way today’s pop music is digitally distributed. Songs, in particular hit singles, become commodities that outshine the album itself, much like the way ‘1234’ “supernova’d” (Feist’s own words) the rest of The Reminder and even her own artistry. Her iPod fame meant that she would forever be typecast as some sort of indie-pop princess, when Feist was always about trying to do the sort of punk rock (à la PJ Harvey) she couldn’t do after injuring her vocal cords. On Pleasure, she alludes to this conundrum with ‘A Man Is Not His Song’, the latter part of the song segueing into a jarring sample of a Mastodon track after she sings the refrain “more than a melody’s needed”. It’s this sort of reflexive self-awareness, that isn’t afraid to consider the counterfactual realities and possibilities of her own artistic realm, that permeates this entire album.
Pleasure is the consummate music record: it ebbs and flows, each song gripping you then releasing the tension just as quickly. The magic in Pleasure for me comes down to three main things:
1) Feist’s willingness to push the envelope and make music that is edgy, not safe. That’s not to say there isn’t classic Feist here — there certainly is — but there’s a lot of risk-taking with the writing here, and it’s easy to get the sense that these were often one-take recordings with minimal studio treatment. (I mean, all that tape hiss!) There are lots of quirky things going on throughout the record, the height of this being Pulp frontman Jarvis Cocker’s spoken-word performance on ‘Century’.
2) The way Pleasure links up so well with where Metals left off, particularly on the track “I Wish I Didn’t Miss You”. It’s the main Metals-throwback moment on the album and marks the point where Feist starts reclaiming herself, by allowing herself the experience of pleasure instead of merely musing upon it. While Metals was very much a stylistic, conscious reaction against the straightforward pop energy of The Reminder, Pleasure goes a bit more meta and discusses that tension. The title track and ‘Century’ were released as lead singles, though they are interestingly two of only three tracks on this album that make use of an electric guitar. The third electric-guitar based track ‘I’m Not Running Away’ is my favourite here, and is what Feist calls “her deal with adulthood”, cut from the same bluesy cloth as one of her oldest songs, ‘Anti-Pioneer’, with a bit of Let It Die’s flavour.
3) The lyrics are intensely personal, but poetic enough just so you can grasp the emotion behind without really knowing what the circumstances that prompted those feelings were. Not that those things need to be explained, when the music is so gorgeously crafted, and provides the listener with all the clues they need. Feist deftly manages to distill the universality in these emotions she experiences, ‘Baby Be Simple’ being a prime example of this. There’s a sense of vulnerability in her voice as she sings these words, but the folk-punk hybridity of the instrumentation here reveals a brute sense of resilience and stubborn tenacity.
Pleasure embraces the beauty in imperfection, yet another album in that ‘wabi-sabi’ theme that’s been talked about in Grizzly Bear’s and Fleet Foxes’ albums. While this isn’t the most polished-sounding album on my list, the fearless, risky nature of this album makes hearing Pleasure a rewarding adventure each time — there are certainly no diminishing returns here. Feist has succeeded in creating a truly fascinating, heartfelt piece of work embodying some complex existential and emotional themes, consistent with her constitutional ethos as an artist who revels in deconstruction. This is my album of the year.
