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I don't think more than two of these records would have made last year's top ten. In a year crowded with good records, 2002 had little greatness to offer. It was a time in which disposable music dominated -- I can't remember why I bought some of the records I bought this year. According to the theory, 2002 corresponds to 1990, when acts like Poison, Michael Bolton and New Kids on the Block were topping the charts. That theory's starting to make a little more sense.
Anna Waronker / Anna I suppose Kay Hanley and Anna Waronker will always be linked in my mind, two sides of a double-headed coin. My thinking tends to play up circumstantial connections, and they've got 'em. Both are former leaders of power pop bands -- Anna from that dog. and Kay from Letters to Cleo. The bands each put out three proper albums, in 1994, 1995 and 1997. In 2001, Kay was the singing voice for Josie in the "Josie and the Pussycats" film; Anna wrote a song for the soundtrack, "I Wish You Well." This past year, they both finally released solo debuts to little commercial notice. Kay's Cherry Marmalade is probably the most emotionally effecting album I've heard since Juliana Hatfield's 1998 release, Bed. How it was made by someone who's apparently happily married and with new kids, I can't fathom. Four and a half months after first hearing it, parts are still hard to listen to. Other parts are still joyous to hear, the pop beauty often in contrast to the devastating lyrics. Sometimes I choose an album of the year for sonic innovation or technical wizardry, sometimes I choose one that tears my heart out. This year it's the latter. Letters to Cleo were always kind of a glossy pop band, even back when they obviously had no production budget, so the sheen on Cherry Marmalade didn't surprise me. The lack of sheen on Anna Waronker's Anna did. that dog.'s swan song, retreat from the sun, began life as Anna's first solo project and was easily the most prettied-up material in their catalog. It was an adult pop record of the type that more alt. rock bands should've been making at the time but weren't. Anna, by contrast, is gritty and unrefined. It's both angry and accepting. Anna reprises "I Wish You Well," giving it a sardonic edge that Kay and her studio Pussycats couldn't, as well as an extra verse. It would probably be the record's best track, if not for "How Do You Sleep?," a rollicking diatribe in which Anna manages to sing "There's a girl like me going down in vein," in such an off-the-cuff manner that you'd never think to check the liner notes for "vain" vs. "vein." From start to finish, the songwriting is crisp, moving pop. The somewhat experimental nature of retreat from the sun, as well as writing for other performers, has clearly opened up new avenues for Anna. She fiddles with time signatures and instrumentation in ways that I wouldn't have expected and shows more understanding of structure than most of her peers. The only downside to the record is that, being on the indie label co-owned by Anna and Go-Go Charlotte Caffey, nobody's ever going to hear about it unless they're reading this piece.
Like most emo bands I find myself loving, I discovered Piebald when the All Music Guide told me if I liked somebody else, I'd like them. So I checked out their If It Weren't For Venetian Blinds, It Would Be Curtains For Us All and found it completely underwhelming. It was ragged, derivative and artistically juvenile. It didn't belong on a respectable indie like Big Wheel, that's for sure. When We Are the Only Friends We Have came out, I really didn't expect anything. But January's a slow month for a new releases, so I decided to give them another shot. And, wow. Has the poppy subsection of emo produced a better record than this to date? None come to mind. Maybe the first Weezer record, maybe the Get Up Kids' Something to Write Home About, but probably not. That's a subjective assessment, clearly. Lead singer Travis Shettel's voice can take some getting used to. His style is melodic but it's not really like singing, it's like he's talking in different rhythms and pitches. I like the style, so it's no hurdle for me but your mileage may vary. If you get past the vocals, what you'll find is the state of indie guitar rock as it exists in Boston today, part of a stream that dates all the way back to Mission of Burma. It's not terribly complex but it is terribly clever. Not since the first Harvey Danger record have I worn a knowing smirk so much while listening to an album. The opener, "The King of the Road," is a simple tune about loss that uses the band's dead tour van as an avatar; the soft, slow beginning envisions the band's post-band futures. The first single, for those Boston-area stations playing Piebald singles, is "Just a Simple Plan," a bouncy pop tune. The repeated refrain, "Got a window in the basement/You got a perfect view/But you don't care," sets up a song in which "You just might sleep yourself to death." Shettel admonishes the "you" in question for inaction and apathy throughout the song, hitting hard with "If you're bored then you/Must be boring too/Did I st-st-st-st-stutter?" Whoever he's singing to, Shettel needs to be kept up with. "American Hearts" is the best rock song of the year, no question. If Piebald were on a major label, you would officially be sick of it by now. If the song wound up on a soundtrack, Piebald would get signed by a major label the next day. The track manages to attack both the nebulous idea of an infallible America and the idea that Americans can remove themselves from their own such critiques. The piano-fronted epic "Long Nights" isn't quite sure if it takes itself seriously but it probably should. "You can't deal with me/I can't deal with you/And now it's justified for both of us/Oh yeah." It goes on maybe a little too long but it's got the best line on the entire album: "Just one more thing/Can you tell me something that I haven't heard?/I wanna hear how it sounds/What was that, that you said?/You can't think of anything/Well, think harder/Oh yeah/Tell me a secret or two." Man, I love that. Throughout the rest of the album -- particularly on "The Monkey Vs. the Robot" and "Look, I Just Don't Like You" -- Piebald combine earnestness, humor and melody with a skill that's severely lacking in the indie world just at the moment. I can't wait to see them do it live.
I probably wouldn't have bought this record had my car not been broken into. Allow me to explain. In late 2001, I went to see the Anniversary at a club in Milwaukee. Except, my car got broken into during the show and I missed the Anniversary's set. This led to me going to Milwaukee's Summerfest this past summer to see them. I also wanted to see Guided By Voices, who were playing on the same stage a few hours later. In between was a band I'd never heard of called OK Go. By the end of their set I'd left $21 at their merchandise booth. When I got home I made a note of their debut LP's release date. The day it came out, I had to walk about half a mile to from the bus stop to Best Buy, since I'd taken the bus straight from campus rather than doing the smart thing and getting my car. OK Go's sound is kind of a retrofitted new wave beast. If Elvis Costello had a son that was in a band with Evan Dando's little brother, the junior Costello would totally dig OK Go. This album is a collection of forward-thinking pop that rivals his dad's early work. The opening clap-along, "Get Over It," is the obvious break-out single attempt; judging by the charts, it's not quite working. The meat of the album follows with the energetic new wave bombast of "Don't Ask Me" and "You're So Damn Hot." (Tangent: we need a new term for extra-generational new wave. True wave?) Later in the record, "Return" and "1000 Miles an Hour" display the band's knack for non-cliche pop ballads. All that worries me about this record is that four of the twelve tracks are taken from their self-released EP's. Do they have material to grow on? I think so; time will tell.
There's a way of looking at Nirvana's two and a half years in the spotlight as one long, Kurt Cobain-produced commercial for the Melvins. The Melvins, along with the Pixies and a number of other truly alternative rock bands, got pimped by Kurt at every possible opportunity. Several years later, Dave Grohl brought the spotlight to bear on Queens of the Stone Age by recording an album with them. I think it's safe to say that the record's strong debut is attributable to Dave but its continued success is coming on its own merits. As much promise as the group's sophomore release, 2000's R, showed, it had a lot of problems. Songs For the Deaf should have repeated them, really. It's a concept album, chronicling a trip from L.A. to the California desert. The songs are divided by mock radio spots, announcements from stations like KLON, the station that sounds more like everybody else (and yeah, GTA3 did it first). And for as big a deal as Grohl's presence is -- he's the best rock drummer of the past 25 years, after all -- the mix doesn't exactly play him up. Why it works is that the material is terrific. Josh Homme and Nick Oliveri have dug an incredible chunk of rock out of the desert sands and they back it up with some of the year's best riffsmanship. Less a literal interpretation of "modern" rock and more the time-travelling descendent of 70's hard rock, what they've created stands apart from everything else on rock radio today. They're aided not just by Grohl's tremendous work on the skins, but also by former Screaming Trees frontman Mark Lanegan, whose presence accounts for most of the album's dark tinges. His vocals on "Song For the Dead" and "Hangin' Tree" make for a superb contrast to Homme. The lead single and probably the best song on the record is "No One Knows." It's tearing up the modern rock singles chart at the moment and doesn't show any signs of stopping; the follow-up, "Go With the Flow," should be released any time now. Dave Grohl's left the band to return to the Foo Fighters full-time but his impact on this album and this album's impact on hard rock will stick around for quite a while.
Goldfinger / Open Your Eyes Remember what rock looked like in 1996? The Nirvana/Pearl Jam grunge explosion was trickling to an end and the Green Day/Offspring punk revival had failed to quite catch fire the year before. With No Doubt coming on strong and Sublime being tagged the next big thing, it looked like third-wave ska was the style to beat. Then 1997 came and the Prodigy and the Chemical Brothers beat it, just in time for Korn to beat them. Reel Big Fish and Goldfinger were among the bands that were supposed to put ska atop the heap. Their 1996 major label debuts each spawned a hit single but didn't get far beyond that. The cheeky hit "Sell Out," Reel Big Fish's moment in the sun, seems to predict the band's future. Their 1998 follow-up, Why Do They Rock So Hard?, was ignored by fans and critics alike, with the apparent exception of myself. I decided it was the year's best record and I've included it on my desert island list ever since. I wasn't sure what to expect when their next album, Cheer Up!, arrived this summer. At first listen, I decided it took four years to make because they were out of ideas. Then i listened to it a couple more times and realized that was idiocy. The album lacks the immediate impact of Why but the band's wit and musicianship are still out in full force. I guess after the precision-targetted vitriol of Why, the best music industry diatribe ever recorded, I was a little disappointed to hear a bunch of songs that are mostly about chicks. Songs like "Suckers," "Where Have You Been" and the title track are worthy, though, and bear repeated listening. The album's high point is an a cappella version of "New York, New York," taken way over the top and just begging to be yelled along with. I'm kind of on the fence about whether this was necessary, since it's so obviously a reaction to the Frightening, but I'm glad they did it because it's such a blast to hear. Unlike Reel Big Fish, who found their inner popster when "ska" stopped being an important buzzword, Goldfinger have regressed into the punk sound that birthed them. Their go-nowhere follow-ups, Hang-Ups and Stomping Ground, toned down the ska rhythms and tried to toe the pop-punk line but they didn't foreshadow Open Your Eyes at all. This is a straight-up punk record like major labels don't make anymore, politics and all. "Spokesman" launches the assault, railing against a phony music industry, but the title track sets it in place. "Open Your Eyes" is singer John Feldmann's left-wing attack on complacency, with some thinly veiled anger about meat. It's a pounding, hard track that makes the band's last few years look a bit silly in comparison. They've also learned how to go soft and melodic, as evidenced by songs such as "January" and "Tell Me"; "Dad" and "Youth" bring a little introspection to the socio-political party. And their snidely humorous side hasn't been completely excised -- "Woodchuck" is a spot-on parody of Disturbed, right down the "wha-ah-ah-ah-ah!" from their "Down With the Sickness," and "FTN" (that's "Fuck Ted Nugent") is just pure crude hilarity. A bonus track, "Wayne Gretzky," finds drummer Darren Pfeiffer fantasizing about having sex with the Great One, accompanied by just an acoustic guitar. All together, it's the best punk record of the year and I'm glad they finally made it.
For all the praise lavished upon the Lips' 1999 release, The Soft Bulletin, I never quite got it. Sure, it was nice, had its moments, but it never seemed to get past a basic sort of mature pop. It certainly wasn't so adventurous as 1998's Zaireeka, an experiment on four discs, meant to be played at the same time on four CD players. This time, I get it. It's entirely possible, I think, that this is the album Brian Wilson could never make to follow Pet Sounds. That the Lips play with psychedelic sound manipulation and orchestral landscapes in service of a concept album about a Japanese girl fighting robots makes it so much the better. If this is the new Smile, "Do You Realize??" is the new "Good Vibrations." The lead single, which you may have heard nowhere, is a pop philosophical treatise backed with a lush choral and string accompaniment. The core thesis: "Do you realize/that everyone/you know/Someday will die?/And instead of saying all of your goodbyes/Let them you realize that life goes fast/It's hard to make the good things last/You realize the sun doesn't go down/It's just an illusion caused/By the world/Spinning 'round." It's more than the core thesis, really, it is the song, with some slight variations. The two-part title track(s) is the most straightforward thing on the record and even it's not what you'd call clear. I mean, yes, it's about Yoshimi and pink robots but you can't really listen to it without trying to dig below the strange surface. Incredibly, the album is getting some mainstream play thanks to MTV's animated series 3 South, which uses "Fight Test" as its theme, and the Grammys (yes, the Grammys). "Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell" is up for Best Rock Instrumental. With it bringing the Lips their best chart position in years, I can only hope this record points to continued success in the future.
Dave Grohl had a "hard rock" project in the pipeline called Probot, which fell off the radar this year. I have to assume it was rolled into the new Foo Fighters record, easily the hardest thing released under the FF name. Opening the album, "All My Life" makes clear the new sound's transitional nature. It might be the best song in the Foo catalog, and that's saying something. The yelled chorus, "Done, done/On to the next one," is fair warning of what's to come on the subsequent ten tracks. Playing with QotSA has clearly rubbed off on Dave, as evidenced by tracks such as "Low" and "Burn Away." He's retained the guitar pop that's always held up the Foo sound but on top there's a melodic grind. He doesn't go as far into it as QotSA but I think it'd be a problem if he did. This isn't mimicking, it's workshopping. The only real down moment is "Tired of You," a meandering would-be ballad that I think never quite reaches the sense of devotion it wants. One By One isn't going to knock either of the first two Foo records off of anyone's list of favorites but it's solid in its own right and hopefully a sign of a new beginning for the band.
I keep hearing people complain that the Audioslave record sounds like you'd expect Chris Cornell fronting Rage Against the Machine to sound. I have yet to figure out why this should be considered bad. I liked Soundgarden and Rage, as did most of the people leveling these complaints. I even liked the Chris Cornell solo album. I liked the demos that got leaked back when the band was called Civilian and I like the record that emerged out of them. I don't really like the name "Audioslave," but I think that's relatively minor. Point is, this is a solid rock record. There's been some criticism that the Rage guys have backtracked from the sound heard on 1999's The Battle of Los Angeles but I don't hear it. Sure, the lead single, "Cochise," is more in the early- to middle-period Rage milieu but "Hypnotize" sounds as fresh as anything in the Rage catalog. There's also been some outcry over Cornell supposedly squashing the band's political inclinations but I don't see that, either. The demos, recorded before Cornell's brief departure, are basically the same songs as heard here. The brunt of Rage's political force always came from Zach de la Rocha anyway. I see no reason to believe that Tom Morello is being somehow oppressed. But, you know, taking all that stuff into account, for good or ill, is pointless. Listen to the album. If you liked Soundgarden or Rage, you're probably going to like this. At a time when those band's followers are setting the standard, it's nice to see the old guard coming 'round to show everybody how it's done.
The Weezer story is one of rock's weirdest. They're a couple years and a couple albums into their comeback and they've achieved a kind of elder statesman status. Even more incredibly, they've already come far enough back to be taken for granted. They're like R.E.M. or, I don't know, Stone Temple Pilots. Which is silly, really. I mean, they were gone for several years. I hardly think two years of tours and albums constitute clockwork regularity. But such is the industry. Maladroit was released to success and appreciation but much milder success and appreciation than that which greeted 2001's self-titled effort. While the lead single, "Dope Nose," isn't the greatest thing ever, it's a better album than its predecessor. "Possibilities" could've been left on the mixing room floor but "Keep Fishin'" is a keeper, "American Gigolo" is a hell of an opener and "Slave" and "Take Control" are two of my favorite tracks of the year. The band's expanding their sound, getting harder and more experimental. I think they're finding their way back to the road they were on with 1996's masterpiece, Pinkerton, before they got knocked into the ditch. With another LP expected in 2003, I think there's every reason to stay excited. Weezer still have miles to go before they sleep.
Eminem saved rap. There, I've said it. Just like Tiger Woods turned golf from a necrotizing industry to a relevant part of the sports culture, so has Marshall Mathers shifted rap away from the tail-devouring cycle of bling and thugs. Which isn't to say that those things are gone from rap, any more than that golf is no longer boring to watch. But the seeds of change have been planted and they're growing. Eminem is selling millions more records than any other rapper because he's bringing in non-rap fans. Why is he able to put up sales figures that place him alongside such pop commodities as Britney Spears and the Backstreet Boys? He's white. That's not the only reason for his success, of course -- just look at how quickly talentless white boy Bubba Sparxxx has faded away -- but it's a major one and it's a major theme on his third major label release. I've suspected since before The Marshall Mathers LP came out that Em was running a long-form media hack akin to Marilyn Manson's concept trilogy. It's now clear that exposing the ignorance and hypocrisy of suburban white America was a primary objective. The Eminem Show's first song, "White America," comes out of the gate full throttle; before even getting to the body of the song he's calling out the New Patriots over free speech. Never one for misdirection, Em gets right to it in the chorus: "White America/I could be one of your kids./White America/Little Eric looks just like this." And there's the premise, laid bare. In taking down the psychological barrier between white kids and a genre whose stars don't look like them, Eminem has shown the world a racist streak in their parents' generation. Everything that GLAAD and NOW are pissed at Eminem about, everything that Tipper Gore and Lynne Cheney -- both namechecked with a screamed "fuck you" -- want to put him in shackles for is years old. Later in the song he calls out protesters for "acting like [he's] the first rapper to smack a bitch or say 'faggot.'" Every attack on Eminem since he first hit the mainstream three years ago has shown us this double standard: it's fine for blacks to do things we find socially unacceptable but a white pretty boy? Heaven forbid. Meanwhile, Eminem has started producing some of his own tracks with surprising success. I wouldn't advise giving up the mic anytime soon but he shows a creative streak that should allow him to keep growing as an artist without Dr. Dre looking over his shoulder the entire time. Tack on a successful record imprint of his own, a couple long-running #1 singles, a huge hit movie and the best album sales tally of the year and the picture is clear: Eminem is the single biggest star in music today and he's got the talent to back it up.
It probably doesn't lend Doves any credibility when I admit that I often think they're Coldplay when they get randomly selected on my MP3 player. Perhaps I should add that when a selection from Coldplay's new A Rush of Blood to the Head comes on, I know right away that it's not Doves. What Doves have that Coldplay don't is a burning need to innovate. Coldplay's debut was a commercial smash on both sides of the Atlantic, turning the band into media darlings and their sound into the source of much emulation. Doves didn't become American It Boys with their first record and it shows on The Last Broadcast. The first song, "Words," shows how much they want to prove to everybody. Combining elements of Brit-pop with indie rock and avant garde, the track unveils a bright new sound that could break them over here, were it not almost six minutes long. Singles "The Pounding" and "There Goes the Fear" (in the UK, that is -- you're not likely to hear Doves singles in Clear Channel's America) are terrific as well, though the rest of the album doesn't do quite as much as it could to expand on what those songs develop. Still, this is the best work to come out of Britain's Next Radiohead industry since OK Computer launched it back in 1997.
I've starting going to Punknews.org for my daily dose of rock news. The downside and upside to this is that I'm unable to avoid the undiluted zeitgeist of vocal indie rock fans. It's been interesting and sometimes distressing to watch the emergence of screamo on the site's discussion boards. ("Screamo" is what I'm calling nominally emo bands that sound like Thursday, the first band I heard layering screamy vocals over poppy emo guitars. They probably didn't invent it themselves but, to be honest, I don't care. I'm not a big Thursday fan.) Finch is arguably the least traditional emo band currently making a name with screamo; they tend to prefer pounding guitar lines to the melodicism normally associated with the genre. They're somewhere between Sum 41 and Jimmy Eat World but not close enough to either to make solid connections. They're a bit like Glassjaw in that regard (except that I actually like them.) Not surprisingly, Glassjaw's Daryl Palumbo provides some guest vocals here, on "Grey Matter." Intellectually, I suppose there's not a lot here. I'd be lying if I said this record made the list for any reason other than my visceral reaction to it. But when "Letters to You" comes on, I need to scream and run and move and explode. It can't be helped. With the exception of the overlong (and very emo) "Ender," every track on the album is infused with concentrated emotion. It's unchecked and occasionally nasty, sounding like the loss of control. I would say that other bands could learn a lot from them, but I don't think this is something that can be learned.
Everything you've heard about Sea Change is true -- it is the late night, dark-souled, break-up album of the year. It is the awful truth hiding under the twinkly veneer of the Norah Jones record. The only reason I don't have it ranked higher is that, well, it doesn't really keep. As good as it is, I don't find myself wanting to queue it up like I did right after it came out. Rather, there a few songs that stick with me. "Lost Cause," the first single, is the record's best moment. Beck's normal too-much-effort enunciation is nowhere to be found, replaced by a deep, throaty lilt. The song comes across as something of a lullaby for hope. The music behind his voice twinkles, presenting the night sky that consumes him. It should be harder to feel for someone whose relationship with a supermodel crumbled, it really should. The record's peak of anger is "Lonesome Tears" and the only way you can tell is that Beck raises his voice to normal singing volume. The chorus's refrain -- "How could this love/Ever-turning/Never turn its eye on me?" -- is as external as his focus ever gets. This album, terrific and melancholy, is the very definition of soul-searching. |
Kay Hanley / 
Piebald / We Are the Only Friends We Have
OK Go / OK Go
Queens of the Stone Age / Songs For the Deaf
Reel Big Fish / Cheer Up!
The Flaming Lips / Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots
Foo Fighters / One By One
Audioslave / Audioslave
Weezer / 
Eminem / The Eminem Show
Doves / The Last Broadcast
Finch / What It Is to Burn
Beck / Sea Change