Focused on the Music, Vol. 1

We're off!

Traditionally, we've limited the scope of our music reviews to the Vintage Album Review, wherein we take a record we owned on vinyl, re-purchase it digitally then review it.  Last year though, when compiling a list of the year's top 10 albums, we realized we had purchased a total of 49 albums during 2011 and could have done a full-on countdown (after we bought one more because the odd number was killing us).

This year, we're doing just that, complete with reviews of each album.  In order to be eligible, an album must have been released between 15 November 2011 and 14 November 2012 and must have been purchased by us during the same timeframe. 

We still very strongly believe in the album as an art form. If we hear a song we like, we buy the entire album, rather than just the single. Often times, we find a song takes on an entirely different feel within the context of the album. And of course, some of an artist's best work can usually be found amongst the unreleased.

Note that any song title with a number next to it in parentheses indicates a song's position on our Top 200 Songs of 2012 list, which will be coming out soon.

For now, we bring you the Top 75 New Albums of 2012.


Part I -- Numbers 75-61:


75. Overexposed
Maroon 5

After we heard the unimaginative and vulgar first single, Payphone, we cancelled our pre-order of this album. Nothing we have heard on the radio or via other samplings since has made us think twice about the wisdom of that decision.

If you own the first two Maroon 5 albums, you have everything they will ever do creatively. You also have at least one more Maroon 5 album than you need to.




74. Mount Wittenberg Orca
Dirty Projectors & Bjork

Bjork's Biophilia was the worst album of 2011 and, at the time, we postulated that it may have been the worst album we had ever heard. Well, congratulations to Ms. Guðmundsdóttir for outdoing herself on this collaboration with NYC's Dirty Projectors.

There is not a single song on this abomination that is worth hyperlinking and subjecting our readers to sitting through. While there are momentary flashes of the tolerable, the incessant use of vocals as "instruments" (and we are being generous here) renders them just that -- momentary. Picture a deranged homeless man randomly banging on trash cans, wailing unintelligibly, with this going on in the background. Then take away anything even remotely entertaining about that scene. That leaves you with this album, whose lone redeeming factor is its running time of a mere 21 minutes and change.



73. Ultimate Hits Remixed
DJ's at Work

We have no idea how we got this album. There is no way we pre-ordered it from the iTunes store, yet there is was one Tuesday morning in our Purchased bin. Having just won a protracted battle over a number of duplicate charges for pre-ordered albums, (if you have iTunes and pre-order albums, we strongly suggest you go through your back invoices to see if you were double-charged for anything -- we were repeatedly charged twice for pre-ordered albums, eventually receiving over $100.00 in refunds), we just didn't have it in us to once again go to war, over ten bucks.

What a pleasant little surprise this album was! Despite the annoying grammatical error in the album artist's name, (unless his name is actually DJ and he is at work), this is a decent little 60-minute mash up of a really eclectic mix of music all the way from the 80's through today, set to a pseudo-techno backbeat. Bowie's Let's Dance gives way to Europe's The Final Countdown leads to Gotye's Somebody That I Used to Know and on and on... From Lady Gaga, to Jason Mraz, to The Pointer Sisters to DuranDuran, a lot of territory is covered here and all of it at least passably, if not revolutionarily.

Unfortunately, we couldn't find a single cut from this album anywhere on the internet to link.



72. Swing Lo Magellan
Dirty Projectors

So after listening to quite possibly the worst album in recording history, what do we do? Well, we go out and buy their follow up, of course. We call this the Sour Milk syndrome. You open the refrigerator door; you know the milk is bad but ya just gotta smell it. There is no way in hell we were not going to buy this album.

And the first 30 seconds made us want to punch ourself in the dick for being so stupid. Seriously -- listen to the first 30 seconds of this (it gets really bad around :20 and really bad at :27). We're idiots, right? After being infuriated by the same vocals-as-instruments opening, the album never had a chance. We listened to the whole thing once, cursed aloud, relegated it to "second-worst album of the year" status and never listened to it again. Until this project. Guess what? It's not as bad as we thought. It's still one of the lowest-ranked albums of the year but at least we were able to find a favorite track this time around, Gun Has No Trigger. Being drunk while listening helps. A lot.



71. And Heady Fwends
The Flaming Lips

It pretty much goes without saying that a Flaming Lips album is going to be weird. They take it to a new level on this album, where they are joined by a number of guest artists. The result is very much like what we saw when we managed hotels in a former life: people get away from the spouse, kids and day-to-day responsibilities and lose their shit. From the opening track, 2012 (You Must Be Upgraded), featuring Ke$sha and the apparently un-credited Daleks, to visits with Bon Iver, Yoko Ono and Biz Markie, the results are as uneven as the sources but it works. It's an interesting, entertaining, yet exhausting album to listen to. Nothing on it is commercial and it's not something one can listen to more than once every couple of months, if that. We've never dropped acid but if we did, we imagine this would be a great musical accompaniment.

Our favorite track: The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face, (197) featuring Erykah Badu.*

*Please note, the link does not go to the official video for the song, which is, roughly, a combination of a Cialis commercial, Rosemary's Baby and bukaki porn. Since we know a large segment of our readership just got really interested, here is the link but seriously -- make sure there are no kids around -- or anyone else you don't want knowing what a damned freak you are.



70. The Idler Wheel is Wiser than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You
More than Ropes will Ever Do
Fiona Apple

Seriously? With a title that long, this album better be worth the time we spent typing that fucking thing out.

Guess what -- it ain't.

The critics absolutely loved this record, lavishing it with praise for its raw emotion and revealing lyrics. We find the lyrics not particularly interesting and the intentional offbeat percussion a distraction. Well, that and the fact that she can't sing.

She tries to work funk, Tin Pan Alley, jazz and pop into one tour de force. The result is a jumbled, incoherent tour de crap. Judge for yourself. Here's the lead single from this train wreck, Every Single Night which, at number 242, was our lowest-ranked single of 2012.



69. Out of the Game
Rufus Wainwright

Mumbling mediocre lyrics on top of over-produced music, this album is just a mess. And a not very interesting one at that. It smacks of someone who thinks he is more clever, talented and witty than he really is.

It's not that this album is necessarily bad -- it's just boring.

Then, just as we are about to completely tune it out, we get to Montauk, which, as best as we can tell, is him telling his child that it is his -- the child's -- responsibility to fight the wars of discrimination on behalf of his two gay parents. Or protect them from each other. Or something. At this point, we just don't care.

Helena Bonham Carter makes an appearance in the video for the lead single and title cut, (108).

*By way of full disclosure, the iTunes album includes a 35-minute "making of" video and, listening to him perform the material raw and hearing him speak of it, we think producer Mark Ronson completely misinterpreted Wainwright's original intention, murdering what might have been a decent album.



68. Covers, Volume One (EP)
Cary Brothers

It's hard to rank very high with an EP, particularly an EP of covers.

We really like Cary Brothers' music and dig the fact that he usually throws a cover or two on each of his albums, as a change of pace and to put his particular spin on the songs he likes.

It's that very thing that makes this EP unnecessary and the execution thereof rather disappointing. These are five solid but unimaginative remakes. Brothers slows down Maps and goes a little heavier on the guitars than INXS did on Never Tear Us Apart (129) but other than that, these are pretty nondescript covers. If this is the last album he needed to turn in to finish out a contract and it was either this or a thrown together live set of his limited catalogue, we get it. If not, it's just an unnecessary record.



67, Viva Duets
Tony Bennett

We had the first part of this review already written, comparing how two very different aging artists have evolved their singing to keep recording when many people are living at the Home. The whole Dylan (never had a good voice in the first place but still evolved his singing -- and in his case writing -- to conform to his aging vocal chords) - Bennett (aging crooner moving from silky smooth to staccato legend) correlation fell apart when we actually listened to the album because issues much more pressing came to the foreground.

First -- this album is called Viva Duets because Bennett is paired with Latin artists, some of whom sing their parts in Spanish. But the arrangements are clearly standard. Not a cumbia, salsa or merengue rhythm to be found.

Second -- wait a minute. These arrangements sound really familiar. Come to think of it, so do Bennett's vocals on a good number of tracks -- like even when he laughs or scats. No way. They couldn't have...they wouldn't have.

They did.

They lifted compositions and, in some cases, actual vocal tracks and laid them down with the new artists' contributions, remastered it and shipped it back out the door.

We call bullshit.

Then again, with such a blatant sell out, maybe a Dylan comparison is in order.



66. Once Upon Another Time (EP)
Sara Bareilles

We've got much love for Sara Bareilles. Except when her ballads drrrrrrrrraaaaaaaagggggg out. Which is exactly what happens with most of this EP. While Bareilles shines in up and mid-tempo songs, she has yet to master the art of the slow song. Always-solid lyrics seem to get lost in a meandering delivery that never feels right.

Bareilles is an excellent pop song writer. She combines a superb non-auto-tuned voice with killer hooks and clever lyrics to craft some of the most listenable music out there. As such, she is already a "serious artist". We're not sure if she's trying too hard to create a "standard" when recording ballads or if she just can't pull them off. In either case, this is the clear weakness in her game and, as four of these five songs are in fact ballads, with the other being what amounts to a novelty song, this ends up being one of the more disappointing releases of the year, as compared

Our favorite track: The aforementioned novelty song and Ben Folds collaboration, Sweet as Whole, (128).



65. Merry Christmas, Baby
Rod Stewart

Rod went crooner about a decade ago, so the inevitable Christmas album was, well, inevitable. It's also pretty routine stuff. He brings in a few friends to help, with mixed result: Ella Fitzgerald and Chris Botti on What are You Doing New Year's Eve (good), Mary J. Blige on We Three Kings (surprisingly good), Michael Buble on Winter Wonderland (predictable), Cee Lo Green on -- who fucking cares? It's Cee Lo Green, so of course it was terrible.

There's really nothing outstanding here. Just a run-of-the-mill Christmas album.





64. A Green River Ordinance Christmas
Green River Ordinance

A nice, straightforward, for the most part acoustic little holiday EP from a local (Ft. Worth) band.

They play it pretty close to the vest and don't try to recreate anything.  And in this case, it's a good thing. 

A nice addition to the holiday playlist.

Our favorite track:  Their pleasantly spiritual rendition of Silent Night.



63. That's Why God Made the Radio
The Beach Boys

The quintessential Beach Boys album, full of sun, sand, cruisin' in cars and lots of girls. Like an ancient but serviceable Barcalounger, the Boys continue to do what they do well. Wiser for the wear, lyrics like, “Sometimes I realize/My days are getting on/Sometimes I realize/It’s time to move along/And I wanna go home”, are interspersed with the usual tales of frolicking in the California Sun.

No auto-tune, redubs or samples. Authentic Beach Boys fun, from the days when the major concerns of the day were what party to attend, which car to race and which wave to catch. In solid voice and played with the tight instrumentation and beautifully-layered vocals one would expect from the band, this album could have been released in 1965 and would have sounded right in place. Being the institution they are, it sounds right today as well. The only reason this album placed so low is that we're simply that into the Beach Boys.

Our favorite song: The title track (209).



62. North
Matchbox Twenty

We were hoping against hope that this would be an actual Matchbox Twenty album and not Rob Thomas & Friends as, much like with Gwen Stefani, we detest Rob's solo stuff, while really liking him within the context of his band. And for the most part, this album delivers on that count. Problem is, we forgot to worry about the fat and happy effect.

It's the worst thing that can happen to a rock band and it's all over this collection. There's just no passion, which is the very thing that differentiated MB20 from its contemporaries in their mid-90's heyday. While there are flashes of brilliance, such as the bridge on lead single She's So Mean, they are too few and much too far between.

The entire experience of this album can be gathered from a three-song stretch early on. Second single Overjoyed is a sappy mess (with the creepiest damned chorus this side of the opening line of Benny Mardones' Into the Night), Put Your Hands Up runs perilously close to Rob Thomas channeling his inner Adam Levine, then Your Song has all the elements of a great song -- except the passion. The closest the band ever comes to exerting that passion, as well as the energy and drive evidenced in their early work is on English Town, which, sitting right in the middle of the set, teases the listener with its potential, only to leave him disappointed with the succession of uninteresting midtempo ballads that make for a whole lot of filler as the band appears to just play out the string until they have enough material for a complete album.



61. Oceania
Smashing Pumpkins

To be fair here, this album probably ranks a lot lower than it should , simply because we're not all that big on the Smashing Pumpkins. We loved 1979 but beyond that have always been pretty lukewarm to them.

That being said, this is solid album for what it is. Billy Corgan is in great voice, the band plays impeccably and this absolutely has the "feel" of a Smashing Pumpkins record. If you're a fan you will love this album. If, like us, you are a casual listener, you'll appreciate the complex layering of the music, the meticulous creation of a mood, then tire of Corgan's voice, all the songs will start to run together and you'll be over it.

Our favorite track: Violet Rays (156)



Up Next: Numbers 60-51.