(continued from part three)
Best live show(s) you saw in 2016
I'm tempted to say Le Vent du Nord at the National Folk Festival in Greensboro in October. Sociopolitical Quebecois folk songs, in French, are not an easy thing to make a North Carolinian general audience enjoy, understand, and sing along (in a foreign tongue) with, and Le Vent have some impressive tricks to make it happen. Also, it was an outdoor show and the weather was beautiful.
But I'm gonna pick Shearwater, the Cat's Cradle, December 14. Their singer's public presentation is like mine -- a somewhat sheepish but agreeable storytelling voice, explaining cryptic lyrics, telling little jokes that sometimes go somewhere, and willing to make carefully-worded exploratory leaps. For example, I didn't know "Backchannels" was about "This little voice I sometimes get in the back of my head -- hopefully it's just me -- that says 'Hey, Jonathan, you've had a really nice run, and maybe now you should kill yourself". But it takes a lot of grace to tell that in a friendly, non-worrisome way and make it about "the last taboo, something we're not allowed to talk about in polite society, and maybe we should be. I suspect it's gotten pretty common since November, like I could bring it up and strangers would say 'Yeah! Me too!'. Like we should bring it into the open and reveal for the tiny, impotent thing it really is".
No, I never feel that way. But what a useful speech, and what a tremendously fond, chatty concert it all was. The covers of David Bowie's Lodger era -- and of "the national anthem", by which Meiburg meant "Scary Monsters and Super Creeps" -- were odd and utterly inspired as well.
Most overrated artist/album
Well, I don't understand Kendrick Lamar's appeal at all. I've listened to his three most recent albums multiple times each, and my issue is simple: I don't like his voice, I don’t like his music, and I’ve spent an excessive amount of time seeing whether that would change. Am I answering the question? Honestly, no. “Overrated” is a critical claim, the lead-in to an argument about what his rating should be. This is more “Sorry *shrug*, I got no idea what y’all are talking about. But have fun!”
Crummy album you listened to a bunch anyway
Anonhi's Hopelessness. The entire album is one trick over and over: in a pretty but ploddingly midtempo voice, be against something bad by sarcastically asking to please please experience it. “I want to hear the dogs crying for water, I want the fish to go belly-up in the sea”. “Have no mercy on me, don’t let them dig up my grave. Sometimes a feeling is reason enough. Execution, it’s an American dream, like the Chinese and the Saudis”. "Drone Bomb Me”. “Watch Me”. "Slap Me With Unreasonable Late Fees", over and over. It’s an alright trick, and her voice really is pretty.
Worst lyrics on a great-sounding song
Ampledeed, "You're a Libra, She's a Bitch" (starting with the title, which could be funny if it wasn't a lazy gendered insult). The music takes one of my personal forms of catnip: grandiose, expertly-played, catchy, multi-segmented, with creamy vocal harmonies and tricky time signatures. But the lyrics are a classic idiotic double-standard attack on a woman who's a horrible person because (1) she has sex with too many people and therefore (2) is lonely and undesirable because no one wants to hang out with a slut.
It's not just that these contradict; I don't understand or endorse *either* part of the equation. Have sex with whomever you want (assuming enthusiastic consent)! Increase your chances of this happening by playing progressive rock songs in their presence!
***
I also dislike the lyrics to Rae Sremmund's very catchy #1 hit song "Black Beatles". They're well-written, they're just gross. I'm aware that the original Beatles were rewarded for being the original Beatles by having lots of sex with lots of not-very-sober women whose biographies they probably hadn't begun memorize yet. The song's not ahistoric or anything. I just spent a lot of time listening to their music before I even hit puberty, so out of childhood nostalgia or music scholarship or whatever, I'd just prefer to ponder their meaning in other terms.
Album that felt most like an obligation to get through and enjoy
Radiohead's Moon-Shaped Pool. Relentlessly morose, and the song structures are boneless blobs.
Thing you feel cheapest about liking
Sweet and spicy chili Doritos. Seriously, they don’t even pretend to consist of actual food.
Most sympathetic or likeable perspective
Regina Spektor. Even when rightly furious, she's always got her sense of fun, and empathy for unexpected recipients.
Most alienating perspective
Weeknd (Abel Tesfaye). His cruel drug-hazed late-night sociopathy used to at least — by being intimate and isolating and convincing, in a way gangsta-rap normally skips past — have a perverse arty appeal. Apparently now it’s accessible and popular. That’s fucked up. (But the little presidents understand.)
Artist you respect, but don't like
Marillion. They're very talented, and I was enjoying their records as recently as 1999, but with every new long and earnestly drifting album, I miss Fish and his (earnest) layers of puns and wordplay more and more.
Good artist most in need of some fresh ideas
New Model Army. They still write very well about political oppression, poverty, desperate rebellion, desperate romantic love, and the calculations of bravery versus getting along day by day. These remain excellent topics. But after 35 years, Justin Sullivan seems to have sufficiently thought them through.
Young upstart who should be sent down to the minors for more seasoning
Car Seat Headrest. They have talent and promise — that’s why they got time in the majors to begin with. Almost any given Car Seat Headrest song has a clever lyric or two and an excellent title, and I suppose they rock, in an indie-rootsy way. But just as a baseball player shouldn’t swing and miss at three straight pitches, a rock band shouldn’t make a chorus out of the same phrase eight times in a row. Plus, if I can afford singing lessons to amuse my cats and sons, and to sing silly songs at the occasional open mike, Will Toledo should be able to afford them to do his full-time job in front of tens of thousands of people.
Hoary old bastard who should spare us all and retire
Metallica. For all that Re-Load and St. Anger weren’t good, they were the sound of a band exploring new ideas — not *understanding* them necessarily, but exploring, trying stuff out. They are now in the stage of making records that are the best pen-and-transparency copies they can manage of their late 1980s classics. (And *still* not good. Maybe I’d give them a pass if they were.)
Will still be making good records in 2026
Deerhoof. This actively great record might prove to be a fluke, but they've released catchy, interesting music every year or two for a long time now.
Prevailing theme or trend of 2016
Songs about wanting to get laid. Prevailing theme, I mean. After this many decades it's not really a trend anymore.
Coming musical trend of 2017
Facebook directly taking over our computers and phones in order to play the songs it has calculated we want to hear at all times. There is no escape.
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