The Client and Server

Geez, this is way overdue.

Like last year, I didn't buy all that much in the CD department. However, this year I did have iTunes and a few more radio stations on the Internets to choose from. So, my list of the best albums of 2004 (in no particular order):

Escondida, Jolie Holland
Eveningland, Hem
How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, U2
Van Lear Rose, Loretta Lynn
Franz Ferdinand, Franz Ferdinand
Good News For People Who Love Bad News, Modest Mouse
The Dirty South, Drive-By Truckers
Final Straw, Snow Patrol
The Gray Album, DJ Danger Mouse

Albums that disappointed me this year:
a ghost is born, Wilco -- A wholly frustrating album. Does Jeff Tweedy want to be the new Thurston Moore? Because they're a really awful Sonic Youth cover band. I gave up on them returning to their alt-country roots two albums ago, but I'm sure not liking the shoe-looking experiementation they're trying now.

Drag It Up, Old 97's -- It sounds as thrown together as it is. Just chalk this one up to experience and hope that Rhett and Co. can reclaim the cohesiveness they used to have.

And my favorite songs:

• Take Me Out, Franz Ferdinand -- In 20 years, this will be the song that will pop into your head when the person in the white coat says "2004." A mid-90s grungy please-date-me intro that drops straight into a Foreigner-meets-East-Germany-martial-rock riff? A song that could be blasting out of a jukebox in 1981 or the be the theme to La Femme Nikita: The Movie Based On The TV Show Based On The Movie? To call this brilliant would be like saying Seurat was a dot painter.


• Portland Oregon, Loretta Lynn -- As it was for Johnny Cash, so it is for Loretta. The difference is while Rick Rubin was a Cash fan, he didn't get him the way Jack White got Loretta Lynn. When she sings, "Well Portland Oregon and sloe gin fizz/
  If that ain't love then tell me what is," you're saying "uh-huh" half a second before she adds it, because it's Loretta Lynn singing the truth, even if you hate gin.


• Won't Be Home, Old 97's -- Weak album, but what a strong song.


• Somewhere Only We Know, Keane -- I said to myself, "This year I won't get sucked in by yet another Bends-era Radiohead soundalike band." Everything was going well until this song went into 24/7 rotation on KEXP. Damnit. And it's so pretty it's worth getting sucked in by. Damnit again.


• Float On, Modest Mouse -- Damnit yet again. It's not that I don't like Modest Mouse, it's just... they were EVERYWHERE this year. Go get coffee, the song is playing. Turn on the radio, there it is. Ride the elevator, it's a David Sanborn-esque arrangement. Heck, the government mind-control satellites were probably blasting it out. I mean, any song with the line "Bad news comes don't you worry even when it lands/Good news will work its way to all them plans" had to be Dubya's campaign theme song.


• Take Your Mama Out, Scissor Sisters -- No wonder Elton John loves this song. It's a better Elton John record than anything he's released in the last 25 years. (And yes, I did rip Fountains of Wayne last year for their Cars homage, but what's different here is that "Take Your Mama Out" is inspired by Honky Chateau-era John, "Stacy's Mom" is a couple of notes shy of a Ric Ocasek lawsuit.)


• Freedom Isn't Free, Trey Parker and Matt Stone -- After three years of craptacular country songs dedicated to making money by lionizing America, someone finally has the gumption to skewer the genre like so much chicken satay.


• Everyone Knows Everyone, Helio Sequence -- Because it's pretty, and because the whoop-whoops are devious little earworms.

And the worst. Not as many as last year, but this is less an indication of an improvement in the quality and more an indication of a lack of quantity heard this year. And oh, I'm tired and want to finish this.

The entire works of William Hung. There's bad and campy (Shatner). There's so bad it's good (The Darkness, aka the Sons of Spinal Tap). And there's William Hung, who isn't good, lacks irony, and needs to get back to Cal soon and get a real career so that my ears will stop bleeding.

The Dog Song, Nellie McKay. I know she's getting all these glowing reviews as this acerbic, New York version of Norah Jones, but this song... annoys me. A lot. I mean, it sounds like William Hung wrote it. It's about 1/3rd the trite lyrics that Jessica Simpson could outsmart, and 2/3rds that gawdawful dog panting.

Comfortably Numb, Scissor Sisters. For as great of an homage "Take Your Mama Out" is, "Comfortably Numb" is a stark reminder that late 70s disco should not be revived, and that there should be an international treaty banning covers of Pink Floyd songs.

Comments

1. I've at least heard of a couple of the groups that made your best album list. But I don't know any of the songs on your favorites (or worst) list. I guess that's partly because I'm a musical luddite, and partly because there's only one station here that plays new stuff, and they never friggin' tell you the song or artist!!!

   Posted by: Harry | January 4, 2005 06:40 AM

2. Now, now. I think that when you combine late 70's disco and Pink Floyd covers, the result is almost bound to be somewhat fantastic. Especially when it's done by the Scissor Sisters, who are more camp than a row of tents.

   Posted by: samantha | January 5, 2005 09:20 PM

3. Samantha dear, the Scissor Sisters are more camp than all the KOAs in Oregon. But they're still hit and miss. And there's just something wrong with camping up Pink Floyd. Parodying Pink I'm all for, but camping?

   Posted by: dw | January 8, 2005 11:08 AM

4. A very late comment, I know, but here's hoping that "Freedom Isn't Free" gets an Academy Award nomination for Best Song when the announcements are made tomorrow.

   Posted by: Kennedy | January 24, 2005 06:52 PM