Best and Worst of 2010 - Part II

Another typically dead week in terms of new releases so we are continuing the Best and Worst theme I began last week with a discussion of albums and songs from 2010.  This time videos have been added for your viewing and listening pleasure.

Have a great New Years and may 2011 bring us world peace, less Jersey Shore cast appearances and lots of good new music!

Best Indie/Pop/Rock Album Reviewed on this Blog - Ra Ra Riot's The Orchard

This is not the album I gave the highest score to during the year (although it did manage a very good 8/10) but rather a retrospective look at what I've been listening to and enjoying on my own this year.  This year's Ra Ra Riot album is one of the most delightful and gratifying discs to be released.  It manages to balance a fun indiepop sound with the depth in lyrics you would expect from a top indie act.  Listen to one of the songs I recommended sampling, "Boy," below to get an example of the band's sound from The Orchard.

Best Electronic Album Reviewed on this Blog - Mackintosh Braun's Where We Are

Okay, okay--this is more of an electropop album than a pure electronic album but that's how good it is!  It manages to beat out albums from bands like Daft Punk and Underworld to take my top electronic album of the year.  Their electropop sound is very similar to the styles of OMD and Pet Shop Boys yet manages to never be a derivative of either of those or any other band's style.  The ability to maintain a sound that is very contemporary while leaning on the styles of past bands is one of the reasons this album is so impressive.  It's the album that I've listened to the most this year.  A pure joy.  Listen to one of the songs I recommended sampling, "Made For Us," below.

Best Hip-Hop/Rap Album Reviewed on the Blog - Kanye West's My Dark Twisted Fantasy

No surprise here really as Kanye's album is getting a lot of attention as the best album of the year from media sites like Pitchfork and Spin.  Kanye and his collaborators create a solid and intelligent album from beginning to end with some damn catchy, even haunting, songs.  (Luckily for Kanye, I don't factor cover art into my final tally...)  However, while there is no doubt this is a spectacular album (I originally gave it a 9/10), it probably would have lost out in this category to the album mentioned below if I had reviewed that album. Watch the video for one of the songs I recommended sampling, "Runaway," below:




Best Album Not Reviewed on this Blog - Cee Lo Green's The Lady Killer [explicit version]
If you've read Part I of my Best and Worst of 2010 then you know I already awarded Mr. Green the best studio cover song of the year for "No One's Gonna Love You."  However that song and the Grammy nominated "Fuck You" are just two of the beautiful and hard jamming R&B/Soul songs that come to us from this album.  The entire album is chock full of music that will get you to either be seriously introspective about your love life (in a good way) or be ready to boogie until your shoes fall off on the dance floor.  It's nearly impossible to listen to this album and not come away loving it.  If you haven't seen the incredibly funny and amusing video for "Fuck You" then ready yourself for a treat below:

Worst Album Reviewed on this Blog - Young Man's Boy

I have already named the best album I reviewed this year so now it is time for me to reveal the most horrific album reviewed on this blog.  First of all this "master YouTube cover artist" released an album with absolutely no cover songs on it!  Yeah, that makes sense.  I guess it would have been okay if the music he did give us was enjoyable or fun to listen to but, unfortunately, Young Man swings and misses on all three counts leaving us one very pitiful and the absolutely most horrible album reviewed on this blog this year.  Congrats Young Man!  You can hear for yourself why this got worst album of the year below (keeping in mind this track is the creme de la creme of the album). 

Most Disappointing Single of the Year - We Are The World 25 for Haiti

Our final category of Bests and Worsts of 2010 is the most disappointing song of the year.  That honor goes to the 25th anniversary revival of We Are The World.  While the original was an off-beat collection of various singing stars from the 80's that Quincey Jones somehow turned into a catchy tune by wisely playing to the strengths of his soloists like Cyndi Lauper, Stevie Wonder, Steve Perry, and Willie Nelson by letting them be themselves.  For the 25th anniversary edition, however, Quincey proves that going bigger does not mean the song is getting better.  First there's waaaay too many artists contributing meaning that each contribution is lessened so you don't give the individual artists enough time to let their personalities blend with one another to create something greater than the sum of its parts.  Instead the entire song seems piecemeal and by the time you do get to something that does sound good you are already turned off by the horrible bits like Justin Bieber's overproduced opening and Miley Cyrus' grating, autotuned two line solo.  And don't even get me started on the bit with a superimposed Michael Jackson.  Enjoy the horribleness of it all below. 

Best and Worst of 2010 - Part I

NOTE:  The weeks around X-Mas and New Years are traditionally dead in terms of new releases so this week and next week we will be going over some of the best and worst releases to come out in 2010.  Rather than choose boring categories like "Best Song," "Best Album," etc. I've decided to make my own categories like "Best Live Cover Song" and "Scariest Album Cover."

Have a great Holiday Season!  Oh and, as my Christmas gift to you, I've gone through the trouble of finding versions of the mentioned songs (when possible) for your streaming pleasure!

Most Original Cover Album:  Amanda Palmer - Amanda Palmer Performs The Popular Hits Of Radiohead On Her Magical Ukulele

This year's most original album of cover songs comes to us from Amanda Palmer (frontwoman of The Dresden Dolls).  Palmer gives us an album of offbeat covers of seven of Radiohead's more famous songs--all performed on the ukulele!  (Okay, okay "Exit Music (For A Film)" has a piano and violin accompaniment but I digress).  Give a listen to the entire album of Amanda Palmer Performs The Popular Hits Of Radiohead On Her Magical Ukulele below:




Best Studio Cover Song: Cee Lo Green - "No One’s Gonna Love You" (Band of Horses)
Cee Lo Green has had a pretty good year with Grammy noms in the Song of the Year and Record of the Year categories for his so-catchy-it-should-be-illegal song, "Fuck You" (or "Forget You" if you're going for the clean version).  So it isn't a huge surprise that his cover of a relatively unknown but one of my personal favorite songs from Band of Horses, "No One’s Gonna Love You," hasn't gotten a lot of attention.  Well, it's only the best cover song of the year, people!!!  Cee Lo turns a pretty somber and slow tempo song from Band of Horses into an orchestral journey with a funk-tinged twist and a unique syncopation choice on the beats.  It's absolutely enchanting.  Listen to it below or watch the video on YouTube.




Best Live Cover Song:  Lissie - "Pursuit of Happiness" (Kid Cudi)
This was a tough category for me because there were a lot of good live covers this year.  I was sorely tempted to choose Jimmy Fallon's (performing as Neil Young) cover of Willow Smith's "Whip My Hair" because it is by far the most unique live cover of the year.  However the song that won out is Illinois singer/songwriter Lissie's cover of the Kid Cudi song "Pursuit of Happiness."  She takes a pretty serious and hardcore sounding hip-hop song and turns into a catchy indie anthem for the ages.  That and the fact that in the clip below Lissie takes a giant swig of tequila before singing the song makes this one the winner by a nose.  Listen to it below or watch the video.






Scariest Album Cover: Kanye West My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy

The cover to the left was eventually changed to one of these alternate versions but not because Kanye or any of the record execs came to their senses and realized that is one of the scariest and most horrific album cover in years.  No, they changed the cover art because Wal-Mart refused to carry the album if they pressed it with the image to the left.  My guess is the people at Wal-Mart didn't like the cover not because it was overly prurient but instead they just realized it is a butt-ugly picture.  Both characters on the original cover look absolutely frightening and the phoenix character on the right looks like she has a face growing out of her armpit for heaven's sake!  That is seriously one dark, twisted fantasy you have, Kanye.  




Most (Potentially) Racist Cover Art:  Massive Attack Heligoland

Okay, the cover to Massive Attack's album from the beginning of the year looks like you have a guy in black face that has just gotten in a bar fight.  That and you have a bleeding black and white rainbow raining down on his head which can be viewed symbolically many ways but most of those interpretations will not be positive I'm guessing.  Great band, horrible choice in album art. 






Coolest Album Cover Art:  Faithless The Dance

Okay, I admit I really don't know what's going on in the cover to the left but I love the imagery they use and how they leave it open to interpretation.  I'm going to assume the big throng of people in the middle are dancing (hence the title of the album) but that's about as far as I am willing to guess without knowing more.  But the color palette is absolutely gorgeous and the layout of the figures on the image is immaculate in terms of framing without being boring.  It's a complex and well thought out piece of art that I find very mesmerizing.

New Music from 12/14/2010 - Michael Jackson, R Kelly, and Daft Punk

Daft Punk Tron Legacy [Soundtrack] - The flashy French electronic duo score the soundtrack to the upcoming Tron Legacy motion picture.  This album--I'm reviewing the single CD version, not the double disk or the iTunes version which come with additional tracks--was released last week but I thought I'd hold my review back until this week when the movie actually comes out.  Daft Punk is definitely one of the more perfect choices to score this movie since they already love to come dressed in futuristic, glowing biker outfits during most of their live gigs.  Also, they are one of the few original electronic acts that could even hope to match the iconic work Wendy Carlos gave us in the first film.  (Movie trivia--Wendy Carlos also scored two Stanley Kubrick classics: A Clockwork Orange and The Shining.)

The album opens with a two and a half minute overture that is very toned down (no drums or beats at all) and is a subtle nod to the anthem Carlos gave us in the original flick.  The next track, "The Grid," picks up the tempo, features some Jeff Bridges dialogue as a kind of spoken word introduction, and blends some of the musical themes from Carlos' score with themes Daft Punk incorporates into their scoring of the sequel.  The rest of the album is purely instrumental with no singing, vocal samples or dialogue present on any of the tracks and has a house/trance feel with some nods to industrial electronica. 

Overall, it's a good film score with well crafted, multi-layered tracks but it doesn't achieve the greatness of the original.  The duo does try to incorporate some of the musical themes Wendy Carlos gave us while being careful to not lean too heavily on that original score.  If anything, they don't incorporate enough of Carlos' work as they try to create something grander and even moodier than before by staying true to their own style.  I would have loved for them to somehow sample extensively or, at least, pay greater homage to "Anthem" and "Love Theme" from the original Tron soundtrack.  Long time Daft Punk fans might also be disappointed in the generally slow tempo of the album but they need to remember this work is intended to accompany a film and not to be used (at least not without some remixing work) for getting down on the dance floor.  The score below reflects the fact that I haven't seen the film yet so I can't judge how well the songs work within that framework. 

Score:  7/10
Song(s) to Sample:   "Derezzed" and "Outlands"

Michael Jackson Michael - The officially sanctioned and first of what I'm sure will be many posthumous albums from the King of Pop (Sony paid a reported $250 million for his unreleased works so I'm guessing there's more on the way...), the Jackson estate releases Michael today.  Not surprisingly, a number of high profile artists act as producers and collaborators on this album like 50 Cent, Lenny Kravitz, and Akon. Supposedly Jackson had been working on a new album since 2007 and a number of songs intended for that album wind up on this release.  The other songs are unreleased works dating as far back as the 80's from the post-Thriller days. 

The album opens with the Akon duet "Hold My Hand" which is a thoughtful and soulful song with charming if simple backing music.  I did find it a weird choice to open the album since it's really the only song that prominently features another performer's vocals as the lead.  The next track is the extremely catchy "Hollywood Tonight" which has a beat eerily similar to "Billy Jean" and is destined to be featured heavily in clubs in the near future.  Unfortunately, after the second track the inconsistencies of the album start to become apparent.  The next two tracks "Keep Your Head Up" and "(I Like) The Way You Love Me" are slow jams that hark back to his past slow jams from the 90's and early 80's, respectively.  "Monster" (featuring 50 Cent) is a fast tempo and probably the most modern sounding song on the album although 50 Cent's rap doesn't really bring a whole lot.  "(I Can't Make It) Another Day" has a sound familiar to "Black and White" but with a more modern twist.  His vocal work on the track, from the restrained refrains that open the song to the screaming in the chorus, shows the potential greatness that we expected from new Michael Jackson music and it truly sounds like a new, modern MJ song. 

Overall, it's not at all a horrible album given the circumstances behind how the songs were completed and how quickly the album was scheduled to be released.  In fact, unlike a lot of posthumous releases, Michael  doesn't feel as piecemeal as I had anticipated or feared.  However, the wide range of years between when some of the songs were recorded is pretty obvious so it's not a totally cohesive album either.  That being said, Jackson's singing voice still sounds as smooth and youthful as it ever did and he and his collaborators always had the ability to write infectious, toe-tapping pop songs.  There are enough gems on Michael that it is probably worth a purchase but if this is the cream of the crop of the unreleased works then any future albums will be pretty average at best. 

Score: 7.5/10
Song(s) to Sample: "(I Can't Make It) Another Day" and "Hollywood Tonight"

R Kelly Love Letter - Since I reviewed the new album by the 'King of Pop,'  I thought it only fair to review the new album from the 'King of R&B.'  Three-time Grammy winner Robert Sylvester Kelly releases his tenth studio album giving us 14 tracks (plus a bonus cover of Michael Jackson's "You Are Not Alone" depending on the version you get) just in time for the holiday gift giving season.  I have no idea why he's trying to channel Ray Charles in the cover art of the album though. 

After a quick prelude, the album opens with the song the album is named after, "Love Letter."  It's a sultry R&B song with inviting harmonies and pleasing vocals even if it's not that complex of a song.  The entire album is full of songs with roots from Soul and R&B music from decades past without directly parroting any particular artist's or band's style.  "Number One Hit" is the first of a couple of songs that pay tribute to the style of Michael Jackson and the sensuous songs he gave us especially at the beginning of his solo career.  "Taxi Cab" is sung in a vocal style similar to how a Bobby Womack might have given us a song over 30 years ago but Kelly's songwriters are able to infuse a more modern sound and song structure making it the song that I wanted to listen to repeatedly because of the entrancing way they were able to blend the different sounds.  However, there are a few songs that do not balance the line between modern and classic as well.  "Radio Message" has a beat that sounds like something from Al Green but the lyrics and vocal sound more like something from a 90's boy band.  It's a song that already sounds dated and brings us back to an age of music most of us don't want to travel to. 

R Kelly manages to release a sophisticated R&B/Soul album that may be the best Soul album of the year.  Unlike in recent albums (Untitled comes to mind), Kelly eschews the naughty and explicit lyrics in the songs and the entire album is chock full of what could be modern The Delfonics or Marvin Gaye hits but with Kelly's silky voice.  It's an album that beckons back to a groovier time in R&B music but still manages to sound very contemporary for most of the album.  It's an album that will work well for a dinner party, for an after party, or for snuggling by the fire because of the seductive songs that are consistently presented to us over the entire album. 

Score:  8.5/10

Song(s) to Sample: "Taxi Cab" and "Love Letter"

New Music from 12/7/2010 - Natasha Bedingfield, Plain White T's, and Crown Royale

Natasha Bedingfield Strip Me - The Grammy nominated British songwriter and pop singer releases her fourth full length album.  Strip Me comes in with 13 tracks in total.  According to Amazon, each song on the album "evokes the innate desires, needs and fears which people feel in these most troubling times."  Oooookay then.  That sounds kinda dreary for a pop album but let's see what Ms. Bedingfield gives us.

The album opens with "A Little Too Much" which has a soft, pleasing pop/adult contemporary feel.  The chorus and the hook is simplistic but reasonably catchy and the song does a decent job of inviting the listener in to experience the entire album.  The second song, "All I Need," has a harder more modern electropop feel with complex, layered vocals.  "Strip Me" is all pop and is the first song on the album that reminded me of songs on Bedingfield's previous albums with its cleverly sung lyrics and pleasing but not forced melody.  "Neon Lights" is another song that evokes memories of Bedingfield at her songwriting best with a string melody and toned down tribal drumming during the bridge and the refrain that is utterly enchanting.  Her first single off the album (released months ago), "Touch," is extremely fetching with quickly sung lyrics and a dance beat during the chorus that will get you motivated to get on the dance floor.

Overall, it's a really enjoyable and well rounded pop album from Natasha Bedingfield.  She stays true to the style that made her popular in the first place but still manages to present to us tracks that sounds new and original.  Despite the ominous sounding description from Amazon above, the music is not dark or depressing and there is a definite hopefulness to many of the tracks ("Weightless" and "Can't Fall Down").  It's not a perfect album but I found I liked a lot more about it than I disliked about it especially on repeat listens.

Score:  7.5/10
Song(s) to Sample:  "Strip Me" and "Neon Lights"

Plain White T's Wonders of the Younger - The five person alt rock/pop band from Illinois release their sixth studio album.  Best known for their 2007 Grammy nominated hit "Hey There Delilah," the band gives us 14 new tracks on this album.  According to recent interviews with frontman Tom Higgenson, the band was attempting to imbue the album with a greater epic feeling than their previous albums.

"Irrational Anthem" begins the album which has a melodic, slower opening before the songs speeds up into an uptempo pop/rock song.  The lyrics and vocals are both very well done on the track although the chorus sounds like something from an old Green Day album.  "Boomerang" has a much more standard soft rock feel I was expecting from the band and features lyrics and hooks that are more likely to get stuck in your head.  "Welcome to Mystery" is the most complex song on the album with a jaunty circus feel, moody guitar playing, and restrained but not timid vocal work.  "Rhythm of Love" features a much softer, almost acoustic, side of the band and reminded me of the type of music a Jason Mraz would give us. 

Okay, I can't compare this album to any of Plain White T's previous albums because I am only familiar with their singles like the aforementioned "Delilah" and "1, 2, 3, 4" but I can tell you that it falls far short of the "epic feeling" that Higgenson and bandmates were striving for.  However, the album was far more complex than I expected going in for a band known primarily for their bubblegum singles.  Unfortunately, a greater level of complexity does not mean that the album is one that I would want to listen to on a regular basis.  There are a handful of songs that are more than palatable on the album but not enough for me to recommend this disc wholeheartedly.

Score:  5.5/10
Song(s) to Sample:   "Welcome to Mystery" and "Rhythm of Love"

Crown Royale Crown Royale - Not to be confused with the rock/swing band Royal Crown Revue or the whiskey that comes in a purple felt bag, Crown Royale is the hip-hop/rap act of DJ Rhettmatic and MC Buff1.  This eponymous 14 track album is the debut release from the duo although they both have solo careers mostly as DJs. I couldn't find too much info on the band itself, but the band's MySpace page has good bios of the individual two artists.  

The album opens with the high energy "Blitz" with a fast tempo rap, quick beat, and synthesized horn sounds. "Crown Royale" has an interesting if very simplistic violin arrangement that works well in creating an effective hook for the song although the latter half of the track with its excessive scratching seemed like an odd choice.  "We Gotcha" is another high energy song but layers on more instruments to create a very pleasing and toe-tapping song.  "Looking For Answers" has a more somber tone and is one of the slower songs on the album.  "GM" has more traditional hip-hip sensibilities with heavy sampling and a more structured vocal style in the rap. 

It's a very respectable and aurally pleasing debut album from two highly credible hip-hop DJs. They have a sound that is very reminiscent of past hip-hop acts like The Roots and Busta Rhymes without sounding like a cheap derivative of any specific band. The entire album has a lot of energy and shows a lot of forethought in the song creation.  It's far from perfect album but it's a more than credible debut album. 

Score:  7/10
Song(s) to Sample:  "We Gotcha" and "Thank You"