10 The Michigan D - Friday, January 21, 2005 - ---------- - ---------- . ............ FRIDAY FOCUS 9) 1 albumso i 0 0 andrewgaerig The Walkmen Bows and Arrows A hugely reverberating album, Bows and Arrows bounces off subway windows and wheel wells with the force of U2's spiraling guitar attack and the rhythmic drive of so many '80s post-punk bands. Hamilton Leithauser scrapes his voice across and chalkboard and winds up angry/confused/hope- ful, waiting for anything that'll take him away from here. Madvillain Madvillainy Hip hop, too often recognized for its harsh and visceral nature, rarely feels as soft and transcendent as this album. Madlib clips frayed shards of your con- sciousness. MF Doom peeks through the cracks, discarding his many masks long 0 enough to get goofy, sad and hilariously confused. Brian Wilson SMILE Go west, old crackpot psycho. Brian Wilson takes a break from lounging scarily around swimming pools to fanta- size, after a 30-year hiatus, about a mythic, candy-cane America. His blend of surreal and serene ignited such holy wanderlust that daddy didn't just take the T-Bird away, he drove it straight into a midlife crisis. oelhoard on death fu Brian Wilson SMILE Mo Wilson's late-'60s genius is Au once again on display on an nie album that ranks right up there with one of the} Pet Sounds. SMiLE's densely layered arrangements are as interesting and Thel complex as its creator. '\ The The Black Keys Rubber Factory "The Lengths," the country-blues epic that splits this album like dried snakeskin, is the type of transcendent ash that their prior albums were missing. It should also put to rest any linger- ing doubts about the blues duo's authenticity, as if there was something inauthentic about growing up in the permanent gray of Ohio and recording your album amidst the fumes of an old production plant. The Streets A Grand Don't Come for Free No matter how badly Skinner wants us to believe he's a stoned-batty slacker - "I should just sit on my couch like I know how" - the grand ambition of A Grand proves it's bollocks time and again. His production, a synthesis of bratty guitars and RAM-powered soul, allows his stilted rhymes to hit with the force of a far less subtle MC. We're all better off for his ambition, whether he admits it or not. L Bork Medulla Bjork's arcane vocals-only concept gave this album a schtick, but it was Bjork's total embrace of Rahzel's gruff production that allowed her to weld the digital choir together with her snak- ing melodies. Medulla is another chapter in Bjork's fantastic fiction. Ghostface The Pretty Toney Album Has anyone ever pined so hard for main- stream acceptance, failed so miserably and still come out with such irresistible art? Bathed in buckets of soul, stoned out of his mind and drunk on his own ridiculous flow, Ghostface eats your under- ground ethos for breakfast. 8 Califone Heron King Blues A bunch of aging, skinny white boys from Chica- go get nutty with Afro-funk freakouts, jamming on a bed of white noise and emptying ma's pan cabinets for their deviant percussion. Like Brian Jones's Rolling Stones on Sly Stone and a slow morphine drip. Y Interpol Antics Annoyingly enough, everything still sounds easy for Interpol. Their effortless second album, however, seeps a humility that their debut lacked, reducing their sound to rock'n'roll's charming holy trinity: guitar/bass/drums. Few bands can take such basic ingredients and sound so huge, so dark. 1 O Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds Abbatoir Blues /The Lyre of Orpheus Cave's been toiling in arty gothic angst for years, but remarkably, this double album is fresher and brighter than anything he's ever released. Imbued with a sense of humor and clarity that his prior material severe- ly lacked, Cave sounds mature, intelligent and surpris- ingly well balanced. Scary. 0 Kanye West The College Dropout You can question his street cred, but not his greatness. Kanye's debut offers a refresh- ing respite from the thug posturing and antagonism that have come to dominate hip hop. Modest Mouse Good News for People Who Love Bad News With their best record to date, Modest Mouse have finally gained the recognition they've deserved for years. Good News makes schizophrenic guitar rock and meditations wor back to roc Pete Dohe' Lunc Aft stre called it q indie-popr 'un for everyone. ountain Goats We Shall All Be Healed stere, stripped-down arrangements and John Dar- lle's byzantine lyrics make We Shall All Be Healed year's simplest and most beautiful pleasures. Libertines The Libertines Libertines are a throwback in every sense of the rd. Both their sound and their backstory harken ck's days of excess. Enjoy them while you still can; rty could self-destruct at any minute. a Rendezvous er more than a decade of flying below the main- eam radar, one of America's best-kept secrets uits - but not before releasing one more classic record. Farewell, friends. in his sleep than 95 percent of the MCs out there. The man simply can't make a bad record. 8 Green Day American Idiot Idiot is about as overblown and pretentious as punk rock can get. Nevermind the absurdity inherent in the idea of the concept; Green Day are still at the top of their game, and their classic sound is unbeatable. The Streets A Grand Don't Come for Free Just like Green Day, Mike Skinner took the concept route this time 'round. Just like Green Day, I couldn't care less about the concept. Skinner's clever laptop pro- duction and quick wit drive the record. Beastie Boys To the 5 Boroughs They weren't able to prevent Dubya's re-elec- tion, but that shouldn't take away from their achievements. Even in their 40s, the B-Boys sound fresh and full of the youthful vigor that put them on the map two decades ago. 0 7 Eminem Encore Sure, it sounds like he's snoozing his way through half the album, but Eminem can make a better album 1A.C. Newman The Slow Won- der The Slow Wonder contains some of the decade's best songwriting. Emotional yet reserved lyr- ics, impulsive rhythms arranged more intricately than lace and a dash of redheaded charm make Newman Canada's future poet laureate. 2 Brian Wilson SMILE Forget context, history and the fact that you've been hearing "God Only Knows" on oldies radio for years. In any era, SMiLE is unsurpassed in its harmonic beauty and conceptual vitality. 3 Decemberists The Tain The fact that this album is an 18-minute interpretation of Irish folklore speaks to the Decemberists' ability to rock your socks off as well as soothe you to sleep. The Tain is more than a between-album tidbit for fans - it's a sign of things to come from one of the most talented bands out there. Destroyer Your Blues Dan Bejar went out on a limb to release Your Blues under his counterintuitive Destroyer moni- ker: It's a series of synthesized dramatic tableaux featur- ing "It's Gonna Take an Airplane," one of the catchiest songs this year. Loretta Lynn Van Lear Rose Loretta Lynn needed a comeback. Jack White needed to work on a project without eye candy/dead weight drum- mer Meg. The end result? Lynn reminds us how kickass she is and White makes up (a little) for Elephant. Fiery Furnaces Blueberry Boat The only reason that the Fiery Furnaces' just- released EP isn't on this list instead of Blueberry Boat is because, well, it just came out. I laud Blueberry Boat as a destination, not a starting point; begin with EP and Gallowsbird Bark and work your way up. meets "The Pied Piper"; they overturn a fruitstand. Also, they're aliens from another dimension. 8 Bjork Medulla After teetering on the crazy edge of avant-pop with her earlier releases, Iceland's premiere chanteuse makes a record as musically complex as her homeland is cold. Y Sufjan Stevens Seven Swans Ever wondered if Michigan's own bard could sound prettier, get sadder or be even more spiritual? Three for three, dude. Frog Eyes The Folded Palm Arguably the most perplexing band to break out in 2004, Frog Eyes' bristling instrumentals and octave-jump- ing, throat-contorting singer Carey Mercer sound a bit like holding a por- cupine up to your face might feel I - at first. But if you keep at it, the payoff will far outweigh any ini- tial pain. Modest 0 0 7 Deerhoof Milk Man Milk Man - alternately danceable, hummable and difficult to listen to- sounds a bit like Tommy andrewhorowitz Brian Wilson SMILE SMiLE, more so than any other release in rock history, was under immense pressure to be nothing short of brilliant. Fortunately, it lived up to its promise, a virtuosic collection of songs that finally close a painful chapter for Brian Wilson. 2 The Arcade Fire Funeral If there's a band worth noting in 2004, it's The Arcade Fire. Their debut LP bleeds with pain and longing, all while producing some of the most memorable tracks of the year. 3 Madvillain Madvillainy Madlib and MF Doom's eccentric collabora- tion overflows with burning rhyme and beats drawn from accordions, old-school TV clips, flute leads, honky-tonk piano and just about everything in between. Maria Schneider Concert in the Gar- den Schneider's composition and arranging is once again luminous on this limited edition release. From the curious accordion of the title track to Luciana Souza's gorgeous scatting, this is one of the finest big band albums to appear in years. Joanna Newsom The Milk-Eyed Mender Who would have thought that a woman sounding more like a whining little girl and accompaniment consisting of mostly harp could be so compelling? William Bolcom Songs of Innocence and Experience Undoubtedly the most ambitious recording of 2004 and possibly in years, Bolcom's masterpiece finally comes to life with the help of the University music school and some special guests. In the hands of Bolcom, the William Blake poems sound like a Pol- lack painting: one minute country, the next atonality and eventually, a resounding reggae. 7Sufian Stevens Seven Swans 7 fThe idea of a religious album inspires immediate skepticism, but Sufjan pulls it off with delicate vocals and just enough banjo. 8 Kanye West College Dropout West's production has graced a number of projects, but not until College Dropout has he truly put his stamp on hip hop. West's innova- tive production and witty banter establish him amongst the giants. Dave Douglas Strange Libera- tilon A chameleon of the jazz world, Doug- las this time dabbles in the fusion sound made famous by Bitches Brew-era Miles Davis. Backed by the New York in-crowd, Douglas's tunes are thoughtful and provocative, taking us in all sorts of directions while revealing hints of brilliance and maintaining intrigue from start to finish. The Streets A Grand Don't Come for Free The opening of Mike Skinner's con- ceptual odyssey announces that "It was supposed to be so easy," and 51 minutes later, we under- stand why "it" wasn't. With large-scale produc- tion and a distinct British lyricism, A Grand Don't Come for Free puts Eminem to shame. 0 6 6 evanmcgarvey Ghostface Pretty Toney Ghostface Killah is the official cultural nexus into which Curtis Mayfield, Samuel Coleridge, Shao- lin kung-fu, John Shaft, Louis Armstrong and most of the Harlem Renaissance flows. Pretty Toney is his most human, romantic and wild spectacle. Get some spinach and "Biscuits" if you know what's good. 2 Bork Medulla She's got high-concept vocals, a United Nations of verbal alchemists and the flooding chants of "Where Is The Line." Haunting silences give way to vnal npaks with nonih warm heatv to melt elaciers Madvillain Madvilliany MF Doom and Madlib are the Kobe and Shaq of indie-rap. Only this time they play nice, smoke buckets of greenery and get deep enough in raps so only the Mole Man can find them. In a perfect world, "Accordion" was the No.1 single of the year. Just "keep an eye out / like 'aye 'aye captain." S Interpol Antics Joy Division, Roxy Music, Mission of Burma. blah blah blah. Charmingly pined down by comparisons, Interpol relaxes and uses all that talent to make some spell- binding choruses. Oh, but Paul, take off that damn hat. / Tom Waits Real Gone anthem for leftists.; 8 ModestMouseGood News r For People Who Love 16 Aim Bad News In the year 2004, Isaac Brock plants an indie-rock flag on Top-40 soil with the daz- zling "Float On." The citizens listen to the whole album, start talking to music nerds and 18 all rejoice. Brock then pounds a fifth of Scotch and passes out. Hail! Young Buck Straight Outta Ca$hville The third most hyped member of G-Unit might I I