The Aughts, as we lovingly call them, were, musically at least, about the new. Nothing stays the same for long, but in the age of the internet, nothing stays for very long at all. That seems to have been the ethos behind music of the last decade. Bands and artists transformed themselves as everything they held on to as being true began to slip. Now, a Sri Lankan refugee can make a hit song satirizing U.S. customs agents and no one questions it. Now, the Southern sons of a preacher can warble a song with “sex” in the title which many people view as being about an STD and become kings of the industry. Now, rock bands make country albums, country bands make rock albums, the top 40 stations don’t even know the difference between country and pop stars, hip-hop, by definition a genre which samples other styles of music endlessly, has become the dominant force on the charts. Today’s blog fodder is tomorrow’s bottom-scraping news items. The most productive rock star of the decade (Jack White) never had a #1 hit single, and the biggest hip-hop star (Kanye West) somehow manages tremendous success despite everyone almost universally agreeing that he’s a total dick. In many ways, this is all old hat; the industry’s always been unpredictably weird when you really think about it. But the influence of the internet cannot be understated; human evolution, not just musical evolution, is occuring at a more rapid rate than ever before. There’s so much going on, and so many places where we can go, that it’s impossible for two people to have the same view of the world in which we live.
As such, when the time came for our staff to choose our Albums of the Aughts, a daunting task proved impossible; nothing is definitive in an age where nothing lasts. It’s exciting and terrifying, everything that life should be. And it’s with this in mind that the AudioSuede staff presents the Albums of the Aughts.
CHRIS POLLEY -
1. The Appleseed Cast – Low Level Owl, Vol. 1 [Deep Elm]
For every album on my list, there’s no other that I come back to more often than The Appleseed Cast’s Low Level Owl, Vol. 1. It’s largely because there’s also no other band that has come even remotely close to approximating the Lawrence, Kansas outfit’s trademark interstellar sound, a style that’s both big in scope and intimate in execution, making for the most magnetic brand of rock music to come out of the States in my personal lifetime, much less decade. What makes it even more perfect? The band is embarking on a spring 2010 tour in which they play the record and its almost equally extraordinary follow-up Low Level Owl, Vol. 2 in their entirety, back to back, all in small clubs. How’s that for instant 00s nostalgia?
2. Explosions In The Sky – The Earth Is Not A Cold Dead Place [Temporary Residence]
Explosions in the Sky may not have invented post-rock, but they sure are responsible for the definitive album of the genre. The Earth Is Not A Cold Dead Place is, in my humble opinion the apex of cinematic rock music because it weaves an inscrutable and impregnable fabric of guitars both brutal and fragile and percussion at once deafening and chilling. It’s not just that there are momentous peaks and lulling valleys in the Austin quartet’s seminal release; it’s that the whole record congeals into a beefy yet spacious entity between the emotional highs and devastating lows. The fact that they do this without nary a lyric or vocal chord becomes inconsequential – this a record that encompasses everything tragic and hopeful about humanity, all communicated through melody and volume.
3. Death Cab For Cutie – We Have The Facts And We’re Voting Yes [Barsuk]
It was an innocent purchase based on word of mouth and an awesome title that turned into a obsessive affair over the course of nine years. I had no idea that that casual trip to the record store the summer between junior and senior of high school would beget so much rabid and meticulous inspiration. Vocalist Ben Gibbard had the voice of a mousey cherub, and that would cause some derision in later years when the band blew up, but it didn’t phase me; rather, it enthralled me. It was delicate and sorrowful (and, I still firmly believe, not whiny) like no other singer I’d heard before, as was Chris Walla’s intricately subdued guitar riffs (to say nothing the man did with the DIY production of this record). For me, Death Cab for Cutie perfected the solitary rock album right here.
4. Idlewild – 100 Broken Windows [Capitol]
Since What’s the Story Morning Glory was the album that catapulted brit-pop into the spotlight in the 90s, it makes unfortunately completely perfect sense why Idlewild’s 100 Broken Windows didn’t resuscitate America’s interest in the other side of the pond. Why? Because while the Oases of the world (two bands I moderately enjoy, by the by) propagated a musical style that was ultimately bland whining with shimmering instrumentation, Idlewild balanced their easily digestible hooks with roars of spit and spazz. The pure energy of each and every song that makes up this album was enough to hold my attention for the first year it didn’t leave my Discman (oh 2000 how I miss thee), but the intellectual wordplay and unrelenting wellspring of melodies are what still keep me coming back.
5. Broken Social Scene – You Forgot It In People [Arts & Crafts]
Playing it loose and dirty has never really been an interest of mine. That all changed drastically when I dove into the caustically beautiful record that is You Forgot It In People. On the surface, it’s just another collection of modern songs with hints of classic rock, folk, and psychedelia: three things that usually make me roll my eyes in boredom. But what the valiant Canadians Kevin Drew, Brendan Canning, Emily Haines, Jason Collett, Charles Spearin, Leslie Feist, and yes – others, do with those classifications on their breakthrough LP is tear them to pieces, rebuild them with wild vigor, and deliver them through every emotional lens humanly possible. Fierce joy, drunken loneliness, and riotous frustration and more are all expressed throughout the album’s flawless thirteen tracks, as if to say, “yes, people still matter.”
6. Volcano, I’m Still Excited!! – Volcano, I’m Still Excited!! [Polyvinyl]
There’s nothing quite like the sound of a Casio keyboard. It sounds ancient, futuristic, and adorable all at once, and one-album wonders Volcano, I’m Still Excited!! are surely quite aware of this, as their inclusion of one of the music toy also practically embodies the spirit of their record. The lo-fi DIY ethic of their spastic pop compositions makes them feel like they’re unearthed from an ancient time, as if 12th century troubadours had gotten a hold of some Guided By Voices records. The bombastic theatricality of the songs, which range from sung rounds to epic builds, also give it a depth of seriousness (also gives us a clue why bandleader Mark Duplass turned into an actor/filmmaker; he co-directed Baghead and stars in The League). And to top it all off, VISE!! is just plain endearing – every strained lyric and popping snare hit an ode to the absurd.
7. Interpol – Turn On The Bright Lights [Matador]
At the outset of the 00s, the adjective “moody” was largely looked down upon in the burgeoning pretentious indie music scene. Associated with the disgusting transformation of the emo genre, it became unhip to have feelings, particularly about love and loss, trickle into your band’s lyrical content. But then the hipsters realized something: Ian Curtis was quite possibly the world’s first and only still-admired emo kid. So when New Yorkers Interpol came along and extrapolated the essence of Joy Division into a glossy and reverb-heavy new sound, “moody” became synonymous with “disaffected” and ushered in a new era of guitar music for pale guys with death on the brain. How that touchstone influenced the decade is up for debate, but there’s no denying the spine-tingling sensations garnered from the simmering and brooding atmospheres constructed on Turn On The Bright Lights.
8. M83 – Saturdays = Youth [Mute]
For every Rick Astley-inspired Internet meme, there was an M83 around the corner proving to the masses of the 00s that the 80s deserved to be rebooted and reconsidered. And when Frenchman Anthony Gonzalez fully embraced that realization with his band before he uncovered Saturdays = Youth to the public, the one thing that was clear was that he was 100% genuine in his desire to bring back the days of John Hughes and breathy vocals for sincere celebration. What makes the album such a knockout success though is not just what Gonzalez has brought back to the forefront of pop, but what he has injected into it. These songs don’t just bubble with gooey soundscapes; they downright propel into a cloudy and heavenly oblivion, creating an orgy of sound that is simultaneously nostalgic and science-fiction, which is a treat for both the ears and the heart.
9. Tegan And Sara – The Con [Sire]
Two girls with guitars and a producer with more than a few tricks up his sleeve can sometimes be enough to construct a perfect pop record. The Canadian sister duo had been slowly working toward their masterwork throughout the decade, with singles here and there that had punch and prowess, but it wasn’t until they teamed up with Death Cab’s Chris Walla that their talents finally culminated in something truly special. Here their voices have never sounded more determined and pained and their simplistic but effective guitar riffs have never sounded more vindictive yet affirming. Add Walla’s subtle manipulations of sound and instrumentation into the mix and you wind up with fourteen tracks of deceit and longing that one could cuddle up with to whisper-sing to or blast in the car and wail with anger to: your choice.
10. Sigur Rós – ( ) [FatCat]
Most bands aim to make you feel, think, dance, or sing along to their music. But Sigur Rós, I believe, is the only band who writes music to stare blankly into space with a mouth agape with awe to. Specifically, ( ) violently and vividly encourages this behavior. The band’s celestial sound has supposedly been confirmed to be of earthly origin, but I still maintain that it’s inhumanly possible to emanate the sounds that come from these guys’ instruments and throats. If indeed somewhere down the line they are exposed as their true alien selves, my thoughts as to what extraterrestrial music might sound like would finally be confirmed, as this band’s ghostly and soul-shattering sophomore release was the indication to me that a guitar is not just the sum of its fretboard and the human voice is not just something to communicate with using language.
COOPER FOYT -
1. The Glow Pt. 2 by The Microphones
For me personally, this is an album that absolutely consumed my days for over a year. I would listen to it several times each day, trying to mine the delicate emotions and themes from this albums rough surface. It was an album that completely changed who I was and who I will be for the rest of my life. But this album is so much more than a personal infatuation; it was a landmark album for folk, freak-folk, lo-fi, and essentially everything that can be described as “indie”. Phil Elverum created an album that was uncertain and awkward about what it was and what its message was. It was imperfect in extreme ways and subtle ways. The mixing of the drums can be harsh, he misses notes on guitar, he sings out of key, he loses focus for tracks at a time. But it’s all assembled in a way where the whole is far greater than sum of the parts. In the end it is a reflection of human existence.
2. The Moon & Antarctica by Modest Mouse
This album is seen by most as Isaac Brock’s opus and I would have to be in agreement with them. This masterfully crafted epic connects every have cooked idea over Modest Mouse’s career and funnels them into pure, concentrated beauty. The album has a focus that transcends their other works and each theme feels fully realized. Although the album clocks in at just under an hour, it never drags and nothing feels extraneous. The sequencing is natural yet surprising (shirking the requisite final track ballad for intensity) and the music feels effortless despite being the most complex songs they have in their library, musically and lyrically. In the end it is an album that transcends even its own medium and enters the arena of high art.
3. Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer? by of Montreal
Kevin Barnes took all the anguish, jealousy, mania, depression, regret, pain, joy, relief, cynicism, hope, and love of ending a relationship and forged it into a one of the most affecting indie pop albums of the decade. He took the separation from his wife and retreat into the Netherlands as the fuel to create the alter-ego Georgie Fruit, a middle-aged black transgendered funk music player to live vicariously through. Seriously. And it absolutely works and excels at all levels of catharsis. Following the transformations early seeds in the first half of the album to its violent emergence in “The Past is a Grotesque Animal” which transitions smoothly into an updated funk jam about random sex is inspiring with every listen.
4. Turn on the Bright Lights by Interpol
A brave and dark album that (I’m told) perfectly captures the New York City night life and culture. Haunting guitars jangle harshly from afar; brooding basslines rupture up from unseen places, the drums propel everything forward at an uncomfortable speed. While I’ve never been in NYC for longer than a few weeks, what always resonated with me in this album was its fractured fragility. Beneath the entire pretense of music and seemingly nonsense lyrics the listener finds glimpses of vulnerability and neurosis. And the effect was the jading and confusing environment that all major cities place us in but we are able to keep our sanity through human connections. And at its base that this album is about: the surprising humanity that can exist in the harsh urban sprawl.
5. Mount Eerie by The Microphones
If The Glow Pt. 2 was a reflection of human existence, then Mount Eerie fits nicely under that umbrella while exploring further the ideas of death. The album deals with the specifics of a single death and the mourning process as well as the larger philosophies of death in a way that feels bizarrely new and bare. Phil Elverum accomplishes this through remarkable and spine chilling transitions between the very large to the very small (try not to get chills when the female vocals quietly ask “”Do you really think there’s anybody out there?”). While some of the lyrics can come off as cliché, especially the conclusion, the overall effect is very rewarding and thought provoking. In a society that has a very real and terrifying fear of death, there are few albums I would recommend above this in an attempt to curb that reality.
6. Holopaw by Holopaw
I will be honest; this pick is made very much on a personal level. Holopaw is a band that held sway over me for much of the decade with each of their releases but never seems to garner much attention on the whole. The music also toes the line between folk and electronic, a cornerstone of the era, in an intimate way. But the true merit of the band lies with lead singer and songwriter John Orth, who is one of the best lyricists of the decade. Taking the everyday and teasing out the beauty that is inherently within the mundane in each song. He sees complexity in simplicity and writes about it in a simple way. His ability to create vivid and detailed imagery throughout the album is uncanny and exhilarating to experience.
7. Funeral by Arcade Fire
Few bands feel as though they have something very important or urgent to say. Arcade Fire is not one of those bands. Each anthemic song on Funeral feels as though it is spilling over the edges with an enthusiastic message of the state and empowerment of the youth. An English professor of mine told me that stream-of-consciousness writing occurred when a person was so close to a truth that it overwhelmed them and they could only describe it in fevered language, and to me this is what this album feels like; Arcade Fire trying to uncover some truth of a generation through an onslaught of powerful songs.
8. Merriweather Post Pavillion by Animal Collective
You really can’t say enough about what this album does. This album is excellent on the largest scale of themes from familial love to growing into responsibility to the banality of materialism to compassion in a modern world, and it rightfully receives most of its praise for this. But the album also boasts an incredible sonic landscape that gets more rewarding with each closer listen. The heartbeat rhythm of “Bluish”, the muddled opening message of “In the Flowers”, and the ever-present tics and squeals of unknown electronic functions all blend together in such a natural and overpowering way that we’re often left reeling by album’s end. Not to mention that few songs this decade have the sheer power to move anyone to sheer joy like “My Girls” and “Brothersport” often did. In the end, what more could you want?
9. Alopecia by WHY?
WHY?’s second album as a band found them in a place darker than Yoni Wolf had gone before. He had always had a confessional slant to his lyrics but on Alopecia he busted the closet door wide open. The fearlessness of the lyrics is what really stands out on this album. Opening line, “I’m not a ladies’ man, I’m a landmine” sets the tone of sex and death as the major focus of the album. “Good Friday” is a neurosis-on-sleeve diary entry put to quasi-hip-hop beat which gives it all the faux machismo qualities that permeate in our society. And after 40 minutes of plumbing the depths of human behavior: death-obsessing, woman-lamenting, destitute masturbation, and delusional stalking we get closer “Exegesis” where Yoni tells us he doesn’t really mean anything he’s said. Truths revealed through lies.
10. The Sophtware Slump by Grandaddy
Jason Lytle was born in Modesto, California in the late 60’s and had the perfect view of the terrifying destruction of the American landscape over the next several decades. This is the perfect album that extrapolates the digitizing of America. Songs cover subjects of robots drinking themselves to death, national forests made up of broken appliances, and the isolation of a society whose major source of contact is through a computer. While albums such as Kid A dealt with these same anxieties of new millennium, Radiohead’s experience always felt as if they had always been in that world. With The Sophtware Slump we are given an outsider looking in perspective which makes it all the more heartbreaking and hopeful. Opener “He’s Hopeful, He’s Dumb, He’s the Pilot” asks the seminal question, “Are you giving in, 2000 Man?”
CHRISTIAN HAGEN -
1. The Arcade Fire, Funeral
Anthemic, cathartic, evocative, brilliant; all these words and so many more could describe Funeral, an album that perfectly captures the mood of its time through its exploration of the world, of life, of humanity, and of death. It could well stand on its own as a classic not only of this decade but of the entire history of rock music. It’s extraordinary that 9 people could make an album so intimate and that a voice as fragile as Win Butler’s could make songs so lush. From the view into four “Neighborhoods” to the call to action of “Wake Up”, the record reveals that we are all, in our many differences, united by the span of time.
2. Sufjan Stevens, Illinois
Illinois is hardly just an album about a state. It’s about the landmarks and people that embody the American spirit, the soul of the lonely man lost on a big planet, and the power, for good or ill, of our imaginations. Stevens researched the history of a place and found his soul in the tales of buildings erected and people slain. At times fervent and thrilling, at times peaceful and reflective, Illinois is a true landmark of independent music. His 50 States Project may have been forgotten, but the brightest result is here for us to remember always.
3. Radiohead, In Rainbows
2007 will likely be remembered as a year when everything in the music business changed, and as the year that Radiohead ushered in a new era for album sales online. Hopefully, it will also be remembered as the year that Radiohead reinvented themselves, going for a retrospective mood that produced by far the warmest songs of the band’s career. A true classic by one of the great bands of all time, and in 2007, you could pay anywhere from nothing to everything to get it, all at your own discretion. Music will never be the same.
4. Brian Wilson, SMiLE
It took almost 40 years of trials, re-recordings, and the constant fear of absolute failure, but in 2004 Brian Wilson finally finished his masterpiece, SMiLE. The official follow-up to The Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds, considered by many to be among the greatest rock albums of all time, SMiLE had all the pressure of the world’s expectations on its shoulders. When the time came at last to listen, we could only awe at its mastery, at the heartache and longing that poured from Wilson’s voice. Perhaps it was the journey that truly made the music, but it was worth every step.
5. Fleet Foxes, Fleet Foxes
Perhaps no musical genre was revitalized in the last decade quite the way folk was. Contemporaries drawing from bluegrass and roots music appeared in all corners of the country, and what could have been a dead genre of America’s past became a new vision of vocal and instrumental lavishness. No group exemplified this as well as Fleet Foxes. On their stunning debut album, singer Robert Pecknold and the band showcase the harmony of their talents while highlighting the harmony of the natural world they live in. The result is as thrilling and haunting as a forest at dusk.
6. Grizzly Bear, Veckatimest
Grizzly Bear may be the best example of a band in the Aughts that, like many other groups, grow proportionally with their level of experimentation. Their first album, the sleepy Horn of Plenty, was essentially a solo record for lead singer Ed Droste. The breakout underground classic Yellow House saw Droste collaborating more with guitarist and second lead vocalist Daniel Rossen, stretching from basement effects-laden solo crooning to rich folk harmonies. But on Veckatimest, every band member made their contributions, and the result was more lush and vibrant than anyone had expected from the young group; string sections, children’s choirs, along with the band’s already impressive songwriting pushed them into a new stratosphere of musicality. Grizzly Bear has become the band to watch moving forward into the new decade.
7. The White Stripes, White Blood Cells
Jack White was easily the greatest rock star of this decade, and nowhere were his powers more finely honed than on The White Stripes’ breakthrough album. Jagged, at times even painful, The Stripes brought everything they had, the blues, the rock, the punk, and threw it all together and painted it in white, red, and black. They smeared their essence over the listener, poured themselves into the ear canals and throats of every indie rock fan, and after a while, you couldn’t just lay back and take it, but you begged for more.
8. P.O.S, Never Better
Never Better may seem an unusual inclusion on a list of this sort. And, frankly, it is. But of all hip-hop albums released this past decade, P.O.S.’s masterpiece may be the most unusual in a very profound way. Admittedly, time will tell whether the album will have any impact; it flew far under the radar of most critics and even of many fans of independent label Rhymesayers Entertainment (probably the best indie label of any genre this decade). But P.O.S., real name Stefon Alexander, is an MC of his own: His flow is mighty and fluid, his lyrics avoid self-congratulation, and, most importantly, his musical influences bleed over every track, rap and punk mixing in a way that makes both styles more excitingly listenable. No song is out of place, and this is why Never Better belongs among the best albums of the Aughts.
9. Arctic Monkeys, Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not
Exploding out of the gate in 2006, The Arctic Monkeys quickly blew past their punk rock brethren, both in terms of sales and in terms of quality, by creating a landmark album. A young band with stories of street hoods and dance clubs told with acerbic wit and sneering swagger that captures the feeling of the nightlife of young English boys and girls who are just trying to have a good time with no idea of what they’re really doing, Arctic Monkeys also capitalize on impressive guitar and drum work to make a thrilling and endlessly entertaining listening experience.
10. Gnarls Barkley, St. Elsewhere
More than chart-topping dance extravaganzas, Gnarls Barkley are proof that honesty and emotion can live and breathe in the pop world. Lyrically, and vocally, Cee-Lo Green possesses one of the most unique talents in all of music. Few other artists could make a classic hit single out of a song as full of pain and regret and trepidation as “Crazy.” But St. Elsewhere, and its more sorrowful, soulful follow-up The Odd Couple, is worth so much more than a party mix. From the album’s stirring title track to the thunderous “Storm Coming,” Gnarls Barkley has, perhaps more than any other act of the Aughts, exemplified the dichotomy between substantive, cerebral beauty and unending upbeat motion that’s worth coming back to again and again.
