The music business experienced something akin to the Cambrian Explosion in the past decade: The diversity of music, and certainly the diversity of the people who make it, grew tremendously. (See? I took a biology class in college.) Who would have thought at the beginning of 2000, when artists like N’Sync and The Backstreet Boys and Limp Bizkit and Korn were still dominant in the charts that by 2010 critics would stop talking about the struggle between rock and pop, would forget all about nu-metal and bubblegum pop. The popstars became club sensations; Britney Spears’ most recent album sounded poised for a rave. And the hard rock acts of ten years ago are all but nullified in the new industry. Blame the internet, the shattering of major label credibility, 9/11 and the embattled soul of a nation, the shrinking of the international divide; whatever the reason, the Aughts were about trying every new thing within reach. That’s how a young British man of Nigerian descent became the face of a new genre of hip-hop unlike anything anyone had heard before. It’s why rock and roll moved from guitar/bass/drums to guitar/bass/drums/keys/computers/whatever is lying around. It’s the reason that places like Montreal, Omaha, and Portland became meccas of a musical revolution.
So here now are the AudioSuede staff’s picks for some of the most important, influential, and all-around-great artists of the Aughts. Some might be left out, and we’re sure you’ll let us know what we missed. But in the end, all of the artists listed here have made an impact in some way:
Dizzee Rascal
Dizzee Rascal took English music by storm in 2003 with his debut, Boy in da Corner. He was seventeen, came from nowhere, and had a sick rapping style – frenetic, with a voice like a yelp and a London accent as thick as a lef of ham. His songs – notably the incredible ‘Fix Up, Look Sharp’, with its huge beats and Joker-style delivery – were incredibly ambitious and well realised, and he had a wide-eyed, almost innocent appeal to him. His next album featured more of the same – including a fantastic South Pacific-sampling ‘Dream’ – and his music has progressively got poppier and more fun. He still has huge edge to him, though, and a real musician’s feel for constructing songs. The curve of his career, from on-the-fringes to king of British pop, is testimony to his talent and winning charm. He is purely of his time, and a wonderful vision of modern Britain.
Rufus Wainwright
Rufus Wainwright remains a very personal artist for me, but I truly think his music has a very particular genius to it. I think his albums from this decade have featured some of the most exquisitely beautiful songwriting of all time: ‘Dinner At Eight’, his attack on his father, which borrows a David and Goliath metaphor to begin with, and ends up with an affirmation of love, is a quite extraordinary song, not least because it piggybacks and one-ups his father’s own confessional style of music. ‘Going To A Town’ is a merciless attack on America; ‘Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk’ a beautiful meditation on addiction. I think Wainwright Jr is a visionary for these times because of the modern gloss he has put on older styles of music, fusing operatics and music-hall with singer-songwriter forms, and documenting his heartbreak and struggles with drugs in a way that is unapologetically queer yet accessible.
Bjork
It may seem weird to pick Bjork as an artist who defined this decade, when she’s so heavily associated with the 90s (and that run of albums from Debut to Homogenic via Post is unbelievable), but for me she produced her best album this decade (Vespertine), and experimented with music in ways that were always thrilling, even if her last album is definitely her weakest of all. She symbolises the modern state of music for me – the restlessness of it, its lack of boundaries, its playfulness, and its use of technology. Hell, she even did the back-to-her-roots thing with Medulla, a brilliant album of acapella songs. Screw Bon Iver and his log cabin. I admire the way she took command of her own career this decade, producing her own songs with her own clear vision of the sounds she wanted, and collaborating with talents like Matmos, Toumani Diabate, Timbaland, Rahzel and Antony Hegarty. Her very last song of the decade, ‘Nattura’, recorded with Thom Yorke, is a masterpiece of cut-up beats – bold and primal like her.
-Caspar
Death Cab for Cutie are easily one of the biggest targets for sadsack pop-rock jokes nowadays, and yet, their music is never taken to task: only their aesthetic. This is because as objective as one can possibly be as a music critic, the band has steadily churned out album after album of expertly written, performed, and recorded tunes. They’re intelligent but inviting, emotional but focused, and laidback but passionate. In any other hands this equation might add up to mild or lackluster, but with singer/guitarist Ben Gibbard’s seductive croon and guitarist/producer Chris Walla’s impeccable knack for hooks and atmospheres, it becomes quite hard to not quiver at the sound of songs like “For What Reason” from their 2000 four-track textured release We Have The Facts And We’re Voting Yes. And as the decade progressed, so did Death Cab in their own slight but evolutionary way. 2001 saw the band refine its sound with The Photo Album, whose highlight “A Movie Script Ending” would foreshadow the band’s ongoing obsession with sparkling soft tones and juggling life as fantasy vs. reality. In 2003, the band’s sudden exposure to the mainstream caught fire with tracks from their third full-length, the gargantuan epic Transatlanticism, winding up practically as plot points in the distinctly 00’s primetime soap opera The O.C.. This started what some (including myself, for a brief period) considered a decline for the band, as they rode this newfound success to a major record label deal which resulted in 2005’s Plans and 2008’s Narrow Stairs, two albums that maybe didn’t match the climaxes or energies of their previous work, but over time have proved to be definitively Death Cab. Overall, the 00s have treated the band well and likewise, Gibbard and co. have shown that with thought-provoking lyrics and instrumentation that equally shimmers and intrigues, a mild-mannered band from Washington can go a long way.
The unfortunate starting point for four quiet guys from Texas was releasing an album with a plane on its cover and the moniker Explosions in the Sky on its spine the week of 9/11. It was particularly unfair because that album, 2001’s Those Who Tell The Truth Shall Die, Those Who Tell The Truth Shall Live Forever was a monumentally poetic 50-minute collection of music hinting at the implications of death and memory – all without any lyrics, just crushing rock and an exquisitely placed audio sample from Terrence Malick’s The Thin Red Line. It didn’t receive proper praise until a couple years later when the dust of that fateful September morning had settled and people were ready to let Explosions hit them, just not too close to home this time. Their 2003 powerhouse The Earth Is Not A Cold Dead Place took the melodramatic themes of their previous album and transformed them into a set of anthems for hope, something people especially needed and could get behind after reeling from the (without getting too political) effects from 9/11 over the past two years. Soon people who never thought they’d listen to a band without vocals (myself included) came out of the woodwork to hear what Explosions’ guitars and toms had to say, without ever absorbing or uttering a single word. The appreciation led to the songs being re-recorded with strings for the film Friday Night Lights and subsequently, the television show of the same name, giving post-rock a firm place in both headphones and movie theater speakers – a sound that’s both completely personal and universally affecting. The tried and true formula continued with 2007’s All Of A Sudden I Miss Everyone, which found the band edging toward some new flourishes including soothing piano riffs and complicated time signatures and song structures. I can only hope that this timeless sound will continue to progress and soundtrack our lives into the next decade.
The distinction between band and collective may seem silly upon first glance, but in the case of Broken Social Scene, it’s a necessity. And it’s part of what makes them one of the defining artists of the past decade. These guys and gals aren’t just a fixed group of friends who get together to write songs, play shows, and release records. As hippy-ish as it sounds, Broken Social Scene are a loose-knit network of friends who, basically whenever the mood strikes them or their schedule frees up, come together or splinter off into various subsets to write songs, play shows, and release records. From their affiliated bands such as Metric, Do Make Say Think, and Stars, to their BSS presents… series in which they highlight the compositions and conductions of particular group members such as Brendan Canning and Kevin Drew, to their three sprawling records of dissonant positivity and smiling destruction, Broken Social Scene is less a singular musical artist than it is a state of mind. While they may traverse the rock subgenre map from straightforward indie rock to synth pop-rock to dreamy prog rock, the Canadian cooperative all have a certain ethic in common: celebrate wildly and celebrate often. Every song from every related outfit has some kind of rejoicing center/core to it that makes everything infinitely listenable and enjoyable. In particular, the three proper albums under the Broken Social Scene moniker (2001’s Feel Good Lost, 2003’s You Forgot It In People, and 2005’s Broken Social Scene) are chaotically gorgeous affairs steeped in a strong and voluminous clatter that is as maddening as it is addicting. In chronological order, they start out ambient and wandering, progress to manic and contemplative, and wind up in a pile of symphonic and impassioned bedlam. The exponential increase in energy gives a good clue as to why after the self-titled record the members had to break out a little bit to focus on their other projects, but it’s also something that will make all BSS supporters yearn for another record, oh please please please, sometime in the next ten years.
-Chris Polley
Animal Collective
As far as trend setting in the indie scene goes in the last decade there really have been few as effectual as Animal Collective. Setting the mood for the freak-folk movement with Sung Tongs and Feels, to the guitar-centric electrolysis of Strawberry Jam, to the washed out electronics of the pristine Merriweather Post Pavillion, to probably even the unseen effects of Fall Be Kind, Animal Collective have been pushing indie music to new places. Side projects from Avey Tare and Panda Bear have been equally monumental with the spacious sampling of Person Pitch and the hushed preciousness of Pullhair Rubeye (when reversed, of course). Sonically they have always had ideas that existed just outside the realm of the indie-consciousness and when they brought them in everyone sighed out a collective (ha!) “Ohhhhhhh!” Beyond that were the lyrics that, in a decade which was tumultuous to say the least, had an eternal optimism which shone like an acid-induced hallucination of a beacon. Earlier in their career, especially on Feels they dealt with sexuality in a celebratory and everyday way that seemed revolutionary. They have us something inward to focus on and cherish. On Strawberry Jam the songs focused on an attempt to push your worldview outside of yourself and to see others in new and fully formed ways. Taking responsibility for your actions and those around you. And finally on Merriweather we see the extrapolated end of this path: fully grown adults finding true joy and comfort in family and friends. A love that can only be built and destroyed by ourselves. Through a destabilizing decade Animal Collective never let a vision of genuine happiness become shrouded in the fear and materialism of the 2000’s.
The Microphones/Mount Eerie
I have always had a soft spot for groups that come out of the North West of the country and the music they produce. There is something undeniably romantic about the never-ending stretches of looming pines and mountain ranges that swallow you up whole. Without being the biggest outdoors adventuring type, most people can have a respect for that kind of untouched and sublime nature. And Phil Elverum made some of the best music about our relationship with that environment under the guises The Microphones and later as Mount Eerie. Without this becoming a rant on the deforestation of America and loss of all things natural in our lives, these are very important changes that have occurred in our lifetimes. As a reaction many artists have attempted to romanticize the natural world in an Emersonian style, but Phil Elverum did us a great favor by exploring the ambiguities of that world and what it means to be in contact with it. On his album Mount Eerie the mountain that stood oppressively over his home town Phil gives it a metaphor of death. And that album can be terrifying and unnerving at times. And that’s okay, because nature can be that. At other times he is finding connections between his own body and the earth while camping, only to be awakened by cars on a nearby highway. He often sings about the uncaring personality of nature and how it seems to disregard him entirely, because it does. And at the same time he celebrates its unquestionable beauty and ability to show us the truths via metaphor that can often escape us in our daily lives. It has the power to change us to and make us feel things that no man-made creation ever can. Over the last ten years Elverum has been doing his damndest to paint a lasting picture of an impossible to describe world and he has done it through ever impressive means. Lo-fi experiments to concept album epics as The Microphones to delicate acoustic pieces to synth-based one offs to quasi-black-metal as Mount Eerie. Each time bringing us all a little closer to a true vision of the world.
WHY?
Yoni Wolf is my favorite and I would say one of the better lyricists of the last ten years. His melding together of stream-of-consciousness word connections, hip-hop influenced rhyme schemes, and existential post-modernist subject matter makes him an absolute wonder to see in action. His three major albums this decade with a full band behind him: Elephant Eyelash, Alopecia, and Eskimo Snow have all been impeccable in the relationship between music and lyric. On their first effort there were songs such as “Light Leaves” which dealt with the sad realization that what we leave behind on Earth is in many ways incredibly insignificant and defiantly claimed that there was no heaven, and then in a winking nod of irony transitioned the studio track to a live performance. In the song “Act Five” off the same album the realities of a slow death are explored while an awful squeal of distortion persists in the background, hidden behind mechanical strums. On Alopecia there is “Simeon’s Dilemma” where a touching love song turns to uneasy obsession while the drums build up into a pulsing crescendo. Or on Eskimo Snow’s “Into the Shadow of My Embrace” where a distorted guitar’s devolved noise hangs over the edge of the bar as Yoni talks about kissing his shrink in a hotel room. These moments, present throughout their albums, provided a rich experience and something rewarding to decode after many listens. The neurosis and heartache were cathartic and discovering the hidden messages felt like finding someone who truly understands.
-Cooper Foyt
Radiohead
What more can be said about Radiohead’s work in the last decade? Following 1997’s colossal OK Computer, an undisputed classic that defined Radiohead in the ‘90s, they had so much to lose going forward. It seemed there was nowhere to go but down; they’d already transformed rock and roll once (some would argue twice, if you count The Bends as a landmark album, which I don’t). So what did they do (what could they do) but blow the entire genre to bits? 2000’s Kid A has been praised to death, but no one can deny its profound impact on the history of popular music. Because of that one album, a thousand bands formed with the simplest of song structures braced with the most complex instrumentations, stripped-down and filled-up all at once. Keys and computers replaced guitars and drums, nonsense lyrics became anthems. Songs like “How to Disappear Completely…” are mind-blowing still today; how can a song that, at its core, is so small, be so grand and sweeping? But it wasn’t just one album that made Radiohead the band of the Aughts. They continued to travel through the wondrous world of musical exploration, picking up steam with 2001’s Amnesiac, regaining their edge with 2003’s Hail to the Thief, eventually leading to a full-blown revolution in 2007. That, of course, was the year in which Radiohead, having split from their major label, released In Rainbows, their warmest and most accessible album, online, allowing fans to pay whatever they wanted for a copy. To conceive of this at the beginning of the decade would have been impossible. When Radiohead did it, it sparked a whole new wave of creativity in the business side of music; now every band has to try a new way of getting their music to the masses, every band has to think outside the box to succeed, and many are doing it on their own, throwing their creative business practices in the face of every major label executive. What Radiohead has done is nothing short of unbelievable, and they aren’t finished yet. How can they possibly continue their dominance? Who knows? Maybe they’ll find a way to reinvent the wheel by the time 2020 rolls around.
The Arcade Fire
In almost every possible sense, The Arcade Fire’s rise has been improbable. A French Canadian band with a string section, an organist, and a member whose job seems to be hitting things as hard as possible, they were only in existence as a group for a few years at the most before shooting to stardom with 2004’s Funeral. Their music inspired the likes of U2, who blasted the song “Wake Up” as they walked onto stage every night during a world tour. The band even caused a minor feud to form between David Bowie and Beck (of all people), each of whom claimed to have discovered the young band in the first place. Singer Win Butler has even become close friends with Bruce Springsteen. How did they find such success so quickly? The answer is in the music. Grand and profound, everything about The Arcade Fire is large and shot through with the deeper meaning of life and death and the world around us. Funeral is filled with an almost child-like energy, full of hope and, in a way, naivety. 2006’s Neon Bible is that same child-like energy grown to the teenage years. Within its darker mood is angst, a sense that the world has gone wrong and we need to get back where we belong. As “Wake Up” is a call to action and “Neighborhood #4” is the fear of old age, “Windowsill” is teenage rebellion, “Keep the Car Running” is excitement and possibility. If this is true, if Funeral is a beautiful child and Neon Bible is a growing teen, oh how exciting it will be to hear what’s next, the fully grown adult that will hopefully reveal itself in this new decade. We need only to wait and believe.
TV on the Radio
In the history of music, it’s rare that we can say that one artist or another “invented” a genre. Miles Davis is credited with the creation of several different styles of jazz, for example. More often, the evolution of a genre of music is a shared experience amongst several artists, and indeed among fans. But when genre bending becomes particularly apparent, it’s often startling, and may even take quite a while to catch on. Such is the case, arguably, with TV on the Radio, who, rather than simply carrying on the evolution of one or two genres, somehow manage to cram several genres together at once to spark something entirely new. In a given TV on the Radio song, one can hear obvious punk rock grinding, heavy afrobeat, electronica, bebop, in some cases even hip-hop. From the opening horn on 2004’s Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes to the rushing, pulsing power of “Wolf Like Me” off 2006’s Return to Cookie Mountain and the spastic energy of “Dancing Choose” from Dear Science in 2008, TV on the Radio is a strange, ever-moving beast. Their melodies are increasingly jagged; Kyp Malone’s outrageous falsetto often scrawls itself, lisp and all, over frontman Tunde Adebimpe’s raw emotional power, writing out with vigor “This is who we are.” And it’s this mentality of the new and the one-of-a-kind experimentation that drives us to listen to the band as they seek the colors and scratches on the walls of our world and our understanding. For TV on the Radio, everything is in play, and play is all they know how to do.
-Christian Hagen
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