In The Midnight Hour

RIP Wilson 'Wicked' Pickett - one of the true greats of soul music.

Hotly Anticipated Records For 2006

It looks likely that 2006 will be another great year, with the early part of the year already promising some treats. I'm hoping for some great debut albums from some of the great new acts to break through in 2005 - The Pipettes, The Long Blondes, Twisted Charm perhaps, but there's no word on any full length releases from these acts as yet. Here are some of the confirmed releases that look most exciting.

In January, Cat Power returns with an album recorded with the legendary Hi Records rhythm section, backing band to Al Green and Ann Peebles among others. It sounds like a fascinating combination. Another peculiar, but perhaps more predictable collaboration comes with the covers album promised from Tortoise and Bonnie 'Prince' Billy. 'The Brave and The Bold' features radically deconstructed versions of Elton John's 'Daniel' and Bruce Springsteen's 'Thunder Roads' amongst other less ubiquitous choice cuts. The Gossip return with 'Standing In The Way Of Control' and tour the UK in February. The sadly underrated Clearlake release third album 'Amber'. Rilo Kiley frontwoman Jenny Lewis ventures out alone with 'Rabbit Fur Coat'.

Not much confirmed for February yet, but a highlight is definitely the new album from the prolific In League With Paton favourites The Broken Family Band. I've already got a copy of this - a review will follow shortly. Apparently not an official follow-up to 'Surrounded in Silence', but more of a stop-gap, 'Security Screenings' is the latest project from Prefuse 73. Animal Collective's Paw Tracks imprint continues in its valiant quest to issue the complete home-recorded works of the wonderful Ariel Pink. 'House Arrest' promises to be his best yet. Erstwhile New Pornographer Dan Bejar returns in his Destroyer guise for 'Destroyer's Rubies'. After the outstanding 'Your Blues', this is one of the albums I'm most looking forward to in 2006. There's also a new record from OutKast, which will no doubt save hip-hop for a while.

In March, there are some absolute gems from the other side of the pond. Quasi return with 'When The Going Gets Dark'. Their last LP, 'Hot Shit', divided opinion somewhat. The increasingly bizarre Liars release third LP 'Drum's Not Dead', which may well be excellent. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs have a lot of expectation to live up to when they release 'Show Your Bones'. Former Screaming Trees frontman Mark Lanegan joins forces with Isobel Campbell to release 'Ballad Of The Broken Seas'. The inevitable Lee HAzlewood/Nancy Sinatra comparisons are already becoming somewhat tiresome. Most exciting of all is the return of Loose Fur, the collaboration between Glen Kotche and Jeff Tweedy of Wilco and Jim O'Rourke. 'Born Again In The USA' surely can't be anything other than superb. Neko Case returns with 'Fox Confessor Brings The Flood' - no doubt more along the reverb drenched lines of recent studio efforts. Back in Britain, it will be impossible to avoid the return of Morrissey, who releases his brilliantly titled 'Ringleader Of The Tormentors' and also promises a massive UK tour, about which I am tremendously excited. Moz claims not to be a performer, which is of course nonsense - he is just about the best performer in the business.

April brings the long-awaited 'At War With The Mystics' by The Flaming Lips. It can't really be better than The Soft Bulletin - but let's hope it won't irritate as much as the worst bits of Yoshimi... Also, Calexico are back with 'Garden Ruin', which will no doubt be dependably controlled. I'm lucky enough to be seeing both acts live over the weekend of the 22nd-23rd April.

There are also lots of vaguely promised record which as yet do not have confirmed release dates. Toronto's finest gay indie types The Hidden Cameras return with 'Awoo', which may well up the silliness factor at the expense of the sensitive. Also, there's new records from the likes of Grandaddy, The Shins, Sonic Youth, TV On The Radio.

There are some long-awaited releases to look forward to. Solo albums from Steely Dan's Donald Fagen don't come around that often (the last was in 1994), but when they do, they are always full of fascinating ruminations and biting insight. 'Morph The Cat' should be an unmissable slice of wry irony set to perfectly constructed lounge backings. Now signed to 4AD, there's a new album scheduled from Scott Walker, although it would not surprise me if his reclusive tendencies lead to this being delayed. It's hard to believe, but the gap between Portishead albums has now stretched to nine years - it sounds like their third will finally arrive in 2006.

In a completely different style, the return of The Lemonheads reminds us only that The Lemonheads were always a revolving cast of musicians. This is not a reunion as such but rather the first recorded output from the new 'heads line-up Evan Dandon took on tour last year. Obviously the solo album didn't sell enough records then. It also looks as if The Notwist will finally release a follow-up to the exquisite 'Neon Golden'. Surely, this is the year for AC/DC to come back with the long-promised 'Strap It On'.

Prince looks set to return on another major label contract with '3121', which may or not be good. Stephin Merritt of The Magnetic Fields has finished his album of original Show Tunes and it will be released in April.

Most exciting hip-hop release looks certain to be the new album from Cannibal Ox, a band who previously announced their split only to immediately reform again. If it retains some of the menace and grit of their masterpiece 'The Cold Vein', it will be a definite top 10 contender by the end of the year. Further underground contenders come from two wunderkinds of modern music - Patrick Wolf, who is currently hard at work on 'The Magic Position', his third album in as many years and Khonnor who will follow up the beguiling 'Handwriting' this year.

In jazz, look out for new albums from Chick Corea and Roy Hargrove particularly. No doubt the F-IRE collective will continue their tremendous momentum - hopefully with a full - length from Jade Fox.

Watch this space for the first reviews of 2006 - coming very soon!

Honorable Mentions

I would have included the following two albums in my albums of the year, were they readily available commercially. It can, however, only be a matter of time before these acts achieve the success they deserve.

Tom Rogerson's self-titled debut album was recorded in New York with members of The Bad Plus (a major coup for a new musician if ever there was one!) and is a highly creative and intuitive improvised work. Tom can currently be seen playing piano with Jeremy Warmsley's backing band the LMNOPs, but the song-based approach of that music is really no preparation for this abstract, yet intensely focussed work. There is feeling as well as science in Tom's unpredictable compositions.

'Halcyon Days', the first proper album from Colonel Bastard is as enjoyable a pop album as I've heard all year. Wonderfully quirky pop songs with a distinctively British sensibility - well removed from the tiresome scenesters which seem to dominate the British independent secto at the moment. Anyway, things move in cycles and, regardless of how terrible they are, it seems likely that the Kaiser Chiefs may reignite interest in this sort of approach in 2006. To order the album, go to http://www.colonelbastard.com

Singles Of The Year 2005

I can't really be bothered to do a precise or comprehensive list of singles - or even decide on the very best. So here, in no particular order, are some of the singles I most enjoyed in 2005.

The Pipettes - Dirty Mind
The Long Blondes - Appropriation By Any Other Name
The Priscillas - Gonna Rip Up Your Photograph
Twisted Charm - London Scene?
Twisted Charm - Broken Girl
Hot Chip - Barbarian EP
Jeremy Warmsley - 5 Interesting Lies EP
Clor - Love and Pain
Teenage Fanclub - It's All In My Mind
Rachel Stevens - So Good
Rachel Stevens - I Said Never Again (But Here We Are)
Arcade Fire - Cold Wind
Animal Collective- Grass
Animal Collective and Vashti Bunyan - Prospect Hummer
Maximo Park - Apply Some Pressure
British Sea Power - Please Stand Up
Broken Family Band - Happy Days Are Here Again
Girls Aloud - Biology
Jackson and His Computer Band - Rock On
Kate Bush - King Of The Mountain
Roots Manuva - Colossal Insight
Jamie Lidell - Multiply
LCD Soundsystem - Daft Punk Is Playing At My House
Daft Punk - Robot Rock
Juan Maclean - Tito's Way
Antony and the Johnsons - Hope There's Someone
Charlotte Church - Call My Name
Common - The Corner
Spoon - I Turn My Camera On
Pussycat Dolls - Don't Cha
McFly - Ultraviolet
White Stripes - My Doorbell
Gorillaz - Dare
Sleater Kinney - Entertain
Pure Reason Revolution - Bright Ambassadors Of Morning
Depeche Mode - Precious
Elbow - Forget Myself
Broken Social Scene - Ibi Dreams Of Pavement
Magnolia Electric Co. - Hard To Love A Man
Sugababes - Push The Button
My Morning Jacket - Off The Record
Broadcast - America's Boy
Four Tet - Smile Around The Face
Caribou - Yeti
Bloc Party - Two More Years
Gorillaz - Dare
Gorillaz - Feel Good Inc
Gorillaz - Dirty Harry
Low - California
Patrick Wolf - The Libertine
Ciara - Goodies
Missy Elliott - Teary Eyed
Missy Elliott - Lose Control
M83 - Don't Save Us From The Flames

The In League With Paton Albums Of The Year 2005

Finally it’s here – the end-of-year megapost, a couple of days late. Sorry for that. Before we start counting down the big 75, it’s worth mentioning that I’ve given time to well over 100 albums this year, and there are plenty of worthy efforts that I haven’t managed to find space for here. There are also some honorary mentions – records I think should probably be in this list but that I simply haven’t managed to listen to properly yet – John Prine, Ellen Allien, Keith Jarrett, Wayne Shorter, Vitalic, Gang Gang Dance, Wilderness,

75. BROKEN FAMILY BAND – Welcome Home Loser

Well there has to be a number 75, but I can’t help feeling a little cruel propping up the list with BFB. As a collection of songs, ‘Welcome Home Loser’ was their strongest set yet, including a number of live favourites that perhaps suffered only from over-familiarity. The production was crisp and (perhaps too) clean, and the trademark Steven Adams dry wit remained on top form.

74. EST – Viaticum

More stadium jazz from Esbjorn Svensson’s hugely popular trio. It’s arguably closer to chamber music than jazz, with Svensson’s limited talents at improvising meaning that it’s more about atmosphere and mood than thrilling extemporising. ‘Viaticum’ was elegantly restrained and very cerebral, but also touching.

73. LOU BARLOW - Emoh

This would be an easy one to overlook, if only because Lou Barlow is such a self-deprecating character. ‘Emoh’ may well be his least assuming album to date, but it’s also one of his best, with strong songs mostly left uncluttered and free of the wilful sabotage sometimes exerted by Sebadoh or Folk Implosion. The melodies are lush and carefully charted, and Barlow’s understated vocal delivery remains one of pop’s most forlorn voices, brilliant at expressing the frustration and confusion he writes about so well.

72. RACHEL STEVENS – Come And Get It

No I’m not joking. It’s really a great shame that both record company and artist seemed to have lost faith in this pure pop gem by the time it was finally released. It’s much more than the usual collection of great singles and slushy filler, and every bit the equal of Annie’s ‘Anniemal’. It’s just a little bit less cool to admit to liking it.

71. MU – Out Of Breach

If most people were grimly fascinated by the Michael Jackson trial, it’s safe to say that Mu was more likely enraged. Her shrieking on ‘Stop Bothering Michael Jackson’ may be the most impassioned sound of the year. With hysterical ravings almost entirely devoid of melody, and a very uncertain grasp of the English language, Mu remains a violently compelling voice. Together with Maurice Fulton’s awesome, relentless percussion-dominated production, she produced an album that was captivating and terrifying in equal measure.


70. JOHN CALE – Black Acetate

Although it was a bit of a strange mix of genres, ‘Black Acetate’ provided plenty of evidence that Cale is still full of ideas, as well as absorbing some very modish new influences and inspirations. He can cover spiky guitar pop as well as the more forward-thinking soulful electronic material. This is a cerebral set that also has an urgency and immediacy absent from, say, the more ponderous Brian Eno album also released this year.


69. JACKSON AND HIS COMPUTER BAND – Smash

The stuttering, glitchy French approach to modern day disco was back with a bang with the slapdash cut and paste brilliance of Jackson. He possibly had the shortest attention span in modern music but from this, he crafted something edgy and thrilling. He also demonstrated a strong sense of humour, and therefore avoided confrontation without results, although his pulverising live shows were something else entirely.

68. LAURA VEIRS – Year Of Meteors

Unfairly dismissed as a move towards more conventional territory, ‘Year Of Meteors’ continued Veirs’ songwriting preoccupations with elements and natural phenomena, maintaining her distinctive sense of awe and wonder whilst developing her melodic gifts. Less abrasive than previous works, but no less fascinating, it is the eerie, evocative work of a maturing songwriter..

67. RUFUS WAINWRIGHT – Want Two

Really an album of 2004, but not afforded a release date in Britain until well into 2005. The vagaries of record company schedules made Rufus work hard to promote two albums he had intended to release as one – but the distance between them made the differences between the two Want albums appear even starker. Where the former was ornate, lavish and occasionally excessive – Want Two is reflective, dramatic and elegant.

66. SOUTH SAN GABRIEL – The Carlton Chronicles

A concept album about a cat? It sounds like a disastrous trip to planet whimsy, but it actually works rather well. This is mostly because Will Johnson (who also records as Centr-O-Matic and under his own name) has a great control of sound and atmosphere. This is an album that can be taken in humorous spirit, but which also contains songs that are delicate, warm and touching.

65. M83 – Before The Dawn Heals Us

Well, it wasn’t exactly a match for the stunning ‘Dead Cities…’ album, but exactly what is? At least M83 didn’t settle for sticking to the same formula. ‘Before The Dawn Heals Us’ seemed to push their progressive elements to the fore, occasionally even resembling the regal pomp of Pink Floyd. When added to their more electronic leanings, this made for a distinctive and powerful combination.

64. FOUR TET – Everything Ecstatic

Whilst not Kieren Hebden’s absolute best work, it still seems inexplicable that this inventive and entertaining record has been left off almost all the major end of year lists. His preoccupation with dense layered percussion (which looks set to be continued in his work with the Steve Reid Ensemble) came to the fore, and ‘Everything Ecstatic’ is an insistent, intensely rhythmic concoction.

63. SPOON – Gimme Fiction

Britt Daniel’s Spoon have produced a remarkably consistent and enjoyable body of work, and ‘Gimme Fiction’ is a dependable collection of quirky guitar pop. Much of this album is raggedly infectious and it’s a shame that the band have been relatively neglected in this country. I’d take this over the banal and infuriating chav-pop of Hard-Fi any day of the week.

62. GIRLS ALOUD – Chemistry

Oh, you love it really. They remain the only decent thing to have come from the vacuous world of reality TV, and this album, surely likely to be their last, will also stand as their enduring legacy. This is disposable, playful pop music, brilliantly produced by Brian Higgins’ Xenomania team, with elements lovingly pinched from the likes of Giorgio Moroder and The Human League. Do the girls really have any talent? Frankly, who cares – they deliver the frequently hilarious lyrics with such shameless gusto that it doesn’t matter at all.

61. DEPECHE MODE – Playing The Angel

Martin Gore was at his most OTT on ‘Playing The Angel’, but even a slightly substandard Mode album is better than most on offer from British bands in 2005 (is anyone seriously suggesting that Arctic Monkeys can work on this level?). This one is especially notable for the introduction of Dave Gahan as songwriting force, and his contributions stand up remarkable well, capturing the same dark, introspective ground as Gore, but arguably in this case, with greater control and success. For me, this album suffered a little from looking backwards, as it mostly retread the sounds and themes of ‘Violator’. Ben Hillier added a few new production tricks, however, and at its best, ‘Playing The Angel’ retained the dynamism that only seems to emerge when this remarkable band set aside their differences and collaborate.

60. THE SINGING ADAMS – Problems

It takes a while to make its impact, but in spite of (or perhaps because of) its lo-rent, lo-fi production values and gritty, forthright lyrics, ‘Problems’ is actually a superb record. There is nothing superfluous here, and Steven Adams’ wry, vulnerable songs are given the necessary space to breathe. Guest appearances from Gill Sandell and Piney Gir add depth and flavour, and the incorporation of what sounds like the influence of folk song is particularly effective.

59. SHARON JONES AND THE DAP KINGS – Naturally

It wasn’t such a great year for R&B in the nu-beats sense, but 2005 saw a real resurgence in the gritty, original, live R&B set-up, with a spectacular return from Bettye Lavette and the continued second life of Solomon Burke. One of the most impressive releases was this superbly swampy, passionate set of danceable classic soul grooves that could set dancefloors alight. ‘Naturally’ is a sensual, primal feast of urgency and energy.

58. SAGE FRANCIS – A Healthy Distrust

I am simply baffled as to why this has not appeared on any of the major end of year lists. It’s one of the year’s most creative hip hop albums, not least for the inspired collaboration with Will Oldham on ‘Sea Lion’, but for its skilful demolition of some of rap’s established clichés and conventions. Its eerie sounds and confrontational performances both disorientate and thrill.

57. SOLOMON BURKE – Make Do With What You’ve Got

He’s so large that he’s barely able to walk but the great man can certainly still sing. There are few living soul artists with this level of power and control, as well as a remarkable subtlety of phrasing. Perhaps it comes from his preaching as much as his singing, but Solomon Burke is a true mass communicator. If I was a little apprehensive that Don Was might produce too glossy a production, my reservations proved largely unfounded. It’s certainly crisper than the earthier ‘Don’t Give Up On Me’ collection, but the song selection is just as inspired. A superbly gritty take on The Band’s ‘It Makes No Difference’, a slinky delivery of Bob Dylan’s ‘What Good Am I?’ are just a couple of the tremendous highlights.

56. BJORK – Drawing Restraint 9

Will Oldham has been getting around a bit in 2005 – and his bizarre contribution to Bjork’s soundtrack to her film director husband Matthew Barney’s latest work may be his strangest work yet. It’s fitting, then, that this is also one of Bjork’s most peculiar and challenging works to date. Mostly instrumental, but occasionally featuring some wordless, intoxicating vocals, it sounds like a modern-day approach to Eastern European folk music and indicates that Bjork is as adept a composer and musical director as she is songwriter and performer. She is forging new and exciting paths with every move she makes – and is in every sense a true artist.

55. THE JUAN MACLEAN – Less Than Human

One of many great records to emerge from the DFA staple, ‘Less Than Human’ manage to generously borrow references from a wide range of sources, including the powerhouse funk of Funkadelic/Parliament, the robotic punk-funk disco stylings of mentors LCD Soundsystem and the pulsating synths of Giorgio Moroder. The result was an intoxicating brew, and one of the year’s best party albums.

54. WILCO – Kicking Television

It would be so tempting to make this a top 10 album, such is its compelling quality. Having made ‘A Ghost Is Born’ my album of the year above The Arcade Fire last year, I will however resist the temptation. It’s been a good year for live albums – but this is comfortably pick of the bunch, capturing the current Wilco line-up at what may well be the peak of their powers. The later, more adventurous material predictably dominates the set, although a crunching ‘Misunderstood’ and a cathartic ‘A Shot In The Arm’ sound entirely comfortably alongside the rest. The spindly, intricate playing of Nels Cline adds an improvisatory spirit to the band’s sound – which is integrated surprisingly effectively with Jeff Tweedy’s more conservative leanings. The album captures the same contrast between propulsive energy and self-absorbed reflection that made ‘A Ghost Is Born’ so fascinating, but turns it into something more immediate and threatening. Not just kicking television, but kicking everyone else into touch.

53. ALASDAIR ROBERTS – No Earthly Man

Alasdair Roberts’ distinctive (and prolific) refashioning of the Scottish folk tradition continued apace with this mysterious and foreboding collection of murder ballads. Roberts has always seen Will Oldham as his mentor, but Oldham’s very presence here makes his influence more overt. Previously a more benign factor, he now imposes a slightly murky and sinister edge to the textures of the music. Roberts’ voice is becoming more assured, and he inhabits these songs with a peculiarly hypnotic charm.

52. LAURA CANTRELL – Humming By The Flowered Vine

There’s very little that’s in any way modern about Laura Cantrell – but in an age where people fall all too easily for the phoney innovations of an M.I.A., it’s refreshing to hear her timeless and traditional approach. It might mean disaster in the hands of a lesser artist, but Cantrell has such an instinctive feel for this old-time music and the results are natural and effortless. She is a very restrained and un-showy singer, and it is through this approach that she captures some of the tensions and heartaches inherent in the country tradition. She impresses both as a writer and as an interpreter, something few can manage these days.

51. BLOC PARTY – Silent Alarm

I spent most of the year thinking that this would remain firmly in the year’s most overrated category – but I think I may be in for a rethink. The band’s sound is relentless and captivating, and largely dominated by the interaction between Kele Okereke’s yelping vocals and Matt Tong’s brilliant, off-kilter drumming. It’s perhaps a little limiting, and they could do with deploying a more melodic approach if the impact is not to dwindle very quickly. But for now, ‘Silent Alarm’ was a treat – a dense, discomforting soundtrack to urban paranoia.

50. TEENAGE FANCLUB – Man-Made

A long-awaited return for the select few who still follow them ardently, ‘Man-Made’ broke little new ground for The Fannies, but simply consolidated their mastery of sun drenched harmony pop. It was perhaps a little less immediate than previous albums and whilst the production of John McEntire didn’t change the band’s sound radically, it did embellish it with new subtleties and textures, particularly on Raymond McGinley’s ‘Only With You’. It reveals new depths with every listen, and is a comfortably warm and familiar work.

49. CARIBOU – The Milk Of Human Kindness

Formerly known as Manitoba, Dan Snaith was forced to revise his trading name after legal action from Handsome Dick Manitoba, a clumsy attempt at self-publicity that only served to raise the profile of the artist on the receiving end of the action. ‘The Milk Of Human Kindness’ moves further away from the minimal electronica of Snaith’s debut, and furthers the clattering percussion and Krautrock inspired minimal harmony of ‘Up In Flames’. It lacks the shock of the new that its predecessor provided, but it’s mercilessly concise and consistently thrilling nonetheless.

48. IMMACULATE MACHINE – Ones And Zeroes

This one hasn’t been officially released in the UK yet, but I’m really hoping someone will pick it up for distribution as it is a masterful and well paced collection of crisp power pop, with infectious melodies and carefully crafted harmonies. There’s no bassist, but the interaction of explosive drumming and jagged guitar lines certifies that this needn’t be a limiting factor. This is as good a set of pop songs as I’ve heard in 2005.

47. BETTYE LAVETTE – I’ve Got My Own Hell To Raise

If it’s good enough for Elvis Costello, it certainly ought to be good enough for me. This remarkable comeback album sees soul legend LaVette benefit from the same Joe Henry production treatment that worked so well for Solomon Burke. This is a collection of songs from unexpected sources – all female. LaVette tackles songs from such disparate writers as Sinead O’ Connor, Leonard Cohen collaborator Sharon Robinson, Lucinda Williams, Fiona Apple and Joan Armatrading. She leaves her own personal stamp on each song, sounding gutsy and determined throughout, but also demonstrating precise control over her expressive phrasing.

46. TORD GUSTAVSEN TRIO – The Ground

Tord Gustavsen’s trio are ploughing the same soft, atmospheric ground as EST, but with arguably more emotion and musical quality. This music manages to be stirring without resorting to anything more than muted dynamics, and its subtlety has a cumulative charge.

45. BROADCAST – Tender Buttons

Now brutally chopped to a mere duo, Broadcast’s loss of band members necessitated a more taut, fearsomely minimal sound. ‘Tender Buttons’ delivered this and more – a direct and intense blast of motorik insistence. It doesn’t have the same level of sheer beauty as ‘Ha Ha Sound’, but then it’s coming from a completely different place, so that doesn’t really matter.

44. BOARDS OF CANADA – The Campfire Headphase

If it’s not quite a classic on the level of ‘Music Has The Right…’ then that’s probably only because familiarity breeds contempt. Repeated listens do reveal new levels of interest in that well-ingrained BoC sound, not least the introduction of live instrumentation, which works surprisingly well. This time, it’s more blissful than sinister though, and ‘The Campfire Headphase’ may lull you into a false sense of security.

43. CHRIS T-T – 9 Red Songs

Chris T-T remains one of the most endearing songwriters at work and even though this is a righteous politically charged album full of anger and bitterness, it still finds room for reflection and all round good humour. T-T’s observational writing has never been more incisive, and simply on a musical level, with its intricate and considered arrangements, this is his best album to date.

42. BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN – Devils and Dust

‘Devils and Dust’ inevitably suffers a little from unfavourable comparisons with ‘Nebraska’ and ‘The Ghost Of Tom Joad’, the other two ‘acoustic’ Springsteen records and twin pillars of his output so far. ‘D & D’ does try something a bit different, however, mixing stripped back meditative storytelling with very basic rockers that don’t sound a million miles away from the much maligned ‘Human Touch’ and ‘Lucky Town’. At its best (‘Long Time Comin’, ‘Maria’s Bed’, ‘Reno’, ‘Black Cowboys’) it proves that Springsteen’s instinctive understanding and sympathy for his characters remains his hard-won quality, and his manipulation of narrative is still questing.

41. VASHTI BUNYAN – Lookaftering

It could hardly be called long-awaited, as hardly a word has been mentioned about Vashti Bunyan in the intervening 28 years between ‘Just Another Diamond Day’ and this new album. It’s really only the patronage of new folk acts such as Animal Collective and Devendra Banhart that has opened the door for her return. ‘Lookaftering’ is full of warm, humane reflection on love, domestic life and family – and Bunyan’s exquisitely vulnerable voice has been one of the most precious and beautiful sounds of 2005. Max Richter’s understated production sustains a captivating aural glow. Magnificent.

40. DOVES – Some Cities

Doves continued to push their epic sound to the limit on ‘Some Cities’, a dense and compelling record that again utilised all their talents in the recording studio. Their sound is intelligently engineered, but not at the expense of energy and feeling, and ‘Some Cities’ captures both with tremendous success.

39. KONONO NO. 1 – Congotronics

It must have been odd for Kinshasa’s premier band to suddenly be hailed as a new phenomenon, having been performing in their hometown for decades. Still, hipster upstarts and world music aficionados alike couldn’t get enough of this extraordinary collection – in which the traditional likembe finger piano is amplified and distorted to create a sound that is both inspiring and terrifying in equal measure. This relentless apocalyptic groove could be extended and extemporised at great length without ever becoming boring. It shows the origins of modern dance music.

38. DAVE HOLLAND BIG BAND – Overtime

Dave Holland is a musician that always seems to find new methods and approaches, and one whose considerable talent shows no signs of diminishing. ‘Overtime’ is a big band album that captures precisely the colossal thrill of big band music – it is aggressive, punchy and also serious fun. Like Matthew Herbert’s recent big band project, it also proves that such a move need not necessarily signify regression. For Holland, this is a captivating and successful side-step.

37. BLACK DICE – Broken Ear Record

I can’t really comment on the apparent consensus that this is Black Dice’s least significant record to date, as it’s my first real encounter with the band. To these ears, it represents a convincing and brave exploration of the possibilities of noise, and it’s structures and sounds are located miles away from anything in mainstream music. It can’t even really be aligned very easily with the rest of DFA’s output. It sounds genuinely industrial – not like the rather spurious musical genre, but in its emphasis on sound collage above melody, it is music for machines made by humans.

36. SMOG – A River Ain’t Too Much To Love

‘A River..’ continued Bill Callahan’s drift away from the unconventional drones of ‘Rain On Lens’ towards something more accessible, although it was a much more enigmatic and opaque collection of songs than the relatively chipper ‘Supper’ album. Like much of Callahan’s best work, its droll irony and misanthropic edge require some work – but once familiar with the dry Callahan stylings, these songs are striking, humorous and frequently incisive. The traditional musical backdrop eschewed virtuosity, but also went beyond a standard Americana template into something more challenging and, ultimately, more rewarding.

35. JUSTIN QUINN’S BAKEHOUSE – Before I Forget

One of many excellent releases from the much feted F-IRE Collective in 2005, ‘Before I Forget’ was arguably a little more conventional than Polar Bear or Acoustic Ladyland, but it had a more slippery and elusive charm of its own. The playing is beautifully fluid and sometimes exhuberant, but mostly it is the lush, impressionistic mood that stands out most.

34. COCOROSIE – Noah’s Ark

This was a sublime, exotic and deeply compelling album, with the slightly nasal, pinched sound of the Cassidy sisters’ voices combining effortlessly with a bewildering array of bizarre instrumentation. It sounded like electronic folk music – in thrall to natural melodies and sounds, but processed through a more modern, anything-goes approach. Even an appearance from the execrable Devendra Banhart couldn’t spoil it.

33. LCD SOUNDSYSTEM – LCD Soundsystem

After two volumes of DFA compilations and several cult singles, the LCD Soundsystem album could easily have been an anti-climax. Mercifully, it delivered on almost every level – with plenty of the driving future new wave disco we’d come to expect, as well as some more melodic surprises to sustain the interest. The fact that it came with a bonus CD collating all the non-album singles was a real bonus. Together – the two discs make for a minor classic. The real test, however, will be James Murphy’s next move. This is music that could quickly become tired and it would be a shame for ideas of this quality to be relegated to a passing fad. How will Murphy develop the LCD sound?

32. DANGERDOOM – The Mouse and The Mask

In an otherwise barren year for American hip hop, there was however no doubting that a collaboration between Dangermouse, legendary producer of the Jay-Z meets The Beatles Grey Album bootleg and rapper extraordinaire MF Doom would be anything other than excellent. It’s not quite as audacious as Doom’s Madvillain collaboration with Madlib – and in many ways, the approach is surprisingly old-school. Nevertheless, the demented wordplay is thrilling and there are many intriguing sounds and heavy beats for sheer enjoyment value. Many of the cartoon references that form the concept behind the album may be lost on British audiences, but the album stood up on a musical level alone.

31. LOW – The Great Destroyer

Another of the year’s most cruelly underrated albums, ‘The Great Destroyer’ saw Low beefing up their sound without losing any of the emotive magic of the instinctive harmonies of Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker. The music was still deceptively basic – with pounding skeletal and rhythms and simple melodies, but it was carried on a new wave of vital urgency and clarity.

30. MY MORNING JACKET – Z

The new line-up of My Morning Jacket remained expansive in their sound and approach, but also broadened their musical palette to feature greater reliance on keyboards and rhythms. Some hyped this rather ridiculously as a trek into R & B production territory. Whilst it wasn’t such a major volte-face as that, it certainly suggested that this line-up of the band may have even more potential than the original model (that is, at least, if they can stop cancelling tour dates). With John Leckie on board as producer, some of the band’s strongest songs to date were transformed into mysterious and fascinating soundscapes, whilst still leaving plenty of space for straightforward rocking out. The streamlined brevity of the album also helped – this no longer felt like it could be stifling admonition masquerading as an epic – it was all the qualities of the epic in a more concise and manageable format.

29. PATRICK WOLF – Wind In The Wires

If Kate Bush’s ‘Aerial’ was the sound of domestic contentment, ‘Wind In The Wires’ was the sound of discontent – the need to escape the claustrophobia of the city and forge a new home. In discarding some of the more frustratingly adolescent themes of ‘Lycanthropy’, Patrick Wolf more than fulfilled that album’s promise, crafting an album of elegant musicality and powerful songwriting.

28. ISOLEE – Wearemonster

‘Wearemonster’ is a dance album that maintains rigorous adherence to the beat but goes way beyond brainless repetition. There are so many ideas pulsing through this superb album, many of them combined into the same track. Each track develops, shifts and mutate, whilst always anchored by an infectious bass line or hook. Numerous ideas are then filtered in and out of the mix, and the results are both subtle and intoxicating.

27. THE BAD PLUS – Suspicious Activity?

Not only do some critics in the jazz world continue to view The Bad Plus as a threat, but many still doubt their musicality. After this, their fourth highly inventive, questing release, surely the doubters must now be silenced. This is a piano trio – but it sounds absolutely unlike any kind of conventional piano trio. Nor do they take their cues from the modern variants – the ethereal atmospherics of EST or Tord Gustavsen don’t feature here at all. It’s a furious, intricate and virtuosic music, but with a sturdy and powerful groove at its core. Mostly focussing on original compositions, ‘Suspicious Activity?’ showcases the writing talents of all three members, and their ingenious polyrhythmic structures are at their most muscular here. It’s a strident, compelling work of dexterity and vigour.


26. KING CREOSOTE – Rocket DIY/KC Rules OK

The prolific Kenny Anderson compiled some of his best songs written between 1988 and 2004 on to two albums in 2005. ‘Rocket DIY’ was recorded in the frail lo-fi, homespun approach that will be familiar to fans of ‘Kenny and Beth’s Musakal Boat Rides’. ‘KC Rules OK’ was recorded in collaboration with The Earlies and also featured backing vocals from a former Fence Collective member, one KT Tunstall – who has now either sold-out or transcended her mentor’s limited appeal depending on your position. I’d opt for the former, as it’s a less conventional, and frequently more touching collection, although ‘KC Rules OK’ is often neatly arranged too.

25. OKKERVIL RIVER – Black Sheep Boy

This is a really great album, and in almost any other year would surely have graced my top 10. A conceptual song cycle inspired by the Tim Hardin song of the same name, it covers the tempestuous torment of unrequited love in a harsh prose-poetry that still manages to sound incisive and dignified, even in its more envious and furious moments.

24. ARIEL PINK’S HAUNTED GRAFFITI – WORN COPY

Thanks to Animal Collective’s excellent Paw Tracks label, we are in the midst of a continuing programme to bring the extraordinary music of Ariel Pink to wider attention. If anything, ‘Worn Copy’ was even better than last year’s ‘Doledrums’. With some of the rough edges smoothed a little, this elusive, home-recorded gem sounds a little like a lo-fi ‘Pet Sounds’. Pink’s methods may be untutored, but the results are as euphoric and symphonic as composed music. This is pop as blissful rapture, and Pink remains isolated in his own unique space.


23. ERIN McKEOWN – We Will Become Like Birds

What on earth leads the UK press to be so apathetic towards this remarkable songwriter? Whilst many monthlies were happy to fall for the feverish publicity surrounding the return of the unbearably pretentious Fiona Apple, this infinitely more interesting and creative record was completely overlooked. It successfully integrated a greater mastery of the studio into her sound and this provided an even greater contrast with her more rootsy solo live shows. The songs were loosely linked around the theme of freedom – a fashionable buzz word for many in the War on Terror, addressed with sympathy and understanding by the delectable Ms McKeown.

22. M WARD – Transistor Radio

An album that invokes the spirit of classic American radio and bemoans its decline into formatted commercial tedium. It’s also perfectly romantic, with a keening and bittersweet spirit at its core. M Ward clearly has a real love and understanding of the American songwriting tradition – but with ‘Transistor Radio’, he has made a strong claim to be an integral part of that tradition’s continual development.

21. PAT METHENY – The Way Up

Reviews that seemed completely astounded by the fact that Pat Metheny had composed one lengthy ‘suite’ of music seemed to neglect the strong tradition of composition in jazz. This was a work that looked more to the long compositions of Duke Ellington and George Russell than the free improvisation of Ornette Coleman or John Coltrane. Yet, Metheny’s music was spacious and elegant and left plenty of room for his expressive and sometimes expressionist playing. His collaborator Lyle Mays was an equally potent force, his layered keyboard textures providing the music with its rich and evocative atmosphere. Another major achievement in an illustrious musical career.

20. SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE – School Of The Flower

Taking hints from the folk rock of Fairport Convention and the psychedelia of Syd Barrett-era Pink Floyd but transporting all these ideas into a more unfamiliar and austere space, ‘School Of The Flower’ was one of 2005’s most bewitching albums. It’s an oddly graceful and enchanting record that rewards with repeated plays.

19. SLEATER KINNEY – The Woods

Here, Sleater Kinney largely abandoned the fervent political stance of ‘One Beat’ and moved back into more personal territory. Musically, however, this was full of righteous anger and unrestrained aggression. ‘The Woods’ is a noisy, thrashing and frequently chaotic beast, but it remains in tune with the corrupted primal blues that has inspired all of Sleater Kinney’s best music. When it returns to a more conventional melodic approach, it does so with aplomb, and the songs always shift gear in unexpected places. Its visceral impact was impossible to resist.

18. POLAR BEAR – Held On The Tips Of Fingers

Some preferred this to its sister album from Acoustic Ladyland and I can almost see why. The deployment of Leafcutter John on electronics makes for some disorientating and innovative atmospherics, whilst the music itself races through many genres and cultures, even incorporating a kind of klezmer march. As one might expect from Seb Rochford, a remarkably talented drummer-composer, it’s rhythmically inventive, but in the duelling saxophones of Mark Lockheart and Pete Wareham, there is also melodic dexterity as well. There is a real understanding of jazz music history on display here – as well as a vigorous desire to propel the music into the future.

17. MAGNOLIA ELECTRIC CO – What Comes After The Blues

For a while, it seemed that Jason Molina was unstoppable, with three successive masterpieces in ‘Didn’t it Rain’, ‘Magnolia Electric Co.’ and ‘Pyramid Electric Co.’. But then came the perplexing name change and ‘Trials and Errors’ an unfortunately bombastic album that obscured Molina’s song writing gifts beneath numerous Neil Young-esque guitar solos and sludgy playing from the rhythm section. It didn’t bode well. Yet, some of the songs from that release appear in studio form here, in markedly better versions, Molina’s inherent vulnerability wisely restored. Many of the songs are more accessible than their predecessors, without losing Molina’s distinctive edge. This is a beautiful album, full of longing and passion and it stands up well in Molina’s increasingly illustrious catalogue.

16. NEW PORNOGRAPHERS – Twin Cinema

This Canadian indie-pop supergroup found real ambition in ‘Twin Cinema’, an album with a refreshingly dirty, live sound but featuring wonderfully quirky songs that veer in all sorts of unexpected directions. The band are never content to blandly strum, or maintain the same relentless feel – instead, we get savage punctuations, inventive harmony and highly infectious tunes. The titles and lyrics remain a little arty and their meaning largely impenetrable – but with songs this immediate and thrilling, that didn’t really matter. At last, they are starting to emerge from the shadow of Neko Case and come into their own as a band, so much so that they can tour without her and it doesn’t even matter too much!

15. BONNIE ‘PRINCE’ BILLY AND MATT SWEENY – Superwolf

After the rather one dimensional ‘Master and Everyone’ and the wilfully perverse re-recorded ‘Greatest Palace Music’ album, Will Oldham shedded his recently acquired layers of disguise to record his most direct, savage and impressive work since ‘I See A Darkness’. His lyrics are at their most uncomfortable and probing here, although much of the credit should go to collaborator Matt Sweeney for writing such elegiac and expressive music.

14. ELBOW – Leaders Of The Free World

Whilst many critics inexplicably fawned over the faux-U2isms of Coldplay’s ‘X&Y’, they risked missing the real deal here. Elbow have been honing that epic sound over the course of three brilliant albums now – and this one may top the lot. It’s their most cohesive and confident work to date, without sacrificing any of the evocative emotion of the best parts of ‘Asleep In The Back’. The sound is remarkably crisp, and Guy Garvey’s incisive dry wit and careful command of melody lead the charge.

13. KATE BUSH – Aerial

After twelve years, was ‘Aerial’ a reaffirmation of La Bush’s singular talent, or an introspective disappointment? Well, it’s frustrating certainly, but its eccentricities are also an intrinsic part of its appeal. Musically, it’s insanely ambitious even when at its most restrained, and a handful of the songs (‘Nocturne’, ‘The Coral Room’, ‘Pi’, ‘King Of The Mountain’, ‘How To Be Invisible’, ‘Aerial’) are the work of an artist on a completely different level from everyone else.

12. SUFJAN STEVENS – Illinois

Such an ambitious gesture could always expect to top the end of year polls, and the success of Sufjan Stevens’ magnum opus has only been marred by a numbing predictability. To my ears, ‘Michigan’ is still the better work – it’s less twee and has more space and depth. Everything on ‘Illinois’ sounds like an attempt to master a big American sound – and mostly it works remarkably well. Stevens remains a humane and compassionate writer, grappling with the both the big themes of American national history, and the experiences particular to his chosen locality. Stevens had immersed himself in folklore, literature and ideas to produce some of the most intelligent music of the year.

11. ANIMAL COLLECTIVE – Feels

Is this the sound of Animal Collective becoming conventional? Well, it’s hardly verse-chorus-verse stuff, but there is perhaps a more melodic approach to be found amidst the endearing yelping and hypnotic psychedelia. Animal Collective’s sound harks back to the most primitive of folk music, but also sounds fresh and modern. It’s unhinged and occasionally difficult, but the very wildness of the sound makes it all the more enticing. They also sound pretty much like nothing else around right now.

10. THE BOOKS – Lost and Safe

After two albums of music that refuses to respect genre conventions, The Books continued their progressive journey. In some respects, ‘Lost and Safe’ is a kind of song cycle, with a greater emphasis on words and melody than previous releases. Yet, it’s still the impressive way they integrate samples and found sounds into their beguiling textures that is most fascinating. ‘Lost and Safe’ was their most coherent statement yet and, in its own quiet and unassuming way, a genuinely radical statement.

09. NINE HORSES – Snow Borne Sorrow

Daniel from Unit described this to me as ‘a bit like Nick Cave if he got a bit more funky’. I’m not sure funky is quite the right word – it’s more almost atmospheric jazz really, but I take the point. A lingering melancholy pervades this album and it is suffused with guilt and regret. It is sublimely evocative, and very well produced. David Sylvian is among those 80s survivors who have gone on to occupy their own space, well away from prevailing trends or critical opinion. This is one of his best works yet.

08. ROOTS MANUVA – Awfully Deep

In a largely disappointing year for hip-hop, this record stood out by a country mile. There are few others in the genre working at this level. Taking ideas and approaches from a number of genres to create a dizzying conflation, ‘Awfully Deep’ sounded like very little else around. Added to this was Roots Manuva’s refusal to bow to lyrical conventions, documenting his own, increasingly paranoid life experience with wry wit and ingenuity. Whilst there are plenty of American musical influences on display here, this showed a British hip-hop artist avoiding the mock-American clichés of some of his contemporaries. A brazenly honest record full of conviction and intelligence.

07. JAMIE LIDELL – Multiply

A digital Jamiroquai or a genuine nu soul genius? Well, probably neither at this stage, although ‘Multiply’ sounded better with every listen and gave every suggestion that Jamie Lidell has a very promising future. Many of the production ideas were more inventive than the ‘white boy soul’ tag suggests, and Lidell’s voice does indeed capture a more modern take on the music of Sam Cooke, Otis Redding or Wilson Pickett.

06. BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE – Broken Social Scene

A slight hint of a backlash seemed to be building in some circles, but for most, Broken Social Scene’s follow-up to their classic ‘You Forgot It In People’ satisfied on most levels. This was a denser sound, but one that also frequently took the band back to their contemporary rock roots (hence the driving energy of ‘Fire Eye’d Boy’ and chiming Sonic Youth-esque guitars of ‘7/4 (Shoreline)’). With scores of musicians contributing, there were a real range of ideas on display, and the unconventional song structures took the music in increasingly unexpected directions.

05. BILL FRISELL – East/West

There have been numerous ‘Americana’ albums fawned over by the monthly music press this year, but the best in this rather spurious genre arguably came from a jazz guitarist. Bill Frisell has worked hard over a long period in demolishing tired genre conventions. Yet, throughout his experiments with country and the popular songbook, his distinctive sustained and looped guitar sound remains the one resolutely consistent factor. This live album provided a particularly potent context for that sound, with Frisell performing in two trios, luxuriating in a plethora of American musical culture. The music is gloriously expansive, performed with subtle appreciation and reverence or gritty enthusiasm, depending on the demands of the material.

04. IRON AND WINE + CALEXICO – In The Reins

In this real meeting of minds, two of the most interesting among the acts often banded together in the ‘alt country’ genre produced their best and most interesting work. The lyrics of Sam Beam echoed the big western spaces of writers such as Cormac McCarthy, but also captured the compacted family narratives of Bruce Springsteen. His delicate vocals and understated melodies helped distil the essence of his brilliant prose-poetry. Calexico’s musical backdrop captured the spirit of border music, with plenty of intricate detail and intelligent musicianship. A wonderful record – and the joint tour that reaches the UK in April 2006 should be a treat.

03. MATTHEW HERBERT – Plat Du Jour

Abandoning his big band, Matthew Herbert produced a bizarre form of musique concrete with his new project, constructed almost entirely from samples of food products and industrial food processes – from the sounds of Battery chickens to the ingeniously ludicrous reconstruction (and destruction with a tank) of the dinner prepared for George Bush and Tony Blair by Nigella Lawson. Mostly instrumental, it was a less accessible and more uncompromising project than his production work for Roisin Murphy and Dani Siciliano, which may explain its absence from most end of year polls. For those who kept an open mind, ‘Plat du Jour’ worked both as thrilling musical concoction and as impassioned political polemic. These two elements also combined effortlessly together, with Herbert’s sampling at its most imaginative. This was a geopolitically aware and utterly crucial musical document.

02. ANTONY AND THE JOHNSONS – I Am A Bird Now

There’s probably little to say about this that hasn’t been said already – but this album of torch ballads dealing with gender confusion was one of the most moving and elegant albums in ages. Antony’s voice certainly takes on board some standard theatrical influences but the much-vaunted comparisons with Nina Simone do have some substance. He also had the power to convey extraordinary feeling as well as a mastery of vibrato technique. The piano led arrangements captured the vulnerability at the heart of Antony’s songs. It's success was completely unexpected and represented a real triumph for outsider music.

01. ACOUSTIC LADYLAND – Last Chance Disco

‘Last Chance Disco’ stood out in 2005 not just for its remarkable quality, but also for its willingness to embrace a diverse range of musical styles and approaches, rejecting the conventional belief that lifestyle choices and narrow interests must dictate music tastes. Some have been frustrated by the recent regeneration of interest in British jazz, particularly from some sources that have generally preferred to ignore that there has been any kind of worthwhile jazz scene in Britain. Yet, the wave of interest which now centres around the F-IRE Collective and Tomorrow’s Warriors surely cannot be a bad thing, especially when it produces music with this much fiery invention.

It’s been called ‘punk jazz’ because of bandleader and saxophonist Pete Wareham’s fascination with the raw, untamed ethos of Iggy Pop and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. This term has been used before, though, in reference to the work of legendary bassist Jaco Pastorius, and it’s easy to forget that Acoustic Ladyland are as much in thrall to a modern, improvisatory jazz tradition as they are to the methods of rock. The playing on this album therefore has the furious urgency of The Stooges, but also the theatrical musicality of Charlie Parker and the creativity of Miles Davis. Wareham also references Nico and Olivier Messiaen, determined to cast his net as wide as possible whilst creating a refreshing and energising musical hybrid of his own. Whilst their debut ‘Camouflage’, in its reworkings of Jimi Hendrix material, was fascinating, this is something else entirely and it’s very exciting indeed. If the term ‘acoustic’ in the band’s name implies an approach that is polite and respectful, the music contained here was anything but ‘acoustic’.

British Bards and Canadian Collectives

Time for a quick reviews catch-up - mostly albums I should have got around to writing about aaaages ago. Oh well. We'll start with two of my favourite British songwriters.

It's taken me some time to get to grips with 'Problems' the debut solo album from Steven Adams of the Broken Family Band, recording under the nom de plume of The Singing Adams. It was well worth persevering though, as this is actually album with as many, if not more, riches than the most recent BFB effort. Adams has adopted a less polished approach to the production here,opting for lo-fi bedroom methods rather than the polite Abbey Road sound of 'Welcome Home, Loser'. It serves these remarkably candid, occasionally dour songs very well. Adams' trademark dry sense of humour remains intact, but its often complemented here by a detached reflection on personal indiscretions and torrid affairs, during which he frequently refers to himself in the third person. Adams admits that he likes a good whine. It's lucky therefore that he's very good at it, elaborating his whinges with frequently incisive lyrical couplets.

Musically, there are plenty of pointers here at how BFB could avoid repeating themselves. The arrangements are subtle, and often folk-tinged (particularly the haunting 'St Thomas' which recalls Alasdair Roberts' reinterpretations of the Scottish folk tradition). There are guest contributions from some of the usual suspects - multi-instrumentalist Timonthy Victor, Piney Gir and Gill Sandell. The most striking musical feature is the predominance of vocal harmonies, which BFB have used relatively infrequently. This works very well on 'Minus Nines', which ends with some insistent and effective chanting. Some double tracked vocals elevate the melodic and melancholic qualities of 'You and Me', one of the more immediately appealing tracks here. The same trick is used on the banjo-heavy 'New Southgate Love Song'. Best of all is the haunting 'Hello Baby' which is completely unlike anything else Adams has recorded. With its softly moaning accapella vocals, it sounds like a masculine version of the sirens scene from 'Oh Brother Where Art Thou?'. Not even the introduction of dissonant squalling guitars at the end can spoil its extraordinary mood.

If it initially feels like it lacks the robust, relentlesss energy of the Broken Family Band, 'Problems' is a decidedly lo-fi, underplayed record with plenty of riches of its own. In its own way, it's a strangely confident sound, even if the lyrics display wry self-criticism, and frequently, some form of disgust. Adams may have a whole wealth of personal problems to draw on, but as a songwriter, he is maturing rapidly with his increasingly prolific output.

Even better is '9 Red Songs', the latest collection from Chris T-T. As the title implies, it's a collection of left-wing political protest songs which works well because it combines T-T's trademark observational writing with incisive comment and knowing humour. There are, after all, few political albums which end with a song about the frustrating pointlessness of protest songs, as T-T does here with the wonderful 'Preaching To The Converted'. Elsewhere, he wonders where all the other protest singers have gone, and pictures Billy Bragg going 'fishing in his 4x4'.

Regardless of how one might feel about its political content and motivations, '9 Red Songs' is quite comfortably Chris T-T's most accomplished musical statement to date. The arrangements are deliberately spare and acoustic, light on percussion and heavy on more unconventional instrumentation, particularly Gill Sandell's accordian and Timothy Victor's broad range of stringed instruments. In fact, it's musically very similar to the Steven Adams record, and T-T also attempts an accapella track with 'M1 Song', which works surprisingly well.

This is a brave and distinctly unfashionable record to release when we are so frequently being admonished into accepting the realities of the 'modern, globalised world', which tends to mean a tacit acceptance of the encroachment of private, market forces and corporate vested interests into the public realm. Although the war in Iraq predictably appears, T-T sinks his teeth into plenty of other issues, often displaying a nuanced understanding alongside his righteous anger and passionate humanism. It moves from endearingly impractical idealism on the opening 'Bankrupt', which envisages a mass boycott of banks in favour of the hiding place underneath the bed, to an effective juxtaposition of the corruption of two different kinds of worship (wealth and God) in the moving 'A Plague On Both Your Houses'.

Fox hunting still seems like a slightly obvious target for class conflict, and is an issue that frustrates me for its relative triviality. Still, T-T uses it deftly to highlight some of the broader problems concerning the town/country divide which have been ignored amid the furore. This is a neat example of how New Labour's policies have largely served to divide communities and exacerbate local problems and it also captures the intrinsic hypocrisy of the Countryside Alliance's claim to be standing for human rights and liberal values ('You loved the f*cking poll tax/you propped up Maggie Thatcher/And you didn't give a f*ck about Tony Blair until he threw your hobby back actha!'). Sadly, the final verse pushes it into provocative and senselessly extreme territory which does little to help the underpinning argument.

'9 Red Songs' is witty, incisive and, of course, occasionally a little whimsical. It has all the usual characteristics we've come to expect from a Chris T-T album, but filters them through a fresh, more considered musical approach and an explicitly political outlook. Sadly, T-T avoids confronting the dangers of New Labour's excessive statism over the individual (I would have liked to hear a demolition of the highly flawed arguments in favour of ID cards). It remains a challenge for the left to find practical means of implementing policy that resists drifts towards authoritarianism. That's hardly a songwriter's duty though, and it's more than enough that a British songwriter is at last engaging with significant issues. Chris T-T is a less conventional musician than the likes of Pete Seeger, and less radical and influential than Woody Guthrie. You get the impression they would both approve though.

Over in Canada, the prevailing idea that bigger means better has been applied rigorously by the sprawling Toronto collective Broken Social Scene. They can sometimes number up to 17 members, and their producer Dave Newfeld has admitted that their latest, eponymously titled effort (what exactly was wrong with 'Windsurfing Nation' as an album title then?) is a conscious attempt to create an even bigger and more confounding sound than that of their acclaimed 'You Forgot It In People' album (my favourite album of 2003). They continue to divide opinion. They certainly have their admirers (not least the Chicago based indie webzine Pitchfork, which has almost single-handedly bolstered the current wave of Canadian acts) - but there are plenty of detractors too. Whilst critical consensus often dismisses indie bands as 'underachievers', it seems that Broken Social Scene have moved too far in the other direction. For some, they are too dense and impenetrable - or simply just too ambitious.

On first listen to 'Broken Social Scene', I almost began to sympathise with this rather limited view. The songs are swamped in layers of fuzzy, distorted guitars and consciously portentous brass arrangements. The vocals are frequently mixed down to render the lyrics largely incomprehensible. Yet, despite the sonic overload, there's a real sense of spontaneity here, and many of the songs have a semi-improvisatory quality which reveal the BSS collaborative approach to songwriting. There's also a wealth of inventive ideas here - more than most bands have across an entire career.

For those that continue to dismiss them as merely an indie-rock band (as if that is in itself some kind of heinous crime), there's the lithe and groovy 'Hotel', with its swooshes of synth motifs. There's also the extraordinary (and brilliantly titled) 'Bandwitch' with its rickety percussion and ostinato female vocal lines. As with 'YFIIP', the band's strong point here remains its ability to manipulate vocals into a constituent part of the instrumental whole, rather than a necessary and conventional imposition. Specifically, they make more frequent and better use here of the distinctive talents of Leslie Feist.

Elsewhere, there are some conspicuous reference points. 'Superconnected' has the something of the sound and fury of early Dinosaur Jr., whilst the spectre of Sonic Youth looms large over '7/4 Shoreline' and ' Fire Eye'd Boy'. The latter seems to marry the Youth's chiming, detuned guitar style to the propulsive Gang Of Four-style groove currently favoured by the latest crop of British bands (hello Bloc Party).

Some have found this album frustratingly diverse and incoherently sequenced but to my ears it is a more conventionally cohesive statement that 'YFIIP' (if not necessarily a better record). The layers of guitar distortion create a hazy, smog-summer kind of feel that would have made the original working title for the album very aposite. It also seems to be structured around a very big opening and an even bigger finale. After an introductory overture, 'Ibi Dreams Of Pavement' is a huge chugger, with Kevin Drew's vocals veering away from regular ideas of pitch and melody. The closing 'It's All Gonna Break' is several songs combined - a sprawling monolith of experimental sound which still finds room for the most immediate and infectious pop song of the band's career so far. It's not a pretentious waste of eleven minutes though - it sounds euphiric and exhuberant, as if the band were enjoying the inherent self destruction.

Given time, 'Broken Social Scene' reveals a band that is not content with staying in its comfort zone. There is little respect here for the conventional boundaries of rock and roll - with occasional references to free jazz approaches and techniques, as well as the loose-limbed groove of the best Seventies funk bands. If Broken Social Scene are just an indie rock band, then they sound like the most inspired and accomplished indie rock band on the planet right now.

Rather less interesting, although not entirely without merit, is 'Apologies To The Queen Mary', the acclaimed album from Montreal's Wolf Parade. Rather predictably, they've already been touted as the heirs to the throne of The Arcade Fire, which is a bit ridiculous as it's entirely reasonable to assume that The Arcade Fire have many more great records left in them anyway. The album is produced by Isaac Brock of Modest Mouse and that band seem to have left a rather transparent influence on the overall sound and shape of the record. It's therefore not as original a prospect as the Broken Social Scene or Arcade Fire albums, nor indeed the best of Brock's own work.

There's plenty here to like though, from the fractured off-kilter stutter of the opening to the insistent thrum of 'Modern World' and 'We Built Another World'. It ticks many of the expected boxes, but rarely veers beyond the comfortingly predictable. It's not thrilling and captivating like Funeral, but it's also not devoid of charm. Much of Wolf Parade's appeal rests on the interplay between their two vocalists, and this may be what makes them a distinctive prospect in the future. For now though, we have to settle for a record which is decent if not compelling.

Hot Chip Will Break Your Legs

...or so one of their rather threatening new songs seems to suggest. I'm not sure who it's all directed against!

I finally caught up with Hot Chip again at their low-key London comeback show at the Horseshoe Tavern this weekend. Now signed to EMI in this country, with LCD Soundsystem's DFA label distributing their work in the US, expect a greater volume of interest in this excellent band in 2006. The organisers had put a somewhat bizarre arrangement in place as the capacity of the venue was insufficient to meet the demand. Upon entry, everyone was provided with one of two coloured wristbands to designate which of the two Hot Chip sets we would be allowed to see. I was early enough to be ushered upstairs for the first set.

First, with an atmosphere of fearful silence (occasionally punctured by some embarrassing ringtones), we watched the support set from the Elysian Quartet, who played an intriguing and very original take on contemporary string music. The group are led by former Hot Chip member Emma Smith, and their set provided a fascinating and welcome surprise. The group seemed intent on breaking most of the conventions of quartet playing, with plenty of plucking and even a form of rhythmic strumming, between which were threaded intensely melodic passages. Chamber music it certainly was not. In case anyone felt it was all too stuffy, there was humour as well, courtesy of a somewhat drunken sounding ansaphone message (possibly from Emma's dad?). It was hysterical - 'Emma....I've just heard your new music - a load of old bollocks - sounds like a cat f**ing a bag of nails!'. Brilliant.

Hot Chip took to the stage and played a relentlessly energetic set comprising both old and new material. From 'Coming On Strong' we got an insanely manic version of 'Down With Prince', with a Sonic Youth-style freak out inserted into the middle which seemed reminiscent of the band's earlier days. 'Krap Kraft Dinner' sounded at turns mournful and bitter as usual, and remains one of their best songs. 'Take Care' has largely been left unchanged and provided some necessary familiarity.

The new material is neither as confounding nor as different as might be expected from a band that seems to move at such a rapid pace. If anything, the 80s synth pop element seems to have been amplified even further - so much so that one of my friends felt moved to identify all the possible references ('Human League! Duran Duran!'). This is not a problem though, as the band are so much more intelligent and engaging than, say, Goldfrapp (funnily enough, Hot Chip are support act on the forthcoming Goldfrapp tour). There also seems to be a more melodic approach at work, with Alexis Taylor's understated voice in particularly good form this evening. 'Boy From School' is particularly enervating, and the closing 'Over and Over' gets the entire crowd dancing, justifying Alexis' claim that the band are making a new kind of 'party music'. It's fantastic stuff but it's increasingly homogenous. One of their more reflective songs would have provided a welcome change of pace - I was hoping to hear the rather lovely 'Barbarian' from their latest EP of the same name. Still, it's difficult to resist the stabs of dramatically funky untutored guitar playing, or the increasing prevalence of crazy percussion - toms, cymbals, agogo bells! New album 'The Warning' is sadly still six months away - it'll be worth the wait.

There's Life In The Old Dog Yet...

Bob Dylan – Brixton Academy 23/11/05

Maybe it’s just that the Brixton Academy is a much more suitable venue for the current Bob Dylan band’s mix of blues and roots music than the cavernous hell-holes of the Docklands or Wembley Arenas, but this show was by some considerable distance the best of the four Dylan shows I’ve seen (all of them post-‘Love and Theft’). Dylan is now a notoriously inconsistent performer. All sorts of theories abound – the voice degenerates towards the end of each tour, sometimes he just can’t be bothered, some, such as Andy Kershaw, believe that he just shouldn’t be doing it anymore. Well, nonsense. Dylan concerts still offer myriad pleasures – not least the chance to hear classic songs deconstructed and rebuilt to fit that decaying but still determined voice. So, when the familiar tones of the ‘Fanfare For The Common Man’ and that subdued announcement ring out (‘Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the poet laureate of rock ‘n’ roll….Columbia recording artist Bob Dylan’) there’s still anticipation and apprehension in equal measure.

There’s no doubt that Dylan seems more engaged than usual tonight. He’s still playing keyboards throughout (is it arthritis or a back problem that now prevents him playing guitar?), but the keyboards are positioned centre stage this time round, rather than hidden at the back as on the previous couple of UK tours. He plays the role of bandleader tonight, ushering in inspired shifts in dynamics and tone with a series of bizarre gestures and signals. His keyboard playing, although sometimes buried in the mix, is actually brilliant, and tonight he trades motifs with the guitarists, and uses the keyboard to punctuate the vocal lines. He plays excellent accompaniment for the soloists too.

Not only this, but on a handful of the songs tonight, he sounded vocally controlled and in real command of the material. There’s a sublime reading of ‘Shelter From The Storm’ where the phrasing is crystal clear and even the melody is handled adroitly. It’s a far more subtle, graceful and sensitive performance than we have come to expect in recent years. I have been a little fearful of hearing the ‘Blood On The Tracks’-era material being delivered in the wayward growl, but this was a version that retained the beauty of the original. ‘She Belongs To Me’ and ‘A Hard Rain’s-A-Gonna-Fall’ are also delivered in powerful, controlled renditions which suggest that, despite his obvious vocal deficiencies, Dylan can still sound committed. The latter is re-arranged, perhaps a little too smoothly for the apocalyptic prophecies of the lyric, as a light country shuffle that is very pleasing to the ear.

More intriguing still is a mesmerising ‘Lonesome Death Of Hattie Carroll’, very similar to the miraculous version performed at Wembley in 2003, where he intones the lyric in sharp, caustic phrasing that actually adds weight to an already emphatic song. There’s no real attempt to deal with the song’s original melody, but the different delivery entirely suits the song’s mood of righteous indignation. Where Dylan’s outrageously gifted musicians sometimes threaten to render him anonymous in live concerts, band and singer integrated effectively and intelligently here.

He can’t sustain the vocal quality for an entire show however. There are still some wayward moments. ‘Positively 4th Street’ suffers from phrasing which is hurried and pinched, while ‘Most Likely You Go Your Way and I’ll Go Mine’ is a little half-hearted. The dreaded ‘upsinging’ (a bizarre device whereby Dylan mumbles most of the line in a low monotone and then leaps an entire octave for the final word of each line) is mostly kept to a minimum, and even used surprisingly effectively on ‘Hard Rain’. Most perfunctory are the obligatory encores of ‘Like A Rolling Stone’ and ‘All Along The Watchtower’, where verses are repeated and most phrases rendered completely indecipherable. The audience lap it up of course, and the band’s playing on both is so outstanding as to ensure that it doesn’t really matter.

The band has had a major line-up shift since the last UK tour, with only the confidently groovy rhythm section of Tony Garnier (bass, now Dylan’s longest serving sideman) and George Recile (drums) remaining in place. Gone are guitarists Freddy Koella (who only lasted just over a year) and the exquisitely gifted Larry Campbell. The hole left by Campbell might well have proved fatal were it not for the addition of the remarkable multi-instrumentalist Donnie Herron, who divides his time between two steel guitars, mandolin and banjo. Completing the ranks are the near-motionless Denny Freeman and the more exuberant Stu Kimbell on electric and acoustic guitars. They are more conventional soloists than Campbell, Charlie Sexton or even Koella, but they play expressively and frequently with real subtlety.

They open with a few bars of legendary guitarist Link Wray’s ‘Rumble’ (Wray died last week) before segueing straight into a riveting ‘Maggie’s Farm’, which appears to have become a staple set opener. Although Dylan professes to be apolitical, it’s hard to believe that the political resonances of the lyric in post-Thatcher Britain are entirely lost on him.

The band are arguably at their best for the ‘Love and Theft’ material. ‘High Water’ is particularly impressive, with Donnie Herron’s nimble-fingered banjo playing contrasting with the tempestuous punctuations of guitars and rhythm section. The section where Dylan brings the band right down in volume before letting them explode again is absolutely electric. The inventive shift between straight and shuffle grooves in ‘Cry A While’ is handled masterfully, whilst ‘Summer Days’ remains a dependably thrilling closer for the main set. The latter, with a knowingly comic touch, provides a canny snapshot of Dylan’s current predicament (‘Riding along in my Cadillac car/The girls all say “you’re a worn out star”’ or, even better ‘you say you can’t repeat the past/ Whaddya mean you can’t, of course you can!’).

The show ends, as ever, with the entire band gathered around the drum kit in hilariously motionless poses, Dylan holding his trusty harmonica. They come back for the predictable aforementioned encores, but also find time for a surprise version of Fats Domino’s ‘Blue Monday’, although I can’t say I actually recognised it at the time as anything other than a blues standard.

The whole show is a carefully balanced mix of fiery blues and steel-guitar dominated roots country. It’s all a little more conservative than the ‘thin wild mercury sound’ that Dylan patented in going electric in 1966, but it makes for a refreshingly old-fashioned, anti-modernist combination. Even after the departure of Campbell, Dylan’s band may well still be the best blues band in the world.

Dylan continues to transform himself in ways that are wilfully perverse and frequently contrary to the expectations of his followers. Yet, it is this that has kept him relevant for over forty years. It is this that means he can get away without introducing the frequently unrecognisable versions of his songs, or even with a conscious failure to address his audience. If his interaction with his musicians and commitment to the finest moments of his back catalogue remain this strong, he’s not likely to quit for a while yet. Until next year, then….

Drawing the Curtain on 2005

In a bid to start work on my final albums of the year list, I've updated my 2005 tracking list over at Rate Your Music.

http://rateyourmusic.com/list/d_pat/in_league_with_patons_best_albums_of_2005

I've seen a number of bloggers claim that 2005 has been a disappointing musical year. How, exactly? To my mind, there's been a wealth of excellent releases, with some artists even having more than one entry in the list (Iron and Wine, King Creosote, Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, Howling Hex etc). I'm still not sure how the final top 75 will end up, but it's certain that a number of really good albums are going to miss out completely.

October and November always seem to bring gems - the new Broken Social Scene album on import, the excellent Wilco and Bonnie 'Prince' Billy live albums. The Nine Horses album is really interesting - a late bid for the top 10 perhaps?

The Top 75 will come just before Christmas, along with the singles and films of the year as well.

The Real Super Monday (Part Two)

A proper analysis of the superb set of releases from October 17th was promised a month ago – at last it is now here!

The most eagerly anticipated release of that day (aside from Stevie Wonder, which I’ve yet to hear) was ‘Playing The Angel’, the first album in over four years from Depeche Mode. The Mode are often either touted as stadium crowd-pullers to rival U2 or REM, or denounced as pitiful 80s throwbacks. Neither description captures the distinct quality that the band have captured on all their albums since ‘Violator’. ‘Songs Of Faith and Devotion’ had a strong spiritual-gospel dimension, whilst ‘Ultra’ was their darkest work since ‘Black Celebration’ (now nearly 20 years old and still their masterpiece), with Dave Gahan at his lowest ebb during the recording sessions. Tim Simenon’s production also leant it additional gravitas. By contrast, the now widely disliked ‘Exciter’ mostly sounded calm and dreamlike. To these ears, it pushed the band into new and subtler territories, but its approach has been almost entirely rejected for ‘Playing The Angel’, which frequently sounds like a very self-conscious attempt to recapture the popular essence of ‘Violator’.

It opens brilliantly, with a harsh wall of guitar fuzz and one of the band’s most immediate and powerful opening gambits. ‘A Pain That I’m Used To’ is hardly anything surprising, but it’s crisp production and neat contrasts between smooth and savage sounds make it remarkably effective. Dave Gahan’s voice is in fine form here, richer and less imposing than on previous albums, but with more a great deal more depth and control. If he’s been taking voice coaching, it’s clearly paid off, as what follows is even better. On ‘John The Revelator’, a superb recasting of the classic blues standard as a sermon against religion, Gahan growls with glee.

Gahan in fact dominates all the finest moments here. Much has already been written about his confrontation with Martin Gore over the share of the songwriting, and his three efforts here are surprisingly good. ‘Suffer Well’ again fits a classic Mode model, with a memorable melody and intelligent, thoughtful production values. ‘I Want It All’ is slower, denser and less penetrable, it’s essence seemingly buried beneath atmospherics. ‘Nothing’s Impossible’ is a real grower though, and one of the best tracks here.

For all that is dependably impressive about ‘Playing The Angel’, there are also significant problems. Martin Gore has always walked a perilous path as a lyricist, and there are certainly lurches into hideous self parody here. The worst is the appalling ‘Macro’, where Gore sings in grandiose mock-operatic tones about seeing ‘the microcosm in macro vision’. Hit the skip button on your CD player at this point. Equally disappointing is Gore’s other vocal effort, ‘Damaged People’. Musically, it’s perhaps the closest track here to the ‘Exciter’ sound, but its theme of suffering outsiders perhaps suggests that Gore has now rewritten this song too many times.

Those who hoped that producer Ben Hillier (Blur’s ‘Think Tank’ and Elbow’s ‘Cast Of Thousands’) might alter the band’s approach or reinvent their sound may come away disappointed, although ‘Playing The Angel’ frequently sounds impressively slick and atmospheric. It’s just that it doesn’t quite reach the alchemical heights of the Mode’s best work – it’s neither their best nor their most original.

By contrast, My Morning Jacket’s fourth album, the mysteriously titled ‘Z’, has been hailed as a complete reinvention. Following the departure and replacement of two key members, things have certainly changed (most notably with the hiring of John Leckie as producer), although I’m not sure that this isn’t more a broadening of the palette than a radical transformation. They certainly haven’t completely abandoned their defining reverb-drenched sound, as many reviewers have mistakenly claimed.

Perhaps it’s because the tracks that sound most unlike their earlier incarnation come first. ‘Wordless Chorus’ and ‘It Beats For You’ are the two tracks that most clearly betray Jim James’ self-confessed fascination with modern R&B and soul. The former displaces guitars to the background in favour of some sweetly processed squelchy keyboards and a particularly limber drum beat. It also does exactly what it says on the tin in the sense that the chorus is indeed wordless. The layers of Jim James’ vocals sound superb. ‘It Beats For You’ is perhaps more elusive, with a spindly melody and understated arpeggiated guitar line. It’s still meticulously constructed, however, and the band have clearly benefited from the introduction of an outside producer.

Best of all are the two epics, the sinister waltz ‘Into The Woods’ (has Jim James really been listening to Sondheim?) and the extended closer ‘Dondate’. ‘Into The Woods’ has what may be the greatest opening line of the year (‘a…., a baby in a blender/both as sweet as a night of surrender’) and sounds something like a musical version of Neil Jordan and Angela Carter’s exquisite film ‘The Company Of Wolves’, which is stunningly appropriate.

Elsewhere, there are extensions of recognisable formulae. ‘What A Wonderful Man’ brings back the guitars and the bone-crushing drums, but adds a twist of ironic gospel. Similarly, the deliberately dragging pace of ‘Anytime’ is recognisable, but its twisting, unpredictable emphasis is. The reggae/ska dimension, previously a passing fascination, is brought spectacularly into the fore in the decelerated skank of ‘Off The Record’. It’s extraordinarily infectious, and even manages to pull of the trick of plagiarising the theme tune from Hawaii 5-O. Even more audacious is its subtly extemporised coda, which sounds like the band at their most effectively collaborative.

‘Gideon’ is perhaps the track that would have sat most comfortably on ‘It Still Moves’, with its massive, almost bombastic rock sound. Yet, it has a depth and control that that album never quite achieved. The same point makes works equally well for a comparison of the entire two albums. ‘It Still Moves’ was a monolithic rock behemoth and, at CD-busting length, far too heavy an experience for one straight listen. ‘Z’ meanwhile, at a clipped 41 minutes, is mercilessly concise, but still every bit as expansive and impressive. In seeking to develop the sound, My Morning Jacket have successfully retained their elemental potency.

Are Boards Of Canada really the reclusive world-changing saviours of electronic music or are they over-hyped, allowing their self-imposed mystique to overpower their music? If ‘Music Has The Right To Children’ was deceptively calm, with very sinister undertones in its repeated sampling of childens’ voices, ‘Geogaddi’ pushed them into terrifying territory. It frequently sounded threatening or menacing, and maintained a refreshing detachment from the wider trends in electronic music at the time. Yet, it also presented a quandary for the duo. Having defined a sound so perfectly, were they now in danger of falling victim to their own formula? The next album would have to be a defining statement to justify the adulation.

On first listen, ‘The Campfire Headphase’ is something of a disappointment. It sticks so rigidly to what is now a very familiar template that even its cover design closely resembles that of ‘Music Has The Right…’. It continues the rather frustrating structural approach of alternating full length pieces with frustratingly brief interludes. Sometimes the short sections are so effective you wish they had developed the ideas a little further. As a whole, the album threatens to become soporific, so cohesive and singular is its identity.

The most obvious change from previous albums is the addition of ‘live’ guitar parts, although they are mostly take the form of heavily manipulated samples. They are something of a double-edged sword, for although they help BoC make tentative steps towards something new, they also help ensure that ‘The Campfire Headphase’ is their most conventional sounding album to date. It’s the closest they have come to actually fitting the generic terms ‘pastoral electronica’ or ‘folktronica’ so often dished out to describe them.

It all flows seamlessly, as one might expect, although this time there are some obvious standouts. ‘Chromakey Dreamcoat’ relies heavily on the duo’s gift for developing repetitive patterns, whilst ‘Dayvan Cowboy’ most effectively integrates harmonic guitar parts with interjections of programmed melody. The beats here are also carefully realised, with seemingly untamed and disorientating crashing cymbals.

The music here is frequently pretty, evocative or otherworldly (most particularly the hypnotic ’84 Pontiac Dream’). However, there isn’t much that really breaks the mould and it never quite captures the attention in the way that its two predecessors managed. It’s becoming increasingly clear that the Boards Of Canada are going to have to reinvent themselves if they are to stay at the forefront of the genre.

Plucked from folk obscurity by a smattering of the new ‘freak-folk- fraternity (Devendra Banhart and Adem both guest), Vashti Bunyan has returned with her only collection of songs since ‘Just Another Diamond Day’, her collectable debut from 1969. Disappointed by the lack of recognition afforded the album on its original release, Bunyan disappeared, but has since become something of a cult figure. Her collaboration with the fantastic Animal Collective on the fascinating ‘Prospect Hummer’ EP earlier in the year brought her back into the limelight and augured well for this new set of songs.

Producer Max Richter has crafted a warm, intimate and absorbing setting for these touching and understated songs, allowing Bunyan’s timid but captivating voice plenty of space in which to weave its alluring web. Like Kate Bush’s comeback album Aerial, many of Bunyan’s new songs deal with domestic concerns, most prominently motherhood and the desire to protect her children. The clearest parallel with Bush’s record comes in ‘Wayward’, where Bunyan sings of ‘days going by in clouds of white washing, life getting lost in a world without end’. There’s also a sense of regret here though. In the same song, Bunyan confesses: ‘I wanted to be the one with road dust on my boots and a single silver ear-ring’.

Most of ‘Lookaftering’ is so exposed that it feels like it was recorded completely solo, with no superfluous intervention. There’s actually a wealth of additional accompaniment though. Richter himself plays a bewildering array of instruments, including glockenspiel, piano, mellotron, recorders and carefully integrated passages of Hammond organ. The recorder, always a callously despised instrument, actually helps imbue the set with a sense of wisdom gained through experience.

The melodies are skeletal and all the songs are remarkably concise. Similarly the lyrics eschew verbosity or poetic conventions in favour of capturing more universal emotions. Sometimes, however, Bunyan conjures words with the touch of magician. ‘Against The Sky’ tells of a tree being cut down, its stately delivery barely concealing a palpable sadness. ‘Turning Backs’ is more abstract, ending with the beautiful lines ‘indifference is the hardest ground, it is the stony silent sound, of plainsong echoing unfound until all the voices have left town’. Bunyan seems as apt at handling isolation as she is at domestic contentment.

In a world of unrestrained warblers, it’s refreshing to here such an unashamedly vulnerable and controlled singer, capable of delivering real and sincere feeling. ‘Lookaftering’ may well be the quietest triumph of the year.

Best of the bunch may well be the third album in as many years from Bunyan’s prolific collaborators Animal Collective. ‘Feels’ is certainly their most coherent statement yet – by some distance the most comfortable to listen to from start to finish. They have largely tamed their tendency for unwarranted provocation, although ‘Feels’ still contains plenty of material that could easily be described as ‘challenging’. It succeeds in assimilating the disparate elements of their sound – the peculiar yelping vocals, Syd Barrett-esque whimsy, the droning electronics and the clattering rhythms provided by percussionist Panda Bear.

The first half of the album is the most immediately stimulating, and contains the band’s most memorable songs to date. The single ‘Grass’ is outstanding, lulling the listener into a false sense of security before piercing the bubble with a series of savage staccato interruptions. Even better is opening track ‘Did You See The Words?’ with its intuitive grasp of melody. ‘The Purple Bottle’ may well be their densest track to date, brimming with nonsense wordplay and compositional invention. It’s unconventional structure is characteristically perverse, and a defining part of its intrigue.

The second half of the album is abstract, slippery and arguably even more unconventional still. It requires a considerable amount of hard work from the listener, as the drones and electronic elements become more prominent on tracks such as ‘Banshee Beat’ and ‘Loch Raven’. As with the Collective’s earlier albums, it’s all about the hints and glimmers of ideas that lurk just beneath the surface, and close listening is essential to uncover many of this exquisite record’s many subtleties.

There’s a whole load of catch-up reviews to come when I get round to it – including live albums from Wilco and Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, as well as studio sets from Chris T-T, Fiery Furnaces, Broken Social Scene, Bettye Lavette and much more!

Better Late Than Never

Kate Bush - Aerial

Twelve years! When Kate Bush last released an album (the criminally underrated 'The Red Shoes' in 1993), we had a Conservative government and Oasis had yet to even release 'Definitely Maybe'. Whole genres have passed by in the interim - Britpop, New Wave of New Grave, the New Acoustic Movement, Drum and Bass, Garage - much to her credit, Bush has existed independently of all trends, be they manufactured or sincere. Her long silence has of itself reaped many benefits. Whilst Kate has focused on motherhood and the domestic life, the extraordinary mystique that surrounds her has grown, enabling her to do the bare minimum of promotion in support of 'Aerial' (one interview to Mojo magazine, two more for BBC Radio) whilst the media publicity machine does most of her work for her. It would have been very easy for many of the female artists who betray her influence (Bjork, Tori Amos) to steal her thunder, but Bush has managed to secure her legacy with consummate ease.

As might be expected, 'Aerial' is wildly ambitious and, in places, quite barmy. It is by no means a masterpiece, but then Bush is too idiosyncratic an artist to produce completely flawless works. It is split into two short discs (around 40 minutes each). The first, subtitled 'A Sea Of Honey' is a collection of seven self contained songs, which are fascinating, peculiar and frequently frustrating. The second disc, subtitled 'A Sky Of Honey' is a conceptual suite, dealing with the passage of the seasons through the course of a single day. Potentially, it's a project riven with pitfalls and could easily have descended into cliche, but Bush just about makes it work (although it perches precariously on the precipice whenever she bafflingly decides to imitate birdsong).

'A Sea Of Honey' is bookended by two remarkable songs. The single 'King Of The Mountain', in which Bush envisages Elvis hidden away in Citizen Kane-style isolation opens the album in a suitably dreamy manner. In a career characterised by the marriages of seemingly opposing musical styles, this is one of Bush's most effective hybrids to date. Its clattering, off-kilter drumming and bizarre reggae chug meld effortlessly with Bush's strangely restrained vocals. It's an entirely charming piece. At the end comes 'The Coral Room', a stripped back piano and vocal ballad that deals obliquely with the death of Bush's mother. A close relation of the heart wrenching 'This Woman's Work' (from 1989's 'The Sensual World'), it is dramatically conceived and exquisitely touching. It provides a powerful reminder of Bush's artistry.

The tracks in between are more problematic. I'm actually rather taken with 'Pi', which finds Kate singing the number to 109 decimal places and marveling over a man infatuated with numbers. It's entirely in keeping with the album's overall theme of awe at the wonder and order of the natural world, and the unique fretless bass sound of Eberhard Weber enhances the texture and sound. 'Mrs. Bartolozzi' appears to be a paen to laundry, with apparently ludicrous lines like 'Washing machine, washing machine/sloosy sloshy, slooshy sloshy/Get that dirty shirty clean'. This being Kate Bush, it's probably about a whole lot more than that, and the lyric about her blouse wrapping around the man's shirt reinvents her old talent for investing the mundane and everyday with erotic imagination. Musically, it is delicate and vulnerable, but suffers from a somewhat hesitant and meandering melody.

'Bertie' is a song for her 'lovely' son. Delivered in a mock-baroque style, it is immensely twee and for every person who is touched by it there will be someone who finds it insufferably nauseating (one wonders what Bertie himself will think about it in a few years' time). With lyrics like 'you bring me so much joy and then you bring me...more joy', it's disappointing that Bush has not found the means to express her obviously genuine emotions more eloquently. 'Joanni' (Joan of Arc) is tough and memorable, with one of the album's more immediate and engaging melodies, but its clunky beats and dated synth string pads do it more harm than good. Much better is 'How To Be Invisible', with its lithe, lightly driving rhythm section and peculiar lyrical incantations. It's the kind of magical realism that only Bush can really pull off. In essence, 'A Sea Of Honey' is never dull, but its experiments are not always successful.

Despite its pretentions, the suite largely fares better. Skip the insipid spoken word intro from Bertie and you arrive at the exquisite 'Prologue' which marks a welcome return for the big drums that worked so well on 'King Of The Mountain'. These produce the album's grandest musical statement when coupled with Michael Kamen's oustanding string arrangement. Kate is in her element here, celebrating the passing of Summer into Autumn with lines like 'it's gonna be so good, we're gonna be dancing'. No doubt someone will describe it as 'pagan', without having any idea what Paganism really is.

Rolf Harris, who first guested on 'The Dreaming' returns here as The Painter, and it's hard to imagine how he resisted the temptation to add the lines 'can you guess what it is yet?'. His jovial, Cartoon Club/Animal Hospital persona doesn't sit very comfortably with the idea of 'A Sky Of Honey' as a grand artistic statement though, and there's something slightly uncomfortable about his appearance, despite its brevity.

'The Architect's Dream' is again exquisitely arranged, although its percussion does sound as if it may have been programmed with the drum pads on a 1980s Yamaha keyboard, but we'll forgive this quirk. Best of all are the closing tracks, which are energised, and full of the highly inventive vocal dexterity for which Bush is rightly lauded. 'Nocturn' is passionate and haunting and with the titles of both discs included in the lyrics, it neatly ties the themes of both discs together, giving the whole bizarre enterprise an appropriately cyclical feel. 'Aerial' is the first piece here that suggests Kate may actually have listened to anything even vaguely contemporary. Its pounding four to the floor bass drum and shouted chorus ('I wanna be up on the roof!') hints intriguingly at club music, most specifically the relentless vocal and rhythmic dynamics of Underworld. Still, with its meticulously realised vocal arrangement, this is still singularly the work of La Bush.

As, if we're honest, is everything else here. It may not be perfect, or even always comfortable, but it's hard to imagine any other artist with this level of courage and conviction. Occasionally her ideas guide her exceptionally well, at others they seem stifling and misguided. It's hard to know what to conclude about such a baffling and confounding record other than at its best, it is the most serious-minded and ambitious pop music of the year and it's certainly good to have her back. It seems unlikely that Kate will perform live again, however, and one serious question remains - is this the start of a new phase of Kate Bush's career, or is it her farewell transmission?