“I’m so glad I came but I can’t wait to leave,” St. Vincent sings on “Slow Disco.” In two different remixed versions of her ghostly, neon-tinged anthem originally heard on last year’s “Masseduction,” she reveals both the rousing elation and haunting melancholy of the same line. My favorite version though is this year’s “Fast Slow Disco,” along with the accompanying music video. Annie Clark moshes among a rambunctious, sweaty mass of burly men dressed in leather and bondage in a gay club. She conveys a liberating celebration while acknowledging how fleeting the sensation can be. “Don’t it beat a slow dance to death?”
This is one of the songs that spoke to me the most this year, along with the arresting contrast of party rhythms and aggressive beats in the explosively topical “This is America” by Childish Gambino, and the enormous, rising wave when I heard Lady Gaga belt out “Shallow” in “A Star is Born.”
But “Fast Slow Disco” in particular made me think of my own concert going and listening this year. I still can’t think of a better feeling than hearing great music at a live show, but I’ve started to notice some of my fatigue. I listened to less new music this year, and I’m starting to be more selective in what concerts I spend my time and money. It could just be this year in music, in which the most important albums of the year were far more divided among critics, and the culture gravitated toward these often meme-worthy tracks and videos more so than a single artist or album.
Or it could be a sign of how my listening might look going forward. So this year, you’ll find a lot of my old favorites, all organized alphabetically, with the exception of my one big new discovery this year.
1. Snail Mail – “Lush”
I first heard Snail Mail in April when they opened for Japanese Breakfast. But I didn’t “discover” them until their album came out in June. It wasn’t until another several months of listening and being in awe of how this band seemingly came out of nowhere that a friend pointed out to me that Snail Mail was in fact the same band we saw that April. I even remember saying at the time that this was a band that could grow into something special, but they weren’t there just yet.
And honestly, they still aren’t there yet. Lindsay Jordan is just 19, and her songs have the raw immaturity of a high school band finding its voice and learning to play together. But she’s part of a new age of young, female indie rockers, being discussed in the same trend pieces with Mitski, Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers, Soccer Mommy and more.
Jordan’s songs are personal, emotional and introspective, not unlike her peers. She sings with some sarcasm, attitude and frustration about wasted weekends, drunken parties, unreliable friends and lost loves, but she’s not by any means singing above her age. And each song is minimal in its instrumentation and production values, but each manages to grow until they’re blooming with color and beauty, fully living up to the album’s name, “Lush.” What sets Snail Mail apart in my mind is how propulsive and loud this band can get. Jordan’s strumming on the invigorating “Pristine” is always varied, always driving forward. And you’d never expect the serene electric guitar on “Stick” to crescendo into the spine-tingling anthem the way it does.
This band is in the conversation for the future of indie rock because they can still grow, they can get better, and you can predict how this young band and songwriter will mature in their lyrics and their sound. And when they do, this time I’ll be sure to remember them.
Arctic Monkeys – “Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino”
I heard it said that Arctic Monkeys’ “Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino” is more interesting to talk about than to actually listen to. And much as I enjoy it, that still may be true. Alex Turner showed his hand in a performance on “The Tonight Show,” donning a strange lounge singer persona as he plucked away at a piano. “I just wanted to be one of The Strokes/now look at the mess you made me make,” Turner sings to open this most peculiar of concept albums set inside a bizarre, remote resort. They’ve gone full on Bowie, stripping back all of the raucous guitars of their early work or even their recent pop reinvention. But it’s not as if this band has never been ironic, experimental or baroque, and what’s neat about this album is how it embraces all of these weirdest impulses for something fully cohesive and unique.
Beach House – “7”
I’m tired of trying to parse just how Beach House is “growing” as a band. There’s not a song on “7” that would sound right among “Teen Dream” or “Bloom,” and yet they sound exactly as they’ve always sounded. Beach House more than almost any other band has been able to capture a mood or vibe of what it is to listen to them. The droning jams that make getting lost in my headphones so easy are still intact. What makes this band still worth listening to are those sonic surprises, the wave of energy from guitarist Alex Scally that climaxes opener “Dark Spring,” the throbbing crescendo of “Drunk in LA” or the sudden, inspiring sprint that transforms the otherwise soothing “Dive.” So I don’t have a reason why they deserve a spot on this list every year; they just spin gold.
Car Seat Headrest – “Twin Fantasy”
If Snail Mail is the future of indie rock, Car Seat Headrest is the sweeping, victorious final gulp of air of indie rock’s old guard. The age of introspective, grandiose, sprawling rock songs about a white guy’s insecurities is quickly going by the wayside.
But then Will Toledo is a remarkable ambassador to the Pavement generation. “Twin Fantasy” is a remake of one of Car Seat Headrest’s early Bandcamp album, redone with fresh arrangements and production values that go far beyond the bedroom, not to mention slightly updated lyrics. “God give me Frank Ocean’s voice and James Brown’s stage presence,” Toledo sings on “Cute Thing,” an ironic pop culture reference about his rock star insecurities that only works in 2018.
His lyrics grapple with uncertainties about fame or about fighting off schizophrenia in the midst of grocery shopping doldrums. He even takes the piss out of his own song construction, explaining why “Bodys” needs another verse to make its chorus more rewarding. But what’s still most impressive about this band is how punchy singles like the disco-inflected “Nervous Young Inhumans” fit together seamlessly with not one but several multi-layered rock epics, most notably “Beach Life-In-Death.” Be it 10 minutes, 15 minutes, Toledo’s songs never feel overlong, needlessly stretched or indulgent. Now if only all the other bland white dude rock bands could learn a thing or two from these guys.
Courtney Barnett – “Tell Me How You Really Feel”
Their Kurt & Courtney excursion is light, whimsical fun, but I personally like Courtney Barnett best when she’s mashing at chords and pop riffs the way the old Kurt & Courtney were doing. “Tell Me How You Really Feel” has Courtney Barnett back to her aggressive, yet still loquacious self. The opening dirge “Hopefulessness” and the punishing “I’m Not Your Mother, I’m Your Bitch” signal how Barnett is still growing as a songwriter. And this album finds her singing about everything from the #MeToo movement to a Sunday cup of coffee. This is only Barnett’s second solo LP, but she sounds like a veteran who’ll keep doing what she does best for a long time to come.
Father John Misty – “God’s Favorite Customer”
Where do you go from the 74-minute orchestral epic that was “Pure Comedy?” Father John Misty skipped the press tour for his fourth album “God’s Favorite Customer.” And by staying quiet, he didn’t disrupt the contemplative beauty of this shorter, more modest collection of songs. This is Misty’s most understated album yet. And you get the sense he’s being a little more sincere and less of a character, whether it’s in the personal mind-trip of “Mr. Tillman” or the spiritual underpinnings of the title track. And yet that hasn’t stopped Misty from being sardonic or arch in his lyrics, liking when he sings that he’s “in the poem zone” and rhymes it with “texting your iPhone.” It’s that dedication to the songwriting that elevates these otherwise elegant songs above those of the bearded songwriter dudes he’s been impersonating so well all these years.
Kurt Vile – “Bottle It In”
One of the comments on a video of Kurt Vile performing a cover of Tom Petty’s “Learning to Fly,” an extended acoustic, looped jam on Petty’s pop classic, read, “He Kurt Vile’d the shit outta that song.” Yeah, that’s about right, and it describes Vile’s latest “Bottle It In” fairly well. I’ve always found Vile a little sleepy on his albums, an impressive guitar player with a knack for musical intricacies and lyrical curiosities, but never compelling as a pop tunester. “Bottle It In” is not suddenly Vile’s “big” album, though it has two tracks that surpass 10 minutes and several others that come close. His songs don’t necessarily grow in the way his one-time band The War on Drugs often do, but the delicate “Mutinies,” the heavier bark of “Check Baby” or the elliptical “Bassackwards” do deepen and continually add layers that allow you to sink deeper into a hypnotic chill.
Mitski – “Be the Cowboy”
I had pegged Mitski as something of a St. Vincent disciple upon hearing her last album. But “Be the Cowboy” shows that this genre and gender-bending artist is something different. These songs defy easy classification, often multiple times within the same track. The single “Nobody” takes a left turn from melodic indie pop to straight up disco, whereas opener “Geyser” finds Mitski at her most dreamy and her most grungy. What’s more amazing is how each of the 14 tracks on “Be the Cowboy” deepen and evolve, yet are so brisk and short as to never overstay their welcome. Hearing this, it’s hard to imagine Mitski putting together some sprawling, 10-minute jam in the way many of her male predecessors might. But then hearing “Be the Cowboy” makes it feel like she could do anything.
Parquet Courts – “Wide Awake”
I run hot and cold on Parquet Courts. Depending on my mood, they can either feel plodding and inaccessible, or they can sound like the most energetic, propulsive and smartest band in the room. The punchy guitars and rapid fire punk tracks are as good as this band has always delivered. But “Wide Awake” is probably as close as Parquet Courts are going to get to their party record. The bouncy bass line is more pronounced, they’ve got near joke tracks like a song called “Freebird II,” the island percussion rhythms on the title track are legit danceable, and the closer “Tenderness” might be their poppiest song yet.
Wye Oak – “The Louder I Call, The Faster It Runs”
You’ve heard me say before how underrated Wye Oak is. What’s different here is that Jenn Wasner’s blend of dreamy, synth-driven art pop and frenetic, often scorching guitar has never been this assured and confident. The scurrying riff that compliments the chorus on the title track or the blaze of noise on the otherwise peaceful “Lifer” are true standouts. And while I wouldn’t put “The Louder I Call” ahead of either of their previous albums, the songwriting on Wasner’s latest effort has more up-tempo urgency here than it does among “Civilian’s” dirges or “Shriek’s” spacey trips. This band just keeps getting better, and by God someday people will start taking notice.
Other albums I enjoyed:
- Big Red Machine – “Big Red Machine”
- Deafheaven – “Ordinary Corrupt Human Love”
- Foxing – “Nearer My God”
- Kitten Forever – “Semi-Permanent”
- Paul McCartney – “Egypt Station”
- Screaming Females – “All At Once”
- Vincent – “MassEducation”
- Ty Segall – “Freedom’s Goblin”
- Ty Segall – “Fudge Sandwich”
- Unknown Mortal Orchestra – Sex & Food
Best Songs of 2018
- Snail Mail – Pristine
- Snail Mail – Stick
- St. Vincent – Fast Slow Disco
- Childish Gambino – This is America
- Ty Segall – Every 1’s a Winner
- Father John Misty – Mr. Tillman
- Father John Misty – The Palace
- Mitski – Nobody
- Mitski – Why Didn’t You Stop Me
- Courtney Barnett – Charity
- Courtney Barnett – I’m Not Your Mother, I’m Not Your Bitch
- Beach House – Drunk in LA
- Beach House – Dark Spring
- Mark Ronson and Lady Gaga – Shallow
- Kitten Forever – Pinky Swear
- Screaming Females – I’ll Make You Sorry
- Grimes ft. HANA – We Appreciate Power
- Kurt Vile – Check Baby
- Parquet Courts – Tenderness
- Arctic Monkeys – Four Out of Five
- Wye Oak – The Louder I Call, The Faster It Runs
- Wye Oak – The Instrument
- Jack White – Over and Over and Over
- Car Seat Headrest – Beach Life-In-Death
- Car Seat Headrest – Bodys