Album of the Year: Sufjan Stevens's Carrie & Lowell

It was one of the many 2 AM nights in March when, taking a break from whatever novel I was reading for comps, I discovered that Pitchfork was streaming Sufjan Stevens's new album. So I decided to listen casually to it as I continued reading, but I quickly found Stevens's soft, sober vocals and jarringly minimalist instrumentals wholly absorbing.  Few albums have struck me so suddenly and powerfully: I distinctly remember sitting in my chair, paralyzed, with tears welling up in my eyes as Stevens so gently--so graciously!--described the night of his mother's death: "The hospital asked should the body be cast / Before I say goodbye, my star in the sky. / Such a funny thought to wrap you up in cloth / Do you find it all right, my dragonfly?"

Listening that night, the album's profound and complex emotions slowly unraveled before me, and I became helplessly captivated. Not much has changed since then.  Upon countless listens, I've found myself awed by Stevens's descriptions of love, heartbreak, depression, and devotion, all of which he centers around his relationships with his often-absent and deeply troubled mother (Carrie) and his heroically loving and seemingly consistently present stepfather (Lowell).  In his storytelling, Stevens proves extremely generous, as he's exceedingly appreciative of his stepfather and, most powerfully, forgiving and understanding of his emotionally and often physically unavailable mother.  When discussing Carrie, Stevens actually never shows resentment; rather, he succinctly and dispassionately recounts his mom's past negligence ("When I was three, maybe four / She left us at that video store") and insurmountable distance ("I just wanted to be near you," he devastatingly repeats in "Eugene").

Even when depicting his despair, Stevens often finds moments of brightness: he ends an otherwise devastating "Should Have Known Better" with a glimmer of optimism ("My brother had a daughter / The beauty that she brings--illumination") and begins the crestfallen "Eugene" with comedy, describing how his name was frequently mispronounced as "Subaru."  These lighter moments provide much needed levity and hope, considering that C&L's centerpiece features the constant refrain "We're all gonna die."  This album, then, is heavy, as its subject matter damn near requires, but Stevens brilliantly allows a few strokes of light to gleam in the record's otherwise immense darkness.

One of my favorite moments of the album's brightness comes on "The Only Thing," when Stevens sings "I want to save you from your sorrow" and the song's slow pace quickens with gorgeous, chimey guitars.  It's subtle, sure, but there's this jolt of hope, of optimism, that nicely and almost necessarily counters the existential doom of the previous "We're all gonna die" declarations.  Lyrically, the line is especially poignant because Sufjan obscures whether he sings from his own or his mother's perspective.  Who's saving whom from sorrow?  The opaque language here, and elsewhere, is wonderfully fitting, as Carrie, Stevens's album explains, left such an imprint on Stevens that he doesn't seem ontologically separate from her.  Thus, her words and perspective meld imperceptibly with Sufjan's.  Despite wanting to be "near her," Stevens now finds Carrie both impossibly distant and hauntingly omnipresent.  Though this realization sounds bleak, on this line it's incredibly moving: both mother and son want to rescue the other from despair, and the song's sudden burst of momentum implies that they each might succeed.

2015 was an amazing year for music, but no record could match Carrie and Lowell's awe-inspiring blend of beauty and emotional depth.  Echoing both despair and hope, the album explores the pangs of rejection and the intense suffering one experiences during a mother's death.  That Stevens can do just that so elegantly, so tactfully, is amazing, but he uses his sorrow for something more: a plea for empathy and forgiveness.  By forgiving his mother, Stevens offers the most powerful articulation of unconditional, enduring love that I've ever heard played to music.  For that reason alone, C&L is a classic, the greatest album of the year and of Stevens's impressive catalogue.

Top Albums and Songs of 2014

Top Albums:

10. Real Estate - Atlas
9. This Will Destroy You - Another Language
8. Cloud Nothings - Here and Nowhere Else
7. Grouper - Ruins
6. Explosions in the Sky - Lone Survivor OST
5. White Lung - Deep Fantasy
4. Knuckle Puck - EPs
3. The War on Drugs - Lost in the Dream
2. The Antlers - Familiars 
1. Joyce Manor - Never Hungover Again

Top Songs:

And here's two-and-a-half hours worth of music to hold you over, with some words below:

Joyce Manor - "Catalina Fight Song": Yes, a one-minute song is my favorite of the year. I've been playing "Catalina Fight Song" nonstop -- and often on loop, something I almost never do -- and it still sounds as fresh and compelling as when I first heard it. Recalling Guided by Voices, Joyce Manor craft songs that are catchy, passionate, and, most of all, succinct. Listen to the guitar that sears through the drums midway through "Catalina." A typical band would've let that guitar play out and cut the opening verse neatly in two, but Joyce Manor refuse to waste a second here, so the vocals keep flowing, their rising intensity matching the amplifying noise.  "Catalina" becomes a minute-long crescendo without all the build-up preceding it, though the song really explodes in the last ten seconds and then abruptly concludes. After such a climactic minute, I feel stunned when the music suddenly ceases.  Somehow, though, I muster the strength to click my radio dial to the left...and then the song repeats.

Knuckle Puck - "Gold Rush": When you hear great pop-punk, it sounds so damn easy -- it really is a formulaic genre -- but few bands truly get the music right.  Often the vocals are too whiny, or the guitars are too distorted, or the hooks simply aren't catchy enough.  But when all a song's pieces do come together, you can recognize a classic instantly.  That's how I felt with Knuckle Puck's "Gold Rush," a song that begins with an urgent exclamation: "If I don't start sleeping on the floor again I'll be testing out my patience,"  This intensity is sustained the whole song through, but what's most remarkable about the track is its fluctuating dynamics: it is not three minutes of pleas, which would quickly grow irritating. Instead,  the vocals are always moving at different speeds and volumes that it's surprising how much you can hear in less than three minutes. (They buy into another pop-punk maxim: brevity is key.)  The group foregrounds the emoish vocals during the verses and bridge, where the band maximizes the poignancy of its universally relatable lines like "I swore I wouldn't feel this way anymore." Then there's the noisier chorus with jolting guitars and staggering drums, not to mention an addictive chorus which I always catch myself involuntarily singing around the house.  Nearing the song's end, the band uses a vocal effect so that the singer's voice swells up, making "Gold Rush" feel gigantic, epically important, which is part of the point: pop-punk magnifies our basic emotions (happiness, sadness, jealousy, anger), which to some seems melodramatic but to others feels like the whole damn universe condensed into a song. Knuckle Puck convince me that whatever they're feeling really matters, and for the three minutes I hear "Gold Rush," I'm totally lost in their world of emotions.

Flying Lotus, ft. Kendrick Lamar - "Never Catch Me": Best hip-hop song of the year.  Few rappers could keep up with Flying Lotus's spazzy beats, but Kendrick accelerates his vocals to blazing speeds, faster than anything heard on his impeccable good kid, m.A.A.d city.  Also check out the stunning video, which shows two young children rise from their coffins and dance through their funeral procession.

The Antlers - "Palace": After releasing Hospice, a devastating concept album acclaimed by critics, I feared that The Antlers might've peaked too early.  But the group's followup, Burst Apart, revealed a band eager to experiment sonically and starting to cultivate a distinct sound.  Following an underrated EP (Undersea), these guys have released the most beautiful and unique work to date: Familiars.  The album is ironically named: this music sounds totally dissimilar to other experimental/stoner indie/alternative music.  In fact, it's even a departure from previous Antlers albums.  Yet this is also a distinct Antlers record, one that no other group could have made.  Listen to how that inimitably angelic falsetto is paired with the ethereal soundscapes we heard on Burst Apart, in addition to warm, brassy horns, which simultaneously cut against the lofty sounds (bringing more earthy tones to the spacey keys) and increase the ambiance.  It's easy to get lost in these warm and oozy sounds until the vocals demand your attention midway through the song during the climactic exclamation.  Listen for individual parts, listen for the whole, listen closely or zone out. This song proves incredibly rewarding and durable.  Seems like they didn't peak too soon, after all.

The War on Drugs - "Under the Pressure":  It's so easy to get lost in the lush soundscapes of this gorgeous record.  We get more of the gauzy shoegaze that we've heard on previous War on Drugs albums, but here the melodies are richer and the songs flow more freely.  Take the album's opener, which ebbs and flows for nine minutes of carefully orchestrated guitars, keys, and muted horns.  It feels otherworldly and transcendent, but the Dylan-esque vocals always keep the song grounded enough that it doesn't loft away into ethereal nowhereland--the foreboding vocals shade these dreamy sounds with dreariness.  We witness this mixture of dreaminess and dread when singer Adam Granduciel admits that he's "trying not to crack under the pressure," and then the song briefly ruptures, all of its pent-up tension suddenly released.  As beautiful as this moment is, it's also the song and singer cracking.  Beautiful moments that capture Granduciel's lowest points.

Real Estate - "Had to Hear":  I liked this group's past album, Days, better than its newest, but this opener epitomizes everything people adore about Real Estate: laid-back vocals, catchy (and deceivingly intricate) guitars, and subtle but moving lyrics.  I just love the line "I don't need the horizon to tell me where the sky is/ It's a subtle landscape where I come from."  Gets me every time, even if I can't pinpoint why.  Maybe it's just a North Jersey thing (these guys are from a town about 15 minutes from me).

The Notwist - "Kong": A lot of publications vaunt Future Islands's "Seasons" as the indie pop song of the year.  I like the song (it made the cut), but give me "Kong" every time, a track that plays like a poppier version of Built to Spill, with the instrumental prowess of a Tokyo Police Club.  This one needs high volume -- let it be the (somewhat morose, but hey it's indie!) jam to your future summers.

Cloud Nothings - "I'm Not a Part of Me":  I still think CN's last album was better, but this song--and the performance of the whole album at the Bowery earlier this year--is superb.  It's no "Stay Useless," but it rocks hard and closes the record with a bang.

Explosions in the Sky - "Waking Up":  By now EITS have mastered the whole soundtrack thing.  And the whole making absolutely gorgeous, wordless music that conjures every bittersweet moment of your life, eliciting near-paralytic states of awe and introspection.  Yeah, that too.  This song brings lightness to a dark film (Lone Survivor) and a largely dark soundtrack, and it offers the chimey guitars and loud/soft dynamics one expects of an Explosions song.  What makes this one special is that the "explosive" crescendo is gentler, and dare I say prettier, than most EITS songs.  And the band operates under time constrains that their albums lack, pulling off an emotionally gripping, wordless song in under five minutes.  This track isn't to be missed by any EITS fan.

Top Albums of 2012, 2-1 + Honorable Mentions

2. mewithoutYou - Ten Stories.  Anyone that's a fan knows the story: mewithoutYou began as a post-hardcore band with spoken- and shouted-vocals and heavy instrumentals but gradually became less heavy and more experimental with each album.  The band's last record, It's All Crazy! It's All False! It's All a Dream! It's All Right, completely deviated from the group's hardcore foundations for a more melodic, singalong aesthetic.  Moreover, whereas earlier albums focused on Weiss' personal struggles, Crazy! centers around fables concerning anthropromorphic animals and vegetables.  So when mewithoutYou announced that their fifth album would be released in 2012, it was anyone's guess where the guys would take their sound.

I don't know anything about truth, but I know falsehood when I see it, and it looks like this whole world you've made.

To my relief, the first song I heard was the thunderous "Fox's Dream of the Log Flume," which features one of Weiss's strongest deliveries ever, as he shouts his last-gasp vocals for two and a half minutes.  Weiss also leads the equally relentless instrumentals, as the rattling guitars, thumping drums, and grooving bass follow his volatile vocals up and down the windy track.  The song is a part of a larger narrative about a circus train's crash in 19th century Montana, and here we listen to the conversation between the escaped Fox and Bear.  But this is not a simple allegory; it's a densely-packed discussion of truth, existence, God, love, and death.  We have brilliant one-liners like, "some with certainty insist 'no certainty exists,'" and there's even some comedy, as the bear recollects: "I asked her, 'do you ever have that recurring fantasy / where you push little kids from the tops of the rides?' She shook her head no and I said 'Oh, neither do I.'" But while culling Weiss's lyrics is often inspiring, it's not always illuminating to the song's grander message: the Fox had once "mistook signs for signified" (or mistook words for something real or concrete) and thereafter tried to find Truth separate from language ("tied my word-ropes in anchor bends").  But the Bear questions whether the Fox can certainly deny all certainty in language and directs some blame at the Fox for their aimless travels: as the Fox withdraws from the world's illusions of truth ("all the bearing points we thought we knew") they move "waywardly on . . . it's still dark on the deck of our boats / haphazardly blown, broken bows."  Between language and silence, certainty and doubt, the Bear announces: "I think it's pretty obvious that there's no God / and there's definitely a God."  Then, during the song's climax, the fox imagines their death in the album's boardwalk/carnival-themed imagery: " I charged at the waves with a glass in my hand / and was tossed like a ball at the bottle stand / and landed beside your remains on the stones / where your cold fingers wrapped round my ankle bone / while maybe ten feet away was a star / thousands of times the size of our sun / exploding like tiny balloons you'd throw darts at." 

This mock trial can no more determine my lot than can driftwood determine the ocean's waves.

The song is a stunning commentary on religion and post-structuralism: if language creates illusions that block Truth, how do we seek and communicate Truth outside of language?  The Fox claims certainty exists, but the Bear is skeptical, finding contradictions in seemingly oppositional binaries: certainty/uncertainty, existence/nonexistence, Truth/Falseness.  The song invokes numerous questions: Why must animals discuss these very human issues?  What does each animal represent?  What does it mean to sing a song renouncing language?  We never receive answers, though we do see the Bear and Fox again in the album's penultimate song, where the weary Bear envisions St. Agnes and jumps off a cliff: "We'll fly in straight lines as from carronades / we'll crash like tidal waves, decimate the islands / as our hollowed lumber falls like water, ends where I start."

Did you come knocking on my door?  Or did I come to yours?  Whose ship came washed up on whose shore?

As if the lyrics were not rich enough, the box set I purchased comes with a twelve-inch lyric booklet with interpretive drawings of each song, providing an interactive and extremely rewarding aesthetic experience to accompany the music. The album is a gift that keeps giving: Weiss's lyrics are difficult but certainly not impenetrable; it simply takes time and experience to unlock his messages.  But it's not just the lyrics that are profound; the music on Ten Stories is wonderfully varied, from the big electric guitars, heavy bass, and wild drums on opener "February, 1878" to the deceptively heavy melodies of "Grist for the Malady Mill."  mewithoutYou also find new ground on songs like "Cardiff Giant," which contrasts bright, jangly guitars with Weiss's heavy screams, and "Fiji Memory," which features wailing guitars over acoustic strums.  

I saw how far I've traveled down the solipsistic road. I climbed out to ask for directions. . . .  [They] asked about the passage from the Bible on my wrists, but I couldn't catch my breath enough to answer.

I know I sound like a fanboy when I describe this album, but Ten Stories is the most engrossing record I've heard all year; each song has layers of meaning that need unpacking to adequately convey its brilliance, and frankly I'm still digging into many of them.  Like mwY's other albums, I imagine I will be listening to Ten Stories for a long time, and it will grow with me over the years.  Overall, Ten Stories represents the intersection of the band's heavier roots with its more experimental, melodic ambitions -- a kind of Hegelian synthesis, which is fitting, since the album ends by quoting Hegel's Phenomenology of the Spirit:

all circles presuppose they'll end where they begin, but only in their leaving can they come back round.

1. JAPANDROIDS - Celebration Rock.  I had a hard time deciding between mewithoutYou's sacred "stories" and Japandroids's secular "celebrations," but the reason I ultimately gave Celebration Rock the nod is a simple one: it's the record that made me happiest this year.  Celebration Rock is a fantastic album, an enormous leap forward from the occasionally amazing but mostly uneven Post-Nothing.  I blasted this album in my car all summer, screaming along with Brian King as he shouts, "OH YEAH! ALL RIGHT! Hearts from hell collide on fire's highway tonight."  The duo said that they anticipated their fans' live reactions to their new songs while recording their fittingly-titled album, and they shouted and screamed to their songs as if they were their own fans.  It's a pretty cool recording philosophy, and it shows.  Plus, it worked.

Top Albums of 2012, 5-3

Part Two of Three.  Thanks for caring.

5. PASSION PIT - Gossamer.  Although it retains the schizophrenic electronica and otherworldly vocals from Manners, Passion Pit's sophomore album sounds wholly unlike its superb predecessor.  As I discovered earlier this year, Manners layers sugary pop music over its devastating lyrics, allowing, perhaps even gesturing, a listener to dance unwittingly to Angelakos's deepest miseries: "you've caused all this pain / and you proudly shame / your whole family's name," he sings on the infectious "Little Secrets."  Yet Gossamer refuses to bury its pain, making for a surprisingly confrontational listen following the superficially joyous Manners.  While a song like "I'll Be Alright" revels in its maximalist approach, from crashing percussion to layers of synths to those glitchy, chipmunk vocals, it's nevertheless hard to miss Angelakos admitting: "I drink a gin and take a couple of my pills . . . I'll be alright."

"I'll Be Alright" leads into the insipid "Carried Away," but then the album picks up with "Constant Conversations," where Passion Pit  pares down its electronic eccentricities to offer something that is both straightforward and rewarding.  By removing these sonic layers, though, PP forces its listeners to confront Angelakos' morbid lyrics, which ominously recall the self-deprecation and helplessness found in Elliott Smith's bleakest songs:

"Well you're wrapped up in a blanket, and you're staring at the floor.
The conversation's moderated by the noisy streets below.
'I never wanna hurt you baby. I'm just a mess with a name and a price.
And now I'm drunker than before; they told me drinking doesn't make me nice.'"

Yet when Angelakos implores, "Everybody now! Oh-oh-oh-oh-ohhh-oh-ohhh.  Sing it now!," you want to sing along and forget what you've just heard -- to be like Angelakos and conceal his pain with melodies and songs and noise.  "Conversations" then leads to my favorite song, "Mirrored Sea," where the depths of sound return.  In one of the most gripping intros I can ever remember, "Sea" opens with a wave of ghostly synths which then bleed into the frenetic keys on the verse.  These discrete parts ultimately intersect at the chorus in the album's best moment.  Sounding like a gothier track from the Manners sessions, "Mirrored Sea" marks a return to PP's opaque lyrics (what's a mirrored sea?) and vocal delivery, though delving deeper reveals some of Angelakos' most illuminating poetry: "He could look good in the light and look bad in the dark / Good men are scarce and few / But always passing through."  

For a few months I stopped listening to Gossamer, thinking it failed to live up to Manners.   Maybe the change from album to album seemed to drastic, or maybe I couldn't handle delving into Angelakos's miseries while reading stuff like Hiroshima and "The Tell-Tale Heart" (but now I can, Merry Christmas!).  But Gossamer is a great album, a more than worthy follow-up to Manners.  And for all its painful moments, Gossamer still stresses its exuberant music over its sad lyrics, like on "Hideway," which starts with staticky, fragmented vocals and then speeds into a huge chorus that commands as much dancing as it does headbanging.  It's a warm, flickery, and all-around pretty song with an encouraging chorus, "someday everything will be okay"--words we so badly want to believe, even if the album gives us a hundred reasons to think otherwise.

Top Albums of 2012, 10-6

I'd stay up all night, just writing and writing. I mean, like pages of dribble-- You know, about The Faces, or Coltrane. You know, just to fucking write.

You have to make your reputation on being honest and unmerciful. Honest. Unmerciful.

I thought I'd start this with two quotes from Almost Famous, a movie that I tragically only discovered this year and which espouses so many of the values I cherish about music and music journalism.   Like Famous's protagonist William, my experience as a music journalist is limited; it really only includes a semester writing for CMJ, though let's pretend my column in The Setonian did something for me other than provide piles of obscenity-filled hate mail.  Regardless of whatever limitations I might have, I'm following Phillip Seymour Hoffman's path and "writing and writing" honestly and unmercifully.  I hope you enjoy my opinions, whomever you are, and even more so, I hope you love this music as much as I do.

10. JENS LEKMAN - I Know What Love Isn't.  Jens Lekman's 2007 Night Falls Over Kortedala is not an album that I play all too frequently, but I almost always love listening to it.  This is fairly rare; even some of my favorite albums occasionally pass as background noise, but with Night Falls, I can't help but listen for my favorite lines, kind of like waiting for the funniest scene in your favorite comedy. Jens's quirky lyrics can rival some comedies, but they can also be solemn and sad, and the brilliance of Night Falls is its balancing of these complex, and often conflicting, emotions.  Take "A Postcard to Nina," where Jens pretends to be the boyfriend of his lesbian friend Nina to please Nina's kind-but-conservative father.  Jens recounts:

"Your father puts on my record, he says, 'So tell me how you met her.'
I get embarrassed and change the subject
And put my hand on some metal object,
He laughs and says that's a lie detector."

After this lighthearted anecdote--and the end of the awkward dinner--Jens writes to Nina, telling her to continue overcoming all of love's obstacles: "I'm sending this postcard just to say / Don't let anyone stand in your way, / Yours truly, Jens Lekman."  When Jens repeats "Don't let anyone stand in your way," he transforms a Hallmark-esque line into a stunning (and, yes, sentimental) moment, where the listener feels empowered to transcend with Nina.  The music throughout Night Falls captures Jens's ability to combine humor with a moral, mixing whimsical samples and instruments with somber piano and string arrangements.  Yet in 2012, five years after his previous full-length, Jens tones down the more theatrical elements of his music with the somber I Know What Love Isn't, an album that finds Jens coping with heartbreak.  This is a more somber songwriter than we've previously seen, but glimmers of Jens's lightheartedness still manage to seep through the sadness, making for a curveball of a long-awaited album that nevertheless meets its high expectations.

Top Albums of 2011, 5-1

5.  Kevin Devine - Between the Concrete and the Clouds.  In 2008, after hearing an acoustic version of "Brother's Blood" for the first time at a Kevin Devine/Jesse Lacey show, I thought Kevin Devine's next record would be his best by a landslide.  As it turned out, "Brother's Blood" was the best song from that album (also titled "Brother's Blood"); unfortunately, though, nothing else even came close.  This is in part to the greatness of that song, but also to the horrible pacing of the album; the tracks either awkwardly bled into each other or sounded so disparate that the idea of an "album" lost its aura.  It seemed like a mix tape--one with some of Devine's weakest songs to date.

So I was apprehensive about "Concrete and Clouds," hoping that one of my favorite performers could bring more of his live energy into the studio.  I couldn't have been more pleased with the outcome.  Much like Bright Eyes' 2011 revival, Devine's lyrics remain the focal point, but now they are accompanied by a full band effort with more pronounced melodies.  The poignant "The First Hit" touches on familiar lyrical themes but sounds like a more polished song from the "Put Your Ghost to Rest" sessions.  "11-17" could have been a quiet, acoustic track, but Devine instead plucks a twangy, electric guitar, and the song ultimately breaks down into a slow-burning haze.  Songs like "11-17" capture the live energy that was absent from "Brother's Blood"; and after listening to the album through the brooding closer "I Used to Be Someone," which could have been written from Devine's or his deceased brother's perspective ("rest assured I used to be someone / A brother's brother and a mother's son"), one thing becomes clear: this is a consistent and cohesive effort--possibly the beginning of Devine's studio evolution from a singer/songwriter to the leader of a full-fledged rock band.

4.  The Weeknd - House of Balloons. From my review at The Setonian: The anonymous R&B singer The Weeknd recently released his 9-song debut, "House of Balloons" – a staggering mix of R&B, dubstep and indie/avant-garde samples. The mixtape sounds like Drake during his most wallowing moments, offering a dark and despairing insight into the world of drug consumption that, for all its sadness and futility, is also undeniably catchy, or perhaps addicting itself.  Opener "High for This" begins somewhat conventionally: hypnotic drum slugging and reverb-drowned vocals a la Drake. However, when The Weeknd implores, "Open your hand," electronic fuzz and dubstep beats suddenly pulsate, awakening the song from its swoon. This weekend party has all the elements of contemporary mainstream rap—lots of drugs and girls—but even when The Weeknd sings the song's chorus, "Even though you don't roll / Trust me girl / You wanna be high for this," he is hardly glorifying this hedonism.

The mixtape's highlight, "House of Balloons / Glass Table Girls," nears 7 minutes, beginning with fuzzy waves of electronic noise and a psychedelic sample from Siouxsie and the Banshees, which revels in its drug-filled indulgence: "This is a happy house / We're happy here in the happy house / This is fun, fun, fun, fun..." The song unwinds midway into the sludgy beat of "Glass Table Girls," capturing the dingy atmosphere of a cocaine-filled after-party: "We could test out the tables / We got some brand new tables / All glass and it's four feet wide / But it's enough to get us ten feet high." The Weeknd alters his normally echoing and despondent vocals with aggressive and confrontational near-whispering, evoking tension and a sense of looming danger.  "House of Balloons / Glass Table Girls" captures the ethos of the perpetually high hip-hop and rap scene, and it is therefore not just one of the better songs released this year but also one of the most culturally and historically significant.

Much like Elliott Smith's posthumous "From a Basement on a Hill," a haunting collection of songs about drug-addiction and dying recorded when Smith essentially was a walking corpse, "House of Balloons" sounds frighteningly earnest—the harrowing words from a moribund singer. If true art is suffering, "House of Balloons" is a ghastly masterpiece.

3.  M83 - Hurry Up, We're Dreaming.   If a group says they are influenced by "Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness," chances are I'm going to listen.  "Hurry Up We're Dreaming" is a joyous album; it's not only just thoroughly enjoyable, but it is one of those albums that makes me happy every time I listen to it, from the stellar "Intro" and MGMT-esque single, "Midnight City" to the childlike visions on "Raconte-Moi Une Histoire" all the way through the second disc, the 22nd song.  I will have much more to say about this album once I review its individual songs and M83 at Terminal 5 (which I paid an arm and a leg for to get me and my brother in).

2.  Bon Iver - Bon Iver, Bon Iver.  Beautiful, majestic, "Holecene."  A perfect album and the fact that it came out in the summer was a pretty daring move for an artist whose music and persona are associated with winter, snow, and log cabins.

I don't care if the last song, "Beth/Rest," sounds like Phil Collins; it remains one of my favorites. Especially when Vernon proclaims, "I ain't living in the dark no more."  What a great line, especially for someone who's unfairly portrayed as a self-wallowing recluse.

One of the many reasons I really enjoy this album is very subjective: nostalgia.  I streamed this record over and over at my summer internship, and it just reminds me of the good times and great people (and no crippling grad school stress) there.  I loved that job and was so sad to leave.  But I still have this album to bring me back, which isn't the worst consolation gift.

1.  The Weeknd - Thursday.  The difference between "House of Balloons" and "Thursday" can be found in their covers: the monochrome debut versus the colorful contrasts on the sophomore mixtape.  I wouldn't love "Thursday" if I didn't love "House of Balloons;" it's the perfect follow-up to a phenomenal debut, adding color to an occasionally bleak palette.  "Life of the Party" revels in the Carnivalesque--it's loud, bold, swanky, dirty, and sadistic: "if you want to go downtown with the drugs in your body / take that step, you're the life of the party."  I don't believe that the Weeknd is a sadistic person but just an imaginative lyricist; he creates a terrifyingly realistic narrative, where vultures ("The Birds" series) scour drug-filled parties for their inebriated female prey. I think this album could be a fashionable listen--something I'm just really into this year and will eventually not like as much--but I cannot deny that this was the album I listened to and enjoyed the most this year, and I'm still loving it.

Top Albums of 2011, 11-6

11.  Bright Eyes - The People's Key.  After a very uneven 2007 release in "Cassadaga" and a 4-year hiatus, Bright Eyes return with a surprisingly solid album, given how spotty Oberst's side projects had been.  Oberst really sings on "The People's Key," sounding as confident as ever -- and for good reason: his lyrics, though now much more abstract than emotional, remain some of the best of our generation, and his voice has developed so he can now harmonize better than ever.  Moreover, after the grandiose "Cassadaga," Mike Mogis displays some much-needed restraint in the studio, focusing more on melodies than worldly soundscapes.  What follows are some of the catchiest songs Oberst's ever produced, with "Beginner's Mind" perhaps his band's greatest triumph.  "The People's Key" may conclude Bright Eyes' stellar, near-15 year catalog, and, if that's the case, Oberst ends his inspirational, prolific, and influential project on a high note.

10.  Kanye West and Jay-Z - Watch the Throne.  I have a major problem with songs "featuring" other artists.  I feel that more often than not the meaning of the song is compromised when another person adds in his/her verse.  Often when the featured guest tries to stay on the song's theme, he/she oversimplifies it or drops a cheesy metaphor to ruin the listening experience (see: Young Jeezy in Drake's "Unforgettable" or Lil Wayne in Drake's "The Real Her" for examples).  But when Kanye and Jay Z, two of the biggest names in the music industry, recorded "Watch the Throne" together, I was intrigued, albeit a little skeptical.  When I listened to the album, though, I heard a collection of loud, witty, brilliantly produced songs that seemed like neither Ye's nor Jay's individual work, but something that melded their two styles together: it was distinctly theirs.  You know its Kanye and Jay on radio hits "Ni***as in Paris" and "Otis," but you can also tell the songs come from "Watch the Throne:" Jay motivates Kanye to rap harder than ever, while Kanye challenges Jay's recent lyrical/instrumental complacency.  Besides being able to hear two prolific artists changing their style to make something great, it was most enjoyable to hear Ye and Jay competing with each other, ricocheting lines off each other in "Otis" or even trying to be the most introspective and, surprisingly,  vulnerable on "New Day."  Perhaps after accomplishing so many individual accolades, Jay and Ye needed to record together for inspiration.  Kanye and Jay seem to not only encourage but also to threaten one another; these guys have always been known for both their egotism and paranoia ("they want me dead," Jay admits on "Why I Love You"), so it's not inconceivable that the rappers are watching each other to protect his (however imagined) throne atop the rap/hip-hop world.

9.  Frank Ocean - Nostalgia, Ultra.  I actually wrote my first blog post on Frank Ocean's "There Will Be Tears," the ninth track off his debut mixtape.  I discussed Ocean's heart-on-sleeve honesty and poetic craftsmanship, which surprised me knowing his affiliation with Odd Future.  That basically can sum up this amazing, surprisingly endearing mixtape, as Ocean's lyrical craft and impressive ear for beats make "Nostalgia" a thoroughly enjoyable listen.  True to its title, Ocean's mixtape encompasses a wide range of feelings: the happiness, sadness, jealousy, anger, naivete, lust, and heartbreak we can vividly remember from our past.  Nostalgia emerges in the first track, where Ocean re-imagines Coldplay's "Strawberry Swing" to sing about lost love and youth during war: "When we were kids / We handpainted strawberries on a swing / Every moment was so precious then / I'm still kicking / I'm daydreaming on a strawberry swing."  That's pretty much the poem I tried to write throughout high school--it both annoys and amazes me how Ocean perfects the poetic imagery and emotions I've been searching for in five lines.

The album's nostalgia persists throughout: even the instrumental tracks, which are mainly the clicking and hissing of cassettes, are named for old NES video games.  Yet the distant past also becomes an immediate future; Ocean accesses his memories to make something timely (or timeless) and real, like on the poignant opener.  Additionally, Ocean samples instrumentals like "Strawberry Swing," "There Will Be Tears," and MGMT's "Electric Feel" to reinvent them--taking from the sometimes very distant past to create something uniquely his own.  Never does this become more apparent than of "American Wedding," which borrows from the Eagles's "Hotel California."  Ocean details a young lust/love and hasty divorce, concluding, "It's an American wedding; / They don't mean too much. ...We had an American wedding / Now what's mine is yours, American divorce."  Ocean continues by begging, "Don't break my heart / This wedding ring won't ever wipe off," only to admit: "But if you stay, girl if you stay / You'll probably leave later anyway / It's love made in the U.S.A."  Once Ocean's disillusion peaks, the guitar solos begin, sounding as if they were written for this exact moment.  The song no longer feels like a cover or a borrowed instrumental; it becomes Frank Ocean's--a remarkable feat for a song whose instrumentals are firmly planted in the rock-n-roll canon.

Ocean's original work is just as compelling; the gritty beat of "Novacane" and ominous piano and bass on "Lovecrimes" mark some of the album's standouts.  "Swim Good" is my newest favorite; there's a sense of urgency to it although the song doesn't seem to try to sound overly urgent, even as Ocean threatens "to drive in(to) the ocean."  It's hard to describe.  Ocean's music simply has many natural qualities to it.  When music is this honest, nothing feels forced.

8.  The Weeknd - Echoes of Silence.  The third mixtape released this year by the mysterious R&B artist, The Weeknd, dropped only a few days before Christmas, so I haven't had a lot of time to digest it all yet.  Which is probably a good thing: this collection contains the grimmest tales the Weeknd has told yet--not exactly ideal for getting into the holiday spirit.  Look no further than "Initiation," where the Weeknd's falsetto croons devolve into deranged, goblin whispers, which maliciously inform a drugged-up girl: "I got a test for you / Baby, you can have my heart / There's just something that I need from you / Is to meet my boys."  Pitchfork claims the song is about gang-rape, which doesn't seem all too farfetched, considering the song's violent, propulsive beat.  What is most disturbing is the song's catchiness despite its violence and cruelty; it seems perfectly appropriate for an insatiably voyeuristic American audience, which overlooks (or stampedes) morality/ethics to pry into the lives of celebrities.  We make nobodys into celebrities just to know everything about them (see: Jersey Shore) and we love to watch people fall.  The Weeknd appeals to these American vultures, first showing us the idealized party that mainstream music glorifies, then dragging us to the reality of O/Ds, false love, and the most intense suffering--showing us all the steps that lead to "the fall."

There's so much more to say about this album: its lyrical and musical cohesion, its place in the trilogy of mixtapes, and the freakin' perfect cover of Michael Jackson's "Dirty Diana."  This is quickly emerging as my favorite Weeknd album, but since I'm supplementing this information in January, I will leave my rank as is. 
 
7. Real Estate - Days.  It seems trendy and hipsterish to pick P4K's BNM's "Days," but as soon as I heard the pensive chimes and washed-out reverb on opener "Easy," I became hooked on Real Estate's breezy sound.  NJ's Real Estate have what I always considered to be an "indie" sound: moody, often brooding pop that is simplistic but meaningful.  Why I had such a precise definition of one of the most amorphous genres around today is beyond me, but hearing RE's music brought me back to "easier" listening "days" when I was first discovering independent music and hearing sounds I seemed to be searching for all my life.  Some journalists are trying to sell bullshit about how RE's music is Springsteen-esque--that it captures some NJ ethos.  But that's not really the appeal to this music (hell, I live in Jersey and don't hear a Jersey sound or influence).  What is great about "Days," though, is its cool, laid-back simplicity; you can easily get lost in the sprawling guitars and low-key vocals or you can bang out the drum beat to "It's Real."  Real Estate doesn't seem to want to fit in with the lo-fi, SO-CAL "chillwave" movement that's trending on indie blogs; their music, much like Frank Ocean's, seems to just flow naturally without trying to conform to a style or trend.  It's genuine and unadorned music--or, simply, "it's real."

6. The Antlers - Burst Apart.  After seeing them nearly steal the show while opening for Explosions in the Sky, I knew I needed to devote some serious listening time to the Antlers's newest album.  While it doesn't live up to their live experience, where the group lets their songs flow into long but tight jams, "Burst Apart" presents some of the richest musical tapestries I've heard in a long time.  The group's large dynamics and haunting vocals on "No Windows" and "Parentheses" stand out as exemplars.  And when the band chooses minimalism on the closer "Putting the Dog to Sleep," the staccato guitar strikes end the album on an emotional high, as the dog-imagery throughout the album culminates in the painful lines, "Prove to me  I'm not gonna die alone... / Don't lie to me, if you're putting the dog to sleep."  I've listened to this album dozens of times and I'm just starting to unravel the lyrics; it's so easy to get absorbed in the album's soundscapes, paired with its impeccable pacing, that it almost makes the group's acerbic lyrics an afterthought.  Which is great: an album this good should require dozens of spins, and constantly finding/hearing new things make the experience all the more enjoyable.