CHIRP: Chicago Independent Radio Project

Posted by Tony TB on December 31, 2008 around 11am

It’s been a great year for music — several of my favorite bands put out albums this year, plus I discovered a number of new artists. It was hard to pare the list down, but these are the albums that really stood out for me. Here they are, in rough but non-scientific order, starting with the best:

Camille / Music Hole
You may know her as one of the vocalists on Nouvelle Vague’s first album, but her solo work is completely different. She plays with styles, from the secular gospel of “Gospel with No Lord”, to the cabaret sound of “Cats and Dogs” to the soaring beautiful vocals of “The Monk”. This album gets better every time I listen to it.

DeVotchKa / A Mad and Faithful Telling
What’s not to love? It’s got passion, hooks, and an infectious beat. I never get tired of it.

Brazilian Girls / New York City
One thing I think is key in an album is that the tracks must all sound different from each other, and there should be several tracks that are really great. New York City is a perfect example of this; the styles vary without being precious, there’s not a dud in the batch, and three of the tracks were contenders for my “best songs of the year”.

Portishead / Third
A top album does not need to be an easy listen. Portishead’s third studio album is challenging in places, but overall rewarding. The song “the Rip” is just about perfect.

The Raconteurs / Consolers of the Lonely
Frankly the Raconteurs seem like they are not quite my style; so why do I love this one so much? Well, I do like a good rock album, and this one delivers in spades.

Kelley Polar / I Need You to Hold On While While the Sky Is Falling
Electronica meant for dancing, but with added layers of complexity, as befits this Juilliard-trained classical violinist (and brother of Blevin Blectum).

Fleet Foxes / Fleet Foxes
Yeah yeah everybody likes Fleet Foxes. You know why? Because it’s damn fine stuff, in the vein of 60’s folk. Just gorgeous.

Allá / Es Tiempo
A Chicago Spanish-speaking trio (that’s “ah-YAH”, not “AH-lah”, people) that produces lush, latin- and jazz-inflected pop.

The Whitsundays / The Whitsundays
Between the Whitsundays, Fleet Foxes, and the Last Shadow Puppets, the 60’s are back. The Whitsundays have perfectly hit that mellow folk-inflected pop sound of 40 years ago… and just when you think it might be too mellow, they suddenly rock out with the song “Antisocial”.

She & Him / Volume One
Good, solid vocal pop from an actress and an indie music veteran.

Zerostars / Basement Stories
What can I say? This album makes me happy every time I listen to it. This Chicago group has been around a few years, but this is their first full-length album.

The B-52’s / Funplex
I heard the B-52’s had a new album in the works two years ago, and could not wait to hear it when it finally came out this past spring. The B-52’s are a band very close to my heart, having been a big part of my high school and college experience. I prepared myself to be very disappointed by this album. I was not.

The Aluminum Group / Little Happyness
This band has been producing reliably good jazz-pop-dance albums for years now. Little Happyness closes out their “Happyness” trilogy. It’s not really any new ground for them, but it’s still really good.

Final Fantasy / Pays to Please and Spectrum, 14th Century
Owen Pallett, what are you doing? Two different EPs released about a month apart, apparently on two different labels? On both EPs, Pallett takes the “pop” out of “chamber pop”, leaving us with something akin to musical theater, only stranger. I like it.

A couple of late additions — I’ve only had a couple of days to listen to these, but they both very good and are worth a mention: The Streets‘ new album Everything is Borrowed is a return to the style of his first album, Original Pirate Material. Dan le sac vs. Scroobius Pip’s album Angles features Scroobius Pip’s self-described “angsta rap” over dan le sac’s electronic music.

And I only just discovered that Juana Molina had an album this year. I haven’t gotten my hands on a copy yet, but she might well have made this list if I had.

There are some songs out there that demand a little attention. You hear them on the radio and you perk up; you turn up the volume; you hope to hear them again as soon as they end. Here, in no order at all, is my list of those songs from 2008:

Camille / The Monk
No Kids / For Halloween
Portishead / The Rip
The Magnetic Fields / California Girls
Fleet Foxes / White Winter Hymnal
Cat Power / Blue
Brazilian Girls / Nouveau Americain
DeVotchKa / Transliterator
CSS / Move
Kelley Polar / Chrysanthemum
Haale / Off-Duty Fortune Teller

There you have it. You know who else is making a top albums list? Mancunian webcartoonist John Allison of Scary Go Round (as he does every year at this time).