Backspacer: Best Album of 2009
RainierWolfcastle
Posts: 48
According to the local news music critic. I know he's a fan of PJ and I thought Backspacer might be in his top ten, but this was a bit of a surprise:
http://www.buffalonews.com/entertainmen ... 89819.html
Looking back at 2009 in music, plus the year’s 10 best albums
By Jeff Miers
News Pop Music Critic
Updated: December 12, 2009, 1:56 PM / 0 comments
It's likely that in terms of music, 2009 will be remembered as the year when Michael Jackson died, Lady Gaga ascended, and Kanye West dissed Taylor Swift during a high-profile, televised industry awards show. That this shouldn't be the case won't change the fact that it is.
Interestingly, all of these events have an air of tragedy about them.
The death of the "King of Pop" rescued his career in a way he had been unable to do himself for the previous 10 years, but did little to shine light into the meaning of what must be considered a tragic life. Lady Gaga is Madonna all over again, but the outfits are even skimpier, the message less clear, and the tunes not nearly as good. The Kanye/Taylor fiasco didn't do anyone any favors, and made country music fans feel the first twinge of self-righteousness they'd been granted since the George W. Bush presidency ended. None of this is good.
Way down here in reality-based reality — where music matters more than fame and we know our throttle from our brake — 2009 was actually a banner year for pop. Plainly speaking, the year-in-song kicked butt. And it's been a long, long, lonely time since we've been able to suggest as much with a straight face.
You can check the pulse of popular music by gauging its diversity. The more things sound, look and smell the same — the more interchangeable they suggest themselves to be — the worse shape pop is in.
When you can find signs of abundant, engaged life across the span of genre classifications — say, in rock, pop, hip-hop, and the experimental acumen toward intermingling them all — that's a good thing for everyone, save the folks whose gig it is to cubby-hole music in order to more easily market it to consumers who apparently are not to be trusted to make up their own minds.
Bearing this in mind, the diagnosis for the corpus of popular music is a positive one this year. And even if you buy the whole ball of wax about albums being dead and "the kids" only being willing to purchase music one song at a time, via their chosen mode of digital download, the best music released this year invariably came packaged in albums, with all that such implies — as in, cohesion, pacing, dynamic variety, and the unfolding of ideas over a finite amount of playing time.
Here are a handful of my favorite recorded artifacts — my picks for the 10 finest collections, and more "honorable mentions" than merited by the past several years combined. Guess it really doesn't rain until it pours.
10) Bruce Springsteen, "Working on a Dream" (Columbia)
Just skip album-opener "Outlaw Pete" — an ambitious mistake — and let the rest of "Working on a Dream" flow unimpeded. It's a masterwork — Springsteen's most beautifully orchestrated and interestingly arranged collection since "The Wild, the Innocent and the E Street Shuffle," and also, the one where he wears his Roy Orbison influence most proudly on his sleeve.
9) Neko Case, "Middle Cyclone" (Anti-)
The queen of modern chamber-folk gives us her very best. A rich record, with much to listen for and to — the arrangements are inspired, the instrumentation astute, and the singing subtly heart-rending.
8) U2, "No Line on the Horizon" (Interscope)
"No Line" already has been labeled a commercial failure — it has sold only a few million copies, after all — but unquestionably, the album represents another artistic breakthrough for the band. Working mostly with Brian Eno, U2 rediscovered its love for the esoteric qualities of "The Unforgettable Fire," and the smart dance music of "Achtung Baby!" and "Pop."
7) Sa Ra Creative Partners, "Nuclear Evolution: The Age of Love" (Ubiquity)
Intellectually stimulating modern R&B and hip-hop? Hook-heavy stuff that avoids the obvious? Rap with a decidedly hippie-esque vibe? Is this possible? Apparently so.
6) Animal Collective, "Merriweather Post Pavilion" (Domino/Independent)
If Kate Bush's brilliant "Hounds of Love" album were approached as "jam-band" music, it might sound something like this richly layered mosaic of danceable post-rock. Way too cool for me, but I like it an awful lot, anyway.
5) The Mars Volta, "Octahedron" (Warner Bros.)
If "Frances the Mute" was the Mars Volta's "Piper at the Gates of Dawn," "Octahedron" is the band's "Wish You Were Here." A surprisingly mellow affair, the album is also the group's most mature effort. A modern space-rock masterpiece.
4) Them Crooked Vultures, "Them Crooked Vultures" (DGC)
A supergroup comprising Nirvana/Foo Fighter Dave Grohl, Led Zeppelin's unsung genius John Paul Jones, and Queens of the Stone Age/Kyuss singer/guitarist Joshua Homme, Them Crooked Vultures released the most interesting heavy rock album of the year. Let's hope this isn't just a one-off.
3) Flaming Lips, "Embryonic" (Warner Bros.)
Yes, the Lips keep getting more and more strange, but at "Embryonic's" center is a heart of luminous gold. You'll get from this one pretty much whatever you give to the listening experience.
2) Mike Keneally, "Scambot" (Exowax/Independent)
"Who?," you ask. Keneally, best known for his work with the late Frank Zappa, is one of the most supremely gifted musicians currently breathing oxygen. "Scambot" is tuneful, progressive, avant garde, classical, frivolous, serious, thinking person's pop. Picture XTC covering Zappa. Dedicated, by Keneally himself, to "anyone who still listens to entire albums with their headphones on." You get the picture.
1) Pearl Jam's, "Backspacer" (Independent)
With the band's 20th anniversary approaching, Pearl Jam released one of the finest, most intensely focused albums of its career. The album starts fast and furious, moves through more subdued, reflective terrain, and ultimately, ends elegiac. A beautiful, fat-free affair.
The also-rans:
Blk Jks, "After Robots" (Secretly Canadian); Rain Machine, "Rain Machine" (Anti-); David Sylvian, "Manafon" (Independent); Steve Earle, "Townes" (New West); Bob Dylan, "Together Through Life" (Columbia); Mos Def, "The Ecstatic" (Downtown); Green Day, "21st Century Breakdown" (Reprise); Cheap Trick, "The Latest" (Cheap Trick Unlimited); Muse, "The Resistance" (Warner Bros.); Mew, "No More Stories Are Told Today..." (Evil Office/Independent); The Church, "Untitled #23" (Independent); Silversun Pickups, "Swoon" (Warner Bros.); Wilco, "Wilco the Album" (Nonesuch); KRS-One & Buckshot, "Survival Skills" (Duck Down); Porcupine Tree, "The Incident" (Roadrunner); Passion Pit, "Manners" (French Kiss); Mastodon, "Crack the Skye" (Reprise); Tortoise, "Beacons of Ancestorship" (Thrill Jockey); Grizzly Bear, "Veckatimest" (Warp); Derek Trucks Band, "Already Free" (Victor/SONY); Alice in Chains, "Black Gives Way to Blue" (Virgin); Richard Hawley, "Truelove's Gutter" (Mute); Regina Spektor, "Far" (SONY); Roseanne Cash, "The List" (Manhattan); Built to Spill, "There Is No Enemy" (Warner Bros.).
<!-- e --><a href="mailto:jmiers@buffnews.com">jmiers@buffnews.com</a><!-- e -->
http://www.buffalonews.com/entertainmen ... 89819.html
Looking back at 2009 in music, plus the year’s 10 best albums
By Jeff Miers
News Pop Music Critic
Updated: December 12, 2009, 1:56 PM / 0 comments
It's likely that in terms of music, 2009 will be remembered as the year when Michael Jackson died, Lady Gaga ascended, and Kanye West dissed Taylor Swift during a high-profile, televised industry awards show. That this shouldn't be the case won't change the fact that it is.
Interestingly, all of these events have an air of tragedy about them.
The death of the "King of Pop" rescued his career in a way he had been unable to do himself for the previous 10 years, but did little to shine light into the meaning of what must be considered a tragic life. Lady Gaga is Madonna all over again, but the outfits are even skimpier, the message less clear, and the tunes not nearly as good. The Kanye/Taylor fiasco didn't do anyone any favors, and made country music fans feel the first twinge of self-righteousness they'd been granted since the George W. Bush presidency ended. None of this is good.
Way down here in reality-based reality — where music matters more than fame and we know our throttle from our brake — 2009 was actually a banner year for pop. Plainly speaking, the year-in-song kicked butt. And it's been a long, long, lonely time since we've been able to suggest as much with a straight face.
You can check the pulse of popular music by gauging its diversity. The more things sound, look and smell the same — the more interchangeable they suggest themselves to be — the worse shape pop is in.
When you can find signs of abundant, engaged life across the span of genre classifications — say, in rock, pop, hip-hop, and the experimental acumen toward intermingling them all — that's a good thing for everyone, save the folks whose gig it is to cubby-hole music in order to more easily market it to consumers who apparently are not to be trusted to make up their own minds.
Bearing this in mind, the diagnosis for the corpus of popular music is a positive one this year. And even if you buy the whole ball of wax about albums being dead and "the kids" only being willing to purchase music one song at a time, via their chosen mode of digital download, the best music released this year invariably came packaged in albums, with all that such implies — as in, cohesion, pacing, dynamic variety, and the unfolding of ideas over a finite amount of playing time.
Here are a handful of my favorite recorded artifacts — my picks for the 10 finest collections, and more "honorable mentions" than merited by the past several years combined. Guess it really doesn't rain until it pours.
10) Bruce Springsteen, "Working on a Dream" (Columbia)
Just skip album-opener "Outlaw Pete" — an ambitious mistake — and let the rest of "Working on a Dream" flow unimpeded. It's a masterwork — Springsteen's most beautifully orchestrated and interestingly arranged collection since "The Wild, the Innocent and the E Street Shuffle," and also, the one where he wears his Roy Orbison influence most proudly on his sleeve.
9) Neko Case, "Middle Cyclone" (Anti-)
The queen of modern chamber-folk gives us her very best. A rich record, with much to listen for and to — the arrangements are inspired, the instrumentation astute, and the singing subtly heart-rending.
8) U2, "No Line on the Horizon" (Interscope)
"No Line" already has been labeled a commercial failure — it has sold only a few million copies, after all — but unquestionably, the album represents another artistic breakthrough for the band. Working mostly with Brian Eno, U2 rediscovered its love for the esoteric qualities of "The Unforgettable Fire," and the smart dance music of "Achtung Baby!" and "Pop."
7) Sa Ra Creative Partners, "Nuclear Evolution: The Age of Love" (Ubiquity)
Intellectually stimulating modern R&B and hip-hop? Hook-heavy stuff that avoids the obvious? Rap with a decidedly hippie-esque vibe? Is this possible? Apparently so.
6) Animal Collective, "Merriweather Post Pavilion" (Domino/Independent)
If Kate Bush's brilliant "Hounds of Love" album were approached as "jam-band" music, it might sound something like this richly layered mosaic of danceable post-rock. Way too cool for me, but I like it an awful lot, anyway.
5) The Mars Volta, "Octahedron" (Warner Bros.)
If "Frances the Mute" was the Mars Volta's "Piper at the Gates of Dawn," "Octahedron" is the band's "Wish You Were Here." A surprisingly mellow affair, the album is also the group's most mature effort. A modern space-rock masterpiece.
4) Them Crooked Vultures, "Them Crooked Vultures" (DGC)
A supergroup comprising Nirvana/Foo Fighter Dave Grohl, Led Zeppelin's unsung genius John Paul Jones, and Queens of the Stone Age/Kyuss singer/guitarist Joshua Homme, Them Crooked Vultures released the most interesting heavy rock album of the year. Let's hope this isn't just a one-off.
3) Flaming Lips, "Embryonic" (Warner Bros.)
Yes, the Lips keep getting more and more strange, but at "Embryonic's" center is a heart of luminous gold. You'll get from this one pretty much whatever you give to the listening experience.
2) Mike Keneally, "Scambot" (Exowax/Independent)
"Who?," you ask. Keneally, best known for his work with the late Frank Zappa, is one of the most supremely gifted musicians currently breathing oxygen. "Scambot" is tuneful, progressive, avant garde, classical, frivolous, serious, thinking person's pop. Picture XTC covering Zappa. Dedicated, by Keneally himself, to "anyone who still listens to entire albums with their headphones on." You get the picture.
1) Pearl Jam's, "Backspacer" (Independent)
With the band's 20th anniversary approaching, Pearl Jam released one of the finest, most intensely focused albums of its career. The album starts fast and furious, moves through more subdued, reflective terrain, and ultimately, ends elegiac. A beautiful, fat-free affair.
The also-rans:
Blk Jks, "After Robots" (Secretly Canadian); Rain Machine, "Rain Machine" (Anti-); David Sylvian, "Manafon" (Independent); Steve Earle, "Townes" (New West); Bob Dylan, "Together Through Life" (Columbia); Mos Def, "The Ecstatic" (Downtown); Green Day, "21st Century Breakdown" (Reprise); Cheap Trick, "The Latest" (Cheap Trick Unlimited); Muse, "The Resistance" (Warner Bros.); Mew, "No More Stories Are Told Today..." (Evil Office/Independent); The Church, "Untitled #23" (Independent); Silversun Pickups, "Swoon" (Warner Bros.); Wilco, "Wilco the Album" (Nonesuch); KRS-One & Buckshot, "Survival Skills" (Duck Down); Porcupine Tree, "The Incident" (Roadrunner); Passion Pit, "Manners" (French Kiss); Mastodon, "Crack the Skye" (Reprise); Tortoise, "Beacons of Ancestorship" (Thrill Jockey); Grizzly Bear, "Veckatimest" (Warp); Derek Trucks Band, "Already Free" (Victor/SONY); Alice in Chains, "Black Gives Way to Blue" (Virgin); Richard Hawley, "Truelove's Gutter" (Mute); Regina Spektor, "Far" (SONY); Roseanne Cash, "The List" (Manhattan); Built to Spill, "There Is No Enemy" (Warner Bros.).
<!-- e --><a href="mailto:jmiers@buffnews.com">jmiers@buffnews.com</a><!-- e -->
10/1/96, 10/14/00, 5/2/03, 6/28/03, 10/1/04, 9/11/05, 9/12/05, 9/13/05, 9/19/05, 5/9/06, 5/10/06, 5/12/06, 5/20/06, 6/23/06, 6/11/08, 6/12/08, 8/12/08 6/8/09 6/9/09(EV), 8/21/09, 10/27-28-30-31/09, 5/10/10
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Comments
The top ten list, although subjective and within the legitimate restraints of the ear of the beholder, is not anywhere as objective as it really should be.
The top ten and the subsequent "back up " contenders list has left out way too many fantastic releases and falls short of opening its arms to a wider spectrum of music. Where was : ????
The Black Crowes "Before the Frost............Until the Freeze"
THE album of 2009 !! Without question, a truly masterful, experimental work of art. Recorded live, over 5 nights in Levon Helm's Studio Barn. MUSICS' natural successor to The Last Waltz itself. It's THAT GOOD. PURE GENIUS.
Also on my "Missing List"
Living Colour "Chair in the Doorway"
Phish "Joy"
Masters of Reality "Pine/Cross Dover"
Wilco "Wilco-the album"
Hope Sandoval "Through the devil softly"
Richmond Fontaine "We used to think the Freeway sounded like a river"
Blakroc (the Black Keys hip hop experiment)
But hey, that's the true beauty of Music. There aint no right or wrong. It's personal. It's individual. Whatever sounds good, is good.
(With the exception of springsteen and the truly awful E street band, of course !! Ha Ha. JOHN MELLENCAMP IS THE REAL DEAL
We obviously all love Pearl Jam, but there is no way Backspacer is the album of the year.
2010: Newark 5/18 MSG 5/20-21 2011: PJ20 9/3-4 2012: Made In America 9/2
2013: Brooklyn 10/18-19 Philly 10/21-22 Hartford 10/25 2014: ACL10/12
2015: NYC 9/23 2016: Tampa 4/11 Philly 4/28-29 MSG 5/1-2 Fenway 8/5+8/7
2017: RRHoF 4/7 2018: Fenway 9/2+9/4 2021: Sea Hear Now 9/18
2022: MSG 9/11 2024: MSG 9/3-4 Philly 9/7+9/9 Fenway 9/15+9/17
He is a charlatan. A musical heathen. No depth to his boring catologue which we've had to endure for the last 3 or 4 decades. Not good enough to lace up Neil Young's dusty old workboots. Sorry Brucie.
And before I forget, U2 !!!!! In the top ten ?? Don't make me laugh/puke !!! Haven't made a decent, relevant, musically engaging record since Achtung Baby. Bloated egos with dodgy politics and a very distorted World view. To be honest, have lost bucket loads of their credibility and "Boner" is a bit of a laughing stock back here in Ireland. Smug, detached from reality and suffering from a super inflated "God complex". A total idiot really.
Yeah i USE it for my DAILY "NUMBER 2's"...PMSL :P
I don't base my music selection of of the personality of people I don't personally know. If the music relates to my personal life, I go with it. I could careless if Bono has an over ego.
Well, when you've won 22 Grammy awards (most by any band), constantly sell out tours and stadiums/arena's around the world, donate millions and help the hunger and AIDS crisis in Africa, be on the cover of Time and be Time Magazine's Person of the Year, I think you could do whatever you want.
Also, "All That You Can't Leave Behind" is a fantastic album.
"Becoming a Bruce fan is like hitting puberty as a musical fan. It's inevitable." - dcfaithful
Backspacer is a pretty fun record, but not close to "best of 2009"
and PJ #1 that's fuckin fantastic
It is for me...I can honestly say I like it better than any other album released in 2009. Everyone has different opinions.
ya it is for me also by far. by like real far far.
2007 was a great year for music. 2009 not so much. But Backspacer is fucking great, and for that alone I'm happy. But anyway great post. I wish I explained my opinon as clearly as you did. nice job.
(granted I'm pretty fucked up!)
It's mine as well..Just because it isn't a mind boggling 45 minutes of in depth thoughdoesn't mean it can't be the best album of the year for some. I think it is their sharpest work in over a decade and absolutely love it. I still listen to it in full nearly everyday and I do have a large music collection including a lot of new stuff.
*BEC, Brisbane, March 1995
*BEC, Brisbane, March 1998
*BEC, Brisbane, November 2006
*QSAC, Brisbane November 2009
*EV Solo, QPAC, Brisbane March 10 and 12 2011
*Big Day Out, Gold Coast, 19 Jan 2014
*EV Solo, QPAC, Brisbane, 22,23 & 25 Feb 2014
Of course my opinions are my own and mine alone and do NOT post to get people to subscribe to my point of view, but I guess that the point I was tryin to make, certainly about U2, was that Bobo (the clown's) distorted ego HAS, without question comprimised his art and that of his bandmates. In fact Adam, larry and the other one have gone on record to say that sometimes he (Bobo) is a great source of embarassment to them when he goes off on one.
Neil Young however, when he chooses to mix music and politics, has a certain heartfelt dignity and sincerity and the music doesn't suffer as a result. Bobo however is only schmoozing with dodgy politicians and preaching sanctimonious when he has a new "product" to sell. Radio friendly unit shifter.
We have a joke back here in Ireland that kinda sums it up :
Q : What's the difference between GOD and bono ?
A : GOD doesn't walk around Dublin pretending He's bono.
PMSL...
I mean that, its not rose tinteds, I just think its terrific from start to finish, and nothing else this year can rival it.