Skip to main content

2019 - Six months in. These records don't suck.

Image
(Steven J Wilson)

In the first six months of 2019, these sixty-six recordings impressed me favorably. Some of them I'll rarely listen to again. Some will become old friends. The ten in bold stand out a bit from the rest of the pack.

I haven't been of a mind to write record reviews for some time now. However, if you want my spontaneous two cent's worth on any of these titles, I'll be happy to give you a quick take to affirm, bolster my support.

In no particular order:

21 Savage – I am > I was

Kel Assouf – Black Tenere

Deerhunter – Why Hasn’t Everything Disappeared

Divine Comedy – Office Politics

Stella Donnelly – Beware of the Dogs

Dream Syndicate – These Times

Du Blonde – Lung Bread for Daddy

Willie Farmer – The Man from the Hill

Felice Brothers – Undress

Flesheaters – I Used to be Pretty

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vppn_T5b_Lo



Fontaines D.C. – Dogrel

Fleshtones – Budget Buster

Robert Forster – Inferno

Better Oblivion Community Center – s/t

Bellows – the Rose Gardener

Pinky Pinky – Turkey Dinner

Rhiannon Giddens – There is no Other

Patty Griffin – s/t

Guided by Voices – Zeppelin Over China

Guided by Voices – Warp and Woof

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ruM6t_3q1p0



Aldous Harding – Designer

Durand Jones and the Indications – American Love Call

Jim Jones and the Righteous Mind – CollecticV

Alex Lahey – The Best of Luck Club

Mattiel – Satis Factory

Mdou Moctar – Ilana (The Creator)

Mekons – Deserted

Mystery lights – Too Much Tension

NOX Boys – out of Touch

Nots – 3

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdBZ-kFyEgI



Offset – Father of 4

J.S. Ondara – Tales of America

Peter Perrett – Humanworld

Jessica Pratt – Quiet Signs

Lucy Rose – No Words Left

Sebadoh – Act Surprised

Emerson Snowe – That’s Rock n Roll

Bruce Springsteen – Western Stars

Mavis Staples – We Get By

Tacocat – This Mess is a Place

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6JC91j2lUc



Tough Shits – Burning in Paradise

Sharon Van Etten – Remind Me Tomorrow

Vandoliers – Forever

Andrew Wasylyk – Paralian

Yawpers – Human Question

Nicole Yun – Paper Suit

Raconteurs – Help Us Stranger

75 Dollar Bill – I Was Real

Kate Tempest – The Book of Traps and Lessons

Mega Bog – Dolphine

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OM6ddp3BMEM




Mike – Tears of Joy

Thea Gilmore – Small World Turning

Summer Cannibals – Can’t Tell Me No

Titus Andronicus – An Obelisk

Westside Gunn – Flygod is an Awesome God

Catenary Wires – To the Morning

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkeWhRw0Xig



Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

The people have spoken.

There is a town in Arkansas called Elaine.

(Steven J Wilson)
Elaine, Arkansas is in Phillips County, one of the poorest counties in the United States, a flat expanse of deprivation where your Google Maps won’t keep you from getting lost. Elaine is lost. It looks like a place where nothing good has happened in a very long time.  That's, at least in part, because something terrible happened there. Something a majority of Americans don't know about.  I'm educated as a historian, but I lack the imprimatur of an advanced degree. I will do my best to offer a concise history lesson.  The facts are straightforward. In order to escape destitution and indentured servitude, black sharecroppers in the Arkansas delta organized under the banner of the Progressive Farmers and Household Union of America. On the 30th of September 1919, a prominent, white attorney named Ulysses Bratton traveled the three hours from Little Rock to meet with the workers to discuss strategy. They met at a small church on the outskirts of Elaine at a place c...
Post a Comment
Read more

Better Ed than Dead

(Steven J Wilson)
Ed Sheeran - He looks like Van Morrison, kinda, huh? Check the tats.   Ed Sheeran is the highest paid entertainer on the planet. I think. I don’t know. They say he’s worth 65 million. Anyway, I read that somewhere. God knows he travels light and doesn’t have to share that dough with an orchestra or anything. I saw Ed once. At least that I’m aware of. He opened for the Rolling Stones in 2015 (or was it 16?) at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City. Just me and several thousand of my closest friends. He came out with a guitar in front of that throng and mesmerized the crowd. Okay, not really. Some kids seemed to like him. Old people, eighty percent of the attendees, treated him as a curiosity or mild irritant, not uncommon for a warmup act served up before the Stones’ Lions and Christians, bread and circuses exhibition. Later, he sang “Beast of Burden” with Mick. He was better than Dave Matthews. I see his ruddy little mug and tousled ginger top here and there in the ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Mississippi: Old Times There are Not Forgotten

(Steven J Wilson)
The deeper you dig the more tenacious the lies. How could it be otherwise when you start with slavery as a cornerstone of the Southern and let’s be honest - American economy? Chattel slavery is the ethic of capitalism taken to its ugliest, terminal conclusion. If labor is a commodity to be bought, why not introduce the option to buy and sell and eliminate as much as possible the requirements of remuneration? It’s just business.   Once an economy is built on such a repulsive foundation what good could come from it? And now The Peculiar Institution lives on. Its legacy is mass incarceration, wealth inequality, housing discrimination, and other institutions and mechanisms of white superiority. My father’s family was part of it. I am saddened by my ancestors’ participation in slavery. Tracing my ancestry, I found documents confirming that my great-great-grandfather owned slaves. If the records I’ve found are indicative it appears that he had few, mostly devoted to household ...
Post a Comment
Read more