Ramblings on Music, Texas, Etc.

Best Albums of 2008: The last word

I was sorta tickled to find a link to my #6 post over at DBT's website.  Since I had the holidays to soak up lots of music, I thought a few revisionist thoughts about my Best of '08 list might be in order...

• Drive-By Truckers' Brighter Than Creation's Dark really was one of my faves of 2008.  I listened to this a ton over Christmas, and it's probably my second favorite record of theirs, behind Decoration Day.  I would definitely move this one up into the Top 2 or 3.  I promise I'm not sucking up (you can view a similar comment I made over at A Free Man's site, where he rightfully slotted it at No. 2).
• Kathleen Edwards' Asking For Flowers shoulda been in the Top 10.  I really love that record, but maybe it has to be cold to appreciate it fully.  Not that it's really been cold in Texas that much lately.
• I completely overlooked Bruce Springsteen's show at Toyota Center, which, obviously, was a 2008 live highlight.  Seeing The Boss live is always a religious experience.  I should also add that Magic has really grown on me lately - probably should have been in my Top 10 of 2007.  I've been listening to a LOT of Springsteen lately.

So we'll call that the last word on 2008.  Hope you're having a decent week back at work!

Best Albums of 2008: #1 Tift Merritt - 'Another Country'

"All of these miles I've come,

All of these dreams I've chased in my mind.

All for something small and simple to find." 

--Tift Merritt, "I Know What I'm Looking For Now"

Here's what I want from an artist or band when they release a new record: 

Show me something new.

Show me something new about yourself, or the world, or even about myself.  Show me another facet of your talent, show me your greatness, or show me your potential for greatness.  Show me that you take songwriting seriously, that you think music is the language that binds us.  Show me your passion for it.  Show me why you should stand out in a sea of artists, in an industry corrupted by money and greed, stuck in neutral while the world changes.  Just show me.

Tall order?  You bet.  I generally expect that no more than one or two records each year will meet those expectations.  These are, after all, just records.  I listen to a lot of music in a calendar year.  To really expect those things from every album would be an invitation to constant and repeated disappointment.  Sometimes a record just catches your ear, brightens your day.  Sometimes, it's good enough that your return to it weeks and months after its release.  Most of these Top 10 albums of mine are simply reminders of that, not timeless classics.  But every now and then, something comes along lives up to such hopes.

Tift Merritt's Another Country is one of those albums.  I do not doubt it.  I have felt so many different ways about this record, but at the end of the day, I've come to love this album a whole lot.  And yet it's strange to regard so highly an album that appears to be so devoid of ambition, so modest in its presentation.  It is Merritt's artistic statement, to be sure, but is not a sweeping declaration.  It does not pound its fists or wave its arms.  Merritt herself has called Another Country more of an invitation, like extending a hand, rather than an attention-grabber like its predecessor Tambourine, which was a rolicking blend of rock, country and soul.  The approach serves her well and preserves the intimacy of the songs, many of which were composed at the piano in a solitary flat in Paris.  Her sound on this record marks a new direction for Merritt, who is equally at ease fronting her excellent band (who appear throughout Another Country) and peforming solo at the piano.  It is probably no accident that this maneuver enables her to travel across the country - and often across the Atlantic - with a minimum of baggage when necessary, not to mention offer opportunities for fans to see her perform in different settings.

Somewhat surprisingly, returning producer George Drakoulias appears as adept at drawing out Merritt's gentler side as he was at releasing her inner-soul-mama on Tambourine.  It is an understatement to say that Merritt is in fine voice here, and for all of her musical talents, her voice is her secret weapon, an instrument that is lovely and warm and, yes, inviting.  In the end, it is the estimable spirit of this album that has drawn me back time and again.  It all sounds so effortless and simple, yet by laying bare so many carefully crafted thoughts, Merritt has delivered the album of the year and of her career thus far.

Tift Merritt showed me something new.

(For a look back at my extensive 2008 Tift coverage, click here.  It also just so happens that No Depression has included their review of Another Country as part of their ongoing Year In Review.)

Best of 2008: Mad dash to the finish!

I know I'm dragging this whole Best of 2008 thing out a bit beyond its welcome.  But thanks for hanging in there.  No. 1 is forthcoming later today (I realize that you've probaby already guessed it), and then the Ramblings will probably start winding it down for the year, since I've got a busy week at work next week, followed by two weeks of travel and time off.  Not to mention a LOT of Christmas shopping.

So here's the recap thus far...

1. ???
2. Susan Tedeschi - Back To The River
3. Sam Phillips - Don't Do Anything
4. Allison Moorer - Mockingbird
5. Alejandro Escovedo - Real Animal
6. Drive-By Truckers - Brighter Than Creation's Dark
7. Hayes Carll - Trouble In Mind
8. Ryan Adams & The Cardinals - Cardinology
9. Kings Of Leon - Only By The Night
10. My Morning Jacket - Evil Urges

You can find all of my Best of 2008 posts indexed here.  You should also check out Josh Hurst's Favorite Fifteen list.  Plus our buddy A Free Man is counting down his favorite records of the year.

Best Albums of 2008: #2 Susan Tedeschi - 'Back To The River'

If I stacked up all of my CD's from all of my favorite artists, it would a) be quite a pile, and b) most likely be enough music to get me through the rest of my life.  Year after year, my tendency is to play an album a few times and discard it forever.  Even these albums in the Top 10 will most likely fade into obscurity within the next year.  So I'm always on the hunt for two things: artists to add to that pile, and albums that I'll listen to five or ten years down the road.

So my great surprise of 2008 was Susan Tedeschi's Back To The River.  Tedeschi's work has been on my radar for a while, mainly due to her 2005 Joe Henry-produced effort Hope and Desire.  That record defied Tedeschi's rep as a "blues" artist and presented her more as a soul artist from the old school.  But even that album, which I liked a lot at the time, got brushed aside eventually.  Which is to say I had hopes for Back To The River, but no exceptionally high ones.  But this album focuses all of Tedeschi's substantial talents into a package that equally reinforces her blues-y roots and also allows her to stretch her wings as an artist.  It's a rock-soul-blues throwdown of epic proportions and, as far as I'm concerned, is Tedeschi's career breakthrough.

No surprise that the disc was produced by George Drakoulias, who turned a similar trick on Tift Merritt's 2004 record Tambourine.  Drakoulias seems to excel in corraling a host of musicians toward a common purpose.  Back To The River is a thick mixture of instruments, layered heavily with guitars and accented by horns, keys and gospel backing vocals.  It's a bold mix, one that would overshadow lesser artists.  But Tedeschi's powerful, rich vocals always command the attention.  Her guitar skills also make a welcome return, though she generously shares the spotlight with other players (not the least of whom is husband and slide wiz Derek Trucks).  The most noteworthy new aspect of the album is the fact that Tedeschi co-wrote nearly all of the songs, working with folks like Tony Joe White, Sonya Kitchell and Gary Louris.  As a result, it has perhaps more personality than all of her previous efforts.

Back To The River is that rarest of albums, the kind that sends me back to the artist's previous work to see what I missed.  I've more fully digested both Hope and Desire and its predecessor Wait For Me, and I've found a whole lot that I did miss the first time around (I still think her debut Just Won't Burn is a bit too generic, though most fans will disagree).  It's also worth mentioning that this album has been criminally neglected, in my opinion - I wonder exactly what value a major label adds if it can't get an artist a decent amount of press.  Whatever.  Back To The River sounds to me like an instant classic, and it deserves whatever attention and praise it garners and probably deserves a whole lot more than that.

(You can read my original review of Back To The River here.)

Best Albums of 2008: #3 Sam Phillips - 'Don't Do Anything'

The astute reader will detect a pattern here (hint: it's 2004 all over again), but even my casual readers will not be shocked to find this album near the top of my list.  Sam Phillips is one of my favorite artists; in fact, 2004's A Boot and A Shoe is one of my favorite albums of all time (followed closely by its predecessor Fan Dance).  Sam's work on Nonesuch has radically redefined her sound, and her work has become more smoky, dark and obtuse over the past decade.  Don't Do Anything had the burden of two stupendous prior efforts weighing it down, not to mention the absence - for the first time in two decades - of producer (and now ex-husband) T-Bone Burnett.  Originally scheduled for a January release, Don't Do Anything was delayed until June reportedly by Phillips' desire to tinker with the tracklist.  For those of us who worry about such things, there was ample reason to worry.

Or not.  It turns out that Sam Phillips' artistic identity is wholly her own, and all of the wonderful idiosyncrasies and subtle nuances that adorned her last two records are here in abundance.  If A Boot and A Shoe sounded at times like a breakup record (which it was), Don't Do Anything is the full-blown postmortem.  But I hesitate to use words like "bitter" because Phillips' always manages to find the silver linings among her storm clouds.  And her belief in the power of unconditional love remains intact:

"I love you when you don't do anything."

I still adore that simple lyric many months after it first struck me.  Perhaps there is a darker subtext - maybe that line references the destructive power of love, when relationships eat you from the inside out.  But I don't buy it.  Phillips' music sounds to me too hopeful to write off such notions as the acerbic observations of a torn and broken woman.  There's too much humor and pathos.

Most hopeful of all, however, is the fact that Sam Phillips will carry on just fine without T-Bone, and she continues to find sympathetic musical travelers (Jay Bellerose, Eric Gorfain) to help realize her singular vision.  Phillips' music continues to thrive quite outside the mainstream and apart from any notion of what is or is not popular or trendy.  That is reason for celebration.  So is Don't Do Anything.

(You can read my original review of Don't Do Anything here.)

Best Albums of 2008: #4 Allison Moorer - 'Mockingbird'

It's probably not a likely candidate to appear on any other Top 10 lists, but Allison Moorer's mostly-covers album Mockingbird kept finding its way into my regular listening rotation.  It's not hard to see why - I belive I've stated on this blog (possibly many times) that I think Allison has the best set of pipes on the planet.  Though I've reluctantly acknowledged her 2006 effort Getting Somewhere as a misstep, I love every other album in her catalog, a remarkable body of work that spans a wide range of styles, despite Allison's being labeled simply a "country singer."

I suppose I had diminished expectations for Mockingbird, despite the fact that studio genius Buddy Miller was at the producer's chair.  But a covers record coming on the heels of Getting Somewhere felt like killing time between Steve Earle tours.  However, my respect for this record has deepened over the course of the year, and I've continued to find things to love about it.  It is stylistically diverse, but I guess it could've used a few less sad-lady songs (all of the songs were written by women as a sort of thematic thread).  Other than that, as covers albums go, Mockingbird is stellar.  Everything is predictably lovely, but Allison has found new, subtle ways to exploit those golden pipes.  One of the highlights is a cranked-up version of Gillian Welch's "Revelator," coming off as a glorious hybrid of The Band and Crazy Horse.  Julie's Miller's "Orphan Train" is less radically re-worked but benefits from Moorer's lovely singing (as opposed to Julie's idiosyncratic delivery).  Cat Power's "Where Is My Love?" (from her recent album The Greatest) is lush and sad, and to my ears is more memorable than Chan's version.  I think it's safe to say that Allison doesn't quite pull off June Carter Cash's "Ring Of Fire" or Patti Smith's "Dancing Barefoot," but she comes damned close to nailing Nina Simone's "I Want A Little Sugar In My Bowl."  And that ain't nothin'.

In my original review of Mockingbird, I called Allison's cover of Joni Mitchell's "Both Sides Now" the lone clunker on the record, and I have to admit that there's a place in my heart for even that track now.  That's just the way it's been with this album.  Against all odds - and yes, perhaps against any sound logic - Mockingbird has become one of my favorite albums of 2008.

(Let me have it, Josh.  You, too, 'Lugats.)

Best Albums of 2008: #5 Alejandro Escovedo - 'Real Animal'

For a dude who worships The Stooges and T. Rex as much as Alejandro Escovedo claims to, it certainly took him a while to crank out a studio album that channels those influences so directly.  Real Animal lives up to its name in many respects, though it retains the signature sound (I'm thinking cellos here) of Alejandro's work over the past 15 years.  There are thoughtful moments throughout Animal, but the highlights are the tracks that find Alejandro glamming it up.  Most of the album was co-written with Chuck Prophet, but it is arguably Escovedo's most autobiographical album to-date, looking back at his early days in NYC and his time on the West Coast with his seminal band Rank and File (Chip and Tony even get their own song).  Like all of Alejandro's work, the songs are unmistakably his own.  But rather than being preoccupied with his age or his own mortality, he looks back as a way of celebrating life and embracing the future.  It's a neat trick - part musical history lesson, part reinvention.

But beyond all of that subtext, Real Animal is just a kickass, rocking record - maybe Alejandro Escovedo's best.  And that is saying something.

(My original review here.)

Best Albums of 2008: #6 Drive-By Truckers - 'Brighter Than Creation's Dark'

Once again, Drive-By Truckers made inclusion in the annual list inevitable.  How else to measure a new DBT album than by the number of cuts that are destined to be noted as "classics" in the future?  If so, there's a good half-dozen or more on the sprawling 19-track monster that is Brighter Than Creation's Dark.  The album is a long, unwieldy, ambitious tour de force that requires too much patience to be digested easily, but then that's always been part of DBT's charm.  No doubt, losing Jason Isbell was a huge blow, but the band has not missed a step -- Shonna Tucker's move to the mic has eased the burden a great deal.  But this is still the Patterson Hood-Mike Cooley show, and they bring all forces to bear on Creation's Dark.  Cooley, in particular, contributes a slew of instant classics, becoming nearly as productive as the song machine Hood.  The promotion of part-time guitarist John Neff to full-fledged band member has added nuance to DBT's sound, and the pedal steel touches push many tracks in an unexpectedly thoughtful direction.

I won't bother recounting every thought I've had about Brighter Than Creation's Dark here.  You can instead check out my review of the album that ran over at BreakThru Radio back in January.

But it goes something like this -- another year, another stellar effort by Drive-By Truckers, who are developing a track record unlike any other rock band out there today.

Best of 2008: Live shots!!

I managed to attend a lot of great shows this year.  Here are some of the highlights, in no particular order:

• Lucinda Williams @ The War Memorial Auditorium (Nashville)
• Drive-By Truckers @ The Meridian (Houston)
• Over The Rhine @ The Mucky Duck (Houston)
• Ryan Adams & The Cardinals @ The Verizon Theater (Houston)
• Grace Potter & The Nocturnals @ Walter's On Washington (Houston)
• Steve Earle & Allison Moorer @ The Verizon Theater (Houston)
• Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band @ The Toyota Center (Houston)
• Tift Merritt (acoustic) @ The Parish (New Orleans)
• Tift Merritt @ The Carolina Theater (Durham, NC)

That last show was probably my favorite, as it was a sort of informal gathering of a lot of nice folks who regularly contribute to the Tift Merritt Fan Site.  I was especially happy that my longtime online pal Andy came all the way from the UK for the show.  And of course, Phillip (and his wife, Andie) and Mitch who are heavily involved with the fan site and have been longtime boosters of Tift's career.  Great venue as well, on Tift's home turf.  I caught her shortly thereafter in New Orleans for an acoustic set, but as my friends BDogg and Amanda can attest, I was in pretty shoddy shape for that one having arrived in Nola at 10:30am that morning.  Curse you, mint julep!

Best Albums of 2008: #7 Hayes Carll - 'Trouble In Mind'

When Hayes Carll released his second album Little Rock independently, it became the first album self-released album to ever land atop the Americana charts (all things being relative).  Subsequently, he landed tours in Europe and continued to earn a small but loyal following.

So Hayes Carll didn't really need Lost Highway Records.  And he certainly didn't need a label screwing around with his sound or pairing him up with a bunch of Nashville cats to co-write catchy tunes.  After a lengthy gestation period, however, Trouble In Mind shows no such signs of record industry skullduggery.  It quite simply is just a great Hayes Carll album, which is to say a great album, period.  It has more diversity than its predecessor, and Carll is as witty and cutting as ever.  "She Left Me For Jesus" earned him a bit of notoriety when it was given away on iTunes as the Free Track Of The Week, and - brace yourself - some people don't have a sense of humor when it comes to songs about Jesus.  Despite that, however, Carll made significant incursions into the mainstream and generally raised his profile, thanks in large part to the distribution muscle of a big label.  For once, the system actually worked.

I haven't much else to say about Hayes Carll's music.  If you haven't checked him out, rest assured that the hype about him as the "real deal" of new Texas troubadours is justified.  And the music rocks pretty hard, too.  He's the best kind of writer -- smart and funny without being smartalecky or relentlessly ironic.  Trouble In Mind is his best effort yet.