Top 5 Albums of 2014

Nozdordomu's List

St. Vincent – St. Vincent

St. Vincent is my favorite album of 2014. It’s St. Vincent’s most accessible album and her first without any obvious weak patches. As much as I love her music, her prior albums all seem to peter out before the end, but not this one. It’s well written as always, with extra helpings of humor and feeling in the lyrics. It’s full of welcome surprises and nifty touches, like that awesome crunchy riff on “Huey Newton,” the jerky video-gamey bass on “Rattlesnake,” the wonderfully textured chorus in “Regret,” the synths on “I Prefer Your Love” that remind me of Madonna (in a good way), etc. Her guitar playing remains as confident and creative as ever, and although I miss the bass on the record, it’s not a huge loss. The album’s also got her best ever closing track, “Severed Crossed Fingers,” featuring one of her most emotional vocals and a brilliant harpsichord arrangement to go with it. Of all the records that came out this year, this one had the most replay value for me. At first I thought the line “I prefer your love to Jesus” was clunky, but now all I hear is the lushness in her voice when she sings it, so it must be true. This is a record that should be heard more than once, and it doesn’t hurt that most of the songs are pretty catchy. A great experience all around and one of my favorite indie rock records in recent memory.

Spoon – They Want My Soul

I’ve been a Spoon fan for most of my life, since they released Gimme Fiction, and they haven’t let me down yet. Sure, Transference was kind of slight, but you can still count on Spoon to make a flat-out good record, even a great record, like they did this year. They Want My Soul might not be my favorite Spoon album, but it does display some of their strongest songwriting and arranging, from the chill-wavy synths and harp glissandos in “Inside Out” to the unstable variety of “Knock Knock Knock” to the mad piano on “I Just Don’t Understand.” “Do You” proves that Spoon can still write a great pop song if they want to, and “Outlier” seems to do everything that Reflektor failed to do. Spoon’s (often-underrated) inventiveness has saved them time and time again from being a “generic indie band,” although, with Britt Daniel’s distinctive husky voice and odd lyrical gift, they were never in real danger of slipping into one. You can count on Spoon.

D’Angelo and the Vanguard – Black Messiah

Let’s face it: 2014 wasn’t a great year for rap. No new Kanye release, nothing much from Kendrick, so-so (and overrated) albums by Schoolboy Q and J. Cole, Run the Jewels 2 something of a letdown, whatever. I did get to see Danny Brown live, which was awesome, but I couldn’t find a great rap album. Still, it was a great year for R&B and neo soul, even if only because D’Angelo put out an album.

A long overdue album at that – Black Messiah is D’Angelo’s first album in 14 years, and thankfully, it’s more than worth the wait. There’s just as much sexy balladeering as you’d expect, with standout cuts like the jitter-funk opener “Ain’t That Easy,” the sweepingly romantic “Really Love,” the ear-pleasing “Prayer,” and “Sugah Daddy,” which has such a great groove that it feels too short. This time around, though, D’Angelo ups his game with some biting social commentary in “1000 Deaths” and “The Charade” (“all we wanted was to talk/instead we got outlined in chalk”), and a great use of live instrumentation, including horns, vintage keys, and guitar (which he just learned how to play). Even with its good moments, Black Messiah – and it’s about time somebody used that title – still plays like a smooth, seamless whole. Smoothness has always been a forte of D’Angelo’s, and it’s fitting for a guy with such a smooth, silky voice, although it’s still hard to tell what he’s saying sometimes. Whatever, we’ll forgive him that, because he (and the Vanguard) brought us Black Messiah.

Aphex Twin – Syro

Speaking of long, long overdue comebacks, didn’t Aphex Twin put out a new album this year? He did – and a Top 20 album at that! You can definitely count on our Cornish friend to make grade-A electronic dance music, of the “intelligent” variety or not, although he’s always been intelligent. Some people might complain that Syro doesn’t sound too different from Aphex Twin’s older work, and while it doesn’t, I’d never complain about that. Where D’Angelo took his neo-soul in a funkier direction, Aphex Twin keeps the same basic musical style but makes it more “personal.” You can hear vocal samples of his family here and there, and you might also hear a palpable sense of nostalgia for old-style electronica. It’s that feeling that keeps Syro – and most of Aphex Twin’s music, for that matter – from devolving into solely cerebral, analytical work. This is real music, and aside from that, it’s just a good listening experience. The glitchy, mind-bendy techno really gets under your skin, and the closer “aisatsana [102]” is very pretty. Hopefully we won’t have to wait so long to hear something that pretty again. I’m talking to you too, D’Angelo.

The War on Drugs – Lost in the Dream

Real Estate – Atlas

This one’s a toss-up, because both albums have greatness in them, but don’t quite stand up as whole great records. In a way, they’re both the same kind of a record: an ear-pleasing, mellow-sounding album steeped in nostalgic sounds but also full of personal torment. You can hear more of the personal on Lost in the Dream, but Atlas is more compact and contained. Both albums have standout songs: the FM-esque “The Bend” and the dreamily catchy “Primitive” on Atlas, along with the 80s-style radio anthem “Burning” and the grooving rock-cum-ambient “Under the Pressure” on Lost in the Dream. Both benefit from clean, uncluttered production, far from their lo-fi roots but all the stronger for it. Both suffer from a number of slight songs (“filler” is too strong a word), but not as much as weaker albums would. I would personally redo the track listing on each album, but as they stand, they’ve still got lots of strengths to recommend them. If you like mellow music but don’t like to be bored, you’ll definitely enjoy these.

Honorable mentions: You’re Dead! by Flying Lotus, Pinata by Freddie Gibbs and Madlib, and Salad Days by Mac Demarco.

Most overrated album of 2014: 1989 by Taylor Swift. Why do people like this?

Crazy Luigi's List

Clipping. – CLPPNG

If there was one album that I had listened to more than any other from this past year, it would have to be this one. Just for background on this one, like another artist that I had mentioned in the past few years that will make its way back onto my own list, Clipping is a rap group trio from California where only one guy’s rapping (Daveed Diggs), while the other two (William Hutson and Jonathan Snipes) end up creating the instrumentation to help Daveed and his guests rap under them as best as they can. However, unlike this other group where having a loud, sometimes unintelligible rapper can invoke power with the instrumentation, Clipping has a more natural rapper spitting out rhymes while the instruments provide a mood that naturally works within what Daveed (and guests) have to say in them. With this group, there tells two important sides that really makes this album in particular work as a whole: the rapping and the instrumentals that accompany it. To me, both areas really do make this album shine under a greater light because of it.

When listening to what Daveed says when rapping about them, you can tell that he has the rapping prowess that only a select few people actually have in terms of skills. In fact, the introduction song alone should be a telltale sign of what you can expect from Daveed, and let’s just say if you don’t like what he has there, you’re probably not going to like this album at all. Many of the songs that are structured within the entire album does revolve around violence and some of the gangsta lifestyles that most rap artists like talking about, but unlike most of those said artists, Daveed doesn’t really glamorize them as much as challenge some of the standards that can be found with those types of songs, such as with "Summertime," "Get Got," and "Inside Out." Speaking of those first two songs, most of the guests that come here are actually veteran rappers like Cocc Pistol Cree, King Tee, and even Gangsta Boo of Three 6 Mafia fame, and most of these guests actually provide their own twists to the songs they’re on that actually makes them sound nice on whatever they’re doing there. Even with that in mind, some of the stories that get told in these tracks like "Body & Blood," "Story 2," "Dominoes," and "Ends" also provide some hidden depth that you normally don’t get in certain rap tracks. However, there are times where the instrumentation of these songs is just as important as the actual rapping, if not more so; luckily the other members of Clipping know that just fine.

You’ve probably noticed that I hadn’t talked much about the other guys involved with Clipping here in William and Jonathan. Well here’s something you should know about them: they’ve both been involved with actual projects of their own as well with Jonathan doing electronic music under Captain Ahab and William providing noise music under Rale. One would think that having a mixture of electronic music with music revolving around noise would create some jarring sounds for you to listen to, and admittedly the first time listening to it, you might be right. However, once the initial stigma goes away, you realize that they handle the mixture pretty effectively with them knowing when to provide noisier music ("Body & Blood," "Get Up," "Or Die"), when to have the music get softer and more atmospheric ("Work Work," "Taking Off," "Tonight," "Dream," "Dominoes"), and even when to do both ("Summertime," "Inside Out," "Story 2," "Ends") under an effective manner. In fact, even though one of the songs does revolve around alarm clocks as being the music and can easily be a love it or hate it track because of it, the clocks do provide unique melodies that you wouldn’t expect from something so simplistic in the first place. Really, with the way Clipping provides rapping and a unique sense of making beats for the rapping, I can see this group create quite a following for years to come. In fact, in some cases, I can easily understand how they can be easier to attract than the following group below in spite of the fact that they provide somewhat similar types of music here.

Death Grips & Björk – Niggas On the Moon

As a fair warning for you guys, this album is technically considered an album that’s kind of cheating the rules here. What I mean by that is this album is actually a part of a double album that won’t be released until sometime this year (perhaps it’s actually out already by the time this article’s published), yet it was released earlier on last year. As such, this album can’t truly be graded as a whole until it’s second half counterpart, known as Jenny Death within The Powers That B double album, gets released since it can either expand or degrade the first half’s quality in various ways. With that said, I can judge the first half on the songs that were released for it already, and if this is anything to go by, I think some of us can’t wait for Jenny Death to come out and complete the saga this group left behind in its wait. It probably helps that it’s also one of their more easily accessible albums for newcomers to date.

With every fan of the Death Grips that’s already heard of at least one of their albums with vocals beforehand (as in not Government Plates and especially Fashion Week), the songs that you’re going to hear from them will likely be nothing too surprising from them. However, if you’re a newcomer to the group and you think you might be interested in them, this album actually a pretty good starting point for you, especially if you looked into Clipping’s album and liked what they provided for you. Songs like "Billy Not Really," "Black Quarterback," and "Big Dipper" help showcase where even if you aren't too fond of MC Ride’s vocals, they do provide solid melodies and easily catches lines that you don’t mind having in your head at times. Of course, there are also songs like "Up My Sleeves," "Say Hey Kid," and "Fuck Me Out" that hold darker overtones that I personally really enjoy as much, if not more than those catchy melodic songs mentioned earlier that are also present here. Even if you have noticed the likes of Flatlander and drummer Zach Hill doing what they do best with providing electronic-like music and hardcore drumming before, the group holds a unique new element for “instrumentation” that I hadn't really heard of using up until now.

When you think of humans and music, more often than not, you think of them as either vocalists or players of instruments like guitars, drums, or even keyboards. However, in this album, you have the stylistic vocals of Icelandic singer Björk show up on practically every single track… as a vocal instrument of sorts. Seriously, in just about every track on this album, she ends up having vocal cues that are either really subtle or are really obvious when you listen long enough that end up blending within the instrumentation that’s normally done by Flatlander and Zach Hill. Normally in situations like that, I’d end up being rather irritated at some point with vocals being instruments (unless it’s supposed to be like acapella music) since it kind of feels like it’s cheap and cheats the listener(s) out of potentially awesome music in the process, and in all honesty, Björk really isn't an artist I find myself listening to so often in the first place. However, by some stroke of genius or luck, the group managed to make her vocals work rather well as instruments to the point where I wouldn't mind hearing more artists having vocals act like background instruments as well. With the things that make the Death Grips surprisingly work combined with Björk providing a unique way of implementing herself onto this album, it’s no wonder why this was my second-most listened album of 2014. Let’s hope that their (potential) final album helps showcase the overall picture that this album tried to portray all those months ago so that their sad cum break up announcement doesn't sound so sad after all.

"Weird Al" Yankovic – Mandatory Fun

Alright, show hands, who hasn’t during at least their teenaged years heard of at least one song (parody or otherwise) or even album from what could very well be the king (jester?) of parody music? Really, I won’t blame you if you did since he’s been one of the longest lasting (living) artists our generation has ever known of and the fact that he continues providing some good laughs to people for nearly 40 years now showcases a legacy that both old and new fans can legitimately respect now. The fact that this album proved to be the first (and only) album of his that turned out to be a #1 selling album on Billboard’s Top 100 albums listing (even if it was only for one week) further illustrates the legacy he’s left upon our world. Of course, I can’t deny that his albums since the new millennium started have had lesser quality than some of his older albums that were released since the 1980’s and 1990’s, but they still had their own fun qualities in their own ways. However, this album I think I say almost competes with those other albums and is not only the best album of his during this new millennium, but it also sends off what’s potentially his last album in a rather satisfying manner.

With “Weird Al” Yankovic, the most important thing we usually like hearing more than anything else for him would be the songs he’s straight up parodying from the people that wanted to be parodied by him. For me, most of the songs that he decided to parody not only had good structures to them, but also sounded rather good as actual parodies when compared to what the songs he was going with like Iggy Azalea & Charli XCX’s "Fancy," Pharrell Williams’ "Happy," Imagine Dragons’ "Radioactive," and even Lorde’s "Royals." Really, the only song that got parodied that I disliked back then that I don’t really care for even as a parody was Robin Thicke, Pharrell Williams, and T.I.’s Blurred Line, and even then it’s not for the idea that he didn’t try at all; in fact, I could probably say that he provided the best attempt to sound great as possible, but the instrumentation that goes on for too long still kills me even to this day no matter who performs this shit. With that said, every parody (especially those with music videos) really do hit the nail on the mark there on what they want to say and how insane some of these places can go sometimes like "Handy," "Foil," and "Inactive." As for the polka song that mashes up a good chuck of popular songs into one whole song, this turned to be one of the best polka mash-ups I’ve heard from “Weird Al”, and considering some of the songs he used for it ("Wrecking Ball" by Miley Cyrus, "Best Song Ever" by One Direction, "Call Me Maybe" by Carly Rae Jepson, "Scream & Shout" by Will.I.Am and Britney Spears, and "Sexy & I Know It" by LMFAO), that’s actually quite an accomplishment in and of itself!

As for the songs that are more original for him that still revolve around using certain styles to make them effective… I think most of them work with it being a bit of a mixed bag sometimes. Don’t get me wrong, songs like "My Own Eyes," "Mission Statement," and especially the "Sports Song" really do provide me with a sense of joy and satisfaction whenever I listen to them. However, both the songs "First World Problems" and "Lame Claim To Fame" end up giving me some feelings that even though I think they’re alright as it is, I think they could have been a bit better. Furthermore, the ending song ("Jackson Park Express") is a nine minute song where even though I’m aware of the sense of how it can be enjoyable and even very fascinating to the listener on where it’s going to go, I kind of think went on a bit too long for my tastes and became one of the weaker parts of the album because of it. Still, in spite of my feelings for those types of songs being more of a mixed bag, they still not only remained a positive, but provided “Weird Al” a true sense of success with not only mastering the parody song in his own way, but also gaining further worldwide recognition in ways not even songs like "Eat It," "Fat," "Amish Paradise," and even "White & Nerdy" could do for him beforehand. As a result, I have to list it as a favorite album of mine this past year for giving me some much needed laughs in a year that also introduced things like ISIS and the War in Ukraine to the national public.

Sun Kil Moon – Benji

One thing that I had noticed within my best albums ranking last year was that I hadn’t really held any diversity with my albums at all. I mean think about it, most of my favorite albums were rap albums and the one that wasn’t really was more of an obvious album to give praise to over anything else. Even if I did find my choices justified, it wouldn’t hurt to actually provide a bit more variety with my choices this year; that’s why I decided ever since the middle of 2014 that I would find a way to diversify my list of favorite albums this year. With this album, I think it might have helped succeed in my goal since this album’s from a (mostly single) folk rock artist who’s usual work involves acoustic guitars, which is usually an area where I’m less excited to listen to when compared to most other genres. However, with the way Mark Kozelek (the main artist that’s credited in Sun Kil Moon) presented the types of subjects that were found in this album, it really made the album really stand out in ways you normally wouldn’t expect it to.

The way many of the songs are presented to the listener here is done under a kind of autobiographical standpoint that Mark had remembered throughout his life of around 46 or so years. This album in particular starts out with an event that starts out rather recent with the death of a second cousin of his that he wants to pay his respects towards and continues to revolve around various humans or events that helped move his life to the path it’s at right now, from his parents, other family members, and even neighbors of sorts like a guy named Jim Wise to events like watching a film he saw in his childhood involving Led Zeppelin, the murders caused by the Satanic worshipping Richard Ramirez, and even one of the more recent school shootings (at the time) at the Sandy Hook Elementary School. Yeah, if you haven’t figured it out by now, one of the more prominent themes that revolves around this album is death and how there can and will be plenty of different reactions involved with either people dying, are (potentially) about to die soon, or are already dead. Normally there would be points of hyperbole or other types of symbolism to offset the types of subject matter related to death like in death metal or horrorcore rap, but Mark ends up providing some brutal truths within life and very specific details about they can affect him or have affected his life as a whole, such as how a funeral near the end of Truck Driver had some Kentucky Fried Chicken served to the funeral goers. Yet in spite of focusing on such a difficult, even brutal at times subject to cover throughout most of the album, it didn’t feel uncomfortable to listen to at all; in fact, the songs actually come off as emotional in all the right places.

Songs like "Carissa," "I Can’t Live Without My Mother’s Love," and "Jim Wise" provide specific moments of sadness that revolve around caring for the subject matters in question. On the other hand, I Love My Dad holds special moments of happiness on how well Mark’s dad taught him in spite of his failings. Many of the other songs also provide different emotional results where you’d feel alright one minute and then you feel like you have a tear or two in your eye(s) or even feel something more complex than that (like in "Pray For Newtown") the next. In the end, it all relates to Mark’s life as it is today with how it’s more mundane these days and how he wants to live it with a bit more passion and oomph that can be understood if you ever lived with monotonous details throughout at least a few moments of life. If there was one negative I could say when listening to this album (aside from the fact that the album has some really long tracks with one track over ten minutes long), it’s that some of the vocals in certain tracks have background vocals as loud as the actual lyrics, which can easily distract some listeners. Other than that, it’s a really enjoyable album and if you either want to listen to some songs from some white guy with acoustic guitars or want an introduction to Sun Kil Moon, this album would be it for me.

Skyharbor – Guiding Lights

Finally, to conclude this list of favorite albums of mine, I have a metal band from the land of India that in all honesty slipped past my mind throughout most of last year that really had quite a grip on me. For everyone that doesn’t know about this group, Skyharbor is a metal group that provides a special use of ambiance to provide a sense of atmosphere that you normally don’t get with most metal albums (or at least not when compared to something like Metallica or AC/DC). The type of metal music they present is called “Djent,” which revolves around providing heavy music that follows a specific sound, and that normally gets a love/hate relationship of sorts with certain types of people (or rather metalheads) that enjoy varied music. However, considering the fact that this group that initially started as a project by one Indian guitarist had Mark Friedman, a (former) Megadeth member collaborate with them and toured with the Lamb of God earlier on in their careers, it’s pretty safe to say that they hold a sense of legitimacy within the metal community even when not all of their songs rely on being heavy. In a way, it’d be kind of fitting for them to bring something light (in multiple senses of the word) and new for a genre that had relied on being a dark and heavy with its tone of subjects and sound for decades now.

If I’m being honest, this is probably the only album from my list that’s a bit better off when being listened to as a whole than as separate songs. Oh sure, I can certainly say a few albums here a sense of adventure with themselves from beginning to end, but they don’t really elicit a journey that has me feeling like I became better with myself after listening to it all. That’s not to say none of the songs can be enjoyed separately off the album either; Evolution provides a sense of rebirth and being free from life’s shackles, while Patience tells a surprisingly emotional story of trying to keep a perfect memory while trying to not be influenced by a town that’s full of deceitful people around you. However, in terms of providing the listener with a whole picture based off the songs given to you from beginning to end, this album’s a great contender to give you an idea of a whole story out of its songs in making sure you end up being a better person while not falling for society’s temptations since we only have one life to live. With that sense, it’s quite a message to follow if you’ve ever felt like you’ve had doubts against yourself for whatever reason (which I’ll admit I have had a few times myself).

When it comes to the vocals, let’s just say that if you aren’t a fan of TesseracT, you’re probably not going to like this group at all. However, I can say that the lyrics here are very introspective and do provide a sense of what’s going on in the vocalist’s mind, and they do come out rather fittingly. Speaking of fitting in properly, the instrumentation that goes on throughout the album does find a sense of when to go hard hitting with itself and when to go lighter on itself, especially in some of the more complex songs on the album. In fact, some of the sounds that come out here have nice little hints of other groups with nice melodies and compositions like the Deftones and Daft Punk from their Random Access Memories days that actually provide a more original light to them. Even some of the guest work by Mark Holcomb of Periphery, Plini, and Valentina Reptile provide some nice, interesting styles to add onto Skyharbor’s work. If there’s one thing that I don’t like about this album, it’s the fact that this album really loves having longer than usual tracks with the shortest song being around 4:30 minutes long and having at least two songs over nine minutes long. Even I admit that it might take a few listens to understand everything within the album, but once you do, it’s sure to be a journey that you’ll never forget (or at least leave you in a better mood than when you were initially under beforehand).