2001: Albums 9-20
Unwound Leaves Turn Inside You (Kill Rock Stars; April 17, 2001)
Voted by: Amir, Chet
In addition to the guitars of Justin Trosper, the bass of Vern Rumsey and the drums of Sara Lund, Leaves Turn Inside You features organ, slide guitar, mellotron, harpsichord, piano, cello, Rhodes� but sounds nothing like Wilco. Rather, Unwound�s double-disc opus comes off more like Sonic Youth channeling Trent Reznor�s lost soul; it�s experimental rock whose Les Miserables opera passes through the crannies of gothic architecture, stony chamber acoustics filtering Unwound�s bold echoes until listeners nibble nails for fear that they are listening to the clamor of ghouls, not humans. Leaves Turn Inside You haunts through its failing struggle to regain life. On the remarkable �October All Over,� Trosper says, �Sometimes you�ll laugh so hard you�ll cry� with the kind of weariness that demands empathy despite its disaffection, and in the conclusion of �Below the Salt,� Unwound take the role of Javert, finding their falling star glory by embracing the night. All of this tumult plays out from a great distance, a great height (or depth), that inspires a chilling sort of awe. –Chet Betz
cLOUDDEAD cLOUDDEAD (Mush; April 24, 2001)
Voted by: Scott, Sean
Most can’t figure out my fascination with this record, and though I’d like to chalk that up to an ill-conceived assumption that they haven’t spent enough time taking it in (it clocks in at over an over with six separate two-part epics — a respectable segment of which is instrumental and/or consisting entirely of samples), I understand the hesitation. After all, most of the Anticon collective, especially in recent years, would lead you to believe that they wouldn’t be capable of an album this massive and near-perfect But think about it: we get Dose at his most tolerable and consistent, Nosdam at his most daring, Why? at his most controlled; and guests (amongst them Sole, Illogic and DJ Signify) that never try to out-weird an already uncategorical sound. Perhaps more surprising to its uninitiated, it’s an Anticon release that collects everything redeemable about their aesthetic without the easy targets that litter the rest of their catalogue; hell, it could just as easily be their collective’s “best-of,” and “I Promise Never to Get Paint on My Glasses Again (Pt. 1)” its defining five minutes. –Scott Reid
Destroyer Streethawk: A Seduction (Misra; April 26, 2001)
Voted by: Scott, Chet, Aaron
You know that feeling you get when you hear the refrain of Pavement’s “Summer Babe” or the beginning of T. Rex’s “Cosmic Dancer” or the Modern Lovers shouting “I’m straight!” or right after Doug Martsch squeaks, “Ain’t it strange that I have brain activity”? You feel warm and great, and you don‘t know why, like you just drank a tiny shot of something that’s somehow going to make everything all right, all by itself. Well, I often get that feeling when I listen to Streethawk: A Seduction. I get it when I hear the booming coda of “Strike; ” or the absurd reference to Herzog’s Fitzcarraldo in “Virgin With A Memory;” or when Bejar almost raps the second stanza of “The Very Modern Dance.” With “The Bad Arts” and “English Music,” the feeling basically buzzes me non-stop, growing in strength until I crack a huge grin and sigh and hug myself. There’s something terrifically uplifting about that which emanates a wistful, hopeful positive ion charge of all rhyme, no reason. Streethawk: A Seduction should be the hold music for suicide hotlines. –Chet Betz
My Morning Jacket At Dawn (Darla; June 5, 2001)
Voted by: Scott, Peter, Candice
Tennesee Fire‘s own merits notwithstanding, the sprawling alt-country/pop/rock of At Dawn marks the first record by My Morning Jacket the complete band and not just a Jim James project with four more-than-apt musicians backing him. It’s an awful lot to take in, but its selling points are virtually endless: “Bermuda Highway” is classic folk-rock at its modern finest; “X-Mas Curtain’s” leads, especially during its intro, are incredible; “The Way That He Sings” is a brilliant Wilco-retelling of “Lion Sleeps Alone Tonight”; “Low Down’s” wonderful southern romanticism; and, best of all, “Strangulation!” — still my favorite song of this infant millenium. Which, for what’s it’s worth, has more vintage Neil Young packed into its eight-plus minutes than a full decade’s worth of failed imitators and respectable homages (Wilco, I’m looking your way) combined. –Scott Reid
Shins Oh, Inverted World (Sub Pop; June 19, 2001)
Voted by: Scott, Peter, Aaron
James Mercer came out of seemingly nowhere (well, Albuquerque, but what�s the difference) and released a pop gem that hasn�t aged a day since. The lush atmosphere and illusive and occasionally dark lyrics made for a fantastic listen. The indie call-to-arms of �Know Your Onion,� the gorgeous �New Slang,� and the beautiful closer �The Past and Pending� made for one of the strongest records of 2001, and still by far one of the best so far this decade. –Peter Hepburn
Prefuse 73 Vocal Studies + Uprock Narratives (Warp; July 17, 2001)
Voted by: Matt, Peter, Chet
In which a crazed white-boy out of Atlanta by the name of Scott Herren saves instrumental hip-hop; Vocal Studies could care less about the rappers — they�re just another part of the mix. And what a mix it is: tracks like �Nuno,� �Point to B,� and �Black List� proved that hip-artistically-driven hop was alive and doing very well, thank you. –Peter Hepburn
Strokes Is This It (Rough Trade; August 27, 2001/RCA; September 25, 2001)
Voted by: Sean, Matt, David, Bryan, Amir
As if living in New York in the Fall of 2001 wasn’t difficult enough, erstwhile hipsters also had to deal with the dilemma that occurred whenever a member of the Strokes elected to grab a drink in the bar that you happened to be in. Trust me on this one: frenzied cell phone conversations would render said bar unbelievably crowded in a matter of minutes, and rest assured you were no longer going to score. And then there was the problem of faux Julians; dude had more stunt doubles than Saddam Hussein. After the hype subsided, all we were left with was a flawless collection of fiendishly catchy rock songs. As essential now as it was 4 years ago; Is This It was the first spark in the unwieldy “garage-rock” bonfire that sent the 4th rate metal bands to their proper conclusion, and for that we should be eternally grateful — Jet notwithstanding. –David M. Goldstein
Circulatory System Circulatory System (Cloud Recordings; August 28, 2001)
Voted by: Scott, Peter
After the disappointing-for-all Olivia Tremor Control implosion — which not long after lead to the unraveling of the entire E6 label/collective — Bill Hart continued down his own slightly-psychedelic alt-pop path, while Will Cullen Hart decided to forge ahead on his own. Like a logical (or at least intelligent) extension of the dream-like pastiche that wound up as Black Foliage Animation Music, Will’s debut under the Circulatory System moniker is very possibly his strongest collection of songs to date (“Forever,” “Yesterday’s World,” “Outside Blasts” and “Your Parades” especially). It mends his ever-present Beatles blueprinting with a massive, SMiLE-like thematic ambition and beautifully detailed production. But Hart makes it all sound easy, and though its confidence might be belied by its commendable lack of pretention, it’s as obnoxious a statement as either of OTC’s two indie-pop milestones. Like the rest of his work, some of it tends to kind of run together, but never once in a way even remotely boring or complacent. Now, if they’d just release Blasting Through, already. –Scott Reid
Explosions in the Sky Those Who Tell the Truth Shall Live Forever Those Who Tell the Truth Shall Die (Temporary Residence; September 4, 2001)
Voted by: Scott, Chet
As much as I’d like to use every last one hundred of these words ranting about how incredible a live band Explosion in the Sky (EITS) are, this list is about records, and this is the finest “post-rock” has given us since — depending on your tolerance for Godspeed — Young Team. More explosive and animate than their 2003 follow-up The Earth is a Cold Dead Place and more consistent than their independently released debut (How Strange, Innocence), it’s an intricate balance of their hypnotic attraction to epic structures and climaxes that can, like on highlights “Greet Death” and “The Moon is Down,” offer a physical pounding at the right volume. Sadly, though, it doesn’t do much for its genre; Those Who Tell the Truth sets a bar that’s far out of reach for many of their contemporaries, most of which are still unsuccessfully practicing year-round to clear Rock Action. –Scott Reid
Microphones The Glow, Pt 2 (K; September 25, 2001)
Voted by: Sean, Aaron, Dom, Amir
My jaw literally dropped the first time I heard The Glow Pt. 2. One of the most ambitious, sprawling, lo-fi (in ethic only) symphonies I’d ever heard, at the time it was the sum of everything I ever hoped to find in an album; and, in many ways, it still is. An album about man’s relationship with nature that illustrates that relationship more clearly and more truly with sound than any words could, The Glow features massive storms of stereo white noise, gusts of acoustic guitar tearing through rattling branches of drums and Phil Elvrum’s dew-covered voice bringing everything to life. Underneath the binaural squalls of natural and unnatural noise lie some simple, affecting pop songs, but the way the disparate aspects of the music become inseparable over the course of the journey seems like Phil’s point. –Sean Ford
Fugazi The Argument (Dischord; October 15, 2001)
Voted by: Peter, Chet, Amir
I had listened to a lot of early Fugazi stuff — Repeater, 13 Songs, etc. — and The Argument came as something of a surprise. Not as hard as the earlier stuff, but certainly smarter, tighter, and way more convincing. This is one of those albums I still throw on all the time when I want a fix of good solid rock. I can only hope that this is not Fugazi�s last word, but if it is they most certainly went out on a great note. -Peter Hepburn
Liars They Threw Us All in a Trench and Stuck a Monument on Top (Gern Blandsten; October 30, 2001)
Voted by: Sean, Matt
It’s hard, I know, but try to imagine a time before bands with punctuation marks for names, before Pitchfork inexplicably named Echoes the best album of 2003, before the words “dance punk” were used only in a punchline, and (oh god please) before the train wreck that was They Were Wrong So We Drowned. If you can, you’ll remember how ridiculously awesome They Threw Us All in a Trench… was the first time you heard it: those toneless, shouty vocals, the completely unexpected bursts of noise, the fattest baselines ever, the way that no matter how atrocious it sounded you couldn’t stop shaking your ass. If you can’t, then at least your memory will be free from that pointless half hour tape loop that closed the album. –Matt Stephens
