—Municipality
TOP ALBUMS OF 2011
And so, we’ve reached the end of the year, and it’s time for the annual roundup of the year’s albums. This year’s total number came out to 46, for some reason. We’ll be counting down the albums to number one this whole month.
8. Goodbye Bread - Ty Segall
When you listen to Ty Segall’s music, it feels like there’s so much going on in nothing. Like rocker Kurt Vile, Segall has the capability of writing extremely basic songs about very little, and turning them into absolute magic - but that’s been evident throughout his entire career, and especially on his reissued singles collection which was also released this year. 2010’s release Melted was considerably Segall’s best: a culmination of everything he’s worked on, in a rocking, punk way that was about as accessible as a punk album can get, maybe with the exception of Ted Leo. And Melted was, although it didn’t make my list in time, one of the best albums of 2010. So where does that leave us with Goodbye Bread? It is a bit more rushed than Melted, a bit slower, a bit more mature. That really only comes through after a few listens, because at first, songs like “California Commercial” and “Comfortable Home” feel like jokes more than anything else - and the title track never picks up like you might expect it to. Segall has been praised for this, being able to cut back on the loud rock that encompasses his band Sic Alps almost to the point where its unlistenable (despite being very good). And when I first heard Goodbye Bread, I felt myself slightly disappointed that didn’t have those tracks like “Imaginary Person” or “Girlfriend,” which are probably Segall’s best tracks. Even more puzzling was the closing “Fine,” which takes a note from “Alone,” but doesn’t give the same payoff that it did. That’s why, after a few listens, you start to realize that Goodbye Bread isn’t Melted at all, but rather a dedication to that movement, while still being a giant leap forward. Song like “Fine” might not have the same power as an “Alone,” but their much more deep and incredible than the easy tracks we’re used to from Segall.
Perhaps the best on the album is “I Can’t Feel It,” which spends its entire second half falling into a chant, before Segall finally breaks it down and we get the guitars we’ve been waiting for. It’s a power ballad in that sense, because the more you listen to it, the more you like what’s going on, and the more you want to play along. “You Make The Sun Fry” has the same feeling behind it, and you like what Segall’s doing as a whole, lyrically: “You can come and meet my mom,” he croons in his lo-fi rhetoric - it’s a song that wouldn’t be possible on Melted, and wouldn’t be possible anywhere else than on Goodbye Bread. But the most puzzling thing about Goodbye Bread is its second half, after “I Can’t Feel It,” when we get much longer tracks from Segall that are less based in quick rock movements like “Mike D’s Coke” or “Bees,” which are considerably easier tracks but are less than actual songs, whereas songs like “My Head Explodes” is a more successful “Melted,” and a pure rock-out. The follow three find themselves as new adventures for Segall, and “I Am With You” is almost more experimental than anything we’ve heard from him, aware of the frustration in life while still giving us a song that feels relevant. There’s a depth to Goodbye Bread that we haven’t seen before - the first half, made up of these dreams that Segall has, the climax of “I Can’t Feel It,” and the comedown of the album’s second half, which is home to more realistic tracks than we’re used to. And finally, there’s “Fine,” which takes a page from “Goodbye Bread” in its calm emotion, but explodes like you’d expect it to. “Fine” and “Alone” are two songs written from the same book, with different outcomes, and which is better is a quiz that I’ll probably never get right. But as a whole, Goodbye Bread comes across as not only a stepping stone for Segall, but a proper follow-up to Melted in the sense that knows its place in a lo-fi world that’s asking more from Segall, and he obviously knows how to deliver.
7. Days - Real Estate
When you listen to the final moments of Real Estate’s Days, you get the sense that the album as a whole means a lot more than you probably expected. Real Estate has a tendency towards these sun-happy, easy going songs, and that’s what they’re debut was, for the most part, unless you listened closer and understood the moments of “Suburban Beverage” and “Snow Days.” It was a massively successful album, even though we’d heard most of the songs going into it, but Days exceeds that record in the purest sense, by being so emotionally ready, while still based in the same music, that it’s uncanny. And it’s probably most prevalent on “All The Same,” where we get lines like, “Oh, I know it’s hard, but you stay with me,” before the epic four minute closer (which I am calling the least pretentious seven-minute track ever). There’s an immediate connection to Deerhunter’s “He Would Have Laughed” both in length, in structure, and maturity, but something that “All The Same” lacks is the idea that there’s nowhere to go from here, whereas Deerhunter seems rooted in understanding it all. Real Estate makes no assumptions about that, but is merely making music about how it feels to be a human. And probably the time of year the album was released says a lot: the falling leaves, the cooling weather, it all seems like it’s part of the album as well. Days and Real Estate as a whole are obviously effected by nature, and this album is a homage to that. But moreover, there’s a beauty and honesty behind everything on Days that resonates so well.
“Green Aisles” might be the most realistic track the band has ever written, that maintains the easy-going rock feel while giving us more than we ever hoped for. It seems to be some sort of sadness growing inside of them as musicians, that we didn’t glean from “Black Lake” or “Fake Blues,” and that’s probably why Days is so successful overall. It’s also because we get lines like, “Blacked out on a bicycle, I made my way back home - the houses were humming all through the night,” it’s a story more than anything else, and it’s a story we can all relate to. Even more relatable is “It’s Real,” which on first listen feels like a standard Real Estate track, but over time seems like a confession of what we already know to be true, and it’s really a beautiful song. Probably the best on the album, though, other than “All The Same,” are the realizations in “Municipality,” which is like a love song but also a heartbreak song - everything on the album seems to be someplace we’ve all been before and can all be a part of. I used to play Real Estate because it was calming and soothing, but I play it now because it’s music that pretty much feels like you’re life living through music. Overall, Days doesn’t feel like a middle ground between the self-titled debut and whatever comes next, but it feels like the realization of what Real Estate is in the most beautiful sense. The songs can be listened to over and over, and never get old, and the voices and instruments behind them ring more true than any other music being put out today. It’s bizarre that a band that can be seen as almost easy-listening can be filled with so much emotion and connotation with feelings, while also doing it so simply. And it probably isn’t until those last moments of “All The Same” that you realize the power of Real Estate, compacted in the slowing guitars and slowing drums - it’s probably one of my favorite moments in music this year. But after you listen to the album again, you start to realize that the whole thing is full of this, and it’s really a forty minute ode to those slowing guitars, feeling good, and feeling bad. It’s music that tells you it’s going to be okay while telling you that things might not work out. And that’s the real success of Days: that it can be both honest and enlightening at the same time.
