Late? Never?
So, because the HH had a delayed production schedule for a while there, we never got around to listing our top tens for 2004. Seeing how it's not yet May, anyone care to join me in listing them?
Top Ten of 2004
Hayden Childs
1. The Fiery Furnaces - Blueberry Boat (album). Read about it here.
2. Mission of Burma at La Zona Rosa, March 18 (live show). SXSW showcase. Roger Miller had ear protection headphones on and stood behind his amp, and all three played like they were 20 years old. Excellent.
3. Jandek played live in Scotland (Oct 17, live show)? Really? I wasn't there, but wow. I'm still speechless.
4. The Wire Season Three (tv show). Featuring the most complex characters and almost primordially compelling storylines of any show ever filmed, The Wire is the best thing about television.
5. Kill Bill Vol 2 (movie). Between this & the Fiery Furnaces, I'm apparently a sucker for form. I loved the hell out of both Kill Bills, both of which were more semi-philosophical set pieces and love letters to great filmmakers than stories. And yet, also like the FF, they carry the weight of brilliance operating in confusing times.
6. Brian Wilson with the Wondermints at the Backyard, Oct. 24 (live show). They played SMiLE in its entirety, making sounds more beautiful than most live bands could even conceive. I remember reading a review of the Pet Sounds tour that commented about the loss of wonder in seeing those sounds reproduced on stage. That guy was nuts; I'm still reeling from the sheer talent in evidence.
7. Animal Collective - Sung Tongs (album). Dude. Seriously. Campfire music on acid.
8. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (movie). This movie was near perfect. Lots has been written about it, but my only personal 2 cents is that it rips my heart out every time.
9. Deadwood Season One (tv show). It's Locke vs. Hobbes in the State of Nature. This show is about why philosophy is almost as important as soap, whiskey, and a sense of honor.
10. My wife's pregnancy (May 2004 - Feb 2005). Nah, this isn't really the least important of the great things in 2004 (and we're not going to mention the horrible, horrible political realities around us). I'm trying not to be overly sentimental, that's all. This one is just so far above the other stuff that it doesn't make sense in context. Our pregnancy months were amazing, almost as amazing as what came after.
Top Ten of 2004
Hayden Childs
1. The Fiery Furnaces - Blueberry Boat (album). Read about it here.
2. Mission of Burma at La Zona Rosa, March 18 (live show). SXSW showcase. Roger Miller had ear protection headphones on and stood behind his amp, and all three played like they were 20 years old. Excellent.
3. Jandek played live in Scotland (Oct 17, live show)? Really? I wasn't there, but wow. I'm still speechless.
4. The Wire Season Three (tv show). Featuring the most complex characters and almost primordially compelling storylines of any show ever filmed, The Wire is the best thing about television.
5. Kill Bill Vol 2 (movie). Between this & the Fiery Furnaces, I'm apparently a sucker for form. I loved the hell out of both Kill Bills, both of which were more semi-philosophical set pieces and love letters to great filmmakers than stories. And yet, also like the FF, they carry the weight of brilliance operating in confusing times.
6. Brian Wilson with the Wondermints at the Backyard, Oct. 24 (live show). They played SMiLE in its entirety, making sounds more beautiful than most live bands could even conceive. I remember reading a review of the Pet Sounds tour that commented about the loss of wonder in seeing those sounds reproduced on stage. That guy was nuts; I'm still reeling from the sheer talent in evidence.
7. Animal Collective - Sung Tongs (album). Dude. Seriously. Campfire music on acid.
8. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (movie). This movie was near perfect. Lots has been written about it, but my only personal 2 cents is that it rips my heart out every time.
9. Deadwood Season One (tv show). It's Locke vs. Hobbes in the State of Nature. This show is about why philosophy is almost as important as soap, whiskey, and a sense of honor.
10. My wife's pregnancy (May 2004 - Feb 2005). Nah, this isn't really the least important of the great things in 2004 (and we're not going to mention the horrible, horrible political realities around us). I'm trying not to be overly sentimental, that's all. This one is just so far above the other stuff that it doesn't make sense in context. Our pregnancy months were amazing, almost as amazing as what came after.
posted by Hayden Childs at 1:47 PM
2 Comments:
I'll play.
1) Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind - The best movie since Mulholland Dr., Kaufman and Gondry firing on all synapses. With each passing reel, every direction that I hoped the story would take was probed.
2) The Wire Season 3 - If Steven Johnson really wanted to make a case that watching TV makes you smarter, he'd have cited The Wire.
3) The Red Sox vs. The Yankees - I'm not even a fan of either team. But jesus.
4) Green Day American Idiot - Continuing the comback begun by their Kinks-inspired Warning, this Who-inspired follow-up has deservedly become a blockbuster. Even my eight year-old niece has put down her Britney Spears record to sing along to "Boulevard of Broken Dreams."
5) Before Sunset - "I know." Those two words rank right up there with "Okay." as the year's best closing lines. And Before Sunset shares more than just that similarity with Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Both films turn on the effect of memory in shaping our lives, particularly in how we make relationships to other people.
6) Pinback Summer in Abaddon - This grew on me like Chia-hair. Delicate, seductive melodies that register more strongly after repeated exposure.
7) The Arcade Fire Funeral - Just the right mix of heart-on-the-sleeve wearin' bombast and rawk. I love how many of the songs build and build, and then release into some sort of dance.
8) The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou - Surely, Wes Anderson has been reading his own press. Surely, he knows that critics were starting to express some concern after The Royal Tenenbaums that he was crawling up his ass. I have to admire Anderson for digging his heels and, instead of venturing into uncharted stylistic territory, retreating even further into Wesness.
9) "This Mystic Decade" by The Hot Snakes - A song. The most flat-out, badass mother of a song I heard all year, in fact.
10) The Rules of the Game DVD - Installed at #10 to boost my credibility. Also, this movie is awesome.
Hoodoo Gurus, Mach Schau!. "Make a show!" According to legend, this was the exhortation given by Bruno Koschmider to The Beatles as they took the stage at the Kaiserkeller for one of their Preludin-fueled R&B shows during the Hamburg years. While the HGs are not carried by EMI/Captiol in US release, this follows hard upon the spectacular one-off outing by Faulkner and Shepherd as The Persian Rugs (a 2003 favorite, if my memory serves). This Australian import is a must-have for Hoodoo Gurus fans, and could easily be well-loved by fans of power pop and Aussie rock. Word has it that their brief reunion stint for the Big Day Out festival series was awe-inspiring. Mach Schau finds a level of three-chord oomph missing on some of the Gurus last releases (In Blue Cave, Magna Cum Louder, Crank in particular) and provides a punchier package than even what's considered as their unqualified best (Stoneage Romeos, and to a lesser extent Mars Needs Guitars! and Kinky). The battering-ram chord structure of "#17" captures their cohesion perfectly, and evokes the feeling of what it is like to hear them live. This album is a double high-five.
Wilco adds Nels Cline to the lineup. While A Ghost is Born tops my short list of heavy rotators on the iPod (so much so that my wife started to enforce an edict not to play it while she's in the car or in the house for a minimum of six months), the personnel change was a positive boon for their already electric live performances.
Guided by Voices leaves the scene after 20+ years, numerous major releases, revolving door personnel changes, and side projects with "The Electrifying Conclusion" tour and the release of Half Smiles of the Decomposed, their 11th or 12th major release. "Or something like that."
Iggy and the Stooges live DVD, featuring Mike Watt on bass. Especially pay attention to the bonus footage, featuring a journal entry read by Watt, and Scott Asheton banging out the rhythms for songs like "Loose" on a kit comprised of cardboard boxes and paint buckets at an in-store. Raw power, indeed.
Elvis Costello, The Delivery Man. The crown of the Elvis Costello '04 three-fer, including the [dismal] torchy/croony North and the Deutsche Gramaphon release of Il Sogno, which I will readily admit I didn't like either. Having now seen the live performance from "The Monkey Speaks His Mind" tour, DVD footage and collateral material on his performance from the Hi-Tone in Memphis, I have even deeper appreciation for it. It was so good I bought it once when it first came out, and then bought it again in the twin-disc repackage. You kill my wallet, Elvis, but I love you anyway. I hope he picks a venue as inspired as Oxford, MS for the next outing.
Mission of Burma, ONoffON. Picking up where they left off, and not losing many steps. They seem to be at the forefront of a trend of "artists who would be handpicked for reunion by the esteemed William Ham of the kinda-quasi-quarterly The High Hat Magazine." But we'll leave an evaluation of the Go-Betweens resurgence for the 2005 lists.
Steve Earle, The Revolution Starts Now. This is the album that Jerusalem could have been. This is more what I expect from Earle, which is steps up from the previous -- and in this case, the measuring stick is what I consider to be the genius contained within Transcendental Blues. Also available is the New West DVD of his performance from Austin City Limits circa 1986 (featuring Bucky Baxter, Mike McAdam, Ron Kling, Ken Moore, & Harry Stinson). It's an interesting artifact of the star on the rise, coming fresh off the release of Guitar Town, but you might especially note his cocaine-addled twitching mannerisms coming out for the first encore. Talk about your open secrets. I wonder if the video footage of "San Antonio Girl" actually made it to the KRLU broadcast. I would be surprised. I managed to miss Steve on his 2004 swing through Nashville, and now that he's departed Fairview for the sunny shores of NYC, it's more of a rare treat to get to see him perform around here.
Kings of Leon, Aha Shake Heartbreak. Based on a recommendation from Earle's XM radio show -- and is it ever good. While I believe that the US release is 2005, this was available as a European import as of late 2004. So it really counts as a 2004 release. Strangely enough, this band is from Tennessee and I have to go around the world to get the latest stuff from them.
A.C. Newman, The Slow Wonder. The New Pornographers tunesmith cuts a solo release, and crafts a wondrous work of power pop. (Honorable mentions here -- Neko Case's The Tigers Have Spoken, featuring The Sadies, and The Sadies Favourite Colours album, which is evocative -- in a good way -- of the Flying Burrito Brothers to my ears.)
Antibalas Afrobeat Orchestra, Who is This America? Props to Doyle Davis for leading me to this American ensemble kicking it Fela style -- I expect a lot more from this band during the next four years of a Bush administration. "Indictment" has to be one of the angriest ... well, indictments handed out against the war criminals in DC. Supposedly they were so damned militant at their show here at the Mercy Lounge that they were driving patrons away. Those who stayed saw a burning rendition of Afrobeat not soon forgotten.
Post a Comment
<< Home