The Top 20 Albums of 2016

For a playlist of my favorite tracks off my favorite 2016 albums, click here for a Spotify playlist.  This list contains all my "Choice Tracks" from each album in the Top 20 plus much more. 

Well, 2016, as far as years go, you were a scumbag, stealing from us some sacred music cows.  Last year’s Top 20 write up got posted mighty late, arriving in February (like this one) to acknowledge the 2015 deaths of Scott Weiland and Lemmy and then, in early 2016, David Bowie.  It was an avalanche of crumbling stars after that, with the departures of Prince, Leonard Cohen, Sharon Jones, Glen Frey, Merle Haggard, Keith Emerson and Greg Lake (Palmer beware!), and George Michael.  Add in other artistic and iconic losses, such as Alan Rickman, Gene Wilder, Gary Shandling, Carrie Fisher, Muhammed Ali, Gordie Howie, Steve Dillon, and John Glenn.  TWO members of Barney Miller’s staff, Abe Vigoda and Ron Glass.  Alan Thicke!  And Fidel Castro and Nancy Reagan are in purgatory somewhere mud-wrestling, and I’m fine with that.  

I also should confess that I haven’t heard Bowie’s final album Black Star.  I just couldn’t do it.  I saw the video premiere for “Lazarus” after he died and I was completely horrified and saddened.  Stomach churning.  Bowie has always been a provocative artist, but it was dispiriting to think that THIS was how he wanted to world to see him as he left this mortal coil – blind, in rags, desperate, insane.  I vowed never to watch it again and then could never bring myself to pick up the album.   Too soon.  

Honestly, none of these losses were more personal and heartbreaking than Gord Downie’s announcement that he is suffering from terminal brain cancer.  He is still with us, inspiring the nation, but the future is dire and upsetting.  The last Hip shows across Canada were epic, shattering goodbyes, and fans have been additionally graced with a new solo record from Gord, an exhortation to Canada to address historical crimes against Indigenous peoples.  Gord Downie’s fragile figure loomed large in 2016.

As always – PILES of great new music.  An embarrassment of riches once again.  Big hitters (for me) Besnard Lakes, Frightened Rabbit, Teenage Fanclub, and School of Seven Bells did not disappoint.  A few brand new artists (for me) pushed into list as well.  A lot of great ambient/psychedelic/instrumental records floated about in 2016 it seemed.  Some extended plays I picked up included new music from previously defunct acts.  Wolf Parade reunited around Sub Pop’s deluxe reissue treatment of Apologies for the Queen Mary and an unexpected 4 song EP (called EP4) of new music.  Excellent return to form.  Even more exciting was the reunion of Lush, seemingly following a trend in the ranks of original British shoegaze (see Ride, Swervedriver, Pale Saints, My Bloody Valentine, Slowdive, etc.).  Their new EP, Blind Spot, is just perfect.

Before I get to the albums, here are my Top 25 favorite songs of 2016:

1. Getting Gone – Mutual Benefit

2. Necronomicon – The Besnard Lakes
3. Break – Frightened Rabbit
4. Ride It Out – Redspencer

5. You – Day Wave

6. Ablaze – School of Seven Bells 

7. Celebration – Yves Jarvis (formerly Un Blonde)

8. Take It Slow – Rogue Wave

9. Lady of the Ark – Kyle Craft

10. Hey You - The Thermals

11. Crucified Again – Arcade Fire

12. 22 (OVER S∞∞N) – Bon Iver

13. Line Them All Up – Black Mountain

14. Lost Dreamers – Mutual Benefit

15. Still Want To Be Here – Frightened Rabbit

16. Mixed Messages – Tuns

17. Yr Face – Yuck

18. Human Performance – Parquet Courts

19. No Worries Gonna Find Us – Plants and Animals

20. Golden Lion - The Besnard Lakes

21. Golden Vanity – The Hanging Stars

22. Bad Texan – Lucid Dream

23. Memory – Preoccupations

24. Racing Country – EZTV

25. I Have Nothing More To Say – Teenage Fanclub           

And now… 

The Top 20 Albums of 2016 

20.  Rogue Wave – Delusions of Grand Fur 

Setting aside the frankly silly malapropism of the title, Rogue Wave convinces me once again that they may be the most criminally underrated indie-rock band of the 2000s.  I ranted about this in reference to 2013’s Nightingale Floors, suggesting it is pure happenstance that bands like The Shins or Vampire Weekend become 1^st tier indie rock stars while Rogue Wave goes relatively unnoticed.  It bugs the hell out of me.  Grand Fur is tightly packed with wonderfully catchy, guitar-driven indie pop, perfect harmonies, and lyrical beauty, richly deserving to be heard and loved.  Choice track: “Take It Slow”. 

19.  Radiohead – A Moon-Shaped Pool

I remember being mystified by the endless accolades handed to Kid A back in 2000.  I felt there were obviously some very strong singles (“Everything In Its Right Place”, “Optimistic”, “Morning Bell”), but I also felt the document was indulgent and  was not nearly as accomplished as The Bends and Ok Computer, two nearly flawless albums.  This trend continued with each Radiohead release… a vague disappointment tempered by some seriously transcendent moments.  Yet…yet…there is always something inescapably superior about a Radiohead album when compared to their peers, and this holds true once again with A Moon Shaped Pool.  It’s a beautiful, introspective, but often bleak record.  It’s challenging stuff, gloomily cyclical, at times moribund, yet deeply immersive if you give it the attention it truly deserves. Why they continue to sell a gazillion records to average music consumers is beyond me, though.   Choice track: “Daydreaming”.

18.  Pinkshinyultrablast – Grandfeathered 

Taking their name from an Astrobrite album, Pinkshinyultrablast are a Russian quartet that assault the ears with supercharged, wall-of-sound shoegaze.  The touchstones are obvious – Lush, Cocteau Twins, My Bloody Valentine – but the delivery is considerably louder and decidedly more raucous.  There is an immense density of trebly guitar, backed by airy synths, drawing comparisons to Luminous Orange, Fleeting Joys, Serena Maneesh, and early Asobi Seksu.  The hooks are undeniable, while the pixie-dust vocals of Lyubov Soloveva keep the cacophony rooted in the pop roots of C86 twee bands of the 80s.  And they sound like they are having a blast.  Is there a contemporary shoegaze scene in Russia?  If we can get more of this rock candy, I sure hope so.  Choice track: “I Catch You Napping”.

17.  TUNS – TUNS

Great bands maintain greatness because of an internal familiarity, a reciprocal instinctiveness that keeps them gelling.  That is perhaps why the “supergroup” concept so often falls short of expectations, with the whole being less than the sum of its parts.  High pedigree collectives like Snowpony, Electronic, The Postal Service, Zwan, Broken Bells, etc. were never awful, and often good, but paled in comparison to their original outfits.  And so it was with trepidatious delight that TUNS arrived, a Haligonian power trio comprising Mike O’Neill (The Inbreds), Chris Murphy (Sloan), and Matt Murphy (The Super Friendz).  These three enter this fray as masterful and venerated indie-rockers who can weave a guitar and vocal hook like nobody’s business.  I am happy to say that the gestalt is super impressive.  TUNS literally sound like all three bands perfectly mashed together – upbeat, super-catchy guitar pop, with delectable harmonies that feel like home.  And more so if you were weaned on the early albums of these humble giants.  Choice track: “Mixed Messages”

16. Cavern of Anti-Matter – Void Beats / Invocation Trex

Stereolab is an all-time favorite of mine, and in some ways the most unique of my most cherished bands whose catalogues I devour.  The band tend to describe their music in their song and album titles and, while comically oblique, are also metaphorically bang on somehow:  Space Age Batchelor Pad Music, Transient Random-Noise Bursts With Announcements, Aluminum Tunes.  Even Refried Ectoplasm attaches to the Stereolab sound in some absurdist manner.  With the band on a "Hiatus/Sabbatical/Pause/Intermission/Breather" we have been graced with a pretty great ‘lab-ish album from Laetitia Sadier (Silencio, in 2012) and now, in 2016, Tim Gane gives us Void Beats / Invocation Trex under the moniker Cavern of Anti-Matter.  Again, the titling seems an analog to the album itself…somehow.  While there are certainly lots of Stereolab touchstones, this record is a little more motorik and cyclical, with less of the grinding organ and guitar in favor of copious bleeps and bloops.  As well, Void Beats is primarily instrumental (Bradford Cox of Deerhunter/Atlas Sound guests on vocals on one of the two vocal tracks), sounding much like Holy Fuck and other analog-techno outfits.  But the short of it is that Gane’s new record is amazing – engaging, fun, meditative, innovative, and grounded in the core history of the Stereolab legend.  Choice track: “Echolalia”.

15.  Sianspheric - Writing the Future in Letters of Fire

The past few years have seen the return of foundational British shoegaze bands – Swervedriver, Slowdive, Ride, Lush, and My Bloody Valentine – and these Canadian genre masters have followed suit.  I’ve been a fan since the first floaty delayed chords of their 1995 debut, Somnium, surprised my ears.  This was surely not a sound one associates with Hamilton, Ontario.  It’s been 15 years since their last proper album and they have come back at the top of their game.  Gentle, slow-tempo, glacial passages carry faraway reverbed vocals lines, with occasional grandiose bursts of distortion and fuzz.  These are songs to lose yourself in, fully and completely.  Headphones and isolation recommended.  Choice track: “It’s Not Over”.

14.  Wire – Nocturnal Koreans

From 1977 to 1979, Wire put out three bombshell albums that were post-punk before first-wave punk was over.  They were unusually innovative and artful in their approach to stripped down, angsty, guitar-based rock, cementing them as revered grandfathers for years to come.  Despite two lengthy hiatuses (1979-1987 and 1991-2003) and some mediocre forays into techno, Wire has consistently lived up to their hallowed beginnings across a stack of great records.  2016’s Nocturnal Koreans is no exception, with their time-tested recipe of taut minimalist guitar lines, brainy nihilistic lyrics, and cold-filtered vocals.  I truthfully can’t think of a band coming out of the late 70’s art punk scene that evolved to remain as relevant, exacting, and exciting as Wire.  Choice track:  “Still”.

13.  Black Mountain - IV

In an obvious nod to Led Zeppelin, Black Mountain’s roman numeraled fourth record is a mammoth psychedelic rock-fest.  Their eight minute opening single, “Mothers of The Sun”, is a stoned, sci-fi elegy to proto-metal at its best, laid at the far-out altars of Hawkwind, Black Sabbath, and Deep Purple.  Thereafter is a quick shift to that odd place where 80’s new wave meets 80’s metal, as if Jefferson Starship was kicking out the jams with Blondie (“Florian Saucer Attack”).  “Line Them All Up” is a glorious prog-folk number in which singer Amber Weber showcases her soulful pipes.  “Cemetry Breeding” almost has a goth feel, were it not for other main vocalist Stephen McBean’s rockist vocal delivery. Top to bottom, this is a big, brash retro-rock record, complete with a cover clearly and wonderfully indebted to Pink Floyd.  Like their previous album Wilderness Heart, IV gifts us with intricate musical homages so perfectly realized that there is no concern of rip-off or derivation, just wide-eyed celebration.  Choice track: “Line Them All Up”.

12.  Teenage Fanclub – Here

Us southwestern Ontarions are a lucky bunch, because for some extremely odd reason, Teenage Fanclub’s Norman Blake decided to relocate to Kitchener (and, I believe, Joe Pernice to Toronto, making their band The New Mendicants a going concern).  I think I can safely assume that there is no other British rock luminary who has made this career move; the possibility of running into Mr. Blake on King St. is positively surreal.  In any case, the Fanclub played Toronto’s Lee Palace recently, and it was seriously nostalgia inducing.  The band has mellowed over the years, for certain, but their M.O. remains fully intact – impossibly catchy and fetching vocal harmonies over jangly, fulsome chords emitted by three intertwined guitars, usually punctuated by a lava-hot solo on a Fender Jaguar.  It’s the kind of set up that seems pedestrian, tired even, on paper.  But the songcraft of Blake, Gerard Love, and their mates is so perfectly developed, a timelessness is assured.  Here, once again, does this all very well and stands up solidly to previous classics like Songs From Northern Britain, Man-Made, and Thirteen.  Choice track: “I Have Nothing More To Say”. 

11.  Explosions In The Sky – The Wilderness

Explosions in the Sky have long been a band that descriptively aligns with a key corner of my musical tastes – wide-screen, cinematic, often fiery instrumental rock.  Key adherents include Godspeed You! Black Emperor (and splinter groups A Silver Mt. Zion, Set Fire To Flames, Fly Pan Am), Mogwai, Kinski, Pelican,  Mono and others (and see RLYR, #10 below).  Explosions in the Sky have helped pioneer this framework since the early 2000s, and while I have enjoyed their records, they always seemed to fall short of the majesty so often evoked by their compatriots.  But The Wilderness takes a rather giant leap forward, primarily because the band has moved outside their typical sonic template (namely, waves of guitar moving from spare, minimalist lines to maximalist crescendos).  I am largely unfamiliar with their soundtrack work for three movies in 2013-2015, but perhaps the narrative demands of film have pushed them to try new things.  The Wilderness sounds like a new Eluvium album, which is a welcome development (Eluvium has released 7 ambient-experimental albums since 2003 that are uniformly tremendous).  Drastically reduced is the reliance on electric guitar as the foundation – it’s still there, of course, but there is a neo-classical richness provided by beautiful synth lines and swells, digital beats alongside their regular kit, reverbed piano, and a singular attention to melody.  The result is uplifting and grandiose, a Chariots of Fire type elevation.  This greater instrumental balance gives the guitar work room to breathe and evolve into entirely new personalities that were not previously possible.   Epic!  Choice track:  “The Ecstatics”.

10.  RLYR – Delayer

I can only assume this new outfit is pronounced “Re-LAY-er”.  Let’s go with that.  I have no memory of how this came across my virtual desk, but I recall being interested as it was a side project of Pelican’s guitarist, Trevor Shelley de Brauw.  Their bandcamp offering did not disappoint.  Take my description of “incendiary instrumental rock” as described in #11 above, and it applies quite nicely to RLYR.  That said, there is a harder edge at play here, much as there is with many Pelican songs, which tugs RLYR into the loosely defined “post-hardcore” genre.  The fuzz/distortion is indispensable, upping the angst quotient considerably, such that RLYR shares the sonic territory of Horseback, Torche,  Jesu, Psychic Paramount, and Wayne Rogers’ body of work (notably Magic Hour and Major Stars).  There are only four songs on Delayer, with one song clocking in at 23 minutes and two exceeding 6 minutes, but this is hardly atypical in this genre. Although there are long extended passages of gritty, buzz-saw guitars, the hooks are there, and they refuse to let you go.  It is worth noting that RLYR plays pretty fast, much faster than the sludgy (but amazing) work of Jesu, for example.  It’s all amped up, up-beat, and determined to anthemically fry your face.  Choice track:  “Slipstream Summer”.

9. The New Lines – Love and Cannibalism.

This is 60’s throwback psychedelic pop, clearly influenced by The Byrds, Moby Grape, Fairport Convention, and early folk numbers by Syd Barret/Pink Floyd.  I also hear a lot of the paisley underground, referencing The Rain Parade and The Dream Syndicate.  The vocals are an acquired taste, delivered with an oddly deadpanned affectation, as if the singer is a not-all-there acid casualty, a 60’s zen caricature. While the maudlin vocals may marginalize some listeners, Love and Cannibalism is otherwise beautiful and lysergic. Lovely 12-string guitar arpeggios, vintage organ, and infernally catchy choruses.  If you like kaleidoscopic baroque pop and long to return to Haight-Ashbury, this is highly recommended. Choice track: “Weatherman’s Apology”.

8. Preoccupations – Preoccupations

Calgary’s excellent noise rockers Women dissolved and reformed with much critical fanfare as Viet Cong.  Viet Cong’s debut, Cassette, was a reverb-drenched noise pop document referencing Pavement, Wire, and No Age.   I was hopeful for the future, but 2015’s self-titled follow up was only good, and not great – something was missing.  The band hit the indie papers with faux-scandal when their name became a subject of much protest, wagging fingers, allegations of racism, and calls for censure.  I thought this was total bullshit and entirely misplaced ire.  The band did not help their cause by shrugging their shoulders with the excuse that they thought the Viet Cong were bad-asses, clearly drawing on superficial celluloid references.  Political quicksand.  Weary of the controversy, they have emerged as Preoccupations.  And while Wolf Parade put out a surprise 4 song EP this year, Preoccupations is my new Wolf Parade (or Handsome Furs, or Sunset Rubdown).  They sound a lot like those bands now, along with a consistent undercurrent of Joy Division, early Psychedelic Furs, and Echo and the Bunnymen.  Amazing!  Choice track: “Memory”.  

7.  Flyying Colours - Mindfulness

Thank you intrepid rock critic godfather, Jack Rabid, founder and editor-in-chief of the incomparable music zine The Big Takeover.  Every quarterly issue is jam-packed with incisive reviews from the world of underground rock and associated genres.  Jack’s Top 40 each issue is a treasure trove of records that would have otherwise passed me by.  Enter Flyying Colours, a group of Aussies that, to my ears, are a bit too pigeon-holed as shoegazing descendants of My Bloody Valentine, Ride, and Chapterhouse.  I get it, but I also hear more straight up psych rock structures and sounds aligning with Brian Jonestown Massacre, The Dandy Warhols, Tame Impala, and The Lilys.  But we’re splitting musical hairs here – this is fulsome, stunning fuzz rock – loud, heavily reverbed, melodic, and explosive.  This album is fucking dynamite.  Thanks again, Jack!  Choice track:  “It’s Tomorrow Now”.

6.  School of Seven Bells – SVIIB

I’ve been a committed fan of this pop-goth-dance trio ever since I saw them open for TV On The Radio back in 2007 or so.  Three amazing albums followed, reigniting my love of bands like Cocteau Twins, Lush, Siouxsie and the Banshees, and Kate Bush.  SVIIB has always had a danceable quality as well, alongside bands like M83, Caribou, and Air.  In some cases, they are 2 or 3 production mistakes away from bad dance pop.  Unlike M83’s latest album Junk (which is horrendous) they maintain their cool.  Tragedy struck the band in 2013 when drummer Benjamin Curtis (formerly of Secret Machines) succumbed to lymphoma.  Through the sadness and devastation, front-women and twin sisters Alejandra and Claudia Deheza assembled, built up and mixed a range of already laid down tracks, demos, and song ideas to release one final posthumous album, in honor of their fallen friend and bandmate.  It is much the same, which is to say, super fabulous – angelic two-part harmonies, irresistible melodies, soaring synths, and dance-floor ready beats.  Choice track: “Ablaze”

5.  The Lucid Dream – Compulsion Songs

Whoa!  For some reason I do not recall how I came across these groovy Brit mofos, but extremely happy I did.  This is an epic psychedelic rock album, but in no way constrained by whatever stereotypes that such a description might conjure.  They burst out of the gate like a Gatling gun, with “Bad Texan”, a four-on-the-floor acid-dance punch up that sounds like the Happy Mondays guitar dueling with Holy Fuck.  Second track “Stormy Waters” reverts to an acoustic folk romp, punctuated by fuzzy auto-wah, suddenly sounding like Gomez or Akron/Family.  And then…an 8 minute psychedelicized reggae dub jam ("I'm A Star In My Own Right), complete with a melodica that would do Augustus Pablo proud.  This reggae detour feels sympatico with the rest of the album, like the Clash's Armagideon Time?  “21^st Century” is off-the-rails garage punk, a full on rendering of MC5, Stooges, Ty Segal, and The White Stripes’ more uncontrolled urges.  The whole album feels eclectic but unified by distorted and otherwise multi-effected wall of guitar attacks.  It’s like the aural equivalent of staring into a oil drum full of burning magnesium.  On acid.  Choice track:  “Bad Texan”.  

4.  Mutual Benefit – Skip A Sinking Stone

Unknown to me at the time, this unassuming folk group landed in the 7^th spot of  2013’s best of collection with Love’s Sinking Diamond.  “Let’s Play / Statue of Man”, in retrospect, was my favorite song from that year (although I believe I initially put it behind “High School Lover” by Cayucas and “Takes Time” by Jim Guthrie).  So I have been waiting for the follow up and felt for some reason that a sophomore slump was inevitable.  Not so!  Another tremendous record.  Skip A Sinking Stone is absolutely stunning, elegant, warm, and pretty.  My love of fuzzy mayhem may be unmitigated, but I am also a sucker for that warm sweet spot where folksy talent meets technical prowess, attentive production, narrative vision.  Every note, swelling string, vocal harmony, finger pick, piano trill, and tremolo decay seems to be in its perfect place.  This may all be meaningless without the all important foundation of melody, and that’s where Mutual Benefit elevates their craft.  The melodies are effortless, winsome, and irresistible.  Every track evokes sunshine, cool breezes, sacred ground.  Love, regret, family and friends.  Traveling, shifting landscapes, and drifting dreams.  Gosh, did I lay that on a bit thick?  You know what, I don’t think so.  In fact, I’m struggling with it sitting at #4 – it may deserve more than that.  Choice tracks:  “Lost Dreamers” and “Getting Gone” (both of these in contention for song of the year). 

3.  Un Blonde – Good Will Come To You

Where do dudes like this come from? Jean-Sebastian Audet, a Calgarian who’s relocated to Montreal, is a wondrous genius.  I had the distinct pleasure of watching him play live at the Hillside Festival in 2016 and, although it was just him and his guitar, I was captivated (I think maybe another player was there, but whomever it was seemed superfluous).  He has this rare alacrity and fluidity in his guitar playing that feels unique, like a totally fresh approach to the instrument (although at times I am reminded of Sandro Perri).  As good as his live set was, it is a shadow of his beautiful 2016 record Good Will Come To You.  Most songs have his acoustic guitar as the foundation, and his strumming patterns are strange and inscrutable, sounding simultaneously lazy and highly disciplined.  Ditto to his jazzy electric guitar overlays, which sound random and jammy – yet entirely purposeful to the structure.  The acoustic passages remind me of Animal Collective’s Sung Tongs, but instead of the paroxysmal hollers and tribal chants, Audet provides us with some of the most soulful, gospel-tinged vocals I’ve had the pleasure of hearing.  I suspect the four part harmonies are all him, from deep bass to ringing falsettos, all sung with a gorgeous vibrato.  The homey production is profoundly intimate – he’s right on the mic, right in your ear, next to you on your porch.   Added to the tracks are a range of found sounds and field recordings, putting you right in the midst of some welcoming downtown neighbourhood, observed through technicolor sunglasses.  It's an intensely “present” record that seems to compel calm and  mindfulness.  And listening to it, I wonder if Audet has any choice but to write, play, and live music.  I can’t imagine he could do anything else.  Choice track:  “Celebration”.

2. The Besnard Lakes – A Coliseum Complex Museum

Ah, the mighty Besnard Lakes – every album they put out is glorious and epic. This oddly named album may be their best yet.  Walls of deeply effected guitars and keyboards with the impossibly high vocals of Jace Lasek soaring above them.  Every song feels anthemic – the Lakes have that lovely ability to sound impossibly huge but then somehow kick it into an even higher gear.  If you wish to get a sense of quintessential sense of this band, check out the compelling and beautiful (and wonderfully ambiguous) video for the single “Necronomicon” (apparently its first screening to co-lead Olga Goreas moved her to tears, and it’s easy to see/hear why).  It’s strange – when I think about Canadian music and bands, I often forget about the Besnard Lakes as I list-make in my head.  But we’re now 5 LPs and 2 EPs  into their growing discography and I am starting to register that they are somewhere in my top 5 Canadian bands of all-time.  Who, in fact, would place after Neil Young, Arcade Fire, and Constantines?  I think it might be the might Besnard Lakes.  Looking forward to 2017 release, apparently coming soon!  Choice tracks: “The Golden Lion”, “Necronomicon”.

1.  Frightened Rabbit – Painting of a Panic Attack

2013’s Pedestrian Verse was good, but could not hold a candle to the triumphs of The Midnight Organ Flight and A Winter of Mixed Drinks, two albums that were ever present in my ears during the late 2000s, and somehow emblematic of a pre-child, financially secure, fancy-free concert going period with many fine friends.  I thought the Rabbits were on a mild downward slide, but 2016’s Painting of a Panic Attack has kicked me in the gut.  Back to back heartfelt and powerful indie-rock songs that send me back 8 years or so.  I have to say, it’s hard to make heart-on-sleeve rock songs like these without slipping, at least a little bit, into self-importance, repetition, and even self-parody.  Many a band have I grown weary of because they couldn’t break out of their original mold, becoming tired and pointless.  This is the risk – if you sound like you are always on a soapbox, or always crying to the love that has rejected you, or always playing the angry isolationist card – well, it’s hard to maintain a sense of authenticity (independent, completely, of “real” authenticity, whatever that means).  Frightened Rabbit have not really changed, yet have avoided this trap fully and completely.  Acknowledging some sonic experimentation here and there, the rhythm/feel/structure feels no different from 8 years ago.  What does this sound like?  Take your old favorite FB songs, and all the best songs of bands like Wintersleep, Snow Patrol, Elbow, The Long Winters, and The Shins, and you have a good picture of Painting a Panic Attack.  Every song gives you a reason to tap your toes, sing along, or fall into sudden repose to get a handle on the greatness you are hearing.  Irresistibly yours. Choice track: “Still Want To Be Here”, “Break”.

Some Great Records Falling Outside The 2016 Top 20 List

Narrowing to the Top 20 was tricky once again, so much so that I have secondary list of a few records that could have easily made the cut.  Perhaps a top 25 was in order, but to lighten the writing load, I stuck to 20 and put these highly worthy records outside the main list. 

By Divine Right – Speak and Spell:  BDR’s full cover album of Depeche Mode’s 1983 classic is brilliant and perhaps should be in my top 20; but I arbitrarily do not allow the inclusion of cover records or compilations.  I don’t know why, I just don’t.  Their translation of DM’s synthetic lines into crunchy guitar pop is tremendous and the live show knocked my socks off. 

Eluvium – False Readings On.  More gorgeous meditative ambient passages from Matthew Cooper.  His dronescapes, dreamworlds, and MIDI operettas truly position Eluvium as the heir apparent to Brian Eno. 

Foreign Fields – Take Cover. If you enjoy lush orchestral arrangements, spacious reverb, emotionally wrought (and highly gifted) vocals, and…well…pervasive melancholy, this may be the album for you.  This is a similar feel to James Blake, but more song-oriented, similar to Antlers, Antony and the Johnsons, Fanfarlo, Sleeping States, and Radical Face – but kind of better than all of them, by several smidges.

The Hanging Stars – Over The Silvery Lake:  The whole artist/title combination feels eponymous to the music itself.  This is a great space cowboy/Laurel Canyon gem and reminds me of Beachwood Sparks.

Holy Fuck ­– Congrats:  What we have come to expect from Toronto’s own Neu-Technocrats – heady, dark, electro dance anthems.  A trancey groovefest.

The Junipers – Red Bouquet Fair.  With Pet Sounds production, syrupy harmonies, and lush orchestration, The Junipers effortlessly channel The Zombies, Beatles, and early Bee Gees.  It is a gorgeous record that sounds fresh and vibrant, with multiple toes dipped in the 60s, and reminds me of the best albums of late 90s Elephant 6 bands (Olivia Tremor Control, Essex Green, Ladybug Transistor, The Minders) and other more recent gems, like the Ruby Suns, Marching Band, The High Dials, and Secret Cities.  Hard to not push this into my Top 20 list.

Parquet Courts – Human Performance:  This band indignantly dismisses that they are influenced by Pavement (they claim their greatest influence is the more obscure, clearly Pavement-sounding Tyvek – also a great band).  This is irrelevant to listeners like myself who hear it so clearly, an amazing call back to Slanted and Enchanted and Wowee Zowee.

Plants and Animals – Waltzed In From The Rumbling:  I’m a little annoyed leaving this out of the top 20. On the cusp, this is yet another accomplished album of soulful indie rock from these amazing Montrealers. 

And here still are more excellent 2016 records that deserve mention, all garnering at least a 7.5/10 by my personal reckoning:

Alcest – Kodama:  Former alt-metalists go the route of Jesu, Torche, and Mew, finding beauty in layers of heavy riffage and 80s synth backdrops. 

Angel Olsen – My Woman:  Not quite as dramatic and sublime as Burn Your Fire (#10 in 2014) but chock full of great indie rock songs with a splash of glam and some vocal pomp.

Bob Mould – Patch The Sky:  Elder punk statesman Bob Mould has always played a bracing, hard & fuzzy punk-pop but this is the closest he’s come in his solo works to his post-Hüsker Dü outfit, Sugar.  A welcome return to scorchers from the early 90s.

Daniel Land – In Love With A Ghost.  Daniel Land (& The Modern Painters) landed in my aural lap back in 2009 with Love Songs for the Chemical Generation, a woozy bedroom pop-ambient affair similar to Hammock, Dan Deacon, and Youth Lagoon.  I was smitten.  Land’s latest offering has a more synth-poppiness to it, reminding of Depeche Mode, Bronski Beat, Air, M83, and Young Galaxy.  

Day Wave – Headcase / Hard to Read:  Simple, catchy indie-pop recalling The Cure, Echo and the Bunnymen, Pains of Being Pure At Heart, and C86 bands in general.  This is a reissue of their first two EPs, but has “debut album” status as the first real physical release.  The live show was a sweet birthday treat.

Gord Downie – The Secret Path is the soundtrack companion to the graphic novel and animated short-film, telling the tragic story of a 12-year-old boy, Chanie Wenjack, who escaped one of Canada’s residential schools to journey home, a trek that would cost him his life.  It’s a symbolic call to action for Downie, who is spending his last days advocating for reconciliation and truth.  It’s a beautiful and sad record.

Haley Bonar – An Impossible Dream.  Bonar, a Canadian growing up South Dakota, graces us with fuzzy guitar pop, recommended if you enjoy Juliana Hatfield, Vivian Girls, Courtney Barnett, Frankie Rose, and the like. 

High Violets – Heroes and Haloes.  Lushy, gazey,  guazy guitar pop.  Lovely airy vocals and hitting the same sonic notes as Pains of Being Pure At Heart, Pinkshinyultrablast, Fleeting Joys, Soft Science, and Tamaryn.  

Hope Sandoval and the Warm Inventions – Until The Hunter:  Not really new territory being covered here, but the dark, sultry underground folk of Sandoval is always welcome. 

Juliana Barwick – Will:  Operatic ambient gorgeousness from spritely Barwick.  The album may pass you by relatively unnoticed if you’re not careful.  But with your attention, it’s completely immersive.  Recommended if you like This Mortal Coil, Tim Hecker, Enya, Hammock, Julia Holter, and Grouper. 

Kestrels – Kestrels:  Buzzsaw wall of guitar pop from Montreal, sounding a lot like old tour mates Ringo Deathstarr and Yuck. 

Little Scream – Cult Following:  After 2011’s St. Vincent-inspired The Golden Record, Laurel Sprengelmeyer starts with an ultra groovy, ear-catching disco number and apparent shift in mandate. Sounding more like Prince or Abba, the dance kitsch starts to wear thin, but the album is ultimately saved by a return to her earlier avant-pop.

Nick Cave – The Skeleton Tree.  Mr. Cave lost his teenage son in a climbing accident and although much of the album was already in process before this tragedy, you cannot help but hear his mourning throughout.  Dark, sad, and harrowing. 

Nopes – Never Heard Of It:  Face-melting, noise punk delivered at terminal speed with anguished lo-fi vocals.  While tough to listen to excessively, Nopes grab your attention and hammers you before you can squirm away.  And it is also clear that the lead guitarist has some serious chops, a rare commodity in this anti-genre.

Nothing – Tired of Tomorrow: Classic shoegaze/dreampop that sits hand in hand with Pains of Being Pure At Heart, Lush, High Violets, Cheetahs, Slowdive, and Pale Saints. 

Noveller & thisquietarmy – Reveries:  I have a penchant for minimalist psychedelia and ambient drones, going back to the early work of Spaceman 3/Spiritualized/Spectrum (and a big list of others).  Noveller is the solo outfit of Sarah Lipstate, who contributed guitar to Receiver-era Parts and Labor.  Thisquitearmy is an experimental drone project of Montrealer Eric Quach.  Together?  Long ebullient swaths of sustained, elliptical guitar and strings.  Truly meditative.

PJ Harvey – The Hope Six Demolition Project.  Recorded behind one-way glass to allow voyeurs a peek into the creative process, PJ Harvey’s follow up to Let England Shake (my #1 album of 2011) is less accomplished, but it is still great and maintains the same political portentousness.

Radical Face – The Family Tree: The Leaves:  Floridian Ben Cooper’s third in his “Family” trilogy of heartfelt acoustic and orchestral indie pop.  Beautifully done and reminiscient of Sufjan Stevens and Lord Huron.  Also check out The Roots and The Branches from 2011 and 2013. 

Sam Beam and Jesca Hoop – Love Letter For Fire.  Admittedly I prefer Sarah Beam’s angelic vocals complementing Sam’s (in Iron and Wine) over Jesca Hoop.  Yet Hoop provides more confident co-leadership in these folky numbers and it’s nice to hear Sam trading off lines.  If you like Iron and Wine, you will like this.

Savages – Adore Life.  Savages are punk as fuck and witnessing the video for “The Answer” feels almost exactly like my first viewing of “Smells Like Teen Spirit”.  Communal rebellion, love, nihilism, release.  I don’t think Savages represent the watershed moment that was Nirvana’s Nevermind, but perhaps they should.  

Several Futures – Before Your Forget.  Long post-punk tirades from Toronto.  Fans of Metz, Ought, Sunny Day Real Estate, and Wire should approve. 

Snowblink – Returning Current.  Groovy, loungey ambient-pop taking copious cues from St. Vincent, Feist, and Little Scream.

Tamaryn – Cranekiss:  These shoegazers dropped a portion of the fuzz and replaced it with cycling electronica, sounding a lot like School of Seven Bells, Cocteau Twins, Curve, M83, and The Cure.

Thermals – We Disappear:  Pure Thermals. High energy, irreverent pop-punk.  No one does it quite like them.

The Tragically Hip ­– Man Machine Poem: The Hip’s catalog has been up and down in the later 2000s, but Man Machine Poem hits the same lofty notes as 2009’s We Are The Same.  Given the tragic news of Gord Downie’s failing health, the record has an extra weightiness to it and a sombre undercurrent as a Canadian institution suddenly says goodbye. 

Wilco – Schmilco:  Another great offering by the grand-gentlemen of indie rock, Schmilco is a little more country, bluesy even, than 2015’s Star Wars.

Wintersleep – The Great Detachment.  Another powerful offering, Wintersleep  is at the top of its game in delivering grand and often spine-tingling rock hymnals.  RIYL Snow Patrol, Elbow, The Dears, etc.

The Disappointments, Miscues, and Disparagements of 2016

And, like every year, we have our disappointments.  These aren’t bad albums necessarily, it’s just that they fall quite short of hopes and expectations.  Which makes me dislike them even more.  They betrayed me.

First, fuck autotune.  Nothing is improved by autotune, even if pitch is technically truer.  It’s an awful sound.  So why would a brilliant singer like Justin Vernon, aka Bon Iver, use it?  His 2016 record, 22, A Million is getting endless congratulations whereas I find it terribly annoying 75% of the time.  At times it sounds interesting and whimsical and progressive, coming across like Múm, Half-Handed Cloud, or a toned down Animal Collective.  But then it regresses to abrasive low-fi beats, unnecessary static and interrupted volume (like a bad mp3 file), and autotuned/vocoded vocals. And the bizarre symbology of the song titles bugs me.  It has its moments though, especially “22 (OVER S∞∞N)”, which is a great track – but overall, man, a frustrating listen.

I have waited patiently, 3 or 4 years I guess, for one Kyle Craft to emerge from the ashes of never-to-be indie stars Gashcat.  Gashcat had no physical releases – just a digital LP and an EP via Bandcamp and an enormous buzz from playing SxSW around 2011-2012.  They were the reincarnation of Neutral Milk Hotel and ready to be my new favorite band.  Then a break up was announced and all online presence disappeared with rumours of lead ‘Cat, Kyle Craft, having moved to Portland from Louisana to hunker down and make some new music.  Happily, he re-emerged as a Sub Pop signee with a brand new album, Dolls of the Highland.  It’s good (and the slightly reworked “Lady of the Ark”, a Gashcat song, retains it’s greatness).  But just good.  Which is far below what I expected, as I expected it to be my new favorite album.  He lost the DIY ramshackle, all hands-on-deck energy of his previous work, moving instead into glam-rock, blues shuffles, and deep south Americana.  Sigh.  I should stress, probably, that it’s quite a good album.  If you like Dylan, David Bowie, and The Band, which I of course do. 

M83’s new album, Junk, is horrendous.  Anthony Gonzalez obviously loves his synthy 80s trappings, but the dancey fluff on here is irredeemable.  It’s like Howard Jones humping the Thompson Twins while Wham watches.  How he can get here from 2003’s Dead Cities, Red Cities and Lost Ghosts is beyond me.

Another big disappointment in a purely relative sense was PersonA by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros.  It’s not bad, but pales in comparison to my top album of 2012, Here.  And I express confused disappointment after being blown away/torn to shreds by the Suuns set at Hillside 2016, only to find the supporting album, Hold/Still a grating, ponderous mess. 

Have at it!  Signing off!
J.