Burnside End-of-the-Year List SPECTACULAR!

Top 10 lists are awesome, but they’re also cliche, so we thought we’d take a different angle this year, come up with a random array, and mash it all together. Hope you enjoy:
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The Top Five Albums By Portland Artists In 2008
by Jordan Green
Last year, Portland’s music scene seemed poised at its peak. Menomena’s sophomore effort lived up to expectations. Elliott Smith had cache of posthumous material wound together in New Moon. Blitzen Trapper and The Shaky Hands were heralded newcomers. Then, in an epic finale, Portland’s best artists all got together, recorded some covers, and released a benefit for p:ear.

For a long time, Portland had been rising, not whispered in the same musical reverence as, say, Austin, but on its way. Then The Decemberists signed to Capitol Records and Britt Daniel left Texas for the Willamette Valley. New York media was falling all over themselves describing our thriving foodie scene, and the rest of the nation was beginning to realize there were better beers out there than Natty Light. Suddenly, the rise is over, and we were there. If you want a make It, you go to L.A. or New York or Nashville. If you want to make great music, you go to Portland.

The fear in these situations is becoming the Big Thing…as quantity increases, quality wanes. For every Julian Casablancas in New York City, there are a hundred cheap imitators.

Then 2008 comes. The old Portland standbys…The Decemberists, Menomena, Britt Daniel, The Thermals…were silent. And still, the city produced some of the finest records in the country. New bands, like The Builders and the Butchers and Blind Pilot, stepped into the void. And established groups like Lackthereof (Danny Seim’s solo project) and Blitzen Trapper took things up a notch.

Deciding the top five albums from Portland bands in 2008 was a lot harder than it seemed. So here’s what I came up with. If you want a more thoughtful and well-researched list, check out Bob Ham’s list on OPB.

1. Blitzen Trapper, Furr.
Last years’ Wild Mountain Nation was Americana on acid, whiplashing between stomping country rock (“Wild Mountain Nation”), noise (“Woof & Warp of the Quiet Giant’s Hem”) and wonderfully melodic sing-alongs (“Country Caravan”, which my wife and I exited down the aisle on).

Furr drops the experimentalism, opting for straight ahead melody. Like Portland bands The Builders and the Butchers and Weinland, Furr tells tales of rural violence and heartbreak…hardly innovative lyrical content…but the stories are told well, draped over head-nodding melodies and building sounds. The stomping rock is back, particularly on rousing opener “Sleepytime in the Western World”, with its Hammond organ blast, and the album’s best track, “God & Suicide”. Inbetween the stomps and dancealongs (“Saturday Nite”), there’s lovely tune about a reformed feral child (“Furr”), country-flecked ballads (“Not Your Lover”, “Stolen Shoes & a Rifle” and “Echo/Always On/Easy Con”), and the requisite Dylan-esque closer (“Lady On The Water”).
All said, Furr isn’t groundbreaking. It’s the just the type of music I like best, done very, very well.

2. Blind Pilot, 3 Rounds and a Sound.
Like Furr, Blind Pilot isn’t interested in reinventing the wheel. 3 Rounds and a Sound is singer-songwriter fare, simple tunes with brushed drums and plaintive guitar strums. It’s the sort of music every starry-eyed, shoe-gazing romantic with an acoustic guitar longs to make. It’s the music I wish I’d been able to make, at least. The problem is, so many try and so very few can. In a trend I’m hoping catches on, Blind Pilot frontman Israel Nebeker sings in a regular voice, letting the simplicity and beauty of his songs shine through. Adam Newton said it well during his interview with Israel on Burnside: “[Blind Pilot] hitch up [their] pants like a grown band, compose some beautiful tunes that defy lazy associations and present [their] sound to the world with an innocent strength that awes listeners.”

(Just for the record, it’s Blind Pilot, not Blind Pilots…that’s a very different band.)

3. Lackthereof, Your Anchor.
And then there’s Danny Seim, who isn’t content to frenetically drum for Menomena. He has to front his own band, Lackthereof, along with his wife, Holly, and an assortment of players (including Blind Pilot’s drummer and Kevin and Anita Robinson of Viva Voce). And they’re just as good.

Like Blitzen Trapper, Lackthereof’s origins in experimentalism have given way to a more crowd-pleasing sound. The changes are relative, though, as Seim’s spot-on imitation of Michael McDonald on a cover of “What a Fool Believes” last year hinted. Your Anchor isn’t quite Friend and Foe, but it is evidence of how entwined Seim is in Menomena’s best songs, with similar use of loops and guitar. Your Anchor‘s strength is its unsentimenal brevity. With songs averaging around three minutes and standouts “Doomed Elephants” and “Last November” hovering around two and a half minutes, Seim gets in, gets to the point, and gets on with it, moving to the next intricate soundscape without looking back.

4. Boy Eats Drum Machine, Booomboxxx.
Booomboxxx, especially on “Planets + Stars” and “The Crack in the Sea”, answers a question you probably never thought to ask: what would happen of Fall Out Boy and Menomena got married and had a baby?

As it turns out, it’s a solid merger. The vocals, which Dan Gibson described as “post-punk white boy soul/emo” are only a slight detractor, and melodies swim comfortably over waves of synth and horn blasts. None of Boy Eats Drum Machine’s songs is singularly as great as Fall Out Boy’s “Sugar We’re Goin’ Down” or Menomena’s “Wet and Rusting”…the closest they get is “We Are An Army”…but Booomboxxx is the most consistently interesting album on this list, mixing blazing fastballs with bewildering changeups and big-hook curves. Even by patchworking two entirely different and established bands, Boy Eats Drum Machine comes up with something altogether new, and this is ultimately what I’ve grown to expect and love about the Portland music scene.

5. Horse Feathers, House With No Name.

House With No Name treads the gothic alt.country territory settled by bands like Songs:Ohia and Varnaline, less interested with the bad-assery of country rock than rich layers of downbeat lamentation. With song titles like “Heathen’s Kiss” and “Working Poor”, House With No Name walks a tightrope over overwrought folksiness, but the sheer quality of these songs maintains a balance. You’re not going to find yourself cranking these tracks for a road trip, but they might be the music you’d play when the hours have gone by and the sun is setting behind you. There’s nary a misstep, and by the time the shimmering “This is What” rolls in, you’ll be enjoying the peace.

Honorable Mention: Talkdemonic, Eyes at Half Mast. The Shaky Hands, Lunglight.
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10 Things that Made Michael Dallas Miller Love Music in 2008
by Michael Dallas Miller

10. Unlike a lot of people that I know and love, I was very excited to hear one of my favorite bands of all time, Wilco, appear on various Volkswagen commercials. I like to think that I grew up as an appreciator of music by not accusing the band of selling out, because if a band is truly great, which Wilco certainly is, then any exposure they get to the American public is a good thing. May quality music continue to spread like a mighty rushing wind through every corner of our great and vast nation.

9. This year, I discovered how important music is to the shaping of my memory. I fell in love this summer to the sound of great music and I will always look back and smile when I think about all that I experienced, and it will all take place in my mind around the context of the music I heard: Cataldo, Wilco, Andrew Bird, and many others will always remind of the summer I got the chance to fall in love with a girl.

8. I usually do not care for classical music, but there was nothing quite like hearing Chris Thile and Edgar Meyer play the mandolin and bass, respectively, at the Seattle Symphony Hall. I got the chance to hear them play from memory and feel classic pieces by Mozart and Bach. I sat in awe at the incomparable skill and talent of these two young men. Sure, there is nothing like the energy of watching an amateur player rock out in a dingy club, but there is something magical and pure about a professional doing his thing on an open stage in an honored venue.

7. In a small, basement pub in London, I got to see My Brightest Diamond perform. And not only that, I got to sit about three feet from her as she played her heart out for the suffocating audience. It should be known that Shara Warden of MBD is one of my biggest celebrity crushes (second only to Zooey Deschanel of She & Him), and to shake her hand and say “good show” made me want to fly, as well as brag to all my indie friends.

6. Feel free to email my buddy Drew Grissom (grissd@spu.edu), and he will testify that I freaking called it: the Fleet Foxes were my iron horse, MY band, and I knew that were about the next big thing, just before they went on their national tour, showed up on Lettermen and every iPod of every man, woman and child with an even minor interest in popular music. This year, it feels that I at least accomplished something vicariously through Robin Pecknold his bearded crew of folksies.

5. I had the opportunity to review Gnarls Barkley’s newest album for this website and it was one of my favorite albums of the year by a band that is just outside of the box, while making album that can appeal to nearly everyone. I went through some mental health issues myself this year, and nothing spoke to me in such an honest and shocking way like The Odd Couple. The infectious beats of Danger Mouse alongside the eerie, wicked and wonderful lyrics and vocals of Cee-Lo Green reminded me that I am not alone in my pain.

4. There was not a more perfect single this year than Blitzen Trapper’s “Furr.” The story makes no sense but it doesn’t make a difference when you have such a soft and lovely melody, the at-home vocals of Eric Early, and the swaying country accompaniment of the band, including a bird call by the greasy-haired bass player. This is a song that will remain with me for the years to come.

3. This actually doesn’t belong in a list of things that made me love music in 2008, but I couldn’t in good conscious let the year go by without mentioning how much I hated Auto-Tune. It takes any and all personality from legitimate artists like Kanye West and Lil’ Wayne and puts a wall between the words and the listener. May God smite it in the year to come. It is a plague to pop music and may it die a quick and definite death. There. I feel much better.

2. On a cold night, after a very close and personal show at the Fremont Abbey in Seattle, I got the chance to sit down to a cold beer with one of my musical heroes, David Bazan, formerly of Pedro the Lion. I got to feel like a real journalist and ask all the questions that have been growing inside of me since I was a sophomore in high school. And, even more than the actually interview, it was great to sit in his cluttered mini-van, listen to cuts off the upcoming album (which will be a step away from prior Bazan work, and put him on his way to what I foresee as a lucrative solo career) and talk about kick-ass chick flicks and IPAs.

1. In the spring, I found myself at a small pub in a small fishing town in Southern Ireland. I don’t think that any other experience will make me love music than listening to average sheep farmers sit in a circle, drink Guinness and whiskey and play folk tunes for hours on end. I was reminded how magical and beautiful pure music for music’s sake can be. It felt like a dream. It made me say a prayer for rock and roll: please, may everyone who picks up a guitar and pen do it for the love of art, of beauty, of community and love. May they play for the reason these people are playing at this pub; for the simple joy of putting music into the air, for making room in circle that everyone can join.
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Top 10 Music-Related Questions I Asked in 2008
by Robert Ham
1. Can someone please explain to me what the fuss is all about? (Asked in response to hearing much-vaunted 2008 releases by the likes of Fleet Foxes, The Hold Steady, Ryan Adams, She & Him, and M83.)

2. This is some kind of joke, right? (Asked in response to hearing the high-profile 2008 releases from Guns ‘N’ Roses, Kanye West and Metallica.)

3. Can you please repeat that? (Asked of everyone around me for a week after having my eardrums pounded into submission at one of my favorite live shows on 2008 – Times New Viking.)

4. Kind of a white audience for this group, don’t you think? (Asked of a friend after realizing the only African-Americans in attendance at the absolutely mind-blowing Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings show were the folks in the band.)

5. Can you hand me a tissue? (Asked of my wife after being moved to tears by the most beautiful and life-affirming Christian/gospel recordings I’ve heard in years – Como Now: Voices of Panola County, Mississippi and Awake My Soul: The Story of the Sacred Harp.

6. Where have you been all my life? (Asked of Black Habit, the debut release by the arch, post punk trio Rings, and my favorite album of 2008.)

7. Why, dear God, why? (Asked of our Lord and Savior after learning that not only was Scarlet Johansson releasing a disc of leaden Tom Waits covers but also that Terence Howard was putting out an album that was influenced by the likes of Christopher Cross and Barry Manilow.)

8. So, is that some combination of karaoke and exercise? (Asked of a friend who spent an hour one morning “doing Cardioke”. The answer was yes, by the way.)

9. Here? (Asked of no one in particular after finding a display of long-playing records on vinyl at my local department store.)

10. Will someone please tell My Bloody Valentine that playing a show in Portland, Oregon is a good idea? (Asked of anyone and everyone that will listen to me.)
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Ten Things I Loved About Music In 2008
by Adam P. Newton
1) Watching the craziness that is an Of Montreal live show

2) Andy Samberg as Ras Trent

3) Cocoa Tea’s “Barack Obama” video

4) Attending festivals like SXSW, ACL, & Fun Fun Fun Fest as a journalist.

5) Quality mashup records like Feed The Animals from Girl Talk and Mixtape 3 from The Hood Internet

6) Anything involving Lil Wayne – records, leaks, mixtapes, and general media hilarity.

7) The year of “returns” – R.E.M., The Breeders, Guns N’ Roses, (potentially more in 2009) My Bloody Valentine & (especially) Portishead and their awesome Third record.

Noel Gallagher continued to be an idiot: there was his “beef” with Jay-Z & then he was tackled/injured on stage later in the year.

9) The Stephen Colbert Christmas Special – Feist, Toby Keith, Willie Nelson, AND Elvis Costello!

10) As dorky as it sounds, falling in love with a woman who enjoys music almost as much as I do has been an amazing way in which to experience music with and because of someone.
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My Ten Shiny Happy Moments With Music In 2008
by Dan Gibson
I know everyone says this, but I’m happy to be done with 2008. The first half was good, and I’m sure if I spent more time thinking about it I could find a reason to redeem the second, but oh well, I’m choosing for now to take the whole year and throw it in the dustbin. Like Bobby Brown said so eloquently, it’s my prerogative and I’ll do what I want to do. So, how did I react to the gloom? Well, partially with by listening to a series of angry metal albums lately, but also by finding really happy music and trying to turn my frown upside down. Hence, here are my ten happy little musical moments of 2008, in no particular order.

Danielson at the Modified, Phoenix, AZ, November 16th
Sure, he sings strangely. The music sort of defies conventions of what is considered “listenable”. Either in spite of those facts or encouraged by them, Danielson and his parade of uniformed music makers put on a heck of a show. So enjoyable. So much fun.

The Reissue of Daniel Amos’ Darn Floor, Big Bite
I wrote about this already here and here. I doubt my endorsement will really sell too many additional copies, but in the end, it’s your loss.

Alphabeat
While Perez Hilton’s endorsement nearly ruins the band for me, the songs (which sound somewhat like the cast of the Danish version of “High School Musical” recording a pop album) gloriously obliterate any sadness or misgivings in their midst.

The Welcome Wagon’s cover of “Sold! To The Nice Rich Man”

Sold! To The Nice Rich Man – The Welcome Wagon

The entire Ne-Yo album The Year of the Gentlemen
There is a contingent that would dismiss this album because it is a popular R&B album. Those people are morons.

The entire Gaslight Anthem album The ’59 Sound
It’s not a happy album, by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s so good that I couldn’t leave it off.

Hot Chip at the Rialto Theatre, Tucson, AZ, September 23
Lots of fun. I danced like an idiot the entire time.

Esau Mwamwaya, “Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa”
I’m choosing not to use the name of Mwamwaya’s collaborator for reasons that will become obvious if you look for this song, so I apologize for any offense in advance. I actually still like the Vampire Weekend disc after hearing it nearly the entire year (the same cannot be said for MGMT), but this cover is a definite improvement over the original.

The Academy Is… album Fast Times At Barrington High
If this band wasn’t associated with Fall Out Boy, we’d be championing them as the return of power pop we’ve been waiting for.

“Rumored Nights” (Donnie Darko tribute video)

This Weird Little Bobbing Dance My Daughter Piper Does When She Hears Music She Likes
Also notable, her attempt to do the twist.

See you next year.