Heeb

Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Fever to Tell

Remember when taking the L train to Williamsburg was exciting? Like anything—anything—could happen? When that small neighborhood in Brooklyn was bursting with non-referential creativity? You don’t? Well, Karen O, Nick Zinner and Brian Chase captured early aughts awesomeness on a ferocious debut album that isn’t afraid to tenderly admit “they don’t love you like I love you.” Miss ya, Billyburg.  

LCD Soundsystem, Sound of Silver

James Murphy really gets us, man. He knows all about the love/hate relationship we have with this hellish rat-infested rat race (“New York I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down"). And that depressing awareness that we’re going through a sobering mid-mid-life crisis? He nails that, too (“All My Friends”). After only two albums and a handful of singles, Murphy’s vision and insight is universally admired. Sound of Silver is like a Dave Eggers short story you can dance to, and no other musician has Murphy’s wryness, wit or poignancy. 

Arcade Fire, Funeral

During their 2007 Vertigo tour, U2 walked out on the stage to this Canadian collective’s “Wake Up.” It makes perfect sense why. Arcade Fire’s debut album, and that track in particular, is epic, inspiring, rousing, goose-bump inducing and incredibly, uncompromisingly large. In retrospect, I’m sure the band never intended to be as big as they’ve become, but c’mon, if a self-absorbed Irish egomaniac can recognize, then surely the rest of us can.  

The Wrens, Meadowlands

Just as LCD Soundsystem resonated with world-weary, aging, urban hipsters, Meadowlands epitomized suburban angst. This cult classic nails the soul-crushing disappointment of the 9-to-5 grind: All I really want is to be happy, in love, or in a rock band, but this after-work glass of whiskey will have to do for now. The band’s inspiring back-story also doesn’t hurt. These four guys had been going at it for years before critics finally heralded them as artists in their rock twilight. The Wrens’s long and winding road started at Secaucus, New Jersey but ended up years later at the forefront of the Pitchfork scene. You could call them indie-rock veterans, but that would imply their best days are behind them. Au contraire.  

The National, Alligator

For our 5765 Best of-List, I named Alligator the best album of the year. “The National’s fourth record may at first sound effortless and offhand, but with each repeated listen, this rough, shimmering gem unfolds into stunningness. Alligator successfully finds the meeting point for Joy Division, Wilco, strong booze and great literature. This is a quintessential American document of unpretentious greatness. Trust us, Alligator’s got teeth.” And the past five years hasn’t diluted this album’s potency in the least.

Vampire Weekend, Vampire Weekend

Twilight, True Blood, blah, blah, blah. Yes, we know. Vampires were so played out this decade. But these once-virtually unknown, well-dressed preppies from Columbia University released a self-titled debut that deserved the blood-sucking hype. Robert Pattinson associations be damned, you can’t ignore the fact that Vampire Weekend’s first album is sensationally accessible and abnormally transfixing. The haters standing next to you will inevitably claim they stole their sound from the Talking Heads and Paul Simon, and, well, they’re right. Musicians, however, call that "being influenced." Based on what we’ve heard from their second album, the Weekenders might not be able to recapture the teeth-baring magic, but album #1 is a stone-cold classic.

Radiohead, Kid A

“Everythiiiiiiiing in its right place.” From the opening line of Radiohead’s fourth album, we knew there was no going back. Gone were conventional songs, the arena-rock power chords, and the soaring earnestness. Radiohead tried its hardest to lose all the fans it gained from the genius OK Computer but, strangely enough, their plan to abandon substance for atmosphere backfired. They’ve become the Grateful Dead of our time, not in sound, but in crazy obsessed fans. I think they call them Radioheads?

Against Me!, New Wave

Against Me! may be the closest thing we have to the Clash. No fooling. With ten songs clocking in at raw and furious thirty-three minutes, their album New Wave is one of the more inspiring records of the decade. The once-anarchist Gainesville, Florida foursome produced a thrilling half-hour rush of unabashed punk rock. It’s both refreshingly hummable and bereft of the self-involved insularity you’ll get from groups that cater to the Hot Topic crowd. Hokey and idealistic as the lyrics sound sometimes (“Protest songs in a response to military aggression/Protest songs to try and stop the soldier’s gun"), Against Me! sing like they want to make this world a better place, and unlike the bands who whine about broken hearts, they actually might.

M.I.A., Arular

Rife with nearly indecipherable lyrics, the thirteen songs on M.I.A.‘s debut are spastic, challenging and confrontational. They’re arcade game soundtracks punching holes in the air, sometimes sounding as charmingly sloppy as a child who just discovered an electric keyboard. At other times, however, Arular pounds from the speakers like a remix collection of third-world battle chants. Laser gunshots thrust out from the background while beats upon beats of percussion layer on top of one another. Mathangi "Maya" Arulpragasam sang/rapped defiantly from the corner of her boxing ring ("I’m a fighta/Nice, nice fighta/I’m a solja underworld"). M.I.A. saw herself as a champion for controversial causes and hasn’t backed away that role since.  

Kanye West, The College Dropout

Before Taylor Swiftgate, before Auto-Tune, before appropriating the cool of Daft Punk, before guest-versing on just about every hip-hop track in the last four years, before being satirized by South Park, before his mother died from an awkward breast implant mishap, before he tried launching a clothing line (but failed), before he started dating a weird Amazon woman

(seems Amber Rose is incapable of not sticking her ass out in every paparazzi picture), before he posed as Jesus on the cover of Rolling Stone, before the Justice and Simian-MTV Europegate, before all the drama, Kanye West stepped into the spotlight with a truly disarming debut that ultimately proved West, despite himself, a genius.

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Heeb Best of 5769: Music