I'm sure there's a format I could have put it in which could have made this more reader-friendly, ah well ...
The main ones are of Songs and Albums, with a few other less considered lists at the bottom.
I’d say, with the Songs and Albums, these are 20 of my favourite 30 or
40, rather than a definitive Top 20 - these ones just lent themselves best to
being written about and had something of a nice balance. As much as possible, I tried not to include the same artists in both lists, with a few notable exceptions.
Particularly with the songs, it was rather tricky to narrow
it down. I made a playlist of about 80 songs to listen to over the last year or
so. The ones that emerged from that playlist
were not necessarily what I would have expected beforehand.
A noticeable thing is how much is from the first decade of
the century – there are a few obvious reasons for that, but I think one of the
main one is my switch to streaming during the latter decade. Being able to listen to so much different
stuff, to pick and choose less carefully, has, I think, meant, that I haven’t let myself live with individual songs
quite as long.
On CD, then on iTunes, I’d make tapes/playlists and listen
to them over and over again, in particular when travelling (which I do less of)
and running (which I don’t do while listening to music anymore).
So, it’s not necessarily the case that I think the 2000s
better than the 2010s, it's just been a different way of listening, where I have tried to give albums a good listen a few times, but then moved on to the next thing … But I have really enjoyed a lot of new music of the last
decade.
I think my taste and my listening used to be a little less self-conscious too, whatever that means.
I think my taste and my listening used to be a little less self-conscious too, whatever that means.
Anyway, I've tried to be honest. I listen to a lot of different types of music, but I expect the majority of it is still, just about, made by deadpan white guys with guitars, and that is reflected here.
20 FAVOURITE SONGS OF THE 21ST CENTURY (IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER)
Pa’lante – Hurray for the Riff-Raff (2017)
I begin here, with probably my favourite song of the last
decade. It’s a protest song, a battle cry for Puerto Ricans in America. It
references the history of the civil rights movement and the protest culture and finds a way to become modern, timeless, specific and universal. The singer is called Alynda Segarra
and she has a voice, a voice you don’t forget.
My best point of reference to describe what she does at the
end of ‘Pa’lante’ is, oddly (or not so oddly), The Proclaimers. Through most of their work, the
singing is, at minimum, fierce, tuneful and distinctive, but there is an extra place the Reids
go to sometimes (e.g. in the chorus of Sunshine on Leith), which is spine-chilling, and brings an uncontainable emotional response from the listener, just as there is an
extra place Segarra goes to here, in the final refrain as she sings “To all who
lost their pride I say Pa’lante, to all who had to survive, I had to say
Pa’lante”.
It’s singing as shamanism.
If anyone is wondering if there is still soulful, tuneful,
beautiful, listenable music of resistance, this is the place to start.
Witness (1 Hope) – Roots Manuva (2001)
I’ve loved other Roots Manuva songs just as much at
different times, but, 18 years on, I can’t think of a time I’ve listened to
this one when it hasn’t brought me joy.
It’s very flexible too – there’s no playlist, from Running to Lullabies for Sleepless Child to English Eccentrics, that it doesn’t suit.
There’s plenty been said about its squelching beat, its
humorous and humble lyrics, its parochial esotericism, its glorious video. It
is one of those rare songs that makes you proud to be English, British, a
Londoner. It’s all there.
Biology – Girls Aloud (2005)
Via Destiny’s Child and one or two others, I’d already
navigated my way to being something other than a narrow-minded rock snob in 2005, and
could enjoy a fair bit of pop music by this point. That’s pretty good, I would think. I quite like that pop song. It’s quite ok, in a pop way.
Whereas, Biology was phenomenal, astonishing, groundbreaking
– it was like a great Super Furry Animals song, a mad collage of tunes and
idea, glistening and hilarious and unexpected. There are other very good Girls
Aloud songs, other very good pop songs of the time, but Biology is an endless
joy still.
Scottish Pop – Spearmint (2001)
“You can call me a plagiaristic English fop, but when I’m
with you, I feel like I’m listening to … Scottish pop” …
That much-maligned old beast, jangly indie pop, can be a thing of
such gentle beauty sometimes.
Spearmint’s love song/paean to their Scottish
heroes is just all together where I was at in those early years of this
monstrous century.
Lose Yourself – Eminem (2002)
You know, I realise this isn’t at all cool. But I can’t help
it. To me, this song is what Eminem could have been, Eminem without all the crap. Neither
dully offensive, verbosely meaningless nor excessively maudlin. He would never
come near Lose Yourself again, but Lose Yourself is a pretty perfect
re-imagining of Eye of the Tiger, a Hollywood self-help story in song.
And, to me, the virtuosity on display remains exhilarating.
I read a very good critique of modern Eminem a few years ago saying how
Eminem’s original genius was in the “anything can rhyme with anything” rapping
he pioneered, but he has kept on doing that to the point of meaninglessness.
But on Lose Yourself, it all fits, it all means something,
it tumbles forward, phrase on phrase, completely on point. Whatever else you
think about him, I think Lose Yourself is a masterpiece.
Plus, of course, it used to be a McGaughey karaoke piece de resistance.
The Trapeze Swinger – Iron and Wine (2005)
The funny thing about this song is how much less amazing the
“official” recorded version, for the soundtrack to the little-remembered film
‘In Good Company’, is, with its mundane reggae-lite setting, than any live
version you can find where it’s just Sam Beam and his guitar, changing tempo as
he pleases, perhaps with a backing vocalist near the end.
First hearing this, at Green Man in 2008, was probably my
favourite live music moment, just for the shock of its magnificence at the end
of a very rainy day at the end of a set by a band I quite liked but did not yet
love, for the theatre and the effect it had on the crowd. It was a thing of
such great beauty I will never forget.
The song is an epic of great musical simplicity and
lyrical complexity about love, life and death.
All My Friends – LCD Soundsystem (2007)
Getting to the nub of it here. The big American songs. This
is certainly in the running for being my favourite of the whole era, this
dance-rock behemoth, with its persistent simple riff, its ever so beautiful
lyrics which anyone between 27 and 50, wherever they were, could get right on
board with, and sing or sigh along to.
Far too long to be a hit single (the radio edit just doesn’t
have the magic), this remains as satisfying, structured, relentless and emotionally satisfying a song
as exists.
And this past-it guy with a belly and a big old head and a so-so singing voice ... an inspiration to us all.
My Girls – Animal Collective (2009)
To me, All My Friends and My Girls are two sides of the same
coin – I listened to them both so very many times between 2009 and 2014,
these two electro-indie bangers about growing up and getting on with it.
I remember being at Green Man; Animal Collective were
headlining and I wasn’t really a fan of the album yet, and honestly they were a
bit (as they’ve admitted themselves) shit, and me and Alex were walking away
and I heard the “I don’t mean to seem like a care about material things …” bit
wafting muddily through the hills, and I recognised the germ of something I
loved even there.
It became more than that, eerily prophetic (though it
follows that pretty common pattern most youngish dudes will follow from their
mid-20s to their early 40s) and though I hardly listen to it anymore, it’s
still a great joy when I do.
The Rat – The Walkmen (2004)
I very nearly didn’t include The Rat because, actually,
these days, I like Angela Surf City and In the New Year (by the same band) better, but, come on,
it’s The Rat. It was mentioned how much I loved it in a speech at my wedding.
There’s
a lot more to this band, but no other band could have done something like this
so well.
Perhaps it was because of this song that everyone decided rock music had achieved all it needed to and everyone stopped caring about it.
Floating in the Forth – Frightened Rabbit (2008)
Sigh … two songs, now, which, I don’t listen to anymore, for very different reasons.
What this song used to mean and what it now means … I always loved it, my favourite track from that superb album 'The Midnight Organ Fight', it felt so honest, hopeful and defiant.
Scott Hutchison had, as this song makes clear, envisaged ending his life by jumping off the Forth Road Bridge. But this song was about the triumph of not doing so. Many people loved that “I think I’ll save suicide for another year” line. I also love “on the northern side is a Fife of mine” … “a Fife of mine” … how wonderful is that.
This song was coming up for air, making it to the finishing line, it was everything …
… and now it’s not, it’s a tragic prophesy, and I can’t listen to it, but it remains, I know, a song of the utmost beauty and power.
To Be Young (Is To Be Sad, Is To Be High) – Ryan Adams (2000)
Nothing so tragic here, just seedy and gross. Without any kind of big statement, I found it pretty easy to let go of Ryan Adams’ music when allegations emerged him in early 2019. It was easy to post-rationalise … yeah, he seemed a bit that way, and, you know, his music’s fine but I can easily live without it.
But To Be Young gave me more than a little pang. Not just because it’s a great song, but because it’s a joyous, humane song, a wise-beyond-its-years song of deceptive power which always stood out among its heartbleeding peers.
I associate it with joy, with friends and with dancing. I listened to it for 18 years – it was a wedding playlist type of song, not a loser self-pity guy song.
So, yeah, here’s to that song. It deserves better.
Hey Darling – Sleater-Kinney (2015)
Sleater-Kinney, man. A great rock band I almost didn’t notice for a while. This is not one of their most acclaimed songs, but this is the one I love the most, for some reason.
It was a toss of the coin whether I included Hey Darling or Take Me Anywhere by Tegan and Sara (both bands are maestros of melodic powerpop, in their different ways) … both have these glorious simple choruses – the Tegan and Sara one is like climbing glass stairs and then they shatter into a million pieces when they get to the top (think I've been watching Frozen too much) while the Sleater-Kinney one is like this waterfall of disdain “It seems to me the only thing that comes with fame’s mediocrity” – anger turned on self, but still euphoric.
Hey Lover – Dawes (2013)
Here’s another “Hey!” song. Dawes are this band of clean Californians who do cheesy, overly worthy and wordy rock songs. I rather like them but there are always caveats. It took a cover (this originally by Blake Mills) to remove the caveats.
I mean, this is still a seriously cheesy song (check the title!) but it’s so guileless it’s a different type of thing.
Honestly, there’s a bit at 1.51, at the start of the 4th verse, when Dawes, who are an accomplished, harmonious group of musicians, throw all their accomplishment and harmony together for about 10 seconds and it’s one of the most unnervingly joyful things I ever heard – it’s like the Beach Boys and the Band and CSNY all at once, like First Aid Kit and the Vandellas and the Proclaimers – it’s the sound of two brothers singing and playing all at once, and that little bit, above all, is why I love this song and listen to it as much as I can.
In California – Joanna Newsom (2010)
There may be other more perfect, more dazzling, Joanna
Newsom songs, but for me this is the emotional heart of her work.
This was my favourite
song of all for a long time, I would listen through its eight minutes over and
over again. For me, Newsom has taken songwriting to a higher level than anybody
else this century. She’s the heir to Joni Mitchell, plus something else. This
and ‘Time (as a Symptom)’ are the truly, heartstoppingly beautiful Newsom songs.
When the Haar Rolls In – James Yorkston (2008)
This is an epic tale of love and memory, my favourite among
many Yorkston favourites. It reminds me of Fife (but would remind me of Fife
even if I’d never been to Fife) - I love the awkward relationship between
London and Scotland that he often writes about.
A song to never tire of. A
deadpan masterpiece which passes through every emotion. (I am a little proud
that I had a hand in it being a clue on Only Connect, thus having 2 million
people, who wouldn’t otherwise, listen to it briefly).
I See a Darkness – Johnny Cash (2000)
You know, I’m going to say the Johnny Cash version (which is
what I heard first) rather than the Bonnie Prince Billy version, though that’s
the one I’ve listened to far more in the intervening years.
Ironically, that’s
somewhat because of Will Oldham’s own backing vocals on the Cash version, which
are just taking the song to the next level.
And the way Cash sings “my best unbeaten brother …” But this
song is so rousingly humane, sad, triumphant, all at the same time, it’s about
the internal and the external, it’s an olive branch and a push away all at
once.
American Trilogy – The Delgados (2000)
Ooh, boiling down to the last couple was hard work. American
Trilogy has a similar mindset to I See a Darkness, but is the expansive yet
miserable Scottish version.
“I’m really a terrible person” this songs says over
several beautiful minutes. The apotheosis of the Dave Fridmann sound which felt
like it couldn’t go much further beyond this – they really don’t make them like
this anymore.
The Delgados, a bit like The Walkmen, are an indie-rock who did
everything right, became slightly famous, but just couldn’t quite make the
breakthrough because ultimately people like what they like and you can’t do
anything about that, and in the end had to give it up with a shrug.
They have several enormous, swooning tunes, but this is the
one that got me first and gets me still.
Dancing on My Own - Robyn (2010)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcNo07Xp8aQ
A late substitution (for Danny Callahan by Conor Oberst, in case you're wondering, which is a stunningly sad song) ... and I also could have had With Every Heartbeat by the same artist, which is an odder, more haunting song.
But this one, it's just for everyone isn't it? It's for girls and boys of every stripe, and divorcees and beery men ... it's just one of those perfect songs which can also be a personal joy .. "stilettos and broken bottles ..." that's the best it.
Dancing on My Own - Robyn (2010)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcNo07Xp8aQ
A late substitution (for Danny Callahan by Conor Oberst, in case you're wondering, which is a stunningly sad song) ... and I also could have had With Every Heartbeat by the same artist, which is an odder, more haunting song.
But this one, it's just for everyone isn't it? It's for girls and boys of every stripe, and divorcees and beery men ... it's just one of those perfect songs which can also be a personal joy .. "stilettos and broken bottles ..." that's the best it.
Us – Regina Spektor (2006)
This being the last one … after quite a bit of thought …
there are four or five Regina Spektor songs I love equally, but this one
remains so gleeful, so glorious – it feels like the definitive song of a time
when there was maybe a bit too many twee indie songs and films and it really
had to come to a stop, but, you know, that time was ok with me.
PLUS:
My Baby Don't Understand Me - Natalie Prass (2015)
Hmm, and so, because I feel like a bit of a dick for including Ryan Adams, but I still want to, just to make the point in a fairly obvious way that the song is always bigger than the singer, here's a bonus 21st, which is just so beautifully sung, produced and arranged, and just haunts and burrows in ... and takes its time to do so.
20 FAVOURITE ALBUMS OF THE 21ST CENTURY (IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER)
Yankee Hotel Foxtrot – Wilco (2002)
This is my favourite album in the world. You know that
perhaps. It’s anxious and prophetic and a whole proper work of art with several
dimensions.
It’s sometimes very obscure and sometimes deceptively simple and it
dips in and out of my head all the time. It’s a headache and then it’s a heavy
analgesic.
The album before it, Summerteeth, and after it, A Ghost is Born, are
also in my Top 30 or 40 albums of all time, just so you know, but this one will
do for now.
Lemonade – Beyoncé (2016)
There are different ways we fall in love with an album –
sometimes slowly, letting it sink in over many days and weeks without worrying
too much about the details we miss first time, sometimes, as in this case,
instantly, in real time, like it’s a film and this is our one shot to really
let it impact on us.
Erm, I think I’ll leave it that. No, I guess I won’t. One
thing about Lemonade is how Beyoncé determinedly,
consciously, went after the serious indie rock crowd, the crowd that determined
what was art and what was pop.
There has been great Beyoncé music for two
decades, but with the 2013 album ‘Beyoncé’ (which I think a slight failure,
though many don’t) and then ‘Lemonade’ she took every genre on, on her terms
and on its terms. The names on the album – Father John Misty, James Blake, Jack
White, Ezra Koenig, Karen O, Kendrick Lamar, The Weeknd. No stone is left
unrolled.
It turned out not to be a perfect album. But, for me, it was
the perfect listen.
Free All Angels – Ash (2001)
What links Lemonade and Free All Angels? Only that, that
first listen. That memorable real-life exhilaration of it. I was in my flat on
the 3rd floor on South Street, St Andrews. There was scaffolding in
front of the flat, which, perhaps, if I remember one or all of us illicitly
rested on. It came out in April – yes, that’s right. Winter was over, the sun
was out.
And it’s a sun-out album. Shining Light had been out months before,
and you knew that, after their mediocre second album, Ash were saved. Maybe
even made for life. Burn Baby Burn was also just out, and is there, honestly, a
better indie-rock one-two this century? No, of course not. And it felt then
that the rest of the album was just as good, though of course, it wasn’t, but
it was almost as good.
It was teenage prodigies still young enough but better,
with extra guitar heft and extra surf-rock girl harmonies.
Now I look at the tracklisting, Free All Angels has almost
as many duds as classics, but it didn’t feel like it then. It felt like an
endless summer. So here it is.
The World Won’t End – The Pernice Brothers (2001)
While this album is a summer that ended. I continue to love
this album, to want to listen to it, even though I thought I had consigned it
to minor status.
In recent years the “album” has overtaken the “song” from it
that I loved the most, Bryte Side, if that makes sense. The whole is greater
than its greatest part.
There are tens, maybe hundreds of underselling great
American songwriters in their 40s and 50s making ends meet these days and Joe
Pernice is my favourite of them, still putting out great records to a world
that never cared too much. This album is exquisite, it never stretches too far
but never bores – song after song perfectly produced and orchestrated and sad.
On the Line – Jenny Lewis (2019)
You’ll get two for the price of one here, because all along
I’ve been planning to write about Rilo Kiley’s More Adventurous, the first
time I listened to it (while watching a rugby match on TV of all things) and
was struck that this was 100% what I liked. More Adventurous is, in its way, my single listening highlight of the two decades.
And there’s been plenty of Jenny Lewis/Rilo Kiley material
I’ve listened to since then, and to be honest, a fair bit of it was a tiny bit
disappointing after that first heady thrill. She seemed like sometimes she
tried too many things, and that her voice and lyrics were just impossible to
miss, could never fade so that you could just blithely think “nice” – if a song
went a bit wrong, you really felt it.
But, then, in 2019, came On the Line which was good as (in
fact, better than) More Adventurous and The Execution of All Things. It was the
great album by the all-American Almost Famous, an album that got better and
better with each track and then with each play, a perfectly judged heartbreak
album full of melodies and lyrics which were memorable but not flash, singing
that was beautiful and not showy.
Melodrama – Lorde (2017)
I wasn’t sure whether to have this on the list initially.
Though I had it as my favourite album of 2017, I remember thinking it rather
the best of an average bunch that year, rather than an out-and-out classic.
But, in the recent re-listening, it has leapt out at me, given me the greatest
pleasure. It is a phenomenal album, a dream of perfectly articulated pop
perfection.
This phrase “sad bangers” is being used lately – seems a bit
stoopid, like that isn’t just the essence of a great pop song anyway. But, in
any case, if we’re to use the phrase, this album is an endless stream of sad
bangers.
There’s this narcotic, euphoric yet realistic power to this
record – the lyrics, the hooks, the singing, the arrangements are all utterly
brilliant. For me, though I always find there are gems among Taylor Swift’s
songs, Lorde (who occupies somewhat the same territory and has the same
co-writer Jack Antonoff) is elevated by the lack of self-consciousness, the
normality of the concerns and their perfect expression.
Nixon – Lambchop (2000)
Coming out in February 2000, this is the first great album
of the century, and still one of my favourites. For me, the opening four tracks
are unsurpassed as a sequence – The Old Gold Shoe, Grumpus, You Masculine You,
Up With People.
The singer, Kurt Wagner, employs two vocal modes, his
laconic low mutter and his ecstatic falsetto. The effect is disarming. He’s one
of the great, humane, spare and poignant lyricists.
The odd thing about this album is the sequencing – it ends
with two Gothic vignettes, The Petrified Florist and The Butcher Boy, which
seem to belong on a totally different record than the others. They’re great
songs, but it feels like they’re there because he didn’t know what else to do
with them. I think that’s always stopped me from giving the album the full
acclaim that I give this next one.
The Trials of Van Occupanther - Midlake (2006)
Do you know, I’m coming round to putting this very near the
top of the pile. This is an ineffably perfect, singular entity by a band who
never hit such heights before or after. It is a work of the rare magic, a weird
and wonderful world unto itself, in the spirit of Daphnis and Chloe and Thoreau.
Hardy, of Nick Drake and Bon Iver and all that … but way more rocking.
I continue to be moved in a way I don’t understand by the
line “They told me I wouldn’t but I found an answer, I’m Van Occupanther, I’m
Van Occupanther” not to mention many others.
Why is this album so good? The musicianship is wondrous and
impeccable, as are the folky arrangements, but it’s the lyrics and the concept
that continue to stun me. For all that Midlake are a collective (Indeed the
lead singer Tim Smith left for their 4th album Antiphon and the
sound changed not all that much), this album feels like an auteur’s vision, an
idea of loneliness and love coming deep from an individual being. I feel this
will be the No 1 most loved record of the post-industrial, food-shortage
wasteland.
Have One on Me – Joanna Newsom (2010)
I think Joanna Newsom is the greatest of the age, all in all, the most accomplished, the most inimitable, the great poet and melodist. Some will say Ys, with its five stunningly arranged story-songs, is her finest, and that the 18 tracks (2 hours) of Have One on Me is a bit much. And sometimes it is.
But when you really give yourself over to it, listen to every minute, it all stands up. It is also, to me, more moving, more soulful, more generous and in touch with its audience than Ys.
Along with In California, other standouts are Good Intentions Paving Company, No Provenance, On a Good Day, Go Long, Does Not Suffice and whatever else grabs you at any given moment.
The ArchAndroid – Janelle Monae (2010)
When this album came out, I thought it was a tremendous
piece of work, in some ways a mirror to Have One on Me, from the same year,
in terms of daring and ambition.
Since then, I’ve continued to enjoy Monae’s work, but have
felt her subsequent albums a little superficial, a little too eager to please,
so I think I’d started to put this in the same box. I intended to put this in
my 20, but with caveats, that it was more about admiration than enjoyment.
But I’ve listened to it again recently, and I’ve loved it,
as much as, if not more than, before. The tunes sound fresher than ever – this
rich collage of genres, underpinned by a musical theatre background and a
grounding in Stevie Wonder. A fabulously ambitious album, but also an endlessly
enjoyable one.
Want One – Rufus Wainwright (2003)
I’m a bit hard on Rufus Wainwright sometimes – I’ve felt
like sometimes he’s (over)blown his talents a little. I actively dislike this
album’s companion Want Two. It’s the dampest squib of a record I’ve ever
known.
But this album remains packed with glorious, rich, moving
songs, all the way from Oh What a World to Dinner at Eight. This one is
primarily a pop album, and his voice soars rather than curdles.
Favourite songs
on this are probably 14th Street, 11.11 and Dinner at Eight.
To Pimp a Butterfly – Kendrick Lamar (2015)
When something is so universally described as a masterpiece
so immediately, I will always find a contrary way to loathe it. So with this, I
was a little resistant at the start, I think because of the looseness, the
length, the jazziness, and yes, the hype.
It was when I started to realise “everything he’s doing here
is brilliant”, in terms of words, in terms of rhymes, with different voices,
with rhythms, with structure that I could accept the album for what it is –
there are several great pop songs on this record, several uncomfortable,
challenging moments, several extremely funny bits, sometimes all at once. A
highlights package is great, but I do find, after all, that it’s best savoured
as a whole. ‘Alright’ is, I guess Dancing in the Street/Blowin’ in the Wind of the age.
1972 – Josh Rouse (2003)
Although Josh Rouse may go down as an archetypal workmanlike
American songwriter, I think he hit on some real magic on his four-album run
between 2002 and 2006. 1972 is, on the surface, a pastiche of the
easy-listening writers of the early 70s, but the songs have real heart. Slaveship and, in particular, Rise, are nestled deep within my
most-listened-to.
His next album, Nashville, is of a similar standard, making
it all seem so easy – sometimes people just go through a phase when they’re
better than they think they are.
Chutes Too Narrow – The Shins (2003)
This one’s rather crept up on me as a high flyer, and I
think fills the space in the list left by Rilo Kiley’s More Adventurous where
I listen to it and think it is archetypally “what I like”. The guitars, the
angles, the masterfully constructed lyrics, the sense that you’re listening to
a really clever person putting an awful lot of work into getting what they’re
doing right.
I don’t know if it’s still as highly rated as it should be –
maybe the Shins have been a bit damned by association with Zach Braff’s passing
star – but this record is just razor sharp and still as good as it ever was.
Phantom Power – Super Furry Animals (2003)
This is my favourite SFA album and SFA are my favourite
band, by and large, so I have to include it, really. It’s Gruff’s favourite
too. Although they were, commercially, just starting on the down slope at this
point, and people rave more about Radiator and Guerrilla, this, for me, is
their most complete set of songs. The second half of the album, in particular,
is packed with underrated joys, like Out of Control, The Undefeated and Slow
Life.
I almost included Gruff’s great solo work, American
Interior, an extraordinary piece of multimedia historical research, with some
of his best songs. Then again, Hotel Shampoo’s pretty great too.
Golden Hour – Kacey Musgraves (2018)
I was going to include Shelby Lynne’s I am Shelby Lynne, but
then noticed it was from 1999, annoyingly. Taking its place, then, another
piece of exquisite country-soul. Can’t say too much about this except her voice is a bit
special and the songs are just exemplary.
Purple Mountains – Purple Mountains (2019)
The full magnificence of this album may, understandably, be
lost in the tragic circumstances of its release. But right now, I can’t stop
listening to it. David Berman employs a stand-up comedian’s precision – this is
the lyric-writing at the highest level, and it is complemented by some
memorable tunes. In some ways, a hard listen, in some ways, not at all.
Skeleton Tree – Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds (2016)
There was a lot of Cave to consider - certainly one of my three favourite artists of the century. As a song, There She Goes My Beautiful World has been filling my headphones of late. And I think No More Shall We Part is the album of his that has given me most pleasure.
But I'm going for Skeleton Tree, from 2016, an extraordinary, extraordinary piece of work. This year's Ghosteen has received similar, if not greater, acclaim, but it's the traditional qualities of Skeleton Tree that do it for me. The tunes, after all that. The likes of Distant Sky and Skeleton Tree have a conventional structure to their beauty that just works on me a little better.
Girl in Amber is, of all of it, the rawest grief I've ever heard on record.
The Hour of Bewilderbeast - Badly Drawn Boy (2000)
Going all the way back to this, which I just loved a great deal for a reasonably long time. Feels like he put everything he had into it. Listening to again, the quality of so many of the songs is still striking, and the noodling in between only enhances that.
There's so much of what was easy to love back then in this - B and S and Nick Drake and Beta Band and then these little touches of classic easy listening pop.
Aah, why regret this boy's career, when there was this.
Carrie and Lowell - Sufjan Stevens (2015)
Skeleton Tree – Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds (2016)
There was a lot of Cave to consider - certainly one of my three favourite artists of the century. As a song, There She Goes My Beautiful World has been filling my headphones of late. And I think No More Shall We Part is the album of his that has given me most pleasure.
But I'm going for Skeleton Tree, from 2016, an extraordinary, extraordinary piece of work. This year's Ghosteen has received similar, if not greater, acclaim, but it's the traditional qualities of Skeleton Tree that do it for me. The tunes, after all that. The likes of Distant Sky and Skeleton Tree have a conventional structure to their beauty that just works on me a little better.
Girl in Amber is, of all of it, the rawest grief I've ever heard on record.
The Hour of Bewilderbeast - Badly Drawn Boy (2000)
Going all the way back to this, which I just loved a great deal for a reasonably long time. Feels like he put everything he had into it. Listening to again, the quality of so many of the songs is still striking, and the noodling in between only enhances that.
There's so much of what was easy to love back then in this - B and S and Nick Drake and Beta Band and then these little touches of classic easy listening pop.
Aah, why regret this boy's career, when there was this.
Carrie and Lowell - Sufjan Stevens (2015)
It feels almost disloyal not to have Lapalco by Brendan Benson as my last one, so regularly have I described it as an underrated masterpiece. And yet I go for something perfectly well rated.
I think probably I'm including Carrie and Lowell because I wanted to include Illinois but then I can't get past the fact that the second half of Illinois is significantly less engaging than the first half, so here we are Carrie and Lowell - a self-contained masterpiece of undemonstrative grief, a collection of lovely songs.
Now then, here are some other great artists I've listened to an awful lot, who've done great live shows, and whose absence from the lists above is a bit harsh
- The National
- Laura Marling
- Bob Dylan
- Belle and Sebastian
- St Vincent
- Damon Albarn
- Decemberists
- Band of Horses
- King Creosote
- Ed Harcourt
- Bright Eyes
- Martha Wainwright
- Manic Street Preachers
- Camera Obscura
- Emmy the Great
- British Sea Power
- Dave
- First Aid Kit
- Kathryn Williams
- Elbow
Ok, that's the (barely) serious stuff ...
now
20 Favourite Beers of the Century
Not a taste test, just taking into account reliability, nostalgia, association etc
Needless to say, there are many I have enjoyed a great deal whose name I have forgotten
- London Pride
- Deuchars
- Peroni
- Corona
- Oakham Citra
- Woodford's Wherry (i had one almost apocryphal pint of it once, and it was the best pint I ever had)
- Brooklyn Lager
- Adnam's Sea Fury
- Williams Brothers Caesar Augustus
- Redwell West Coast Pale Ale
- Shepherd Neame Whitstable Bay
- Fuller's Honeydew
- Nanny State (for that time in your life when it needs to be Nanny State)
- Curious Brew IPA
- Biere d'or D'Alsace
- McEwans 80/
- Hazey Daze
- Asahi (for karaoke)
- St Austell Tribute
- Hobgoblin Ruby
21 Favourite Films
- Adventureland
- United 93
- Before Sunrise/Sunset/Midnight (I'm taking it as one film if that's ok)
- Memento
- Role Models
- Donnie Darko
- Two Days and One Night
- Patterson
- Star Wars: The Force Awakens
- The Irishman
- Rust and Bone
- Boyhood
- The White Ribbon
- Brick
- High Fidelity
- Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
- Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri
- Pride
- Philomena
- Sing
- Brokeback Mountain
- Andy Lee
- Miguel Cotto
- Choi Tseveenpurev
- Nonito Donaire
- Vasyl Lomanchenko
- Anthony Joshua
- Gennady Golovkin
- Audley Harrison
- Joe Calzaghe
- Keith Thurman
- Carl Froch
- Amir Khan
- Darren Barker
- Chris Eubank Jr
- Carl Frampton
- Paul Malignaggi
- Anthony Crolla
- Michael Katsidis
- Junior Witter
- Timothy Bradley
20 Favourite Books of the Century
- This is Uncool: The 500 Greatest Singles Since Punk and Disco - Garry Mulholland
- The Corrections -Jonathan Franzen
- Let the Great World Spin - Colum McCann
- Autumn/Winter/Spring - Ali Smith
- Normal People - Sally Rooney
- Cryptic Quiz Book - Frank Paul
- 33 Revolutions per Minute: A History of Protest Songs - Dorian Lynskey
- The People’s Songs: The Story of Modern Britain in 50 Records - Stuart Maconie
- Night Train: Sonny Liston - Nick Tosches
- A Cultured Left Foot - Musa Okwonga
- Netherland - Joseph O'Neill
- Half of a Yellow Sun - Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie
- Home Fire - Kamila Shamsie
- Days Without End - Sebastian Barry
- 45: Bill Drummond
- Straw Dogs: John Gray
- In Black and White: The Untold Story of Joe Louis and Jesse Owens: Donald Mcrae
- One Day - David Nicholls
- A Visit from the Goon Squad - Jennifer Egan
Erm, I might add more, but that'll do for now.
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