Everyday Be Listening to Nathan's Favorite Records, 2014

1. D’Angelo and the Vanguard, Black Messiah
Out of nowhere, D'Angelo and his appropriately-named backup group cast a spell of hypnotic jazz-funk-hard rock-flamenco-Great American Songbook-Beefheart-There's a Riot Goin' On jams so potent that they make up for 14 years of silence.

2. Freddie Gibbs and Madlib, Piñata
Culled from years of relaxed sessions between the Gary, Indiana emcee and former Stones Throw's vinyl virtuoso, Cocaine Piñata (the semi-official title) finds Gibbs smoking Madlib's best-laid rhythms like they were nickel bags. A soul sample lover's paradise.

3. The Underachievers, The Cellar Door: Terminus Ut Exordium
As the title suggests, this LP is all about linguistic beauty unrelated to meaning. Issa Gold and AK have the endless back-and-forth energy of a young OutKast, and like that group, their tightness reinforces each other's skills.

4. Kimbra, The Golden Echo
With her stunning musicianship, ace choice in collaborators, unlimited vocal range, and twin allegiances to the groove and the avant-garde, the New Zealand pop star is in a class with only one other artist: Janelle Monae.

5. Schoolboy Q, Oxymoron
Schoolboy is the edgiest, nerviest, most unpredictable rapper in the Top Dawg roster and perhaps on the entire West Coast.  Oxymoron is a gangsta/confessional record that is alternately a scary, hopeful, and thrilling window into the mind of a restless thinker.

6. Boris, Noise
Another year, another Boris album with a so-generic-it's-audacious title, another set of explosive churning stadium rockers that never go anywhere one expects. "Angel" is the 19-minute monster of the year.

7. Goat, Commune
Do I care about Goat's devotion to Swedish vodou traditions and communal mysticism? Not really. But their music is enveloped in pleasure, bursting with dozens of uncharacteristic influences (afrobeat, psychedelia, drone, Beatlesque melodies) that will dizzy the listener who attempts to identify them.

8. Sturgill Simpson, Metamodern Sounds in Country Music
The psychedelic qualities of this record are overstated--this is outlaw country-rock in the Kris Kristofferson, Gene Clark mode that is stronger because it demonstrates Simpson's authentic songwriting before lightly breaking the Nashville sonic mold (unforgettable album closer "It Ain't All Flowers").

9. Big K.R.I.T., Cadillactica
No one seems willing to anoint Big K.R.I.T. "king of the south," so he made this 15-song case. This time, he leaves the production to others and refines his songwriting and hooks. Is there a better rapper in America?

10. Run the Jewels, RTJ2
Best listened to divorced from thinkpieces on Ferguson, etc. (as if Killer Mike and El-P were the first rappers ever to protest police brutality), I prefer to think of RTJ2 as the best rap-rock record since the Judgment Night soundtrack.

Nathan's Favorite Music, 2011 Edition

1. Destroyer, Kaputt

The smoothest, most immersive listening experience of 2011, by a considerable margin. Singer/songwriter Dan Bejar takes a few compositional cues from AOR and soft rock but this nine-song set is the opposite of anodyne--it constantly teems with fresh ideas, from the silvery disco pulse beneath to the proudly anachronistic flute and sax solos on top. If there's a theme to this list, it's that the best music of 2011 didn't care what year it was.

2. Raphael Saadiq, Stone Rollin'

Saadiq is a veteran showman, producer and arranger, but his bounteous command of classic soul productions usually lags behind his skills as a songwriter. Not so with Stone Rollin', an album of immaculately-orchestrated tributes to different eras of soul, entirely devoid of retro-gazing. In 2011, no album made more mellifluous use of the Mellotron, an instrument not traditionally associated with soul and R&B, modern or otherwise.

3. DJ Quik, The Book of David

He may call himself a "crucial if not lesser-known artist from the West" but the pristine beats of The Book of David demonstrate that Quik, if not before, definitely now deserves a place in the top tier of West Coast hip-hop. Few late-career rap albums are as restlessly committed to an unstoppable groove--in Quik's eyes, funk and hip-hop are always mutually reinforced properties, etymologically unrelated to the overprocessed goo-goo synths of much modern hip-hop.

4. Big K.R.I.T., Return of 4Eva

Though Big K.R.I.T. has garnered a reputation as a Southern rap virtuoso, his 2011 mixtape Return of 4Eva is more than just a collection of a creatively-expressed drawly Southernisms spat over crunkified click tracks. K.R.I.T. is also rapper of great depth and range, and his evocations of life in rural Meridian, Mississippi give this album a country flavor that puts most rap from the city, Southern or otherwise, to shame.

5. Fucked Up, David Comes To Life

Just when you thought Fucked Up's massive three-guitar sound couldn't get bigger, they embark on the most epic undertaking of their career--a three-part, eighteen-song concept album about a dude in a lightbulb factory. The overall "concept" might be a bit lost among the fuzz and stentorian talk-vox, but the twin totems of beauty and aggression endemic in Fucked Up's best work are still there, to a transcendent, almost tiring degree.

6. Blouse, Blouse

Call them a dream-pop trio from Portland, but that really fails to do the sounds of Blouse justice. Coasting on the familiar 80s combination of gothic synths and ethereal lady vocals, Blouse makes novel use of common instrumental techniques. Their self-titled debut album is alarmingly dense, averaging an impressive two or three massive hooks per track. Consistency of this sort is harder than it looks.

7. Boris, New Album

In a characteristic move, the beloved Japanese metal band Boris set out to confuse fans as much as possible by releasing three albums in 2011. Attention Please was the more electronic-oriented release, while Heavy Rocks concentrated more on the band's aggressive punk-metal roots--but it was New Album, occupying a nebulous middle between those two extremes, that I found the most compelling. From careening Timbaland percussion stabs to string-laden metal monsters to the occasional dalliance with J-Pop, the diversity of tunes contained was unmatched in metal, or anywhere else.

8. A$AP Rocky, LiveLoveA$AP

As my colleague has previously noted, 2011 was a big year for insurgent rap from the likes of Odd Future, Lil B, Danny Brown, etc, but I bet that in 2012 I won't be spinning anything from that 2011 repertoire as often as LiveLoveA$AP, Harlem rapper A$AP Rocky's breakthrough mixtape. Augmented by spacey, codeine-inflected beats from the likes of Clams Casino and Spaceghostpurrp, 24-year old A$AP spits like a emcee repping an extra decade's worth of self-assurance. The result is a rare mixtape with almost too many classic tracks to name offhand.

9. Mutemath, Odd Soul

Bands like New Orleans' Mutemath--solid, dependable and exciting purveyors of mainstream blues rock--are an undervalued commodity in America. Mining everything from classic NO jazz to Peter Green-style blues guitar freakouts, Odd Soul is first and foremost an album filled with remarkable performances, from musicians who have clearly spent years learning to play together aggressively and effectively. There's a soulful side to these heavy riffs that give this a more playful and funky edge than recent material from, say, the Black Keys or other blues rock revivalists.

10. Yuck, Yuck

Speaking of bands not made for these times--the London-based Yuck might have garnered more comparisons to Dinosaur Jr. and Pavement than any other artist in 2011, but that doesn't take any value away from the explosive energy of this debut. In my opinion, Yuck isn't a perfect album (it does lose some energy towards the end), but as far as debuts go I cannot imagine a more youthful-sounding rejoinder to the pre-end times rhetoric of so much "2011 in music" think pieces.

Honorable Mention: Gil Scott-Heron and Jamie XX, We're New Here

A year ago, I gave Gil Scott-Heron's I'm New Here the highest accolades on my list of 2010's best albums. Back then, it was his big comeback album, but now it has become his swan song--Scott-Heron died in May, ostensibly during the planning stages for a followup to I'm New Here. A few months before, however, XL Recordings put out a remixed version of the album, with new productions from Jamie Smith (the bassist/singer from the xx). Though Gil Scott-Heron's vocal contributions are the same as before, We're New Here is at least 60% its own beast, and at the very least, a more rattly, electronic type of experience than the original I'm New Here. It isn't exactly a different album, but I would be remiss if I did not mention it in some fashion--it, as well as its dead creator, one of the greatest poets and musicians of the last 50 years. RIP once more Gil--and Poly, Gary Moore, Teena Marie, etc. etc.

Critical Beatdown: Round 12.5

The Strokes, "Under Cover Of Darkness"
NS: Forgive me if I once again choose to believe the hype. Contrary to public opinion, the Strokes never "fell off" per se (the first half of First Impressions Of Earth is amazing, if you bother to listen to it), but clearly Casablancas and Co. want to reverse-engineer their lo-fi roots. A dangerous proposition, to be sure, but this impressively busy track is capped by a delirious Albert Hammond, Jr. solo, a real scorcher. 4.5/5

AM: A song that masks its fear of failure in myriad hooks, none of which are given room to connect. The overstuffed but clean "Under Cover" zig-zags along, evoking just enough of what made the band worth listening to in the first place. 3/5

J Mascis, "Is It Done"
NS: Mascis has always been a great, quaky singer with an intuitive songwriting style, which is why his Dinosaur Jr. antics translate just as easily into an acoustic number like this. No telling what Lou and Murph could have done with this, but I'm glad when some fleet-fingered electric playing enters the mix at 2:34. 3.5/5

AM: Shot through with the sweet uncertainty that's colored Mascis' songwriting since "Repulsion." His fabled Jazzmaster makes a brief appearance, but the C&W twang in his voice carries this one. 4.5/5

Raekwon feat. Ghostface Killah and Jim Jones, "Rock N Roll"
NS: Nothing I've heard from the Wu crew lately has risen to the level of Raekwon's previous, but given Rae's perfectionist tendencies (which, unlike Dr. Dre, don't seem to demonstrate latent OCD), I have high hopes for Shaolin Vs. Wu-Tang, and lo: this song feels like a real return to form. Ghost is better than I've heard in forever, and even if the production isn't next-level, these guys never needed it. 4/5

AM: DJ Khalil's beat tries to marry crossover appeal with Rae's punch you in your face ethos, and ends up with neither. The central metaphor--of rock and roll being like crack rocks sort of in some way--is empty, and even Ghost and Rae wring nothing out of it. 1.5/5

XXXY, "Ordinary Things"
NS: It's not a song big on variation, nor is it likely to change the mind of House skeptics who feel these sorts of Mancunian dub-techno epics never really go much of anywhere. But if you like a good, ponderous type of music build, "Ordinary Things" will set ecstatic expectations nicely. 3/5

AM: This recombinant cut splices together the DNA of a Missy Elliot production with rubbery synths and chipmunk vox. "Ordinary Things"--which is borderline extraordinary--just keeps floating up and up. 4/5

Boris, "Party Boy"
NS: Another great female guitarist I forgot to mention in my piece on Marnie Stern: Boris' Wata, maybe the most stoic Les Paul slinger in Japan, possibly the world. "Party Boy" may sound surprising to Boris fans more accustomed to the band's drone metal roots, but there has always been a heavy pop psychedelic streak underneath all the fuzz, and "Party Boy" juggles both sides of the band's personality with ease. 5/5

AM: Acid-tinged bubblegum pop. "Party Boy" won't set your next social event on fire, but it's soft, burbling groove might freak out your neighbors. 4/5

Fleet Foxes, "Helplessness Blues"
NS: I didn't like the last Fleet Foxes album, and this track sounds exactly the same as the first, but I don't want to be accused of contributing to the Internet hate, so I'll stop there. Except: is "If I had an orchard" the most boring rock lyric ever? 1.5/5

AM: After a very lovely intro, the predictably rustic "Helplessness Blues" runs its unremarkable course. Alas, Fleet Foxes are still in need of a Levon Helm. 2/5

Pusha T, "My God"
NS: As Pusha probably learned in his pre-rap days, sometimes the best recipe for a chorus is the simplest ("My God." Not much need for fancy wordplay there). This mixtape highlight is anchored by some appropriately reflective versage, but I still must ask (if you don't mind me pilfering a favorite TV show) Where the fuck is Malice? Huh? (Oh, he also has a solo joint coming out this year, never mind.) 3.5/5

AM: This mean march sounds like a Booker T & the MGs jam from the ninth circle. Pusha T raps better here than he did on My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, even if a few of his weird empahses are West-ian. His expression on the cover art--a sneer masquerading as a smile--really says it all. My god. 4.5/5