Southland Mission, Phil Cook

It’s What-the-Hell-is-This-Wednesday! Wherein I listen to something I know absolutely nothing about. 

Southland Mission, Phil Cook, 2015, :32

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

No idea who this guy is (he's played in some bands I've heard of or heard only snippets of) or why I picked this retro '60s album cover to play.  The spirit just struck me.  He plays what Wikipedia calls "freak-folk."  It's sort of a neo-folk, an acoustic folk-blues-rock, I guess, somewhat akin to a cheerier aSon Volt or a more bluesy Golden Smog.  On the album cover he looks like Jerry Garcia's spiritual nephew.  This album starts off strong with two catchy, uptempo songs, but then settles down to a more sleepy groove.  He's a fine musician, but I found myself not listening very carefully to most of the album, even at a brisk 32 minutes.  Favorite tracks: "Ain't It Sweet," "1922," "Gone."  

Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit, Courtney Barnett

It's the title word count-up to ten! Ten words! We made it.

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Sometimes I Sit and Think and Sometimes I Just Sit, Courtney Barnett, 2015, :44

This Australian singer-songwriter tells rambling stories in her songs, her deadpan, singsong-talky style spinning out unusual rhymes ("Headphone wielding to the Nicholas building / He trips on a pothole that's not been filled in") and lines you don't often hear in pop music ("I'm not suicidal, just idling insignificantly / I come up here for perception and clarity / I like to imagine I'm playing SimCity").  All of those lyrics are from the same wonderful song.  I think she's brilliant, although I prefer her faster material than the slower, longer tracks like "Small Poppies." Another song, "Depreston," features some actual singing, which is also very pretty. Overall, her good stuff is so damn good that this is a five-star album in my blog. Favorite tracks: "Elevator Operator," maybe my favorite find of the year; "Dead Fox;" "Pedestrian at Best;" "Nobody Really Cares If You Don't Go to the Party;" "Debbie Downer."

Beat the Champ, Mountain Goats / Blast From the Grassed, Hayseed Dixie

Continuing the alphabet of albums, we have a B twofer.

Beat the Champ, Mountain Goats, 2015, :45

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

A concept album about wrestling, and very specifically so, with references to cage matches, spectators in the rafters, faces turning to heels, and even name-checks of specific wrestlers. But also, an album very much about people and the choices they make and the connections and spaces between them. The song "Animal Mask," for examplw, is a very clever blend of a description of a wrestling match and a rumination on singer John Darnielle's new baby son, and "Unmasked" uses the metaphor of the wrestler dropping his character to explore how accurately we seen each other in general. The album is best when straddling these two worlds. Favorite tracks: "Foreign Object," "Choked Out," "Heel Turn 2."

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Blast From the Grassed, Hayseed Dixie, 2020, :41

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

The world's best bluegrass cover band takes on a dozen songs from various decades. I love pretty much anything these guys do, but I especially like it when they get goofy and fast. They've toned down the "dumb hillbilly" image a bit since their debut, but still can whoop it up. Favorite tracks: "You Need to Calm Down," "Take On Me," "Dancing Queen."

Anthems For Doomed Youth, the Libertines

Currently doing one album for each year, 1960-2020. Today: 2015. 

Anthems For Doomed Love, the Libertines, 2015, :45

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

What a brilliant comeback!  Yes, you can call it a comeback.  Brilliant lyrics, gorgeous melodies, wonderful blending of lead vocals.  But it's far from a retread of their superb self-titled album; it's a step forward.  "Here's a story about the rules of death or glory / To be learned by heart by all children of men / It's the hour of the morning on the day after the dawning / When the sun they said would never set finally set again."  But then the sun did rise again on the likely lads' Albion, at least for a while.  The dry fatalistic poetry of the boozer, wrapped up in sweet guitar licks.  Favorite tracks: "Anthem For Doomed Youth," "Belly of the Beast," "Glasgow Coma Scale Blues."

You Look a Lot Like Me, Mel Blum

It’s What-the-Hell-is-This-Wednesday! Wherein I listen to something I know absolutely nothing about.

You Look a Lot Like Me, Mel Blum, 2015, :37

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

I have never heard of this person, who is not famous enough to have their own Wikipedia page. They are apparently a nonbinary transgender individual. It’s very good stuff! I would call this folk punk, or maybe anti-folk. Catchy, introspective, emotive. Their voice and lyrical themes and tempo sounds like Kimya Dawson or that small brunette in Garfunkel and Oates, but deciding to play good music this time. "But I'm not much of a networker / Unless you like non-sequiturs / About mold or ghosts or chubby little dogs." This reference won't mean anything to anyone, but it reminds me of acoustic punk band Defiance, Ohio. Like them, Blum deserves to be more widely known. Favorite tracks: "Reality TV," "The Shrink Thinks," "Better Than I Was."