Everyone has their favorite part of the holiday season. Maybe it's sitting down for a delicious meal with family. Maybe it's the look on someone's face as they open gifts. Maybe it's the spirit of togetherness, love, and joy that brings us all together.
Me? My favorite part of the holidays is right now, when I get a few precious inches of column space every year to pretend I'm an important entertainment critic and offer my picks for the best records of 2022.
In many ways, it was a turbulent and trying year, and pop culture can often reflect that in unpleasant ways. But there WERE a handful of records this year that redeemed our cultural landscape and proved that creativity still runs wild, waiting for its moment to shine. 2022 produced some serious bangers, from the sunshine dance bliss of Sofi Tukker's "Wet Tennis" to the seedy underbelly of Taylor Swift's "Midnights." There were triumphant returns from stalwarts like The Boo Radleys and Suede, and admirable debuts from new faces like Horsegirl and Yard Act.
But five records really stood out for me as 2022's best:
#5 - Andy Bell - Flicker - As guitarist for Ride and bassist for Oasis, Andy Bell has soundtracked my life for decades. For his second proper solo album, Bell went the extra mile and dropped a double-album that takes a multitude of seemingly disjointed ideas and crafts them into a cohesive record that ruminates on the passage of time and coming to terms with yourself: "Now time's not on our side / See the flicker as a fire starts to burn / It's not enough / Burn down the world for me / Use a mirror to remember, and look back with something like love." Whether its an introspective acoustic instrumental or brilliant hooks coming through a psychedelic haze, "Flicker" contains some of Bell's finest work and secures his rightful place as one of indie's great songwriters. A triumph of a record and an absolute treat for long-time and new fans alike.
#4 - Wet Leg - Wet Leg - Seemingly coming out of nowhere (but actually hailing from the Isle of Wight), Wet Leg hit the ground running in 2021 with a handful of ridiculously catchy singles that perfectly embodied the fun and care-free bliss of jaded youth. Wet Leg reject any attempts to take themselves seriously, and swear in interviews that they're embarassed by all the fuss being made over them. After all, they're a band formed on a lark while sitting atop a Ferris wheel at a music festival. But people SHOULD take them seriously, because the pop hooks flow like caramel on their frenetic debut album. If it's all a schtick, it's a very GOOD schtick, and almost justifies the overexposure they've received this year. The million-dollar question will be whether they've got the ability to convert this one magical musical moment into a triumphant career or if it's all just one brilliant flash in the pan -- but if it's destined to be just a fleeting firework, it's one of those shells that burns in a dozen colors and ends with a surprise explosion.
#3 - Let's Eat Grandma - Two Ribbons - In 2016, I declared the debut album of Norwich duo Let's Eat Grandma to be the best record of the year, and rightly so. At the time, it was incomprehensible how a pair of young teenagers could have possibly crafted an amateur album so captivatingly weird and otherworldly in their bedrooms (often using non-traditional toy instruments.) At the time, the duo of Rosa Walton and Jenny Hollingworth explained their creative success as having been best friends from age four and operating on a shared wavelength. A few years down the road, and that friendship has now been tested. Hollingsworth lost her boyfriend to a rare form of cancer, while Walton moved to London and suffered a nervous breakdown. The tracks for Two Ribbons were written separately and contain lyrics of loss and failed friendship. Their charming ethereal kookiness might not be as pronounced as their earlier records, but this newfound lyrical honesty and depth serves the duo well, and the resulting record is an emotional synthpop rollercoaster and yet another triumph from a collaborative team that never seems to fail.
#2 - Pale Blue Eyes - Souvenir - It was a couple months ago when my friend Stuart texted me a simple Youtube link with a text message that simply said, "!!!!!" That link ended up being to "Honeybear," the achingly beautiful centerpiece of the debut record from Pale Blue Eyes, a band that had previously been 100% off my radar. It was so captivating that I ordered the entire record on the spot. Hailing from a home studio in the small market town of Totnes in southern England, Pale Blue Eyes have somehow managed to fuse the best bits of vintage indiepop together into a modern masterpiece that wears its influences proudly but doesn't just sound like a 1980s nostalgia trip. The result is breathy dreampop atop quirky synths, Krautrock rhythms, and angular guitar lines clearly inspired by classic alternative bands like The Cure and New Order. I'd love a peek at their record collections, because I have a feeling they share a lot with mine. Far and away, they're my favorite discovery of 2022. "!!!!!," indeed.
#1 - Alvvays - Blue Rev - Usually my favorite record of the year has to be some pretentious beast of an album trying desperately to make an artistic statement. This year, the accolade simply goes to a great band who just put out their greatest album. Alvvays (pronounced "always") are a Canadian indiepop band fronted by Molly Rankin, daughter of the late John Rankin, fiddler for the acclaimed Celtic folk band The Rankin Family. Until now, Alvvays were known for intelligent jangle-pop pierced by Rankin's resonant and languid vocals. When Blue Rev first arrived, I threw it on in the car, expecting a nice little slice of smartly dour pop bliss. But at exactly six seconds into the lead track "Pharmacist," the guitars explode out of the gate into a dizzying circular shoegaze epiphany that literally made me stop and replay the song a good half-dozen times as I drove around dumbfounded. The record simply soars and soars again, with pop hooks meeting sonic grandeur at every turn, but still with the signature underproduction that's always made Alvvays charming and homey. It's the kind of record that has at least five or six spots where I forget to breathe because I don't want to miss a second of its fuzzy grace. It's not an album that's going to change the world, but it's one that still captivates even after the umpteenth listen, and it's easily the best thing I've heard this year.
Next week, let's talk TV.
No comments:
Post a Comment