10 other names for Thom Yorke’s new band

Besides the “obvious” Atoms for Peace, which is basically fine anyway:

1. The Erasers
2. EraserHead
3. New Yorke/The New Yorkers/New Yorke Groove
4. Black Swan
5. thosethatarefeelingpulledapartbyhorses
6. The Drooping Eyelid/Ptosis
7. Athomicauda
8. We, Having Hailed the Thief, Will Rock You
9. ’Ronker
10. Halloweed (seriously)

Best of the decade

My list:

1. Radiohead, Kid A (2000)
2. Spoon, Kill the Moonlight (2002)
3. M.I.A., Arular (2005)
4. Arcade Fire, Funeral (2004)
5. 50 Cent, Get Rich or Die Tryin’ (2003)
6. Wilco, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (2002)
7. Nick Lowe, The Convincer (2001)
8. The Shins, Oh, Inverted World (2001)
9. Kanye West, The College Dropout (2004)
10. Cat Power, The Greatest (2006)

(Average is 2002.8, slightly on the fogy side.)

The next 10:

11. Webb Brothers, Maroon (2000)
12. Salif Keita, Moffou (2002)
13. Feist, The Reminder (2007)
14. Dirty Projectors, Bitte Orca (2009)
15. Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, Raising Sand (2007)
16. Teenage Fanclub, Howdy! (2000)
17. White Stripes, White Blood Cells (2001)
18. Beyoncé, Dangerously in Love (2003)
19. Grandaddy, Sumday (2003)
20. Camille, Le Fil (2006)

Decade postmortem: 2000 and 2001

UPDATES: I tweaked the 2000 list a bit and added an addendum to 2001.

Now is the time when the music critics of the world compile their lists of the best releases of the year, and, even more agonizing, of the decade. Actually, for most writers that time was a month ago. I always get to these late, cuz (1) I don’t usually have a pressing early deadline, and (2) I find it psychically impossible to look back on a year until at least the second week of December.

I’ll be posting my 2009 list soon. But while scanning through the best-of-the-decade cloud, I’ve also been reflecting on my own past choices. Every critic should be held up to the lasting wisdom of his or her old year-end lists. Anybody can pick 10 faves, but a good critic is supposed to have the insight to find quality amid the mediocrity, and to explain and contextualize it. The problem is that aside from a few obvious mega-masterpieces (Thriller, Nevermind, William Shatner’s The Transformed Man) no one knows what will stand the test of time, which is the only test that matters. As a result, the art of the year-end top 10 includes an embarrassing amount of guesswork, fanboy advocacy and consensus groupthink gone stupidly wrong.

In 2007 the Village Voice ran a brutal but very funny reckoning about its Pazz and Jop poll, which covers hundreds of critics each year. (New Times had recently bought the Voice and begun booting its staff, so the motivation might not have been purely journalistic.) Reviewing decades of old Pazz and Jop tallies, the new Voice found a lot of howlers. Our nation’s rock critics got Thriller and Nevermind right (phew), but otherwise came out looking only slightly smarter than Grammy voters. For instance, in 1991 P.M. Dawn was laughably overestimated at No. 5, while My Bloody Valentine’s Loveless only made No. 14 and Dinosaur Jr’s Green Mind No. 37. Those are two of the most important alt-rock albums of the ’90s, and it was pretty obvious at the time how big a deal they were. In 1995 Elastica was No. 5 but Ready to Die was shunted all the way down to No. 38. I think we know who killed Biggie Smalls!

Over the next week or so I’ll be reviewing my past lists to see how well they hold up, and revising them as needed. Feel free to take me to task, shout in solidarity, call bullshit. It can be tricky to define exactly what we’re saying with these rankings. The big question is whether they represent only personal affinity or are larger statements about artistic or cultural importance. I lean toward the former, although I think a critic isn’t doing his job unless the latter plays a significant part.

❧

First up: 2000. I can’t find a list for that year; if I made one at all, it was informal. But with the benefit of hindsight, here’s the one I would (or should) have made:

1. Radiohead, Kid A
2. Webb Brothers, Maroon
3. High on Fire, The Art of Self Defense
4. White Stripes, De Stijl
5. Grandaddy, The Sophtware Slump
6. Sigur Ros, Agaetis Byrjun
7. Bebel Gilberto, Tanto Tempo
8. Outkast, Stankonia
9. Coldplay, Parachutes
10. Dead Prez, Let’s Get Free

I can’t deny Kid A, which stunned me when it came out. It was amazing that something so bizarrely beautiful went to No. 1. It’s a milestone in the history of weird music. It wasn’t a breakthrough exactly: it wasn’t the first “post-rock” album, nor was it really a major reboot for Radiohead (that was OK Computer). But Kid A continued and surpassed all the post-rock/electronica that had been bubbling up through the ’90s, when those sounds were new and revolutionary. And after a decade it still hasn’t been surpassed. Why? Because Radiohead made it look too easy. In the same way that 1,000 shitty lo-fi bands tried to fake being Pavement in the 1990s, 1,000 shitty post-rock bands tried to fake being Radiohead in the 2000s. It’s still happening, and that’s why Radiohead are still giants.

I also love the Webb Brothers, who reside in a different and less futuristic musical continent. These young sons of Jimmy Webb (“Wichita Lineman”) absorbed their father’s songwriting classicism and applied it to the druggy, debauched fast life in an epic concept album dripping with melody. (I originally had this in my 2001 list, but I believe the album came out in 2000. I can’t remember anymore.)

Following that, High on Fire’s debut was an instant classic of stoner metal, and De Stijl was the album that got the buzz going on the White Stripes. (I bought it at Midnight Records on 23rd Street; I hadn’t heard of them before, but it had one of those covers that guarantees something interesting.) Otherwise, I don’t have much to say about this list, other than that I remember being very struck by Dead Prez at the time, and that it took some time for me to make sense of Grandaddy; I probably would not have included them on this list if I had written it in December 2000, but now it seems essential to me. The Sigur Ros album had a complicated release history but it basically broke in 2000. (First major press mention on Nexis: announcement of NME Premier Awards nominees, Jan. 21, 2000.)

❧

And now, 2001. Here’s the list I made at the time:

1. Spoon, Girls Can Tell
2. White Stripes, White Blood Cells
3. Lightning Bolt, Ride the Skies
4. Manu Chao, Proxima Estación: Esperanza
5. Radiohead, Amnesiac
6. Low, Things We Lost in the Fire
7. Moldy Peaches, Moldy Peaches
8. Webb Brothers, Maroon
9. Fugu, Fugu 1
10. Tortoise, Standards

I think I’m right about a lot of this. But there are two big, big albums I would need to add: Nick Lowe’s The Convincer and the Shins’ Oh, Inverted World. The Convincer has become a real favorite of mine; discussing it with Claudia Marshall on WFUV recently, I called it “the most tasteful album of the 2000s,” and I stick by that. It’s magnificently elegant and eloquent, the perfect sound for Lowe’s wry but still warm-hearted reflections on the follies of life and love. The Shins I don’t need to explain; it’s fabulous, and it gets me right there. What I will say in defense of this revision is that that both albums reached me too late because of 9/11, when my life shifted to constant fifth-gear mode for several months. (Lowe’s album was released on that day; the Shins came out earlier, but I don’t think I heard it until early 2002.)

Otherwise, it’s a fairly easy decision to remove Manu Chao and Tortoise, neither of which has held up terribly well for me, and as noted above Marooned is reassigned to 2000. More difficult to lose is the lovely and playful Fugu. It charmed me eight years ago and is still nice, but here in 2009 it don’t sound like such great shakes.

That leaves room to add two titles, and there are some prominent candidates: Bob Dylan’s Love and Theft, the Strokes’ Is This It, and Jay-Z’s The Blueprint. In terms of who made the best album, I think Dylan wins out, and as much as I might loathe the Strokes, I have to admit that Is This It holds up really, really well. It was also the year of Miss E ... So Addictive, but my frustration with Missy albums is that aside from two or three brilliant tracks they tend to get pretty boring.

So here’s my revised list for 2001:

1. Nick Lowe, The Convincer
2. Spoon, Girls Can Tell
3. The Shins, Oh, Inverted World
4. White Stripes, White Blood Cells
5. Lightning Bolt, Ride the Skies
6. Radiohead, Amnesiac
7. Bob Dylan, Love and Theft
8. Moldy Peaches, Moldy Peaches
9. The Strokes, Is This It
10. Low, Things We Lost in the Fire

Addendum: Teenage Fanclub’s Howdy, released in the UK in 2000, came out in the US in 2001. It’s gorgeously pastoral, and asks simple, honest and poignant questions about life and love. (Here is my review at the time.) If I were to put it in this list it would be between Nos. 3 and 4, but I don’t want to mess with it at this point.

❧

Next up ... 2002!

Yorke + Flea = Good

My take on Thom Yorke’s still-unnamed new band is online now.

Internet desperately drives traffic to W.A.S.T.E.

Hey, did you hear that Thom Yorke is releasing a new solo single?

• Thom Yorke Announces “Feeling Pulled Apart By Horses” Single (Rolling Stone)
• Thom Yorke to Release New Old Song (New York magazine)
• THOM YORKE CONFIRMS NEW 12", CONSIDERS NAME CHANGE (Stereogum)
• Thom Yorke's new 12inch (Sound Verite')
• Thom Yorke Confirms Two New Tracks on September 21 (Green Plastic Radiohead)
• Thom Yorke Confirms Plans To Release New Solo Songs This Month (Gigwise)
• Radiohead's Thom Yorke Announces New Solo Single (Billboard)
• THOM YORKE TALKS FEELING PULLED APART BY HORSES AND HOLLOW EARTH 12-INCH... (The Daily Swarm)
• Thom Yorke Confirms New Single (Pitchfork)
• NEW THOM YORKE 12” VINYL AVAILABLE FOR PRE-ORDER (Radiohead At Ease)
• New Thom Yorke 12" coming soon (Burn the Bowery)
• Thom York [sic] Confirms Solo Single for Sept. Release (Prefix)
• New Thom Yorke 12" (wdub new music blog — "reviews, news, and general musings of the music staff of WDUB 91.1 FM in Granville, Ohio")
• Thom Yorke confirms new 12″ (Consequences of Sound)
• Follow-Up: Thom Yorke Single (Absolutepunk)
• FeelingPulledApartbyHorses/TheHollowEarth 12inch(Radiohead/Thom Yorke (Drowned in Sound)
• Radiohead’s Thom Yorke Confirms Upcoming Single ... But Is It “New Moon” Bound? (Wall Street Journal)
• Thom Yorke Announces “Feeling Pulled Apart By Horses” Single (Fuzzfizz)
• Radiohead's Thom Yorke picks new solo project name – video (NME)
• Thom Yorke Confirms New 12" (Paste)
• Thom Yorke (of Travis, Muse, Coldplay, and Radiohead cover band The Karma Police) Confirms 12-Inch Due This Month (Tiny Mix Tapes)
• Thom Yorke Confirms New Songs Are Coming (INDIEBLOGHEAVEN)
• FeelingPulledApartbyHorses/TheHollowEarth 12inch(Radiohead/Thom Yorke) (Drowned in Sound)
• Anuncio oficial de nuevo single (Exit Music)
• Thom York [sic] releases solo single (Digital Spy)
• Radiohead’s Thom Yorke Picks New Solo Project Name, Video Available (Frantik)

Radiohead’s 64-laser video

The video for Radiohead’s “House of Cards” was made with no cameras but rather a spinning device that contains 64 lasers:

There are articles about it in Creativity and the Guardian. (Which has probably the worst lede you could ever imagine in a Guardian article: “Cameras? Radiohead don’t need your stinkin’ cameras.”) Google Code, something I had never heard of, has an amazing feature that allows you to play with the 3-D data:

And here is a making-of-the-video video:

(Via TDS, BB.)

‘In Rainbows’ goes to eMusic

You missed your chance to download it at a price of your naming, i.e. for free, when it was released last October. You didn’t order the expensive “discbox” in time. You didn’t feel like buying the CD in a store. You didn’t feel like buying it on iTunes. Somehow you, Radiohead fan, have not heard the songs enough from your other Radiohead fan friends over the last seven months, and have also somehow not downloaded it illegally. And you still want it.

So here’s your chance: “In Rainbows” is now available on eMusic, the subscription download service that specializes in independent music. Depending on the plan you have, you can get the album for as little as $1.20. Thom Yorke has got to be amazed at all the ways people want to buy this thing.

OK, there is one reason I wish I had been at Coachella

Via the Daily Swarm.

Best of 2007

ALBUMS

1. Dirty Projectors, Rise Above. Much has been said about the concept. And it’s brilliant. But what got me was how Dave Longstreth advanced the emerging indie-boys-discovering-Afropop minigenre. He rips up highlife and uses just what he wants — the sunny, melodic dance lines, the manic guitar counterpoint — which is exactly what he does with/to Black Flag and those Stockhausen-esque alien harmonies. Oh, and it kicks ass, too. (Example; Black Flag’s original.)

2. Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, Raising Sand. This seemed a potential trainwreck when I first learned of it, but it turned out to be a glorious surprise. Luxuriant and masterly, it’s the O Brother, Where Art Thou? of blues, country and rockabilly, with a center of gravity in the 1950s instead of the ’20s.

3. Spoon, Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga. I gave it a mixed review when it came out because the looser, jammier approach of latter-day Spoon seemed less compelling than the structure-mad minimalism of the Kill the Moonlight era. But I was wrong. This is Britt Daniel in magnificent command of sound and vision, and though it’s less compositionally compressed than before, not a single sound is wasted.

4. Battles, Mirrored. The nuttiest, tightest and most surprisingly danceable math(ish)-rock album of the year.

5. Feist, The Reminder. First impression: Sounds like Feist. Six months later: Pretty much a perfect archetype of what soft-rock can be in the ’00s, tasteful and grown-up but squarely in the indie idiom, not folk. That means its interests extend beyond the acoustic guitar, and the central emotional tone is mature vulnerability, not earnestness.

6. Amy Winehouse, Back to Black. It was clear long before her Lohanization that Amy is a star. Back to Black is a broadly conceptualized, flawlessly executed vision of neo-soul, with big, hip-hop-y beats that could be samples were Amy and Mark Ronson — who deserves his share of credit — not in love with real, live sound. But listen again to the suicide note that is “Rehab”: she was fucked up way pre-Perez Hilton.

7. M.I.A., Kala. Actually my biggest disappointment. Ms. Arulpragasam made a very, very good album instead of another freakin’ unbelievable one. Her agitprop also threatens to get boring eventually. But I had the pleasure of interviewing her, and found her very willing to be challenged and debated on politics. A simple egotist/ideologue wouldn’t be.

8. Arcade Fire, Neon Bible. Second-biggest letdown, because three years ago they made a supreme statement of optimism and joy at a time when the ruling dogs were the Strokes, Modest Mouse, etc. Neon Bible is their apocalypse album, and it’s excellent. But it feels like 47 minutes in purgatory, which by definition isn’t exactly satisfying.

9. Avril Lavigne, The Best Damn Thing. It’s the best pop record I heard this year. So fuck you.

10. Radiohead, In Rainbows. It’s a bad year when your top 10 includes three disappointments. This is a gorgeous, classic Radiohead album — how infinite in faculty! in form, in moving, how express and admirable! in action how like an angel! in apprehension how like a god! — but it doesn’t tell me anything I didn’t already know about the band.

THE NEXT 13

The National, Boxer
Black Lips, Good Bad Not Evil
Linda Thompson, Versatile Heart
Beirut, The Flying Club Cup
Ryan Adams, Easy Tiger
Animal Collective, Strawberry Jam
St. Vincent, Marry Me
Yeasayer, All Hour Cymbals
Kanye West, Graduation
Neil Young, Chrome Dreams II
White Stripes, Icky Thump
Essie Jain, We Made This Ourselves
Tegan & Sara, The Con

ALSO RECOMMENDED

Arctic Monkeys, Favourite Worst Nightmare
Nicole Atkins, Neptune City
Meg Baird, Dear Companion
Big A Little a, gAame
The Bird and the Bee, s/t
Andrew Bird, Armchair Apocrypha
Bonde do Rôle, With Lasers
Deerhoof, Friend Opportunity
Deerhunter, Cryptograms
Dinosaur Jr., Beyond
Julie Doiron, Woke Myself Up
Dolorean, You Can’t Win
Justine Electra, Soft Rock
Tim Fite, Over the Counter Culture
Frames, The Cost
Fratellis, Costello Music
Erik Friedlander, Block Ice & Propane
José González, In Our Nature
Jesca Hoop, Kismet
Jennifer Gentle, The Midnight Room
Jesu, Conqueror
Klaxons, Myths of the Near Future
Lavender Diamond, Imagine Our Love
Bettye LaVette, The Scene of the Crime
LCD Soundsystem, Sound of Silver
Nick Lowe, At My Age
Nellie McKay, Obligatory Villagers
Nina Nastasia & Jim White, You Follow Me
No Age, Weirdo Rippers
Okkervil River, The Strange Names
Josh Ritter, The Historical Conquests Of
Shins, Wincing the Night Away
Elliott Smith, New Moon
Spanish Harlem Orchestra, United We Swing
Mavis Staples, We’ll Never Turn Back
Marnie Stern, In Advance of the Broken Arm
Richard Thompson, Sweet Warrior
Teddy Thompson, Up Front & Low Down
Ween, La Cucaracha
Tinariwen, Aman Iman
KT Tunstall, Drastic Fantastic
David Vandervelde, The Moonstation House Band
Voxtrot, s/t
Rufus Wainwright, Release the Stars
White Williams, Smoke
Wilco, Sky Blue Sky

REISSUES

Young Marble Giants, Colossal Youth
Betty Davis, Betty Davis/They Say I’m Different
Pylon, Gyrate

SINGLES

1. Amy Winehouse, “Rehab”
2. Rihanna feat. Jay-Z, “Umbrella”
3. Avril Lavigne, “Girlfriend”
4. Bonde do Rôle, “Gasolina”
5. Lil Mama, “Lip Gloss”
6. Robin Thicke, “Lost Without U”
7. M.I.A., “Boyz”
8. Fratellis, “Chelsea Dagger”
9. Spoon, “You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb”
10. Grinderman, “No Pussy Blues”

HONORARY MENTIONS

Radiohead, “House of Cards”
Kanye West feat. Mos Def, ““Drunk and Hot Girls”
Bruce Springsteen, “Livin’ in the Future” (time travel theory here)

NOPE

Fall Out Boy
Architecture in Helsinki
I’m From Barcelona
Mos Def
Polyphonic Spree
Dean & Britta
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
Sage Francis
Dntel

DISAPPOINTMENTS

Keyshia Cole
Rilo Kiley
Bjork

BLANK STARE

Levon Helm (he’s great and everything, but album is terrible, and gushy reviews are inexplicable)

REALLY, REALLY BUMMED OUT THAT I MISSED LIVE

Daft Punk

REALLY, REALLY GLAD I SAW LIVE

Dirty Projectors

TRULY IS THAT GOOD

Feist

SPECIAL CITATION FOR OPENING A PORTAL TO THE BORE-UNIVERSE FOR 77+ MINUTES

Boredoms, 77BOADRUM, Brooklyn, 7/7/07 (I was behind this guy, at position #69)

POOR THING

50 Cent

COOLEST TITLE

Tom Zé, Danç-Êh-Sá

DUMBEST TITLE

Radiohead, In Rainbows

BEST NEW BLOG BAND

Vampire Weekend

MOST OVERRATED NEW BLOG BAND

Black Kids

BEST USE OF ‘WOLF’ BY A CANADIAN INDIE BAND ...

AIDS Wolf

... AND WORST

Sea Wolf (because they’re from L.A.)

MOST PATHETIC KERFUFFLE

Fallout from Sasha Frere-Jones’s misguided essay on the whiteness of indie-rock. David Brooks should never write about music, with the possible exception of political allegories drawn from Marx Brothers musical numbers. As has been noted, Carl Wilson performed an excellent tear-down of Frere-Jones’s piece.

BIGGEST LIE

Live Earth. It had nothing to do with saving the planet and everything to do with Al Gore’s ego. Ever wonder why the musicians most outspoken about environmental issues — Pearl Jam, Neil Young, Willie Nelson, Radiohead, U2, even emissions-credit-buying Coldplay — were not involved?

WORST ALBUM OF 2007 (tie)

Prince, Planet Earth. Come on people, it sucks. And let’s all just admit it: he hasn’t done anything worthy since Diamonds and Pearls (’91) and nothing truly great since Lovesexy (’88). He’s awesome in concert and looks good and all, but please.

Jesse Malin, Glitter in the Gutter. Bruce, say it ain’t so.

---

The year in live music.

Best of 2001

ALBUMS

1. Spoon, Girls Can Tell
2. White Stripes, White Blood Cells
3. Lightning Bolt, Ride the Skies
4. Manu Chao, Proxima Estación: Esperanza
5. Radiohead, Amnesiac
6. Low, Things We Lost in the Fire
7. Moldy Peaches, Moldy Peaches
8. Webb Brothers, Maroon
9. Fugu, Fugu 1
10. Tortoise, Standards

EX POST FACTO

Nick Lowe, The Convincer
The Shins, Oh, Inverted World

SINGLES

1. Bob Dylan, “Tweedle Dee & Tweedle Dum”
2. Webb Brothers, “I Can’t Believe You’re Gone”
3. Daryll-Ann, “Surely Justice”
4. White Stripes, “Hotel Yorba”
5. Rapture, “Out of the Races and Onto the Tracks”
6. Pink, “Get the Party Started”
7. Teenage Fanclub, “Dumb Dumb Dumb”
8. Daniel Johnston, “Funeral Girl”
9. Neil Young, “Imagine”
10. Peaches, “Fuck the Pain Away”