An Ear For An Era: 2001

A Space Odyssey. Still the first thing I think of when I hear "2001." Even though experiencing it first hand it didn't feel like science fiction. It was an incredibly transformative year for me personally and for the country and the world, for better or worse. At the time it just felt like life was happening. The expected (going to college, hanging out with my same friends), the unexpected, I just took it as it came. Lived in the moment as I felt necessary.

I'm not sure what I'm getting at here. I just feel obligated to make this a pretty reflective piece for 2001.

It was so long ago when I listened to this stuff. Or about a month. I just took a long break before writing this. We'll see how it goes. It's really just guideposts for things that have always been in my head for years.

Like Radiohead's Amnesiac. Silly enough, this was my first Radiohead album. I think. If I remember correctly. Best Buy or someone had a deal that if you got Amnesiac you'd get half price on another Radiohead album or something, and I think I also got OK Computer.  But I liked Amnesiac quite a bit pretty quickly, particularly the driving beats on "I Might Be Wrong." The closest link to punk I could find, even though it was miles away from everything else I listened to at the time.

Electroclash was starting to gain steam in 2001, not that I would have known/cared about it at the time. A few years later I'd get way into it for about a year though. Miss Kittin & The Hacker's First Album was a great dance party with all the appropriate filthy/sexy songs that just turn the party up that much more. And "La La Land" by Green Velvet would be one of my favorite songs in 2005 dance mode. Finally (not really electroclash but dancy), the self-titled debut from !!! had "Intensify" which is still probably my favorite live song by them.


Remember those "The" bands? They were supposedly saving rock and roll or something? I saw it as a stupid thing at the time, they were not original, they were just playing garage rock. And rock and roll didn't need saving. I'd been listening to rock and roll for quite some time, punk rock for about 5 years at this point and it was doing just fine. So I saw through the BS that MTV was trying to feed me. The Strokes? You gotta be kidding me. The dude just got a record deal because he's related to someone important. I think. I eventually did cave, YEARS and YEARS later, and got Is This It. It's a decent record. Maybe above decent. The media just turned me off to them before I could have given them a chance at being relevant to me.

The same thing happened to me with The White Stripes. Another damn "The" band thinking they are so cool with their costumes! What about music? Focus on your music, not your image! Of course, the music on White Blood Cells is some of the greatest music created this century so I really must have given them no chance at all. I probably only heard "Fell in Love with a Girl" and assumed they were just another Strokes-type band. Oh, the years I wasted not listening to The White Stripes. This has since become one of my favorites if you can't tell.

Gorillaz got quite popular in their own way. I was dating a girl obsessed with Blur so she was also into Gorillaz. I couldn't really get the appeal, although it would be pretty soon after this that I'd discover how awesome Del the Funky Homosapien is. But that album, I like it quite a bit in retrospect.

What I was into was indie rock! Built to Spill, yo! I remember a bunch of hipsters (before those were a thing everybody hates) were in my dorm cafeteria sitting within earshot. They were talking about Modest Mouse and Built to Spill and I thought, "Wow! Somebody else knows about these bands!" I did not go talk to them because I still thought I was cooler than them and/or not cool enough for them. One of the dudes ended up being in a couple of my film classes though. Anyway, Ancient Melodies of the Future is a pretty good title for an album put out in 2001. Especially for something you're listening to in 2015. I don't know, my main memory of Built to Spill is putting this song on pretty much every mix CD I made for anyone from 2001-2005.

Built to Spill "The Weather"

Former (and current) Pixie Frank Black put out an album with The Catholics called Dog In The Sand. I remember seeing a postcard thing for the album at Albums on the Hill when I visited Boulder for some reason (before going to college). I eventually got the album but one song I heard early, I think from illegal downloading way back when, "If It Takes All Night" has stuck with me for the past 14 years as a favorite.

I remember the day Fugazi's last album The Argument came out. Because that was the day in college I went to Wax Trax after class to pick it up. And the accompanying Furniture EP, of course. You know, 2001 was also the year I saw Fugazi. I turned 18 in 2001 and they played in Denver the night before my birthday. So I hit midnight on my 18th birthday in the front row of the Ogden Theater listening to maybe the most legendary band of my youth. Unfortunately, the Fugazi Live Series has not posted that show yet. I was hoping it'd be up before I listened to 2001! Anyway, that was an amazing life experience. What to say about the album though? Who knew it would be their last? It is as epic as anything else they did, so it's a fitting farewell. I just want more, always.


The Hip Hop:
Word of Mouf was a great continuation of the fun and silly Ludacris I liked so much a little later. Jay-Z and Nas had quite the words for each other on their respective releases. I liked Jay-Z's better. The Blueprint is pretty classic and in addition to "The Takeover" it has my favorite Eminem song, his collaboration with Hova called "Renegade." But you probably already know that song. Oh, and Dilated Peoples' Expansion Team was fantastic. I only recently acquired that one so I'd only known "Worst Comes to Worst" before this.


Remember in the last entry when I explained my thoughts on Suicide Machines' self-titled album that angered me so? I think some of that anger pushed me to be overly judgmental of another of my favorite bands. Asian Man Records has always had a policy of supporting their artists as they get too big for such a tiny label and need to move on. But when Alkaline Trio moved to Vagrant Records, I was pretty furious. This was a band I took VERY personally, because they had spoken to me on such a personal level at a critical time in my development. So the idea of having to share them with people not cool enough to track them down on their own made me pretty sad. But I also like to think I gave them a chance. When the track listing for From Here to Infirmary came out, I remember just being so excited about the prospect of Dan singing a song called "Crawl" or Matt singing one called "You're Dead." But then the album came out. And I hated it. When, to be fair, I probably should have only liked it a little less than Maybe I'll Catch Fire. But "Stupid Kid" was all over MTV and some of those songs were just not up to par lyrically. When you have to have the lyrics "In case you're wondering we're singing about growing up..." then maybe you're either being too cryptic otherwise or you don't think too highly of your audience's ability to understand a song. Anyway, listening to the album in 2015 I realized it's pretty decent. It's got some good songs on it. They couldn't just keep making Goddamnit.

On the other hand, related band The Lawrence Arms continued their ascent into my heart with a split EP with The Chinkees called Present Day Memories. The four Lawrence Arms songs instantly became some of my favorites, so perfectly expressing the exasperation of loneliness and laziness and not finding your way out. Only The Lawrence Arms could speak so boldly with a sigh in a song...

The Lawrence Arms "Hey, What Time is 'Pensacola: Wings of Gold' on Anyway?"

And the triptych concludes with The Honor System. 100% Synthetic sees them moving a little away from the Broadways influence and rocking just a little bit harder without sacrificing any of the passion that made them great.

Cursive was in between their two great albums so of course they put out their great EP Burst and Bloom. "Sink to the Beat" is my go-to when I want to convert someone to the greatness that is Cursive. So I'll play it for you now in case you didn't know and feel the need to know.

 Cursive "Sink to the Beat"

The final album by The Wunder Years was an EP recorded in Fort Collins. I have to credit The Blasting Room for bringing so many great bands through our small city outside of Denver, providing many great memories and making so many records feel all that more personal, knowing they were recorded in my hometown. I think I saw The Wunder Years three times. One of the times was at The Back Alley, a tiny venue that didn't last long but was my favorite venue while it was around. Have I already told this story? I don't know. It looked like it was a 21+ show so I emailed the band asking about it because I was only 17 or 18 or so. He wrote back saying I should be able to get in. I went and I got in. And he found me and somehow knew I was the one that had written (maybe I was obviously the youngest person there?) and asked if I got in okay. What a guy! Anyway, Function Over Fashion is a great final word to go out on for The Wunder Years as well as a look into the future of Brian's next band The Ghost. Just a harder take on things with that much passion.

The Smoking Popes' final album was full of covers and pretty good. But my interest gravitated toward former Smoking Popes guitarist Tom Daily. First I heard him cover their rarity "First Time" and just destroyed it. Will never get over that version. Then I ran across his album The Burlington Northern, which quietly became one of my favorite albums. Something I can't really relate to with anyone, because I don't think any of my friends really listened to him. I got one friend to enjoy "What's It Like?" by putting it on a mix (and I think I also played "First Time" for him) but beyond that, this is my own personal treasure. It feels like a very personal record filtered through lots of digital effects that aren't meant to cover anything up, but rather bring you in. Pique your curiosity with some echoes here or there but bring you in with some straightforward melodies and lyrics. I guess it's my original, personal version of The Postal Service.

Another former Smoking Pope (and Alkaline Trio drummer at the time) Mike Felumlee took part in a message board I posted to and founded an awesome record label, and I became a fan. He put out an album called 64 Hours and it was a great collection of Smoking Popes-style pop with his own personal take.

I guess Beulah fits here because indie pop or whatever. The Coast Is Never Clear was their best album in my opinion, a great combination of cynical lyrics and Beach Boys-meets-90s-indie-pop music. References to Stephin Merritt. It's just so upbeat and good sounding to deliver such hatred, it's a wonderful thing. La la life sucks! Perfect for me in the early 2000s.

What can I say about Polysics? I have to say something about Polysics. When I first heard them it was on an Asian Man Records compilation and I didn't care for them. Too weird somehow for me in 2001. Even though I was way into weird in 2001. It didn't take me too long to get curious enough to listen some more though, because as "too weird" as it was it still had me curious. I think my friends learning and doing a goofy dance to it helped. So anyway, eventually I just went for it and got their first album (to be released in America) called Hey! Bob! My Friend! and I haven't looked back. They idolize Devo, they play a similar new wavy type music with a ton of energy. Perfect for freakin' out squares and going crazy over.

And I'll end it with some ska. Acoustic ska. Chris Murray from King Apparatus put out a simple solo album on Asian Man Records called 4-Trackaganza! I quite enjoyed it but it came to mean so much more to me. Early in the morning on September 11th, I was in my dorm when the phone rang. My roommate had gone to class but his sister called and I answered it. I don't remember the exact conversation, other than her telling me that we were "under attack" and to turn on the TV and that a plane had gone down near "the 'Burgh" (he was from Pittsburgh) but his family was okay. And I turned on the TV and it was on when he came back to the dorm. I gave him the message from his sister. I don't remember much else. I feel like we were more in disbelief than anything. Not visibly upset, but not knowing what to think or how to feel. It took me days to process what had happened and what was going on around me, all the hatred that was coming out, everyone saying to bomb Afghanistan, all the racist talk that became so rampant. We were inevitably headed for war and beyond my selfish concern about being of age for the draft and being sent there myself (obviously there was no draft), I was just concerned about the direction the world was heading. Then one day on shuffle this song came on and while it didn't make me feel better about anything, it helped articulate my concerns.

Grandma's sewing denim patches on the pants of destiny
at the dawning of an era, watching history repeat
it's lookin' like the easy answer is to blame society for the wars
they were swimming in the ocean 'til they crawled up from the sea
then one day they started dying, 'til the last one disappeared
no they never saw it coming, though the signs were there to see
            -Chris Murray, "Dinosaurs"

Other things:

• The final piece from The Impossibles. 2001 I was in the CU marching band and we went to Austin. We met up with the Texas trombone section and one suggestion was to go see The Impossibles. Unfortunately, us punk rock band geeks got outvoted and we ended up playing a drinking game at some house somewhere. I did not drink. The end of that story. Oh yeah, the piece. 4 Song Brick Bomb. An EP with...4 songs. Great stuff.
• The first Quasi album I got was The Sword of God. It has the song "It's Raining," which might be my favorite of theirs.
• "Crystal Frontier" may have been Calexico's finest achievement.
• I remember "Rockin' The Suburbs" by Ben Folds! That one amused me. Turns out that record has a few great songs on it.
• 2001 was when Adult Swim was getting started on Cartoon Network. My beloved Space Ghost Coast to Coast had an expanding universe with lots of great shows. One of these was The Brak Show (not to be confused with Brak Presents The Brak Show Starring Brak). In one episode, Zorak has something removed from his throat and he ends up having a singing voice not unlike the popular boy bands of the era. All of this is to say I still have the songs from that episode. Zorak singing about kicking your ass. Good stuff.
• Thelema is a nifty little EP by Murder City Devils.
• Amethyst Rock Star is a great intro to Saul Williams and he would turn out to have a big impact on me personally.
• That Pigeon John Is Clueless album is kind of funny in its very Christian messages on a couple songs. I'm glad he toned that down a little later on.
• Perennial favorites Enon put out a collection of loops called On Hold. It was pretty rare but I eventually picked it up at a show. It's pretty great for what it is. I used to think it needed some rappers to rap over some of the tracks on some sort of remix version to give it more exposure, but this last time listening to it I realize it is dynamic and interesting without the aid of others. Just a really cool album.
• Spoon was really finding themselves, but I didn't get into them quite yet. But Girls Can Tell is pretty great, a band that would end up being one of the most consistent in rock.
• The Ex was still amazing all these years later on Dizzy Spells.
• After hearing the song he was featured on on the 6ths album, I had to hear more from Momus. Eventually I tracked down his album Folktronic and paid a pretty penny for it. Must have been an import or something. Most of the album is silly and ephemeral and not really worth listening to much, but there are a couple songs that break through the silliness to reach something profound. "The Lady of Shallot" is a mixtape favorite.
• Rufus Wainwright's Poses is a great, personal, devastating album.

Next Time:
2002! The last palindrome year of our lives! Let's see...Trail of Dead! Early Amy Winehouse stuff! My first hip hop purchase (and favorite for a long long time), Blackalicious! A personal favorite Elvis Costello album! The greatest Enon album! Yoshimi! Perfecting Loneliness! The Lawrence Arms reaffirm my love yet again! Early LCD Soundsystem songs! Talib Kweli! Wilco! Lots of great personal stuff here.

An Ear For An Era: 1999

Let's close out this millennium with style! Swag! Something special! Exclamation points maybe!

1999 was the year I got my driver's license and then broke my leg three days later playing soccer. One thing I remember from that ordeal was that the TV was messed up in my hospital room and so I requested that my parents bring me my discman and the CDs that were in the 6 disc changer in the car. I'd put 6 of my favorites in because duh, I got to drive and I was excited. I know Chumps on Parade was on there, probably Suicide Machines and Skankin' Pickle as well. And probably some Less Than Jake. Etc. Another thing I remember about the ordeal was that I decorated my crutches and walking cast with band stickers. All of this is to emphasize how much skapunk defined this experience for me, music was my life. My own music.

1999 was also the year my brother went to college. We drove down to Arizona with him to help him move in. I don't remember much about that trip except that I must have just gotten the Dan Potthast album Eyeballs right before, because I listened to that CD repeatedly on that trip. I was obsessed with that album. It emphasized the lyrical skills he had, the stories he told with multiple meanings, the clever way he turned a simple story into an analogy about life. And cute love songs, there are plenty of those as well. With Rivers Cuomo/Brian Wilson levels of insecurity. I wrote him a fan letter by hand and sent it in the actual mail and he wrote me back by hand. Such a cool guy that Dan Potthast is! And he's still at it! His band MU330 also put out two albums in '99 because he was so damn prolific in these days. There was a Christmas album that I always put on around Christmas even 15 years later (that wasn't part of this project because I've excluded Christmas music, not wanting to listen to the stuff in January-November) and their self-titled album. I remember this one being new, getting the album at that show I spoke of in a previous entry. The production on it was a little odd, a little lo-fi for MU330, but yet another showcase of Dan P's increasingly personal lyricism.

The Hippos improved when they put out Heads Are Gonna Roll. They shed their Reel Big Fish copping style for a synthy 80s flavored skapunk. Like The Cars meet skapunk. This time I listened to it while running my first half marathon and still really like their cover of "Always Something There to Remind Me."

The next album that came up during the half marathon was Fun in the Dark by Groovie Ghoulies. I don't know why I never got more of their albums because this one has been a favorite of mine for a long time. I always bust it out around Halloween time. It's just perfect spooky-ish pop punk. Spooky in the 50s horror/sci-fi style and pop punk in the 70s Ramones style. I'm glad it came up during October because that was perfect, and I'm glad it came up during the race because it was quite motivating.

One album from this era that I loved at the time and hadn't revisited in a long time but it all came back when I did was Hopeless Romantic by The Bouncing Souls. In '99 I enjoyed the earlier Souls records but they were both from a million years ago (i.e. from before I knew about them) and Hopeless Romantic was the one that came out while I was into them. So to me it feels a bit more mature but not too mature. Some sentimental tracks and some fun tracks. "Bullying The Jukebox" takes me right back to the time I saw them with my brother. They were playing with Less Than Jake and we saw them in downtown Denver. My parents dropped us off there and picked us up at Hooters (the only place we could find with a pay phone...remember pay phones??). Anyway, I'm getting off topic. They played and the singer just bounced around stage and it was just so much fun.

Another one I listened to contemporarily was Weird Al's Running With Scissors. This was a weird one for me but also the perfect one for me at the time. I had just enough exposure to mainstream music at the time to know and understand what he was parodying, and enough hatred for mainstream music at the time to laugh at it. Maybe too much hatred and too much laughter. But I really did hate that Offspring song "Pretty Fly for a White Guy" so I doubly appreciated Weird Al mocking it. It was also funny when the Backstreet Boys were in the polka and my little sister's friend got mad about it, "he can't be allowed to do that!!" I think this was the one where he shaved his mustache too, so it kind of signifies the second era of Weird Al or something. Where he was contemporary to me, up to date, and relevant. Yes, those all kind of mean the same thing.

After The Broadways (about whom I wrote very lovingly if you will recall), The Lawrence Arms formed and put out their debut album A Guided Tour of Chicago, featuring two of the members of The Broadways. The Lawrence Arms would soon become my favorite band for several years and are still up there. The debut was a lot more lo-fi than anything else they would do, and that made it feel like a step back from The Broadways at first. Some political songs, some songs of self loathing, it's a decent collection but their second album (coming up in 2000!) is where it's at.

Their peers Alkaline Trio put out their most solid release of all in 1999, the I Lied My Face Off EP. Four songs, all four stars or more in my ratings. Two Matt songs, two Dan songs. They were just on the top of their game, with Matt getting more poetic and Dan reaching the pinnacle of his angry side.

Alkaline Trio "This Is Getting Over You"

It was my college days when I got knee-deep in this melodic punk/"emo" stuff and Piebald was one of my favorite groups in those days. If It Weren't For Venitian Blinds It'd Be Curtains For Us All is probably their best one. I remember seeing them live and how awesomely unkempt the singer's appearance was, all with a white t-shirt and messy hair and scruffy face, and thinking of how awesome that was. Such beautiful music coming from someone who looked like he just walked in off the street. Maybe that's why I always let myself go in the facial (and head) hair department(s). Look up the song "Fat and Skinny Asses" though, because that's the good stuff.

I lost track (and then re-gained very recently) of Brian Moss, the singer for many projects over the years, starting with The Wunder Years. They had a couple releases in 1999. One was a split CD with Sorry About The Fire called On Behalf of Rock n Roll. It's decent, and I love the first track "You Know Who You Are" but the other album is one of those all-time favorites, Pitstops on the Road Less Traveled. Just an album of motivational songs for a high school kid, delivered with high amounts of passion. I hadn't listened to this album in a long time and of course it was another one of those where it came on and I was immediately singing along, remembering those days.

The only cure for cynicism is optimism. Or something like that. In the early '00s I was all down because my girlfriend had broken up with me and I listened to lots of that pseudo-emo stuff (and some real emo stuff!). I went to a show at Tulagi's in Boulder and Dressy Bessy opened (or maybe who I was seeing opened for Dressy Bessy?) I went by myself and I don't even remember who I was there to see. Because the thing that turned me around, changed my life in a way because it was what told me it would all be okay, was this Dressy Bessy set. Just some pure pop sugar to turn me around and show me that it will be okay. Optimism without sounding like something trying to tell me to be happy when I was not happy. I must have just been ready for it. I bought their CD Pink Hearts Yellow Moons and it's always been there for me since then.

Dressy Bessy "If You Should Try to Kiss Her"

Jim O'Rourke put out two amazing releases in 1999. The first was Eureka, and I don't know how to explain how brilliant it is. I'm sure others have been successful at that. But I just think it makes me feel good. It's comforting and the right kind of sad at the right moments. I think "Movie On The Way Down" is what exemplifies it for me, as it reminds me of the scene in Love Liza that uses it. Just the composition and the words it uses. The drunkenness of the horns. How it stumbles around in sadness.

Jim O'Rourke "Movie on the Way Down"

Keep it Like a Secret is arguably the best Built to Spill album. I think I might prefer some of their others, but they scaled back on the jamminess of Perfect from Now On without losing its technical brilliance. Pop music with respectability. Very 90s indie rock. The end of 90s indie rock?

Where do I fit Tom Waits into here? Mule Variations is yet another brilliant work by him, maybe even more brilliant than most of his other work. It starts off lo-fi-ish and pushes out from there. His blues songs have always been on point and the chaos around him splashing around, not overtaking the power of his vocals. I kind of hope one day to have a child listen to this with me and sing along with "Cold Water."

I didn't get into the Flaming Lips until a bit later than '99, even though I know my friend was a fan. But in retrospect, yes, The Soft Bulletin is one of the greatest albums of 1999. Full of songs of hope and hopelessness but trying. Just doing our best and it not being enough. It's sad but from a perspective of persistence. And selflessness. It wasn't until around 2006 that I saw this video but it is just so touching and everything I love about this album contained in a clip.

The Flaming Lips "Waitin' for a Superman"

Notice I called The Soft Bulletin "one of the greatest albums of 1999." That's because, without question, the BEST album of 1999 was a three-CD collection of 69 Love Songs by The Magnetic Fields. Sometimes an artist just has a time period where everything they do sounds just perfect, they're just tapped into this something. And Stephin Merritt took advantage of that by letting it all pour out over 69 damn songs. Sure there's filler, but it's barely any. Just a few silly songs like "Punk Rock Love," a repeating of the lyrics "Punk rock love punk love, punk love love..." Otherwise though, these are completely solid and overwhelming. Romantic, hopeful, sad, sadder, funny, and all very clever. Several perfect songs, as far as I'm concerned. My wife thought "Papa Was a Rodeo" was a cover of an old country song, and I have to think that's because it's so timeless now it's hard to imagine it being new ever. Like that line from Inside Llewyn Davis, that blues songs were "never new and never get old." My friend introduced me to the band with the song "The Luckiest Guy on the Lower East Side," which was funny and true and full of longing and sadness in a happy song. But the first song I actually ever heard by them was the result of grabbing a bunch of songs off a file sharing program in college. I didn't know what to think of it at the time, it wasn't really "rock" so why was it in the "indie rock" section? It sounded like an old song (as usual) and it stuck with me until I eventually figured out who this band was and put the song into context. And eventually, that was the song I danced with my wife to as our first dance at our wedding. No, not "The Book of Love," which everyone uses (even people who don't know who Stephin Merritt is!). This one. Simple but perfect, obvious but not too obvious. A song I love to associate with my marriage.

The Magnetic Fields "Nothing Matters When We're Dancing"

Other Stuff:

• Jay-Z's album Vol. 3...Life and Times of S. Carter is okay. It's got "Big Pimpin'" on it.
• The debut of !!! and sister group Out Hud was seen on their split EP Lab Remix Series Vol. 2. Very promising (and knowing history, both bands would turn out to be killer)
• Goodnight Pavement, Terror Twilight was their final album I believe.
• Fat Wreck put out a compilation of 101 30 second songs called Short Songs for Short People. I remember liking it for a few reasons. It introduced me to lots of bands. Blink-182 had a very profane song on it as did MTX. I don't know if anything else really stood out to me other than stuff like "hey cool a Rancid song!" and stuff like that.
• Eminem. The Slim Shady LP. I hated him at the time as a crusader against rap and as a budding crusader against homophobia. But why him specifically? Not sure. 
• Fifteen kind of entered that phase of their career of being super political and more about that than the music with Lucky. But it's heartfelt enough that I still find it somewhat endearing. And at the time I loved it because it was more lessons for me in leftist thought. 
• Beck's all super funky and such on Midnite Vultures.
• I only have a couple songs off The Faint's Blank-Wave Arcade but they are pretty great.
• AFI went all goth/dark/whatever on Black Sails in the Sunset, and at the time I dug it. Not super memorable though, 15 years later.
• The Roots were still awesome duh.
• Dr. Dooom killed Dr. Octagon. I like those Dr. Dooom records. No chorus. Really stupid album artwork. And rhymin' like only Keith can do.
• The first Hank Williams III album Risin' Outlaw is a great showcase of his vocals sounding just like his granddad's. Just a small hint of the way he would blow up the whole country music genre in a bit, it's pretty traditional but quite enjoyable.
• ODB! Got Your Money!
• The White Stripes' debut. I'll save my thoughts on them for a couple albums down the line. But it's good stuff.
• I liked a couple songs on the debut Common Rider album Last Wave Rockers. A different side of the OPIV singer, I kind of liked the songs he rapped on and remember thinking "this is the kind of rap I can appreciate." In retrospect, that was very silly of me.
• Sigur Ros, that stuff's pretty dreamy isn't it?
• More hip hop brilliance: Mos Def's debut album Black on Both Sides was quite the manifesto and a great start (not counting the already brilliant Black Star of course) and Handsome Boy Modeling School's debut So...How's Your Girl? was a nice collection of beats by two of the all-stars of hip hop at the time. With some fantastic guest spots from like likes of Del and El-P.
• Gah Les Savy Fav was great too!
• No Division was a Hot Water Music album I never got myself, but I always wanted to because I have two songs off it and they are probably my favorite HWM songs, "Free Radio Gainesville" and "Rooftops."
• And finally, the debut LP by Blackalicious Nia. Who knew that in a couple years I would discover this group and my entire perspective on hip hop would change? I probably would have actually liked this in '99 if I'd heard it. Very apparent skills on the mic, smart lyrics expressing the same thoughts I've always had, it's just a fantastic album.

Next Time: in the year 2000........(insert your favorite Conan joke here)

Aesop Rock, Alkaline Trio, At The Drive-In...and other letters besides A! Common and Cursive put out some of their best work, Deltron is appropriately futuristic, Enon, The Honor System are the flipside of that Broadways breakup, and my favorite Lawrence Arms album by the way, Ludacris, New Pornographers, Nina Nastasia, Reflection Eternal, Shellac, I get betrayed by The Suicide Machines, Weakerthans, other stuff. 

An Ear For An Era: 1998

Wow, 1998 was a good one! Maybe I can call it my personal 1997 (going by that oft discussed theory of the '7s). A great concentration of my favorite albums of the 90s occurred in 1998 so I'm going to focus on those. A banner year in music...for the underground at least. I'm pretty sure there were some pretty terrible things being done to music in the mainstream. In 1998 I was learning to ignore that and dove in to some great things that many people didn't know about.

We'll go by the general order in which I discovered things. Which means we'll start out with ska/punk. Battle Hymns by Suicide Machines was my first "punk" album when I actually knew what punk was (meaning not counting The Offspring or Green Day). I went from skapunk to wanting to get some "pure punk" and even though there is ska on Battle Hymns it seemed close enough at the time. The longest track on the album is 2:19. Just an album full of short bursts of energy. Politics and punk and a tiny bit of ska but not as much as their previous album. I remember seeing them on the Fourth of July 1998. It was high energy show and the singer handed me his Gatorade to pass around. Then we took the bus to City Park to watch fireworks. Good year, that.

The very first time I went to a record store the day an album came out was for Less Than Jake's Hello Rockview. I probably took the bus because there was a bus stop right by Rocks Off Records. Or maybe it was when Tribal Rites had a record store. That was on the same block. But buses were free for minors like myself so I loved taking that bus downtown. On a Tuesday I showed up after school. I had to ask about it because it wasn't on the shelf. The guy said they just got these boxes in. He opened one up and there it was! I was probably the first person in Fort Collins to buy Hello Rockview! Buying albums the day they came out became quite a hobby for me over the years that I still follow pretty regularly (the last year or two I've slowed down on that just because this project means I can't really listen to it for a week or two anyway). However, I remember the music being fairly disappointing. I liked the energy but the production just seemed like overkill to me. The horns seemed almost synthesized. I know I'm in the minority about this album and it's a fan favorite but it was really the beginning of the end for me and skapunk. It's funny that most of my favorite ska/punk albums are from the years leading up to me listening to it, and then when I was into it most of the stuff that came out was inferior to the glorious 1994-1996 stuff.

One major exception to this was Slow Gherkin. Shed Some Skin may have been the last great skapunk album. Not that that genre fits it particularly well. More like a mix of two-tone ska and Weezer-esque rock. Whatever you call it, I loved it and I still love it; it's much more consistent than their debut. They figured out their sound here and put so much passion into it. Later I wanted to use the title track as my "personal" high school graduation song because the class' song was something stupid. In retrospect, it'd serve better as a high school reunion song because it's about going away and growing up and coming back. Anyway, this album was also the general timeline of the most unbelievable memory of any show I've ever been to. I was at this one with my friends this time, and we spent some time haggling with the band on the price of the CDs at the show (which in retrospect was kind of mean of us, sure we could get them cheaper from Asian Man but the band needs help on the road NOW!) and then while they were playing the craziest thing EVER EVER EVER happened to me. It seems like a dream. We were on the right side of the stage, front row, right in front of the valve trombonist. I think his name was Matt. During an instrumental break he actually HANDED THE TROMBONE TO ME. I picked it up and I PLAYED WITH SLOW GHERKIN! I HAD A SOLO! WHAT?!?!?!?! Thinking back, I kind of wonder if that was on purpose or he was just putting it down and I took it from him. But how would I assume he was handing it to me unless he was being obvious about it? He had to have been. I don't remember if I'd talked to him about trombone before the show, but how else did this happen? How else would he know I kind of knew how to play? Was it a dream? I believe it really actually happened.

And back to punk rock. I know I'm not being fair but that first Dropkick Murphys album Do or Die holds a special place in my heart more than anything they've done since. I didn't even drink back then and I loved these drinking anthems! The deep appreciation to the hard working union man, fighting against oppression and incorrect assumptions, and just being rowdy. Here is my favorite drinking song.

The Dropkick Murphys "Barroom Hero"

Refused put out their final statement in The Shape of Punk to Come and lived up to the audacious title. The use of electronic beats, jazz, and a whole lot of other things serves well to further intensify the hardcore punk that screams out of the speakers from behind every corner. It's like a good horror movie where the moments of calm are there to build tension and make the jump scenes that much more effective. And the whole thing turns on a dime, shifting rhythms and hitting harder than anything.

Refused "The Deadly Rhythm"

Oh, what's that? My favorite album or at least nearly my favorite album of all time? Broken Star by The Broadways. No question about it. Now. How do I explain this? The Broadways took highly political subject matter and made it highly personal. Three distinctive voices with three perspectives, different styles of lyrics, brought together in such a cohesive, infectious way. The music itself was deep, complex, comforting, and aggravating all at the same time. Brendan's overtly political listen-to-what-I-just-read-about style, Dan's lamenting of a world that has gone the way of commercialism, and Chris' personal struggles to deal with such a place. It's an unspoken narrative. It's three overlapping parts that tell an overall story of this world and how we deal with it and where it's been and where it's going. Without trying. It's a bunch of punk rock songs. But it's bigger, so much bigger than all this...here's the one song that combines each vocalist/lyricist to hopefully kind of demonstrate what I'm talking about. But to really get it, you need to listen to this record. Over and over again.

The Broadways "I Hear Things Are Just as Bad Down in Lake Erie"

I admit that I didn't get Alkaline Trio's debut LP Goddamnit in 1998 when it came out. This was a time when mailorder from Asian Man Records was one of my favorite things in the world but the curse word in the title made it hard to navigate sneaking it by my parents. The funny thing now is that when the 10 year anniversary remaster came out they got it for me for my birthday without me even mentioning wanting it. But here's my history with Alkaline Trio way back then. They were on a tour with MU330 and stopped by Fort Collins. Even back then I was going to shows by myself because I didn't have any friends there and while I was waiting for the show to start some dudes invited me to play pool with them. I was pretty terrible but what do they expect, asking some kid? But it was fun. I ended up losing by scratching on an 8 ball shot. Anyway, while all that was going on apparently Alkaline Trio was playing and I totally missed it. I would soon regret that (but I was there to see MU330 anyway). When their second album came out I got that and then came back around to Goddamnit. And then that became one of my favorite albums ever. Heart-on-your-sleeve punk rock got me through some tough times and I go back every once in a while. I really love this early Alkaline Trio stuff for its insane drum fills, clever lyrics, repeating motifs, and extended codas. It's a good formula that served them well.

Alkaline Trio "San Francisco"

Jets to Brazil's debut album Orange Rhyming Dictionary kind of cleaned the slate of any sour impressions people had of the last Jawbreaker album because while it had some similarities (particularly Blake's cleaned up vocals), the passionate lyrics and just plain beautiful songs opened up a whole new world of possibilities. This is not Jawbreaker. This is nothing like Jawbreaker. This is a new project and it has pretty songs.

I think I discovered Neutral Milk Hotel in college when I pretty much discovered every indie rock band. Because of music downloading sites. I forget what the one was called that I used, but one night I just went through the first 20 pages or so of most popular "indie" bands and downloaded a song by each of them. "In the Aeroplane Over the Sea" became a favorite. It took me a while to actually acquire the album (also called In the Aeroplane Over the Sea) but it was easy to listen to that one on repeat. Kind of a precursor to some other now very successful indie bands, particularly The Decemberists. Literary, passionate, easy, catchy.

I have no segue to switch over to hip hop.

I shamefully haven't listened to Aquemini by Outkast nearly enough to say much about it, but it is quite an incredible album. They pretty much could do no wrong. Moment of Truth is another great Gang Starr album and includes my introduction to them, "You Know My Steez." Thanks to my friend with a very extensive hip hop knowledge I discovered one of my favorite MCs. I remember Hello Nasty by The Beastie Boys had some fun videos and got a lot of praise. I didn't pay much attention to that at the time but it is yet another great one by them. One girl that liked the same ska bands as me insisted that Lauryn Hill was better than I was giving hip hop credit for. But I just would not listen, even though I think it contradicted every argument I had about hip hop being bad. But ok, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill is a pretty great album, I'll give you that finally after all these years.

And one of my favorite hip hop albums of all time, probably my favorite hip hop album of the 90s, came out in 1998. It took me a while to come around to these guys but everything about Black Star is amazing. Hi-Tek's (and others') beats, Talib Kweli's and Mos Def's next-next-next-level flows and wordplay, the energy and the love, it all comes together in such a ridiculously good way.

Black Star "Definition"

Other things:

• Mutations by Beck was another good one by Beck.
• Massive Attack, Fatboy Slim, and Air were pretty good there too.
• The two songs I have off Deserter's Songs by Mercury Rev are fantastic and I wish I had the full album!
• It's a bit rough listening to a full 25 song album by Wesley Willis but I made it through! The highlight of course was "Cut The Mullet."
• Remember that video for "Rabbit In Your Headlights" by UNKLE featuring Thom Yorke?
• The soundtrack to Velvet Goldmine is pretty golden. Awesome throwback to the glam era featuring Shudder to Think and Thom Yorke and others!
• Empty Bottles Broken Hearts by Murder City Devils is very great, but maybe not quite up there with their self-titled album from '97.
• Featuring "Birds" by Quasi was on my radar to check out for a long time, and then I finally got it and have only listened to it a few times. Turns out I'm not as into them as I thought. Still good though.
• Jay-Z Vol. 2 ... Hard Knock Life.
• I used to think End Hits was the last Fugazi album and they had broken up. Or some sort of collection of songs from the end of their tenure and they had broken up. How exciting it was when they put out another album a couple years later! But that seems to have been it.
• Electro-Shock Blues may be Eels' best album. Very personal. I love that song "Climbing to the Moon."
• The Ex - Starters Alternators. Still pushing forward 20 years into their career (and this was 16 years ago!)
• Interesting to hear feuding tracks between Hepcat and Skinnerbox...
• The Boy With The Arab Strap is another great Belle & Sebastian album guys.
• Elliott Smith was still good. xo was very good.
• Early Calexico effort The Black Light has "Trigger" on it so you know they started strong.
• Pulp. This is Hardcore. I remember the album cover from way before I ever heard the album. Provocative! The album itself? Also provocative! I like Pitchfork's description of it as a "hangover" album after their last one.

Next Time:

We close out the 20th century so let's party! Sigur Ros, Alkaline Trio's amazing EP, Beck goes funky, Built to Spill's maybe best, Dr. Dooom, Slim Shady, The Soft Bulletin, Handsome Boy Modeling School, Hank III, 69 Love Songs, Mos Def solo, The Decline, Out Hud/!!!, Pavement bows out, The Roots, and another classic from "Weird Al" Yankovic.