Nickell’s Bag

In Friday’s Missoulian, we’ll be running the “Albums of the Decade” picks of a whole bunch of local folks, including Wantage Records founder Josh Vanek and Pearl Jam bassist Jeff Ament. I also took it upon myself to compile my own best-of-the-decade list. It was a daunting challenge, and I imagine it’ll only confirm the suspicions of some that I have strange tastes. I don’t claim to have a line on objectivity; quite the contrary, this is my attempt at sharing what moves me at the most personal level.

Today, I’ll share my closest runners-up to that list — my 11th-20th favorite albums of the decade — along with a little background that might give context to my tastes. On Friday, I’ll post up the top 10. I’ll also take a specific look at some albums by local bands that have managed to find a permanent home in my record collection.

After wasting away most of my teen years as a pop-music junkie in the 1980s, I spent the entirety of the 1990s immersed in classical music, to the exclusion of pretty much everything else. Then, at the end of 1999, my brother gave me a homespun mix CD that launched me on an entirely new trajectory as a listener, introducing me to some of the best and most influential rock, hip-hop, alternative, and electronic music of the 90s.

Since then, I’ve spent the decade catching up, as it were, to the music of the moment. I can’t claim to have heard even a decent fraction of the music released in that time; this has, after all, been the decade of homemade digital recordings, Napster, Myspace, iTunes and Pandora – technological watersheds that have conspired to completely change the breadth of the music we can access right from home, and the means by which we access them.

In that sense, even the idea of compiling a best-of-decade list of albums seems somewhat dubious: Who listens to albums anymore?

Well, I do, for one. Get this: I even still buy them in hard copy. I guess I’ll never catch up.

Anyway, if nothing else it’s a fun personal exercise to recall the albums that have stuck in my CD player and haunted my ears the most over the past ten years.

So with all that said, here starts the countdown, with #11-20:

20. Black Keys: “Attack & Release”

I’m generally not a fan of straight-ahead rock ‘n’ roll; my ears yearn for newness, which is not a hallmark of the genre anymore. But with help from producer Danger Mouse, the Black Keys created an album that broods and burns with the kind of carefree rebellion that undermines any quibbles about originality. With the quivering, vulnerable vocals of Dan Auerbach set against a dark backdrop of face-meltingly overdriven guitars and crashing drums, songs like “Strange Times” manage to make even this jaded, balding middle-aged guy pump a fist or two.

19. J.S. Bach: “Six Sonatas & Partitas for Violin Solo,” played by Lara St. John

St. John’s record company tries to sell her albums with sex appeal. If you’ve got it, flaunt it, I suppose; but these recordings are a revelation that’s more than skin-deep. St. John plays with an uncanny balance of naïve discovery and wizened insight. As to the music, it has remained at the core of the violin repertoire for more than 250 years. Enough said.

18. Ben Sollee: “Learning to Bend”

Sollee plays an instrument that few of us associate with solo pop music: the cello. But as he strums and plucks his instrument, you’re bound to forget how unusual it is – especially when he starts to sing, and your heart melts. Blessed with a golden voice that’s hauntingly reminiscent of Marvin Gaye, Sollee belies his age (he’s 24) and his classical background throughout this alternately folky, rocking, and soulful album.

17. Iron & Wine: “Our Endless Numbered Days”

Parallel to the rise of studio-as-instrument, glitched-out, electronica-soaked rock, this has been a remarkable decade for stripped-down, melody-driven folk music. Fleet Foxes, Bon Iver, Magnolia Electric Company, Joanna Newsom – there’s a long list of great stuff there. Alongside Bonnie Prince Billy’s “Master and Everyone,” this album stands out. Any album that echoes Nick Drake and Joni Mitchell without copying them can’t be bad. Dreamy, poignant, unabashedly beautiful folk music that somehow manages to feel completely current; and there’s not a bad track on the album.

16. Mountain Goats – “We Shall All Be Healed”

What’s with all the awesome animal-named bands these days? Grizzly Bear, Band of Horses, Andrew Bird, the Duhks (pronounced ‘ducks,’ so we’ll count it), the Doves, Animal Collective…It’s a zoo out there. Songwriter John Darnielle crafted this understated masterpiece out of surreal intuition and jittery apocalyptic angst. I’m not sure what he’s talking about when he croons, “The men were here to get your Belgian things / They’ll store them for you in an airplane hangar” – and yet the image sticks in my head long after the disc stops spinning.

15. Lily Allen – “Alright, Still”

It seems like Amy Winehouse gets all the love when it comes to foul-mouthed, sharp-tongued, scantily clad Brit-pop starlets. This album may not have a single track as good as “Rehab,” but end-to-end it’s a better record, blending sunny pop confections with clever lyrics and a few surprisingly daring musical turns. “Alfie” isn’t just cute; it’s a skewering march for the post-slacker generation.

14. DJ Food – “Kaleidoscope”

I’d recommend it for just one tune, the patchwork pool-ball riff, “The Break.” But then there’s the creepy fantasia, “”The Ageing Young Rebel,” and the aptly-named “The Riff,” and a whole bunch of other tunes that’ll finally convince you (if convincing you need) that DJs can be every bit as musical and mad-skilled as the other great musicians of history.

13. Kronos Quartet: “Nuevo”

The Kronos Quartet has been widely (if begrudgingly) respected in classical circles for decades for its unflinching devotion to cutting-edge modern music. But it wasn’t until the new millennium that the string quartet finally managed to put together an album that makes that music seem truly relevant, vibrant, and downright fun. “El Llorar” is a tequila-shot Mexican yodel that’ll bring tears of joy to your eyes; “Sensemaya” will totally creep you out; and the gorgeous romantic melody of “Perfidia” will blow your mind all the more when you realize it’s played by a guy blowing on a piece of grass.

12. Bjork: “Medulla”

The Icelandic siren has made more accessible albums, and perhaps better albums. But who else can claim to have made an album that sounds a decade ahead of its time, out of almost nothing but human voices? “Mouth’s Cradle,” with its clouds of choral harmonies and throbbing scat-tronica beat, is a soaring anthem that literally invites you into Bjork’s mouth, and mind. Go there.

11. Coldplay: “Parachutes”

None of us want to admit that this album totally got stuck in our heads for way too long. C’mon now, complete the phrase: “Look at the stars, see how they…”

*****

As I said way up top, tomorrow I’ll share my top 10 of the decade. In the meantime, you can vote for your own picks through this handy-dandy poll, or leave your comments below….

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