2020 Album Highlights:
Written by Dave Konstantino
Tough Age – Which Way Am I?
Describing their music as “culmination rock" fusing elements of surf, garage, punk and indie pop, Toronto’s Tough Age released their fourth full-length album Which Way Am I? on Mint Records in August 2020. Tough Age is made up of singer/guitarist Jarrett Samson, Penny Clark on bass/vocals and Jesse Locke on drums. Musically the album draws from the sonic textures of indie bands such as The Clean, The Chills, The Bats and other early New Zealand bands on the Flying Nun record label. In addition to this there are other musical signifiers such as Sonic Youth, Television and The Feelies. Lyrically, the songs are very introspective, that often question and contradict at the same time. “Self-Confidence” opens Which Way Am I? With scratchy guitars, driving bass and steady, yet explosive drum patterns, this song opens with the question many people in the arts find themselves in “Here we are back on track/Anyone still looking?” The song questions being a band in the modern age of Internet streaming with Samson’s own sense of wit and humour. “Penny Current Suppression Ring” comes in as track two on Which Way Am I? Sung by bassist Penny Clark, this song with lyrics that poke fun at Samson’s obsession with New Zealand Flying Nun bands. The song thrives with energy and influences of bands such as Eddy Current Suppression Ring (who are from Australia, not New Zealand). Like many of the songs on this album, more than one thought runs through it. This song also poses the question what success would mean in order to be happy. Which Way Am I? is just one of those albums that you can’t really describe why it affects you so much. The way that this three piece plays together on this album projects an energy and mesmerizing cohesion. Maybe that’s it? Whatever it is, Which Way Am I? creates its own sonic landscape that swirls with different lyrical and musical textures that are intense at times, but also thrilling and addictive.
Recommended Tracks: “Self-Confidence”, “Penny Current Suppression Ring”, “Consequences”
Teenanger – Good Time
Put out through Telephone Explosion Records, Good Time is a lean record that wields a large burst of creative energy. “Beige” starts off Good Time. With its watery guitar, bass that treads with strong melodies, intense feedback and drums that provide a resilient backbeat, “Beige” brings forth lyrical images with words such as “I’m stuck in a strange wave/Everything starts to feel beige/Can’t walk in a straight line/Can’t stay in time” and “It’s the safest shade/Everything is beige”. Within the opening moments of the album, Teenanger leave plenty for the listener to contemplate. “Touching Glass” mixes new wave/post punk sounds with pop. Sung by bassist Melissa Ball, “Touching Glass” arrives with a seemingly laid back approach, but digs in as the chorus “You’re touching glass/We’re fading fast” hits and cutting guitar and drums break through. This song delves into the frustration of being absorbed by our phones all day. As the song reaches its close, the band moves into a funkier groove with sweeping synthesizers and polyrhythms that would make fans of Talking Heads or even Tom Tom Club move their feet. With Good Time, Teenanger breaks free from the rut of repeating themselves. Produced by drummer Steve Sidoli in their newfound rehearsal space/functional studio named Studio Z and mixed by Sandro Perri, the title of the album may be tongue-in-cheek, it may not. Teenanger’s lyrical subversion and irreverent humour shine through as they harness their creative energies to create a new post punk aesthetic for themselves. This proves to anyone who listens that despite the challenges and negativity that can surround us it is not impossible to have a good time.
Recommended Tracks: “Romance For Rent”, “Good Time”, “Touching Glass”
Shadow Show - Silhouettes
Detroit’s Shadow Show combines elements of 60s psychedelia and garage rock. The band features guitarist/vocalist Ava East, bassist Kate Derringer and drummer Kerrigan Pearce. Recorded and mixed by bassist Kate Derringer in Ann Arbor, Michigan and mastered by Jim Diamond, Silhouettes, their debut full-length album contains ten tracks that cast infectious melodies and a mysterious energy. “Charades” features a 1966-era Beatles psychedelia with its marching drumbeats, apregiated guitars, bouncing basslines and lyrics “I could be you/You could be me/I could be anything I see/But that’s part of the dream” that start off the album with a range of thoughts and sentiments. As the song picks up and it drifts into the surfy breakdown, it moves back into undeniable grooves that make you move as lyrics such as “Now the mystique is to be known/its light as curious as shadow/cause that’s part of the show you know” provide further depth in the opening moments of Silhouettes. “Contessa” is a garage rock track with lush vocal harmonies and lyrics about deception, “The Alchemist” deals with psychedelic elements and features lyrics such as “You seek the place/I seek the center of your mind/watch it closing in on you”. “Trapeze Act” sways back and forth on the edge with its steadying drums, dizzying guitar riffs and basslines. With Silhouettes, Shadow Show deliver a strong debut album with a range and depth featuring psychedelic grooves and catchy harmonies that is also rooted in the raw, uncompromising Detroit sound. Silhouettes outlines a sound and vision that is all their own.
Recommended Tracks: “Charades”, “Contessa”, “Silhouette”
More 2020 Album Highlights:Written by Adam Peltier
Fiona Apple - Fetch the Bolt Cutters
If punk is not a sound as much as an attitude, nobody made a more punk record this year than Fiona Apple. Fetch the Bolt Cutters is an uncompromising collection of piano and experimental percussion that completely subverts any expectations of listeners still wanting to hear another “Criminal” out of the artist. Beyond the abrasive and experimental sounds of the record, Apple was also uncompromising in the subject mater she sung about: misogyny (“Under the Table”), sexual assault (“For Her”), and the complexity of the songwriter’s relationships with other women. In fact, what is so fantastic about this record is how centred it is on the experiences of women, whether through the nostalgic reminiscences of “Shameika” or the scathing critique of how society positions females into confrontational roles as described in “Ladies.” Personal and political, Fetch the Bolt Cutters is Apple’s boldest and most honest record to date, a revelatory listen that demonstrates that she is one of our generation’s greatest songwriters.
Recommended tracks: “Shameika”, “Heavy Balloon”, “Cosmonauts”
Bob Dylan - Rough and Rowdy Ways
What’s left to say about Rough and Rowdy Ways? The bard’s 39th studio album was met with glowing praise on its release, with dozens of articles acclaiming the Protean-songwriter’s return to original material after a clunky series of covers-records. Like the other great late-era Dylan albums (think Time Out of Mind and Love & Theft), the legend hoarsely intones his elliptical poetry over sympathetic bare-bones blues arrangements. However, what stands out about the record is the quality of Dylan’s songwriting. His acerbic verse describes encounters with the spectre of death in “Black Rider,” the Pygmalion-cum-Frankenstein creation of an idealized lover in “My Very Own Version of You,” and describes passing into old age as a tumultuous sea-voyage on “Crossing the Rubicon.” It also features the best up-tempo numbers to come from Dylan in over a decade, such as in the bluesy “Goodbye Jimmy Reed” or the hard-hitting satire of “False Prophet.” Then there is “Murder Most Foul,” the epic seventeen minute piano ballad about the assassination of JFK which landed Dylan his first ever number one single. Though just shy of eighty, Rough and Rowdy Ways proves that Dylan has lost no steam and is still capable of producing some of the most profound and moving music of his storied career.
Recommended tracks: “False Prophet”, “I Contain Multitudes”, “My Very Own Version of You”
Cindy Lee - What’s Tonight to Eternity
Cindy Lee, the experimental project by former Women guitarist Patrick Flegel, is simultaneously beguiling and alluring. The sounds produced from this outfit sound both nostalgic and dystopian: the Cleaver’s house is on fire, Dick and Jane are chasing you with knives, Brigitte Bardot is flashing a smile at you while pouring sulfuric acid on your face. Traditional balladry evoking 1950’s pop music is subverted throughout What’s Tonight to Eternity: imagine Lynch’s Blue Velvet filtered through the apocalyptic dissonance of Sonic Youth’s “Death Valley 69.” Sounds of 60’s ye-ye pop are merged with VU style distortion on “Plastic Raincoat.” The bouncy synth-pop of “I Want You to Suffer” is suddenly plunged into cacophonous feedback. Even the album’s most conventionally beautiful song “Heavy Metal,” a tribute to Flegel’s late bandmate Chris Reimer, bristles with an unsettling undertone of menace. This noir nightmare of an album display’s Cindy Lee’s incredible range and manages to craft a unique sonic world unlike any other record released this year.
Recommend tracks: “Heavy Metal”, “I Want You to Suffer”, “Plastic Raincoat”
Show # 860 Playlist (Originally Aired December 19th, 2020)(Albums of 2020 Part Two):
1. Tommy & The Commies - Hurtin' 4 Certain (Hurtin' 4 Certain EP - Slovenly Recordings - 2020)
2. Demolition Doll Rods - That's Insane (Into The Brave - In The Red Records - 2020)
3. Fuzz - Mirror (III - In The Red Records - 2020)
4. TV Freaks - Space (People - Schizophrenic Records - 2020)
5. Osees - If I Had My Way (Protean Threat - Castle Face Records - 2020)
6. Jon Mckiel - Management (Bobby Joe Hope - You've Changed Records - 2020)
7. Nap Eyes - Mark Zuckerberg (Snapshot Of A Beginner - Royal Mountain Records/Jagjaguwar - 2020)
8. Daniel Romano's Outfit - Never Yet In Love (How Ill Thy World Is Ordered - You've Changed Records - 2020)
9. Bloodshot Bill - My Heart Cries For You (Get Loose Or Get Lost - Goner Records - 2020)
10. Waxahatchee - Witches (Saint Cloud - Merge Records - 2020)
11. Bill Callahan - Breakfast (Gold Record - Drag City - 2020)
12. Jeff Tweedy - Gwendolyne (Love Is The King - dBpm Records - 2020)
14. Neil Young - Homegrown (Homegrown - Reprise - 2020)
15. X - Goodbye Year, Goodbye (Alphabetland - Fat Possum Records - 2020)
16. Jeff Rosenstock - Leave It In The Sun (No Dream - Polyvinyl Record Co. - 2020)
17. Drive-By Truckers - The New OK (The New OK - ATO Records - 2020)
18. Drive-By Truckers - Armageddon's Back In Town (The Unravelling - ATO Records - 2020)
19. Shadow Show - Contessa (Silhouettes - Stolen Body Records/Greenway Records - 2020)
20. Fontaines D.C. - A Hero's Death (A Hero's Death - Partisan Records - 2020)
21. Thurston Moore - Cantaloupe (By The Fire - Daydream Library - 2020)
22. Wire - Off The Beach (Mind Hive - Pinkflag - 2020)
23. Metz - Blind Industrial Youth Park (Atlas Vending - Sub Pop - 2020)
24. The Strokes - Brookyln Bridge To Chorus (The New Abnormal - Cult Records/RCA - 2020)
25. Pottery - Take Your Time (Welcome To Bobby's Motel - Partisan Records - 2020)
26. Protomartyr - Michigan Hammers (Ultimate Success Today - Domino - 2020)
27. Teenanger - Good Time (Good Time - Telephone Explosion - 2020)
28. Tough Age - Consequences (Which Way Am I? - Mint Records - 2020)
29. Bob Dylan - False Prophet (Rough And Rowdy Ways - Columbia Records - 2020)
Show #859 Playlist (Originally Aired On December 12th, 2020)(Albums of 2020 Part One):
1. Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers - Quick Trick (Just Coolin' - Blue Note - 2020)
2. King Khan - Wait Till The Stars Burn (Infinite Ones - Ernest Jenning Record Co./Khannibalism - 2020)
3. Rolling Blackouts C.F. - The Cool Change (Sideways To New Italy - Sub Pop - 2020)
4. Dog Day - Hell On Earth (Present - Fundog Records - 2020)
5. Sweet Dave - Future Dirt (Pink Dreams - Pointless Product - 2020)
6. Guided By Voices - Haircut Sphinx (Mirrored Aztec - GBV Inc. - 2020)
7. Fiona Apple - Shameika (Fetch The Bolt Cutters - Epic/Clean Slate - 2020)
8. The Microphones - The Microphones in 2020 (excerpt) (The Microphones in 2020 - P. W. Elverum & Sun, Ltd. - 2020)
9. Cindy Lee - Heavy Metal (What's Tonight to Eternity - W.25TH / Superior Viaduct - 2020)
10. Yves Tumor - Identity Trade (Heaven To A Tortured Mind - Warp Records - 2020)
11. Ron Leary This Guitar (Musicians Make Great Construction Workers - 2020)
12. Ron Leary & Dean Drouilliard - First Love (As Long As I Ain't Thinking About It - 2020)
13. Johnny West - Lead Bullets (Year of the Sleepwalk - Tosteestosta Music - 2020)
14. James O-L - All That I Need (No Fear - Famous Last Records - 2020)
15. Orville Peck - Summertime (Show Pony - Columbia Records/Sub Pop - 2020)
16. The Flaming Lips - Dinosaurs On The Mountain (American Head - Warner - 2020)
17. Jarv Is… - Swanky Modes (Beyond The Pale - Rough Trade Records - 2020)
18. Destroyer - Kinda Dark (Have We Met - Merge Records - 2020)
19. U.S. Girls - Overtime (Heavy Light - 4AD - 2020)
20. Porridge Radio - Sweet (Every Bad - Secretly Canadian - 2020)
21. Crack Cloud - Something's Gotta Give (Pain Olympics - Metal Machine - 2020)
22. Special Interest - Don't Kiss Me In Public (The Passion Of - Night School / Thrilling Living - 2020)
23. Coriky - Have A Cup Of Tea (Coriky - Dischord Records - 2020)
24. Lie - Digging In The Desert (You Want It Real - Mint Records - 2020)
25. Dean Marino - Haunted No 3 (Love-Thirteen - Flowerpot Records - 2020)
26. Kestrels - Blue and Grey (Featuring Jay Mascis) (Dream Or Don't Dream - Darla Records - 2020)
27. Damaged Bug - Microminature Love (Bug On Yonkers - Castle Face Records -2020)
28. Rough Francis - Urgent Care (Urgent Care -2020)
29. No Age - Agitating Moss (Goons Be Gone - Drag City -2020)
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