Year in Review: 45 Lines About 22 Records by Patrick Wall
In which a beleaguered soon-to-be former alt-weekly music editor offers brief and often non-critical thoughts on some of his favorite records of the 2013. Because, hey, music is personal and subjective, right? Results listed in alphabetical order and subject to change.
Alpoko Don, The Ol Soul EP
Alpoko Don is a former drug runner from Greenville, South Carolina, who makes his beats by banging his fists and knuckles on tables—a trick he picked up in prison—and who spits widescreen and Technicolor rhymes about surviving the trap game with a field-holler delivery. Alpoko Don rules.
Daniel Bachman, Jesus I’m a Sinner
If you’d told 12-year-old me, knee-deep in The Offspring, that in 20 years I’d be not only listening to acoustic psychedelic Appalachian music but loving the hell out of it, I’d probably have thrown my GameBoy at you. But here we are.
Boards of Canada, Tomorrow’s Harvest
Only Boards of Canada failed to disappoint in a year fraught with comebacks; the brothers Sandison did so by not merely revisiting their signature style but by doubling down on it. The Earth is not a cold, dead place, but they made it seem like one.
Brokeback, Brokeback and the Black Rock
Or, Ennio Morricone’s lonesome crowded west: Tumbleweeds and abandoned strip malls. Ghost towns and forlorn mesas and broken-down buses on desert highways.
Richard Buckner, Surrounded
I saw Richard Buckner for the I think 7th time this year, in a tiny bar in Durham, North Carolina, touring behind Surrounded, a record that when I reviewed it for Dusted I liked but didn’t love. After seeing him silence the room solo—no loops, no eBows, no tricks, just Buckner and a beat-up acoustic guitar—the innate power of those songs came into stark relief.
Chance the Rapper, Acid Rap
Kendrick Lamar’s good kid, M.A.A.D. City was my favorite rap record of last year; Acid Rap, which trades SoCal funk for Chicago soul and bounce but shares a stunning scope, reminds me a lot of good kid. So.
Deafheaven, Sunbather
I remember the dustup over whether Liturgy’s Aesthetica was a black metal record or not, and remembered how stupid I thought it was. Regardless of genre, Sunbather is awe-inspiring, chaotic but beautiful and the pinnacle of the year’s heavy offerings.
Chris Forsyth, Solar Motel
Worship service: The Most Rev. Chris Forsyth, Bishop, Church of the Sonic Guitar, Carrboro Diocese, presiding. Four-party homily on deconstructivist rock ‘n’ roll.
Steve Gunn, Time Off
For about half the year, I commuted an hour-and-a-half from Charlotte, NC, to Columbia, SC, often driving along rural backroads to avoid the traffic congestion that choked Charlotte’s arteries. Time Off, redolent with pastoral charm and backwoods splendor, was always the best soundtrack to those drives.
Tim Hecker, Virgins
Tim Hecker, I’m convinced, is smarter than any other ambient musician. The malevolent drone on Virgins utilizes darkness and the space in which it was recorded as if they were instruments.
Glenn Jones, My Garden State
My Garden State tells a story about a son and his ailing mother, an accidental autobiography whose careful narrative is guided by graceful momentum and meditative precision. And Jones does this without uttering ever so much as a murmur.
KEN Mode, Entrench
One of the loudest, most aggressive and best shows I ever saw was KEN Mode in a small, sweaty house lived-in by dudes in hardcore bands in 2011; it was the middle of summer in South Carolina, and it was hot and the room was packed with dudes in crust-punk bands who didn’t shower and it smelled like balls and sewn-leather Crass patches. Entrench reminds me of that summer—the last summer of my twenties in which I sweated and drank too much whiskey and lived dangerously and killed my ears in dive bars and punk houses and kind-of-sort-of chased a girl I really shouldn't have been chasing and just didn’t give a fuck and would end up kicked out of my house come the winter. So, you know, good and bad, but it resonates nonetheless, and that’s what matters to me.
The Necks, Open
There’s always a point in The Necks’ 68-minute opus Open where I think it’s finally winding down, and I’m a little bummed, because this deeply affecting music is almost over. Then I look, and I see I have another 20 minutes, and all is right with the world for a little bit.
Oneohtrix Point Never, R Plus Seven
R Plus Seven kind of makes me want to take DMT. And I’m pretty sure Mr. Lopatin pulled some of his sounds from Mario Paint.
William Onyeabor, Who Is William Onyeabor?
True story: I saw Dave Chappelle in a coffeeshop in my hometown. The shop was playing Who Is William Onyeabor?, and Chappelle said, “Man, I’ve never been to a coffeeshop that plays Fela Kuti.”
Polvo, Siberia
Now two records into its career’s second act, Polvo, once indie-rock’s most challenging ensemble, has re-established itself into a potent and pretty ruthless AOR-rock band. But, like, an AOR-band that digs diminished chords and raga-like guitar runs.
Puig Destroyer, Puig Destroyer / Wait for Spring
Fuck you, I like baseball and grindcore. #ONEMANFIVETOOLS
Run the Jewels, Run the Jewels
The second line of the dangerously, deliriously fun Run the Jewels, in which El-P delivers the modus operandi: “These motherfuckers all thorn, no rose.” Antagonists El and Killer Mike certainly don’t pull punches: They throw elbows, crush windpipes with forearms, curb stomp, beat the bottoms of feet, spit psilocybin, unload banana clips, and generally shout “Come at me, bro!” to all challengers.
Savages, Silence Yourself
I was born in 1982; Ian Curtis was dead for probably 18 or so years by the time I first heard Joy Division. So maybe I’m wrong when I say that Savages is the closest thing I’ll ever come to really, truly experiencing a band like Joy Division, but I don’t think I am, and this is my list, so jog on.
Speedy Ortiz, Major Arcana
It was a pretty good year for women in rock bands (for the record: Savages, yes; Haim, no; Waxahatchee, hell no). But Sadie Dupuis, who recalls the queens of ’90s indie/alt-rock (see: Donnelly, Tanya; Phair, Liz; Timony, Mary), reigns supreme, and her bandmates pull from indie rock’s past without being retro or recidivist.
William Tyler, Impossible Truth
2013, judging by my favorites list, was apparently the year I decided I hated rock singers. In a year of great guitar records—oh yeah, I remembered I really love instrumental guitar music, too—this one was my absolute favorite, because William Tyler is a wizard.
