The Best Of 2006/Top 11 List (Music)
Posted by Evocator Manes on 01.01.2007
Roll another number for the road..
Intro:
Somebody somewhere is going to lie to you. That, dearest friends and lovers, is an established fact. It may be your boss, your parents, your lover, even a trusted website, but it will come and you won't have any warning before it strikes. It will hit when you never expect it. So...who can you trust and why am I yammering on about this in the introduction to a column about the Year In Music 2006? The answer to the first is yours truly, of course. For over four years, basically ever since there was a Music Zone on 411, EM has been here, delivering the goods, time after time. Consider that since I've "retired" from active writing, I've still turned in around 100 reviews and either wrote or contributed to quite a number of additional columns as well. As for the why is this here, it is to serve as reinforcement that I will never steer you wrong, ever. Other Year In Review pieces, maybe even some of them on this site, will tell you untruths in an attempt to replace cold, hard fact with content, but never me. EM is a name you can trust, just as I have been for the last 4+ years here and time immortal before that.
Main:
Before I get into the actual Top 10 list of the best releases of this year, a list which I'm fairly certain will surprise at least some longtime readers, I wanted to comment on the year of 2006, musically. If I could sum it up in one word, that word would be lackluster. Sure, there were a lot of great surprises and quite a bit of shiny gems put out there, but there were an equal number of hugely disappointing records. For every One Man Army & The Undead Quartet disc taking the world by storm, there was a huge misfire from the Prince camp and so it went on.
It was not much of a roller-coaster year, though. The majority of releases were decidedly average. Bands like In Flames, Satyricon, Strapping Young Lad, even the mighty GWAR, all of them put out albums that nowhere even remotely closely lived up to the vast hype and expectations (some generated by the bands) surrounding the discs. In the case of The Haunted, they took several steps into outer space and delivered junk instead of something resembling music. Even old heroes had a hard time. Ritchie Blackmore was on two consecutive duds released this year, as was Ice T. On the guitar hero side, Joe Satriani and Zakk Wylde, with Black Label Society, both released solid, but very much unspectacular additions to the musical world.
The music scene, as a whole right now, is clearly floundering. Nobody has any idea what the big trend of the moment is and it's very confusing for a majority of persons. The 80's were hair metal, the 90's that grunge bullshit, but what is going on now? The boy band/pop mistress fad has fizzled entirely, leaving...what?
Certainly not hip-hop/rap, which has now, with the exception of a very distinct, select and few number of artists, is now at its most irrelevant point, ever, serving as nothing more than poorly done porn music with more bass. Country? No one has cared about that for years and continues to not care at about the same level. Heavy metal is making a slight comeback, but no one has replaced any of the old guard, as of yet. There are no staggeringly brilliant or popular bands on the horizon on the level of a Judas Priest or Iron Maiden or KISS nor are any likely appearing soon. There are hugely interesting bands like the Dresden Dolls and Eisley kicking around, but are any of them stadium acts. In fact, are there any viable stadium acts even around anymore (first person who says Rolling Stones will spend time removing my Nikes from their crotch)? Live shows have gone the way of festival tours lately and there is seemingly no turning back.
Looking at the upcoming releases for 2007, it seems there is little relief on the horizon....
With no further ado, here is the Top 11 Indisputable Best Albums Of 2006:
11) Manowar The Sons Of Odin EP: Rarely will an EP make a Top 11 list for releases of a year, but it's been that kind of year. If this is any indication, the forthcoming Gods Of War release in 2007 will be truly spectacular. This is one of the greatest EP packages that has ever existed. Manowar web presence.
10 ) Rhapsody Of Fire -- Triumph Or Agony: Not sure if the album title is related to the band's recent letter of cease and desist from a download service, but adding the "Of Fire" to the band's name seems to have given them a decided kick in the ass. The only known practitioners of "film score metal", this is the band's best effort. It also shows a band getting better with each release, which means the best is yet to come...imagine Lord Of The Rings set to music...Rhapsody Of Fire web presence.
9) E-40 My Ghetto Report Card: Stupid title for a record, but E-40, after delivering album after album of high quality East Bay rap and inventing an entire style and lexicon has finally done something that has previously eluded him. He has released an album with high commercial potential without sacrificing his "sound". Still showing promise after all these years...E-40 web presence
8) Muse Black Holes & Revelations (no link, both reviews are messes): I "discovered" this band by wandering around FYE and hearing it on one of the 6 sets of speakers they had in the ceiling, all of which were playing different things, incidentally. I demanded the guy behind the desk tell me what it was, but he didn't know and had to ask a few people, which irritated me so much that I went to an indie record store to buy it and was accordingly wooed by one of their young female fans behind the till. They were appearing in concert 2 days from when I was buying the disc and she asked me if I was going and though she was a bit young, she still looked tasty, dig? So, anyway, one thing led to another and the song that really captured my imagination on here was because of the guitar hook and that song was Exo-Politics, though nearly the entire album is very good. One or two of the songs drag, but overall, this is a very interesting record and the second best one released by a British band this year...Muse web presence
7) Therapy? One Cure Fits All: I'll say up front that this album does not have as many "great" and catchy songs as previous efforts, but it is very good. Some of the stuff is right up there, neck and neck, with the best they've done in their career, but overall, this album is a bit below several of the previous efforts, which is still worlds beyond much of what is being output by other various so-called "musical" acts...Therapy? web presence
6) Dresden Dolls Yes, Virginia: This is one of my favorite reviews not written by me and one of my newest favorite bands that I discovered through a friend of mine suggesting something to listen to on a road trip taken this year in late May. While the first album is more poignant and sad (and somewhat more interesting), this is a fine continuation and shows the band losing none of their skill at arranging and songwriting. Amanda Palmer is a brilliant musical force and drummer Brian Viglione plays off her will and with inventiveness and fire. The most interesting new musical act on the horizon is now here and here to stay (I hope)...Dresden Dolls web presence
5) I Between Two Worlds: Abbath is back and things are better than ever. Immortal has risen from the ashes, but it is this side project that did much to save metal from a huge slump in the second half of the year. Combining Motorhead, KISS and Immortal, Abbath has created a fantastic album, bottom to top. Here's hoping he never leaves again...I web presence
4) Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan The Ballad Of The Broken Seas: Done from two separate continents, the two participants met only for the photoshoot, but you'd never know it with how brilliantly they play off of each other on one of the best releases of the year. This also marks yet another truly marvelous review by Morgan Marx, who is the best reviewer on the site not me. Phenomenal and unexpected album...Isobel Campbell web presence | Mark Lanegan web presence
3) Angel Blake Self-Titled: Only one album got a 10 this year from me and it was this album. Not only do I stand by everything I wrote in that review, but if there was a way, I would double it and give it a rating beyond 10. It is just that much more than everything else out there...this probably should get the top slot on this list as well, but there are albums I liked more, which is what this list is about...(at the conclusion of this list, I will show a comparison list)Angel Blake web presence
2) One Man Army & The Undead Quartet: Out of the ashes of The Crown came two awesome musical forces. One is in the paragraph above. This is the other. Don't get me wrong, I still mourn the loss of The Crown, who were taken from me shortly after I discovered them. There will never be another band like them. This band and the one in the preceding paragraph are not replacement bands, as no one can replace them, either. However, both musical acts released very enjoyable discs. This one gets a higher nod because it fits my temperament better and is closer to my beloved band, The Crown, though the other is better musically...One Man Army & The Undead Quartet web presence
1) Placebo Meds: I'll let you in on a little secret. This was not my favorite album of the year. It was not what I think was the best album of the year, but if I am going to claim honesty as my hallmark, I must abide by it all the time, with no days or even moments off, ever. I listened to this disc much more than any other released this year, which has to be telling. In fact, I probably listened to this as much as I did all the other albums I reviewed this year combined. For whatever reason, I really, really connected to this album, after hearing it in a local indie store, thinking it was first a chick singing, then being somewhat disappointed briefly because it was not, then being completely mesmerized by the album every time I played it. This is one that starts high and gets better as time goes on and you can never have too many of those in your collection. Placebo web presence
Bonus:
It's hard coming up with new ways of doing this, year after year, of being original and interesting, even to me and the assumption here is that if I don't find this interesting, damn sure none of you will, though me finding it interesting does not guarantee you will, only that there is a chance. If I don't, though, it is a sure bet you won't.
I digress. Anyway, for point of comparison with the above list, I thought it would be interesting to see what the Top list would look like this year in terms of rating, which is meant more as a quality notation than an album that catches my fancy. Since I am limiting this to albums I reviewed, the Muse, Dresden Dolls and Campbell/Lanegan entries are automatically disqualified, which must necessarily change the list (score/rating follows the numbering):
So, there it is, another year in the can. This has been for me, personally, much like for Music, not a very good year overall. Without getting too far into things, there are a lot of changes taking place and it is only with hope I look forward to 2007, unlike for Music. In any event, I should be around somewhere, in some form or another. As always, I thank you for joining me and wish you all the best.
