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18 READER | JANUARY 6, 2006 | SECTION ONE

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continued from page 17 suring formula and startling sub- visiting from the city (Emily tics. The film is well-paced and Best animated: Howl’s Moving ( West Beirut) is set in a dilapidat- ject matter. The main story is a Blunt), much to the displeasure has an impressive historical Castle, Corpse Bride, Wallace ed suburb, where a quiet, sweet screwball romance between of the country girl’s older brother sweep, though Giordana gener- & Gromit: The Curse of the gifted Moroccan teenager a lonely performance artist (July) (Paddy Considine), who’s ates that broad perspective Were-Rabbit. (Mohammed Khouas) is drawn and a hapless shoe salesman returned from prison a sancti- through intimate observation of Best general-interest docs: into a secret romance with a white (John Hawkes), but woven into monious evangelical Christian. the many characters’ everyday March of the Penguins, neighbor (Vahina Giocante). Her this conventional fare are sub- This small-scale British drama lives. The film was produced as a Murderball, Tell Them Who exquisite beauty and sexual bold- plots that boldly explore the nar- by Pawel Pawlikowski was pro- TV miniseries but rejected by the You Are , Up for Grabs. ness make her a walking powder rowing sexual divide between moted for its lesbian romance, Italian state network and ulti- keg in the poor, largely Arab com- children and adults. July handles but despite all the idyllic after- mately released in theaters, Best music docs: Fallen Angel: munity, and a conflict involving this taboo material with a dis- noons on rolling hills, it’s a story where it screened in two three- Gram Parsons, Moog, The the hero’s leering buddies leads arming frankness and simplicity, of brutality and betrayal. hour segments; a DVD release is Nomi Song, Rock School, We both lovers to the brink of absorbing it into her main con- scheduled for February 7. Jam Econo: The Story of the tragedy—and to genuine love. cern—the joy of discovery, be it 8. A History of Violence . In David Minutemen. sexual, romantic, or creative. Cronenberg’s harrowing crime 10. The Devil’s Rejects. Who’d Best political docs: Enron: The 4. Grizzly Man. German master drama, some people are born to have thought that Rob Zombie, Smartest Guys in the Room, Werner Herzog finds a uniquely 6. Palindromes. Todd Solondz kill, others are born to be killed, the freaky-looking dude who The Future of Food, The American focus for his career- dives headfirst into the abortion and at the end a small-town fam- once fronted the metal Protocols of Zion, Wal-Mart: long fascination with man and controversy with this heartbreak- ily gathers at the dinner table, White Zombie, would conjure The High Cost of Low Price. nature: Timothy Treadwell, a ing moral comedy about a young united and stained by this awful up the most frightening movie self-invented grizzly-bear expert girl who is forced to have an abor- knowledge. This was adapted since The Blair Witch Project? Best movies I couldn’t jam into who became a media personality tion, runs away from home, and from a hard-boiled graphic Moving like a bat out of hell, this any of the above categories: before a grizzly devoured him in falls in with a born-again family novel, and Cronenberg, despite tale of a murderous family on the The Ballad of Jack and Rose, Alaska in 2003. Working with of deformed children. Dividing his own history of Grand run from a vengeful sheriff taps The Beautiful Country, more than 100 hours of video the main character among eight Guignol, honors the form with a into the same fear of backwoods Breakfast on Pluto, Brokeback footage Treadwell left behind, actors, each chosen for her inno- remarkably spare narrative. crazies that’s powered the genre Mountain, Capote, Charlie Herzog fashions an unnerving cence, was commercial suicide, since Two Thousand Maniacs! and the Chocolate Factory, portrait of a troubled man whose but it was also typical of a 9. The Best of Youth. This six- and the original Chain- Crash, The Constant Gardener, congress with the grizzlies was filmmaker who acts more from hour family saga by Marco Tullio saw Massacre . Good Night, and Good Luck, Kontroll, Layer Cake, Millions, both religion and death wish. pure feeling than common sense. Giordana traces a middle-class Best noirs: The Ice Harvest, A Munich, Nine Lives, Purple Italian clan from 1966 through Tout de Suite. 5. Me and You and Everyone We 7. My Summer of Love. A homely the end of the century, as two Butterfly, Separate Lies, The Know . Miranda July made an orphan in rural West Yorkshire brothers are united by their Best comedies: Wedding Crashers, Squid and the Whale, auspicious feature debut with (Nathalie Press) is drawn into a affection for a mentally ill young The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Sarah Thumbsucker, Tony Takitani, this canny combination of reas- steamy affair with a posh bird woman and then divided by poli- Silverman: Jesus Is Magic. Walk the Line, Yes . v CHICAGO READER | JANUARY 6, 2006 | SECTION ONE 19 The Best Music of 2005 Our Section 3 regulars have made their lists. Even though some of them don’t believe in lists, man.

Liz Armstrong

I was positively, wholeheartedly obsessed with everything on this list at some point in the year, either for months or just for a few hours. I’ve put the entries in alphabetical order, because arranging them according to the amount of time I fixated on them would be silly.

AIDS WOLF “We Multiply,” “Opposing Walls,” “Fuck You McLean,” “Panty Mind Extended” | MP3s on MySpace A tangled orgy of wall-to-wall shrieking in a paradise full of dirty naked people.

COCOROSIE Noah’s Ark | Touch and Go Stripped bare but still lush, heart-wrenching but kind of creepy—like the songs a Jean Clockwise from left: Bettye LaVette, Spoon, , M.I.A. Genet novel would sing. analog synths to summon a hood grit, antifashion fashion, west-coast gangsta rap. The DELIA GONZALEZ & GAVIN RUSSOM vision of crows flying into a and National Geographic. Kabir Hamid Game is so hardcore I bet The Days of Mars | DFA/ dark eternity. all the muscles he uses to Instrumental electronic art- NEON BLONDE smile have atrophied right gallery music that’s like the SAM FLAX KEENER Chandeliers in the Savannah | off his face. deeply revelatory moment in the “Backwards Fire” | MP3 at Dim Mak denouement of some trippy, grit- mindmilk.com Two of the Blood Brothers set 3. BLACKALICIOUS ty, long-lost 70s film set in a win- A transmission from Marc jazzy, ass-ripping screeching to The Craft | Anti- try New York, stretched out to Bolan’s ghost channeled by rollicking cabaret piano, spiny Not even their best, but still last a whole hour. a blond, feather-haired New guitar, and hectic beats. head and shoulders above Age twink. almost all the other hip-hop HARRY MERRY OCS this year—Gift of Gab’s inex- Well . . . Here’s Another Nice Mess 3 & 4: Songs About Death and haustible flow defies belief, You’ve Got Me Into! | Tocado Dying Vol. 3 and Get Stoved | 1. EDAN and Chief Xcel packs ideas Keyboard chaos and arrhyth- Narnack Beauty and the Beat | Lewis into his tracks like a guy who mic percussion, simultaneous- Like a lazy summer evening on the Edan spins a dense, claustropho- knows he won’t run out. ly giddy and desperate—the porch, tipping back warm whiskey bic matrix of 60s a hamster might hear with friends while some weird rock samples around his deeply 4. COMMON in its head as it tries to navi- dusty troubadour guy no one real- weird lyrics, which he delivers in Be | GOOD/Geffen gate the most elaborate ly knows sings and plays guitar. an authoritative, scissor-tongued Chicago’s native son resurrects Habitrail ever. style. The hip-hop equivalent of himself after the flop that was SSION a Salvador Dali painting. Electric Circus: his love songs INDIAN JEWELRY M.I.A. “World’s Worth” | Sound Virus to the ladies are great, and his Invasive Exotics | Girlgang | XL/Interscope Sleazy Robitussin party jams fist- 2. THE GAME love songs to the street corner Shamanic badasses wield Dangerous dance music that’s fucking outrageous Vivienne The Documentary | Aftermath are even better. shadowy guitars and sinister equal parts jump-rope taunt, Westwood punk. Single-handedly rehabilitates continued on page 20 20 CHICAGO READER | JANUARY 6, 2006 | SECTION ONE

Best Music

3. M.I.A. the creative process can some- tech stasis, jackin’ house, and the plus of aggression: they sound Arular | XL/Interscope times have a happy ending. nasty boom of southern bounce, it heavy, hammered, and happy. This displaced Sri Lankan art stu- meets all your needs in a single dent has more than earned every song. Asses are clapping in . MARIANNE FAITHFULL overthought review with her Jessica Hopper Before the Poison | Anti- politically ambiguous agit-pop— 9. PELICAN Possibly her best since Broken and her dancehall-tinged Brit- The Fire in Our Throats Will Beckon English back in 1979. She’s been continued from page 19 hop beats are so good they render the Thaw | Hydra Head working that singular voice—the 5. CAGE all that verbiage irrelevant. Lush instrumental metal that jaded older woman with her Hell’s Winter | Definitive Jux appeals equally to fans of Egg wicked wisdom—since she was One of indie hip-hop’s most 4. Hunt and Iron Maiden. Several what, 19? And it sounds even notorious nutcases grows up | Frenchkiss songs here clock in at around 11 better now that she’s aged into it. and decides to share: openly These boys now confi- minutes, but they could all stand autobiographical stories from dently inhabit the bar-band to be two or three days longer. HIGH ON FIRE his incredibly messed-up life go idiom they once merely imitated, Blessed Black Wings | Relapse toe-to-toe with some apocalyptic which helps ’s caustic I didn’t think dense, smart, Def Jux beats. lyrics jell—you don’t have to be a 1. unhyphenated metal needed four-eyed lapsed Catholic from | Asthmatic Kitty anyone to defend its honor, but 6. the upper midwest to appreciate Because Chicago is worth it! I’m still happy to watch these Late Registration | Roc-a-Fella his fractured urban legends. guys leave all the other would-be Whether Kanye’s lyrics are 2. SPOON champions in the dust. charming or just cutesy is open | Merge to debate, but there’s no arguing Perfection in rock isn’t interest- with the richness and maturity of ing or compelling, except when it his almost orchestral beats. is. I can’t help but surrender my breath to the sweet plodding of 10. COMMON 7. DANGERDOOM the piano and drums on this one. Be | GOOD/Geffen The Mouse and the Mask | Epitaph The musical counterpart to Bell Doom. Danger Mouse. The 3. MAKE BELIEVE Hooks’s The Will to Change: Cartoon Network. Together they Shock of Being | Flameshovel Men, Masculinity, and Love— cut an irreverent fart in the gen- Tim Kinsella’s been threatening self-examination and a love ethic eral direction of all that’s self- 5. KANYE WEST to give us a real punk band since as an antidote to mainstream serious in hip-hop. Late Registration | Roc-a-Fella 1997—who knew his version hip-hop’s apocalyptic patriarchy. IRON & WINE Kanye demands the best in col- would be this commie-situation- Woman King | 8. ASAMOV laborators, and when that won’t ist blitzkrieg combining the aes- Every so often you hear a song so And Now...| 6 Hole work he samples them—top-tier thetic of Pere Ubu with the atti- Monica Kendrick perfect it gives you goose bumps, The debut from this four-man pop producer Jon Brion adds his tude and ideals of Huggy Bear like this EP’s title track—eerie, Florida posse is the Little grandiose arrangements, and the and Born Against. The notion of ranking my favorite hermetic folk that’d earn the disc Brother wish they’d made this voices of Ray Charles and Otis music is incomprehensible to me. a spot on my list even if the rest year. Laid-back, infectious grooves Redding root the whole project 4. LUNGFISH First I think, “Is this album of of it sucked. with fun, feel-good rhymes. in the soul tradition. Feral Hymns | Dischord rootsy hillbilly better than The only band worth owning 11 this album of black-hole drone?” MODEY LEMON 9. ONE.BE.LO 6. SLEATER-KINNEY by. All Day I Dream And then I think, “What the hell The Curious City | Birdman S.O.N.O.G.R.A.M. | Fat Beats The Woods | Sub Pop About Dan Higgs’s Beard. kind of question is that?” In This trippy, tribal, mannerist Former Binary Star member All the Led Zep comparisons alphabetical order, then: neogarage, undoubtedly the rhymes his ass off over a warm, obscured another obvious refer- 5. MARYJ. BLIGE product of ill-advised whackjob jazzy soundscape. ence point—this is what Heart The Breakthrough | Geffen ambition, succeeds in spite of could’ve been if they’d interro- I know it might sound sacrilegious sounding like it’s constantly 10. gated the power of boy rock as given the exalted status of Blige’s falling apart—just like about 87 You Can’t Imagine How Much Fun expertly as they harnessed it. early records, but The Breakthrough percent of my favorite rock We’re Having | Rhymesayers is nuclear—it’s her most consistent records ever. Solid all around, and the closer, 7. THIONE SECK disc from song to song, the cameos “Little Man”—where Slug reads Orientation | Stern’s Africa are pure fire, and the production SUNN O))) letters he’s written to his son, his Youssou N’Dour’s 2004 release is fuck a brick. Mary’s back. The Grimmrobe Demos | Southern father, and himself—is one of the Egypt untangled the Arabic and Lord most self-aware hip-hop tracks Middle Eastern roots of West 6. JOHN DOE Like being in the womb, only bet- I’ve heard in a long time. Africa’s musical culture, and this Forever Hasn’t Happened Yet | Yep CROOKED FINGERS ter. And louder. (No offense, mom.) disc from Dakar’s perpetual Roc Dignity and Shame | Merge number two attraction under- It’s such a relief when the new This dark, quirky, and very com- TRAVELING BELL Keith Harris takes something similar—though record from an aging punk hero poserly singer-songwriter Scatter Ways | Secret Eye it’s sweeter and earthier, and doesn’t make you wish he’d left well record had me at hello—or at On her drony, elegant solo debut, reaches even further east to spice enough alone. There’s still nobody the very least at the asking-for- Kathleen Baird of Spires That in the music with Bollywood fillips. who duets better with lady singers. directions part. the Sunset Rise sounds steely and fierce—like a dryad in a spiked tree 8. MOUNTAIN GOATS 7. RIVER CITY TANLINES DALEK waiting for a lumberjack to make The Sunset Tree | 4AD River City Tanlines | Dirtnap Absence | Ipecac her day. Think Nico’s Desertshore A longtime enemy of the autobio- A bona fide icon with her own Ever wondered how weird hip- without the desperation. graphical lyric, crafts label, Alicja Trout is the Ian hop could get if it were set free of these acerbic songs about his own MacKaye of garage punk—and the expectation that normal WILLIAM ELLIOTT WHITMORE adolescence with the same artis- on top of that she solos like a humans should be able to dance to Ashes to Dust | Southern tic distance that makes his third- fever. This is just a collection of it? Dalek shows us one possibility, There are a lot of whippersnap- 1. person narratives so powerful. singles, but it’s sick, sick business. wrapping skittery beats in searing, pers on Fat Possum who wish Bang Bang Rock & Roll | Fierce Panda droning goth-industrial guitar. they were this guy—or if they Wire-weaned English lads use 9. MINOTAUR SHOCK don’t, they should. faux-Fall two-and-a-half-chord Maritime | 4AD DEAD MEADOW barrages to set up ’s David Edwards undercuts the Feathers | Matador punch lines about forming a whimsy in his intricate laptop These D.C. psychonauts have a Peter Margasak band, failing in the sack, and pop with wistfulness, as if to ask, swoopy, sludgy sound thick freaking out in art museums. “Yes, you got the high score, but enough to pour on pancakes, 1. BETTYE LA VETTE was it really worth it?” with rhythms like slow-swaying I’ve Got My Own Hell to Raise | Anti- 2. GOGOL BORDELLO seaweed and lyrics that might as Would’ve been the comeback of the Gypsy Punks: Underdog World 10. well be Robert Plant cutups—but year if LaVette had ever gone away— Strike | Side One Dummy Extraordinary Machine | Epic unlike many other bands flourish- perfect production, classic soul Lyric-spitting madman Eugene These scaled-back rerecordings 8. ROD LEE ing under the “” grow arrangements, and material by the Hutz and his merry band throw a trump the intriguing but fussy Vol. 5: The Official | Morphius lights, they hardly hint at post- likes of , Fiona Apple, spastic Gypsy dance party for mar- demos leaked online, proving Baltimore club is God’s dance 1975 metal. Nor do they taint and that sounds ginalized mongrels everywhere. that a major-label intrusion into music: combining cold - their lumbering riffs with a sur- shockingly great in her hands. CHICAGO READER | JANUARY 6, 2006 | SECTION ONE 21

2. AMADOU & MARIAM Dimanche a Bamako | Nonesuch Wunderkind producer Manu Chao keeps the swirling arrangements and hypnotizing beats small, letting the outsize personalities of this blind Malian couple shine through.

3. DAVE DOUGLAS Keystone | Greenleaf The trumpeter crafts his best electroacoustic jams yet—as sound tracks for some of Fatty Arbuckle’s forgotten silent films.

4. DEERHOOF | /5RC Deerhoof fuses twee pop and organically, with a thousand delicate connections—and though this album is ’s most im- mediate and streamlined, that care- fully balanced yin and yang hasn’t Clockwise from top: Sleater-Kinney, Sufjan Stevens, Common, Edan lost a bit of its bushy-tailed energy. three-disc live set, bring the Marcus Schmickler alter- DAN PENN & SPOONER OLDHAM 3. EDDIE HINTON 5. SEU JORGE intensity and adventurousness of nately caresses and dices the Moments From This Theatre | Beautiful Dream: Sessions Vol. 3 | Cru | Wrasse free to carefully composed minimalist figures of AMM Proper American Zane The songs he sang postbop tunes—even the searing pianist John Tilbury in this Two of music’s greatest story- A collection of unreleased gems on-screen in The Life Aquatic solos are controlled and concise. serene but startling impro- tellers—and one of its greatest from the late lamented southern made him a celebrity, but these vised set. songwriting teams—run through soul man and session ace. strikingly original, stripped-down 9. DOMENICO GUACCERO their back catalogs in front of an sambas will make him a star. Da Cantare | Die Schachtel awestruck Dublin audience. 4. CAST KING This Italian composer wrote these Bob Mehr Moments has been available as an Saw Mill Man | Locust 6. M.I.A. mind-blowing vocal works between import since 1999, but was finally This recently rediscovered coun- Arular | XL/Interscope 1951 and 1983. Some of the materi- There’s a dead heat for the released in the U.S. this year. try songsmith and onetime Sun Maya Arulpragasam’s charisma al sounds like insane-asylum ; number one spot, so my 2005 Records prospect released his transforms this composite of elsewhere Guaccero abandons all list actually goes to eleven. astonishing debut album at the familiar forms—hip-hop, electro, pretentions to genre, layering ripe young age of 79. bhangra, , favela —into weird, blocky percussion atop har- something fresh and irresistible. monically berserk choral singing. 5. Home for Orphans | Sympathy for 7. CAMILLE the Record Industry Le Fil | Virgin and his garage- This French chanteuse, better rock gang retrofit a clutch of known as one of the singers from the their favorite tunes as glorious Nouvelle Vague project, uses multi- Memphis country-soul. tracked vocals—from melodies to 2. EDGAR “JONES” JONES mouth percussion—to create a sly Soothing Music for Stray Cats | Viper 6. OUTRAGEOUS CHERRY pop masterpiece that flirts with 1. RICHARD HAWLEY Cheeky, brilliant pop from the Our Love Will Change the World | chanson, funk, and doo-wop. Coles Corner | Mute former leader of the Liverpool Rainbow Quartz Former Pulp guitarist captures band the Stairs, combining On its seventh full-length, Matthew 8. ATOMIC 10. MARCUS SCHMICKLER the late-night magic of Frank sounds from jazz, doo-wop, and Smith’s Detroit combo toughens up The Bikini Tapes | Jazzland & JOHN TILBURY Sinatra, , and classic R & B—and recorded its jangly 60s fuzz pop with barbed Five of Scandinavia’s finest Variety | A-Musik Scott Walker on this set of almost entirely on a digital lyrics and lean arrangements. improvisers, captured here on a German laptop wizard nostalgic pop numbers. eight-track in his home. continued on page 22 22 CHICAGO READER | JANUARY 6, 2006 | SECTION ONE

Best Music

continued from page 21 5. HOOD 7. PHANTOM BUFFALO Outside Closer | Domino Shishimumu | Rough Trade Lyrical, lo-fi , treated The year’s most offbeat and to hip-hop-inspired production inventive psych-pop record was and expressing a deeply English originally pressed in a tiny run in rural melancholy. 2003, back when this group from Portland, Maine, was still 6. KONONO NO. 1 calling itself the Ponys. Rough Congotronics | Trade gave it a widespread This Congolese dance band uses release last winter. a sound system built from junk, auto parts, and repurposed 8. VARIOUS ARTISTS megaphones to amplify thumb- Cult Cargo: Belize City Boil Up | piano grooves past the point of Numero Group disintegration. Anthology of reggae, R & B, and pop produced by artists from the 7. WIRE tiny Central American nation in The Scottish Play: 2004 | the 1960s and ’70s. Pink Flag These legendary art punks prove 9. BETTYE LA VETTE that angry young men don’t I’ve Got My Own Hell to Raise | always mellow out with the pas- Anti- sage of time. Producer helmed this excellent studio comeback from 8. LAUNAU the old-school R & B diva. Kuutarha | Locust Rough-hewn, rustic Finnish 10. SHARON JONES & THE DAP-KINGS acid folk. Naturally | Daptone On their second disc, Jones and her nimble band plunge into soul so deep you can’t see the bottom. Bill Meyer

9. THELONIOUS MONK QUARTET WITH JOHN COLTRANE At | Blue Note This 1957 concert recording, lost for nearly half a century, turns out to be the most complete por- Clockwise from top: Vijay Iyer, Iron & Wine, Hold Steady, Cocorosie, Low trait of the brief but momentous association between these two 3. PONYS effort—it’s even impossible to hate up songs, which at first seemed 1. VARIOUS ARTISTS jazz giants. Celebration Castle | In the Red the song from that iPod commercial. like above-average filler, now feel American Primitive Volume 2 | Jered Gummere and company as strong as the hits—I guess Revenant 10. LOW soar to desperate new heights, 8. FRANZ FERDINAND false modesty is as classically dif- Before he died, John Fahey The Great Destroyer | Sub Pop alighting on the aerie where You Could Have It So Much Better | fident a pose as any. plucked these 50 gloriously The quietest band in rock turns and are Domino eccentric obscurities from 78s it up—way up. reimagined as one another. For my money, still the best made at the dawn of American (and most likable) of the post- J. Niimi recorded music. 4. EPOXIES Strokes boy bands. On their sec- Brian Nemtusak Stop the Future | Fat Wreck Chords ond disc, tongue-in-cheek art- 1. M.I.A. 2. JACK ROSE Even better than the Rezillian fare rock dandy Alex Kapranos and Arular | XL/Interscope Kensington Blues | VHF on their breezy and blistering debut. crew simply dish up more of the Shriekin’ Sri Lankan makes post- The best of the new generation Everyone from to Gwen same Roxy rock—but when it’s terrorism dance pop from Atari of American Primitive guitarists Stefani could learn a thing or two this good, who cares? glossolalia, talking toy machine infuses his lyrical rags, blues, from these guys about how this neo- guns, and a whole lot of dance- and ragas with remorseless rock new-wave thing oughta be done. 9. AMON TOBIN hall hustle. With a militant Tamil heaviosity. Chaos Theory | Ninja Tune separatist for a dad, she’s so 5. CARIBOU The reigning lord of the other- authentic she makes Ice Cube 3. THE FALL The Milk of Human Kindness | Domino worldly soundscape—whose basalt look like Jello Biafra. The Complete Peel Sessions Dan Snaith, served with cease- plateaus teem with metallized 1978-2004 | Castle and-desist from Handsome Dick insectoid legions, marching in the A six-CD set that’s both a trove 1. regarding the Manitoba moniker, glare of exploding stars—does the of rarities and an invaluable At the Center | Thirsty Ear finally works off his debt to Boards sound track for a first-person condensed history of this can- Electro-dub-industrial trail- of with his first full-length shooter, Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: tankerous English postpunk blazer charts a as Caribou. Psychedelimotorik Chaos Theory. Can you say “duh”? institution. bold new course on this ele- excursions to the subarctic reaches gantly jazzed-up outing. A of the glitchtronica frontier. 4. ROGER SMITH & LOUIS shotgun blast of antivenin for MOHOLO-MOHOLO today’s poisoned brains. 6. The Butterfly and the Bee | Witching Hour | Emanem 2. BROADCAST This disturbed dance music could be 2. LCD SOUNDSYSTEM The title is a play on the phrase Tender Buttons | Warp the sound track for a lost Deodato LCD Soundsystem | DFA/Capitol “insect music,” long used to Addition by subtraction: film—it pulses with a palpable, deli- Affectless dance-floor describe (or dismiss) English James Cargill and Trish cious unease that’s like a photo neg- gets a snarky sense of humor. free improvisation, but it dou- Keenan drop their supporting ative of 604’s synthetic euphoria. Irony will free your mind, and bles as a metaphor for this cast and produce their most your ironic ass will follow. duo’s unusual sound: Smith’s delicate and gripping album 7. 10. KAISER CHIEFS light, prickling acoustic guitar to date. A wild, fluttering Demon Days | Virgin Employment | Universal 3. ELECTRELANE adroitly balances the much rush, like a clockwork wax- I like a few tracks on the first album I was initially pretty dismissive of Axes | Too Pure heavier tones of Moholo- wing crashing through win- better than anything here, but this album, but it’s grown on me Programmatic post-rock with Moholo’s percussion. dowpane after windowpane. Demon Days is a more cohesive like all hell. Even the less juiced- heart and balls as well as the req- CHICAGO READER | JANUARY 6, 2006 | SECTION ONE 23

uisite brains, wringing suspense fusing pop melodies played on just one genre. Like the sound them myself, since the labels that 2. MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO and drama out of its sonic plot classical instruments to anabolic track to the dystopian sci-fi release this stuff aren’t making The Spirit Music Jamia: Dance arc like a good film noir. beats. movie that 2005 sometimes enough money to send promo of the Infidel | Shanachie seemed to be. copies to folks like me. I’m sure The superb bassist opens up to 4. DANGERDOOM I’ve overlooked a few worthy jazz both past and present—the The Mouse and the Mask | Epitaph Miles Raymer 8. contenders as a result, but Lin arrangements recall electric The Shel Silverstein of rap joins Silent Alarm Remixed | Vice Chen’s silky, sinewy, soulful voice Miles, and the guest musicians forces with the Grey Album’s furry Underground dance-floor makes this the best example I include Don Byron, Neal Evans, rabble-rouser and realizes that the tastemakers rip apart an OK found all year. and Wallace Roney—and in decline of narrative in hip-hop frees Britpop record and stitch it back the process points to a fertile him up to talk about stuff besides together into something that 5. DEADLY SNAKES possible future. nines, Escalades, and pussy. lives up to the hype. Porcella | In the Red has over 3. KEITH JARRETT 5. THE FALL 9. DAVID BANNER for a barbecue and serves Radiance | ECM The Complete Peel Sessions 1978- Certified | SRC/Universal them ...to Satan. Solo piano, but a lot more cutting 2004 | Castle One part conscious rapper and than the pastoral stuff you expect A fitting tribute to both the Fall two parts strip-club hedonist, 6. ANTONY & THE JOHNSONS from Jarrett. Two Japanese con- and the late great John Peel. The 1. SPOON Banner makes Dirty South | Secretly Canadian certs recorded three days apart world would be a noticeably Gimme Fiction | Merge bangers with a pissed-off politi- If Antony’s androgynous cabaret and combined into one kaleido- crappier place had neither of The long wait for to cal bite to match their tear-up- doesn’t make you weepy, you scopic, 17-part treatise. them existed. stop making merely good the-club rowditude. need an empathy transplant. albums and put out something great is over—this tense, creepy 10. VARIOUS ARTISTS postpunk pop sounds like a 70s The Sexual Life of the Savages: AM radio signal bounced off a Underground Post-Punk from lonely satellite. Sao Paulo, Brasil | Soul Jazz Sao Paulo’s early-80s postpunks injected hot blood into the genre’s ironic poses—further proof that Brazilians can make any style of music exponentially funkier. 4. DAVE DOUGLAS 6. JENS LEKMAN 7. EPOXIES Keystone | Greenleaf Oh You’re So Silent Jens | Secretly Stop the Future | Fat Wreck Chords In case you just can’t believe Canadian Ann Sterzinger If you don’t fall in love with new- that the silent films of the long- Sensitive Swede nominates him- wave goddess Roxy Epoxy, you discredited Fatty Arbuckle self to be the Scott Walker of might want to check your libido could’ve inspired the year’s best . Warm, lonely music 2. HOLD STEADY for leaks. fusion disc, this release includes for bus stations at 3 AM—like Separation Sunday | Frenchkiss a DVD where Douglas’s music “Midnight Train to Georgia,” Possibly the year’s best work of 8. LAST TARGET provides an obliquely comple- except from the point of view of literature, and you know no one One Shot, One Kill | BYO Records mentary sound track to the on- the guy who’s pawned all his in the New York Review of Books Has there ever been a bad year screen chicanery. hopes for a ticket to a simpler sounds like the E Street Band for Japanese punk? Not since I place and time. gone feral. hit puberty at least.

7. COMET GAIN 3. KONONO NO. 1 9. VAZ City Fallen Leaves | Kill Rock Stars Congotronics | Crammed Discs 1. MOMUS The Lie That Matches the Furniture | These Brits lean hard on the The world’s best street musicians Otto Spooky | American Patchwork Narnack canonical C86 sound, especially make Powerbooks and Sometimes I think Nick Currie is Just when you’re getting jaded in the way domesticated amp clat- sequencers look bad by banging one of them real live genius the indie-metal haunted house, a ter catalyzes the ugly beauty of out the year’s densest, ass- things, but what do I know? real live loup-garou pops out confessional cockney speak-song. shakingest dance record on from behind a giant foam-rubber homemade thumb pianos. 2. MARGOT & THE NUCLEAR tombstone and gives you the BJ 8. WILDERNESS SO & SO’S of your life. 5. JOHN HOLLENBECK Wilderness | Jagjaguwar 4. MAKE BELIEVE The Dust of Retreat | Standard LARGE ENSEMBLE Baltimore boys show up late to Shock of Being | Flameshovel Recording Company 10. TENEMENT HALLS A Blessing | OmniTone the early-aughts postpunk yard Lyrically, it’s probably the most You could call these self-described Knitting Needles & Bicycle Bells | Having recently revitalized cham- sale and get stuck with the part relevant record of the year, and “scarf rockers” precious, or you Merge ber jazz with his Claudia Quintet, of PiL nobody wanted: the probably still will be when every- could quit resisting their wistful, Chris Lopez, of the dearly the drummer and composer rein- vocals. They make lemonade. one else catches up to Make wintry tunes and let your tears departed Rock*a*Teens, multi- vents the jazz orchestra, nodding to Believe’s next-level tweakcore wash the crud from your soul. tracked this almost-solo disc of Charles Mingus, Aaron Copland, 9. BASEMENT JAXX style sometime around 2011. raw but delicate garage—remi- Thad Jones, and Steve Reich. The Singles | XL niscent of the Thrills, if they Pixelated dance-pop outfit swallows 5. COMMON sounded less canned and tidy. 6. THELONIOUS MONK QUARTET club-culture flotsam—styles, singers, Be | GOOD/Geffen WITH JOHN COLTRANE samples, timbres—like it’s some sort With a little push from Kanye, At Carnegie Hall | Blue Note of magical food that makes you hun- Common dropped the record- Neil Tesser This technically superior record- grier the more you eat. geek navel gazing and got back ing of an artistically superior to writing raps that shout out 1957 concert provides the most feminism as fiercely as other valuable window yet into the MCs rep their clothing lines. On short-lived Monk-Coltrane part- “Go” he even got folks to dance nership—and its discovery was to John Mayer. 3. DMBQ jazz’s feel-good story of the year. The Essential Sounds From 6. CELEBRATION the Far East | Estrus 7. ERNEST DAWKINS’S CHICAGO 12 Celebration | 4AD This vortex of wild, psych- Misconceptions of a Delusion Gothic and vaudevillian and drenched blues-punk would’ve Shades of a Charade | Dawk steeped in slapback, this album made my list even without the Written by local saxist Ernest makes me picture one of those compassion points I awarded the 1. VIJAY IYER Dawkins to commemorate the 10. KELLEY POLAR cartoon bands of skeletons who band after the death of their bril- Reimagining | Savoy 35th anniversary of the Chicago Love Songs of the Hanging Gardens | play music on their own bones— liant drummer in a van crash. The clearest statement yet of Seven conspiracy trial, this Environ except it’s actually scary. China Mana, R.I.P. the pianist’s Indian-American piece captures much of the Croatian violin prodigy gets fusion: he stitches mathemati- lively burlesque (both intended expelled from Juilliard for what 7. M83 4. INVISIBLE BALLET cal theories and ancestral and not) of that time and place, his label claims was a “riot” dur- Before the Dawn Heals Us | Mute Escaping Light | Nilaihah modes into jagged, powerfully with its anger, pathos, and ing his master’s recital, then Epic in its scope and sadness I usually have to track down lyrical music that excites both helter-skelter anarchy. becomes a postmashup club star, and impossible to box into synth-pop records and order head and heart. continued on page 24 24 CHICAGO READER | JANUARY 6, 2006 | SECTION ONE

Best Music

continued from page 23 EUGENE “HIDEAWAY” BRIDGES philosopher behind his trick- 5. SUFJAN STEVENS 8. RICHARD GALLIANO Coming Home | Armadillo ster’s mask. Illinois | Asthmatic Kitty NEW YORK TRIO Buoyant but tasteful guitar It’s not just his songs, as smart Ruby, My Dear | Dreyfus blues, technically flawless and JAMES BLOOD ULMER and tender as they are—it’s those Galliano plays accordion, and it deeply soulful—even the most Birthright | Hyena ravishing arrangements. speaks to his virtuosity and exuberant good-timey tunes Aided by producer Vernon Reid, musicality that you won’t be sound refreshingly adult. Ulmer creates the feel of a bar- 6. JUDEE SILL tempted into a single Lawrence BETTYE LA VETTE ren, haunted landscape on this Dreams Come True | Water Welk joke. GOSPEL KEYBOARD TRIO I’ve Got My Own Hell to Raise | ferocious solo acoustic record. This hopeful anticipation of Heavenly Keys | The Sirens Anti- His adventurous playing and the apocalypse, recorded in 9. ANTHONY BROWN’S ORCHESTRA Chicago keyboardists Willie LaVette can extract more feeling naked lyrics—about sex, race, 1974, would’ve been the singer- Rhapsodies | Water Baby Jones, Leonard Maddox, and from a single phrase than most and religion—both invoke and songwriter’s third album if Brown has already transformed Dwayne Mason proclaim their soul singers get from an entire transcend the deepest roots of she’d lived to see it finished; the music of Ellington and faith in a set of churchy hymns, set. You may need to lie down the blues. it was finally mixed and Monk, and to complete the trip- up- shouters, and stately after this one. released this year. tych he’s rescored, reharmonized, spiritual songs, both solo and as and restructured Gershwin’s a trio—it’s virtuosity infused AARON NEVILLE Douglas Wolk Rhapsody in Blue, incorporating with an uplifting earnestness Tell It Like It Is | Empire Musicwerks Asian influences and instru- and joy. When this angelic crooner 1. LCD SOUNDSYSTEM ments and a touch of Latin fla- unfurls his quavering falsetto on LCD Soundsystem | DFA/Capitol vor. Scandalous, heretical!—until BUDDY GUY a ballad like this set’s classic title James Murphy is the best dance you hear it. Bring ’Em In | Silvertone tune, hearts melt for miles producer in America, and he Lately this Chicago blues leg- around—but he can also sharpen makes a pretty great rock star too. end has developed a distres- his voice to match the streetsy sing tendency toward over- signifying on jumpy R & B num- 2. THE NEW PORNOGRAPHERS wrought performances, espe- bers like “A Hard Nut to Crack” | Matador cially in full-band settings, and “Space Man.” The Canadian power-pop legion 7. SLEATER-KINNEY but he imbues the updated sets a new world record for The Woods | Sub Pop 60s soul tunes here (and the DAN PENN & SPOONER OLDHAM hooks per unit time. Veteran Portland trio cranks up occasional pop number, like Moments From This Theatre | the amps to “pulverize” and bar- Dylan’s “Lay Lady Lay”) Proper American 3. VARIOUS ARTISTS rels off into terra incognita. with emotional depth and It takes a hell of a singer to pull One Kiss Can Lead to Another: Girl good taste. off a line like “Go back home, Group Sounds Lost & Found | Rhino 8. 10. FREDRIK LUNDIN OVERDRIVE see the old folks / They’ve all Five hours of magnificent 150-sec- Come, Come to the Sunset Tree | “Belly-Up”: The Music of Leadbelly | HERMON HITSON had heart attacks and light ond epics from the 60s, packaged self-released Stunt You Are Too Much for the Human strokes,” but blue-eyed soul in a hat box. A hat box, people. The LP-only edition of John This Danish saxist leads his Heart | Soul-Tay-Shus brother Dan Penn is a hell of Darnielle’s taut, compassionate big band in an inventive trib- A compilation showcasing this a singer. He and Spooner valediction to an abusive stepfa- ute to the American folk-blues almost forgotten 60s soul singer Oldham, who wrote and pro- ther, with home-recorded ver- icon—and doubles the ante from Atlanta. Hitson was ham- duced some of the most sions of the songs on the CD. by dedicating each arrange- pered by second-rate production memorable R & B of the 60s, ment, in spirit as well as in for most of his career, but at his reprise some of their best 9. SHARON JONES & THE DAP-KINGS name, to an American jazz best he packed an emotional tunes in gritty, graceful country- Naturally | Daptone great, from Charles Mingus wallop to rival ’s or folk versions. As far as this joyful funk band is to Gil Evans. ’s. concerned, it’s 1971 and they’re BOBBY RUSH glued to the top of the R & B charts. DENISE LA SALLE Night Fishin’ | Deep Rush David Whiteis Wanted | Ecko This time Rush mixes his usual 4. THE FALL 10. PRINCESS SUPERSTAR Odes to womanly prowess, both tales of backdoor shenanigans The Complete Peel Sessions My Machine | !K7 Given the range of subgenres in and out of bed, from a veter- with songs like “We Had Love,” a 1978-2004 | Castle A science-fiction hip-hop opera and styles represented, I haven’t an soul-blues stylist, laced with thoughtful meditation on a Twenty-seven years of status in which motormouthed ranked these—consider each the her trademark take-no-prison- childhood enriched by old-fash- reports from a marble-mouthed Concetta Kirschner turns all best of its kind that I encoun- ers raunch and leavened with ioned family values—a welcome avant-garde poet and his riff- other celebrities into “dupli- tered in 2005. good humor. glimpse of the serious-minded crazy backup bands. cants” of herself. CHICAGO READER | JANUARY 6, 2006 | SECTION ONE 25 Reviews Music Books

Rhino’s latest Nik Cohn’s Triksta REVIEW BY ROBERTMENTZER girl-groups box and Harry Stephen Keeler’s Evie Sands’s The Riddle of the Traveling Skull Any Way That You REVIEW BY JOHN MARR

Want Me D OY a REVIEW BY JESSICAHOPPER

25 Y CHRIS FL THA MCNEAL 27 TRAIT B Y OF BER

TES a The Velvelettes OHN POR UR CO NIK C Music

VARIOUS ARTISTS ONE KISS CAN LEAD TO ANOTHER: GIRL GROUP SOUNDS LOST AND FOUND (RHINO) EVIE SANDS ANY WAY THAT YOU WANT ME (REV-OLA) Girls, Girls, Girls And you thought “” had it rough.

By Jessica Hopper he first time I stole a ing but a tear-stained pillow record it was because I and poetic metaphors: “All I T wanted to be in a girl can see on the beach / Is a piece group. It was easy. I went to the of driftwood / And it somehow library, picked up a copy of 25 reminds me / Of the twisted Years of , cut out the memories / Left in my mind” magnetic alarm strip with a goes the dramatic spoken razor, slipped the five-album set interlude of the Bitter Sweets’ into my large schoolbag with “What a Lonely Way to Start the spray-painted peace sign on the Summer.” it, and headed home to listen to But One Kiss Can Lead to “Reflections” by the Supremes a Another is more than just an few dozen times in a row. I was exhaustive tribute to broken obsessed with Diana Ross, Mary hearts and high-tease hairdos: Wilson, and Florence Ballard it’s a chronicle of how the girl- and desperately wanted to be group sound impacted rock ’n’ them all. That wasn’t the norm roll. Many of the girls came amongst 11-year-old Minnesota from gospel backgrounds and girls in 1988, but my fandom brought along the soul-holler was immutable. Much as their and hand claps. Phil Spector’s harmonies killed me, what I production for the Ronettes not really loved was their aesthetic: only created the template for Mary had the better voice and the girl-group sound—forceful bouffier hair, but Diana was my vocals cut with gunshot snares, favorite because she always pizzicato string stabs, and seemed to be wearing twice as reverb by the metric ton—but much eyeliner. They were the upped the ante for other pro- most majestic representation of ducers who sought to compete: young womanhood I knew, so Brian Wilson, Spector arranger princesslike, and I bought into side of the story—sort of. strong: “Please find it in your like the Shangri-Las—things end Jack Nitzsche, future Bread the dream of it completely. Crooning and cooing about the heart / To make all my dreams in tragedy. founder David Gates, and The four-disc genre retrospec- triumphs and travails of young come true / Let me get close to The girls are never true aggres- Motown’s resident genius team tive One Kiss Can Lead to love (and little else), wagging you,” sings country star Skeeter sors; rather, they are t-r-u l-u-v Holland-Dozier-Holland. They Another: Girl Group Sounds gloved fingers in time to their Davis on her girl-pop turn “Let hopefuls, keeping the heart made symphonic pop and made Lost and Found (Rhino) is a honey-sweet three-part no no Me Get Close to You.” Over a flames alive somewhere beneath it loud as hell, a cavernous cav- monument to that dream: the nos, the girl groups proffered snare crack that sounds like a their bullet bras. For these girls alcade of harps, timpani, and romantic fever dream of the inverse of the thrusty rebel- cannon shot and a bed of perfect- there’s just one kind of boy—the orchestra-size string sections teenage-girl narratives written lion and innuendo that had ly harmonized bum-she-bum-ooo- One and Only—and their love, with occasional tracks of audi- by adult songwriters. In the pre- been codified by men: the ultra- eee-ooo-aaa, the Chiffons’ Judy it’s Forever and Always. As for ble sobbing. The sound is as Beatles days of the early 1960s chaste longings of a bunch of Craig booms with pride, “I have a their love objects, they’re bad timeless as the sentiments of girl groups came to dominate purported virgins in satiny boyfriend / Met him a week ago / boys, other girls’ boys, ex-boys, lovelorn teens and still holds up the charts, supposedly due to evening gowns. He’s mine forever / Last night he and next boys, and they’re all decades after the genre’s final the vacuum left by the overseas Looking back, girl groups seem told me so,” on “I Have a elusive. Whether he’s a commit- years, represented here by the deployment of Elvis and the the epitome of the gender pre- Boyfriend.” Then, so we don’t mentphobic cad, a cheater, an Lovelites’ 1969 teen-pregnancy deaths of Eddie Cochran, scription of the time: that women think she’s some good-night-kiss- abuser, or a dude with a drag- classic, “How Can I Tell My Ritchie Valens, and Buddy and girls should be guileless and ing hussy, she adds, “Someday race death wish, she wants only Mom and Dad?” Holly. Trios and quartets of high pure, doting and servile, never we’ll walk down the aisle / So in to make him happy—and all he Much as the sound of pop school- and college-age women, fully women unless validated by love.” Their physical desires can can doisdisappear. She can may have changed, the subject many of them black, supplanted the love of a man. In song after be safely expressed only through shoop shoop shoop all night matter—love and how to suffer slick-haired boys on the radio song, the promise of romance double entendre, and when they long, but he ain’t coming back. it—is still intrinsic to the soul- and got a chance to tell their and the redemption it brings is stray—as with “bad girl” groups In the end she’s left with noth- continued on page 26