It's the time of the year when the leaves have fallen, a chill is in the air, Christmas lights with decorations fill the windows, my wallet is hurting, and I feel reflective on the past year. Personally, 2014 has been a wonderful year surrounded by great people and I hope to continue that momentum into 2015.
Musically, 2014 brought some exciting new acts like Sam Smith and solidified other already known artists like Ed Sheeran. On the whole, I preferred the new music from 2013 to that of 2014. Daft Punk's Random Access Memories, released May 2013, was a monumental album and those don't come around every year. But I feel the music industry in a good place. There's a lot of good being music being made and it continues to be more and more accessible to the listener.
My favorite albums of 2014:
10. They Want My Soul - Spoon
Spoon was relatively unfamiliar to me before 2014, admittedly I didn't watch any of The O.C. during high school. But I had the opportunity to see them at Boston Calling this year and they are a solid group with an extensive collection of good songs. They Want My Soul adds some more well written songs to Spoon's catalogue, in particular the expressive and catchy "Do You".
9. This is All Yours - Alt-J
Indie rock is not typically my cup of tea. Alt-J's 2012 debut album, An Awesome Wave, was promising. This is All Yours in 2014, which got a lot of love from Spotify, was a solid followup. Alt-J's has an expressive, often mellow, sound. But the group can also groove with well sung vocals. The chorus of "Left Hand Free" may be the best use of cowbell since Blue Oyster Cult's "Don't Fear the Reaper". Bruce Dickinson would be proud.
Ed Sheeran's sophomore album X solidified Sheeran as a major player in pop music. And "Sing", its debut track, is an example of what happens when talented artists collaborate with Pharrell Williams. Slightly out of his acoustic comfort zone, "Sing" adds the rhythmic punctuation some of his ballads are missing. On the rest of X, Sheeran can croon with the best of them. Though I must admit that it is weird seeing young women fall in love with a goofy looking ginger from England.
Isn't it refreshing when a band puts their best track first on the album? The opening track "Seasons (Waiting on You)" is one of the best by a relatively unknown in 2014. The vocals are superb, so emotive and powerful. Lyrically, "Seasons" is about love lost, metaphorically to the Winter with a craving to summers future. The rest of the album continues the momentum. The instrumentation of 80s rhythmic synth lines with often times heavy guitars and exceptional vocals that sound almost late Elton John-esque gives Future Islands an exciting and distinct sound.
For a group best known for their live shows, Umphrey's McGee makes damn good studio albums, too. Similar Skin features Umphrey's doing what they do best, which is rock. The piano driven "No Diablo" is quickly becoming one of my UM favorites (though as a piano player, I may be biased). Beloved by the jam band community and their cult following of Umphreaks (including members of ESPN's Around the Horn for which UM does the theme song!), Umphrey's McGee should be appreciated by all fans of rock and roll.
When I heard Herbie Hancock would be collaborating with Flying Lotus, I was excited. FlyLo (the nephew of Alice and John Coltrane) reached new levels of avant-garde with You're Dead, an album composed of 19 tracks about death. Somehow, it tackles the subject being both lighthearted and psychedelic. It's difficult to put this album into any genre but it has audible influences of experimental jazz, hip hop and soul. Its best track "Never Catch Me" features Kendrick Lamar who is stellar. Flying Lotus' bassist and collaborator, Thundercat, is excellent throughout.
Todd Terje had been making singles/EPs in Norway for a couple years prior so it's appropriate that his first album was named It's Album Time. Terje is a slick producer of 21st century electric-disco. Reminiscent of Giorgio Moroder, It's Album Time flows from one danceable groove to the next. The layers of synthesizers create a beautiful, rich sound combining interesting harmonies with tight grooves. "Delorean Dynamite" would be the perfect score for an action movie car chase scene (I love driving to this track). The goofy album art speaks to Album Time's fun nature. Terje's musicianship makes this enjoyable album one of my favorites of 2014.
[Side note: this album was released in December 2013 but for all intents and purposes, I'm calling it 2014. Which I guess is ironic given the album's theme of the internet's influence and its instantaneousness. Regardless...]
What can't Donald Glover do? Because the Internet is packed with great tracks connected by a common theme that, well, this is a crazy time to be alive. By nature, all music is a product of the time when it is written. But Because the Internet comes off like an album written about the time when it is a product. Gambino is a gifted lyricist who is both emotive and witty (needless to say, Donald Glover is a brilliant guy). This is an angry album and it's superbly produced with myriad layers of sound. It may be top heavy (the first half is superior) but it's an excellent, heavily detailed, headphones album. I got to see it performed at Boston Calling, which was also excellent but for very different reasons. Gambino loves to yell for the crowd to BOUNCE which tends to get the people going. "Crawl", the opening track, is my favorite though the whole first half of the album is excellent and should be listened to fluidly.
Snarky Puppy is one of my favorite bands currently in its prime. The 8+ piece band made up of monster musicians who met at the University of North Texas continues to pave its own way in jazz/rock music. Playing hundreds of shows while consistently producing albums each year, Snarky Puppy is one of the hardest working bands today. These are monster players with tight, interesting arrangements, creating a very new sound using 20 (twenty!) musicians on this album which was recorded live-ish (watch the videos). The keyboard solo on "Lingus" beginning at 4:18 is prodigious; I love watching the reactions of the other people in the room, particularly the other keyboardist. Both a great headphone listen and live show, Snarky Puppy is a band in its prime and I think they like it here.
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Pharrell Williams went from being a superstar to a super-mega-colossal-star. If you watched the Nickelodeon game show "GUTS", then you are familiar with the "Crag." GUTS was a game show in which kids competed in a series of physical challenges. The Crag was the show's final round in with each season it got larger and longer in its name. The Crag became the Aggro Crag, then the Super Aggro Crag. By the end I think it was the Super Nitro Colossal Aggro Crag but then again I was 6 years old. Anyway, that's Pharrell Williams. In 2014, Pharrell is Super Nitro Colossal Aggro Pharrell Williams.
With GIRL, Pharrell can add a major solo album to his accomplishments. Although the biggest track on the album is undoubtedly "Happy", it's impossible to speak objectively about a song that was played billions of times in the past year (I'm writing this, over 516 million times on YouTube alone). But my favorite track may be "Gust of Wind". "Gust of Wind" has a great groove, lush string arrangements, and a catchy talkbox hook provided by Daft Punk. Tragically, it's marred by horrible lyrics (When I open the window / I wanna hug you / cause you remind me of the air / I said, yeah). But I love the jazzy keyboard voicings with the text painting by the strings (the sweeping, ascending and descending line at the beginning sounds like, well, a gust of wind). Top to bottom a great pop album.
