TEN THOUSAND WORDS...

2004-12-21T15:12:00.000-05:00

PROLOGUE

Like probably many of you, I'm obsessed with lists, especially the Best Albums/Films/TV Shows of the Year/Decade/All-Time variety. A year ago, Rolling Stone published a poll presenting their Top 500 Albums of All-Time. Dreadfully predictable and skewed towards the same tired classics that tend to pop up on such endeavors, it inspired me to create my own list of 100 favorite albums (I'd be really scraping to get to 500).

I sort of attempted an embryonic version of this in 2001. With an excess of free time at the job I had then, I began writing brief, Robert Christgau-like paragraphs about fifty of my favorite albums. I did this randomly, not placing the entries in any particular order. If you're curious to see it, forget it--I lost the file some time back. Fortunately, blogging gave me the opportunity to execute and complete a proper list. The title comes from a song called "One Thousand Words" by Northern State. My original goal was to write at least a one hundred words about each album, thus a total of at least ten thousand words (as I got closer to number one, the entries got longer, and the final word count is somewhere around 15,000).

As for the rankings, well, isn't it difficult to say exactly what makes one album ever-so-slightly better than another? When I started this project, I culled together 100 albums that I loved with a general idea of which ones I valued significantly more than others. Early on, I changed the order here and there and made a few substitutions. I've acquired some great stuff in the interim, and if I had started the project today, it would definitely include The Shins' Chutes Too Narrow, Massive Attack's Mezzanine and possibly Ted Leo and the Pharmacist's Hearts of Oak. Kings of Convenience's 2004 album, Riot On an Empty Street, would certainly take the place of Quiet Is The New Loud, and Bjork's Medulla might be there instead of Selmasongs.

But, such speculation is irrelevant going forward. You'll notice that the recent, higher ranked entries seem a little more personal than the earlier ones. Somewhere along the way, I realized that I had difficulty writing about some of these albums without placing them in a context that expressed how much of an impact they had on my life, and exactly how (or when or where) they made that impact. What follows is a sort of musical autobiography in bite-sized pieces...

2004-12-21T13:45:00.000-05:00

1. R.E.M., Automatic For The People (Warner Bros., 1992)

Upon its release, when pressed to describe this beautifully cryptic, somber record, R.E.M. bassist Mike Mills simply noted that its songs were "weird". While far from the weirdest album to ever just miss topping the charts (Garth Brooks kept it from entering at number one), Automatic For The People was more idiosyncratic and unabashedly out of time than, well, Out of Time, the band's previous record--just scan the oblique cover photo, the in-joke of a title (supposedly a greeting belted out by a diner owner to his customers) and the puzzling song titles ("Star Me Kitten", "Nightswimming"). How did a slow, strange song cycle revolving around mortality and loss (with few obvious hit singles) strike a chord with so many people?

Before Automatic, I admired the band at a distance, enjoying hits like "Stand" and "Losing My Religion", but I wasn't in a mad rush to obtain the album--that was, until I heard the first single "Drive" on the radio. Something about that minor-key guitar arpeggio and the song's fluid, dynamic swings from acoustic splendor to charged electricity and back again really pulled me in. Admittedly, the rest of the album took more time to register. I didn't know who Montgomery Clift or Andy Kaufman were, so in terms of narrative, neither "Monty Got a Raw Deal" or "Man on the Moon" made much sense to me.

I can remember lying on my bed one Friday evening a few weeks later, listening to "Man on the Moon" on headphones, and suddenly feeling the music's pull--particularly its outgoing melody, cathedral-like expansiveness, and tremendous warmth. Soon, other songs similarly began to resonate: "Sweetness Follows" soothing all the pain away with its gently sawing cellos, "Nightswimming" capturing the melancholy, autumnal glow of a faint but significant reminiscence, "Try Not to Breathe" brightening the darkness with its sway and verve.

"Everybody Hurts" is something else altogether, and probably what drew so many people towards this album. A few fans of R.E.M.'s earlier work have criticized Michael Stipe for making his vocals, once enigmatic and garbled beyond belief, all too intelligible at this point (and thus, not as distinctive), but his clarity is vital to this song's impact. Over an arrangement as expansive as an arena power ballad (only smarter) and a melody as classic and engaging as "Bridge Over Troubled Water" or "Hey Jude", Stipe talks a friend out of committing suicide. It's melodramatic and over-the-top because it simply has to be, and it's emblematic of the whole album's urgency, humaneness and willingness to go out on a limb and open yourself up to the world. One of R.E.M.'s earliest hits was called "Talk about the Passion" and Automatic does just that more fluently than any other album I've heard.

2004-12-18T11:33:00.000-05:00

2. Joni Mitchell, Blue (Reprise, 1971)

It took many spins to fully embrace this album. Despite my repeated efforts, Blue didn't scan well as background music when I worked as a desk receptionist for student housing at Marquette. The songs all ran together and I couldn't discern any immediate hooks. When I moved to Boston a year later, I arrived with a minimal assortment of cassette tapes to tide me over until the rest of my belongings arrived. One of these was my dubbed copy of Blue. Much like another album, I listened to it constantly on headphones, in and out of my apartment, and eventually, I understood what made it so exemplary and rare. The key to Blue is its intimacy, openness and fragility--more than half of its tracks are skeletal, nothing but a voice and a lone guitar or piano. Although Mitchell may have not necessarily written these ten songs about herself, her confessional delivery and keen lyricism is so raw, naked and felt that you wonder how they could possibly be about anyone else. Each one is like a personal, poetic travelogue--listen to the way she makes the most of a fleeting moment in "Carey" or how she sums up the side effects of fame on her generation in the title track. Still, it's the melancholy final three songs ("River", "A Case of You", and “The Last Time I Saw Richard") that leave the most lasting, unsettling impression. Like the final shot of Annie Hall, they summarize the narrator’s pain and desires (without any self-pity) while leaving a few things open and unresolved.

2004-12-15T11:13:00.000-05:00

3. Belle and Sebastian, If You're Feeling Sinister (Jeepster/Matador, 1996)

On a wintry New Year's Day a few years back, as mounds of snow piled up outside her family's suburban split-level, a good friend and I listened to this album for the first time and we both instantly fell in love with the opening song, "The Stars of Track and Field". Like Stuart Murdoch's best work ("The State I Am In", "Lazy Line Painter Jane"), it begins quietly, gently, barely audible even, then it gradually builds, adding on piano, trumpet and strings until the chorus swells and roars with Murdoch's fey warble exuding a force you never knew it had. “Seeing Other People” follows with a sharp lilt that mixes the Smiths with Vince Guaraldi; the remainder, as I once described to another friend, could be the love child of Paul Simon and Ray Davies (with the Beatles presiding over the birth, of course). If You're Feeling Sinister wasn't this Scots collective's debut album, but it was the first one most people heard. To discover it is to come across an anomaly in pop music, an alternate universe that has absolutely nothing to do with rock star celebrity or artistic pretension. Even more so than the work of another man with the same initials, these bittersweet, literate songs bring to mind people playing together in a room because the music and each other's company is what they live for.

2004-12-13T11:48:00.000-05:00

4. Everything But The Girl, Amplified Heart (Atlantic, 1994)

Despite the title, this is Tracey Thorn and Ben Watt's most organic and acoustic record next to, well, Acoustic, the covers collection that preceded it. On first listen, it comes perilously close to easy listening or elevator music--every note seems smooth, sophisticated, carefully chosen and executed, like aural wallpaper suitable for subdued cocktail parties and pleasant enough to play for your parents. Additional spins, however, reveal lots of raw tension subsisting beneath the glassy veneer. I recently heard someone call this one of the best ever albums about a failed relationship; it's an apt description, although I never thought of it that way, for it wasn't this duo's last album (they're currently no longer together). On the contrary, backing away from the tinny overproduction of EBTG’s past few releases, it felt like a rebirth. Watt had also just survived a rare intestinal disease that almost killed him. One of the two songs he sings, "25th December", seems unbearably poignant with this in mind, but it’s only a crescendo on an album suffused with eloquent longing, regret, melancholy and resolve. And although I initially thought the hit Todd Terry remix of “Missing” was a sellout, it really fleshes out the original (both are included here) and adds something crucial even as it trims it down into a minimalist electronic soundscape.

2004-12-11T18:23:00.000-05:00

5. Ivy, Apartment Life (Atlantic, 1997)

I already wrote nearly one thousand words about this one for Splendid earlier in the year. To that, let me add that it continues to grow on me (it's surpassed this record, for chrissakes). More so than any other album I own, I can imagine playing it anytime, anyplace. I want every future boyfriend of mine to hear it so I can use it as a litmus test for whether he's worth hanging on to. I'll buy this trio's next album when it comes out in March 2005 even though it'll probably be an inevitable letdown. Apartment Life is still the best purchase I've ever made from a used CD store on a whim. Check back with me in five years to see whether it will be my all-time favorite album.

2004-12-10T16:59:00.000-05:00

6. The Beatles, Abbey Road (Capitol, 1969)

Everybody has an album that "changed their life" and this is mine. Up until my senior year of high school, top 40 radio and MTV molded my taste in music. One afternoon, I heard "Come Together" playing in a friend’s car. Although I knew the song, it seemed much cooler than before--the snarky wordplay, the unorthodox percussion, the bluesy electric piano. A few months later, I borrowed this CD from the library just to hear that one song again. However, I felt my world shifting left of center as I took in the entire album. I was delighted to find another old favorite, "Here Comes the Sun", but was just floored by the multi-song suite that concludes the disc (and the band's career). I had never heard anything so ambitious, clever, intricate and effortlessly executed. It encouraged me to listen to classic rock, which in turn led to college radio, checking every available music publication, spending hours rummaging through used record stores, etc; In short, Abbey Road was like the first, primary domino, and undeniably responsible for what I listen to today. For that, it’s obviously still my favorite Beatles album and an exceptionally cohesive piece of art--pretty miraculous when you consider how close the band was to disintegrating when they birthed it.

2004-12-07T10:43:00.000-05:00

7. The Avalanches, Since I Left You (Elektra, 2001)

On one end of the sampling spectrum, you have P. Diddy and "Ice Ice Baby"; on the other, you have this Australian collective. Since I Left You takes the kitsch-en sink approach DJ Shadow introduced on Endtroducing... about ten steps further, constructing a Frankenstein monster out of a disparate array of existing sounds. Yet, such a monster never moved about so gracefully. Suffused with layers and echoes and recurring motifs, this is an orchestrated work. It doesn't register as background noise all too well--you need to hear it on headphones to entirely feel and appreciate its depth and impact. The album opens with an androgynous vocalist repeatedly intoning "Since I left you / I've never felt so blue" and concludes an hour later as another finally responds "Girl I just can't get you / Since the day I left you". Between those two bookends, we hear a glittering assortment of funk, trip-hop, and disco, but it seems wrong to use those simple, recognizable terms. How exactly does one categorize a track like “Frontier Psychiatrist”, which creates a supple, silly, exuberant narrative out of a symphony of random snippets? Does it matter when it makes for a riveting dance party skewed more towards the mind than the feet?

2004-12-03T17:01:00.000-05:00

8. Saint Etienne, Good Humor (Sub Pop, 1998)

After taking a breather in the mid-90's, this trio came back into the fold with something different, an album that had no instrumentals, no obscure sound bites from classic British films, no barmy experimental detours--just eleven winsome, melancholy pop songs with vocals. Assisted by Cardigans producer Tore Johansson, Good Humor gazes back to the heyday of '60s/'70s AM radio, largely supplementing Saint Etienne’s proclivity towards electronics/programming with a crack live band. The results are admittedly less challenging and dynamic, and some fans still regard this as their worst album. I’ll argue that it's their best. Chanteuse/secret weapon Sarah Cracknell spent the layoff learning how to make the most out of her limited range (see her solo album) and the deeper, more versatile tone she displays here flawlessly complements the simplicity, sincerity and puppy dog warmth these songs emanate. Everything sparkles, but "Sylvie" is Saint Etienne's finest moment: a lengthy piano intro gives way to an irresistible samba/disco pulse with an astute lyric about a teenaged girl whose boyfriend has just been snatched away by her younger sister. It’s the sort of heavenly pop song that breaks your heart and makes you feel glad to be alive so you can listen to it again.

2004-12-01T15:51:00.000-05:00

9. Stevie Wonder, Innervisions (Motown, 1973)

Some deemed him a genius when he was 12, but Stevie Wonder really didn't earn that title until a decade later. Like Marvin Gaye, he rebelled against the Motown assembly production line and took control of his art, but he went much further. In addition to playing nearly every damn instrument himself, he made blisteringly personal music that was innovative (and a tad idiosyncratic) but always approachable. More so than the rightly praised if overstuffed Songs in the Key of Life, this is Wonder's sharpest, riskiest set. Although still chiefly an R&B album, you can tell he was soaking up everything from folk-rock and Abbey Road to post-Bitches Brew Miles Davis and Broadway. Yet, these influences come back filtered entirely through Wonder's innate sensibilities, veering between social activism ("Living For The City", “Higher Ground”) and individual contemplation ("All In Love Is Fair") until they blur and seem inseparable. He's thoughtful and abstract on the acoustic-guitar driven "Visions" and startingly direct on "Too High" (he frankly disses a girl because "she wasn't very nice"), but the Latin-jazz "Don't You Worry 'Bout a Thing" really displays what made him a prodigy: compassion, melodic virtuosity to spare and a wonderfully weird sense of humor.

2004-11-29T21:36:00.000-05:00

10. Tori Amos, Scarlet's Walk (Epic, 2002)

This icon spent at least half a decade bewildering fans of Little Earthquakes with a slew of unusual, challenging, and often obtuse offerings that left little doubt she really did wanna be the next Kate Bush, only weirder. After the torturous covers record Strange Little Girls, few expected to hear anything accessible (or remotely likable) from her ever again--which is what partially makes this album an absolute stunner. Certainly a return to form but not exactly a retreat, Scarlet's Walk takes the original template of Amos’ early '90s work and applies to it all of the musical dexterity she's acquired in the interim. Inspired by her tour across America in the weeks following 9/11, this 18-track, 75-minute set is as sprawling and ambitious as Boys For Pele. But where that one felt insular, loose and occasionally schizophrenic, this one's inviting, disciplined and unswerving. While I have difficulty tracing the album's lyrical trajectory across the zigzagging map of the United States included in the CD booklet, I do get a keen sense of how these songs coalesce into an arresting, stream-of-consciousness travelogue. I also sense that, for the first time, Amos seems wholly aware of a world beyond herself and the faeries.

2004-11-28T17:09:00.000-05:00

11. The Magnetic Fields, 69 Love Songs (Merge, 1999)

Any music geek obsessive enough to alphabetize his 500+ CD collection needs to hear this extraordinary act of chutzpah from Stephin Merritt: a sprawling three-disc set that catapulted him into modern-day Cole Porter territory. Working with five vocalists (including his ever-distinct low register bellow), at least twenty-five genres, and lots of stuff sung by one gender but written for the other, the sheer bulk of it all is obviously impressive. Not everything's as funny as "A Chicken With Its Head Cut Off" or as lyrically brilliant as "Crazy For You (But Not That Crazy)" or as catchy as "I'm Sorry I Love You" or as moving as "All My Little Words"--if that were the case, 69 Love Songs would be number one on this list. Still, fewer clunkers (or even subpar tracks) surface than you'd expect. I originally fell madly in love with this collection because I thought it was so endearing and sincere to hear these people making music in a tiny little bedroom cramped with piles of second-hand recording equipment (or so I'd like to imagine). Of course, sincerity isn't exactly correct for an auteur so fond of irony and pastiche, but the dedication and talent put into this project is such that you almost believe every last word.

2004-11-24T16:43:00.000-05:00

12. XTC, Skylarking (Geffen, 1986)

Neither XTC nor producer Todd Rundgren had much of a reputation for putting out consistent, tight albums until this shimmering song cycle appeared (seemingly from out of nowhere) and re-established both of their then-moribund careers. Although band leader Partridge notoriously butted heads with Rundgren during the recording sessions, the results sound seamless, harmonic and far-reaching. Maybe great art is born out of conflict (the similarly genius Apple Venus came out right before guitarist Dave Gregory quit the band). This wasn't the first (or last) time XTC indulged in a little late '60s lush, psychedelic pop, but it remains their strongest, least-dated effort. Thematically, Skylarking passes through the four seasons while likening them to the human life cycle (or vice-versa, if you prefer). Hardly an original framework, but it proves an ideal setting for miniaturist observations like "Grass", "Earn Enough For Us" and "Big Day" (only "Dear God", a former B-side added on after it became a big hit, grapples with weightier issues). Alternately swooning and tartly cynical, languorous and lucid, dreamlike and down-to-earth, Skylarking is high on a teeny tiny list of the very best Beatles-esque albums.

2004-11-23T23:56:00.000-05:00

13. Stew, The Naked Dutch Painter and Other Songs (Smile, 2002)

Music geek that I am, I usually try to keep a close eye on new CD releases. However, a week before this album was officially available in stores, I came across a promotional copy of it in a used record bin without any knowledge of its impending existence. I couldn't have asked for a more delightful surprise--Stew's second solo album is a ramshackle but substantial masterpiece, and the finest introduction to this quirky, obscure, droll songwriter. Falling somewhere between a live document (complete with 'tween song banter) a lushly-produced studio set, and an original cast recording, it defies easy categorization. The Naked Dutch Painter... blends all the man's obsessions into a thick, heady... um, stew, making room for jaunty piano cabaret about "girls who carry switchblades and are very well read", Marvin Gaye-by-way-of-The Beatles balladry ("Reeling") and an astounding three-part "Drug Suite" that waxes rhapsodic about intoxication and abstinence with wit and precise detail. Plus, the climactic title track is as sharp and intuitive as a short story by Raymond Carver or Dorothy Parker, only better because Stew can enhance his narrative prowess with a terrific melody.

2004-11-18T17:05:00.000-05:00

14. Concrete Blonde, Bloodletting (I.R.S., 1990)

Some albums take you back to a particular time and place. This one inevitably conjures up memories of college, of taking the Badger Bus back and forth between Milwaukee and Madison and strolling through the student ghettos of each city. I first heard this in 1994, and it only took a few spins for me to realize how solid it was--you know, one of those rare records where messing with the sequence would seem sacrilegious because it's perfect as is. Johnette Napolitano remains one of the world's most underrated female rock vocalists. She makes up for her lack of technique tenfold with how well her beguiling wail simply fills up a space, be it your bedroom or a concert hall. Although the title track forever established this band as a favorite in Goth circles, the album’s bulk is less theatrical and brooding. Supposedly, Napolitano wrote these songs in a rush after deciding not to break up their band, and their urgency comes through in undulating details: Peter Buck's shimmering mandolin in "Darkening of the Light"; the "Be My Baby" drumbeat that kicks off the band's lone hit "Joey"; the hushed, nearly eerie calm permeating the defiant "I Don't Need A Hero".

2004-11-16T13:33:00.000-05:00

15. Ani DiFranco, Dilate (Righteous Babe, 1996)

When I moved to Boston in ’97, if I didn’t have homework to do or a rented video to watch, I strove to just get away from my cramped, run-down apartment. On many walks, I listened to this album repeatedly on a crudely-dubbed cassette tape (with no song titles written on its homemade notebook paper sleeve). As with other fans, this was my first Ani album, the first to nationally chart and the one that catapulted her beyond cult phenomenon. It remains her most focused and complete work, and that’s saying a lot for someone with such a sprawling, uneven catalogue. Maybe sticking to an overall theme (the dissolution and aftermath of a love affair) helped, but the sequencing’s also strong without feeling heavy-handed or lapsing into concept-album obviousness. Dilate begins with a venomous but calm “Fuck you” and ends with quiet resignation and possible enlightenment. In between, she screams, wails, laughs, confesses, falls into devastation and despair, and gradually puts herself back together again--and she secures your attention every step of the way.

2004-11-15T17:14:00.000-05:00

16. Vince Guaraldi Trio, A Charlie Brown Christmas (Fantasy, 1965)

Peanuts has always had an curiously significant presence in my life. As a kid, I didn’t care about collecting Transformers or obtaining tickets to Wrestlemania; I was more content with tracking down every last available Peanuts reprint book and taping all the television specials. As an adult, I’m collecting the strips all over again (via Fantagraphic’s stellar reissue series). As for the specials, the first and best, A Charlie Brown Christmas continues to resonate with me more as an adult, and I think that’s partially due to Vince Guaraldi’s score. In 1965, the last music you’d expect to hear in a television cartoon was a jazz piano trio, yet the results nailed (if “nailed” isn’t too gauche a word) the thoughtful, understated tone of Charles Schulz’s clean, modernist style. To this day, Guaraldi’s gentle, wistful interpretations of chestnuts like “O Tannenbaum”, “What Child Is This” and “The Christmas Song” stand in sharp contrast to the bulk of plastic, cheery, loud holiday music. Along with “Linus and Lucy” (alone surely a case for Guaraldi's genius) and other originals, they provide a warmer, more melancholy and far more realistic soundtrack to the season.

2004-11-12T15:25:00.000-05:00

17. Portishead, Dummy (Polygram, 1994)

Suggested alternate title: Spooky. A decade on, this quintessential trip-hop album holds up far more sturdily than you'd expect. For all of its noir-drenched gloom, Dummy remains accessible and oddly inviting because instrumentalist Geoff Barrows and strange chanteuse Beth Gibbons (perhaps the '90s equivalent of Nico?) paid as much mind to song structure and melody as they did to tension, mood, texture and cannily-employed samples. When they tried again with Portishead three years later, they somehow screwed up that synergy--the songs just didn't blossom as they do so fluently here. Supposedly, they also made a short film called To Kill a Dead Man to accompany this album, and it's a wonder why Barrows didn't do more scoring--you don't even have to rent When The Cat's Away to imagine how flawlessly the steadily shattering album closer "Glory Box" lends itself to a film's credits roll.

2004-11-11T15:23:00.000-05:00

18. Aimee Mann, Bachelor No. 2 (Superego, 2000)

This was the first album I'd ever purchased from an artist's website because you could do so weeks before you could buy it in stores. After two frankly amazing albums (plus the career-reviving Magnolia soundtrack, which slyly previewed a few gems from this one), I dearly hoped that Mann could pull off a triple play, and this solid, sterling set more than did the job. It’s as cunning and cutting as ever: "How Am I Different" and "Nothing Is Good Enough" continue and perfect that failed relationship = faltering career vibe omnipresent in her work, while "Ghost World" almost captures the ennui of Daniel Clowes' comic as well as Terry Zwigoff's great film would a year later. But Bachelor also suggests that Mann’s now listening to Bacharach (she even name-checks him on “It Takes All Kinds”) as much as the Beatles. Songs like “Satellite”, “Red Vines” and “You Do” come across as the perfect blend of those two primary influences, but Mann retains such a singular, witty voice that the results remain distinctly hers.

2004-11-09T16:00:00.000-05:00

19. Ben Folds Five, Whatever and Ever Amen (Sony 550, 1997)

Imagine trying to explain Ben Folds to future generations: "Yeah, this piano man could've stayed in Chapel Hill and earned his graduate degree in musical theory. Instead, he had the gall to unapologetically sound like early '70s Elton John and Billy Joel when everyone was listening to Stone Temple Pilots and Bush!" (Inevitable response: "You mean that Bush was a rock star before he became president?"). Often accused of being insincere or too clever for his own good, Folds had the talent and tunes to answer his detractors. His second album also showed he had enough depth and finesse to pull off those lofty comparisons. True, attention-grabbers like "Song For The Dumped" could be crude (if riotous and adequately cathartic), but more thoughtful, pensive numbers like "Selfless, Cold and Composed" and "Evaporated" and the somber, poignant "Brick" (a surprise hit ballad) still reveal the honest, vulnerable soul behind the smart-ass.

2004-11-05T16:16:00.000-05:00

20. Morcheeba, Who Can You Trust? (Discovery, 1996)

Yes, that's a pot plant on the cover (as if the silly band name didn't already tip you off). Actually, it never occurred to me to listen to this album while intoxicated--the grooves and flow are already there, no matter what you bring to it. The title could've come from some altered-state paranoia, but not the music. As trip-hop collectives went, these guys were almost the anti-Massive Attack--as moody as the rest of their peers, but far hazier and mellower. Apart from the beatless, orchestral interlude "Col", everything pretty much sounds the same and, in this case, that's an advantage. This is a chill-out album with hooks (languorous and sneaky as they may be), plus Skye Edwards' smoky, sultry vocals are vital signs rather than chilly detachments. Every album Morcheeba has put out since is a shade more upbeat and varied, thus less consistent, but who cares when they have one in your catalogue as complete and unerring as this?

2004-11-04T13:34:00.000-05:00

21. Saint Etienne, Tiger Bay (Heavenly, 1996)

Until recently, I underrated this band's third album because I only knew the original US version, which replicated the UK edition's first two thirds but replaced the rest with superfluous remixes and a charming-but-slight Christmas song. This version, released somewhere in Europe a few years later but currently available at an uncommonly low import price, radically re-imagines the UK version--the first and last tracks are in the same position, but everything else is rearranged with four additional songs (including the irresistible "He's On The Phone", a hit single from '95). Initially, the sequencing seems a little jarring, but after a few spins, it solidifies well enough. Certainly the most cinematic (and diverse) of all their albums, Tiger Bay could easily accompany the painterly long takes of a Terence Davies film. It's also a stunning travelogue: just reference the titles of expansive soundscapes like "Urban Clearway", "Like a Motorway", "Pale Movie" or "Tankerville". Most striking, however, is the hymn-like "Former Lover" and the gentle, orchestral centerpiece "Marble Lions"--both take risks that would've seemed inconceivable back when the band was doing dance-pop covers of Neil Young.

2004-11-03T15:16:00.000-05:00

22. Dionne Warwick, The Dionne Warwick Collection: Her All-Time Greatest Hits (Rhino, 1989)

I'm skeptical of calling an album a "guilty pleasure", but if anything qualifies for me, this is it. I have a friend who adores Barry Manilow because her parents played a lot of "Copacabana" when she was very young. Oddly enough, my parents didn't own a single Dionne Warwick record (my Dad opted for Burt Bacharach (dreadfully) singing his own material). Still, it seemed like she was everywhere during my formative years--in the car, in restaurants, at the barber's. Yes, it was almost muzak, but throughout the '60s, Bacharach's matchless arrangements (somewhere between immaculate, intricate and ingenuous), Hal David's lyrics and Dionne's yearning, elegant vocals coalesced into classy, emotionally complex pop of the highest order. "Walk On By", "Do You Know The Way to San Jose", "I Say A Little Prayer" and all the rest remain influential (if not exactly hip) today, even if very few can fully replicate what these three talents accomplished together.

2004-11-02T14:20:00.000-05:00

23. k.d. lang, Ingenue (Sire, 1992)

Everyone's favorite Canadian, Patsy Cline-worshipping lesbian diva doesn't entirely leave the country-western stylings of her previous work behind here. Since she never really conformed to many genre strictures anyway, this shift towards torchy, adult-contemporary pop didn't seem so sudden at the time. A dozen years on, however, Ingenue radiates bravery and smarts in an environment where far too many artists allow themselves to be advertised and consumed in neat, little identifiable packages. Its music creates a special, singular, hard-to-classify space that provides a perfect backdrop for Lang's nuanced, drama-drenched voice. This is also as much of a coming-out album as Very: its deserved breakthrough single, "Constant Craving", warmly surveys the pain and eventual liberation of a repressed desire surfacing after many frozen, contained years.

2004-10-25T17:25:00.000-04:00

24. Ani DiFranco, Living In Clip (Righteous Babe, 1997)

Most critics argue that Ani's studio recordings don't even remotely capture the energy and presence of her live shows. So, go to this double-disc tour document, recorded, perhaps not-so-coincidentally, in support of her best studio album. Although most of the crowd noise and applause was edited out of the final mix, reactions like the *gasp* of surprise when she changes a significant song lyric in "Shameless" remind us that the very best performers know how to communicate with an audience. That rapport also allows Ani to open up her compositions to a degree that it seems like what was once in black and white in the studio now breathes with vivid, living color. With ample, fluid support from bassist Sara Lee and drummer Andy Stochansky (and, on two tracks, the Buffalo Symphony Orchestra with Doc Severinsen (!)), this captures the spontaneous, often-mesmeric vibe of being there like few other live albums in my collection.