Monthly Report: November 2020 Albums
1. The Nels Cline Singers - Share The Wealth
Nels Cline has lead ensembles of almost every possible shape and size and configuration of instruments at this point, but most of the Nels Cline Singers albums have been primarily trios where Cline gets a lot of room to stretch out and improvise over bass and drums, with occasional collaborations with outside musicians like the ROVA Saxophone Quartet or Yuka Honda. But Share The Wealth features an expanded sextet with two percussionist, a keyboardist, and a saxophonist, and it really feels like he's figured out how to maintain the intimacy and spontaneity of the trio records with a larger band in a cool way, Brian Marsella's keys in particular add a lot of texture, historically have not heard Nels Cline play over piano a lot and they find ways to give each other space and not step on each other's toes. The little triggered electronic percussion bits from Scott Amendola on "Stump The Panel" are really interesting sounds too. Here's the 2020 albums Spotify playlist I fill with every new record I listen to.
2. Kylie Minogue - Disco
Kylie Minogue is a perennial pop chart fixture in the rest of the English-speaking world, but I wish she still had that kind of presence in America that she had in the early 2000s. Despite it being the title of just this particular album, she's really been making modern disco for decades, and a lot of this album would sound great on the same stations that play Dua Lipa's latest hits. Plus Minogue is now the same age Cher was when she made "Believe," so it seems like a good time to have a late career revival. In any case, Disco is a solid album, I particularly like "Real Groove" and "Unstoppable."
3. Megan Thee Stallion - Good News
My main gripe with Good News is that about half the songs have big familiar samples of famous old songs, which always feels like a crutch to me -- I think Saweetie probably needs nostalgic samples to make hits, but Megan doesn't. That said, it's fun to hear Meg kill some Biggie and Eazy E beats, and I love how the Jazmine Sullivan loop is chopped on "Circles." And even as a repeatedly delayed debut album carefully assembled for wide appeal, it holds together pretty well, DaBaby and City Girls and Young Thug may be on everyone's albums, but they all have good musical chemistry with Meg and I'd be happy to hear some combination of "Cry Baby," "Freaky Girls," and "What's New" on the radio for the next year. More likely it'll be the divisive crossover song "Don't Rock Me To Sleep," but I don't even really mind that one, it works about as well as Doja Cat's pop records.
4. 2 Chainz - So Help Me God!
Between the Pretty Girls Love Trap Music pink trap house and the LeBron campaign for Rap Or Go To The League, 2 Chainz has remained savvy about how to grab everyone's attention with an album rollout even now that radio doesn't play him around the clock. So I thought that if anyone could capitalize on Verzuz to actually get people interested in his new music, it'd be him. Unfortunately, the great "Money Maker" kind of fizzled as a single, and So Help Me God! did terrible first week numbers, so Tity Boi's references to this being his final album for Def Jam are probably true. But the album with the title borrowed from one of Kanye's many unfinished albums is very solid, aside from Kanye himself stepping in to damn near ruin a very promising track with a Brent Faiyaz hook. And the Hall & Oates sample on "Can't Go For That" is just killer, hope that one becomes a single. Also really enjoy "Toni," great TM88 beat that veers out of nowhere into a big familiar sample for a minute in the middle of the song. And "Vampire" is one of those really deep and sincere 2 Chainz songs he never gets enough credit for.
5. King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard - K.G.
At this point these guys are just showing off how often they can release really high quality albums, like any super prolific act the records start to blend together a little, but I think one has a particular wealth of cool acoustic (or clean electric plugged staight into the mixing board) guitar tones. I still really don't know anything about these guys or who does what, I can tell there's multiple singers but I should figure out who sings what to differentiate their voices and writing styles better. I'm also really curious how they put together the transitions between songs on this one, it's hard to tell if they played the songs together or just edited them together very carefully. And it's cool how they finish off the album with the hardest rocker, "The Hungry Wolf Of Fate."
6. AC/DC - Power Up
King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard are definitely the best Australian band right now, but AC/DC have probably been in the top two for about 45 years running. It's kind of heartwarming but also so AC/DC that Angus Young recorded a bunch of songs he wrote with his brother before Malcolm died but those songs include the hilariously sleazy "Money Shot."
7. Future & Lil Uzi Vert - Pluto x Baby Pluto
I was really hoping that Uzi and Young Thug would be the next big rap collaboration album before this was announced, but Uzi and Future is cool too, "Too Much Sauce" was a classic. Uzi definitely seems to take the lead as the dominant force on most of the album, but Future shines on my favorite track, "Sleeping On The Floor." And "Real Baby Pluto" and "Million Dollar Play" would be worthy additions to my Future/Zaytoven playlist.
8. Jeezy - The Recession 2
I've always been pretty cynical about aging rappers doing sequels to their popular early albums. But The Recession is my favorite Jeezy album, and I've been saying for over a year that Jeezy should go ahead and make a sequel since we are in a recession again. And Busta Rhymes doing ELE 2 turned out pretty well, so hey, why not. The Recession 2 doesn't live up to its potential, partly because he sticks to the topic even less than the original album, but there's some good stuff here, even the Demi Lovato feature weirdly works.
9. various artists - No Stagediving: Volume 1
The Ottobar is one of my favorite places to see live music, in Baltimore or in the entire world, and like any other venue, they're doing what they can to stay in business until they can have concerts. So I was happy to buy this fundraiser compilation on Bandcamp, especially since my buddy Mat mastered it and the 51 tracks include a ton of my friends and favorite bands. Some of it's previously released, but there's some good new tracks and exclusives, like Santa Librada's PJ Harvey cover and Wye Oak and Future Islands live tracks recorded at the Ottobar. My favorite track that introduced me to a band I hadn't heard before is Oda Red's "Gold," gonna have to go see them when there are shows again. And Volume 2 will be out this Friday.
10. The Dirty Knobs - Wreckless Abandon
I've always been a big fan of Mike Campbell, he was such an integral part of Tom Petty's catalog, both with the Heartbreakers and solo, a great guitarist and writer. So one of the silver linings of Petty's passing is that Campbell has gotten to stretch out and do a wider variety of other work, including the first album from his other band The Dirty Knobs, that weird stint with Fleetwood Mac, and a lot of session work on things like the new album by Chris Stapleton, who guests on one song on Wreckless Abandon. Campbell is kind of a funny cantankerous figure on this record, he's a more limited singer and a more whimsical lyricist than Petty, but there's still a lot of that Heartbreakers spirit on here.
The Worst Album of the Month: The Smashing Pumpkins - Cyr
The last Smashing Pumpkins, the first with James Iha in almost 20 years, was also my worst album of the month. But this one is actually worse, twice as long and half as strong, with diminishing returns on the synthy new wave aesthetic that Billy Corgan got some great songs out of in the band's '90s run.
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