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OTHER NOTABLE ALBUMS
U2 – Songs Of Experience: The companion piece to Songs of Innocence is an unfortunate misstep lyrically and musically, trading in lightweight themes of love and light that should have hit harder, given the whole reason for this album’s delay was to rework it based on the Trump/Brexit twin peaks. The songs try too hard to be hits (RefuJesus!), the Edge is reduced to background noise or processed effects, Bono experiments with voice modulation (no!), and the quartet seems to have lost the grandiosity of their best work. Still, it’s U2, whose missteps and lesser entries are compelling and melodic, but it’s the first disc of theirs I haven’t felt the need to purchase in a long time.
Noel Gallagher – Who Built The Moon: Noel wins this round! The Gallagher sibling rivalry continued with two solo albums released only weeks apart; Liam’s was a fun party record, Noel’s was a more thoughtful, forward-looking disc and a fine third addition to his High Flying Birds project. You need not be an Oasis fan to enjoy, but if you are, you’ll love it.
Afghan Whigs – In Spades: The second comeback album isn’t quite as effective as Do To the Beast but is still unmistakably the Whigs.
NOTABLE SONGS
Surfer Blood, “Six Flags In F Or G”: Its parent album wasn’t much different from the now-standard sub-311 Surfer Blood sound, but this song stood well above the rest of the disc and is their best to date.
U2, “Red Flag Day”: The standout track on Songs of Experience recalls various points of U2’s history, much like the best songs on Songs of Innocence did, and call me nostalgic but I was glad to have the post-punk guitars and the Edge’s background vocals make a return. Those elements of the band cannot be lost, no matter how many producers try.
Broken Social Scene, “Vanity Pail Kids”: I was not a fan of the band’s “comeback” 15-person blowout album, with the exception of this song. Other critics will put this on their top rock records list; without this song, I don’t think it makes any lists.
Algiers, “The Underside Of Power”: The gospel-punk-Southern rock band’s album wasn’t quite the success it hoped to be, but its best moments were indicative of this unique band’s musical approach, and the title track hits all the right buttons. Worth checking out.
Katy Perry, “Chained to the Rhythm”: A great pop song that didn’t do as well in the charts as it should have, maybe because nobody likes being told they’re too attached to their phones and social-media-driven lives to care about the world. The beat is good, Perry’s voice (especially the up-and-down effect in the chorus) is solid, Skip Marley’s guest reggae-rap is fine, and the whole thing just works.
NOTABLE FLOPS
Roger Waters – Is This The Life We Really Want?: Not sure where this went wrong, but it felt like it should have been a lot better musically.
John Mayer – The Search For Everything: While sipping sherry on his yacht, a rich white dude softly laments a failed relationship with all the soul and passion of an insurance salesman from Cleveland. A man indebted to the blues should not be aping Steely Dan and Michael McDonald guitar licks and singing about his heartbreak with the offhand vocals of someone who got onions on their burger at McDonald’s by accident. When your personal pain soundtrack is so lame that it gets played on the Muzak at Kohl’s during the holiday season, perhaps you aren’t doing it right.
Foster The People – Sacred Hearts Club: I was so excited for this album – Supermodel was a great record – and so let down by the neo-disco personality-free black hole that this album was. There is nothing under the surface here, and the surface has been done already by many other bands. Skip this one.
Weezer – Pacific Daydream: I know a band has to expand and grow and not repeat the same formula over and over, but Weezer’s growth was a lateral move into pop that makes them sound like their fellow-aged contemporaries, not the idiosyncratic band that can still make good music. A pervasive melancholy on some of the numbers was a welcome callback to earlier Pinkerton days, but the bulk of the disc is forgettable.
