by James Cassara

I’ve long resisted my own temptation (as well as reader requests) for a “top ten albums” end of the year list. They hardly represent the best albums of the year – such declarations are at best arbitrary – but rather a subjective inventory of favorites. However, 2011 was such an unusual year, both in the abundant quality of wonderful music and the ever shifting ways in which that music reaches our ears, that I at last feel compelled to give it a go. What the heck, it’s my column, so I may as well take advantage of the freedom Rapid River Magazine affords me. And so, without further ado, and with the understanding that the order will change with the winds:

5. Tom Waits

Bad As Me

The maestro of broken dreams and broke down heroes wisely took the advice of wife and musical collaborator Kathleen Brennan to keep his twentieth studio album simple. Best to leave the oblique epics for next time and concentrate instead on the songs. As such Bad as Me works best when it adheres to this formula, especially the horn infused jaunt of “Chicago” and the stutter step rockabilly of “Get Lost,” and briefly loses its way when it relies too heavily on such big name guests as Keith Richards and Flea rather than utilizing the talents of his usual touring band. The entire affair is a bit rickety, but it is as glorious a train wreck as this gravel voiced Rock and Roll icon has ever recorded.

4. The Black Keys

El Camino

I’ve been waiting patiently for the duo of Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney to hit their stylistic stride, and with the eight cylinder strength of El Camino they have finally done so. Replete with colossal, fuzz laden guitars and explosive drums – along with a vocal wall of noise that would make Phil Spector smile – the songs take second place to the sound. And while such delights as “Hell of a Season” and “Dead and Gone” do make for great listening, it’s the overall impact of El Camino that really shoots the moon.

3. Beirut

The Rip Tide

Zach Condon might have a strange fixation with (of all things) Balkan folk music but his obsessions continue to make for fascinating music. Beirut luxuriates in the sort of three minute pop songs that once dominated AM radio and somehow managed to bridge the divide between critical acclaim and commercial triumph. Given the “next great thing” buzz factor, you’d expect Beirut to be some sort of huge statement. Instead it’s the most modest record of his catalog. It’s also the most accessible, which is its primary joy and inevitable heartbreak. And while his band spans an at times gluttonous 11 members, Condon remains firmly in control, one of the most confident and enigmatic artists of our day.

2. The Decemberists

The King Is Dead

My opinion of this album has admittedly wavered to and fro but with repeated listens it become obvious that what it lacks in heft it more than compensates for in durability. Gone is the baroque rock opera at which the band excels, replaced instead with a far more intimate and personal statement of where Colin Meloy’s head is these days. He still tosses out words with Faulkner like density but the presence of R.E.M guitarist Peter Buck – who seems to act here as spiritual advisor and co-producer – gives the album a lovely rustic and restrained (a word not typically associated with this band!) veneer. With only one song over five minutes The King is Dead might well signal a bold new direction for the band. Or given Meloy’s mercurial impulses, it just as easily might not.

1. Wilco

The Whole Love

Darn you Jeff Tweedy! Just when I am ready to write you and Wilco off as another pre-millennium band that peaked far too soon, you keep proving me wrong. Considerably less indulgent than its immediate predecessors The Whole Love is the least forced effort they’ve released since Summer Teeth. It’s also the first to make full use out of the post-Jay Bennett line up. Whole Love tethers itself to every Wilco album before it while creating an expanse that only hints of things to come. In short, it is the sort of experimental music, played with gusto by a band with nothing to prove, that made us fall in love with them to begin with. Be sure to pick up the bonus disc version featuring “I Love My Label.” It’s quite possibly the most ironic song Tweedy has ever written, which is saying something.

The second tier in no particular order

Saint Vincent

Strange Mercy

Had I heard this a bit earlier, it would likely have cracked my top five. As it is, the ways in which Annie Clark keeps effortlessly tossing us curve balls – just when you think you’ve settled into an emotional groove she again shifts gears – all the while giving us one emotional kick after another. Now, would someone please give me a virtual kick in the backside for having missed them at MoogFest?

John Wesley Harding

The Sound of My Own Voice

An incredible collection of verbal epistles arranged with pure pop intuition and sung with an urgency to match the times. Not to mention that stellar cast of guest stars. Harding himself is easily the best folk singer in England not named Billy Bragg.

Adele

21

Sure she dominates the airwaves but let’s not be elitist: Just because she is so damn popular doesn’t mean she isn’t good. Her raspy beyond her years voice tends to dominate the surroundings but taken on their own the songs that populate 21 might even be stronger than those on her magisterial debut. Once she recovers from her bout of throat ailments the world will indeed be her oyster. I look for her to return sounding refreshed and ready to take no prisoners.

Feist

Metals

It’s easy to dismiss the relative lightweight nature of Leslie Feist’s music but that quality of understated assurance is the very thing that makes her so likeable. There’s not a hint of self consciousness to this album, but rather a yearning for better times and better loves. What really makes this collection shine are the lilting arrangements and the commitment to finally put her remarkable voice up front and center, where it should have been all along.

TV on the Radio

Nine Types of Light

Less dependent on the intense grooves of 2008’s Dear Science the more stripped down approach found here better supports the songs within; there are still those trademark layers of instrumentation but here they are more easily dissected and enjoyed.

That sense of space is a good thing, giving Nine Types of Light plenty of room to breathe, and the listener time to digest the richness of the songs. And while the introduction of a few acoustic instrumentals might at first seem a bit disconcerting, in the end they make perfect sense. Not quite a masterpiece but rather another solid addition to their catalog.