Raphael Saadiq's official music video for 'Stone Rollin'. Click to listen to Raphael Saadiq on Spotify: As featured on Stone Rollin'.

Stone Rollin ' is the fourth studio album by American R&B singer, songwriter, and producer Raphael Saadiq. It was released on March 25, 2011, by Columbia Records. Find great deals on eBay for raphael saadiq. See more like this Raphael Saadiq - Stone Rollin' (2011. See more like this RAPHAEL SAADIQ THE WAY I SEE IT RARE.

I’ve been noticing a lot of complaints from my fellow critics and bloggers, who seem to think year-end list-making is something of a chore. I don’t really blame them, but also don’t really agree. I love doing this, because I love celebrating the albums that have offered me truth and beauty, revelation and sheer enjoyment, over the past dozen months or so.

And what a year this one has been. The short version of the story: Joe Henry wins my hypothetical awards for Songwriter and Producer of the Year, as well as 2011 MVP. My favorite performance by a band in 2011 would be either Over the Rhine or The Roots, and, not too coincidentally, my favorite performance by a singer this year was from Over the Rhine’s Karin Bergquist, while my favorite bit of MC-ing was from The Roots’ own Black Thought. I’ll also give The Roots the year’s best album cover. Favorite concert I saw in 2011? Take your pick between Trombone Shorty, Joe Henry, Elvis Costello, Gillian Welch, and Over the Rhine.

Favorite old music released in 2011? It’s gotta be either the gospel music box set, or else the superb single-disc Sinatra The Best of the Best.

The year’s biggest surprise? Maybe it was Hugh Laurie’s blues album turning out to be so good. Maybe it was Ry Cooder ditching his usual guitar heroics and making one of his best-ever albums in the process. But it was probably the fact that three of my all-time favorite musical entities have made, after 20+ years in the game, albums that probably stand as their career-best.

Como Actualizar El Software De Un Sony Ericsson K550i. And that brings us to my favorite albums of the year. I’m going to run down my top fifteen, more or less in the right order, but with the caveat that the top three albums are, again, exemplary works from peerless musicians—so who really cares which one is two and which one is three?

I’ll also list just a handful of very honorable mentions before getting to the list proper. Your 2011 listening experience is not complete if you haven’t heard Raphael Saadiq’s; The Black Keys’; Meshell Ndegeocello’s; DeVotchKa’s; or The Decemberists’. Pull Up Some Dust and Sit Down Ry Cooder the man who taught Keith Richards to play the blues takes us on a tour of ancient musics and modern maladies, turning in the funniest, angriest, most ferocious protest album I’ve heard in a good while. Plus: The title is an old softshoe joke from the Great Depression era. Kids these days have a lot to learn—we all do, I reckon—and Ry Cooder is just the man to teach us.

Let Them Talk Hugh Laurie Louis Armstrong’s rendition of “St. James Infirmary” is a ragged and darkly comical delight—one of the greatest recordings of all time, I’d say. Hugh Laurie does it here as an epic, grave and grandiose, and the highest compliment I can pay him is to say that I have no interest in comparing his version with Louis’. I’m glad they both exist, and overjoyed that the rest of is similarly passionate and professional, a labor of love from a moonlighter who takes the blues as seriously as his day job. The Old Magic Nick Lowe This is a in songwriting, especially on the ballads: “Stoplight Roses,” “I Read a Lot,” and “House for Sale” prove that nobody’s better than Lowe at saying a whole lot with very little, and at speaking volumes with what’s left altogether unsaid. Meanwhile, “Restless Feeling” was described in the press release as a roller rink anthem, and it’s amazing to me how apt—and how surprisingly pleasant—that description turns out to be. The Road from Memphis Booker T. Design Expert 6 0 8 Portable Pitching.

Jones and the Roots Regular readers will know that I have a soft spot for “legacy” artists—Jones is 67, and a legend by any standard—doing fine, fresh work; for soul music and for small-ensemble spontaneity; and for the crisp sound of?uestlove’s snare and hi-hat. For these reasons and more, the Booker/Roots is a finer-popping good time, and a vibrant example of a music that never goes out of style or out of season. Let England Shake PJ Harvey I can’t deny that this album might mean more to me if I were a Brit—but I also can’t deny that Harvey’s assessment of toxic nationalism and a violent human condition are anything but universal.

My favorite thing about this isn’t the precision and compassion that inform her indignation, but rather the way she makes this sound like a collection of spooky old folk songs, as if to say that this story is nothing new. So Beautiful or So What Paul Simon God the Father and God the Son are walking the earth, and one says to the other that he thinks it’s time to leave. Ah, but then what will these people be left with, the other responds. Love and hard times, the answer goes. For this scene and many others, Simon’s album remains one of my favorite of bold and beautiful songwriting from the past year—or the past several. Passenger Lisa Hannigan There are lots of references to air travel on this one, so of course I’ve found that it’s a perfect soundtrack for plane rides.

Surprisingly, it is also good for dancing, at least on the upbeat songs. Given how many singer/songwriter albums are either too leaden or too airy, this is a significant accomplishment, but it’s hardly the only thing I love about Hannigan’s. This is a savory concoction of passion and craft, a thoroughly modern album that feels like a timeless classic. For True Trombone Shorty I really think he’s the hardest working man in showbiz today—certainly, the most righteous flag-bearer for modern New Orleans swagger. Shorty’s are very different from the epic jam sessions that are his Orleans Avenue gigs, but no less impressive; here he keeps things short and sweet and song-oriented, showing that he’s not just a party animal and horn boss but also an ace soul singer and a non-stop good idea machine.

Bad as Me Tom Waits How apt: There’s been a Tom Waits album for the saloon, a Tom Waits album for the back porch, a Tom Waits album for the graveyard and whatever Real Gone is, of course. Now we have a Tom Waits for the roadhouse jukebox. For anyone who thinks Waits is just an eccentric weirdo—or that American roots music has to be boring and well-mannered— Bad as Me should prove a real mind-expander. What Were You Hoping For? Van Hunt This one wins the award for most perfectly coy album title of the year—because nobody possibly could have expected this album from Van Hunt, nor could any listener’s response to it be anything other than pure delight. I remember when Hunt was still singing for Blue Note, corralled in with the neo-soul scene. Now he’s making freakish funk monsters that channel Prince, Sly Stone, and D’Angelo in equal measure, but ultimately prove Van Hunt to be in a league of his own.

50 Words for Snow Kate Bush Nobody else this year delivered such truth in advertising. The title song here is, indeed, a litany of precisely fifty words for snow. Some are matter of fact; others, whimsical and silly. All are delivered by Stephen Fry, of all people, who, along with Bush, seems to relish the chance to celebrate rhythm and poetry and simple beauty, linear meaning be damned. And that’s to say nothing of the star-crossed Elton John duet, or the dreamy 35-minute, snow-drift opening act!

All told, there’s never been a like this, but for me, its patience and slow-burn sensuality make it a delight. The Harrow and the Harvest Gillian Welch I saw Welch and her partner Dave Rawlings play almost all of these songs, and plenty others, to a packed theater. They stood on a naked stage, armed with only acoustic instruments and songs, and kept us entranced. This is their darkest, but also their most seductive. It’s an album about reaping and sowing—about “all the little ways I’ve found to hurt myself,” Welch sings—but its pleasures are so many that it’s impossible not to simply give in to its sway. The Long Surrender Over the Rhine It opens with a song about pressing on in spite of, or maybe even because of, failure; that it’s so soulful and sublime makes it, and the whole, a glorious monument to a band that has been inviting and enabling quiet mysteries and simple beauty for two decades and counting.

They’ve still got stories to tell; in fact, this is their best album, and not only because of their perfect camaraderie with producer Joe Henry. When has such an unassuming and intimate album so shaken and rattled the soul? For me, maybe never. Reverie Joe Henry This was, and is, a special record for me; its allure was enough to get me on a plane and fly across the country just for the honor of hearing Joe and his Garfield House players perform it. I’ve called it his Basement Tapes and his rock and roll album, but really the scrappiness of is a bit of a canard. It is just disheveled enough to initially obscure the fact that it’s the most thoughtful, mystery-abiding and –embodying album he’s ever made.

Undun The Roots Fate and free will meet on the corner, but that’s not the only cosmic collision on; there’s also an epic pileup of hip-hop past and future, with the Roots drawing from disparate sources—gospel hooks, soulful beats, a free-jazz explosion, even a string quartet—and somehow pull them into the hardest, toughest, most streetwise album of their career. But more than anything, it’s the words that enliven undun. It’s hip-hop mythology done as anti-heroism, and I confess to finding it riveting, disquieting, and profound. The Roots have made a rap masterpiece of and for the times, but its political and philosophical resonance never gets in the way of the thing just bangin’—the sound of veterans finding new inspiration and zeal in their craft. I imagine we’ve done this enough that a disclaimer is no longer necessary, but I offer one anyway: Lest there be any confusion, I claim no authority on which to pronounce the Best, or the Most Significant, albums of 2010.

All I can offer are my selections for the ones I’ve kept coming back to– the records that have moved both heart and imagination, and in several cases the hind quarters as well. What a year of abundance it’s been– a year that convinced me of hip-hop as a genre towering higher and higher with creative vigor, of gospel and old spirituals as links to a shared history as strange and mysterious as the present, of legacy artists as those with the most left to tell us. Among my fifteen favorites I count a “folk opera,” a concept record about the environment, and a hip-hop album about hitting middle age. Of course, I’ve also got a Genesis frontman visiting the orchestra, Zeppelin’s golden god recasting indie rock as country/blues, and, naturally, Yeezy noodling around with the Autotune. These albums have blessed me tremendously already– and I suspect I’m only beginning to understand the extent of what they have to offer. The Bad Plus Never Stop Another year, another Bad Plus album—and with each new record, the argument over what it means for jazz music—is it the music in its purest form?

Or is it something else altogether?—seems exponentially less interesting. Oh, I suppose their first album of muddies the waters more than ever—with nary a single left-field cover song in sight, it’s still the Bad Plus album with the most nods to jazz convention, and the one most prone to unorthodox flights of creative whimsy—but the men themselves seem far less concerned about this than they do knocking out a record of roaring, visceral thrills. And that’s why I love them.

P.S.—Jazz record or not, the title song is one of the year’s hookiest pop songs. Peter Gabriel Scratch My Back There were a few barbs traded over the entire endeavor, but none of them came out of my living room. I love everything about this one: How it gracefully showcases the diverse colors of the orchestra, how it plays like a masters’ class in the malleability of great pop songwriting, how it makes a case for Gabriel as one of rock’s most souful interpretive singers. I love it too for what an unforeseen delight it turned out to be, the loosest and most un-Peter Gabriel-like album to ever be made by Peter Gabriel. He’s still restless, still an explorer, and the level of integrity he’s invested into this project suggests that he doesn’t particularly care to conduct his adventures on anyone’s terms but his own.

The Black Keys Brothers Could’ve/should’ve been their White Blood Cells—and even if the indie kids didn’t quite catch on like they might have, I’d still call it their. When last we heard from them the Keys had turned to Danger Mouse for a minor makeover, but here they turn within themselves—and when you’re as resourceful a band as this, why not? There’s a Howlin’ Wolf reference in the cover art and psychedelic shadings throughout, more than enough vintage references to cement their cred as a duo of considerable smarts and a record collection gilded in classic rock chic, but what I really care about is that they’ve still got it where it counts: They play the hell out of this thing, stirring up a ruckus like they’re two kids banging around in a basement at the end of the block. Grinderman Grinderman 2 ’s subversive, and no less profound because of it.

These are high-minded concerns, spoken in dick jokes and crude come-ons; Cave and Co. Seem at first to be laughing their way through a mid-life crisis, but the jokes is on anyone who thinks the crisis is anything less than a global pandemic, a scourge on manhood and marriage alike, or that Cave isn’t taking all of this stuff very seriously indeed. They’ve also gone a bit psychedelic on us, but here again, all these new textures only affect the telling, not the story itself—for all the colors they’ve added to their palette, they haven’t forgotten that noise is still the one they wear best. Robert Plant Band of Joy I reckon this shouldn’t register as much of a surprise: Robert Plant—obsessive myth-seeker, and frequent myth-maker—plays with the tropes of classic Americana, turning a couple of Low songs into backwoods incantations, a Richard Thompson song into weepy C&W, and some 60s pop nuggets into soulful gems that could have been written by the Beatles—or, written yesterday. Still: Just listen to this thing, especially after the lovely but relatively conservative Raising Sand, and try not to raise an eyebrow. Everything here—from the rolling thunder of the drums to Patty Griffin’s presence as spectral siren—is just a touch removed from the expected, and the album is all the more sublime because of it.

John Legend and the Roots Wake Up! I’ve heard this one called a “throwback,” but there’s nothing throwback about it. Legend and the Roots crew salvage politically-charged obscurities from the soul/R&B vaults and champion them as living, vital documents of concerns that are very much those of our present situation. That is both the point and the ultimate of this record. Yeah, Brother?uesto nails the sonics on all of the vintage-sounding stuff, but hip-hop adrenaline is never far removed from the equation; as far as covers albums go, this one’s remarkably streetwise. It’s also remarkably on balance: There are moments of pure, hippie-dippie idealism, and moments of abject, hopeless rage; there are protest songs and love songs, there’s grit and blues and the sweet, smooth strains of gospel.

All of it’s necessary for pulling off a project so precarious, and all of it’s here, exerting its own right to our attention with just as much suavity and grace as it might have in 1969. Mavis Staples You Are Not Alone Top to bottom, Mavis sets every one of on fire—a holy fire, occasionally mixed with brimstone. Alongside the songs of sin and sadness, though, there are songs about hope and faith and community; it might have been “inspirational” music in the blandest sense of the term, but there’s nothing bland about an album mixed so perfectly with shades of humor and heartache, message music and personal testimony. I still can’t believe the thing moves so naturally from its opening Pop Staples reverb to the Sunday School sing-along of “Creep Along Moses,” only to end things on a sublimely bluesy tip. But I am increasingly credulous as to Jeff Tweedy’s stature as a producer of gospel-soul- or is it soul-gospel? Doesn’t matter; the way it all comes together here is a match made in heaven, and that’s doubly true for Tweedy and Mavis. Gorillaz Plastic Beach How is it that so high on concept—a thematic record about environmental woes and consumerism gone mad, performed by Damon Albarn’s cartoon rock and roll troupe—works so splendidly as a collection of pristine pop pleasures?

Maybe it’s all the deep references to pirate radio and The Who Sell Out: Like that record, this one hangs together on the strength of its narrative thread but the real joy is in the simple, ragged joy of the songwriting and the performances. I love that this one takes so many views on its central conceits, swinging so gracefully between sadness and humor both cheerful and black, each guest performer so perfectly chosen to breath his or her character to life, everything united by Albarn’s whipsmart pop instincts, hooky as ever even in a hip-hop and club-oriented context. In a way, it’s a nice mirror image to some of those great Blur albums; where Parklife sought to reclaim lad culture from a sea of faceless nationalism, this one’s about rescuing shared humanity from the corrosive effects of modernism. It’s a more ambitious project, and, to my ears, an even greater achievement.

Anais Mitchell Hadestown “Ambition” has been the watchword for so many of the albums on this list, and in many ways I’m inclined to say that ’s is the most ambitious of them all—a “folk opera” that recasts the myth of Orpheus as a sort of sociopolitical allegory for the America of the Great Depression and the America of today, it’s literally an album unlike any other. But that is neither its greatest achievement nor the source of its pleasure; I, for one, keep coming back to it because the songs are so good, kicking up just the right amount of dust and finding weathered authenticity in the period details.

And I love that it isn’t primarily a screed, but a tale of love and morality: I’ve read any number of interpretations of “Why We Build the Wall,” as a metaphor of everything from economic division to conflict in the Middle East, but no matter how you slice it the record cuts deep as an unflinching meditation on trying to do the right thing, even when the chips are down. Kanye West My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy At first I felt like wasn’t doing enough to bridge the gap between Hip-Hop and Art, but whenever I get to “Lost in the World,” the concern is immediately dropped. Who else would splice together a Bon Iver tune with a Gil Scott-Heron recital and underpin it with a jungle beat that’s totally bangin’? In terms of sheer audacity, there’s none like him.

This album is many things—an event, a blockbuster, an already-legendary 10.0—but mostly I think it’s a triumph of self-expression. I’ve never heard any artist, in any idiom, so skillfully reinterpret his past as something so rooted in the present, or so heroically convert every one of his weaknesses into a feat of incredible creative strength. Elvis Costello National Ransom You can say what you will about Elvis Costello—that he’s lost some of his edge thanks to a decade or more of writing operas and singing with jazz orchestras—but gives us a Costello who’s as sharp as ever. What’s more, the album’s razor edge is not in spite of, but precisely because of its sophistication, its literary scope, its historical awareness and its integration of everything Costello’s done since he was first playing the pubs. So yes, the title song could almost have fit on an early Attractions date. But he also pens parlor tunes and nightclub jaunts, country shuffles and string band jams. In the last song, he even does a little bit of the ol’ soft shoe—but if the apocalyptic omens and prophetic overtones are any indication, he’s still pushing as hard as ever.

Aaron Neville I Know I’ve Been Changed Simplicity speaks powerfully to Truth. As a producer, Joe Henry understands that better than anybody; his approach is to throw a bunch of studio pros into a room together and stay out of the way while they make something really special, something spirited and spontaneous and alive.

When it’s all done, the man looks like a genius just for leaving well enough alone. He brings Allen Toussaint on board for, which essentially does for gospel music what his Solomon Burke album did for soul: It strips away the inessential and reminds us of the power this music has always held. I don’t know that much needs to be said about the singer or the songs. It’s Aaron Neville—voice as sweet and soulful as ever—and a bunch of spirituals that have weathered the ages.

And they’re presented just as they should be: Without distraction. Elizabeth Cook Welder The first three songs almost play out as the album in microcosm.

“All the Time” is an ass-whoopin’, barroom anthem, a sure-thing country radio hit if only there were any justice in Nashville. It symbolizes everything that makes country music great.

“El Camino,” on the other hand, strips away the country conventions and turns our preconceptions of roots music on their head. And then there’s “Not California”—a folksy power ballad that swells with emotion and doesn’t seem to give a shit whether we want to call it “country music” or not. But things only get more daring from there: Cook proves her love of country tradition over and over, but songs like “Heroin Addict Sister” prove that she isn’t beholden to it, because no one else is writing songs like that these days. This is a hilarious and heartbreaking album that flaunts and then shatters roots music standards, and as such it is, quite frankly, the most idiosyncratic and wonderfully personal I’ve heard in a decade or more.

Big Boi Sir Lucious Leftfoot: The Son of Chico Dusty It took me a while to figure it out, stacked as this album is with killer singles, but I’ve come to think of “The Back-Up Plan” as a break-up song, of sorts—only, the object of General Patton’s jilting is the rap game itself. He still loves her, to be sure, and probably always will but these days, she just can’t keep up. Is an album made by a man who isn’t interested in running the rap game so much as he knows that he’s outpaced it; ironically, it’s also something of a throwback to the genre’s most foundational virtues, not to cult-of-personality rapping but to the sheer, giddy joy of the sound of words and their innate sense of rhythm. As a words man, I confess that I find that to be pretty irresistible. By the way, I do have a slight preference for this record over Kanye’s, and I think it’s largely because Yeezy seems to be working so very hard, both to entertain us and to prove his mettle, while Big Boi knows that he doesn’t really need to.

He’s a master of his craft, and this is an album-length display of mesmerizing vocal dexterity and incredible showmanship. Those are things that speak for themselves. The Roots How I Got Over Early in the, Black Thought laments a sad possibility– that perhaps “ the light shines once in a lifetime.” As in, only once. A couple songs later, though, he gets his fight back: “The light comes in different types/ Be more specific!” It’s a powerful moment, and the emotion is earned. To boot, it’s earned the old-fashioned way: Through an exquisitely-crafted, nine-song set of luxuriously soulful, groove-oriented hip-hop numbers, through perfectly-sequenced record-making and economical songcraft. In many ways, this is a very different rap album than the others that hit so big this year, arguably not even a straight rap record at all– where Big Boi and Kanye employed the sheen of modernity, The Roots crew opts for vintage warmth; instead of club-ready rap, they spike their hip-hop with flavors of indie rock, but the whole thing sounds more than anything like a soul record; and instead of sprawling ambition, this is an album of deliberate succinctness. And yet, I think it’s an album that matches anything else released this year in terms of its ambition– and not just because it’s so doggedly out-of-step with current trends.

This stuff is artful and profound, the product of what has historically been a youth-dominated idiom that here turns its attention to the crises of middle age, to growing up and coping with changes that aren’t always good. They’ve called it an album for a “post-hope” era, but it’s hardly hopeless; on the contrary, this is a soul-stirring, moral wake-up call, an album-length argument for perseverance as a good and noble thing, worth striving for in and of itself. It has been, in my opinion, a very rich and fruitful year for new music. I could come up with a very fine Top 10 or 15 list right now– and we still have six months ago. So naturally, compiling my list of favorites so far is tough; I can only imagine what kinds of agonizing decisions I’m going to have to make when it comes time for the year-end list in December.

As with my “best of the first quarter” list from earlier this year, I’m only counting albums that have already released as of the end of June 2010; thus, such excellent records from the “coming soon” department, including (but not limited to) Big Boi, Ray Lamontagne, Robert Plant, The Innocence Mission, and others, are not considered here. And speaking of that “best of the first quarter” list, let it be noted that, from that list, only two albums return for this top ten, which goes to show just how many terrific recordings have come out in the spring and early summer. So, with no further explanation, here are the ten albums that have moved me, entertained me, rewarded me, and inspired me the most in the first half of 2010– and yes, all or most of them could very well end up on my year-end-list come December. The Roots How I Got Over () 02. Elizabeth Cook Welder () 03. Anais Mitchell Hadestown () 04. Gorillaz Plastic Beach () 05.

The Black Keys Brothers () 06. Robert Randolph and the Family Band We Walk This Road () 07.

Trombone Shorty Backatown () 08. The Tallest Man on Earth The Wild Hunt () 09. Alejandro Escovedo Street Songs of Love () 10. Josh Ritter So Runs the World Away () Some Honorable Mentions: Paul Weller–; Spoon–; Elizabeth Shepherd–; Peter Gabriel–; Peter Wolf–; Gil Scott-Heron–; Mary Gauthier–. I tend to think about music in terms of albums– which, I freely admit, makes me a bit of a dinosaur in the iTunes era. My year-end (and year-half-over,.) lists have always been of full LPs, never of individual tracks.

That’s largely because it’s just too darn hard to keep track of individual cuts, much less rank them, but in light of some recent, high-profile single releases by the likes of Arcade Fire and The Roots, I feel oddly inspired to celebrate my ten favorite singles of the year so far. If you’ve got iTunes credits to spare, check ’em out. And by all means, share your own picks in the comments section. 1., “Tighten Up” 2., “Change of Time” 3., “Dear God 2.0” 4., “El Camino” 5., “King of Spain” 6., “I Saw the Light” 7., “Tragedy” 8., “Stylo” 9., “Tightrope” 10. Big Boi, “Shutterbug”.

Sometimes, the mentor becomes the mentoree. It isn’t blasphemous to say that copped a lot of his blues chops from guys like Muddy Waters and —indeed, if his first few albums were modeled after the Woody Guthrie blueprint, latter-day records are equally indebted to the electric blues masters—but what’s talked about less is how Dylan went on to be an inspiration of sorts for those old pros—though, admittedly, it was against their will. Dylan famously went electric in 1964, infusing his folky persona with all the mayhem and frenzy of garage rock, and it wasn’t but a few years later that Waters and Wolf were doing something much the same, releasing—at the behest of their label bosses—albums that snaked their blues leanings through the smoke and mirrors of then-popular psychedelic effects and Hendrix-style guitar meltdowns. Albums like Water’s Electric Mud, or This is Howlin’ Wolf’s New Album. They sold okay, but blues purists tend to consider them as abominations, and fifty years after the fact, nobody talks about ‘em much. That makes them strange inspirations for a new Black Keys album, but it seems to be their inspiration nonetheless—and not just because Dan Auerbach and Pat Carney’s Brothers lifts the template of that Howlin’ Wolf album for its text-heavy, matter-of-fact album art. Are they still a blues band?

But the increasingly-hip duo is less about warts-and-all blasts of bluesy, in-the-garage fury as they are crafting an album that celebrates sound as much as song, that clothes their blues muscle in weird cinematic effects and flourishes of psychadelia. It really isn’t that surprising, or unnatural; even ignoring the fact that these guys are clearly students of the blues, and that dipping into this oft-ignored patch of blue history is an organic progression, fans have long known that the Black Keys have never really been as monochromatic as their color-coded name and two-man set-up would suggest. There was Auerbach’s solo album, of course, with its hints of country and folk and pop, as well as the album they made with Danger Mouse, the glossed-up, to say nothing of their oddball hip-hop detour as. All of this suggests that the Black Keys have musical interests well beyond the realm of traditional two-man blues set-ups or garage rock in the White Stripes mold, and Brothers is the natural culmination of their experimentation with new colors and sounds—every bit as sound-oriented as Attack & Release, as varied as Auerbach’s, and as grimy and gutbucket-dirty as the cheerfully vulgar Blakroc. Read the rest.

I think I’ll always look back on 2004 as one of the richest musical years– certainly of this decade. With spectacular new releases, from veterans and rookies alike, and from innumerable different genres and pop idioms, the year was practically a deluge of truly landmark recordings, and I dare say that no other year will play as prominent a role in my Best of the Decade list.

Or, for that matter, my all-time desert island list. It was a year of towering twin peaks: Standing high above everything else and defining the year’s creative vibrancy were Nick Cave‘s two-disc Bad Seeds opus, Abattoir Blues and the Lyre of Orpheus, and Sam Phillips‘ spare, devastating break-up chronicle, A Boot and a Shoe. These two albums are masterpieces of very different kinds, and in my mind they are essentially tied for Album of the Year honors, although, for its sheer scope and audacity, I usually choose Cave’s album as the year’s “official” champion.

And indeed, with all of his in tow and his poetic gift at the peak of its powers, Cave created a sprawling album of astonishing spiritual fervor; you’d have to go back to The Joshua Tree for another rock album of such burning, gospel-fueled passion. Smaller in scale but equally exploratory and profound was ‘ album, a tightly-constructed gem that used a romantic break-up to address issues of suffering, providence, and grace. The impact of both of these albums on my own life– and my listening habits– is, to be quite honest, immeasurable. But if those were the standouts, they were hardly the year’s only memorable albums.

Going into 2004, the album I was most primed to hear was the new, long-delayed offering from. Of course this album turned out to be How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, and, to be frank, it’s one of my least favorite of their albums; that said, given what a profound blessing this band’s music has been in my life, that hardly means I didn’t like it. I’ve wavered a bit in just how much I like it, finding all of the songs to be good but the production and the cohesion of the album to be lacking; these days I consider it to be a slight disappointment, but the songs still mean a lot to me, so my attitude toward the album is primarily one of great fondness. But I’m the first to admit that, in 2004, Bono and the boys were out-U2ed by a band that can legitimately claim to be the heirs to the U2 throne– Arcade Fire, that rarest of bands that deserves every hyped-up word that’s been written about them.

Their debut, Funeral, is a brave and stunningly assured work of catharsis and rich feeling, brimming with a youthful poetry, at once weary and romantic, that could only come from rock and roll. Tom Waits released his edgiest, hippest, and altogether strangest album in 2004 (which is saying a lot, given Waits’ astonishingly weird career). Real Gone is a nasty little rock record that finds inspiration in everything from hip-hop to parlor folk. It’s Waits’ most daring experiment, pushing the aesthetics of Rain Dogs and Bone Machine to their breaking point.

It’s also a profound reflection on history and sin, and in many ways it’s my most cherished Tom Waits album. Another veteran singer/songwriter who topped himself in 2004 was the great Buddy Miller, whose Universal United House of Prayer was the year’s best gospel album, as well as one of its most profound– and compassionate– political statements. Released during a time of war, ‘s album sidestepped polemics in favor of spiritual songs bemoaning man’s depravity and begging for God’s grace. He preached peace through love and faith, and the songs– drawn from mountain music but filtered through rock and roll– matched the lyrics in their fervor and urgency. Ron Sexsmith released one of the decade’s finest pure pop albums in Retriever, an album of grace and elegance that drew from a number of singer/songwriter traditions but came to be something far more, an incredible showcase of melody matched with lyrics brimming with beauty, sincerity, and truth.

Wrote about love as something rooted not in carnality, but in divinity; fittingly, his hooks were positively heavenly. American roots music– everything from country to gospel– was rich and vibrant in 2004. In addition to the Buddy Miller album, of course, there was the Jack White-produced comeback album by Loretta Lynn, an album overflowing with energy, personality, humor, and storytelling virtuosity. Meanwhile, Ben Harper collaborated with the Blind Boys of Alabama for an irresistible gospel concoction– with rock underpinnings, of course– called There Will Be a Light.

And Patty Griffin‘s Impossible Dream is a record of rich, devastating, and utterly mesmerizing sadness. And speaking of rock, 2004 gave us formative recordings from some of the decade’s most promising and exciting bands, most notably ‘ breakthrough album, Rubber Factory, and the fully-formed debut from, Almost Killed Me. And then there was the album: American Idiot is a blockbuster and a modern-day classic, and for good reason; its mixture of political fire, rock and roll mayhem, and pop craftmanship make it one of the most ambitious mainstream rock albums of the decade, as well as one of the best. Singer-songwriters were in fine form in 2004, too, particularly in indie music: ‘s Our Endless Numbered Days was a hushed, spooky reflection on death and fidelity, while Sufjan Stevens‘ Seven Swans was a hushed, spooky reflection on death and faith. Both are, in my opinion, the best albums yet made by the two respective artists. And the beat goes on. ‘s The Slow Wonder is a pop gem.

‘s Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes revealed a band with a fully-formed voice that was entirely their own. Devendra Banhart‘s Rejoicing in the Hands is a riveting update on the old, weird Americana. And on and on. That was 2004 for me. What were your favorites from that year? See also:;;; and.