khoistop100

[khoistop100]

2018 TOP 20

20. Snail Mail: Lush

My most controversial/optimistic view when it comes to albums is that albums can still be very good even if only half of the songs are good, sometimes even less (I’m talking about American Football here because I am usually thinking about American Football because I did not have fun time in tenth grade). Luckily for Snail Mail, I didn’t find the second half of her 2018 release bad, it just wasn’t nearly as memorable as the first half. Luckily for me, the first half of “Lush” is 20 minutes of gorgeous music. From its muted, vaguely nostalgic intro, to the grander “Pristine”, to the lonely and lost “Stick”, the album never loses this dewy/dreamy quality that sits just on top of whatever room the sound occupies. It’s a weighted blanket: comforting and soft sounds you can wrap yourself in to, for just one minute, feel safe which I needed in 2018. I don’t know if “Lush” will be one of the top twenty albums I think of when I look back at 2018 in a few years, but right now, I can’t imagine a 2018 without it, meaning it most definitely belongs here on my top 20 albums of 2018.

19. Joyce Manor: Million Dollars to Kill Me

Life can get substantially easier when you figure out the simple truths about yourself. I discovered that I was a Pisces through and through my senior year of high school, when a classmate, upon hearing it was my birthday, told me, “Everything about you makes sense now.” Despite my protests, nothing has or will change the fact that I am deeply emotional and day-dreamy, essentially, a Pisces you can spot a mile away. I’m also an emo bitch, most likely a side of effect of the Pisces thing, and unlike those emotionally healthy people that grew out of their emo phase in ninth grade, I don’t think I ever will. I’ve come to terms with this, and this led to me realizing that Joyce Manor is a fucking stellar band. They continue to be stellar in their 2018 album “Million Dollars to Kill Me”, which delivers the frantic energy and enticing guitar-driven melodies that made me fall in love with their 2014 album, “Never Hungover Again”. “Million Dollars” is much more subdued than their previous works, gentler even. To me, it doesn’t come off as being washed up but rather as a natural course of, maturation. They’re growing into their new sound wonderfully, with the album’s title track easily being one of my favorite songs released this year. “Million Dollars” does the best thing an album can do, which is keep me excited for the band’s future while keeping me totally happy with the band’s present.

18. The Vaccines: Combat Sports

Speaking of high school, look whose back with a killer release! Seven years after their breakout album, “What Did You Expect from the Vaccines?”, and around five years after I started listening to them, The Vaccines’ “Combat Sports” sounds just as bright, bouncy, British, and boyish as they did when I found them, which is a relief. One of my worst habits as a music listener is my tendency to find an album from an artist who has plenty of other great, acclaimed releases and never listen to anything other than the first album I found. This has happened repeatedly; despite how much I love, “Black on Both Sides”, “It’s Dark and Hell is Hot”, “Hospice”, and “Slanted and Enchanted”, I have never listened to another Mos Def, DMX, or Hospice album, and I only recently gave Pavement’s “Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain” a shot, which was smart because “Crooked Rain” might be better. The Vaccines were, until this year, stuck in this limbo, as I had generally ignored their previous two releases, though from the little I’ve heard from “Come of Age” that might have been the right decision. However, I am glad to say that “Combat Sports” is a triumph. It brings the fun and charisma of “Norgaard” and “Post-Breakup Sex” in tracks like “I Can’t Quit” and “Out On the Street” while keeping the slower sincerity of “Somebody Else’s Child” on tracks such as “Maybe” and “Young American”. It’s my “roll down the car windows” album of 2018 and I can’t wait to see if anything can top it in 2019.

 17. Saba: Care for Me

It would have been a shame if I had missed Saba because I don’t really care for Chance’s “Everybody’s Something” and “Coloring Book” as a whole. It would’ve been a shame if my brother hadn’t convinced me to give Noname’s “Room 25” a shot and I never heard “Ace”, her track with Smino and Saba. It really would’ve have been a shame if, after listening to “Room 25”, my phone had died as I sat in the library, as it was on 1 percent when I decided to give Saba a shot and watch his NPR Tiny Desk concert. And after my long road to Saba, what I found was not only, in my humble opinion, the cutest rapper out now (I’m open to other opinions on the cute debate, but Saba’s smile is number one and it’s not particularly close), but also the best, young, male rapper I found this year (number one is probably the best but that is also up for debate. I enjoy talking about these things feel free to hit me up). His flow on “Life” is one of those “oh yeah I guess old heads have a point this fast, intricate, carefully crafted hip hop is astounding” moments, and the hook on “Broken Girls” is inescapably sticky and fun while keeping the darker, heavier atmosphere of the song. Yet, the most impressive thing about Saba is his storytelling, which I think is a majorly underrated aspect of rapping, and his double-song “Prom/King” was one of maybe four tracks that made me cry this year (it was as I walked into my astronomy class, which is terrible in terms of timing but great in terms of memorability). I love Saba now, which is to say, I “Care for Him”.

16. Antarcticgo Vespucci: Love in the Time of Emails

Not much makes me warier of a piece of art than critique of modern technology, i.e. the internet, social media, and the like (also on the list, woke music about the daughter you just had and the words “void”, “calloused”, and “bruised” showing up in a poem. So much bad, youth spoken word, just so so much). So, under normal circumstances, I would have skipped over Anarctigo Vespucci’s new release, but since “Post”, “Worry”, and “To Leave or Live in Long Island” are some of the best albums I’ve listened to this year, I’d say Jeff Rosenstock deserves the benefit of the doubt. And “Love in the Time of Emails” makes the record four for four (Wendy’s, if you’re listening, bring back spicy nuggets), though it would be stupid to ignore Chris Farren’s contributions on the album. Farren is the star here, with his vocal ability to switch between the poppier tracks like “Kimmy” and “White Noise” to the more pop-punk moments in “Breathless on DVD” and “Not Yours” being what defines the album’s aesthetic. It is power-pop and a great album and it is, somehow, only my second favorite Jeff Rosenstock project this year.

15. The Pillows: FooL on CooL generation

No one reading this should feel even remotely interested in listening to this album, unless, by some chance, you happen to be a fan of the anime FLCL. If that is the case, the Pillows (the band responsible for FLCL’s soundtrack, which is one of the best parts of the show) has an album out on spotify, featuring iconic songs Last Dinosaur AND Little Busters. “FooL on CooL generation” is the soundtrack to FLCL’s two sequels, FLCL Progressive and FLCL Alternative, neither of which I have seen (and I don’t know if I really want to. I’ve heard a lot of mixed reviews and it makes me nervous), but the fact that I haven’t seen the shows hasn’t stopped me from falling head over heels for this release. It has the same vibe as the FLCL soundtrack I’ve been listening to all year, which is to say, the Pillows are very good at creating rock music that can both blend into the background and grab your head with two hands and bang it for you. And though this soundtrack is missing killer tracks like “Ride on Shooting Star”, “Instant Music” which is one of my favorite songs of the year, and “Hybrid Rainbow”, “FooL on CooL generation” is way more consistent all the way through and is an overall much more enjoyable listen. Everything I love about FLCL is reflected in the Pillow’s music; they’re able to establish a  nostalgic dreariness without the music sounding mundane and then shatter that oppressive peacefulness with this incredibly fun, invigorating crescendo that leaves me feeling victorious. Because that’s what FLCL is about. It says “life can be boring and when we are young, we often try to grow up too fast and we miss how whacky things around us are. But if you let life happen around you, life is wild and fun and, sometimes, if you’re lucky or patient, you’ll win”. And yeah, in the show, victory can come in the form of using a Gibson Flying V as a bat to send a baseball-shaped bomb the size of a small school building back into space and saving your entire, boring little town. Other times, its beating your dad in an airsoft gun fight. Sometimes, you win but you’re not the hero, in fact, you were just there. Is all of this conveyed through the music alone on “FooL on CooL generation”? Probably not, but if you’ve watched the show, hopefully you can at least see why it’s what I get out of this album. And if you haven’t, it’s only six twenty minute episodes (and made by the people who made Neon Genesis Evangellion, if you’re a weeb reading this. Though, I will warn you, the shows have nothing in common except for a whiny, little boy as the central protagonist). FLCL changed a lot about my view of art, from how and why it should be made to what makes art good and effective. I will always be thankful to it, and by extension, the Pillows, for how they shaped my life and continue to provide me with some killer entertainment.

 14. Kids See Ghosts: Kids See Ghosts

2018 was a rough year for a lot of people, and, in a lot of ways, Kanye West made it worse. Overall, I would say he definitely made it worse for me, being a fan of his. I thought his first release of the year, “Ye”, was as uninspired as it was uninteresting. What I love about Kanye is that all of his prior works sounded like he had an idea and wanted to make the most intricate, grandest, and dopest version of that idea he could. “Ye” doesn’t sound like it has half the effort of even “Life of Pablo” and was simply a disappointment. It wasn’t as nearly as his antics online, from his recent spat with Drake to his public devotion to the right wing, the latter leading me to ignore this album for awhile after its release. I loved Kanye, and my favorite Kanye album is “808s & Heartbreak”, the Kanye album with the most Kid Cudi inspiration, but with all the negativity Kanye had brought me in 2018, I didn’t think “Kids See Ghosts” would be worth it.  And it wasn’t; even now I’d say it was a net negative year for my relationship with Kanye, but goddam if this album isn’t fantastic. It’s ambitious Kanye again, teamed up with this raw and emotionally open Kid Cudi. “4th Dimension” has an almost “Jesus Walks” feel to its beats. The album opens on this big, clouds-in-the-sky sample followed by a silky-smooth Pusha T verse followed by Kanye’s erratic, ad-libbed gunshots, indicating, “yes Kanye is back on his bullshit but in a new way” which is how the best Kanye albums start. The album does fall off at the end, I think, which is especially tough when the album is only 7 tracks and 23 minutes. I love a short album, but if it’s not consistent, every bad song is a bigger percentage of the album that’s bad. I’m still lower on Kanye leaving 2018 than I was going in, but this album does nearly everything it can to keep him in my good graces.

13. Pusha T: Daytona

It’s hard for me to look at “Daytona” now without comparing it to “Kids See Ghosts”. Both were released by GOOD Music this year, both are seven tracks and around 20 minutes long, and both were produced by Kanye West. So what Pushes “Daytona” ahead? A few things. One, holy shit Pusha T is really good at rapping. I grew up pretty sheltered, especially when it came to music. This lead to first rap song I ever fell in love with being Eminem’s “Mocking Bird”, which I was only able to listen to on my cousin’s hacked DS. This also lead to me missing Clipse’s “Grindin” and the rest of Pusha T’s career, until I got into Kanye West my freshman year and heard him absolutely devour his verse on “Runaway” (probably still my favorite Kanye song). This is all to say, man I wish I had known about Pusha T longer to save me from misguidedly believing that Eminem was ever the best rapper alive (to clarify, I don’t think Pusha ever was either. But I don’t think I ever would have put Eminem over anyone if I knew how many amazing rappers were out there so, thanks mom) (side note, I’m convinced that Spotify has some sort of agenda, because I’ve listened to “Grindin” way more times than I have “Weird Honey” but “Grindin” wasn’t on my Top 100 of 2018 and “Weird Honey” was? Just release the raw data Spotify, let me see exactly how many more times I listened to “My Boy” than “Provider” and I’ll be happy). Second (back to why “Daytona” is higher than “Kids See Ghosts”), I think the peak of “Daytona” is higher than “Kids See Ghosts”, meaning, I think “The Games We Play” is better than “Feel the Love”. KSG has more tracks that I like, but there is really nothing that comes close to “The Game We Play”. It’s on the shortlist for my favorite songs of the year; it may even be one of my favorite rap songs period. From Pusha’s heavy, pendulum flow, to the bars, to the Samurai Champloo-esque beat its everything I want in a rap song. He doesn’t kill it on every track, sadly, but this song makes “Daytona” one of 2018’s unforgettable albums.

12. Clairo: diary 001

At times, it feels like there is just too much music out there, especially in the rap and indie scenes. It doesn’t help when the aesthetics and sounds all sort of blend together. I wouldn’t say that Clairo’s “diary 001” break through the of lo-fi, indie, Bandcamp white noise cloud. Rather, she runs it through an air purifier and uses her sound to fill a balloon and asks you what your favorite animal is. It’s a fun album to listen to, which I can’t say for every pop or indie album I’ve listened to this year. It’s a really fun album to sing along to, which is easy, since Clairo’s writing is as simple and inviting as it is honest and vulnerable. There’s not much to parse but there’s plenty to enjoy, even if the EP is only fourteen minutes long (barely longer than Car Seat Headrest’s SONG Beach-Life-In-Death which was my third favorite song from the band that delivered my least favorite live performance). I did feel a bit strange putting an EP on this list, but considering how short some of this years best albums were and the fact that there are other EPs I loved from this year, I would be lying to myself if I kept “Diary 001” off my list or put it any lower.

11. Curren$y, Freddie Gibbs, and The Alchemist: Fetti

There are always the artists you want to enjoy. I really wanted to love Freddie Gibbs’ other 2018 album, the self-titled “Freddie”, and for the first few listens I did. Yet, as the plays piled on, I realized that the album was just okay. It had almost everything I loved about “Pinata”, the album that made me fall in love with Freddie’s tough, braggadocious style (Gibbs’ persona is a kind of rap game Gaston from Beauty and the Beast). Sadly, I found its production got old quickly and the latter songs dip off. It was disheartening. A few months later, as 2018 seems like it may finally be wrapping itself up as it headed into December, I hear Gibbs has another album with New Orleans rapper Curren$y and producer the Alchemist. As of right now, I’ve only had a few weeks with this album and I’ve got to say it deserves this number 12 spot. Yes, I’m wary of recency bias, as it took a bit for me to sour on “Freddie” but there are a few things that give me a bit more confidence in “Fetti”. First is the production. The entire album has a hollow, shadowy vibe that creates space for Gibbs and Curren$y to thrive in, as well as lending the project a sense of cohesion that doesn’t sour into mundanity (man does 4:44’s production get repetitive). Second, both rappers really shine in this album. I’ve been a fan of Gibbs before, but this is my first time listening to Curren$y and shame on me. He’s smooth and sounds extremely New Orleans, like the old coworkers that tried to convince me that A.I was ten times the player Kevin Durant is and ever will be became one of the slickest rappers of 2018 (if anyone is interested, my old coworkers were also New Orleans rappers and would rap almost every shift. Let’s just say they were better at basketball analysis then they were rapping). What really makes “Fetti” work, though, is the interplay between the two rappers. It’s almost like (back to basketball for one last time) the duo of Dame Lilliard and CJ McCollum. Are either the best rapper out right now, no and I wouldn’t say it’s particularly close. But on any given night they can have the best performance, and over the season their team is generally successful. Part of that success is, while the duo are also in close in terms of skill, Portland definitely belongs to Dame and “Fetti” is, in my opinion, clearly Curren$y’s album. He’s the best part of the majority of the songs, but on the rare occasion he does falter a bit, Gibbs is there to make sure the song still slaps, see “Now and Later Gators”. “Fetti” might not stay my twelfth favorite album of 2018 forever, but it’s great enough for me to keep me rooting for these two.

10. Harunemuri: harutosyura

There aren’t a ton of reasons for me to like Harunemuri’s 2018 album “harutosyura”. Most of the album isn’t in English, which should be a problem for me considering I primarily listen for lyrics (although I think I could make an argument that English is no longer an obstacle, as I am currently getting back into k-pop for the fourth time in my short life. Though, considering there are two other albums on my list made by Japanese artists so maybe I’m just a weeb). The album is extremely experimental, with plenty of songs layered with heavy effects, and melodies ranging from poppy to rock often within single songs, which is nothing to say of the vocal performances. Harunemuri seems to love this rapid, almost anxious rambling pace when delivering her lyrics, closer to spoken word poetry than traditional singing, yet there are places where the music drives her to place where she, and often myself while listening along, has to scream. And I love that. I like how easily this gets my heart racing, how it keeps me off-balance always guessing what’s coming next, how at times the music can feel like a spectacle. After months of listening to this album, there still aren’t any individual songs that stick out, as the album feels like a cohesive unit that demands to be listened to as such. It has momentum, both the individual songs and the project have a kind of centrifugal force that pulls me in and keeps me within its orbit. This album is a tough recommend (unless you just happen to be a huge fan of Claire de Lune, which briefly appears on this album and is easily the strangest sample I’ve heard all year) but its also easy for me to see why fans of this album, including myself, love it.

9. Kendrick Lamar: Black Panther Album Music From and Inspired By

Sometimes, the world gets lucky. Everything aligns, the planets, the stars, and one of the best directors gets one of Hollywood’s biggest IPs and gets the worlds best rapper to do the soundtrack AND somehow it still manages exceed expectations (oh also they got one the hottest actors alive to be the primary antagonist and though he did not exceed expectations in terms of hotness, definitely met them and made his kinda underwritten character very appealing). It’s crazy to me that this movie came out this year, as this year has felt like was the rumored, uncut version of Black Panther that clocked in at like five hours or something crazy like that. Then again, I can’t imagine it coming out any other year. This album was a chance for some of music’s big names to get music out before releasing full projects this year: 2 Chainz, Khalid, SZA, Vince Staples, Jorja Smith, Anderson .Paak, Future (unfortunately? Verdicts still out on “slob on me knob” personally), and Travis Scott, not to mention Kendrick, ScHoolboy Q, and Isiah Rashad whose only music this year is on this album. So yeah, if you are a fan of literally any of those artists, this is a good album to check out. It’s almost like our generation’s we are the world, except instead of funding a charity for Africa, the crew of Black Panther’s soundtrack (and to a further extent, everyone behind the movie) are celebrating the massive impact and dominance they have over American culture. It’s a well-earned victory lap, as well as an incredibly well made and enjoyable one.

8. Travis Scott: Astroworld

While trying to figure this year’s top twenty, I was surprised by how far up my list Travis Scott’s “Astroworld” made it. I think a few months spent complaining about its length and reading about how Sicko Mode is this generation’s Bohemian Rhapsody had soured me on the project as a whole (it’s not, in case anyone is wondering. Sicko mode isn’t even the best song by either Travis or Drake. I still think Travis’ best song is Maria I’m Drunk and Drakes is Know Yourself and now I’m sad again because I’m thinking about how disappointing Scorpion was). What I forgot was that Travis managed to craft arguably his best album to date, and one of my favorite albums in 2018. He continues to adapt Kanye’s peculiar ability to get the most out of artists, allowing them to fit into the album’s specific tone or aesthetic while still sounding like themselves (Travis also takes the “let’s get a Bon Iver feature to fit onto this rap song” mantle from Kanye, which I never thought I’d see). Are these features a crutch for Travis? Sure, he’s still only an ok rapper at best and the worst tracks on the album are the ones where Travis is by himself and has to showcase that. But that only applies to 6 of the 17 tracks and in his defense, the opening track, Stargazing, is fantastic despite the lack of features. In fact, Astroworld may have the best four songs of any album this year, with Sicko Mode being the best song on the project (though a Nav-less Yosimite would be stiff competition). The album is as diverse as it is good, constantly shifting up tempos and moods. One moment it can be jamming on No Bystanders (which has a “BITCH!” comparable to Sheck Wes’ on “Mo Bamba”) the next its close and eerie with 21 Savage on NC-17, which, can I take a minute here to talk about what a year it’s been for 21? Aside from this verse, which was my favorite of his this year, he’s fantastic on Metro Boomin’s “Not All Hero Wear Capes” and 21’s own “i am > i was”. He seems to consistently better every year and at some point, he’s gonna be unarguably a top 5 rapper out. Shit, he might already be there. Back to Travis, my biggest fear with this album is that it doesn’t feel like Travis’ sound has necessarily evolved. “Astroworld” feels, at time, like Travis cleaning up and trying to perfect a sound he muddied up on “Birds In the Trap”. 2018 was a year of new heights for Travis, but here’s to hoping he can fly even higher.

7. Young Thug: On the Rvn

I’ve never been quite as ready for someone to break a promise as I was when Young Thug declared that he wasn’t going to release any more music in 2018. Of course, being Young Thug, he’s released three projects in 2018 (not to mentioned the teased “Barter 7”), with the last of these being the EP “On the Rvn”. The EP is only six songs, clocking in at a quick 22 minutes in which Young Thug showcases every reason I continue to love Young Thug. His songs are a great balance of fun and turnt, as Thug has a sort of swiss army knife utility along with an ability to identify exactly what a song needs from him. Whether that means switching up flows, singing, playing with tone/inflection, adlibbing, or utilizing autotune, he knows what is going to make him and, quite often, his feature sound the best. Take my two favorite tracks, “Climax” ft. 6lack and “Sin” ft. Jaden Smith. Despite 6lack’s experience as an r&b singer, Thug takes the singing responsibility on the hook with this breathy falsetto that is sampled throughout all of 6lack’s verse. Thus, 6lack’s cool, smoother voice is highlighted and gives the entire track an almost lacquered feel. Meanwhile, on “Sin”, knowing that Jaden has a penchant for delivering his verses in a breezy, flowy, not-quite sing-songy style, Thug goes for his more conventional, deeper voice and focuses the emphasis and rhythm of his verse. Thug’s plodding grounds the song while Jaden is allowed to create the songs height. To top it all off, Thug has a song with Elton John, in which he blows the legendary singer-songwriter out the water. Jeffery just loves adding to his GOAT case. This isn’t Thug’s best project or even close, but since he’s easily one of my favorite rappers out right now, I’ll get a ton of mileage from any above average project he drops. (Final thing before I leave, “Audemar” is his best song this year and I want to find a way to frame his “skrrt”s on that song and hang them on wall as my most prized possession).

6. Brockhampton: Iridescence

The worlds’ best boyband has a new sound. And it’s exciting! Just maybe not as exciting as it could be. It’s understandable, I can’t imagine it’s easy to follow up the release of three mixtapes in twice as many months, as well as the well-deserved explosion of popularity that comes from dropping some of the best and freshest sounding hip hop of 2017. Considering all the buildup, “Iridescence” does well to show that Brockhampton is still growing and still great, just in a new way. After the group’s (correct) decision to kick out one of its most important members after sexual misconduct allegations came out, many, including me, were curious about the direction their sound would take. From “Iridescence”, it seems that their answer is less of a role for Kevin Abstract (which is sad for me, because he’s still my favorite musician of the group. It was clear from the singles released prior to “Iridescence” that his presence was going to be lessened going forward. Hopefully that changes). and Matt Champion (who, after four albums, I still can’t remember what any of his verses are about? Like they sound good I just don’t know what the fuck he’s trying to say) and more opportunity for Dom (the best rapper of the group), Merlyn Woods (the cutest member), Joba (the most exciting/highest variance member), and Bearface (the hottest if I was still in middle school/a local). “Iridescence” is Brockhampton’s most melodic project yet and feels the most vulnerable, which are both exciting propositions. Yet, it’s a bit too long and there are some experimental moments like the ending of “Vivid” and some moments that sound pulled out of the Saturation Series that sound a bit old hat like “Where the Cash At”. At the end of the day, this is only Brockhampton’s third best album (it’s like the Dark Souls 2 of the Brockhampton discography. Also, this is mostly for my brother if he’s reading this, after going back and listening to all the Brockhampton albums, I admit that Sat 3 is the best overall. My favorite songs are still on Sat 2, but Sat 3 is the better album. You win). Still, at their third best, it’s good enough to be one of my favorite and most exciting albums of the year.

5. Ichiko Aoba: qp  

I think one of the most powerful things a meal or song or any piece of art can do is evoke something from your childhood. Like no matter how old I get, when I make myself Vietnamese porridge and add too much black pepper, that first bite is always going to remind me of my grandmother taking care of me when I was sick. Ichiko Aoba’s “qp” is an fantastic album on its own, but what lands it here on this list is its ability to evoke the calming sounds of the “Basket of Plums” cd I would listen to as a kid. The cd is a compilation of songs written by the Plum Village Monastery, a Buddhist monastery founded by Vietnamese monk Thich Nhat Hanh. It was a mainstay in my house growing up, my early music library consisting mostly of “Basket of Plums”, “Abbey Road”, and the Vietnamese karaoke cassette tapes “The He Tre” (which probably are to thank for my ability to enjoy music where I have no idea what the singers are saying). That being said, it’s not like “qp” doesn’t stand on its own merits. Aoba’s voice has this immediately intimate quality to it, which when paired with her ability to create wispy and intricate melodies makes some songs sound how dewy spiderwebs look. Yet, there’s nothing overwhelming about her music. It’s familiar, friendly, and comforting, all without crossing the language barrier. If you ever have a night where you can’t fall asleep, maybe there are too may things to do when you wake up or too many things happened during the day, give “qp” a try. Maybe you’ll get lucky and it’ll bring you back to a simpler time.

4. Jeff Rosenstock: POST

Looking back, “dumbfounded, downtrodden, and dejected” is not only a great way to kick off an album and the new year but also a great warning to what 2018 had in store for all of us. This album’s January 1st release represented a lot of 2018 for me; how much fun the year would be, how tumultuous and chaotic the year would be, how the year would take an eternity to end (Let Them Win is a good song but it has no business being 11 minutes long). Most importantly, starting in the new year with “POST” was indicative of just how much Jeff Rosenstock I would listen to this year. I’ve spent the entire year going through his catalogue, starting with “POST”, moving onto my favorite of his albums, “WORRY”, before checking out his time with Bomb the Music Industry, then finding out his project with longtime friend Chris Farren, Anarctigo Vespucci, had a new album (see number 16 on this list). The guy is good at making music and he’s made a lot. Of all the things Rosenstock does well, from writing simultaneously catchy and furious lyrics to composing fantastic instrumentals (I’m a huge fan of the drums on this project and became an even bigger fan after seeing him live and realizing that the drummer was Asian! I’ve seen maybe a total of 15 Asians at rock shows over the year and the drummer was probably the first I’ve seen onstage), I think it’s the tremendous amount of energy that he’s able to cram into songs that keeps me coming back. Take the one-two punch of “Yr Throat” into “All This Useless Energy”. Both songs are about this force that’s trapped in the body and it manifests itself, not only through the lyrics and Rosenstock’s vocal performance, but in this nervous/excited energy that radiates out from the music into you and it sounds like I’m listening to the audio equivalent of being exhausted and drinking a red bull, only to have your heart pounding while the rest of the body is total limp. It also helps that it sounds like Rosenstock is trying as hard as he possibly can on every track, sometimes to the point where it sounds like he thinks his effort wasn’t quite enough. It’s the same desperate/motivated feel that I love about Panucci Pizza’s “Don’t Tip the Delivery Boy” and that I thought was missing on “Ye”, and since “POST” is built on it, it’s remained one of my absolute favorite albums of the year.

3. Vince Staples: FM

In terms of everything outside of rap, Vince Staples is my favorite rapper by a longshot. From his twitter, to his Hot Ones appearance, to every interview or video I’ve ever seen of him (especially the video where he and Hannibal Burress discuss the real or fake tough guys of the NBA), he comes across as incredibly funny, clever, charismatic, and enigmatic. All of those attributes came across on his first album “Summertime ‘06”, though, I think that album suffers from running on too long. The first CD is close to perfect, and while the second half has some good songs, I think it does more harm than good for the album as a whole. That’s not a problem with “FM”. Being only 22 minutes, every song is important, and every song is fantastic. It’s Vince doing what Vince does best: bringing his gritty, sobering storytelling to bright, bouncy, interesting beats. Yet that’s not all Vince brings on “FM”. The entire album is strung along by this radio show theme (with a personal highlight being the “New earlsweatshirt – Interlude” but more on him in a bit) that makes the short album flow by even faster. The album also benefits from having a clear best song (makes the album stand out more in my memory when there’s one track I always want to go back to), in my opinion, which is “FUN!”, a song with near infinite replayability (the line “fried catfish at the ritz in Japan” stands out as one of my favorite of the year) and a really FUN music video (my second favorite of the year, behind This is America). Vince is quickly reaching the point where I stop deeply wanting a musician to release more music and, instead, just sit back and enjoy what they’ve given me so far (the list is Earl after this year, Frank Ocean, Outkast, and the Mountain Goats). There’s nothing quite as exciting as one of your favorite musicians release an album and it turns out to be your favorite, and that’s exactly what he has done here with “FM”.

2. Earl Sweatshirt: Some Rap Songs

           My favorite rapper dropped a new album! For the first time in three years! And I love it!

To top it all off, this is the first project he’s released since I’ve become a fan of his, which always makes that album a little more endeared in my heart (the same reason why the Mountain Goat’s “Beat the Champ”, Kendrick’s “To Pimp a Butterfly”, and Kanye’s “Life of Pablo” all hold special places in my heart). I had invested so much into the release of the album, from Earl’s song on Vince’s album to the two fabulous singles Earl released before the album to freaking about the two seconds of audio he released on his Twitter a few weeks before the album rolled out. Which is why I was disappointed the first time I listened to the album. I think I was expected some sort of perfect masterpiece after three years of not releasing music, some manicured and particularly perfect album, something close to what I got from Frank Ocean’s “Blond”. But that’s not what “Some Rap Songs” is. “Some Rap Songs” is weird, highly experimental, and incredibly open, like looking at an open wound someone cut for the sake of art. And after a couple dozen more listens, I love it. Earl’s production is one of my favorite things about his music and he continues his streak of picking these heavy, static-y beats, now laced with highly modulated samples. It’s a lovely contrast, with Earl’s deadpan, brutal and honest lyrics backed by these eclectic, unpredictable beats. It turns out I can’t not love Earl’s music; it’s my musical funny bone. It’s why I, a generally indecisive person, was so quick to decide he was my favorite rapper. The burst that starts off “Ontheway!” hits at the base of my spine and the beat on “Peanut” leaves my jaw numb. His line “lot of blood to let” off “The Mint” is on the short list of lyrics I would want to turn into a tattoo. The closer is sunnier than any song I’ve heard Earl release but still sounds distinctly like Earl. Every time I come back to this album, I find something new to love. These are some of the best rap songs of the year, and who knows, at this rate this album may be a classic in my eyes when his next album drops.

1.Tierra Whack:Whack World

In honor of my favorite album of 2018, I’ll keep this review ultra-brief. Tierra Whack’s “Whack World” is as fun and entertaining of fifteen minutes that is out there. A perfect, peculiar blend of pop, rap, techno, and country(?!), it’s the actual closest thing this generation has to Bohemian Rhapsody. With the amount of music being released everyday being larger than ever and the fact that we have more access to all that music, it’s remarkable that Tierra Whack already has her own distinct, remarkable voice. I don’t think I’ve ever been this excited for a musician career. It feels great.

[khoistop100]

#52 Doris - Earl Sweatshirt

    I always appreciate when you can listen to a song by an artist and tell which album it came from. Like, for the majority of Green Day’s early discography, up to Warning I’d say, I couldn’t tell you what album any given song by them is on because they’re music wasn’t really evolving at a drastic rate. Each album’s sound blended into the next. Now, bands like Arctic Monkeys and newer Kanye West feature separate, different sounds on each album; no songs on Humbug feature the immature, rebellious sound of Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not just as none of the techno-infused tracks on 808’s and Heartbreak sound like the braggadocios Graduation (except for maybe Amazing but I digress).

    Earl Sweatshirt certainly fits into the “every album is different” category, which puts me in a weird spot. Earl is my favorite rapper and I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Go Outside is one of my favorite albums, but the sound on his earlier works is different, causing me to almost resent it in a way. The logical part of my brains understands that these albums came first and are vital points in Earl’s progression. On the other hand, the dumb, caveman part of me simply wants more music in the world that sounds like I Don’t Like Shit and Solace (which I’ll get to at the end of this review).

    It’s not like Earl’s earlier works don’t sound like Earl, in fact I’d say he sounds pretty unique on Doris (I can’t really comment on his mixtape, Earl. I don’t think I ever got through it all the way, which is weird to think about since he is my favorite rapper and all. Just wasn’t for me I guess). It’s just not I Don’t Like Shit and that’s affects the way I listen to the album. Luckily, it wasn’t too long ago that Doris was the only Earl I had listened to aside from his feature on Super Rich Kids by Frank Ocean, and I can remember what about Doris made me fall for the Odd Future graduate. To put things simply, Earl is really good at rapping. More specifically, I love the way Earl rhymes. It’s bars like “Prior to arriving to the studio, eyes glued to a gluteus maximus” off the track 20 Wave Caps and “You Know me, drugs out, front the telly, I’m couch-crunk and ready to fuck, count fetti and bucks” off of Molasses that show what Earl was about which is dope, intricate, immature rhymes. And when I say that the lines are immature it isn’t a slight, that was the vibe coming from the entire Wolf Gang outfit at the time. They were brash and vulgar and having fun being famous on the internet and, most importantly, they were really young. Earl was only nineteen when Doris dropped. I am nineteen. To think that millions of people are hearing what you create is wild.

    Earl’s bars aren’t the only good thing he has going for him on Doris. One of my favorite things about Earl is that he produces as well as he raps and some of the music on this album is great (see tracks two through eight). The run of tracks four through six are some of the best music Earl has made. Sunday features the most beautiful boy in the world, Frank Ocean, with this spooky beat and remorseful verse from Earl and actual bars from Frank (and boy do I love when Frank raps I love everything he does), who addresses the Chris Brown moment at the Grammys perfectly. Hive is Earl’s most impressive song writing wise. It’s really clear that he’s someone who is inspired by MF Doom, as Earl’s rhyming and off balance/kind of on beat rapping style seems like a direct descendants of Doom’s. Also, I still lose it a little whenever Earl says, “So here I sit, eye in the pyramid/ God spit it like it’s truth serum in that beer and then/ disappear again, reappear bearded/ on top of a leer, steering it into the kids’ ear again.” Hive also features an incredible Vince Staples feature (one of Vince’s many incredible features and the first feature that started the “Vince is significantly better on other people’s songs” conspiracy theory I’ve been developing. Which is wild, because his music is so good. His features are just that much better). Finally, Chum, which is a first look at the deep dive into depression that would consume Earl’s later works. He talks about the struggles of his personal life, from growing up without a father to the difficulties of being in Wolf Gang and the fame that comes from it. Together, the songs create this seamless, timeless run that belongs in my personal pantheon of music.

    The album still has flaws though, even aside from simply not sounding like Earl’s later works. For one, the album’s quality drops off after track eight, meaning that the entire last half of the album is underwhelming. Additionally, the album is inundated with features. Only three of the songs don’t have a feature and one of those songs, 523, is an instrumental. Some of those features are great: Domo Genesis on 20 Waves Caps, Frank on Sunday, Vince on Hive, and Tyler on Sasquatch. Yet, when your favorite rapper has an album you want to hear as much of that rapper as you can (after all, it’s usually takes a while for artists to drop music unless your name is Jeffery/Young Thug how does he make so much music goddam).

    I shouldn’t judge this album for the fact that it isn’t as developed as Earl’s later works, I realize that. Still, even though I think that this album is severely lacking compared to I Don’t Like Shit, it’s a thoroughly rap album and, most importantly, is Earl! I like that guy a lot, which brings me to…

 52.5 Solace

     Super quick review on Earl’s ten minute, mini-album Solace. If you picture the transition from Doris to I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Go Outside as taking a step down into the darkness, Solace is what you hear as you’re falling and tumbling down the stairs. It feels disorganized and chaotic and every time you think you’ve found solid ground the beat shifts and you’re floating again. It might be my favorite ten minutes of music Earl has put out and it’s up there for top ten minutes of music ever. Worth a listen if you are sad and if you want to try something more experimental or if you care about me as a person.

[khoistop100]

# 72 Zaz - Zaz

I am someone who prioritizes lyrics in music. As a writer, they’re just easier to sit down and analyze, whereas the music is just sound that hits everyone differently. Some of those sounds are very nice, but it isn’t as concrete and therefore I tend to value lyrics a lot more in my music.

    Which is strange, because I find something intrinsically enjoyable about music in languages that I don’t know. Whether it be kpop, anime intros (which I could easily write a review on my top twenty anime intros and why I love them. Your Name’s OST might even make this list if I had to remake the list again today. It’s close), some Juanes, or Zaz, the self-titled , debut album from a French pop artist.

    The key component of listening to albums in language I don’t know is that I can let go of any attachment to the lyrics. I almost never look up the lyrics because, at that point, the lyrics aren’t why I listen to the music. They’re just another instrument in the grand scheme, though it is something blindly fun about learning the words and singing them without knowing what you’re saying. There’s always a chance that I am saying something objectly horrible and offensive but that’s a risk worth taking for Girls Generation (speficially, the songs The Boys, I Got a Boy, and Run Devil Run. All are iconic and will stay with me forever). Of course, with kpop, there’s always that one English phrase in the hook you can cling to but where’s the fun in that.

    Zaz doesn’t have that English you can cling to but it does have plenty to love. The majority of the album is poppy and jazzy, feeling like a bright, sunny Saturday morning. It features this great blend of piano, guitar, and sometimes trumpet, each instrument getting it’s time to shine next to Zaz’s smooth yet evocative voice. It can be jangly and bouncy, it can be suspenseful, it can even slow it down and paint a grey and dreary picture. And all of these emotions are actually heightened by the fact that I do not know French. It’s counterintuitive but the fact that Zaz’s vocals are only a tool to convey mood and not something trying to tell a separate story or evoke their own images, the song’s instrumentals take full focus and whatever they conjure, they conjure. Take the last song on the album, Eblouie par la nuit. It begins with this passionate cry that I can’t understand but still, it gets me emotional. The lack of instrumentals creates this room that Zaz’s voice seems to fill up and consume with a desperate sadness. Would it be more effective if I understood what she was saying, possibly, but the music is enjoyable even without it. Even if I understand nothing of what she’s saying, I know that I love this album and I can love music regardless of whether I know that they’re saying or not.

[khoistop100]

# 7 American Football - American Football

    Sometimes, I just want music that sounds nice. Pleasant. Good. Pleasing. American Football is nice music. I don’t often sit to listen to an album. Most of the time I am listening to music, I’m also driving or playing a video game or cooking. There are tons of albums that don’t really lend themselves to background noise, like any Pink Floyd album or Black on Both Sides by Mos Def or Hospice by the Antlers to name a few. American Football sits firmly in the easy listening side and may even be the king of it (Drum Chord Theory has a strong claim to the throne).

    Now, this isn’t to say that American Football’s music is simple. Quite the contrary, a lot of the appeal is the way the band’s guitars dance around each other to create dreary, late afternoon vibe. That’s something that American Football does particularly well, it’s great zone out music but also music that’s great to focus on and intensly listen to. It’s partially because the lyrics are so understated and also because, as I’ve said before, the music is just nice to the ears. And that music is hard for me to put a label on. It’s sad music, yes, but I haven’t heard much anything like it. As I said before the majority of the music simply consists of two guitars and drums, but there are also moments with groovy bass (like on the track Honestly?) and trumpet (including the worlds saddest sound, the trumpet on the track The Summer Ends that starts at second 20. You poor sad trumpet, I hope you find love one day). The lyrics are sparse on the album, but have this great, emo vibe to them. All in all there can’t be more than twenty or so verses on the album but each song, or rather the songs with lyrics, have these great emo gems on them. The opening song, Never Meant, has the lines, “Goodbyes/and the autumn night/ when we realized/ we were falling out of love” and “not to be/ overly, dramatic/ I just think it’s best/ Cause you can’t miss what you forget” (side note, “not to be overly dramatic” is the one of the most dramatic prefaces in the English language), the eternally awkward lines on The Summer Ends, “I’m thinking about leaving/ and how I should say goodbye/ with a handshake/ or an embrace/ or a kiss on the cheek/ possibly all three”, the IMMORTAL “Honestly I can’t remember teen dreams/ all my teenage feelings” on Honestly? (the phrase “all my teenage feelings” is what is left when the album is reduced down to a sludge that you can inject directly into the ghost your broken high school heart. Also, the image of this album cover with the title replaced with the words “I did not have fun in 10th grade” is a cursed image that causes me to giggle uncontrollably if I think about it for too long).

    Then there’s the album’s most special, most emo song; I’ll See You When We’re Both Not So Emotional. It’s this album’s First Day of My Life, that is to say, the song that got me to give this album a chance. If you couldn’t tell from the title, this song is peak teen angst. The vocals are as pitchy and distant as they get on the album. The song rumbles and tumbles through verse and hook and bridge as if it’s falling down a hill, while presenting some of music’s most painfully “that’s exactly how I felt in high school and no one understood me because I was too awkward to make friends let me find solace in the fact that this lyricist from Illinois has truly unlocked the complexities of my heart” lyrics. The song is brief and curt but is filled with these great lines, “You may accidentally misinterpret honesty for selfishness”, “You won’t understand me or my motivation for being alone”, and the seminal “I’ll see you when we’re both not so emotional” (surprisingly emotionally mature of this guy. I loved losing arguments because I was too emotionally involved and I was and still am great at it).

    I should also note before I finish this review that this is an album I never listen to all the way through, I always turn on something else after I’ll See You When We’re Both Not So Emotional. It’s not that the last two songs are atrocious, in fact I think that they are just middle of the road, run of the mill American Football songs. But I skip them because I don’t think they add anything to the album. Now, does this mean my perception of this album is skewed because I am not judging the entirety of the album? Sure, if it floats your boat to say that then go ahead. I, personally, don’t care, because what I look for in music is experience. I choose to experience this album the way I think maximizes the album’s appeal to me.

    Yet, even with the two final tracks, this album is an emo classic that I couldn’t possibly leave off this list if I wanted to. There’s something so magnetic about the music that captures the feel of my formative years, the mood and emotions of the era that I first became aware of myself and my place in the world. I was angry and scared and sad and alone and it was most likely all my fault but as long as there was music like American Football, I could zone out and drown myself in something more beautiful than the life I made for myself.

[khoistop100]

# 25 Mean Everything to Nothing - Manchester Orchestra

     There’s something sad about classics. On one hand, something timeless and great has been created. On the other, there’s the question of whether or not the artist will be able to reach that peak again. Yet, while Andy Hull and Manchester Orchestra never reach the heights of Mean Everything to Nothing again, this classic is more of a celebration of everything you could want from a Manchester Orchestra album.

    Mean Everything to Nothing is electrifying. From the way that album sort of “turns on” on the first track, The Only One, to the shrill energy that Hull’s voice seems to have for the first five tracks, the album seems more excited than its predecessor, I’m Like a Virgin Losing a Child. It’s more rock, it’s more fun, and it’s a spectacular way to start to start an album. After those first five songs comes 100 Dollars, a humorous interlude, then the album brings out the heavy hitters.

    I Can Feel a Hot One is Manchester Orchestra’s, and really Andy Hull’s, only six star song. It is sad and slow and hopeless unlike anything on Right Away, Great Captain. It’s ethereal and deliberate unlike anything on Bad Books. It’s perfectly composed unlike anything by Manchester Orchestra. And that’s what it takes to be a six star song; it has to do something that no other song can do in a way that no other song does. It’s hard to define but when you find a six star you can tell. The song manages to hit that fiction level that Hull thrives in, whether he’s talking about his struggles in life or the dream struggles that haunt his sleep. He deals with God in the verse about “Manna”, he makes a slick call back to earlier in the track listing with “I was in the front seat, shaking it out”, he deals with the theoretical death of his wife “Your blood was dry, it was sober…And I realized it then you were perfect.” The way he echoes himself on the later verses, the strings in the background that support the lonely guitar, everything works to push this image into your head and heart and you don’t know exactly what that image is at first (or ever) but you know its immensely sad so you become overwhelmed anyway. At least, that’s how the song is for me, even now some five odd years after I first heard it.

    I Can Feel a Hot One’s brilliance isn’t the only thing that keeps the second half of the album great. It’s immediately followed by My Friend Marcus and Tony the Tiger, my second and third favorite songs on the album you can see what I mean by the album picks up after 100 dollars). My Friend Marcus helps the momentum of the album by bringing back some pace and energy. From the bouncy “and I don’t give a good shit if you’re lonesome” to the chorus’ reference to the album’s title “Now I can see/you mean everything to nothing” which is clever but not in a smartass way but a “oh hey, I got that. Nice” way. Tony the Tiger, on the other hand, keeps the energy up but in a more suspenseful and understated way. It has the gem of the line, “What did you mean when you said it’s destructive/ and you sank yourself right into me.” The song is frustrated and angry, contrasting the manic sadness of Hot One and the stuck-ness of Tony the Tiger. The three tracks really showcase everything the band had to offer in a small sample, a really enjoyable microcosm of Manchester Orchestra.

    The album ends with the album’s title track, which is enjoyable but ultimately sounds like an elaboration of the chorus of Tony the Tiger, and the closer, The River. The River is another great closer, doing the stop and go, quiet and hollow to ferocious and loud thing that Hull seems to have perfected on this album. The song has some really cleansing moments, be it the “Oh my God, Let me see again” or the repeated “I’m going to leave you the first chance I get”, all images that scream rebirth through water, hence, The River. The final track also has a fantastic hidden song. At around the seven and a half minute mark we discover the song Jimmy He Whispers, a quiet and religious affair. It feels half prayer and half comforting words to someone less consolable than yourself, a sacred and scared ending to the album.

    Mean Everything to Nothing is the first music I had ever heard from Andy Hull and it remains my favorite piece of work he’s done to this day. Music was special back then, my brother would show me whatever bands he had found through sputnikmusic.com by playing cd’s he’d burn on a broken radio/boombox that was only ever used before to fill us in on the news during a hurricane. We would listen to music and play Fifa 07 even though it was years out of date and that was how I found the majority of the music I would listen to throughout middle and high school. And out of all of that, the band that sticks out the most is Mean Everything to Nothing, so much that I can remember the match we were playing when I first listened to the album (it was a four and a half star tournament, we had upgraded to Fifa 12 by then, and the first match was Napoli vs. Tottenham). Manchester Orchestra and Andy Hull and Mean Everything to Nothing are all great, and that greatness has cemented itself into my heart for as long as I can listen to music and probably a couple years after that.

[khoistop100]

# 28 Church of the Good Thief - Right Away, Great Captain

    You would think that after three reviews about a single guy I would run out of things to say. Seeing as I still have yet to review my favorite Andy Hull album and I have to defend picking this album over Manchester Orchestra’s Simple Math (mostly to my brother, the only person I really get into it over music with), I still have a solid amount to say about the writing and music of Andy Hull.

    When looking at albums on the star system, Simple Math is a five star album no doubt. Much like I’m Like a Virgin Losing a Child, Simple Math is a very solid album with some great moments on it, mainly Deer, Pensacola (very bouncy, fun, not common for Manchester Orchestra), Pale Black Eye, Simple Math, and Leave It Alone. Yet when comparing it to I’m Like a Virgin, it doesn’t have the same level of diversity, that is to say, it doesn’t go from Sleeper 1972 (a song that barely moves through time on account of it being totally engulfed in mourning) to Golden Ticket (loud and almost indignant, with this undertone of longing that makes the song seem near but also far away). Now, it is easy to justify picking I’m Like a Virgin over Simple Math, since both are five star albums. Church of the Good Thief is four star, four and a half tops. Only about half of the songs are stellar, the other half are sort of run of the mill and unspectacular, but the peaks are so high for me, personally. The songs Blame, When I Met Death, Fur Stop Caring, I Wait For You, and Barely Bit Me are all great, with Blame and Fur Stop Caring standing out as particularly excellent.

    Blame, as I’ve said before, was the first song I heard by Right Away, Great Captain and remains one of the best. For one, the song has the most exposition of any of Right Away, Great Captain’s songs. It surmises the plot thus far, talking about the how the narrator murdered his brother after he caught his brother sleeping with his wife. The poetry in which Hull describes this moment in time is truly wonderful. “This house was my flowered heart, my petals have fallen/ if you love him tell me now and I’ll show you my scars.” It’s hallowed and forsaken in ways that I feel like only Hull can really hit and if that’s bias because he has already established himself as one of my favorite songwriters then fine, I just think he’s brilliant.

    Speaking of hallowed, Fur Stop Caring, a song that, like Mess Inside by The Mountain Goats, almost always gets me teary-eyed. In this song, the narrator is dealing with a ghost, be it his captain or his wife. “Shaking like a man should never shake I pulled a coin out from my breast, pretending it could change you” and “Stupid is as stupid does and stupidly I pulled the plug on you/ finally stopped beating/ stupid is as stupid does and somehow you’ll forgive the both of us/ the load that we still carry.” The most one I find that’s impacted me the most, recently, is “and from the shadow to the light/the God I know could not be tired/ but I am such a separate story.” I had the story of the Good Thief explained to me and it got me thinking about this project again. The story, in short, Jesus was crucified with two thieves. One of the thieves talked smack about Jesus while another while the other said that he believed that Jesus truly was the son of God. That thief, the good thief, was saved and sent to heaven. In one moment, a single moment of faith was enough to save someone for eternity. On the opposite side, we have the sailor from this story. Theoretically, his life was entirely good before this one act of rage and evil. Does that, then, define his life or does the entire life of good outweigh his one moment of bad. However, if the sailor’s life is seen as just a long list of bad and failure, the idea of a “Church of the Good Thief” would make since, as the sailor’s only hope for salvation would be to believe that God can forgive if you truly have a change of heart at the end of your life (I just want to shout out my wonderful girlfriend at the time of writing this. She’s super patient when it comes to telling me all about Christianity, as she was raised in an uber-Christian home and I was not. It’s wonderful to see work I already love in a new light, as Christianity is something so many artists are forced to grow up and deal with. I really appreciate her patience and top tier storytelling and her because she’s a great girl and great friend and a wonderful girlfriend).

    The Church of the Good Thief is not a perfect album but it has enough great songs that it’s a must listen for any fans of Andy Hull or storytelling over acoustic guitar. At its best, it’s an album that can echo in your heart, forever.

[khoistop100]

# 1 In the Aeroplane Over the Sea - Neutral Milk Hotel

In the Aeroplane Over the Sea is one of the greatest albums I have ever had the pleasure of listening to. Nothing will change that. And here’s the beautiful thing about this, you can disagree. You can say that it’s completely overhyped and overrated and you can be right but music, much like life, is subjective and knowing that, nothing can take away the admiration and love I have for this project.

    I don’t always feel the need to defend my position but this album is a curious case. In the Areoplane Over the Sea is one of the most, if not the most, notorious albums on the internet because of its position as one of the most, if not the most, famous indie albums ever made. That fact ultimately changes how if you are going to try to get into the album now. It has these expectations levied against it, whether you initially want the album to be great or to suck. And that is part of why I put it on the classics list, because it is an album whose fame will most certainly affect the way you listen to it.

    However, I was lucky enough to hear the album before being introduced to any of the baggage. I heard it at an early time in my life, a time when I was still starting Infamous on ps3, when I stilled played for the same soccer team I joined in second grade, when I still thought that my phone was unable to send texts (a wonderful story, the first time I ever got texting on my phone, I did not know that I had to delete messages. I was actually texting a girl I had a crush on when I stopped getting anymore texts (it cut off mid conversation) and I thought she had gotten mad and stopped talking to me. And for the next year and a half, I was simply convinced that I just never got a text from any person ever, only possible because I had about zero friends at the time. Never saw or heard from the girl again but I do get texts now so it’s a net win for me in the long run). My musical palate was different back then, too. I was past the pop punk phase, into heading toward a feaux-deep, “this is so deep” phase. The majority of my library were bands like The Strokes and The Arctic Monkeys, mostly poppy, modern rock. Lines like, “I’d probably still adore you with your hands around my neck/ or I did last time I checked” were the peak of poetic potential.

    Needless to say, I was totally unprepared to appreciate, or even like, Neutral Milk Hotel the first time I heard it. It was shown to me the way almost every album back then was, by my older brother Kiet. He walked into the living room while I was playing the aforementioned PS3 game, Infamous (a great game and also the first game I ever 100% completed so it will always hold a special place in my heart) and told me that he had just heard one of the best albums he heard in a while. “Everything runs together and it’s just so good,” he said, and since we were both raised by a dad who worshiped the track seven through sixteen run on the Beatle’s Abbey Road the same way he worshipped the Buddha (both are unfathomably groundbreaking in their respective fields and that fact was ingrained in both of us as kids), so the fact that the tracks ran together instantly necessitated a listen. I made him burn me a CD, because back then we weren’t allowed to use the computer too late (though I often did to play League of Legends because I was probably addicted and also lonely and thirteen or fourteen like, that’s kind of the point of being that age) and played the album for the first time on my CD player alarm clock.

    I don’t remember my initial reaction but I also don’t remember hating or loving the album. I remember disliking Jeff Magnum’s voice, which made sense seeing how I was a stupid petulant shitbaby who knew nothing of the world used to singers like Alex Turner and Julian Casablancas, guys whose smooth voices sounded like they were made for music. I also remember being thrown off by the music, it was strange and folky but it also had horns and big grand moments which I thought wasn’t supposed to be happening together and ultimately I was confused. I was also intrigued and, most importantly, I was totally incapable of putting the album down. I was entranced, it was 1 AM and I was mindlessly eating the Spicy Nacho Doritos that was In the Aeroplane Over the Sea.

    It’ been over half a decade since that first listen and I can confirm that I do really really fucking love this album. From the first those opening guitar strums to the crumpling of paper that sounds the end of the album, there is nothing that I can bring myself to dislike. Sure, there are a few low points, the instrumental tracks of Fool and Untitled being some and the song Ghost being another. But even these tracks are ones I adore and fit the album perfectly well. Without the long droning horns on Fool, the quick cut and burst of energy at the beginning of Holland, 1945 isn’t as pronounced. Without Untitled we don’t get the haunting introduction of Two – Headed Boy (Part 2) that is cut through and dissipated by Jeff Magnum’s nasally, desperate voice, an effect that gives the final song a sense of clarity and bareness that the other tracks don’t have. And those are the weaker tracks. There is so much this album does right. The music is everything and everywhere, it’s galloping guitar and these grand horns and bombastic drums but then there’s lonely, acoustic guitar with these quieter, tame horn and spirits swirling in the background then the swirling turns into a roar and threatens to swallow everything then, oh shit is that bagpipe what’s happening. The sounds are confusing and can be a mess but they are beautifully constructed and layered and are accompanied by Magnum’s songwriting which is just impossibly insane. If we take the “level” of fiction theory that I have been running with that pictures the amount of fantasy, the level of separation from reality, as vertical height, most work I enjoy is right at telephone wire level. It’s high up, higher than I’ll ever reach but it’s nice to know that if I had to throw something up there I probably could. In the Aeroplane Over the Sea is soaring among the birds, below the clouds but untethered to reality by any measurable standard. They are hopeful and sweet and sexual yet desperate and sad and scared all at the same time, all the time being haunted by the memory of Anne Frank, whose diary shook and haunted Magnum throughout most of this album. Just look at Two Headed Boy (Part 1) to see the mood the album creates: “Two headed boy/ There’s no reason to grieve/ The world that you need is wrapped in gold silver sleeves/ Left beneath Christmas trees in the snow/ And I will take you and leave you alone/ Watching spirals of white softly flow/ Over your eyelids and all you did/ Will wait until the point when you let go.” I previously described as Magnum’s voice as desperate and that’s true in different ways on the album. Sometimes, as it is in the passage above, it’s a quiet desperation, a prayer or birthday wish, and sometimes, like the “Say what you want to say” on oh comely, it is biting and bone-chilling, nasty in its sadness.

    And before I go I just want to talk about the best song on the album and the rare song that I think is a six star, Two Headed Boy (Part 2). The song does everything that the album does as a whole but at the top level. “Daddy please here this song that I sing” (desperation), “Long ago wrapped in sheets warm and wet” (sexual), “And in my dreams you’re alive-” (happy, hopeful) “and you’re crying” (sad again). “God is a place where some holy spectacle lies” is a line that pushes me further and further into my deep interest in Christianity and understanding how so many people in this world have grown up in while also being a line that haunts my bones until I hear “God is a place you will wait for the rest of your life” and every last muscle of my heart slows to a crawl as it waits for the last lines. “Two headed boy, she is all you could need/ she will feed you tomatoes and radio wires/ and retire two sheets safe and clean/ but don’t hate her when she gets up to leave.” Then Magnum leaves and you are left to wait in the dark and quiet.

    You can disagree with everything I just said and be right. In that case thank you for reading. You can think that everything I read into is just part of the problem of the cult surrounding this album and in that case I thank you for getting this far. But at the end of the day, music is subjective and based off what it does for me. What it does is makes me love music. I will enjoy every moment on this album for the rest of my life.

[khoistop100]

# 26 II - Bad Books

    The third and final of Andy Hull’s side projects to make this list, Bad Books’ II is one of the borderline albums of the list. That is, after I had picked eighty-five or so albums, I had to scan through my iTunes library to find what albums would or wouldn’t make the cut. II was one of the last albums I wrote down and the reason it took me so long to make a decision was because the choice I was making was whether or not to put this album or Simple Math by Manchester Orchestra on the list. Simple Math got cut and here’s why. I do think that Simple Math is most likely a better album in terms of construction and song quality. It does a ton of interesting things sonically, from the first song, Deer (which may be my favorite Manchester Orchestra opener) which is has a mist rising over the lake vibe, to the title track that feels sneaky but also stuck in molasses, to the dark, bombastic Virgin with it’s The Wall-esque child choir. It feels like a natural evolution for the band. From I’m Like a Virgin Losing a Child to Mean Everything to Nothing the band became more moody and alternative and the jump from Mean Everything to Nothing to Simple math just goes further down that line.

    So the question I asked myself was, “if I was stuck on an island and I could only listen to 100 albums, which one do I pick” and II was clearly the choice after that. There’s a lot of charm on the album and it will always hold a special place in my heart because of how I found the album. It was a time where I had exhausted all of Right Away, Great Captain and most of Manchester Orchestra. I did not like and still do not like Cope (I do like their new album though, a return to form). I was watching the final season of How I Met Your Mother on a friend’s recommendation and not enjoying it (except for the “throwing a tantrum” joke that was great). And then I heard a voice that sounded kind of like Andy Hull singing a song I actually really enjoyed. So, naturally, I went to go find what song it was and found Bad Books. Then I found their Wikipedia page and discovered that they were yet another side project of my beloved Andy Hull. I felt like I had uncovered a little cache of his music, I was a discoverer.

    Aside from the excitement of finding it, which I still feel a little every time I listen to the album, II is just another great album. Nothing too spectacular, just very satisfying. Front men Andy Hull and Kevin Devine have different yet complementary voices, giving each song a different layer. Overall, the album is zippier than any of Hull’s work. There’s an air of hustle and bustle to the album coming from not just the pacing of the songs, in fact some of the songs really take the foot off the breaks and decide to either plod along or take a stroll and enjoy the air. The zippiness comes from the bright sounds, blends of kazooish synths, plucky guitar, and harmonies that Hull and Devine seem to dance around. The album also has an almost rustic feel on songs like Pyotr, 42, Lost Creek, and Ambivalent Peaks (especially on the last two). These song’s seem to have an open air to them, not a hollow sound as that would imply boundaries. The open air sound is more similar to campfire smoke, as if the sounds were the flames and as they crackle they float upwards and dissipate as they rise. The album does have its moments lyrically as well, from both Devine and Hull. Highlights include: “I bought a bird that repeats what I say/ but I’m lonely is all that he’s heard” from Forest Whitaker (my favorite song on the album by a far. The whistling gives it this pizazz that I don’t find in a lot of other Andy Hull songs. The songwriting is fantastic as a whole, this line is just the one that sticks out to me on most every listen), all of Pyotr (a song about the Russian Tzar, Peter the Great, and his adulterous wife, Catherine. The song switches perspectives with each verse, with the first being from Peter’s perspective and the second being the lover (side note, I can’t find the male equivalent of mistress and I think that’s kind of fucked man)), “I left you there cause honey I was tired/ I left you but that doesn’t make it right” from Petite Mort, “You and your dad/ what a tragic mishap/ when a man loves a drink more than blood” on 42 (which is just Hull continuing to paint various dysfunctional homes, as he does so well on Girl With Broken Wings and La Di Da off of Nobody Sings Anymore, their EP lost and hidden away that I somehow have a copy of thanks to my older brother’s ex-girlfriend), and all of Ambivalent Peaks, which is my favorite Devine song on the album. It’s the most campfire of the aforementioned campfire songs, there’s warmth, there’s crackle, and, most importantly, there’s a underlying sense of quiet, which isn’t easy to nail in music.

    II isn’t as much of a new face of Andy Hull as it is seeing him in a new light, much in the same way Right Away, Great Captain is. The light in this case is Kevin Devine and the two bounce off of each other really well in terms of harmony, lyrics, and style. Bad Book’s II is the perfect thing for old fans of the artists involved, a fresh sound that’s familiar enough to enjoy and well done enough to adore.

[khoistop100]

# 60 Flower Boy - Tyler, The Creator

    There were more than a few albums I left off of my list due to recency bias. There’s albums that have come out this year, like SZA’s CTRL, both of BROCKHAMPTON’s SATURATION albums (wow, 2017, the year of all caps albums, throw in Kendrick’s DAMN and that’s four) Beautiful Thugger Girls by Young Thug, Vince Staples’s Big Fish Theory and The Mountain Goat’s Goths would have probably sneaked their way on their if they had more time to grow on me, while albums like RTJ2 and Chutes Too Narrow by The Shins are albums I didn’t get around to listening to a lot until this month. Yet, Tyler, The Creator’s Flower Boy made the list after only being out for four months, and it’s not because I listened to it any more than the other albums (which would be a simple reason). I probably have listened as an album to Goths the most of all the albums listed and spent more time listening to CTRL or BTG as a whole (I was listening to Drew Barrymore for months before the album’s release and that was before I knew who SZA was or that she had an album coming out, so how pumped I was when I found out about CTRL (side side note, since I won’t write a CTRL review for a while, I can’t listen to Drew Barrymore when I listen to the album anymore. I skip it every time. It’s still my favorite song; the song is just too emotional for me and if I don’t skip it, it wrecks my emotional state and by the time I get to The Weekend I’m a shell of myself)).

The reason Flower Boys makes the cut is because I’ve really wanted to love a Tyler album for years (a simpler reason). Ever since I started listening to Earl Sweatshirt and heard Tyler’s verse on Sasquatch, I’ve been sifting through his discography, trying to find an album I could really get behind. Before Flower Boy, none of them really appealed to me. Didn’t love Bastard, Goblin had some tracks I enjoyed, same for Wolf, the Tamale music video is great, I think he has two of the best verses on Oldie, and Orange Juice is still pretty entertaining. Hell, before Flower Boy, Cherry Bomb was my favorite album and it seems to be pretty much anointed as his worst album. I just enjoyed the albums production, especially on the first five tracks and definitely on Smuckers, one of my favorite Tyler songs to date. Still, I definitely didn’t love any of Tyler’s albums or his music as a whole, but I still loved and supported the guy. I found it hard to root against a guy who is not only a multi-dimensional artist, which I have a soft spot for, but brought him and his friends up through the internet. Between the memes (showing my little sister the birthday sketch from loiter squad for the first time was one of the highlights of the month) and his life, which seemed to be filled with optimism and joy in the past few years, Tyler had a ton of things in his favor in my mind, everything except for his music.

Which is why I was so excited for Flower Boy. Everything leading up the album seemed to suggest that it would love it, from the bee countdown on Instagram to the release of Who Dat Boy and 911/Mr. Lonely, two singles that I enjoyed tremendously and replayed to the point where hearing Who Dat Boy transition into Pothole (as it does on the album) is strange and I still expect to hear 911 (as I heard it hundreds of time when they were released together on Spotify) (and I think the 911 transition is still a little better). Then Boredom dropped and suddenly it was like the album couldn’t come quick enough, and I have to say that it did not disappoint in the slightest.

The album, quite simply, is beautiful. The organization of songs is impeccable, as Tyler comes into his own as, not only a producer but a composer. The track list hit plenty of notes, the introduction to the album, Foreword, is straightforward hip hop with a poppy beat, Where This Flower Blooms and Pothole slide and groove all over the place (shout out to Jaden Smith, whose feature on Pothole is better than any of his appearances on Childish Gambino’s Kauai), See You Again has this lovely melody that ramps up in the middle with some of my favorite “ok’s” in music then cools back down like nothing ever happened, Who Dat Boy and I Ain’t Got Time! are the album’s hardest tracks and truly bang, while Garden Shed and November are more on the dreary, cloudy side, with Garden Shed being this patient, measured trip through sound and Tyler’s feelings, like the It’s a Small World After All ride at Disneyland except all the puppets are Tyler and the lyrics are (slightly) gayer. Then there are my favorite songs. Boredom is this beautiful ocean with waves of synth heavy keyboard and rich backup vocals, punctuated by these little, well placed bleeps and boops, all anchored by a solid beat. 911 is groovier, with a hook that sounds like it easily could’ve been straight out of Matt Martian’s Drum Chord Theory (the most surprising album of this year for me, I love that thing). The transition into Mr. Lonely is fantastic, with the song dropping off a cliff and landing on this sound that sounds a lot closer to the ground, highlighted by these glimmers of light coming from some higher synth notes. These two songs are the peak cruising on down the highway songs, though the entire album is fantastic for that too.

Now onto the lyrics. This is, by far, Tyler’s most vulnerable album, never reaching the peaks of, say, Answer, but is pretty consistent with its introspective tone. Whether it’s talking about his sexuality, how far he’s come, loneliness, love, even anxiety (he also never says “faggot” on the album, so props on that too, I guess). It’s not his most impressive album rap wise, though I don’t think this album’s focus was bars (and I also think Tyler is a sort of underrated rapper in terms of skill, mostly because of what he raps about and before you bring up the fact that Eminem gets props and talks about things that are just as if not more vile, Eminem is far better at rapping than Tyler and also probably gets a little more credit than some rappers for being white. Probably). The features are all solid, with a variety of singers to help prop up some of the melodies and great verses from A$AP Rocky and Lil Wayne, even School Boys little pop up fits November really well. There just isn’t too much for me to dislike from this album if anything.

Flower Boy is Tyler’s best and most mature album. It’s gratifying to see artists grow and expand with time, not only sonically but personally as well. I mean, the guy is only twenty six, only nineteen when Bastard dropped (shit, who knows how I’ll look back on this in seven years). For a guy who got the spotlight from a pretty young age, I’d say he turned out really well, bumps in the road accounted for. And with his age and the way his career has gone, it honestly gives me gooses bumps knowing that creators like him and Frank Ocean have a chance to be the defining sounds for my generation (if they weren’t already). Yet, even if he never releases music again (knock on any piece of wood in a thousand mile radius), we will always have a truly gorgeous album in Flower Boy by Tyler, the Creator.

[khoistop100]

# 12 Never Hungover Again - Joyce Manor

    Sometimes, simple is better. As impressive as albums like Dark Side of the Moon and OK Computer are, there’s just as much to enjoy in something simple done really well. That’s Never Hungover Again by Joyce Manor, a straightforward twenty minutes of great pop punk. It doesn’t push any boundaries, it isn’t ground breaking by any means, but it is a good, fun, quick listen that I would recommend to any fans of the genre.

    The album also doesn’t seem to have any misconceptions on what it is. This isn’t blink 182 trying to have their cake and eat it too with dick, poop jokes and sappy, serious songs showing up on the same album. Never Hungover Again is teen angst at its finest, the way pop punk should be. Yet, despite most songs sounding pretty similar, there’s a good amount of variety and pacing to the album. Some songs kind of plod along, like Christmas Card and Schley, while songs like Victoria and Heart Tatoo have this great bouncy momentum to them. The album also has great moments on every song. Whether it’s the album opening on the lines “Looking at your face in the dark/You don’t even look that smart” or the energy of “furniture store, shards of glass, I wanna kiss you through your hockey mask”. I’d also be remiss if I didn’t mention the album’s closer, Heated Swimming Pool. It’s mellowed mood comes out of left field and the late into the party vibe it has, that moment where some people have started to leave and the house is riding off the energy from earlier on in the night, is a great note to end the album on. This is a short review for a short album because I can’t say anything else but this is, simply, a fucking great album.

[khoistop100]

# 27 The Eventually Home - Right Away, Great Captain

    Andy Hull is like a musical Swiss army knife. He whispers or shouts, fires on all cylinders and stops time, and while this versatility appears on all of his works, it’s really on full display on Manchester Orchestra first album, I’m Like A Virgin Losing A Child. Andy Hull is the front man for Manchester Orchestra, Bad Books, and Right Away, Great Captain, all groups that appear on my list. So when I say that the Mountain Goats are my favorite band I mean it but when I say Andy Hull is my favorite musician that is also true. Between his songwriting and the way he’s able to manipulate atmosphere, it’s hard for me to picture anyone else doing what he does.

    And what he did on his first record with Manchester Orchestra is create a rock album as diverse yet consistent as they come. Whether the album is jamming on tracks like Wolves at Night or The Neighborhood is Bleeding or turning the everything down to a zero on songs like Sleeper 1972 or Don’t Let Them See You Cry, the album’s quality is not only great but has no weak spots for me. Even some of my favorite albums, I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Go Outside, Tallahassee, Aquemini, hell even my favorite Manchester Orchestra album, Mean Everything to Nothing, hits a few bumps. But to have an album that, not only has no low points, but only have songs that are thoroughly enjoyable in their own right is incredible (for instance, Zaz’s slef titled album has no outright low points but that’s because many of the songs end up sounding interchangeable. It’s technically consistent but not in the same way). However, the album lacks a six star song, a track that transcends music for a person and exists just as this beautiful thing in their heart and memory forever. I can only list a dozen or so songs that I would consider six stars off the top of my head, so not having a six star song isn’t really a knock against an album, but when comparing a totally consistent album (I’m Like A Virgin Losing a Child) to a very consistent album with a six star (Mean Everything to Nothing), I’ll take the album with the higher peak (which is why American Football made it onto the list but that’s for another day)(not to mention a lot of the songs on Mean Everything to Nothing are simply better than songs on Like a Virgin).

    Back to the album at hand, the biggest through line that keeps the album rocking is Andy Hull’s songwriting and voice (stay with me, this review is about to go a little off the rails). If we measure fiction and fantasy on a scale of totally realistic fiction (say, almost any contemporary sitcom) to something completely fanatical (like Dune, a universe that has almost no connection to ours), there’s this middle ground that is, essentially, our reality mixed in with a little bit of the fantastical. A good example is Pan’s Labyrinth, and a lot of Andy Hull’s music hits a point of mysticism just below where Pan’s Labyrinth is. On Like A Virgin Losing A Child, it allows him to mix in these Biblical themes that all mostly go over my head, seeing as I was raised Buddhist, but remain interesting to me all the same. Take one of my favorite songs on the album, I Can Barely Breathe. I read it as this kind of rapture like second coming of the flood that absolved the world back in Noah’s days, a damp and dark time. Yet there is this personability to the song, the anger in lines like “I watched the beauties, watched the fire/ and watched the fire burn the beauty in their eyes” to then contrast that with the quiet “If you knew I was dying would it change you?” (which the music accompanies brilliantly) gives a life to the song. Even in songs on the album that seem entrenched in reality like Sleeper 1972 seem haunted and hallowed in a real way, as if the ghosts in the songs exist in the world of the song and the one in which you’re hearing it.

    There are just so many gems on here, be it the great opener, Wolves At Night, or underrated tracks like The Neighborhood is Bleeding and Golden Ticket, but I would be remiss if I failed to give a little love to my favorite Manchester Orchestra closer by a mile, Colly Strings. The song is this love story that switches perspective every stanza or so (something he’d go on to nail again on the Bad Books track Pytor). But what gets me every time are simply the images that compose the picture the song paints: “bourbon brown that can burn my eyes” and “a pink t-shirt and khaki pants” and “a pseudo-boy that would rather wear a blouse”. They’re disorganized and sporadic and are just part of this love that hurts but that’s supposed to be the point “Don’t stop stop calling, you’re the reason I love losing sleep/ and the building collapse, we’re so shop worn, we’re shop worn for something.” Hull chooses to make these off-fictional worlds where, still, nothing works. Nothing will work in any world, real or otherwise, but dealing with that dysfunction is what makes life worth living. Whether it be the lost souls on The Mountain Goats’ All Hail West Texas or the shattered hearts that litter I’m Like A Virgin Losing A Child, we have music to help us understand that the world is broken and ugly and we get to, not just live with it, but thrive in it. At the end of the day, that’s why I like this album and Andy Hull as a writer, because good music reminds me what life can be and what music can be.

[khoistop100]

# 24 I’m Like a Virgin Losing A Child - Manchester Orchestra

    Andy Hull is like a musical Swiss army knife. He whispers or shouts, fires on all cylinders and stops time, and while this versatility appears on all of his works, it’s really on full display on Manchester Orchestra first album, I’m Like A Virgin Losing A Child. Andy Hull is the front man for Manchester Orchestra, Bad Books, and Right Away, Great Captain, all groups that appear on my list. So when I say that the Mountain Goats are my favorite band I mean it but when I say Andy Hull is my favorite musician that is also true. Between his songwriting and the way he’s able to manipulate atmosphere, it’s hard for me to picture anyone else doing what he does.

    And what he did on his first record with Manchester Orchestra is create a rock album as diverse yet consistent as they come. Whether the album is jamming on tracks like Wolves at Night or The Neighborhood is Bleeding or turning the everything down to a zero on songs like Sleeper 1972 or Don’t Let Them See You Cry, the album’s quality is not only great but has no weak spots for me. Even some of my favorite albums, I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Go Outside, Tallahassee, Aquemini, hell even my favorite Manchester Orchestra album, Mean Everything to Nothing, hits a few bumps. But to have an album that, not only has no low points, but only have songs that are thoroughly enjoyable in their own right is incredible (for instance, Zaz’s slef titled album has no outright low points but that’s because many of the songs end up sounding interchangeable. It’s technically consistent but not in the same way). However, the album lacks a six star song, a track that transcends music for a person and exists just as this beautiful thing in their heart and memory forever. I can only list a dozen or so songs that I would consider six stars off the top of my head, so not having a six star song isn’t really a knock against an album, but when comparing a totally consistent album (I’m Like A Virgin Losing a Child) to a very consistent album with a six star (Mean Everything to Nothing), I’ll take the album with the higher peak (which is why American Football made it onto the list but that’s for another day)(not to mention a lot of the songs on Mean Everything to Nothing are simply better than songs on Like a Virgin).

    Back to the album at hand, the biggest through line that keeps the album rocking is Andy Hull’s songwriting and voice (stay with me, this review is about to go a little off the rails). If we measure fiction and fantasy on a scale of totally realistic fiction (say, almost any contemporary sitcom) to something completely fanatical (like Dune, a universe that has almost no connection to ours), there’s this middle ground that is, essentially, our reality mixed in with a little bit of the fantastical. A good example is Pan’s Labyrinth, and a lot of Andy Hull’s music hits a point of mysticism just below where Pan’s Labyrinth is. On Like A Virgin Losing A Child, it allows him to mix in these Biblical themes that all mostly go over my head, seeing as I was raised Buddhist, but remain interesting to me all the same. Take one of my favorite songs on the album, I Can Barely Breathe. I read it as this kind of rapture like second coming of the flood that absolved the world back in Noah’s days, a damp and dark time. Yet there is this personability to the song, the anger in lines like “I watched the beauties, watched the fire/ and watched the fire burn the beauty in their eyes” to then contrast that with the quiet “If you knew I was dying would it change you?” (which the music accompanies brilliantly) gives a life to the song. Even in songs on the album that seem entrenched in reality like Sleeper 1972 seem haunted and hallowed in a real way, as if the ghosts in the songs exist in the world of the song and the one in which you’re hearing it.

    There are just so many gems on here, be it the great opener, Wolves At Night, or underrated tracks like The Neighborhood is Bleeding and Golden Ticket, but I would be remiss if I failed to give a little love to my favorite Manchester Orchestra closer by a mile, Colly Strings. The song is this love story that switches perspective every stanza or so (something he’d go on to nail again on the Bad Books track Pytor). But what gets me every time are simply the images that compose the picture the song paints: “bourbon brown that can burn my eyes” and “a pink t-shirt and khaki pants” and “a pseudo-boy that would rather wear a blouse”. They’re disorganized and sporadic and are just part of this love that hurts but that’s supposed to be the point “Don’t stop stop calling, you’re the reason I love losing sleep/ and the building collapse, we’re so shop worn, we’re shop worn for something.” Hull chooses to make these off-fictional worlds where, still, nothing works. Nothing will work in any world, real or otherwise, but dealing with that dysfunction is what makes life worth living. Whether it be the lost souls on The Mountain Goats’ All Hail West Texas or the shattered hearts that litter I’m Like A Virgin Losing A Child, we have music to help us understand that the world is broken and ugly and we get to, not just live with it, but thrive in it. At the end of the day, that’s why I like this album and Andy Hull as a writer, because good music reminds me what life can be and what music can be.

[khoistop100]

#70 I Shouldn’t Look As Good As I Do

70. I Shouldn’t Look As Good As I Do – Math & Physics Club

     I remember when my little sister first grasped the concept of melancholy. My dad was asking her if she had ever heard or used the word and when she said no he asked her what it meant. It took her a second, I think she went to talk a couple times before cutting herself off, unsatisfied with what was about to come out of her mouth. Eventually, she said, “I think it’s supposed to be like the ending of Eragon. Like I remember being happing and satisfied with the way the book ended but it was also very sad and it will never have a happy ending.” I don’t know if this is the dictionary definition of the word but it’s the definition I’ve been using ever since; a small semblance of joy underlined by a sadness that will never be resolved.

    I Shouldn’t Look As Good As I Do by Math & Physics Club doesn’t totally fit that description but it’s general vibe is definitely soft and melancholic. The vocal energy never rise above a casual stroll, sounding almost dewy at times. And so many sounds seem to drag in the album, with the guitar often sounding like the trains left my raindrops on a car window (the ones that fall naturally, not like the ones on the windshield that are swept around everywhere). It’s cloudy day, coffee shop music, indie and soft and simultaneously good background and foreground music.

    Then there are the lyrics that are somehow the most indie part of the album. And not indie as in never seen before, deeply nuanced writing but indie in the I wear button ups all the way and have played piano since I was a kid and now I want to rock kind of way (which is charming and endearing to a point and I think that this album is at the very precipice of tipping over into the obnoxious side). Just a quick look at the track listing feels incredibly Urban Outfitters, with highlights such as “Jimmy Had A Polaroid”, “Everybody Loves a Showtune”, and “We’re So DIY!” (which I am surprised haven’t shown up on a shirt there yet. All seem to fit their “I Heart Taco’s” vibe. Maybe it’s too on the nose, or maybe Math & Physics Club is still too too indie). The album’s lyrics go further to establish that melancholy, with some happier, cuter lyrics on songs like We Make a Pair (“but you and me/ get into trouble easily/ it’s all your fault/ you’re supposed to be the one with the good sense/ you disable all of my defenses”) but the majority of songs focusing on some sort of failure of love, i.e. Trying To Say I Love You, Love or Loneliness, Will You Still Love Me, I’ll Tell You Anything, and I’ve Been That Boy. And then there’s Everybody Loves a Showtune, which is by far the wackiest yet enjoyable song on the album. It doesn’t fit into the general mood or tone of the album, the jangly banjo is a unique sound that never shows up again, yet I am really happy that it exists on the album.

    I’m really happy that the album exists at all, I mean obviously, why else would it appear on my top 100 list. And I think it’s because there is still something charming about its mood. The album feels like all the best parts of the friendzone mentality. Sure, the entire mentality of “oh I was nice to you now you are required to requite any affection I have for you” is toxic and sexist and I still think it’s a generally bad mindset that people should avoid. That being said, this album seems like it’s composed mostly of the “nice” parts of the “nice guy mentality”, which is the good part, as the “guy” part is where all the crappy misogyny comes in. I Shouldn’t Look As Good as I do is pleasant, and if you ever want to listen to some soft, sweet music that, most likely, nobody else has ever heard of, I can’t think of a better album.

[khoistop100]

# 21 Graduation - Kanye West

    Graduation was the last we ever saw/heard from the old Kanye. And as much as I love the new Kanye (the bad mood Kanye, the spaz in the news Kanye), there is something magical about a pre-808’s Kanye West. It’s a gentler bravado, more lighthearted, and a different sound, closer to his soul inspired beats from his first two projects. It was also the first Kanye I ever encountered and a great jumping in point for anyone who is willing to enter the Church of Yeezus.

    But before we can talk about his cult we have to talk about how I came to love Kanye. As I’ve said in my Because of the Internet review, I didn’t listen to a Kanye West album until I watched Donald Glover’s standup special, in which he jokes about a bear, who was on tour with Kanye West and Lady Gaga in this hypothetical, refusing to eat Kanye because of the tremendous respect he had for the rapper due to him writing Graduation. It’s a good sell, definitely enough to get me to give the album a listen. To say that listening to the album was a good idea would be a major understatement, as Graduation would not only go on to make my top 100 albums ever (over some of his projects that are probably better like Yeezus and College Dropouts and albums I may like a little more like Life of Pablo (although there is some recency bias, as Graduation has years of listener’s fatigue whereas Life of Pablo has significantly less)).

    So what makes Graduation so good? Well as I said earlier, it is classic “Old Kanye”. That means some dazzling singles in Can’t Tell Me Nothing (the most enjoyable of all of the singles), Stronger (by far the most iconic single), Good Life (the most uplifting and up there for top uplifting Kanye West songs), Flashing Lights (the best rhyme of all the singles, when Kanye rhymes “paparazzi” and “nazi”), and Homecoming (probably my favorite Kanye single to hear on the radio). On top of that, the first two tracks on are a perfect introduction to the album, especially with the “uh”s and drums on the intro of Good Morning. They have this sweet blend of “yeah, check me” and “fuck you dude” that captures the mood of the album, a mood highlighted in tracks such as I Wonder, Can’t Tell Me Nothing, and Flashing Lights. I would also like to note before we go any further that Good Morning is a more than serviceable song to wake up to if you want to use it as an alarm (it is also a very good way to start the day of your actual high school graduation, which I can confirm through experience). The second track, Champion, is also a great second song to hear after you wake up, as it’s upbeat grooviness is enough to get you moving but not too  sunny to the point of being obnoxious.

    Another point the album has in its favor is how easy it is to root for Kanye here. Say what you will about his later work, it’s harder to cheer for a guy once he refers to himself as a god (even if it is ironic. And I still don’t believe that Kanye was being totally ironic on that track but I digress). There’s a balance Kanye manages to maintain Graduation. There’s his success, as shown on songs like Champion (“I don’t know why I need a stylist when I shop so much I can speak Italian”) and Good Life (in which Kanye lists nine cities that he enjoys living his good life in) or even Can’t Tell Me Nothing (“I had a dream I could buy my way to heaven, when I awoke I spent that on a necklace”). There is also this sentimental, scrappy side to Graduation, like on Champion (“They used to feel invisible/ Now they know they invincible”), Flashing Lights (“Feeling like Katrina with no Fema/ Like Martin with no Gina/ Like a Flight with no Visa”, a list that seemingly goes down in order of severity), and the entirety of Everything I Am and Homecoming and a good portion of Big Brother. But I don’t listen to Graduation to feel sentimental (I go to my favorite Kanye West album for that, 808’s and Heartbreak) so here are a couple more lyrical gems about how great Kanye West’s life was in 2007:

·       “You should be Honored! by my lateness/ that I would even show up for this fake shit” on Stronger

·       “how many ladies in the house? How many ladies in the house without a spouse? Something in ya blouse got me feeling so aroused” which gets points not only for being incredibly Dr. Suess-like but also because Kanye rhymes blouse with aroused? Which, I’m still not sure how.

·       The rest of Can’t Tell Me Nothing, as it is an amazing song and probably my favorite on album, only tied with Everything I am and Homecoming

·       Ok but at one point on the song he says “So if the Devil Wear Prada, Adam Eve wear nada/ I’m in between but way more fresher” and I think any Meryl Streep reference (even if indirect) is amazing but the way he also ties in a Biblical reference only to one-up both…it’s just a poetry that only Kanye could pull off this effortlessly

·       “But I’ll just take the I Got A Lot Of Cheese Award” on Everything I Am

·       “With my ego I can stand there in a speedo and be looked at like a fucking Hero” on The Glory

Graduation is everything you could want from glamour rap and it’s that good because it’s made by Kanye West, the master of blending an overwhelming sense of overconfidence with just enough corniness that you don’t grow immediately jealous of and eventually resent him. He’s a great avatar to live vicariously through (we all, deep down, want to say that Bush doesn’t care about black people on national TV and that is probably part of what makes Kanye’s life so enviable). And before tortured artist life he would go to take on, before autotune and intricate production would go on to define his later works, and before Kanye West became just Kanye, we had Graduation. And we really loved it because it’s a fucking great album.

[khoistop100]

# 79 Hind Hind Legs - The Lovely Feathers

    In almost every review I’ve written thus far, I’ve at one point or another talked about how the music in the album isn’t technically impressive and I think I’m done talking about that. Because what we find impressive in music isn’t something that can be measured objectively, so trying to establish what makes music objectively good or bad is impossible. Music is good if you enjoy it, regardless of how hard or easy the music is to play.

    That being said, Hind Hind Legs is not an impressive album musically. Don’t get me wrong, it’s pretty good, but it isn’t the album’s quality that gets the album on my list. Rather, it’s what the album represents to me. However, before I start rambling about that, I do feel like I should talk at least a little about the album’s sound. The first band that comes to my mind when listening to this Lovely Feather’s album is Los Campensimos. They’re unruly and wild at its peak and drowsy and reluctant in their valleys. Picture the children’s toy lawnmowers that have a plastic dome with rubber balls inside that bounce around when the lawnmower moves; The Lovely Feathers are either bouncing or not moving at all. On top of that, the band has their fair share of catchy and out there lines. “Mr. Fleece, you’re talking to the guy with the penis” and “I know I’m not comfortable with you and your friends in the large scale situations they create/ They tend to make me and anxious and I’m trying to avoid that” are a just a few standouts (honorable mention: the “ooh you shocked me”s on Ooh You Shocked Me). Hind Hind legs is good, loud music with plenty of noise to fall into and blow fifty-three minutes on.

    So why does this album make the list if not a deep love for the lyrics or the instrumentals or the composition of the entire album? I found this album with my girlfriend in the one dollar box at a local store named F.Y.E. It was just sitting there, one of hundreds neatly line up with nothing but the spine exposed. At the time, my girlfriend and I would go to the store every week or so and each pick an album out of the box with no prior research, all we had to go on was the cover, the band’s name, and the name of the album. This practice resulted in a ton of duds. I kept around half and I still have a solid stack of cd’s I’ve only listened to once and will probably never listen to again. Yet, we were able to find this one album that was actually pretty good. I don’t know if the love for it at the time was exasperated by the tons of low quality music that preceded it, but at the time, the find seemed special, something that would never happen again. I fell in love with that idea; that amid a mountain of throw-aways and rejects that there was still this one piece of really good art, unknown to probably 99.99$ of the world. At the time, I couldn’t even find a Wikipedia page for the band and that made it even more special to me. And not in the ugly, hipster way, but in a hopeful way. There was also a part of me that became overwhelmed, realizing that it was physically impossible for me to find all the good music in the world. There will always be more content, especially now, and if you think about that you’ll start to feel very small. If so, remember that there is still good and love sprinkled throughout all of everything, all you have to do and keep looking.

[khoistop100]

# 64 Barter 6 - Young Thug

    Here’s something I should have done at the very beginning of all of this, big thanks to my older brother, Kiet, for showing me so much music and also being a great older brother. If not for him there is so much that I would have missed out on in life and music and especially Shea Serrano’s The Rap Year Book, a book that is almost singlehandedly responsible for three albums appearing on this list (DMX’s It’s Dark and Hell Is Hot, UGK’s Ridin’ Dirty, and this album). If not for Kiet and Shea I don’t think I would have ever encountered Thug and I can’t imagine how much duller my life would be.

    Young Thug makes music that only Young Thug could make and that music is beautiful. Now, if you enjoy intricate lyricism in rap, Young Thug is not for you. If you think it is important for lyrics to tie together and just generally be comprehensive, Young Thug for you. Shit, if you want to be able to just understand what words a rapper is saying, Young Thug is probably not for you. Essentially, don’t listen to Young Thug if you do not like mumble rap, because Young Thug is all mumble and it is beautiful. He’s like cilantro, some people are just genetically predisposed to hating him and that’s fine if you don’t like him there’s no need to keep reading.

    For those who enjoy Young Thug or are at least willing to give him a chance, let me try to explain what he does. The first ingredient to a Young Thug song is the beat which will either be provided by London on the Track or someone else. If the former is true, Young Thug will almost always inform you, in which case you should prepare yourself for a good time because the two pair as well as Young Thug and fashion. Important to note, Young Thug is a fashion force unto himself. While it does not affect his music directly, it makes his music infinitely more enjoyable if you picture him in a designer jacket with all of his chains on, napkin tucked into his shirt and a set of doritio locos tacos resting on several racks. Imagine that as what he is doing at any given time while you listen to him and the music becomes more endearing I promise. Not all rappers would become more entertaining if they openly and casually enjoyed fast food on top of their boundless amounts of cash, but Young Thug is definitely one of them. (and that’s just his Instagram. His twitter is an entirely different entity, whether he’s espousing his profound sadness for pacman or his disgust of GIRLS dying). The next thing you need in a great Young Thug song is some Young Thug adlibs peppered throughout the song. Whether it be one of his signature “SKRRTTTTTTTT”s or an enthusiastic “YA!” or one of a variety of gunshot noises (the sound of the gun almost always reflects Thug’s emotion at the time, leading me to believe that Thug’s guns are also, possible, dramatically altered depending on Thug’s emotions somehow. I don’t know how and cannot possible begin to explain how but I do think that it is the case and I will believe in Young Thug until I die). If you are very lucky, you may encounter a golden adlib, like on the closer to Barter 6, Just Might Be, in which Young Thug states, “Her heart like an old diaper, I can’t leave it leave it EWWWWWWWWWWW”. Which brings us to the third and possibly most vital part of Young Thug’s music: his lyrics. Here is a list of my favorite line from each song on the album:

1.  “I stick to the ground like a motherfuckin rug” and the fact that Birdman is on here just to make Young Thug seem better by comparison

2.  “I’m so faster I’m so faster than Sonic man”

3.  “I call the spot elementary cause I keep a K around here” and the fact that Young Thug wouldn’t hesitate to pop a cap in someone’s cat if the owner crossed him (I would not be surprised if Thug believed that some cats had nine lives, leading him to feel less remorse for shooting the admittedly innocent cat)

4.  (the illustrious) “If cops pull up I put that crack in my crack”

5.  A tie between “She running away from my weed like it farted” and “All my dogs they dirty check for mange”

6.  “And I wanna be like Mike and I ain’t talking Phelps bruh” (Phelps is the second to last Mike I would have guessed, the first would be Ditka. Also, shout out to how Yak Gotti introduces himself on this song, it’s unique but maybe not the best way to meet new people)

7.  “I would rather be a coyote than be a coward” an easy choice really, also honorable mention to the fact Young Thug states that he has 5,120,000 hoes, roughly equivalent to half of Georgia’s entire population

8.  Halftime has too many great Young Thug lines but the most iconic will always be, simply, “I like fish in water, I’m a bear”

9.  Angelically sang “we roll that kushy up, we eat that pussy out”

10.         “She make me lean back like a sofa bed” not because it is inherently entertaining but for the fact that it is his second sofa to self comparison on the album

11.         “Yeah I treat that beef just like a fuckin manwhich”

12.         Either “All my diamonds come in yellow like a Funyun” as any Funyun representation is good Funyun representation or “sticky fingers, no porcupine”

13.         And finally, “that’s called breathin’…(heavy panting)”

And those are just the best lines. Within every song are plenty of other lines and adlibs, all delivered with a confidence that could only come from a genius or a total buffoon. Luckily, Thug is most definitely a genius, who understands music in dimension we could never possibly comprehend. Or maybe he’s just having fun. Or maybe both. Either way Barter 6 bangs.

[khoistop100]

#45 waste yrself - Teen Suicide

    For me, most music has a time that goes along with it. Huey by Earl Sweatshirt is a 3 PM song, Taking Back Sunday’s cover of Just like heaven is an 11 PM song, An Introduction to the Album by the Hotelier is an 8 AM song, ect (I have a whole list for each hour of the day listed out). waste yrself is an album that lives strictly between the hours of 2:30-4:30 AM. Now, this time assignment is due in part to the intro to track five, everything is going to hell, in which the singer states that the song is being recorded at 4:37 in the morning but it also exists where it does in time for me because of the vibe of the album. The entire album is coated in this thick static that sounds like the white noise caused by the interstate across the street of the house I grew up in. No matter when I fell asleep, and it would usually be quite late because I was (and still am) a night owl, there was this dull rush, a monotonous drone of cars dragging themselves trying to get somewhere before they fell asleep. This lo-fi vibe engulfs everything, from the way the instrumentals blend into the lyrics and the static and the way the vocals are distorted and often drag or fall of. Songs either feel like a tumultuous wave that flows over and consumes everything within it, like lonely boy goes to a rave or the end of falling in love, or the jumbled whispers you would think to yourself before falling asleep, like haunt me(x 3) or the beginning of falling in love.

    This album has the benefit of being one of the shorter albums and, like Songs For Dads, the album hits with every song. And every song is sad. This album, in fact, is sad (maybe you’d think I would have figured that out from the name of the band. Teen Suicide, seems cheery). What keeps this kind of one note, not diverse sadness interesting is 1, the fact that I haven’t found many other bands that do this brand of sadness and 2, the fact that this album was given to me by a very sad friend who didn’t open up much at the time but at least we both have this. And for most people, that second reason won’t get you to listen to the album or really understand how it sounds to me because I can’t make everyone sit with me on the forty-five minute drives home from her house at 3 AM listening to this album on repeat until I would get home and fall asleep hoping she had a better day tomorrow. But I can try to talk about the first.

    There is a lot of sad music, as it is infinitely easier to make struggle interesting as opposed to success. In fact, usually the most interesting part of success is the struggle that came before, but I digress. There are mopey sad songs that will show up in a lot of pop punk, the music for those who feel bad but are set on doing nothing about it but feeling generally annoyed with the world (which is very much a good amount of the time), see I Miss You by blink 182. There’s the overwhelming despair kind of sad, see the album Hospice by the Antlers (which I can’t wait to review while constantly wiping tears off the computer screen like a mid-2000’s Taylor Swift). There’s the subtle sadness you can find in Sufjan Steven’s Carrie and Lowell most of I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Go Outside by Earl Sweatshirt. The sadness on waste yrself can be loud and angry, which isn’t totally unique, and it can be sad and quiet, which is also not totally unseen before. What waste yrself does that makes it stands out is how all of it melts together, it all feels like the album was left in a Louisiana car for too long (which is any amount of time between the months of March and October). Toss in the static to all of that and the kind of aired out lyrics that make the verses are and the thoughts running through the writer were floating around suspended, occasionally bumping into one another to form sentences and you get this kind of depressing sound that’s perfect to sink into. It feels liquid, a perfect vibe to lose yourself in when the day and time itself starts to lose meaning as it does around 4 AM.