Miner at the Dial-A-View
Reassessing My Top 20 Albums Of 2004
A lot has changed since my Junior year of college. For starters, that $160,000 journalism degree never got put to use in any professional sense. Unless you count a couple bylines on now-defunct websites like Ozy. Or maybe a co-editor credit on a book no one’s ever read. I hope my parents don’t lay awake at night thinking of all the ways they could have spent my tuition bettering their own lives.
Nostalgia is a hell of a drug.
I’ve been spending time lately consolidating various external storage devices into a massive archive of all my digital music. On one old hard drive (I don’t even think it stored 1TB of data) I found a file called “Articles” that contained every single story I ever wrote for my college newspapers. One of the most cringe-inducing discoveries I made was my list of the top albums of 2004. The title of the article (I don’t know what the paper’s editor was thinking) is, The Music of 2004 In Review: Rolling Tumbleweeds and the Occasional Burst of Sunlight Bathing The Faces of Small Children.
Aren’t college kids the absolute worst?
It’s kind of amazing how 20 years have altered both my taste in music and writing style. My closed-mindedness and egocentrism were fully on display as, semester after semester, I would talk down to my peers about “good” music. Take a look at this intro:
The general consensus seems to be that 2004 wasn’t so cool. I mean, I thought it’d be fun if I asked a bunch of friends to submit lists of their favorite albums from the past year, but no one I asked wanted to. No matter what I offered in return (money, power, sex, a byline) it wasn’t good enough to coax a single antisocial hermit out from his or her shell long enough to wax poetic about the music they like.
Brace yourselves. I’m about to make a totally erratic comparison buoyed by esoteric random images of nature. I think the music of 2004 was wholly void, filled with rolling tumbleweeds and the occasional burst of sunlight bathing the faces of small children. In short, I guess it had its moments. To sum it up even more succinctly, “meh.”
Giving a 20-year-old a soapbox seems so cruel in hindsight. Who am I talking to? What is that second paragraph even trying to say? Who writes like that? Did I have an editor? Actually I had two. One of them — I forget her name, the one who edited the digital newspaper — would simply upload my articles without even checking for spelling mistakes.
Honorable Mention:
Brian Wilson Smile
Silkworm It’ll Be Cool
The Advantage The Advantage
Blonde Redhead Misery is a Butterfly
Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy Greatest Palace Music
Hella The Devil Isn’t Red
ISIS Panopticon
Mission of Burma OnoffOn
90 Day Men Panda Park
Vietnam The Concrete’s Always Grayer on the Other Side of the Fence
Vetiver Vetiver
Bearclaw Find the Sun
I’m afraid to look at the actual ranked list at this point because Panopticon and Misery Is A Butterfly have probably aged better better than 3/4 of what I — at the time — seemed to prefer. The Advantage isn’t even really an album, it’s just covers of video game music. Without peeking ahead, I’m going to predict that I’ve spent at least 100 more hours listening to Panopticon over the past twenty years than any other record released that year.
20) The Arcade Fire - Funeral: It’s a struggle to include this on the list because I really think this band is over-hyped. The first half of the record contains an epic opening and an incredible driving gem in, “Neighborhood #3 (Power Out),” but after awhile it lags and stops challenging the listener. I don’t see what all the fuss is honestly, I wouldn’t call it a masterpiece or hail them as the scene’s new torchbearers, but it is a decent indie-pop record. (Merge)
I’m dead. The band who literally became the raison d'etre of Swan Fungus, I thought deserved inclusion on my list of favorite albums of 2004. Just one year prior to my launching the blog. Actually, wait. This would have been published in early 2005, mere months before I launched the blog. What was I thinking? Did I just want free records and swag from Merge? Was there a girl I liked who said she was into them and I was trying to impress her? Was I afraid of not including it on my list when every other journalist alive did? What an idiot. Whatever my reason might have been, I’m already regretting my decision to revisit this period in my life. Nostalgia is a very bad drug. Maybe even the worst drug.
19) Brother Danielson - Brother is to Son: Maybe it’s the rampant spirituality. Maybe it’s the catchy melodies. Maybe, just maybe, it’s the giant seven-fruit-tree costume. There’s just something about Brother Danielson that makes you stop and say, “Aww” like when you’re ogling a cute girl and she trips over her own feet. If you can cast aside the timbre of Daniel Smith’s shrieking (which I find brilliant), you might just agree that he’s a genius. (Secretly Canadian)
18) Castanets - Cathedral: Gloomy and slow, just the way I like it. This album doesn’t have the immediacy of other records on this list but Cathedral is a sparse, brooding collection of tunes. “You are the Blood” is a brilliant dirge on an album filled with harrowing songs. (Asthmatic Kitty)
I do still enjoy Fetch The Compass Kids and Tell Another Joke At The Ol’ Chopping Block but I don’t think I’ve listened to Brother Is To Son at all in the last ten years. Castanets I’ll spin every now and then. Along with bands like The Clientele, they’re an poppy, folky, light-psych itch I still like to scratch every now and then.
17) Wolf Eyes - Burned Mind: Despite the fact that it is difficult to listen to this album for more than ten minutes at a time, it deserves to be alongside the best of 2004. It’s louder and more frightening than any other album on this list. I still prefer Slicer or Dread, but the uniqueness that is Wolf Eyes must be lauded over the modern day blasè of most current bands. (Sub Pop)
The feeling I’m getting at this point is that I didn’t really have twenty albums I loved at the time so I felt obligated to include certain records. Sub Pop was generally really generous with their promos for college kids and they helped turn me onto a lot of bands at the time. By the way I haven’t listened to Burned Mind more than once since 2004, and I think it’s currently in a bag of cheap records I’m going to take to Amoeba for trade credit in the near future. Dread is still an incredible record.
16) Tarentel - We Move Through Weather: If you like shape-shifting ambient music then you’ll like this record. Droning guitars and white noise galore. It’s definitely the best 4am comedown album of the year. It’s pleasant and inventive for the duration. (Temporary Residence)
No complaints here. I’ve been toying with the idea of Rolling Stone style list of the 500 most important records released in my lifetime, and From Bone To Satellite would be very, very high on that list. Tarentel — and by extension Jefre’s label Root Strata — was my gateway to noise and drone artists too numerous to count.
15) Magnetic Fields - i: The follow up to 69 Love Songs is a worthy successor. You’d think after a triple-disc monolith Stephin Merritt would be all tapped out on the songwriting front. With i, he’s managed to pen fourteen more fantastic brooding pop tunes. (Nonesuch)
14) Sonic Youth - Sonic Nurse: Would be much higher if it weren’t for “Kim Gordon and the Arthur Conan Doyle Hand Cream.” Nothing against Kim as a songwriter or bassist, but I’ve never liked her vocals. Once you’ve seen Alex Cox’s Sid and Nancy you might never again listen to Kim’s grating yelp without hearing Chole Webb’s Nancy Spungen. It’s a frustratingly marred track on an otherwise classic album. (Geffen)
The Sonic Youth inclusion feels odd to me because I honestly don’t remember ever liking that record. I don’t even own it. And I certainly wasn’t on any list that was getting Geffen promos at the time. I’m guessing I saw it ranked really high on Pitchfork and sheepishly included it for “cred” purposes. Hot take: Sonic Youth was done after Murray Street.
13) Mirah - C’mon Miracle: She had me hooked the first time I heard “Cold Cold Water,” the lead track to 2001’s Advisory Committee. C’mon Miracle is a quiet and memorable album from a stunning singer/songwriter. (K)
12) Black Dice - Creature Comforts: When I saw them open for Godspeed You Black Emperor last year I was intrigued and horrified at the same time. Creature Comforts is an album of off-kilter sounds and cosmic meanderings, and a creepy late night masterpiece. (DFA)
Black Dice was a smart pick. I’m happy to see that I was starting to venture further from pop and indie music. And I reserve the right to point at myself and laugh if I ended up ranking Soupjam Stevens number one on this list.
11) Comets on Fire - Blue Cathedral: This record is the sonic equivalent of being way too stoned. And yet it still manages to boast heroic, raging rock songs. Throw in an Echoplex to freak-it-all-out, and you’ve got a quite a wild experience. What else would you expect from the band who brilliantly titled one of their EPs Bong Voyage (Sub Pop)
10) Oneida - Secret Wars: Oneida makes such a beautiful dirty mess. Huge sludgy stoner rock songs that scream for your attention and any liquid ephedrine you may have hidden in your old-school metal lunchbox. Freak out along with the psychedelic noise or just take it in. Either way it’ll take multiple listens in different stages of intoxication to grasp the force of its lasting effect. (Jagjaguwar)
I admire myself for including these records, but maybe not the constant elusions to smoking pot. Anyone who ever went to college smoked pot, Evan. You weren’t special. Comets On Fire actually got some press for that record, while bands like Oneida and Sightings were not that well known outside of the New York area at the time. Actually, I saw Sightings open for Comets on Fire later this same year.
9) Xiu Xiu - Fabulous Muscles: Wonderful lo-fi experimental pop/rock. Jamie Stewart sings with so much emotion you have to wonder if it’s a put-on or dead serious. Either way, I like it, and you should to. But you don’t have to. We’re all entitled to our own opinions. That’s all this list is, anyway- one man’s opinion. It’s just better than yours. (5RC)
8) Elliott Smith - From a Basement on the Hill: Aside from a slightly cluttered mix, this album contains nary a sour note. He may not have been a role model in every facet of his life, but in Elliott Smith, the world lost a genuinely sincere and honest artist. Now all we have left is a self-portrait, a life that swims in melody and harmony. And that will never die, because luckily, Elliott was able to leave us pieces of himself that will remain constant and alive forever. (ANTI)
Flowery nonsensical prose aside, I really did love that Elliott Smith record. I wrote an entire article about it when it was released. I’m surprised it wasn’t number one on this list, as I definitely listened to it more than anything else here. I don’t listen to it much anymore, though. I’m more likely to listen to the self-title album or XO.
7) The New Year - The End is Near: The first track on The End is Near, “The End’s Not Near,” is one of the best songs the Kadane brothers have ever written. Performed live with five guitars, it sounds like orchestra of violins swelling as it lurches forward. “Chinese Handcuffs” and “Plan B” are standouts, and the (gasp) 8-minute jam “18” ends with a bang. (Touch & Go)
This should be ranked much higher. I don’t know what’s ranked ahead of it but I’m sure it’s better than at least two or three records I liked more at the time. I still listen to it regularly. Also I’m not the only person who loved “The End’s Not Near,” because Band Of Horses’ cover of it wound up in the final episode of The OC, which apparently shares the same name as the song.
6) Sufjan Stevens - Seven Swans: Stevens took a short break from his planned homage to the fifty nifty United States to release his fourth album on Daniel Smith’s “Sounds Familyre” label in 2004. Smith also gets producer nods on this follow up to last year’s stunning Greetings from the Great State of Michigan. With spirituality at the forefront of this record, Stevens continues to stake his claim as a bona fide indie-folk hero. (Sounds Familyre)
Boy, Sufjan really hoodwinked us all didn’t he? How’s that 50 states project going? Also, he kinda took Daniel Smith’s whole schtick and ran with it — to much acclaim — while Smith was left to kind of languish in obscurity. I remember going to see Sufjan and his band later that year at the Mercury Lounge (with Br. Danielson as opener) and leaving midway through his set because I was so offended at how his stage show aped the Danielson Family so completely. The matching costumes. The “family” band. It takes a lot of nerve to headline a show where your act is identical to your opener. What an ass. I haven’t listened to him ever since.
5) Death From Above 1979 - You’re a Woman, I’m a Machine: VICE has proved to be much more than just the greatest publication on earth. They released this record from DFA1979, a pair of musicians who expand upon the stylistic foundation built by noise artists Lightning Bolt etc. It’s a bit more poppy with the addition of synths, but the bombast remains. “Black History Month” is fantastic. (VICE)
VICE also gave us Gavin McInnes, which turned out to be not such a good thing! This record still holds up pretty well, I just don’t listen to it as often. The New Year record is way better. Panopticon runs laps around it. They were a fun live band.
4) Iron and Wine - Our Endless Numbered Days: I remember listening to this album for the first time in my car with rain driving slanted towards my windshield and thunder roaring outside. I was coming home from a court date at a town on the tip of the state, and Sam Beam’s voice rose and fell with a subtle, southern gothic beauty that was instantly alluring. (Sub Pop)
When Sub Pop sent me this promo I thought it was a hard rock or metal band. I threw it on the back seat of my car and ignored it for a while. And then, yeah, I was driving home from school for the weekend and had to stop and pay a fine for a speeding ticket on my way home. And then it started pouring rain, and for some reason I thought, “Fine. I guess I’ll listen to that CD Sub Pop sent me now.” I still have a soft spot for it.
3) Devendra Banhart - Rejoicing in the Hands / Nino Rojo: There’s been a boom in the number of folk artists gaining popularity in recent years, and Devendra Banhart may be the most progressive. A quivering voice rich in emotion tiptoes around his guitar and the occasional string arrangement. His performances are deeply personal and ethereal. The album has moments of sadness, elation, and some deadpan silliness to help create an aura of realness. It’s an intriguing record, subtle and great. (Young God)
I definitely don’t listen to Devendra Banhart anymore. That whole Devendra/Akron Family/Vetiver thing was definitely cool at the time, but I don’t think it aged very well. I will say I still listen to the Akron/Family album Love Is Simple a lot. That’s a killer record. Weird as hell, too.
2) Mclusky The Difference Between Me and You is I’m Not on Fire – My favorite Welsh trio returns to the fold with a new drummer in tow. The follow up to the brilliant Mclusky Do Dallas isn’t quite as revelatory, but it is close. It will pummel you with aggression. The compositions are more mature and the lyrics singer Andy Falkous yelps are as cynical and sly as ever. “Without MSG I am Nothing” is a fiery opener, and the final track “Support Systems” as a sonic assault of unparalleled brilliance. With razor sharp wit and violent guitar scratching, Mclusky will force your attention on them. (Too Pure)
I approve. I might have been a terrible, self-absorbed writer and at the time, but at least I knew well enough to rank this album as high as I did. It’s phenomenal. I still listen to it all the time, maybe even as much as Panopticon! Best of all Mclusky are still killing it. Here they are in LA earlier this month.
1) Mono - Walking Cloud and Deep Red Sky, Flag Fluttered and the Sun Shined: It seems like every year some hack journalist claims that post-rock is “dead.” It’s depressing how everyone seems so adamant about searching for the next big thing. The desire to break some new band that is just blatantly replicating their predecessors has led many to skip over this year’s most triumphant effort. Mono builds layers of towering notes to a thunderous crescendo and let fly a roar of wall of noise deafening and beautiful. It’s raucous, yes, but the high soar over clouds of fuzz. Each song is a slow melting frenzy. The most admirable part is, unlike so many modern bands whose careers begin with a bolt only to soon fade into nothingness, Mono is realizing their potential as they age. Their sound is continually evolving, and each dim melody is filled with hope. Their symphony is the album of the year. (Temporary Residence)
Fair. It’s a great record, and I love Mono. I saw them live for the first time a few months before this article was published and there is no doubt it left a lasting impression on me. I still pull the record out from time to time to revisit it. Hell, when I was in Japan I made sure to visit the Thousand Paper Cranes at Fushimi Inari Taisha based on my knowledge of Sadako And The Thousand Paper Cranes, which came from this album. It’s an acceptable choice, and certainly went against the grain of what other ‘zines were hyping at the time.
I’ll never get over the inclusion of that Arcade Fire album, though. That’s an unforgivable offense.