Music Blog

Best Local Music of 2008

This year saw a rather incredible number of our local musicians receive boatloads of praise in the national press and on blogs around the world. And rightly so, as incredible album after incredible album kept arriving in my mailbox from Portland bands and record labels these past 52 weeks.

It has put me in the enviable position of having to make a selection of the cream of this crop. The list has been changing almost daily over the last month as a certain song or show will remind me just how great a particular album is. But I have forced myself to choose five albums released in 2008 that I think are worthy of the world's time and attention. More importantly, I think they are worthy of your time and attention.

1. Horse Feathers - House With No Home (Kill Rock Stars): No album broke my heart faster than this quiet masterpiece. What cuts me so deep is front man Justin Ringle's voice. His singing is all buttery midrange with clipped ends and an oddly rounded pronunciation. And it is just what these songs require, adding the perfect note of nostalgia to an already wistful deep folk sound.

2. Blind Pilot - 3 Rounds and a Sound (Expunged): This humble act is one commercial endorsement or late night TV appearance away from ubiquity. Israel Nebeker and Ryan Dombrowski managed to find new inspiration in between the gatefold sleeves of '70s folk/rock and the jewel cases of the late '90s indie world. 3 Rounds is another dusty sounding gem in a year full of them.

3. Parenthetical Girls - Entanglements (Tomlab): The Girls' version of a lush Orange County/Van Dyke Parks pop song cycle ends up just as pixilated and disorienting as their earlier electronically minded works, but is somehow sweeter and more irresistible than ever before.

4. Dykeritz - Rearrangerologystics (Lucky Madison): Absolutely nothing on this album is predictable. Just when you think you have a vocal melody or aching synth line figured out, a newer, shinier version takes its place. It's the aural equivalent of the iTunes visualizer.

5. Pink Widower - The Enchanted Realm of the Pink Widower (North Pole): You're not likely to find a more loose-limbed and seductive album released by a band of six white kids this year. The sly, horn-drenched tunes caramelize jam band wonkiness into a perfectly sticky-sweet reduction.

Honorable mention: The Portland Cello Project - S/T, Talkdemonic - Eyes At Half Mast, Wow & Flutter - Golden Touch, Ghostwriter - Wreck The City, New Bloods - The Secret Life, A Weather - Cove, Whiskey Puppy - Unleashed, Bark Hide & Horn - National Road, Boy Eats Drum Machine - Booomboxxx, Eternal Tapestry - Mystic Induction, Paint And Copter - Damnatio Memoriae, Musee Mecanique - Hold This Ghost, Carcrashlander - S/T

Bob Ham is a freelance writer here in Portland. His work can be read most often in Willamette Week, The Oregonian and Relevant Magazine. He can be reached via e-mail at miller.ham (at) gmail.com or through his blog The Voice of Energy.
 

Comments

December 13, 2008 at 11:05pm by Matt Kelly

What about these?

•All Girl Summer Fun Band--Looking Into It
The all-girl girlie-girl girlie fun-band takes on a little bit of an edge with their much-too-long-anticipated new album. Drummer is the bass payer for the punk band The Thermals. Good stuff.
Check out Everything I Need and This Will Never End
Achtung: uncontrollable head-bobbing. In the words of a famous top-ten list promoter: “Give me a woo-woo or a yeah-yeah-yeah, and I am SO there.”

•Colin Meloy—Colin Meloy Sings Live!
The lead singer of the Decembrists’ action figure may come with amazing dictionary looking-up action, but Colin Meloy takes me back to drama club and English class in a good way. And he basically wrote my pregnant wife and my cheesy theme song for this year—Wonder.
Check out Wonder, Devil’s Elbow, The Gymnast High Above the Ground…lots of winners

December 14, 2008 at 11:33pm by inmemoryofjohnpeel

JP - I'm with David regards the Portishead making it into the 10, at the other end of the scale I'll probably make room for Dirty Mittens... My list is narrowed to around 15, will post soon.
Zaph

December 14, 2008 at 11:39pm by Jeremy Petersen

We'll take them until probably mid-week, so you have some time. Always a painful cut, those last few in particular. It was a strong-ish year for releases, all in all, I think. Maybe not many for the ages, but still...much to choose from.


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