Good grief, so much stuff has come out this year since I last checked this thread...
Jamila Woods - LEGACY! LEGACY! : This is looking like my favorite of 2019 so far. Excellent performance. The pacing and emotion of every song is so good. Every song has emotional weight. No bad songs. Only bad moment in the whole album is Saba's contribution. He ruined a Noname song last year too IIRC.
Titus Andronicus - An Obelisk : Strong no2. Patrick just yells his god damn brains out the whole album, the madman!
Purple Mountains - David Berman (Silver Jews) is one of the best songwriters of our time, and he's operating on his prime (and emotional worst) in this post-divorce / mid-depression / pre-recovery snapshot album. Berman has this ability to define abstract concepts, take away their horrifying power, and make life a bit easier.
Patio - Essentials : Excellent jaded cynical 90s style tunes.
Charly Bliss - Young Enough : A surprising pivot to pop from their lo-fi debut, but they make it work. Very effective lyrics about being a young woman in 2019.
Booji Boys - Tube Reducer : Sloppy lo-fi surfer punk. It is what it is. (i love this)
some stuff i haven't loved:
Vampire Weekend - Father of The Bride : Not a good album. Too many half baked ideas. Would have liked this a whole bunch if it was kept to the best 8 songs, but a lot of this is a chore to get through.
The Get Up Kids - Problems : Every GUK album has been better than the last, but this one feels like a step back into something they should have released in like 2001. Just your standard emo-indie-pop here. Solid, but I expected more out of such a veteran group.
Hideki Kaji - Goth Romance : Always a fan of Kaji's brand of wholesome pop. Nothing special here, just wanted to give it a shout out.
Fujiya & Miyagi - Flashback : I've always loved their pop take on krautrock, and how clever they've been at subtle tweeks from album to album, but the over-synthesized thing they're going for here just doesn't do it for me.
Otoboke Beaver - Itekoma Hits : You may have seen this make waves in the indie scene. It's half new material, half compilation, so I'm not that excited about it, but hey I love me some spastic de-testosteroned punk rock so check it out.
Bad Religion - Age of Unreason : This is really good, but I don't know how to sell you on a Bad Religion album in 2019. I appreciate how thoughtful their takes on the current world are. I don't think they are going to reach who they want to with the message here though.
Hot Chip - A Bath Full of Ecstasy- Hot Chip descends too far down the club ballad rabbit hole. No straight up bad songs here. Any one of them would stand out on any of their other LPs, but this is just the same song over and over again, with only "Hungry Child" standing out because it just goes for it harder than the rest.
Metz - Automat : b-sides comp, but depending on if you love or hate this band, it's no better or worse than a mainline album.
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