Why I love the Love Language (and why you should too)

The Love Language is by far and away the most underrated band on Merge Records. While well-deserved I'm kinda sick of Spoon and the Arcade Fire getting all the love (how bout their upcoming Madison Square Garden gig, eh?). Last year, I wrote at length about their debut self-titled album which is a lo-fi folk lover's paradise that vacillates wildly between upbeat, orchestral party pop and morning-after melancholia with ramshackle glee. But my love has been renewed after 1. hearing their upcoming album and 2. seeing them in the live.

First off, Stuart McLamb's croon expands tenfold on stage. Without the fuzz of the tape-recorder its given ample room to fly off the stage and into your ears. His vocal prowess lends the songs a new found emotional heft, one that leaves you swooning as a result. The arrangements are also given room to breathe so there's an extra energy to the music.



In other words this is a band who could write a textbook on how to win me over. All other bands take note: Step 1. Write pitch-perfect songs 2. Compile said songs into an album and title it LIBRARIES (I am currently getting a Masters in Library Science). 3. Make ultra cute t-shirts with purple cats on them (OMG I LOVE CATS!!).

But the BEST news of all is that you can stream their ENTIRE upcoming album, the aforementioned Libraries on Merge's website and then buy it on July 13.

Oh and while we're out it download these goodies:
Lalita - The Love Language
Heart to Tell - The Love Language

Best Of Oh Nine: Megan Edition

Do you guys realise it's been ten years since every time you turned on the radio that 'we're gonna party like it's 1999' song was playing? I can not tell you how thankful I am that no 80s rockstar decided to write a song about '09. Could you just imagine the Bon Jovi ballad, 'it's already 09 and we still don't know what to call this crazy decade?'

In the absense of that smash hit, let me share with you now my favourite music of the year that I had to make do with:

5. The Love Language - The Love Language
I blogged about this one already, a few months back, and it's continued to grow on me ever since then. This has got to be one of the most underrated, or at least underexposed, albums of the year. Listening to this album is like catching a sonic glimpse of another time. Not the past, neccessarily, these melodic, fuzzy little tunes could just as easily be coming from a future where waltzing is back in vogue. (Oh, wouldn't that be lovely?)
Night Dogs


4. Monsters of Folk - Monsters of Folk
Most pleasantly surprising album of 09, for me anyway. The obbssevive completionist who dwells in my soul insisted that I buy this album on account of Conor Oberst's presense in it, despite the fact that I wasn't hugely impressed with his past two non Bright Eyes releases. (Not that they were bad, they just left me all... eh). But this! Such a beautifully crafted meloncholy buy stubbornly hopeful little album! From the obvious single 'Say Please' to the classicly Oberstian 'Man Named Truth,' I loved every second of it. Having such big solo personalities (M. Ward and Jim James or Yim Yames or Y. Diddy or whoever he is now being the other two, well and Mike Mogis but outside of Bright Eyes I don't think he's so well known) could easily have ended in an ego-copalypse. It's a credit to all of them that this thing turned out so well.
His Masters Voice


3. The Killers - Live at Albert Hall
I have loved me some Killers this year. I'd have put Day & Age on the list, but that came out at the end of 08, even though I didn't come to really appriciate it this year. And in case it wasn't until I saw the Killers live at V Fest in April that I shifted from 'oh, yeah the Killers, they're pretty ok,' to 'wow, the Killers, yeah those guys are awesome.' See, I'm used to indie music, where the music is delicate and often restrained. All the bobbastic synth of Killers distracted me from the fact that, woah, Brandon Flowers can actually sing. He did this accoustic version of Sam's Town at the festival and I was just blown away. Plus, he has a southern accent and you know how I am with accents.
For Reasons Unknown (live at the Albert Hall)


2. The Mountain Goats - The Life of the World in Flux
No, I've not made an embarresing error and got the name of The Life of the World to Come wrong. The Life of the World in Flux is the bonus album that you got if you ordered the album from London's Rough Trade store. (See, when the new mountain goats album gets released two days before your birthday you can ask to have it expensively shipped across the glove to you!) With every album the goats get a little more polished, which isn't neccessarily a bad thing. But sometimes I miss the crackle and yowl of ye olde mountain goats, you know? Which it is why the demo and outtakes version of the new album has made my list in place of the album proper. Just Mr. JD and his voice and his guitar and his genius.
Psalms 40-2


1. The Sunset Rubdown - Dragonslayer
I simply can not say enough good things about this album. I am baffled, BAFFLED, as to why not everyone is raving about it at every chance they get. I love every song, from the first note to the last. I'm not kidding, there is not one moment of this album that I don't wholeheartedly love. You know how many other albums I can say that about? Two: Aoeroplane Over the Sea and The Sunset Tree. Seriously. I LOVE this album. I love that each song seems to almost tell the part of a larger epic narrative that I can almost but not quite grasp. I love the imagary, the atmosphere, the sweeping epic moments and the quiter ones, the recurring images and themes, everything everything everything. Seriously people. You know what, you should go elsewhere for information about this album, because you not going to hear anything other than 'buy it! it's awesome! why haven't you bought it yet!'
You Go On Ahead (Trumpet Trumpet II)

Thesis Soundtrack 2009

It's been all quiet on the Megan front lately, because I’ve been killing myself working on my post-grad thesis ("the effects of the shift toward digital music and the individual", just in case you were interested), which has left me zero time for blogging. Which sucks, because when I’m writing, be it creative or academic, is when I listen to music the most. It’s a cosmic joke that I have heard so many fantastic albums released this year and haven’t had the chance to share them.
I’ve taken the morning off and am writing a post summarizing some of my favourites of the year. I’ve included them in a zipped mix at the end, but if you would like me to upload any individual tracks just comment and I will!


Wild Light
Don’t be fooled by the album cover, like I was. It looks like the kinda cover you see on bland, generic alternative pop crap doesn’t it? And the album name doesn’t help. I don’t know how many times I have to be taught to stop judging things by their covers before I actually, you know, stop doing it.
This album is pretty cool. Classic indie without being boring by the numbers indie. Harmonica and harmonies and a lead singer with an interesting voice (and you know how I love my interesting voices). They definitely remind me another band, or bands, but I’m having trouble pinpointing who exactly. My brain keeps saying the Decemberists, but I really don’t think that’s it. Help me out VK listeners!

Songs included in the .rar file:

California
On My Mind
My Father Was A Horse

Throw Me The Statue – Creaturesque
Haven’t had a chance to listen to this album in any great depth, but ‘m digging what I’ve heard. Kinda like a less crazy and uninhibited of Montreal.

Songs included in the .rar file:

Hi-Fi Goon
Venice

Veils – Sun Gangs
Picked up this EP on Amie Street, my eMusic replacement, and I’ve been digging it. Very rich instruments and male/female vocals, which is always nice. They also like to do that think where the quite builds slowly from a soft song to a rocking out one. Also, don’t be surprised if the band friends you last.fm after you listen to them for a bit, it seems to be something they do…'
This one’s been popping up everywhere, and for good reason. The album has a The National / Editors vibe going on like crazy. That combination of slow rolling songs and deep lead vocals. Very nice.

Songs included in the .rar file:

Sit Down By The Fire

Vandaveer – Divide and Conquer
Another album I’ve been seeing get raved about all over the place. It falls into the same category as other bands I’ve recently discovered that I wouldn’t have liked even a year ago. Soft, folky (not folksy), introspective music. I suspect my mother’s death has a lot to do with my sudden willingness to sit quietly and listen to what quite music and think, but even if your mother is still alive I’m sure you can dig this album.

We’ve got the male female vocals again, and nicely arranged songs. If the last.fm bio thing is to be believed lead singer/song writer Mark Charles Heidinger has a pretty full on family history on his father’s side, which maybe doesn’t mean anything to you but I personally get something extra out of music if I know a little about the context in which musician was forged. (Lol, forged, like they’re freakin' swords or something.)

Songs included in the .rar file:

Divide and Conquer
Before the Great War

The Love Language
Ah now, this album I really love! It’s like, the songs are beautifully arranged, with horns and strings and drums and guitars and I mean they are really awesomely done. But then the band is all like, yeah we’ve put all this effort into making this perfectly crafted songs, but we’re so cool we’re going to record it on a dodgy little tape deck.

I don’t know if the songs were recorded into tape deck, but they have a similar sound the early Mountain Goats stuff, so maybe. Very lo-fi, is what I’m saying. But whereas lo-fi is normally just a guy and guitar, or a garage band, these guys really have gone for a Rufus Wainright-level of song arrangement. And I love it. The contrast between the polished songs and the lo-fi fuzziness, it works way more perfectly then it should.

Songs included in the .rar file:

Lalita
Grey Court

Lord Cut Glass
Now, see, just up there I was berating myself for being wary of the Wild Lights album because of its cover, but then this here album I bought solely because of it’s awesome Napoleonic cover.
Turns out this was one instance where my cover bias paid off. This is Alun Woodward’s, of the Delgado’s, solo release and oh my, accent! Scottish, no less. The words roll into each other at the ends and you’d better believe I love it! The songs themselves are very clever and upbeat, once again I am reminded of someone but I’m not sure who. (What kind of self respecting music blogger can’t compare acts to one another? That’s like our thing!)

Songs included in the .rar file:

Look After Your Wife

Builders and the Butchers – Salvation is a Deep Dark Well
Ah, this band sounds a lot like the Hold Steady and, damn it, someone else I can’t place. I’m sorry guys, I understand if you want me to resign. Seriously though, the Hold Steady comparison is solid. The lead singer has that same preachy kind of voice as does Craig Finn. In this instance the preachyness works well because the album has a distinctly fire and brimstony kind of religious bent to it, but in a good way.

Songs included in the .rar file:

Devil Town

The Low Anthem – Oh My God, Charlie Darwin
This album works perfectly next to the Butchers and the Builders one. Its plays with the same themes and ideas (although, as the title might suggest from the other side of the argument), and has a similar sound. It softer though, more folk than rock, and boy oh boy am I in love with the lead singer’s voice. Gah. It’s not even “weird” as the vocals I love usually are, I’m confident that most people would agree that it is one nice voice.

Songs included in the .rar file:

Cage the Songbird
To Ohio

A.C. Newman – Get Guilty
New Pornographer’s front man's latest solo offering (not, sadly, a sequel to the Mountain Goats’ Get Lonely). The thing about A.C.’s solo stuff is that it sounds an awful lot like New Pornographer’s stuff, which is good if you’re a TNP fan, which I totally am. Melodic power pop up the wazoo, in other words.

Songs included in the .rar file:

There Are Maybe Ten or Twelve

(that’s the name of the song, I haven’t included 10 or 12 A.C. Newman songs…)
Well, now that was cathartic! Forgive any typos, all of my editing reserves are used up!

The .rar file! (remember, I’m more than willing to upload any individual tracks you might want)