#5 
A Woman A Man Walked By
PJ Harvey & John Parish
A Woman A Man Walked By opens with the bombastic “Black Hearted Love”, but that one amazing track is actually wildly unrepresentative of the rest of the album. Its real emotional core lies in the twisted organs and PJ Harvey’s strained voice on “April” and the psychosexual intensity of the title track. A Woman A Man Walked By is not a comfortable album by any stretch of the imagination, but the feverish lyrics, combined with John Parish’s eerie, rustic music, create a fascinating and emotionally gripping ride from start to finish. Even the most beautiful songs on the album, like the mandolin-led “The Soldier”, are undercut by extreme tension. As always, Harvey is an absolute revelation as a singer, not performing songs as much as living them. A Woman A Man Walked By lets her show her full range, from terse growls all the way up to almost childlike shrieks. Harvey and Parish both bring a lot to the table as musicians and this album succeeds because both have an innate understanding of how all the various tools at their disposal can be combined into something great.
[original review]
#4
Only Built 4 Cuban Linx… Pt. II
Raekwon
Literally picking up exactly where the original Only Built 4 Cuban Linx… left off, Raekwon’s much anticipated (and much delayed) sequel finally arrived in 2009, becoming a welcome throwback to the great rap long-players that seem to be rapidly going out of style. While OB4CL2 has plenty of the usual Wu-Tang tricks (kung-fu movie samples, RZA’s crisp, dry production), the album also recognizes the amount of time that’s passed since Rae first started rhyming about crime, drug dealing and his Wu family. Multiple tracks pay homage to fallen Wu brother Ol’ Dirty Bastard, while Rae and the expected mob of Wu-related guests tackle the same old subjects from a wiser, more thoughtful angle. At the same time, OB4CL2 sounds immediate and more than a little brutal. “House Of Flying Daggers” is the best gangster rap anthem in years, while the queasy “Black Mozart” and “Surgical Gloves” maintain the dark edge the Wu-Tang Clan has always been famous for. Toss in a few great, radio-ready cuts (“Cold Outside”, “Mean Streets”) and you’ve got the best rap album of the past several years. It may have taken over a decade, but Only Built 4 Cuban Linx…Pt. II is worth the wait.
[original review]
#3
The Crying Light
Antony And The Johnsons
No album in 2009 could match The Crying Light for sheer beauty and grace. From the plaintive violins and fragile piano all the way to Antony’s peerless, unimitatable voice, this is simply a gorgeous album. However, tucked away behind all the wonderful, sparse music is a deep undercurrent of sadness. Antony’s voice may be beautiful, but it’s also incredibly haunting and filled with pain. The Crying Light is the sound of someone maintaining poise and composure in the face of a world that seems to be falling apart. When Antony sings “I need another world, this one’s nearly gone,” it feels like he’s ready to willfully fade away and leave this flawed world behind. When Antony’s voice finally begins to crack, during the powerful second half of “Aeon”, you start to becoming deeply worried about this vulnerable, pained figure. With only his astonishing voice, Antony evokes tremendous empathy in listeners. With music that matches his emotional-but-elegant style, The Crying Light is nothing less than a masterful artistic triumph.
[original review]
#2
Crack The Skye
Mastodon
How does an album that features lyrics like “the screaming arrows burst through my soul” and “please tell Lucifer he can’t have this one” become my second favorite album the year? The answer to the question is two-fold. First, Crack The Skye kicks ass. Mastodon have spent most of the decade refining their melodic reinvention of modern metal and all that work finally paid off with Crack The Skye, an album that’s simultaneously heavy as an actual mastodon, but also very accessible. They’ve got a Metallica-esque ability to craft great melodies out of distorted guitars, all while possessing a strong grasp on how to use dynamics to underscore the emotional content of their songs. But the second reason Crack The Skye is such an accomplishment is that it taps into a vein of very personal, human sadness. Written for and partially inspired by drummer Brann Dailor’s sister Skye, who committed suicide at the age of fourteen, Crack The Skye is a harrowing document of coping with painful loss and the disorienting confusion that comes with it. Of course, that’s all tied up in a semi-absurd story about Rasputin and astral travel, but the emotions are still quite visible. I sternly believe that Mastodon have been the best metal band of the 2000s and Crack The Skye is their best album, injecting some needed humanity into a genre that’s rapidly losing touch with its universal appeal.
[original review]
#1
Merriweather Post Pavilion
Animal Collective
I’ll never forget the first time I heard Merriweather Post Pavilion. It was late December and I was holed up in a house, trying to outlast the Wisconsin winter. I was putting the groundwork for what would become Pretzel Logic in place, but I wanted an album to review for my very first post. It was brought to my attention that Animal Collective’s latest album had leaked online and, despite my general distaste for their music, decided that they would be a good, well-recognized band to launch my blog with. I tracked the torrent down, cued up “In The Flowers” and did my best to listen with an open mind.
Two songs in, I felt like my life had been changed.
Merriweather Post Pavilion is an album of contradictions. It’s dense, but also very light and airy. It’s warm and welcoming, but also very metallic and jarring. It feels profoundly organic, but was made mostly with electronics. Strangest of all, it features songs that are, for the most part, unequivocally happy, yet it feels somewhat down, even a bit mournful. I still don’t completely understand how Animal Collective did it, but they combined all these disparate elements into one singular piece of work that stands as one of the most compelling slabs of music released in the past ten years. From the lighthearted fun of “Summertime Clothes” all the way to the hushed (and weirdly underappreciated) “No More Runnin’”, all the songs on Merriweather Post Pavilion are different shades in one massive, multicolored ocean of sound. The crowning achievement is “My Girls”, which is one of the most touching and honestly joyful songs I’ve heard in my life, but the whole album maintains a similar level of quality. Twelve months ago, I couldn’t even fathom that Animal Collective could make an album like this. Now, here I am, waxing poetic about it on my blog. MPP was the first album I ever reviewed on Pretzel Logic and I’m overjoyed that, one year later, I’m still singing its praises.
[original review]
A Woman A Man Walked By
PJ Harvey & John Parish
A Woman A Man Walked By opens with the bombastic “Black Hearted Love”, but that one amazing track is actually wildly unrepresentative of the rest of the album. Its real emotional core lies in the twisted organs and PJ Harvey’s strained voice on “April” and the psychosexual intensity of the title track. A Woman A Man Walked By is not a comfortable album by any stretch of the imagination, but the feverish lyrics, combined with John Parish’s eerie, rustic music, create a fascinating and emotionally gripping ride from start to finish. Even the most beautiful songs on the album, like the mandolin-led “The Soldier”, are undercut by extreme tension. As always, Harvey is an absolute revelation as a singer, not performing songs as much as living them. A Woman A Man Walked By lets her show her full range, from terse growls all the way up to almost childlike shrieks. Harvey and Parish both bring a lot to the table as musicians and this album succeeds because both have an innate understanding of how all the various tools at their disposal can be combined into something great.
[original review]
#4
Only Built 4 Cuban Linx… Pt. II
Raekwon
Literally picking up exactly where the original Only Built 4 Cuban Linx… left off, Raekwon’s much anticipated (and much delayed) sequel finally arrived in 2009, becoming a welcome throwback to the great rap long-players that seem to be rapidly going out of style. While OB4CL2 has plenty of the usual Wu-Tang tricks (kung-fu movie samples, RZA’s crisp, dry production), the album also recognizes the amount of time that’s passed since Rae first started rhyming about crime, drug dealing and his Wu family. Multiple tracks pay homage to fallen Wu brother Ol’ Dirty Bastard, while Rae and the expected mob of Wu-related guests tackle the same old subjects from a wiser, more thoughtful angle. At the same time, OB4CL2 sounds immediate and more than a little brutal. “House Of Flying Daggers” is the best gangster rap anthem in years, while the queasy “Black Mozart” and “Surgical Gloves” maintain the dark edge the Wu-Tang Clan has always been famous for. Toss in a few great, radio-ready cuts (“Cold Outside”, “Mean Streets”) and you’ve got the best rap album of the past several years. It may have taken over a decade, but Only Built 4 Cuban Linx…Pt. II is worth the wait.
[original review]
#3
The Crying Light
Antony And The Johnsons
No album in 2009 could match The Crying Light for sheer beauty and grace. From the plaintive violins and fragile piano all the way to Antony’s peerless, unimitatable voice, this is simply a gorgeous album. However, tucked away behind all the wonderful, sparse music is a deep undercurrent of sadness. Antony’s voice may be beautiful, but it’s also incredibly haunting and filled with pain. The Crying Light is the sound of someone maintaining poise and composure in the face of a world that seems to be falling apart. When Antony sings “I need another world, this one’s nearly gone,” it feels like he’s ready to willfully fade away and leave this flawed world behind. When Antony’s voice finally begins to crack, during the powerful second half of “Aeon”, you start to becoming deeply worried about this vulnerable, pained figure. With only his astonishing voice, Antony evokes tremendous empathy in listeners. With music that matches his emotional-but-elegant style, The Crying Light is nothing less than a masterful artistic triumph.
[original review]
#2
Crack The Skye
Mastodon
How does an album that features lyrics like “the screaming arrows burst through my soul” and “please tell Lucifer he can’t have this one” become my second favorite album the year? The answer to the question is two-fold. First, Crack The Skye kicks ass. Mastodon have spent most of the decade refining their melodic reinvention of modern metal and all that work finally paid off with Crack The Skye, an album that’s simultaneously heavy as an actual mastodon, but also very accessible. They’ve got a Metallica-esque ability to craft great melodies out of distorted guitars, all while possessing a strong grasp on how to use dynamics to underscore the emotional content of their songs. But the second reason Crack The Skye is such an accomplishment is that it taps into a vein of very personal, human sadness. Written for and partially inspired by drummer Brann Dailor’s sister Skye, who committed suicide at the age of fourteen, Crack The Skye is a harrowing document of coping with painful loss and the disorienting confusion that comes with it. Of course, that’s all tied up in a semi-absurd story about Rasputin and astral travel, but the emotions are still quite visible. I sternly believe that Mastodon have been the best metal band of the 2000s and Crack The Skye is their best album, injecting some needed humanity into a genre that’s rapidly losing touch with its universal appeal.
[original review]
#1
Merriweather Post Pavilion
Animal Collective
I’ll never forget the first time I heard Merriweather Post Pavilion. It was late December and I was holed up in a house, trying to outlast the Wisconsin winter. I was putting the groundwork for what would become Pretzel Logic in place, but I wanted an album to review for my very first post. It was brought to my attention that Animal Collective’s latest album had leaked online and, despite my general distaste for their music, decided that they would be a good, well-recognized band to launch my blog with. I tracked the torrent down, cued up “In The Flowers” and did my best to listen with an open mind.
Two songs in, I felt like my life had been changed.
Merriweather Post Pavilion is an album of contradictions. It’s dense, but also very light and airy. It’s warm and welcoming, but also very metallic and jarring. It feels profoundly organic, but was made mostly with electronics. Strangest of all, it features songs that are, for the most part, unequivocally happy, yet it feels somewhat down, even a bit mournful. I still don’t completely understand how Animal Collective did it, but they combined all these disparate elements into one singular piece of work that stands as one of the most compelling slabs of music released in the past ten years. From the lighthearted fun of “Summertime Clothes” all the way to the hushed (and weirdly underappreciated) “No More Runnin’”, all the songs on Merriweather Post Pavilion are different shades in one massive, multicolored ocean of sound. The crowning achievement is “My Girls”, which is one of the most touching and honestly joyful songs I’ve heard in my life, but the whole album maintains a similar level of quality. Twelve months ago, I couldn’t even fathom that Animal Collective could make an album like this. Now, here I am, waxing poetic about it on my blog. MPP was the first album I ever reviewed on Pretzel Logic and I’m overjoyed that, one year later, I’m still singing its praises.
[original review]
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