Daniel's 2013 in Review

My Very Favorite Albums of A.D. 2013

20. Mikal Cronin - MCII

MCII is a starkly straightforward guitar album. It won’t make you think. It won’t make you wince. It’s not going to rearrange your definition of rock and roll. It won’t change you. But it will make you want to take a walk. It might get you looking out a window for longer than you even realize. I woke up the other day with a tune in my head. It was early in the morning, earlier than I normally get up at least. It killed me for about 20 minutes (including a failed attempt at googling fragments of lyrics). Then, I realized it was “Weight,” the first track from this record. I sat down in a chair with some headphones and put it on. 40 minutes later the album was over, and I had barely moved at all. It’s been a while since I’ve started a day so fresh. Mikal Cronin’s music is so god-damned everyday, but it’s the most spectacular kind of everyday I can picture, a no-holds barred assault of perfectly timed pop-music cheap shots that will wind you (the crowd goes wild!) and make you feel proud to be everyday human you are. 

Album Review: Kurt Vile - Wakin On A Pretty Daze

Album Rating: A-

There seems to be an almost irrepressible human need to scrutinise the new and compare it to the old. We’re always searching for influences and similarities and we have a nagging, awkward desire to label someone “the new [insert classic artist].” But sometimes, something comes along which reminds us of the beauty of simplicity, and that rather than dissecting things we should enjoy them in a primal, fundamental way. It’s certainly a view which Kurt Vile welcomes, and when you listen to Wakin on a Pretty Daze, it’s easy to see why. Rather than pin-pointing his influences he’s keen to remind us that “everything’s an influence,” and that music sometimes thrives most when it lives and breathes and exists because of everything around it. The lush, uncomplicated melodies and soft diction which dominate Wakin on a Pretty Daze embody the organic simplicity Vile aims for, and it succeeds largely on this premise.