Hey, here are my 154 favourite albums of 2014. As usual, I haven't aimed for a fixed number; just listed everything, in a loose order, that I've enjoyed these past 12 months.
To Cargo, earlier this week, for what I think might have been one of my favourite gigs of the year. I wrote about Xylouris White and their "Goats" album a few weeks ago, but even that excellent record was scant preparation for Jim White and George Xylouris' incandescent live show.
Neil Young appeared as a guest on Howard Stern's SiriusXM radio show on October 14.
During the 75 minute interview - which you can hear below - Young reiterated his recent proclamation that CSNY would never play live again, as well as his Pono digital music service, views on the Woodstock Festival and his upcoming new album, Storeytone. He also addressed his ongoing environmental concerns.
A bit frustrating this week, since I can't really talk about a couple of the most significant musical arrivals here, due to record label embargoes and so forth. Sorry, as ever, about the teasing: I'll reveal more as soon as I can.
No point in messing about this week: scroll down to hear new music from, among others, Neil Young, Cool Ghouls, Bryan Ferry, Frazey Ford, Kendrick Lamar, Joan Shelley and the extremely promising D.D. Dumbo, plus a couple of amazing full gigs from Hiss Golden Messenger and a Purling Hiss/Spacin' supersession, both courtesy of the invaluable www.nyctaper.com.
Weird serendipities aplenty this week: versions of "O, Death" on two albums I downloaded one after another, by Mike & Cara Gangloff and Bessie Jones; dovetailing into Sea Island overlap between Jones and Loscil. It makes for a nice blurring between time and genre with, say, the Gangloffs using esoteric strategies to achieve a similar kind of transcendence that Jones and the Georgia Sea Island Singers reach through more orthodox, albeit uncommonly raw, Gospel routes in these Lomax recordings from the early '60s.
Thanks for all the nice feedback about the Liam Hayes/Plush piece I wrote earlier in the week. Lots of other good new arrivals in the list here, and you could do worse than start off by listening to the Cool Ghouls from San Francisco, especially if you're interested in the Allah-Las, the Ty Segall axis, Nuggets ad nauseam and so on.
