{"id":672,"date":"2011-12-23T05:08:49","date_gmt":"2011-12-23T10:08:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=672"},"modified":"2011-12-23T05:08:49","modified_gmt":"2011-12-23T10:08:49","slug":"best-of-2011-new-music","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2011\/12\/23\/best-of-2011-new-music\/","title":{"rendered":"Best of 2011: New Music"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

This was easily the most difficult category for me. So many amazing albums came out that it’s pure folly to limit myself to only five. So I haven’t (but six was still tough).<\/p>\n

DC Fontana – La Contessa<\/em><\/strong><\/a> — For me, this group had the hands-down best album of 2011. The near-perfect La Contessa<\/em> brings together elements of highly charged Northern Soul, and fronts it with the lovely and lively Karla Milton<\/strong>, a worthy successor to Julie Driscoll<\/strong>‘s late-sixties work. To call this music thrilling is no overstatement. If this doesn’t make you move, like the man said, Jack, you’re dead.<\/p>\n

Agony Aunts \u2013 <\/strong>Greater Miranda<\/strong><\/em><\/a> \u2013 They might or might not even appreciate the nod, since Agony Aunts is but one of many side-projects from the Bay Areas pop cottage industry operating under the Mystery Lawn Music banner. But this effort — with members of the Corner Laughers<\/strong> and The Orange Peels<\/strong> \u2013 is consistently endearing and entertaining. And if you dig it, most everything else from this crowd is nearly as splendid.<\/p>\n

Dennis Coffey \u2013 <\/strong>Dennis Coffey<\/strong><\/em><\/a> \u2013 One of the legendary Funk Brothers<\/strong>, Coffey’s distinctive guitar lines graced many a 70s funk, soul and rock album out of Detroit. After a number of years’ low profile, Coffey roars back with this incendiary set. Dennis Coffey<\/em> is that rarest of creatures: an album where the guest spots actually make sense.<\/p>\n

The Penguin Party \u2013 <\/strong>Sex Furniture Warehouse<\/strong><\/em><\/a> \u2013 In film, comedy is much tougher to pull off than drama: while most agree what’s dramatic, opinions differ widely as to what’s humorous. Which isn’t to say that The Penguin Party’s latest is a comedy album: more properly it’s described as as and honest musical look at middle-aged life that happens to be funny as hell.<\/p>\n

Blackfield \u2013 <\/strong>Welcome to My DNA<\/strong><\/em><\/a> \u2013 That this one made my list surprises even me. While I’m a huge Steven Wilson<\/strong> fan, Wilson’s involvement with this album (he’s a busy guy) is well below the 50% mark. And in general I’m no huge fan of Aviv Geffen<\/strong>‘s highly Israeli-accented voice. And — in contrast to earlier Blackfield releases — this is much more a Geffen project than a Wilson one. But the songwriting and playing on Welcome to My DNA<\/em> are so uniformly amazing that I had to include it. It’s more accessible, in the end, than Wilson’s own 2011 solo release, the also-excellent Grace for Drowning<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Special Bonus Mention: Ben Craven \u2013 <\/strong>Great and Terrible Potions<\/strong><\/em><\/a> \u2013 This one falls into the \u201cclassic prog\u201d genre. With production, songwriting, playing and arrangement that recall the heydays of progressive rock, Ben Craven’s one-man release is a tour de force.<\/p>\n

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DISCLOSURE OF MATERIAL CONNECTION:
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 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This was easily the most difficult category for me. So many amazing albums came out that it’s pure folly to limit myself to only five. So I haven’t (but six […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-672","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-best-of-list","cat-8-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=672"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/672\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}