Ten local albums that kept the home fires blazing—
then burned down the house
Audition
Rhymesayers
Expressing the social conscience that Slug admits to between songs, P.O.S. is about the only rapper who could get guest star Craig Finn to write like Ian MacKaye. When the MC starts slicing up eyeballs on the very next track, he's merely reminding you he's an artist—shades of Hüsker Dü's "Diane" to offset "Real World" on Metal Circus 23 years ago. P.O.S. is no more a product of his environment than Hüsker, Prince, or the Replacements were, but you can't help but notice how local culture shapes male rockers differently, not so much in their lack of women problems (not hardly) but in their refusal to engage machismo in the usual way, or to view homosexuality as a problem. These things add up in hip hop, making P.O.S.'s juicy, Phife-like flow a rallying point, and not just a new flavor. —Peter S. Scholtes
Tim O'Reagan
Lost Highway
The test of any classic album is if it plays as well in the morning with coffee as it does at night with whiskey; in the bedroom or car; in the loud or quiet hours. O'Reagan's debut has been with me in every moment imaginable since it was released on House of Mercy Recordings last year, and properly released by Lost Highway this year. His voice reminds me of something a friend of mine wrote about her aging face—"a wizened disaster"—which is to say that most things get more beautiful with age, but some things, like a drummer-turned-unleashed-crooner, get positively translucent. —Jim Walsh
Duluth Does Dylan Revisited
Spinout Records
Bob Dylan has never shown much regard for his birthplace. After all, the now-65-year-old iconoclast didn't bother to play a show in Duluth until 1999. But as this loving tribute album displays, area musicians don't hold the lack of affection against him. Most contributors to this second volume of Duluth-does-Dylan tracks opt to treat the material fairly straight, including earnest takes on "Masters of War" (Hattie Peterson) and "When the Ship Comes In" (Ol' Yeller). But the two standout offerings throw reverence out the window, with Cloud Cult performing a lovely, ethereal version of "Mr. Tambourine Man," and Retribution Gospel Choir transforming Dylan's cryptic "All the Tired Horses" into an epic funk workout. —Paul Demko
Total Fucking Blood
Blaze the Lord
Freedom From Records
The midterms meant it was a bad year for extremity, so the story goes. Maybe so, but let's not have a return to normalcy in our music, thank you. St. Paul's Total Fucking Blood gave us the comforts of implacable, abstract ferocity, and for that they deserve a grateful nation's thanks. Blaze the Lord's 11 tracks are shorter than my commute and as mesmeric as Brazilian children's television. This is distilled music, everything superfluous blasted away, the exposed remnants blown out to absurd proportion. It sounds like it was recorded in your bathroom. There's a teasingly bleak sense of humor at work (the title track, "You Got Serbed"), perfect for another precarious year in a world adrift. —Geoff Cannon
Enjoying Fire
Speakerphone Records
Story of the Sea's debut, Enjoying Fire, is eighth grade. It's pool parties. It's making out for the first time as the sweat forms little tributaries in the bends of your knees. It's nostalgia that encompasses the Reagan era and the Cobain generation. It's bubble gum and burliness. It's sweet hooks and giant riffs. It's xylophones that frolic and rhythms that detonate. Enjoying Fire is all grown-up, too—the kind of grown-up that doesn't need Sears-catalog haircuts or herky-jerky keyboard players to be cool. Instead, it simply relies on its three primary players—Adam Prince, Ian Prince, and John McEwen—to strut its stuff and swallow up the entire room as if it always belonged anyway. Even if frontman Adam Prince is talking about love when he sings, "Maybe we feel that way because we think we should, and that's no good" on "Bubble Gum," you can't help but want to shake off all the kitsch and irony, and rock out like a grownup who isn't afraid of messing up her Cost Cutters coif. —Molly Priesmeyer
Venom
Crustacean Records
Just when you thought internet-dork pseudo-viral D-movie memes had completely destroyed the comedy potential of snake-related activities forever, Annie and Danny from the Soviettes come out with the most aggressively ridiculous local record of the year: a bass-drums duo (plus occasional keyboard) that plays songs largely about snakes and/or things that are awesome. An example of the former: "Snakes vs. Jerks"; an example of the latter: "It Would Be Awesome If We Weren't Here." It sounds like the bastard child of the Adolescents and the B-52's and makes the Ramones' first album seem about as punk as Tarkus. Plus, the cover looks like Motley Crüe's Too Fast for Love as drawn by a 13-year-old. I'm with P.O.S., who prefaces a guest spot ("P.O.S. vs. Awesome Snakes") with a declaration—"I got a name for people who don't like snakes: Fucker." —Nate Patrin
Lure the Fox
Afternoon Records
It's hard not to be jealous of Haley Bonar. At 22, she's amassed three albums, rave reviews, and stage time with Neko Case and the Arcade Fire. But one listen to her latest alt-country release, Lure the Fox, and all is forgiven. Bonar's voice is strong beyond her years, backed by soft, lollygagging guitars and gentle drums. Her songs start small, with plodding beats or tinkling piano, and build into lush arrangements full of wailing vocals and passionate chords. "Don't let me give it up," she pleads on the seventh track, a haunting song with morbid overtones. Not to worry, Haley—we're not planning on it. —Mary O'Regan
Broken Hearts
Afternoon Records
You'd think this band of punky coffee shop workers (brewsters?) would have a fairly sharp edge, especially considering their Commandment-breaking name and affinity for photo shoots with bloody baseball bats. As it turns out, you'll find raunchier doo-wop on the Little Shop of Horrors soundtrack. Broken Hearts never goes further than first base ("Tell me, tell me/How much longer till I can kiss you?") and nobody gets hurt in the process (at least not physically), but that didn't stop us from heaping gobs of praise on the God Damn Doo Wop Band's otherwise killer debut. As the title suggests, there's plenty of heartache spread throughout these nine original puppy-crush tunes, made all the more poignant by the singers' spot-on three-part harmonies and the guitarist's period-perfect tremolo work. It's for fans of pop punk, dual-strawed malt glasses, Twin Peaks, and cute girls in poodle skirts. By our calculation, that's about 99 percent of the entire freaking universe. —Chuck Terhark
The Careless Flame
JIB Door
"The careless flame don't burn the same," sing-raps Crescent Moon on "Strangers in the Doorways," and neither do Kill the Vultures. They'd rather burn in a way no hip-hop crew ever has—and the whiskey-stinking hobo racket of The Careless Flame certainly does. Crescent Moon's rough flow sounds as confused as it is smart, and he serves as the perfect argument for rappers to look as deep into their own psyches as DJs do their record vaults. Speaking of which, KtV's super-producer Anatomy reaches further than ever on The Careless Flame; check out this note from the album's credits: "track #2 contains flute elements from collected Syrian flute songs." As Prince Paul told XLR8R magazine of these guys, "If you get high or are the serious mad-at-the-world type, you'll love this." You don't actually have to meet either of those qualifications. But it helps. —Chuck Terhark
The Alcatraz Kid
Princess Records
Jeremy Messersmith writes about Everyman's fat cousin, the one who does something with computers, maybe, and whose social life makes Walter Mitty look like Keith Moon. The singer-songwriter's cautious heroes come home not around seven, but precisely at 7:02. When urged to follow a lover to the West Coast, they hop in the Focus, and head in early for work. The Alcatraz Kid, Messersmith's basement-bred debut, also features a science prodigy's forlorn waltz, and a grown-up scientist's soft-voiced jeremiad, sung to a You we can presume to be divine. There are other heartbroken nebbishes, all interesting in their own dull ways, all granted canny melodies underneath which Messersmith strums and plucks his 3:00 a.m. acoustic. The losers win in the end, causing an ad hoc street choir to chant "Gimme Indie Folk!" until well past nine thirty. —Dylan Hicks
Honorable Mentions
The Alarmists, A Detail of Soldiers (self-released)
The Belles of Skin City, You Do The Company Proud (Totally Gross National Product)
The Brass Kings, The Brass Kings (Dream Horse Records)
Chooglin', Chooglin' (self-released)
Martin Devaney, Letters Never Sent (Eclectone Records)
Dosh, The Lost Take (Anticon)
Faux Jean, Light It Up/Burn It Down (New Fidelity Records)
The Get Up Johns, Trouble in Mind (Mercy Recordings)
Mike Gunther and His Restless Souls, Burn It Down for the Nails (Heart of a Champion)
Mark Mallman, Between the Devil and Middle C (Badman Recordings)
The Plastic Constellations, Crusades (Frenchkiss Records)
The Seawhores, Forest (Essay Records)
Superhopper, Party Killers (Guilt Ridden Pop)
Träma, Träma Dusa: The Ugly Album (K.E.P. Inc)
Trampled By Turtles, Live at Lucé (Banjodad Records)
Truthmaze, Expansions + Contractions Psoems 1:1 (Tru Ruts/Speakeasy Records)
The Winter Blanket, Golden Sun (Paper Trail Records)
Unknown Prophets, The Road Less Traveled (www.unknownprophets.com)
Various artists, West Bank Boogie: Forty Years of Music, Mayhem and Memories book and CD (Triangle Park Creative)
Various artists, Candy Floss: The Lost Music of MidAmerica, 1967-1969 (Weekend Records)
Venus, Trashed and Broken Hearted (SkinDog)
Willie Walker and the Butanes, Memphisapolis (Haute Music)
Irv Williams, Duo (Ding-Dong Music)
The Year in Music
Local Music Yearbook '06
Prince went to Vegas. Smokers went to Maplewood. Tapes 'N Tapes went to the moon. And sometime after the last zombie dance party got busted, we wrote it all down for you.
God Damn Skunk Bud!
...and other true tales from local musicians.
There Goes the Neighborhood
Ten local albums that kept the home fires blazing— then burned down the house.
It Was Free Cuz I Stole It
The year in unfair shares.
(Some of) All That Jazz
Swinging and swooning over 10 of 2006's best jazz albums.
Ten Great Rap Albums from 2006
Donuts, fishscales, and bigger weapons
Also in this Issue
- Local Music Yearbook '06 Prince went to Vegas. Smokers went to Maplewood. Tapes 'N Tapes went to the moon. And sometime after the last zombie dance party got busted, we wrote it all down for you. (Cover Story)
- It Was Free Cuz I Stole It The year in unfair shares (Cover Story)
- (Some of) All That Jazz Swinging and swooning over 10 of 2006's best jazz albums (Cover Story)
- God Damn Skunk Bud! ...and other true tales from local musicians (Cover Story)
- Ten Great Rap Albums from 2006 Donuts, fishscales, and bigger weapons (Cover Story)
- More articles from this issue...
About CP Staff
From the Archive
- Winter (Cover Story - Dec 6, 2006)
- They Only Come Out at Night Election Leftovers 2006: outtakes from an evening of politico galas (Galleries - Nov 15, 2006)
- Night of the Short Knives As the GOP suffered the death of a thousand cuts last Tuesday, CP staffers captured scenes from the victory party that (mostly) wasn't (Cover Story - Nov 15, 2006)
- Fade to Blue Five or six things about last week's winners and losers (Cover Story - Nov 15, 2006)
- Too Much Is Never Enough Two Shows, Forty Local Bands (Music - Oct 4, 2006)
- Picked to Click XVI This one goes to 11! (Cover Story - Sep 27, 2006)
- Fall Arts Movies (Film - Sep 13, 2006)
- The Show Must Go On... and On... and On Not Reviewed Here: Another 140 Fringe Plays. Sorry. (Cover Story - Aug 9, 2006)
- More articles from the CP Staff Archive...
