Sound Fix | Music

Music

1. Animal Collective: Sung Tongs
On Sung Tongs, their first record distributed by FatCat, the two-man Animal Collective come on like sun-scorched acid eaters gathered around the campfire, strumming and grinning while they weave ...read more
2. Neil Young: After The Goldrush
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3. Akron/Family: Akron/Family
The debut from these Williamsburg freak-folksters was one of the best albums of 2005, an endlessly beautiful, rich and inventive record that established these youngsters as one of folk’s lead...read more
4. Devendra Banhart: Oh Me Oh My
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5. Devendra Banhart: Cripple Crow
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6. Devendra Banhart: Nino Rojo
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7. Devendra Banhart: Rejoicing in the Hands
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8. Grizzly Bear: Yellow House
The musical world scratched its head in puzzlement when our local freak-folk favorites Grizzly Bear signed with the indie-electronica label Warp, home to the likes of Boards of Canada and Broadcast...read more
9. Bonnie 'Prince' Billy: I See A Darkness
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10. Bonnie 'Prince' Billy / Matt Sweeney: Superwolf
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11. Bonnie 'Prince' Billy: Master and Everyone
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12. Bonnie 'Prince' Billy: Ease Down the Road
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13. Bonnie 'Prince' Billy: Summer in the Southeast [live]
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14. Akron/Family & Angels of Light: s/t
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15. Wayfaring Strangers: Ladies from the Canyon
The Numero Group, the great label known for their excellence in discovering wonderful and little-known soul, gives similar treatment to West Coast female folk in the early 1970s. The music here is ...read more
16. Six Organs of Admittance: The Sun Awakens
A fabulous and lush new album by Ben Chasny, a.k.a. Six Organs of Admittance. On this album, his second for the always reliable Drag City, Chasney takes us on many musical voyages into the lands o...read more
17. CocoRosie: Noah's Ark
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18. CocoRosie: La Maison de Mon Reve
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19. Nick Drake: Pink Moon
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20. Nick Drake: Bryter Layter
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21. Nick Drake: Five Leaves Left
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22. Nick Drake: Made to Love Magic
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23. Fred Neil: Fred Neil
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24. Joanna Newsom: Ys
This might just be the most ambitious record I’ve heard all year. I could go on in great detail about the metaphorically loaded packaging and the heavily referential lyrical excursions on Joa...read more
25. Elvis Perkins: Ash Wednesday
One of the finest debuts of 2007, Elvis Perkins’ Ash Wednesday is a lovely and haunting record, filled with tender and affectionate songs. It’s a sad record in many ways, as Perkins ...read more
26. CocoRosie: The Adventures of Ghosthorse & Stillborn
The weirdest and most adventurous of Brooklyn’s freak-folkers (and that’s really saying something) take another unexpected step on their third album, incorporating hip-hop beats and rapping on some...read more
27. James Blackshaw: The Cloud of Unknowing
There are so many levels on which to appreciate the music of James Blackshaw. For guitarists, there’s the sheer how-does-he-do-it of his dazzling technique, used to produce three simultaneous...read more
28. Six Organs of Admittance: RTX
This two-disc set (for the price of one) reissues rare material: two splits, a subscription, a previously unreleased track, and a limited edition, ranging from 1998 to 2003. This is Ben Chasny at h...read more
29. M. Ward: Hold Time
Matt Ward is one of those characters who does things in such an understated manner that it’s easy to forget just how jaw-droppingly talented he is. M. Ward’s seventh album, Hold Time, w...read more
30. Bibio: Vignetting the Compost
The means might be electronic but the ends are pure folkie escapism. On his fourth Mush album, Stephen James Wilkinson—the English producer better known as Bibio—reveals himself to be a...read more
31. Connie Converse: How Sad, How Lovely
You gotta love how some things just gather steam on their own and become—well, “hyped” seems the wrong word to apply to this music, such are its humble charms and origins. Connie ...read more
32. Peter Walker: Long Lost Tapes 1970
Wait, STOP! Don’t look at the goofy cover photo of geekly grinning Peter Walker—holding an acoustic in his best smash-me-Belushi pose—until you’ve given me a chance to convi...read more
33. Woods: Songs of Shame
Words will never quite be enough for Woods. Not to suggest this Brooklyn outfit is The. Greatest. Thing. Ever!, just that when I tell you Songs of Shame is a collection of ramshackle floaty folk-ro...read more
34. Bill Callahan: Sometimes I Wish We Were an Eagle
Like his labelmate Will Oldham, Bill Callahan has spent his long career honing, altering, adding to and subtracting from an identity that has acted as a conduit for a now staggering amount of excep...read more
35. Akron/Family: Set 'em Wild, Set 'em Free
Everybody’s favorite band-with-a-slash-in-its-name follows up Love Is Simple with another spectacularly eclectic offering that flits from screaming brass (somewhere between Balkan marching band and...read more
36. Iron and Wine: Around the Well
Iron and Wine’s new two-CD/three-LP set compiles B-sides, rarities, and outtakes from one of the best songwriters and most charismatically intimate performers of the decade. Sam Beam’s soft, ...read more
37. James Blackshaw: The Glass Bead Game
After garnering a reputation for combining the best elements of John Fahey and Sandy Bull in his beautiful, intricate 12-string-guitar playing, English virtuoso James Blackshaw started branching ou...read more
38. Bibio: Ambivalence Avenue
What a year for the UK artist known as Bibio, a.k.a. Stephen James Wilkinson. Not long ago he hovered just under the folktronica radar as a Boards of Canada acolyte. This year he jumped from Mush t...read more
39. Bowerbirds: Upper Air
Sounding every bit like the rural folk outfit from Down South that they are, Bowerbirds make their debut for the well-respected Dead Oceans label with the very likable Upper Air. Phil Moore handles...read more
40. v/a: Wayfaring Strangers: Lonesome Heroes
This is the third release in Numero’s Wayfaring Strangers series of folk compilations, this one focusing on obscure ’70s male American singer-songwriters (though the release dates among the 1...read more
41. The Mountain Goats: The Life of the World to Come
The Mountain Goats’ sixth album on 4AD finds them in trio formation: John Darnielle and Peter Hughes are here joined by *Superchunk*’s Jon Wurster on drums. It’s the most dynamic “full-band” Mounta...read more
42. Devendra Banhart: What Will We Be
With the help of his increasingly close-knit band of buddies (including Megapuss’ Greg Rogove and Little Joy’s Rodrigo Amarante), freak folk icon Devendra Banhart hones and distills all his playful...read more
43. Joanna Newsom: Have One on Me
After 2006’s astonishing concept album Ys, there was some question of how Joanna Newsom could ever gracefully follow it up. But the girl is nothing if not fearless, and rather than easing meekly ba...read more
44. Jack Rose: Luck in the Valley
This is our last earthly transmission from Jack Rose, a master of the guitar who’d been granted access to the instrument’s ancient book of secrets, only to be taken from us — all ...read more
45. Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy & The Cairo Gang: The Wonder Show of the World
Will Oldham’s latest album just snuck into stores (the mysterious announcement of its release came only a month in advance, with very little information being offered following), but despite its in...read more
46. The Tallest Man on Earth: The Wild Hunt
To be honest, the voice will be the dividing line. If Kristian Matsson doesn’t set your teeth on edge with his nasal, Dylanesque vocals, then you might just love The Tallest Man on Earth (who...read more
47. Woods: At Echo Lake
Last year’s Songs of Shame made me a hardcore Woods believer, so At Echo Lake arrives just in time to keep this warm season cruising along in my corner of things. And wow is it sweet — ...read more
48. Phosphorescent: Here's to Taking It Easy
Summer's approaching and we all dream of lying around and doing a whole lot of nothing, but the title of the new Phosphorescent album could give you pause: Making music sound easy is usually pretty...read more
49. Band of Horses: Infinite Arms
The new and third Band of Horses album is being jointly released by an odd trio of indie and major labels, but fans care about just one thing: those harmonies. Infinite Arms has them in spades, sta...read more
50. The Alps: Le Voyage
Style into substance -- that's the magical feat of San Francisco trio the Alps on their gently affecting (and at times subtly unnerving) fourth album, Le Voyage. This instrumental record provides o...read more