I decided that as a means of procastination to studying, I'll listen to all of my music from this decade in chronological order and review each year. This might end in a definitive best of 2000s list, but more likely it will peter out around 2004.

In the year 2000, I listened to very little new music. I think it has a lot to do with I was more occupied with chasing chicks and getting drunk. Also, I wasn't on CMJ yet and probably just didn't know about as many new releases yet. I was still looking for music the old fashion way by going to record stores.

First album to reevaluate - BRMC - S/T.

I loved this album in 00' and I had high hopes for this band. They came out a year before the big "garage rock revival" of 01' that was spearheaded by the Hives, Strokes, and Stripes. That was a good thing because they'd probably would have been unfairly lumped into that convient catch-all category.

9 years hasn't washed away that this album sounds completely borrowed from the JAMC and VU. However, the execution of the fuzzy guitars and a driving rhythm section really elevate the songs out of mere imitation. Simply, these songs sizzle.

'Whatever Happened to Our Rock'n'roll' was an anthem in 00' that seemed so badly needed coming off the heals of the late 90s, and 9 years later it is still fun.

If Casablancas and company mined detached cool, these guys were fully engaged. They want you to know they care. Still like this. In retrospect, BRMC could never recapture the energy and excitement as their debut. 8/10.

Ambitious. I salute you.

I eventually came around on BRMC although I've never heard this one. Will check out, thanks.

x2


I agree about that first BRMC album. Derivative as all hell, but still a fresh enough take to be interesting. The limitations of their sound came to a head on the follow-up, and the roots retooling of Howl was only 50% successful. Their last album seemed to be an admittance of defeat.

btw - BRMC came out in 2001, didn't it?

I actually double checked on AMG because I thought it might be 01' but according to my itunes and amg, it's 00.

Their debut is by far my favorite from them.

Howl has some interesting moments, but I prefer their original sound. Their other two albums aren't very good.

Badly Drawn Boy - Hour of the Bewilderbeast


It seems that the hype machines of this decade didn't get into earnest swing until This Is It. But this album and Badly Drawn Boy seemed everywhere I turned in 00.

In listening to this album again, I can't help but think this is a failed british answer to Beck much like Donovan falied to answer Bob Dylan in the 60s. It doesn't matter how many hooks BDB writes (and there are some good ones), this is just lightweight. The best tracks on this album are 'The Shining" and 'Falling in a River', which both keep the "baroquness" in the baroque folk pop formula to a minimum. Unfortuantely, those songs are in the first 4 songs of this 18 song set. 6/10.

yeah that's about right. i liked it pretty well when it first came out but it has basically zero repeat play appeal

I keep telling myself if Bloor, Jsh, DJ, and Gar can listen to all of the dick picks, this should be easy.

Very true. I think I made it through this once, but I never deleted it because I like those first 4 or 5 songs. Should have been an EP.

i have hundreds of albums from this decade...it would be impossible.

Damien Jurado - Ghost of David



I found this album on the recommendation of a clerk at Baton Rouge's independent record store. I listened to the first song 'Medication" at the store and bought the cd w/o listening to the rest of the album. When I brought it home, I was disappointed by the rest of the record. I was curious how the rest of the record would play to these ears in 09.'

Medication is still a devestatingly personal song about mental illness, and the emotional punch has not diminished.

The rest of the songs are better than I remembered. Desert sounds like a proto-iron and wine song. Johnny Go Riding is reminescent of the more country sides of Neil Young.

I would give this album a higher score if not for too many weaker songs that just bore me to want to study. 7/10

Totally agree about Badly Drawn Boy.



Same here.

i have most of his albums but don't have this one. I like pretty much all of them but love none of them.

I probably average around 60 albums per yer.

JJ72-S/T


They used to play the crap out of this on KLSU, LSU's radio station. The release date says 2000, but the sound is still very much 90s. You could easily describe this as Nirvana meets female caterwaul with a little Cranberries mixed in. I'm sort of surprised that this album has remained on my harddrive all these years. I guess this is the miracle of more megabytes than I'll ever need. If 'Snow" had been released 5 years earlier, it would have been a massive hit on the scale of Bush. 4/10.

Hmm. Not sure I hear the Nirvana in JJ72. And that lead singer is a man.

I agree that this album does not hold up well today. I'm surprised that both of us still have it on the harddrives

Badly Drawn Boy's debut was so outlandishly overhyped, overrated, and over-praised that all subsequent attempts to match it were doomed from the start. Fans of that album would never again hear whatever nebulous junction of age, experience, and climate existed to create that illusion of greatness.

See also: Liz Phair

i don't have that Damien Jurado album but I have several other releases that I like quite a bit.

Pearl Jam - Binaural



This is an immensely personal album for me, and an album I haven't been able to listen to since 2000 until now.

When I first got to LSU, I bonded with another freshman over Pearl Jam. We'd both felt like we were one of the few people still listening to their records. He was a much bigger fan than I was, but it was a common bond that lead to a friendship.

I remember the single 'Nothing As It Seems' had been released, but not the album yet. In the days before everything leaking, the spooky sound of Nothing As It Seems caused a great deal of excitment. I ran into Trey at a bar, and we spoke about our antipation of Binaural and seeing them in summer when they came to New Orleans. It was to be our last conversation. The next week the album came out, but I never got the chance to talk about it with Trey because the following weekend he committed suicide. His long time girlfriend dumped him, and he responded by tracking her down in a mall parking lot and shooting himself in front of her. I listened to Binaural constantly in the wake of this because it offered a connection to something that was gone. I don't think I could have began to offer any thoughts on the quality the album back then because that would be a bit like judging the quality of medicine. After 00' ended, I put Binaural away and I've never been able to listen to it since. Here goes.

One thing is clear is this album slightly departed from the Neil Young classic rock of No Code and Yield, which is evident on the lead track 'Breakerfall.' It's a tighter and darker tune. The lyrics are kind of stupid, but it envokes the energy of Ten. 'Light Years' is still hard to listen to because it is clearly about losing someone who leaves to early, but I think it's an underrated song in the Pearl Jam catalog. It feels like it belongs more on Yield than amongst the other songs here. 'Nothing as It seems' still seems like an unfulfilled promise for a new Pearl Jam reborn in the new century. 'Insignificance' is another strong track that would become a live staple with a classic Pearl Jam guitar riff. 'Rivals' has a weird mellowness that I like, but it seems out of place here. 'Soon Forget' is Vedder and a ukelele, which is enough said. The album closes with 'Parting Ways,' which always seemed erie to me.

This is clearly the work of a band that didn't know where they wanted to go and felt out of place. There's a couple of interesting tracks. A few Pearl Jam classics. But a lot unremarkable meddling tracks. Not sure they ever really found an identity again, and I quit paying attention to their releases. But I can't help think how this album seemed like it was written for my life then. 6/10.

"Nothing As It Seems" is one of my 10 favorite PJ songs, but your story...just wow.

Whisper through a megaphone indeed.

haha, kingfish is dumb.

I salute your efforts at doing this decade review though I would be interested in hearing none of these albums so far.

North Mississippi Allstars - Shake Hands With Shorty


I heard the NMA live before I bought the cd. They were the first band at one of the stages at Jazzfest. For 10:00am, they rocked and were a lot of fun. I bought this cd at blockbuster music when I got back to Baton Rouge.

This record is still a lot of fun. It's really no more than a bunch of middle class white boys singing the blues. However, the the Dickinson brothers know the source material and instead of trying to play it straight, they're trying to have fun with it. Also, I'm a sucker for a slide guitar. If you put a slide guitar on your track, there's a 75% chance I'll like it.

From here, the boys would drift off into Widespread Panic jam band territory. I would see them again live but the energy wasn't the same, and they were not as tight.

7/10