Marnie Stern - “Patterns of a Diamond Ceiling”
Although an incredible song, I’m not sure I could say anything about it that the song doesn’t already say for itself. If you haven’t heard it, it’s essentially a visualisation exercise in which Stern narrates a grand vision while shaping the images with her renowned and inventive guitar playing. “Patterns of a Diamond Ceiling” isn’t exactly meditative - well, for a little while it is - but it does evoke certain visuals more powerfully than I’ve ever experienced from a song before.
Silver Jews - “Pretty Eyes”
Woulda done it in memory of a girl.
Sleigh Bells - “Treats”
Maybe the reason “Treats” sounds so good to me now is because I rarely got to it while I was listening to that album. Treats brings back memories of riding between houses in the evening, the sun not yet set but casting some pretty colours over the bay just down the hill, waiting to get my drink on. Thing is, my hometown crew don’t live that far away and a round trip only took me to “Crown on the Ground”. The eponymous track itself, while sounding charmingly evocative of Love Spit Love’s cover of “How Soon Is Now?”, lacks that personal connection.
Titus Andronicus - “The Battle of Hampton Roads”
A fourteen-minute opus with crescendos in all the right places to make it the perfect closer to Titus Andronicus’s saga-esque The Monitor that I’ve listened to on many train rides, not even attempting to stop myself becoming visibly, viscerally elated when the guitars crash in and begin to build following the contemplative drums as Patrick Stickles chants “Please don’t ever leave.” Too contemporary.
Bruce Springsteen - “Jungleland”
Couldn’t do it justice.
The Thermals - “You Changed My Life”
Arguably woulda done it in memory of a girl, a different one though, but it could’ve been excusable given how well the track functions in the album. Personal Life was really an album-y album, my favorite kind. I’m sure I’m not unique in preferring some narrative thread to unspool over a loose collection of tracks, and even though Personal Life isn’t really a concept album, the progression of tracks covers each step in the timeline of a relationship with devastating precision. This was actually the frontrunner for a while because I think it was a really overlooked album, but ultimately, what with all the Los Campesinos! listening this year, I thought it’d be more interesting to write about something other than girls, a trope I’ve accepted I’ll never escape but from which I don’t mind occasionally vacationing.