If you value music with which you can let yourself be rocked through the day in a funky way, then there can only be one album of the week: “Beat Tape II” (Stones Throw) by the Dutch lo-fi R’n’B- King Tim van Berkestijn alias Benny Sings. For the previous album “Music” by the singer, rapper, producer and songwriter, which was only released in April, you could very well lie in your thoughts by the pool and watch the air flicker with narrowed eyes. The way from the fridge to the couch feels like this to new somnambulously lively songs like “Look What We Do” or the grandiose “Beat 100”, which in the best sense sound like they just tumbled out of the beat kit As if the crowd parted in the club when you hit the dance floor with a new drink. Well, with narrowed eyes at least.
Otherwise the list-season started, the time of the pop year, when lists of the albums and songs of the year are published everywhere. Well respected and, as always, early on with its 20 songs of the year is the British one Guardian. It is noticeable this year that there is not a single song by a male pop artist in the top ten. “I Do This All The Time” by British singer and avant-garde pop songwriter Rebecca Lucy Taylor alias is chosen as song of the year Self Esteem. Less a song than a haunting self-care and don’t-let-you-get-down monologue about beats including a gospel-like chorus: “Look up / Lean back / Be strong!” Keep your head up, lean back, be strong. No question about music as the solution at the moment. At least as up-to-date, but a lot more swing and wit, “Chaise Longue” by the British indie rock trio took second place Wet leg. You never heard this verse of the year: “On the chaise longue / on the chaise longue / on the chaise longue / All day long / on the chaise longue”. The third place goes to Guardian the passable, but actually not so flashy, slightly avant-garde scrawled mainstream pop song “Bunny Is A Rider” by the American singer and songwriter Caroline Polachek, which in turn is the case with the most important online music medium Pitchfork lands right at the front. Except for “Bunny Is A Rider”, the two most watched lists do not overlap this year, which is no wonder in a pop year that lacked the really sensational strokes of genius. But that nowhere Lordes Hit “Solar Power” shows up at the front, then it’s amazing.
The tireless one Neil Young has his old band again for his 41st studio album “Barn” (Reprise / Warner) Crazy Horse activated. It is said to have been recorded under a full moon this summer in a restored 19th-century barn in the Rocky Mountains. The cover shows a strangely oversized log cabin in front of a sunset that Bob Ross would not have painted more cheesy. Obviously, the old folk rockists should be warm to the heart before they have even heard a note. Full moon! Rocky Mountains! 19th century! 19th century? What does folk rock of the 1970s actually have to do with the 19th century? It doesn’t matter, the great art of folk rock has always been to invent music from a past that didn’t even exist. Fortunately, Neil Young’s eternally thin voice and the sheer dragging, scratchy force of his arrangements have saved each of his songs from kitsch. In other words: On “Barn”, Neil Young is once again not particularly inspired on an exceptionally high level.
The bad word is elevator music. But pop music as a soundtrack for everyday errands and soul massages of all kinds – that’s actually a noble purpose. Sometimes it is imperative to numb your brain a little with a subtle synth chirping. The main thing is not to listen too closely. But of course there is also exactly the opposite in pop: music that only ceases to bother you when you listen to it like a radio play made up of sounds. The American avant-garde pop and post-rock guitarist Jeff Parker, former guitarist of the acclaimed post-rock band Tortoise, makes music like this on his new album “Forfolks” (International Anthem) – all alone with an undistorted semi-acoustic electric guitar. It’s a completely different calm that can be found when you don’t just want to be a stowaway on your eardrum for a change.
And finally the question of the week: Just in time for Christmas time, which two songs are at the top of the German single charts? Exactly, “All I Want For Christmas Is You” by Mariah Carey and “Last Christmas” by Wham!. You don’t really know whether you should feel comfort or have a panic attack because of it. You might not go wrong emotionally these days with a mixture of the two. Advent, Advent!