Quote Originally Posted by HowardRoark
Scottsdale, hello. Is the caller there?
Ty has been a bit busy...as he prefaced it with he hoped it would be daily. But, because you prompted:

8. Sleeping in the Aviary, Expensive Vomit in a Cheap Motel(Science of Sound)

Expensive Vomit in a Cheap Motel (2008’s most visually vivid album title, to be sure) is a far cry from last year’s, Oh, This Old Thing?, a handful of punk tracks that clock in at under 25 minutes.

Instead, the Madison band churns out a raucous, whiskey-slurred bit of lo-fi folk that’s a big change and an even bigger improvement.

The new material sounds as if lead man Elliott Kozel has been listening to just as much Sebadoh and Neutral Milk Hotel as the Kinks and the Violent Femmes. The result is an unpredictable conglomeration of wry alt-country and some wicked harmonica.

It all makes for a 45 minutes of youthful desperation, intoxicated exuberance and catchy pop. One of the year’s best.

7. The Dutchess and the Duke, She’s the Dutchess, He’s the Duke (Hardly Art)

The beauty of simplicity is gleaming on The Dutchess and The Duke’s debut album, She’s the Dutchess, He’s the Duke. A guy, a girl and a guitar (with the occasional handclap and flute toot, for good measure) make for a most endearing end result: a near-perfect road-record.

Signed to Hardly Art, the duo is unlike most of their counterparts at sister label Sub Pop, shunning grandiose production for an understated, folksy lo-fi soundtrack suited for the dusty trail. Certain albums were born to wander the country (almost everything from Neil Young and Springsteen’s catalogs), and this one certainly qualifies.

Pair it with a windy mountain road (well, as mountainous as AZ gets), as I’ve done, and it only seems natural. The points of reference are numerous – and perhaps hard to believe. She’s the Dutchess, He’s the Duke stands on its own, starched stiff by nothing more, perhaps, than unrepentant honesty. Not cheerfulness, necessarily, but truth, a quality even the most jaded can appreciate.