Critics of ranked lists like this see it as a bug that they’re entirely subjective and somewhat arbitrary. I see it as a feature. There’s not really any difference between #12 and #13. Frankly, there’s not all that much difference between #1 and #25. But my feeling has always been, everyone gets that. No one actually thinks you can mathematically rank works of art. But the trying offers a wonderful opportunity for music nerds to look back at the best of the year, and for the sort of vigorous debate on which such nerddom rests.

This year’s list was a blast, full of internal debates and the full range of emotions: joy at relistening to my favorite albums and a little heartache at cutting some great stuff (I can only write so many blurbs). I’m sure many people reading this live in Vermont, but if you don’t, forget that detail and just think of it as a year-end list that looks very different from every other year-end list you’ve seen (Spoiler: Lana Del Rey isn’t at the top of this one). There’s a lot of great music to discover. Hopefully this entirely-subjective-and-somewhat-arbitrary format offers a way in for outsiders, and an opportunity for debate for insiders who already know enough to be outraged by my selections.

25. Expected Guest – Upon Arrival

I first stumbled upon Logan Patnaude’s music a couple years ago with a beautiful EP released under the name Dawnlander. It alternated vocal sections with long stretches of ambient guitar noise. With his new project Expected Guest, Patnaude ditches the former and goes all in on the latter. It’s also entirely improvised – but don’t confuse that for boring or uninspired. Upon Arrival meanders in the best way, the guitar passages layered with drones and field recordings to create a small sonic world.

24. The Dubois – Poops and Boobs RPM #10

An album titled Poops and Boobs does not inspire much confidence. But those expecting an endless stream of potty humor might be surprised. Poops and Boobs is sung by a new parent. And when there’s a newborn in the house, poops and boobs are a simple fact of life. So sure, there’s still potty humor, but it’s informed potty humor, in the service of a funny and irreverent look at the indignities of parenting. This scattershot collection doesn’t entirely hold up as an album; Daniel Johnston is a cited influence, which tells you all you need to know (“Baby Noises and Guitar” is exactly that). But some pretty catchy songs lie buried beneath zany sound effects and noise. Just don’t expect much sentimentality. “Don’t Cry, Little Baby,” for instance, sounds like a heartwarming message until you get to the next line: “You’re bugging the shit out of us.”

23. Katie Trautz – Passage

Over the past decade, violinist Katie Trautz has recorded ten albums, both solo and with other bands. But none contained her own songwriting. She spent that time honing a body of work, and finally released some of it this year. The compositions on Passage hardly sound like the work of a novice. The title track, written in the three grief-stricken weeks between her mother’s death and giving birth herself, blooms with imagery of healing and perseverance. “We Don’t Ask” builds from a banjo-plucked ballad to a life-affirming horn reverie. “Same Old Town,” meanwhile, reads like a scene in a one-act play. One surprise on the album, given her past experience: There’s little violin. She’s been doing that for a decade. Time to try something new.

22. 99 Neighbors – Television

A few months ago, Warner Records and Chance the Rapper’s manager announced they’d signed hop-hop collective 99 Neighbors. A day later, the group released its first song on the new label via Zane Lowe’s Beats 1 radio show. So perhaps this hip-hop collective is already moving beyond the album they released at the top of the year. The follow-up will no doubt boast bigger production and splashier features. But on Television, they prove they can do it all themselves.

21. Eric George – Song of Love

I’ve compared singer-songwriter Eric George to Woody Guthrie more than once. Woody’s would not be the first name that comes to mind on this EP though. On Song of Love, the folkie radically switches genres, to gritty garage-punk. It sounds like an awkward fit on paper, but George wears the new sound well. A raucous band allows him to break out of the Dust-Bowl-balladeer mode for a high-energy set that delivers his trademark witty writing in a very different sonic context.

20. Princess Nostalgia – Thank Heavens 4 Opposable Thumbs

Since her last album two years ago, Lili Traviato’s been dropping a steady stream of polished-perfect singles that have generated glowing attention in her new hometown of Burlington, Vermont. Not bad for a college student. She rounds up some of those loosies and adds a bunch more on the just-released Thank Heavens 4 Opposable Thumbs. Ever restless, she even tweaked some of those earlier singles with new arrangements and effects. One thing hasn’t changed: She does it all herself, from the writing to production to the impressive artwork.

19. Spencer Lewis – Riffs on a Broad Reach

Across 27 or so albums (!), Vermont contemporary composer Spencer Lewis sometimes gets tagged as new age music. You wouldn’t know it from his latest though. Though instrumental, Riffs on a Broad Reach is more folk-rock than anything (Lewis rechristens the genre “folkthatrocks”). It makes for beautiful background music, but offers enough riffs, melodies, and intricate full-band performances to grab ahold of for more active listening too.

18. The Bubs – Golden Thread

Every song on The Bubs’ Golden Thread has a loud sing-along hook. They’re usually wordless, and ideally accompanied by fist-pumping. Live, this enormous collective has a half dozen singers strictly on “holler-along” duty (they jump a lot too). That raucous energy never lets up on this manic blast of garage-punk power. Every song sounds like it should end with an instrument being smashed.

17. Sad Turtle – This Day in Age

The song titles on Sad Turtle’s 2016 debut were all Seinfeld references (“The Marble Rye,” “Feats Of Strength,” etc). But the songs weren’t explicitly about Seinfeld. They weren’t explicitly about anything, in fact – that’s what happens when you’re an entirely instrumental band. But don’t think ambient or background music when I say “instrumental.” Even without words, Sad Turtle demands attention on their followup. Their freewheeling but intricate constructions pull from those hyphenated rock genres like math- and post-.

16. Omega Jade – Wounded Healer

“This ain’t no gangster shit,” Omega Jade rhymes on a song titled “G That I Am” (she soon clarifies that “G” stands for Goddess: “That tops gangster, fam.”) You’d be forgiven for thinking it is after a cursory listen to the rapper’s debut Wounded Healer. But the album’s many disses and lyrical barbs are directed less at other rappers than at no-good men in her life and, above all, at herself. Coming from a background in standup comedy, she brings a savage wit to songs she’s been workshopping for several years. But, like many standups, the humor comes in the service of getting real – about parenting, about her own flaws and insecurities, and about trying to be better today than she was yesterday. She can be funny, but she’s dead serious.

15. Erin Cassels-Brown – Dreamin’ on Overdrive

After an earlier EP in a folkier vein, Dreamin’ on Overdrive presents a proper band album of full-throated roots-rock -emphasis on the rock. From barrelhouse piano on “No Good Man” to the shred-your-voice chorus of “Classic Records,” Cassels-Brown channels various facets of The Band, putting his quiet folkie side square in the rearview.

14. Sabrina Comellas – Sabrina

The Vermont-via-Long Island songwriter delivered a stunning set on her assured debut, tackling subjects from Shakespeare (“Romeo”) to protest (“What the World Looks Like”). Her vocals take center stage – she was recently nominated for Best Vocalist by her hometown paper, and deservedly so – but listen close to catch her guitar work, inventive licks and finger-picks that gently nudge the songs forward.

13. Reed Foehl – Lucky Enough

Songwriting veteran Reed Foehl has had a couple years of geographic instability. After living in Colorado for almost two decades, he planned a big move to Nashville in 2017, to capitalize on new opportunities opening up after country icon Lee Ann Womack recorded a song of his. On his drive down, though, his mother called. She had lymphoma, and needed him at home in Massachusetts. He turned the car around, and spent the next year and half there caring for her. After she passed, he headed to Austin to record the songs he’d written during that time, then moved to a barn in the tiny town of Pownal, Vermont. It’s a stark journey, reflected in the songs on his moving fifth album Lucky Enough, recorded with roots favorites Band of Heathens as his backing band.

12. Matthew Mercury – Matthew Mercury

You can trace the entire lineage of post-punk through Matthew Mercury’s self-titled debut album. The dark and thundering “Contessa” sounds like Joy Division or The Cure, while the peppier “Dark City” brings in elements of Duran Duran. Frontman Ezra Oklan kept the production all analog to emulate those ’80s touchstones. The results don’t come off as an exercise in nostalgia, though, as much as a modern homage. Oklan’s longtime collaborator Matthew Dublin writes the lyrics but doesn’t perform with the band – he’s the Bernie Taupin to Oklan’s Elton John. Dublin’s enigmatic lyrics can be hard to pin down, but convey a slightly wry angst (very post-punk!).

11. Blackmer – Rinse. Repeat.

Singer-songwriter Sam DuPont has appeared here before in his Everlys-channeling folk duo The DuPont Brothers. Well, the DuPont Brothers are no more, and while their new indie-rock band SoundBrother gets underway, they’ve been working on solo projects. Zack DuPont’s new EP was a highlight of last year, and his brother followed it up with the beautiful Rinse.Repeat, released under Sam’s middle name Blackmer.

10. Miriam Bernardo – Songs from the Well

Miriam Bernardo’s debut record took her five years. It was worth the wait. A close collaboration with producer friend Peg Tassey – her name’s not on the cover, but she’s otherwise everywhere here – the album sees Bernardo pulling songs from a long list of friends and bandmates. Most notable among them is perhaps recent Tony-winner Anais Mitchell, who said Bernardo “seems to sing from a deep place in her body, [like] there’s a pure, direct line between her voice and spirit.” Her voice is certainly the star, and couldn’t have a better musical bed on which to lie, with inventive arrangements and production that sit back where necessary, but burst forth with swooning accordion (“Just One Taste”) or jittery percussion (“Contraption”) when the moment calls for more.

9. Henry Jamison – Gloria Duplex

Describing Henry Jamison’s album makes it sound like a term paper, well-intentioned but tedious. The press release describes it as “a musical journey towards understanding the role of straight, white, middle class American men in – and their larger responsibility in undoing the deep-seated patriarchal aspects of – modern-day society.” And it is that, to be sure. But Jamison’s finesse with a melody and Thomas Bartlett’s quirky productions make the straight talk stick. Far from a lecture, Jamison points the finger inward first, interrogating his own actions and impulses.

8. Strangled Darlings – American Pageant

The sounds that Strangled Darlings make seem like cousins to many artists, siblings to few. For instance, there’s a good bit of Tom Waits in their unruly arrangements, but their voices are far prettier. Amanda Palmer comes to mind too, but this duo veer more towards folk than cabaret. The closest I’ve come up with is Tim Fite – and that’s a useless comparison, because no one knows who he is. They have one song about Harvey Weinstein, and another about a supporting character on Justified. Truly, this strange brew is all their own.

7. Lissa Schneckenburger – Thunder in My Arms

The second in an extremely micro trend this year: Traditional violinists recording their own compositions with minimal violin (see Katie Trautz above). And not compositions that sound like old reels and jigs either, but contemporary folk-rock songs that sound like the 21st century, not the 17th. In Schneckenburger’s case, she brings in horns and strings and other vocalists to channel jazz-tinged pop singers like Norah Jones (“I Need Us Together”) and Regina Spektor (“I’ll Stick Around”). A concept album in a loose sense, Thunder in My Arms centers around parenting. “In my attempts to be a better parent, I found plenty of invaluable books and workshops that got that point across, but no songs,” she writes. “I set out to write songs that would resonate with other parents like myself. Songs about loneliness, exhaustion, beauty, abandonment, love, loss, and above all, hope.”

6. boys cruise – Jerry

Like early Best Coast or Ty Segall, boys cruise packs a lot of pop smarts in a sloppy package. Their debut album sounds like Motown songs as performed by one of those one-hit ’60s garage bands on Nuggets. Also like Motown songs, the sonics can conceal some unexpectedly moving lyrics. Silly party-rock energy masks minimalist bummer poetry. Ask them about it, though, and the mischief returns. Turns out the whole thing was inspired by their dead rat Jerry.

5. Ernest – I’m Gonna Do It (Anyway)

Mark Daly almost called his debut solo record Pop Song Playbook. That’s more or less what it is. As a writing exercise, he studied pop songs, figuring out the sonic tricks major chart-toppers employ. Then, with tongue only partly in cheek, he brought them to his own songs. It’s hard to believe he needed the help – his recently-resurrected band Madaila featured some serious pop hooks without the homework. But it pays off on this sprawling double album, an upbeat electronic first half followed by a quieter acoustic second half. No matter the sound, his pop instincts remain sharp. The next curious songwriter should just study him.

4. Cricket Blue – Serotinalia

Few bands entered 2019 with as much ambition as Cricket Blue. And this is, bear in mind, an acoustic-guitar folk duo – seemingly the simplest of setups. But they don’t do simple. Every line on this mesmerizing record was honed to perfection over months or years, as Laura Heaberlin and Taylor Smith craft short stories in miniature (or not so miniature, in the case of 12-minute epic “Corn King”). That level of attention to craft could easily lead less careful players to an overstuffed mess, but part of their skill comes in paring back. Though many songs feature complex orchestral arrangements, they prove just as impressive on a simple folk song like “Little Grays.”

3. Tom Pearo – I Am a Mountain

Though guitarist Tom Pearo’s album has no lyrics, I Am a Mountain tell a very specific story. Think a coming-of-age road journey as told by J.R.R. Tolkien. The phrase “39-minute instrumental guitar piece” will send many running for the exits without a little hand-holding, so Pearo offered an exhaustive guide to the “plot” of his album. Like in any movie, there’s a cast, in this case made up of the instruments (very Peter and the Wolf). The Earth is portrayed by the bass, The Wind by the strings, The Rock by the drums, and The Path by Pearo’s guitar. The plot is too intricate to summarize here, but you’ll hear it in the music – wandering, but never aimless.

2. Kristina Stykos – River of Light

Kristina Stykos’ songs of the earth and of freedom remind me of Buffy Sainte-Marie. Her voice, on the other hand, sounds almost the opposite of Buffy’s tremolo belting. In 2017, the veteran singer, songwriter, and producer lost her voice due to a neurological disorder. It never fully came back. So Stykos, who’s been singing since the 1970s, had to adjust. In some ways, with a weaker voice, her singing has never been stronger. Like Leonard Cohen, she compensates for limited range with a powerful understated delivery, almost spoken word at times. Frank and passionate, her voice draws you in and her songs keep you there. Far from the sound of a singer struggling to overcome a handicap, River of Light ultimately celebrates life and living. In both the music and the lyrics, it chronicles fighting through tough times with grit and determination and never, ever giving up.

1. Hallowell – Hallowell

Joseph Pensak, the man behind Hallowell, may be a a Presbyterian pastor singing spiritual songs, but his music wouldn’t fit on any modern Christian rock playlist. The obvious comparison point is Sufjan Stevens, both for the light religious touch and the baroque instrumentation (20 musicians deep on this album with strings and horns and more). The two also share a mentor: the leader of the adventurous and experimental band Danielson, who years ago released Stevens’ seminal Seven Swans album. Just as Stevens has alternated his own songwriting output with many Christmas albums, Pensak mixes his own compositions with new arrangements of centuries-old hymns, like “Pass Me Not, O Gentle Savior” – practically a Lumineers song in Pensak’s reimagining.

Now check out the Best Vermont EPs and Best Vermont Songs of 2019!

The post The Best Vermont Albums of 2019 appeared first on County Tracks.

This Top 40 looks nothing like the actual Top 40. None of these songs charted, and I don’t think any of them aspired to. That is no knock against them, which probably goes without saying here – anyone reading music blogs knows that much. The adjectives “great” and “popular” occasionally attach themselves to the same track, but not often enough.

So just think of this as an alternate history of 2019 singles. It has no horses, and no town roads. It doesn’t teach love, patience, or pain, and isn’t 100% that anything. It also, as the headline says, only includes artists from one rather small state. But this wildly subjective, somewhat arbitrary survey of the past 12 months should serve as a small introduction to the wealth of talent in one community on the geographic fringe. There was a lot of wonderful music being made this year, much of it far from the big cities, or the Billboard charts. Duh.

40. Amelia Devoid ft. Bleach Day – Afraid to Touch Her

Clouds dominate the single cover, and it’s hard to think of a more fitting image. This dreamy reverie seems the perfect soundtrack to staring into the sky and getting lost in your own thoughts. The electronic musician’s last album tackled some heavy themes (for one: genocide), but the new single seems light as a breeze.

39. Allison Fay Brown – Summit

Like a good short-story writer, Brown offers just enough narrative details to intrigue while leaving plenty of gaps to fill in yourself. For instance…what’s in that box on the doorstep??

38. Zak Kline – I Will

When I first stumbled across Vermont singer/songwriter/producer Zak Kline’s personal-empowerment single “I Will,” his gorgeous falsetto and intricate production immediately grabbed my attention. Like a Bon Iver song, it managed to sound intimate even buttressed by string sections, backing choirs, and huge crescendoing choruses. Compared to the earlier material I found on his Bandcamp, “I Will” leapt out. It seemed to indicate a bold new direction – except he’s already moved on to other sounds. Hopefully he’ll revisit this style, as he seems to still have a lot to offer.

37. Abby Sherman – Hand with the Devil

If the only Satan-themed violin song you’ve heard is “The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” Abby Sherman’s “Hand with the Devil” might throw you for a loop. Rather than rollicking fiddlin’, Abby Sherman and violinist Katie Trautz – who we’ll hear more from in a second – create something truly spooky, like the sort of Gillian Welch track you don’t play in the dark.

36. Ionee – We Are More Than I

Electronic music producer and singer Ionee’s latest music video features a lot of great visuals, but the first truly important shot is subtle: A map of the world with a lot of little dots coming out of Africa and heading to the Americas. As anyone who explored the New York Times’ 1619 Project knows, this year marked the 400th since the beginning of slavery in America. The Times took a sober look at this history in a magazine supplement and podcast. Ionne, aka. Maurice Lajuane Harris, takes a very different tack on the same sad history, creating a haunting house track and a mesmerizing animated video.

35. Katie Trautz – Ghosts

Katie Trautz uses a little to say a lot. Each verse of “Ghosts” is only three lines of plain-spoken language (rare is the word that hits two syllables). But it paints an evocative portrait of a couple trying to find tranquility away from some unspoken darkness. Similarly understated, the music creates a tasteful Americana bed of slide guitar and brushed drums on which the lyrics can lie.

34. Blackmer – Flash Flood

The idea of “digital detox” has grown a lot of currency in the last few years. The New York Times seems to run an article a week about the importance of unplugging (and I always see them on my phone… hmm, they may have a point). “Digital detox” is a dry phrase, though. Sam Dupont brings more beauty to the concept on the meditative “Flash Flood.” The narrator yearns to escape to Arizona’s open skies, away from the news, away from all the LED displays. It’s certainly a relatable feeling, and rarely expressed so poetically.

33. Chazzy Lake – Not Afraid of Your Crying Eyes

After post-punk band Bison broke up, Charlie Hill looked forward – while looking much further back. A far cry from post-punk, his single “Not Afraid Of Your Crying Eyes” channels Roy Orbison – and not just with a key word in the title. Though Hill doesn’t have Roy’s deep voice (who does?), the song’s jangly sound and soaring melody line recalls the blends of country and pop that Orbison was stirring up at the dawn of the rock era. But, despite echoes of the ’50s, “Not Afraid Of Your Crying Eyes” may actually be less retro than his post-punk band was. Hill veers well clear of any nostalgic trappings by melding these old influences with more recently-minted sounds like bedroom pop and chillwave.

32. Danny & The Parts – Misdirected Allocations

I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what to write about this song beyond “it’s really good.” Then, after listening to it a few times in a row yesterday in search of inspiration, I found it got stuck in my head for the next 24 hours (and counting). Maybe that’s all the recommendation it needs. Listen at your own risk.

31. The Grackles – Glitter

Despite the bird’s name, the common grackle seems a relatively uncommon inspiration for a band name. But now there are at least two. There’s Canadian duo Common Grackle, who a few years ago released the hilarious country ballad “[I Don’t Want to Die] At the Grindcore Show.” And now there’s another duo, with a similar name but a very different style. Duffy Gardner and Ariel Zevon (Warren’s daughter) released their debut album earlier this year, the high point of which is this poignant piano duet.

30. Hallowell – Another World

Hallowell’s Joseph Pensak came early to the year’s Mister Rogers-appreciation trend. He wrote “Another World” as a tribute to both his childhood hero and a second figure from the television show: François Clemmons, who played the neighborhood policeman. Pensak incorporated samples of the pair’s dialogue from the show into this inspirational pop croon. Then he did one better, getting Clemmons himself to sing on the song.

29. The Pyros – Coffee

The Pyros cite 1950s rockabilly and Pulp Fiction as inspirations. The first you can hear in their single “Coffee,” and the second you can see in its slightly crazed retro video (one of three on their “video EP” Christian Mingle). Like a Sun Records artist trying to make a big first impression on one side of a 45, they blast through the track in under 90 seconds, sending you right to YouTube’s replay button.

28. Henry Jamison – True North

In a recent interview with Henry Jamison, the journalist compared narrative songs like “True North” to Mark Kozelek. Jamison gently pushed back – because who wants to be compared to Mark Kozelek in 2019? But if you jump back a decade in Sun Kil Moon’s discography – when his songs still had melodies, and his persona wasn’t full troll – the similarity makes sense. A beautiful retelling of a pedestrian experience that took on emotional significance, “True North” recounts Jamison driving down the great highway, talking to his girlfriend on the phone and mulling over past mistakes.

27. Omega Jade – Tricks Of The Trade (Petty With A Purpose)

“I write these verses to break generational curses,” rapper Omega Jade rhymes on “Tricks Of The Trade (Petty With A Purpose),” the final track on her debut album. She passes on some hard-earned business lessons to her kids: “Follow your heart but take your brain with you / Not every damn friend is meant to work with you.” She spits proverbial fire going after fake friends and slacker collaborators, grinding her way to the top.

26. Bishop LaVey – The Myth Has Broken

Bishop LaVey (aka. Kane Sweeney) describes his music as “doom-folk,” a genre label that’s pretty dead on. Over spare and echoing guitar, he hollers a deep guttural roar, bringing heavy goth undertones even when the instrumentation reads as Americana. And what heavier topic for a heavy sound than ancient mythology. Specifically: how the Judeo-Christian belief system effectively murdered the old gods.

25. Michael Roberts – Jolene

No, this ain’t Dolly begging Jolene not to take her man. In Michael Roberts’ version, some other man already took Jolene. Quite a while ago, from the sound of it. This regret-filled winter lament gets lifted by a perky horn section in a high point of Roberts’ overall excellent debut solo album.

24. SoundBrother – Plastic Baby

The formerly-known-as DuPont Brothers become the newly-rechristened SoundBrother exactly 52 seconds into their debut single. When they first announced the name change in 2017, Sam and Zack DuPont billed it as a move to a new genre, from folk to indie rock. For the first almost-a-minute into “Plastic Baby,” it’s hard to hear the difference. Then pummeling drums come in, with echoing guitar on their heels. You can see why a new sound needed a new name.

23. Strangled Darlings – Buckets of Sand

Jess Anderly and George Veech spent three years on the road living in an RV before recording their new album, and you can hear those travels in “Buckets of Sand.” To be honest, I’m surprised more of those years weren’t spent in New Orleans. That’s the location I hear most on this – less the city’s famed jazz side, but its weirder Americana scene that birthed Hurray for the Riff Raff and Benjamin Booker. The song boasts a ramshackle DIY feel, with perfectly loose harmonies and an easygoing attitude.

22. Madaila – Clandestine Magic

When Vermont’s dance-pop breakouts Madaila announced an indefinite hiatus last year, they had the better part of a new record in the can. I figured we’d never hear the rest, but, as indefinite hiatuses so often do, it finally came to an end. They haven’t lost a step in their new-wave catchiness, and frontman Mark Daly’s falsetto remains as soaring as ever.

21. Kristina Stykos – State Line Diner

Using a beaten-up Chevy as a metaphor for an aging narrator’s resilience, “State Line Diner” would prove compelling no matter who sang it (in fact, someone like Emmylou Harris should cover it). But Kristina Stykos’ sing-speaking delivery lends a weight to lines like “The day I surrender and lay my chassis down / and empty my compartments, and crumble to the ground / I’ll still be full of living, ‘cause I ain’t done yet.”

20. A2VT – Wave Your Flag

Refugee pop group A2VT released one of last year’s best singles with “Faas Waa.” The Burlington-based Said Bulle and George Mnyonge originally hail from Somalia and Tanzania, respectively, and their story infuses their music. Their follow-up single “Wave Your Flag” keeps the energy high, mixing languages over a colorful video. They’ve also added more members from Vermont’s refugee community: guest singer Meax (Tanzania/Burundi) and dancers Mr. Oli (Tanzania/Congo) and Fantome J (Nigeria).

19. Princess Nostalgia – The Talking Drug

Lilian Traviato’s “The Talking Drug” incorporates shades of Sade or SZA, arty R&B with some Nile Rodgers-esque funk guitar (by frequent collaborator Joe Leytrick). And, as with all her singles, it comes with an intriguing piece of visual art the college student does herself.

18. Mal Maïz – Pizuica

Maïz Vargas Sandoval, frontman for cumbia band Mal Maïz, says the band’s new song was inspired by the Costa Rican folk take of Pizuica, the god of the underworld. Despite the scary-sounding name, a devil like Pizuica was considered a good spirit who helped scare off invaders, oppressors, and conquistadors. All of that is vibrantly depicted in the music video (slightly NSFW, though there’s a lot of body paint).

17. Lean Tee – Expected

That terrific EP cover art (painted by Drew Parkinson) perfectly encapsulates the vibe of this melancholy song. The music meanders along, pleasant but slightly unsettled, for a couple minutes until an unexpected drum pattern kicks in.

16. Couchsleepers – In My Head

The band formerly known as The Giant Peach made both of our best of 2018 lists with a sprawling Talking Heads-inspired pop music. They’ve since changed their name, but show a similar ambition under the new moniker Couchsleepers. They’ve stripped down their sound a bit on their first new song – though stripped-down for them means one horn instead of a half dozen.

15. Reed Foehl – If It Rains

Singer-songwriter Reed Foehl teamed up with roots mainstays Band of Heathens for his new album, and the pairing works wonders. He brings the powerful and catchy songs, and they help bring a rich tapestry of sound, with just-so touches of organ and slide guitar blending together so well it can be hard to identify the individual instruments. Nowhere do both artists hit harder than on “If It Rains,” which sounds like early Wilco or the sort of lush Americana record Dan Auerbach produces down in Nashville.

14. boys cruise – A Stupid Song for Stupid Me

“A Stupid Song for Stupid Me” is every bit as self-loathing as the title implies. But, to me at least, it reads as the sort of cathartic self-pity that can be therapeutic. Just a guy wallowing in despondency for a bit, knowing there’s time to pick himself back up tomorrow. The vocals follows the lyrics; every line is basically an agonized moan. Until it amps up to an equally agonized holler, and the band explodes behind him. Bet he started to feel better after this dose of primal screaming.

13. Cricket Blue – Corn King

Looking at the track list for folk duo Cricket Blue’s debut album Serotinalia, one song leapt out: “Corn King.” It’s not the title as much as the run time: 11 minutes and 57 seconds. On a folk album, one imagines a song this long must be an epic ballad comprising dozens of verses, their “Desolation Row” perhaps. The reality is much stranger. Though quiet and acoustic in its presentation, the song’s structure leans more progressive-rock than folk. Add drums and a fretless bass solo and “Corn King” could be a Rush song. The duo bring a dream-logic approach to lyrics that wind as quixotically as the music, retelling an old myth of a ritual sacrifice.

12. Francesca Blanchard – Baby

“Baby” is not a song title that implies much backstory, but the simple name masks some complicated feelings. She wrote it after returning from five months in Ecuador hiking and teaching guitar. A relationship that started shortly before she left had fizzled in the meantime, and her return precipitated what she termed a “quarter-life crisis.” “Baby” also continues Blanchard’s transition from folk to a sound closer to indie-R&B, and has earned her some of the biggest acclaim of her career, including praise from NPR, which called it a track for “when you’re crying in paradise” (I couldn’t tell you what that means, but still think it sounds about right). 

11. Eastern Mountain Time – Different Tomorrow Night

All those artists supposedly “saving” country music often do so by bringing in non-country elements, from Sturgill Simpson’s psychedelia to Kacey Musgraves’ disco flair. But on new single “Different Tomorrow Night,” Eastern Mountain Time saves country music by playing the genre right down the middle. A cry-in-your-beer weeper that George Jones could have sunk his teeth into, “Different Tomorrow Night” chronicles songwriter Sean Hood’s breakup over appropriately mournful harmonica and slide guitar.

10. Lissa Schneckenburger – I’ll Stick Around

I don’t know whether Regina Spektor was a conscious influence “I’ll Stick Around,” but she’s the obvious point of comparison. The similar lilting stutters on certain lines (“He hides in my daughter’s smi-i-i-i, i-i-iiiile”) comes off so beautifully you wonder why more singers don’t do it. Just swap out Spektor’s piano for Schneckenburger’s violin.

9. Glorious Leader – Sweet Louisa

“Sweet Louisa” sounds like Kishi Bashi. I’d like to add another artist to that list for readers for whom a Kishi Bashi comparison means nothing, but no one else comes close (just Google him once you finish this list). I used to think Bashi’s featherlight plucked-violin pop was singular, but now there’s one more artist on this road less traveled. Kyle Woolard, who records as Glorious Leader, nails the soaring vocal leaps, xylophone choruses, and all the other accoutrement. In lesser hands, this would seem insufferably twee. In his, it works wonders.

8. Clever Girls – Remember Pluto

Emotions run high and guitars get turbulent in Clever Girls’ “Remember Pluto,” but the volume knob never turns above a 6. Imagine if Mazzy Star covered Nirvana, or if some sound engineer turned the vocals up and guitars down on My Bloody Valentine.

7. Fever Dolls – Adeline

Never short on ideas, Fever Dolls pack a lot into under three minutes. In this case, an entire piece of musical theatre written in miniature, plotted around a husband and wife both in love with the same woman. “[Singer Renn Mulloy] and I spent years playing in different bands with people that wanted to make Radiohead’s Kid A,” songwriter Evan Allis said, “while we were trying to make Disney’s The Kid.” Yeah, they give good quotes too. The madcap video stays true to that cinematic vision. The rest of the band serves as Mulloy’s backup chorus, channeling musical-theatre tropes from Grease white tees to West Side Story finger-snapping over a country-cabaret singalong.

6. Dino Bravo – Pop Music

“All the songs are about addiction, the ocean, My Morning Jacket, party rocking, and my wife,” Dino Bravo singer Matthew Stephen Perry said about his writing contributions to Dino Bravo’s debut album. You can hear a bit of all that on “Pop Music.” Party rocking and My Morning Jacket come through loud and clear in the roaring music. The others pop up in the lyrics. Just one exception: in this song, he goes home alone.

5. Miriam Bernardo – I Got a Well

Singer Miriam Bernardo’s debut album has been a long time coming. In her many years performing around Vermont, she’s connected with many of the local folk musicians, most notably recent Tony-winner Anaïs Mitchell. Mitchell even contributed a song to open Bernardo’s album, the beautiful “I Got a Well.” When they one day stage the Hadestown revival, this could fit right in.

4. Ernest – Wish I Knew

Off the 22 songs on Mark Daly’s sprawling double album I’m Gonna Do It (Anyway), probably half were in contention for this list. He divided the set into electropop and Americana halves, and proves equally adept at both genres. From the former half, “Wish I Knew” doesn’t bounce as much as some of its competitors, but the catchy ballad (is “catchy ballad” a contradiction? Not in Mark Daly’s hands) showcases the inventive production touches and beautifully layered vocals.

3. Erin Cassels-Brown – Classic Records

Few street musicians boast songs a club crowd could pump its fists to, but former acoustic busker Erin Cassels-Brown amps the volume way up on the hard-rocking “Classic Records.” His tight backing band channels a tight ’70s rock combo (speaking of classic records), injecting energy and muscle as he pushes his vocal chords on the yell-along chorus.

2. Sabrina Comellas – Romeo

Despite Sabrina Comellas’ background in Shakespeare (she graduated from Emerson in 2017 with a theater degree), her Romeo and Juliet homage doesn’t center on either character. She narrates from the point of view of an invented third party looking to the doomed duo for answers. The unnamed protagonist, a hopeless romantic removed from the Elizabethan trappings, offers a relatable way into the narrative and avoids the song becoming a sonic CliffsNotes. Even if you know nothing about Shakespeare, the gorgeous melody and Comellas’ big belting-to-the-Globe-balconies voice will draw you in.

1. Matthew Mercury – Contessa

“I am the worst singer in the band,” Matthew Mercury’s Ezra Oklan said. He is, as you may have guessed by my mentioning it, the band’s singer. And, as you might have also guessed by this song’s placement here, he undersells himself. Though perhaps his low croon wouldn’t work in other genres, it perfectly fits this band’s post-punk rumbles. A high point of the band’s self-titled debut, “Contessa” piles killer vocal hooks and inscrutable lyrics atop pounding drums and an insistent bass line.

Now check out the Best Vermont Albums and Best Vermont EPs of 2019!

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The opening notes of Erin Cassels-Brown’s new album signal his Dylan-goes-electric moment.

A former street busker, Cassels-Brown has spent the last few years building a reputation around his Burlington, Vermont home as a folk singer and guitar-strummer around town. But on Dreamin’ on Overdrive, he joins the long lineage of former folkies who plugged in and amped up. While it’s hard to imagine Pete Seeger swinging an axe to cut the cable, it shows Cassels-Brown deliberately shaking off his local acoustic-troubadour reputation, and opening himself up to a broader national audience.

Opening track “Classic Records” lays down the gauntlet, his tight backing band injecting energy and muscle as he pushes his voice on the yell-along chorus. It’s a far cry from his former life; few street buskers boast songs someone could conceivably pump a fist to. There’s even an honest-to-goodness guitar solo.

“I love quiet folk songs, and I am sure I will always revisit that side of things in my writing over time, but I wanted the chance to rock out a little bit,” he says in an email. “The records I listened to growing up and the ones that I keep coming back to were, for lack of a better word, the louder side of Americana.”

He cites an obvious inspiration, and a historically relevant one given the mid-’60s Dylan comparison: The Band. He adores the heartbreaking vocals of a ballad like “It Makes No Difference,” he says, but appreciates them balancing that tenderness with a level of wildness. “Levon Helm had an amazingly athletic playing style behind the drums and he drove their live shows with an almost frenetic energy,” he says. “The music that I love the most can bring both of those elements together. Sweat and tears.”

Of the equally catchy and high-energy title track – the single, with a music video forthcoming – he writes: “When I hear the opening notes of the song I feel like it’s time to roll the windows down and try to remember that feeling of childhood wonder when you hit a baseball and start running for first base like nothing else in the world matters.”

Even the slower songs seem more the product of full-band camaraderie than a singer-songwriter’s singular vision. “Great Divide,” for instance, has grown from a solo guitar song he was performing a couple years ago to a driving organ ballad channeling Garth Hudson (the song title surely another Band nod). And “Heavy Heart,” understated though it is, benefits from a tight rhythm section, beautiful backing vocals, and little guitar licks.

Cassels-Brown says that song was inspired by the least rock-and-roll meal of them all: breakfast.

I wrote this in Portland, Oregon when I was on tour there a while back. The friends that I was staying with (a couple) had just cooked breakfast in the other room. They burnt the toast but were laughing about it and seemed so happy to be sharing the same kitchen. It really made me miss home and my partner and a sense of melancholy set in…

I have a tendency to compare my life and career to people who are incredibly famous and successful and sometimes get down on myself in comparison. But in that moment I had the realization that I didn’t really care about looking at my life through the lens of a music autobiography or trying to figure out how and when I would feel successful in my career. I just wanted to be home cooking breakfast.

Click here for more of the best new rock music from Vermont.

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Abby Sherman – Dreamcatcher

Abby Sherman released one of 2018’s best folk songs with “Wanting to Run,” and she’s returned with a catchy new single. Mandolin features prominently, joining her vocals to front a tight roots band on a song about looking back and accepting one’s own history.

Andy Harrington – Potato Eaters, A Play, Act I, Scene II

Picking a “song” to highlight from Andy Harrington’s new album is tricky because there aren’t really “songs.” As he notes on CDBaby, it’s more of a radio play with music than any sort of traditional album. Inspired by Van Gogh’s Potato Eaters painting, the aptly-titled Potato Eaters, A Play mixes poetry, prose, narration, and stage directions in with some beautiful and inventive music. It’s a lot to wrap one’s head around, and part of me wishes he’d release the music as a stand-alone album. But maybe that defeats the purpose of this ambitious production. (That CDBaby link includes the written out script, which proves helpful in following along.)

Be-er – He Said, She Said

To quote the poet Fred Durst: “It’s all about the he said, she said bullshit.” Thankfully, there’s now a much better song (low bar) about said bullshit. Rock quartet Be-er – which means “people who be” in addition to the obvious pun – indulges in some jammier tendencies elsewhere on their self-titled debut album, but on “He Said, She Said” keep it tight for a grungy power-pop holler.

cordless – All Your Faces

The first two songs of Midwest-Vermont transplants Maria Bobbitt-Chertock and Noah Sauer are immensely appealing. Poppy in a removed way – happy tenth birthday, chillwave! – they present sonic twists and turns, a lot of ideas in a few minutes. Bobbitt-Chertock’s vocals channel Annie Lennox over backing that veers from dream-pop to dream-grunge (a genre they may have invented).

Elder Orange feat. Adam Turner – Daybreak

I don’t listen to much electronic music, but a few years ago I discovered the mesmerizing 13-minute track “Matthew and Toby” by Rocketnumbernine. The combination of synthesized electronics with live human drumming proved immensely appealing. Elder Orange’s new song with drummer Adam Turner offers a similar juxtaposition of men meeting machines. The machines here adopt a more subdued approach than on the Rocketnumbernine song, though; other than some periodic synthesizer rising to the surface, this collaboration leans closer to jazz.

Erin Cassels-Brown – Classic Records

Erin Cassels-Brown’s 2017 debut EP Northern Lights, Vol. 1 feature four quiet singer-songwriter ballads followed by a single loud rocker. Two years later, the track that then seemed like an outlier turned out to point the way forward for him. Though it’s still just his name on the cover, Dreamin’ on Overdrive presents a proper band album of full-throated roots-rock -emphasis on the rock. From barrelhouse piano on “No Good Man” to the shred-your-voice chorus of “Classic Records,” Cassels-Brown channels various facets of The Band, putting his quiet folkie side square in the rearview.

Ernest – Little Things

Singer-songwriter Mark Daly’s new project Ernest announced itself with the pop banger “Autotune.” But as he said at the time, there was another side to his debut record I’m Gonna Do It (Anyway). The second half of this double album strips things down from the dance jams, returning closer to the folk-rock sound he’d first done with his first band Chamberlain. “Little Things” come from that second half – comparatively calm, but hardly a solo folk singer strummin’ away either.

He describes the album’s duality in an email: “Over the last two years I’ve experienced so many ups and downs. To the joyous elation and love I’ve experienced with my son and becoming a father, to getting married. To the depths of anxiety, fear and doubt from breaking up [popular dance-pop band] Madaila and letting so many people down. I think there are displays of this all over the record. There are sad songs where I have no answers. There are happy songs where it seems I have everything figured out. It’s been a journey and I’ve just tried to capture it all and write it all down. Writing songs and pouring out my emotions right into them has kept me afloat.”

Ian Steinberg – Guidance

Folk-pop singer-songwriter Ian Steinberg gets personal on his debut album. Guidance centers around mental health, with a sonic arc tracing both his descent into and rise out of depression. It’s heavy stuff, and powerfully told. But the album isn’t the downer the description may imply. Winsome melodies and intricate arrangements lift the songs up high, so even when things get dark, there’s light on the horizon.

Matthew Mercury – Contessa

“I am the worst singer in the band,” Matthew Mercury’s Ezra Oklan recently told Seven Days. He is – as you may have guessed by my mentioning it – the band’s singer. And he undersells himself. Though perhaps his low croon wouldn’t work in other genres, it perfectly fits this band’s post-punk rumbles. A high point of the band’s self-titled debut, “Contessa” piles killer vocal hooks and inscrutable lyrics atop pounding drums and an insistent bass line.

Michael Roberts – Jolene

No, this ain’t Dolly’s begging Jolene not to take her man. In Michael Roberts’ song, some other man already took Jolene. Quite a while ago, from the sound of it. This regret-filled winter lament gets lifted by a perky horn section in a high point of Roberts’ overall excellent debut solo album.

The Renegade Groove – Nobody Knows

Posting this song a few days ago, indie music blog Earmilk called The Renegade Groove “Vermont’s best kept secret.” “Nobody Knows” follows the band’s debut, which channels 1980s pop music with soul and a lot of humor. “Nobody Knows” is less self-consciously jokey, and a big step in their songwriting. The band gets tagged as neo-soul revivalists, but “Nobody Knows” is the sound of looking forward, not back.

Troy Millette – Enter Sandman (Metallica cover)

Troy says: “This was a cover I started doing back in like 2014 when I was first starting to really gig and grind regularly in Burlington. We used to cover ‘Jumper’ by Third Eye Blind and during a live show I did a finger-picked bridge and sang the first verse of ‘Enter Sandman’ over it, and it was just a short, quirky part of the live show for a bit, and then it just got lost. I did a Robot Dog session for Tim Lewis and WBKM and Tim made a joke about how only metal covers were allowed, and I jumped back into this tune. A week or so later I went back to Robot Dog Studios and cut a quick one-take version to hold people over for the EP release, which then ended up happening before the cover was released! I wanted it to be as much of a living-room performance as we could capture, and [engineer Ryan Cohen] did a great job of capturing that vibe!”

The Wet Ones – Articulate Frankenstein

The Wet Ones’ album cover features a tombstone in the ocean, which is a fitting image. This trio blends surf-rock with a heavy dose of goth and doom. Think The Ventures meeting The Cramps. If Lenny Kaye ever curates an aquatic sequel to his classic garage-rock comp Nuggets (Seashells, perhaps?), the Wet Ones would fit right in.

Check out the Best Vermont Songs of 2018 here.

The post The Best New Songs of June 2019 appeared first on County Tracks.

What is an EP?

I don’t mean that as a philosophical question, but a practical one.

Back in the vinyl era, the EP had a clear reason for existing as a stand-alone format from the album. If you had enough songs to fill a 12-inch, 33RPM record, you made an album. If not, you put what you had on a 10-inch, 45RPM record and called it an EP. They looked different; they felt different; they cost different amounts.

In the digital era, free of physical limitations, the distinction has blurred. An artist’s latest collection of music can be two songs or two hundred. The idea that a 60-minute collection of music constitutes an “album” and a 15-minute one constitutes an “EP” is purely artificial.

Yet the EP hangs on, because musicians like the format. Nowhere more so than in Vermont, where the EP offers new bands a way to test the waters and experienced bands a way to toss out a few songs between “proper” albums. In a musical climate where local musicians rotate constantly around new bands and monikers, the EP offers a low-stakes way to try out a new sound or collaboration.

As a result, this list is no ugly stepchild to the Best Albums list we’ve got coming next week. There may be no more practical reason to keep the EP designation, but these ten EPs justify their own reasons for existing.

10. Maddie Rabin – Autumn Bound

“Folk music plus cello.” It’s a simple elevator pitch, one that in less capable hands might seem like a gimmick. But the unusual instrument augments rather than detracts from these five beautiful songs. The real star turns out to not be the strings al all, but Rabin’s voice, a bold and emotive instrument perfectly suited to dance atop the low notes.

9. Wool See – Leaving / Left

The title track on rapper Wool See’s latest EP describes his recent cross-country move: “Boy meets cold world then a East Coast girl / Shows up like space heater / Brings him home, make his holidays sweeter / He meets her family, it’s awkward but official / As inches of fresh snow makes for picturesque stroll / In the small town she grew up in / It’s different from the city he’s accustomed.” The longtime Portland, Oregon rapper is now settled in Vermont’s rural Northeast Kingdom, and there’s even a Bernie shoutout to show he belongs in his new surroundings.

8. Hellascope – From Below

One of my favorite recurring music features is Stereogum’s monthly metal column The Black Market. And it’s not because I like the music; I mostly don’t. If it has “black” or “death” or anything with the suffix “-core” in the genre tag, I know it won’t be for me. But the writing is great throughout, and every now and then they turn up a less scream-y doom metal band I love. And in that category, they should really get on Hellascope. The band only has three members, but it sounds like an army, charging forth with huge riffs and a massive roar.

7. Erin Cassels-Brown – Northern Lights, Vol. 1

On his debut solo release, 22-year old Erin Cassels-Brown channels the Greenwich Village songwriters of the 1960s. No, not that one. He’s less Bob Dylan and more Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, Phil Ochs, and Tom Rush. Cassels-Brown started as a street busker, traveling the country by bus singing for his supper, and sounds it. He’s taken five of his finest road-honed songs for this debut, telling his life story in just 15 minutes. He’s a Woody Guthrie for Generation Z.

6. Tom Pearo – Headspace

There’s a playlist floating around that compiles 90 minutes of the Grateful Dead tuning in between songs. It’s every bit as excruciating as you might expect. The sad fact is, though, it sounds at times indistinguishable from any number of ambient guitar albums out there. Luckily, Tom Pearo shows more focus on Headspace. “Ambient” needn’t be synonymous with “aimless,” and on these six tracks Pearo crafts a winding landscape with crags and valleys and a whole world to get lost in.

5. Belly Up – Loss

Belly Up is loud. That’s the first thing that hits you, I suppose: the volume. But like their obvious influence My Bloody Valentine, once your ears adjust to the noise you discern melodies and countermelodies, nuances and layers lurking beneath the waves of distortion. The EP’s title Loss refers to the suicide of singer and drummer Ben Lau’s best friend, and, as the first song says, “No matter what, my mind returns to death.” A heavy subject, but one made cathartic in this massive, mammoth debut.

4. Mark LeGrand – Wrong Turn

“I Don’t Sing in Barrooms Anymore,” reads the title of one of Mark LeGrand’s new songs. You wouldn’t know it from his sound. The EP channels a honky tonk at the end of the night, only a few patrons remaining, swaying along. Merle Haggard is the obvious comparison point, but the Hag never wrote about drug addiction with the forthrightness that LeGrand does. “My eyes are hot from crying / And I ache deep in my bones / Better get myself to the clinic / But I wish I could just go home” he sings in addict’s lament “Four Walls, a Door, and a Window.” Like so many, his family has been affected by addiction, so he knows first-hand how it affects everything around it. So even when he tries his hand at a stock country trop, the my-love-left-me weeper, substance abuse worms its way in: “There’s the bottle, and over there’s the glass / There’s the pipe, waiting for the match / There’s the cocaine, telling me what to do / Every time I’m getting over you.”

3. Acid Roach – Circuitous

Metal trio Acid Roach have released over twenty albums and EPs in the last three years. It’s a stunning feat of productivity, though perhaps aided by the fact that much of their music is improvised. You wouldn’t know it from their latest, though, a two-song, thirty-minute journey through all things doom. Guitars ebb and flow like a classical composition, winding around a furious rhythm section. Like running a marathon through smog, it leaves you exhausted and sweating and gasping for air.

2. Clever Girls – Loose Tooth

I’d only advise meeting someone on Craigslist if you’re in the market to get murdered. But singer-guitarist Diane Jean first met bassist Winfield Holt through an ad on the site, and from such inauspicious beginnings the trio Clever Girls was formed. Fully formed, judging by their fantastic debut EP. The five songs of jangly indie-rock demand replay, whetting our appetites for a proper album.

1. Bison – Get In

Post-punk riffs and sing-along hooks abound in Bison’s stellar debut EP. Think New Order, or – if your reference points are more recent – Interpol. Unlike the ironically titled Joy Division, though Bison’s songs exude feel-good vibes. These five fist-to-the-sky anthems carry huge enough melodies to uplift even the most downer lyric. You find yourself singing along to “Contrast” before the words even start, and the seven-minute workout “In a Fortnight” rushes by.

Check out The Best Vermont Albums of 2017 and The Best Vermont Songs of 2017.

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We’re finally at about the six-month mark at what has been a long and deeply stress-inducing year. But there’s perhaps some small comfort that 2017 has so far been a great year for music. So to celebrate being halfway through – as well as County Tracks’s own six-month birthday – we’re rounding up some of the best Vermont-made songs we’ve heard this year so far.

We narrowed the list down to a dozen for the sake of sanity, but couldn’t go without mentioning some of our other favorite tracks, which we listed at the bottom. We also rounded up as much as we could in a Spotify playlist. Enjoy!

Apartment 3 – No Feeling

Snotty and DIY as hell, the best Apartment 3 songs work like Nirvana or Pavement: half-assed on the surface but with some insanely catchy songwriting lurking beneath the slacker shrug. This was the final release by beloved local label Section Sign Records, but they went out on top.

Blowtorch – Mirror

It took punk band Blowtorch forty years to put out their first record. At a Ramones-worthy 16 songs in 35 minutes, it was worth the wait. “Mirror” is an epic jam by their standards (over two minutes long!), but Clark Russell’s snarl sells every second.

Clever Girls – Crazy

As everyone from Willie Nelson to Gnarls Barkley has learned, you can’t go wrong titling your song “Crazy.” Clever Girls’ Diane Jean (the only actual girl in the band) puts her own spin on the trope in this catchy garage-country gem, bringing a whole lot more swagger than Patsy Cline ever had.

Erin Cassels-Brown – Athena

Every superhero movie needs an origin story and maybe street buskers do too. On his standout song “Athena,” Cassels-Brown spins his tale about getting himself fired from his carpentry gig so he could pursue music full time. We’re glad he quit his day job.

Ghost Weapons – Auroras

“What if science has it wrong?” Gary Peter asks in “Auroras.” The song addresses the death of a father he had a difficult relationship with, but rather than a maudlin ballad, does so with a righteous blast of post-punk fury.

Henry Jamison – The Jacket

We wrote in February that Henry Jamison looked like Vermont’s next breakout act – and that was before he released “The Jacket,” the best track of his young career. Tender and stirring, this falsetto sway is the first taste of what may be one of the biggest local albums of the year.

J. Bengoy – So Good (I Could Die)

We argued last month that this peppy tune should be the song of the summer, and we stand by that assessment (though we wouldn’t put money on it coming true). The earworm has not left our head since we first heard it, a delicious little nugget of power-pop that’s the feel-good jam of the season.

Josh Panda – Drive You Home

Josh Panda released our #1 song of 2016, and he’s since followed it up with a full album. “Drive You Home” sounds like the sort of country-rock gem that could have aired on AM radio in the 1970s, a romantic ballad perfect for wedding first dances or slow cruising down a dusty back road.

The Pilgrims – Millennial Whoop

“You’ll never live up to the Greatest Generation!” the Pilgrims cheerfully holler in their snotty anthem for the screwed millennials. Sung from the point of view of high-and-mighty baby boomers, it’s a gleefully ironic takedown of parents bemoaning the younger generation’s laziness. Cheeky lines like “We won all the wars (the ones we lost are not our concern)” indict the entitlement of elders while standing up for underemployed 20-somethings everywhere.

Sam Morris – Left The Candle Burning

Leonard Cohen from Montreal passed last year, but Sam Morris from only-a-little-further-south ably picks up the mantle with this haunting folk song. Like Cohen’s best, the simple and understated playing hides a mesmerizing song that draws you deeper with each listen.

The Snaz – Summer Underground

The Snaz seemed to have their whole careers ahead of them when they broke up this spring – after all, they hadn’t even graduated high school yet. But they went out on top with their final album Sensitive Man, including this funky gem that quotes a popular children’s rhyme way better than Ke$ha did.

Swale – Release Your Records

Given the timing, I’d guessed from the title that “Release Your Records” would be an anti-Trump protest sound about his tax returns. Instead it concerns something far more timeless, the love of music and, specifically, the vinyl revival.

Honorable mentions:

* Amelia Devoid – Don’t Understand

* Belly Up – You’ll Never Take Me Alive

* Cricket Blue – The Milkman

* Ebn Ezra – Polycrystalline

* Eric George – Franky Dear

* Francesca Blanchard – My Heart

* Jack Labbe – Plastic Rose

* Joey Agresta – I Feel Like Shit And I Want To Die

* Maddie Rabin – Autumn Bound

* Mark LeGrand – Wrong Turn

* Self-Portrait – Fears Are Foolish

* Some Hollow – Via Champlain

* Wren Kitz – Haunted Hole

Top photo of Swale by Brittain Shorter.

The post The Best Vermont Music of 2017 (So Far) appeared first on County Tracks.

We normally don’t do concert previews here. My goal with this young blog is to spread the gospel of Vermont music to an audience beyond the state’s sometimes-confining borders. And writing about regionally-specific events generally goes against that mandate.

This weekend’s Waking Windows festival is an exception.

Waking Windows is the Vermont music scene in microcosm. In some respects the Burlington equivalent of SXSW, Waking Windows surrounds a few bigger names (Real Estate and Dan Deacon this year) with dozens of the state’s best local bands. Naming the best Vermont artists playing the festival almost doubles as naming the best Vermont artists period. And that is exactly our mandate.

And there are a lot to get through. My plan was to highlight just ten or twelve here, but the list ballooned as there were too many I couldn’t leave out. In fact, to put some limit on this thing, I excluded anyone I’ve already written about at length before. They’re all worth seeing too of course, so read their various posts to catch up:

• Apartment 3: “The Dream of the ’90s Is Alive in Apartment 3, Your New Favorite Lo-Fi Slacker Band”
• Tyler Daniel Bean: “This Music Video Hauntingly Depicts Depression Taking Over”
• Blowtorch: “Trump Inspires Reagan-Era Punk Band to Finally Release Its First Album”
• Erin Cassels-Brown: “Near-Death Experience Gives Street Busker New Purpose on Debut EP”
• Cricket Blue: “Gillian Welch Meets Annie Wilkes in a Folk Song About a Milkman Obsession”
• Ebn Ezra: “Japanese Synth-Pop and The Little Mermaid Inspire Haunting Electronic Album”
• Henry Jamison: “Vermont’s Latest Breakout Henry Jamison Gently Electrifies Gordon Lightfoot Cover”
• Hellascope & Kiefcatcher: “Four New Doom Metal EPs to Get You Through the Winter”
• The Mountain Says No: “Hear an Epic Post-Rock Song About ‘Game of Thrones’ Fandom”
• The Snaz: “America’s Best High School Band Grows Up (And Wishes You’d Stop Focusing on Their Age)”
• Swale: “A Song Celebrating Vinyl That Marc Maron Would Appreciate”

Below, find our picks for the best twenty-plus Vermont artists playing Waking Windows this weekend. But even if you’re not going to Waking Windows – even if you’ve never heard of Waking Windows – these artists are among the best the state has to offer and well worth your time.

Amelia Devoid

Devoid’s newest single “Woman Is Silence” features an image of moon on the cover, which seems appropriate – this music is spacey. Subtle beats and shimmering electronic waves back up gorgeous singing that echoes through your headphones and around your skull well after the track finishes. (And if you like her music, there’s a lot more to discover in the column she writes about other electronic and off-kilter Vermont musicians for alt-weekly Seven Days.)

Barishi

If you didn’t guess from the long hair and leather jackets, perhaps some of Barishi’s song titles will clue you into their genre: “Grave of the Creator.” “Death Moves in Silence.” “Bonesetter” (my personal favorite). Yes, Barishi are metal of the heaviest order. They combine doom riffs and the occasional throwback thrash with instrumental precision and growled vocals. Their latest music video for “The Great Ennead” features a use of animal skulls that makes Nine Inch Nails’ “Closer” seem tame by comparison.

Black Rabbit

Worshipping at the church of CBGB circa 1976, Black Rabbit’s music spans the gamut of the artists who played there: early Ramones to early Blondie. “Nicky Says” sounds like a nod to the Velvet Underground’s “Candy Says,” while “It’s Cold” could be a lost Dead Boys song.

Blue Button

When Blue Button played Grace Potter’s annual festival Grand Point North last year, Seven Days wrote that they might be “the loudest band ever on the GPN stage.” The Stooges-inspired garage band certainly does know how to make a racket, but frontman Jason Cooley has a knack for writing catchy hooks that emerge from the walls of distortion.

Cam Will

Not every musician gets written up on a cemetery blog, but not many musicians have had a career quite as odd and circuitous as Cam Will. As Cameron Boyd, the New Jersey native became a child actor with a recurring role in The Sopranos and a part in the forgotten kids movie Manny & Lo alongside an 11-year old Scarlett Johansson. He burned out on acting and moved north to become a songwriter, but you can sense his background in his lyrics, where some of his verses could be short films.

The DuPont Brothers

From Everly to Louvin, Americana music has a rich history of brother duos. Sam and Zack DuPont are the latest in the lineage, a pair of songwriters who began strictly in the folkie lane but have broadened their sound to incorporate touches of country and indie rock. Throughout their genre experimentation, though, their beautiful vocal harmonies keep them rooted to the brother-duo tradition.

Ellen Degenerates

Ellen Degenerates is a great band name. So great, in fact, that two different bands are using it. Thankfully, the one playing Waking Windows is not the one that labels themselves “two-piece screamogrind.” This Ellen Degenerates is an uber-catchy indie rock band whose debut EP Staleboat features clever and often cheeky lyrics. A sample, from the song “Winnebago”: “Christopher Columbus and a New World chick / Some call him a modern hero / But he probably gave her syphilis.”

The High Breaks

Despite being several hundred miles from the nearest ocean, Burlington, Vermont boasts not one but two of the best surf-rock bands operating today. Barbacoa are the veterans, having been on the scene playing spaghetti western-inflected surf instrumentals for decades (they share members with ’80s-era punk band Blowtorch). The High Breaks are the relative upstarts, Barbocoa’s younger, better-dressed brethren. They pay a little more fealty to the history of surf music than Barbacoa, with song titles like “Surf Showdown,” “Voodoo Wave,” or “The Big One” that sound like deep cuts from early Beach Boys album.

Iron Eyes Cody

Middlebury’s Iron Eyes Cody made my favorite album of 2016, and four months into 2017 I’m still listening to it obsessively. They make anthemic indie-rock in the vein of Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros or Decemberists that proves impossible to resist.

Ivamae

In the past year, Memphis songwriter Julien Baker has blown up everywhere from the New York Times to Pitchfork. Her sole album is only thirty minutes long though, so fans of hers would be well advised check out Burlington’s Ivamae when they’re looking for the more. Over spare and solo electric guitar, Ivamae sings haunting and ethereal songs on her debut EP Ocean Studios.

Lake Superior

A blues-rock duo from the Rust Belt, now why does that sound familiar? White Stripes and Black Keys comparisons inevitably follow Lake Superior, who began in Detroit before moving to Vermont. They’ve recently added a third member, which should help blunt the more obvious comparisons –
though the Keys do tour with more members now too – and prove they are a great band in their own right.

Michael Chorney and Holler General

Michael Chorney is the Rick Rubin of Vermont Americana, a man who lurks in the background of many of the state’s best albums. He produced Anaïs Mitchell, and helped her develop her recent New York musical version of Hadestown. He also helped polish the musical visions of the Dupont Brothers (listed above) and Maryse Smith, who would also be on this list if she hadn’t moved to Philadelphia. Chorney’s current band Holler General has released several albums that find him at his most raw, channeling old weird America sounds with delicacy and unexpected twists and turns.

Navytrain

Navytrain’s EP Souls may have been the most fully-formed debut of last year, a tight five-song package blending indie rock, country, and some seriously funky guitar picking. There’s a sense of virtuosity and tasteful jamming slightly reminiscent of the Dave Matthews Band, but without Dave’s more eye-rolling tendencies (if that’s possible). They also released some seriously beautiful live videos for each track.

Old Sky

The duo of Andrew Stearns (guitar and banjo) and Shay Gestal (violin) rivals fellow duos Cricket Blue and the DuPont Brothers for prettiest harmonies in the state. They have yet to release a full-length album, but their two EPs exhibit a world of promise. “Tired Whistle” alone ranks as one of the best Vermont-made songs in recent years.

Quiltro

The two press blurbs on Quiltro’s Facebook come from Psychedelic News Today and something called Doors of Perception Magazine, which should give you an idea of the trip you’re in for. Unlike so much psychedelic rock, though, this trio’s music doesn’t feel at all aimless (or require drugs to enjoy). Speaking of psychedelia, honorable mention here to Siding Spring, who sound great in the one live video they’ve released.)

The Pilgrims

The Pilgrims’ music videos exude a distinct Tim and Eric vibe, though how much of that is deliberate irony and how much is a genuine lack of technical ability is hard to say. Even if it’s the latter, they turn a weakness into a strength with goofy, supremely low-budget animation that looks like Flash videos circa 1998. The visuals fit the sound, cheeky punk rock with titles like “Treap Chick” and “My Bad, Wrong Horse.”

Rough Francis

One of the few (only?) bands on this list to have their own Wikipedia page, Rough Francis are best known as the progeny of Detroit punk icons Death. But in the nine years since they formed, the younger punk band has come to stand on its own, earning writeups in SPIN and Consequence of Sound, who said “their impact on the punk scene will be felt for decades to come.”

Sleeping In

Sleeping In have a song called “Big Starr,” but you’d have to bury deep beneath waves of distortion to find any hint of Alex Chilton and co’s catchy power-pop. It’s in there, but like My Bloody Valentine or The Besnard Lakes, the melodies lie beneath a whole lot of beautiful haze.

The Smittens

A decade ago the Smittens were one of the most prolific bands in the state, but these days they mostly seem to come together once a year to play Waking Windows. Even googling “smittens” finds their website buried beneath multiple distributors of truly ugly mittens. Nevertheless, the records they have made over the years rank among Vermont’s catchiest music ever. They wear the term “twee” like a fuzzy badge of honor, hearkening back to the 1990s where cute and simple DIY love songs were not something to be looked down upon.

Some Hollow

From their press photo – bearded dudes posing in a snowy forest – you might guess Some Hollow played folksy Americana or, possibly, seriously heavy metal (see: Barishi). They do neither. This relatively new indie-rock trio at times channels Cheap Trick, at other times muscular country singers like Chris Stapleton. They draw from an array of influences, but at no point did I hear either banjos or double kick drums.

The Welterweights

The most promising newcomers on the lineup, The Welterweights haven’t actually released any recordings of their own (just the radio session below). But the four band members are all artists we love and have covered: Kelly Ravin, Erin Cassels-Brown, Lowell Thompson, and Willoughby Morse of Madaila. Bridging two generations of the Vermont’s best musicians, the band blends southern rock and country – at least in the video, we’ll see what happens once they start recording.

Willverine

The elevator pitch for Willverine is short and sweet: electronic music performed by a trumpet player. The music backs up the gimmick though, catchy and soulful pop songs with no shortage of horn solos.

Wren Kitz

With writeups just this month from SPIN and Tiny Mix Tapes, recently-signed NNA Tapes artist Wren Kitz is poised to be one of the buzziest local acts at the festival and probably of the year. A longtime member of psych-rock band Paper Castles, Kitz’s solo stuff is quieter and stranger. He takes tape loops and found sounds and lays them under his slow, meandering melodies. It’s mesmerizing and haunting stuff, and with his NNA Tapes debut out in June, he’s someone the world will likely be hearing a lot more from soon.

That not enough music discovery for one day? Check out The Best Vermont Albums of 2016 and The Best Vermont Songs of 2016.

The post The Best Vermont Artists at Waking Windows (And In General) appeared first on County Tracks.

Though he’s only 22 years-old, Vermont songwriter Erin Cassels-Brown has packed in a lot of living since he nearly died.

When he was in college, a burst appendix sent his body into septic shock, landing him in the hospital for an extended stay – he says he left “12 pounds lighter and a million life thoughts heavier.” His brush with death made him reevaluate his purpose, dropping out of college and leaving work at his father’s solar company to pursue music full time.

“I decided to get on a bus and try to be a street performer for a while,” he says. “I went to Asheville, North Carolina and Charlottesville, Virginia. I didn’t make much money, but I made some amazing friends and it gave me a new lease on life, both physically and emotionally.”

Cassels-Brown traveling around busking on the street, trying to scrape together a life from tips tossed into his guitar case. On his debut EP Northern Lights, Vol. 1, the song “Virginia, Bring Me Light” traces his Kerouac-ian journey. “That might be the saddest song on the album,” he says. “It certainly doesn’t include the happy ending of the real life adventure, but I was trying to write from the place I was in right before I got on the southbound bus.”

Produced by Willoughby Morse of Madaila, Northern Lights, Vol. 1 channels classic country songwriting just left of the mainstream, from Steve Earle to Guy Clark. Cassels-Brown cites The Tallest Man on Earth as a major influence too, and you can hear that in a song like “Virginia, Bring Me Light” which brings an ethereal wash to augment the acoustic guitar.

Then on “Athena,” he and his former North End Honeys bandmate Hannah Fair channel Gram Parsons and Emmylou Harris for a classic road song. It’s “Turn the Page” as written by Levon Helm. As he sings to open the song, “I’m leaving for a long time, my dream is coming true, but I’ll be living so far away from you / Is it worth it if that dream is shaded blue, casting shadows over all we meant to do?”

“The thing I’ve wanted most in my entire life is to be a full-time touring musician,” he says. “I got a small taste of that in The North End Honeys when I wrote the song. I was making money playing music for the first time. My dream was starting to be real, but I missed my friends and had a very hard time keeping any sort of relationship together.”

Back home in Vermont and with his street-performing days behind him (for now), Cassels-Brown plans to record his debut album this year. He plays with a number of our favorite local bands, including new combo The Welterweights with Kelly Ravin, Lowell Thompson, and Morse and until just a few months ago in Little Slugger, who released one of our favorite albums of last year. And he continues working towards the goals he made when he got out of the hospital.

“A really good friend likes to remind me that we could get hit by a bus any day,” he says. “That sounds morbid, but for me it’s a motivator to make the things that are important to me happen.”

Click here to discover more of the best new folk music in Vermont.

The post Near-Death Experience Gives Street Busker New Purpose on Debut EP appeared first on County Tracks.

Last weekend, Fantastic Negrito won his first Grammy Award for “Best Contemporary Blues Album.” It’s a safe bet that few Grammy voters would have ever heard of him had he not won another award two years prior: the NPR Tiny Desk Contest. And if the future is just, last year’s winner, the wonderful violinist Gaelynn Lea, will soon be collecting Grammy statues of her own.

Fantastic Negrito hails from California, and Lea from Minnesota. So as this year’s contest continues, we think it’s time for the Northeast to – to quote Lea’s winning song – linger in the sun. To aid in that effort, out of dozens of locally-made videos, we’ve picked our favorite Vermont entries in the 2017 contest.

The only real rules for a Tiny Desk Contest video are that the song has to be an original and a desk should somehow figure in (it doesn’t even need to be tiny). But many of the state’s finest musicians went beyond the bare minimum, one dragging a not-so-tiny desk to a mountain summit, another finding a tiny church to match the desk. The songs span from folk to prog, soul to punk to classical piano. There’s also a song about dinosaurs, and a special celebrity entrant: Officer Clemmons from Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood!

So read on to discover our dozen-plus favorite Vermont entries. Then head to the Tiny Desk Contest website to browse other entries from Vermont and beyond. Our favorite non-Vermont find: this bizarre David Lynch fever-dream masked performer.

The Welterweights

Kelly Ravin and Lowell Thompson have both been kicking around the Burlington music scene for some time, Ravin in local southern-rock-up-north heroes Waylon Speed and Thompson playing in any number of bands. Their latest is a collaboration called The Welterweights, a local supergroup of sorts that also features Willoughby Morse (of Madaila) and Erin Cassels-Brown (scroll down for more on him). They haven’t released anything yet, but check out a recent full-band session over at Vermont Public Radio. If they win the Tiny Desk, they could have a full career recording sessions for public radio affiliates.

Kat Wright

Kat Wright has made three consecutive Tiny Desk entries, and each year her videos look and sound better than just about anyone’s. In year one, she crammed an eight-piece band (with horn section!) into the old lamp store she owns. Last year they returned with more cameras, for a gorgeously-produced clip that’s nearing ten thousand views. This year, they leave the lamp shop and strip the band down to a four-piece to do a song from her fantastic debut album.

Paul Lyons

Definitely the most descriptively-titled number on the list, “Dinosaur Song” delivers just what it promises: dinosaurs. It sounds like an old Dr. Demento comedy radio hit from back in the day, using cheesy synthesizers and effects to sing about how dinosaurs are “just like you and me.” Hilarious tangents abound over these surreal seven minutes, from a bit about the gas in your car coming from dino remains to a deeply-researched investigation into the end of the species: “Fire in the sky from outer space / blew away and melted every dino face.”

Erin Cassels-Brown & Hannah Fair

Formerly two-thirds of a great Vermont group called The North End Honeys, Cassels-Brown and Fair have gone their own ways. Two terrific songwriters in their own right, Cassels-Brown delivers a beautiful country ballad while Fair brings a good dose of humor, gently ribbing other cities around the country in the spirit Randy Newman’s “I Love L.A.”: “OK weather ain’t always okay / Arizona’s too dry and Seattle’s too grey / and a Texas twister might up and steal you away.”

Eric George

Local Woody Guthrie acolyte Eric George is off the ground running: NPR Music has already featured his entry on their Tumblr. They write, “With a swaying performance on his 12-string and spiritual accompaniment by a spotted pup, George has shared a slice of stirring self-affirmation and bracing goodwill.”

Skeleton Dancer

The most vibrant video by far, neon wigs, rainbow dresses, and a giant “Smash the Patriarchy” sign colors Skeleton Dancer’s punk-rock reggae. Gogol Bordello’s Eugene Hütz hails from Vermont; Skeleton Dancer should open their next tour date up north.

Erik and Francois

Francois Clemmons uses to have another duet partner: Fred Rogers. For 25 years, he played Officer Clemmons on Mister Rogers Neighborhood – one of the first African-Americans to have a recurring role on a kids’ TV series. He’s retired now, but occasionally records with a singer decades his junior, Erik Benepe. Once you finish their video above, revisit your childhood with this classic Clemmons-Rogers duet from a 1993 episode.

Marcie Hernandez

Look beyond some audio synchronization issues here. On a gorgeous ballad somewhere between folk and fado, Hernandez smoothly switches between Spanish and English. She sounds fantastic in either language.

Gracie Farese & Julia Hass

Current Middlebury College seniors Gracie Farese and Julia Hass sound great together – witness their recent street-busking video – but went solo for a pair of lovely, lilting songs.

Andrew of the North

A piano instrumental admittedly probably doesn’t a huge chance of winning. But if the Tiny Desk Contest had Grammy-like genre categories (“Best Rural Contemporary Piano Instrumental”?), Andrew of the North aka. Andrew Grosvenor would be a shoe-in.

Leyeux

Leyeux aka. Jack Snyder certainly wins the effort award, schlepping not only his guitar but his own tiny desk up to the top of a mountain in 11 degree weather. His video was worth the effort, a beautiful song that sounds like a falsetto Bert Jansch.

Mohan Fitzgerald

If you’ve noticed by now that a few of these videos look similar, it’s because Burlington restaurant and music venue Skinny Pancake had the smart idea of staging their own Tiny Desk showcase. The event gave an easy setup to musicians who might not own video equipment (or a desk – these are musicians, after all). The latest to take advantage is Mohan Fitzgerald, who delivers a Dave Matthews-esque jam accompanied by some extra picking and a dry-humored accompanist who quips up front: “You’re not going to win.”

Raven Ocasio

Ocasio earns points right off the bat by finding not only a tiny desk, but a tiny church. He then moves to a full-size church to perform his beautiful ballad “Little Sister.”

Plastique Mammals

Spacey grooves become a ten-minute sonic journey from instrumental duo Plastique Mammals. Blending prog and ambient, a stripped-down duo of Remi Russin on bass and piano Evan Raine on drums build an impressive soundscape out of very little.

Gneiss

The Tiny Desk Contest takes place in the dead of winner, but that didn’t stop Gneiss from recording this jammy ode to summertime.

Brightbird

This Tiny Desk recording was apparently Brightbird’s first-ever performance. Pretty impressive debut.

Browse more Tiny Desk Contest entries at NPR Music.

The post Who Should Win the NPR Tiny Desk Contest appeared first on County Tracks.