Best New Albums: June 2012

With the advent of Spotify, I now organize my music a little differently before I decide to purchase full albums. I put the ones I'm curious about into a file called "Albums to Listen To" and I make them available offline for my commute and other headphone-listening travels. The ones that hold up over a couple of listens go into my "Albums to Buy" file. The ones that don't get trashed. Life is too short.


So friends can enjoy all of my obsessively diligent work, I then compile a Spotify folder called "Best New Albums," which I update frequently.


So a new related monthly feature here at the Lunch Box is "Best New Albums," which I'll aim to post around the first of every month. You can stream all the albums mentioned for free at my Spotify link above.


Best Album of the Month:

Paul McCartney - RAM.
This was his first major release post-Beatles and it shows that he hasn't lost any chops, just three really great musical collaborators. The remastered version of the original album and plentiful extras make it an essential purchase.

The Rest:

The Beach Boys - That's Why God Made the Radio
This is the best Beach Boys since "Kokomo." They look pretty awkward in the live performances I've seen on late-night TV, but wow can they still harmonize like no others.

Here We Go Magic - A Different Ship
After I read about the band picking up director/hitchhiker John Waters while touring around the country, I had to check them out. Folky and electronic-y, but unusually warm for those genres.

King Tuff - King Tuff
This is actually the best new album I heard all month (since McCartney's is technically not new). The band is loaded with garage, lo-fi, power pop hooks. And it doesn't hurt that J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr. is the drummer.

Best Coast - The Only Place
I had no right to dislike this band's lo-fi indie debut. Everyone raved about it and that's pretty much my favorite genre of music. But something about it bugged me. This one is less noisy and more melodic. And I somehow like it a lot.

J. Mascis Rocks the Kennedy Center

Dinosaur Jr.'s guitar master J. Mascis stumbled into the Kennedy Center's Millennium Stage tonight for a free, after-work, hour-long "acoustic" solo set that relied on a nice dose of effects that ratcheted up the sound to almost-daring levels for such an august locale.

The show was composed of classic songs from the 80s and 90s, with the best bits of Mascis' 2000s output. Max, Fran, and I and the other attendees (hipsters, art supporters, and intrigued but ultimately confused and sometimes-sleeping tourists) were treated to upbeat tunes almost the whole way through. That was until J. had to throw in the extended proggy "Alone" that featured a mix of sweet pickings and amazing tones out of his guitar that sounded like thunder and creepy door squeakings.

And then he walked out, simply saying that was all the time he had. The setlist:

The Wagon (Green Mind - 1991)
Missed It (Several Shades of Why - 2011)
Circle (Edie Brickell cover)
Crumble (Beyond - 2007)
"There's an Ocean" ?
Get Me (Where You Been - 1993)
Not the Same (Where You Been - 1993)
Listen to Me (Several Shades of Why - 2011)
Not Enough (Several Shades of Why - 2011)
A song that was, I think, from 2007's Beyond
Quest (Dinosaur - 1985)
A classic from maybe Green Mind that I can't remember the name of
Little Fury Things (You're Living All Over Me - 1987)
Alone (The John Peel Sessions - 2003)

****1/2 out of ***** stars