THE NICSPERIMENT'S TOP NINE ALBUMS OF 2002 (REDUX)
I've decided to go back to every year since 1999 and create a Top Nine Albums of
the Year list. I created a list for '04-'05 and '08-'22 here at the end of each
of those respective years, so I'll be doing an updated entry for each of those,
as well as hitting the years I previously missed. I'll be doing each year in a
random order.
These entries will be divided into three sections:
A. The Redux List
B. The Original List (when applicable)
C. A Quick Postmortem
I'm excited to finally hit those years I missed, as well as revisit the years where I've already made lists, to see if and how my opinion has changed. This is all part of a bigger project I am calling DO I STILL LOVE THIS?
I didn't make an original list for 2002 (The Nicsperiment was still gestating), so this Redux list will actually be the first 2002 list. This particular list, which coincidentally commemorates 2002's 20th anniversary, was quite difficult to make. It turns out, 2002 was a quite a year for music, at least as far as I am concerned. Indeed, when I made my top 50 albums list last year, SEVEN were released in 2002. Apparently, that year had a deep impact on my musical tastes as well, as I jammed some of these in 2002, but discovered most of the others throughout 2003, 2004, and 2005. I also find that I come back to these albums more than just about any others, which is strange, as I spent much of the latter portion of that year, the first half of my junior year of college, in a deep depression, mostly hiding in my room with the lights off when I wasn't on campus.
All that to say, this is a special musical year, and thus...there are many ties. If I needed to cheat the TOP NINE format badly for any year, it's this one.
Please remember musical preferences are completely subjective. Oh, and ties...as I've said, they're 100% legal!...and for 2002, 100% necessary. I at least tried to pair the ties up with musically similar matches. Here's the list.
The Redux List:
TIE 9. Blindisde -- Silence
The fall of 2002 continued a trend of Christian hard rock/heavy bands jumping to a major label. Swedish hardcore heroes, Blindside, were essentially invited to the big stage by their American buddies, P.O.D., who had made it big the year before with the multi-platinum Satellite. These lovable Nordic lads made the best of the opportunity, somehow creating a less heavy, masses-pleasing major debut in Silence that their small, but loyal original fanbase still enjoyed. The songs are well-written, the album flows like a river after a fresh thaw, and the four-piece are hitting on all cylinders, from the snappy rhythm section, to the crunchy guitars, to Christian Lindskog's shamanisticly sung and banshee screamed vocals. The album even has a meditative third quarter and an emotional acoustic closer to give it a clean and complete emotional arc. While Blindside's time in the American spotlight only lasted for about three years and three albums (during which they popped up on Conan and appeared in a major Hollywood film), they're still able to pull 150K-plus listens a month on Spotify 20 years later, largely due to the enduring popularity of Silence.
TIE 9. Project 86 -- Truthless Heroes
Underground hard-rockers, Project 86, also had their name called during the Christian heavy band to major label boon, but things worked out a little differently for them than it did for P.O.D. and Blindside. In what may be the only case of a band losing popularity AFTER releasing their major label debut, Project 86 followed up their epic, extremely heavy, indie-released Drawing Black Lines with the Atlantic Records-released, verse-chorus-verse, streamlined hard rock of Truthless Heroes. At the time of its release, most of the original Project 86 fans SHUNNED this album. I can't remember how many conversations I had with friends and acquaintances on the LSU campus that week that started with them saying, "Did you hear the new Project 86 yet? It sucks so bad, I brought it back to the store." The crazy thing is, 20-years later, Truthless Heroes is generally found at or near the top of current Project 86 fans' lists. Beneath the more streamlined songwriting and polish are some great instrumental performances, and the vocals are much weirder upon further inspection, particularly the medieval scales of some of the melodies. However, the album's most resonant factor is Andrew Schwab's lyrical work, as he uncannily predicts the social media influencer/icon figures that would arise in the next decade. This Aldous Huxley and T.S. Eliot-influenced concept album follows the titular "Truthless Hero" from ambitious youth, to a journey to the mountaintop of culture, to a hollow, empty descent, while also providing commentary on the post-9/11 political climate in the United States. With time, Truthless Heroes has revealed itself to be a remarkable album.
8. TIE Demon Hunter -- Demon Hunter
I was talking to then Zao drummer, Jesse Smith, backstage at Cornerstone 2002, when he grabbed the big bald guy next to him and said, "This is who you really want to talk to. His new band is gonna be huge." The bald guy was Ryan Clark, frontman for Demon Hunter, whose debut was released several months later. I'd already gotten hyped by the single the band had released earlier in the year. They had adopted an anonymous, "the members of this band are a mystery" stance for that first self-titled album, even obscuring their faces on the back cover album photograph...but I knew who was belting those big melodies and bellowing out those throaty screams because of that encounter. Maybe it was the lack of mystery, the slightly muted initial critical response to the album that fall, or the brief moment the band subconsciously lift a Deftones riff on the album's third track, but I highly undervalued Demon Hunter at the time of its release, immediately latching onto their second album, Summer of Darkness, when it was released in '04, as the much superior work. Indeed, I do still think that second album is better, but this apocalyptic hard rock debut has greatly risen in my esteem over the last 20 years. From crashing rhythms and guitar riffs that combine to create an outright avalanche of sound, like being in a volcano when it's exploding (even in '02, I often muted my TV while playing Metroid Prime's Magmoor Caverns to blast this album(NOTE: that game has an excellent soundtrack of its own too!)), to Clark's epic vocals, to a heavy nu-metal influence (NOT A BAD THING!) absent from the vast majority of their following work, Demon Hunter's 2002 debut is a joy. Jesse Sprinkle's non-metal metal drumming, just as on Summer of Darkness, is idiosyncratic to a highly pleasurable degree, so much so that Clark seems to have written the album's dark, massive closer as an excuse to let Sprinkle showcase his abilities to the greatest extent. I love this album.
TIE 8. mewithoutYou -- [A->B} Life
While Ryan Clark may not have performed at Cornerstone in 2002, mewithoutYou emerged newborn from the wet, well-trod Bushnell dirt to perform three shows, and I eagerly attended all of them. mewithoutYou released their incredible debut, [A->B} Life, on Tooth and Nail Records that summer, and I just couldn't get enough of its unique art-punk fury. This is the most aggressive and up-tempo of the band's records, focusing on a vitriolic breakup that involves a lot of religious musing, and the first taste of Aaron Weiss' poetic, immersive lyrics. What a debut!
7. TIE Nine Inch Nails -- Still
My favorite NIN album, which is ironic, as this wasn't exactly released as an album, but as a bonus disc for a live release the band did in '02. Still is mainly piano based, accompanied by minimal instrumentation, and just a hint of the electronics Trent Reznor is mostly known for, and even then, just as brief, atmospheric touches. Four of these tracks are reworked versions of previous songs, though they completely stand on their own in this fashion, and five new songs, only one of which includes vocals. There's so much emotion packed into these nine tracks, and while much of that emotion is a damaged, longing melancholy, there's a lot of beauty here too on this album I just can't help but love.
7. TIE System of a Down -- Steal this Album!
Speaking of my enjoying a band's odds 'n sods album more than any other work in their discography, in 2002, idiosyncratic hard-rockers, System of a Down, formally released Steal this Album!, a collection of unused songs from the 2001 Toxicity sessions that didn't make that album. These songs had previously leaked to the Internet in low quality form, so the band decided to spruce them up, sequence them correctly, and release them in an album with a tongue-in-cheek title. Ironically, Steal this Album! has a better musical, emotional and thematic flow than any of the band's other LP's, to the degree that it isn't just my favorite, but the favorite amongst several System of a Down band members. As one song flows seamlessly into the next, Steal this Album! is the perfect, breathless balance of the band's more extreme and more mainstream sensibilities, their dadaist lyrics, and their socially conscious ones. It's awesome.
TIE 6. John Williams -- Star Wars: Episode II: Attack of the Clones (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
Until the abysmal sequel trilogy was released, most, including me, considered Attack of the Clones to be the weakest Star Wars film. The second prequel has since grown in my estimation, and its soundtrack even more. This feels like a John Williams master-class in creating a classical suite, as he introduces the main musical idea, "Across the Stars," then presents various movements that work in the main idea at select moments, while also introducing several key motifs, before building up to a massive concluding repronouncement of "Across the Stars." Throughout, the music not only stimulates the imagination, but the adrenal gland, as Williams' brassy, energetic action cues here are stunning, even as he experiments with seemingly incongruous instruments, like a distorted electric guitar. This may be my second favorite of Williams' Star Wars soundtracks, behind only that of The Empire Strikes Back.
TIE 6. Howard Shore -- The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
Howard Shore gives the middle chapter of this timeless film trilogy as timeless a soundtrack (just as he does for the other two films), creating a magnificent string theme for the horse-bound Rohirrim, deepening several of the returning themes from the last film, and utilizing vast orchestrations, including a Mount Doom-full of haunting, epic choral pieces, to create a stunning piece of work that's imminently listenable on its own, one that earns its place amongst the greatest all-time classical works. It also does a wonderful job of musically finding hope in almost insurmountable hopelessness, though this is likely the darkest soundtrack of the trilogy. CUT TO, December 21, 2002. I've been depressed and down most of the semester. I finish up my night shift DJ'ing at KLSU, and I walk across the street to the PMAC to watch LSU basketball take on #1 Arizona. On the quick walk to the PMAC, I catch a glimpse of the nearly full moon, that Rohirrim violin theme pops in my head, and I suddenly feel optimistic. LSU upsets #1 Arizona, 66-65, and I start walking back to my car, and come across the LSU cheerleaders. One of them catches my eye, as if we know each other, then we run full-speed toward each other, she jumps into my arms, and we hug each other deeply, then look into each other's faces and both say, "Wait, I don't know you" at the same time. I walk away chuckling. Life did get better. That was a fun night.
5. Norma Jean -- Bless the Martyr and Kiss the Child
I first received this album as a radio station promo, threw it on in my car, and within five seconds, was hooked. When I went back in for my shift, I said, "I think I just listened to one of the best albums I've ever heard." While my initial comment reached doubtful ears, BTMKTC eventually won over a whole bunch of them--them being...ears--and became a monumental release in heavy music. To quote myself when I previously reviewed this "Here is an album that defies categorization. Scogin, no longer employing digital distortion, has a scream thicker than a thousand Janet Lee's, going from deep bellowing to high-shrieks in the same second. The songwriting is brilliant, full of such a meticulously ordered diversity of tempo, texture, and emotion. The production, done without the aid of computers, sounds so full, with the drums in particular sounding deep and resonant..." The sound and album artwork conjure both an old haunted house in the middle of the woods, and a horde of angry ghosts absolutely tearing down said house.
TIE 4. Sigur Rós -- ( )
I was leaving a Sunday night shift at the radio station, when the request show guys coming in after me said, "Listen when you get in your car. We're about to play something good." They then played "Ný batterí" by Sigur Rós, without naming the band or the song...and then two other guys took over their show the next week and I never got to ask them who they'd played. All I knew was that the singer sounded vaguely Icelandic. I then went to Best Buy, bought Sigur Rós ( ), and found it was the right band, but the wrong album. No matter, as ( ) immediately put me under a spell. I pulled an all-nighter to ( ) when I got home from Best Buy to finish a final English paper, then listened to the album all summer, its strange frozen alien landscapes and I in some illicit relationship where I didn't want to share the band or their music with anyone. The emotional arc of this album is stunning, from an instrumental thaw, to a slow sunrise, to a sad, funereal third-quarter, to an unbelievably cathartic, drum-head shattering finale. I eventually shared my love for this band with others, and the band put out several other albums (I even went back and got the one "Ný batterí" is on), but ( ) is still my favorite.
TIE 4. Múm -- Finally We Are No One
Speaking of 2002 Icelandic albums that sound like they were made by aliens, Múm's Finally We Are No One, which combines acoustic instrumentation with experimental electronics and strange, childlike female vocals, creates an incredibly unique and satisfying musical world. As with ( ), the heightened emotions of this album are incredible (I don't know what was going on in early 00's Iceland), with a highly satisfying arc as well. From a melancholic start, to some happier tones, to some quite bleak ones, to more optimism, to a finale called "The Land Between Solar Systems" that sounds exactly like that, and is, by some insane coincidence, somehow just 13 seconds shorter than ( )'s 11:58 closer, Finally We Are No One is an incredible musical and emotional feat.
3. Dredg -- El Cielo
Dredg's strange, dreamy, haunted, sleep-paralysis-focused experimental rock album had the power to send me to other realms when I first heard it, and it still does today. There's not another album like this one, even in the band's own discography.
2. Beck -- Sea Change
This is an all-timer. Beck's magnificent breakup record is the type of ultimate musical mood-booster that only comes around once in a blue moon. Taking inspiration from Nick Drake, Beck takes his acoustic guitar and resonant, plaintive vocals, writes a bunch of incredible, timeless songs, and pairs them with rich, lush, full string-enhanced and diverse folk instrumentation, to create one of the greatest albums of all time.
1. Interpol -- Turn On the Bright Lights
If this isn't the consensus coolest album of all time, it's the coolest album of all time to me. From the lonely streets of 2002's New York City at the witching hour, Interpol unleash an 11-song opus that not only they, but none of the bands in the Rolling Stone magazine-fabricated early rock revival of the early 00's ever topped. From the way Carlos Dengler's thick, mix-dominant bass interplays with Sam Fogarino's active, beat dominant drums, to the supremely satisfying intermingling of Daniel Kessler and Paul Banks' guitar lines, to Banks' paradoxically emotionally distant, highly emotional, distinct baritone, every element here is in perfect balance. The songwriting is also impeccable, clearly pieces that have been resonating in the band members' heads for years to create one of, if not the best debut by any band in the 21st Century. A miracle.
Postmortem:
Looking at the list above, I see now just how influential DJ'ing at KLSU was on my musical experience. I'm really thankful that happened. While there are a lot of other albums I've jammed from 2002, here are a few I feel I need to mention. I have a huge soft spot for Iron and Wine's lo-fi debut, The Creek Drank the Cradle, a lovely album that drags just a bit in places, but at its best reminds me of my rural farm childhood. I bought Chevelle's Wonder What's Next on CD from Wal-Mart on release day for $4.99, and while at the time I only found it to be a Deftones ripoff, the album, and particularly the band, have grown on me in the last 20 years. The Flaming Lips' Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, with its 70's textures, is a beautiful experimental pop-rock album that made a major impression on me at the time, though the more weightless, slowed-down second half has become more of a slog for me to get through as the years have worn on. I'm a huge fan the The Apex Theory's Topsy-Turvy, and extremely fun, high-energy hard rock album. Embodyment's Songs for the Living is a great rock album with Southern Rock touches, and an interesting swansong for a vastly underrated band. Jars of Clay's solid The Eleventh Hour contains some extremely powerful moments of emotion (especially in the vocal and guitar melodies), and captures some of that post 9/11 sadness/confusion/waiting feeling, but some of the upbeat stuff is dated and cheesy. It took me a while to warm up to the Celtic punk of Flogging Molly's sophomore effort, Drunken Lullabies, but now I like it nearly as much as I do their debut, Swagger. This really underrated rock band called Denison Marrs put out a very good rock album called Then Is the New Now that for some reason isn't streaming as if it never even existed, but it did and I like it. Kent's Vapen and & Ammunition is so cool, an excellent rock album as long as you don't mind that it's all in Swedish--it's not among my top favorites in their catalogue, though. Moby's 18 is a letdown compared to his previous album, 1999's magnificent Play, and it's also a huge downer, but it's also a pretty good album. Zao's Jesse Smith swansong, which was supposed to be the band's swansong, Parade of Chaos, is a musically demented take on "What if an early 00's metal band was a 70's rock band?" Parade of Chaos is so damn weird and felt monumentally eventful at the time, the sadness of one of heavy music's greats fading into the either, but then the band just moved on without Smith and have released five albums since. A lot of fans are down on Slick Shoes' self-titled album, but I love it--Slick Shoes is basically the punk rock love song manifesto.
These entries will be divided into three sections:
A. The Redux List
B. The Original List (when applicable)
C. A Quick Postmortem
I'm excited to finally hit those years I missed, as well as revisit the years where I've already made lists, to see if and how my opinion has changed. This is all part of a bigger project I am calling DO I STILL LOVE THIS?
I didn't make an original list for 2002 (The Nicsperiment was still gestating), so this Redux list will actually be the first 2002 list. This particular list, which coincidentally commemorates 2002's 20th anniversary, was quite difficult to make. It turns out, 2002 was a quite a year for music, at least as far as I am concerned. Indeed, when I made my top 50 albums list last year, SEVEN were released in 2002. Apparently, that year had a deep impact on my musical tastes as well, as I jammed some of these in 2002, but discovered most of the others throughout 2003, 2004, and 2005. I also find that I come back to these albums more than just about any others, which is strange, as I spent much of the latter portion of that year, the first half of my junior year of college, in a deep depression, mostly hiding in my room with the lights off when I wasn't on campus.
All that to say, this is a special musical year, and thus...there are many ties. If I needed to cheat the TOP NINE format badly for any year, it's this one.
Please remember musical preferences are completely subjective. Oh, and ties...as I've said, they're 100% legal!...and for 2002, 100% necessary. I at least tried to pair the ties up with musically similar matches. Here's the list.
The Redux List:
TIE 9. Blindisde -- Silence
The fall of 2002 continued a trend of Christian hard rock/heavy bands jumping to a major label. Swedish hardcore heroes, Blindside, were essentially invited to the big stage by their American buddies, P.O.D., who had made it big the year before with the multi-platinum Satellite. These lovable Nordic lads made the best of the opportunity, somehow creating a less heavy, masses-pleasing major debut in Silence that their small, but loyal original fanbase still enjoyed. The songs are well-written, the album flows like a river after a fresh thaw, and the four-piece are hitting on all cylinders, from the snappy rhythm section, to the crunchy guitars, to Christian Lindskog's shamanisticly sung and banshee screamed vocals. The album even has a meditative third quarter and an emotional acoustic closer to give it a clean and complete emotional arc. While Blindside's time in the American spotlight only lasted for about three years and three albums (during which they popped up on Conan and appeared in a major Hollywood film), they're still able to pull 150K-plus listens a month on Spotify 20 years later, largely due to the enduring popularity of Silence.
TIE 9. Project 86 -- Truthless Heroes
Underground hard-rockers, Project 86, also had their name called during the Christian heavy band to major label boon, but things worked out a little differently for them than it did for P.O.D. and Blindside. In what may be the only case of a band losing popularity AFTER releasing their major label debut, Project 86 followed up their epic, extremely heavy, indie-released Drawing Black Lines with the Atlantic Records-released, verse-chorus-verse, streamlined hard rock of Truthless Heroes. At the time of its release, most of the original Project 86 fans SHUNNED this album. I can't remember how many conversations I had with friends and acquaintances on the LSU campus that week that started with them saying, "Did you hear the new Project 86 yet? It sucks so bad, I brought it back to the store." The crazy thing is, 20-years later, Truthless Heroes is generally found at or near the top of current Project 86 fans' lists. Beneath the more streamlined songwriting and polish are some great instrumental performances, and the vocals are much weirder upon further inspection, particularly the medieval scales of some of the melodies. However, the album's most resonant factor is Andrew Schwab's lyrical work, as he uncannily predicts the social media influencer/icon figures that would arise in the next decade. This Aldous Huxley and T.S. Eliot-influenced concept album follows the titular "Truthless Hero" from ambitious youth, to a journey to the mountaintop of culture, to a hollow, empty descent, while also providing commentary on the post-9/11 political climate in the United States. With time, Truthless Heroes has revealed itself to be a remarkable album.
8. TIE Demon Hunter -- Demon Hunter
I was talking to then Zao drummer, Jesse Smith, backstage at Cornerstone 2002, when he grabbed the big bald guy next to him and said, "This is who you really want to talk to. His new band is gonna be huge." The bald guy was Ryan Clark, frontman for Demon Hunter, whose debut was released several months later. I'd already gotten hyped by the single the band had released earlier in the year. They had adopted an anonymous, "the members of this band are a mystery" stance for that first self-titled album, even obscuring their faces on the back cover album photograph...but I knew who was belting those big melodies and bellowing out those throaty screams because of that encounter. Maybe it was the lack of mystery, the slightly muted initial critical response to the album that fall, or the brief moment the band subconsciously lift a Deftones riff on the album's third track, but I highly undervalued Demon Hunter at the time of its release, immediately latching onto their second album, Summer of Darkness, when it was released in '04, as the much superior work. Indeed, I do still think that second album is better, but this apocalyptic hard rock debut has greatly risen in my esteem over the last 20 years. From crashing rhythms and guitar riffs that combine to create an outright avalanche of sound, like being in a volcano when it's exploding (even in '02, I often muted my TV while playing Metroid Prime's Magmoor Caverns to blast this album(NOTE: that game has an excellent soundtrack of its own too!)), to Clark's epic vocals, to a heavy nu-metal influence (NOT A BAD THING!) absent from the vast majority of their following work, Demon Hunter's 2002 debut is a joy. Jesse Sprinkle's non-metal metal drumming, just as on Summer of Darkness, is idiosyncratic to a highly pleasurable degree, so much so that Clark seems to have written the album's dark, massive closer as an excuse to let Sprinkle showcase his abilities to the greatest extent. I love this album.
TIE 8. mewithoutYou -- [A->B} Life
While Ryan Clark may not have performed at Cornerstone in 2002, mewithoutYou emerged newborn from the wet, well-trod Bushnell dirt to perform three shows, and I eagerly attended all of them. mewithoutYou released their incredible debut, [A->B} Life, on Tooth and Nail Records that summer, and I just couldn't get enough of its unique art-punk fury. This is the most aggressive and up-tempo of the band's records, focusing on a vitriolic breakup that involves a lot of religious musing, and the first taste of Aaron Weiss' poetic, immersive lyrics. What a debut!
7. TIE Nine Inch Nails -- Still
My favorite NIN album, which is ironic, as this wasn't exactly released as an album, but as a bonus disc for a live release the band did in '02. Still is mainly piano based, accompanied by minimal instrumentation, and just a hint of the electronics Trent Reznor is mostly known for, and even then, just as brief, atmospheric touches. Four of these tracks are reworked versions of previous songs, though they completely stand on their own in this fashion, and five new songs, only one of which includes vocals. There's so much emotion packed into these nine tracks, and while much of that emotion is a damaged, longing melancholy, there's a lot of beauty here too on this album I just can't help but love.
7. TIE System of a Down -- Steal this Album!
Speaking of my enjoying a band's odds 'n sods album more than any other work in their discography, in 2002, idiosyncratic hard-rockers, System of a Down, formally released Steal this Album!, a collection of unused songs from the 2001 Toxicity sessions that didn't make that album. These songs had previously leaked to the Internet in low quality form, so the band decided to spruce them up, sequence them correctly, and release them in an album with a tongue-in-cheek title. Ironically, Steal this Album! has a better musical, emotional and thematic flow than any of the band's other LP's, to the degree that it isn't just my favorite, but the favorite amongst several System of a Down band members. As one song flows seamlessly into the next, Steal this Album! is the perfect, breathless balance of the band's more extreme and more mainstream sensibilities, their dadaist lyrics, and their socially conscious ones. It's awesome.
TIE 6. John Williams -- Star Wars: Episode II: Attack of the Clones (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
Until the abysmal sequel trilogy was released, most, including me, considered Attack of the Clones to be the weakest Star Wars film. The second prequel has since grown in my estimation, and its soundtrack even more. This feels like a John Williams master-class in creating a classical suite, as he introduces the main musical idea, "Across the Stars," then presents various movements that work in the main idea at select moments, while also introducing several key motifs, before building up to a massive concluding repronouncement of "Across the Stars." Throughout, the music not only stimulates the imagination, but the adrenal gland, as Williams' brassy, energetic action cues here are stunning, even as he experiments with seemingly incongruous instruments, like a distorted electric guitar. This may be my second favorite of Williams' Star Wars soundtracks, behind only that of The Empire Strikes Back.
TIE 6. Howard Shore -- The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
Howard Shore gives the middle chapter of this timeless film trilogy as timeless a soundtrack (just as he does for the other two films), creating a magnificent string theme for the horse-bound Rohirrim, deepening several of the returning themes from the last film, and utilizing vast orchestrations, including a Mount Doom-full of haunting, epic choral pieces, to create a stunning piece of work that's imminently listenable on its own, one that earns its place amongst the greatest all-time classical works. It also does a wonderful job of musically finding hope in almost insurmountable hopelessness, though this is likely the darkest soundtrack of the trilogy. CUT TO, December 21, 2002. I've been depressed and down most of the semester. I finish up my night shift DJ'ing at KLSU, and I walk across the street to the PMAC to watch LSU basketball take on #1 Arizona. On the quick walk to the PMAC, I catch a glimpse of the nearly full moon, that Rohirrim violin theme pops in my head, and I suddenly feel optimistic. LSU upsets #1 Arizona, 66-65, and I start walking back to my car, and come across the LSU cheerleaders. One of them catches my eye, as if we know each other, then we run full-speed toward each other, she jumps into my arms, and we hug each other deeply, then look into each other's faces and both say, "Wait, I don't know you" at the same time. I walk away chuckling. Life did get better. That was a fun night.
5. Norma Jean -- Bless the Martyr and Kiss the Child
I first received this album as a radio station promo, threw it on in my car, and within five seconds, was hooked. When I went back in for my shift, I said, "I think I just listened to one of the best albums I've ever heard." While my initial comment reached doubtful ears, BTMKTC eventually won over a whole bunch of them--them being...ears--and became a monumental release in heavy music. To quote myself when I previously reviewed this "Here is an album that defies categorization. Scogin, no longer employing digital distortion, has a scream thicker than a thousand Janet Lee's, going from deep bellowing to high-shrieks in the same second. The songwriting is brilliant, full of such a meticulously ordered diversity of tempo, texture, and emotion. The production, done without the aid of computers, sounds so full, with the drums in particular sounding deep and resonant..." The sound and album artwork conjure both an old haunted house in the middle of the woods, and a horde of angry ghosts absolutely tearing down said house.
TIE 4. Sigur Rós -- ( )
I was leaving a Sunday night shift at the radio station, when the request show guys coming in after me said, "Listen when you get in your car. We're about to play something good." They then played "Ný batterí" by Sigur Rós, without naming the band or the song...and then two other guys took over their show the next week and I never got to ask them who they'd played. All I knew was that the singer sounded vaguely Icelandic. I then went to Best Buy, bought Sigur Rós ( ), and found it was the right band, but the wrong album. No matter, as ( ) immediately put me under a spell. I pulled an all-nighter to ( ) when I got home from Best Buy to finish a final English paper, then listened to the album all summer, its strange frozen alien landscapes and I in some illicit relationship where I didn't want to share the band or their music with anyone. The emotional arc of this album is stunning, from an instrumental thaw, to a slow sunrise, to a sad, funereal third-quarter, to an unbelievably cathartic, drum-head shattering finale. I eventually shared my love for this band with others, and the band put out several other albums (I even went back and got the one "Ný batterí" is on), but ( ) is still my favorite.
TIE 4. Múm -- Finally We Are No One
Speaking of 2002 Icelandic albums that sound like they were made by aliens, Múm's Finally We Are No One, which combines acoustic instrumentation with experimental electronics and strange, childlike female vocals, creates an incredibly unique and satisfying musical world. As with ( ), the heightened emotions of this album are incredible (I don't know what was going on in early 00's Iceland), with a highly satisfying arc as well. From a melancholic start, to some happier tones, to some quite bleak ones, to more optimism, to a finale called "The Land Between Solar Systems" that sounds exactly like that, and is, by some insane coincidence, somehow just 13 seconds shorter than ( )'s 11:58 closer, Finally We Are No One is an incredible musical and emotional feat.
3. Dredg -- El Cielo
Dredg's strange, dreamy, haunted, sleep-paralysis-focused experimental rock album had the power to send me to other realms when I first heard it, and it still does today. There's not another album like this one, even in the band's own discography.
2. Beck -- Sea Change
This is an all-timer. Beck's magnificent breakup record is the type of ultimate musical mood-booster that only comes around once in a blue moon. Taking inspiration from Nick Drake, Beck takes his acoustic guitar and resonant, plaintive vocals, writes a bunch of incredible, timeless songs, and pairs them with rich, lush, full string-enhanced and diverse folk instrumentation, to create one of the greatest albums of all time.
1. Interpol -- Turn On the Bright Lights
If this isn't the consensus coolest album of all time, it's the coolest album of all time to me. From the lonely streets of 2002's New York City at the witching hour, Interpol unleash an 11-song opus that not only they, but none of the bands in the Rolling Stone magazine-fabricated early rock revival of the early 00's ever topped. From the way Carlos Dengler's thick, mix-dominant bass interplays with Sam Fogarino's active, beat dominant drums, to the supremely satisfying intermingling of Daniel Kessler and Paul Banks' guitar lines, to Banks' paradoxically emotionally distant, highly emotional, distinct baritone, every element here is in perfect balance. The songwriting is also impeccable, clearly pieces that have been resonating in the band members' heads for years to create one of, if not the best debut by any band in the 21st Century. A miracle.
Postmortem:
Looking at the list above, I see now just how influential DJ'ing at KLSU was on my musical experience. I'm really thankful that happened. While there are a lot of other albums I've jammed from 2002, here are a few I feel I need to mention. I have a huge soft spot for Iron and Wine's lo-fi debut, The Creek Drank the Cradle, a lovely album that drags just a bit in places, but at its best reminds me of my rural farm childhood. I bought Chevelle's Wonder What's Next on CD from Wal-Mart on release day for $4.99, and while at the time I only found it to be a Deftones ripoff, the album, and particularly the band, have grown on me in the last 20 years. The Flaming Lips' Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, with its 70's textures, is a beautiful experimental pop-rock album that made a major impression on me at the time, though the more weightless, slowed-down second half has become more of a slog for me to get through as the years have worn on. I'm a huge fan the The Apex Theory's Topsy-Turvy, and extremely fun, high-energy hard rock album. Embodyment's Songs for the Living is a great rock album with Southern Rock touches, and an interesting swansong for a vastly underrated band. Jars of Clay's solid The Eleventh Hour contains some extremely powerful moments of emotion (especially in the vocal and guitar melodies), and captures some of that post 9/11 sadness/confusion/waiting feeling, but some of the upbeat stuff is dated and cheesy. It took me a while to warm up to the Celtic punk of Flogging Molly's sophomore effort, Drunken Lullabies, but now I like it nearly as much as I do their debut, Swagger. This really underrated rock band called Denison Marrs put out a very good rock album called Then Is the New Now that for some reason isn't streaming as if it never even existed, but it did and I like it. Kent's Vapen and & Ammunition is so cool, an excellent rock album as long as you don't mind that it's all in Swedish--it's not among my top favorites in their catalogue, though. Moby's 18 is a letdown compared to his previous album, 1999's magnificent Play, and it's also a huge downer, but it's also a pretty good album. Zao's Jesse Smith swansong, which was supposed to be the band's swansong, Parade of Chaos, is a musically demented take on "What if an early 00's metal band was a 70's rock band?" Parade of Chaos is so damn weird and felt monumentally eventful at the time, the sadness of one of heavy music's greats fading into the either, but then the band just moved on without Smith and have released five albums since. A lot of fans are down on Slick Shoes' self-titled album, but I love it--Slick Shoes is basically the punk rock love song manifesto.
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