Hi all,
Welcome to the 2018 edition of the TOA Music Awards - or as it is more commonly known, the most self-indulgent post of the year!
As I’ve done in the past, I’ll hand out a number of irrelevant honors to various bands and artists in today’s opening post before following up over the next few weeks with some leftover thoughts on songs, concerts, and the year ahead. I liked how the format from last year’s awards held up when I revisited it in preparation for this post so we’ll just run it back this year and see where that takes us. Those interested in past winners should refer to the footnotes.
Without further ado, then…
Rookie of the Year – Arctic Monkeys
I've noted in the past that a good way to predict whether I’ll like a band requires understanding some basic criteria. First, is the band a strong live performer? Second, can the band cover a song? And third, does the lead singer have an unusual voice within the genre? I went to see the Arctic Monkeys perform in July and found that they easily passed muster as it related to all of these questions. The rest of the year was spent catching up to a lot of their live performances on Youtube and I’ve found about ten to fifteen songs I like (which is around the average for me if I like a group). I’m a little late to the party with this group given that they’ve been fairly relevant for over a decade but in hindsight it seems like it was just a matter of when, not if.
Becoming an Arctic Monkeys fan introduces a couple of bizarre and pointless observations. First, this Sheffield-based band isn’t even my favorite group from England’s Steel City – that pointless honor remains with Slow Club (though I suppose the defunct two-piece is now officially under threat). And second, this isn’t the first band I’ve gotten into after showing up to a concert – that distinction remains with Rubblebucket, a band I’ve gone to see a few times since my initial introduction to them when they opened for Lake Street Dive.
Most Improved – Muse (Arcade Fire, The Killers)
This was a three-way race defined more by a lack of strong candidates than it was a significant change in the way I considered these groups. I had essentially written off Arcade Fire at this time last year but I found in 2018 that I was pleasantly surprised when I dug into the archives for some of their older concerts. The Killers made it into the shortlist solely on the power of their various cover performances that I enjoyed exploring over the past year.
In the end, it had to be Muse. They released their 9th album, Simulation Theory, and although it won’t go down in history as my favorite album I liked a number of the songs and their corresponding early live performances. It also prompted me to dig back into the archives for some of their songs I’d never paid close attention to – ‘Butterflies and Hurricanes’, ‘Neutron Star Collison’, and ‘Thoughts of a Dying Atheist’ foremost among them. The opportunity to explore Muse’s work, whether it was new or just new to me, made it a good year for the band in my esteem and propelled them upward in my internal rankings. I’m looking forward to their next show in Boston.
Before moving on, I’d like to point out that one of the best parts of being a longtime fan of any band is the opportunity to see how all the reviews that come out with each new album start egging each other on to produce an increasingly ridiculous narrative about a group. The current Muse narrative is that it's officially uncool to like them (Muse, meet U2), my favorite thought along these lines being from NME – you won’t want to admit you liked (the new album). What sorry lives the readers of NME must lead! I’ll admit here that I did like it, and that I encourage all TOA readers to admit what they like, unless they wish to become qualified to review albums from aging rock bands for their local newspaper.
Lifetime Achievement – T.I.
I’m still working out what exactly it means to win a TOA Lifetime Achievement Award. For now, I’m reserving it for groups or artists that I’m grateful to for contributions to my life yet have no expectations for in terms of further contributions. The explanation isn’t very succinct or even helpful but it does accurately describe how I feel about T.I., my favorite rapper. I think although I’ve always liked rap, at this moment it doesn’t feel like I’ll ever become a loyal fan of the genre.
I’ve written about T.I. on TOA before in the context of his appearance on VH1’s Storytellers series. This show encouraged artists to talk about the stories and inspirations that went into their work before performing those songs in front of an intimate studio audience. Though I enjoyed his entire performance, the segment about ‘No Matter What’ always moved me. T.I. talks about feeling isolated and betrayed when those who once stood close by his side suddenly disappeared as his success was interrupted by a period of difficulty and crisis. He then explains how this challenged and motivated him to grow as an artist by creating something a little different – as he put it, he couldn’t use this as an excuse for writing another ‘ghetto anthem’. Instead, he dug deep into himself to understand what drove him and poured his energy into creating ‘No Matter What’.
This track remains one of my favorite songs. I like it because it’s a good rap song, of course, but also because I relate to the intensity of its hurt, defiance, and confidence. Of course, I also have no doubt that T.I.’s speech on Storytellers played a huge role in my feelings about the song. It was, in essence, a two minute dissertation about creating art, and it was the first such explanation I’d ever heard in my life. In short, every time I hear ‘No Matter What’, I’m reminded that the depths of failure, disappointment, and despair isn’t a place to where we fall but a place where we make ourselves comfortable until we are ready to start scaling the mountain once more.
TOA Band of the Year – Chvrches (U2, Lake Street Dive)
I considered more groups than usual for this honor but ending up finding easy reasons to cross them off during my preliminary deliberations. Courtney Barnett and Arctic Monkeys were both boosted by concerts late in the year but these shows were not enough to make up for the time I spent mostly ignoring them in the first half of the year. I liked 2011 champion Muse and 2015 winner Lake Street Dive’s new albums but neither record captured my imagination in the same way of past releases.
Ultimately, I found myself with the two-horse race I sort of predicted in last year’s awards. The U2 concert in June was a highlight of the year and I did think the ancient rock band was headed for top honors as I walked into the Orpheum Theater in late October for the Chvrches show. However, Chvrches’s electric performance combined with a consistent year of finding good live performances on Youtube helped me conclude that on balance this Scottish synth-pop group did more for me this year than did any other in my musical rotation.
For a band that I described in November as ‘the band the Yeah Yeah Yeahs would have become if they’d paid their electric bill’, Chvrches is showing some surprising promise with their unplugged work. I found many excellent acoustic performances from the group this year that suggest they are more than a temporary blip on my musical radar. They will be challenged like any other group to innovate within their strengths and, perhaps more importantly, stay together, but if they can keep their focus I think I’ll probably have some more to say about them at this time next year.
Footnotes / well, endnotes…
0. My updated award list...
Folks, as promised, here’s the full list. Readers should note that The Band of the Year is the only award I did retroactively (up to 2016) and that runners-up/honorable mentions are in parenthesis.
Band of the Year
1987 - 2006: Eminem (Nelly, Nirvana)
2007 - 2009: U2 (Counting Crows, Passion Pit)
2010: The Killers
2011: Muse (Arcade Fire)
2012: 'Podcasts' (sorry)... (Oasis, Foster The People)
2013: Yeah Yeah Yeahs (T.I., P!nk)
2014: The Head and The Heart (Sara Bareilles, Yeah Yeah Yeahs)
2015: Lake Street Dive (Of Monsters and Men, U2)
2016: Slow Club (Courtney Barnett, Lake Street Dive)
2017: Rubblebucket (Celtic Social Club, U2)
2018: Chvrches (U2, Lake Street Dive)
Rookie of the Year
2017: Chvrches (vkgoeswild Youtube channel)
2018: Arctic Monkeys
Most Improved
2017: Of Monsters and Men (The Head and the Heart)
2018: Muse (Arcade Fire, The Killers)
Lifetime Achievement
2017: The Yeah Yeah Yeahs
2018: T.I.
