Anna St. Louis: If Only There Was a River (2018)

Release Date: October 12, 2018

Produced by Kyle Thomas and Kevin Morby

Side One: Water; Understand; The Bells; Paradise; Daisy

Side Two: Desert; Hello; Freedom; Mean Love; Wind; If Only There Was a River

Hailing from Kansas City, singer-songwriter Anna St. Louis released one of the most impressive albums of 2018. A collection of melodic, somber, and minimal folk tunes, her vocal style has been compared Loretta Lynn and Joni Mitchell and at same time expresses a varied emotional range.

"Water" features strings and a muted acoustic guitar, setting a mood of uncertainty and suspicion towards the figure in the song. "Understand" is a standout track, atmospheric and melancholy, using spare lyrics to perfection. Anne repeatedly asks in the refrain, "understand me, do you understand" takes on a hypnotic tone.

"The Bells" may be a sly take on Dylan's sardonic farewell song "Don't Think Twice (It's All Right), even Edgar Allan Poe's poem "The Bells." "Paradise" is a folk song about finding possibilities in malaise: 

Paradise, Paradise
Has a nice ring
But it's hard to find

Side one concludes with an instrumental, "Daisy."

"Desert" has more of a Western vibe, a sense of wonder at the vast landscapes and their spiritual undertones. Musically, it's more sonic and epic. On "Hello" Anne sings "the dark is never dark enough" to what could be a mirror image of herself. "Freedom" is about a solitary wanderer searching, but keeps returning to a mysterious town connected with her past. 

"Mean Love" continues with the searching motif, asking if what appears to be good for you is actually that good. The soft Western tone of 'Wind" seeks a communion with nature. "If Only There Was a River" end the record on an uncertain beat, with the refrain "if only."

A quiet album with a lot brimming beneath the surface, St. Louis's introspective collection of songs leave a lasting impression.

The Albums of 1970: The Temptations: Psychedelic Shack

Release Date: March 6, 1970

Personnel: Dennis Edwards, Eddie Kendricks, Paul Williams, Melvin Franklin, Otis Williams

Lyrics and Composition: Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong

Instrumentation: The Funk Brothers

Produced by Norman Whitfield

Side 1: Psychedelic Shack; You Make Your Heaven or Hell Right Here on Earth; Hum Along and Dance; Take a Stroll Thru Your Mind

Side 2: It's Summer; War; You Need Love like I do (don't you); Friendship Train

The 12th album by The Temptations continued their cycle of psychedelic soul records which began with their 1969 album Cloud Nine. Full of good vibes with an eye towards a better future, there's an optimism propelling the album along.

"Psychedelic Shack" opens the album, imagining a place where creativity and peace flourish in the midst of the mayhem of the outside world, getting the record off to a rousing start. "You Make Your Heaven or Hell Right Here on Earth" offers a simple message, we get to choose how we live. Everyone has a choice:

You and your beliefs
Are the weights
The things you do each day
Determine the balance

"Hum Along and Dance" is an instrumental inviting everyone to join in. "Take a Stroll Thru Your Mind" is a standout track. A sonic journey of doo wop, soul, and psychedelia - their 1965 hit "My Girl" is even referenced.

The album's single "It's Summer" recalls an early Temptations song, smoothly produced with some wonderful harmonies. "War" would become an anthem of the era, becoming a number one hit for Motown artist Edwin Starr in June of 1970. 

"You Need Love Like I Do" never quite takes off like the other tracks, but "Friendship Train" continues the theme of unity and friendship - the only forces that can save the world. Your heart just has to be in the right place.

Psychedelic Shack offers up Utopian visions but never shies away from the realities of 1970, the sound and style have aged well.

The Albums of 1970: Simon & Garfunkel: Bridge over Troubled Water

Release Date: January 26, 1970

Produced by Paul Simon, Art Garfunkel, and Roy Halee

Side 1: Bridge over Troubled Water; El Condor Pasa (If I Could); Cecilia; Keep the Customer Satisfied; So Long, Frank Lloyd Wright

Side 2: The Boxer; Baby Driver; The Only Living Boy in New York; Why Don't You Write Me; Bye Bye Love (Live); Song for the Asking

The fifth and final album of the duo from Queens stands as their most complete and satisfying collection of songs. With the duo about to go their separate ways, Garfunkel into movies, and Simon embarking on a solo career, their swan song proved an affectionate, but uneasy, farewell. Backed by a roster of superior session musicians with a production style mimicking The Beatles, Bridge over Troubled Water offers a variety of styles. 

Opening with the majestic title track, with Garfunkel's close to divine vocal, it's one for the ages. Painstakingly composed and performed, the song stands right alongside the best pop songs of all time. Transcending the division of 1970, the song will never become dated.

"El Condor Pasa (If I Could) is an Andean folk song Simon erroneously thought was in the public domain but was actually written by Daniel Alomia Robles. Another wonderful production, "El Condor Pasa" extended the stylistic range of the album. The frenetic folk rock of "Cecilia" about a promiscuous girlfriend also became a radio hit. "Keep the Customer Satisfied" recalls "Got to Get You Into My Life" from Revolver with the prominent trumpets, creating a unique tone for a whimsical tune. "So Long, Frank Lloyd Wright" is attributed to Simon saying farewell to his singing partner who had studied architecture at Columbia:

I'll remember Frank Lloyd Wright
All of the nights we'd harmonize till dawn
I never laughed so long

Side two opens with another popular single "The Boxer," the tale of a young man struggling to survive in New York City. "Baby Driver" would inspire a film of the same title by Edgar Wright in 2017, the tale of a country boy celebrating a wild life on the road seems to recall Dylan's surreal epics he wrote in the mid-60s. The B-side to "Cecilia", "The Only Living Boy in New York" is a hymn to loneliness and ennui in the city (also inspired a 2017 film).

"Why Don't You Write Me" also speaks to longing as adulthood beckons. A live version of The Everly Brothers song "Bye Bye Love" was included because of Paul and Art liked the clapping accompanying the performance. And the subdued acoustic number"Song for the Asking" is Paul speaking to Art about the end of their partnership and the possibility of reunion.

Bridge over Troubled Water is a wintry record. There's a sense of exhaustion and poignant hope with occasional humor. Simon is reflective and looking backward, taking stock at the start of a new decade, one without Garfunkel. Despite their differing trajectories in life, together Simon & Garfunkel created a fulfilling culmination of their years together. 

The Albums of 1970: The Moody Blues: A Question of Balance

Release Date: August 7, 1970

Personnel: Justin Hayward (vocals, guitar, mandolin), John Lodge (vocals, bass), Ray Thomas (vocals, flute, tambourine), Graeme Edge (percussion), Mike Pinder (vocals, keyboards)

Produced by Tony Clarke

Side 1: Question; How is it (we are here); And the Tide Rushes Down; Do you feel Small; Tortoise and the Hare.

Side 2: It's Up to You; Minstrel's Song; Dawning is the Day; Melancholy Man; The Balance

Known for pioneering the concept album with their 1967 LP Days of Future Past, The Moody Blues began the 1970s with a more stripped down record which included a killer single with "Question." A Question of Balance would reveal a folk influence fused with the cosmic awareness with which the band had become known for. The album would reach #1 in the United Kingdom and peak at #3 in America. 

As evident in the collage of the album cover, The Moody Blues were apprehensive at the state of the world. Justin Hayward mentioned how the song "Question" spoke to this in an interview, "After a decade of peace and love, it still seemed we hadn't made a difference in 1970." The song asks the same questions we're asking ourselves in 2020:

Why do we never get an answer
When we're knocking at the door
With a thousand million questions
About hate and death and war?

The acoustic driven rock of the first section gives way to a more introspective balladry and then picks up for a reprise of the first section for a blistering finish. 

"How is it (we are here)" continues along a similar theme with a more psychedelic edge. The song asks how can we keep taking from the earth and giving nothing back. "And the Tide Rushes In" reflects on how everything disappears with time, all of our worries, ambitions, and triumphs will all vanish as nature looks on with indifference. 

"Don't You Feel Small" moves into a folk rock direction with a prominent flute. It's also about nature, which makes a mockery of the human ego. One look no further than a mirror."The Tortoise and the Hare" uses the famous fable as a metaphor of doing things at your own pace and not worrying about how fast others are moving. 

Side two opens "It's Up To You" a love song about finding peace through love and everyone has the choice to either turn away or embrace the world. "Minstrel's Song" is a catchy tune, defiant against the tides of the time. Love is everywhere if you look, it can come from anywhere. The Minstrel could be anybody, any holy figure with the knowledge. "Dawning of the Day" is even more spiritual, a lovely acoustic number, the simplicity that comes from the sounds of the morning. 

"Melancholy Man" is haunting, filled with monk like chanting, but it's really about redemption, out of a despair will come a cyclical understanding:

A beam of light will fill your head
And you'll remember what's been said
By all the good men this world's ever known

A Question of Balance ends on a hopeful note of compassion with "The Balance." Rock critics tend to turn their nose up to spoken word poetry, but I never minded it, it brings the record to a suitable ending, followed by some wonderful harmonies.

Musically, A Question of Balance improves with multiple listens. It opens on a note of frustration and anxiety and ends with a sense of peace - a spiritual journey with an ecological focus.

Randy Newman: Sail Away (1972)

Release Date: May 1972
Produced by Lenny Waronker and Russ Titelman (Reprise)

Side One: Sail Away; Lonely At the Top; He Gives Us All His Love; Last Night I Had A Dream; Simon Smith and the Amazing Dancing Bear; Old Man

Side Two: Political Science; Burn On; Memo To My Son; Dayton, Ohio -1903; You Can Leave Your Hat On; God's Song (that's why I love mankind)

Randy Newman's at times comical, at times heartbreaking, 1972 album Sail Away updates the American songbook with a post-1960s sensibility. Majestic and satiric, the record ricochets between romanticism and cynicism.

"Sail Away" encapsulates the promise of America as a bountiful land of promise, only it's from the perspective of a slave trader beckoning Africans to cross the ocean into bondage. The striking arrangement itself is deceptive, wrapped inside inside the melodies are suffering and shame. 

"Political Science" serves a companion song to "Sail Away," a prophetic song imagining MAGA movement. 

"Lonely At the Top" is a Sinatra parody, the narrator has everything an entertainer could ever want and yet feels unhappy. While "Simon Smith" looks at the bottom side of fame in a playful manner. Both songs aspire to a God like perspective, a recurring theme throughout Sail Away. 

"He Gives All His Love" imagines a compassionate God kindly looking down on everyone from above, an erstwhile hymn on the surface. On the closing track, "God's Song", Newman imagines a sadistic deity amazed at humans still worship him after all the loss and destruction he's wrought.

The melancholy "Old Man" imagines a life lived, "Memo to My Son" a playful song about fatherhood. 

"Last Night I Had A Dream" and "You Can Leave Your Hat On" are fanciful love songs that lighten up the mood of the record. 

Two songs are about Ohio. "Burn On" makes light of the Cuyahoga river catching on fire set to a pastoral melody. "Dayton, Ohio 1903" imagines an idyllic America, full of industry, kindness, and confidence in direct contrast to the Rustbelt of the 1970s. 

In 30 minutes of music, Randy Newman takes an ironic and emphatic view of the American experience, each track could be a novel.

The Albums of 1996: Wilco: Being There

Release Date: October 29, 1996
Produced by Wilco
Active Members: Jeff Tweedy, John Stirratt, Jay Bennett, Ken Coomer, Max Johnston, Bob Egan

Side One: Misunderstood; Far, Far Away; Monday; Outtasight (outtmind); Forget the Flowers
Side Two: Red Eyed and Blue; I Got You (at the end of the century); What's the World Got in Store; Hotel Arizona: Say You Miss Me
Side Three: Sunken Treasure; Someday Soon; Outta Mind (outtasight); Someone Else's Song; Kingpin
Side Four: (Was I) In Your Dreams; Why Would You Wanna Live; The Lonely 1; Dreamer in My Dreams

The sophomore Wilco LP Being There was a double album recorded in an era when the concept was borderline obsolete. Featuring 19 tracks that recalled the power pop simplicity of A.M. and the Midwest punch of Uncle Tupelo, yet at the same engaged on a deeper level with the past and present of rock.

"Misunderstood" unabashedly goes for the big time, an epic rocker that quotes Ohio cult hero Peter Laughner, as if Tweedy is putting the entire experience of a disaffected young men in the Midwest into one song. "Far, Far Away" is smooth country western rock song about longing. "Monday" channels Exile on Main Street Era Rolling Stones. "Outtasite (outta mind) and then "Forget the Flowers," very much in the twangy Uncle Tupelo style.

"Red-Eyed and Blue" opens side two, a melancholy state of mind song about writer's block and trying to hold a fledgling band together. "I Got You (at the end of the century)" defines slacker rock, feelings of dwindling expectations in the Rustbelt but the records are still on the shelf. "What's the World Got in Store" mediates on uncertainty and malaise, "Hotel Arizona" deals with the life of a band at a crossroads. "Say You Miss Me" Tweedy goes a soulful lyric on another song about the road.

Disc 2 opens with "Sunken Treasure", a continuation of the themes of introduced on "Misunderstood" albeit a more mature approach. "Someday Soon" is another alt-country rocker, "Outta Mind (outta sight)" is a reprise at a slightly slower tempo and a wearier vocal. On the acoustic ballad "Someone Else's Song" Tweedy confesses, "I keep on singing, your eyes, they just roll" speaks to how his music might be derivative of many others, but he'll keep singing anyway. "Kingpin" is a swamp rocker worthy of CCR. 

Side four begins with "(Was I) In Your Dreams" another country western ballad with a Gen X edge. "Why Would You Wanna Live" returns to the world weariness motif, backed by excellent strings and banjos. "The Lonely 1" may be one of the tenderest ballads ever written by Tweedy, while "Dreamer In My Dreams" serves as a coda to the entire record.

Critic Robert Christgau called Being There a triumph, but an insular one. While it's bigger and more ambitious than A.M., it also lacks some of the sly sense of humor. The incarnation of Wilco on Being There would transition to modern folk rock by collaborating with Billy Bragg. Tweedy would write more abstract lyrics more informed by his reading of modernist literature. Jay Bennett would also change the sound of the band and add a sonic dimension to the sound. Being There got the attention of critics (and fans) and cemented Wilco as a distinct voice in the rock landscape. 

The Replacements: Let it Be (1984)

Release Date: October 2, 1984

Active Members: Paul Westerberg, Bob Stinson, Tommy Stinson, Chris Mars

Produced by Steve Fjeistad, Peter Jesperson, Paul Westerberg

Side 1: I Will Dare; Favorite Thing; We're Comin' Out"; Tommy Got His Tonsils Out; Androgynous; Black Diamond

Side 2: Unsatisfied; Seen Your Video; Gary's Got A Boner; Sixteen Blue; Answering Machine

For their third LP the quartet from Minneapolis copped a Beatles album title for the hell of it. Nevertheless, they recorded a selection of songs worthy of the title, one of the best rock albums of the 1980s in fact. The album cover says all one needs to know about The Replacements: Bluish gray, Midwest, sitting on a roof and no doubt plotting some fatal strategies to beat back the boredom.

"I Will Dare" is a come on song that begins the record on a playful note, "How young are you/ How old Am I/ Let me count the rings around my eyes," with some great guitar work. "Favorite Thing" speaks to a low rent rock and roll lifestyle that's preferable to most others, a pure Replacements song with a post-punk sensibility. "We're Comin' Out" may allude to the chaos of their live shows, notorious for being alcohol fueled wildly erratic. "Tommy Got His Tonsils Out" is a novelty song about doctor trying to cram in an operation so he get a round of golf in, based on Tommy actually getting his tonsils removed. 

Paul Westerberg wrote "Androgynous" for Frank Sinatra, that's no joke. The tune sounds like a drunken ballad played at a dive bar around 4am. It's also one of the more progressive songs of the decade when classical gender norms were being enforced by mass culture. The song imagines Dick and Jane, a couple with ambiguous genders who love each other. If anyone's got a problem with it they should take a hike. A cover of "Black DIamond", a classic Kiss song, ends side one on a heavier, darker tone.

The masterful "Unsatisfied" opens side two, an epic statement on dashed expectations, being young, bored, and melancholy. A sentiment expressed eloquently by Westerberg's vocal. "Seen Your Video" takes aim at MTV and what passed for mainstream music in the 80s. The "Mats" were always caught between their we don't give a shit punk attitude and striving for big time success in the form of record sales and mass airplay. When they opened for Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers on a 1989 stadium tour their style never took with the MTV/FM rock crowd. The throwaway "Gary's Got A Boner" is there just because, Gary being a recurring figure of ridicule in the Mats universe.

"Sixteen Blue" was written for Tommy, Westerberg sympathized with his youth and how strange and confusing the world looks when you're 16. The song builds and builds, culminating with mournful, beautiful guitar solo by Bob Stinson. "Answering Machine" appropriately ends the record on a note of angst and frustration abetted by technology.

Let it Be ironically plays like a Beatles album with its jarring shifts in tone and youthful spirit with a chip on their shoulder. They're charming, but also abrasive. And that's fine. "Unsatisfied" or "Sixteen Blue" could've been hits, but they were too real for 1984.