Last year we started our year-end review of best albums that we heard in the past year. This week we head positions 14 to 1. For the number one this year I chose Californian band Cool Ghouls. After several delightful garage rock records, last year they took a huge leap and made a fantastic genre spanning record that shows good taste, measure and expert knowledge of rock’n’roll history. One song will remind you of Beach Boys, other on Todd Rundgren, another one of Byrds, Love, Leonard Cohen… approach seems deliberate and result is stunning album. In a post-post-post modern post-capitalist world an this album looks like a conveyor belt in which best moments of the past roll by one by one, perfectly strung together until the final product comes out. They do their recycling shamelessly and proudly. It’s paradoxically original. It’s an art form. And we love it here.
Our list for 2021 looks like this…
30 The Most - Of What We Have
29 Mike Edison and Guadalupe Plata - The Devil Can't Do You No Harm
28 Chris Church - Game Dirt
27 Kid Khan Unlimited - Opiate Them Asses
26 Daniel Romano - Kissing The Foe
25 Grave Flowers Bongo Band - Strength Of Spring
24 Motorpsycho - Kingdom of Oblivion
23 Yola - Stand For Myself
22 The Exbats - Now Where Were We
21 Shaye Zadravec - Now and Then
20 David Gahan and The Soulsavers - Imposter
19 Danny Kroha - Detroit Blues
18 Murlocs - Bittersweet Demons
17 Salebarbes - Gin à l'eau salée
16 Red Devil Ryders - Pour Me Another One
15 Big Hogg - Pageant of Beasts
14 Endless Boogie - Admonitions
13 Bevis Frond - Little Eden
12 Lelee - Cuka, bije, pumpa
11 Astute Palate
10 Divine Horsemen - Hot Rise of an Ice Cream Phoenix
09 Kid Congo - Swing From The Sean DeLear
08 Rosali - No Meduim
07 Petrified Max - Year Gone By
06 Dinosaur JR - Sweep Into Space
05 Richard Rose - Radiation Breeze
04 A Little More Time With Reigning Sound
03 Bat Fangs - Queen of My World
02 The Reflectors - Faster Action
01 Cool Ghouls - At George's Zoo
And playlist for today is:
Endless Boogie – Bad Call;
The Bevis Frond – Cherry Gardens;
Lelee – Pozeluvam;
Astute Palate – Loose Wings;
Divine Horsemen – Mind Fever;
Kid Congo and The Pink Monkey Birds – (Are You) Ready, Freddy;
Rosali – Mouth;
Petrified Max – Blue Skies Always;
Dinosaur JR – And Me;
Richard Rose – Evil Twin;
Reigning Sound – You Ain’t Me;
Bat Fangs – Never Coming Down;
The Reflectors – Carry On;
Cool Gouhls (Closing Meddley).
We continue our countdown to the best albums in 2018 and in this episode we announce two albums which share the title of the best one at The Little Lighthouse in the past year. I Am The Polish Army debut album My Old Man struck us with its great enthusiasm, musicianship, songwriting and playful performance. Harlan T. Bobo finally put out his record The History of Violence out on Goner, which just might be his greatest yet. Chip Kinman, along with the help of his son on guitar and his brother behind the knobs created a post-modern patchwork of an album with an astonishing amount of historical and rock references under the Ford Madox Ford moniker. Two ladies, Bat Fangs brought us a quick and powerful rock’n’roll album with hits going steady. Tony Molina on his Kill The Light is even more brief, but the brevity just makes you play the album over and over again. Bad Sports brought an excellent barrage of love punk rock tunes worthy of the greatest examples in the past. Patsy Gelb and her Rats compiled all those perfect singles from their inception on a single record, seriously contending Singles Going Steady as one of the strongest compilation records in the history of rock music. Schizophonics with their amps turned to the max gave us an album that floats like a perfect MC5 tribute. Mama Rosin teamed up with Mick Collins on a collection of cajun and zydeco chants. Ty Segall is as active as ever, but his main release this year entitled Freedom’s Goblin is one of the deepest he recorded yet. Krist Novoselic is back with Giants In The Trees. And that’s our top 10 this year! Looking back at that top 10, this was a really good year and we can only wish 2019 can be at least as good as this one.
Today we start off with the new music from Pat Todd and his Rankoutsiders. They have a new single out. We also introduce the new band Bat Fangs for Betsy Wright, who was in Ex Hex and Laura King, who was in Moaners. We also introduce Number Ones from London UK and Gary Ritchie from Austin TX, both in the realm of power pop. Daniel Romano is back with three new albums, two are solo, Human Touch and Neverless and one is with his Ancient Shapes, Silent Rave. Kramer joined forces with Bill Frisell for the new installment of tributes to the songs that came out of The Brill Building in New York City.