Hey folks!

Today’s Best Album of 2001 match is:

#2 The Strokes, IS THIS IT

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vs.

#31 The Dismemberment Plan, CHANGE

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To vote, follow this link to the Google Form. You will need a Google login to vote. If you can’t or won’t have one, let me know ASAP (either through this newsletter, my email [[email protected]] or on the Best Album Brackets Bluesky account) and I’ll see what I can do.

We have four Designated Cheerleaders today, two for each album! First up, for IS THIS IT, it’s @tomewing.bsky.social. Take it away, Tom!

Is This It is fundamentally a pop record. I bought it at the same time as the Kylie album which is a pop album in a surprisingly similar way to The Strokes - pop that’s stylish and new but also in love with pop’s own past, specifically a particular idea of New York cool. At the distance of 25 years, the difference between Studio 54 and CBGBs no longer seemed terribly important. At the distance of 25 more years, it matters even less.

The Strokes is a new wave record decades after the new wave receded, a band imitating bands imitating the Velvet Underground’s VU and Another View (for a while the easiest records to get by them). Kylie is a pop star wearing disco like a vintage dress. Neither - sorry “Can’t Get You Out Of My Head” - sound remotely like the future, though plenty of music from 2001 did. But both are pop music, understanding that part of pop’s central appeal is great hooks, cool worn lightly, a nice arse.

The Strokes did turn out to be the future (briefly) and people have written books mythologising that. What struck me at the time was how exhausted they sounded by their own poses: Julian Casablancas’ vocals are a bored croak, straining for affect then fraying into a trail of ennui. Is this it? Can this really be where the grand boho rock tradition is ending up? He sometimes sounds up for it, or at least the picture of hot diffidence, but more often he feels the weight of indie hopes like Frodo feels the One Ring. “I will do my best” he sings on “Someday”, sounding sad and small.

What saves him are his band, who refuse to slack off or slow down, approaching each song like a sprint, functional and lean, giving their singer’s langour a chance to unfold itself on each song without actually losing any of the track’s energy. Is This It is admirable in its refusal to dick around. Nothing breaks four minutes, a minor miracle in a bloated year. Everything has a functional hook or two, and everything could be danced to.

Someone who wrote for my site at the time - I forget which writer it was, I’m sorry - had the excellent insight that the Strokes and the scene around them were American Britpop. A retro scene based on pop’s first principles (see above about the nice arses) and driven by bright young things in a bright young city. Fair enough, I think. Is This It reminds me a lot of Elastica by Elastica, the same “we’re stealing stuff? What are you going to do about it?” energy.

But while I don’t have much time for most Britpop and less time for most of what came after The Strokes, I think Is This It is even better than that, because of that ennui, that sense of decadence, the feeling you get that the band know it’s all downhill from here, for them and for rock music and white boy cool itself.

The second worst song on Is This It is the only one that you might briefly worry is about something, “New York City Cops”, and it’s still pretty good. (You can forgive it as it annoyed the actual NYC Cops, too). The worst song is “Trying Your Luck”, the closest they come to sloth. And the best song on Is This It isn’t on Is This It at all, it’s the bootleg version of “Hard To Explain” that grants Casablancas the release from toil he’s been searching for and puts Christina Aguilera’s “Genie In A Bottle” vocal line over the top. Suddenly a space opens up where The Strokes and Kylie could meet.

It works because “Hard To Explain” is a disco record, the realisation of which unlocked the whole album for me back in 2001. The rhythms of Is This It aren’t sophisticated or even groovy but they are party rhythms and that’s why they still sound good.

A Dedicated Champion by Tom Ewing. Written in the 35’48” the album took to play. Over and out.

Thank you, Tom!

Next up, also for IS THIS IT, it’s @renamj.bksy.social. Take it away, Rena!

Full disclosure: I did not nominate The Strokes' debut album Is This It for the 2001 album tournament, nor did I give it a seed vote. It doesn't need my help, and I wanted to champion lesser-known albums that could really use the boost. But it was my favorite album when I was an actual teenager in 2001.

2001 was a pivotal year for me: I became a high school senior (Class of 2002!); I was literally in my AP U.S. History class when 9/11 happened (lol); I turned 17 in October; I was accepted to my first choice college (they had rolling admissions so I could apply early); and in December I finally got my driver's license on my third try. I was ready for the next chapter of my life as a young adult, even though I had no idea what to expect. I knew I would have a better life..."someday."

I was getting more into music around this time, reading album reviews and watching MTV2 after school. Early on in high school I went through a "pretending to be normie" phase where I tried to be like everyone else - wearing trendy mall clothes and listening to Top 40 (nothing wrong with pop per se, but most of my peers were mainstreamers who didn't have a deeper appreciation of music). To put it bluntly, it wasn't me. I didn't really know who I was yet, and school is a terribly confining environment. It goes without saying that music is an enormous part of my life, and this was only the beginning.

For the record, I did go through an "indie" phase in my late teens/early twenties. Then I discovered SoulSeek and a much broader scope of music. One great thing about music communities like this one is discovering just how much music is out there, beyond what gets written about in Rolling Stone or Pitchfork (I was never a fan, I found them off-putting even then) or other major music sites. As I always say, look beyond the canon.

The Strokes had a deafening amount of hype around them, and even then they had very vocal haters on message boards. "The Strokes are jokes" and all that. Is This It is the Anora of the indie revival scene (personally, I liked Sean Baker's Oscar-winning film but did not love it.). Anyway, I bought the CD, maybe at the local CD World, and I played it over and over (favorite tracks: "The Modern Age," "Soma," "Barely Legal"). I couldn't really relate to the lyrics per se - I was awkward and inexperienced and more focused on my grades anyway. I just thought the songs were catchy.

In retrospect they were sort of a "gateway" band for me. There are folks who got into The Velvet Underground, The Cars, The Modern Lovers, and Television through them and I think that's great! Listening to these songs now, they're not exactly earth shattering but they're still fun. I actually think their second album, Room on Fire, is even better.

Is this the best album of 2001? No! Not in my humble opinion, anyway. As a work of art, I think Björk's Vespertine is far more interesting, to name one example. But it meant something to me at one point in my life and that does matter.

Thank you, Rena!

Now, for CHANGE, it’s @robbiebuffalo.bsky.social. Take it away, Robbie!

There are very few albums that I anxiously anticipated as much as CHANGE. I had bought The Dismemberment Plan's previous album EMERGENCY & I in early 2000 and became obsessed with it. Their crazy mix of DC punk/math rock, new wave, art rock, funk, soul, and even hip-hop sounded like nothing else to me. Singer/lyricist Travis Morrison is 10 years older than me, but his lyrics about navigating the confusion, angst, and general ridiculousness of your early to mid 20's resonated completely with me. I first saw the band in early 2001 and their live show blew me away. At the time they were playing a few songs that would end up on CHANGE. "Time Bomb" in particular stood out. I couldn't wait to hear what the whole album would sound like.

After getting the CD in the mail (this was 2001) I probably listened to CHANGE 10 times within the first few days. I wasn't quite sure what to think. It wasn't EMERGENCY & I but The Dismemberment Plan told you exactly that with the album title. They weren't trying to recreate EMERGENCY & I, but how could they? That album's unique alchemy would have been impossible to repeat. CHANGE does sand away the abrasiveness of their earlier work - there's nothing with the spazzy, manic craziness of "I Love A Magician" or "Girl O'Clock." But it still has all the hallmarks of the band's sounds - jittery, interlocking guitars, keyboards and synth that can be both squiggly and rhythmic, and the tightest, most creative rhythm section in indie rock. But it also adds a warmth and restraint to their music they hadn't displayed before.

"Time Bomb" did prove to be the most immediate song on the album. With its driving guitar and intense keyboards the song propels forward with increasing momentum while Morrison recounts all the ways he is a destructive force (a time bomb, poison, a trip wire, a fault line) before confessing that actually he's just "a lost soul" sending out a "cry for help." "Face of the Earth" is another song that wouldn't have been out of place on EMERGENCY & I, as Morrison describes an early relationship ending when the woman he's dating literally vanishes in front of his eyes. I've always loved how vivid Morrison's imagery is, as he sings about how "I freeze the look of pre-alert and study it still" before the woman is "jerked skywards, limbs flailing like an unloved marionette."

But it's the more subtle, introspective songs on CHANGE that I come back to the most now. Many of these songs are about accepting the limitations of who we are and what we can be but constantly striving to move forward anyways. The warm keyboards and jittery guitar of "Superpowers" convey exhaustion while Morrison sings "I guess you could call it Superpowers, but no one will change the world with what I've got." The static guitar solo that builds to the full band kicking in together is one of my favorite moments on the album. "Following Through" is a call to arms, as chiming guitars build to Morrison proclaiming "I can do it anywhere with anyone at any time, don't you forget this is my life and it's going to be good/not a promise or a threat or ultimatum, though i can do that too/I've just got this life, I've just got to live, I'm just following through." "The Other Side" wrestles with the day-to-day contradictions between the most casual interactions and the most serious relationships before resolving to keep pushing through. I went to pull my favorite line from the song as an example but found that I could take any line depending on what I'm feeling at the moment. The "Other Side" also features another insane, highlight performance from drummer Joe Easley. What I love so much about CHANGE is that so many of the songs include these types of incredible, unique musical elements while stuffed to the brim with literary or insightful lyrics.

The album ends with "Ellen and Ben", a song where our narrator describes the beginning, middle, and end of a relationship he observed. But what becomes clear as the song moves through its verses is that our narrator isn't telling us the story of Ellen and Ben, but how Ellen and Ben made him think about his own relationships. As the final verse makes clear what our narrator is really preoccupied with, the song's extended outro builds to a warm and satisfying conclusion to CHANGE.

It's easy to roll your eyes at a more "mature" sounding album as that often can mean that a band has lost their personality and tried to achieve a more mainstream sound. But CHANGE still sounds exactly like The Dismemberment Plan. Over time I've come to appreciate it for everything it is, rather than what it isn't.

Thank you, Robbie!

Then, last but not least, for CHANGE, it’s @uosdwisrdewoh.bsky.social. Take it away, Paul!

Travis Morrison loves to sing “no” whether that be “no” or “know.” Their debut album ! (1995) was stuffed with refusals, with several songs where the chorus was basically yelling “NO,” and the whole record concluding with him wailing “no no no no no noooooo way!”

The wailing anger of ! gave way to skittering anomie of …Is Terrified (1997) and the existential dread of Emergency & I (1999). Their four album Change is the dreaded mature record bands write as they face their thirties. It’s more positive, but old habits die hard. “No” is the second, eighth, and tenth word sung as it opens. “There’s no heaven and there’s no hell, no limbo in between. I think it’s all a lie.”

Beyond the lyrics, the band is clicking like never before. The rough edges have been smoothed away, but that does not portend the boredom that usually implies, rather the grooves are more assured, and the band members feel fully locked in and at ease with each other (and it’s not like the energy’s gone; Joe Easley’s relentless drums on “The Other Side” are awe-inspiring).

This is the good part of maturity. You’re still wrestling with life’s shit, a promising relationship that seems to evaporate out of nowhere (“The Face of the Earth”), nothing going right (“Secret Curse”), absolute inertia (“Automatic”), but you’re more able to grapple with it, to come at it with some hard-won wisdom.

“Come Home” is the kind of mature song that can go very wrong. It’s sentimental and features a talk with his dad, but it’s the crux of the album, wrestling with all these feelings explicitly, with gemlike clarity, singing “that anger's all right, and bitterness, no. Cold, uncontrollably sad and unable to let it go. And it should be as easy as telling a scab from a scar. Well I don't know,” and he repeats that last line and belts it out on the last “know,” taking up his old enthusiasm for that “no” sound.

“Ellen and Ben” finds Morrison downright contemplative, seeing friends come together and break apart with wry distance and love, finally reflecting on his own space in the world, and finding it okay. “Well I’m doing fine . . . call me when you can now. You know how I love a surprise,” and what word does he use to sing the album to a close? “Oh, yeah.”

Thank you, Paul!

Click here to see the current results for the entire tournament, and click here to see the current results for the prediction bracket contest.

Thanks,

Kent