The Seldom Seen Kid (Elbow, 2008)

I listened to this album thanks to a friend's tip. It had been lying dormant in the recesses of my files for several weeks, before I fished it out and queued it up this morning. Ten hours later (been shut-in at home all day: writing, reading, watching) and I am declaring The Seldom Seen Kid as the best album of the year so far. There have been such excellent albums I've heard this year (some of which I have yet to review including the new NIN albums, the debut album from The Last Shadow Puppets and others), but this is the very finest.

The strongest thing I can say about this album is it's stark brilliance -- I didn't need to listen to it a couple of times, to 'get it,' or for the tunes to grow on me; it happened instantaneously! I was also surprised to find that the Led Zeppelin-ish track "Grounds for Divorce" was used by the Coens in the trailer for "Burn After Reading." Smart fucks have a great taste in music too.

Elbow is a band from Manchester, England, which makes them Mancunian, just like Jim Noir, whose album Jim Noir I reviewed a few weeks back. Their lyrics are about their love-hate relationship with the town and also about the band's slippery road to success and the uneasy dance of staying on top once they reached it (even if its mostly in terms of critics' love; commercial success is slowly creeping up on them).

I love lead singer Guy Garvey's velvety voice and his simple, evocative lyrics. The Seldom Seen Kid is titled after a friend of the band's, who died two years ago. Another interesting factoid is that this album was recorded, produced, mixed entirely by the band, without any outside help. The guys are very proud of this, and I am very proud to have discovered this band with their fourth and, apparently, best album yet.

Favorite tracks: "Loneliness of a Tower Crane Driver," "Grounds for Divorce," "The Bones of You," "Mirrorball," "Startlings"