Kentuckyseven

1. Deer Tick – The Black Dirt Sessions

It’s hard picking out 7 albums from one great year in music. But the choice was clear, The Black Dirt Sessions is on top of the list.

This record has been in my player since the day it got out. And it will stay there for a long long time. John McCauleys voice, the melodies, the emotions and the sound. It’s magic. Magic in so many ways. The album is mellow, pretty dark but with a nerve that tells us what this band is capable of. Deer Tick is band that will mean something. Something for me. For many.

2. Wolf People – Steeple

As I have said before, psych-rock is often balancing on a thin wire. Easy to fall over, in the wrong direction.

Steeple, british Wolf People’s debut, is right on that line. And stays on top of it. An album that with thunder, ratteling and mysterious sounds. Get’s you wanna get out and buy a fur west. An extraordinary sound, all the way thru to the other side.

3. John Grant – Queen of Denmark

After the complete and utterly love for Midlake, after their latest album, the connection with John Grant became unevitable. And and natural.

Grant has managed to create an album that reminds me emotionally of Antony & The Johnsons debut. Fragile, sad and very very personal. I am glad to have got to know John Grant, on that level, thats the way you feel after listening to his music. Just listen to ”I Wanna Go To Marz”, don’t you wanna go?

4. Phosphorescent – Here’s To Taking it Easy

Phosphorescent with Matthew Houck from Athens GA, you get the feeling, just by the name.

Phosphorescent, with the hardest spelled name in the business (for us swedes), is the band who knows how to do it right. How to make country become huge. On that sweet bluesnote. The voice of Houck is born to do this. This kind of music. Was there really any choice for the man? Best song? Mermaid Parade, and the rest of the songs on the album.

5. Mountain Man – Made The Harbour

Molly Erin Sarle, Alexandra Sauser-Monnig and Amelia Randall Meath, made the perfect debutalbum. American folkmusic at it’s best.

It’s hard not to be mezmerized by the harmonies, the voices and the guitars on this masterpiece. I miss nothing, when I listen to Made The Harbour. The white noise has a purpose. The sound of fingers moving across the strings. Hard to beat.

6. The Tallest Man on Earth – The Wild Hunt

Just when you thought that releasing an album after a debut like that was impossible, The Tallest Man does it again.

And what a followup. Impossible is the word. It’s as Dylanesque as before, and exactly as rockin. If you can listen to The Wild Hunt without slapping your knees, stomping your feet, bobbing your head, you are not in touch with your musical side. At all. Impossible you say? I say Kristian Mattsson from Dalarna, Sweden. You haven’t heard nothing yet.

7. I’m Kingfisher – Arctic

Thomas Denver Johansson, was to me, a blank page before he turned into I’m Kingfisher. Now he’s my best friend.

It’s amazing when you find an album that you love, from the first note. Arctic is one of those albums. It’s like it is written for my ears only. Kentuckyseven-music at its core. Lyrics and melodies are honest, beautiful and at a perfect melancholic key. With a sense of winter, mystique and red wine in front of a campfire, Arctic tells you something about the great of the north. The thing us swedes are proud of. Not the other stuff. Just wrap a blanket around you and listen.

1. Håkan Hellström – 2 steg från Paradise

Ten years after his debut, Håkan Hellström made a masterpiece. No more, no less. Meet the lyrics, the music and the feelings of 2010.

This is a classic album, most of all a unity, a ensemble of songs that really matters.

Håkan did the most powerful and impressive album of the year. I´m just glad being around when it happened.

2. Deer Tick – The Black Dirt Sessions

A gang of racketeers from Providence, Rhode Island has made a record full of Kentuckysevenmusic. Their black sessions stucked like dirt to my heart.

People tell me that Deer Tick is a band on a mission. That they´re about to reinvent livemusic as we know it. That they play every nite as it were their last.

I love the sound. The band leader John McCauley III mixes blues, folk and rock in a way that makes me a believer. In every word he sings.

3. Justin Townes Earle – Harlem River Blues

Justin Townes Earle keeps thrivin his honky-americana. That alt-country gospelstuff , impossible to turn down.

Son of Steve Earl, named after Townes van Zandt, drugproblems all over. A scarred background gives his songs an extra dimension.

I can´t stop bootstompin when Harlem River Night or Workin´ for the MTA hits the stereo. It´s good, it´s for real.

4. Anna von Hausswolff – Singing from the grave

Anna von Hausswolffs debut knocked me right out. A hard hit on the head, made me loose my breath.

I saw her in church on a hot and weary summernite. She hit that piano til it became religion, it was cosmos right there.

I don´t know where AVH finds her strenght. I know it´s unique, I know it hurts, I know I need it.

5. Neil Young – Le Noise

This is only Neil Young and a disted guitar. No fellow musicians, no Crazy Horse, no doo-wop-girls. It´s the most intresting record of the year.

The producer Daniel Lanois (U2, Bob Dylan) has made a brave sound, a wall of noise that only the old mans voice could break thru.

It´s a discharge. I listen to the words of the song Hitchhiker and man, this album is turning into a friend.

6. Delta Spirit – History from below

Delta Spirit is a fantastic rockband. They play almost 300 gigs every year. They pick up the trashcans and bring them out on stage. They grew up listening to great music, and they are giving it all back.

It´s darling american, it´s sweet sweet music. It´s epic songs like St Francis, Bushwick Blues och Vivian. It´s fucking awesome.

7. Tweak Bird – Tweak Bird

Already in the first song of the album Caleb and Ashton Tweak make their statement: “In our minds we are the chosen ones”.

The brothers from Illinois are rocking their kind of riff n´roll with the attitude of an tigertank. It´s World War 3 right here. I´m lightning up my cigarette and enjoying the ride. This could turn ugly.

Photo: Sarah Jurado

Kentuckyseven proudly presents, Al James from Dolorean.

The acclaimed Portland band Dolorean, came with their debut Not Exotic in 2003, The New York Times said in their review ”The songs gesture at folk and country, but they do it quietly and slowly, as if hesitant to disturb Mr. James’s delicate parables. And yet, despite the stillness, this is a wild, passionate album.” Since then Dolorean has released Violence in the Snowy Fields 2004, You Can’t Win in 2007, and now releasing their fourth album The Unfazed  in january 2011.

We got a sneak preview of The Unfazed, and it will be reviewed soon here on Kentuckyseven. The titlesong can be heard on Dolorean’s website below.

What are you listening to?

–  I mostly listen to music on my turntable early in the morning when I wake up or in the evening while I’m fixing dinner.  My favorite music right now is a combination of new and old records.  I love the new Deerhunter album Halcyon Digest, Gonjasufi – A Sufi and a Killer, Damien Jurado’s Saint Bartlett, Lightning Dust’s Infinite Light, Woods – At Echo Lake, and Kurt Vile – Constant Hitmaker.  The older re-issues I’m loving are Bob Desper – New Sounds, Ted Lucas – The Om Record, and Lazy Smoke’s Corridor of Faces.

Best book read during 2010?

– Man, I love to read but don’t get as much time to read as I’d like.  My favorite contemporary author is Willy Vlautin.  I love his most recent novel that came out in 2010 – Lean On Pete.  Definitely the best book this year.

Who deserves a breakthrough in 2011?

– To be honest, I hope Dolorean has a big year in 2011.  We’ve been working so hard for so long.  I really want to reach more people with our music next year.  In addition to Dolorean, I hope that Mara Miller’s band Bosque Brown has a great 2011.  She sang a duet with me on The Unfazed.  I’m a huge fan of her voice and her songs.  She definitely deserves a bigger audience.

Kentuckyseven is hoping for a big year for Dolorean as well. If you haven’t met them yet, get to know Portlands finest at:

Dolorean @ Myspace @Spotify @Facebook @Partisanrecords or just check out Doloreanmusic