{"id":2787,"date":"2019-09-06T13:18:34","date_gmt":"2019-09-06T20:18:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/billchapin.net\/allthecitylights\/?p=2787"},"modified":"2019-12-30T22:00:32","modified_gmt":"2019-12-31T06:00:32","slug":"albums-of-the-teens-i-guess-time-to-delve-into-2012","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/billchapin.net\/allthecitylights\/2019\/09\/albums-of-the-teens-i-guess-time-to-delve-into-2012\/","title":{"rendered":"“Albums of the … Teens I guess?”: Time to delve into 2012"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"Shearwater's
Shearwater (by Greg Szeto, courtesy of Sub Pop Records)<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Is there an over-arching theme to my picks for albums to highlight from 2012? (Other than the fact that I personally listened to them a bunch, obviously.) In a word? Nope. Not really. I’ve thought about it. I mean, no, of course not. Of course there’s not a through-line other than my own musical taste and the year. It’s silly to think there would be, and I’m definitely not doing it for any of the remaining years in this series.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unless I can come up with some sort of through-line. Then I definitely will.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Animal Joy<\/em>, Shearwater<\/a><\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\"Cover<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Released: Feb. 28, 2012<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Expansive sounds as big as an Antarctic glacier or the Serengeti” is how I described this album back in 2012<\/a>. Informed by\u2014I’ll just go ahead and assume\u2014band leader Jonathan Meiburg’s occasional day job as an ornithologist and natural history scholar<\/a>, Shearwater’s music has always had a bit of a fixation on the the savage beauty of the natural world; it’s front-and-center here, from the album title to the album art to the thematic explorations of the struggle between the call of the wild and the safety of civilization. For folks who … <\/strong>enjoy that intellectual branch of ’80s art pop, a la Peter Gabriel and Talk Talk. Moment that gets me every time: <\/strong>In response to a recent post<\/a> from ubiquitous Twitter music inquisitor Henning<\/a>, I decided that the Keatsian final track, “Star of the Age,” might be my favorite album closer of all time: “But still, my love \/ the only relieving light \/ in the spinning darkness of our lives \/ is when I see you again \/ in the moonlight \/ in the starlight \/ in the sunlight \/ and I believe it again.” If you listen to just one song: <\/strong>“You as You Were” is fairly representative of the overall sound, mood, and theme.<\/p>\n\n\n\n