Snobbin: Beautiful Trash in the Pop Culture Gutter

In no particular order this year. Dawn Landes- Meet Me At The River (Yep Roc) Austin Lucas- Immortal Americans (Cornelius Chapel) Pig Destroyer-Head Cage (Relapse) Fucked Up-Dose Your Dreams (Merge) Sleep-The Sciences (Third Man) Ken Mode-Loved (Season of Mist) Grant Lee Phillips-Widdershins (Yep Roc) Damien Jurado-The Horizon Just Laughed (Secretly Canadian) Superchunk-What a Time To Be Alive (Merge) Nothing-Dance on the Blacktop (Relapse) War on Women-Capture the Flag (Bridge 9) Neko Case-Hell-On (ANTI-) Jeff Rosenstock-POST- (Polyvinyl) Lucero-Among the Ghosts (Liberator) Bettye Lavette-Things Have Changed (Verve)

I've been a fan of Cory Branan since I stumbled on to him during a Revival Tour (an acoustic, mostly ex-punk review) date a few years ago with Chuck Ragan of Hot Water Music and Tom Gabel of Against Me; I was blown away. Ragan has always put on an awesome show, and to be truthful his set was the best. I've never been much of an Against Me fan, and although they have a few good songs here and there, they've never done all that much for me. Gabel's solo set was fine, but not explosive, even though our group quickly realized that much of the crowd was there for him. He wasn't able to make me a believer in his punk retread as acoustic act though. Overall, the set was quite impressive.  Branan was the unknown variable, and we found ourselves transfixed beyond expectation. He had heartfelt lyrics, drunken amiability, and a penchant for damn good storytelling, complete with a catchy rhythm style that got us dancing. He was all over the map, and drunkenness was o...

Austin Lucas' "Splinters" is one of those songs that sends chills up my spine. Lucas' knowing vocals and his well-chosen lyrics anchor a song of uncompromising beauty and pain. The picking alone at the beginning is enough to nominate it for one of my favorite songs of last year. If I would have paid more attention to the record, it would have certainly made my top ten. I first encountered Lucas on the record that he did with Chuck Ragan, Bristle Ridge, a few years back. I lost track of him until romeosidvicious posted a review of his new record, Stay Reckless on one of my favorite blogs, Nine Bullets, which seems to be all too infrequently updated these days; it's a shame because they always turn me on to great records. Lucas comes on like a bluegrass southern-fried version of Damien Jurado, crafting personal character studies in his songs. "Splinters" speaks to faith, romantic relationships, and the self-doubt that comes with living in this world....