Top 8 Music Albums of 2006 by DriftingOrpheus

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The music zeitgeist has seen its fair share of luminous storytellers but few vividly beseech their audience to partake in their free-flowing whimsy like balladeer-extraordinaire Joanna Newsom. Yet, when discussions of this generation's most profound creators, her name seems to reside on the periphery. This is an unspeakable injustice. To call her dexterous would be an understatement, having mastered the piano, harpsichord and the seldom-conquered pedal harp. These instrumental exploits have produced work that's drawn comparisons to the Romantic era, coupled with the singer's unmistakable, naturalistic vocals. Never has Newsom's music sounded more idyllic and enchanting than on 2006's Ys. Named after the mythical French city engulfed by the sea, the album is comprised of five long-form treatises which metaphorically recount four distinct experiences undergone by the harpist in the span of a year. The autobiographical nature of the subject matter enriches the poetry of the record and renders every lyric endlessly interpretable. Newsom's scholarly, fairy-tale epic is equal parts whimsical and irreplicable.

The fantasy-tinged odyssey materializes with opening number, Emily. The song is inspired by Newsom's astrophysicist sister and the revered moments shared between them. As you'd imagine, Joanna's harp is the centerpiece of the sprawling, musing procession. The might of the string section smolders behind her handiwork creating a sensation of perpetual motion that never allows the 12 minute opener to stall but rather to wander with concentrated beauty. Newsom's ability to rhapsodize approaches mythic plateaus on the track as she requests, "Let us go though we know it's a hopeless endeavor; the ties that bind, they are barbed and spined and hold us close forever; though there is nothing would help me come to grips with a sky that is gaping and yawning; there is a song I woke with on my lips as you sailed your great ship towards the morning." It's just one stone that resides within the collection of embarrassing riches of this era's greatest lyricist. Second track, Monkey & Bear, expands the sonic repertoire slightly but the songstress' harp still chaperones. The song flaunts calculated orchestral flutters buoying Newsom's unabridged poetic amendments. The thematic roots of the sweeping nine minute piece are entrenched in the legend of Ursa Major, a constellation in the frame of a bear. Potentially more personally akin to Newsom's experience, the song echoes sentiment of the damning effects staying steadfast in romantic kinship at the cost of surrendering personal independence. "Until we reach the open country, a-steeped in milk and honey; will you keep your fancy clothes on, for me; can you bear a little longer to wear that leash," she details. Album epergne, Sawdust and Diamonds, bears the sweetest of fruits. The track is bolstered by Newsom's sublime harp arpeggio that acts as the engine for the song's excellence. It also ranks as one of the finest lyrical labyrinths of her career. It communicates a moment of adversity between two lovers and ponders if said love will persevere or subside. "And in a moment of almost-unbearable vision, doubled over with the hunger of lions; hold me close, cooed the dove, who was stuffed, now, with sawdust and diamonds," Newsom sings with fragility. It's a harrowing excursion that remains one of the artist's most ethereal yet lucid declarations. Its tendency to induce tears is formidable.

Only Skin, is a serpentine account of the events that befell Joanna during the year that inspired the album and the interrelation between those fragments. The track is Ys' most sonically voluptuous as it features backing vocals from Bill Callahan and burly cello contributions. The tuneful escalation does not supersede Newsom's poetry, however. She protests, "But always up the mountainside you’re clambering, groping blindly, hungry for anything; picking through your pocket linings, well, what is this; scrap of sassafras, eh Sisyphus," as she alludes to a partner's polygamous lust. Only Skin transmutes multiple times throughout its 17 minute runtime, punctuating Newsom's ability as a virtuoso spinner of feminine, fantasy sagas. The album comes to rest with Cosmia, where Joanna calls upon moths to lead her to the warming light of solace. Her vocal work is her mightiest here, as she calls for her "little darling" and how she misses a particular "precious heart". Additionally, the heavenly falsettos she unleashes joyously contrast backing accordion hums. She asks, "Can you hear me; Will you listen; don't come near me; don't go missing, and in the lissome light of evening, help me, Cosmia; I'm grieving."

It's important to step back slightly and gaze at the mountainous mosaic that Newsom has architected. It's tremendously difficult to synthesize one's intimate thoughts into such a boundless tapestry of wordplay and metaphor. On Ys, Joanna Newsom seems to operatively channel her convictions while remaining blissfully, beautifully unfazed by the rigors that would derail mortal songwriters. This is not Newsom's lyrical coming out party as she was profoundly bardic on 2004's The Milk-Eyed Mender, but the poeticism has ballooned into a hulking behemoth on Ys, all the while bending one of the world's most challenging instruments to her will. It's clearly difficult to be humble when describing the young woman's ever-blooming genius. I'll just leave the humility to her as it seems to come her naturally as all things inherently do. With a quartet of albums under her belt, she's likely to have more future triumphs and adornments affixed to her name. Still, she'd be hard-pressed to outdo her chamber folk paragon. It's a carefully constructed journey of enlightening pain and a promise of subsequent emotional provision. It is destined to harbor the necessary magic native to the fantasy settings that which galvanized its creation. Ys is simply a fossilized memento of a forgotten and forlorn age, washed up on a forbidden shore as considerate waves propel it lovingly toward you.

"From the top of the flight,
Of the wide, white stairs,
Through the rest of my life,
Do you wait for me there?"

-Sawdust and Diamonds

Standout Tracks:

1. Sawdust and Diamonds
2. Emily
3. Monkey & Bear

94.3
[First added to this chart: 06/13/2020]
Year of Release:
2006
Appears in:
Rank Score:
8,944
Rank in 2006:
Rank in 2000s:
Overall Rank:
Average Rating:
Comments:
Buy album United States
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In 2006, a documentary on the musical life of Scott Walker was produced. 'Scott Walker: 30th Century Man', its title taken from a 'Scott 3' track, begins with narration from Sara Kestelman comparing the mythic tale of Orpheus, the Greek hero endowed with extraordinary musical prowess, to Walker's career, as the opening chords of 'Cossacks Are' ring out. It's said that Orpheus' skill could enliven and enchant not only people, but trees, rocks and the inanimate at large. Orpheus was able to convince Hades, Greek god of the dead, to relinquish the hero's beloved Eurydice with just the call of his song. The fabled maestro was the only mortal to return from the underworld and rejoin the likes of the living. Orpheus returned just once, Scott Walker has done it countless times. The notoriously undefinable figure found the Elixir of Life and was resurrected in 1984 with 'Climate of Hunter', in 1995 with 'Tilt' and most notably in 2006 with 'The Drift'. It was the latter that long held serve as his most experimental, ethereal and nebulous point, plotted on a map of increasingly unstable, scorched Earth. 'The Drift' places a heavy emphasis on imagery, much of it nefarious, discomforting and calling upon past horrors for inspiration. He bakes in percussion motifs powered by fists upon meat, wood blocks cascading into wood blocks and the union of hammers and well-pummeled steel. Yet, he christens his appropriately sinister, 13th studio effort with an aura that remains idiosyncratic. After all, who could produce music like this other than Walker? Who would dare even try?

Scott's much lauded voice is no longer the pristine, nimble entity which once danced gracefully atop oceans of orchestral merriment and crystalline, sonic soundscapes. Walker's voice, yet still powerful and imposing, is weather-beaten, strained and distinctly operatic. The transfiguration began in earnest on 1995's 'Tilt', however, here, Walker has completed his conversion into a decidedly tragic, tortured and spectral organism. He exists now, not as a separate presence isolated from his music, but rather a byproduct of its potent, thematic futility. Opening track, 'Cossacks Are', typifies the malefic overtones of the record to come, unfurling with a snarling, tumbling guitar spine, fused firmly with a stop/start drum motif which creates a dizzying sensation of circling dread. Walker's motives on 'Cossacks' are vaguely political, despite never being explicit. There's a glimpse of a warning that a black cloud of returning fascism is on the horizon. Walker cites quotes from an investigation regarding the war crimes of former Serbian President Slobodan Milošević, which included the murder of his political adversaries. Walker prophesizes on future unrest to come by bellowing, "Cossacks are charging in, charging into fields of white roses." The weighted, punishing 'Clara' follows, a lachrymose romance told from the lips of Benito Mussolini's mistress, Clara Petacci. It's markedly obscure but Walker has found himself determined to venture further and further into the gray. The track is distinctly sectional, alternating between swirling, pulsating percussion and soft spoken words from both Walker and guest vocalist, Vanessa Contenay-Quinones. It may be the most visceral nightmare featured on 'The Drift', yet, Scott has described it as a fascist love song. It's easy to forget amongst passages of what sounds like congregating insects and vicious body blows. The dichotomy of Contenay-Quinones's serene vocals and the hellish soundscape spearheads the thematic intentions of the song. "Sometimes I feel like a swallow, a swallow which by some mistake, has gotten into an attic and knocks its head against the walls in terror," she laments. Petacci followed her lover to her death, opting to die alongside him and shooing away safe passage. 'Clara' is a fully-realized account of misguided, unshakable loyalty to an insidious, but powerful bigot. It's an absolute stroke of virtuosity.

Walker's appetite for obscure inspiration is wet further on third entry, 'Jesse', a track that finds parallels between the events of September 11th, 2001 and the death of Elvis Presley's stillborn brother. Pause quickly and internalize that. The thematic connective tissue that unites the two ideas are the immense voids that linger with their absences. Accompanying Walker's vocals is a crooked, malformed alteration of the famous guitar revs found in Presley's own, 'Jailhouse Rock'. It's a sluggish, hopeless confessional which ends with the narrator punctuating his profound loneliness by proclaiming, "Alive; I'm the only one left alive." Bouncing from one fever dream to the next, fourth track, 'Jolson and Jones' is an account of a pair of two crazed, post-limelighted showmen. Embedded within, the shaking of hands between the shuffling of feet on pavement and the panicked howls of a donkey is conducted. Valiantly, Walker is able to create a cohesive structure from these ingredients (and a damn good one at that). 'J&J' crescendos with the famous utterance of "I'll punch a donkey in the streets of Galway" proving that there is no gig or amount of degradation this pair of washed-up performers won't entertain. Subsequently, 'Cue' is a full itinerary in the life of a virus down to how it grows, mutates and spreads. Scott has also indicated that the track is a hazy rhapsodization on the philosophical concept of the self. I'll avoid rumination on the intricacies of those postulations for fear of doing a disservice to Scott's immaculate headspaces. However, 'Cue' is worth its 10-minute runtime for featuring the album's most ominous presence of unease. Late album entry, 'The Escape' represents a moment of abject oddness on 'The Drift'. It again accents a perceptible sensation of plummeting by way of the shadowy rhythm section. Conversely, it flourishes with airy outbursts of psychedelia. It's only fitting that the coda comes in the form of Walker (I still can't believe it's him) performing a Donald Duck impression by way of a Bugs Bunny quote. "What's up, Doc" is intended to be a reference to a Mel Blanc car-accident induced coma spring loaded within a track designed to detail a Jewish Rabbi witnessing a car bombing. You got all that? There will be an exam. It's an incomprehensible piece of music. The album comes to rest with 'A Lover Loves', a subdued acoustic guitar vehicle with heavy production stripped away. It's as if the record is a wounded animal seeking respite from fight-or-flight. A beautiful conclusion, but not without some of Walker's creative curiosity.

There's a tried and true formula for solving complex problems. Turn it on its side and look at it from a different perspective. That's the simplified way of summarizing 'The Drift'. Walker examined issues that captured his interest, made origami from them and presented them to the world in a shape which only he could conceive. The record doesn't gain its gravitas from the mere act of going off of the sonic deep-end. It's a captivating collection of songs because of the author's ability to synthesize the ugly, horrid and just plain odd into stirring tapestries. Walker has eschewed the term 'songs' when describing the album's chapters. A cynic would likely label that as self-importance or ostentation. However, a closer look at the man and his boundless humility would quell those accusations. Scott, at this point in his career, was practically a flesh-bound vessel for inhuman beings hard-pressed to tell tales of woe. How a human being reaches that state of consciousness is sure to remain a mystery, but as long as albums like 'The Drift' continue to arise, the vast, undiscovered arctic plains of creative exploration will need to be mapped. Unfortunately, Scott's dead and the remaining land will need a new Magellan, but he managed to chart a lifetime's worth of territory while keeping a detailed, frightening and thought-provoking travel log. 'The Drift' is his circumnavigation.

"Into pockets unstitching so weighted with pins,
Into eyes imploding on mazes of sins."

- Jolson and Jones

Standout Tracks:

1. Clara
2. Cossacks Are
3. Jolson and Jones

88.3
[First added to this chart: 05/13/2021]
Year of Release:
2006
Appears in:
Rank Score:
903
Rank in 2006:
Rank in 2000s:
Overall Rank:
Average Rating:
Comments:
Buy album United States
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82.5 [First added to this chart: 06/13/2020]
Year of Release:
2006
Appears in:
Rank Score:
824
Rank in 2006:
Rank in 2000s:
Overall Rank:
Average Rating:
Comments:
Buy album United States
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82 [First added to this chart: 06/13/2020]
Year of Release:
2006
Appears in:
Rank Score:
2,125
Rank in 2006:
Rank in 2000s:
Overall Rank:
Average Rating:
Comments:
Buy album United States
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80.4 [First added to this chart: 06/13/2020]
Year of Release:
2006
Appears in:
Rank Score:
10
Rank in 2006:
Rank in 2000s:
Overall Rank:
Average Rating:
Comments:
Buy album United States
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77.2 [First added to this chart: 06/13/2020]
Year of Release:
2006
Appears in:
Rank Score:
17,345
Rank in 2006:
Rank in 2000s:
Overall Rank:
Average Rating:
Comments:
Buy album United States
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76.8 [First added to this chart: 08/09/2022]
Year of Release:
2006
Appears in:
Rank Score:
794
Rank in 2006:
Rank in 2000s:
Overall Rank:
Average Rating:
Comments:
Buy album United States
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74.7
Year of Release:
2006
Appears in:
Rank Score:
12
Rank in 2006:
Rank in 2000s:
Overall Rank:
Average Rating:
Comments:
Total albums: 8. Page 1 of 1

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Top 8 Music Albums of 2006 composition

Artist Albums %


Joanna Newsom 1 13%
Scott Walker 1 13%
Tim Hecker 1 13%
Thom Yorke 1 13%
Blitzkid 1 13%
Arctic Monkeys 1 13%
Ghostface Killah 1 13%
Show all
Country Albums %


United States 4 50%
United Kingdom 2 25%
Mixed Nationality 1 13%
Canada 1 13%

Top 8 Music Albums of 2006 chart changes

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(from the 2000s)
TitleSourceTypePublishedCountry
Top 9 Music Albums of 2009 DriftingOrpheus2009 year chart2024
Top 10 Music Albums of 2008 DriftingOrpheus2008 year chart2024
Top 17 Music Albums of 2007 DriftingOrpheus2007 year chart2024
Top 8 Music Albums of 2006 DriftingOrpheus2006 year chart2024
Top 9 Music Albums of 2005 DriftingOrpheus2005 year chart2024
Top 13 Music Albums of 2004 DriftingOrpheus2004 year chart2024
Top 13 Music Albums of 2003 DriftingOrpheus2003 year chart2024
Top 9 Music Albums of 2002 DriftingOrpheus2002 year chart2024
Top 14 Music Albums of 2001 DriftingOrpheus2001 year chart2024
Top 11 Music Albums of 2000 DriftingOrpheus2000 year chart2024

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