Daytrotter's Best 15 Albums Of 2007: No. 7 Kings of Leon's "Because of the Times"
Jan 14, 2008
Words by Sean Moeller
Illustration by Zack Sultan
The Kings of Leon have made a rogue with _Because of the Times_, an album that feels like it’s fighting out from down in a foxhole, but also running away from home with the sweetheart whose parents completely disapprove of a love that’s meant to be in the two young hearts. There are children out of wedlock - those bastardized babies, there’s illegitimacy and there are demons inside these heads that don’t have that new car smell anymore. Done love us some damaged goods, some broken up boys with spicy tongues and just the right numbers of spoonfuls of sugar to help the medicine go down. Kings of Leon, for all intents and purposes, is arguably the best American band operating right now (with nods to Wilco, Dr. Dog, Cold War Kids and My Morning Jacket) bands that just ooze "our America," the one that inspired some stoners to put on a glorious thing like Woodstock, the one that smells like hard work, cold beers, good souls and lawnmowers. _Because of the Times_ holds the distinction of getting so good during tracks No. 7, 8, 9 and 10 - so late in the record - that you flit back to the top without a second’s hesitation, you’re the one on repeat. You just can’t break free from the centrifuge - the rusty guitars, the loose and husky vocals and the Vietnam-era feeling that something’s happenin’ here and what it is ain’t exactly clear, just that we know it’s sheer honesty and grittiness we can wrap our arms around.
*Daytrotter's Best 15 Albums of 2007*
15. John Vanderslice -- _Emerald City_
14. The National -- _Boxer_
13. These United States -- _The Forest and the Garden_
12. The Teeth -- _You're My Lover Now_
11. Dr. Dog -- _We All Belong_
10. Brother Ali -- _The Undisputed Truth_
9. Delta Spirit -- _Ode To Sunshine_
8. Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings -- _100 Days, 100 Nights_
7. Kings of Leon -- _Because of the Times_
*Daytrotter contributor Jacob Henneman’s Top Albums of 2007*
11. Sondre Lerche _Phantom Punch_
There was no reason to believe _Duper Sessions_ was to be the permanent face of Sondre Lerche, but what is shocking is how chameleonic he has become in his ever so young career. From Europop, to jazz, to sleek garage guitar rock with _Phantom Punch_ has been a rewarding journey, but this may be his most rewarding release yet. Lerche doesn’t quite achieve knock-down-drag-out results other artists with the same guitar sound and a less blue-eyed crooner background catalog, but perhaps that’s what floored me in the first place.
10. Siberian _With Me_
Although this band hails from the Pacific Northwest, you can’t help but feel a little Union Jack has been infused in their roots. It’s not out of the question to believe all their copies of _The Bends_ have been worn out by repeated and repeated spins. _With Me_ is Siberian’s full-length debut with lots of guitars battling each other for spatial harmony and superiority. It all sounds as though this could be their 4th or 5th album, which bodes well for their future and all the eyes and ears that could and should be devoted to their guilty pleasured sound in due time.
9. Jens Lekman _Night Falls Over Kortedala_
We all have our own Kortedala, or at least I hope we do. Lekman’s storytelling isn’t as heart-on-the-sleeve emotional as other artists on this list but damned if it isn’t just as real. I’ve never visited the "Drive-In Bingo," I don’t have an embarrassed friend "Nina," and whether many of the things on _Kortedala_ really did happen to Lekman are inconsequential because this album is the definition of nostalgia. He does it with those horns and strings and winds that skirt the gap of time between antiquated and modern like they could have been spewing out of a Victrola or blasting out of a radio over the joy and color of a city parade.
8. Vic Chesnutt _Northstar Destroyer_
Pulling off satire in music is nearly impossible in my mind, but Chesnutt’s "You Are Never Alone" is one such exception. Sarcasm drips on lines like "It’s OK, you can have an abortion and keep on keeping on." The majority of _Northstar Destroyer_ is not so sarcastic, though. Instead, it is a bitingly truthful eye on the state of America and issues that affect the rest of the world. Chesnutt tackles healthcare, politics, religion and whatever else is in his wrecking path. With help from A Silver Mount Zion and Godspeed! You Black Emperor, this album is a southern gothic-folk masterpiece that is heightened by the aforementioned bands’ strings and guitar work that create an intense paranoia that crawls up your skin and tingles your spine and generally helps piss you off as much as Chesnutt is. Listening to this album from start to finish is an experience. In the words of Chesnutt on "Marathon," _Northstar Destroyer_ is like "training to run a marathon with your dress shoes on."
7. Songs of Green Pheasant _Gyllyng Street_
A man standing alone on a cliff overlooking the sea graces the cover of Songs of Green Pheasants _Gyllyng Street_. That man could be Duncan Sumpner, a schoolteacher who made a tape that eventually landed in the hands of record companies who were eager to sign him. The only problem was they had no contact information and no idea exactly where Sumpner was. He was eventually tracked down and this is his third release since his 2004 self-titled debut under the Green Pheasant name. _Gyllyng Street_ is much like its predecessors stripped bare, desperate but powerful folk music. "Alex Drifting Alone" and "West Coast Profiling" are open spaces filled disparately with minimal instrumentation. That person on the cover could be anyone. It may be Duncan Sumpner, or as you fall deeper and deeper under this albums spell it could become you.
6. Elvis Perkins _Ash Wednesday_
Few bared their souls and cleared the skeletons from their closets as Elvis Perkins did this year with _Ash Wednesday_. Dealing with some trying personal losses, Perkins delivered an album full of finding one’s place in the world, of coping with tragedy. This album is a procession. There will be tears, laughs and black and white photographs, and you won’t forget any of it. Perkins’ Dylan-esque storytelling on universal truths like loss and love are as relevant in 2007 as they will forever be.
5. Cass McCombs _Dropping the Writ_
I’m just going to come out and say "That’s That" and "Petrified Forest" might be the best back-to-back songs of the year. Come to think of it this album has a half dozen of the best tracks I heard all year. I didn’t know if it was possible to improve on McCombs first few releases, but his off kilter autobiographical lyrics can stand up to even Morrissey, and his songs are all gorgeous and sensible but he also takes many chances. Particularly, he uses his voice as the deciding instrument, inflecting in unpredictable places just to weird the album out enough to give it an edge.
4. Deerhunter - Fluorescent Grey
"I woke up in the middle of the night/I called out/I called your name." And so the four song EP starts like waking up from a nightmare in a cold sweat. But what if you never woke up and life itself was the nightmare, a world full of fluorescent grey fleshed corpses and faceless useless bodies polluting crowded city streets. _Fluorescent Grey_ is glooming with surrealistically macabre soundscapes that make you feel like you’ve been transmitted onto the canvas and world of a Dali painting.
3. Spoon _Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga_
_Ga_ x5 is a "Cherry Bomb" exploding with razor sharp guitar lines and indelibly catchy pop hooks. It becomes clear early from the searing "Don’t Make Me a Target" that the Texas band is traveling on their way to the pinnacle of what has already been a brilliant discography. The most important lesson this album can teach us all, though, is to never, under any circumstances, underestimate the underdog for you will not survive.
2. Radiohead _In Rainbows_
No surprise, Radiohead dropped a bombshell again by announcing their new album just days before its release. The only thing more unpredictable than that bit of news was how the album was going to sound. Would it be another _Kid A_? Would they return to their guitar rock days? Well, the answer turned out to be both and neither. It’s a mix of atmospherics and straight forward guitar lines, of piano ballads and danceable rock songs. It is both diverse and cohesive in the way only Radiohead can achieve.
1. Luke Temple _Snowbeast_
If Stanley Kubrick made a folk album, _Snowbeast_ would be the result. These are definitely folk songs by a folk artist, but the album is dark and brooding with some archaic synths and altogether original recording techniques. And say all you want about the recording of the album, _Snowbeast_ is all about the songs and that voice of Temple. It’s fragile and delicate, but always undaunted and unwavering in the face of the darkness around it. This album is a damn strange trip full of darkness and light, of an angelic voice traveling through purgatory and coming out, of course, on top.
