By Jason Stonerook

CLASSIC REVIEW: Thriller by Michael Jackson (1982)
Thriller is not an artistic masterpiece (the McCartney duet is literally bad), but is essential for any collector. To understand its importance, start in 1970, and not with the Jackson 5 but with the collapse of the Beatles, around whom the rock and roll universe revolved. 12 years later, Michael Jackson and producer Quincy Jones filled that vacuum (for better or worse) with their brand of silvery, synthesized soul. Suddenly, it made pop sense for funk (“Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’”), hard rock (“Beat It”), adult contemporary ballads (“Human Nature”), and disco (the infectious yet unsettling “Billie Jean”) to co-exist. Kids bought Thriller after its groundbreaking videos hit MTV, and their baby boomer parents followed suit. The result was the highest-selling album ever, a glossy yet edgy blockbuster that could stand alongside Star Wars, Indiana Jones, and E.T. Listeners soon began using Jackson’s work to decode a warped personality, but the joy of hearing Thriller in 1983 was that we were not yet burdened by biography. It was simply the coolest thing on the planet. Following Jackson’s death, it is a relief to find people appreciating and delighting in his music again.

 The Ecstatic by Mos Def
Pan-African? Muslim? The labels still fit, but they’re too constricting now for Mos Def. Let’s try “global” instead. There are samples here of Brazilian, Indian, Turkish, and Nigerian origin, and even a rap in Spanish honoring low-wage workers in the developing world. The theme is how you owe Allah your survival, and how this world’s survivors become super-heroes. “Auditorium” switches from an elementary-aged rapper keeping on in Bed-Stuy to an Iraqi kid who becomes the “Elvis of Baghdad” after mouthing off to a soldier. America had better get used to this new spin on soul music.

 Wilco (the album) by Wilco
Wilco’s recent sonic experiments take a backseat as they explore the fine lines separating companionship, support, and dependence on this sober, straightforward alt-country album. Early on we encounter a man adrift on a trireme searching for his Penelope; later, we meet another guy sitting in a Chevy Nova with blood-stained hair and a girl in the trunk. Loneliness is awful but the wrong form of companionship can be crippling. And addictive. Still, if you need “a sonic shoulder…to cry on,” know that “Wilco will love you baby.” Best lyric: “I was cold as gasoline.” Best George Harrison homage: “You Never Know.”

 Horehound by the Dead Weather
Based on this side project, Jack White of the White Stripes must have mugged the devil when he traveled to the crossroads rather than offer up a fair trade. Now Satan’s out for his soul, but White has Alison Mosshart of the Kills in his corner. Not that I’d trust her, either. She’s a proper Robert Plant who spits vile, threatens violence, and anticipates pain; for her, the blues is a form of masochism. Judge Holden and Anton Chigurh have nothing on this witch. “I’ve done some bad things,” she sings, “And they get easier to do.”

Big Whiskey and the GrooGrux King by the Dave Matthews Band
DMB’s first album since LeRoi Moore’s passing opens with a soulful sax solo from Moore himself before kicking into a muscular, newly-electrified collection of songs about death, eternal love, Katrina, and sex. (This guy’s hornier than a beaded trumpet at Mardi Gras.) Matthews has his growl back, so if you like DMB, you’ll love this return to form. And if you’re like me – a 2000 graduate of a certain northeastern Iowa liberal arts college – you’ll think the album sounds like a Friday night in Brandt Hall, like a visit to KWLC, like a homecoming picnic on the library lawn.

 BLACKsummer’snight by Maxwell
With a voice reminiscent of Marvin Gaye, neo-soul singer Maxwell begs his lover during the opening track to “make [him] crazy” by “[proving] it to [him] in the nude.” By the time a second relationship crumbles near the album’s end, however, he admits, “I go insane, crazy sometimes/ Trying to keep you from losing your mind.” Maxwell knows the first lustful moments of a romance have nothing to do with logic, but he learns over the course of this funky yet elegant album that even a mature understanding of love cannot purge a relationship of its irrationality.

 Bible Belt by Diane Birch
Consider the song “Fools”: That simmering piano line brightened by a mellow horn section, the way the singer inflects the words “bed” and “head” with a tender touch of soul. That isn’t Carole King, but I wouldn’t fault you for making the mistake. Bible Belt is a pitch perfect homage to Tapestry. The only thing the album lacks is context: The sound of a liberated adult female voice formalizing the rock and roll songbook meant much more thirty-eight years ago than it does today. They just don’t make records like this anymore; in fact, no one has since 1971.

 Manners by Passion Pit
Somewhere, John Cusack is in talks with Michael Cera and Zooey Deschanel about starring in a movie based on the life of Michael Angelakos, the 21-year-old founder of Passion Pit who recorded a homemade Valentine’s Day EP for his girlfriend that eventually landed him a record deal with Columbia. Manners is as compulsively likeable as a Roy Lichtenstein painting, but its Indie-style celebration of 80s synth-pop sounds regressive. The children’s choir certainly doesn’t help his case, and that unrelenting falsetto only seems to say that Prince sounds a lot like Barry Gibb, which I find a little too hip.

 Electric Dirt by Levon Helm
For the past decade, 69-year-old Levon Helm – former drummer/vocalist for the Band – has hosted rootsy jam sessions open to the public in his barn near Woodstock. If that intrigues you, you’ll probably appreciate this effort. From a critical perspective, however, I wonder if Helm’s voice has completely recovered from his late-90s bout with throat cancer as he now strains to reproduce the ache that defined songs like “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down” and “The Weight.” The inclusion of youthful, pristine, female gospel vocals also feels out of place; rather than lend authenticity, they come off as an indulgence.

 The Eternal by Sonic Youth
I’ve always struggled intellectually to penetrate the music of Sonic Youth. It just seems that such carefully composed dissonance could contain more clarity and dimension. If you share that predicament, The Eternal can help break those barriers. The album’s crisp, hard rock riffs evolve into noisier arrangements that reveal the band’s post-punk/no wave roots. In the process, we see Sonic Youth’s debt to pioneers like Lou Reed and Patti Smith, as well as the influence this important band has exerted on acts like Nirvana and PJ Harvey. Daydream Nation makes a little more sense now.

Jason Stonerook is the author of Rock ‘N’ Politics: A State of the Union Address. According to his birth certificate, he was born in Cedar Rapids, Iowa … or was he?