Culture
Suggested Listening 2024: Chris Pyle
By: WOUB Culture Team
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WOUB Culture’s Suggested Listening series highlights the music that resonated with WOUB Culture contributors and regional artists in 2024. Today we spotlight local music enthusiast Chris Pyle, owner of Donkey Coffee.
1. Hit Me Hard and Soft by Billie Eilish
I listen to almost no pop radio/top 40 music these days but Billie Eilish is the rare exception. I like her “chill” music the most and this album has that in spades. What an incredible talent – not to mention her brother Finneas who helps write and produce everything she has done up to this point. What a team.
2. Manning Fireworks by MJ Lenderman
I never get tired of country/Americana music done with a punk/DIY sensibility – if done well. When Tom Petty was asked about the state of “radio” country these days he said most of it sounded like “really slick bad rock bands with fiddles.” Perfect. The state of radio country has been this way for quite sometime now, unfortunately. I love country music but most of the good stuff is found in the underground these days. The next Johnny Cash or Hank Williams will not be found on the radio. This is loose, dirty, and real – the way country should be.
3. Johnny Blue Skies by Sturgill Simpson
Another great country artist that, of course, doesn’t get played on the radio. This is more mellow, dark, and reflective than his other records. He is now eight for eight – not one bad album in the bunch and always trying to do something a bit different from one record to the next. Nashville needs to start embracing these incredible underground country artists because their artistry is just too good to be continually overlooked.
4. Hollowed Out by Ducks Ltd.
I can’t get enough of “jangle rock” – something about chiming bright guitars that I really connect with. This has a somewhat low fi sound like their two previous albums but I think the songwriting is a notch above this time around. They are not reinventing the wheel – they just use the wheel a lot better than most in this genre.
5. Tigers Blood by Waxahatchee
This is her best record yet. Indie rock meets Americana with brilliant songwriting and execution. Love the sound of this album.
6. Scheduled Explosions by Second Grade
Lo-fi indie rock at its best. Much like Guided by Voices before them, they are masters of melody and keep the songs short. Twenty-three songs in 38 minutes! This is what an album is supposed to do – take you on a journey. What an incredible ride.
7. Woodland Studios by Gillian Welch & David Rawlings
Gillian Welch and David Rawlings are back with one of their best. It’s wonderfully melancholy and really get under your skin in the best possible way. Hopefully she won’t wait almost 15 years to release her next studio album.
8. GNX By Kendrick Lamar
He’s back! While this album isn’t quite as good as his three record classic run of Good Kid, To Pimp a Butterfly, and Damn, he’s back in form after an uneven record with Big Steppers. Bono once said that most of the best music is when people are writing about running to God or running away from God and Kendrick has always done this amazingly well.
9. My Method Actor by Nilufer Yanya
With a sound all her own, Nilufer brings the music down a notch from previous albums and it has the effect her sounding like a twisted torch singer. Like St. Vincent before her, her guitar work is so original and inspiring that it’s sometimes hard to tell if it’s actually guitar that you are hearing. Gets better after every listen.
10. Only God Was Above Us by Vampire Weekend
I’ve gone from not liking this band to liking them quite a bit to now loving them. This is my favorite record of theirs so far. It has more of an edge and even more quirky songwriting than the others – and it still retains the witty and goofy lyrics that make you either love them or hate them.
Honorable Mentions: Lady Blackbird, Leyla McCalla, Jack White, La Luz, Loma, MK. Gee, Jessica Pratt, Tyler The Creator, Kim Gordon, Friko