#GreatAlbums1980s - #SuzanneVega - Solitude Standing (1987). New York's Vega channeled the anxieties of modern living in songs that echoed Joni Mitchell and Rickie Lee Jones. The acapella "Tom's Diner" was a concise vignette of New York life. Hit single "Luka" brought rare mainstream attention to domestic violence. Longer tracks, including “Ironbound/ Fancy Poultry” and “Wooden Horse (Caspar Hauser’s Song)" expanded the musical vista of Vega's poetic art pop.
#GreatAlbums1980s - #TracyChapman – Tracy Chapman (1988). No one in '88 expected an LP of introspective folk to shift 20 million copies. "Fast Car" had no chorus or obvious hook, while “Talking ‘bout a Revolution” was a vamp on repeated chords and lyrics. But Chapman's voice connected with listeners hungry for simplicity and sincerity. “For My Lover” and “For You,” explored sacrifice and pain as further evidence nothing is as simple as it sounds in Chapman’s lyrical world.
#GreatAlbums1980s - #BruceSpringsteen – Nebraska (1982). After The River poised him for superstardom, Jersey's bluejeaned bard surprised everyone with this stark and haunting set of ballads recorded on a consumer-grade 4-track. "Nebraska" retold the story of spree killer Charlie Starkweather, followed by tales of hopeless gamblers, lovelorn losers, and morally conflicted lawmen. Like Guthrie or the early Dylan, Springsteen turned a dark mirror on the American dream.
#GreatAlbums1980s - #NicJones – Penguin Eggs (1980). UK folksinger Nic Jones mined the Roud folk index for his fifth and final studio LP. A fine guitarist for whom open tunings expanded the harmonic range, Jones backs his resonant voice on pieces like "Canadee-I-O" and "Courting is a Pleasure." But the centerpiece of the set is Jones's reading of Harry Robertson's "The Humpback Whale," a stark ballad of Melvillian force. A tragic accident ended Jones's recording career in 1982.
#GreatAlbums1980s - #DickGaughan – Handful of Earth (1981). The folksinger/ activist from Leith, Scotland worked with the Boys of the Lough and Five Hand Reel around a series of traditional folk solo sets beginning in 1970. Handful of Earth sharpens Gaughan's anti-conservative stance in the age of Thatcher with songs of both political urgency and lyrical beauty. "Erin-Go-Bragh," "Now Westlin Winds," and the gorgeous "The Snows They Melt the Soonest" are among many highlights.
Lankum is an Irish folk group interpreting traditional songs through a dark postmodern lens. Not for the faint of heart, this relentlessly bleak album rarely lets in the light. If a doom metal band suddenly began interpreting Steeleye Span on a steady diet of Godspeed You! Black Emperor, it might come out sounding like Lankum’s foreboding, cinematic take on traditional folk. Find it on Bandcamp.
#23From2023 - #SufjanStevens – Javelin. Stevens returns to singer-songwriter mode on a set of ballads exploring life lessons and resilience in the face of tragedy. “Everything That Rises” turns a Flannery O’Connor trope into a haunting spiritual quest. “Javelin” is a wry meditation on chance and circumstance. The interpolation of “There’s a World” revises one of Neil Young’s lesser-known tunes. Stevens works mostly alone with guest turns from his folk and indie compatriots.
#23From2023 - #Mitski – The Land is Inhospitable and So Are We (Dead Oceans). Mitski’s stark folk-rock echoes the likes of Lana del Rey and Weyes Blood. But on “Buffalo Replaced,” “Heaven” and the hit “My Love Mine All Mine” the lonely cadence of her voice negotiates with the cosmopolitanism of her upbringing. Baroque strings, pedal steel and gospel choruses deepen songs that enable pop, classical, and folk traditions to coinhabit a single musical timeframe.
#23From2023 - #IrisDeMent – Workin’ on a World (Flariella). On her latest disc, DeMent applies her Arkansas drawl to a set of songs lamenting current injustices while celebrating the past progress of “people who were workin’ on a world they never got to see.” DeMent’s gospel inflections bring a positive note to even her darkest subjects, while the musical accompaniment (directed partly by her daughter Pieta Brown) layers horns and jangling guitars for a classic roots-rock feel.
#GreatAlbums1960s - #VanMorrison – Astral Weeks (1968). Van the Man never made another album quite like this one. Its jazz-inflected folk wanders through pastoral soundscapes as Morrison’s poetic lyrics and vocal improvisations trip through a personal cosmos of blissed-out emotion. “Beside You,” “Cyprus Avenue” and “Madame George” are what WB Yeats might have sounded like if he’d grown up among the beatniks and absorbed the lyrical cadences of sixties counterculture.
#GreatAlbums1960s - #Pentangle – The Pentangle (1968). Key to the British folk movement (along with Fairport Convention, Steeleye Span, et. Al.), Pentangle filtered its original and traditional folk through the jazz colorings of bassist Danny Thompson and guitarists Bert Jansch and John Renbourn. Broadsides such as “Let No Man Steal Your Thyme” feel modern without losing their pastoral flair, and the band’s own “Pentangling” and “Waltz” showcase their low-key virtuosity.
#GreatAlbums1960s - #Nico – Chelsea Girl (1967). A folkier companion to The Velvet Underground and Nico, this LP situates Nico’s dry, haunting voice in baroque settings iced with flutes and chamber strings. Three of four Velvets (Lou Reed, John Cale, Sterling Morrison) contribute songs and instruments – most affecting on Reed’s brooding title track. Jackson Browne lightens the set, writing three songs suited to Nico’s lovelorn style, including an early cut of “These Days.”
#GreatAlbums1960s - #TimHardin 1 (1966) & Tim Hardin 2 (1967). The archetypal musical misfit, Hardin spread the dozen songs on which his legacy rests over these two LPs. “Don’t Make Promises,” “Reason to Believe” and “How Can We Hang On to a Dream” (on 1) and “If I Were a Carpenter,” “Red Balloon” and “Black Sheep Boy” (on 2) are classics of tense emotion and haunting beauty. Covered by many, the songs thrive best in Hardin’s plaintive versions – eerie omens of his early death. #GreatFolkAlbums