Cough Syrup & Nicotine

Keywords: Odd, atmospheric, hypnotic, fever dreams, swinging wide the doors of perception
Use while: Staring at your black light posters, smoking weed, wandering in the desert/woods, going on a vision quest, playing air guitar under strobe lights
For fans of: The weird Beatles, Pink Floyd, the Velvet Underground, Peter Gabriel-era Genesis, Tom Waits, spacy Neil Young, spacy Talking Heads, “Disintegration”-era Cure, early-Smashing Pumpkins, Flaming Lips, Radiohead

1. “I Will Possess Your Heart” and...
2. "Bixby Canyon Bridge," by Death Cab for Cutie, from “Narrow Stairs” --- Death Cab has spent a decade making conservative, pleasant indie pop I mostly ignored. But here the band is aiming for something completely different. Starting a pop album with these two songs is just nuts. I love that the 8-minute “I Will Possess Your Heart” was the single.
3. “Phonytown,” by Rogue Wave, from “Asleep at Heaven’s Gate” --- I’ve always thought this band was decent enough, but man, this guitar knocks my socks off!
4. “Ragged Wood” and
5. “Blue Ridge Mountains,” by Fleet Foxes, from “Fleet Foxes” --- Nobody argues about who's the quietest band in rock. We can shout until our ears hemorrhage about how the Who's decibel level tramples Led Zeppelin's, but sitting around discussing quiet bands is lame. Yet here are the Fleet Foxes. In mid-July, I got to see the band with 150 other people at the Middle East Upstairs. The Seattle five-piece, led by angel-voiced Robin Pecknold, re-created the same soft, pastoral harmonies that make their self-titled debut album transcendent. Using a beat-to-hell sound system in a room with iffy acoustics, the Foxes turned the dark, cramped club into a temple.
6. “Hopscotch Willie,” by Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks, from "Real Emotional Trash" --- Kinda like Trey Anastasio channeling his inner Lou Reed. "Slanted and Enchanted" obsessives may be bummed, but Malkmus has become a guitar god. An anti-guitar god like Jay Mascis or Thurston Moore, but a god nonetheless.
7. “The Beach,” Dr. Dog, from “Fate” --- Dr. Dog's music could serve as a soundtrack to the Summer of Love, the Great Depression or a dozen other pre-rock eras. That timelessness has won the group fans across the modern musical spectrum. Since 2004, Dr. Dog has opened for the Strokes, My Morning Jacket, the Raconteurs, Black Keys and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah.
8. “The Mermaid Angeline,” by Apollo Sunshine, from “Shall Noise Upon” --- Man, this is some freaky stuff. If you wanna blow the doors of perception wide open, turn off your Strawberry Alarm Clock and spin this third album by Boston's Apollo Sunshine. It oozes like a lava lamp between bright and happy folk rock, chromatic and chaotic psychedelic rock and wild postmodern blues raves.
9. “One for the Cutters,” by the Hold Steady, from “Stay Positive” --- This is why they’re my favorite band. A bar band that can pull this off? Listen to these lyrics. All of them. In one sitting.
10. “I Got the Drop on You,” by Mike Doughty, from “Golden Delicious” --- He’s not Jack Johnson yet. That’s a good thing.
11. “Hey Ma,” by James, from “Hey Ma” --- There are two Jameses. There's the Manchester megaband with a slew of Top 10 hits across Europe. Then there's those dudes who sing "Laid." It doesn't matter how big the British superstars are across the Atlantic, in the States they're that band with the song drunk frat guys blast, utterly oblivious of the seriously unmanly lyrics: "Dressed me up in women's clothes/Messed around with gender roles/Line my eyes and call me pretty." This is the other James.
12. “Along the Way,” by DeVotchKa, from “A Mad and Faithful Telling” --- I’m still surprised they’re not that big, what with the “Little Miss Sunshine” soundtrack and all. Props to a Denver band for being this cool.
13. “Mercy,” by Plants and Animals, from “Parc Avenue” --- Man, this is weird.
14. “42,” by Coldplay, from “Viva La Vida or Death to All His Friends” --- The band's least-uniform release, "Viva la Vida" was labeled Coldplay's most Radiohead-lite album, which is neither fair nor true. Artistically, the Radiohead homages are infrequent and well-placed. But by and large the band pilfers more from unexpected sources than obvious ones. They pinch from the Beatles' "Fool on the Hill," Eastern European melodies and neo-classical stuff for a Chopin-does-Britpop effect. It's all very cool and different and, yes, experimental. But if you're a Coldplay hater, nothing here will turn you around.
15. “Love Dog,” by TV on the Radio, from "Dear Science" --- This album accomplishes two significant feats. First, in the one-and-done modern alternative world where so many (Interpol, Strokes, Bloc Party) peak with debuts, TVOTR's new album accelerates artistically. That's because, two, the New York band has made the record Prince would have if he came up in the current Brooklyn indie scene (or what Radiohead would have sounded like growing up in '70s Minneapolis). It's both tough, dirty and funky and evangelical, jazzy and electronic.
16. “You Can Do Better Than Me,” by Death Cab for Cutie, from “Narrow Stars” --- See? They’ve really got something cool going on.
17. “Slapped Actress,” by the Hold Steady, from “Stay Positive” --- I just wanted to end with this song. I doesn't make a lot of thematic sense, but I just had to.