With such a nostalgia-inspiring title for Lali Puna‘s first single off her upcoming LP – the group’s first in over five years – one can’t help but reminisce on the past. I recall picking up 2004′s Faking The Books around the time of its release; I quickly became obsessed with “Micronimic”, the title track and “B-Movie”. These songs, along with selections from Neon Golden by The Notwist, came to define my music obsessions of 2004. I can see “Remember” launching Our Inventions beyond Lali Puna’s past albums, much in the way Neon Golden did for The Notwist.

“Remember” hints at what Lali Puna created with 2004′s Faking The Books but lays out a clear path forward for 2010′s Our Inventions. It’s easy to hear the influence of sister group The Notwist through Markus Acher’s dark shield of skilled electro-pop, and Valerie Trebeljahr lends the perfect vocal accompaniment to dominate atop the somber, introspective electronics. The song is dreamy, with Trebeljahr’s wispy, airy vocals repetitive over the band’s hypnotic, atmospheric beats.

When it comes down to it, Lali Puna’s “Remember” shows immense promise for the impending Our Inventions. Though it’s yet to be seen, Archer may finally have created something to match Neon Golden.

Our Inventions is out April 6 on Morr Music.

Lali Puna: Remember [mp3]

The third installment of A Retrospective, this time the focus is on 2002. The year of rebuilding, so to speak. It was the year I discovered Cider Jack (and did so plentifully) at the local Pullman bar Rico’s, and we all would rehearse Bill Brasky skits (from the SNL spots, and made up on the spot) as twenty feet away the university jazz combo performed excellent renditions of Van Morrison’s “Moondance” and various Motown favorites. As we see every year, 2002 saw several real great releases. Here are my favorites.

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15. Tallahassee by The Mountain Goats
Tallahassee is a concept album of sorts, devoted to the fictional married couple always leaning toward divorce. The recurring characters receive tribute throughout the album, which sees The Mountain Goats‘ front-man John Darnielle further defining his pointed vocals and powerful acoustic folk melodies.

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14. Spring Came, Rain Fell by Club 8
A diversion from their prior self-titled record which found the band dropping in more electronics and bordering on dance tracks, Spring Came, Rain Fell split the band’s loyalties between that sound and one much more along the lines of the indie-pop created by Acid House Kings, another of Johan Angergård’s groups. Club 8 does a good job bridging the two sounds in this viable follow-up. The album went out of print but was reissued last year on Labrador Records.

Club 8: Spring Came, Rain Fell [mp3]

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13. Read Music/Speak Spanish by Desaparecidos
After several mopey records from Conor Oberst under the name Bright Eyes, it was good to hear him take on something more societal and political under Desaparecidos. Songs like the “Man & Wife” pair and “Mall Of America” fit well with the times. And backing the highly emotive social commentary which made up much of the subject matter of Read Music/Speak Spanish was loud distorted guitars that seemed more fit for Cursive than Bright Eyes. To this day, Read Music/Speak Spanish is, in my opinion, one of Oberst’s greatest works.

Desaparecidos: The Happiest Place On Earth [mp3]

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12. The Execution Of All Things by Rilo Kiley
Like many, when I hear reference to Rilo Kiley‘s The Execution Of All Things, I immediately think of that one track – the stunning “With Arms Outstretched”. It found a welcome home on the first episode of Weeds: Season 1. On the album, Jenny Lewis strays between storytelling and folk-worthy narratives backed by pleasant folk-pop melodies that wouldn’t seem too out-of-place were they to be released this year. And that’s something that won’t likely change for years to come.

Rilo Kiley: With Arms Outstretched [mp3]

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11. Don’t Fall In Love With Everyone You See by Okkervil River
Okkervil River always seemed a bit odd. At times barely in tune vocals were borderline awkward yet it has worked so well throughout the band’s library of work. With the power of folk-pop sensibilities behind them, and the powerful ability to write stellar lyrics, Okkervil River created an album with easy showstoppers like “Kansas City” and “Red”. And while the first two songs on Don’t Fall In Love With Everyone You See are the best, most recognized songs on the album, with repeat listens others effortlessly follow suit.

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10. Songs About Leaving by Carissa’s Wierd
Songs About Leaving didn’t quite live up to its two predecessors as a whole. Instead, select tracks like “September Come Take This Heart Away” and “Sofisticated Fuck Princess Please Leave Me Alone” did with ease while other fell slightly flat. Here, Carissa’s Wierd shined brightest when they added the full instrumentation (in other words, ripe with strings) that made You Should Be At Home Here great.

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9. Highly Refined Pirates by Minus The Bear
Highly Refined Pirates was a great album circa 2002 and 2003, and even beyond that. But even so, it paled in comparison to seeing Minus The Bear perform these songs live during the same time period. The band had yet to grow into their current fan-base and that being as it was, they created a masterpiece ahead of its time.

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8. Mondays Are Like Tuesdays and Tuesdays Are Like Wednesdays by Acid House Kings
I didn’t discover Acid House Kings until the release of their 2005 pop epic Sing Along With The Acid House Kings, but in the brief four years since finding them they’ve become one of my most listened-to bands. Mondays Are Like Tuesdays was an album filled with soft Swedish pop songs like “Sunday Morning” and “Brown And Beige Are My Favorite Colors”. And who could forget “Say Yes If You Love Me”? The band is currently working on their follow up to Sing Along With, claiming they’re working toward creating the perfect pop album. However, in their prior records, they’ve already accomplished that feat several times over, one of them being Mondays Are Like Tuesdays And Tuesdays Are Like Wednesdays.

Acid House Kings: Say Yes If You Love Me [mp3]

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7. Yankee Hotel Foxtrot by Wilco
Wilco, for me, is a band that makes an immense impression and then disappears for one, sometimes two years at a time. Returning to the Wilco of old, I’m struck by the senselessness of that statement, especially as it pertains to Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. This is an album that should have continuous mainstay capabilities; one that should never really leave. I guess that’s why it’s #7 and not higher. Still, when it does return, it wows at full force.

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6. The Beginning Stages Of… by The Polyphonic Spree
One of my all-time favorite movies is Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind. It is beautiful in every way possible, from Joel and Clementine’s odd little quirks to unique use of minimal special effects (watch the commentary). It was with great excitement that I heard The Polyphonic Spree while watching this movie in the theater. Not often do you find a band that could very well be a cult, full with flowing colorful robes and an effervescent leader. Other bands have come close, but in numbers only (I’m From Barcelona, Dark Meat…). These songs all have a joyousness to them, a sunny demeanor. Haha, right? …many are about sun, love, happiness, and light.

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5. Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots by The Flaming Lips
The Flaming Lips are a band capable of releasing one great album after another, and Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots is just that. “Fight Test” and “Do You Realize??” had the ability to be album toppers, but that pinnacle spot was reserved for “Yoshimi Battles Pink Robots Pt. 1″. Two words to describe the power of this album? Very strong.

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4. Neon Golden by The Notwist
Meshing electro-pop and a shoegaze-style hypnotism is nothing new; in Neon Golden, however, The Notwist gave it a refreshing makeover. Dark and mysterious, Neon Golden is an album that packs an emotional punch from the opening moments of “One Step Inside Doesn’t Mean You Understand” and on throughout. Even in the more upbeat of moments, The Notwist maintain a mesmerizing and entrancing style. Yet unlike a large chunk of music that fits the description, Neon Golden is also catchy and fully contagious.

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3. You Forgot It In People by Broken Social Scene
Oh man, listening again to “KC Accidental”, it becomes immediately clear why this band is so great. One moment they rock your nuts off with legendary noise and the next it drops into beautiful and romantic lyrical poetry. The songs on You Forgot It In People are at times hardly cohesive, yet there’s an undeniable power behind the tracklist. “Anthems For A Seventeen Year-Old Girl” may remain the showstopper with its peaceful infectious melody, but each song Broken Social Scene writes holds weight.

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2. Kill The Moonlight by Spoon
Kill The Moonlight by Spoon was a bit of a sleeper for me. It wasn’t until shortly after Gimme Fiction that it came to be my favorite album by the famed Austin band. Then again, several artists have fit the description, like Stars. Upon release they don’t necessarily hold the weight you expected, or just didn’t catch on right away. But a year, maybe two down the road, and suddenly … BAM … they strike. And the result is phenomenal.

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1. Castaways & Cutouts by The Decemberists
Before all the theatrics and flare came to dominate and embellish The Decemberists music (which has ultimately allowed them to create and produce a unique and wonderful show), there was just a highly educated, smart folk album called Castaways & Cutouts. Sure, hints of the future dramatic stage presence existed in tracks like “California One / Youth And Beauty Brigade” and “A Cautionary Tale”, and even “The Legionnaire’s Lament” but it was also wholesome and, to an extent, the educated innocent. Their follow-up albums saw the band expanding into (more) bizarre tales of ghosts and lyrics seemingly pulled from book-like plots and expanding the instrumentation and group size in general, all of which has been great. But Castaways & Cutouts was not only an introduction, but an introduction to a band on the rise to fame and glory.

The Decemberists: Here I Dreamt I Was An Architect [mp3]

Written by Jon Hegglund

The first time I listened to The Devil, You & Me, I put it on the iTunes and walked away from the computer to do some chores around the house. At one point, after I thought the album had played in its entirety, a muted, pretty acoustic guitar came floating out over the computer speakers. I thought, initially, that it was the opening to Nick Drake’s lovelorn folk ballad, “Northern Sky.” Before my confusion could be cleared up—wait, “Ni” should come before “No,” right?—Markus Acher’s quiet, melancholy voice dropped in and I realized that, yes, this was still The Notwist, with “Gone Gone Gone,” their brief and beautiful coda to the album.

What does it say that I momentarily confused a band that in 2002 would have been synonymous with glitchy electro-pop (before Tamborello & Gibbard delivered it to the malls and MySpace) with the singer-songwriter who inspired thousands of pensive coffeehouse folk strummers? Maybe it reveals more about The Notwist than about my own lazy listening. For all of its fuzzy beeps and digital crackles, The Notwist’s 2002 landmark Neon Golden was really a headphone album full of sadness and silence, but one with wonderful pop instincts nonetheless. Listening to
Neon Golden, in other words, was a lot more like listening to Elliott Smith than Christian Fennesz.

To find the band veering away from electronica toward a more acoustic sound, then, feels entirely appropriate, especially since a glitch-filled reprise of Neon Golden would seem just a bit dated in this post-Postal Service world. The emotional center of the band is without a doubt Markus Acher’s voice, whose slight German accent and flat tones create the impression of someone struggling to name and narrate feelings in a language not quite his own. Acher seems to sing very close to the mic, with almost no reverb, creating the sense of someone whose words are caught somewhere between thought and voice. Why is everything so locked up? Acher asks in “Gloomy Planets,” as if he suddenly found himself walking the streets after hours in an alienating American cityscape, beset by some confused sadness.

This is not to say that the group has packed up their electronic gear completely—just that the signature samples and electronic crackles are more seamlessly woven into straight-ahead alternative rock instrumentation. The opening track “Good Lies” provides the perfect template: beginning with a split-second of sampled strings before a muted electric guitar riff, the song feels almost conventional until the guitars fall away and the chorus floats over a single acoustic guitar, with Acher, aching: Let’s just imitate the real / Until we find a better one / Remember the good lies win. The song slowly builds itself back up until it almost rocks out in a swirl of guitars and drum samples.

Oddly enough, the weaker tracks on The Devil, You & Me are those that sound like they might have been leftovers from the Neon Golden sessions. “On Planet Off” plays out its programmed beats and whistling synth lines at a plodding rhythm, creating a somber mood but lacking the resonant immediacy of other tracks. “Hands on Us” is also a perfectly competent piece of dark electro-pop that drags on a minute too long. In contrast to the many others that feel more like fully realized songs than mere mood pieces, these tracks sound like the work of skilled artists working on a paint-by-numbers canvas.

Although I’ve been listening to and enjoying The Devil, You & Me for a few months now, it’s a difficult album to appreciate in the summertime. I’m sure I’ll love it even more once the winds and rain of autumn blow in and I can walk the hilly streets of my town with “Gloomy Planets” or “Boneless” on my headphones, the songs giving a small measure of warmth as I lean into the wind. When Acher’s plaintive voice and the band’s spare, lush sound take up the space between my chilled ears, then I’ll be able to say with confidence that The Devil, You & Me is one the best records of 2008.

The Notwist: Good Lies [mp3]

Domino [CD, 2008]

1. Good Lies
2. Where In This World
3. Gloomy Planets
4. Alphabet
5. The Devil, You + Me
6. Gravity
7. Sleep
8. On Planet Off
9. Boneless
10. Hands On Us
11. Gone Gone Gone