I assume by now that you’ve all heard the big Star Wars news.

If not, I’ll summarize. Disney bought LucasFilm. All of it, including ILM, Skywalker Sound, and all the rights to Star Wars. They spent $4.05 billion on this deal, a figure that to me actually seems pretty low, and in return, they get to make new Star Wars movies. With or without George Lucas. Which they have already announced they will do, beginning with Star Wars: Episode VII in 2015.

I probably don’t need to tell you that this is the biggest news to hit my little world in a long time. And when I first read it, I was elated. New Star Wars movies! A chance to bring new writers and directors into the fold, and re-energize the saga! As the story kept unfolding, it just got better. Lucas will stay on as a creative consultant, providing the story outlines for the new movies, but not writing or directing them. The first three out of the gate will be the fabled Episodes VII, VIII and IX, which, had Lucas decided to make them himself, would probably have ended up just like the prequels – an easy target for fans who cringe at Lucas’ dialogue and stilted staging.

Surely, I thought, this news is making every Star Wars fan in the world happy right now. But no. Star Wars fans happy? What was I thinking? Since yesterday I’ve read diatribe after diatribe about how Lucas has “sold out” and how Disney will ruin Star Wars. How the Mouse House is a soulless conglomerate that will swallow the Skywalker clan whole, and spit out empty garbage. How they’re certain – just certain – that this is the worst move Lucas has ever made, and that the whole of Star Wars is ruined now.

And about halfway through the day, in the midst of a Facebook back-and-forth with one of my oldest friends, I hit upon the phrase that defines my feelings on this. I am choosing to be hopeful.

Now, listen. The naysayers may be right. But here’s why I’m optimistic. I’m a guy who liked the prequel trilogy a great deal, but even I can see the flaws. Lucas is a tin-eared dialogue writer, and has no idea how to reproduce on the page the actual rhythms of speech. (“George, you can type this shit, but you sure as hell can’t say it,” as Harrison Ford once opined.) His pacing is wrong, his direction inadequate. In those prequels, he managed to coax bad performances out of some of the finest actors around. The prequels could have been masterpieces, but they merely connected the dots, and the problem was Lucas.

You have to give the man his due. His imagination is boundless, and he created the entire Star Wars universe from scratch. But he’s forgotten how to be a good filmmaker, and I’m glad he realized that it’s time to step away. As a creative consultant, Lucas’ vision will still guide the Star Wars franchise. But with this new deal, Disney is under no obligation to listen to him. A mechanism is now in place to veto disasters like Jar Jar Binks. In the best case scenario, we get all of the vision and none of the bad ideas.

Disney can now hire anyone they want to write and direct new Star Wars movies. If they’re smart – and based on their handling of the Marvel stable, I believe they are – they’ll pay for fan-favorite visionaries, and then step back and let them do their thing. Joss Whedon’s on the short list, of course, but I’ve heard other fascinating names, like Brad Bird, JJ Abrams and Duncan Jones. Any one of those guys would add a welcome dose of personality to Star Wars. Remember, the consensus favorite of the first six films is The Empire Strikes Back, written by Lawrence Kasdan and Leigh Brackett and directed by Irvin Kirshner. It’s the film Lucas had the least amount of involvement with.

Above all, I think Disney knows what it has, and will take care of Star Wars. The fanbase is massive, and also quick-tempered and judgmental. I believe everyone involved knows this, and will do their best to please us. They may screw up, but I don’t think it will be because they want to suck the life out of the saga, and milk it for all it’s worth. I expect we’ll get some real Star Wars fans to take the reins now, and I think this may be just the thing to bring one of my favorite entertainments to new heights.

Why do I think that? Because I am choosing to be hopeful.

* * * * *

I have realized I hold to the same philosophy when it comes to buying music. I want to like everything I buy, and I head into every one of these musical relationships with hopes held high. Even when the odds are stacked against me, and I just know something I’m plopping down 12 bucks for is going to suck beyond all reason, I still want to believe that it won’t. I’m most often the Mulder, not the Scully.

That goes double for records I buy on recommendations, without hearing them first. I know some of you are aghast at that notion, especially considering the digital age we live in. Yes, I could easily listen to these albums before buying them, and decide from that whether or not to spend the money on them. But what fun would that be? At least a dozen times I year, I pay my money and I take my chance, based on nothing but the word of people I trust. And it almost always works out beautifully.

I have two cases in point this week, and the recommends both came from the same guy. Rob Hale is an employee at Kiss the Sky, the greatest record store in the Chicago suburbs. He’s a musicologist – the guy listens to everything, from Impulse label jazz to Steely Dan to Porcupine Tree. He’s introduced me to quite a lot of new-to-me artists, and I’ve learned to take him at his word. Plus, he’s one of the only people I know of who is as excited to play new music for me as I am for him.

Lately, Rob’s been in love with the new Tame Impala album, Lonerism. And after buying and hearing it, I can’t say I blame him. I still have not picked up Innerspeaker, the first Tame Impala record – I have something of an aversion to hyped-up new bands, preferring to let them establish a track record before dipping in – but I understand that it’s similar, if smaller and less adventurous. I’m still excited to hear it, but the sense of adventure is what knocks me out about Lonerism.

For all intents and purposes, Australian Kevin Parker is Tame Impala. He writes all the songs, plays all the instruments (except a few piano lines this time), and produces and records everything at home. But don’t let that fool you into thinking this is cheap-sounding stuff. Lonerism sounds like Parker spent a million on it, so intricate are the arrangements and so crisp is the recording. This is keyboard-tinged ‘60s-influenced psychedelic rock, and its canvas is huge, its palette bursting with color.

The record begins with a repeated mantra: “Gotta be above it,” panted out over thundering drums and heavily processed keyboards. The song doesn’t do much with its powerhouse opening, but it doesn’t need to – before long, we’re neck-deep in “Endors Toi,” a remarkable piece of synth-drenched pop. Its flurry of sound never stops moving, and it sets the tone for most of Lonerism. Parker’s a guy who knows how to construct swarms of sound, but he also knows how to leave spaces – check out the wide-open chasms in the bass-driven “Apocalypse Dreams.”

He also knows how to write a melody. It may take you a few listens to truly hear the tunes beneath the production, but they’re here, and they’re wonderful. “Music to Walk Home By” exudes charm, with its catchy refrain and trippy keys. My favorite part, though, is when the guitars kick in near the end, playing a nimble little run that drives the whole song home. I’m also fond of “Keep On Lying,” which seems to start in the middle – it fades in mid-chorus, repeats for a while, then unfolds into a psych jam of the highest order. (Especially when you consider that Parker is playing all the instruments.)

In a way, this is all prelude to the lumbering juggernaut that is “Elephant.” A relentless stomp of a song, “Elephant” feels in places like a long-lost nugget of the ‘60s, complete with cheesy organ sounds and distorted push-and-shove bass. But there’s an element of doom metal to it as well, which gives it an energetic edge over much of Lonerism. Not that the rest of it falls short – the dazzling mini-epic “Nothing That Has Happened So Far Has Been Anything We Could Control,” for example, will make your head spin, and the deceptively dark piano ballad “Sun’s Coming Up” closes things out on a winningly weird note.

Lonerism is an album that lives up to its title – it’s the kind of thing that can only be the product of an individual vision, given free reign. It’s fun, it’s trippy, it’s endlessly inventive, and it’s unfailingly melodic. It takes a few listens to grasp what Kevin Parker is up to here, but once it clicks, Lonerism is a fine, fine piece of work. Looking forward to hearing Innerspeaker now, and following wherever Parker goes next.

As much as I like it, though, the Tame Impala album is not one of my favorites of the year. Rob’s other recommendation certainly is, though. It’s another Australian band, this one named Husky, after its lead singer, Husky Gawenda. Their debut album is called Forever So, and it’s in the mold of Fleet Foxes and Andrew Bird. But there’s a certain magic to it that I won’t be able to adequately explain. Forever So is a collection of tiny acoustic folk-rock songs, sung and played gracefully, but there’s more here. It’s beautiful in ways so few albums are – respectful of space and silence, every element used sparingly and working toward the whole.

This is an album of details – the watery backing vocals that crop up only a couple of times on “Tidal Wave,” the well-placed finger cymbal on “Fake Moustache.” It’s an album that demands attention. It would be easy to let these quiet, wispy tunes fade into the background, but Gawenda and the band have carefully crafted every moment, every note you hear (and every space you don’t). It’s meant for immersive listening. That’s not to say it isn’t immediate, too – “History’s Door” is one of the finest little pop songs I’ve heard this year, and showcases the band at its loudest (which isn’t very loud), and nimble tunes like “Hunter” and the title song are simply lovely.

But there’s a cumulative effect here that goes beyond just pretty songs. Forever So flows perfectly, one gorgeous piece of music into another, and listening to it all in a row is like wrapping yourself up in a warm blanket on a snowy day. Gawenda’s high voice has its limits, but he uses it well, never rising above a sweet half-whisper, and the subtle, yet remarkably intricate production spins around it like fireflies. The best records do this – they take you over for their entire running times, casting a spell that doesn’t lift until the final note is played.

Forever So is like that. It’s such a thoughtfully constructed album, and such a beautiful one to boot, that you won’t want it to end. That ending – the hushed “Farewell (in 3 Parts)” – is just as gentle and moving as the rest of this little gem. Even the concluding horn arrangement is like a caress. Forever So is one of the best records I’ve heard this year, and it sets the bar high for Husky’s future. I hope they can keep making albums like this one, because I haven’t been able to stop listening to Forever So for more than a week now. And I love that feeling, when my hopes are fulfilled, when my optimism is proven right. I choose to be hopeful, and sometimes, it works out.

Thanks, Rob. I owe you.

Next week, could be anything. Leave a comment on my blog at tm3am.blogspot.com. Follow my infrequent twitterings at www.twitter.com/tm3am.

See you in line Tuesday morning.

Last week we talked extensively about solo albums by artists better known for the bands they belong to. This week, we’re going to touch on the other two kinds of solo artists – those working under a band name, and those who have never worked under any name but their own.

We actually brought up the first category last time, and it’s more common than you may think. Though Jason Lytle is putting out music under his own name now, he essentially was his old band Grandaddy, writing and singing all the songs and playing most of the instruments. The same way that Matt Hales is Aqualung, or Jason Martin is Starflyer 59, or Justin Vernon is Bon Iver, or Kevin Barnes is Of Montreal, or Trent Reznor is Nine Inch Nails, or Mark Kozelek is Sun Kil Moon.

Or like Natasha Khan is Bat for Lashes.

Lord knows why she has picked that particular name, but Bat for Lashes is all Khan – she writes all the songs, co-produces, sings, and plays a host of instruments. The marvelous mix of lush sounds she creates and curates is entirely at her direction. She even appears naked on the front cover of her new album, The Haunted Man, holding a similarly-naked man over her shoulders. It’s as if to illustrate the point: this is me, exposed, doing all the work. Get to know this record and you’re getting to know me.

Given that, you may expect something soul-baring and sparse, something, well, haunted. But it should be no surprise to Khan’s fans that she’s used her third album to delve even further into the sonic territory she staked out with her first two. Khan’s 2009 album Two Suns found her plunging headlong into electronic beats, yet maintaining the dreamy Kate Bush influence, and the result was simply amazing. Two Suns is a singular piece of work, a dark and delightful album unlike anything else out there. I’m not sure The Haunted Man is a better effort, but it doubles down on ambition and vision.

This is, no doubt, Khan’s Difficult Third Album. She makes no concessions to those looking for pop singles, or those without the patience necessary to follow her through these tunnels of song. “Moody” is an accurate, yet wholly incomplete description of this music. It unfolds slowly, adding details instead of big moments. Though Khan made waves with the danceable “Sleep Alone” last time out, she has not tried to replicate it. Tempos remain slow and shimmering, and keyboards are used for atmosphere, and rarely for punctuation.

The Haunted Man is often beautiful. Opener “Lilies” begins softly and builds so slowly that you won’t believe the amount of passion Khan bleeds into the climactic line: “Thank god I’m alive, thank god I’m alive…” The slinky “All Your Gold,” which almost sounds like a single, makes great use of its full, rich string section. Meanwhile, the actual single, “Laura,” is the record’s loveliest tune, and it’s stripped back to piano, a subtle horn arrangement, and Khan’s voice. “You’re the train that crashed my heart, you’re the glitter in the dark,” she sings, and while I have no idea what she’s talking about, the song is gorgeous.

But this album is just as often thoroughly, deeply weird. The title track, for example, stutters along on beats made of white noise, Khan singing over lush keyboard beds, before everything moves out of the way and a drum corps marches in, accompanied by a male voice choir. Somehow, this choral canticle integrates perfectly with the rest of the song when it comes charging back in, horn section and all. Similarly, “Horses of the Sun” starts off conventionally, with thumping drums and a propulsive melody, but it stops short for its off-kilter autoharp chorus. Then it gets stranger.

Through this entire record, Khan stays true to her own inimitable vision. I’m not sure who else would write a lovely, synth-burbly tune like “Marilyn,” and then nearly derail it with out-of-nowhere munchkin voices. Straight to the end, the shivering six-minute “Deep Sea Diver,” The Haunted Man commits fully to Khan’s worldview, and it’s both easier to admire and harder to love than Two Suns. I commend Khan for realizing this thing so thoroughly. It may take me some more time to fall for it, but I can already tell the investment will be worth it.

* * * * *

Of course, I have a million examples of the final type of solo album.

For example, I could talk about Regina Spektor’s new record, What We Saw from the Cheap Seats. It’s very good, perhaps the best distillation of her penchant for both lovely and quirky. Foreboding single “All the Rowboats” is definitely a highlight, but songs like “Firewood” and “Open” are among her prettiest efforts. She manages to both rein herself in and let her freak flag fly on this album, and the results are splendid.

I could talk about Tori Amos, and perhaps I will soon. Her new album Gold Dust consists of re-recordings of older material, backed by an orchestra. And nothing symbolizes the decline of one of my once-favorite artists more than this new, antiseptic version of “Precious Things,” which sounds like music for shop window dummies. I could also mention Suzanne Vega, who completed her much more successful re-recording project with the graceful Close Up Volume 4 this month. The acoustic versions on the Close Up set run the gamut of Vega’s career, and showcase just what a tremendous songwriter she is.

I could also bring up Norah Jones, who delivered one of the year’s biggest surprises with Little Broken Hearts. I’m hoping to find time and space to give this a full review soon, but here’s a sneak preview. Jones teamed up with Danger Mouse, and together, they brought her voice to marvelous new places. The album is dark and slinky and awash in electronics, and despite the fact that it sounds like nothing Jones has ever done, she’s comfortable here. No, hell, she shines. Little Broken Hearts is a must-hear record from an artist who, as far as I’m concerned, has never made one before.

These would all be good choices, but the solo artist I most want to talk about this time is Beki Hemingway.

Longtime readers will remember my glowing mini-review of Hemingway’s 2002 full-length, Words for Loss for Words. That album went on to earn a place on my top 10 list that year, on the strength of Hemingway’s songs. I still include “Good Again” and “To Spare You” on mix CDs for friends, and the latter song can still reduce me to a quivering puddle, so sharp and graceful are its lyrics. I wondered then why Beki Hemingway isn’t famous, and expected it would happen before long.

Well, it still hasn’t, and I still don’t understand. Granted, she hasn’t done a lot since then – she made an Americana record and a Christmas EP with fellow songwriter Jonathan Rundman – so maybe it’s unreasonable to expect everyone to take notice. But man, everyone is missing out. Hemingway has a new EP called I Have Big Plans for the World, and it’s great – meat and potatoes pop songs played with a snarling verve. I dare you to listen to this and not like it.

I Have Big Plans is only six songs, and less than half an hour. But that’s enough to show you what Hemingway can do. This EP is the loudest thing she’s done – opener “Lose My Mind” stacks up the roaring guitars, but Hemingway’s strong voice cuts through them, delivering a chorus you’ll be singing for hours. The song reminds me of Jonatha Brooke at her most raucous, a sense that continues through “Last Wish,” with its delightful electric piano and soaring chorus. “Northbound Traffic” brings Wayside stalwarts John and Michelle Thompson on board for a dusty rocker right out of the Lucinda Williams playbook.

Hemingway saves her best material for the end, though. “Finnieston” is the record’s one quiet moment, featuring cello from Jen Smith and backing vocals by another terrific songwriter, Carey Ott. It’s a gentle oasis of a tune, and it leads perfectly into the closer, “Skybound.” A nimble mini-epic that once again brings Jonatha Brooke to mind, the song just takes flight, Hemingway harmonizing with herself beautifully. “We could be skybound,” she sings, and I can’t imagine what’s holding her to the ground. The song is just wonderful.

I just don’t get why Beki Hemingway isn’t better known. If you’re a fan of strong, literate pop songwriting, you owe it to yourself to check her work out. She deserves to be famous, and I’d be stunned if you can get through all six songs on I Have Big Plans for the World and disagree. Beki’s website is here and you can buy her record from CD Baby here.

Next week, hopefully Paul Buchanan, but definitely Dead Can Dance and the Early November. Leave a comment on my blog at tm3am.blogspot.com. Follow my infrequent twitterings at www.twitter.com/tm3am.

See you in line Tuesday morning.

The recent Ben Folds Five reunion has me thinking about solo albums.

I know, that doesn’t seem to make sense, but bear with me. The Five originally broke up in 2000, and Ben Folds went on to a (mostly) successful solo career. The primary criticism I heard of his solo material, at least at first, was that it sounded exactly the same as his work with the Five. Well, of course it did, was my response. Ben hasn’t thoroughly changed his songwriting style just because he struck out on his own.

But while the style remained the same, there was a difference in the sound. It was subtle, and if you weren’t a fan, you probably wouldn’t have noticed. After playing all of the instruments himself on Rockin’ the Suburbs, Ben put together a new Five, with bassist Jared Reynolds and drummer Lindsay Jamieson, for Songs for Silverman. But here’s the important thing: they weren’t a band, not the way the Five was. They were session players. It was Ben’s name on the cover, and he called all the shots.

The difference wasn’t immediately obvious, but with the release last month of the real Five’s reunion album, The Sound of the Life of the Mind, it’s become crystal clear. Folds has an interplay with Robert Sledge and Darren Jessee that he doesn’t have with his hired session players, and you can hear that democracy in action all over the new album. I love Ben Folds on his own, but there’s something about the band that he has never been able to replicate.

Of course, he’s been able to do things as a solo artist that the band format wouldn’t have allowed, like his album of a cappella tributes, or his recent collaboration with Nick Hornby. That’s what solo albums are for, in general – to give the artist a chance to try something different, to light out in another direction, even if the trip is short and circular.

So it’s a little frustrating, then, to hear the first solo album from another Ben, Benjamin Gibbard, and realize that it’s basically a very minor Death Cab for Cutie record. There’s nothing here Gibbard couldn’t have tried with his main band, no moment where he veers sharply away from expectations. Former Lives was recorded in bits over the past eight years, and it would have a slapped-together quality to it if all of these songs didn’t sound essentially the same.

Gibbard’s high, even tenor is one of the most distinctive voices in modern music, and the control he has over it is remarkable. That voice can make even simplest wisp of a song worth hearing, and he relies on it more than ever on Former Lives. These songs barely exist, they’re so slight and wistful. They jangle in all the right ways, but they’re over before they really do anything. It’s hard for me to believe that the same guy who wrote the emotional powerhouses that made up Death Cab’s Transatlanticism and Plans could find anything interesting in the non-story of “Dream Song,” but here it is in the leadoff position of Gibbard’s record.

“Dream Song” is about a guy who has bad dreams. That’s it. “He counts the hours creeping by, his thoughts racing, eyes stuck open wide, tossing and turning through the night,” Gibbard sings over the most generic acoustic indie-pop backing you could imagine. Aimee Mann tries to liven up “Bigger Than Love,” but its melody just sits there, weighed down by too much repetition. The sound is right – the guitars chime, the pianos ring out, the drums propel everything forward, and if not for the song itself, this could be a fine Death Cab track. It’s just too simple and cute to leave any kind of impact.

It’s worth noting that Gibbard played virtually every instrument on Former Lives, which could explain the timid nature of these tunes. Tellingly, the best songs here are the ones with guest players adding color and depth. “Something’s Rattling (Cowpoke)” brings in Trio Elias for a mariachi flavor. “Broken Yolk in Western Sky” is a southern-inflected story about a man who dives out of his lover’s car, watching as she drives away. “And in the gravel and scattered trash, I faded into your past,” Gibbard sings, while Mark Spencer lets loose with the pedal steel.

The best track Gibbard manages on his own is “Duncan, Where Have You Gone,” with its deliberate pianos, layered vocals and stabbing guitar solos. But even that song goes nowhere, repeating its signature motif again and again. I want to like this, because Gibbard’s voice remains an undimmed joy. But Former Lives is agonizingly mediocre, and the fact that it sounds exactly like a depressingly bad Death Cab album only adds to the disappointment. Gibbard didn’t use his solo bow to set himself apart. This record finds him doing what he’s always done, only doing it worse.

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Trey Anastasio, on the other hand, is a guy who knows what a solo career is for.

Anastasio is known as the singer and guitar player for stripped-down jam band Phish, and in that setting, he is definitely part of an organic whole. On stage especially, Phish is a nimble, epic band, stretching songs to 30 or 40 minutes, heading off on tangents led by nothing more than the telepathy between the four members. With Phish, Anastasio has firmly established himself as a guitar master, peeling off one legendary, lengthy solo after another, and deftly executing tricky numbers like “The Divided Sky” and “Stash.”

But if you’re looking for that jam band mentality from Anastasio’s solo records, you’ll be disappointed. His solo career is chock full of experiments that he simply couldn’t get away with in Phish. He’s made experimental collages alongside glossy pop albums, convened a 10-piece band for instrumental workouts, given us orchestral pieces, and with “Time Turns Elastic,” presented a 30-minute suite for strings, electric guitar and voice. Phish later recorded their own version of “Elastic,” but it’s nowhere near as fascinating as Anastasio’s.

And now he’s done it again with Traveler, his ninth solo effort. About half of this album is fairly typical stuff, Anastasio working with his longtime partner Tom Marshall to deliver breezy little rock and roll tumbles. But the other half is wild and wonderful, some of the most offbeat material Anastasio has yet written, and it sets Traveler a cut above.

Start with the mostly-instrumental “Land of Nod,” with its cartoon horn arrangement and trip-hop drumming. Then move on to the dazzling six-minute epic “Scabbard,” which tips its cap to Frank Zappa, and yet finds space for some lovely acoustic passages. Both of those songs sport terrific string arrangements, and “Scabbard” finds Anastasio working with electronic beats and sounds, like a born master. The final two minutes of the piece devolve into ambient bliss, like a journey finally reaching its peaceful end. And then he leads the band through a winking, wonderful cover of Gorillaz’ “Clint Eastwood.”

Anastasio’s newfound interest in electronics informs this record without overwhelming it. “Architect” is a simple song recorded in a delightfully complex way, with computer beats in the distance supporting fractured acoustic guitar and lush strings. It’s like the sun trying to break through, and it works beautifully. “Valentine” drops another fine string and horn arrangement over a propulsive tune that ranks among his best. Just listen to the final three minutes – Anastasio whips out the electric guitar, but this is no jam, this is a fully arranged playout.

This is all so good that the lesser lights, including the bike-riding anthem “Let Me Lie,” can’t bring Traveler down. The album ends with the title track, a graceful, sunny number that isn’t a million miles outside of Phish’s orbit, but with its strings, organ, chimes and backing vocals, it sounds completely different. That’s what makes Anastasio’s solo work so compelling. He uses solo albums as opportunities, and on Traveler, his restless nature has led him to gold.

* * * * *

What, then, to say about Jason Lytle, whose solo material is often exactly the same as his work with his former band, Grandaddy?

Even Lytle has called his solo work and Grandaddy’s output interchangeable, and there’s a lot of truth to that. Grandaddy formed in 1992, and eight years later released their defining album, The Sophtware Slump. It was here that the Lytle template emerged – low-budget epics with sweeping melodies buried under layers of old-school keyboards. Their sound is sometimes reminiscent of the Flaming Lips at their most serious, even down to Lytle’s voice, but there’s an element of closet space-rock to Grandaddy that sets them apart, and subsequent albums Sumday and Just Like the Fambly Cat emphasized that element. It’s widescreen, galaxy-spanning music that still sounds made at home.

With Grandaddy on hiatus, it should be no surprise that Lytle has continued to make music on his own, or that the music he makes breaks no new ground. His second solo album, Dept. of Disappearance, could have appeared under the name Grandaddy, and fans would have embraced it just the same. All the touchstones are here – the cheesy-awesome keyboards, the pulsing bass lines, the spacey melodies, Lytle’s pinched yet perfect voice. There really is no difference.

Is this a problem? Isn’t this the same thing I laid into Ben Gibbard for doing? Well, yes and no. With Grandaddy no longer a going concern (except for the odd reunion gig this year), Lytle has no other outlet for these songs. And it’s clear these are the kind of songs he writes. What he’s given us with Dept. of Disappearance isn’t an inferior version of Grandaddy, it essentially is Grandaddy. In some ways, the band name was a lie – it’s always been Lytle’s vision – and in most cases, Lytle’s performances, on just about every instrument.

I mean, just listen to “Last Problem of the Alps,” an absolutely crushing epic chock full of ambient synths and gorgeous pianos (all played by Lytle) that builds to a massive finish. This could have fit perfectly on Sumday without any changes. “Matterhorn” is Grandaddy through and through, from the processed vocals to the sky-high keyboard sounds. The biggest departure is “Somewhere There’s a Someone,” which sounds like Grandaddy playing a Coldplay-style pop ballad. But even that only stands out because of its raw, unaffected emotion.

There’s no one else making music like this. That said, I do find myself wishing that Lytle would shake up his formula now and again. While nothing on Dept. of Disappearance will disappoint Grandaddy fans, nothing will surprise them, either. The oscillating keys and melody of “Willow Wand Willow Wand” are classic Lytle, for better and for worse. And it should shock no one that the album ends with an eight-minute synths-and-piano excursion, this one called “Gimme Click Gimme Grid.” It’s fantastic, beautiful stuff, as usual.

Isn’t it enough just to enjoy Dept. of Disappearance as if it were another new Grandaddy album? Do we need Lytle to dance to a different tune? With no one else producing this particular brand of beautiful, I’m not sure we do. Perhaps, if this album showed even the slightest hint that Lytle was running out of steam, I’d think differently. But it doesn’t. Dept. of Disappearance is just another lovely piece of work, no matter what name its author chose to release it under. As far as I’m concerned, Lytle can keep making music like this forever, and call it whatever he likes.

* * * * *

Next week, more solo projects with Bat for Lashes and Beki Hemingway. Leave a comment on my blog at tm3am.blogspot.com. Follow my infrequent twitterings at www.twitter.com/tm3am.

See you in line Tuesday morning.

Nothing is harder to review than pretty.

I know how to review clever, and epic, and fun, and heartbreaking, and disastrous. In fact, I sometimes have to watch myself, so I don’t use the same method of reviewing each of those twice. (I slipped up last week and reused a line from a prior Muse review. It’s a good line, though, so I’m oddly OK with it.) But when an artist’s goal is just to make the prettiest thing you’ve ever heard, I often just don’t know what to say about it. I slip into flowery language – it makes my heart sing out like a million choirs. Crap like that.

And if the album in question is pretty beyond words, I’m usually at a loss for them. Understandably so, I think, but that doesn’t help me tell you why you should hear them. “It’s lovely, I like it” just isn’t enough. So bear with me this week as I struggle to write about two of the prettiest records of 2012. If the following doesn’t convince you to pick these up, I’m sorry, but trust me that the failing is mine. If you’re a fan of undiluted beauty, you should buy both of these albums immediately.

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It’s been a while since Beth Orton moved me.

Beth’s a British singer-songwriter with a remarkable voice – it simultaneously weighs down and lifts up the notes beneath it, if that makes any sense. She first made her mark by singing hooks in electronic pieces by William Orbit and the Chemical Brothers, and she carried some of that beats-and-synths sensibility over into her wonderful solo bow Trailer Park. (Seriously, if you haven’t heard “She Cries Your Name” or “Galaxy of Emptiness,” you’re missing out.)

But it was her second record, the gorgeous Central Reservation, that truly showed off her skills. The few electronic numbers left shared the stage with hushed, acoustic stunners like “Blood Red River” and “Devil Song.” Simple and delicate backing, stepping into the wings and giving the voice the spotlight. And when given all that room to roam, Orton’s voice is nothing short of astonishing. She doesn’t engage in vocal acrobatics, and she’d never make it on American Idol, but there’s a power in her voice that draws from an unimaginably deep well.

The problem with her subsequent albums, particularly 2006’s Comfort of Strangers, was that the songs boxed her voice in. They were fine ditties, but they didn’t play to her strengths. I’m not sure I’ve listened to Comfort of Strangers more than twice in the past six years. By contrast, though, I’ve heard her new album, Sugaring Season, twice today, and a dozen more times in the past week. It’s an album that finds Orton resetting, remembering what makes her special, and truly showing it off.

And because of that, the album is unendingly beautiful. Most of these songs are uncomplicated things, based on revolving acoustic guitars. Opener “Magpie” sports a total of two chords, swapped back and forth, with Brian Blade’s drums and Eyvind Kang’s viola adding coloring. Right from the start, though, the focus is where it ought to be – on Orton’s vocals. Her repeated “what a lie, what a lie” is the record’s first pure delight, but far from the last.

“Candles,” for example, is a minor-key wonder, the strings and drums there to support an arresting vocal performance, the production adding hints of psychedelia. (Just listen to that cello bass line in the third verse.) “Something More Beautiful” ventures into jazz ballad territory, with a superb chorus that tests Orton’s limits. She pulls it off, though, and gallops back in for the repetitive yet delirious “Call Me the Breeze,” and the heart-rending “Poison Tree,” based on a poem by William Blake. (Yes, this is the kind of album that bases songs on poems by William Blake.)

The brief “See Through Blue” is the only thing here that could be described as playful, and it leads into a shimmering concluding trilogy that fully explores Orton’s capacity for beauty. Whether accompanied by a stark piano, an acoustic guitar or a full folk band, she gives everything to these last three songs, and they’re simple but fantastic. “State of Grace” is the perfect Beth Orton song, her rolling guitar supporting some lovely piano, drum and violin work as she sings of unconditional friendship.

And finale “Mystery” strips everything away but a low organ, a guitar, a violin and that voice, rising to the sky. “Alive, alive, alive, alive,” she sings, and as she does, you can’t imagine anything more beautiful. Sugaring Season is quick – it’s 38 minutes long – but it lingers, like the truest things, wrapping itself around you. It is the Beth Orton album that we Beth Orton fans have been waiting for, an album that once again showcases her talent for the unspeakably lovely.

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And speaking of unspeakably lovely, there’s the new Hammock album.

For eight years now, Hammock has been making some of the most gorgeous music I’ve ever heard. The band is a collaboration between brilliant ambient guitarist Marc Byrd and production guru Andrew Thompson, and their work has been described as shoegaze, float music, dream pop, and all manner of other cloudy monikers. What they really do is this: they take sounds and make them infinite.

Hammock works with the same tools every band has at their disposal – guitars, keys, drums, strings, sometimes vocals. But in their hands, these sounds grow to incredible expanses, filling the sky and the space beyond. Byrd doesn’t play much, in terms of notes, but each note he plays sounds as big as the Pacific. And when they work in strings and trumpets, they’re the most massive, glorious strings and trumpets you can imagine. This is quiet music, on the whole, ambient and flowing, but it’s astonishingly loud quiet music.

With their fifth full-length, Departure Songs, Hammock has started thinking even bigger. It’s a two-disc affair lasting about 110 minutes, and its 19 songs are both a perfect distillation of what they do, and a sign that they’re evolving even further. Byrd’s guitar still stretches to the horizon, but there are more drums supporting it than ever before, more full string sections, and even a pair of almost-pop singles. When that first one, “(Tonight) We Burn Like Stars That Never Die,” arrives on its dirty synth bass line, it’s jarring, and when it unfurls into an absolutely crushing mass of sound, it’s electric.

And yes, there are lyrics on that and several other songs, a rarity for Hammock. Byrd’s wife, Christine Glass-Byrd, sings most of the words, and her voice is processed and layered into the wall of sound, a la shoegaze music of old. It’s possible to listen to all of Departure Songs in the background and miss the fact that there are vocals on here at all. Glass-Byrd sings wordlessly on “Awakened, He Heard Only Silence,” for example, but she sounds like another instrument in the echoing, cavernous beauty of the piece.

But I’m giving examples of Hammock playing around with their sound, when most of this album finds them refining and reveling in what they do best. “Pathos” is a perfect case in point. It opens with guitar chimes like ripples on a lake, before the miles-wide ambience creeps in. Drums propel the song forward, and for six more minutes, it’s simply heart-meltingly lovely, Byrd’s clean guitars like water drops on a frozen tundra. “Frailty (For the Dearly Departed)” is impossibly gorgeous, rising up on a synth piano figure and reaching the sky on grandiose strings.

Byrd and Thompson are meticulous about their soundscapes, carefully weaving them element by element. “Dark Circles” begins with a droning organ, then a rumble of percussion, before unfolding to its full magnificence. “We Could Die Chasing This Feeling” unfurls slowly, waves of cloud-like shimmer setting the scene before the drums, bass and guitar come shuddering in. By the four-minute mark, it’s immense, guitars cascading atop one another. After that, you need the two-minute break the formless “Glossolalia” offers.

Departure Songs ends with two perfect examples of what Hammock do so well. “(Leaving) The House Where We Grew Up” is perfect, a trembling bass line leading to a dreamlike guitar melody, which then covers itself like a blanket. And then the strings bring it to the next level – the song ends at six minutes because it just couldn’t get any bigger. And then “Tornado Warning” concludes things on a gentle note, Byrd strumming and Glass-Byrd singing beautifully. A cello melody, a slow fade to rain sounds, and it’s over.

I can’t say Hammock has reinvented themselves on Departure Songs, but they have delivered their best work. If you want to hear some of the prettiest, most soul-enlivening music being made today, you can’t do any better. Hammock’s music sounds bigger than our world’s ability to contain it, bigger than any words I could use to describe it. It’s infinite, and the only thing you can do with the infinite is try mightily to experience at least some small part of it. Here is your chance.

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Keeping things short this time. Next week, a trio of solo albums for your listening pleasure. Leave a comment on my blog at tm3am.blogspot.com. Follow my infrequent twitterings at www.twitter.com/tm3am.

See you in line Tuesday morning.

Six years ago, Sufjan Stevens made my Christmas.

That’s when he released the functionally-titled Songs for Christmas, a collection of the first five of his annual holiday EPs. See, Sufjan makes one of these glorious discs every year, featuring his renditions of Christmas classics and his original entries into the canon, and he gives them out as gifts to friends and family. And then, after he’s accumulated five years’ worth of them, he releases them commercially in a big, beautiful box.

I’ve been buying Christmas music for as long as I can remember, stretching at least as far back as that first A Very Special Christmas collection in 1987. (Yes, the one with “Christmas in Hollis” on it.) I have dozens of holiday records, and Sufjan’s Songs for Christmas may be my very favorite. It’s one I keep coming back to, and in recent years, it just hasn’t been Christmas for me until I’ve spun this set at least once.

So imagine my inexpressible joy at the announcement of the second volume of Stevens’ Christmas chronicles. Silver and Gold features five more annual EPs – 58 songs in total, lasting for two hours and 45 minutes. Seriously, I nearly did a full-on dance at work when I first heard the news. And yes, these EPs coincide with his The Age of Adz period, so I expect some strangeness and some unbridled ambition. (One song, “The Child with the Star on His Head,” runs for more than 15 minutes.) It’ll be Christmas music the way only Sufjan can do it.

Between that and the announcement of the first Godspeed You Black Emperor album in a decade, the back third of the year is looking up.

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This is the kind of column I hate to write.

Honestly, it is. Some critics love trashing new albums, excited at the chance to prove how clever they are, how they can slaughter even the most sacred of cows with their withering wordplay. I’ve never been that guy. I go into every musical relationship hoping to fall in love. I never want it to end in recriminations and pain. I never want to walk away unhappy.

But sometimes, it must be done. It’s especially frustrating for me when I find myself disappointed by artists who have knocked me out in the past. I never like realizing that the thrill is gone. Which brings us to this week. All three of the records on tap come from artists who have found their way into my top 10 list in prior years. This year? Let’s just say they won’t be there. None of these three albums are unlistenably bad, but they definitely don’t keep the magic alive. And when you climb so high, the fall is so much farther.

It shouldn’t be a huge surprise that Contestant #1 is Green Day. Now, I’ve been buying Green Day albums since 1994, like everyone else. But unlike everyone else, I’ve been tracking their career, hoping they would grow and evolve. And they have, much to my delight. After hinting at grander ambitions on Nimrod and Warning, the California trio shot for the rafters on 2004’s American Idiot, a rock opera in three chords. And then, amazingly, they went even farther on 2009’s terrific 21st Century Breakdown. This was the album where their songwriting caught up with their more expansive vision. In a lot of ways, it was the first very good Green Day record, and I was excited to see where they’d go next.

So what to make of Uno, their just-released ninth album? It’s the first of a planned trilogy, with Dos and Tre to follow in the next four months. Which sounds as ambitious as their last two, if not more so. How big could this music get that they need three CDs to contain it? Would they play with an 80-piece orchestra this time? How about a dozen guest stars singing different characters? After 21st Century Breakdown, anything seemed possible.

So of course, Uno is nothing like that at all. In fact, it’s the laziest, most tossed-off album they’ve made in more than 10 years. If you’ve been waiting for them to ditch all this “growth” and get back to making Dookie Part II, well, this is your year. They’re older, and they’ve calmed down a little, but musically, there’s no other evidence that 18 years have passed. Uno is three-chord pop-punk with no imagination, no spark.

Even worse, Billie Joe Armstrong has apparently decided to channel his 22-year-old self, filling these lyrics with bratty, sneering, shallow fist pumps. Hey, remember when it was cool to say “fuck” in pop songs? Remember how that seemed like a revolutionary act when you were in your early 20s? Armstrong sure does. “I’m taking down my enemies ‘cause they’re all so fucking useless,” he shouts on “Loss of Control,” and elsewhere he repeatedly urges the listener to “kill the fucking DJ.” “Fucking” seems to fill up any two-syllable hole in these lyrics. It’s the album’s most-repeated word.

There’s nothing really wrong with indulging your juvenile side, but it makes for a wearying 40-minute listen. Only a couple of songs – the aforementioned “Kill the DJ” and album closer “Oh Love” – break from the standard pop-punk template here, and some of these songs (“Troublemaker,” “Stay the Night,” “Sweet 16”) sound so uninspired that I can’t believe they took longer than 20 minutes to write and record. I certainly hope that this isn’t an indication of the quality of the entire trilogy, but it doesn’t bode well.

Then there is Mumford and Sons, who sprang from obscurity two years ago on a thundering wave of banjos. Mumford is a four-piece from London without a drummer, but with enough strumming acoustic guitars to make up for any loss of momentum. They play a ragged, rollicking form of folk music, which tumbles forward on rolling banjos and the emotional voice (and persistent bass drum thump) of Marcus Mumford. Their debut album Sigh No More impressed me enough to end up on my top 10 list.

And now, here they are with the follow-up, Babel, and it’s… exactly the same, only somehow less. There’s no mistaking this record for anyone else – the Mumford sound is in full effect, the wrist-breaking guitars and banjo plucks and raw vocals all present and accounted for. In fact, we’ve gone a little bit more epic, with more horn sections here and there, more massive walls of acoustic sound. This is definitely the band’s “prove yourself” moment, and I can feel in every corner of this thing that they believe they’ve made an important masterpiece.

If only the songs were better. Most of these tunes – and I’m just talking about the music now – are painfully boring. They fail to light upon anything memorable, any hint of a melody that can match “The Cave” or “Little Lion Man.” Occasionally it feels like Mumford is coming close to hitting a stride, like when “Ghosts That We Knew” rises up from its humble beginnings, but these moments are teases. The songs don’t really go anywhere. First single “I Will Wait” is the most memorable of the first eight tracks. And songs like “Lovers’ Eyes” make me want to claw my own out.

And that’s a shame, because lyrically, this is a very important album for Marcus Mumford. Most of these songs are about his faith, about coming through life broken and torn and turning to the heavens for comfort. “When I’m on my knees I’ll still believe,” he sings in “Holland Road.” “And when I’ve hit the ground, neither lost nor found, if you’ll believe in me I’ll still believe.” Later, in album highlight “Hopeless Wanderer,” he cries out: “But hold me fast, hold me fast, ‘cause I’m a hopeless wanderer, and I will learn, I will learn to love the skies I’m under.”

The closest thing to a hymn on Babel is also the closest thing to a great song. “Below My Feet” starts out delicately, but in true Mumford fashion, is soon whipping through the air like a hurricane, its wordless chorus rising and rising. “Keep the earth below my feet, for all my sweat, my blood runs weak, let me learn from where I have been, keep my eyes to serve, my hands to learn,” Mumford sings passionately. One song later, in album closer “Not With Haste,” Mumford takes in lessons learned: “So not let my fickle flesh go to waste, as it helps my heart and soul in its place, and I will love with urgency, but not with haste…”

I wish I were the kind of music fan who could be happy with strong lyrics alone. The Biblical force of Mumford’s words is striking, but it’s blunted by the unfortunately typical music the Sons have written to accompany them. Babel may please some of Mumford’s fans, and those who love the strummy sound the band conjures will find much to like here. But for a band with a lot to prove, they didn’t quite come up aces this time. I like enough of Babel that I’m interested in whatever the band does third, but in the main, it’s a disappointing effort.

In the end, Mumford and Sons just didn’t try hard enough. British prog-pomp trio Muse, on the other hand, has always had the opposite problem. For five albums, they teetered precariously on the edge, always threatening to send their operatic orchestral sound careening over the top. On their sixth, the just-released The 2nd Law, they’ve finally made good on the threat. This is the album on which it becomes impossible to tell if Muse is a serious band pretending to be silly, or a jokey one trying to convince us that they’re serious.

Either interpretation works, quite honestly. This is Muse unrestrained, and there’s no way any of this is accidental. The 2nd Law, as messy and nutty as it is, feels like exactly the album Matthew Bellamy and his cohorts set out to make. It’s a strange combination of Queen, U2, Trans-Siberian Orchestra and, yes, Skrillex – there are electronic beats aplenty on this album, though not quite as many as the pre-release hype may have led you to believe.

Past Muse albums have often felt disjointed, but this is the first one that plays like an ‘80s Queen album on overdrive. None of these 13 tracks belong on the same piece of plastic. Opener “Supremacy” sets the tone well, with its jabbing guitar lines, horns and strings. You’re going to want to sit down and hold onto something when Bellamy gets to the title phrase – he lets his unshackled falsetto fly free, tearing the sky asunder. It’s something. By contrast, “Madness” is positively mellow, a simple computer beat and melody that reminds me of Zooropa-era U2. And then “Panic Station” brings the funk – slap bass, backwards snare, a hook line ripped off from “Thriller.” It’s hard to believe this is Muse, or that the same three guys came up with all of these songs.

But then, “Panic Station” contains their mission statement: “Do what the fuck you want to, there’s no one to appease.” Never have they followed that advice more than on the absolutely ridiculous “Survival.” This song, the official theme of the 2012 London Olympics (really), has its own orchestral prelude, the silliest lyrics Bellamy has ever written (“Life’s a race that I’m gonna win, and I’ll light the fuse, and I’ll never lose…”), and a laugh-out-loud choral arrangement to deliver them. At one point, the choir is repeating “You were warned and didn’t listen” while the strings flail and the guitars pound and Bellamy screeches. I’m pretty certain Freddie Mercury would have listened to this and said, “You know, dearies, you may want to take it down a notch or two.”

If you’re not doubled over with laughter at this point, you may want to press on, since The 2nd Law does actually get better. “Follow Me” is a simplistically-written lullaby for Bellamy’s infant son, so of course the band chooses to render it like a lost song from the Tron soundtrack. But “Animals” is pretty good, with its spooky electric piano and Radiohead drumbeat. “Explorers” is pretty silly – it’s an epic ballad about overpopulation that even works in the line “fuse helium-3, our last hope” – but they play it convincingly.

That’s as good as it gets, though, as bassist Chris Wolstenholme takes the lead vocal spot on two mismatched songs, proving that Muse without Bellamy singing just sounds wrong. And then the record ends with the two-part title track, which pushes the orchestral-dubstep sound to its unfortunate limit. The first part, “Unsustainable,” is unlistenably bad, its Cyberman voice and trashy electro-beat the closest thing to an overt joke here. And “Isolated System” feels flown in from a different album altogether, a shuddering whisper of a track that goes disco by the end.

And then it’s over, and you’re wondering what the hell you just listened to. Muse is far too talented to veer as sharply into Spinal Tap territory as they do on much of The 2nd Law. As the immortal David St. Hubbins said, it’s a fine line between stupid and clever, and too much of this album vaults right over that line. They’ve been on the edge for a while now, and The 2nd Law is proof that Muse needs to step back and reconsider. They’ve been making this music alone for a long time, and as they so eloquently state it, an isolated system is unsustainable.

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Next week, lots of choices. But I may go with Hammock’s gorgeous Departure Songs and Beth Orton’s lovely Sugaring Season. Tune in to find out. Leave a comment on my blog at tm3am.blogspot.com. Follow my infrequent twitterings at www.twitter.com/tm3am.

See you in line Tuesday morning.