December Theme: Perhaps the only other people making lists in December more feverishly than my 5.5 year old are music critics, pundits, and fans. Top Ten Albums! Best Album of the Year! Best New Artist! Broken out by genre and category!
I suck at this sort of ranked list making, so I don’t do it. But, I do spend time each December thinking about what music has stayed with me most over the course of the year. During the next four weeks, I’ll highlight four of my favorite albums from 2017 (ones that hang together, top-to-bottom) and share the In My Ear-2017 playlist.
This week: Spoon, Hot Thoughts.
This band just keeps cranking out distinctive, rocking records! They’ve got that ability to evolve their sound, incorporate different influences, grow as musicians, and yet still produce music that is instantly recognizable as “Spoon.” I caught their live show in Portland this fall and they absolutely killed it. Easily, one of the best shows I’ve seen in the last couple of years.
Their 2017 record Hot Thoughts is just packed with great tracks. I couldn’t find a freely accessible version of my favorite one from the album, “Shotgun,” so this is a live performance of one of their singles “Do I Have to Talk You Into It?”
In My Ear 