The Best Vinyl of Nice, A Fest
Welcome to Hump Day News’ very professional and profound analysis of the latest, greatest vinyl available from artists performing at Nice, A Fest end of July. Full rankings here. Because numbers are involved, these estimations are “hard science,” so you Arts & Humanities losers can go jump off a bridge. If you like what you see, it’s a good bet that you can find these records at their merch tables.
But why vinyl, Hump Day? Sure, it’s heavy & more expensive than a download & you need to keep feeding your record player new needles every so often. On the other hand, the sound quality is great, the album covers live with you forever as works of art unto themselves, and the physical format can’t be stolen off your phone by weirdo corporations who have decided that the lease of the online format (which you thought you purchased) is expired. Plus, streaming sucks for artists money-wise and physical formats of whatever (records, t-shirts, beer koozies) help fund the music scene you love.
OK, on to the categories, each quantified on a 0-1 scale…
sonic fit
period-ness
posterity
novelty
cool
monumentalism
Sonic Fit
Sonic Fit is all about connecting the dots between the sound of the music and the strengths of vinyl as a medium. We’re not going to get into a debate about the superiority of vinyl over other formats, nor engage the naysayers. For our purposes here all that needs to be said is that vinyl has its strengths (and weaknesses) and some of those sonic strengths match up really well with the sound of certain instruments, certain styles of music, or a certain ethos of recording.
Kitner’s Shake the Spins is a prime example of a beautiful recording where the instruments, style, and recording ethos find a match in the strengths of the vinyl medium. Kitner goes loud, goes quiet, goes clean, goes dirty – and vinyl is there for all of it, capturing the jangly guitars and percussion in all their expressive warmth. At the other end of the spectrum, Speedy Ortiz has produced great vinyl records but the mammoth 2xLP The Death of Speedy Ortiz & Cop Kicker …Forever seems like an ill fit. The recording ethos is DIY and experimental, the sound is raw. While there are magical moments in the double album, couching it in vinyl seems like overkill. Shades of Sentridoh’s Losing Losers, which you love to have on the shelf, but how often do you really spin that wheel?
Period-ness
Period-ness is not a word, but what we mean is whether the historicality of the record format is being folded into music experience. Whatever the vinyl bros say about the medium’s resurgence, vinyl as a format is past its peak and never returning to its glory days. That’s OK. Music is timeless and there are many artists who live their entire creative life exploring the sights and sounds of times past when vinyl was at its peak. For artists that do this well, it just makes sense to release music in vinyl format.
Evolfo’s Site Out Of Mind is a throwback to the psych rock of the 60s and 70s. On the album cover they double down on the tripped-out aesthetic, curating a very period-appropriate look to accompany their period-appropriate sound. Extra points for the organ. This is a record that belongs on vinyl for its period-ness.
The Profound Analysis algorithm feels less strongly about the period-ness of Rat Tally’s In My Car. The composition of lead single “Spinning Wheel” sounds more contemporary. This album wants to be a well-loved CD living in the dashboard of your beat-up Honda, not a record on a shelf.
Posterity
Posterity is about what lasts, either in terms of the physical strength of the vinyl medium, or in terms of artist’s intent, or both. As a matter of fact, vinyl records are a hardy species inasmuch as that can be said about any physical format. Sure, they don’t like scratches. But a few nicks and scrapes can add character to the playback of a record, whereas the tiniest scratch of a CD drops you straight down 700 floors into the “Infinite Skipping Track” layer of hell.
As for artist’s intent, many musicians who release on multiple formats will make sure to release on vinyl because that is one they know will be cared for by the end-user. A prized place on the mantle. We all know where CDs end up: scuffed, scratched, and in the landfill. An album like Hallelujah the Hill’s I’m You is an album featuring a band hitting some of its highest heights. It deserves a vinyl release to showcase its sound, glorious cover, and keep the musical experience intact (nay, let it age like a fine wine!) over time. On the other hand, Leopard Print Taser’s Teeth Are Not Bones 7” makes no pretense to posterity. 7”’s, god bless them, barely play when brand new.
Novelty
Novelty might seem superficial, but catching the eye in a crowded market place is nothing to sniff at. Vinyl lends itself to novelty design in many ways because the surface area of the format is BIG. Clever covers, colored vinyl, album inserts and extras. There are no limits except your imagination and your budget. Leopard Print Taser’s 7”’s may not stand the test of time, but the pastel wheels look like sweet Necco wafers on your turntable.
Shout out to all the colored vinyl on the list, including Kal Marks, Twen, Speedy Ortiz, Weakened Friends, Rat Alley, Raavi, Future Teens, Colleen Green, Anna Fox Rochinski, Black Beach and more. With all the colored vinyl on the market, it might make a statement to play it cool with the traditional black. Kudos to Rebuilder’s Live From 2021 and Pet Fox’s A Face In Time and Maneka’s Dark Matters for staying the course, but points deducted by the novelty algorithm.
Cool
Cool factor is a subjective evaluation, right? Wrong! All of these factors have been algorithmically generated and certified by the American Science and Date Algorithm Council. At the upper end of cool, it would be a major blunder to bypass Colleen Green’s Cool. Given the title, we’re definitionally required to list it at the top, but the album deserves it on its merits. Cool (the album) is also a good example of how Cool (the factor) intermingles with Novelty to amp up the energy for both. The Cool record is colored a smoky grey, which dovetails nicely with the black and white album cover, as well as the stripped down style of songwriting. It all works together to make the album aesthetic novel in a cool way.
Monumentalism
Our final category is Monumentalism. Probably every album that an artist has sweated and labored over feels monumental to them. But are all these albums the kind that will make the music buyer turn their head and think “What the fuck is that over there?” For better or worse – we all know monumentalism can be awful like Trump hero portraiture.
The albums on this list, though, are here for good reasons. One that is especially strong in terms of monumentalism is Speedy Ortiz’s TDOSO&CK …F. If you need to turn the title into an acronym because it’s too tedious to write out, or speak out, then you’re halfway to building a monument. Turn that into a 2xLP and you’re all the way there.
Another album worth mentioning: Rebuilder’s Live From 2021. It falls under the interesting monumentalism subcategory of happening-core. There is some external historical event that structures the production of the music and makes it a lasting memorial to the event. In this case Rebuilder packed up their shit, headed to a friend’s barn in the middle of the pandemic, thrashed out in a punk riposte to disease, and got it all recorded live. Spontaneity makes the album work, like Woodstock made the Woodstock movie work, but it seems less fun than Woodstock. Man, fuck dem babyboomers.
Honorable Mentions
Black Helicopter’s LIVE on Pipeline! includes the album art concept of a punch-out papercut helicopter. Tremendous fun. But they’re not playing Nice, A Fest.
SEED’s Dun Pageant gets a mention here. They ARE playing Nice, A Fest but their album is not on vinyl. The available format is cassette, which is a lovely second-best, but the epic darkness of its death & dirge doom choir deserves a none-more-black vinyl edition.
Complete Profound Algorithm Results
A kind of grindy, thrashy jam right out of the gate.