Best of 2011: Individual Top 10 Lists

After a staff vote, we agreed on a group Best Albums of 2011 countdown that we posted last week. But, since there’s nothing we like more than talking about good music, here’s a look into some individual “best of” ballots.

Karlie Justus

1. Pistol Annies – Hell on Heels

Gritty, grim and girly – three words rarely associated with mainstream country music, let alone a chart-topping, twang-for-days side project from one of the genre’s biggest stars. From the initial rumblings of the record on Twitter (thanks, @ashleymonroe, for the heads up) to my first listen of the swampy, simmering single “Hell On Heels,” I knew this would be something special for not only each of the group’s leading ladies, but for country music as a whole. Waylon Jennings’ name was tossed around a lot this year (Justin Moore and Brantley Gilbert and Jason Aldean, oh my!), but the Pistol Annies’ gutsy take on songwriting, sexuality and Music Row’s set ways truly represented the spirit of that storied Nashville rebel.

2. Blind Boys of Alabama – Take the High Road

Country music has a long history of finding healing in honky tonks. In song, George Jones never met a shot of whiskey that didn’t help to lessen the pain of love lost, and when faced with unemployment or marital strife, Merle Haggard could always find a few kindred souls just a couple bar stools down. But Take the High Road takes an entirely new approach to that steel guitar-soaked niche of country music, marrying that honky tonk sound with The Blind Boys of Alabama’s trademark twist on gospel music.  Producer Jamey Johnson continues to impress me with his eye (and ears) for opportunities to combine traditional material in modern ways, with more than a little help from Willie Nelson, Hank Williams, Jr., Vince Gill, Leeann Womack and a host of other country music stars. Amen!

3. Miranda Lambert – Four the Record

First, a confession: Before 2011, I never really “got” the appeal of Miranda Lambert. She won my attention and respect almost by default, a respite from the glossy worlds of female industry favorites Carrie Underwood, Hilary Scott and Taylor Swift. Even “House That Built Me” bored me in a way I didn’t like to readily admit, a faint spark where everyone else saw a blazing fire. But between this year’s Pistol Annies’ project and her own Four the Record, Lambert won me over in spades with both albums’ combinations of raw, crazy and honest. Here, Lambert proves her spot-on knack for both finding and writing the best collection of songs in all of country music in 2011.

4. Sunny Sweeney – Concrete

Concrete boasts two of my favorite just-for-fun songs of the year, “Mean as You” and “Fall For Me.” Both showcase Sunny Sweeney’s thick Texas accent and penchant for biting playfulness, but beneath her entertaining streak is a dark streak that really threads the record together. On “Helluva Heart,” she disapprovingly sneers “Hell of a way to treat a woman you should be scared of,” nicely summarizing the album’s other-woman theme – on which Sweeney plays both sides well. In a year where she was largely overshadowed by a burst of country females, Concrete seems to have only scratched the surface of Sweeney’s depth as an artist.

5. Vince Gill – Guitar Slinger

Can Vince Gill do any wrong? Guitar Slinger is a solid vote for why no, no he can’t. A stellar offering from one of Nashville’s most beloved pickers and personalities, the album hits on almost all of my favorite Gill-isms from over the years: There’s spiritual Vince on “Threaten Me With Heaven” and “Bread and Water,” scoffing Vince on “Tell Me Fool,” and wistful Gill on “Who Wouldn’t Fall In Love With You,” joined by the song’s impeccable co-writer Ashley Monroe. He’s all those things and much more, and Guitar Slinger is another keeper in his long line of classics.

6. Chris Young – Neon

As a honky tonk lovin’, neo-traditional jonesin’ country music fan, Chris Young more than satisfies my itch for steel guitar and sex appeal on mainstream radio. Luckily, Young rounds out airwaves-friendly singles such as “Tomorrow” with deliciously nineties-centric album tracks such as “When She’s On” and standout title track “Neon.” Even without a cowboy hat on the album’s cover, Young effortlessly joins the likes of Josh Turner, Jamey Johnson and Easton Corbin’s old-turned-new school take on country music tradition.

7. Hellbound Glory – Damaged Goods

Hellbound Glory frontman Leroy Virgil’s voice boasts a dirty, ragged edge reflected by the material and vibe of the band’s sophomore album Damaged Goods, a smoky sound that commands attention. Perhaps most encouraging is the catchy, just left of center mainstream sound that permeates this record, which should signal a growing fanbase in the new year. The cover art ain’t too shabby either – it looks like someone’s been studying at the George Jones Bad-Ass School of Cover Art, which always gives extra credit for a lit cigarette.

8. Eric Church – Chief

Eric Church is an artist whose previous albums have slowly grown on me, and Chief was no exception. Upon first listen, it’s a mish-mash of Church’s loud and flashy takes on artists from Waylon to Springsteen, with a lot of noise and sounds jumbled in between; but on repeated listens, it’s hard to deny his place as one of modern, mainstream country music’s edgiest risk takers. “Hungover and Hard Up” and “Over When It’s Over” are honest, raw songs sans Church’s infamous bravado, stripped down and well-performed. He gets the most attention for controversial tunes such as “Homeboy” and party-anthems like “Drink in My Hand,” but his quieter talent for writing and building boundary-pushing albums like this one pushes country music in a positive direction.

9. Gillian Welch – The Harrow & The Harvest

If it feels like forever since the last proper Gillian Welch album, that’s because it has been. Eight years after 2003’s Soul Journey, this album was a nice re-introduction to Welch and her partner David Rawlings after Rawlings’ 2009 project A Friend of a Friend. For a folk newbie like myself, the dark material of “The Way It Goes” balances well with a catchy chorus, and the instantly vintage, harmonica-infused “Six White Horses” makes for an album highlight. For a folk newbie like myself, the sparse grittiness of The Harrow & The Harvest won me over with its laid-back storytelling by one of the genre’s modern-day flag bearers.

10. Randy Travis – Anniversary Celebration

For a greatest hits project to make year-end lists like this one, it has to bring something new to the table. The 25^th anniversary celebration of Randy Travis’ long, rich career does just that, pairing the baritone singer both with representatives of country music’s old-guard (Kris Kristofferson, John Anderson, Willie Nelson) and new-guard (Josh Turner, Brad Paisley and Zac Brown Band). All of the favorites are here, but with some all-important twists: A mash-up with fellow neo-traditional stalwart Alan Jackson entwines Jackson’s “She’s Got the Rhythm (And I’ve Got the Blues)” with Travis’ “Better Class of Losers,” both products of the pair’s nineties co-writing sessions, while Jamey Johnson takes Travis’ old duet spot on “A Few Ole Country Boys.” When Johnson sings about looking up to Travis just as Travis once sang about George Jones, the importance of this retrospective really kicks in.

 

Sam Gazdziak

1. Hayes Carll – KMAG YOYO

Carll continues to excel at wordplay and clever lyrics in his song, most notably in the running liberal/conservative argument in “Another Like You” and in “Stomp and Holler.” However, songs like the title track show that he’s becoming a very well-rounded songwriter, and one of the best of the current crop of Texas singer/songwriters.

2. Foster & Lloyd – It’s Already Tomorrow

After a 20-year absence, with both Radney Foster and Bill Lloyd having well-established solo careers, they reunited to make a record that sounds exactly like a Foster & Lloyd record should – part country, part rock, completely contemporary and a most welcome return. Songs like “That’s What She Said” show that the Foster & Lloyd songwriting magic is still potent after a couple decades’ absence.

3. The Dirt Drifters – This Is My Blood

The Dirt Drifters released the best and most exciting debut I heard in 2011. How refreshing to hear country songs that weren’t afraid to cover the darker side of blue-collar living, or even have a body count. Songs like “Always a Reason” and “Married Men and Motel Rooms” bring to mind the likes of Steve Earle and Chris Knight and makes the Dirt Drifters a band to watch in 2012.

4. Miranda Lambert – Four the Record

Maybe it wasn’t the great leap forward that Revolution was, but Lambert still shows a willingness to experiment and repeatedly step outside of the typical mainstream country comfort zone. “Dear Diamond” and “Mama’s Broken Heart” are two of the best songs of the year, and Lambert is probably the only singer in Nashville who would lead an album off with the brilliant “All Kinds of Kinds.”

5. Steve Earle – I’ll Never Get Out of This World Alive

Domestic happiness apparently suits Earle, as he released one of his best albums in years. He continues to be one of the go-to songwriters for current events (“Little Emperor,” “The Gulf of Mexico”), but he added some tenderness with the autobiographical “Every Part of Me” and “Waitin’ on the Sky.”

6. Eric Church – Chief

Not every experiment on Chief was successful, but Church deserves kudos for being willing to take some risks, especially when most of his contemporaries are just recording 10 songs about girls dancing on pickup trucks and calling it a day. Church gets more leniency from me to talk about how much of an outlaw he is when he releases songs as cool as “Creepin’” or as touching as “Like Jesus Does.”

7. Various Artists – This One’s For Him: Songs of Guy Clark

The quality of the material isn’t a surprise, considering the contributors had Clark’s strong catalog of songs to work with. The real strength of the album is how each singer is perfectly matched with their song. Whereas some tribute albums can be a slapdash affair, the care taken on this album is evident, and it shows in the end result.

8. Reckless Kelly – Good Luck and True Love

After veering more toward rock, Reckless Kelly has pulled it back with their last couple of releases, settling into a nice Americana/alt-country groove. “I Never Liked St. Valentine,” written by Willy Braun and Todd Snider, is worth the price of admission by itself, but the whole album rivals RK classics like Wicked Twisted Road. The band also makes a case for the benefits of physical media over digital music, as Good Luck has the best-designed CD cover of the year.

9. Pistol Annies – Hell on Heels

It got largely ignored by country radio, but the title track was cooler than most singles released this year – and it was one of the weaker tracks on the album. It was just so nice to hear songs about drugs, drinking, infidelity and family strife in country music again, making the Pistol Annies a bright spot in an increasingly watered-down and bland country market.

10. George Strait – Here for a Good Time

More than 30 years into his professional career, George Strait breaks out his songwriting abilities, notably with standouts “Shame on Me” and “I’ll Always Remember You.” That’s on top of his usual impeccable taste picking songs like Jesse Winchester’s “A Showman’s Life.” Give him credit for evolving when he could be coasting, and keeping the traditional country flag waving when pop- and rock-influenced country dominates the scene.

 

CM Wilcox

1. Pistol Annies — Hell on Heels

Miranda Lambert rounds up two of her song-slinging gal pals for a throwback of an album centered around the take-no-crap Southern woman in all her various incarnations, from wild child to pregnant bride to put-upon housewife to struggling barroom singer. Though unrelated, their voices blend naturally in sisterly harmony. Released digitally with limited fanfare and no radio hit, the album immediately tops the Billboard Country Albums chart. Sounds like a fairy tale, but it’s not.

2. Hellbound Glory — Damaged Goods

Hellbound Glory is officially on a roll. Proving that last year’s Old Highs and New Lows was no fluke, the boys return with a razor-sharp collection as notable for its adroit lyricism as it is for its hard-hitting outlaw sound. Indeed, a case could be made for frontman (and chief writer) Leroy Virgil as one of the truest heirs to the songwriting legacy of Merle Haggard, whose “Livin’ with the Shades Pulled Down” feels not a whit out of place as the closing track.

3. Various Artists — This One’s for Him: A Tribute to Guy Clark

A two-disc tribute helmed by Clark biographer Tamara Saviano and Shawn Camp, featuring Willie Nelson, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, Emmylou Harris, John Prine, Steve Earle, Radney Foster, Kris Kristofferson, Robert Earl Keen, Jerry Jeff Walker, and more than 20 other Americana heroes? It’s an obvious can’t-miss proposition that somehow ends up being even better than expected.

4. Matraca Berg — The Dreaming Fields

There was a time, during the ’90s, when the women of country music were regularly outdoing their male counterparts with some devastatingly intelligent, melodic tunes written from the perspective of an actual living, feeling human adult. Matraca Berg had a lot to do with it. On her first album of the new millennium, Berg’s charms (as songwriter and singer) have only deepened. Maybe the surprise success of “You and Tequila” signals a resurgence of commercial interest as well?

5. Reckless Kelly — Good Luck and True Love

It takes a couple songs to build up steam, but from track four onward it’s up there with Wicked Twisted Road as some of the best work the trend-setting Red Dirt quintet has ever done. Key tracks: “I Never Liked St. Valentine,” “New Moon Over Nashville,” “I Stayed Up All Night Again.”

6. LeAnn Rimes — Lady and Gentlemen

Rimes returns to her classic country roots with Vince Gill as her spirit guide, delivering on the promise she exhibited as 13-year-old Patsy Cline soundalike. This time around, she sounds fully herself, bringing her own distinct flair to classics like “Wasted Days and Wasted Nights,” “Sixteen Tons,” and “Rose Colored Glasses” on her way to a new definitive version of “Blue.”

7. Justin Haigh — People Like Me

He sings with the vocal charisma of Tracy Lawrence and knows a thing or two about Waylon (whose “Rose in Paradise” he covers here), but this Texan’s true ace in the hole might be his Strait-like song sense. Haigh helps himself to top-shelf material from Jamey Johnson, Mary Gauthier, and Erv Woolsey — major ‘gets’ for a little-known Texas indie act — but really stakes his claim with a trio of stunners from fellow Texan singer-songwriter Kevin Higgins, including “Monahans” and “In Jail.”

8. Hayes Carll — KMAG YOYO

Trouble in Mind remains his artistic high water mark, but KMAG YOYO contains too many fine moments to ignore, from silly (aisle-crossing hook-up song “Another Like You”) to poignant (“Grateful for Christmas”). But Carll may have preempted himself somewhat by passing several of these songs off to the Country Strong soundtrack in the months preceding his own album release. Now, they feel a touch too familiar.

9. Miranda Lambert — Four the Record

More adventurous but less consistent than her Pistol Annies set. Sleek snoozers “Safe,” “Over You,” “Baggage Claim,” and Shelton duet “Better in the Long Run” squander some of the good will earned in the album’s many quirkier moments, but it’s certainly an encouraging sign that a song Lambert wrote by herself (“Dear Diamond”) is among the album’s best.

10. Dirt Drifters — This Is My Blood

Where Haggard meets Mellencamp, The Dirt Drifters present the year’s strongest debut album by an actual band. Slices of rural life like “Married Men and Motel Rooms” and “Always a Reason” can easily stand toe-to-toe with anything else released this year.

 

Ken Morton, Jr.

1. Pistol Annies – Hell on Heels

It’s only right that the three ladies from the Pistol Annies utilize stage names like Lone Star Annie and Holler Annie. Song after song is delivered with a fascinating flawed character as the protagonist. It’s wrapped up tightly with equal parts backwoods charm, empowerment, grit and spitfire. And that is the perfection in the album. While the redneck bleeds through proudly on nearly every track, it’s the smartest thing written all year long.

2. Chris Young – Neon

“Tomorrow,” “Flashlight,” and “Neon” are some of the best songs of the year and seem perfectly matched up with that deep, resonating voice of his. Like Lambert, Young has a knack of staying traditional to his roots but delivering radio-friendly fare that doesn’t feel like pandering.

3. Lori McKenna – Lorraine

McKenna delivers a highly introspective collection of mostly relationship-oriented songs that are hypnotically autobiographical. The songs are blanketed in the insecurities, vulnerabilities and celebrations of life. It’s genius.

4. Miranda Lambert – Four the Record

There isn’t an artist in Nashville doing a better job at straddling the commercial and critical lines as Mrs. Shelton right now. She can sell a tender ballad just as easily as she can crush a guy’s soul. Amazingly, both are done with a Southern independent spirit that’s as charming as can be.

5. Vince Gill – Guitar Slinger

Death, forgiveness, salvation and redemption. Those topics may sound like a full-on Christian album, but Gill does it square in the country center. “Old Lucky Diamond Hotel,” a perfect snapshot of classic Americana, “Bread and Water,” a solemn story of making good with your maker, and “Threaten Me with Heaven,” an emotional and personal mission are some of the best of the year.

6. The Dirt Drifters – This Is My Blood

The blue collar themes are lamented and celebrated with equal parts across this outstanding album. The Drifters use evocative storytelling to tell their Southern story. And in a country radio world where back roads are synonymous with country heaven, here a name sewn on a shirt is compared in equal parts of a cursed life filled with dirt, grease and unfulfilled dreams. There’s a hardship in rural living and this album tells that story very well.

7. Justin Haigh – People Like Me

Haigh will instantly remind you of all of the best parts of Tracy Lawrence delivering the greatest of his neo-traditional fare. He pulls in writers like Randy Houser, Jarrod Niemann, Mary Gauthier and Jamey Johnson and turns indie Texas music into solid country jukebox gold.

8. Stoney LaRue – Velvet

Terrific and varied instrumentation on each song abounds: shuffling percussion on “Travelin’ Kind,” harmonica on “Sharecropper,” mariachi influence on “Te Amo Mas Que Va Vida (I Love You More Than Life),” and piccolo on “Wiregrass,” to just name the standouts. The title track closes the album with a sensual little number with Sarah Buxton adding fuel to the fire.

9. David Nail – Sound of a Million Dreams

Nail avoids the dreaded sophomore slump with this personal and introspective collection of songs that build on this terrific songwriter’s career. He draws regularly on deep life experiences that are fantastically autobiographical and revealing.

10. Jimmy Rankin — Forget About the World

Rankin’s solo career comes after winning awards galore in his native Canada as a member of the incredibly talented Rankin Family band. On Forget About the World, he tackles matters of seriousness and heartache with near perfection. “The Hurtin’ Part” is as vulnerable a lyrical delivery as any performance this year.