Top 12 Albums of 2014: JJ — V

The opener on V, the title track, begins with a dissonant horn drone, then samples JJ’s own “Things Will Never Be the Same Again” from their 2009 album JJ №2 for a split second before a bell abruptly plunges the song into silence. It’s a good summary of the album: just like their previous works, yet somehow very different, as if bits of the old songs were spun through a different, more fragmented filter.

It’s a little darker overall — especially the last third. By that point, the party isn’t completely over, but the sun has gone down, the crowds have thinned, and the remaining guests have ambled inside, possibly to deal with a little substance-induced emotional fragility. “Inner Light” might win the award for “saddest auto-tuned vocals in 2014,” and the mood sure doesn’t pick up from there. “Hold Me” seems to seek desperate, drunk comfort in a terrible world, while the quiet “Be Here Now” repeats “this is our last goodbye.” The familiar tropical beach-party rhythms make a return in the final track, “All Ways, Always,” but with “I could die tonight” sung over them.

From start to finish, we still have the JJ trademark sweet but slightly woozy, croaky vocals, the same thoroughly chilled out electronic drumbeats, hip-hop samples and beach-party synths. Mostly, the music is still so intriguingly weird — intermittently unsettling yet relaxing, and utterly intoxicating.

If that sounds like a decent description of a drug experience, that’s probably not accidental; the lyrics, which are even a bit more disjointed and bizarre than before, are replete with drug references. Is this nihilistic or hedonistic? Or sorta tongue-in-cheek? With lines like “life’s a party/I can die if I want to/God’s is here/say hi if you want to” (from “Dean and Me,” a highlight track that lyrically and sonically blends the party and the desperation in captivatingly equal measure) “don’t stop ’til you bleed,” and “I’m doing X ’cause I don’t wanna die,” it might be all three.

Note 1: This Top 12 list is not ranked. It’s generally a good idea to have 2014 coverage be published in 2014. Before Christmas, even. If I had to rank these, we wouldn’t be done until next August.

Note 2: More on the “Put Your Money Where Your Typing Is” selection methodology here. Short version: These are the 12 albums I bought on CD/vinyl/both this year.