Some of the best records I heard in 2019

by John Dugan

Cate Le Bon, Reward (Mexican Summer)
What can I say? Reward was my favorite album this year. Both off-kilter (weird keys, saxophone?, downtown NY basses) and intimate, Reward has that balance of art and comfort that’s so rare. In less sure hands, it would be a curiosity, but le Bon’s voice--statuesque, dignified, but mercurial--brings it all together.
Play “The Light”

Purple Mountains, Purple Mountains (Drag City)
I’ve testified to the genius and humanity of David Berman’s musical output in Silver Jews forever… well, forever since the middle of college. Even managed an interview that once. That said, it took news that Berman had a new album and had relocated down the road from me to reignite my passion for one of our great American lyricists of the past 25 years. Alas, Berman passed on, which makes listening to Purple Mountains a mournful experience, but one for which I’m grateful to have at all. Respect to DB. 
Play “Margaritas at the Mall”

black midi, Schlagenhelm (Rough Trade)
Many a band of young people ascends the wild mountains of post punk hoping to come away with something as skronky, ornery yet beautifully sleek and mysterious as black midi do. How’s it done? Subtly complex rhythmic touches, impressionistic and minimalist vox hold on to micro moments of attention while the guitars are dunked in fresh concrete… only to break out once the tension has been exhausted. 

Mdou Moctar - Ilana (The Creator)
I gushed about Ilana for the Economist. And I could go on. I couldn’t get enough of this Touareg shredder meeting Western rock at the crossroads and borrowing the licks that suit him. Charismatic rock that struts across the globe brazenly.

Ex Hex - It’s Real (Merge)
Perhaps sliding dangerously close to a glorified Def Leppard at the edge of nostalgia, I still found myself throwing Ex Hex’s second album on to get through the day. Bubblegum hard rock stomper as self care? I’ll take it.

Aldous Harding - Designer (4AD)

Xlouris White - The Sisypheans (Drag City)

FACS, Another Country (Trouble in Mind)

Devendra Banhart - Ma (Nonesuch)

I was on a college radio station compilation CD with Don McGahn

by John Dugan

Some experiences are just too rich to simply “tweet out.” I banged out this piece on crossing paths with former White House Counsel Don McGahn at the University of Notre Dame—both of us appear on the campus band compilation CD The Jericho Sessions. Washingtonian publishes some great writing, so I had to rise to the occasion.

[One correction—it’s not McGahn on lead vocals on “Hide Away,” but his buddy Glenn Fogarty—we didn’t have the CD liner notes to check that and no one I interviewed for the piece seem to know that. Only McGahn is pictured on the CD sleeve.]

Read “I Was on a Compilation CD With Don McGahn in College — A DC punk veteran discovers he shares a musical past with the former White House counsel,” at Washingtonian.

"Like, if Studs Terkel had been born in 1980"

by John Dugan

I did a bunch of press interviews in 2016 around the release of the Empty Bottle Chicago book and it was featured in the Reader, Chicago Magazine, Vice and a few other places, but somehow I missed this thoughtful and brilliantly written review by Robert Rodi in New City, one of those Chicago publications that’s well worth picking up as it’s often full of surprises.

"Histories of entertainment venues tend to skew either toward brain-numbing listicles or institutional hagiography. But in fact “The Empty Bottle,” edited by John Dugan, is pure delight; it’s a compendium of short tributes and memoirs by close to two dozen people who have worked, played or hung out at the club, and whose voices are wonderfully varied and engaging. Yes, there are the obligatory recollections of early dates by Nirvana and Arcade Fire, but the cumulative result is something much greater—in fact, a genuine and consistently beguiling social history. Like, if Studs Terkel had been born in 1980." Read more at New City.

“The cumulative result is something much greater—in fact, a genuine and consistently beguiling social history. Like, if Studs Terkel had been born in 1980.”
— New City, May 24, 2016