4. B'lieve I'm Going Down . . . / Kurt Vile

Kurt Vile is the coolest dude in music right now.  His nonchalant chill oozes out of his records, and B'lieve I'm Going Down is no exception.  It is arguably his best album yet, or at least his most refined, which is really saying something considering his last two records, Smoke Ring for My Halo and Wakin on a Pretty Daze, were Top Ten material.  Stuffed with golden folk-rock, laid-back country, and filtered new wave, Vile's sixth studio album drips with swagger.  His relaxed confidence in his prodigious skills is charming as always; everyone loves the unassuming kid in the corner that turns out to be the most talented person in the room.

B'lieve I'm Going Down is all vibes, a persona, a feeling, a way of living.  Blissed-out, chilled-out, badass suburban guitar wizardry.  Vile's unique vocal delivery is now as much his own as Dylan, Springsteen, Petty, and he has full command of his drawn-out vowels or halting emphasis when it suits his songs best.  His conversational style brings to mind bleary-eyed mornings, midnight conversations, shell-toed sneakers, vinyl records, bookshelves, and vintage instruments, a chillaxed chain of being that focuses only on the killer without the filler.

Vile is an unassuming dude by most accounts: a good person with a wife and two kids, trying to do right as an artist and human being.  His low-key, off-beat humor bubbles up throughout the record, and his observations on life always seem to come at things from a uniquely disarming angle.  He seems like the kind of friend that you would seek out for serious advice, giving calm and caring feedback, no doubt, while also sharing a funny barb that would be just as valuable.

But sometimes the difficulties of life persist.  Vile faces them by channeling a wry melancholy throughout the record, his hazy introspection inviting feelings of both sadness and self-assessment.  He called B'lieve his nighttime album because he recorded much of it in the late and lonely hours after his two children were long asleep, and it certainly has an unhurried, effortless quality to it, as if it is just a guy feeling his way out in the next room.  I was bugging' out about a couple-two-three-things / Picked up my microphone and started to sing / I was feeling worse, than the words come out / Fell on some keys and then this song walked out.

It is not just another guy in the next room, of course, no matter how hard he tries to keep his head down.  It is a long-haired guitar savant playing rock music even when rock music is no longer writing the narrative.  Whatever.  Vile will do his thing, superbly.