#0 on the 2021 Bacon Top 31 — Rostam
Changephobia by Rostam
The 2022 Bacon Top 31 will be kicking off in earnest on Sunday, per usual. I’m here a couple days early to correct a year-old mistake. Back in January, midway through the 2021 Top 31, my lovely wife, Anna, began speculating what my top 5 of 2021 would be. She had the benefit of knowing what picks #16–#31 were, because I’d been publishing those picks daily throughout the first half of January. And she had the added benefit of me having pushed all kinds of music on her throughout the year, so she already had a strong feel for what I’d been liking.
She started rattling off a few names that would land near the top the 2021 list. “War on Drugs for sure, and Big Red Machine. Nation of Language…” — the corners of my mouth start to curl up as she goes through her mental musical rolodex — “Fleet Foxes… Rostam? His new one came out this year, didn’t it?” — and my expression shifts immediately, from a smirk to mild panic.
My mind starts racing… Rostam! I haven’t listened to him in a couple months, but damn Changephobia is a great album… Did we start listening to it in 2021 — when did it come out? I quickly bring up Wikipedia: released June 4, 2021. SHIT. Now what do I do? The rest of the Top 31 is already locked in… there’s no way to fit it in without pulling something else out, and I’m certainly not cutting something from my remaining top 15 of the year to make room for a clear Top 10 album.
So I resolve to amending the list. I’ve had to do it once before, back in 2014, after all. Changephobia will just have to be a #0 for 2021, out of the official ranking for the year but every bit as important as the rest of the list. I knew what I needed to do, but then time got away from me, the rest of the year flew by, and here we are on the cusp of the 2022 Top 31, and I’m finally writing about one of the best from 2021.
You may not know who Rostam is, but if you’re reading this, chances are you’ve heard me talk about him before. His full name is Rostam Batmanglij (رستم باتمانقلیچ in his Iranian parent’s native Persian1), and he has been all over the Bacon Review since it began in 2009:
- He was a founding member of Vampire Weekend whose albums hit #6 in 2010 and #3 in 2013. He left the band prior to their fourth album, but he still produced a couple songs on that album, which hit #3 in 2019.
- He produced and co-wrote two songs on Hamilton Leithauser’s debut solo album, which hit #11 in 2014.
- He wrote one and produced another song on Frank Ocean’s Blonde (#4 in 2016)
- Wrote and produced three songs on Francis and the Lights’ debut album (#21 in 2016)
- He and Hamilton Leithauser released a joint album that hit #19 in 2016).
- and he produced Haim’s Women in Music Pt. III which hit (#19 in 2020
That is no fewer than eight separate Bacon Top 31 albums he’s been an integral part of, and I left his 2nd full-length album off the 2021 list. Ugh, I hate myself2. At least I’m making up for it here. Changephobia is a lovely album. I got to see him perform solo for the first time in August 2022, at Neumos. Despite him lacking a full-bodied stage presence (this was his first show post-covid, and he’s not used to owning the spotlight on his own – look at that laundry list of big names he’s propped up on his shoulders, above), it was a magical experience.
Changephobia is a great follow-up to his 2017 debut, Half-light, which was my #2 album of 2017. If you’ve not heard either album, I urge you to do so. Hit play on the video above to hear his voice first hand (and don’t miss the who’s who of guest stars in that video: HAIM, Charli XCX, Wallows, Kaia Gerber, Remi Wolf, Nick Robinson, Bryce Willard Smithe, Samantha Urbani, Demi Adejuyigbe, Seth Bogart, Huck Kwong, Ariel Rechtshaid, Matt DiMona, Ghazal Hashemi, Carter Howe, Julian McClanahan, and Chris Paloma all make an appearance in the back of that cab).
If listening to his original music doesn’t cut it, then listen to these two non-album covers he’s done: Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone” and the Pogues’ “Fairytale of New York,” which I had on repeat all Christmas season this year. The man is a genius, and I can’t wait to hear what he does next.
And that is how we finally wrap up the previous year here on the The Bacon Review. This is a one-person operation over here, desperately needing a systems manager / editor. Until I magically get a budget and an ability to hire, mistakes will continue to be made, but I’ll do everything I can to stop them from happening! In the veritable words of Matthew Wilder, “Ain’t nothing gonna break-a my stride, nobody gonna slow me down, oh no, I got to keep on moving.” See you on Sunday to start up the 2022 Top 31!
1. Isn’t that language just beautiful to look at? I love Arabic script, and may someday learn to write a language that uses it just so I can make calligraphy with it.↩
2. The technological reason that led to the omission is just plain dumb: I use a smart playlist in Apple Music to pull together all the albums I download for a given year. The 2021 version had two new rules applied to that playlist that I thought would help me greatly: I told it to exclude anything with “single” or “ep” in the name. Guess what two letters appear next to each other in the word “Changephobia.” Worry not, the 2022 smartlist does not have those rules repeated.↩