Oddisee, Others Advance in Baffling Music Tournament

Music

Missing the "Live Look-in"
Oddisee, Others Advance in Baffling Tournament

Oddisee has advanced in the winners bracket of this baffling music tournament he does not know he is in.

Part One: Expanded Confusion
Part Two: Cute Metal
Part Three: Live Look-Ins
Part Four: An Empty Head
Part Five: Lots of Colons
Part Six: Champion Determined

By Matthew Kauffman Smith

miss the “live look-ins” that CBS used to have. At halftime of the local game in your area, CBS would scan the other games. Even better, if the game you were watching was a dud, CBS would switch to coverage of a close game. No one missed a live buzzer-beater or 15-seed beating a No. 2. Nowadays, all of the games are on in their entirety—no interruptions—on four different channels. I can have one game going on my TV, one streaming on my phone, one playing on my Commodore 64, and one on my Etc- a-Sketch. But it isn’t the same.

Plus, with all of my responsibilities writing Album Bracketology, I don’t have that kind of time. I do have a life. Without the live look-in, people watching other games missed this:

Propeller vows not to make the same mistake. While Album Bracketology prides itself on its focus and not jumping from point to point, we owe it to our fans to alert them when there is an upset brewing.

Let’s go back to the action. When we last left off, we revealed albums No. 49-69 for 2015, with few upsets. The Screaming Females were holding on as the lowest seed remaining and we warned you about the twelve-seed Heartless Bastards. But the upsets were few and the top nineteen seeds remained alive in the winner’s bracket.

It’s 11:58 p.m. somewhere: So much for everything going according to plan. Cinderella is still alive, as the Screaming Females defeated Guster to advance to the round of sixteen in the winner’s bracket.

Chalk drawings: Elsewhere, the top seeds are advancing. No. 2 Sleater-Kinney defeated Langhorne Slim and the Law, No. 10 Beach Slang beat Moon Taxi, and No. 4 Grimes beat the Weepies. Wait!

Live look-in: We have an upset! No. 25 Lady Lamb, despite her confusing band name—though to her credit, she shortened it from Lady Lamb and the Beekeeper—just defeated No. 8 Misterwives.

Hip-hop: It was a strong year for hip-hop as Oddisee and Blackalicious released great albums. And Album Bracketology especially salutes Chance the Rapper, who provides star power in the group cooperative Donnie Trumpet and the Social Experiment. Chance gave the album away for free earlier this year and said that price will never change.

Live look-in: The king is dead! Well, actually, the king moves on to the loser’s bracket. Donnie Trumpet and the Social Experiment, the No. 32 seed, just defeated the Decemberists, the 2011 champion. Speaking of the loser’s bracket:

Loser bracket round 4 (losers comprise picks 33-48):
The Weepies def. The Domestics
Torres def. Dwight Yoakam
Brandi Carlile def. Baio
Bully def. The Watkins Family
Misterwives def. Wilco
Fidlar def. Father John Misty
Leon Bridges def. Titus Andronicus
The Decemberists def. Ought
Israel Nash def. Langhorne Slim and the Law
Summer Cannibals def. Twenty One Pilots
Greg Holden def. Moon Taxi
Kurt Vile def. Speedy Ortiz
Blackalicious def. Frank Turner
Bottle Rockets def. SOAK
Los Lobos def. Unknown Mortal Orchestra
Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats def. Guster

And that means we’re more than halfway through our countdown:

48. Guster: Evermotion
47. Moon Taxi: Daybreaker
46. Baio: The Names
45. Langhorne Slim and the Law: The Spirit Moves
44. The Domestics: The Domestics
43. Father John Misty: I Love You, Honeybear
42. 21 Pilots: Blurryface
41. Wilco: Star Wars
40. Frank Turner: Positive Songs for Negative People
39. Dwight Yoakam: Second Hand Heart
38. Ought: Sun Coming Down
37. Speedy Ortiz: Foil Dear
36. SOAK: Before We Forget How to Dream
35. Watkins Family Hour: Watkins Family Hour
34. Unknown Mortal Orchestra: Multi-Love
33. Titus Andronicus: The Most Lamentable Tragedy

A special shout-out goes to punk rockers Titus Andronicus, who created a sprawling, ninety-minute concept album about mental illness. Too long? Yeah, maybe. As is customary, we salute an eliminated artist. We honor Dwight Yoakam for his durability and because he was wearing skinny jeans long before the hipsters took over:

Chekhov this on your list: I’m sure Anton Chekhov was a nice, bracket-loving dude back in his Russian heyday and he has given playwrights and fiction writers invaluable advice on cutting out the fat that may exist in fat places in people’s fat writing that goes on and on and on. Not only was he against repetition, he was also against redundancies. He basically said that if a rifle is hanging on the wall in a play, it shouldn’t be hanging at the end; it needs to go off.

Reality doesn’t happen like that. I built up the Heartless Bastards as the cute-yet-vicious No. 12 seed in the last installment and I told No. 5 seed Alabama Shakes to beware. And I’m here to tell you that nothing happened. The Alabama Shakes won. Album Bracketology, like the NCAA tournament, is not pre-determined. In life, rifles don’t just go off randomly to make the story better. [Ed. note: Obviously, rifles do go off accidentally in reality. We’re allowing this sentence to stand, though, because vague and/or incorrect sentences appear to be part of this writer’s “voice.”]

So yes, I was hoping that the Heartless Bastards would win, increasing the drama of our little tournament. In the end, it’s important to remember that Album Bracketology isn’t fiction. It’s real, and even Chekhov would agree that reality sometimes bites. (And interestingly enough, the 1994 movie Reality Bites, starring Winona Ryder, is loosely based on Chekhov’s play The Cherry Orchard.) [Ed. note: Album Bracketology is not real—the bands do not actually compete with each other in any real way. Reality Bites is not based on The Cherry Orchard. It is doubtful the author of this article has read or attended a performance of The Cherry Orchard.]

Live look-in: We now go down to sideline reporter Vance, known at the Propeller offices as Uncle Vanya. Donnie Trumpet and the Social Experiment have scored yet another upset, defeating No. 17 Chvrches. [Ed note: No idea what the writer is doing here. The writer claims we will be hearing from his invented “Vance” character, but then simply moves forward, as if the writer forgot his own conceit before he had even finished writing the sentence.]

Chalk update: In addition to the Alabama Shakes, No. 2 Sleater-Kinney, No. 4 Grimes, No. 6 Courtney Barnett, and No. 9 Skinny Lister remain alive, as does 2013 champ Jason Isbell.

It’s 12:01 a.m. somewhere: And the Screaming Females are heading to the loser’s bracket after losing to D.C. rapper Oddisee, the No. 19 seed. And now Uncle Vanya goes over to check in on the action in the losers bracket. [Ed. note: We just have no idea. Is there or is there not a “Vance” or “Uncle Vanya” character in this piece? What is the writer doing?]

Losers bracket round 5 (losers comprise picks 25-32):
The Weepies def. Torres
Bully def. Brandi Carlile
Misterwives def. Fidlar
Decemberists def. Leon Bridges
Summer Cannibals def. Israel Nash
Kurt Vile and the Violators def. Greg Holden
Blackalicious def. Bottle Rockets
Los Lobos def. Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats

The Decemberists’ dream of becoming the first two-time champion in Album Bracketology. [Ed. note: We’re just going to let that stand. Something’s obviously missing or incorrect in that fragment, but trying to turn this into solid prose seems foolish at this point.] That puts us down to the top twenty-four, but first, here are numbers 32-25:

32. Fidlar: Too
31. Greg Holden: Chase the Sun
30. Israel Nash: Israel Nash’s Silver Season
29. Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats: Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats
28. Brandi Carlile: The Firewatcher’s Daughter
27. Torres: Sprinter
26. Bottle Rockets: South Broadway Athletic Club
25. Leon Bridges: Coming Home

It’s a bit tempting to play Israel Nash here because he looks a bit like Crosby, his songs are still, his name is Nash, and he sounds like Young. But his videos aren’t as entertaining as Fidlar’s.

We’re down to the Elite Eight in the winners bracket and twenty-four contenders overall. Anton Chekhov, the patron saint of Album Bracketology, wants you all to know that you have been presented with brackets. And there will be a winner.

69. Mynabirds: Lovers Know
68. Hop Along: Painted Shut
67. Girlpool: Before the World Was Big
66. Kacey Musgraves: Pageant Material
65. Rayland Baxter: Imaginary Man
64. Oh Wonder: Oh Wonder
63. Tamaryn: Cranekiss
62. Tame Impala: Currents
61. Briana Marela: All Around Us
60. Death Cab for Cutie: Kintsugi
59. Amason: Sky City
58. Radical Dads: Universal Coolers
57. Ezra Furman: Perpetual Motion People
56. Motopony: Welcome You
55. Shovels & Rope: Busted Jukebox, Vol. 1
54. Mikal Cronin: MCIII
53. Wolf Alice: Creature Songs
52. Kelela: Hallucinogen
51. Protomartyr: The Agent Intellect
50. Andra Day: Cheers to the Fall
49. FFS: FFS
48. Guster: Evermotion
47. Moon Taxi: Daybreaker
46. Baio: The Names
45. Langhorne Slim and the Law: The Spirit Moves
44. The Domestics: The Domestics
43. Father John Misty: I Love You, Honeybear
42. 21 Pilots: Blurryface
41. Wilco: Star Wars
40. Frank Turner: Positive Songs for Negative People
39. Dwight Yoakam: Second Hand Heart
38. Ought: Sun Coming Down
37. Speedy Ortiz: Foil Dear
36. SOAK: Before We Forget How to Dream
35. Watkins Family Hour: Watkins Family Hour
34. Unknown Mortal Orchestra: Multi-Love
33. Titus Andronicus: The Most Lamentable Tragedy
32. Fidlar: Too
31. Greg Holden: Chase the Sun
30. Israel Nash: Israel Nash’s Silver Season
29. Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats: Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats
28. Brandi Carlile: The Firewatcher’s Daughter
27. Torres: Sprinter
26. Bottle Rockets: South Broadway Athletic Club
25. Leon Bridges: Coming Home

[Ed.note: The brackets below are included as sent to us by the author. All Propeller editors or designers are either on vacation or have declined to be associated with Album Bracketology. Apologies.]

THE DECEMBERISTS BRACKET