Here’s my list – I decided to narrow it down to 5 albums. It was hard to do as this year was a very good year for music, the influential rise of Witch House & Dubstep alone could populate a top 10 list with fantastic albums. This year though the more i’ve thought about it, the more i want to highlight the albums that have really resonated with me emotionally. So many arguments can be made the anthropological or technical value of an album like the universally loved Cosmogramma – but what matters for me is how it works as a soundtrack to my daily life, and though i’m sure there are no hard feelings, Flylo ain’t got nothing for me. These albums however do.
5. Salem – King Night
I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one that feels like shooting a big bag of heroin after listening to this gargantuan sludge beast of an album. If Kanye’s latest is the emotional 8ball (complete with moments of hysterical crying), King Night is the massive dose of Ketamine and heroin that finally brings me down. Wayyy down. To the point where blood red subbass rolling it’s uglies all over the screaming face of Oh Holy Night or lyrics like
“It’s like people say, we all gonna die
But me is different Im not tryin to be alive
I just try to get high
Baby I just I just I
pull the sheet over my face before I die”
Slurred and menacing over molasses-slow dirty south beats held under water by an industrial freezer synth bass and punctuated by samples of cars crashing. These are just what the good doctor ordered. It’s a sound that always feels like it’s on the verge of it’s eyes rolling back up into it’s own head and passing out with a Malborough 120 in its hand, but somehow manages to be not only the soul transcendent offering from the whole Witch House scene to date, but one of the best albums of the year.
(See also Balam Acab, OOooOo, White Ring, etc)
4. Zola Jesus – Stridulum II
Zola Jesus’s Nika Roza Danilova is the voice of the over-mother. Cold, powerful, emotionally and physically all encompassing – her drums pound like a determined heart and her synths continually rise and wrap round with thick blankets of cold, stifling love. (What? Me?Mother issues? Nah…) I’m just saying, Stridulum II is the best sequenced, mixed and mastered version of Zola Jesus to come out yet. When Zola finally uncovered her voice and melodies from behind the wall of noise she showed us she was ready to take it all on, and showed us what was really there – angst, sure, but anger and violence turned out to be love, strong determined love – A woman hell bent to shield her lover from harm, to offer protection, to assure them of the end of suffering.
Stridulum II soars with leaden inevitability, there’s a deep core of strength, and even when she sings “You gotta help me out” on Manifest Destiny, you know she’s gonna make it regardless, and on the way she’ll rescue you, the kids, and anyone else she sets her love to.
(see also Zola Jesus)
3. Twin Shadow – Forget
This album was so close to being my number one, and depending on my mood, how much I’ve had to drink, how sentimental I let myself get – it can quickly run up the charts and stay on the top of my playlist for days. Tight, melodically dazzling songs about romantic young love, dancing, ghosts, a voice that takes me back to everything that’s great about Morrissey but minus some of the whine and none of the falsetto yelping, shimmering synth lines, lean, choppy guitars, funky bass lines, swinging drum machines – everything in it’s right place. A true gem of an album that on every listen gives you a new favorite track, new favorite lyric ( “As if it wasn’t enough to hear you speak, they had to give you lips like that.”), and new favorite reason to let this one just roll on repeat.
(see also Wild Nothing, The xx)
2. The National – High Violet
The National are my boys – I wanna sit in the back of a bar in a button-up shirt and jacket, tie askew, hair-line receding (faster and faster) – Whiskey in hand and listening to this album on repeat with these guys. They’d pick it and each other apart, laugh at it, downplay it, there would be quiet moments and deep draws, we’d go out and smoke cigarettes even though we shouldn’t – we’re getting older and there are fewer of us around these days…
Some have argued that it’s the same album they’ve been making for the last 3 or so, but that’d be ignoring the subtleties, the small but important changes, new skills learned, melodies refined – much like the common person’s life, when viewed from afar, seems the same, unchanging, monotonous – but we all know that upclose and person, we’re all constantly in flux, growing and straining.
The National are the soundtrack to my everyday, while the rest of the albums on my list are part of my escape from it, High Violet is the sound of the working week, driving to the doctor, the grey skies, late to bed, late to rise weekdays that bleed into weekends, domestic disagreements, quiet insignificant resentments, things we forget to do, things we wish we’d never done.
It’s an album about the cold, uncertain world and its uncertain people making uncertain decisions and its little, wiry special power is that it makes it all feel ok. In fact, The National’s music lifts up all those moments in our mundane lives and drinks a sad toast to the secret drama and magic we give them.
(see also The Walkmen)
Sufjan Stevens – The Age of Adz
With his sixth proper album, Sufjan Stevens does battle with what we’ve come to expect from a proper Sufjan Stevens album. This time, instead of painstakingly humanizing the locations, historical inhabitants, and trivia of a certain slab of America, he’s more concerned with his own state of mind. Banjos are out; moody electronics, deep bass, and drums that burst like geysers are in. The lengthiest song title on his last LP, 2005′s Illinois, was 53 words long; here, that same superlative goes to a tune called “I Want to Be Well”. He’s whispering less, hollering more. And at the climax of The Age of Adz, the devout Christian and poster boy for mannered indie-dude sensitivity shouts, “I’m not fuckin’ around!” no less than 16 times. Believe him. Read the full Pitchfork Review
Belle & Sebastian – Write about Love
Write About Love opens confidently with a strong drum pattern, simple piano chords and Sarah Martin gently cooing, “Make me dance, I want to surrender”. That track is I Didn’t See It Coming, and it sets the tone for the first half of the record with its synths, wandering bassline, airy feel and careful layering. The tracks begin fairly sparsely, but build into something fully immersive and represent some of the most professional and well-crafted work the group have produced. Even songs that don’t immediately jump out on first listen have plenty to recommend them, like the gorgeous chord change to introduce the chorus of the languid ballad, Calculating Bimbo. Read the full Noripcord review
Antony & The Johnsons – Swanlight
With a voice that embodies both life’s fragility and something as towering as that great white bear, Hegarty has carved his own luminous path. He communes with the sacred and majestic in life, often against a backdrop of pain and suffering, and with the natural world as his most charged landscape. On the twinkling “Swanlights,” the fourth studio album he’s made with his classically attuned band, working in a more stylistically abundant form here than last year’s “The Crying Light,” he captures the otherworldly more often than not. Occasionally, though, the songs overreach or miss some central point. Read the full LA Times review
Orb w/ David Gilmour – Metallic Spheres
When there’s no brain-massaging kick beat or snappy guitar delay to mark the time, The Orb and David Gilmour’s two-track collaboration Metallic Spheres gracefully drifts to its peak. This stands to reason, because both artists have a sense of timing that’s brilliantly suited to vast, lengthy formats. Between the 14- and 24-minute marks on “Metallic Side,” the ambient ravers and the Pink Floyd guitarist manage to recall the folkier moments of Ummagumma and Meddle, and even the playful expansiveness of U.F.Orb, amid backdrops that glitter and drones that warmly glance off each other. Read the full AV Club Review
KT Tunstall – Tiger Suit
It’s hard to believe it’s been 3 years since KT’s last effort, “Drastic Fantastic”, which featured Tunstall’s signature folk-rock sound as well as more more pop laden tunes, such as the airy “If Only”.
Now she’s back with “Tiger Suit”, an album which takes the signature Tunstall and adds…wait for it…a dash of electronic sound. While this may sound like it could a disaster, the sound works quite well for Tunstall, who uses it in smart doses to add emotional depth. Read the full review at wordsfinest
Avett Brothers – Live Vol 3
Some bands are great on record but the polar opposite in concert. I thought the folk band the Avett Brothers was one of those bands, but upon listening to its new live album, I soon realized I was wrong. The CD records the Avett Brothers’ performance in Charlotte, N.C., and is the group’s third live album. The volume negates any doubt about whether they can wow an audience.
The Avett Brothers — Seth Avett, Scott Avett, and bassist Bob Crawford — have progressed throughout the 2000s into a hybrid of bluegrass, folk, rock ’n’ roll, and punk. The band is recognizable by its vocal harmonies, thoughtful lyrics, and, of course, the Southern twang from Scott Avett’s banjo. Read the full review on The Daily Iowan
Fistful of Mercy - As I call you down
Most of the tracks on “As I Call You Down” seem made for dewy, slow-to-rise mornings, with lines of steel guitar and the kind of slightly cockeyed melodies that keep the listener poised for surprise. Sometimes a rambunctious mood sets in, as on country-blues stomper “Father’s Son.” At other times, the threesome tucks in for meditation: “30 Bones,” the only instrumental track, is a gorgeous, feathery construction. Read the full review on LA Times
Michael Franti & Spearhead – The Sound of Sunshine
The Sound of Sunshine is the seventh studio album from Franti and his crew, and he sites his time spent recovering from a serious medical condition as the inspiration for many of Sunshine’s songs. Franti explains, “I almost died…I really took a moment to prioritize what’s really important…it’s really about the people I love. Even in that hospital, I could laugh with the people I love, cry with them, and start to find the sun again.” This live for the moment, “take care of the people around you” vibe, clearly shines through in both the up-tempo, pop/reggae beats and feel-good lyrics. Read more at Suite101
John Legend & The Roots – Wake Up!
For all their talent, the band will always simply and conveniently be known as a live hip-hop band. Perhaps in a way to demolish that apt yet restrictive label, the focus of this effort is less about rap and more about ’60s soul covers built on tight instrumentation. “Compared To What” could have been a soul classic, the kind of funk-tacular, loose-played jam of an everyday narrator looking in on his world and painting a picture of degradation and hope for change while evoking a rhythmic, free-flowing indignation. While not a soul classic, the cover of “Hard Times”, originally by Baby Huey & The Babysitters, is just as much about injustice but more to the tune of the band’s often rigid yet inspired playing, newly adorned with an army of flutes. Beyond these songs, the strength of the album lies in Legend’s voice, that of an old soul who understands mainstream black music sensibilities, and The Roots’ ability to blend in and let the spotlight shine not on big beats or singular feats of musical greatness but on the construct as a whole. Read the full review at Consequence of Sound
Matt Costa – Mobile Chateau
His natural approach to melody is heightened here, more than ever. There are no tracks contained that aren’t instantly ‘hum-able.’ There’s more than a slight flavor of ’60s guitar pop, with the catchiest of hooks married with bass drum and tambourine crashes. As usual, Costa’s voice is a charming vehicle, delivering pithy lyrics that assert a modernism that leave his influences behind. It’s obvious, when holding Mobile Chateau against his previous two albums, that the artist’s voice has found its own character, rather than relying on mere characteristics. Everything feels decidedly more adult here, more assertive, more substantial. Read the full review on Buzzline
Serj Tankian – Imperfect Hamonies
With Chinese Democracy now a reality, hard rock fans can look to a System Of A Down reunion as their new great lost cause. Since its hiatus began in 2006, the band has essentially split in two: Daron Malakian and John Dolmayan have formed the lamentable Scars On Broadway, while Serj Tankian has undertaken an unpredictable, yet often rewarding, solo career. His newest album, the sprawling, almost painfully eclectic Imperfect Harmonies, is ambitious to a fault: It seems like there’s nothing Tankian doesn’t want to accomplish in the space of a single album (except, unfortunately for his old-school fans, a return to anything resembling metal). Read the full review on the AV Club
I’m not going to say much about these two videos by South African outfit Die Antwoord (The Answer). I’m going to let them speak for themselves and let you, the intrepid Pure Pop music lovers figure out what it all means. Is this just another low-brow (no-brow?) calculated ploy at grabbing headlines through Harmony-Korinesque caricatures of empty pop culture. Or is this, more shockingly so – the real (and still vapid) deal?
Or maybe it’s something else altogether. You decide. Their major label debut comes out soon. Oh yeah, Not Safe For Work.
Walkmen – Lisbon
In that elegantly disheveled mutter-wail thing of his, frontman Hamilton Leithauser starts new album Lisbon off by singing: “You’re with someone else tomorrow night/ Doesn’t matter to me/ ‘Cause as the sun dies into the hill/ You got all I need.” He’s sad and pathetic and needy and yet somehow still smooth, which is sort of the central animating paradox at the heart of the Walkmen. They make these wounded, anxious songs, but they make them so confidently, with such unearthly rich-guy assurance. The band’s specific style of indie rock is very rooted in a scrappy, scratchy New York tradition that dates back to the Velvet Underground or Bob Dylan, but their take on it is theirs and theirs alone. You know one of their songs right away when those winding, circular guitars and surging drums and gargling vocals kick in. They’re so performative in their sadness, but that stuff never rankles or comes off tantrumy, since the band is just so good at this stuff. There’s a song on Lisbon called “Woe Is Me”, and it’s not even remotely a joke. Great song, too. Read the full review
Black Angels – Phosphene Dream
Opener ‘Bad Vibrations’ is every bit the song its title suggests, a wobbling and ebbing intro of throbbing guitar barely making space for Alex Maas’s strained vocals, which throughout the record sound like they’re coming from somewhere down the hall, spreadeagled against a corner, deep inside some personal void. The sting, in this case, is very much in the tail, as eerily picked lonesome guitar segues into a brisk up-tempo motorik for the final quarter of the track. Granted, it’s neither rocket science nor re-inventing the wheel, but the best moments of Phosphene Dream categorically prove that The Black Angels are at their best when they just let things roll on by. Read the full review
Of Montreal – False Priest
False Priest is a generally enjoyable record. In all honesty when I started listening I hated it, hearing it as nothing more than a silly and pointless indulgence without any sort of consistency or narrative to keep me engaged. After a few listens though I realised that yes, it is silly (the opening two songs in particular) but it can also be unashamedly enjoyable for the listener too. It’s easy to try seek meaning from this record and at times it shows itself: there are a few references to Barnes’s childhood, letting us delve a little deeper into his mind while there are also songs that could be interpreted as continuations of “Touched Something’s Hollow” where Barnes explores what having an alter ego can do to his mind. For a record with a title like False Priest you might even expect Barnes to explore the nature of religion and its effects or even the effect it had on him more deeply (he grew up in a Catholic household). Instead at the end of the record he seems to take up the role of preacher, dismissing the idea of having faith in a God. For a free spirit like Barnes it seems odd to have him judging us for once. Read the full review
Blonde Redhead – Penny Sparkle
Despite its deliberate evolution on each previous album — a habit kept up since 1995 — Penny Sparkle marks Blonde Redhead’s most dramatic shift yet, a record that eschews organic instrumentation for synthesizers and drum machines on a near-total scale. Penny Sparkle is a dense, textural affair that Makino likely knew would be lost on a portion of the band’s post-punk die-hards, and perhaps the shift initially evaded her, too. Regardless, the band emerged from Scandinavia with a fantastic document of their modern electronic taste, a record that, while not their best work, serves as a rewarding continuation of the band’s trademark pop elegance, sensuality, and otherworldliness. Read the full review
Sometimes it’s fun to set yourself arbitrary rules to see what you can accomplish and sometimes it’s fun to raid youtube for lost classics and old forgotten relics. Sometimes, those two past times collide and create a fun little game where i pick an artist or band and scour the internets looking for only their offically released videos. You get to enjoy the fruits of this labor. I know I know, you can thank me later. Feel free to suggest an artist or group, or link in sources to videos you think should be included.
More videos after the jump.
Ghostly International, one of my favorite below the radar labels of the last handful of years has been quietly putting out incredible albums by artists like The School of Seven Bells, Lusine, and Tadd Mullinix. Their artists range is style from slightly left of center indie-rock, to the far corners of minimal electronica and experimental composition, but regardless of what genres GA’s artists are pulling from, they seem to maintain a very high level of quality and that unique Ghostly International character.
GA just released a great list compiling their favorites of the decade for no other reason than just to share what they like – and well, you know how much we like a good list. And this is one of the best. I mean, any best of list that contains Bonnie Prince Billy, Farben, Tim Hecker and Broadcast on the same page is basically a contender for best list ever.
You may be wondering to yourself… Dam-funk? Nite Jewel? Who the hell are these two? Well, fair enough, they’re not exactly household names, both play in the shadowy areas on the outer edges of modern hiphop, funk, pop, and Indie-electronica, and have only lately (thanks to fast rising star of the whole Chill Wave / Glo-Fi genre) had the opportunity to bring their distinctly L.A. Sound to a larger audience. Now XLR8R magazine got a chance to sit down with both artists together for a day while they hung out and recorded together.
Definitely for fans of DIY beats & Cheese synths.
You may know Eric Olsen from his various musical endeavors. He is a member of a number of beloved Burlington-based outfits, including Swale, Led Loco and James Kochalka Superstar. He’s also a web and graphic design guru, a husband and, most recently, a father.
Tanner: Hey Eric – what are you shopping for today?
Eric: I’m looking for the Spoon album -
Tanner: Find what you’re looking for?
Herb: boxes havn’t arrived yet cause of the holiday delay…
Eric: Because of MLK day, the shipments were delayed – activists man, they always fuck shit up.
Tanner: What have you been listening to today?
Eric: Been going through albums in alphabetical order – I’m up to B, so I’m up to that Art Brut album – then there was that Basement demo’s from Elliot Smiths post suicide album… something else, can’t remember…
Tanner: What are your preferred mediums – vinyl, mp3, cd, cassette, 8-track, a-dat etc?
Eric: That would depend on the setting -
Herb: What if you were being held prisoner?
Eric: That would depend on the size of the prison…
I’ve slacked on vinyl – i like to get my albums, and rip them to MP3 for my Ipod. I have alot of vinyl, but i wouldn’t call it a collection, i’m mainly CD though. Usually my record player is in disarray.
Tanner: Conan or Leno?
Eric: I’m with CoCo. Actually in my opinion, Leno is like a red state thing, they’re gonna win – it’s like the decline of western civilization.
Tanner: Read anything good lately?
Eric: Murakami - What I Talk About When I Talk About Running, or is it “what i think when i talk about thinking”? … no wait. I’ve also been reading Bill Bryson‘s, A Short History of Nearly Everything – basically cliff notes of the history of science and all things. Also since I’ve been coming here last week, i’ve been constantly checking out Gawker.com pretty religiously, we’ve been having alot of laughs at the house about Conan’s list of possible porno names if he starred….
Tanner: If you could be one person in music history who would it be?
Eric: Fela (kuti) I’d have a sovereign nation. Not every musician has that.
Herb: You’d be dead.
Eric: he had alot of sex.
Herb: Not like, Warren Beatty levels of sex.
Tanner: ZZ-Top or DeeDee Ramone?
Eric: Ooooh tough one…. It’s a toss up, ZZ Top would be in the running before they remastered their drums, did not like that. Depends, every other day, I’d go back and forth – shared custody.
Tanner: Your #1 album of 2009.
Eric: Umm… hmm… not sure.
Tanner: Your #1 album of 1989.
Eric: It was either Nation of Millions or Daydream nation…I’m dating myself now aren’t I?
Tanner: Shower singer or car singer? If so, what song?
Eric: Bath Singer – You got another thing coming by Judas Priest.
