Well, this is it, the final culmination of the year into a nice condensed, almost soup like formula, read for your speedy and enjoyable consumption. Whether you’ve been reading along with me for most of the year or just found my blog today, I’d like to thank you and wish you a great new year. Oh, and a bit of advice, take the songs you find here and put them into a play list on your ipod/zune/zen/whatevs, then get some good running shoes. One plus one equals doing a body good. It’s what I’m doing, so I thought I’d send out an invite you you fine folks as well. Alright, without further babbling, onto the top 11.
11. Klaxons – Myths of the Near Future
With the amount of hype leveled at them by NME, the Klaxons could have suffered a massive backlash, but they didn’t. This is because their music is different, it might not be the rallying cry, flagship of a whole new genre (Nu Rave) that NME wants it to be, but it is definitely distinct and worthwhile. There are similarities between some Klaxons songs and typical rave music, but they are only in the spare sound effects laid upon the throbbing bass and breakneck beats. While the jagged guitars and angular synth hold down the dance rock, the vocals in particular deserve some attention. From soaring cryptic choruses to the kind of vocals you’d expect possessed monks to be chanting as they stumble towards you in the woods at night, the voices complete the strange world that the Klaxons are trying to evoke. NME may have actually been right about something, we should really get someone to check the temperature of hell.
10. Mason Proper – There is a Moth in Your Chest
Mason Proper was another pleasant surprise that popped up this year. This group from Michigan has incredible depth, as they can pull off everything from meaningful experimental ballads to the perfect synthesis of keyboards and guitars for a full force thrash down dance party. Their guitar riffs explode seemingly effortlessly moving in and out of hard rocking and ethereal synth supported vocals seamlessly. The range of sounds offered up on There is a Moth in Your Chest, is huge, and is always full and satisfying. Mason Proper’s immediacy and readily apparent songwriting genius has garnered them comparisons to The Pixies, rightly so, but to paint a better sonic picture add in a bit of The Faint, some Devo, and a pinch of the Shins, and you have a cocktail for one of the year’s best new bands. The energy in their songs is constantly throbbing, like that kid in class that can never sit still, and the feeling is contagious.
Mason Proper – Light’s Off
9. Plastic Operator – Different Places
If you can’t tell by now, I like surprises. Plastic Operator came to my attention after surfing some music blogs and I got turned onto their myspace because they were compared to Styrofoam and the Postal Service, and me be the connoisseur of contemporary synth pop that I am, I couldn’t resist. I have to say the reviews that say that the London two pieces’ album Different Places is the most complete synthpop experience since the Postal Service’s Give Up are absolutely correct. From the opening 8-bit Melody of “The Pleasure is Mine” to closer “The Long Run”, every song hits the spot. Plastic Operator is definitely a band you’re going to want to put into your new music folder.
8. Justice – Cross
Justice provided the most anticipated dance album of the year and under a mountain of hype actually delivered. Their unique Daft meets trashed production style has been a hallmark of the electronic music of the year. Producing one of the year’s longest lasting and most remixed singles of the year “D.A.N.C.E.” as well as other dance floor scorchers like “New Jack”, “Phantom” parts one and two, and the undeniable, unforgiving fury that is “DVNO”. I don’t think I’ve ever been hit so hard with slap bass or string samples before in my life, and one thing is for sure, I’ve never enjoyed them more.
7. Air – Pocket Symphony
When I picked up Air’s Talkie Walkie I really wanted it to be, like one of my favorite albums ever, but as much as I liked the mathematical piano, and the amazing atmosphere, it all seemed like a lot of well made, well prepared, well seasoned tofu. This time around with “Pocket Symphony”, each song is rich with its own wonderful ‘flavor’. The wonderful instrumentals and minimalist vocals are back in all their glory, but this time there are shades of everything from hope, wonder, awe and melancholy. There are even excellent guest vocalists on the album, like the inimitable Jarvis Cocker, who delivers some of that aforementioned melancholy. One thing’s for sure, after this album’s over you’re going to realize two things, that Air has the best instrumentals ever, and that you want to listen to the album again.
6. (We Are) Performance – (We Are) Performance
I’ve been looking for work from these artists since news of them came to me through NME. They debuted their song “Love Life” along with Editor’s “Bullets” back in 2005. Since then I’ve heard little from them, one single called “It’s Bad and It’s Just Begun” came to my attention last semester, but it was this semester that I saw the name “Performance” on his computer and I demanded that he send the album to me. Apparently they had had issues with the label but did put out their debut this summer. Everything from the two songs that I had heard had been polished and perfected to form a series of the most bombastic, catchy, dramatic and dancy songs imaginable. Their sound is a sublime mixture of the Human League style backing vocals and Cure-ish intellectual yelping. Joe Stretch provides some of the most innovative vocal hooks I’ve heard since, who knows when. To add another layer of awesomeness to (We Are) Perfomances’ repertoire, is that they’re actually from Manchester and are continuing the tradition of producing excellent and addictive music. I couldn’t think of anyone better to carry the Mancunian musical torch.
(We Are) Performance – Live a Little
5. Interpol – Our Love to Admire
Interpol’s latest effort starts off the quietest of any of their releases and gently expands like a stream moving into a river. The well dressed quartet keep you rowing into the unknown until the river takes a fast turn over a waterfall, after which you’re left alone in an unknown land. From there, the sound only gets deeper, more expansive, and more isolating in the way that only Interpol could provide. The production on this album is fantastic, each instrument is almost lyrical in creating song after song, and Paul Banks’ vocals have never sounded better. Interpol may not have an abundance of up tempo rockers this time around, but they make up for it in the sheer might of their more refined sound. The single “The Heinrich Maneuver”, as good as it is on it’s own is so much better in the full context of the album. Interpol have made their best cohesive album to date. Each song draws you in not only for repeated listens of that song but of the whole album as well.
Interpol – Pace is the Trick
4. Arcade Fire – Neon Bible
Neon Bible is a peculiar album, you see, because when I first listened to it, I loved the songs that everyone else loved on the album and found the slower songs kind of monotonous and boring. Although, something happened in the time from when it was released to now. Now all of those slower songs have revealed their full meaning to me, and now all the incredible power of the lyrics and the simplicity is apparent to me. So now when I listen through the album, I hear catchy enjoyable songs framed by these towering epic songs, that are all veering in the same direction. They evoke all the terror and hope that everyone experiences today. It feels like each song is a reaction to Armageddon, do you rejoice? Do you do all the things that you were afraid of doing? Do you repent? Do you take cover? The album ends with one of the most emotionally powerful songs of the year, “My Body is a Cage”, which sounds like the story of a man conflicted, who has a hard road to travel. If Funeral was filled with wide eyed wonder, Neon Bible is filled with the discovery and disillusionment of adolescence, and it makes for a compelling listen.
Arcade Fire – The Well and The Lighthouse
3. LCD Soundsystem – Sound of Silver
On the opening track “Get Innocuous”, James Murphy and company choose to, instead of punch you in the face “Daft Punk is Playing at My House” style, begin to remove all the furnishings of your home until you are pulled into a hypnotic groove vacuum. I’ll put it this way, if any song could work with just a seven minute long repeating clip from inside the millennium falcon moving at light speed, it would be the Sound of Silver opener. At the end of that song, you’re transported fully inside the disco ball and treated with track after track of the wry wit of Mr. Murphy and the funk he replaced your furniture with. There’s not a misstep to be found on the album, “North American Scum” proves that LCD Soundsystem still has the mastery over the build build build build release dance song structure; it also proved that Nancy Wang has great back up vocals. The song “Someone Great”, shows that even if a song has a syncopated rhythm and bells augmenting the vocals, it can still be heartbreakingly lovely. LCD even sharpen up their out of left field piano pop numbers with the unforgettable “New York I Love You But…”. The highest achievement has to be the perfect combination of dance rock bliss and pure pop perfection that is “All My Friends”, which is undeniably the best single of the year. If you haven’t climbed into that disco ball yet, you better get to it.
LCD Soundsystem – All My Friends
2. Jens Lekman – Night Falls Over Kortedala
There has always been something extremely enjoyable about Jens Lekman’s music, whether it’s his charming unconventionality or his time warp production techniques. When I first heard his song “You are the Light” on MTV U while I was running on a treadmill at Alfred, I was hooked by the faux vegas singer vibe and floored by the sarcastic handclaps made by the singer who was in full medieval armor. His last album, “When I Said I Wanted to be Your Dog” was certifiably unique and enjoyable but there was an edge in his sound that needed to be developed, it needed more of that lyrical wink, the earnest guy in a ridiculous situation and the retro musical styling. That is precisely what Mr. Lekman delivered this year with Night Falls over Kortedalla. The lyrics are tighter, the music is more powerful, and the songs have never been more signature of Jens. From the over the top Vegas strings, to 50′s back beat doo wap samples, to actual beats, Lekman delivers.
Jens Lekman – A Postcard to Nina
1. Spoon – Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
Where to start… Spoon one of my all time favorite bands, it seems that anything they release is going to get a mention from me. The thing is though, if they weren’t so consistently awesome, my fascination with them would die down. Even their b-sides are better than the majority of other songs out there today. On Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga, Brit Daniel and company don’t miss a beat, coming right out of the gate with a song with probably the most identifiably hooks ever, “Don’t Make Me a Target”, and when the riotous piano breaks out, forget about it, you already know this album’s going to be a winner. Even the red herring, “The Ghost of You Lingers” is an enjoyable piano ballad dripping in reverb and would be perfect in a boxing movie or on a jogging mix tape, don’t forget to jump with your arms outstretched in a victory pose when you get to the top of the library steps. All of the familiar guitar rock is still present and leaps out at you in a relentless fervor ala “You Got Yr Cherry Bomb”. For fans of the hyper rhythmic “I Turn My Camera On”, there is “Don’t You Evah” which once again satisfies that need for a delicious groove. The singles material is what’s got Spoon the initial attention on this album, but it’s the core songs, the ones that aren’t going to get all the attention, that are the ones that make Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga album of the year. “Rhythm and Soul”, “Eddies Ragga”, “Finer Feelings”, are all incredible growers, the lyrics will jump out at you and demand that you sing along on the second listen. The album also has the best closing song of the year, with “Black Like Me”, can anyone else see the sun set when the viola plays? Long story short, it feels good when the underdog wins.
