Paul's favourite albums of 2009
Honourable mention: Sweet Mother Logic - Sweet Mother Logic
Last year I gave this slot to OKGiraffe. Their album was really good; a pleasure to hear and very promising as far as further albums from the band go. But it was flawed, and it really only displayed potential above all else. That's pretty much how I feel about Sweet Mother Logic's debut. Last year's Ascension Island distilled the band into four songs, and it really helped to have everything be so condensed. This year's is much more inconsistent: the hits and misses are both more extreme. Intelligently composed songs share the space with meandering atmospheric pieces that don’t really go anywhere. “Anthomedusae” and “Ghost Army” are good examples of the type of ideas the band really shouldn’t be entertaining at this point. Not to say that the record isn’t good, because it’s great. Their best material yet is on this one, with songs like “Funch” and “Counting Sheep” really defining them as a band. Leaving aside the reprise at the end, “Curious Expedition” is easily the most concise and to-the-point song the band’s written thus far. But the album as a whole is very demonstrative of many new bands’ main problem: they're not completely sure what they want out of the band yet, so they stretch out in as many directions as possible to find out. As a result, the album seems poorly paced, jumping awkwardly from idea to idea. In the end, though, it’s only disappointing because my expectations were so unreasonably high. But needless to say I’m very excited for the next one.
10. UUVVWWZ - UUVVWWZ
My love of shrieky girl singers isn’t a secret, but somehow this year this was the only band with one that really caught my attention. They’re still working out the kinks in their formula, but when they hit, they hit hard. “Berry Can” is easily one of the best openers of the year; it’s downright mesmerizing, as is “Castle”. But it’s the simple songs that really resonate, with “Jap Dad” and “Trapezeus” being the most entertaining. Recommended if you like the sound of four kids having a ton of fun!
9. Future of the Left - Travels with Myself and Another
Future of the Left keep me from spending every waking moment wishing for Mclusky to get back together. Their sophomore album is a huge improvement on their first one (which was amazing to begin with): they shaved off all the fat, and what’s left is 33 minutes of pure fury. Nothing’s as well-realized as “Manchasm” off of Curses, but the album as a whole just pummels you from start to finish. “Lapsed Catholics,” the last track, is one of the best songs they’ve written, and one of the best of the year for sure, starting with stilted acoustic guitar and bizarre rambling and ending with one of the most monolithic riffs ever put to tape. This album is for those who doubted that Mclusky’s spirit lives on through this band.
8. The xx - xx
This one took me a little while. I was hooked once I realized that this isn't just overly sensual R&B, it's also a really great experiment in minimalism. These guys take guitar, bass and keyboard and really spread them out, leaving so much space in the middle you'd swear they left out a blistering sax solo or something. It really works as an album, too, serving as a set of variations on the theme laid out in the intro. Certain songs do stand out, though: "Shelter" is a great vocal performance from Romy Croft, and "Night Time" is incredibly funky despite being a ballad. Recommended if you feel like R&B is JUST TOO EMOTIONAL these days.
7. Girls - Album
The major theme in my list last year was noise rock, with a good handful of excellent albums exploring the less angry and more joyful aspects of that type of music. This year seems to be the one for earnest garage rock, the first example of which is Girls. This band is poised to be everything I dislike about indie music: extremely hateable frontman in the vein of Ariel Pink (whom he’s played with, no less), disgusting hipster sexuality, and short shorts. So it’s a testament to the band’s talent that their music overcomes all these things. The album runs the gamut from askew pop to woozy jams to harrowing confessionals, holding your attention the whole way through. In a year with tons of endearingly weird pop music, this is the simplest, most genuine one. And it’s catchy as all hell.
6. Japandroids - Post-Nothing
Japandroids is two guys playing the music they want to play in the most fulfilling way possible. It’s garage rock with catchy melodies and emotional singing. Saying anything more would be a disservice to them. You should check them out.
5. Songs - Songs
You can always tell when a band owes far too much to their influences. Right off the bat, Songs opens with an exact duplicate of the Velvet Underground. They later do this to the Modern Lovers with “Different Light.” But through and through, as they switch through so many different styles and moods, the band always shines through. Somehow, by essentially navigating the history of alternative music, Songs forge an identity for themselves in line with, but distinct from all the bands to whom they pay tribute. And on a debut album, no less, when I had never heard a note from them before. The band proves throughout the whole album what an incredible command of melody they possess, even in the middle of long drone sessions. They’ve come into being fully-formed, somehow conveying the benefit of years of experience while still seeming as vital as a band this young should.
4. Torngat - La Petite Nicole
I’ve been following Torngat for seven years, and there was a very warm feeling inside me when I realized they released their best album yet this year. It felt like all that waiting paid off. After 2007’s straight-laced, inoffensive You Could Be it was easy to lose hope, and it came as a shock to hear something so raw and stripped-down from these guys. The songs sit behind a wall of distortion and noise, with melodies only sometimes shining through. The “classic” Torngat sound does emerge a few times, most obviously on “Afternoon Moon Pie,” but for the most part the band takes some very creative left turns on the album. “Turtle Eyes & Fierce Rabbit” is one example, starting as a bizarre dance track and ending with a fierce noise jam. “Going What’s What” is exactly the opposite: while the band’s done ballads before, they’ve never written anything like this. It’s one of the most subtle songs I’ve ever heard, starting with one theme and almost reaching another so slowly it’s almost imperceptible. The song unravels at its own pace over seven minutes, never jumping to a conclusion too soon and only reaching its bittersweet climax when the time is right. It’s hands down the best song the band has ever written, and the album it’s on is so good that it fits right in.
3. Micachu - Jewellery
Jewellery doesn’t sound like anything else I’ve ever heard. Sure, it’s rooted in UK club music and it’s got a pop grounding, but Mica Levi is making music no one’s ever made before. It took me three listens to even think of it as a pop album, because it’s so entrenched in its own sensibility. But once you become familiar with its world, it’s not so mystifying after all. It’s just a girl with a fractured take on pop music and some hand-built instruments making music by her own rules. And she’s fully behind it. The way she strums her non-chords at the start of “Vulture” is as endearing as any heartfelt folk song. Even at its weirdest, the music exudes so much confidence you can’t help but be enchanted by it. The album is unique and original without ever being aggressively so, and as a result it comes off as easily one of the most likeable ones of the year.
2. Joel Plaskett - Three
If Micachu is the poster child for uniqueness, then Joel Plaskett can stand for nothing but derivation. I know in my mind that I should hate everything he does because it’s all been done before, but he’s just so good at doing it that my heart won’t allow that. So here we are. A three-disc album of generic classic rock. Not only a three-disc album, but a three-disc concept album. Based around the number three. There’s something so wrong about that, but yet it works so well. Joel Plaskett is a song machine, writing and recording twenty-seven songs in two years, with not a single one being filler. Each song has its place in the album, and can stand alone just as well. It’s certainly stretching out from Ashtray Rock, with Plaskett using drum machines, fiddles, horns and flutes, and none of it sounding out of place. Likewise, Three finds him exploring soul, folk and country more than he has before, but he’s perfectly at home there too. Plaskett’s an expert songwriter at the top of his game, and his charisma overshadows any qualms anyone could have with the album. If almost two hours of music is too much for you, some highlights include “Sailors Eyes,” “Deny, Deny, Deny” and “Rollin’, Rollin’, Rollin’.” But every track is great, really. The album does require a fair bit of patience, but it’s rewarding the whole way through. It’s so deliberately planned and paced that you barely remember you’re listening to three discs of material. Three is surprisingly accomplished, impressively genuine, and above all, unmistakably Canadian.
1. Dirty Projectors - Bitte Orca
What else could it have been? Dave Longstreth has created a masterpiece with Bitte Orca. Through their history, Dirty Projectors have always been more promise than delivery. When Longstreth first played his old songs with his new band, it was like a match made in heaven, but there were still signs that they could do better. Even 2007’s excellent Rise Above showed hints of greatness in the background. It’s as if Longstreth woke up one morning and decided to write the album everyone’s been waiting for without telling anyone. In that way Bitte Orca also has a sense of potential about it, because it seems like he’s forcing music on his band that they’re not yet fully comfortable with. But there’s a sense of rightness to it. I’ve seen the band three times this year, and each show found them more comfortable with their new roles than the last. In the latest one, Angel Deradoorian sang the most heartbreaking version of “Two Doves” yet, Brian McOmber’s drums were louder and more forceful than ever, and Amber Coffman was fully into “Stillness is the Move,” never holding back. There are elements of all earlier Dirty Projectors albums in this one (Prince-style funk, West African guitar music, bizarre Asian vocal interplay), but it’s filtered into such great pop music (along with a new love for R&B) that it sounds like none of them. It’s his most upfront album to date, and yet its music sticks with you from the first listen until far after it should’ve outstayed its welcome. It’s such a fulfilling feeling to see a band try and try and get closer and closer and finally, in one burst, fully realize their potential. I knew instantly after hearing it that it was the best album released this year. Bitte Orca is awe-inspiring from when the first guitar chord buzzes out until the final synth stops ringing.