My Year in Lists 2013
Tomorrow is my last day of work before the holiday vacation, which is usually when I post my big, year-end wrap-wrap-wrap-up. Here goes.
MOVIES
The Ten Best Movies of 2013
The slogan that best describes the movies I loved most this year: Go Glitzy and Big or Go Very, Very, Intimately Home.
1. Inside Llewyn Davis
I admit I was already in the bag for this movie, but I never realized that what I wanted the Coens to do next was have people sing me sad songs all the way through. How can people accuse them of being cold?
2. Gravity
I held my breath for 90 minutes. I might still be holding it.
3. The Great Gatsby
I don't just love this for the part where fireworks go off during "Rhapsody in Blue," but I do find that scene to be utterly perfect. It's possibly the best movie scene to ever take place on Long Island.
4. The Bling Ring
Goes hand-in-hand with Gatsby. It's a perfect combination of Sofia Coppola's fascination with lost young adults and her natural stylishness.
5. Frances Ha
This movie made my heart so light and springy, I just wanted to dance down the street to "Modern Love."
6. Prince Avalanche
David Gordon Green synthesizes the prettiness of his older, indie movies with the comedy from his bigger studio pictures, then makes his leads look like Mario and Luigi. It's as if he called me up and asked me what kind of movie I wanted him to make.
7. 12 Years a Slave
I can't recall another time when a group of actors this strong has come together for the purposes of being so brutally ugly to each other. (Then again, I haven't seen August: Osage County yet.)
8. The World's End
Let's boo boo.
9. American Hustle
It's a thriller-comedy that manages not to be very jokey, but still very funny. And all that hair! So much incredible hair. With the money they spent on all that product, they probably could've bought a dozen science ovens.
10. Her
The best thing about Spike Jonze is that he really commits to a movie premise, no matter how outlandish. It's not a movie about a guy who's stupid for falling in love with an operating system-it's a movie about the repercussions of falling in love with an operating system. (Otherwise, the movie would be titled Her?) Joaquin Phoenix, who has to act out a romance by himself, is so good I forget what he's actually like in real life.
The Next Five
1. Before Midnight
2. The Conjuring
3. In a World
4. The Spectacular Now
5. Drinking Buddies
The Five Worst
1. Bad Milo
2. Thanks for Sharing
3. The Big Wedding
4. Upside Down
5. Runner Runner
Children of Men Award Nominees
As of this writing, I have not seen Anchorman 2, The Wolf of Wall Street (and IT'S KILLING ME), The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, August: Osage County-or, you know, Grudge Match.
Overrated
People like Upstream Color because it makes them feel smart. They "figure out" what's going on in the movie, and it validates their intelligence. In truth, once the movie is over, there's nothing really to "figure out"-it's all there. (This? Not necessary. I got all this in one viewing, and I'm not the most absorbent movie viewer in the world.) It might be unusually presented, but it doesn't need a 10-page guide like the one Salon did for Donnie Darko. I didn't see Primer, but I don't think Upstream Color needs the same amount of puzzling to sort out what happens. Shane Carruth better watch out, because he's going to get a reputation for movies that require you to untangle them when you don't. He's headed into M. Night Shyamalan territory, where people start talking about the "twists" in movies that don't have twists. (The Happening is not good by any means, but it's not a "twist" that the plants are at fault-it's regular a mid-movie plot point.) Without congratulating myself over the puzzle aspect, Upstream Color a fine movie that gets points for originality. But it didn't blow my mind or anything, and it's not very fun to watch. Except for the pigs.
Underrated
Poor Tony Stoneham. Both Warm Bodies and Jack the Giant Slayer were all right (the former probably moreso), but he didn't break out. Looks like he'll have to stay Beast forever.
Jude Law Award
I saw Benedict Cumberbatch in Star Trek Into Darkness, 12 Years a Slave, and The Fifth Estate. I heard/saw mo-cap of him in The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, and I plan on seeing him in August: Osage County. In the absence of new Sherlock episodes, I am totally okay with this.
Guilty Pleasure
I know that everyone's nuts about the Fast and the Furious franchise (as am I-pour one out for Paul Walker), but I'm more tickled by the bonkers world-building in the Riddick series. Chronicles of Riddick is still my favorite, because it spends the most time in the crazy society it invented ("you keep what you kill"), but the opening of Riddick really did it for me, since it's a near-wordless pastiche of Vin Diesel just chillin'. And by just chillin', I mean kicking nature's ass in a man-vs-nature survival tale. Eventually it becomes more like Pitch Black-the least exciting chapter in the series-but watching Vin Diesel befriend space dog-monsters is enough to carry the rest of the film.
Biggest Disappointment
Let me start off by saying that, like most of America, I found myself underwhelmed by this year's crop of summer blockbusters. I really enjoyed Iron Man 3 for its Shane Blackiness, and Pacific Rim for its robots fighting monsters. But Man of Steel, Star Trek Into Darkness, World War Z, After Earth, Elysium, and The Lone Ranger (except for that last action sequence) all failed to really excite me. Of those, only Man of Steel was painful to sit through, but nothing really captured me the way Inception did two years ago.
But the biggest single disappointment has to be A Good Day to Die Hard. I can't believe that, as John McClane gets older, he also gets more and more invulnerable. The movie completely forgets that the first Die Hard is so good precisely because he's not a superhero. John McClane? Can't find love-especially not with movies like this.
Pleasant Surprise
Gimme the Loot and The We and the I are both movies about the Bronx that don't succumb to Precious-style everything-is-horrible-and-we-have-no-hope misery. Both movies are warm, sweet, and extremely charming-and Gimme the Loot makes me wish someone would go and tag the Mets' home-run apple.
Best Performance Outside My Top 20
Three of them, actually: from Mia Wasikowska, Nicole Kidman, and Matthew Goode. Stoker just barely missed my best-of list, but if you're looking for three chilling performances, it's a go-to. The movie has nothing else to rely on but its actors, and they certainly deliver. The spider doesn't count as giving a good performance, though, because I'm pretty sure he's CG (and, if he's not, more points to Mia Wasikowska for not freaking out when it crawled up her leg).
Best Scene Outside My Top 15
The part where they kill the shark in Kon-Tiki was top-to-bottom amazing. A parrot has never been so avenged.
Best Outwear
It's a tie between the wine-colored corduroy waistcoat that Bilbo wears in The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug and the persimmon-colored canvas jacket Theodore wears in Her. When The Hobbit started, I thought, "Oh! I remember this coat. Watch the movie-don't become obsessed with the coat." Throughout the course of the movie it gets dirtier and dirtier-nooooo!-and I did become obsessed with it, rooting for it to come out okay. For the latter, if Pantone had watched Her, it would've changed the color of the year to whatever color Theo's wearing. I covet.
Most Anticipated Movie of 2014
I'm hoping that the sci-fi of Interstellar and Jupiter Ascending will be better than this year's Elysium/Oblivion/After Earth three strikes, but, c'mon, nothing gets me more excited than Grand Budapest Hotel. Until then, you know the drill-zip it.
MUSIC
Favorite Albums of 2013
I always say that some years the music is better than the movies, and some years the movies are better than the music. This was definitely a music year, as it had a lot of bands releasing albums I listened to a lot in full: The Dismemberment Plan, Los Campesinos!, Arcade Fire, Haim, They Might Be Giants, Okkervil River, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, etc. But there are two I was basically listening to all the damn time. The first was 180 by the Palma Violets-super fun, garage rock songs that are great to sing along to in the car. Their songs are almost like The Hold Steady's songs, in that they don't always do the verse/chorus thing, and sometimes they turn into different songs halfway through. The other was Modern Vampires of the City by Vampire Weekend. Every time, Vampire Weekend makes their albums so that they're just so easy to like. This one isn't as "chamber-pop" as previous ones, but they're just as charming.
Favorite Songs of 2013
1. "Best of Friends" by the Palma Violets
I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a stretch of 2013 when I listened to this song every day. And I'd probably be embarrassed if I admitted how long that stretch was.
Runners up: "Last of the Summer Wine," the rest of the album
2. "Diane Young" by Vampire Weekend
As I said in my PopMatters write-up (the last one on the page), this song has all the hallmarks of a good Vampire Weekend song: Clever wordplay! Wearing their influences on their sleeves! (Buddy Holly this time.) And crazy noises on the "baby, baby, baby" parts.
Runners up: "Unbelievers," the rest of the album
3. "The Wire" by Haim
I'm kind of a sucker for bands that sound like the '90s, but I'm not really a sucker for bands that remind me of the '80s. The fact that Haim has worked its way so thoroughly into my heart proves that these girls have chops. I want to be a Haim.
Runners up: "Don't Save Me," "Forever," "Falling"
4. "Avocado, Baby" by Los Campesinos!
I love it when Los Campesinos! songs have chanty parts-and boy does this one have a chanty part. The one-take video, directed by the kid from Submarine is pretty great, too.
Runners up: "What Death Leaves Behind," "Glue Me" (which has the best Titanic reference in recent memory)
5. "Black Skinhead" by Kanye West
Hearing that riff makes me excited no matter what, even if it's being used in those dumb Moto X commercials.
Runner up: "New Slaves"
6. "Daddy Was a Real Good Dancer" by the Dismemberment Plan
This and "Papa Was a Rodeo" should be sold as their own boxed set or something, because they're both excellent in similar ways.
Runner up: "We Go and Get It"
7. "Nanobots" by They Might Be Giants
Only TMBG would be worried about the overcrowding of tiny things, but it tickles me to hear them singing about the robots "making do with leftovers" and "bunking up".
Runner up: "Circular Karate Chop," which sounds like "On the Drag" in a good way
8. "Here Comes the Night Time" by Arcade Fire
Yeah, I wouldn't have guessed that I would be so into the one with the steel drums, either, but it has an awesome slow-to-fast switch that gets me every time.
Runners up: "Afterife" (also a great video with a punch-dancing Greta Gerwig), "Reflektor"
9. "San Francisco" by Foxygen
The rest of the songs on the album don't really sound like this-they sound more Velvet Undergroundy-which is a shame because I like the sound of this song much better.
10. "Grace for Saints and Ramblers" by Iron and Wine
It's Iron and Wine, but upbeat! Bonus points for using the phrase "rubbing ghost on ghost" as a metaphor for heavy petting.
The Next Five
"White" by Okkervil River
"Despair" and "Subway" by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs
"Ragtime" by Neko Case
"Run Fast" by the Julie Ruin (Honorable Mention: "Cookie Road," because the band tweeted at Jesse that the title was inspired by the cookie store near our apartment)
"Minnie" by Sleigh Bells
Overrated
I don't usually hate songs the way I hate Katy Perry's "Roar". It's fridge-magnet empowerment slogans sung over a plodding nursery-rhyme melody. I can forgive cheesy pop songs if they have a good melody, but the sing-songiness of "Roar" just irritates me more than anything--it's like hearing someone sing the ABCs.
Runner-up: I still can't figure out why I love Haim but don't feel anything for Chvrches. I like a little '80s, but not that much '80s?
Underrated
Besides the Palma Violets, the band I've successfully gotten zero people to like with me despite the gushing? People do underestimate the Strokes. Not that their album this year was any great shakes, but every Stroke album has at least one great song. (This year, that song is "One-Way Trigger".) And it didn't get nearly as much attention as "Home," but "Better Days" by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros is good to listen to when you have the blues.
Guilty Pleasure
This summer, I was pro-"Blurred Lines". I was especially pro-"Blurred Lines" covers. (Vampire Weekend! Jimmy Fallon!) I know some people were skeeved out by the lyrics, but I don't really consider it creepier than any of the other I-want-to-sleep-with-you songs out there. (It demonstrates the Dobler/Dhamer Theory, as described by How I Met Your Mother, where the song is fine if you like it and creepy if you don't.) I actually preferred "Blurred Lines" to its everywhere-this-summer kindred song, "Get Lucky," which was a little too repetitive. Then again, I find myself turning off "Blurred Lines" when I hear it pop up now. It shouldn't really exist outside of summers. Totally a summer fling.
Runners-up: "Why'd You Only Call Me When You're High" by the Arctic Monkeys is dumb but I like it, and "Girls Like Us" by the Julie Ruin irritates me but I like it anyway despite myself. ("Girls like us stand back-to-back just because, you know, we want to know.")
Biggest Disappointment
I like the new Sleigh Bells album, Bitter Rivals, but it's not the all-killer-no-filler explosion that was Treats and it doesn't have any songs I like a much as "Crush." "Minnie" and "Bitter Rivals" are worth it, though.
Pleasant Surprise
Hey, "A Hot Minute", the song written by Tegan & Sara and performed by Lisa Loeb, is really good! It sounds like the best parts of all of them. ("How Come You Don't Want Me" and "Closer" from the actual Tegan & Sara album are pretty good, too.)
Best Covers
Paraphrasing Jesse: There are no punk covers of pop songs. There are no acoustic covers of hip-hop songs. THERE IS ONLY HAIM. Their version of "Wrecking Ball" is a serious improvement (it does the first chorus quietly-dynamics!-and dispenses with the horrible bridge that rhymes "let me in" with "let you in"). "Strong Enough" reminds me why I owned that cassingle, and "Hazy Shade of Winter" is basically the Bangles' version, which is great.
If another band/artist could sneak in a cover past Haim onto this list, it'd be She & Him, who did a really respectable "Sunday Girl" on their newest album.
Most Anticipated Album of 2014
Gee, is there any band left that didn't put out an album in 2013? Oh yes, THE HOLD STEADY. And it's been far too long.
Live in '13
They Might Be Giants (x3, counting NYE 2012 into 2013)
Ty Segall
Stars
Yeah Yeah Yeahs (regular + festival)
The Postal Service
She & Him
Belle and Sebastian
My Morning Jacket (festival)
Wilco (festival)
Bob Dylan (festival)
Beck
Vampire Weekend (Solange opening)
Palma Violets
The Dismemberment Plan
The Felice Brothers (soon)
Best in Show
I remember thinking that, after the last show with The Dismemberment Plan, I didn't want to wait another ten years before I saw them again. And I didn't have to! It was great! I got to stand in the front row and nobody hassled me! I found a Vine from the show that just kills me, because you can really see how into it we are-a little pocket of happiness. (We're all the way to the left.)
NB: I made a Spotify playlist of much of the above for your listening pleasure.
TV & BOOKS
My most satisfying TV experience this year was Breaking Bad. We watched the entire run of the series this year-or maybe we started at the tail-end of 2012-but it feels like a very 2013 undertaking. It just worked out that way, but it makes sense to have started it and ended it in one year, since the best thing about it was its completeness. It had an extremely satisfying ending, which might be better than trying to pull of a surprising ending (and possibly failing). Then again, if that surprise ending involved Todd and Lydia riding off into the sunset, I might have been equally pleased.
Other than Breaking Bad, new shows that I've picked up this year and would encourage others to watch are Sleepy Hollow, which I like because it balances monster-of-the-week episodes with a crazy-ass overarching plot that moves too fast to really get bogged down by (and, you know, time-travel jokes!); Brooklyn Nine-Nine for the amazing deadpan by Andre Braugher (even if it's not very Brooklyny); and Trophy Wife, which reminds me of what I liked about Modern Family before I got sick of Modern Family.
For books, YA-division, I was as charmed by Eleanor & Park as everyone else was. Way to be a love story that in no way involves any kind of triangles, Eleanor and Park. Or vampires. In the non-YA division, Sisterland got me on a tear of reading books about twins. (Including Fangirl, the Eleanor and Park follow-up.) I have Her Fearful Symmetry on my nightstand ready to continue this trend.
Happy holidays, everyone, and I'll see you in 2014!
MOVIES
The Ten Best Movies of 2013
The slogan that best describes the movies I loved most this year: Go Glitzy and Big or Go Very, Very, Intimately Home.
1. Inside Llewyn Davis
I admit I was already in the bag for this movie, but I never realized that what I wanted the Coens to do next was have people sing me sad songs all the way through. How can people accuse them of being cold?
2. Gravity
I held my breath for 90 minutes. I might still be holding it.
3. The Great Gatsby
I don't just love this for the part where fireworks go off during "Rhapsody in Blue," but I do find that scene to be utterly perfect. It's possibly the best movie scene to ever take place on Long Island.
4. The Bling Ring
Goes hand-in-hand with Gatsby. It's a perfect combination of Sofia Coppola's fascination with lost young adults and her natural stylishness.
5. Frances Ha
This movie made my heart so light and springy, I just wanted to dance down the street to "Modern Love."
6. Prince Avalanche
David Gordon Green synthesizes the prettiness of his older, indie movies with the comedy from his bigger studio pictures, then makes his leads look like Mario and Luigi. It's as if he called me up and asked me what kind of movie I wanted him to make.
7. 12 Years a Slave
I can't recall another time when a group of actors this strong has come together for the purposes of being so brutally ugly to each other. (Then again, I haven't seen August: Osage County yet.)
8. The World's End
Let's boo boo.
9. American Hustle
It's a thriller-comedy that manages not to be very jokey, but still very funny. And all that hair! So much incredible hair. With the money they spent on all that product, they probably could've bought a dozen science ovens.
10. Her
The best thing about Spike Jonze is that he really commits to a movie premise, no matter how outlandish. It's not a movie about a guy who's stupid for falling in love with an operating system-it's a movie about the repercussions of falling in love with an operating system. (Otherwise, the movie would be titled Her?) Joaquin Phoenix, who has to act out a romance by himself, is so good I forget what he's actually like in real life.
The Next Five
1. Before Midnight
2. The Conjuring
3. In a World
4. The Spectacular Now
5. Drinking Buddies
The Five Worst
1. Bad Milo
2. Thanks for Sharing
3. The Big Wedding
4. Upside Down
5. Runner Runner
Children of Men Award Nominees
As of this writing, I have not seen Anchorman 2, The Wolf of Wall Street (and IT'S KILLING ME), The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, August: Osage County-or, you know, Grudge Match.
Overrated
People like Upstream Color because it makes them feel smart. They "figure out" what's going on in the movie, and it validates their intelligence. In truth, once the movie is over, there's nothing really to "figure out"-it's all there. (This? Not necessary. I got all this in one viewing, and I'm not the most absorbent movie viewer in the world.) It might be unusually presented, but it doesn't need a 10-page guide like the one Salon did for Donnie Darko. I didn't see Primer, but I don't think Upstream Color needs the same amount of puzzling to sort out what happens. Shane Carruth better watch out, because he's going to get a reputation for movies that require you to untangle them when you don't. He's headed into M. Night Shyamalan territory, where people start talking about the "twists" in movies that don't have twists. (The Happening is not good by any means, but it's not a "twist" that the plants are at fault-it's regular a mid-movie plot point.) Without congratulating myself over the puzzle aspect, Upstream Color a fine movie that gets points for originality. But it didn't blow my mind or anything, and it's not very fun to watch. Except for the pigs.
Underrated
Poor Tony Stoneham. Both Warm Bodies and Jack the Giant Slayer were all right (the former probably moreso), but he didn't break out. Looks like he'll have to stay Beast forever.
Jude Law Award
I saw Benedict Cumberbatch in Star Trek Into Darkness, 12 Years a Slave, and The Fifth Estate. I heard/saw mo-cap of him in The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, and I plan on seeing him in August: Osage County. In the absence of new Sherlock episodes, I am totally okay with this.
Guilty Pleasure
I know that everyone's nuts about the Fast and the Furious franchise (as am I-pour one out for Paul Walker), but I'm more tickled by the bonkers world-building in the Riddick series. Chronicles of Riddick is still my favorite, because it spends the most time in the crazy society it invented ("you keep what you kill"), but the opening of Riddick really did it for me, since it's a near-wordless pastiche of Vin Diesel just chillin'. And by just chillin', I mean kicking nature's ass in a man-vs-nature survival tale. Eventually it becomes more like Pitch Black-the least exciting chapter in the series-but watching Vin Diesel befriend space dog-monsters is enough to carry the rest of the film.
Biggest Disappointment
Let me start off by saying that, like most of America, I found myself underwhelmed by this year's crop of summer blockbusters. I really enjoyed Iron Man 3 for its Shane Blackiness, and Pacific Rim for its robots fighting monsters. But Man of Steel, Star Trek Into Darkness, World War Z, After Earth, Elysium, and The Lone Ranger (except for that last action sequence) all failed to really excite me. Of those, only Man of Steel was painful to sit through, but nothing really captured me the way Inception did two years ago.
But the biggest single disappointment has to be A Good Day to Die Hard. I can't believe that, as John McClane gets older, he also gets more and more invulnerable. The movie completely forgets that the first Die Hard is so good precisely because he's not a superhero. John McClane? Can't find love-especially not with movies like this.
Pleasant Surprise
Gimme the Loot and The We and the I are both movies about the Bronx that don't succumb to Precious-style everything-is-horrible-and-we-have-no-hope misery. Both movies are warm, sweet, and extremely charming-and Gimme the Loot makes me wish someone would go and tag the Mets' home-run apple.
Best Performance Outside My Top 20
Three of them, actually: from Mia Wasikowska, Nicole Kidman, and Matthew Goode. Stoker just barely missed my best-of list, but if you're looking for three chilling performances, it's a go-to. The movie has nothing else to rely on but its actors, and they certainly deliver. The spider doesn't count as giving a good performance, though, because I'm pretty sure he's CG (and, if he's not, more points to Mia Wasikowska for not freaking out when it crawled up her leg).
Best Scene Outside My Top 15
The part where they kill the shark in Kon-Tiki was top-to-bottom amazing. A parrot has never been so avenged.
Best Outwear
It's a tie between the wine-colored corduroy waistcoat that Bilbo wears in The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug and the persimmon-colored canvas jacket Theodore wears in Her. When The Hobbit started, I thought, "Oh! I remember this coat. Watch the movie-don't become obsessed with the coat." Throughout the course of the movie it gets dirtier and dirtier-nooooo!-and I did become obsessed with it, rooting for it to come out okay. For the latter, if Pantone had watched Her, it would've changed the color of the year to whatever color Theo's wearing. I covet.
Most Anticipated Movie of 2014
I'm hoping that the sci-fi of Interstellar and Jupiter Ascending will be better than this year's Elysium/Oblivion/After Earth three strikes, but, c'mon, nothing gets me more excited than Grand Budapest Hotel. Until then, you know the drill-zip it.
Click to view MUSIC
Favorite Albums of 2013
I always say that some years the music is better than the movies, and some years the movies are better than the music. This was definitely a music year, as it had a lot of bands releasing albums I listened to a lot in full: The Dismemberment Plan, Los Campesinos!, Arcade Fire, Haim, They Might Be Giants, Okkervil River, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, etc. But there are two I was basically listening to all the damn time. The first was 180 by the Palma Violets-super fun, garage rock songs that are great to sing along to in the car. Their songs are almost like The Hold Steady's songs, in that they don't always do the verse/chorus thing, and sometimes they turn into different songs halfway through. The other was Modern Vampires of the City by Vampire Weekend. Every time, Vampire Weekend makes their albums so that they're just so easy to like. This one isn't as "chamber-pop" as previous ones, but they're just as charming.
Favorite Songs of 2013
1. "Best of Friends" by the Palma Violets
I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a stretch of 2013 when I listened to this song every day. And I'd probably be embarrassed if I admitted how long that stretch was.
Runners up: "Last of the Summer Wine," the rest of the album
2. "Diane Young" by Vampire Weekend
As I said in my PopMatters write-up (the last one on the page), this song has all the hallmarks of a good Vampire Weekend song: Clever wordplay! Wearing their influences on their sleeves! (Buddy Holly this time.) And crazy noises on the "baby, baby, baby" parts.
Runners up: "Unbelievers," the rest of the album
3. "The Wire" by Haim
I'm kind of a sucker for bands that sound like the '90s, but I'm not really a sucker for bands that remind me of the '80s. The fact that Haim has worked its way so thoroughly into my heart proves that these girls have chops. I want to be a Haim.
Runners up: "Don't Save Me," "Forever," "Falling"
4. "Avocado, Baby" by Los Campesinos!
I love it when Los Campesinos! songs have chanty parts-and boy does this one have a chanty part. The one-take video, directed by the kid from Submarine is pretty great, too.
Runners up: "What Death Leaves Behind," "Glue Me" (which has the best Titanic reference in recent memory)
5. "Black Skinhead" by Kanye West
Hearing that riff makes me excited no matter what, even if it's being used in those dumb Moto X commercials.
Runner up: "New Slaves"
6. "Daddy Was a Real Good Dancer" by the Dismemberment Plan
This and "Papa Was a Rodeo" should be sold as their own boxed set or something, because they're both excellent in similar ways.
Runner up: "We Go and Get It"
7. "Nanobots" by They Might Be Giants
Only TMBG would be worried about the overcrowding of tiny things, but it tickles me to hear them singing about the robots "making do with leftovers" and "bunking up".
Runner up: "Circular Karate Chop," which sounds like "On the Drag" in a good way
8. "Here Comes the Night Time" by Arcade Fire
Yeah, I wouldn't have guessed that I would be so into the one with the steel drums, either, but it has an awesome slow-to-fast switch that gets me every time.
Runners up: "Afterife" (also a great video with a punch-dancing Greta Gerwig), "Reflektor"
9. "San Francisco" by Foxygen
The rest of the songs on the album don't really sound like this-they sound more Velvet Undergroundy-which is a shame because I like the sound of this song much better.
10. "Grace for Saints and Ramblers" by Iron and Wine
It's Iron and Wine, but upbeat! Bonus points for using the phrase "rubbing ghost on ghost" as a metaphor for heavy petting.
The Next Five
"White" by Okkervil River
"Despair" and "Subway" by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs
"Ragtime" by Neko Case
"Run Fast" by the Julie Ruin (Honorable Mention: "Cookie Road," because the band tweeted at Jesse that the title was inspired by the cookie store near our apartment)
"Minnie" by Sleigh Bells
Overrated
I don't usually hate songs the way I hate Katy Perry's "Roar". It's fridge-magnet empowerment slogans sung over a plodding nursery-rhyme melody. I can forgive cheesy pop songs if they have a good melody, but the sing-songiness of "Roar" just irritates me more than anything--it's like hearing someone sing the ABCs.
Runner-up: I still can't figure out why I love Haim but don't feel anything for Chvrches. I like a little '80s, but not that much '80s?
Underrated
Besides the Palma Violets, the band I've successfully gotten zero people to like with me despite the gushing? People do underestimate the Strokes. Not that their album this year was any great shakes, but every Stroke album has at least one great song. (This year, that song is "One-Way Trigger".) And it didn't get nearly as much attention as "Home," but "Better Days" by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros is good to listen to when you have the blues.
Guilty Pleasure
This summer, I was pro-"Blurred Lines". I was especially pro-"Blurred Lines" covers. (Vampire Weekend! Jimmy Fallon!) I know some people were skeeved out by the lyrics, but I don't really consider it creepier than any of the other I-want-to-sleep-with-you songs out there. (It demonstrates the Dobler/Dhamer Theory, as described by How I Met Your Mother, where the song is fine if you like it and creepy if you don't.) I actually preferred "Blurred Lines" to its everywhere-this-summer kindred song, "Get Lucky," which was a little too repetitive. Then again, I find myself turning off "Blurred Lines" when I hear it pop up now. It shouldn't really exist outside of summers. Totally a summer fling.
Runners-up: "Why'd You Only Call Me When You're High" by the Arctic Monkeys is dumb but I like it, and "Girls Like Us" by the Julie Ruin irritates me but I like it anyway despite myself. ("Girls like us stand back-to-back just because, you know, we want to know.")
Biggest Disappointment
I like the new Sleigh Bells album, Bitter Rivals, but it's not the all-killer-no-filler explosion that was Treats and it doesn't have any songs I like a much as "Crush." "Minnie" and "Bitter Rivals" are worth it, though.
Pleasant Surprise
Hey, "A Hot Minute", the song written by Tegan & Sara and performed by Lisa Loeb, is really good! It sounds like the best parts of all of them. ("How Come You Don't Want Me" and "Closer" from the actual Tegan & Sara album are pretty good, too.)
Best Covers
Paraphrasing Jesse: There are no punk covers of pop songs. There are no acoustic covers of hip-hop songs. THERE IS ONLY HAIM. Their version of "Wrecking Ball" is a serious improvement (it does the first chorus quietly-dynamics!-and dispenses with the horrible bridge that rhymes "let me in" with "let you in"). "Strong Enough" reminds me why I owned that cassingle, and "Hazy Shade of Winter" is basically the Bangles' version, which is great.
If another band/artist could sneak in a cover past Haim onto this list, it'd be She & Him, who did a really respectable "Sunday Girl" on their newest album.
Most Anticipated Album of 2014
Gee, is there any band left that didn't put out an album in 2013? Oh yes, THE HOLD STEADY. And it's been far too long.
Live in '13
They Might Be Giants (x3, counting NYE 2012 into 2013)
Ty Segall
Stars
Yeah Yeah Yeahs (regular + festival)
The Postal Service
She & Him
Belle and Sebastian
My Morning Jacket (festival)
Wilco (festival)
Bob Dylan (festival)
Beck
Vampire Weekend (Solange opening)
Palma Violets
The Dismemberment Plan
The Felice Brothers (soon)
Best in Show
I remember thinking that, after the last show with The Dismemberment Plan, I didn't want to wait another ten years before I saw them again. And I didn't have to! It was great! I got to stand in the front row and nobody hassled me! I found a Vine from the show that just kills me, because you can really see how into it we are-a little pocket of happiness. (We're all the way to the left.)
NB: I made a Spotify playlist of much of the above for your listening pleasure.
TV & BOOKS
My most satisfying TV experience this year was Breaking Bad. We watched the entire run of the series this year-or maybe we started at the tail-end of 2012-but it feels like a very 2013 undertaking. It just worked out that way, but it makes sense to have started it and ended it in one year, since the best thing about it was its completeness. It had an extremely satisfying ending, which might be better than trying to pull of a surprising ending (and possibly failing). Then again, if that surprise ending involved Todd and Lydia riding off into the sunset, I might have been equally pleased.
Other than Breaking Bad, new shows that I've picked up this year and would encourage others to watch are Sleepy Hollow, which I like because it balances monster-of-the-week episodes with a crazy-ass overarching plot that moves too fast to really get bogged down by (and, you know, time-travel jokes!); Brooklyn Nine-Nine for the amazing deadpan by Andre Braugher (even if it's not very Brooklyny); and Trophy Wife, which reminds me of what I liked about Modern Family before I got sick of Modern Family.
For books, YA-division, I was as charmed by Eleanor & Park as everyone else was. Way to be a love story that in no way involves any kind of triangles, Eleanor and Park. Or vampires. In the non-YA division, Sisterland got me on a tear of reading books about twins. (Including Fangirl, the Eleanor and Park follow-up.) I have Her Fearful Symmetry on my nightstand ready to continue this trend.
Happy holidays, everyone, and I'll see you in 2014!