oh yeah, i have a livejournal
i have yet to receive my grades, but i'm pretty sure i made a's. we'll see. i enjoyed my first semester of big kid school and look forward to the next one. other than school, i haven't done much. i need a job next semester. i've only worked three months this year. three horrible months of hate-working.
whatever.
it was a damn good year for music. 2008 was kinda meh, but 2009 rocked my socks.
first, the disappointments:
the decemberists - hazards of love - i get it, somehow a rock opera is supposed to be the next logical step for a literate indie band, but this just did not work. at all. it's hard to carry a narrative through an entire album, even craig finn has more or less given up on trying to do it, but it doesn't help that the decemberists are not a classic rock band. the instrumentation choices were wrong and felt false and hollow. some of the proggy elements of the crane wife worked because they were put inside long songs and bookended with standard acceptable indie rock conventions. basically the decemberists stepped too far outside of their established milieu and paid the price.
regina spektor - far - everything about this album is horrible. the songwriting is pedantic and lazy for someone who has proven herself to be talented. the slick production values do nothing for the songs and ultimately highlight just how bad the writing is. what is absolutely maddening is that are segments in each song that work and sound good until she fucking ruins them by making dolphin noises or pushing the song into another overwrought chorus.
the mars volta - octahedron - i'm losing patience with the mars volta. is this another case of a band going off drugs and then sucking? some of the lyrics were so groan inducingly emo (not that they're lyrics were ever the draw)that i couldn't take the music seriously. this is not the same band that put out de-loused at the crematorium or amputechture, this a caricature of that band.
now, the albums that surprised me:
memory tapes - seek magic/ neon indian - psychic chasms - the "chill wave" or "glo fi" or whatever people want to call this movement worked well for me. both albums triggered 80s nostalgia but in a good way. these bands put out fun, warped electronic music with a sheen of dreamy production. several other bands jumped on the wagon: jj, washed out, toro y moi, ducktails, delorean, etc. but for me, memory tapes and neon indian rose above the rest.
girls - album - if we look at punk rock as a form of music that respectfully holds up traditional pop rock conventions to gleefully shit on them, then girls is the break out punk band of the year. despite the lo-fi approach, the songs sound huge and full. christopher owens vocals owe a debt to elvis costello but where elvis sneers, owens giggles. naming your first track "lust for life" is a ballsy move; making that the song the best opening track of the year is a true accomplishment.
bear in heaven - beast rest forth mouth - if the flaming lips made the stoner album of the year, this is a close second. echo chamber vocals, warm synths, beats, and a hazy atmosphere round out this perfect headphones album. the songs build and expand and wheeze and groan their way through the album. the songs feel like they could go on and on and i would still want more.
fever ray - s/t - normally, i don't trust dense, sparse works. that's why it took years for me to warm up to kid a (which i still think is incredibly over-rated). but i enjoyed the knife's silent shout and thought i would give fever ray a chance and i'm glad i did. it is odd to listen to something so obviously inspired by bjork, odd in that it makes me feel like an old man. some people i've talked find the pitch-shifted down to the bottom of her register vocals jarring and too creepy but i think they work well and add the foreboding atmosphere of the songs. despite all the goth trappings and minimal percussion there is nothing depressing about this album. i want to know how she pulled that off.
blakroc - i had no idea that a collaboration between the black keys and several rappers (mos def, ludacris, q-tip, rza, reakwon, jim jones, and the corpse of odb) would work this well, but it does. The combo of blues riffs, heavy beats and nicole wray's backing vocals make this album work as more than just a crossover indie/hip-hop experiment but a fun listening experience that leaves you swaying along.
YACHT - see mystery lights - yacht didn't make it onto anyone's top 50 list and that's pathetic. this album is fun glitch/electronic music that is perfect for sunny days and beers. furthering humanism by deconstructing new age bullshit and religious dogma, yacht is having a lot of fun with their laptops.
st. vincent - actor - with actor, annie clark avoided falling into the all-too-common indie rock trap of relying on cutesy to get by (looking at you regina spektor). this album takes you to the wrong side of three in the morning and leaves you strung out and growing a pair of donkey ears. disney orchestration meets abrasive noise-guitar assaults. songs build up and go nowhere, leaving you tense and deprived of any kind of release. but it all works.
fuck buttons - tarot sport - i liked the first fuck buttons album a lot, but i had no idea that they would be able to grow their sound like this. none of these songs reach the heights that "sweet love for planet earth" did but "surf solar" and "space mountain" come close. ten minutes goes by fast with the fuck buttons as they layer noise on top of melody on top of beats. they threw out their gritty grind vocals for this album and added more pretty sounds to contrast with the sheets of white noise that pulse through each song. this album makes you want to buy the expensive headphones and speakers so you catch everything they're throwing.
albums i expected to like and did:
the flaming lips - embryonic - i can't imagine that people who jumped on the flaming lips bandwagon after listening to the soft bulletin are too impressed with this album, but fuck them. this is the stoner album of the year. it pushes you further and further into your couch. this is the album they've been promising for years: a noisy, cluttered mess of barely held together songs that attack all the new age mysticism people project on the band. that's a compliment. other bands i love put out great records this year: built to spill, yo la tengo, wilco, the yeah yeah yeahs, why?, etc. but none were as daring as the lips.
dan deacon - bromst - there is one song i don't like on this album. "wet wings" is loop experiment that fails where "woody woodpecker" succeed in his last album. other than that, this is deacon at his peak. all the songs build and shrink and turn inside out, just the way you want them to. the swirling player piano and high bpm ratio work in tandem with his trademark chipmunk vocals work well, but the biggest surprise is the long building songs that prove deacon is maturing and taking his music further than anyone expected.
mos def - the ecstatic - mos def outdoes himself in this album. his live music experiments were hard to take seriously but he's back to form now. his globe spanning samples compliment big fat beats. he takes on serious subjects like the iraq war, homeland security and the police state and never falls into misogynistic, homophobic rantings (seriously, the homophobia thing is what's keeping busdriver and doom off my list this year, wtf?).
grizzly bear - veckatimest - it takes a while to fully unpack this one. the songs that don't work on the first listen grow on you after a while but don't stand on their own too well. this isn't a bad thing. "two weeks" and "while you wait for the others" are great singles and "southern point" is a great opener but wading through "dory" and "foreground" is difficult at first. i want cohesive albums where all the songs stand out and can work in mixes but that doesn't always happen (more like that never really happens). this album works as a whole and should really be listened to as one. some albums tend to be like boondocks saints - fun at first, but they get worse with every subsequent visit - this album rewards you for going back to it.
animal collective - merriweather post pavilion/fall be kind - i don't have much to add to the discourse surrounding this album, other than to say it's great. i've been hearing a lot of "i don't get the appeal" arguments dismissing the band as a button pushers who have no musical ability and that is a false argument given that they've proven in previous, less electronic albums that they have plenty of musical prowess and know how to play "real" instruments. the thing that bothers me is that if what they do is so easily dismissed because "anybody can push a button" than why aren't there scores of imitators? for me the year began and ended with animal collective. just when i'd worn the album out, the ep showed up featuring the best song they've made yet, "what would i want sky?". as recording techniques grow more advanced, limits to what can be done in a pop song are eroding. animal collective are recording fun, warped pop songs that occasionally contain bursts of noise or screaming fits and it works for them. each album is different and builds off of everything that came before it. that's really all i want from a band.
honorable mention:
reakwon - only built 4 cuban links pt. 2
white denim - fits
atlas sound - logos
HEALTH - get color
andrew bird - noble beast
dirty projectors - bitta orca
the pains of being pure at heart - s/t, higher than the stars ep
califone - all my friends are funeral singers
a few great non-album songs that came out this year:
sufjan stevens - you are the blood
burial - fostercare
crystal stilts - love is a wave
air france - cbg belongs to us
lcd soundsystem - bye bye bayou (alan vega cover)
leaked 2010 albums i'm currently enjoying:
beach house - teen dream
los campesinos - romance is boring
midlake - the courage of others
yeasayer - odd blood
peace.
whatever.
it was a damn good year for music. 2008 was kinda meh, but 2009 rocked my socks.
first, the disappointments:
the decemberists - hazards of love - i get it, somehow a rock opera is supposed to be the next logical step for a literate indie band, but this just did not work. at all. it's hard to carry a narrative through an entire album, even craig finn has more or less given up on trying to do it, but it doesn't help that the decemberists are not a classic rock band. the instrumentation choices were wrong and felt false and hollow. some of the proggy elements of the crane wife worked because they were put inside long songs and bookended with standard acceptable indie rock conventions. basically the decemberists stepped too far outside of their established milieu and paid the price.
regina spektor - far - everything about this album is horrible. the songwriting is pedantic and lazy for someone who has proven herself to be talented. the slick production values do nothing for the songs and ultimately highlight just how bad the writing is. what is absolutely maddening is that are segments in each song that work and sound good until she fucking ruins them by making dolphin noises or pushing the song into another overwrought chorus.
the mars volta - octahedron - i'm losing patience with the mars volta. is this another case of a band going off drugs and then sucking? some of the lyrics were so groan inducingly emo (not that they're lyrics were ever the draw)that i couldn't take the music seriously. this is not the same band that put out de-loused at the crematorium or amputechture, this a caricature of that band.
now, the albums that surprised me:
memory tapes - seek magic/ neon indian - psychic chasms - the "chill wave" or "glo fi" or whatever people want to call this movement worked well for me. both albums triggered 80s nostalgia but in a good way. these bands put out fun, warped electronic music with a sheen of dreamy production. several other bands jumped on the wagon: jj, washed out, toro y moi, ducktails, delorean, etc. but for me, memory tapes and neon indian rose above the rest.
girls - album - if we look at punk rock as a form of music that respectfully holds up traditional pop rock conventions to gleefully shit on them, then girls is the break out punk band of the year. despite the lo-fi approach, the songs sound huge and full. christopher owens vocals owe a debt to elvis costello but where elvis sneers, owens giggles. naming your first track "lust for life" is a ballsy move; making that the song the best opening track of the year is a true accomplishment.
bear in heaven - beast rest forth mouth - if the flaming lips made the stoner album of the year, this is a close second. echo chamber vocals, warm synths, beats, and a hazy atmosphere round out this perfect headphones album. the songs build and expand and wheeze and groan their way through the album. the songs feel like they could go on and on and i would still want more.
fever ray - s/t - normally, i don't trust dense, sparse works. that's why it took years for me to warm up to kid a (which i still think is incredibly over-rated). but i enjoyed the knife's silent shout and thought i would give fever ray a chance and i'm glad i did. it is odd to listen to something so obviously inspired by bjork, odd in that it makes me feel like an old man. some people i've talked find the pitch-shifted down to the bottom of her register vocals jarring and too creepy but i think they work well and add the foreboding atmosphere of the songs. despite all the goth trappings and minimal percussion there is nothing depressing about this album. i want to know how she pulled that off.
blakroc - i had no idea that a collaboration between the black keys and several rappers (mos def, ludacris, q-tip, rza, reakwon, jim jones, and the corpse of odb) would work this well, but it does. The combo of blues riffs, heavy beats and nicole wray's backing vocals make this album work as more than just a crossover indie/hip-hop experiment but a fun listening experience that leaves you swaying along.
YACHT - see mystery lights - yacht didn't make it onto anyone's top 50 list and that's pathetic. this album is fun glitch/electronic music that is perfect for sunny days and beers. furthering humanism by deconstructing new age bullshit and religious dogma, yacht is having a lot of fun with their laptops.
st. vincent - actor - with actor, annie clark avoided falling into the all-too-common indie rock trap of relying on cutesy to get by (looking at you regina spektor). this album takes you to the wrong side of three in the morning and leaves you strung out and growing a pair of donkey ears. disney orchestration meets abrasive noise-guitar assaults. songs build up and go nowhere, leaving you tense and deprived of any kind of release. but it all works.
fuck buttons - tarot sport - i liked the first fuck buttons album a lot, but i had no idea that they would be able to grow their sound like this. none of these songs reach the heights that "sweet love for planet earth" did but "surf solar" and "space mountain" come close. ten minutes goes by fast with the fuck buttons as they layer noise on top of melody on top of beats. they threw out their gritty grind vocals for this album and added more pretty sounds to contrast with the sheets of white noise that pulse through each song. this album makes you want to buy the expensive headphones and speakers so you catch everything they're throwing.
albums i expected to like and did:
the flaming lips - embryonic - i can't imagine that people who jumped on the flaming lips bandwagon after listening to the soft bulletin are too impressed with this album, but fuck them. this is the stoner album of the year. it pushes you further and further into your couch. this is the album they've been promising for years: a noisy, cluttered mess of barely held together songs that attack all the new age mysticism people project on the band. that's a compliment. other bands i love put out great records this year: built to spill, yo la tengo, wilco, the yeah yeah yeahs, why?, etc. but none were as daring as the lips.
dan deacon - bromst - there is one song i don't like on this album. "wet wings" is loop experiment that fails where "woody woodpecker" succeed in his last album. other than that, this is deacon at his peak. all the songs build and shrink and turn inside out, just the way you want them to. the swirling player piano and high bpm ratio work in tandem with his trademark chipmunk vocals work well, but the biggest surprise is the long building songs that prove deacon is maturing and taking his music further than anyone expected.
mos def - the ecstatic - mos def outdoes himself in this album. his live music experiments were hard to take seriously but he's back to form now. his globe spanning samples compliment big fat beats. he takes on serious subjects like the iraq war, homeland security and the police state and never falls into misogynistic, homophobic rantings (seriously, the homophobia thing is what's keeping busdriver and doom off my list this year, wtf?).
grizzly bear - veckatimest - it takes a while to fully unpack this one. the songs that don't work on the first listen grow on you after a while but don't stand on their own too well. this isn't a bad thing. "two weeks" and "while you wait for the others" are great singles and "southern point" is a great opener but wading through "dory" and "foreground" is difficult at first. i want cohesive albums where all the songs stand out and can work in mixes but that doesn't always happen (more like that never really happens). this album works as a whole and should really be listened to as one. some albums tend to be like boondocks saints - fun at first, but they get worse with every subsequent visit - this album rewards you for going back to it.
animal collective - merriweather post pavilion/fall be kind - i don't have much to add to the discourse surrounding this album, other than to say it's great. i've been hearing a lot of "i don't get the appeal" arguments dismissing the band as a button pushers who have no musical ability and that is a false argument given that they've proven in previous, less electronic albums that they have plenty of musical prowess and know how to play "real" instruments. the thing that bothers me is that if what they do is so easily dismissed because "anybody can push a button" than why aren't there scores of imitators? for me the year began and ended with animal collective. just when i'd worn the album out, the ep showed up featuring the best song they've made yet, "what would i want sky?". as recording techniques grow more advanced, limits to what can be done in a pop song are eroding. animal collective are recording fun, warped pop songs that occasionally contain bursts of noise or screaming fits and it works for them. each album is different and builds off of everything that came before it. that's really all i want from a band.
honorable mention:
reakwon - only built 4 cuban links pt. 2
white denim - fits
atlas sound - logos
HEALTH - get color
andrew bird - noble beast
dirty projectors - bitta orca
the pains of being pure at heart - s/t, higher than the stars ep
califone - all my friends are funeral singers
a few great non-album songs that came out this year:
sufjan stevens - you are the blood
burial - fostercare
crystal stilts - love is a wave
air france - cbg belongs to us
lcd soundsystem - bye bye bayou (alan vega cover)
leaked 2010 albums i'm currently enjoying:
beach house - teen dream
los campesinos - romance is boring
midlake - the courage of others
yeasayer - odd blood
peace.