It's that time of the year when publications, websites and bloggers make lists of the music they have listened to throughout the year. I haven't listened to enough to definitively rank "the best ten albums", "the worst number one singles" or "Rage Against The Machine's lamest moment" (oh wait, we all know what that was) so I'm going to rank all of the albums I've bought/heard, ignoring any which I haven't given enough time to to make a fair judgement (how unusually reasonable of me!) and say a few words about the top five too. In order of merit...
The XX (s/t)
I listen to music a lot of the time. I prefer to listen through my amp and speakers, but sometimes it's through headphones, laptop speakers, radios and small ghetto-blasters. A combination of the poor quality of outputs and the way that a lot of music is produced, mixed and mastered means that sometimes I want to scream SHUT UP as loud as possible an then go and sit in a quiet room while I wipe my tears and massage my head. No, I'm not a nervous wreck, it's just that too much sound coming out of a small speaker sounds horrible.
Where is all this going? Well, the XX are a band who under the power of understatement and more importantly s p a c e. I love the bravery they've shown in going for such sparse arrangements. Soft, almost whispered vocals, crisp drum programming and simple, NOT-over produced guitars answer my prayers for music which doesn't abuse my ears by being too loud and busy. The production is beautiful, the vocals in particular sounding as if someone is standing right behind you, singing just to you.
My favourite track is probably Islands, with it's great drum track, vocals traded between male and female voices and gorgeous building to climaxes. The is where the XX bring the funk the most, but in their own decidedly creepy way. The other highlight is Night Time with its huge echo as a counterpoint to the loneliness which pervades.
A fantastically dark, engaging album and the coolest looking band since Galaxie 500.
Wild Beasts - Two Dancers
This one is near the top of most lists, and deservedly so. All the King's Men in particular is brilliant, but my personal favourite is We Still Got The Taste Dancin' On Our Tongues. The song has a slightly shuffly feel. The wooping and tremulous singing lends a real playfulness which I think really suits the subject matter. So he kissed a girl? So what? It's great to hear a "traditional" rock/pop band setup doing something which sound so fresh.
Scenester moment - my friend knows this band.
Fever Ray (s/t)
It was always hard to tell who was singing on The Knife's releases due to their penchant for pitch-shifting, and Fever Ray does nothing to clarify the situation, with a number of voices appearing throughout the album, all belonging to Karin Dreijer Andersson, the female half of The Knife. If I Had A Heart, the first single which preceded the album sets out the stall - creepy and greyscale, with foreboding bass. The introduction's saw-like rumbling sounds very violent; a chill runs throughout the album which is less violent than the opener, something closer to fear. Seven is my pick, the track which sounds most as if it could be performed by a "traditional" band (though that's incidental). I think the vocal melody is actually lovely, building from the verse into the chorus, with the vocals less produced than in other places - maybe Karin at her most vulnerable.
The darkness of The Knife's Silent Shout is identifiable here but, despite the business of the programming in some parts, the whole feeling is far more minimal, and I think this is a real night-time album.
Animal Collective - Merryweather Post Pavillion
Animal Collective, indie darlings? Well, this release wasn't a crossover smash exactly, but a hell of a lot more people were talking about Animal Collective afterwards. I'm not so cynical as to suggest they wrote an album to expand their fanbase, but taking Merryweather as a whole, it is definitely a lot catchier and "poppier" than earlier material, although I was happy that the overwhelming fizzy-drink-sugariness of previous album Strawberry Jam has been toned down a bit.
My Girls is a pulsing treat of a song, with trademark trebly bleeps and high, calling voices but with massive punch at the low end - it translated excellently to the stage at the Forum and Brixton Academy when I saw them; indeed throughout, Animal Collective brought bass to really round out their experimental sound. I also really like the chanted chorus - "I don't mean to seem like I care about material things like a social status, I just want four walls and adobe slabs for my girls." The vocal production on this track is reminiscent of Panda Bear's wonderful Person Pitch and I wouldn't be surprised if he was mainly responsible for this one.
I also really like the understated Bluish which somehow sounds innocently childish and is so honest; it works well as a moment of relaxation amidst the energy of the rest of the album.
Andrew Bird - Noble Beast
I was a newcomer to Andrew Bird's orchestrated nuggets with this album, but this was hella convincing - the arrangements and songwriting is so lush and detailed. Fitz and Dizzyspells is upbeat, but with lovely dynamics; it pushes and pulls between feeling like a real stomper and then holding back much more delicately. Effigy is a tour de force of harmony and taste. It's very gentle but the vocal climaxes are so strong.
The instrumentation is fantastically strong across Noble Beast and I think Andrew Bird must be one of the best songwriters around now.
As for the rest of the albums I've bought this year, in order of merit:
Phoenix - Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix. Excellent, and a clear step up from It's Never Been Like That, which was never going to be easy.
The Horrors - Primary Colours. Novelty band obsessed with dressing like Victorian-era goths? Not on the strength of this. Yummy overdriven shoegazey guitars and Sea Within a Sea is so so cool.
Florence & the Machine - Lungs. I'm embarrassingly late to Florence and somehow managed to completely miss her all this year, but Rabbit Heart (Raise it up) is definitely one of the best songs of the year.
M. Ward - Hold Time. Not to everyone's taste, and a bit of a pastiche of early twentieth-century Americana, but I think it's great.
Bat For Lashes - Two Suns. Well done Natasha Khan for raising your game post-Mercury Prize, Daniel is a great song.
Hope Sandoval and the Warm Inventions - Through the Devil Softly. 1990s indie heartthrob Hope brings the gentlest album I heard all year - deliciously whispered.
The Big Pink - A Brief History of Love. An unfair comparison perhaps, but more in debt to shoegaze and less original than the Horrors, but still good.
Girls. I'm a bit surprised by the high placing of this in other lists. It's OK, but not amazing...
The Maccabees - Wall of Arms. There's not much wrong with this, but they lot the immediacy of Orlando's vocals which for me was the main attraction on Colour It In.
Sky Larkin - The Golden Spike. I liked this when it came out, but haven't revisited it much. Fossil, I and Molten are both really good, but the rest isn't quite up to scratch. I would be surprised if they don't have a lot more to bring, though.
---
Phew.
Here's a gem of a track from Mercury-winner Speech Debelle. Bouncy, natural hip-hop. Spinnin'
---
Two days ago I walked past the site of where the Astoria used to, at the junction of Charing Cross Road and Tottenham Court Road. Despite a campaign to "Save the Astoria", the building has been torn down to make way for Crossrail and a shopping development (as if Oxford Street needs another one of those...). I wasn't hugely sentimental over it, but I saw some good gigs there, most notably the Bravery and the Von Bondies.
---
It's good to hear Laura Marling back, even if it is with a Christmas song. I can't wait for her new album, out sometime early next year.
Ta ta for now.
0 comments:
Post a Comment