Apologies for the tardiness in putting the rest of this up (too hard to choose or something like that), but here are the rest of my favourite releases of 2009! Already outdated though. Sad face.
#10: Male Bonding: EVERYTHING THEY DID THIS YEAR
Okay so I’m starting off this top ten by totally cheating, seeing as Male Bonding have only released a handful of tracks across split tapes and 7″ releases, but since everything they touched has turned to rackety, messy gold, it seems like cruelty / lying to myself to leave them off this list. Above you’ll find a collection of five tracks across releases with the likes of Meth Teeth, Mazes, Pens, Graffiti Island, and heaven knows who else. The great loud hope for 2010. And apparently they’re the band behind Akiko in PRE?!?! Legitimately badass.
Possibly the harshest listen of the year, but really fun, in a way. Electronics squelch together in collision of flesh and metal, alien frequencies transmit in from time to time in garbled half-speech, somehow jamming everything together in a funk-like groove (see Earnings Plus Interest). Then, of course, there are the noise jams, which abruptly break into piston malfunction sounds. There are discernible vocals here and there, but they’re hardly the focal point. This is the sound of a robot overloading with information, and spewing everything out in one stream-of-consciousness 45 minute audio track. And, somehow, this comes out as their most cohesive effort yet. Actual structure in tracks like Nite Creme and La Cucaracha make this an insane, but overall completely absorbing listen. YES.
One of the later entrants into this list, but sooo wholly deserving of its place. Ghostly weaving harmonies fly in and out of every track, leaning from desperate wailing to almost sinister, wispy melody. Their sense of pacing is almost perfect, particularly in standout To Where, with guitars overlapping at an incredible rate. Then, of course there are the last two tracks, which employ mariachi horns to amazing effect, lending an overbearing sense of sadness to an already melancholy, fast, and album. STUNNING. The link above will take you to the one of the best blogs on the internet, Pukekos, with a better blurb than I could write and links to their album and a split CD. You want to go to there.
It took me awhile to come around to Ducktails I think, but the payoff was totally worth the patience. It’s not the most direct album, but upon repeated listens it becomes more and more hypnotic and engaging, everything flowing by at it’s own pace. It’s total immersion into late 80s / early 90s advertisements and stoned afternoons, with a dash of upbeat Range Rover advertisement intensity via Landrunner to boot. Largely instrumental, and using only guitar, synth and drum machine at that, it’s a perfect album to get lost in on yr chosen journey, ’spiritual’ or otherwise.
Everything I think I would want to say about this album, I’ve probably already said here.
I kept thinking I wasn’t going to have this in here, I think I’d listened to Shelia and Walkabout too much to ‘get a feel for the album as a whole’ or something. Then I put on The Light That Failed and remembered that it probably should be here. I don’t think anyone’s nailed the ‘hypnagogic pop’ thing quite like Bradford Cox has, tape squiggles and drips walking side by side with his double-tracked vocals coming off as both introverted and welcoming. It’s not just introspective bedroom shuffle rhythms going on here, though – he steps into the sunlight with Noah Lennox, a little outwards into shoegaze on Quick Canal with the Stereolab babe, and into straight-up blissout pop on Shelia. It’s a mixed album in terms of style from song to song, but it all flows and entrances. Bradford Cox is everybodys best friend here, and it’s good to know.
So, apparently there is this town in New Jersey called Ridgewood. Actually, scratch that. It’s a village. Their main website has headlines like ‘Christmas Trees Are Now Being Picked Up at the Curb’, and it has a Wildscape Association. Population of just over 27,000. Matt Mondanile and Martin Courtney went to high school together there. I think? Anyway. There’s a definite serenity in smalltown suburbia for me, something which echoes althroughout Real Estate’s debut album. The songs are all familiar, covered in oak tree leaves and thoughts of the beach, while the whole time finding its roots in that bland suburban dream, paddling pools on the front lawn and deckchair laziness. I read yesterday about an interesting idea, The Stress of Boredom. Cabin fever, essentially. This album is the cure to that. It’s nice, easy listening, sure, but it’s all the better for it. Finally, after years of cringeworthy Zach Braff memories, Jersey looks amazing.
Swagger. It’s everywhere on this album. Choruses are spat, rather than sung. Instrumental breakdowns, like at the end of Psychik Shok and The Red Lights, draw on, building and building, laying waste to all around it. Filled with aggression, arrogance, fun and general badassery, this was far and away my favourite NZ album of the year. IT JUST OWNS. 3Ds never got emulated so well as they did here.
Epic. Just so incredibly epic. I don’t even mind that The Lisbon Maru steals the chord progression from Sweet Love For Planet Earth, because it serves as a nice comparison as to what makes Tarot Sport so mindblowingly good – it’s massive scope. Everything feels titanlike in it’s size, juggernaut fuzzy effects rolling in and out like thunderstorms, glitched vocals in lead single Surf Solar twitching and dancing around a four-to-the-floor kick drum while fireworks fly overhead. Fuck, every moment feels like the soundtrack to someone climbing a mountain in a film, or performing some herculean feat that boggles the mind. Even when it edges the closest Fuck Buttons have ever come to ‘dance music’, on closer Flight of the Feathered Serpent, it retains its definite cinematic aesthetic. It’s almost belittling, how grandiose this album is. We’re probably not worthy of it. I mean come on, there’s a track called Olympians.
#1: Animal Collective: Merriweather Post Pavilion
Here, the routine becomes fun. Really, everything takes on a positive spin. Smiles, handclaps, woo’s, the amount of ecstasy throughout this album is almost too much. There’s been so much written about this album already that anything I put here already feels like it’s redundant (I mean this album has been out for what is essentially a blog ecade), but I guess I’ve already given my twopence on the rest. There’s that sense of overwhelming glee which overtakes at some point during this album (I think at that first exultant line of Daily Routine) where I realise I’m listening to something pretty amazing. There are missteps, sure (No More Runnin, looking at you, buddy), but on the whole, this album flows from one amazing track to another. Plus, the In The Flowers / My Girls combo has to be one of the best 1-2 combos in recent memory. Nothing really manages to come close to topping this album as a whole for me.
Oh great, another list about Animal Collective.
