A list. Everyone’s already done one and, to be honest, I feel kinda left out. Sure, I dislike them, but I'm bored and hungover, and maybe someone out there would appreciate a 2009 list that’s released after the year has actually ended. Seems everyone else has already moved on to the new year. Just a couple of weeks ago I read quite possibly the worst article ever. It was based around the confidently held premise that “Vampire Weekend are going to turn out to be the Strokes of this decade!”.
Anyway, now I'm going to do a quick reflection thingy on 2009, which is what you do before you release the list. Builds tension or something. Ok. 2009. Here we go.
I don’t know what this says about the state of the music industry (or my mind), but the very first thing that I recall when I think back is that Lily Allen became kind of pretty all of a sudden. I don’t know how she did it (cocaine?), but this kind of snuck up on me and weirded me out more than it should have. Lily Allen did more than look pretty in 2009 though. She also made lots of bad songs. However, one of her bad songs had easily the best lyric of the year embedded in there somewhere: “Oh I lie here in the wet patch / In the middle of the bed / I’m pretty hard done by / I spent ages giving head”. I really feel for Lily. Poor girl.
On another note, 2009 was a fine year for hip hop, with the return to form of both Mos Def and Q-Tip (of A Tribe Called Quest fame), as well as Raekwon’s brilliant Only Built 4 Cuban Linx…Pt. II, which really shows, rapping about crack just never gets old. 2009 was not a fine year for Michael Jackson though. He died. Sadface.
The first half of the year, from a commercial perspective, also saw a triptych of UK ladies do very well for themselves. I refer to, of course, Bat for Lashes, Florence & the Machine, and La Roux. Whilst I’m sure last year was smashing for their bank balances, I am still going to have to offer them the indignity of missing out my list. I’m sure they’re gutted. Could be just me, but with all the hype and over-exposure they all kind of merged into some sort of multi-headed-pop-inflected-gorgon, with La Roux having slightly catchier songs and tons more hairspray, Natasha having slightly more talent, and Florence having a whole lot more creepy to her lyrics.
The first half of the year, from a commercial perspective, also saw a triptych of UK ladies do very well for themselves. I refer to, of course, Bat for Lashes, Florence & the Machine, and La Roux. Whilst I’m sure last year was smashing for their bank balances, I am still going to have to offer them the indignity of missing out my list. I’m sure they’re gutted. Could be just me, but with all the hype and over-exposure they all kind of merged into some sort of multi-headed-pop-inflected-gorgon, with La Roux having slightly catchier songs and tons more hairspray, Natasha having slightly more talent, and Florence having a whole lot more creepy to her lyrics.
But enough of that. At long last, here’s the list. It’s a top twenty with a little blurb and video about each worthy entrant (make sure you watch the Phoenix/Bratpack one).
20) Temper Trap: Conditions - Temper Trap are kind of like the more poppy, more minority friendly and much less talented third-cousins of Wild Beasts. On the whole this is more or less a good thing, but the overall feeling of the album is that there is something missing. A soul perhaps. Yet a good album it remains, and it still deserves to creep onto the list. Either that, or I couldn't think of 20 albums that didn't suck this year.
19) Empire of the Sun: Walking on a Dream - If MGMT started eating Peyote Cacti for breakfast, lunch and dinner, then they might be called Empire of the Sun. In short, Empire of the Sun are two utterly absurd people and I really want to hate them for it more than anything in the world. But I don't, because they seem to have this uncanny gift for making catchy music (if you ignore the meaningless new age lyrics that is).
18) The Wave Machines: Wave If You’re Really There – This album is a sublime collection of ditzy fuzzballs of joyous pop, mixed in with some abstract lyrics. Plus they're from Merseyside, which makes them sound a little bit funny.
17) The Very Best: Warm Heart of Africa - The Very Best are Maliwi-born singer Esau Mwamwayu and French-Swedish group Radioclit. They met in a second-hand furniture store that Esau was working at etc. Warm Heart of Africa, the follow-up to their superb mixtape Esau Mwamwayu and Radioclit are The Very Best, features the likes of Ezra Keonig from Vampire Weekend and M.I.A. But it is Mwamwayu (who sings predominantly in his native language Chichewa) that remains the star throughout, with his stunning voice proving a bonafide show-stealer.
16) The Drums: Summertime! - The Drums are a hard band to hate. If you're happy, they'll probably make you feel happier. If you're sad, they'll probably make you feel less sad. They somehow levitate between that fine line of coming across as too cheerful that you want to kick them in the shins, and somehow manage to to remain genuine, if not naive. Prediction. They'll do a Vampire Weekend in 2010 and probably release a song that's way over-played and I'll hate them for it forever.
15) The Flaming Lips: Embryonic - While I can't bring myself to like this record as much as I thought I would, it still couldn't miss the list. At times part nursery rhyme madness, at others borderline apocalyptic, this album from the Lips is as adventurous and dense as they've ever been. Plus the video clip below is swell.
14) The Maccabees: Wall of Arms - Lead singer Orlando Weeks' voice has never sounded so haunting, so ominous, so altogether large. Wall of Arms is a huge shift from Colour It In; it's a more mature record, and on another note, it also possesses the best album cover of the year (by Boo Ritsen).
13) Crystal Stilts: Alight the Night – Crystal Stilts have a shit band name and make incredibly moody, stripped down garage-rock ditties. Which should be my worst nightmare, but Alight the Night, which should, on face value, make me morbidly depressed, has never made me smile so much. I almost danced.
12) Raekwon: Only Built for Cuban Linx…Pt. II – Raekwon the Chef heralds the return of crack rap...again. That is all.
11) Fuck Buttons: Tarot Sport –The cluster-fuck of sound that makes up this record is underpinned by some of the sweetest melodies you will ever hear. It's a more subtle, experimental, and crucially a more accessible record then previous LP Street Horrrsing. Gone is the grating expletives of sound, and from album opener 'Surf Solar' onwards, it is the most cinematic and intriguing record of the year.
10) Mos Def: The Ecstatic – Mr. Hollywood Mos finally makes a return to his roots, hip hop, and it works wonders. The Ecstatic is an album that also possesses the single of the year in the form of the Slick Rick featured 'Auditorium'. Listen to it below (Mos has obviously been too busy on Hollywood duties to get around to making a video clip though).
9) Girls: Album – Christopher Owen is the only lead singer on this list that can legitimately sing “I’m just crazy and fucked in the head” and really, honestly mean it. That's because he is. After all, he was brought up in the Children of God cult, where religious prostitution was used to raise money, pedophilia was encouraged, pop music was banned and members began committing suicide and killing each other. He's crazy and fucked up for a reason. It's a great story, but the albums probably better.
8) Wavves: Wavves – Lead singer Nathan Williams is one crazy little king of Yankee lo-fi. He sure did have a big year with his public breakdown at Primevera festival after mixing Valium with Ecstasy and yelling at his drummer whilst taunting the Spanish crowd in a language foreign to this earth. He promptly got belted with bottles and a shoe…rightly so. While it's easy to fault his character, Williams has produced the best lo-fi bedroom recording of the year by far. And yes, that's a compliment.
7) Q Tip: The Renaissance – An appropriate album title for an album that has done more than any other this year to spark the renaissance of hip hop. While Q Tip may not bring the same sort of bravado on record as the likes Lil Wayne and Jay Z, the simple fact remains, he’s the best rapper alive. Fact. 'Official' is the album highlight, but this is an album that works best when listened to from start to finish.
6) Phoenix: Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix – Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix is pop perfection (well, almost). Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix (apart from being a great phrase to say out-loud) also happens to have on it the best instrumental of the year in the form of 'Love Like a Sunset Pt. I'. Check out the clip below. It could just be the best YouTube mash-up ever made.
4) Wild Beasts: Two Dancers – Probably the only lyricist where I would bring in the phrase “voice of an angel” in an entirely non-ironic manner. Two Dancers is a pitch perfect album from start to finish.
3) The xx: xx - These funny lookin’ East Londoners really made it big this year with their sublime debut album. Although, this is one of most abstract r+b records you will ever hear. Sure, the songs are mostly about sex and relationships and the like, but duel vocalists Romy Madley Croft and Oliver Sim aren't your ordinary practitioners. Furtively exchanging awkward come-on's and wistful rhymes over minimal compositions, Croft and Sim's create something so endearing and fragile that's it's almost like being invited into the bed of a couple of self-conscious romantics who want nothing more than to have wild sex with each other but are too afraid to say it without the use of a really shitty metaphor. Don't ask me how it works, but it does.
2) The Horrors: Primary Colours – One of the best sophomore albums you’ll ever hear. The Horrors have fashioned one hell of a transformation for their debut LP, going from cheesy garage-rock to Krautrock and shoegaze, and they've even stopped singing about graveyards and started singing about love, and, um, at times, even happy things (who knew lead singer Faris Badwan had it in him?). Don't get me wrong, the gothic gloom still hangs over Primary Colours, but at times it's more of a likable, poppy kind of mist that wouldn't even sound that out of place on the radio. The Krautrock influence is undeniably the highlight (on 'Sea within a sea' Faris even sings that he bought a "Can record"), and the result is the most unexpected surprise of the year.
1) Grizzly Bear: Veckatimist - Best album of the year. Hands down. No contest. Grizzly Bear are the best etc. etc.
Notable Mentions – Mariachi El Bronx, Telepathe, Micachu & the Shapes, Cold Cave, Yeah Yeah Yeahs
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