It’s hard to tell whether this was a really great year for music or if I was just paying attention more than last year. That sums up my feelings at the end of every year. I don’t want to do too much of an introduction because I have quite a bit to say. I’m not putting these releases in any particular order, they are just my favorites. Some I listened to more than others, but putting them in order just seems too subjective and a pointless waste of time.
Chad VanGaalen – “Diaper Island”
Chad Vangaalen - "Diaper Island"
Listening to this album filled the void left by Women not releasing anything this year. This was my gateway into listening to more of VanGaalen’s stuff and it remains my favorite album of his. With it’s haunting and warm sound, psychedelic imagery and noisy guitars Diaper Island hit all the right notes. Standout tracks “Peace on the Rise,” “Heavy Stones” and “Do Not Fear” would be a good fit on any year end mix. (review here.)
Fucked Up – “David Comes to Life”
Fucked Up - "David Comes to Life"
Simply put, this is one epic album. It may seems like a chore to listen to this nearly 78 minute hardcore opera about love and loss, but when it comes down to it the album still relies on catchy hooks, pure unbridled emotion and more guitars than have ever appeared on any album ever. The complexity of the arrangements may be overshadowed by the brash vocals but take another 10 or 20 listens and you’ll undoubtedly start to appreciate how truly brilliant this album is from it’s structure and lyrics right on down to the execution. This continues Fucked Up in their clear evolution of a hardcore band that is always searching for new ways to expand the medium.
Radiohead – “The King of Limbs”
Radiohead - "The King of Limbs"
Radiohead will never be able to catch a break ever again. They are caught in the terrible, yet still enviable, position of people expecting great innovations from album to album and then fans and critics regularly misunderstanding their music and heaping faint praise onto them. Make no mistake The King of Limbs is a fantastic album. Sure, it is short, and there isn’t much in the way of guitar on it, and it’s really percussion heavy. It’s still a Radiohead album though and in my mind they are nearly at the level where they can do nothing wrong. There are definite gems on here and it should not be simply cast aside. (review)
[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/07-Give-Up-The-Ghost.mp3|titles=Give Up The Ghost]
tUnE-yArDs – “w h o k i l l”
tUnE-yArDs - "w h o k i l l"
Probably the most divisive album of the year. I have yet to come across anyone that could say, “Yeah I heard the tune-yards album, it was ok”. The reactions were always hard to one side. If I recall correctly even those of us in the Tympanogram camp were at odds over how we felt about it. My take on it is that it’s a wholly new sound that is interesting rhythmically to a very high degree, orchestrationally it also makes great use of everything available but never tries to go too far, or do too much. This album manages to do all of those things while continuing to keep it interesting and different from song to song covering a variety of moods. (review)
Wild Flag – “Wild Flag”
Wild Flag - "Wild Flag"
This is a straight up rock record. I had been looking forward to its release ever since Carrie Brownstein left NPR to pursue music in a touring band once again. They manage to easily sidestep any of the normal pitfalls of a debut album because all of the members of Wild Flag are seasoned pros. Each track is exciting and energetic and simply rocks. They captured the energy of a live show and released it simultaneously as they toured across the country garnering acclaim for their exciting, energetic show. (review)
Colin Stetson – “New History Warfare Vol. 2: Judges”
Colin Stetson - "New History Warfare Vol 2: Judges"
This album is the only thing I have listened to that has left me absolutely speechless and astounded upon its conclusion. It’s flashy, arty and walks that line between art-music and jazz. It’s another album that stands in a category of its own, which is exactly the kind of thing that I’m attracted to. What’s even more amazing is that it’s almost all solo saxophone music, except for one track that Stetson performs on French Horn. On the surface it is not exactly the kind of thing that I would be drawn to, and maybe it’s not the kind of thing that you’d be drawn to either. To you I would say this is definitely worth a listen or ten. It’s damn near revolutionary and will leave you spellbound. (review)
[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/12-The-righteous-wrath-of-an-honorable-man.mp3|titles=The righteous wrath of an honorable man]
[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/07-Home.mp3|titles=Home]
[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/05-From-no-part-of-me-could-I-summon-a-voice.mp3|titles=From no part of me could I summon a voice]
Starfucker – “Reptilians”
Starfucker - "Reptilians"
Catchy as hell, synth-laden, danceable pop tunes about life and death, though mostly about death. This was definitely an album that I had cast aside earlier in the year, but when I came back to it I found that I was surely missing out. There’s something satisfying about a thick, buzzing synth sound.
Tim Hecker – “Ravedeath 1972”
Tim Hecker - "Ravedeath 1972"
I definitely don’t fashion myself an expert on ambient music, but there is just something so moving about this album the way that it uses masses of sound to create an atmosphere that is ethereal and familiar all at once. I can’t quite put my finger on exactly what I love about this album. Maybe it’s the fact that I keep coming back to it, that it keeps forcing me to come back to it. It’s just so damned intriguing.
Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks – “Mirror Traffic”
Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks - "Mirror Traffic"
The Pavement nepotism is obvious. I became absolutely obsessed with Pavement when I finally started paying attention to their albums around 2006. Come to find out I was wasting all sorts of time missing Pavement because Malkmus has been putting out fantastic albums since right after Pavement’s last album came out in 1999. “Mirror Traffic” is full of songs with interesting harmonies, sudden shifts, catchy melodies and Malkmus’ literate and sometimes cryptic lyrics.
The Two Koreas – “Science Island”
The Two Koreas - "Science Island"
I know that hardly anyone is going to agree with me on this album. I also know that not too many people have heard this album and that is a shame. That is also partially the reason why I am making it a point to mention it on my year end list. The music is sloppy to a certain degree, totally embodying a garage rock aesthetic. Every track is a barn-burner sung with a sneer with plenty of jangly, noisy guitars adding to the overall experience. If you listen to anything on this list, or are inspired to listen to anything new I would suggest most highly this album. (review)
We can always count on Radiohead to change the game from album to album. Because of this I feel that their latest album, “The King of Limbs”, deserves something beyond the usual track by track review. Everything that Radiohead does, musical or otherwise, is subject to an extraordinary level of scrutiny such that few, if any, other musical acts in existence today have to contend with. Not many would know how to cope, let alone be able to utilize all of that scrutiny and turn be able to turn it into something productive. This is one of the reasons why Radiohead is the most important bands active today. The public expects an almost inhumanly high standard from the band, who in turn are able to consistently live up to that standard by consistently producing groundbreaking albums that regularly change our ideas of what is new in current music. They are the singular arbiters of pushing the boundaries and raising the bar to a point where no other act can reach. Any attempts at following in their footsteps are hopelessly cast in their shadow.
Despite this the band, in interviews and concerts, don’t seem to think of themselves as so important. They manage to be immensely popular while at the same time retaining artistic credibility. It is a rare thing to have mainstream success while maintaining a high degree of indie acceptance. They constantly sell out the largest venues, yet remain out of the headlines and still manage to appear guarded about their personal lives. To me this points to them as not involved in music for the fame. They are creating intelligent music with artistic integrity. This flies in the face of anyone that thinks you can’t push boundaries, and still have something to say while retaining a sense of relevancy and importance with a large and emphatic audience.
As an audience we are responsible for elevating them to such a place of popularity and even importance. We are the ones that overly scrutinize every musical decision that they make. We are the ones cataloging every song they’ve ever performed live, comparing it to the previous instances of its live appearances and how those versions, in turn, compare to the recorded version. A song may not have been committed to tape until 10 years after it first debuted on stage in Stockholm but we are the ones that can chart its development and have therefore cast it into the realm of importance.
We are also the ones that argue over the validity of each version and whether the version that ended up being recorded, having therefore gained a level of permanence that the bootlegs and live versions lack, is the “definitive” version or not. The audience is responsible for deciding if what an artist is doing is good or bad, or more appropriately, they decide whether or not they are happy with the direction the band is taking and what it means for their cultural musical superiority, dominance and importance. All separate things.
Of course all of these things are done without the consent or approval of the band, who in turn seem perfectly content with going their own way and charting a unique path. Personally, I wonder how much the members of Radiohead use this information to guide their decisions. Do they think about manipulating the way that we are going to think about this album? Do we try to compensate for this by heading them off at the pass, intellectually, by taking into account that they think they know what we think and are therefore going to change our thoughts about their actions based on what we think they think we are thinking?
Radiohead - "The King of Limbs"
It’s all ridiculously convoluted, and you can see where the role of artist and audience member is challenged in this instance. It’s complex and perhaps you would think that it isn’t happening, but it is. Right now. The scrutiny, the over-thinking, the critical analysis, all of it is a testament to the importance of this band that we are even bothering to wrap ourselves up in this kind of process.
That process is my whole premise. Listening to a new Radiohead album has transcended the traditional listening experience to a point of a self-critical paranoia inducing obsession that eventually leads to submission.
With anything so new and different from anything that we have recently been listening to, the initial exposure to “The King of Limbs”, much like that first listen to “Kid A” is a point of aggravation to a certain degree. The mind is overcome with such a new and surprising experience that it doesn’t quite know how to process all of the information. We become overwhelmed.
Do our expectations exceed what we have been given? The answer to this question always seems to be an unconditional “Yes” at this point. We sit and try to pick out the memorable material, which is quite literally impossible at such an early stage as the music is passing through our ears for the first time. We wait for upbeat tunes, interesting contrapuntal textures, complexities in the lyrics that speak to us in coded, metaphoric language about politics (possibly). It’s difficult to find all of these things and explore them all at once, in one go. Frustration and awe are residing in equal parts within us as the end of the album draws near and we are left with choosing between “forget it, it’s a mess” and “I gotta listen to this again, there must be something in there.”
This is where Radiohead truly takes charge as a musical group of cultural importance. We trust that they are doing something that we need some time to understand, we trust in them. We have faith in their integrity that they have done something deserving of multiple listens.
After the release of “In Rainbows” there were discussions in several online forums that tried to unravel a code in binary that people thought existed that the band was hinting at all over the place, and had been for years. I don’t recall anything productive coming from those discussions, which ran parallel to surface arguments that stemmed from their “pay what you want” model that they had developed for the album. This is where most of the focus of the mainstream media was. People reached their own conclusions. Some felt that the physical release of the album was an admission from the band that their experiment had failed. Everyone ignored the main point the whole time was that if you release something officially, ahead of people that are going to just give it away for free anyway, there is some control there.
The real key is that people were talking. People were trying to unravel a supposed mystery, and nobody can conclude that it has been completely uncovered. Because of this we continue searching.
After a few listens one begins to sort things out. A few short motifs are memorized and the picture begins to come into focus. The acoustic guitar in “Give Up the Ghost” that sounds so intimate and subdued. The way in which that song opens up when an electric guitar makes a brief appearance and the vocals are looped and repeated, harmonizing into a swirl of dissipating sound before the bassline becomes the only thing we can hear.
Electronic glitches and other clipped up sounds permeate most of the album. Percussion and vocals are clearly the most prominent aspects of “The King of Limbs”. At first this makes the work difficult to grasp. There doesn’t seem to be enough melody and harmony to grab onto and hum along with. Perhaps this is the point. What ends up happening instead is really great. This alteration of the foundational elements allows the band to explore shifting metric pulses as the generators of the song structure. The songs exist without our participation. We can’t immediately internalize them, or sing along.
Radiohead
Think of the opening section of Igor Stravinsky’s “The Rite of Spring”. There is the only melody at the very beginning of the work. The metric pulses seem to be lost in an ethereal state of suspended animation while the melodies are constantly spun out. Despite the unorthodoxy and apparent complexity the melodies have a fairly high level of memorability. That section gives way to a pounding, primal turn that features heavy use of downbowed strings with shifting accents that continually catch the audience off guard. That is where this album exists. In that juxtaposition. Where the rhythmic complexities take prominence and melody and harmony, though still very much there, are subjected to a more secondary role.
Music seems to change as we listen to it. Rather, our perception of the music adjusts as we listen and become more acquainted. We need to compartmentalize as humans. We have a space in our head for only a certain kind of music, so we force this album into that box. We change what we hear to what we want to hear, what we can hear and what we can understand. Soon, after a few dozen listens we are singing along to “Little by Little” while simultaneously wondering if that title is the band’s sly way of letting us know that that is exactly how we are coming into understanding this album.
They are still three steps ahead of us.
As the physical release date for the album approaches the band has announced that they will be publishing a newspaper. It will be free and available in major metropolitan areas. Nobody knew what exactly what was going to be published in the newspaper until yesterday, which is undoubtedly adding to the mystique surrounding the album release. Unfortunately people are also using this to dismiss the release as another piece of evidence that the band has lost its way. Do they really need to innovate everything, from the inside out with every release? What is a “newspaper album” anyway and does Radiohead really need to rush out and be the first band to release one?
There is also curiosity about the albums length, the shortest release by the band to date, as to whether or not there is going to be more to it. Will there be another release hot on its heels like the twins separated at birth that were “Kid A” and “Amnesiac”? The former seen by most as the first major point of departure for the band. The curiosity is no doubt stemming from the same people that were trying to break the binary code of “In Rainbows”.
The album opens with melodic and memorable looped opening that is soon overtaken by overlapping rhythms and disjointed bass. That very opening seems to spring to mind a state of déjà vu. It seems as though this has come from somewhere before. Perhaps it is just a result of listening to the album obsessively trying to get a firm understanding of it. The pulsating loops from the opening are then relegated to background bed track on top of which the remainder of the song is built. It serves as a constant pedal point that the rest of the material is weighed against. Peals of trumpets add a new layer, mimicking and varying the themes of Thom Yorke’s vocals.
“Morning Mr. Magpie” with its palm-muted guitar in driving rhythm with the off kilter hi-hat beating out borrowed metric pulses creates an incredible sense of restraint. Yorke’s voice is clear with a subtly distant shout of the lyrics. The interaction of guitars and bass here is similar to “Weird Fishes/Arpeggi” from their “In Rainbows” album.
This seems to be their newly reinvented guitar arrangement style. Less like early Radiohead’s clear division of the standard rhythm guitar vs. lead guitar where Jonny Greenwood would hold back before bursting forth with angular lines with feedback drenched crunches and squeals out of the blue. The lines have once again become blurred.
The video for “Lotus Flower” has already been fed to the wolves at the meme machine of youtube, appealing to yet another level of audience. That audience seems to consist at least partly, if not mostly, of those that don’t even bother trying to listen to, let alone understand the music, instead creating a viral market from the ground up. Some of the results, though few original and none surprising, can be entertaining. It is appropriate that this song is the lead single, being that it is the most “song like” off the album and catchy with Yorke’s bluesy vocals spinning out a few hooks, though those hooks are unlike anything one would normally or previously think of as “catchy”.
After “Lotus Flower” the album seems to reach a breaking point. The feel doesn’t so much change as much as the style. Piano on “Codex” is shrouded in reverb, similar to that of “Pyramid Song” from the “Amnesiac” album. The peals of brass are also present on this track. “Give Up the Ghost” inserts a brightly strummed acoustic guitar into their sonic landscape.
“Seperator” sharply returns us to the style of the beginning of the album with very clean, clear mix and the drums re-entering and up front. The line that truly haunts from this song is “If you think this is over then you’re wrong” which seems to remind us that we think that there may be more to this. There may be a piece of the puzzle that we are missing. It seems that they really are playing with us. This song, like so many others on the album, has a way of really blossoming as it moves forward.
Not only does that song leave us wanting more, in a desperate search for something, but even after several listens we still don’t know what it is exactly that we are looking for. By this point it doesn’t really matter, we have succumbed to the album. We have allowed it to change the way that we think about listening to music, and what we typically expect from an album. This last track ends with a harmony that seems to go somewhere separate from the vocals. Yorke’s voice extends the harmony that is already rich with intervals that one would typically not find outside of jazz.
“The King of Limbs” charts a path of exploration which is usual for Radiohead, but it seems to want to, at the same time, break off into a new direction within the album itself. Harmony is secondary to rhythm for parts, and then the opposite on the latter half of the album. The songs don’t necessarily feel segmented or choppy, they feel natural and are well written and intricately put together with utmost attention to detail. It’s this fission that develops across the album that helps get us to listen again and again in rapt attention as our minds adjust to Radiohead changing the game again. It meets our expectations by exceeding them, and that is why Radiohead will always have the upper hand.
[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/03-Little-By-Little.mp3|titles=Little By Little]
[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/07-Give-Up-The-Ghost.mp3|titles=Give Up The Ghost]
Well, here it is. I tried, throughout the course of the past few months, to review as many of the albums that I have heard this year that I could. This has been quite a year for new music, a year that caught me by surprise. I did not realize all of the great albums that came out until about mid November. Many of the albums that I heard I did not get until several months after they were released. These are the ones that got the most spins, and for good reason. Here they are in order, well reverse order, to heighten the suspense.
I had to go with 15 because I really couldn’t narrow it down any further. If there is a problem, please write your congressman.
15.) Animal Collective -“Strawberry Jam”
This band out of Baltimore turned out a great electronic, rock, noise album this year in “Strawberry Jam”. The hooks are just as catchy and the vocals are at times soaring and hopeful and at others thoughtful or just plain surreal. It’s always interesting to see how a band operates outside of the “rock” idiom, and the Collective definitely make things interesting. It is unclear as to the instrumentation in each of the songs. Sound manipulation plays a more important role than that of a “drum part” a “guitar part” and verse-chorus-verse structure. Working in the experimental genre can be a tricky balancing act but the Animal Collective do it well. Just the right amount of reaching out and trying new things and straight up classic “good songwriting”.
14.) Marnie Stern – “In Advance of the Broken Arm”
For me this album came out of nowhere. Kirstie was shooting her for Venus and told me about this crazy two-hand tapping technique that Marnie used. My brother said it was like Maps and Atlases and I can see the connection with her densely contrapuntal and layered guitar sound and vocals that are alternately screamed and sung Marnie’s sound is quite unlike anything else that I have ever heard before. Her lyrics speak of self-confidence and metaphysics and everything in between. The album, however, does seem to weaken a bit towards the end and I think that is going to be quite a challenge to follow up an album like this with a set of songs that are equally intense and interesting without beating the style to death. The use of Hella’s Zach Hill on drums is the perfect choice, as his all out assault on the drums is the perfect match for Stern’s continuously moving and perfectly articulated guitar textures.
13.) Battles – “Mirrored”
The clean and precise production on this album speaks of its straddling the line between prog-rock and jazz-fusion. Like Interpol, or Marnie Stern for that matter, the guitars of Battles create a very layered and contrapuntal sound that creates as much forward motion as to propel the listener through a 10 minute track without getting bored. Many of the tunes on this album don’t rely specifically on the talents of one member in particular but as the band truly working as a single unit. The track “Tonto” is a perfect example of this with it’s slow and controlled build up and the perfectly engineered dénouement that closes the track with a gradual slowing of the tempo until everything dies away the way that the track began. There is attention paid to the form of each piece on this album, as well as the form of the album as a whole, with opening and closing tracks working together to form perfect bookends. The album is quite demanding on the listener though, by the end I usually feel rather worn down. This is not quite mindless background music, it is pretty heady and well thought out music that may only appeal on certain levels to true music dorks.
12.) Liars – “Liars”
The follow up to the sparse, hallucinogenic inspired tomes of “Drums Not Dead”, “Liars” finds these Australian crazies synthesizing all that they have accomplished to date. Tracks like “Freak Out” still feature out of tune guitars, but with a funky bass groove that would remind fans of early work such as “Mr. You’re on Fire Mr.”. Elements from their more far out and experimental albums is still present in some tracks like “Sailing to Byzantium” and “The Dumb in the Rain” but for the most part, from what I can tell, this is just an album of great songs. There is no hint of a super-intellectual story-telling going on in this album, which is great. This album was the perfect decision for Liars to follow up an early-Sonic Youth-esque stage in their careers, get back on track with some really catchy, yet characteristic songs and probably continue to frighten audiences around the world with their astounding live performances. If you ever have the opportunity to catch this band live I would suggest it highly.
11.) Caribou – “Andorra”
Simply put the songs on this album are great. I know that that is a cop-out, as, well, it is obvious that I find the songs great on this album, why else would I put it on my year end best-of list? But I find it to stand out particularly from this years other contenders partly because of it’s seeming stance to bring back the Motown production sound, mixed with a little bit of Phil Spector. The reverb used on this album, along with the sleighbells (particularly the ones heard on the opening track) make it sound like a forward thinking relic of an album. I can’t imagine that there was too much state of the art equipment used in the making of this album, though I could be very wrong. I just really like the authentic sound of this album. One could imagine that this would eventually happen with Caribou, as there are strands of this sound in development in “The Milk Of Human Kindness” though this album benefits from tighter songwriting and less tinkering in an instrumental abyss than past work. This album is a great step forward and according to people I know that have seen Caribous live since this album came out he is definitely an act worth catching.
10.) The Bad Plus – “Prog”
Cracking my Top 10 is an album closer to the stylings of jazz than anything else. The performance ability of each of the three guys in The Bad Plus is absolutely amazing. They are all masters in their own right, working closely together as composers and performers. This album of covers (yes, it is that good, that I would even consider an album of mostly cover songs shows how great this album actually is) with a few original compositions mixed in for good measure is quite amazing. Covers of David Bowie, Rush and Tears for Fears mix seamlessly with original compositions. The covers are each treated to their own very unique process, parts are added and solos are taken to a whole new level of virtuosity. Though this album clearly stands squarely in the jazz idiom there is a rock sensibility that touches upon each song on the album. The precision, attention to detail and high standard for excellent performance stems from three well-trained jazz musicians but the reckless energy of rock stands behind everything.
9.) Thurston Moore – “Trees Outside the Academy”
The latest solo release from Sonic Youth frontman Thurston Moore is, obviously, quite similar in style to many of the songs that he recently penned for SY’s “Rather Ripped” but there is a more simple style at work when he is without his cohorts. Thurstons strips down the guitars a lot, and the result is a much more clear and relaxed album. The addition of violin is a nice touch, and actually is the element that truly sets the songs quite a far distance apart from anything Sonic Youth has done. This album also shows that Thurston has evolved quite a bit from the “Psychic Hearts” days, the songs here are more focused and calm, but his punk energy still shines through. He’s getting older but he’s always going to be the coolest guy on the planet.
8.) Field Music – “Tones of Town”
Much like The Futureheads Field Music has a densely layered and contrapuntal sound that sounds like the next generation of 70’s prog rock. Obviously heavily influenced by Yes and other bands of that era these Brits manage to pack quite a lot of excitement and energy into a very diverse album of very catch tunes. This album, for me, was a late entry in my year end lineup and if I was given more time with it I’m sure it would be much higher up on my list. Each song is great in its own way, and it sounds wonderful too, great production quality. I haven’t had the opportunity to listen to their first album, as I didn’t know that they existed prior to November but I am definitely going to make it a point to look into this band further.
7.) Cuff the Duke – “Sidelines of the City”
I truly think that Cuff the Duke can do no wrong. They are quickly becoming one of my favorite bands. Every song that I have heard from them is great. They jump comfortably from genre to genre and sound great and confident no matter what they are doing. The lead singer has a unique, very instantly recognizable voice. The instruments change up a bit from time to time. This time out the opening track adds a single violin playing in a folk style, country inflicted (as many of their songs are) and truly sounding like an American folk-tune. This is an album that I never skip a track on, and I have listened to this album many many times in the past few months. I am already looking forward to their next effort. Unfortunately they aren’t too popular in the U.S. and seeing them any time soon would probably be a dream. To me seeing Cuff the Duke would be a legendary, unforgettable event, though to many Canadians I’m sure that it is just commonplace. Check out this band! You will not be disappointed.
6.) The Good, The Bad and The Queen – “The Good, The Bad and The Queen”
An incredibly dark album about war, times of frustration, uncertainty and suffering. This is a great album, if it all is kind of the same sound over and over again. Each of the songs put you in a place that is dark with a sense of foreboding doom. I have never heard an album that sounds like this before and I am almost positive that this super group of sorts will not be putting out another album, or if they do it will not be anytime soon. I am quite jealous of Damon Albarn’s ability to crank out music all over the place with several different projects going at once it seems. Each of the tracks on this album feel monumental, noteworthy and legendary I would place it higher, but like I said, each of the songs sort of sound a bit the same, thankfully they are all excellent.
5 .) Menomena – “Friend and Foe”
Menomena is a great group of musicians, in case you didn’t know. Three guys, all great songwriters and multi-instrumentalists, sharing singing and songwriting duties. They are just as tight live as they are on record. Each of the guys has a distinctive songwriting voice and several instruments are used to create a lush sound. Tracks range from the tragic to the imploring, light and gentle to dark and unnerving. Whenever a band chooses to operate in this manner it can be just what is needed to propel an album through to the end, a distinct amount of variety. Their sound is distinct, to say the least, yet they don’t stray too far from tried and true forms and catchy hooks. What it really comes down to is that these guys are fantastic songwriters and great instrumentalists. This is another album that has been in heavy rotation on my itunes for months and months, and will continue in this manner for a long time to come I’m sure.
4.) Joel Plaskett Emergency – “Ashtray Rock”
Another album from a fantastic songwriter and amazing guitarist. I don’t even care if he rips off Jimmy Page left and right, it’s fun and it sounds great and he does it well and that’s all I care about. Have you heard Jimmy Page lately, he sounds like shit, but I digress. Joel can write a song about anything, I’m convinced, after seeing him live twice and watching him rewrite lyrics on the spot. He has strung this album into a series of songs that tell a rather simple story, not sure if it’s a true story or not but that is nearly beside the point. The album is so well thought out and well put together and every song is catchy as hell and great (yes even Fashionable People, I happen to love that song). Plaskett blasts through each song with a mind boggling array of guitar sounds and at the same time jumping from inspiration to inspiration making the album truly sound like a recollection from his childhood. This album is also proof that if an album is made by someone that truly has fun while playing music the album will be fun to listen to and in general great, it’s contagious. I could go on for days about how great this album is and how much I love Joel, but I won’t, if you haven’t heard this album, go now and listen.
3.) Interpol – “Our Love to Admire”
New York City neo-shoegaze turned gloomy math-rock band Interpol just keep getting better. Does it matter that it takes them 3 years to create an album? They hardly toured for the better part of 2 years, didn’t do any interviews, were not on TV and when they emerge Carlos D. has a creepy mustache and the guys have put together a truly mindblowing album of thoughtful and complex tunes with cryptic lyrics. I can’t even begin to tell you how many times I listened to this album when it first came out. The album itself got into my bones like a virus, slowly working it’s way out from “The Heinrich Maneuver” and eventually spreading to the rest of the album. I couldn’t get enough and soon I was hooked, listening to it everywhere and several times a day. I would say more things about the album in detail, but I think I already did a pretty good job of that here.
2.) Radiohead – “In Rainbows”
Well if I had any indie cred I am apparently about to shoot it out the window. I don’t know why hating Radiohead seems to be the cool, hipster thing to do these days, but you can not deny that these Brits can write an absolutely phenomenal album, without a doubt. I, no exaggeration, listened to this album 10 times a day for at least 2 weeks immediately following its release. Not a bad second, no complaints, nothing that I could possibly imagine changing. The gentle lulling of “Weird Fishes/Arpeggi” featuring a great, closely voiced double guitar line is my favorite of the album. The closing track “Videotape” is reminiscent of other Radiohead closing tracks. This is a truly great album, it is an important album and if you are not listening to it because you think they are too popular or you want to be different and it seems that everyone loves Radiohead, well, pull your head out of your fucking ass, swallow your pride and listen to this album. It will blow your mind. It is legendary. No joke. Next.
1.) Spoon – “Ga ga ga ga ga”
The best album of the year happens to have the worst title of any album, ever. Whatever. I have already talked about this album here. This is a great improvement from their last album “Gimme Fiction” a truly overblown, overdone near piece of garbage. “Ga ga ga ga ga” is stripped down, intelligent and great from cover to cover. Nothing truly mindblowing here, just great rock tunes that position Spoon, I feel, much in the same place that Sonic Youth was upon the release of Daydream Nation. Spoon has become the indie band that any other smart indie band wants to be like. They have a large following, are writing great songs, have been at it a while and became the talk of the town after this album was released. I am hoping that the electricity that I felt when they were playing Saturday Night Live was not imagined. I want to believe that not only did they play perfectly but that they connected with the home audience and got some more, well deserved fans. This album sounds fantastic and I am still obsessed with it, and that will last a long long time I’m sure. I am probably the only one that has this at the top of their list, but as Brit says “you got no fear of the underdog, that’s why you will not survive”.
![Chad Vangaalen - "Diaper Island"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Diaper_Island-Chad_VanGaalen_480-300x300.jpg "Chad Vangaalen - "Diaper Island"")
![Fucked Up - "David Comes to Life"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/David-Comes-To-Life-Fucked-Up.jpg "Fucked Up - "David Comes to Life"")
![Radiohead - "The King of Limbs"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/The_king_of_limbs-300x268.jpg "Radiohead - "The King of Limbs"")
![tUnE-yArDs - "w h o k i l l"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/tuneyards.jpg "tUnE-yArDs - "w h o k i l l"")
![Wild Flag - "Wild Flag"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/wildflag.jpg "Wild Flag - "Wild Flag"")
![Colin Stetson - "New History Warfare Vol 2: Judges"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/New-History-Warfare-Vol-2-300x300.jpg "Colin Stetson - "New History Warfare Vol 2: Judges"")
![Starfucker - "Reptilians"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/starfucker_reptilians-300x300.jpg "Starfucker - "Reptilians"")
![Tim Hecker - "Ravedeath 1972"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/krank154-300x300.jpg "Tim Hecker - "Ravedeath 1972"")
![Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks - "Mirror Traffic"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Stephen-Malkmus-Mirror-Traffic-300x300.jpg "Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks - "Mirror Traffic"")
![The Two Koreas - "Science Island"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/two-300x300.jpg "The Two Koreas - "Science Island"")
![Radiohead - "The King of Limbs"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/thekingoflimbs-1024x914.jpg "Radiohead - "The King of Limbs"")
15.) Animal Collective -“Strawberry Jam”
