Happy new year everyone, I hope you didn’t spend it like I did, with a 103 degree fever which I’m still recovering from. I haven’t posted in awhile so I wanted to give small recaps of the year through the always fun, best of lists. I think I’ll be making 3 or so of these perhaps with the general areas of: music, comics/books, other.
My own list of albums of the year (notice that not all the albums actually came out in 2009, I just bought them in 2009, although they’re all relatively recent) note that they aren’t in any particular order, I can’t really pick one album as an album of the year:
1. Mountain Goats – The Life of the World to Come (2009)
Another great John Darnielle work, I thought it a funny concept following his previous album “Heretic Pride”. As I understand it Darnielle is an avid churchgoer, and each track is named after a bible verse. That’s about as directly biblical the album gets, don’t get me wrong there is a lot of religious references in the songs as per usual, but John Darnielle has sort of reached this strange subtle multilayered genius with his lyrics, where you can’t ever really tell what he’s singing about whether it’s heartbreak or being a sacrificial slave in the circus maximus. Hannah and I saw him recently, and as per usual The Mountain Goats are really good live.
2. Krallice – Dimensional Bleedthrough (2009)
I guess these guys are labelled as Black Metal but they’re far to experimental to be considered just black metal. Dimensional Bleedthrough is the band’s second full length album. I also got their first album, which is S/T, this year and it is equally amazing. There is so much technical shredding, and layered changes to every song that it almost sounds like an ambient album at times, if it wasn’t so fucking metal. Tied for my favorite metal album of the year.
3. Antlers – Hospice (2009)
Picked this up fairly recently, very dark and introspective album, brooding at times, all while being very pretty music.
4. Converge – Axe to Fall (2009)
Easily the best album since Jane Doe. I’ve always liked Converge, and Jane Doe remains one of my favorite albums of all time. Axe to Fall is really really hard, brutal hard. Tied with Krallice for favorite metal album of the year.
5. These Arms Are Snakes – Tail Swallower and Dove (2008)
I don’t know how I missed this album in 2008, but whatever, great record. These Arms Are Snakes are former members of Botch, by far one of my favorite bands of all time. This record is a lot tighter, controlled and angrier than their previous album Easter.
6. Wavves – Wavvves (2009)
If you don’t know Wavves it’s the project of Nathan Williams, and sounds like this awesome lo-fi, noisy, surf rock. Choruses like “I’m soooo bored” and having half the song titles involve the word goth in them seems to be a pretty good recipie for success. I saw the guy play with Zach Hill drumming which was fucking awesome.
7. …And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead – The Century Of Self (2009)
I did not like the two albums following Worlds Apart, and I didn’t actually like Worlds Apart very much either. That said, this album is really good, a lot of comparisons have been made to Source Tags, and I think they’re pretty justified, Century of Self has a very large scope and is an epic album.
8. Matt & Kim – Grand (2009)
Really catchy stuff, high energy pop, and these two are really good live.
9. Fucked Up – Chemistry Of Common Life (2008)
Although they don’t sound really alike, this album reminds me of Refused- Shape of Punk To Come. Fucked Up is a punk band for sure but this album is unconventional in it’s non traditional 4-4 setup, heavily layered guitars, instrumental tracks, etc. all the while being very angry. I saw them play a special show where they only played this album, which was awesome as they had a bunch of extra musicians like Andrew WK and the Vivian Girls to play all the extra studio parts, these guys are good live. They have three guitarists, the band is huge.
10. Here We Go Magic – S/T (2009)
I sort of picked this up randomly, but it’s a great one. Very chill and catchy, but also pretty ecclectic if that makes sense. Didn’t realize this guy’s based out of brooklyn too.
Honorable Mentions: Isis – Wavering Radiant, Legion of Two – Riffs, Animal Collective – Merriweather Post Pavillion, Major Lazer – Guns Don’t Kill People Lazers Do, Coalesce – Ox, Charles Spearin – The Happiness Project, Sunn O – Monoliths & Dimensions
Shows seen: Krallice (twice), The Happiness Project, Mountain Goats, Sufjan Stevens, White Mice, Wavves (w/ zach hill drumming), Fucked Up, Melt Bannana, Mount Eerie, 3 Inches of Blood, Lightning Bolt, Blonde Redhead, can’t remember the rest but it was a pretty good concert year. Also to note, I saw Liturgy like at least 5 times this year as they seemed to open for every band I went to see, they’re a good metal outfit, with a really good drummer.
Albums I want to pick up: Sunny Day in Glasgow’s second album, new Mos Def album, new MF Doom album, Fever Ray, new Lightning Bolt
Looking forward to in the immiediate future: new Four Tet album in Jan. and show at Le Poisson Rouge in Feb.
