i think that about wrap(s)ed it up for capp(s)ing it off, 2007-wise. well ready to be done with it. well chuffed. the only thing that's missing in terms of replicating my round-up ritual from last year is a list of mixes - well, as it happens there's really only one that i care to mention (just didn't hear that many this year), and i have retroactively tacked it on to the end of my albums list. as for the mixes that i made (the ostensible subject of this blarg, remember?), they were few, but they made me happy at least: popsical/summertime, the theoretically-still-in-progress love is the dancer, and the nostalgia-trippin' supast*rdeejays, which i will finally get around to slapping up here, next post i promise. (also: marriage is hot..., musician plugs ii, and two volumes of ladies love for my sis.)
i just saw my idolator ballot today...well, for the first time since i wrote it, i suppose. (nevermind the results for the poll as a whole; they're as boring as they're supposed to be, which goes for the editorials as well.) my favorite part is that i got the chance to vote for rumble in the jungle, a compilation of early 90s british ragga/jungle which was possibly my only actual "favorite reissue" of 2007 (that actually came out in '07.) i don't think i ever managed to mention it here or anywhere but it contains some of the most exciting, life-affirming music i can think of, so much so that i broke down and ordered the thing at full price after just listening to the sound clips on the soul-jazz website (just listen them!)
was also glad to see that i saw fit to vote for "stay my baby" and "oh my god," even though neither made the new years mix. meanwhile, my essentially off-the-cuff comments said roughly what i needed to say in my lengthy apropos-of-albums commentary a couple posts ago, and more besides, but in only two paragraphs. "indecisiveness is a good thing."
finally, definitely the most fun part of the whole idolator pop thingummy is their collection of commissioned annotated mixtapes. which is dangerously engrossing (if you're me), and makes me want to hear them all, though i'm a little curious whether they all actually work that well as mixes. needless to say, i already made mine and annotated it, both in hyper-extensive fashion (the annotations took me nearly as long to complete as the mix itself, i think.) maybe you even looked at it. (you should at least listen to it - much more fun!) but i didn't really give you the track list in a very accessible fashion, so here it is again, without the interruptions. goodnight goodnight two-double-oh-seven. time to get away.
[1] cassie: "is it you?"
fantasia: "hood boy"
amerie: "gotta work"
amy winehouse: "you know that i'm no good"
sharon jones: "tell me"
the budos band: "ride or die"
[2] katharine mcphee: "love story"
dizzee rascal: "pussyole (oldskool)"
dj khaled, ft. pretty much ehrrrbody: "we taking over"
ashley tisdale: "he said she said"
justice: "d.a.n.c.e."
britney spears: "piece of me"
low: "hatchet"
aesop rock: "none shall pass"
nelly furtado: "say it right"
[3] gwen stefani: "the sweet escape"
tracey thorn: "it's all true"
hilary duff: "dreamer"
lcd soundsystem: "get innocuous"
matthew dear: "pom pom"
nôze: "love affair"
will.iam: "heartbreaker"
roisin murphy: "let me know"
[4] escort: "all through the night"
aly+aj: "like whoa"
rihanna: "please don't stop the music"
the chemical brothers: "a modern midnight conversation"
gui boratto: "beautiful life"
von südenfed: "fledermaus can't get it"
[5] bonde do role: "solta o frango"
calvin harris: "the girls"
muscles: "sweaty"
dan le sac vs. scroobious pip: "thou shalt always kill"
armand van helden, "nyc beat"
[6] sophie ellis-bextor: "me and my imagination"
stanton warriors ft. sway: "get 'em high"
m.i.a.: "xr2"
cornelius: "wataridori"
simian mobile disco: "love"
modest mouse: dashboard
fujiya and miyagi: ankle injuries
r. kelly ft. t.i. and t-pain: "i'm a flirt (remix)"
burial: archangel
[7] miley cyrus: "see you again"
candie payne: "one more chance (mark ronson mix)"
spoon: "you got yr cherry bomb"
the ark: "absolutely no decorum"
tegan and sara: "back in your head"
sally shapiro: "he keeps me alive"
[8] lethal bizzle: "police on my back"
shop boys: "party like a rockstar"
dude 'n nem: "watch my feet"
björk: "declare independence"
aberfeldy: "do whatever turns you on"
pop levi: "pick me up - uppercut"
skye sweetnam: "ghosts" (with tim armstrong)
[9] avril lavigne: "girlfriend (remix ft. lil mama)"
sugababes: "about you now"
paramore: "misery business"
the veronicas: "untouched"
maxïmo park: "our velocity"
17 January 2008
'007 is sleeping in heaven
11 January 2008
07 is sleeping 08 is burning!
(burning copies of the mix, naturally.)
picking up where we left off: dancing the night away to the toasts and jams of 2007.
oh-eight's just a baby... i wanna make it stay up all night!
Title: [...] New Years Dance Mix 2007 [....oh wait...]
Format: continuous DJ mix, 74 minutes. currently available on mp3 or CD-R
Date: 28 December 2007
my first attempt at making a mix using traktor, specifically using the "native mix recording" process - an almost entirely foreign working method to me - after a week or so of trying to figure out how or whether it was even going to be possible. i made almost the whole thing (at least 80% of it) on the 27th and 28th (i stayed up all night finishing it, and ended up not sleeping for over 40 hours) progressing very slowly as the program kept crashing and i gradually learned how to make it crash somewhat left.
turned out pretty good i think. it's remarkably similar to ¡OhSix! in overall shape and flow (and in many specific moments too) - unintentionally but largely just an artifact of my working process, which basically consists of making a big list of songs and sequencing them in order of ascending BPM. this time i didn't loop around from the top of the tempo range (160~180) to the bottom (80~90) [as i did towards the end of last years mix, and exactly in the middle of SupaStarDeeJays], i just let it get faster and increasingly unhinged towards the end to the point that it's almost (deliberately) comical. (and somehow we managed to keep dancing through the whole thing.)
in some ways it's not as complex and nuanced as last year's was (i made it much more quickly and with a less precise tool that allowed less flexibility with editing), but on the whole i think it actually came out better - smoother, more consistently danceable, less fussy - though it took me a couple of listens through to accept that.
anyhoo, i hope you dig. here's whatcha get [numbers correspond to the break points on the CD version]:
[1]
it's Ross of Love bitch !!
[standard obligatory wtf pile-on intro, featuring, as it happens, the two songs of year, as well as my two favorite songs of the year. also jojo/toto's "anything," which wasn't anything in particular of the year, but fit well with the journey and the groove and kicks off an overt sample-friendly meme that continues throughout. and also "house of cards," which i didn't actually pick for its lyrics, but its infamous opening line turned out to be almost identical to that of what i think is the actual opening song of the mix;]
Y cassie: "is it you?"
didn't know where to start, but i'm glad i landed on this. it has become very possibly my favorite single of the last few months, or else my first favorite single of '08, depending on what counts. nice to hear some guitars in r&b that actually growl and snarl and rawk, as opposed to the kinda turgid ones in "party like a rock star" and r. kelly's "rock star." relistened to cassie recently (my #15 album of last year) and it is truly wonderful - getting super-psyched for connecticut fever or whatever her next album's gonna be called.
fantasia: "hood boy"
amerie: "gotta work"
the fantasia technically came out in '06 (though it's the first song i remember hearing on the radio all the time in january '07), and who knows how to reckon where amerie falls anymore (what a fucky and a wtf her recent career handling has been), but these are two fantastic songs that don't deserve to fall through the cracks (yknow, the cracks between the years that are full of songs.) both proudly harness their '60s soul sample chassis (one motown, one stax) - '60s soul sounded bigger in '07 than it has in almost thirty years, i'd wager - to 2007 horsepower rhythm engines, rev up their best diva-style vocal passion, and leave us to wallow in their glorious dust. (um, how's that for an inane metaphor?)
amy winehouse: "you know that i'm no good" it didn't sound like a single to me the first fifty times i heard it, and i still maintain that it doesn't actually have a hook, but i heard enough people talking about "that tanqueray song" this year for it to worm its way into my head too. anyway, i'd already used "tears dry" (on my folks' mix) and "rehab" (on last year's model), and like it or not you can't properly evoke the soul of '07 without a splash of ms. wetwetwet.
sharon jones: "tell me" gotta be honest, i was a little underwhelmed by sharjo's offering this year - maybe just 'cause i knew what to expect. i saw her do her schtick for the fourth and fifth times in '07, to diminishing returns; my paper on her got rejected from emp; mark and amy went and got rich off her horn section; and she turned 51. still sounds pretty good though.
the budos band: "ride or die"
same goes for those lovable second-fiddles the budos. the good-sounding part that is. (no judgment yet on whether the songs still pass muster.) i had wanted to keep the funk going with their half-siblings antibalas, their semi-cousins tinariwen, and/or a cut from the impressively pedigreed superbad ost - prob. my movie of the year, btw - but this will have to suffice.
[2]
Y katharine mcphee: "love story"
it seems like it should be too dumb to work, but it just keeps sounding better. cops the exuberance and the basic template of "crazy in love"/"1 thing," without being as complex or interesting musically, which actually makes it more purely soulful (that ain't a sample yo.) still didn't chart why?
dizzee rascal: "pussyole (oldskool)" veering off from the soul/retro-soul/simulacra-soul train, here's...yet another song based on a very familiar sample. didn't hear this (or the rest of maths + english) until very late in the game, but it takes no time to warm to; only slightly more to recognize as reasonably righteous in its own right (not just for the deathless e-z rock/lyn collins crib.) based on not enough listens (to any of the three), m+e may be my favorite dizzee album, just because it doesn't sound like it's trying to be anything other than fun.
dj khaled, ft. pretty much ehrrrbody: "we taking over"
weird song. sort of epic, but pretty silly at the same time. i guess that's what happens when akon tries to be epic. what a weird dude to be dominating music the way he has - no wonder this year was so weird. i have yet to feel any inkling of akon being interesting as a person (or t-pain, or lil wayne for that matter though admittedly i haven't been trying. i do enjoy rick ross, and t.i. sort of although the most charismatic i've heard him was back on "rubber band man") my main association with this song is hearing it blasting from car windows at my fairmount apartment this spring. also this: memo to rappers.
>ashley tisdale: "he said she said"
this seemed like such a nothing, insignificant album when it came out. i still pretty much feel that way about it, so i've been surprised by all the attention/love it (or at least certain songs) it continued to get from the teenpop thread (or at least frank) throughout the year. it seemed like a much slower year for teenpop than 06 - which is my only expanation - but maybe that was just me.
justice: "d.a.n.c.e."
britney spears: "piece of me"
of course. two quintessential crossovers of 07. whatever that means. from pop to popular, or vice versa. they play pretty nice together too. and i've wanted to do that feist interpolation forever since i thought their "five" sounded more like "feist" (actually it's "fight.") what would be the correct cheeky mash-up title for this? "dance, britney"? "piece of justice"?
low: "hatchet"
ha! suckas. does this sound okay to you, cuz i've convinced myself it works. the synthpop reharmonization makes it creepier, inadvertently more in line with the rest of the album. btw the album version is actually dancier than the optimimi remix, though it's less groovy and less optimimi.
aesop rock: "none shall pass"
last time i really cared about an ace-rock song was when i put "no jumper cables" on 03 in pop; i actually liked this one before mixing it (and the rest of the album shows potential too, so i may attempt to digest it further), but its inclusion here still substantially boosts the chances that i'll remember it in a year's time.
nelly furtado: "say it right"
i got around to owning loose in 07; perhaps in 08 i'll get around to caring about it. in the meantime this daringly minimal, deceptively simple ditty did manage to conquer my headspace more effectively than either of its more hamfisted, loudmouthed predecessors. those i noticed long before i liked; this one took forever to notice, but by that time like/dislike didn't seem to be a relevant question anymore.
[3]
gwen stefani: "the sweet escape"
there's something obnoxious about this (maybe something to do with how oversaturated it became - but it somehow sounded oversaturated even when it wasn't) but i've got a pretty generous soft spot for it all the same, mostly because it is so sweet. no matter strident and cloying gwen and akon may sound, or how preposterous the lyrics are, it's got some real, messy, overexaggerated life to it.
Y tracey thorn: "it's all true"
okay, here's finally one about which i have nothing conflicted or negative to say. unless its, as i've said before, that it's almost too perfect. it just glides. i love how the metallic kaleidascopy bits work in the context of this mix.
hilary duff: "dreamer"
i've written about this before. still cracks me up. had to let it play out long enough to get to the great deadpan second verse.
lcd soundsystem: "get innocuous"
plays "we share our mother's health" to "dreamer"'s "play with fire" (q.v. last year's mix.) fittingly enough since lcd was more or less to 07 as the knife were to 06, albeit with a bit more avuncularity, a bit less shock & awe. by the way, none of sound of silver's dance jams (which, after all, were much more than just dance jams) could touch last year's "kick out the chairs," the james murphy collab w/ whomadewho (as heard on popsical.)
Y matthew dear: "pom pom"
the clear standout from a very confusing, conflicting album that i really wanted to love, but couldn't quite hack. though it does have probably the sexiest opening moments of any 07 album. to be honest i guess i've never really understood matthew dear in album form. part of the problem here is that (like lcd) he's no longer really trying to make dance jams, though (unlike lcd), i can't really tell what he is trying to do. but a couple slipped out anyway. the nicely if typically inscrutably titled "pom pom" (it's more sound than sense) is poppier but less anthemic than, say, "dog days." and sometimes i dunno wtf is going on with his vocal sounds. still, it's hard to come by a lyrical hook as simple but arrestingly honest as this one: "i've got to figure out love!"
nôze: "love affair"
and i love how (and this wasn't really planned), immediately after dear utters that declaration for the second time, along come nôze, leading the way out of this pile-up of innocuous befuddlement with their goofy, cocksure, way-frenchy absolutely certainty about love. or at least about the necessary preparatory steps for a love affair. i also love how they pronounce the names of their body parts (i brush my teez? i clean my nôze?) and how perfectly the screwy, jaunty music suits the absurd lyrics. this tune is from a couple years ago, not actually 07, (was on an 06 singles comp and, coincidentally, hot chip's 07 dj-kicks) but i just found it and wanted to share.
will.iam: "heartbreaker"
hopefully i'll get around to writing up my list of reasons why will.i.am's songs about girls is superior to kanye west's graduation (west's absence here is quite deliberate, as was gnarls barkley last year - i thought about teasing the sample again, but it's just warmed-over daft punk anyway, and who needs that)...in the meantime just feel the groove. so smoove. so fly. so-so-so-so-sorry.
roisin murphy: "let me know"
disco is alive and well. "overpowered" may have caught more ears with its edgy acid teeter, but this one is a thing of beauty, pure and simple.
[4]
escort: "all through the night"
('fake') "authentic" disco. hey who's counting? sounds great - sounds a lot more happening that sharon jones right at the moment. my cousin plays drums on this. at the club last night the dj played a mash-up of it with a twista/pharell song. whoa, muppety video!
Y aly+aj: "like whoa"
it feels good, it feels good! teenrock confessional dance; slow-burn verses, pyrotechnic chorus. it didn't really occur to me before but this section of the mix is pretty enraptured - the michalkas sound about as hot and bothered here as the hyperverbal escort divas, after their fashion. good girls gone bad?
rihanna: "please don't stop the music"
07's fave bajan babe sounds practically relaxed by contrast. another potent sample here - takes some temerity (or utter shamelessness) to nab michael jackson's most overt, bluntest floor-filler. could have been obnoxiously overpowering, save for how it savvily only sneaks in about a minute into the track's masterful slow build, taking enough time for the full reveal that the handclap stomp and big stupid stadium synths have ample time to burrow into your brain before you realize what's happening. it sounds obvious, but it's deceptively impressive how gracefully this track deploys all the heavy artillery at its disposal. "umbrella" seemed like an unlikely smash at first; this one sounded like a no-brainer from the get-go, and it's only now starting its chart ascension (#26 this week after 7 weeks on the chart) - we'll have to keep an eye and see how prophetic the titular request becomes.
the chemical brothers: "a modern midnight conversation"
did you hear the lily allen is having ed chemical's baby. damn dawg. i listened to we are the night, the chem's 07 album (and their first i haven't owned...yet...i guess) a few times, and nothing really stuck except this one, an appropriately modern-sounding groover which seems to take some cues from so-called minimalism. not that it's especially minimal (or minimalist), but there's a healthy modicum of restraint within its typically expansive galactic funk. it actually sounds sleek, which they haven't managed in a minute or so. good looking out. more like this, and better luck next time.
gui boratto: "beautiful life"
certainly the hook of the year, house/trance/electro-disco-wise. euphoric but understated; pop-kissed but elegant. hearing it throb from the window of a passing rittenhouse square car on the way to unsilent night this year was as magically transformative as unsilent night itself - it made me feel like the whole block had suddenly entered one of those slinky, futuristic car commercial, in a good way. the problem is that the track itself, though it contains several excellent builds, is constructed somewhat poorly for actual dancefloor use, making it more useful as a headphones bliss-out than a bona-fide club anthem, or more properly perhaps, a necessary subject for remixes. unfortunately, i didn't hear any (there must have been some, right?) but i think i did a decent job of incorporating the most quintessential portion, even if i had to leave out the secondary hook ("i can feel life..."), which doesn't come in until the third round of waning and waxing. even the most pounding, propulsive part of the track comes off as a bit of a floaty respite in the context of the poptacular disco inferno that precedes it here, so it serves as something of a breather and a palate-cleanser.
von südenfed: "fledermaus can't get it"
and then we are rudely plunged down from that cosmic euphoria into what i think of as the 'hooligans' portion of the mix. who knows what mark e smith is on about here, but he certainly isn't being very polite about telling us whatever it is. meanwhile mouse on mars concoct what sounds like a fartier version of "losing my edge."
[5]
bonde do role: "solta o frango"
not quite as over-the-top as "office boy," but i guess a dab of subtlety can't hurt amidst all this loony chaos. not that there's ever anything truly subtle about the bonde. i like how the chorus mostly consists of them shouting "o-le!"
calvin harris: "the girls"
still digging on calvin, perhaps because i never got around to overplaying him, and this may be even better than "acceptable." i'm not too keen on the bit where he list of types of girls that he likes (which i tastefully left mostly obscured by bonde do role's yammering - which for all i know might be just as tasteless), but i like the rest of it; i like the phrase "oversubscribed with relationships," i like his bluntness that he'll play around "for sure, for sure!" (reminds me of jonah hill in superbad), i love that main synth hook, and i loved the way the girls at the new years eve party took to the refrain "i get all the girls" right way.
Y muscles: "sweaty"
but really now, that unwashed chauvinism gets pretty stinky pretty fast, and that's why i got muscles here (all the way from oz) to undercut it with a little of that old-fashioned peace love ecstasy unity respect. simply put, this song is awesome! and it is special! hooray for hooligans!
dan le sac vs. scroobious pip: "thou shalt always kill"
love. yeah, there are a couple of dumb lines, but even those become more endearing as you get to know it, rather than discoloring the whole thing. had to include a good long chunk of it here b/c it seems unlikely to get much of an airing anywhere else. on the other hand i also had to loop it and fade it after the "repetitive generic music" part. you're not missing too much good stuff after that anyway, it's just pop-song allusions and things that don't make any sense to us clueless americans (pheonix wtf?) incidentally, i'd like to point out how awesome the beat of this song is; it'd be a pretty sweet weirdo electro-funk workout on its own, without the slam-poetry punchlines.
armand van helden, "nyc beat"
just a basic booming beat and a killer bassline. hard to argue with that. i've even grown to like the admittedly totally vapid chant. i'll also admit that i watched the video more times than is healthy.
[6]
sophie ellis-bextor: "me and my imagination"
yay sophie. still don't really know what makes her special, of the assorted british pop diva ladies, except that she's probably the most posh i guess (i will likely delve into her albums soon for amg purposes), but this is one massively, stomping tchune. rather unsubtle electro-disco extolling the virtues of subtlety. "magic stays where myth remains."
stanton warriors ft. sway: "get 'em high"
this was a bonus track on this year's sway ep (which i probably wouldn't have noticed except that i reviewed it for amg) - not sure if it appeared on an earlier stanton warriors release or what. anyway it's neither of their best work, but it ain't too shabby.
m.i.a.: "xr2"
massive. pretty much definitely my favorite track to dance to this year. (the album version that is - better than the "turbo" version - single? remix? leak? - which turned up early in the year.) made both of my critpoll top ten ballots. freaked out to it on dancefloors more than once. still can't hear it without jiggling involuntarily. listening to it again, that's almost all due to the beat, or more specifically the beat plus that incredible dirty synth hook. i've got no problem with m.i.a.'s lyrics/vocals, it's just that they have relatively little to do with why this track is so great. i continue to struggle with the rest of kala - i do enjoy a lot of it, but for some reason it still doesn't do what i want from it as an album. dunno.
cornelius: "wataridori"
(what? i didn't hear anything, did you?)
Y simian mobile disco: "love"
another fortuitous lyrical dovetail (with "xr2"): some say "love is all you need to know." not quite sure what to make of the verses (s-p-e-ls fiasco?) except that they're very silly still pretty catchy, but the chorus is one of the year's more touching and beautiful. of course i take it at face value, what do you think? so i had to give it a bit of breathing room and let love rule for a little minute before moving on. except, i guess, for "i believe," i didn't like the singles from attack sustain decay release as much as most of the album tracks - go figure.
modest mouse: dashboard
barely listened to this after i initially heard it and thought it was pretty good. but then i remembered it, which will have paid off if anybody else remembers it too. was the album any good? i pretty much wrote them off after good news, but then i didn't even really care for the singles from that one.
fujiya and miyagi: ankle injuries
from last year (ish) and not too dancey (ish), but i have a soft spot for this one mostly because of the title. (also because of the way they repeat their own bandname incessantly.)
r. kelly ft. t.i. and t-pain: "i'm a flirt (remix)"
how the hell r. kelly manages to keep on making singles that seem like goofy novelties at first, but turn out to be compulsively, endlessly listenable, i think i'll never understand. if i had to guess, it's very possibly the song i listened to most this year; certainly its up there. i kind of regret how much i obscured its simplicity and laid-back bounce here by mashing it against assorted obscurantist british hipster-hypesters - but then, you've heard it before. also, the reharmonization is pretty nice, particularly the turnaround on the fujiya tune.
burial: archangel
still not convinced by burial in general, but this one at least has a nice skeletal two-step/d&b thing going on. very well suited to my purposes. (though my favorite thing to mash up with "i'm a flirt" is squarepusher's "my red hot car" - this gets at the same kind of groove juxtaposition, but it's not quite as much fun.) anyway, more of this sort of beat is a good idea.
[7]
Y miley cyrus: "see you again"
and now for the rock/indie/non-"dance music" detour. took this one on faith for a while, but no, it's true, this is an absolute stormer of a teenpop/rock/country/dance should-be/could-be/would-be smash. (bedbugs here on the phenomenology of its success.) so far i've still mostly warmed to miley/hannah on a per-song basis (only about three songs have managed to win me over to date, including the also-great "east northumberland high") but maybe i'll go see the concert movie or something, and figure out what all the fuss is.
candie payne: "one more chance (mark ronson mix)"
ronson, you dog. i find him vaguely repugnant for the same reasons as kanye, something about the obvious and formulaic nature of his working methods, but he is often damnably effective. been listening to candie's album a fair bit, and this one still stands out as by far the biggest pop nugget. indeed, possibly the best (and least overachieving) neo-girl group single we've had in this recent spate - beats the pipettes for both songwriting and sound (though it lacks the unfettered exuberance of "pull shapes"), and amy winehouse for credibility and non-obnoxiousness, while lucky soul haven't quite pulled out a truly smashing single (though "lips are unhappy" comes close.) it's no "he's a rebel," but considering this is 2007 it'll serve.
spoon: "you got yr cherry bomb"
yeah, this too. can you believe there are two separate segments of (neo-) soul music on this mix? and that's not even counting disco. black sixties pop is alive and well. and living in austin, tx. what the hell is this song about? "octopus for good"? oh right it's britt daniel. nevermind then.
the ark: "absolutely no decorum"
not really sure why i included this. nobody else is possibly going to recognize it or care that it's on here (except maybe dave); i didn't particularly like the album it came from; and i don't particularly love the song either, though it's not bad (the best thing about might be the title phrase.) mostly i just really like the ark, and wanted to give them another chance to shine. comes off ok.
tegan and sara: "back in your head"
this on the other hand - i didn't especially care for the song or the album (though i'll listen more), but i knew there'd be an appreciative audience (as there was, at least on new years.) and it just seemed like such an unlikely and idiosyncratic thing for there to be a hit like this (well, a semi-hit - at least among certain demographics it definitely was) - an odd conflation of folky, indie rock, teenpop, and ABM/NPR music, earning supporters from all of those camps and probably others. particularly since it's not really that remarkable of a song. but yeah, i like it okay too.
sally shapiro: "he keeps me alive"
this, on the other hand, i love. it's singular in a way that makes it feel kind of indelicate to just slot it in here, roughly juxtaposed against whatever happened to be in its BPM cohort. but by the same token it works its fragile magic regardless of the context, and is just as devastating and heartbreaking - maybe more so, with this additional injustice added to co-dependent self-injury.
[8]
lethal bizzle: "police on my back"
i think i almost like it more over sally's frosty disco synths than the fun but slightly grating clash sample. have you noticed that i've been giving at least as much space and attention to british rap (dizzee, sway) as the homegrown variety? i never even considered myself a particular fan of u.k. rap, but with bizzle added to the ranks i'm coming around to the idea that it feels a lot more witty, inventive, and just plain fun these days. this one's great - classic doofy scofflaw storytelling (had to let it play out so as not to leave you/him hanging in that shed) and his vocal tics and funny sound effects are ridiculously endearing. (though my favorite is on his other 07 single, "bizzle bizzle," where he lets out a snortled yelp of glee about being on somebody's "top 8 hitlist" on myspace.) t-t-totally dude.
shop boys: "party like a rockstar"
omg wtf. i can't quite comprehend how actually popular this was. the actual song neither rocks nor parties - it's just yr standard-issue dirty south drawl, with a couple more guitars - but the concept was too apropos not to include it just here.
dude 'n nem: "watch my feet"
björk: "declare independence"
party like a demented icelandic artstar. "declare my feet"? "watch my independence"? ("feet independence" is probably better, though it lacks the imperative intensity that is crucial to both of these tunes.) an unholy alliance of two wholly different impish rapscallions, united in their not wholly dissimilar assertions of blunt, bone-headed impudence. makes for one of my favorite, most gleefully unhinged moments on the mix (i want to spin it into a stand-alone mash-up; it practically is already, but it doesn't line up quite perfectly.) i've always been pretty much floored by "declare independence" - definitely my most lasting impression of volta, though recent return listens have reminded me there's plenty more to enjoy - and i'm glad i finally got away with sneaking it into a dance party. it also lends considerable urgency and darkness to the stupid-awesome "watch my feet," although i'm not sure how "dark" it's technically possible to be whilst eating egg-a-rolls in your hat hat and your shirt shirt.
aberfeldy: "do whatever turns you on"
pop levi: "pick me up - uppercut"
skye sweetnam: "ghosts" (with tim armstrong)
i'm considering rejiggering the whole mix from this point on, starting with the revised björk'n'nem remash. actually, when i was making it, it was about 6:00am when i got that point, and i was gonna stop and call it a night (morning), but something inspired to keep going and i cranked out this last fifteen-odd minutes in almost a single burst of sloppy rock'n'roll energy. which is why the songs play out longer than usual and the transitions are somewhat approximate. i could probably trim some of the excess and make it a little sleeker and more dancefloor-palatable. on the other hand i do like all of these songs. even if i should probably stop pretending that aberfeldy count for this year. even if pop levi is a total weirdball that i don't understand at all. even if skye sweetnam disappointed even her biggest cheerleader this year. actually, this is maybe the best and most infectious of these three - channels mid-'90s so-cal so perfectly, effortlessly. (n.b. skye's "music is my boyfriend" is easily one of my favorite singles of the year - and my favorite video as well, not that i'd ever make that list - but it was a little too intense and unhinged even for this mix, which is kind of inconceivable. er maybe it's just not dancy enough.)
[9]
avril lavigne: "girlfriend (remix ft. lil mama)"
actually nevermind, it gets back on track here. i really like how tim armstrong's guitar solo leads into this. and does anything more need to be said about the song itself? you remember right? [like how it was the first rock #1 single since 2001 (but nobody noticed because they didn't think it was rock for some reason?) but then lil mama came around and demonstrated that it's actually a hip-hop song?] right.
Y sugababes: "about you now"
doesn't sound quite as massive coming out of "girlfriend" as i'd like - verse restraint be damned - but nevermind, it's still crushing. kinda strange that this is the sugababes, but who ever knows what to expect from them anyway. so sweet.
paramore: "misery business"
holy cow. cowabunga. now we're talking. and we're off to the races. hail hail rock and roll!
the veronicas: "untouched"
how does this possibly come off as an actual slight lessening of energy? must be a volume issue. should have extended the paramore ghost verse a little further into it i think, until the v's own guitars take over. (will get it on the rejigger.) actually, this is definitely not one of the better songs on "hook me up," but whatever. (it's the most intense, for sure.)
maxïmo park: "our velocity" [dj velociropter's "per second per second" retempo]
kind of a random place to end - and there's still a few minutes grace left for fully-stuffed CD-R maximization - but it was past 8:00 by this point and i still had editing and transferring (traktor>garageband>itunes>toast, probably not the most direct system but hey it works) not to mention packing left to do. plus there wasn't anywhere obvious to go from here - the most pragmatic step would be to loop back around for some low-key, low-tempo hip-hop/r&b (devin the dude? MIMS? was vaguely planning on UGK's "int'l playas anthem") but that would seem like an unnecessary comedown, and hardly a better way to end. (maybe i'll end up tacking on "stay my baby," just so amy can finally get her due - though i'd particularly wanted to emphasize that song's unexpected, "grindin'"-esque boom-bap.) so we close with the maxïmos, with, to be fair, probably the most urgent and blistering single of the year after all (and one of my favorite djing moments too, closing the night at the M room back in august), even if it retains the distinct whiff of XTCian prissiness. that just makes it cuter, right? and just to wring every ounce of patent dancefloor ridiculosity from it, i made it blast into the tempo stratosphear. could have done so even earlier and harder; sometimes too much is just enough...
07 January 2008
to bed with '07 (counting down to midnight...)
just like last year - i guess i'm falling back on old forms for lack of new inspirations - the way i really capped off my musical year was with a big honkin' round-em-up mash-em-up dance mix. available for your downloading pleasure in two handily-sized portions, by clicking on those words; also from the sidebar.
the tracklisting will serve in lieu of a favorite singles list - the majority of my favorite tracks and artists of the year made it on here - well at least those that fit into any vaguely dance-related genres. for those that don't (and others that do), please see the musician plugs 2 mix, which i'll probably never get around annotating. but just to make this a more complete repository for my favorite 07 singles, consider:
these songs were disqualified due to inclusion on earlier mixes (popsical, summertime, cont., or the soon-to-be-revamped love is the dancer):
lil mama: "lip gloss"
natasha bedingfield: "i want to have your babies"
mistah f.a.b: "ghost ride it"
bonde do role: "office boy"
rihanna: "umbrella"
mark ronson ft. lily allen: "oh my god"
mims: "this is why i'm hot"; fat joe: "make it rain (rmx)"; birdman/lil wayne :" i know what i'm doing" (sorta)
calvin harris: "acceptable in the '80s"
dragonette: "i get around"
justin timberlake: "lovestoned" and "summer love" (also generally disqualified for being from 2006)
fujiya and miyagi: "collarbone"
victims of temporary amnesia:
rich boy: "throw some d's"
frankie valli (and the four seasons): "beggin' (pilooski edit)"
casualties of war (er i mean editing/whittling):
amy diamond: "stay my baby"
el-p: "up all night"
les savy fav: "patty lee"
digitalism: "zdarlight"
mims: "this is why i'm hot" ['cause it deserved a spot anyway]
devin the dude ft. andre 3000 and snoop dogg: "what a job"
alice smith: "woodstock"
tiniwaren: "matadjem yinmixan" [notice how that title contains both "dj" and "mix"?]
lyle workman/superbad OST: "flashback party weekend"
kylie minogue: "2 hearts"
arctic monkeys: "flourescent adolescent"
linda sundblad: "back in time"
fall out boy: "this ain't a scene..."
joss stone: "girl they won't believe you"
ashlee simpson: "outta my head"
apples in stereo: "same old drag"
meanwhile, here's what we danced to leading up to midnight on new years eve:
"Lips Are Unhappy" by Lucky Soul
definitely my favorite song from an album that i still can't quite wrap my mind around. my capsule nugget is 'halfway between camera obscura and the pipettes' (which isn't much of a span to traverse), and everything about that description hits me exactly right, but though there are definitely a number of stunners i'm not sure the songs are quite all there. either way, this one's pure pop bliss. and dig the groovy video!
"Parentheses" by The Blow
by special request. technically '06 but most people (including me) heard it this year. total jam. also a totally weird song.
"Lose You" by Linda Sundblad
in the top 4-5 of both my critic poll ballots (which only had three or four songs in common.) i feel i have not done well enough by this song, as linda still has yet to grace a mix of mine - save the ladies love series of girlpop comps for my sister - but i'll keep swooning right along. at least i gave it it a good profuse gush on amg.
"I Want To Have Your Babies" by Natasha Bedingfield
i've gotten over it a bit, but it still does the trick. some excellent possibilities for demonstrative acting-out dances here.
"Stay My Baby" by Amy Diamond
feel particularly bad for amy as she got cut out of last year's mash-mix too, just because i ran out of time to squeeze her in right at the end, back at the low end of the tempo-wheel. jury's out on album #3 (not me, not now) but this one's a keeper.
"Lip Gloss" by Lil Mama
"Umbrella [remix ft. Lil Mama]" by Rihanna
"Take Control" by Amerie
"Gimme More" by Britney Spears
"1 2 3 4" by Feist
a.k.a. dancepop inevitables, 2007 edition
"Paper Planes" by M.I.A.
"Bunny Ain't No Kind Of Rider" by of Montreal
then we took it down a notch and played an abortive game of celebrity password to this soundtrack:
"Hatchet (Optimimi Version)" by Low
"Bookshop Casanova" by The Clientele
"Someone Like You" by Aberfeldy
"Again & Again" by The Bird And The Bee
"Baby I'm Broke" by Lucky Soul
my other possible favorite by them. so fragile, so sweet. calls to mind "crown of love," which i'd nearly forgotten i once loved.
"Solid Ground" by Marit Larsen
"Blush" by Aly & AJ
"Boy With A Coin" by Iron and Wine
haven't really given the album a fair shakedown yet, but this single bodes well
"Fake Empire" by The National
i go back and forth on whether i actively like the rest of the record or just passively enjoy it, but this song is undeniably something special.
"Behind The Sun" by The Good, The Bad & The Queen
"Shirin" by Jens Lekman
"Falling Off A Log " by Tracey Thorn
and then it was midnight...or, not quite, it was slightly past, or by the oven clock maybe a little before, but we decided to pretend that it would be midnight at precisely the end of the song, which was:
"The Underdog" by Spoon
a fitting enough fanfare/farewell, musically at least, pumping us right up into 2008 and the beginning of my mix, which carried the dance party through the first 70 minutes of the new year, at which point we switched over to "like a prayer," phoenix, and beyond. new year, new entry for the mix proper. stay tuned...
p.s. party pix: dance dance dance dance!!!
05 January 2008
puttin' 07 to bed (first yawn)
been in minor brow-wrinkling panic mode here for the last little bit, trying to sort out how best to cap off a year when i very possibly heard more music than any other year - according to my running tally i bought/got/acquired 344 physical records this year (most of them CD albums, though that figure includes LPs and EPs and whatnot too) - over a third of them (117) within the last three months, october-december (versus 65 over the same period last year, though there wasn't quite so dramatic an uptick for the year as a whole.) of which i'm going to guess somewhere between a quarter and a third were 2007 releases. and then there were the digital records - i started downloading torrents for the first time in '07, and heard enough albums that way to utterly clog up my laptop (not a few of which i later purchased on CD, thank you very much.)
so i can't tell if my apathy to conclusive listmaking this time around is reflective of there not being as many albums i felt truly passionate about, or just the result of having had way too much intake to process in a meaningful way, or simply an indication that my 2007 music experience doesn't neatly in list format - specifically, i have no obvious #1. i'm willing to accept any and all of these explanations - and there are plenty of other ways to sum up our year of the double agent, some of which i have already executed (see the top of the side bar for new years round-up mixness...more on that soon)
but i still feel like i owe the world (or, more honestly, my future self) a list. and if any given album stood out from that mass enough for me to consider it here, it must be pretty good or at least interesting. so here's a list. i didn't make this order up but it actually seems to work out about right:
the Top Ten (+ 1) Albums of 2007
1. (tie) Aly + AJ - Insomniatic
Britney Spears - Blackout
Devon Sproule - Keep Your Silver Shined
LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver
Low - Drums and Guns
6. (tie) Radiohead - In Rainbows
Sally Shapiro - Disco Romance
8. (tie) Spoon - Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
Tracey Thorn - Out of the Woods
10. (tie) The Good The Bad and the Queen
They Might Be Giants - The Else/Cast Your Pod to the Wind
ties cheap? maybe you say, but forced comparison of different beasts does little to help anyone either. let's just say this covers my #1 rock album of the year, my #1 pop album of the year, my #1 songwriter album of the year, my #1 dance album of the year, and my #1 art album of the year. and then a couple confused close seconds (art/rock? dance/pop?) and then two evenly-matched though divergent pairs of steadfast old friends who delivered yet again.
and again...with cover art reviews!
i must say something too about the title. it took me a while to warm up to this album (and i'm still gonna hold off on buying it until the deluxe edition gets used, which might mean a year off - unless of course i happen to stumble across a copy with "blush" - bah, most of the best tracks from their last album were only on the deluxe ed, and i won't get fooled again.) one problem was that the first mp3 i got of "potential break-up song" strangely omitted include the del shannon sample, so it took me a while to realize that it featured a very smartly lifted lick from one of my absolute all-time favorite songs (on the other hand, a similar realization didn't entirely do wonders for my opinion of "beautiful girls," though i like that song okay.) i think the moment that it finally fully clicked for me, though, was when i read their definition of "insomniatic" (which has made it into urban dictionary if not into the parlance) and realized that it was not (just) an annoyingly over-clever and apparently meaningless album title, but (also) an apt and actually-clever neologism for a phenomenom that i in fact experience quite frequently.
[the title track is still one of my least favorite songs, however. best track, hands down - or at least the one that's been ruling my headspace for several solid weeks - is "if i could have you back."]
★★★
the musical brilliance of this chef d'œuvre and the recent tumultuous complexification of britney's public presence aside, i can't help but wondering what things would have been like if this had come closer to the beginning of the year, just post her divorce from k-fed, when everybody was rooting for her and she seemed poised to reign supreme in 2007 (that is, in a different way from how she eventually actually did.) given the generally positive attention this record has received (from non 'net-pervs, even) as is, i can only imagine how tremendously it might have been received with more fully open arms.
[best track: "heaven on earth." but i like 'em all.]
★★1/2
this cover is funny - i don't really understand why she used this picture - it's nice enough, but doesn't exactly scream album cover (which is probably the point - it just looks like any old snapshot.) i guess it does a decent job of capturing how gawjess and elfin devon is in person. i don't know who her friends are. one of them's pregnant. i always think it's a dressing room but it's actually a bedroom. the retro nods (sepia tone photo, song titles on the cover) are effectively understated, not (deliberately) campy like this. nice fontwork too. oh-kay devon.
[best track? well the title song is the obvious pick, but "let's go out" is ruling me more at the moment.]
<3<3<3>★★★1/2
oh yeah, the cover. if that's the best we can do for iconic these days i guess it'll have to do. the writing's on the floor. i like that it's the floor. i like that it's (maybe?) a studio shot. hmm.
[best track: "someone great," first last and forever. my single of the year, unless it's "lipgloss".]
★★★1/2
that cover sure ain't helping. frankly low have managed exactly one great album cover in their career (for things we lost in the fire, and they're not getting any better at it.) yeah, i know, minimalism is cool (just ask the field, whose cover i actually did like, perhaps hypocritically, possibly more than i actually loved the album), and the book packaging format is a good in theory (the package design is fairly nice, actually, though it feels a little paltry in your hands.) and yes i have to admit that this particular shade of whitish off-grey, with the smudges and the faux-fabric texture and the grainy type does fit the bleakness and sparsity of this album. but it just doesn't make a statement.
which is really poor planning because the music contained on the cd does absolutely have something to say, but it's threatened to be drowned out by the devastated monochromy of the cover art and the flat detachment of the title and the inexplicably offputting vocal panning. the whole thing just resonates barren desolation to the extent that it's no wonder it was (at first genially commended and then) generally overlooked.
and yes, there is some serious barren desolation here - it's all over the opening track, "pretty people," which is probably the most frightening and uncomfortable thing i heard all year - a bracing and perhaps necessary tone-setter, but hardly the way i'd expect my album of the year to begin. it sure ain't the unapologetic sirens'n'boom-bap'n'moaning that kickstarted "turn it up" and paris last year, or the a cappella lead-in (redolent of the first three elvis costello albums!) to "you and your memory" (amusingly literal video re-enactment here) and the sunset tree before that. nor, even, is it the glorious "poopy bass" and grunge-friendly menace of "monkey" or the glacial, crushing, ethereal "(that's how you sing) amazing grace."
but but but - get beyond that (easy enough - just skip past track 1 to the gorgeous "belarus" - blasphemy whatever) and this is far from a monochromatic album, even though the basic palette (drum loops, atmospheric scufflings, "treatments," and high hardpanned lonely lovely low-vox) is fairly relentless and minimal. still, there's sweetness here, and hope and anger and sympathy and soul-searching - truly, there's just so much emotion, it aches and it breathes and it wears you out, which is another reason this is not an easy album to get through - and serious beauty and beautiful serious and, huh-yup, there's humor too.
[mostly that's "hatchet," which is in the running for my favorite song (qua song, whatever that means) of 07, in either album or remixed "optimimi" form, though as a favorite track on this album i might have to side with "dragonflies." there's also the tremendous closing one-two of "murderer" and "violent past" (this is one of those albums that builds up to a finale, rather than trickling out after an initial bang), the first so potently, pointedly conflicted, the latter so ultimately, utterly resigned. oh man, i do really love this band (adjective reuse alert), after all.]
★★
[best track? tough choice - really anything except the first two, for which i don't particularly care and which just feel tacked on, and which i often skip. couldn't they just have kept it strictly on the mellow tip? would make for a stronger album, i think. might have actually succeeded in attracting less attention though (nobody hailing their 'return to rock' - why do i like this so much less than when they rocked the first time?) okay i think i have to say "videotape." this album's "scatterbrained" (which didn't occur to me until just now.) but, possibly, better. with a hint of "wolf at the door," lyrically.]
★
[my two favorite songs would have to be the two covers, "anorak christmas" and the new "he keeps me alive," which are polar opposites in their emotional subject matter, but convey it equally immaculately. but i want to stress how well the album works as a continuous whole.]
★★★★★
they have had a slight difficulty in recent years coming up with the goods (okay, the greats) songwriting-wise, and if this isn't fully a return to the consistently popcraft of girls can kill (mind, it's not necessarily trying to be) there are at least a pair of effortless pop corkers (the pure-pop "underdog" and the "nothing but heartaches"/"king horse"-riffing "cherry bomb") and a few other forays toward tune-over-texture (...almost. if only britt bothered to enunciate a little better.) and if this band's achilles' heel (or lack thereof) is their tendency toward inscrutable dispassion, they finally, unexpectedly, manage to warm up and even, gasp, emote in the simply stunning last two songs, either of which could contend for spoon's sweetest punch since "anything you want." (and, needless to say, they both sound fantastic.)
as for the cover - well spoon have their style honed in that dept too, though although i dig the vibe i've gotta say this is my least favorite spoon cover since telephono: i don't like the font, i really don't like the title (though i liked how fast britt spit it out in concert), and the image, though interesting in theory, doesn't do much for me. always dig the white border though. (a la girls.) it's not bad, but i expect more from merge and these guys.
[best track: the 1 uptown, gush-flirting with some girl about how hot they are, on the ride home from the nearly-rained-out rockefeller park show this july, the day after the record came out.]
★★1/2
this album has the nicest opening moments of this whole list, those sweet twinkly synths sound like waking up. i like how it's a electro/dance album that takes a couple songs to warm up to full-on dance, intersperses its bangers with its ballads and ends on an anthem rather than comedown. great to hear her working with some hip minimal/micro-house names, but honestly, tracey could sing anything and i'll be happy. love her lyrics too.
["it's all true" is almost too perfect to adore; "grand canyon" and "raise the roof" tie for beautiful dance-world-love come-together mini-epics; "falling off a log" mixes modes and metaphors, might be the best microcosm of all.]
★★★★
cover's pretty fabulous and fitting too, in concept and execution, though i don't love the typeface.
[best song: "green fields." ...above all things i've learned it's the honesty that secures the bond in the heart]
★★★★
and, coincidentally(?) it's their best album since john henry. hands down. a bit of careful pruning and interspersing a couple of tracks from the awesome if overgenerous bonus disc cast your pod... might have made it even stronger.
["climbing the walls." also, "the shadow government." and too many to choose from on the bonus disc.]
★★★★
[ETA: just one more thing: my favorite mix of the year (just one): Dirty South Dance by A-Trak
yeah, it's gimmicky and jokey enough to possibly give you the wrong idea about the ideological intentions of this mix (think what you want, but the amount of care a-trak clearly took in assembling it readily belies any hint of hipster irony or pandering), but it's still a startling and refreshingly different cover image. plus it's just fun.
★★★★]
12 December 2007
listlessnesslessnesslessness
(albums edition)
[but first, a metacritic update: and their refinement of the decline dropped from #2 to #4 thanks to the addition of this justifiably incredulous but still horribly written 1.5/5 review (presumably underweighted.) i still haven't heard it (though i want to) so not sure why i'm so keen on reporting about it, except that i want to make up for my initial skepticism of tired sounds of. (i have now heard untrue, or at least most of it, and am not entirely convinced.)]
i don't really believe in compiling finalized year-end lists until at least the end of the year. but it is certainly time to start getting my thoughts together, for mix-envisioning purposes (really not sure about that, but i do have an ostensibly working optical drive now), or if nothing else for the twin critics polls, which both have next friday as their deadline (a relief, as i'd thought one was this friday.) don't want to end up with another 2005 on my hands.
still, stuff's tough. years are just too long, for one thing, and this year feels especially poorly defined, both personally and musically. it's hard to even know what counts as '07 sometimes.
technically '06 albums i'll probably count anyway:
sally shapiro, disco romance (released dec '06 in europe; oct '07 in canada - dunno about u.s.)
joan as police woman, real life (released in uk/feted online '06; released us '07)
long blondes, someone to drive you home (similarly)
keith urban, love pain and the whole crazy thing (released november '06, so it's fairly questionable, but i didn't hear it until early '07 and loved it.)
albums that i considered for '06 (and mostly didn't like at the time) and therefore don't seem like they should count (even though i like several of them a lot more now) although they were released here in '07 (in what felt like a total onslaught):
the pipettes, we are the pipettes
peter bjorn and john, writer's block
lily allen, alright, still
amy winehouse, back to black
i'm from barcelona, let me introduce my friends
fujiya and miyagi, transparent things
cornelius, sensuous (the only one i'd consider possibly including, since i may have given it an unfair shake last year.)
some of my favorite albums of the decade (that have never been on my year-end lists) which i could probably fudge as '07 if i wanted to, even though it would be totally unfair:
robyn, robyn (sweden release '05. uk release april '07. uk re-issue august '07. us release december 4th, allegedly???)
rachel stevens, come and get it (uk release '05. american itunes-only release june '07 wtf.)
marit larsen, under the surface (norway release '06. but for some reason i didn't fall head-over-heels for it/her until this year. and it is maybe possibly maybe going to get a u.s. release sometime maybe soonish? probably not in '07 though i guess. maybe '08?)
other '06 albums that i only heard/got in '07 and would otherwise have listed:
aberfeldy, do whatever turns you on (but nobody heard it. amg review forthcoming)
extra golden, ok-oyot soundystem
sid and susie, under the covers, vol. 1
hot chip, the warning (i know, i blew it.)
regina spektor, begin to hope (ditto)
justin timberlake, futuresex/lovesounds (heard '06; loved '07 - by dint of the singles one could theoretically decide to count it, but actually i refuse to even count the '07 singles.)
nôze, how to dance (pretty left-field - but i'm diggin' it.)
additional confusion:
radiohead, in rainbows (okay, it was "released" in '07. and is indisputably an '07 album, perhaps the zeitgeistest of them all. but it's also an '08 album, since the u.s. physical release date is january 1.)
as for albums which i can't actually invent qualms about voting for, well, i can at least wring my hands about comparing apples with oranges whose appeal stems from totally different places. (and don't tell me oranges don't have stems and apples don't have peels.) roughly in order of preference in each category:
indie (rock?) about which i give at least a damn:
low, drums and guns (a strong #1 contender - it's old and lived-in now, but that shouldn't count against it too much.)
okkervil river, the stage names (i tend to give them too short a shrift, but they still haven't managed make anything as immediate and pleasurable as the wonderful don't fall in love with everyone you see again - i get the sense they haven't really been trying.)
the national, boxer
the clientele, god save the clientele
lucky soul, the great unwanted
(indie?) rock, about which likewise:
spoon, ga ga ga ga ga
pop levi, the return to form black magick party
the new pornographers, challengers
maxïmo park, our earthly pleasures
the ark, prayer for the weekend
arctic monkeys, favourite worst album title
some sweet-ass hipster dance albums:
lcd soundsystem, sound of silver
justice, †
m.i.a., kala
simian mobile disco, attack decay sustain release
a-trak, dirty south dance
bonde do role, with lasers
electronica or something like it (mostly listeny, not dancy)
caribou, andorra
pantha du prince, this bliss
gui boratto, chromophobia
strategy, future rock (just got it, but really liking it so far)
the field, from here we go sublime
rootsy/folky/country/soul/ABM ladysingers:
devon sproule, keep your silver shined
alice smith, for the lovers, dreamers and me
miranda lambert, crazy ex-girlfriend
patty griffin, children running through
feist, the reminder
bettye lavette, scene of the crime
mirah and spectratone international, share this place
sharon jones and the dap-kings, 100 days, 100 nights (eh...to be honest i'm kinda getting over the whole dap-thing. hopefully seeing sharon on friday will re-excite me.)
taylor swift, taylor swift (haven't actually really listened to the album, but i think i know i'll like it)
[why no menfolks? you tell me. mostly my listening prejudice - haven't given much of a fair shake to iron and wine, donnie, nick lowe, or other possible contenders here. though these categories fudge and bleed anyway.]
sentimental favorites from back in the day (an auspicious category):
tracey thorn, out of the woods
the good the bad and the queen, the good the bad and the queen
they might be giants, the else/cast your pod to the wind
the apples in stereo, new magnetic wonder (it feels like a guilty pleasure just when i thought i was immune to them. i think they planned it that way.)
jarvis cocker, jarvis
[elliott smith's new moon probably ought to be on here, but for some reason i didn't listen to it all that much.]
jazz?
the bad plus, prog (?)
jason moran, artist in residence (?)
floratone? nels cline singers?
(oh, what the hell: )
battles, mirrored
the budos band, ii
rap?
hmm. not sure. lethal bizzle (the new sway for '07)? devin the dude? aesop rock/el-p? yeah, ok whatever. should listen to dizzee and weezy and jayzee s'more.
so far that's all well and good, but it really gets confusing when i try to rank those against pop, which is getting to feel like a fundamentally separate interest, with separate tendencies and listening habits from the kind of music that other people who think they like music think they like. hm hm.
pop albums that are better than their singles
aly & aj, insomniatic
the veronicas, hook me up
hilary duff, dignity
will.i.am, songs about girls
pop albums that may well be at least as good as their singles
britney spears, blackout
linda sundblad, oh my god
roisin murphy, overpowered
sophie ellis-bextor, trip the light fantastic
kylie, x
pop albums that aren't as good as their singles, but are still pretty great (and/or the singles are so good it doesn't matter):
r. kelly, double up
rihanna, good girl gone bad
amerie, because i love it
skye sweetnam, sound soldier
amy diamond, music in motion
sugababes, change
avril lavigne, the best damn album title
katharine mcphee, katharine mcphee
fairly disappointing but still somewhat interesting albums that i wish i liked more, and should probably listen to again, just to make sure:
tunng, good arrows [=not as good as their first two albums]
patrick wolf, magic position [=not as good as its singles]
shins, wincing [=really not as good as their first two albums]
of montreal, hissing fauna [eta: actually, this is a lot better than i gave it credit for.]
sondre lerche, phantom punch
colleen, les ondes silencieuses [really wanted to like this but no dice]
bjork, volta [really wanted to like this...it works better when i'm not trying so hard]
jens lekman, night falls on kortedala [omg what was he thinking?]
von südenfeld, tromatic reflexxxions [omg what was i thinking?]
chemical brothers, we are the night [...yawn...]
06 December 2007
plug tuning, pt. 2
i'm not enitrely ready yet to commence the year-end listing, and all the soul-searching, self-imposed self-conscious listening that entails - to say nothing of the year-end mixmaking - though bedbugs' fairly comprehensive '07 teen-pop round-up makes a good inspiration/starting point. but here goes i guess the last mix-tape i made in regular season play this year, which will stands as a sort of informal beginning to that process, since it rounds up many of my favorites from the first two-thirds of '07 (and the last half or so of '06); and i'll use it as a way to begin commenting on those artists/albums/tracks, as seems appropriate.
it's possibly the most 'conventional' mix i've made in ages, which is to say that, even more than its mood-based predecessor (which drew from a wider array, temporally speaking) it has no especial theme or organizing principle other than to survey recent highlights in a way that makes an enjoyable, relatively cohesive listen.
Title: Musician Plugs II (subtitle: paren(t)heses)
Format: 2 CDs
Date: September 2007
Packaging: similar to the design of the original, with inserts made from that same calendar, but in a long, DVD-size jewel case (the fancy kind that allows two discs to fit on the spindle.) this time it's ingrid bergman on the front/inside cover, and humphrey bogart on the back cover, and for some reason i decided the track listing on the calendar squares should be upside down with respect to the numbers. so it's pretty hard. i won't even bother showing you a picture of the track list for the first disc (which is in the tray, underneath the cd) - look down to see the list for the second disc (which is inside the 'booklet'.)
incidentally, the critics have been raving:
1. LCD Soundsystem, "Someone Great"
2. Caribou, "Sandy"
3. Patrick Wolf, "Overture"
4. The New Pornographers, "My Rights Versus Yours"
5. Battles, "Leyendecker"
6. Keith Urban, "I Told You So"
7. Miranda Lambert, "Guilty in Here"
8. The Blow, "Parentheses"
9. Spoon, "Finer Feelings"
10. Pop Levi, "Flirting"
11. The Long Blondes, "Weekend Without Makeup"
12. Okkervil River, "Black"
13. Hot Chip, "No Fit State"
14. The Ark, "Let Me Down Gently"
15. Gui Boratto, "Xilo"
16. Aberfeldy, "Hypnotized"
17. M.I.A., "Paper Planes"
18. Oakley Hall, "Living in Sin in the USA"
19. Patty Griffin, "I Don't Ever Give Up"
20. Feist, "1 2 3 4"
1. Low, "Hatchet (Optimimi Version)"
2. Margaret Berger, "Naive (16)"
3. Lauryn Hill, "Lose Myself"
4. Junior Boys, "Count Souvenirs"
5. Regina Spektor, "Better"
6. The Good, The Bad and the Queen, "Behind the Sun"
7. Maxïmo Park, "Books From Boxes"
8. The National, "Fake Empire"
9. They Might Be Giants, "Climbing The Walls"
10. Arctic Monkeys, "Flourescent Adolescent"
11. Andrew Bird, "Heretics"
[alternate selection: Joan as Police Woman, "Eternal Flame"]
12. Joanna Newsom, "Cosmia"
13. Ellen Allien + Apparat, "Way Out"
14. Tracey Thorn, "Falling Off a Log"
15. Amy Winehouse, "Tears Dry On Their Own"
16. The Hold Steady, "You Can Make Him Like You"
17. The Gothic Archies, "The World Is A Very Scary Place"
18. Beirut, "Scenic World"
19. Barbara Morgenstern, "The Operator (Single Edit)"
20. The Bird and the Bee, "Again and Again"
21. John Vanderslice, "New Zealand Pines"
22. Jarvis Cocker, "Black Magic"
23. Marit Larsen, "Solid Ground"
[stay tuned for commentary on the tracklists]
