Best Songs of 2009

2009 was a great year in music. There was new music from great new bands (The xx, Japandroids, etc.), bands we already knew and loved (Grizzly Bear, YYY's, etc.) and surprisingly great music from bands that some of us had almost written off (The Horrors, The Maccabees, etc.). People keep saying that the album format is dying or, more drastically, that the whole music business is dying, but from the evidence of the past few years it is only getting better.

This year there is simply a Top 15 list for songs, a Top 20 for albums and a newly added Top 3 for remixes. The lists have been split into to two posts, one for songs and one for albums. The reasoning is simple and obvious. The greatest songs do not always come from the greatest albums and vice versa.

Disclaimer: A song does not have to have been released as a single to make the list. Rather, it is a list of my favourite individual songs of the year.

1. The Horrors - Sea Within A Sea

There was never any doubt in my mind when I had to choose a favourite song of the year. That this song comes courtesy of The Horrors is surprising, to say the least, considering that their debut album was decent at best. But lo and behold, the band has matured (immensely) and produced a revelation of an album in Primary Colours. Sea Within A Sea was the first single and what a single it is. The song clocks in at 7:57, but at no point do you feel like it is too long. The song sounds like a great long lost Can or NEU! (with vocals) song  and is easily the best krautrock in years. What really makes this the best song of 2009, though, is how it climaxes. When they break it down at around the 3:30 mark and the synth line kicks in, you know something great is about to happen. And it only gets better from then... I don't know if it is more Geoff Barrow than The Horrors, but I know for sure that this is the best song of the year.

2. Wavves - Cool Jumper

This was a tricky one. At first listen the song struck me as being too cluttered and chaotic. Then I gave it a second listen and for some reason everything clicked and it just made sense. There is a lot going on in the song and taking it all in takes a listen or two. But this is exactly what is the strength of the song, as each listen unravels another layer of chaos and in the end you have a really f'ng great song. I am not a big fan of Wavves’ other songs (too stoned for my liking), but adding Zach Hill's ADD drumming takes the song to a whole new level. The laid back 60s surf vocals of Wavves mixed with the distorted guitar, synths and the aforementioned drumming all combines to make a wonderfully vibrant yet dark 'pop' song.

3. Vivian Girls - Lake House

This is simply C86 and surf combined to perfection. I was a fan of the Vivian Girl's self titled debut from 2008, but I always had a feeling that their songs could be a little bit more. Lake House has that little bit more – that extra magic. To me the song is one long chorus, kicking off at full speed with a change of pace midway through before powering on again after about a minute of soloing. Clocking in at 2:05, it is the perfect little 'pop' song. Just long enough for you to love it, but also short enough for you to want to hear it over and over again. The song even came out early '09, so it is a testament to it that I still love it to this day (what can I say, I move fast). It is simple stuff, but it just works so well.

4. Tiny Vipers - Dreamer

This song is all about the intensity and sincerity with which it is sung. Jesy Fontino has a great voice and puts it to such hauntingly beautiful use in Dreamer. It is the little things that make this song work and stand out. It is the care with which she pronounces each word and the way she changes pitch at the end to startling effect. You really feel her pain.

"I'm going to live, but I'm living far away/ I'm going to die. I'm dying for a way out" 

I do not normally care much for singer-songwriters, but Tiny Vipers get me. It is intense and I feel it deep deep down. It touches me and I love that (I swear I'll cut back on the cheese from now on).

5. Grizzly Bear - While You Wait For The Others

Grizzly Bear really had a break out year in 2009 (in indie terms) and understandably so. Veckatemist was song for song an incredible album that can compare with best of any year. In my humble opinion, the album had two stand out songs: While You Wait For The Others and Ready, Able. To be honest I had this #5 down as a tie, but forced to pick one I went for WYWFTO. The song displays what it is that makes Grizzly Bear such a great band and Veckatimest such a fantastic album. Everything, from the slow build to the immaculate harmonies in the choruses, is so perfectly crafted and wonderfully executed.

6 VEGA - No Reasons  

7 Micachu and the Shapes - Lips 

8 Wild Beasts - Hooting and Howling 

9 Golden Filter - Thunderbird 

10 YACHT - The Afterlife 

11 Lushlife - The Kindness 

12 Japandroids - Young Hearts Spark Fire 

13 The Big Pink - Velvet

14 The xx - Islands 

15 Bat for Lashes - Daniel

Honourable Mentions:

Beach Fossils - Vacation, Ellie Goulding - Under the Sheets, Siriusmo - High Together, The Thermals - When We Were Alive, Phoenix - Lizstomania, Sleigh Bells - Crown to the Ground, Staff Benda Bilili - Polio, Fever Ray - If I Had A Heart, Fuck Buttons - Olympians, The Decemberists - The Rake Song, Harlem Shakes - Strictly Game, Port O'Brien - My Will is Good, Marina and the Diamonds - Obsessions, Atlas Sound - Logos, Julian Casablancas - 11th Dimension, Lars and the Hands of Light - Hey Lover (Hey Love!), Snake And Jet's Amazing Bullit Band - Smiling Makes Bitter, Oh No Ono - Hoplessly Young, Delorean - Deli, Hospitality - Betty Wang, Dead Man's Bones - Pa Pa Power

Best Remixes of 2009

The remix Top 3 was added mainly due to the brilliance of the Top 2. The remixes of You've Got The Love and In For The Kill took the respective songs and turned them on their head. Even more so, though, the remixers managed to take songs that were good, but not spectacular, and make something much better (read: great) of them, and that is something to be applauded.

1. Florence and the Machine - You've Got The Love (XX Remix)

2. La Roux - In For The Kill (Skream Remix)

3. The Gossip - Heavy Cross (BURNS Remix)

This Means Nothing To Me...

Sorry for the long break in posting. I have been busy being important and doing what important people do. Travelling, relaxing and other hardships. But I'm back (!) and soon I'll post my long- long- list addedum to the "Sound of 2010" post and then my recap of the best releases (songs, remixes and albums) of 2009.

Are you excited? Good. You should be.

In the meantime...

Ultravox - Vienna



You'll never guess where I went on my travels...

BBC Sound of 2010

The BBC ‘Sound of 2010’ long list is up and we can now all breathe easy knowing who and what will be big in the coming year. The list is 15 acts long and is a good indicator of the coming year in music (or at least the first six months). Looking at it and comparing to my own (which is essentially why I did my own in the first place), then 6 out of my 10 made the long list. A ratio of 60%, which is acceptable.

The Long List (in alpabetical order)

• Daisy Dares You
• Delphic [got it]
  
• Devlin
• The Drums [got it]
• Everything Everything
• Giggs
• Gold Panda
• Ellie Goulding [got it]
• Hurts
• Joy Orbison [got it]
• Marina and the Diamonds [got it]
• Owl City
• Rox
• Stornoway [got it]
• Two Door Cinema Club
  

The list is pretty much the usual mix of landfill- indie rockers (The Drums and Two Door Cinema Club), token rapper (Giggs), post-punkers á la Joy Division (Delphic), new folkers (Stornoway), synth poppers (Hurts and Ellie Goulding), etc.. This time though, they have thrown in a few leftfield electronic acts who probably won’t be huge commercial successes, but will probably strike a chord critically (Gold Panda and Joy Orbison). Still, to be honest, some of the acts featured are kinda… well, shit. Three in particular are really shit.

Sound of 2010

It is that time of year again. The leaves are falling off the trees, the weather is getting cold(er) and soon all kinds of music magazines, blogs and the like will publish their end-of-year lists as well as their predictions for what is going to make it big in the next year. Trying to predict what is going to be big "next year" is always going to be sketchy business, especially as most lists act as selffulfilling prophecies as the journalists themselves have much to say in who will "make it". Luckily, my blog is small and insignificant so I have no such worries. I win again! No? Damn...

It's A Life That I Can't Believe

This year has seen some excellent hiphop releases with personal hightlights being Mos Def’s The Ecstatic, Raekwon’s Only Built 4 Cuban Linx Part II and Lushlife’s Cassette City. The latter has especially struck a chord with me, mixing chamber pop with old school early 90’s east coast hiphop influences. Taking influence as much from DJ Premier as Burt Bacharach. The album has an impressively cohesive feel and it is obvious that a lot of thought and heart has gone in to the making of the record. A great album that really deserves wider recognition.

The song that ignited my interest for Lushlife was The Kindness. The song sounds like a J Dilla production – which is quite a compliment in my book – and immediately caught my attention. From the weaving soul sample to the chopped strings and harp, it is extremely well produced and executed.

Lushlife – The Kindness



Another  song that really deserves a mention is Meridian Sound [Part Three], which combines a Beach Boys sample with a drum beat heavily influenced by The Ronettes' Be My Baby. Your average piece of hiphop it is not. What it is though is really clever and I love it.

Buy the album. Now.

Songs of Euphoria

My two favorite songs at the moment are both songs of overblown proportions. Songs that are drenched in massive big synth, bubbly bass and soft-the-hard-way drums. I don't know if it says something about my current state of mind, but these songs are just on constant repeat at the moment.

VEGA - No Reasons



VEGA (spelled all capitals) is Alan Palomo. VEGA is great. Succinct and to the point.

VEGA is also the guy behind the first of my two current favorite songs. No Reasons is unashamedly catchy and just bounces happily along. I love how it sounds like the french touch house of yore, such as Mojo and Stardust (and more recently The Phantom's Revenge and Louis la Roché), but in an edgier post-Justice less polished sort of way. It sounds like an old soul song has been sampled and chopped for the song (the gorgeous and so-simple-yet-so-effective "can't live without you"), and yet it blends so well with his own voice that I'm not sure. The song in itself is not too complex with the bass and drums pretty much just bouncing along together, but that is also what I love about it. It does not try to hide the fact that in essence it's just a great pop song. The sort of song that just makes you smile.

Siriusmo - High Together



Similarly, but even more explicit, High Together is clearly new wave french touch house. I love french touch, because it's such a feel-good genre. Most of the music (bar Justice) is filled with these great warm sounds, which feels like being hugged by this big blanket of synth.

Siriusmo (a name I was always forget how to spell) has thus far gone under my radar in favor of other acts such as MSTRKRFT, Yuksek, LifeLike, Pilooski, etc., but this song just grabbed my attention instantly. How could it not? The way it opens up with the faded and chopped salsa beat, which suddenly breaks and explodes into an amazingly lush sounding synth and bass. Once it explodes, it does not pause for a break - it just goes on and on. It is relentless. It is euphoric. I have no idea what the voice says and I really do not care. Just listen to that synth. Can you say aural orgasm?

Turn It Loose, Alright!

Some Sunday Night Funk (SNF).

James Brown & The JB's - Give It Up, Turn It Loose



That is so tight. Damn! Kinda makes you wish you were alive back then so you could have danced along. Then again, what's stopping you from dancing now? Turn it loose!

... and loving the pose he cuts at 1:39. Badass.

Z-O-M-B-I-E... ZOMBIE!

Sounding like a cross between Arcade Fire and Langley School Music Project (great music and great story) this is the perfect song for Halloween. My Body Is A Zombie For You (song title of the year?) is just one of those great songs that remind you that music does not have to be complicated to be great.

Dead Man's Bones is a band consisting of Ryan Gosling (yup... that guy) and Zach Shields. Two guys who actually can't play instruments. This is not hard to hear, but that has not stopped from making great songs. The music is simple yet very effectful. Some of it is down to Gosling's great trembling voice, but what really does it is L.A.’s Silverlake Conservatory Childrens Choir. There is just something endeeringly creepy about a whole choir of children singing about zombies. A gem of a song.

Dead Man's Bones - My Body Is A Zombie For You

I'll Ask You Kindly To Make Your Way

Grizzly Bear's Veckatimest has been universally lauded since its release and rightly so. It's a terrific album with great melodies, harmonies and pretty everything you could want. Definitely one of the albums of the year, but that is really not a surprise.

Having had the album for a while now I'm glad to see that the choice for second single is also my personal favorite track (well, one of two fav's with Ready, Able being the other). Good on you, Grizzly Bear.

While You Wait For The Others is a true break-up song filled with heartbreak and big emotions. The song builds terrifically and hits you right where it hurts. Right where you want it to hurt. Something we all can relate to now and then.

... and you gotta love a song that has a version with Michael McDonald doing the vocals. Pure genius.

Grizzly Bear - While You Wait For The Others

Death Is Not The End of This Song

“YACHT is about group consciousness. YACHT is about the individual man or woman. If you believe these assertions to be contradictory, consider the Triangle: it is both a collection of points and a shape.” (YACHT mission statement)

YACHT makes electronic dance-y music in the classic DFA vein (which incidentally also happens to be their label). Their songs have the spoken vocals over dance-y music á la LCD Soundsystem, which just seems to work really well and projects a sort of effortless cool.

The Afterlife is, to me, their best song to date. The song is jampacked with little details and really showcase their ability to mix all kinds of weird (for lack of better words) sounds to create what is essentially a party/pop song. Not your conventional pop song, but a pop song nonetheless. I am particularly partial to the lyrics of the song as, with a subject such as death, it could easily become cheesy and contrived. Rather, on this song the lyrics come off almost, well, insightful. Sample lyric:

"It's not a place you go
It's a place that comes to you
And it's not about who you know
or who is in your heart
It may come as a surprise,
but you are not alone
All that you have is not what you own"

Not something you expect from a dance song.

YACHT - The Afterlife