It's pretty well established that I have shitty taste in music myself, but that doesn't mean my friends all do too. Only most of them. My lists of the best, and more importantly, the worst pieces of shit songs of the year are coming soon, but in the meantime I asked some bros and girl bros to share their top five songs of the year. If you'll excuse the moment of sincerity, there's a ton of stuff in here I didn't pay attention to, and I'm glad I did now that they made me. That's how music works at the end of the day, right? Pushing a band into your friend's face until they relent.
I think by the end of this post we'll have all learned a little something about the music of 2011, and about ourselves, and about the greatest lesson of the holiday season: free music on Spotify. Also love.
I made a playlist for most of the songs included below, which you can go check out here, I think? Computers, am I right?
Evan Kenney, , PTSOTL
I spent the past hour figuring out that all of the newest songs that I love are from 2009. I am so out of the loop, dude. Totally thought that CCR's "Run Through The Jungle" was from a few months back, apparently it's from 1970. (adjusts collar). Here is my list of the songs that I downloaded from iTunes after I heard cooler/younger kids talking about it.
The ultimate soundtrack to summer, makes you proud to be young, dumb, and full of cum. A kiss of the Ramones with a side of Nuggets thrown in. Singing about eating ice cream and shit.
This songs will trick you into thinking that there is a world that you don't have to ever argue with your girlfriend on the phone while standing in a Walgreen's parking lot when it's 26 degrees out.
I used to do drugs with these dudes at Umass, now they are playing All Tomorrow's Parties with Animal Collective and I am a barback.
This is the best band to come of out of Boston since Boston. REEEAAALL TALK - R. Kelly
Six Puerto Ricans who sound like The Black Lips covering a Nerves song that everyone thinks is a Blondie song.
Jake Zavracky, musician person, PTSOTL
This track really reminds me of something from the second half of D'Angelo's "Voodoo". Bon Iver also often reminds me of that. A lot of people are resistant to D'Angelo because he has big muscles. But I am only concerned with one of his muscles. His love muscle. That he sings love songs with. His pecks are pretty good too though. James Blake doesn't have good pecks but he does have a giant love muscle.
"I write poetry for myself." I love the really weird production on this whole record, it's like 70's soft rock, an odd choice. It sounds sort of like Al Stewart. Don't bother with Al Stewart though, just listen to this. Somehow it works, really well.
A great song which I assume is about that dream that you have that your teeth are falling out, which apparently is very common and means that you are feeling anxious about finances. I have this dream all the time. I also have the dream where I have to change a guitar string and there's a very large audience waiting for me to play and they start to leave because I can't change it fast enough. Since I can change guitar strings really fast in waking life, the only part about that dream that's realistic is the part about the audience leaving while I'm on stage.
Baths "Hall"
Hits all the pleasure centers in my hearing holes. I'm excited to see where this kid, who is really young, is going to go next. Not that you have to be really young to be exciting, am I right everybody?
This song is like the song the band is playing in the scene in a club in a movie about a dystopian future society. I don't know what the members of Gang Gang Dance look like but I imagine they have green skin and tentacles.
J. Bennett, super important and famous metal journalist
Leave it to a pack of Swedish teenagers to write the best metal song of year. Okay, they’re not all teenagers, but singer Pelle “Hornper” Åhman definitely is. He’s also a hyper-satanic philosopher of the highest order. Though he’d probably scoff at the description, “To Her Darkness” is Iron Maiden and Mercyful Fate locked in unholy coitus on a snow-capped mountaintop on the other side of forever. If you’re not into metal, that means it’s fucking awesome.
Holland’s The Devil’s Blood are more of a female-fronted classic rock band in the vein of Heart (no joke) than a full-on metal band, but they get lumped in the with the windmillers, headbangers and earthdogs because they’re Satanists and they cover themselves in animal blood before they hit the stage. (Again: not a joke.) Imagine if Ann and Nancy Wilson sang songs about Lucifer instead of, like, coke dealers in tight pants. That’s this.
TOMBS “Passageways”
Tombs’ ringleader Mike Hill is an old-school Boston head who used to play guitar in the semi-popular local rock outfit Otis. Remember Otis? Neither does Mike. But we remember when our man used to carry a madball—a cueball jammed into a tube sock—around with him in case he needed to knock any motherfuckers out. Which he occasionally did. Anyway, he lives in New York now. And this song is like the best song that Joy Division and Swans never wrote together.
Yeah, the song title is goofy as balls, but then again, these dudes have a song called “Stargasm” on this album. Anyway, the opening lines of this jam go like this: “I killed a man because he killed my goat/I put my hands around his throat/He tried to reason with the sky and the clouds/But it didn’t matter ’cause they can’t hear a sound.” That’s what I call RULING. And the main riff is catchier than whatever it is you got off that bus station toilet seat one time. I’ve had this song on psychotic repeat for months now, and I still have no idea what a burl is. But I know that I like it.
Normally, I don’t go in for 11-minute death metal songs. Or graphically detailed songs about torturing people to death. But there’s something about the way these Bay Area masters combine kneecap crushing and genital mutilation with epic running time that’s making me reconsider my position. Because this song has it all: pathos, melody, an undeniable cinematic quality, and a woman screaming in the background. Cry feminism if you want, but she probably deserved it.
Walter Cornelius, comedian, Walt Vs Himself
Action Bronson is my favorite part of pretending I like hip hop. He’s insane. He sounds just like Ghostface Killah, who I totally know who that is. This song is about killing his girlfriend who left him. He wears her hair. Take that, mom.
This (and anything off the Ghostly label) is what it sounds like in my head, all the time. Pretty dreamy no? Feel free to take your pants off.
I have a $600 German-engineered device for inhaling only the THC vapor of cannabis.
Is this the list for top 5 songs I’ve cried to while watching insurance commercials on mute? No? Good. I’ve never done that.
Not from this year, or this millennium, but it’s easily one of my top listened to songs of the year. It’s a gloomy antidote to a Bieberized world, plus, you can’t kill the rooster and whatever, amiright?
Alex Maniatis, promoter, producer of , Together Electronic Music Festival
This was the year Montreal's Jacques Greene sampled Ciara's "Deuces" and combined that with one of EDM's most exciting "holy shit" drops of the 2011 (listen here ..start at 2:45 onward). I walked to work playing this song every day from May-July 2011. Go Canada!
Scuba made a very, very, very catchy techno track. And yes it's the same Scuba who run's the forward thinking label Hotflush Recordings (home to Mount Kimbie, Sepalcure, George Fitzgerald, Joy-O etc.) The dude has a grasp on the future of dance music like few out there do. A must own record.
"Bax" is all about the bassline. My favorite label of the year NUMBERS (out of Glasglow) released this track with a house/garage feel 130 BPM. Pure goodness. Simple fun dance music.
This dude is having a hell of a friggin year. Not only is he one of the leaders of the rising Bristol scene he has also made noise stateside by gaining the attention of Dirtybird head honcho Claude Von Stroke. "Battle For Middle You" is one of those "I dont give a fuck what time it is, turn this up!" tracks. I even think I heard this being played at Tavern In The Square at Wing Night by DJ Choochy-McChooch. It can be heard anywhere , it's that good
I think i listend to this track 14 times and drank 14 Simpler Times when I first heard it. Definitely broke some dishes clapping and dancing in my old apartment with my friends David and Susan. Blawan brought back the love for Brandy and the love for minimal percussion.
Found them on a blog as I searched for other Welsh and Scottish bands seeing as I had a crazy Frightened Rabbit phase. Whole album is good, but this song is straight up catchy 90's style rock as Luke has eluded to several times this year.
Mysterious band who no one knows anything about makes cover of NME. We've seen it before, but something about the opening section of this song that really speaks to me in a Stone Roses kind of way. Then the singer comes in and kind of ruins it. At least he has the bad singing thing in common with Ian Brown.
16 year old ginger brit kid channeling Billy Bragg with Jazz Chords. I fucking love it.
British Wanker band that I like cause every song is catchy. Yes its familiar but still good songs.
Arvind Dilawar, blogger,
This song is so sexy, it makes you overlook that the title sounds like slang for having a yeast infection.
Probably going to hate this in a month, but right now it's all ketamine and girls who sing like they have a serious lisp or maybe even Down's syndrome.
Composed and performed by assembly-line robots from a recently shuttered GM factory, this song proves that even machines can love.
My now defunct band opened for these talented assholes. They closed their set with a cover of "Shout" so savage, it could've brought John Belushi back to life. (JK, that dude's really, really dead.)
Thrash for girls, which is perfect 'cause I am a bit of a pussy.
Coralcola, DJ, producer (; )
M83 "Midnight City"
Because it's still stuck in my head.
Because I miss brandy being relevant.
Because I love getting stoned
Because I'm emo.
Julio Bashmore "Battle for Middle You"
Because I heard it everywhere and never got sick of it.
Susan Zalkind, reporter, biggest dancehall fan evar (, )
A classic dancehall medley with some of the biggest names. The riddim is cheesy, but it’s also unexpected, so it works. My favorite parts are when they dress up like old people and when Sean Paul and Future Fambo wedding crash.
Ce'Cile has been putting out a slew of solid tracks as late. Check out her album Jamaicanization. Hey is the perfect song for crushing to.
I picked this track because it really turns me on. Ok, Lil Wayne's bit is cheesy, and by the end of the summer it was totally overplayed. But it reeks of sex and it doesn't sound exactly like all the other pop-hop so you've got to give it credit for something. I foresee this track reappearing in mixes, "back in the day" joints, make out parties, etc, for the next fifteen years or so.
Even though he has been locked up for nearly half of 2011, Vybz Kartel still put out about half the songs on my top 10 this year. For those reasons, I would probably go half in on making a baby with him if given the proper opportunity. I still don’t know what an “icicle child” is though.
In this song Spice tells male listeners they shouldn't check her out if they aren’t able to have sex with her properly.
I feel weird for not putting Popcaan on this list. But he’s on every other dancehall list right now so I didn’t want to waste one of my slots on him. That said, he’ll be on your mother’s list next year.
Joe Keohane, news-man,
Just listen to this fucking thing. Colossal.
The Decemberists “All Arise!”
The odiously twee Decemberists pull off an excellent country song.
Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears“Mustang Ranch"
Dirty, crazy and all around excellent soul tune about getting your ham glazed at a whorehouse.
Aurore Ounjian, Mean Creek
Yuck “Georgia"
Amongst the synth-pop/electronic/whathaveyou that seems to be very popular these days, I was ecstatic to hear a straight up rock band who wrote simple and catchy, yet interesting songs. Also, Dinosaur Jr. guitars and Pixies bass lines never did anyone wrong.
I first fell in love with this band after hearing “Hellhole Raterace” off their first album (In fact, it’s become one of my favorite songs to ever exist.) As I slowly start getting into their newest album,"Father, Son, Holy Ghost", I am especially drawn to the vocal and guitar melodies in “Alex.”
Kurt Vile “Society Is My Friend"
I love the overall feel of this song. I love the sarcasm in the lyrics and the groove in the rhythm. Kurt Vile’s vocal delivery and the overall production make this song for me.
R.E.M “Oh My Heart”
Michael Stipe is one of my favorite songwriters/lyricists. From the beginning of his career in R.E.M., up until the end, he still amazes. This song in particular breaks my heart.
Just listen to the verse, it’s so damn good.
Joe Keohane, news-man,
Because the only way to follow a sensitive folk rock release is with a song about puking in people’s cars.
Tom Waits "Bad As Me”
Waits sounds more unhinged and menacing than usual on this one. "No good you say? Well that's good enough for me."
Hayes Carll “KMAG YOYO”
A tour de force about a teenaged soldier getting caught stealing drugs from the Taliban, then getting pumped full of LSD by the Pentagon and shot into space. Then joining the Peace Corps. So pretty standard country music.
Tom Waits "Bad As Me”
Waits sounds more unhinged and menacing than usual on this one. "No good you say? Well that's good enough for me."
Hayes Carll “KMAG YOYO”
A tour de force about a teenaged soldier getting caught stealing drugs from the Taliban, then getting pumped full of LSD by the Pentagon and shot into space. Then joining the Peace Corps. So pretty standard country music.
Just listen to this fucking thing. Colossal.
The Decemberists “All Arise!”
The odiously twee Decemberists pull off an excellent country song.
Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears“Mustang Ranch"
Dirty, crazy and all around excellent soul tune about getting your ham glazed at a whorehouse.
Aurore Ounjian, Mean Creek
Amongst the synth-pop/electronic/whathaveyou that seems to be very popular these days, I was ecstatic to hear a straight up rock band who wrote simple and catchy, yet interesting songs. Also, Dinosaur Jr. guitars and Pixies bass lines never did anyone wrong.
I first fell in love with this band after hearing “Hellhole Raterace” off their first album (In fact, it’s become one of my favorite songs to ever exist.) As I slowly start getting into their newest album,"Father, Son, Holy Ghost", I am especially drawn to the vocal and guitar melodies in “Alex.”
I love the overall feel of this song. I love the sarcasm in the lyrics and the groove in the rhythm. Kurt Vile’s vocal delivery and the overall production make this song for me.
R.E.M “Oh My Heart”
Michael Stipe is one of my favorite songwriters/lyricists. From the beginning of his career in R.E.M., up until the end, he still amazes. This song in particular breaks my heart.
Just listen to the verse, it’s so damn good.
Equal parts My Bloody Valentine and Neu, I cranked Belong’s Common Era every rainy day this year. It’s a (expletive) masterpiece.
Does it get any deeper than this? I remember listening to this on a remote ranch in Texas after getting banged up at sxsw and thinking that ambient music had reached a new frontier. That sentiment has not wavered.
A real gem from "The King of Limbs." Thom’s vocals from 2:35 on might be the most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard in my entire life. Bloody heartwrenching. This tune along with Thom’s solo track “Atoms for Peace” were major influences on my song “Lemondrop.”
I am über-excited about this new project from Kurt Feldman formerly of Depreciation Guild. Unabashed sparkling synth pop.
The amazing video by Alex Zhang Hungtai was the first thing to catch me. The refrain “speedway, taking over me” was always in my head while making late night / early morning drives back from NYC.
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7 comments:
Some good stuff here. I play "Midnight City" at least once a day (usually more). I'd have to throw Phantogram's "Turning Into Stone" and Young Magic's "You with Air" into the mix, but I'm just some anonymous guy, so my opinion is whatever.
Oh word, let me go check those out. Music binge today.
I haven't heard of almost all of these. Liking what I've checked out so far.
Think Alex's is my favorite list of the bunch at the moment. Everything else is good, except for the inclusion of Tom Waits, who is just objectively awful in all ways. Jokey organ grinder music.
Vegan Jules, Art Student:
Austra 'Lose It'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8LJtMrhb558&ob=av2e
Widowspeak 'Harsh Realm'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8lzc6xipzY
Still Corners 'Cuckoo'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uL8ATo1Qpuk
Alela Diane & Wild Devine 'Desire'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAnTY6_jXRU&feature=related
Midlake 'Acts of Man'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EK7YFRmFdOM
back that Midlake record hard, but it's from 2010 I think. Will check this other shit.
What do other people like this year? Feel free to share
No. It's from 2009, realized that when I youtubed it, but couldn't think of anything else and thought I might be able to get it by you. But nothing gets by you Luke.
The rest are safely 2011.
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