BACK IN NY

16 Great Albums of 2008 (and more)

Alphabetical Order

atlas sound / let the blind lead those who can see but cannot feel

Bradford Cox took a break from Deerhunter to record a really interesting album.

beck / modern guilt

Soul of a Man became one of my top 25 most played this year. And when I saw him live in St. Paul in late September, his rendition of Chemtrails was superb.

coldplay / viva la vida

Brian Eno produced a great great piece. It’s a story – something totally new for Coldplay. Great on vinyl, too.

david byrne and brian eno / everything that happens will happen today

Geniuses collide again!!

deerhoof / offend maggie

Continuing off from Friend Opportunity, they’re just as weird and experimental. It’s always great – and instrumentals of their songs are available towards the end…so as rare as it would be to have Deerhoof karaoke…it’s now possible without expensive software to take out the vocals.

deerhunter / microcastle

I love this band. Never Stops and Agoraphobia – 2 big steps forward for them. It’s pop-ier, but true to their intended messiness.

girl talk / feed the animals

Another law suit, another good album.

hot chip / made in the dark

Ready for the Floor didn’t do it for me, but One Pure Thought is great.

m83 / saturdays =youth

One of the few bands that really gets away with emo lyrics.

portishead / third

Machine Gun is epic.

ratatat / lp3

You don’t even have to play this one on vinyl – it’s already there.

the raveonettes / lust lust lust

A lot noisier than Pretty In Black, but layered as all hell.

sigur ros / med sud i eyrum vid spilum endalaust

You find a real structure in his ballads – inciting incident, rising action, climax, and resolution.

stereolab / chemical chords

Another notch on their belt – I wish I were there with them in the studio…

thievery corporation / radio retaliation

So explorative and ridiculous – I felt like I traveled the world in an hour.

tv on the radio / dear science

This album really brought TV to a whole new level. Some of the the songs sound like early Bloc Party (Halfway Home,) which is nice – but the majority of the songs carry really poignant melodies—Kip’s voice is like one of those hypnosis tools.

(one of the) Most Anticipated Album of January:

animal collective / merriweather post pavillion

check out "brothersport"

Panda Bear says this will be their best album yet - beach boys rave...

Today's Listen

Wolf Parade: At Mount Zoomer



I was somewhat familiar with Apologies to the Queen but now I can really see the similarities among Sub Pop's artists - This Wolf Parade album is great, but certainly has it's Shins moments as well as those of Sunset Rubdown (even though Wolf Parade is miles better than SSRD.) And actually, as I finish up the album now with "Fine Young Cannibals," there's a lot of Spoon in here too. I think they're pretty great though.

Wolf Parade / Language City
Wolf Parade / Fine Young Cannibals

Brazilian Girls at Celebrate Brooklyn - Photo Diary

*all pics retrieved from prefixmag.com - I was too involved to take my own.

This concert was good - I wish they played "Homme," though, and also that Celebrate Bklyn's neighborhood laws weren't so stingy as to prevent BG from playing "Jique" at only 10:30! Regardless, the crowd was wylin'.

Brazilian Girls / Crosseyed and Painless (Talking Heads cover)
and download their single "A Good Time" from the upcoming Aug. 5th debut New York City

Wet Hot...Missed it

I knew Michael Showalter would be there, and I was bummed I couldn't go...but PAUL RUDD??? Fuck!

5 reasons why i like the new coldplay

1. Brian Eno returns - He introduced Bowie to noise, and Talking Heads to polyrithms.* Who wouldn't want Eno to produce their record? Even if his last project, U2's How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb is not that great, the work seriously shows- (this might be a testament to the band.) With everything from lyricless interludes in the beginning to Chris Martin's vocal reprises of "ooooh" in every other song, all of these aspects mirror the timeless qualities of a record. I wouldn't like this album as much if I heard it in pieces. Eno makes you want to listen to the whole thing. "Life in Technicolor" fades into "Cemeteries of London" seamlessly. This is, frankly, moreso Eno's cool comeback than it is Coldplay's. After "Clocks," I thought this band had totally sold out, and it somehow deterred me from liking their music as much. I soon realized that you should just like music because you like it, and this record assisted me in coming to that conclusion. Props!

2. No more sun moon sky space bullshit - On X/Y this was all Chris Martin sang about. The band literally lives their lives on Earth in Viva la Vida and their is a musical death to all his celestial friends.

3. More reverb - it just sounds more produced. This goes back to Brian Eno...

4. Influences - If you're going to have Brian Eno on your team, and everything but "Violet Hill" is going to sound a bit different than your old music, you might as well learn from the best. Eno evidently shed light on Pink Floyd for "42." The entire those who are dead sequence is very Floyd. As well, in "Lovers in Japan," I found myself subconsciously mashing up U2's "I still Haven't Found what I'm Looking For" with it. It's that driving drum beat that underscores the guitars.

5. The lyrics are better - In "Violet Hill," Martin says "when the future's architected by a carnival of idiots on show, you better lie low." Pretty good.

This album is great!

*Slate Online Magazine

Coldplay : 42
Coldplay : Lovers in Japan/Reign of Love
Coldplay: Death to all his Friends

Coldplay "Life in technicolor" and "Violet Hill" in Barcelona

office lobotomy

I found this notepad with a glaring blue stain from a sharpie on it, and on the four sheets behind it were the remains, so I drew something on each sheet inspired by the stain.

wave machines / i go i go i go (hot chip ripoff, but good)
the stone roses / fools gold