2007 In Review: The Top 30 Albums (Part 3: 4-1)

Tier 1: Part 3 (4-1)



Let me preface this by revealing by predispositions regarding Radiohead: 1) one of my fondest and earliest memories in which I recall enjoying music, involved hearing “Creep” on the radio in 1993, or thereabout, as a young kid, traveling in a car around dusk with my father. We were just outside of Merrillville, Indiana, and after hearing the song on the radio, I had fallen in love. I remember feeling so compelled to sing along, despite not really knowing the lyrics. Eventually, my father noticed me singing, “I’m a creep/I’m a wiener," laughed for a while and lovingly corrected me; 2) both OK Computer, along with Kid A marked formative progressions in the development of my own personal interest and passion for music. All of this aside, I don’t think I’m all that uncommon. I give these examples to demonstrate the cultural impact the band has had on my generation; I believe we are the “Radiohead Generation” in some sense. From a time when music was interesting on the radio to their electronic-pop experimentation, Radiohead has had an incommensurable influence in its fourteen years of existence and seven LPs released. It’s no surprise then, that Radiohead do carry a natural imperviousness to much negative criticism. Everyone expected this album to be Radiohead's jump into the deep end. And as soon as I heard the release date announced so nonchalantly, I began to wonder: what will happen if this albums is terrible? I quickly began seeing myself quickly becoming as alienated those Ryan Adams devotees (you know if you're one), hopelessly buying records and fighting tooth and nail (or turning my nose upwards) to defend the band's artistic credentials.

Completely conscious of my own potential fantacism, I believe In Rainbows is an outstanding album that rivals most of the best albums put out this year, and ranks highly among their own work (right now, I’d say third best). If it ranks below OK and Kid A, it does so just barely. Just as Liars, another one of my favorite acts, Radiohead has finally taken a pragmatic approach to music making and has dropped their outsized, weighty rhetorical and conceptual devices. I believe, even more so than Liars, this conceit comes at a much-needed time for the evolution of the band. Unlike Hail to the Thief, Radiohead has found more modest and inspired modes to pursue their own musical complexities. With more guitar and real drums, standout tracks such as “Reckoner,” “Nude,” and “Bodysnatchers” show the same Radiohead with a reborn curiosity for rock and roll. Above all, I think the quality of this album speaks just as loudly as their inventive pay-what-you-want marketing approach. (Call me a tool but) I paid $9 for this album, and have no regrets. What more can I say? Don't hate the player. Hate the game.



It was just two Januarys past that I knew that Drum’s Not Dead, Destroyer's Rubies and (what would later be called) Return to Cookie Mountain would rank high on my year-end list. This January, I had a feeling Person Pitch was going to be a favorite for my top 5 of 2007. As you all know, it wasn't a hard shot to call. Noah Lennox, aka Panda Bear from Animal Collective, has released a true masterpiece. Put frankly, Panda Bear has made his nod to Brian Wilson (could I write anything about this album without namedropping him?) and moved far beyond the campfire elegies of Young Prayer, and rechanneled distortion as a tool of violence (oft deployed by Animal Collective) into aural bliss in order create a personal experience for the listener (just as with my #2 album, you should hear this album on a good pair of headphones). And like Cryptograms (but with much different effects), the songs of Person Pitch stand a bit inelegantly when left alone, however in full continuity the album delivers pure aural perfection.

I’ll spare you and myself any attempts to form any original opinions (just listen to the album or google it), however, here are some other brief things that immediately come to mind when think about Person Pitch:

• Panda Bear's exploration of the sublime; the dissolution of time and space (on an equal scale see Field below, on a lesser scale see Pantha du Prince, and Efdemin above)

• Quality of Noah Lennox's harmonies and samples (hear the tribal drum solos of "Good Girl/Carrots" as they perfectly saunter into what sounds like a long-lost late '50s pop song; no one beats the samples found on Person Pitch this year)

• Panda Bear’s “meta-pop” approach (songs inside of songs inside of songs—more akin to Bebop) juxtaposed to Animal Collective’s seemingly “anti-listener” pop approach (see above).

As I’ve been collecting my thoughts about some of the (quite incredible) albums of 2007, I made the mistake of stumbling upon Zolbourg’s year-end list. I was pleasantly surprised to find a top 10 very close to my own. Besides Cryptograms (do I have any friends that enjoyed Deerhunter as much as I this year?), I’ve been really surprised to see From Here We Go to Sublime so far from the top of many lists of my peers. The Field, for me, has been a clear-cut winner (just as transparent as Person Pitch) for making the top two or three of my own year-end list.

From Here We Go to Sublime is the pinnacle of Kompakt’s monumental achievements this year. Just as Dan has began to describe, Axel Willner crafts a sort of never-ending state of a waking dream; combining minimalist dance music and repetitive ambience, The Field maintains constant 4/4, and creates a feeling of what pop-Trance could be (like what low-brow Tiësto or ATB may sound like if they listened to music outside of their-own vain and excessive Global Underground scene). His samples, with delicate melodic snippets and stutters of vocals, guitar and bass, are delicately laced into large expanses of pure rhythm. If it sounds like a skipping record over kickdrums, you’re not listening closely enough; the Field has created one of the most exciting electronic albums in years (this album is better than any other Kompakt release this year, and just as good as, if not better than one of my favorites, Vocalcity). Just as my favorite album of 2007, Untrue, I believe Willner provides a larger almost anagogic, reading of the current state of electronic music (if not music generally) by sampling the most nominal song fragments. Willner takes these petty bits and slivers and adroitly appropriates them into beautiful and expansive textures. Like Boratto, Willner is a master craftsman of rhythm, using every clip eruditely; every track, from the opening track featuring the sample of Kate Bush blissfully cut and chopped in “Over the Ice” to the closing title track, The Field, as the name of his album is so aptly describes, carries us through the Sublime.

Expect to read a much closer analysis of the FHWGtS from me in the upcoming weeks. I have listened to this album most consistently over the past year. This album, without doubt, would have been my number #1, if it weren't for...




It’s quite funny how “sonic hauntology” has sneaked into most of my friends descriptions of Untrue. As I’ve been discussing with Kyle, there are many aspects of Spectres of Marx that could lend itself (almost too easily) to a discussion of this album; the problem of Amy’s analysis, however, was her superficial application of Derrida's "hauntology" to Burial’s aesthetic (Untrue does sound like an apparition with the soul of Nina Simone singing through a machine). I am sure Amy from Shake Your Fist was just working out some thoughts, however, she seemed to miss many key aspects of Spectres that seem to have much deeper resonance with Burial: 1) the impact of the “speed” of technology (as applied to music, of course), and 2) Derrida’s concept of l’avenir—that “messianism without the messiah”. Burial, in Untrue, captures a sort of Heidegerrian prudence towards technology, carefully seeking hope among those ghastly voices, disembodied from the forgotten top 40s and club hits of yesteryears.

This is all expressly conveyed from the beginning in the first real track “Archangel”; from the closing minute of the song, Burial’s incorporeal voice calls out, “"If I trust you..." and there isn't a response or silence. Above all, Burial’s assemblage of salvaged and repitched soul, r&b, and dance (done so, of course in UKG-styling), refuses to completely damn (or ensure salvation for) the listener. From the beginning two-step shuffles of “Archangel” to the mid-pitch/gender bending vocal of “Etched Headplate” to the pop enjoyment of “Homeless” to the album’s finale in “Raver,” Burial uses future technology and sound, in the present to long and mourn for a lost time (of the past and future). (Again, where was Amy’s actual discussion of Derridean “non-linear” perceptions of time?)

These engaging issues coupled with brilliant songcraft, have made Untrue the near-only thing I’ve been listening to for the past two and a half months. Untrue has somehow surpassed the introspective solemnity of Burial's self-titled debut. Please look for a more nuanced elaboration of this in the weeks to come.

Above all, if you found Untrue as great as I did, please get your ears around some other major dubstep releases of the year, in particular the two-disc Underwater Dancehall by Pinch or Glyphic by Boxcutter. Although these albums may not carry the profound humanly affect of Untrue, these albums, like Burial, reveal a hopeful time for electronic
music.

2007 In Review: The Top 30 Albums (Part 2: 10-5)

First Tier: Part 2 (10-5)


At the time I was first exposed to Hendrik Weber, I was copy-editing a review for this album and had little exposure to a fair amount of microhouse. Yes, of course I had heard Villalobos (whose Fabric 36 I really did enjoy this year), pre-Scales Herbert, and Vocalcity, but Pantha du Prince somehow spoke to me. This Bliss seemed to freely move between the essence of House and Techno; but very often Weber takes the scary winding path through spooky woods and abandoned châteaus to make this transition.

After initially hearing this album, I began fishing through his discog. Weber’s remixes of Depeche Mode, Animal Collective and his amazing singles “Lichten/Walden” (which would also register high on my list of the best songs of 2007) affirmed my love for This Bliss. There has been lots of conjecturing about Weber’s motivations for walking the lines of house, techno, and experimentation the way he does (see Philip Sherburne’s brief campanological interpretation; or Mark Abraham’s diagnosis of Weber as Herzog). The orchestration of “Saturn Strobe” (easily the best song on the LP) along with its pure groove is completely emblematic of Weber’s ample and established production chops. Weber isn’t limited to these showy textures, his nuanced approach in “Steiner im flug” (Jordan, do you catch the Herzog reference?) uses a rising bass line and a simple melody while combining samples from Herzog’s soundtrack by Popol Vuh. This Bliss has reoriented my own (electronic) sensibilities towards a darker, more experimental aesthetic. Hendrik Weber, in This Bliss, creates a beautiful (and cleverly) textured and harmonious voyage through pure melancholy.



For me, 2007 was an incredible year for electronic releases. A new Fennesz(!), Field, Burial, a great year for Kompakt generally (of course, SuperMayer aside) have marked an above average year for a breadth of electronic music. In particular, with the rise of various German labels like Kompakt, Cadenza, Mojuba and liebe*detail, in my opinion, the scene seems to be shifting from Detroit, Baltimore and Chicago to Berlin, Hamburg and Frankfurt. The deep house output of Germany (as I’ve already alluded to with Pantha du Prince) places my friend Mikel in the epicenter of dance: Berlin. There, DJs like Phillip Sollmann, aka Efdemin, release great single after great single, and can be seen live any given night of the week.

Efdemin, like Pantha du Prince, is most interesting because he blends the lines of distinctly different genres of electronic music; his debut, which hasn’t in my eyes received its due credit this year, happily moves from a feel of New York house, to Berlin minimalist. Just listen to the single “Lohn und Brot” (whose Sebo K and Tobias remixes are superb as well) or the dark “Acid Bells,” and you’ll understand what Efdemin is getting at. Barry O’Donoghue’s brief description of the album as a “red-eyed, late night take on deeper techno, house…and occasionally trance” is the most succinct and accurate description of Efdemin. Efdemin and This Bliss were the perfect albums to accompany me through many dark sleepless nights this semester. Regardless if you value sleep or not, you should still listen to either of these albums, if you haven’t already.



Now we enter the portion of the year-end listing where I am unable to say anything original and mildly thought provoking as it’s all been said and written.

That said, I personally have not always been a LCD fan (although I love DFA). I found James Murphy’s self-titled LCD Soundsystem to be half-formed/felt. To me, it ran as a great EP or single with hits like “Tribulations” and “Daft Punk Is Playing At My House,” but there seemed to be little cohesion or form. Without a doubt his single “Losing My Edge,” was LCD’s greatest output until Sound of Silver. What made “Losing My Edge” his best work was Murphy’s self-critical lyrics (ok, maybe self-deprecating) combined with catchy pop-song craft. This introspection offered more to me then the seemingly one-dimensional dance hits of “Disco Infiltrator” or “Movements”.

Sound of Silver has taken that self-critical edge of “Losing My Edge” and finally intimated it with personal experience. I could write about everyone’s favorite “All My Friends” as the best example of this, however, I think my personal favorite, “Someone Great” is more illustrative of Murphy’s growth. “Someone Great” is a pop masterpiece. I think it could be Murphy’s (a man deeply engaged with pop music—think of DFA’s remixes of Brittney Spears, NERD, Hot Chip and Gorillaz) best original contribution to pop-music making. Furthermore, the song reveals a truly bloody content, that of a terrible breakup/divorce and the continuation of life after said relationship. The juxtaposition of the catchy chorus and refrain against the brutal lyrics (I immediately think of “Suicide is Painless” but with the pop lunacy of “Hey Ya”) has a truly dazzling effect. Just listen to Diplo’s (another man deeply steeped in pop music) simple mashup of “Someone Great” with JT’s “My Love,” and you will understand Murphy’s inspired, and nearly universal, pop sensibilities. I bet even your grandmother would enjoy this album.



I’ve seen Animal Collective now three times, and the past two times (which have been in the last 10 months), the band has played virtually nothing from any of its older albums, Sung Tongs nor Feels. Upon hearing Strawberry Jam, I realized they weren’t playing anything from that album either. Animal Collective, on stage grinding out some sort of amazing grimey, dub, experimental noise-pop were probably test flying their forthcoming EP Water Curses (coming out April 2008) in May of 2007. These guys are more than way ahead of the curve. They are the trendsetters, dabbling in freak-folk, tribal drum, and jerky noise rock months before others; the band consistently moves onwards as the rest of the pack follow behind. Animal Collective has come to lead the indie-rock avant-garde, if one could be said to exist.

Strawberry Jam is no exception to this. But as one can infer from listening to 2007 (or many of choices for my Top 30), much of “indie-rock” has momentarily abandoned experimentation in exchange for pop ecstasy (e.g. Liars, Caribou, Battles). Animal Collective is no exception to this. Noah Lennox, as we can also see through some similarities to his amazing solo album, has obviously gained some sort of creative leverage within AC (all I hear are the harmonics of Brian Wilson, veiled under a net of Goo-era Thurston Moore din). Panda Bear hits mutli-tracked falsettos while Avey shrieks and cries in front of pop percussion lines and distorted (yet catchy) guitar progressions. Although the album may seem abrasive at first listen, Strawberry Jam is defiantly Animal Collective’s most reachable and cohesive works to do date. The band, just as Liars, don’t seem phased by much criticism, as they continue to follow their own path. I recall watching Animal Collective live on Conan O'Brien play one of their most abstract tracks from the album, “1," over their poppy "For Reverend Green" or "Winter Wonderland". As a self-proclaimed Animal Collective follower, “Fireworks” ranks for me, among my top five favorite tracks the band has produced. Strawberry Jam finds (Brian Wilsonian) pop beauty, experimentation, and progression for the band with little compromise. Most importantly, never judge an album by its title or album cover.




I have never liked M.I.A. Sure I’ll admit I fucking danced like no other when I heard “Galang” out clubbing (at the trons, no doubt), but who wouldn’t. Unlike the commercial controversies that have haunted “indie” bands in 2007 (I think of Wilco and Of Montreal), the use of “Galang” in a Honda Civic ad didn’t seem too distasteful to me. Despite her "leftist" politics, what’s wrong with exchanging one ephemeral cultural creation (the club hit, remix, etc) with another (the television commercial). In 2005, I wasn’t really moved by Arular, unlike many, many others (see my discussion about LCD Soundsystem’s debut above).

Sri Lankan Maya Arulpragasam, a visual artist, vocalist, and producer, also known as M.I.A, is done with Civic commercials now; she's on to bigger and better things, hopefully. Kala is one of the best-produced records I’ve heard in a very long time. This comes as no surprise given that M.I.A. is often spotted on the arm of (Philly-based!) legend Diplo; Kala has amazing tracks produced by Switch, Timbaland, Blaqstarr and Morganics. I include the lesser Morganics given the impossibility they achieved on their track “Mango Pickle Down River”; somehow, the production is so good they’ve made an amazing hit out of children actually rapping. So much has been written about these tracks, I don’t even want to try to offer something to the fold. Although I probably won’t give her (nor Jay-Z!) the political salience that Harvey does, however M.I.A. can be seen as a sort of pop music personification of the loaded term “globalization”. Just as I’ve mentioned with The Tough Alliance’s “Something Special,” M.I.A. with great production and unadorned lyrics, has created an incredibly poignant statement about the ever-expanding fissure that exists between the first and third worlds, while maintaining the functionality of a near-perfect pop song; “Paper Planes” is that good. The real proof is in the pudding given that his album is produced so amazingly, that I have yet to find a remix that can truly beat the original cuts.



This summer I had the incredible chance to intern for two semi-respectable music criticism outlets in Chicago. In doing so, I was able to actually meet celebrities and rock stars. The two most memorable experiences with rockstars involved food: 1) Dan Deacon, I watched him use an unpeeled banana as a spoon to eat guacamole, as he told me “Don’t worry, you can’t taste the peel over the guacamole,” and; 2) Bradford Cox, the lead singer of Atlanta’s Deerhunter, in front of a free ice-cream truck at Pitchfork's Music Festival this summer (the only real perk of being a “VIP”)—there in a long slender yellow sundress, Cox strong-armed me into choosing a drumstick over an orange Dreamsicle. I remember vividly, Cox fitfully uttering “no really, you’ll thank me for those extra nuts and nugget…later”.

Although I was only able to speak with Cox for five or seven minutes, our interaction seems like a near-perfect reflection of my perception of their album Cryptograms: frenetic, cryptic, and frustrating. At first listen to the album, one can hear what sounds like a stop-and-go pace; from the beginning, Cox and co. are not performing to provide the listener with a comfortable stream and flow (I.e. the just too long “Intro,” into the amazing “Cryptograms,” stepping back in the slow-drifting “White Ink”). Listening to Cryptograms so much, I’ve come to think of it as conceptual album of sorts: just as its title proclaims, the “message” of the album drifts from the tousled and abstract of the first few tracks of the album into the clarified and harmonious (“Spring Hall Convert,” “Strange Lights,” and “Hazel St”).

In this way, the album makes its statement as a classic “record”: Side 1, with its dreamlike static and drone climaxing in “Lake Somerset” and ending around “Octet”; and Side 2, with its subverted pop songs, likewise culminates in “Strange Lights” and runs through until the ending track “Heatherwood”. I’ll admit that my acceptance of those early abstract songs derive from my new found (at least, more extensive) appreciation of Shoegaze (yes, Michael, Jordan and Dan; I’ve finally given in). To me, Side 1 blisses in-and-out between ambience and guitar-driven static. This sort of loss and relocation is what I’ve come to cherish in shoegazers like MBV and Spiritualized.

Deerhunter’s Fluorescent Grey EP rewards the true believers, and scorns the skeptical. This EP easily jumps four styles with easy and precise continuity. In contrast to those immovable tracks in the beginning of Cryptograms, Fluorescent provides four amazing songs (the title track and "Mr. Glass" easily rival the best tracks on the LP). They removed those early moments of “relocation” and “refocus” and created a remarkable and stunning EP. This year I’ve been completely blown away by Deerhunter. I can’t wait to see what this band has to offer; for one, I’ve already heard Cox’s solo project, Atlas Sound, and it seems to maintain its own unique sound and splendor. I'm excited/scared to see what Cox and Deerhunter will bring us in the upcoming years.

2007 In Review: The Top 30 Albums (Part 1: 30-11)

(fig.1)

Hold music close, against your side with its head in the crock of your arm under your armpit
(see figure 1).

Down with 2007! It’s time for Lazercat to throw his hat into the year-end list madness. I've narrowed down the best of the year down to a smooth 30. Please feel free to post your own lists, argue about your favs, and placement. I've been listening diligently for a year now, and here is the list of my favorite albums of 2007:

Second Tier (30-16):

30. Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings - 100 Days, 100 Nights
29. No Age - Weirdo Rippers
28. Apparat - Walls
27. Muscles - Guns Babes Lemonade
26. The Honeydrips - Here Comes the Future
25. Spoon - Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
24. The Besnard Lakes - The Besnard Lakes Are the Dark Horse
23. Dirty Projectors - Rise Above
22. Christ. - Blue Shift Emissions
21. King Khan and the Shrines/BBQ Show - What Is?!/King Khan and the BBQ Show
20. Ghostface Killah - The Big Doe Rehab
19. Times New Viking - The Paisley Reich
18. Jens Lekman - Night Falls Over Kortedala
17. Caribou - Andorra
16. Fennesz - Endless Summer

First Tier: Part 1 (15-11):

I began dating Jessica just a month or so after first hearing the leak of Drum’s Not Dead. I recall visibly perceiving the anxiety that the record caused her every time I tried to play it around her. Despite her otherwise generally cultivated tastes, Liars are one of the very few bands that still gets under her skin (e.g., one time she actually passed out at a Liars/Apes show). Among many other reasons, that’s because Liars abhor things like femininity and pixar-cute-animal-quest movies.

Yes, Liars is not as good as Drum’s Not Dead, but neither are most albums of 2007. In tracks like “Houseclouds,” “Leather Prowler,” and “Freak Out,” the band shows itself capturing the portions of their live intensity, while still trying to maintain the artfulness of Drum’s. Liars clearly don’t give a fuck about our expectations, and that’s precisely what will probably make them one of the best bands of the 2000’s.


Because of the sheer amount of great albums released this year, I’ve decided to leave compilations off my list. Among the most notable missing, Italians Do It Better After Dark, Manteca’s The Very Best of Éthiopiques, and Kompakt’s Total 8. One of my favorite tracks from that Kompakt comp is the Robert Babicz mix of Gui Boratto’s “Mr. Decay”. Unlike other acts this year that primarily depend on remix and edit culture for the best examples of their work, such as Justice or Klaxons, Boratto stands competently on his own two feet. Gui Boratto, a Brazilian architect and DJ, represents Kompakt’s expanding identity as a label—growing into “pop” sensibilities while maintaining much of the minimalist convictions of Michael Mayer’s label.

I’ve been listening to Boratto since he released the Arquipélago 12”; moving beyond that deep cerebral sound, Boratto has created an instant minimal masterpiece with Chromophobia. Running a smooth 4/4 the whole duration, Boratto masterfully controls layered sounds, and runs what seem to be Trance terms into beautiful sprawling pop epics. Without question, “Beautiful Life,” the only track with vocals on the album (sung by his own wife), will convince your friends, your mom, dad, and strangers on the street that electronic music has something astonishing to offer: pure unbridled hopefulness. Other tracks like “Gate 7,” “Xilo,” and “Acrostico” offer radiant and ingeniously produced hooks that push all “pop” boundaries of electronic music.


The real national debt is owed to Sweden, for consistently providing the world with great music (I think there are five Swedish outfits that made my top 30—not bad for a country of 9 million). This time last year, I was writing this same list (with Knife as my choice for the best album of 2006) and had just downloaded the New Waves EP. “Silly Crimes,” and “Mine was Real” robbed most of my attention of early 2007. “Mine was Real” is a cover of a great soul track by Rozetta Johnson I remember my grandmother listening to often. That cover, like the band’s cover of Primal Scream’s “Velocity Girl,” with its cut-and-copy production, Caribbean percussion, and erratic sound effects, somehow recreates the earnestness and ardor of the original. The Tough Alliance’s variation of détournement easily fits the discussion of a Situationist aesthetic (which appears in various unsubstantiated mentions and references throughout douchey reviews across the internets).

However, this album won’t be making everyone’s year-end list just because of its supposed Situationist alignment. Their work is infectiously crafted, replete with major key-chords, catchy vocal arrangements, and pop sampling. “Something Special,” the opener for New Chance, is emblematic of the unique dualism found in TTA’s work: perfectly crafted pop music combined with subversive political undertones. Using a sample from Arabic pop music, Henning Fürst and Eric Berglund, sing “Not much left to care about/Work full time to shake the doubt”. While functioning as a damn good pop song, “Something Special” seems to subversively confront the pressing issues of immigration in Sweden (and Europe largely). Followed by “Miami,” an unfussy dance song with beautiful texture and equally dissident lyrical content (the only comprehensible words being “Ecstasy!/Miami!”), Tough Alliance despite it’s beautiful pop structural form, somehow appears to be critically engaged (can we really count on Carl Newman to attend to the distresses of capitalism?). Lastly, TTA consciously performs these songs live over a taped recording. Without the theatrics of their Swedish brethren the Knife nor the shame of Ashlee Simpson lipsyncing on SNL, the Tough Alliance further complicates the SI question. I'll admit they do fit the basic bill of a “Situationist”: Plasticity of identity (two “punks” or “rockstars” singing pop songs)—check; unity of cultural capital (integrating sampled elements from various outlets of culture, sound clips, foreign musical elements, etc., into Western pop song structures)—check; and the playful manipulation of the spectacle (aforementioned “punks” singing over pre-recordings)—check. Tough Alliance may be Situationist by Greil Marcus' terms, however, Prince or Paris Hilton may qualify as well. The fact that the music could pose these sort of questions of identity-politics to the listener, while still abide so closely to conventions of pop music is incredibly profound. This band has terrible potential; this is an extraordinary album.

p.s. if you don't believe me, go download their collaboration with Victoria Bergsman entitled "Taken Too Young". It will change your mind.



Firstly, I’d like to thank my friend Dan Solberg for exposing me to Battles just a couple years ago. If it weren’t for him, I would have never got a hold of their EP C/B EP, or Tras EP and realized what Battles meant to me. Every so often, I still listen to “Bttls” on EP B and think about having Dan (and Kyle—when we weren’t tiffing) just down the hall to chat with about music, film, Resident Evil 4 and Soul Calibur. Moreover, “Bttls” (the track and the band) has served as major conversational stepping stone with my now good friend Denny. Denny is a Battles superfan (one more committed than I) so we quickly hit it off over the EPs and Mirrored.

My personal Battles partialities aside, Mirrored represents exactly how technically adept and conceptually brilliant the band truly is. Broken free from those previously masturbatory math and kraut-rock bonds of their EPs (peace be upon them), Mirrored moves the band only upward. The arithmetical depth of those EPs still shines through in tracks like “Tonto” and “Rainbow,” however the strongest tracks on the album are those willing that inventively take on pop refrains and choruses. “Leyendecker” is unquestionably a dance song above all else. “Atlas” drones on joyously for four minutes, contained in complete pop structuring of refrain-chorus (albeit, one of an indistinguishable squirrel voice). Is it wrong that I always envisioned “Atlas” scoring a scene from Spiegelman’s Maus in which the fascist cats are goose-stepping pass the Arc de Tríomphe? Call me tasteless, but don’t take anything from Mirrored.


I’ve been avoiding a substantial amount of year-end lists, as I finish my own, however, I accidentally drifted over to Mikel’s place to see Yearbook 1 received high marks there as well. However, every year there seems to be a great album or two that his held up in distribution limbo. This always seemed unfathomable to me given how many shitty bands find good (enough) record deals and distributors. Needless to say, just as Junior Senior’s masterful Hey Hey My My Yo Yo, Studio’s Yearbook 1 may not get the acclaim it rightfully deserves at year-end due to non-existent distribution (I have a dilemma paying $15-$17 for vinyl, yet alone $25-$35 for import discs).

Yearbook 1 has it all. Combining aspects of krautrock (seems to be a reoccurring theme in the past few years), electronic pop, postpunk, and new wave synth pop, Studio creates a diverse and epic (over seventy minutes) sound. I will spare you a description of “No Comply” (one of my favorite songs of the year), however “Out There” illustrates this amalgamation perfectly. With outmoded drum machines and dry bass akin to Joy Division, the braided synth and guitar create a sound like A Certain Ratio, the Durutti Column, and The Human League. The Durutti reference makes even greater sense after you listen to “Life’s a Beach”. Above all, these songs jam hard, ranging from four minutes to over 15; creating four to five minute pop songs (“Self Service” and “No Comply”) shifting styles to complete twelve to fifteen minute jams (“Out There” and “No Edit”), the sonic scheme of Yearbook 1 never seems to break from its natural style and continuity. Again, I wish truly wish I could place this album higher on my list, but it's been a good year.