I almost didn’t make this list. I mean, come on. It’s New Year’s Eve. No one cares anymore. Everyone’s just getting psyched for Ariel Pink or Titus tonight (you should definitely go to one of those shows, by the way), and looking forward to the whole music cycle starting over again in 2011. I swear I started trying to make this list at least two weeks ago, but as I was getting closer and closer to posting it, I started dreading it more and more.
I realized that I didn’t listen to enough music this year. Seriously, I think I only got through Halcyon Digest three or four times. I know the album is great, but it didn’t permeate my year the way new music has in the past. That’s mostly my fault. I got really frustrated around August with the state of music- everything seemed too lazy, not good enough, too stuck in woozy 80s throwbacks to really hold my attention, or come anywhere near historic importance in music as a great album- a criterion I partially wanted to base my list off of this year. I started listening to a lot of Replacements and Guided By Voices instead of new music. When I got to making my list and the only albums I thought were going to live on from this year were The Monitor, Before Today, The Suburbs, and maybe Teen Dream, I felt really down. I only really liked one of those.
I guess what I’m trying to say is, this isn’t the list I was hoping it would be, but all of the artists on here did put out very good albums that are worth listening to. It’s a list of albums I liked this year. It’s by no means exhaustive. I’m not even going to write blurbs for them because I’ve run out of time and my mom needs help cleaning up the house for her New Year’s party (blogging: the glamorous life). The moral of my musical year: learn to buck up when things aren’t going your way musically- you’ll be surprised when you sit down to make your year end list how much music you actually should have been listening to.
Still, the only albums I feel very strongly about- about their quality and longevity and originality- are The Monitor, the Cloud Nothings 12″, Melted, and Have One On Me. All the other albums I greatly enjoyed. The following albums ought to be on this list, but I am a total slacker and didn’t listen to them quite enough to make them my favorites:
Hippes – Harlem
Be Brave – Strange Boys
Moon Deluxe - Andrew Cedermark
Jungle Surf – Pill Wonder
Tomorrow Is Alright – Sonny & The Sunsets
Marnie Stern - Marnie Stern
Crush – Abe Vigoda
Prince Rama - Shadow Temple
Infinite Love - Dustin Wong
And my favorite 25:
25) The Wild Hunt - The Tallest Man On Earth
24) The Mistress - Yellow Ostrich
23) Under the Table Tennis - Tim Fite
22) Nothing Hurts - Male Bonding
21) Worry - Big Troubles
20) Public Strain - Women
19) Halcyon Digest - Deerhunter
18) Everything In Between - No Age
17) Twin Hand Movement - Lower Dens
16) Dungeon Dots - Air Waves
15) Odd Blood - Yeasayer
14) King of the Beach - Wavves
13) Aloha - Your Youth
12) At Echo Lake - Woods
11) In Evening Air - Future Islands
10) High Violet - The National
9) Play It Strange - The Fresh & Onlys
8 ) I Will Be - Dum Dum Girls
7) Litanies - Royal Baths
6) Sports - Weekend
5) Have One On Me - Joanna Newsom
4) Happy Birthday - Happy Birthday
3) Melted - Ty Segall
2) Group Tightener 12″ - Cloud Nothings
1) The Monitor - Titus Andronicus
I think Woods and Grinderman are the 2 that aren’t getting enough love in general in end-of-year listapalooza. Glad you like Woods a lot too.
My top 10, in no particular order except the Monitor #1, are probably
The Monitor
Deerhunter
Woods
Grinderman
Big Boi
Broken Social Scene
Local Natives (seriously, did everybody completely forget this album or is it that it technically came out in the UK in 2009?)
Free Energy
New Pornographers (majorly underrated)
Dum Dum Girls
But, like you, I had a fairly major tune-out at some point in there. Just catching back up now. Haven’t even given Beach House a proper listen.
I really liked that Grinderman album a lot, but somehow I kept feeling like it didn’t fit on my list or on my blog. Woods didn’t figure higher because while I thought the album was amazing, I didn’t think it was more amazing than last year’s album, so it didn’t fall as far ahead in my listening habits. But it’s pretty damn great, and I’m glad you liked it, too. No Big Boi because I don’t do hip-hop. No BSS because I didn’t like that album, same with New Pornos. I also did not like the Local Natives album (thought it was boring), but their live show is still incredible. I loved Free Energy’s singles, but never gave their album a chance as a whole.
I’m surprised to see Dum Dum Girls on there. Get used to the reverb? Or just impressed by the album?
The latter. The album was way way better than I thought it would be. Really well-produced without being overdone. They get bonus points for blowing my expectations out of the water.
It was definitely helpful to me to see what you recommended based on your 2010 album listens. It reminds me that I need to give more of these a listen.