new music january

Less than a month ago I was busy rating and ranking my favourite albums of last year. January isn't even over yet and here I am with a handful of albums I won't be shoving aside any time soon. Notable releases like Pantha du Prince's Black Noise and Four Tet's There is Love in You have yet to sink in. Currently I cannot get enough of Toro Y Moi's electronic masterpiece (?), Causers of This (set to be released in late February), the first of two long players he plans to release this year. Closer to my comfort zone is Surfer Blood's debut Astro Coast, a catchy straight-up indie rock record that steals the best elements from bands like Built to Spill and pre-crappy Weezer. Heavy guitar driven songs that sound as familiar as Pavement. Nothing too complex here, but with the right formula I'm a pretty easy sell. Probably the most essential album to released so far in 2010, however, is the latest opus from Owen Pallett, who's dropped the Final Fantasy moniker due to legal worries -that's my guess anyway (he know's he's gonna be huge in a couple months). Heartland is an album I still need to give a significant amount of time to. It's much larger in scope than anything he's done before, both musically and conceptually. The album is a collection of twelve monologues from Heartland's main character, Lewis, a farmer from a place called Spectrum. Over the course of the album Lewis eventually vows to kill his creator (i.e. Pallett). Hmm. Meta-narrative much? The final album of this rant is Beach House's third album, the more adventurous Teen Dream. Like all their work, it's dreamy folk-pop bolstered by droning atmospherics. I've been listening to this album for a month now and I'm convinced it's their best. How could it be anything less with a song like "Norway"? I can't believe we're only a month into the new year and there's already a wealth of fantastic new music out there. If this continues my head might explode. But thinking back to this point last year, a good number of us were already convinced that Animal Collective's Merriweather Post Pavillion was going to be the best album of 2009. Some of us tend to get ahead of ourselves.

brooklyn follies

It's about time for a real post. Last night I finished Chaim Potok's My Name is Asher Lev, which I'll soon start recommending to everyone. It's about an orthodox Jewish boy from Brooklyn, who has a talent for painting and the sort of tortured soul every artist wants. All points come to a head in his masterpiece, "The Brooklyn Crucifixion," a family portrait with him mother hanging from the cross. It's a bold representation of conflicting traditions, that is based on a painting by Potok, himself an accomplished painter.

I am fascinated by Brooklyn, not simply because of the novel, but because it fosters such creative energy. Many of my favourite film directors (Noah Baumbach), authors (Paul Auster) and musicians hail from Brooklyn. In fact, a good deal of my most positive record reviews over the last year or two have been about "Brooklyn-based" bands. I mean, Brooklyn does have 2.5 million people, making New York's most populous region.

This year especially, Brooklyn can lay claim to the year's best albums. I am, of course, talking about Grizzly Bear's Veckatimest, and Dirty Projectors' Bitte Orca. There's also a loose connection with Animal Collective who are undoubtedly this year's most celebrated group and the most likely contenders for album of the year with Merriweather Post Pavilion. A few weeks back New York Magazine put out a list of the top 40 songs that define the "Brooklyn sound." It's a staggering list, when you consider it's all coming from the same place. I'm sure they're tied into a conspiracy with Pitchfork.

40 Light Asylum - "Angel Tongue"
39 Oakley Hall - "All the Way Down"
38 Here We Go Magic - "Fangela"
37 Apache Beat - "Tropics"
36 Bishop Allen - "Click, Click, Click, Click"
35 White Rabbits - "Percussion Gun"
34 Japanther - "Challenge"
33 Class Actress - "All The Saints"
32 Miles Benjamin Anthony Robinson - "The Debtor"
31 Ninjasonik - "Art School Girls"
30 Antibalas - "Beaten Metal"
29 Black Dice - "Glazin'"
28 The Antlers - "Kettering"
27 Panda Bear - "Comfy In Nautica"
26 The National - "Mistaken For Strangers"
25 Amazing Baby - "The Narwhal"
24 St. Vincent - "Actor Out Of Work"
23 Neon Indian - "Deadbeat Summer"
22 Matt & Kim - "Daylight"
21 Grizzly Bear - "Knife"
20 Suckers - "Beach Queen"
19 Sharon Jones And The Dap Kings - "100 Days, 100 Nights"
18 The Drums - "I Feel Stupid"
17 A Place To Bury Strangers - "To Fix The Gash In Your Head"
16 Chairlift - "Bruises"
15 Telepathe - "Chrome's On It"
14 Crystal Stilts - "Crippled Croon"
13 Das Racist - "Combination Pizza Hut And Taco Bell"
12 The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart - "Young Adult Friction"
11 Hercules & Love Affair - "Blind"
10 Animal Collective - "My Girls"
09 Yeasayer - "2080"
08 Vampire Weekend - "Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa"
07 Vivian Girls - "Where Do You Run To"
06 Gang Gang Dance - "House Jam"
05 TV On The Radio - "Golden Age"
04 LCD Soundsystem - "All My Friends"
03 MGMT- "Kids"
02 Grizzly Bear - "Two Weeks"
01 Dirty Projectors - "Stillness Is The Move"

This is the first of what will be many lists in the days to come. It's that time of year/decade.

animal collective's lovers and haters

Now that the relative backlash surrounding Animal Collective's eighth studio album has subsided, let's forget about what Merriweather Post-Pavillion is or isn't and enjoy the album on its own terms. I am, of course, joking. The ship's out - there's no getting off. AC's latest may just be one of those albums that is simply impossible to listen to on it's own merits. The debate over MPP continues even now, over a month since its official release.

If Animal Collective aren't being blamed for their depoliticized suburban fantasies, they're getting knocked for their good behaviour. While I personally enjoy AC's experiments with atmosphere and expansiveness, there's still plenty of oddness to buffer the trio from unconditional praise. For every moment of elation, there are enough droning synths and washed-out vocals to dampen AC's Brian Wilson-ey euphoria. As on past releases, dub, trance, and Afro-pop figure into Merriweather Post-Pavillion's spaced-out mixture of synths and rhythmic clatter.



It's unrelenting and at times overpowering, but MPP is also the group's most accessible album to date. And that's where things begin to get a bit unpleasant. Animal Collective are crossing over. Whether it's simply a trek through moderate popularity, adulthood, or something more, I don't know. These days, Animal Collective sounds like its composite parts could be on the verge of a midlife crisis. The drugs still work, and that's part of the problem.

Depending on your outlook (and vanity), there's never been a better (or worse) time to give Animal Collective your attention.

There's been plenty of debate surrounding the album, it's reception and the "meaning" of Animal Collective as a substantial group, whose timely appeal has something to do with their brand of buzz. Plenty of observations come by way of Simon Reynolds at Blissblog, whose speculation lands soberly, right in the middle of the pile (although he's not too thrilled with negative reactions). Yes, listening to MPP is like getting sick on sugar and most reviews of the album are likely to produce a similar effect. I'm getting a little sick of MPP myself, but right now it's one of the few albums my roommate and I mutually enjoy. And if that's not worth something I don't really know what is.

It's Valentine's Day, so I had to end on a sentimental note.

with fruit surcharg'd

First things first: the date's been set for my essay in the Globe and Mail. On February 20th I have to buy my own copy. That's right. It's completely pro-bono. Not even a free issue. I don't know why they call it "Facts & Arguments," anyway. None of the featured essays I've read argue anything other than the worth of reading a few linked anecdotes. No, I'm not bitter. I'm over-joyed.

I'm currently in the middle of writing a paper on the relationship between Satanic pride and the surveillance in Milton's Paradise Lost. Shame and paranoia overtake the happy couple after their notorious ingestion, which at first ignites their eyes and loins. Visual stimulation alone is out of step with the Garden of Eden's utility and perverts the pro-creative impulse that ties each object to the image of its Maker. The flipside of pornography, it turns out, is the feared surveillence of God, whose previously celebrated omniscience is reduced to a pair of eyes that gaze like Satan: the post-lapsarian God, for Adam and Eve, is detached from the world (how else can he maintain perfection) and ego-centric (no wonder no one likes him).

Writing a review of Animal Collective's latest is my reward for getting the paper finished and sliding it under the door of my prof. I've totally cut myself off from Merriweather Post-Pavillion until then. It's far too infectious. "My Girls" keeps pummeling you and my attention span is fragile enough already. Until then, here's a nice piece by Simon Reynolds (over at blissblog) on the recently inhabited space of mid-mainstream popularity that AC have achieved with MPP. Deserved accolation, I'd say.

And now, back to work.

Let the sycophancy begin!

First day back and already the web is ringing with the praises of Animal Collective and their Merriweather Post Pavilion LP. Pitchfork gives AC their usual heap of (deserved) adoration. In Mark Richardson's review he demonstrates critical skill he must have developed in his undergrad degree in English: "The lyrics focus on the body, basic human connection, the need to take care of oneself, the puzzle of existence." So far, it sounds like this could be the flipside of a TV on the Radio review. "It's of the moment and feels new, but it's also striking in its immediacy and comes across as friendly and welcoming." That about does it. Next to TV on the Radio, AC has claimed the pristine pedistal of unreserved critical adoration and an enigmatic "nowness." Tinymixtapes seems to agree. And stereogum is already begging the question: the best album of 2009? All this fanfare was to be expected, but the last time I checked, AC were worth a shit because they refused to take themselves too seriously. So I guess I'm slightly put off by all the over-the-top praise. They've drummed up high expectations before, but this has surely been one of the most anticipated albums by anyone in years, not least for the "magic-eye" album cover.

Well, I'm saving myself for the official release (tomorrow, on vinyl), even though there's been a leak available for weeks now. Until then, the jury is out because I say it's out. My prediction is that in six months everyone will be afraid to say how much they love the new Animal Collective album; whereas now everyone will be afraid to disagree with the statement that Merriweather Post Pavilion is the "running commentary on the essential mystery of being alive."

In other exciting news, cokemachineglow has posted their annual "fantasy covers podcast" which I have yet to download.

Now I'm off to an important confidential meeting.