Am I Behind The Times?

There's something about music that feels so incredibly current. If you're not on the ball, plugged in, or obsessively following the scene you'll miss it. I suppose you could describe all culture that way, but because I pay more attention to music than to visual art or fashion or film or theater I feel a greater responsibility to know what is now.

But why do I beat myself up, figuratively of course, about not discovering a particular band until well after their moment in the sun or 15 minutes of fame? Why does it matter when I find out about something I like? Do I feel like I missed out on a collective societal experience - a moment in time that will never be recreated? Well, yes.

One way this happens is, especially living in NYC, you don't find out about a band you like until they 'make it' and then it's impossible to get tickets to a show when they come to town (She & Him, Animal Collective, etc etc etc). Or you miss the tour supporting a particularly great album (Of Montreal- Hissing Fauna). Or you don't realize you like a band until they no longer exist (Uncle Tupelo). Or you feel silly suddenly liking a band because you heard them in a commercial and their 'real' fans think they've 'sold out' (this list could go on forever but Nick Drake comes to mind first even though he was dead well before someone put him in a Volkswagon ad).

This is perhaps not the best example but this week I started listening to a Manchester, England based band called Working For A Nuclear Free City, specifically their 2007 album Businessmen & Ghosts. They were on Pitchfork's radar way back in '06 but didn't make much of a splash in the US until '07.

I guess I should give myself a pass on this one - they've been playing in the background (literally) with some songs in everything from video games to movies. But when I heard them for the first time this week I was hooked - I hear an amazing distorted harmonica from time to time, Chemical Brothers-esque electronic loops, shoegaze-y guitars that burst into rock anthem-worthy solos, and some lyrics worth straining to hear. Each song, while contributing to the whole of this massive album, seems to have its own unique influences. (I also think Animal Collective must have been influenced by some of this when they made Merriweather.) Then all of a sudden out comes a poppy drum beat, like on England, and you're bopping your head and toe tapping before you really know what the song is. Love.

Needless to say, I'm now a fan. I discovered them for myself. Am I behind the times? That remains to be seen, but now I know about them and can happily anticipate their new album coming out later this year, Jo Jo Burger Tempest.

My 09 List

In no particular order. Not everything came out this year, but we 'acquired' everything this year in one way or another. I chose to do a list of what I think I listened to the most this year in lieu of what I think the best music of this year was - mostly because I got burned out on music from being at Anthology for awhile and didn't keep up with what was being released. But here's my list!


Phoenix - Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix - 1901




Camera Obscura - My Maudlin Career - French Navy




Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavilion - My Girls




The Avett Brothers - I and Love and You - I and Love and You




Blitzen Trapper - Furr - Furr




(I'm going to regret doing this, but...)
Conor Oberst and the Mystic Valley Band - Outer South - Air Mattress




M. Ward - Hold Time - Never Had Nobody Like You
(volume on this is really low for some reason)




Of Montreal - Hissing Fauna Are You The Destroyer -
(I get to count this because we got the LP this year and realized that we never had all the songs from the album until then)




Rodriguez - Cold Fact - Sugar Man




Titua Andronicus - The Airing of Grievance - Upon Viewing Bruegel's "Landscape With the Fall of Icarus"




Wilco - Wilco (The Album) - Wilco (The Song)
We are *almost* in this video, actually. Front and center. Great show!

Stereogum.com's MySplice III

Hi folks - Happy Holidays!
For the 3rd year in a row, Stereogum.com has posted their MySplice III where they have a DJ remix 10 songs of that year. I think previous years' mashups were better but this is a pretty nice, free thing to be able to listen to today. You can also download the album as a zip file but I think that would only be worth it for a few tracks like Debbie Does Montreal which is Blondie vs. Of Montreal.

Also, the RIAA is dropping their filesharing lawsuits!