One last year in review post. This time – music. I acquired quite a bit of music this year. So I’ve split things up into categories with approximately 10 albums per category. First up we’ve got albums released this year.
Favorite 2009 Albums:
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Dinosaur Jr. – Farm Loved this album. Being relatively new to Dinosaur Jr. I don’t have the connection to their earlier albums that a lot of the hardcore fans do. So keep that in mind when I say this is my favorite album of theirs. |
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Heartless Bastards – The Mountain – Great songs all the way through this one – some of the best blues rock I heard this year. |
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Dan Auerbach – Keep it Hid – Speaking of blues rock, another great example here. Auerbach’s concert was absolutely amazing. The album was just as good. |
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Sunn 0))) – Monoliths and Dimensions – ‘Alice’ is a wonderful song. This isn’t what I was thinking when I thought of drone metal, but I was pleasantly surprised by this one. |
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Grand Valley State University New Music Ensemble – In C Remixed – This one is a little more hit and miss than the ones above it, but the high points are really, really good. |
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Fuck Buttons – Surf Solar – Best electronic music of the year, hands down. |
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Dead Weather – Horehound – More blues rock. Very solid record. |
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Mastodon – Crack the Skye – ROCK!!! |
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Moritz von Oswald Trio – Vertical Ascent – Deceptively simple electronic music – the foundation feels like it’s almost slipping away underneath. Pretty cool. |
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Fever Ray – (self-titled) – This one could still climb the list with some more listens. |
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Dredg – The Pariah, the Parrot, and the Delusion – Kind of disappointed in this record. Still some good songs on this though. |
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The Decemberists – The Hazards of Love – Just didn’t get into this one the way others clearly have. |
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…And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead – The Century of Self |
Toward the end of last year I discovered that I didn’t own any music from the 1980’s. I solicited the help and advice of others and came up with some music to rectify that hole in my collection. Here is that list.
1980’s Albums (alphabetically):
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Butthole Surfers – Locust Abortion Technician – ‘Human Cannonball’ is worth the price of admission, but overall a pretty uneven album. |
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Coil – Horse Rotorvator – Pre-industrial music. Liked this one quite a bit. ‘Ostia (Death of Pasolini)’ and ‘Slur’ are favorites. |
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Dinosaur Jr. – Bug – ‘Freak Scene’. So good. |
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Guns N’ Roses – Appetite for Destruction – You probably already know about this one. A classic. |
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Jane’s Addiction – Nothing’s Shocking – More rocking than I expected. ‘Mountain Song’ & ‘Jane Says’ are very good. |
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Meat Puppets – II – This album is awesome. Listened to this on to the point that my wife started asking me to turn it off (that’s how you know it’s good). |
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Pixies – Doolittle – ‘Gouge Away’ convinced me to buy this album and the next one. |
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Pixies – Surfer Rosa |
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R.E.M. – Murmur – I had already listened to plenty of early 90’s R.E.M. – so it’s cool to get their debut. |
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Replacements – Let it Be – The album that started this whole list. ‘Androgynous’ is deliciously odd. |
Classical Albums (no order at all):
Most recently I’ve found myself exploring classical music – with a focus on the ‘cello (remember Cello Week?)
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Zoë Keating – Natoma – Actually bought this in ’08, but this makes it an even ten albums. Anyone who has been around here knows I’m a fan of Keating, whose new album ‘Into the Trees’ comes out March 1st. |
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Kronos Quartet – Dreams and Prayers of Isaac the Blind (O. Golijov) – Probably the only album on this post that I regret buying. Just didn’t like this one very much. |
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Wendy Sutter – Songs and Poems for Solo Cello (P. Glass) – A pretty good record, not anything that knocked my socks off, but pretty good. |
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Eighth Blackbird – Fred: The Music of Frederic Rzewski – The most ‘modern’ music on this list, I really like ‘Les Moutons de Panurge’ it’s barely controlled chaos. |
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Grand Valley State University New Music Ensemble – Music for 18 Musicians (S. Reich) – A minimalist classic that I find mesmerizing and very cool. |
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Grand Valley State University New Music Ensemble – In C Remixed (T. Riley) – I like the story of this orchestra, they’ve had two ambitious projects, and they’ve pulled them both off marvelously. |
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Bang on a Can All-Stars – Classics – ‘Industry’, Michael Gordon’s electronic destruction of a cello makes this album. David Lang’s ‘Cheating, Lying, Stealing’ is also very good. |
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Osvaldo Golijov – Oceana – This one has ‘Tenebrae’ performed by the Kronos Quartet, which is heartbreakingly beautiful. |
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Maya Beiser – World to Come – A couple of different composers on this album. Pärt’s ‘Fratres’ is very good (a different arrangement served as the main theme of ‘There Will Be Blood’) |
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Steve Reich – You Are – A half-album that I bought just to have Maya Beiser’s performance of Reich’s ‘Cello Counterpoint’. |
You’re still reading? Well, you’re persistent at least. So what did I miss out on this year? What should I focus on in my collection in the coming year?
I may have more later, but you really should have Dreamday Nation by Sonic Youth for your 80s collection.
I have ‘Teen Age Riot’ and ‘Hey Joni’, and I’ve listened to the whole album a time or two at lala.com. It’s good, but the whole 80’s thing kind of fell by the wayside after a while. Perhaps I’ll pick it up at some point.
Isn’t Anything by My Bloody Valentine is an 80’s record I think you might like. Loud, melodic, and groovy as all hell.
Farm and The Mountain also made my year-end list.
Here’s some must have 80’s music
Madonna — Like a Virgin.
O.k. I kid…
X — Los Angeles, Wild Gift
Minutemen — Double Nickels on the Dimes
Elvis Costello — Imperial Bedroom
Talking Heads — Name of this band is talking heads
Big Black — anything, get an anthology
Violent Femmes — Violent Femmes
Husker Du — Zen Arcade
U2 — Unforgetable Fire
The Cult — Electric
Jesus and mary Chain — Darklands
This Mortal Coil — It Will End in Tears
Mekons — Mekons Rock and Roll
Soundgarden — Louder than Love
Guided by Voices — anyting they released in the 80s