Kieran's Pretentious Crap: May 2013

Top 20 Albums of the Year (so far)

20. The 20/20 Experience – Justin Timberlake

19. FIDLAR – FIDLAR

18. Amok – Atoms for Peace

17. Silence Yourself – Savages

16. The Man Who Died in his Boat – Grouper

15. True Romance – Charli XCX

14. Pedestrian Verse – Frightened Rabbit

13. MCII – Mikal Cronin

12. Muchacho – Phosphorescent

11. Wolf – Tyler, the Creator

10. MBV – My Bloody Valentine

While the debate behind whether My Bloody Valentine’s second studio album was worth the twenty two year wait continues to drag inanely on, reasonable people are too busy celebrating its existence to trivialise its excellence. While it isn’t as immediately mind blowing, ear-shattering or heart melting as Loveless, it’s arguably just as accomplished. It’s MBV’s distinctive sound, the inexplicable utilisation of distorted white noise to create something profoundly beautiful, but refined, polished, yet still majestically raw and explosive. ‘Only Tomorrow’ and ‘In Another Way’ are welcomed by ‘Only Shallow’, ‘When You Sleep’ and ‘Soon’ into their best-of echelons.

9. Wakin on a Pretty Daze – Kurt Vile

Adored by the likes of Kim Gordon and Matt Berninger, Kurt Vile has become the revered face of underground folk. Vile evokes Pavement’s despairing, helpless lethargy and Neil Young’s love of complex conceits in his latest, and best, album. Wakin on a Pretty Daze opens with the ten minute, lo-fi folk-rock masterpiece title track. Although it never matches this astonishing opening, the LP is remarkably consistent. It’s lyrically minimalist, rarely articulating itself further than in fleeting images and metaphors, preferring to rely on the dreamy, psychedelic chords of Vile’s guitar to instigate the listener to open the doors to Vile’s contented state, and to accept his tranquil philosophy.

8. We are the 21^st Century Ambassadors of Peace and Magic – Foxygen

An audacious, bizarre album title from an equally audacious and bizarre band. A wonderfully, nostalgically trippy tribute to the Rolling Stones, Lou Reed, the Beach Boys… the list is interminable; it’s simultaneously the most innocently fun and audibly pleasant album of the year. It’s much more than just a homage. ‘No Destruction’ is a relaxed, Dylan-esque introspective grumbling, while ‘On Blue Mountain’ represents arguably the record’s ‘rockiest’ track, with bombastic percussion, clinkety piano and the enthusiastic intrusion of female backing vocals. ‘San Francisco’, a gloriously fun, pretty love song, is the highlight of the album, with its gorgeous chorus.

7. You’re Nothing – Iceage

You’re Nothing doesn’t so much explode as implode, in the same way that it isn’t so much anti-establishment punk, as anti-societal. It doesn’t attack political or economic systems, but rather us, themselves. As the title implies, these Danish teenagers condescend and vilify the concept of distinct importance, the individual’s perception of significance bolstered by ego-stroking consumerist advertising and a materialist societal structure. They scream of ‘pressure’ in one song, ‘excess’ in the next, before bitterly questioning ‘where’s your morals?’ An obviously self-aware sentiment, directed just as much at themselves as to their listeners. Quite possibly the best post-punk album since McLusky Do Dallas.

6. Acid Rap – Chance the Rapper

The best hip-hop mixtape of the year, Acid Rap highlights the genius of Chance’s flow. His rhyming is nonchalant, appearing improvised in its weary irreverence. He laughs, moans, spits and questions without apparent transition, his voice always perfectly in sync with his excellent production; a relaxed drum machine underscores an orchestra of synths and traditional hip-hop samples; (Chance’s love of rap music seeps through the tape’s cracks, corroborated by his endless referencing and namedropping) it’s minimalist, but tremendously effective. Thematically it’s identical to most major label hip-hop debuts: the explicit joys and implicit stresses of fame and fortune, but it’s too lyrically overwhelming (in a good way) to be considered anything anywhere near banal or unoriginal.

5. Random Access Memories – Daft Punk

Yes, it’s overproduced, and yes, it’s not Daft Punk’s most consistent LP, but there are a plethora of individual songs destined to be considered some of the French duo’s finest; the docu-epic ‘Giorgio by Moroder’, the space-age ‘Touch,’ the instant classic ‘Get Lucky,’ and the indefatigably cool ‘Lose Yourself to Dance’. Standing above them all is DP’s flawless mission statement, ‘Doin it Right.’ In RAM Daft Punk have seamlessly integrated the old and new, their universally adored dance anthems are complemented by bold meditations on the history of dance music, and on its future. Indeed, ‘Touch’ can be viewed as ‘Giorgio by Moroder’s’ polar opposite, the latter explaining the positive influence of electronics in music, the former begging for the application of human touch in creating something musically personal.

4. Impersonator – Majical Cloudz

Majical Cloudz are perhaps best summed up as ‘Leonard Cohen behind a computer.’ Like Cohen, their music is just a harmonising backdrop to their deeply intimate and bluntly expressive lyrics. They employ white noise, peaceful synths and distant thuds to accentuate their imagery in the same way that sound effects are used to improve immersion, the proposition of fantasy becoming reality, in children’s audio-books. Impersonator is a hugely immersive experience, a collection of short stories. Devon Welsh’s expansive narratives cover family, death, desire, disillusionment and lost love, fluttering transcendentally from one theme to another painlessly. It’s a soothing record, but also intensely powerful, Walsh’s gripping vocals pointing out the strength required to actively live, including all the connotations such a statement suggests, but not necessarily claiming that he possesses such a strength.

3. Anxiety – Autre ne Veut

Autre ne Veut’s incredible second LP is powered by discord, the barrage of conflicting, often out-of-tune instruments (the saxophone blasts on ‘Counting’ being the most obvious, the percussion in ‘Promises’ being another) and disharmonious pitch changes shouldn’t work, but it really does. Each song has a personal, innate melody. They’re refreshingly inventive, but still retain the fundamental catchiness inherent, and necessary, in R&B melodies. It’s a masterpiece of songwriting structure and production. Where Anxiety really shines is in its ballads, ‘A Lie’ and ‘Gonna Die’; when Arthur Ashin’s cries of dissatisfaction can’t quite reach the notes he desperately aspires to reach, it’s more touching, more affecting. Anxiety is this year’s Channel Orange; a progressive, moving R&B record that both challenges the boundaries of the genre while exemplifying why the fusion of Blues with a stable, Pop rhythm makes so fascinating a sound.

2. Trouble Will Find Me – The National

The National are my fourth favourite band, behind Radiohead, Sonic Youth and Joy Division. Their heartfelt, melancholic depictions of middle class disillusionment, brutal romantic regret and chilling existential alienation (they capture the ephemeral quality of human actuality better than any other band) are hypnotically endearing. I’d go as far as saying that, across their six LPs and numerous EPs, they are the most consistently excellent Alternative band, probably, of all-time. Trouble Will Find Me is their best album yet. Matt Berninger’s baritone previously had the capacity to excite even the most heterosexual male, like that of an alcoholic angel, but he’s bettered himself here, exploiting a higher register than heard before. Like many of The National’s best songs, most tracks are quietly, subtly anthemic; ‘Fireproof,’ ‘Graceless,’ ‘Don’t Swallow the Cap.’ ‘Sea of Love’ is welcomingly ‘rocky’, while ‘Heavenfaced’ will probably be the most beautiful and heartbreaking love song you’ll hear this year. A consistently brilliant band becoming consistently better.

1. Modern Vampires of the City – Vampire Weekend

While numbers two and three would easily have fought out over the number one spot in any other year, they’re just not as utterly ingenius, as blisteringly magnificent, as iconically huge as Modern Vampires of the City; the best Indie album since Funeral. It’s, yes, about existence, but also faith, love, embracing life to the fullest. It’s just as fun and cheery as it is broodingly, philosophically questioning. ‘Diane Young’ and ‘Hudson’ should contradict one another, but they substantiate the other’s importance, Koenig identifying that happiness and sorrow are inextricably linked. Koenig’s trademark lyrical genius and wit is no longer raw and unmediated, it’s matured to Thom-Yorke-but-amusing levels. If you hear a cleverer chorus than ‘Step’s’, your ears are deceiving you: ‘the gloves are off/the wisdom teeth are out,’ referring to his own musical pretentiousness. Vampire Weekend cover an assembly of varying themes and sounds intelligently and passionately, their unfaltering love of music and its artistic potential prevalent throughout. Let there be no mistake, this is a work of unmitigated brilliance. That Ezra Koenig studied English Literature remains justification for my degree.

Top 40 Songs of the Year (so far)

40. Suit and Tie – Justin Timberlake

39. She Will – Savages

38. Worship You – Vampire Weekend

37. The Seer – Jenny Hval

36. Smoke Again – Chance the Rapper

35. In Another Way – My Bloody Valentine

34. Demon to Lean on – Wavves

33. Retrograde – James Blake

32. Get it – Run the Jewels

31. Mirrors – Justin Timberlake

30. Dropla – Youth Lagoon