2006, The Year in Music

Please validate me by listening to my mix. I worked hard on it.

Randy’s 2006 Dance Mix

In 2006, the promise of a new dance music was realized from scraps of electro, rock, and disco that had been coalescing for years; early entrants could be said to have included The Rapture, Peaches, T. Raumschmire, Figurine, Knifehandchop, Fischerspooner, !!!, Fannypack, Bloc Party, Hollertronix, LCD Soundsystem, and Vitalic. In other words, all of Randy’s favorite music. I call it Hipster Dance Music, although I don’t know if anyone else calls it that or agrees that it came together this year.

This discovery was the prompting I needed to get serious about DJ’ing, so I bought some software and learned to use it and spent countless hours pulling together an mp3 library from cds and the internet. The plan for the near future is to start playing out in LA and elsewhere. Ask me, I’ll spin your party.

My backup DJ name is Gemini Radio (I already own the URL!), but I’ll give a prize to anyone who comes up with a better one. Chattanooga Trainwreck was briefly considered and rejected.

Top 10 Albums of 2006

I’m not sure I did such a great job on albums this year, so please post your favorites that didn’t make my list!

Professor Murder – Professor Murder Rides The Subway
Despite having only four full songs, this album tops the list with its vibrant and tightly-focused reinvention of danceable rock. Hefty, organic rhythmic arrangements establish the visceral pulse behind compositions which always hit the next emotional beat you didn’t realize you needed. Intoxicating, gratifying, and very human.

The Knife – Silent Shout / Deep Cuts
(If Deep Cuts had been released in 2006, as opposed to re-released domestically in the US, it would have been the clear winner, but Silent Shout as the more legit candidate doesn’t quite capture the same appeal, as it’s far darker and fairly draining.)
Inspiring a cult-like following with artcore theatrics and the unprecedented establishment of a new continent in music-space, this sibling duo delivers spooky synth-intensive material more listenable and emotionally-resonant than the best Eurithmics tracks, except that they’re totally fucking unhinged and insanely restless in every way imaginable. Clearly some of the most inventive music of the decade.

Scissors for Lefty – Bruno
Catchy, crisp, and breathlessly tense rock-pop with playful, crafty songwriting. Stylish, fun, fresh, and flirty, this album feels like a reincarnated Lou Reed, young again, off the drugs, and determined to seduce the world.

Peter Bjorn and John – Writer’s Block
Unmistakably borrows from twangy 60s pop rock but is driven by a modern fearless intensity. Heartwarming and satisfying like you remember your favorite songs from high school, this is music that won’t let you down when you need a little reassurance.

Snowden – Anti-Anti
Rock written like electronica, poppy but grim, bored but passionate, immediate but distant, predictable but surprising, apathetic but anthematic, this is some of the freshest music I’ve heard since Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes.

The Blow – Paper Television
Last year’s Poor Aim, Love Songs was an astonishing atomic bomb so powerful that it should have revitalized the Pacific Northwest indie scene until echoes were heard in distant subgenres, transporting you effortlessly, as it did, into a semi-imaginary world where the sweet, sincere outsiders of yesteryear, evolved now into insightful cool kids, led an fierce and epic revolution to reform the world in their image, leaving behind only beauty and truth. It’s hard to imagine following up on that with another album mandatory for daily life, and Paper Television isn’t that album, but even if half of the tracks feel like Poor Aim, Love Songs as seen through a smoky glass and heard through oven mitts, vaguely missing the point, it still fucking rocks and no one else is going to come close any time soon.

Junior Boys – so this is goodbye
Whispering, soulful boy vocals over sombre but uptempo arrangements of basic synth sounds, this band captures the sadness of youth with a sexy determination.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs – Show Your Bones
I can’t convince anyone that this album is as good as Fever to Tell. It rages, it flails, it thrusts, it bites deep into rock roots soul, and Karen doesn’t back down. Okay, so maybe she thinks a bit more and screams a bit less, but a sincere, loud listen still leads to involuntary air instrument playing. Come on, people.

Hot Chip – The Warning
Sounding as unpretentious and familiar as a country neighbor, this playful but soulful quintet pushes their intelligent explorations into synthcore pop rock in new directions by…oh, why am I writing this, you already own the album.

Ninja High School – Young Adults Against Suicide
So exactly captures the spastic, infinite energy of high school punk bands that it takes a while to notice they never stray from a lo-fi hip hop format, which alternates between sloppy, frantic rap verses and repetitive, anthematic choruses -- “Shut the fuck up because this is what’s up!” “You’re going home in a fucking ambulance!” “We built a big gun so we could realize our goals!” -- which somehow come across as friendly and inviting rather than lamely threatening. Totally charming and grating at the same time.

Honorable Mentions:
mirah – joyride: remixes
Poni Hoax – Poni Hoax
Love of Diagrams – We Got Communication
TV On The Radio – Return to Cookie Mountain
Phoenix – It’s Never Been Like That
James Figurine – mistake mistake mistake mistake mistake
Holy Fuck – Holy Fuck
Born In The Flood – The Fear That We May Not Be
Tokyo Police Club – A Lesson In Crime
Sunset Rubdown – Shut Up I Am Dreaming
Band of Horses – Everything All The Time
Tunng – Mother’s Daughter And Other Songs
Love Is All – Nine Times The Same Song

Disappointing Releases in 2006

Not bad; it’s just that I had such high hopes.

The Rapture – Pieces of the People We Love
Sounds like the band stopped abusing heroin, and now they have nothing to sing about.

Scissor Sisters – Ta-Dah
I guess they already hit up the best Elton John, Billy Joel, and Bee-Gees covers.

Joanna Newsom – Ys
Dost thou hunt the king’s stags and shalt we make merry at the ball with flagons of mead whilst perambulating amongst the heather? Verily!

Ratatat – Classics
Outtakes from the first album?

Dabrye – Two/Three
Once the grooviest, most intelligent glitchy hip-hop vibe of all time, now verbally despoiled by second tier rappers singing about bitches.

Gnarls Barkley – St. Elsewhere
Crazy probably was the track of the year, the first 50k times we heard it, but the rest of the tracks are on another wavelength. And what’s with that marginal cover of the worst song on Violent Femmes?

Favorite Trashy Pop Songs of 2006

Los Angeles = the celebration of mainstream!

Nelly Furtado - Promiscuous
Sean Paul - Temperature
Shakira – Hips Don’t Lie
Beyonce - Check On It
Eminem - Shake That Ass
Justin Timberlake – Sexy Back
Snoop Dogg – I Wanna Fuck You
Akon – Smack That
Paula DeAnda – Walk Away (Remember Me)
Cassie – Me And U
E-40 – U and Dat
Kellis – Bossy
Fergie – Fergalicious
Pussycat Dolls – Buttons
Ciara – Get Up

Mp3 Blogs

In 2006 I discovered an amazing and mysterious thing called MP3 BLOGS. Have you heard of it?? Between these, soulseek, and compulsively listening to every SXSW track on the website, I definitely previewed more new music this year than I have since I had a college radio show – thousands of mp3s.

This section is going out to the kids who requested the “Randy Metafilter”. Here are the blogs I hit up the most.

http://this.bigstereo.net/
In case you were worried I might be getting cool, I’ll confess that something like half of the songs on my ‘06 mix were from this blog. Tons of Hipster Dance with soul and substance and plenty of fresh, forward-looking rock and punk, too. If the consistent top-quality selection isn’t enough, try the genuine, friendly, and succinct posts written with an infectious enthusiasm. My homepage away from homepage.

Justice vs Simian - “We Are Your Friends” (Lee Cabrera’s “Lower East Side” Remix)
Portugal. The Man - “How The Leopard Got Its Spots” (Blake Beatz remix)
The Bird And The Bee - “F*cking Boyfriend” (Peaches remix)
The Blood Arm – Do I Have Your Attention?
Teddybears featuring Annie - “Yours To Keep”
Zeigeist- “Tar Heart”
J*Davey - “Dirty Love”
Datarock- “Fa-Fa-Fa”
Scanners - “Low Life”
Rizzo and Pizzo - “Two Of Hearts”
Young And Restless - “Police! Police!”
In Flagranti- “Reputation or Notoriety”

http://www.fluxblog.org/
Fluxblog reliably delivers interesting, fun singles worthy of attention. Grounded in buoyant indie electro pop rock but happily slutting it up with any genre that captures its interest: hip hop, pop, balie funk, idm, folk, experimental. If Arghwa, my college radio show, had been a blog, it would have been this one. The author even has a similar writing voice to mine, excluding the penchant for superlatives but including that too-many-words thing.

Peter Bjorn and John featuring Victoria Bergsman "Young Folks"
Charlotte Gainsbourg "The Operation"
Muscles "Chocolate, Raspberry, Lemon & Lime"
Amy Winehouse "Rehab"
Jeffrey & Jack Lewis "Williamsburg Will Oldham Horror"
Clipse featuring Slim Thug "Wamp Wamp (Pistol Pete Remix)"
Blog 27 "I Still Don't Know Ya"

http://blentwell.com/
In a way I have Blentwell to thank for introducing me to Hipster Dance, though his own selection covers a far wider range of electronic and urban music. Turns out he’s a former Brooklyn-based DJ who moved to Burlington roughly when I moved away. The two shows he guest-DJ’ed on WRUV, the local college station, were as seminal to my music research as anything else I was exposed to. His blog is a metafilter for full DJ sets, not individual tracks, and he also sometimes commissions his own.

http://www.blentwell.com/bookmarks.php/mr.blentwell
I won’t link to anything in particular, but go to the site and either sort by genre or just download the most recent links in the “Mr. Blentwell’s Picks” category. On-demand, high quality mixtape action that’s always worth a listen.

http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/
Pitchfork is huge enough now that bands just emerging from the primordial soup don’t tend to appear on their radar, but the upside is that if they post about it you know people are listening to it, which means it might be good. Just be careful to ignore their opinions - not only are they biased towards dreary art bullshit and write about hip hop like white college students, I also got confirmation from a writer who works there that they deliberately obfuscate their reviews (more time spent on the page = more advertising revenue) which is why you can never find information about, say, what the music is like. I tend to think their pretentiousness has collapsed under its own weight and become an amusing aside. The fact is they post a lot of mp3s covering a wonderfully wide range, and if you don’t have time for all of that, you could do a lot worse than DL’ing everything from the carefully-filtered Infinite Mixtape series.

Professor Murder: Free Stress Test
Junior Boys: In the Morning
Band of Horses: "The Funeral"
Arty Fufkin: "Atoms for Idols" (Thom Yorke: "Atoms for Peace" vs. Kelly Clarkson: "Because of You")
CSS: Let's Make Love and Listen to Death From Above
Sunset Rubdown: "Stadiums and Shrines II"
Midlake: Roscoe
Danielson: Did I Step on Your Trumpet
My Robot Friend: One More Try (Vocals by Antony)
Fujiya & Miyagi: Collarbone
Ladyhawk: The Dugout
Oxford Collapse: Please Visit Your National Parks
Mark Fosson: Variations On A Thumb

http://fluokids.blogspot.com/
Ultra-sexy and unmistakably French dance blog spanning the range between spazzy, jagged synthcore and traditional house and techno with more than a touch of four-on-the-floor. Who needs to read posts in English when you’ve got photos of hot French girls!

Dead Kids - Fear And Fluoride
Yuksek - Break Ya
Sluttt - When I Want It (demo)
The Teenagers - Homecoming
Lo-Fi-Fnk vs Karin Ström - Psykos
International Pony - Our House (Ada remix)
Adam Kesher - Where's My Place
Aoki Takamasa - See That Girl

http://therichgirlsareweeping.blogspot.com/
Welcome to the firehose of mediocre and problematic rock. As one of the more prolific blogs, it has its share of gems but requires a bit more previewing to pick them out. The Austin-based blogger has a conversational writing style that’s easy to digest.

Snowden -- Black Eyes
Dntel -- Rock My Boat (feat. Mia Doi Todd)
Devastations -- Sex and Mayhem
Goldfrapp -- Strict Machine (We Are Glitter Mix)
Okkervil River -- The President's Dead

http://gorillavsbear.blogspot.com/
The genres are all over the place, but the commonality of the selection is compelling production and thoughtful songwriting, which works for me.

Sparrow House When I Am Gone
The Arcade Fire Intervention (live on KCRW)
Beach House Master of None

http://www.goodweatherforairstrikes.com/
Good Weather has a nice bitter quality, like unsweetened dark chocolate, which permeates its selection of rock, dance, and hip hop, some of which is stunning, some of which is blandly high energy. Far too much text, but I’m not there for the text anyway.

“More Is Enough (feat. Plan B)
Phones Remixography
“Leni” - GoodBooks
“Mouths to Feed” - The Epochs

http://www.youaintnopicasso.com/
Specializing in lively organic indie rock, I really only downloaded from here for a month, but it left me with a good impression and a few great tracks. The writing is succinct and informative.

Black Bear - Black Bear
Man Man - I’d Rather Be Blind
Meligrove Band - Our Love Will Make The World Go

What can I say, I listened to a lot of music this year. Please let me know what you enjoyed most in 2006, and thanks for reading!

Comments

[karen]

the main author of rich girls... is actually a friend of mine, and is no longer an austinite.

[Lulu]

Amazing how far our tastes have diverged. My favorites this year:
Bonnie "Prince" Billy - "The Letting Go"
Pink Mountaintops - "Axis of Evol"
White Magic - "Dat Rosa Mel Apibus"
Mogwai - "Mr Beast"
Built to Spill - "You In Reverse"
Brightblack Morning Light
Beirut - Gulag Orkestar

I do agree however that Ys was (hugely) disappointing, and that the Gnarls Barkley VF cover is lame.

[kristine]

Oh, I was one of the people who requested the meta-filter, and this DL of information should be enough to keep me busy well into when hipster dance music has moved onto some new genre I can't define.

I agree with you that Show Your Bones is a great album. Definitely different than their past work, but not all inferior.

[Ms. Burge]

You are a big nerd and I know I got to hear about this all year long, but it's still nice to see it in a big long methodical list. I don't hate music as much as I use to because of you.

xoxox

p.s. let's stop arguing about Show Your Bones;)

[Randy]

mary - that's about as nice a thing as someone can say to me, thanks! xoxo

karen - i knew someone was going to call me out on that. your friend has a great blog, actually, just when it comes to hardcore music DLing it isn't as yielding as some of the others.

[jef]

yeah! downloading now!
i'm always super pumped for your mixes. and, in fact i've only heard a handful of the artists on this one...which makes me even more pumped! double-pumped?

it's been a while since i've had a vehicle for comfortably listening to new musics, but i'm all ready for it now! ipod and a car..dang!

[poopface]

You know what, Ys was incredibly well orchestrated, and in my opinion, very gutsy move on Joanna Newsom's part. So what if it could pass as a Disney soundtrack. If you watch her sing/play any of those songs live, you'd understand. Heck, just consider having to memorize 10-20 minutes worth of lyrics and harp (not to mention the stamina involved in playing.) She doesn’t belong in that hipster gritty, lo-fi genre anymore for good reason.

[kim]

While it came out in 2007, it's a 'best of 2006' mix that gets my vote for best album of 2006.

"Best of Bootie 2006"

Which I posted about here:

http://www.kimpallister.com/2007/01/manic-mashup.html

Several of your faves from above are on it, but mashed up with other songs (e.g. Justin Timberlake + Siouxie and the Banshees = Sexy Peekaboo)

[Randy]

dear mister poop,
thanks for your thoughts! although i wonder if you actually like the music? i might be impressed at the intellectual and physical skill required to play a 20 minute prog rock guitar solo, but that doesn't mean i want to listen to it.

[Lulu]

In poophead's defense, Cosmia is a great, beautiful, listenable song on Ys. And live, she rocks the blistering harp solos like nobody's business. When I first saw her, she played "the book of right-on" for about 20 minutes, then she kicked over the harp and set it on fire.

[poopface]

wow, really? rock and roll. and Randy, i loovee her, and her new music with all it's fantastical celtic influences, and i don't think a 20 minute composition is comparable to 20 minutes of meedly licks and riffs, but whatever you say.
and that's miss poop to you.

[ALiCiA]

Hey what about dJ Scratchit?

[Paul]

To me the best album of 2006 is Stadium Arcadium by the Red Hot Chili Pepper. They're #1 on rankopedia.com.

[Lulu]

emphasis on *rank*.

[Randy]

I note that Ace Frehley Greatest Hits Live is in position #11.