You may think, at first, that this song is a bit of a meandering old-timer, repeating itself. But you'll wake up one morning, and it'll be there with you. You'll go about your day, and every little tap you make will be the snare here, starting a beat and bring you along. You'll here that hook floating around in the background everywhere you go, and you'll put the song on repeat until you know it off by heart, and it will keep you warm.
This song is by a fine Irish songwriter, and is itself one of the finest of the whole year. It's taken from gorgeous Hollow Kind EP, to be bought here, if you know what's good for you.
One of my favourite bands of the decade (and makers of a new record which I am eagerly awaiting) are Efterklang. Their music is the kind of racket that can make every little facet of your life seem like a Big Deal, and yet somehow make you feel like there's nothing you can't handle. Rasmus, bass player and all-round super-nice guy, agreed to write a little bit about his four favourite records of this decade, and indeed other decades, but I don't mind really, it's not like I have editors.
Anyway, here they are!
Opiate -Objects For An Ideal Home This might be from 1999, I can't remember, {it was} but I did not get my hands on it before this decade - it introduced me to the whole listening electronica scene at the time, and it is still my favorite.
Einstürzende Neubauten - Silence is Sexy My first album with this legendary band. They haven't ceased to amaze me (us) and I (we) have followed them closely and enjoyed their history during the last 8 years now.
Arcade Fire - Funeral This record made me like rock music again. No kidding.
Paul Simon - Graceland When I was a kid we had this on tape in our family car. Two years ago I decided to get the album again and I have now decided that this is my favorite record of all decades.
--- Relatedly, Efterklang have just announced a new tour, bringing them from the USA to Europe, and reaching Dublin in April. Good times are ahead.
The first time you spend Christmas somewhere other than home is a muddle of feelings. It's fun, but it's not entirely the same. There's a distinct sense of the hidden, that you're dreaming, and just beyond your patient little alarm clock is the end of the dream, and the cold bright light of Christmas day. Still, you stick with it, and it might not be what you were waiting for, but it's kind of beautiful nonetheless, a little backwards realisation: of course it would be like this. And you could do it again.
{MySpace} The above images are from this video, which is a little silly, but also really gorgeous and effective for such a simple idea. You have to see the little flames flickering happily to properly appreciate it. It also helps to love Berlin.
As I often do at this time of year, I've asked some of my most-loved musicians to tell me what they got excited about over the last twelve months. First up are one of my favourite discoveries of late, New York's Twin Sister. Their Vampires With Dreaming Kids EP has scarcely a bad second on it, and if that's not enough, it's available as a free download too.
Ava Luna - Clips We got turned on to them by playing a basement show with them at a mutual friends house in Jersey City.
Lil' Wayne - Swag Surfin' We don't listen to much new music really, and most of it is hip hop. We're kind of dreading his "rock" album, but until Carter IV drops, the No Ceiling mixtape will definitely tide me over.
Black Eyed Peas - Meet Me Halfway The chorus of "Meet Me Halfway" by Black Eyed Peas is great, be it Fergie or someone else, it rules. We first heard it (Gabe Andrea and Dev) in Andrea's slick black VW Bug on the Brooklyn Queens Expressway after a late night of practice. It was very fitting. We could tell she felt a little weird to be showing us a song by them, but by the end we were singing along. It's all about that chorus, it's a huge one!
Albums:
John K's Double Record John is a great friend of ours who happens to be unbelievably prolific. He's put out something like 4 records in the time we've put out 4 songs. It's hard to explain how important his music is to all of us, and how much influence we take from the stuff he does.
Q-Tip - The Renaissance This came out last year, but whatever.
Raekwon - Only Built 4 Cuban Linx Pt. 2 We found the last Wu-Tang album kinda baffling. The one great thing about it was hearing Method Man on his game. He's all over this record too, and still sounds great. Raekwon, Ghostface, and him all more menacing than they have in years.
Shows:
Lake & Karl Blau at Ash's Place (10/29/09)
Lost Boy? at George's House (10/31/09)
David Byrne at Prospect Park Bandshell (6/8/09) A few of us arrived to this show to find a huge line that had been waiting all day to get in. We figured we'd be lucky to be able to see the screens outside the main area televising the show. Luckily, we found a friend very close to the front of the line, and got to see David Byrne, his excellent band, and fantastic dancers play a set that was almost 1/3 Talking Heads songs. Awesome!
Holy heck, this is a fine song, and I like it more every time I hear it. Sleep Thieves are clearly going to get up to wonderful things next year. More immediately, they're ending 2009 by playing the very worthy Bring The Toys night in Dublin's Twisted Pepper this Saturday. Bring a toy, get in for free, and the whole thing is in aid of Crumlin and Temple Street Children's Hospital. Nice.
I had a dream about this song. I dreamt that way back when, whenever our heads evolved the need for sleep, things went differently, and that which wakes us became that which did the opposite. I dreamt that falling asleep was a struggle, a feat of concentration, and the ideal circumstances for it were loud noises and violent movement. Like the start of this song. People would listen to this with big headphones, trying to get a bit of shut-eye, this fleet of guitars cresting waves of colour. Couples would scream at each other until they fell over onto the bed, energy expended, and they would have dreams of each other's laughing faces, because people look funny when they make loud noises. Slumber would be well-earned, not something to be staved off, but to be cherished. And people would love those who brought them to sleep as gently and lovingly as possible. This really is one of those songs that is constantly accompanied by colours and a frantic energy that pushes the listener to think mad thoughts. It's gorgeous, and loud, and brash, and has guitars flying into synths and drums like something that fell out of Wolf Parade's sound. It's from one of the finer albums of the year, which you can buy right now.
This song sounds so oddly natural, all earthy and smouldering, like the morning-after charcoal of last night's campfire. There are massive guitar lines here, big as oak trees, that descend and topple like messages from above, or clouds falling from the great blue sky, because they could and what could you say about that, nothing, except: lucky escape, and let's go home with your arm around your love, walking in the same direction, lucky you. Even if it were missing those massive guitars, that singular acoustic strum and those leaf-soft vocals would bring this song home to you, they're that right.
This song is quite special, because it is from the new annual by The Lifted Brow, which is certainly my favourite literary journal, and probably should be yours too if you like this blog, what with the gorgeous music by tUnE-YaRdS, Bodies of Water, and the E.L.F., and short stories by folks like David Foster Wallace, Douglas Coupland and me. Yep, me.
This issue is an atlas, with songs, stories and illustrations based on the countries of the world, and some other places too. Jana Hunter has a nice song about Morocco, and I have a nice story about both Ireland and Germany. You can pre-order it now, and you obviously should, because, including shipping, it will only cost you €21.56 to get it, or 35 Australian dollars, or $32 US dollars. You can even get some sneak previews over at MBV, where they are showcasing songs, art, and excerpts from stories.
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Also: head over to Said the Gramophone and read Sean's songs-of-2009 list. It's gold.
Final Fantasy - Lewis Takes Action (album version)
Initially, if you're used to the more energetic and straightforwardly sweet RSO version, this seems a little slow, a little mad, and spoiled slightly by a wayward brass section. But if you give it time, the idiosyncratic details reveal their charm, the excited whoops before the verse, the Motown-y snare, the sweetness of the atmosphere. It can only get better in its proper context, when the listener is properly immersed in Heartland, but for now, I can say that this song is everything I'd hoped it would be.
You can download it for free from Domino, and simultaneously enter a competition to win a signed 7" of the single. Go, now!
This band is going to make a great debut album, if they keep coming up with songs like this, something so good and forcefully upbeat that I plan on waking up to it tomorrow, and seeing what wonderful things happen during the rest of the day. {Holy wow it's nearly December! The lists are coming. I am especially looking forward to Said the Gramophone's song list, as well as State's best-of-decade countdown, which began today. The lists here should be fun too, so they should.}
This is Efterklang at their best, meaning: thrills, space, sounds that come up to you and sing in your ear. It's a fine song, and it's so so easy to get carried away listening to it. You want other people to be there too, you want it to be one of those moments where great crowds of people are flooding through streets, and for once, they're not searching for happiness, but bringing it with them, sweeping up all they see, everyone around the next corner wondering what the noise is, those at the last corner trying to keep up with the frenzy.
As well as being some of the nicest people you could ever meet, Efterklang are ridiculously talented musicians. I'm really hoping to catch them again on their next tour. Their new record, Magic Chairs, will be out on 4AD in February. 2010 is starting to look rather marvellous.
