Paco's Top 56 Albums of 2008: 23-14

Almost there…

23. WYLD WYZRDZ - we are everyone. (A. Star) : With such a ridiculous name I thought for sure that this would be some kind of silly pranksters. But in actuallitywiseitude, Braden J. McKenna, the one man wrecking crew, has put out a nice album. For fans of Emeralds and Co., Adam, or actual Wizards, provided said wizard enjoys sort of electronic psych rock that builds a good head of steam until it crashes into an ocean of sound just outside the dronesville depot. Additionally! He gets bonus points for giving away all albums and EPs free on his website! I have only downloaded this, but I plan on taking all that I can soon. His website also has plenty of good grammer and the letter "z." Lastly, dude says, "Email blah blah blah if you have any WYZRDZ things to ask, I want to make an Album with you." Something I have yet to do, but Perhaps we should look into contacting him and making an album with him. Course he's in Salt lake city. But still! Still!!! P.S. The album rules!

22. Fleet Foxes - Sun Giant (Sub Pop) : Yeah, Yeah, I liked it too, who doesn’t like mellifluous harmonies? Although, just to be contrary, I felt like the full length didn't quite live up to the promise of the EP. But promises are hard to keep, unless you are in Promise Keepers and then its just a given I guess. Additionally they get bonus Promise Keepers™ street cred because some members were in Unwed Sailor and one was even in Scientific! Scientific!!!! Weird! Talk about NBA Street Cred Bennies®! And look where he is now. Where's Josh Mackey when you need him? Additional Note is Minus points for members being ex-members of Saxon Shore, who I thought sucked way back when, but I guess could actually be okay.

21. Max Richter - 24 Postcards in Full Colour (130701) : Max Richter makes his best record yet, and nobody seems to have batten down an e ye. Note to Max: No annoying British lady's voice saying dumb cliché and cheesy sounding narration = your best album yet. It’s more than that, but that plays a big role. The title says it all. 24 Postcards. Mini-pieces all of beautifulness. I think I heard tell that these were meant as ring tones. If so they are the most beautiful (and therefore probably ineffective) ring tones ever. I don’t know cause I don’t have a phone. Try it out for yourself. Report back in two weeks. (by the by, I just found out while writing this that dude did the soundtrack for "waltz with bashir" the movie, which I now want to see even more.)

20. Isengrind/TwinSisterMoon/Natural Snow Buildings - The Snowbringer Cult (Students of Decay) : Isengrind (no, not Isengard) is Solange Gularte. Mehdi Ameziane is TwinSisterMoon. Together they are Natural Snow Buildings. Mix all three (Disc 1: Solos, Disc 2: Buddies), add a dash of cool album art drawings, and some long droney faux eastern psych folk, some low-key electronics, and an insane variety of other dense, delicious sounding hits = Huge Double Disc goodness, "The Snowbringer Cult." If you love trends, then you may have thought that New Weird America/Freak Folk/Whatever stopped being cool even before Devendra started dating Natalie Portman. Well, you may be right, but these humans are French. And additionally they are totally laying waste to the genre and re-writing it from the ground floor. It's like the best parts of every reference you could name, but better, and then some. Seriously this album is a monster. It's like the Lord of the Rings of slow drone yet somehow epic, almost GYBE folk. You will need 2.5 hours to even listen to it once, but you'd be better off trapping yourself in a cave, shut off by a landslide, for about 3 years, to really get a hold of this. Finally a cult we can all feel good about! Prepare to be Destroyed! Jonny, if quiet is the new the loud, get your lil' mitts on this pronto! Vermont ought to be erased and replaced with a giant version of this album.

19. Deaf Center - Vintage Well (Type) : This was a 3 song 7” lasting approximately 10 minutes. And it’s my 19th best album of the year. Must be pretty good then, eh? Norway represent! The blessed home country! This 7” is definitely making some promises that I hope it intends to keep. If their next full length follows in the pattern of this sweet youngster, then they are in for releasing the number one monster of awesom e ambient/modern classical of whatever year it is that they eventually release the best album of that year. Which is hopefully next year. Did you even love quietness or quietude? Does you even love this? Wow, whaoh!!!!

18. Benoît Pioulard – Temper (Kranky) : Kranky is having a good year too. Pioulard wraps his fairly straight forward yet pleasant acoustic singer/songwriter fare in blankets of melancholy, brown noise, warm fuzz, cold rain, and lo-fi field recordings. Only thing is missing is a song about Ohio. Good times here.

17. Cloaks – Serene (Students of Decay) : See what I mean about Students of Decay though? Yet, another case of the album art telling it all, Cloaks kinda sounds like that looks. This release is two tracks, The first a 35 minute ambient/field recording joint and the second a short contemporary classical piece. While both are good, its clearly the first which ranks this bad boy a mention. Like most 35 minute songs its take some work to get through it. Most ambient is best at night time or at least in a dark cave. But This is sun beam ambient. This is day-walking over hills and through forests ambient. Very fine.

16. Matthew Robert Cooper – Miniatures (Gaarden) : This almost didn’t make my list because for some reason I spent most of 2008 thinking that this came out in 2006. MRC may not sound familiar to you, but Eluvium probably does. Well, this is his real name. I’ve always been mixed about eluvium. While I do enjoy them, especially I often have a feeling of generic-ness or incompleteness when I hear them and I feel like they only camp at the outskirts of the city gates of goodambientopolis. This release, however, is welcome inside the doors and right down the main drag. Composed of 9 Miniatures, none of these noisy or weird, giving them a feeling that everyone, even non-fans of experimental or ambient music can enjoy.

15. M83 - Saturdays=Youth (Mute/EMI) : Even if the whole album sucked, Kim and Jessie is awesome enough to carry it all. But the album doesn’t suck, and its definitely a return to greatness for M83. Plus I love Tears for Fears real bad.

14. Crystal Castles - S/T (Last Gang/Different) : Hated in the small small world of chip-tune/8-bit/video game/bloopy bleepy music for a couple of controversies. Disliked in other circles as possible hipster posers. But I’ll be darned if they don’t crank out catchy dance hits, and do so with a delicious Nintendo style. Who evan gives a car? Just listen in and dance it up! They’re good! That’s all there is too it. Will they stand the test of time? Who cares? The test of time is a fake and meaningless test anyway. Crank it up while you still have the chanst.

Next Time: The End of it all!

Paco's Top 56 Albums of 2008: 34-24

It just keeps going!

34. Burnkit2600 - This is the Sound! (burnkit2600.com) : I know very little about this free internet download, I found it on a circuit bending blog I read, and its awesome. Additionally, rather than hide thier cool diy instruments from wannabes they encourage you to try it yourself and explain their gear in depth. The first song, which has a lot of shouting, is kind of annoying but it really gets going with "When Demons Attack." "b00" is a spooky time jam of the highest quality. If you like circuit bent sounds, crossed wires, and messed up electronics with catchy beats, or that Dan Friel album, you will like this little guy. And its legally free.

33. Hercules & Love Affair - S/T (DFA) : Hey, wow, thanks for looking out! Hey, Good Dancin' Out! Thanks for dancing out, thanks. whoah! Antony has a weird voice but its all good and the dancing beats are hott. Check out all these traxx in your ride. or more like on the floor! Don't you love it?

32. Cut Copy - In Ghost Colors (Modular) : This was popular enough I don't think I need to talk about it. Nice Dancing Pops. Catchyness which borders on cheesy at first listen, until you realize that its not, and everything is totally fine, so don't even worry about it. I like "Hearts on Fire" the best.

31. Aidan Baker & Tim Hecker - Fantasma Parastasie (Alien8) : Man, I'm getting really tired of writing about all these things. I should listen to less music. Or maybe I should just go to bed, get over my stomach flu, eat a huge sandwhich, and then do these again. But in anycase this is good. Imagine Aidan Baker (NOT of Godspeed), ambient guitar processor extraodinaire, hanging out with Tim Hecker, ambient electronics jimmyrigger supreme, and bam! You get this. It's good. It should probably be better. But its real good.

30. Peter Wright - Pretty Mushroom Clouds (aRCHIVE) : I first found about Peter Wright when I downloaded (and never really listened to) a live show of him with my main men, Stars of The Lid. Although I never really gave it the listen it needed, if a fellow can collab with SOTL then he’s just alright with me. But then I forgot about him. Then one day, browsing my sites, checking my sites, checking in with my check in buddy, This release popped up. And I nabbed it. According to Pete, its got a lot of “noisy ambient” that didn’t go on some of his other more quiet releases. This appears to be mostly true. In addition to that musty truth, this is an excellent album of ambient, field recordings, and occasionally noisy sounds and tones. Gentle and Non-Gentle, for Gentile and Jew alike!

29. Black Milk - Tronic (Fat Beats) : Looks like I was late to the Black Milk boat too. Well at least I’m on board now, and tying my legs to the stern. If you do not like Black Milk then perhaps I will talk sternly to you, young wo/man! General consensus is that while his beats are incredibly tight (especially his drums), his raps don’t hold up as well. I, however, will mildly disagree. It think he comes out alright. He’s not an amazing MC but he seems fine enough, and he’s not bad or annoying. His beats are truly great though, and in light of how good they are, maybe it is his mic abilities that are keeping this out of masterpiece range. I care more about sweet beats anyway…

28. Taiga Remains - Descend From Ivory Cliffs (Waterscape) : Sleep on this! Head of one of my fav. new labels "Student of Decay," Taiga Remains is one track of sweet ambient build up goodness. Ignore the lame looking typeface on the cover.

27. 14KT - The Golden Hour (ASide Worldwide) : You would be forgiven if you walked into a room (or perhaps even a juke joint) where this was playing and asked if it was Dilla. After all it is a mostly instrumental beats album, it does have that Michigan/Detroit City sound, and it is extremely good. He’s even got a song for Dilla and another that uses the same sample as Dilla. But after you got over all that, and started giving the thing a few listens, I would hope that you would begin to realize how good an album, and of his own style, 14KT ("KT" is apparently pronouced "Kaytee") as just issued into our grimy mits and sweaty paws. Hailing from Yipsilanti, MI and a member of the acclaimed Athletic Mic League family, KT definetly knows and loves his Dilla and is also clearly from the area. But he also knows the boards and he’s not ripping anybody off. Why would he be number 27 if he was?

26. Gerald Cleaver's Violet Hour - Gerald Cleaver's Detroit (Fresh Sound New Talent) : I saw Gerald Cleaver and his Violet Hour for the first time ever after a long day of Jazz at the Chicago Jazz Fest this year. They were playing an after fest kinda show a little ways uptown. Now, at the time, I had just watched like 10 hours or so of Jazz. And I like Jazz but I was also incredible exhausted and ready to go to bed. However, I suddenly found myself walking about 30 blocks at about midnight and arriving at the show. After a forced donation, in light of my long walk, and how sleepy and tired I was, I was in a pretty bad mood. Not to mention, my girlfriend was with me and also experiencing all the same things as me, thus making me feel worse. Additionally there was no where to sit, so I had to stand…there was no way it could be worth it…And then they played…and it was exactly what the doctor ordered! They played my tiny shriveled face off and put it into a small leather case! And excellent and impeccable mix of east coast and midwest jazz, and everybody was swinging like hell. But the main man was Gerald hisself. Dude was pounding the skins like tammy skinpounders and all the while smiling a super happy smile. Of course the albums not as good as all that. But it’s still very good.

25. HEALTH - //Disco (Lovepump United) : It's funny that I still haven't bothered to listen to any unremixed HEALTH. They are probably good. In anycase, this is just the kind of rough, extra noisy dance rock that I can really sink my teeth into. Plus who doesn't love a band named HEALTH?

24. John Robinson - Who is this Man? (Project: Mooncircle) : My boi MF Doom on the boards. John Robinson on the bikes. J-Rob (not his real nickname) has apparently been around in high quality and positive undie rap groups for a while, but I missed all that. Better late than never. It's always good to hear new Doom beats and John is a nice man on the mic.

Stay tuned, we’re almost done…

Paco's Top 56 Albums of 2008: 45-35

I forgot to mention on the last list that, for no apparent reason, this list excludes compliations. Therefore, although there were lots of good comps out this year, I didend putem 'ere. Perhaps, I will make a sweet comps list if I have time. But also maybe not...

This is where things start to get really good. And to be honest most of the selection from here on out could probably be in the Top 10 on any other day. That's how good this year was! Booyah!

45. Drip House - 1 and 2 (Night People) : Did I mention tapes, the Night People label, or Raccoo-oo-oon yet? Daren Ho of said dudes first solo releases. Both of them are equally good and about equal length ('round about 12 minutes). Get' em while you can.

44. Windy & Carl - Songs for the Broken Hearted (Kranky) : Drone/Ambient Masters (finally!) return with a new full-length album. If you are familiar with the ambient couple (think about being married making drone together! what a dream!) then there is nothing much new to report. It's more of the same good stuff, although perhaps with the emotion ratched up a notch. If you didn't care about them before, you won't care about them still. But they are definetly dedicated.

43. Abe Vigoda - Skeleton (Post Present Medium) : See, I like indie rock still! Presumably named after Abraham Charles "Abe" Vigoda, Abe Vigoda are pals with trendy Pitchfork loved (but also good) bands like No Age, Health and other LA rockers who play at The Smell. While still kinda lo-fi/punk, they are a lot more straight forward (less shit-gaze/lo-fi sounding) than many of thier friends, as well as darn catchy. For some reason everywhere on the innernettes referes to them as "Tropical Punk Rock." I don't know about that but they've got some nice lix.

42. Sparkling Wide Pressure - Touching Pasture (Students of Decay) : Enough with Night People what about Students of Decay! They are cranking out the his. I have no idea how to classify this aside from quiet, hazy, awesome, and free. The album art picture there kind of does it as well as any words could. Frank Baugh is certainly a student of decay.

41. Dan Friel - Ghost Town (Important) : “Electronic noise and catchy melodies totally have raging boners for each other, and have since the ’60s,” he says. “Think about Hendrix, Sun Ra, Velvets, My Bloody Valentine, Sonic Youth, etc. I’m just following their lead, and reducing it to all simple electronics.” (Did you know that Friel also released a tape once on Night People? haha!)

40. The Foreign Exchange - Leave it All Behind (Nicolay) : I'm still disappointed that there is only one actual rap verse on this followup to perhaps my all time favorite hip-hop album (2004's Connected). It seems like all the rappers don't like rapping no mo. Well, in any case, Phonte is not actually that bad at singing and Nicolay is still dropping unstoppable beatsmithery. Matt will be happy to note that this is exactly the kind of neo-soul album I would have hated about 5 years ago. My how times have changed. Still, this is should have been closer to #1, not #39. On the other hand, it probably will move up later as it is pretty new.

39. Damien Jurado - Caught in the Trees (Secretly Canadian) : "Gillian was a Horse" is one of the best Wilco songs he's ever written and "Trials" is the best Elliot Smith song he's ever written. The rest of the album is highly decent, consistent ol' DJ. The deciding factor is probably that my girlfriend likes it a lot, which ranks it up pretty high.

38. Manual - Confluence (Darla) : I had sort of forgotten about Manual. His 2002 "Ascend" was the kind of solid post-rockish-electronic-glitchy-quasi-ambient-morr-music type album which really hit me at that time. I didn't listen to 2005's Azure Vista much finding it fairly disappointing and New-Agey (Ty would probably disagree with me). Then one day in 2008 I was browsing me mp3 blogs and wham! This album just popped up out of no where. And It's incredibly good and probably the best thing he's ever produced. It seems he's gone (either now or in the past when I wasn't watching) true good news ambient and this is aa beautiful and quiet album, free from all the cheesy sounds of yore.

37. Seconds In Formaldehyde - Suchness #3 (Gears of Sand) : While it was released in 2008 it was techincally recorded in 2007 live at the Auerworld Festival. Apparently just one dude with a guitar, it does not sound like that at all. This dude is especially good at "Creating Moods and Atmospheres with just one chord or one single Note that stretches across time and space," and "Building a Wall of Guitar Harmonics and Subnotes and let them flow into Infinity." These are both things that I am really into, especially the first. Suchness is a 40 minute track cut into three. Soak your brains into thee pure guitar sound.

36. Bonnie "Prince" Billy - Lie Down in The Light (Drag City) : I've always like BPB slightly depressed more than happy, but really he can do whatever he wants and I will love it. I've also always been suspicious of singer/songwriters but ol' BPB, a true gentleman, can do as he pleases. Good job here.

35. Claudio Rocchetti - Another Piece of Teenage Wildlife (Die Schachtel) : This release is all over the place, but everwhere it goes is good. In fact, its so varied it almost sounds like a compilation or best of sort of album, as it lacks the cohesiveness we normally associate with full lengths. Rather than describe the album let me just show you the linear notes:

Claudio Rocchetti: voice, guitar, turntable, cassette, field recordings, piano, percussion
Valerio Tricoli: voice, tape loops
Margareth Kammerer: voice
Madame P: voice
Xabier Iriondo: guitar, mahai metak
Massimo Carozzi: ghost electronics

or this: "The work of Claudio Rocchetti is a deep plunge into thick sound, investigating its innermost workings. Using a variety of devices such as turntables, audio cassettes, samplers, radios, and microphones, often incorporating other objects and traditional instruments, Berlin-based Rocchetti builds compelling structures that employ sound as sheer matter, mass, and impact. 'I have a very direct approach to sound, trying to act on instruments and devices,' he says."

If that or anything else you might read about him doesn't get you going, then you need to get real. This is an awesome album. Plus "I miss you like hell," aside from being a great song title, is a pitch perfect Rip-off of the best kind of Stars of the Lid spell for the first 7 of is 16 minutes.