The Festive 50 (2010)
Published: December 21st, 2010 in Music Reviews
Another great year of music releases comes to an end. The list below represents my favourite 50 of the 120-plus new-release albums I’ve had the pleasure of hearing over the past 12 months. Some of my selections surprise me, when viewed in the cold light of these pixels. If someone had suggested to me last January that Kanye West would be making it onto my top-50 list for the year I’d have laughed in their face. However, I’ll give credit where credit is due. He released a quite excellent album last month and clearly should hole-up on Hawaii for 6 months at a time more often.
Those of you with hard rock and metal sensibilities may find the releases by Alcest, Black Mountain, Sleepy Sun, Kylesa and Grinderman to your liking. They have certainly enlivened many an otherwise boring work day at the website-building coal face.
I’m also partial to a bit of electronica now and then and Pantha du Prince, Caribou, Four Tet, The Chemical Brothers, Massive Attack and Underworld all had my head nodding with their rather fine albums from 2010. The Underworld record has a bit of a qualitative dip in the middle for 2 tracks – a fact that translated through to their otherwise hugely entertaining live show in November. “Between Stars” and “Diamond Jigsaw” are just not up to scratch and should be quietly forgotten. Netsky gets the vote for début, of the year. His album on occasion veers quite close to being a little cheesy but for sheer bravura drum and bass production values and outright enjoyability it was hard to beat.
Special mention must go to the female quartet of Laurie Anderson, Janelle Monáe, Anaïs Mitchell and Joanna Newsom for their efforts this year. Four epic albums full of invention and otherworldly beauty.
I see from my iTunes listing stats that I’ve listened to Pantha du Prince’s album more than any of the others, but it’s been out since very early in the year and holds an unfair advantage for that reason. 2010 also saw an enormously welcome return for Gil Scott-Heron with I’m New Here. The album’s not perfect but Gil is always worth listening to. However, despite receiving the occasional lukewarm review, I think my album of the year is Steve Mason’s Boys Outside, closely followed by Laurie Anderson’s Homeland.
Seek these albums out (if you have not already sought, I know what discerning people you are). Auditory satisfaction guaranteed.
The list is, as last year’s, not in any order of preference but follows a more conventional alphabetical listing.
- Alcest – Écailles de Lune
- Anaïs Mitchell – Hadestown
- Antony & The Johnsons – Swanlights
- The Arcade Fire – The Suburbs
- Ariel Pink – Before Today
- Belle & Sebastian – Write About Love
- Black Mountain – Wilderness Heart
- Broken Bells – Broken Bells
- Broken Social Scene – Forgiveness Rock Record
- Caribou – Swim
- Charlotte Gainsbourg – IRM
- Chemical Brothers – Further
- Cherry Ghost – Beneath This Burning Shoreline
- Deerhunter – Halcyon Digest
- Four Tet – There Is Love In You
- Gil Scott-Heron – I’m New Here
- Grinderman – Grinderman 2
- I Am Kloot – Sky At Night
- Janelle Monáe – The ArchAndroid (Suites II and III)
- The Jezabels – Dark Storm (EP)
- Joanna Newsom – Have One On Me
- John Grant – Queen Of Denmark
- Jónsi – Go
- Justin Townes Earle – Harlem River Blues
- Kanye West – My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy
- Kristin Hersh – Cats and Mice
- Kylesa – Spiral Shadow
- Laura Marling – I Speak Because I can
- Laurie Anderson – Homeland
- LCD Soundsystem – This Is Happening
- Massive Attack – Heligoland
- Matthew Dear – Black City
- Micah P. Hinson – Micah P. Hinson and the Pioneer Saboteurs
- Midlake – The Courage of Others
- The Miserable Rich – Of Flight and Fury
- The National – High Violet
- Netsky – Netsky
- Pantha du Prince – Black Noise
- Peggy Sue – Fossils and Other Phantoms
- The Radio Dept. – Clinging To a Scheme
- Sade – Soldier Of Love
- Scuba – Triangulation
- Shearwater – The Golden Archipelago
- Sleepy Sun – Fever
- Spoon – Transference
- Steve Mason – Boys Outside
- The Tallest Man On Earth – The Wild Hunt
- These New Puritans – Hidden
- Underworld – Barking
- Villagers – Becoming a Jackal
Bubbling under …….
Mogwai – Special Moves
Bill Callahan – Rough Travel For A Rare Thing
The Tallest Man On Earth – Sometimes The Blues Is Just A Passing Bird (EP)
Foals – Total Life Forever
Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan – Hawk
Under normal circumstances both Mogwai and Bill Callahan would be making my top 50 with ease but their releases this year are live albums and, although both are excellent, I decided to open up the two spots for other records fighting for inclusion on the list.
The War You Don’t See
Published: December 16th, 2010 in Media, Misc., TV
A cursory glance at the programming schedule for ITV1 on any evening of the week usually prompts a deep sigh of disappointment. Tonight, for example, one can wallow in the bilge of Celebrity Grimefighters at 9pm and after a short break for the ITV News (which needs to sharpen up its ideas a bit) it’s an empty-headed leap into the fuel-injected gracelessness of 2 Fast 2 Furious. Unless you are a particularly vacant yet excitable teenage boy this film is not for you. It was with a great deal of surprise then that I noticed that the same channel had devoted upwards of 95 minutes to the broadcast of John Pilger’s new film The War You Don’t See on Tuesday evening at 10:35pm.
The film focuses mainly on the recent conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq and the manner in which public consent was, in the opinion of Pilger and others, manipulated by the US and UK governments with the aid of largely unquestioning editors in the mainstream media. Pilger’s passionate viewpoint is, I believe, too politically idealised to achieve the fait accompli he clearly believes he is presenting, however much in the film should be mandatory viewing for all thoughtful people and certainly for all working journalists.
You should watch the film (for free) on your own particular TV-on-demand service or on the ITV player (for the next 28 days).
Nostalgia and national pride. A potent mix.
Published: November 17th, 2010 in Cycling, Edinburgh, Misc.
This morning I watched a video (available below) showing Scottish mountain bike trials pro rider Danny Macaskill performing all manner of jaw-dropping stunts during a journey from Edinburgh to Skye and it evoked some strong emotions within me. Not only is there the warm nationalistic pride in seeing familiar areas of my beloved (but mainly cold and grey) country shot in HD video but there is also an aching nostalgia for all the carefree time I spent as a teenager on a Haro Master BMX bike. A Haro Master bike not dissimilar to the one pictured at the top of this post (click on it to enlarge). Read More »
Her spelling’s really coming along!
Published: October 12th, 2010 in Misc., Parenting, Uncategorized
Scene: Sunday 4:30pm. Very busy soft drinks aisle in Tesco Extra, Drumbrae, Edinburgh. Father (in this instance played by me), 5-year-old daughter in the trolley seat (played with determination by Rachel, 50% of the fruit of my loins), supporting cast of a dozen docile consumers.
Rachel: Daddy?
Me (expecting request for something treat-like): Yeeeees.
Rachel: How do you spell cock?
Woah! This is from leftfield and not at all what I was anticipating. I frantically scan the shelves to try and figure out what might have prompted such an unwittingly frank question.
Me: Do you mean Coke?
Rachel (loudly): No Daddy! COCK!! C (kuh), O (ohh) ….
Me (increasingly uncomfortable in these very public cicumstances): Shhh! What are you talking about?
Rachel: You know, you hit it with a racquet and it goes up in the air.
Me (slightly relieved): Oh, you mean shuttlecock?
Rachel: Yes shuttlecock …. but just cock. C (kuh), O (ohh), C (kuh).
<adopts loud sing-song voice> I can spell cock. I can spell cock!
Good Christ! I hurry from the aisle and the increasing number of raised eyebrows, picturing myself in a courtroom desperately trying to talk myself off some register.
Road bike training with Garmin Edge 705
Published: September 11th, 2010 in Cycling, Misc.
I have been trying to regain some fitness lately. The spectre of beer-gutted middle-aged complacency had been becoming more and more real in recent years, especially throughout the toddler years of our twins. Most weekday mornings I am managing to go running but the feeling of freedom experienced, and the sheer distance that can be covered, during a lengthy road bike expedition appeals to me hugely.
With that in mind, I ventured out from Edinburgh, via Kirkliston, Linlithgow, Grangemounth, Kincardine and Culross, to complete a loop around the River Forth for the second time in as many weeks today. On this occasion I tried out my new Garmin Edge 705 cycling-specific GPS gizmo. It not only guides me around my pre-defined low traffic route perfectly, measures the height gained and lost but also records my heart rate and pedal cadence throughout the ride. As techie boy toys go, it’s right up there. Fantastic.
Over the coming months I’ll be using this new toy to shed the indolent pounds surrounding my lower torso while seeing parts of Scotland I otherwise would never see. My entry to the Etape Caledonia 2011 is already in.
Allez! Allez!
Here is the summary of the route and my (not particularly impressive) stats:
