LHNA's Best of 2009 pt. 1 (100-51)

100. The Silent Years - Forest Fire

"I'm just trying to act my age

Find some new ways to pretend

I'm not everybody's loser friend"

99. Octoberman - Thirty Reasons

A sweet come-back-to-me love song to wipe that cynicism off your face.

98. Shelley Short - Time Machine/Submarine

97. Lily Allen - Not Fair

[Eliza:] A lot of unhappy Lily Allen fans wrote angry letters to NME complaining that she "sold out" because she changed the, ahem, 'controversial' line "I spent hours giving head" to 1950s-housewife-style "I spent hours kneading bread". Frankly, it doesn't matter whether it's one or the other about when the song is so addictive.

96. Best Coast - When I'm With You
[E:] What I like about this song is that is avoids hyperboles. No grand statements, no rich metaphors or romantic declarations. Just: when I'm with you I have fun. Because, at the end of the day, what else is there to it? When I'm with you I have fun. I hate sleeping alone. Simple as that.

95. Big Spider's Back - Perfect Machine
[E:] No idea why the band chose that horrible name for itself. Or what sort of contraption its members had in mind when they were singing about this "perfect machine" of theirs. I can't even make out the lyrics most of the time. But in unexpected moments after a glass of wine I find myself singing "I've got a perfect machine, I've got a perfect machine, I've got a perfect machine" ad nauseam; sometimes literally.


94. Monsters of Folk - Man Named Truth
[Steven:]Yes, this really should have sucked as hard as a porn star in debt, and yet, it's actually pretty good. Perhaps there's hope for Conor after all...

93. Orba Squara - Come So Far
Maybe my favourite song off Orba Squara's 'The Trouble With Flying'. Like the rest of the tracks from the album, it's extremely understated. It never peaks. It's content with dancing softly around, a leaf carried by the autumn wind. And that's precisely what makes it stick with you.

92. Go Away Birds - The Year of Letting You Down
Catherine Ireton proving she doesn't need to sing Belle & Sebastian songs to win us over.

91. Sunset Rubdown - Apollo and Buffalo and Anna Anna Anna Oh
[E:] The problem with Sunset Rubdown is their songs are often so complex they shift and transform right before your eyes when you least expect it and jump around and slip between your fingers. Each song seems to take so much out of you that it's hard to listen to the whole album. So you focus on two or three tracks that stand out. This is one of them.

90. Julian Casablancas - 11th Dimension
[S:] Well what do you know!?! Who knew Julian had it in him!? It bleeps, he beeps and pings and makes us want to shake our metallic asses.


89. Tinariwen - Imidiwan Afrik Tendam

88. Emmanuel and the Fear - The Rain Becomes the Clouds

[E:] Sometimes I have weird, dystopian-novel dreams about the end of the world. There is a huge hurricane, or a fire, or the trees start swallowing the Earth or the air solidifies and closes in on us and squashes us. My most memorable one is of a volcano. I've had this dream more than once. There is lava everywhere  - everywhere! - covering every little surface apart from skyscrapers and mountain peaks. I know it's the end of the world, me and everyone around me, we all know that. But no one is scared. It takes me a while to figure out why; and I'm swimming around and around in lava until it finally clicks: the reason no one is afraid is because nobody is hurt. Nobody is going to get hurt. It's the end of the world, yes, but not for us, we are all swimming in lava that I now realize is cold. It's not hurting us. The planet looks different but we're still the same. We'll build new homes that float on top of the volcano. It's all okay. It starts to rain. That's when I wish this song would start playing in my head.

87. The Lovely Feathers - Lowiza

[E:] If I say this is the catchiest song about asexuality you're likely to hear this year you'll probably think that's not saying much, right? After all, there aren't that many songs out there that tackle the subject. Well, uhm: "it's the catchiest song about asexuality you're likely to hear this year". There, I said it.

86. Danger Mouse and Sparklehorse - Little Girl

The coolest little girl in this whole town!

85. The Pastels vs Tenniscoats - Vivid Youth
[E:] When we run and then come home. When we lose each other and find each other. When we think it's over but it starts all over again. When we feel older every day and suddenly find something that makes us act like children again. When we do nothing but stare at the sky, and still understand each other perfectly. Silently. Easily. Like this.

84. Sister Suvi - Deadwood

[E:] Sister Suvi's 'The Lot' was one of our favourite songs of 2008. And, though I still think it's better than this one that doesn't mean there isn't a lot to love in this song. It just means this one needs more listens in order to get what they're trying to do here. It just means that this is the kind of band that will have you falling in love with a different song of theirs every month. It just means that it's a damn shame they broke up.

83. Cuddle Magic - Expectations
Thanks Said the Gramophone for this one.

82. Woods - To Clean

For once a band that sounds exactly the way its name suggests it might.

81. Themselves - Roman Is As Roman Does

[E:] A: "What do you call this? Can you call this hip hop? If not, what else? Do you call it electronic? What d'you call it? Experimental I suppose?"

B: "You call it brilliant. Then you recommend it to your friends. Then you start writing Anticon Rocks! with permanent markers on white T-shirts and give them out free at kids' lemonade stands. That's what you do."

80. Window Twins - Maybe It's Time

79. The Sound of Arrows - Into the Clouds

[E:] They have disco parties in heaven every time someone plays this song.

  78.  Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Zero
[S:] 2009 was the year Yeah Yeah Yeahs took back the zero from Billy Corgan, while the latter lost the plot even further.

 

77. Bill Callahan - Jim Cain

76. Thunder Power - Ship in a Bottle

75. Black Lips - Starting Over

[S:] This was the year the Black Lips (almost) got  kicked out of India, released 200 Million Thousand and blew our minds (again) at Pukkelpop in August.

"We'll it’s just a wasted year
I'm doing my time
If things don't go right I'll drink some more beer
And I'll blow I blow out my mind" 
Hear hear.

74. Egyptian Hip Hop - Rad Pitt

[E:] Back in 2001, the Moldy Peaches released their by now legendary self-titled album. There was a song on it called 'On Top'. Its lyrics went like this:

"We hate dance and we hate rap
But we like to contradict ourselves
And that's alright"

The irony of it all was that they were actually rapping these words, not singing them. It looks like someone was paying attention, because seven years later this couldn't-get-any-indier band decides to name itself Egyptian Hip Hop and put pictures of 50 Cent on their MySpace page. And make some good music while they're at it, too.

73. Old Canes - Little Bird Courage

In the face of danger, these guys are not afraid. It's essential that you know that.

72. Girls - Hellhole Ratrace

71. David Shane Smith - Miserablism

Don't dismiss the track until you reach the shift at 3:20.

70. Museum of Bellas Artes - Who Do You Love

The only cover in this top, so it bloody well be good huh? Have a listen.

Can you get more... Swedish?

69. Fuck Buttons - Surf Solar
 [S] In which our heroes fill a rusty blender with several buckets full of coloured and trampled glass, feed it to a blender. Then RE-mix the contents of said blender (+a bag of sugar) and push RECORD while chasing small children around a small circular wallpapered room until all participants are puking up their cupcakes, feet are bleeding and the children crying.

68. Wale - New Soul

67. Dark Mean - Lullaby
"I close my eyes, haven't slept in five days
I'll sleep when I'm dead again."
[E:] In the year 2617, all the joie-de-vivre in the world will be squeezed in glass jars, left there to soak up the summer sun and freeze in the winter cold for a whole year. After exactly 365 days, on the first day of spring, the jars will be thawed and emptied out and their contents will reemerge as these two song lines. Mark my words.


66. Jónsi - Boy Lilikoi
[E:] I've tried thinking of little starving African children, 101 gruesome ways to carry out the capital punishment and puppies crushed to death by merciless filthy trucks - all in an attempt to wipe that ridiculous dopey smile that appears on my face whenever I hear this song. Pointless.


65. Warpaint - Billie Holiday
Well if you want to know me, I'm a war. Come paint.

We are birds of a feather.

We can't explain it any better than that.

64. The Crayon Fields - Impossible Things
[E:] I would like to play this song in the morning, rain beating confused drops against the window, a barely-alive flame glowing faintly in the fireplace; slippers on my feet, coffee mug in hand. I would like to say that it makes me feel good, makes me dance, makes me whistle. I would like to pretend its rhythmic handclaps are hopeful rather than nostalgic. I would like to be able to listen to it on cold days like this one without longing for warm summer sun. I still want impossible things.

63. Glass Ghost - Ending
Something new is happening, indeed.

62. Windmill - Big Boom
I can't say Windmill's 2009 effort is a great album. It's a good one. Not a great one. As far as concepts albums go, better than many. An album nostalgic for a lost childhood, for fleeting moments gone unnoticed. Well worth listening to for their fans. If you've never heard of them before though don't start with this. If you've never heard of them RUN get your hands on Puddle City Racing Lights. Fall in love with them. And then listen to this.

61. City Center - Open House
[E:] Doorbell. Key. Open house. Open Arms. Come in. Noise, noise, noise. Beautiful Noise. A thousand nails scratching, a thousand bottles breaking, a thousand voices screeching, noise. It's all coming together.

60. Neon Indian - Deadbeat Summer
Bounce?

59. Horse Shoes - The Imperial School
"I want to be your only friend in life
I want to hold your hand all through the night"
So sweet.

58. Cass McCombs - Dreams Come True Girl (ft. Karen Black)
 
57. Daniel Johnston - Mind Movies

56. The Rest - Modern Time Travel (Necessities)

[E:] It is a truth universally acknowledged that all songs about time travel must have a few oh-oh-ohs and yeah-yeah-yeahs in them. These guys are well aware of that fact.

55. Casiotone for the Painfully Alone - Killers

[E:] Fuck lovers. Why should we be lovers when we could be killers... just for one night?

54. Delay Trees - Desert Island Song

[E:] The first time I heard this I thought of Cast Away. Yep, that movie with Tom Hanks and no one else in it. I wish my first thought would have been something else set on a desert island - something cooler than that - maybe Lost or The Tempest or Lord of the Flies or, heck, even Robinson Crusoe but no - it was Cast Away. I imagined Tom hanks crying his eyes out and asking the volleyball "Do you really think that they are coming back? We're stranded on this island..." And I smiled. Then I imagined him  hugging the ball romantically and singing: "I know I'd never make it without you". And I smiled. Then I stopped thinking of Tom Hanks and started paying attention to the soft tropical-sounding guitars and the singer's voice. And I smiled again.

53. The Lonely Island - I'm on a Boat (ft. T-Pain)

[E:] Continuing with the Cast Away theme (I know, where the hell did that come from?) this song should play during the part where... well, come on you can guess this. YES, that's right , during the part where Tom Hanks thinks he's dead and then he's unexpectedly found by a passing cargo ship.  Of course that would make the movie funny for five minutes, something that its creators would definitely not want. It would totally ruin the "this is SO dramatic" atmosphere so maybe instead it should play during the part where... you know, fuck this. Forget Cast Away. The point is this is the funniest shit I've heard all year. If you can't see the humour in this, then I think it's safe to assume you have no soul. (ultimate proof: you probably didn't think Coco Jumbo was funny either) I mean just listen carefully to the way the singer/rapper shouts at the world: "I'm on a BOAT motherfucker!" with the same sense of pride and achievement as if he were saying "I've just single-handedly put an end to world hunger, motherfucker!" Someone less shameless would be embarrassed to do this. These guys don't give a fuck.

52. Yeasayer - Tightrope
A charity album one of the best of the year? Yep.

51. Taken By Trees - Anna
[E:] This song made me think of the countryside and barns and yellow hills in summer and how there are so many sounds out there I never pay attention to - crickets, bells, wind, voices, feet. The sound of leaves cracking under our boots,the sound of pencil on paper, the sound of our breath. It makes me want to start listening harder.

>The content provided on this post is for promotional purposes only. If you like the mp3s, please consider buying them. If you own the rights to any of the music/images found on this post and do not wish it to appear here, please contact us at letterarms[at]gmail[dot]com< Thanks!

Letters have no Songs!

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 Merry Christmas!!!

 Letters have no Arms, December 25th 2009

Top 5 reads of 2009

1. "I Know This Much Is True" by Wally Lamb

Recommended for: people who like depressing books, people with an interest in mental illnesses or twins, people who like complex, daring, good books in general

I don't know what I can say about this book that will make you go and read it NOW. I wish you would just go and read it because I said so, but that's not how these things work. So I'll start by stating boldly that I haven't read anything this good in a very long time. Although I'm not sure it's the best way to go with this one, let me lay out the plot for you a bit. I Know This Much Is True is essentially the story of two brothers: Dominick - our protagonist and narrator - and Thomas, his schizophrenic identical twin. They do not know who their real father is and their stepfather is...well...let's just say he's not a role model. Their family history is a big mystery. And their lives are pretty much as f***ed up as they can get. Sounds like a big cliché? If only all books were such stunning and heartbreaking clichés. Like all amazing works of literature, I Know This Much Is True contains little glimpses of life scattered all over the place. Reading the words on every page feels a bit like sucking on your favorite lollipop - you just have to stop every now and then, the better to savour its taste. Me, I had to pause a bit after each paragraph. As soon as I started it I knew it would be one of those books - the ones you're sad to say goodbye to, the ones you want to keep reading forever. The storytelling is fantastic, nothing overdone, but nothing understated either. The plot is compelling and believable, the conclusion is realistic yet extremely touching, and the characters make you love them and hate them and be angry with them and fear for them and pity them – in short, they act like real people.  Not one person feels secondary in this book; everyone has a role, everyone has a story, there are no peripheral "flat" characters that are just there to fill a void. The book manages to discuss and explore religion, racism, identity, education, politics, war, parentage, jealousy, immigration, history, and pretty much everything in between. Also, bonus points go to the writer for the effort he has put into researching the issues that the book explores: Lamb has evidently done his homework on schizophrenia, on twin brothers, on the Italian immigration to America, on psychoanalysis, on the history and geography of the area where he places his characters and weaves his story. Like many reviewers of this book have done before me, I urge you not to be put off by its size. Believe me, as soon as you start reading it, you will want it to be long. There are about 5 novels that can brag about having made me cry. This is one of them. Only one warning: this is not a jolly holiday read. You have to be there. You have to invest in it. You have to be in the mood.

Opening sentence: "On the afternoon of October 12, 1990, my twin brother Thomas entered the Three Rivers, Connecticut Public Library, retreated to one of the rear study carrels, and prayed to God the sacrifice he was about to commit would be deemed acceptable."

2.       “The Last Samurai’ by Helen DeWitt (really this is number 1 as well)

Recommended for: fellow whizkid-lovers!, fans of the Glass family, people interested in foreign languages, education, and child-rearing, people who like bildungsromans, smartasses.

I have mentioned my obsession with whizkids many times before, although now that I think of it, it was never on this blog. So then you won’t mind if I repeat myself. Here goes. I LOVE WHIZKIDS. There is possibly no subject matter in the world I find more fascinating. If you happen to mention in passing a movie that has a child prodigy protagonist in it, or a child prodigy secondary character, or possibly even a child prodigy chimney sweeper that only appears for five seconds during the entire movie, chances are I’m gonna watch it. This all started years ago with Salinger’s Glass family, my favourite favourite favourite fictional characters which no one has yet – and probably never will - manage to dethrone. There were many whizkids I fell in love with after that. Stanley Spector from Magnolia, Klaus and Violet from the Series of Unfortunate Events, Dexter from Dexter’s Laboratory, Brain (Pinky & the Brain – although not exactly a “child”), Hermione Granger, Velma, Teddy and Esme and more recently (recently for me) Joshua Waitzkin from Searching for Bobby Fischer. Like I said none of these will probably be able to dethrone Seymour and Zooey Glass from their no.1 spot. But Ludo, age seven, child prodigy and the protagonist of The Last Samurai sure comes in a close second. I loved this boy with all my heart. And though usually when people say they love a kid they only mean it in a “aww he’s so cute” way, I mean it in a “aww he’s so cute and smart and interesting and brilliant and damaged and fantabulous and loveable and heartbreaking and great and can-I-please-please-please-order-one-just-like-him-somewhere?”

I want to make one thing clear in case you were wondering: the title coincides with the title of a known Hollywood movie with Tom Cruise in it. Like I said, coincides. Totally accidental. The book in fact takes its title from another movie: Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai. The relationship between Seven Samurai and this book is not so straightforward as the back cover would have you believe. Yes, it’s true that Sibylla, Ludo’s mother is worried about her son growing up without a role model since his father is ignorant about his existence, so she decides to play the movie every day for him in order to give him not one but 8 male role models: the seven samurai and Kurosawa himself! But the truth is that the relationship between book and movie is much more complex than that. There are beliefs and ideologies embedded in the movie that have become part of who Ludo is. There are life lessons to be had from it. There are languages to be learned. There are words of wisdom to be memorized and repeated. There are fictional characters that become real friends.  The complexities of the parallel that DeWitt is trying to draw between the two is mostly up to the reader to figure out. I don’t want to say anything more because the book is not so much about the plot. Suffice to say, The Last Samurai ties with I Know This Much Is True for my number one spot this year. Go read it.

3. “The Left Hand of Darkness” by Ursula K. Le Guin

Recommended for: sci-fi fans, people interested in gender roles and sexuality, people with a passion for folklore and legends, people who like a good alien-human friendship story (see: E.T., District 9 - but 10x more complex than either), people interested in ethnography and sociology

"Our entire pattern of socio-sexual interaction is non-existent here.(...) There is no division of humanity into strong and weak halves, protected/protective. One is respected and judged only as a human being. You cannot cast a Gethenian into the role of Man or Woman, while adopting towards "him" a corresponding role dependent on your expectations of the interactions between persons of the same or opposite sex. It is an appalling experience for a Terran..."

Genry is sent to the planet called Gethen as an envoy, his mission being to further the cause of the Ekumen - an alliance of various planets, including Earth, that would like to count Gethen amongst its members. He is sent there alone so as to prevent Gethenians from seeing him as a threat, and so he can explain to them the benefits they would experience if they were to be part of the Union: benefits economic, scientific, medicinal, political and, of course, cultural. His mission, however, is complicated by many factors. For one thing, Genry is considered a "pervert" because he is not androgynous and because his sexual potency is not limited to a few days per month - he is in constant "kemmer". For another, while his reproductive system is considered abnormal, such cases have been known to exist on Gethen and so many do not believe that he comes from another planet, having never seen an "alien" before. In fact, no birds or any sort of winged animals exist on Gethen and therefore, not only do they not believe it is possible to build spaceships, but they think it impossible to fly at all. "How could it ever occur to a sane man that he could fly?", asks one Gethenian. Further complications arise when political considerations get in the way of the mission; when leaders that are suppose to care for the general good of all mankind, are too blinded by personal interests and territorial disputes to see the bigger picture.

Because of the ambiguous sexuality of the Gethenians, who are potentially both Man and Woman, the novel is often seen as a study on gender and sexuality. It is true that by using an alienating device (no pun intended) to great effect, Le Guin makes us reconsider gender roles. She manages to explore the way in which such a trivial factor as sex can determine our entire roles in society and shape out behaviour patterns that we follow through life. But The Left Hand of Darkness amounts to so much more than gender study. There are so many layers of meaning! Le Guin creates a whole world filled with the myths, legends, religions, popular beliefs and traditions of a rich and complex society. Many of these are interspersed throughout the book not necessarily to advance the story but, it seems, for the single purpose of enriching our experience. The ideologies and unspoken rules of behaviour that surface through the Gethenians' speech and through their actions make it possible for us to see their true nature. We recognize that the inhabitants of this cold planet (nicknamed "Winter" by Earthlings) are so very different, yet at the same time so similar to us; that they are unmistakably human. Le Guin does not only teach us about gender, but also about friendship and trust, about politics, about tradition, about respect, about patriotism and about bigotry, about lies and truth, about ambiguity, about the acceptance of the Other, whether that Other is of a different gender, or of a different colour; whether that Other is merely an inhabitant of a different country, or whether he is a strange black alien who is considered a pervert because he "must carry always his sexual organ outside himself" .

4. “The Crimson Petal and the White” by Michel Faber

Recommended for: Victorian period fans, people who like London, people who think they would like a story about a prostitute called Sugar and her attempts to climb up the social ladder, people who don’t get “offended” easily, people who like big books

The Crimson Petal and the White is a book that knows precisely where it stands - and where it stands is at the utmost edge between Victorian and postmodern. Its themes, its conflicts, its setting, its people, and the motivation behind their actions and thoughts are utterly Victorian. All the concerns of the era, from the Woman Question to the technological advancements and the loss of the "natural", from the "evil of prostitution" to the inhuman working conditions, from the religious dilemmas of the time to the conflict between "tradition" and "modernity" - everything and anything that might concern the Victorian man or woman is addressed here. Issues of poverty, hunger, dirt, and criminality are dealt with so perceptively and touchingly that it would flummox even Dickens. The hypocrisy of the upper classes and their preoccupation with nothing more than balls, parties and "social calls" are ridiculed with a wit and sharpness worthy of Austen. But if you glance at the novel's form and writing, the daring pen of Michel Faber makes it clear that The Crimson Petal and the White, despite the title's allusion to a famous Victorian poem, does not belong to the 19th century. Faber, the writer, often steps into the story - to great comical effect - to offer the readers advice or to stir the story into another direction. He makes his authorial presence known and, in true postmodern fashion and in the spirit of Lemony Snicket, often addresses the reader directly: "So there you have it: the thoughts (somewhat pruned of repetition) of William Rackam as he sits on his bench in St. James's Park. If you are bored beyond endurance, I can offer only my promise that there will be fucking in the very near future, not to mention madness, abduction, and violent death." It seems that he uses every device and trick known to writers to keep the reader interested in the story, but makes the whole thing seem so effortless - he never lost me for one second. Most importantly, the distance between mr. Faber's era and the era he is describing makes it easier for him to see the past in a clearer light, and allows him to express his observations and his critique openly. "This is the novel that Dickens might have written had he been allowed to speak freely", The Guardian says, and they're definitely onto something here. It was a comfort to see a writer that finally has the courage to address that most mystifying feature of the Victorians - one that jumps out at me whenever I pick up mr. Dickens - the fact that sex is an unmentionable topic with them. Of course, the conflict between the Victorians' behaviour and their "morals" is transparent: while prostitution is soaring and people are certainly no less interested in sex than today, they insist on acting as though sex is simply inexistent, far way from their thoughts and lives. The effects of this sexual repression on society's part are made clear enough in the novel: people battling with their consciences, trying to reconcile the idea of sex as something that is clearly natural and desirable in their hearts of hearts with the idea of sex as filthy, degrading and evil.

The only reason why I didn't award it a full five stars is a certain death that I thought was completely unnecessary - it seemed to me that it was just an easy way to dispose of a character that served a purpose no longer. Other than that, this is a wonderful book. Sugar - our prostitute heroine - along with William Rackam, Henry Rackam, Emmeline Fox, Agnes, Sophie, Caroline, Colonel Leek, Clara, Ms. Castaway will draw you in and never let you go. Great cast, great story, great writing, great book.

5.  “The Book of Daniel” by E.L. Doctorow

Recommended for: history buffs, people interested in American politics, people who like historical metafiction, people who find random trivia fascinating, people who love stumbling upon an unusual authorial voice, people who like the 60s

I can tell just how much I love an author's writing mostly the days after I've finished reading one of his books. When I start writing an e-mail to a friend and after a couple of sentences think"wait a minute, this is not my style, where did I get this from?". When an author is that good, his way of using punctuation or syntax, his unusual metaphors or sentences or a certain attitude and tone behind the words inevitably work their way into your own writing style. Doctorow is that kind of author. His voice stuck inside your head for days and days. Using language and writing in a way that constantly undermines the reliability o language and writing. "The early morning traffic was wondering - I mean the early morning traffic was light, but not many drivers could pass them without wondering who they were and they were going" Or if you prefer: "In any event, my mother and father, standing in for them, went to their deaths for crimes they did not commit. Or maybe they did commit them. Or maybe my mother and father got away with false passports for crimes they didn’t committ. How do you spell comit?" And if you think all this is postmodern mumble-jumble and where's the plot, the story? The story, I will let you know, is wonderful. Wonderful and sad and infuriating and thought-provoking and suspenseful and everything you could wish for. This is the story of the execution of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg (renamed in the book Paul & Rochelle Isaacson) seen from the point of view of their son - Daniel in the book. Our protagonist. Trying to make sense of something that could not and should not make sense for any person calling himself/herself a human being. I could go on but I find that all I want to do is not describe the book (which would be doing it an injustice) but quote passages from it. So I'll just say for me this is a must-read. And stop there.

"The difference between Socrates and Jesus is that no one has ever been put to death in Socrates’ name. And that is because Socrates’ ideas were never made law."

Disclaimer: this post is about books I happened to read this year, not books that were published in 2009.

Lately we've been listening to:

Lady & Bird - La Ballade of Lady and Bird

Dave Rawlings Machine - Sweet Tooth

The Magnetic Fields - Everything Is One Big Christmas Tree

Elvis Perkins - Doomsday

It's Christmas! Let's be Glad!

it's Christmas! let's be glad!
Sufjan Stevens - It's Christmas! Let's be Glad!
The Hives & Cyndi Lauper - A Christmas Duel

The Raveonettes - The Christmas Song

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - All I want for Christmas

Darlene Love - Christmas (Baby please come home)
The Lisps - The Winter that I Missed

John Prine - Christmas in Prison

Low - Just like Christmas

 

Three things

1. Songs that will sadly not be making our top 100 for the year
...but that we love nonetheless:

Washed Out - New Theory
Small Black - The Kings of Animals

Blake Miller - Tomorrow Sorrow
Orenda Fink - High Ground

Tada Tátà - Hit the Wall
Real Estate - Black Lake

2. Another thing that begs to be mentioned. Okay so maybe I'm begging for it to be mentioned. I keep seeing The Rural Alberta Advantage's "Hometowns" on so many best-of-the-year lists. But the album was released in 2008 - and was re-released by Saddle Creek in 2009. I'm not really keen on the idea of counting re-released albums and we had the album - or a song from it - on our top last year. The annoying thing is, if I wasn't so anal about release dates I would have my quandary about what to place as my number one solved. I'm pretty sure the top spot would have gone to  "Frank, AB". If only for those last 20 seconds of the song. Or just for those lyrics. Seriously that song makes my hair stand on end every time.
You need the backstory first: (Wikipedia) "Frank, Alberta is a coal mining town in the Crowsnest Pass, Alberta. On April 29, 1903, at 4:10 a.m., 90 million tonnes (30 million cubic metres) of limestone crashed from the east face of Turtle Mountain and covered approximately three square kilometres of the valley floor. The slab of rock that broke free was approximately 650 m high, 900 m wide and 150 m thick^. The slide dammed the Crowsnest River and formed a small lake, covered 2km of the Canadian Pacific Railway, destroyed most of the coal mine's surface infrastructure, and buried seven houses on the outskirts of the sleeping town of Frank, as well as several rural buildings. Frank was home to approximately 600 people in 1903; it is estimated that 90 of the roughly 100 individuals in the path of the slide were killed. Only fourteen bodies were recovered from the debris at the time of the slide."

And now lyrics:
My love, I will hold on to your touch  until there's nothing left of us
save you from this life
And the cold depths of the rocky clutch won't take away our love
save you from this life
...
And under the rubble of the mountain that tumbled
I'll hold you forever
I'll hold you forever
They'll build up another on the bodies of our brothers
I'll love you forever 
 

And if the end doesn't touch you you're dead inside.

3. This post might have evolved into a love letter to The Rural Alberta Advantage, but initially it was meant to be used as an excuse to post some of Chelsea Greene Lewyta's exquisite illustrations. So here they are:

Adam's Song

Blink 182: Adam's Song

A Look Back: Primavera Club 2009

It was a tiring week (we're staying 30 minutes outside Barcelona and the daily back and forth was something of a challenge) but well worth it. We ate Pakistani food, visited our beloved Wok to Walk, saw a lot of the city and uhm, obviously a bunch of great bands!

 

 -Best venue: Sala Apolo (located in a beautiful 1940s dance-hall)

-Best performance: Beach House (Steven), Jeffrey Lewis & The Junkyard (Eliza) - I'm sure the fact that they played Bugs & Flowers specially for her had something to do with that ;-)

-Cheapest beer: Monasterio (€3.50)

-Best (and funniest) inter-song talking: So Cow

-Most fun: Devendra Banhart and the Grogs (though Eliza thought: "So yesterday we saw Devendra Banhart. It was packed, he was cool, did some cute silly dancing, the crowd loved him. But, this being the first time I'd seen him, I couldn't help but feel a bit disappointed. I've always felt his biggest strength lies in his quieter, mellower songs, the ones that bring out his voice. Todo los dolores. At the hop. This beard is for Siobhan. The Beatles. Mama Wolf. He played none of these songs. Highlights: Baby, Angelika")

-Best standing-in-one-place-dancing-and-looking cute-as-hell: Neon Indian's keyboard player

-Longest queue: Woods at Jamboree 

-Best surprise: Furguson

 

Best covers* we heard at Primavera Club: 

Neil Young - Out on the Weekend (Deer Tick)
John Prine - Sam Stone (Deer Tick)
Television Personalities - This Angry Silence (So Cow)
Nirvana - Sifting (Jeffrey Lewis)

 

(*These are all the original versions)

The Pastels - Sala Apolo

Furguson - Sidecar

Jeffrey Lewis merch table - Sala Apolo

Jeffrey Lewis & the Junkyard - Sala Apolo

Post Woods - Jamboree

 

So Cow - La [2] De Apolo

Neon Indian - Sala Apolo

(waiting for) Neon Indian - Sala Apolo

 See you all in May!

Repetition

Repetition.mp3 - The Fall

Lists and subtitutions.

photographs via Esther K.

My most played albums in 2009, according to Last.fm*:

1. Au Revoir Simone: Still Night, Still Light

2. Metric: Fantasies

3. Slow Club: Yeah So

4. The Thermals: Now We Can See

                              5. Emmy the Great: First Love

6. Sin Fang Bous: Clangour

7. Passion Pit: Manners

8. Fanfarlo: Reservoir

9. Nurses: Apple's Acre

10. Dead Man's Bones: Dead Man's Bones

11. Mew: No More Stories Are Told Today, I'm Sorry, They're Washed Away

12. Cymbals Eat Guitars: Why There Are Mountains

13. Casiotone for the Painfully Alone: Vs. Children

14. The Woodlands: The Woodlands

15. Animal Collective: Merriweather Post Pavillion

This top of course doesn't necessarily - actually cross that, it definitely DOES NOT  coincide with my favourite albums of 2009. First Love, for example (Emmy the Great's debut album) was a bit of a disappointment for me. Sure some of her old songs - previously unreleased but available online of course - were as good as I remembered, but the new ones left me decidedly unimpressed. The fact that the Thermals' Now We Can See is in this top is due almost exclusively to the song of the same name, which I must have played ad infinitum ever since I first heard it. The rest of the album however, apart from one or two songs, is unexceptional. And, while I enjoyed Yeah So, Fantasies, and Clangour, Fanfarlo's Reservoir should have been higher on the list than all of those if the aforementioned list were to reflect my preferences. So basically what I'm saying is that this list is just a lazy substitute. It's a lazy substitute for the Best Albums of 2009 list that we're not going to make. And we're not going to make it because, just like last year, we want to focus on individual songs rather than albums that may or may not have more than one or two good songs on them.

One album I was surprised to see on that list was the Woodlands' self-titled debut. Not because I didn't think it was great but because I hadn't realized I'd listened to it so many times. I'm glad that it did get to be there however, because that means the video we received in our inbox yesterday came just in time:

Can We Stay from The Woodlands on Vimeo.

The Woodlands - Can We Stay

Fanfarlo - Drowning Men (Acoustic)

Related posts:

LHNA's Best Songs of 2008 pt. 1 (mp3s still work!)

LHNA's Best Songs of 2008 pt. 2 (without mp3s)

LHNA's interview with The Woodlands

*Last.fm shows all the albums I've listened to the most during the last 12 months. I've included here only the ones released in 2009.

Asobi Seksu Live at Olympia Studios

If you were expecting more playful showgaze from Asobi Seksu, you might be disappointed because this is an album of softly sung words, acoustic guitars and toy pianos. If you were expecting new tunes, again you'll be out of luck, because this is all about remastered stripped down versions of their old songs. If you were only expecting some beautiful music though, then you'll probably find that this will do.

Thursday (Live at Olympia Studios)

Suzanne (Live at Olympia Studios)

I also wanted to mention that...
Seabear are set to release their sophomore album, We Built a Fire in March. I know, that's not very soon, is it? The good news is you can already listen to the whole thing here.

And one last thing...
We haven't been posting very much lately. Sorry about that. We have two good excuses, though. One, we're busy with Primavera Club. And two, Steven and I are both working very hard on compiling our best albums of the decade and best songs of 2009 lists, respectively.
Patience, grasshopper.

And we're off! Primavera Club 2009!

art by Jose Manuel Hortelano

  

Yes indeed, Primavera Club 2009 is upon us, kicking off with The Pastels, The Black Heart Procession and HEALTH tonight. It'll also be my very first concert in Barcelona (and Eliza's second), so we're pretty excited.

 

The festival will continue until Sunday night, and we hope to see these bands and more over the next five nights, before collapsing from sheer exhaustion on Sunday night, smelling of fast food, good music and cheap sponsored beer. Whee hee!

  

The Pastels - Nothing to be done

HEALTH - Nice Girls

The Galloping Horse

Burning Hearts - The Galloping Horse

Burning Hearts - Aboa Sleeping

Close the door
Go down the stairs
This is goodbye.

Music sounds better with you: 10 cheesy, sad, obvious, wistful, yearning or seasonal songs about missing someone

   

"It could rain for a thousand days
Or something i don't know
Look to the sun and we're having fun
Beside the river flow
You're doing this and you're doing that
Workin' all the time
Tonight you'll call me on the phone
You've got a worried mind"

Ween - I'll miss you
 

Where are you and I'm so sorry
I cannot sleep, I cannot dream tonight
I need somebody and always
this sick strange darkness
comes creeping on so haunting every time

  

Blink 182 - I miss you

   

I dreamed of a fever
One that would cure me of this cold, winter set heart
With heat to melt these frozen tears
And burned with reasons as to carry on
Into these twisted months I plunge without a light to follow
But I swear that I would follow anything
If it would just get me out of here

  Bright Eyes - If Winter Ends 
 

 Wait
They don't love you like I love you

 Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Maps
 

 

   I've been hanging out so long
I've been waiting on your call
Lord, I miss you

I've been sleeping all alone
I've been hanging by the phone
Want to kiss you

I've been haunted in my sleep
You've been starring in my dreams
Lord, I miss you

  

The Concretes  -  Miss You

 When life is a loop,
you're in a room
without a door.

Pick up the phone
and answer me at last.
Today I will
step out of your past.

  

The Notwist - Pick up the Phone

 
I send my love to you
I send my hands to you
I send my clothes to you
I send my nose to you
I send my trees to you
I send my pleas to you
won't you send some back to me?

  Palace Brothers - I send my love to you

 

I wish they didn't set mirrors behind the bar
cause I can't stand to look at my face
when I don't know where you are
Then the feeling fades away
but you sort of wish it would of stayed
inside... the golden days of missing you

  Silver Jews - Inside the golden days of missing you

 

Darling won't you please come home

 

Math and Physics Club - Darling, please come home
 

 They're singin' 'Deck the Halls'
But it's not like Christmas at all
I remember when you were here
And all the fun we had last year

The Raveonettes - Christmas (Baby please come home)