2011 Albums

Janet's 25 Favorite LP Albums released in 2011

In very rough increasing favoriteness

With self-defeatingly defensive commentary

25. David Lynch - Crazy Clown Time
I don't care to defend myself.
best tracks: Pinky's Dream, Strange and Unproductive Thinking, Stone's Gone Up, Crazy Clown Time

24. Summer Camp - Welcome to Condale
Okay, like a lot of other stuff this year, it's variously retro. English people doing American new wave pop. Not exactly heavy listening, but easy on the ears with the occasional subversive complexity.
Best tracks: Brian Krakow, Summer Camp, Nobody Knows You, Down, Ghost Train, 1988

23. Wild Flag
This is a great choice. It is. It's only this low because okay, I couldn't always listen to all of it. But it's a supergroup made of the best musicians in 90s feminist indie rock!
Romance, Boom, Short Version, Racehorse

22. Ladytron - Gravity the Seducer
Usually Ladytron would be up near the top of the list, but this is their only weak album. It was about time they made one - it is a grower, as it turns out, much more atmospheric and mature. It's quite pleasant, because the weakness is only in comparison to other Ladytron, and that's just not fair.
Mirage, Moon Palace, Altitude Blues, Ambulances, Melting Ice

21. Deerhoof - Deerhoof vs. Evil
Along with and despite of a concept somehow revolving around nuclear world war is some of the genre-eluding band's catchiest nonsense.
The Merry Barracks, Super Duper Rescue Heads!, Secret Mobilization, I Did Crimes For You

20. Starfucker - Reptilians
This just some great dance music. Plus there are Alan Watts samples.
Best tracks: all of them, whatever

19. John Maus - We Must Become The Pitiless Censors of Ourselves
That there were ads for this guy on Spotify did the opposite thing ads are supposed to do and made me put off listening to him. The guy is a philosophy professor at some college in Hawaii, and what he does is Ariel Pink like.
Quantum Leap, Head for the Country, Matter of Fact, Believer

18. Lykke Li - Wounded Rhymes
It occurs to me that nobody's paying me to recommend anything.
Youth Knows Know Pain, I Follow Rivers, Get Some, Sadness is a Blessing, Jerome

17. Fucked Up - David Comes to Life
Hardcore punk anarchist romance story cycle
Queen of Hearts, The Other Shoe, like most of the songs are worth listening to in order, it's pretty impressive

16. St. Vincent - Strange Mercy
To be honest, I kept feeling like I should like this album more.
Cruel, Surgeon, Northern Lights, Dilettante

15. Neon Indian - Era Extraña
I don't know how to describe what the kids are doing these days except that I think it sounds like they were conceived to it.
Polish Girl, Blindside Kiss, Hex Girlfriend, Suns Irrupt, Arcade Blues

14. Cults
Well-hyped faux indie that is quite good actually
Abducted, Go Outside, Never Heal Myself, Oh My God

13. Dum Dum Girls - Only In Dreams
I like the EP they released this year better, but Dee Dee & co's second album brings the best things about rock n roll from the last 40 years into its girl-group reinvention.
In My Head, Heartbeat, Wasted Away

12. Dengue Fever - Cannibal Courtship
Stand back, everyone. Let the 60s Cambodian pop inspired professionals handle all your amazing music needs.
Cannibal Courtship, Cement Slipper, Family Business, Thank You Goodbye

11. Thee Oh Sees - Carrion Crawler / The Dream
This thing just goes by in a blur whenever I listen to it. A mindblowing blur of psych punk that keeps me churning along in my meatpuppet as long as it lasts.
Fucking everything, okay

10. Ponytail - Do Whatever You Want All The Time
The LAST ALBUM. Probably. Which is too bad because Ponytail could probably be prescribed as an anti-depressant. At least it takes a while to build up a tolerance.
Easy Peasy, AwayWay, Music Tunes
9. Hooray for Earth - True Loves
I don't know anything about this band really. Nevertheless, I stand behind this album's high placement.
Sails, True Loves, No Love

8. Cold Cave - Cherish the Light Years
Goth your face off
Confetti, Underworld USA, Alchemy and You

7. Austra - Feel It Break
I'm actually just really emotionally attached to this album by Canada's answer to The Knife. It may or may not have staying power.
Lose It, Beat and the Pulse, Hate Crime, The Noise

6. Man Man - Life Fantastic
As my date to their amazing live show dubbed them, Man Man Man Man Man. Man, Man Man, Man. Man!
Piranhas Club, Haute Tropique, Shameless, Bangkok Necktie

5. PJ Harvey - Let England Shake
In which Polly Jean becomes a belated World War I poet.
Let England Shake, The Glorious Land, The Words That Maketh Murder, Bitter Branches

4. MEN - Talk About Body
It is weird that this shot so high on this list, but I feel like JD Samson fronting an art pop band that may or may not be a queer deconstruction of DEVO was necessary.
Life's Half Price, Credit Card Babie$, Boom Boom Boom, Rip Off

3. YACHT - Shangri-La
Sci fi dance music. YACHT do what they want. I like her voice.
Dystopia, Love in the Dark, Holy Roller, Paradise Engineering.
Shangri-La the song makes me cry.

2. Tune-Yards - W H O K I L L
Merrill Garber has that voice AND mad percussion skills AND does live loops AND righteous lyrics AND made that energy fit on her second long record. Okay? Can we at least agree on this?
My Country, Gangsta, Bizness

1. Pictureplane - Thee Physical
This year belongs to horny 20 year old kids with synthy gadgets, careful extraction from pop and trance, elaborate retro-futuristic ideologies (like "cyberculture" is still a relevent term here), and an impossible nostalgia for the early 90s. I'm sorry. It probably just hit me at the right moment and won't appeal to you. Thanks for listening, anyway.
Post Physical, Trancegender, Breath Work

2010 albums

Hey!  You don't care what I like because I have no taste! I've limited the numbered list to 20 this year, but some other good ones were: Vampire Weekend - Cousins, Ratatat - LP4 , Bear Hands - Burning Bush Supper Club , LCD Soundsystem - This Is Happening
Anyway.  If you click on the links I think I might get some money no matter what you buy, so get to Amazon through me, thanks!

 
20. Woodhands - Remorsecapade

 
19. Holy Fuck - Latin


18. Wavves - King of the Beach


17. Dum Dum Girls - I Will Be


16. Girl Talk - All Day.

 
15. Robyn - Body Talk . Favorites: Fembot, Time Machine, Cry When You Get Older, Love Kills


14. Sufjan Stevens - The Age of Adz. Favorites: Age of Adz, Too Much, Vesuvius, I Want To Be Well, Impossible Soul


13. Jenny and Johnny - I'm Having Fun Now. Jenny Lewis, Jonathan Rice. Favorites: My Pet Snakes, Big Wave, Animal, Committed


12. Wolf Parade - Expo 86. Favorites: What Did My Lover Say? (It always had to go this way.) , Yulia, ghost pressure, cave-o-sapien


11. Best Coast - Crazy for You . Sounds like missing L.A. from New York. Favorites: Boyfriend (quinceañera video), Crazy For You, When I'm With You, Bratty B


10. New Young Pony Club - The Optimist. Favorites: Lost a Girl, Dolls, Chaos, The Optimist. Mostly-female dry-voiced dance rock.


9. Janelle Monáe - The Archandroid (Metropolis Suites II-III)
If I were more into every song, instead of just Cold War (EMOBOT), Tightrope, Faster, and Come Alive, her persona and the urban SF messiah story which is not nearly central enough to the album, this would be top 5.


8. The Knife, Planningtorock, and Mt. Sims - Tomorrow, In A Year . This is nothing like a The Knife album, even the parts that mix techno in with postmodern opera and sound-evolution minimalism. Favorites: Minerals, Seeds, Colouring of Pigeons


7. Sleigh Bells - Treats . You either love or can't stand these Cool Kids, cheerleader-like vocals by 5th grade teacher Alexis Krauss and punk fuzzed guitar by Derek Miller.  I played it at work once and a toddler sang along. Favorites: Kids, Infinity Guitars, Rill Rill, Crown on the Ground, A/B Machines, Riot Rhythm


6. Marnie Stern - Marnie Stern . Supposedly she went through a dry spell of writing and the suicide of the ex that got her into "good music" provoked more abject songwriting. Though it's not the breakthrough I was expecting to come next, it's a grower. Favorites: For Ash, Risky Biz, Female Guitar Players are the New Black, Gimme, Building a Body

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5. David Byrne, Fatboy Slim, a kajillion collaborators - Here Lies Love.  It's a disco biopic of Imelda Marcos told through the class tensions between her, her nanny, and other mostly female voices. Byrne's explanations of it suggest it's examining how the personal is political. Favorites: Every Drop of Rain, Don't You Agree, Please Don't, Order 1081, Why Don't You Love Me


4. Yeasayer - Odd Blood The video for ONE resembles a Samuel Delany story. Madder Red. Ambling Alp, Mondegreen, Rome.


3. Arcade Fire - The Suburbs . The Suburbs, We Used To Wait, Half Light II, Sprawl II (Mountains beyond Mountains). FULL OF WIN.


2. Crystal Castles II . I love them more than you'd expect of someone who's never done coke. Favorites: Doe Deer, Baptism, Empathy, Pap Smear (platform dance!)


1. Joanna Newsom - Have One On Me. It's big and long and it hurts so good. Favorite tracks: Have One On Me, Good Intentions Paving Company, Go Long, Soft as Chalk, Kingfisher