Songs of 2009 part 7: Top 10 Albums of 2009

Argh! Running out of time to get this up before the end of the year... (okay, I didn't really make it. Happy 2010!)

Below are my favourite albums of the year. Most of these I knew I loved upon first listen, and only grew to love even more as I listened and relistened and played each to death over the year, in the car, on my ipod, while studying, doing my chores.

First, some honourable mentions:

About Time (EP) by Straylight Run

More upbeat and yet at the same time angrier and harder than before, Straylight recovered from the disappointment of being dropped from their major label with a great four song EP. I look forward to seeing what they come up with next.

Buy: About Time (for only US$4!)

Lost in Pacific Time (EP) by The Academy Is...

Following on sonically from their underappreciated third album Fast Times in Barrington High, this is a great five track EP, all jangly guitars and a driving rhythm section overlaid with great melodies after a pop sensibility.

Buy: Lost in Pacific Time (AU$6)

Dark Was the Night

A compliation two disc album where the proceeds went towards HIV/AIDS work. The contributors read like a who's who of indie music, an amazing list of artists and songs and collaborations. I highly recommend getting a copy for yourself, it's worth checking out for Sufjan Stevens' reworking of 'You Are the Blood' or for Cat Powers' lovely version of 'Amazing Grace' or for Gillian Welch and Conor Oberst together on 'Lua'.

Buy: Dark Was the Night


And now, to the actual list... *drumroll*

10. There Is No Enemy by Built to Spill

A return to form for veteran band BtS. The album has that fuzzy guitar sound, Doug Martsch's yelp-like voice, and some almost-alt-country melodies as the lyrics contemplate the fears and worries of the everyday and this world.

listen: 'Things Fall Apart', a standout track; slow, and slow-building, almost-dreamlike.



9. New Again by Taking Back Sunday

It's a patchy album, but when TBS are good they're really good. Bookended with the best songs: the 1-2 punch of the album opener 'New Again' and lead single 'Sink Into Me'; and the revengeful, regretful closers 'Capital M-E', 'Carpathia' and 'Everything Must Go'. The latter is particularly bitterly heartbreaking as everything - the lyrics about the end of a dream and Adam Lazzara's angrysadbrokendown voice and all the rage and regret - comes together in one fantastic song.

Listen: 'Everything Must Go'



8 Middle Cyclone by Neko Case

Her voice is so beautiful, and it rings through the alt-country tinged songs of this album, soaking it in an atmosphere of smoke and tenderness and longing.

Download:
People Got A Lot of Nerve (click to download)


7. Hold Time by M. Ward

I love the sound of this album, all lo-fi and folky, matched perfectly with the lazy huskiness of his voice. There's something for everybody, from the upbeat collaborations with Zooey Deschanel like 'Never Had Nobody Like You' to slow, grand songs like the sombre, beautiful title track.

Download:
Never Had Nobody Like You


6. Zounds by Dappled Cities

Dappled have gone with a more electronic, darker sound on this third album, but they haven't lost their touch at building great songs: there's the same great grasp of melodies, blending shimmering synths and layers of guitars and dreamy vocal calls over evershifting drumlines.

Download:
The Price


5. I and Love and You by The Avett Brothers

Late to the party, but oh, I'm so glad Al pushed them time after time at me. A little folk, a little Americana, a little alt-country, but most of all, plenty awesome. From beautifully sweet songs like 'I and Love and You' to the fun, witty 'Kick Drum Heart', the songs are perfect in their simplicity.

Watch/Listen: 'Kick Drum Heart'

The Avett Brothers - Ch 7: "Kick Drum Heart" (Official Music Video) - Watch more top selected videos about: The_Avett_Brothers


4. Brother's Blood by Kevin Devine

Kevin Devine is a singer-songwriter who says his influences are "comic books, 90's guitar rock over and underground, good folk and country music, punk rock, social justice, books in general, books and books and books", which comes across most strongly in his way with words. He writes great songs about things going wrong (with the world, with relationships, himself) with an angry, weary passion and I love the way this album makes me feel; that yeah, even when sometimes we're bruised and hurt we press on the bruises, we go back for more.

I really really recommend the two tracks below; they are fantastic, complex songs, lyrically and musically.

Download:
Brother's Blood
Carnival


3. Hazards Of Love by The Decemberists

Not content with having one concept album under their belt (previous album The Crane Wife, based on a Japanese fable), the Decemberists returned with a full rock-opera, originally planned as a musical. Having seen them perform this in its entirety, I can say unequivocally that it is meant to be enjoyed in this form. And the more I listen to it, the more I am amazed that a band has the guts to make such wonderful anachronistic music and be celebrated for it.

Buy:
The Hazards of Love

When it came down to these two albums, I couldn't justifiably rank one above the other. So I cheated; I have two absolute favourite albums of the year.

1. = Daisy by Brand New

Still moody, but maybe even more angry and frustrated and resigned this time around. I was surprised by the relative simplicity of Daisy compared to the more accessible but complex previous album The Devil and God are Raging Inside Me, but I love it all the same for the directness of emotion that comes across in the harsh, restless music. It's the sound of a breakdown in process, an unravelling; it's raw and painful and mesmerising. I will always remember the first time the hymn slid without warning into the screams on 'Vices', surprising and shocking me into the mood of the album.

Watch: a stripped back version of 'At the Botton' in the studio

Brand New - At the Bottom (Daisy Sessions) from The Old Man and the Seymour on Vimeo.

1. = Mean Everything to Nothing by Manchester Orchestra


I was sucked into this from the moment Andy Hull sings the first line: "I am the only one who thinks I'm going crazy". The first half of the album is packed with layered, intense rock songs, howling and powerful and almost overwhelming, save that it's balanced by a sense of insecurity and worries in the lyrics. The latter half of the album, however, is more contemplative; softer and more vulnerable and emotionally painful. Andy Hull's voice is amazing; it roars over the pounding guitars and drums, and cracks in the softer moments, tender and broken. I listen to this album when I'm feeling down, bruised, and scared; not because it tells me that everything will be okay, but because it gets how I feel.

Download:
I've Got Friends


Songs of 2009 part 6
Songs of 2009 part 5
Songs of 2009 part 4
Songs of 2009 part 3
Songs of 2009 part 2
Songs of 2009 part 1

Movies of the Decade: 2009

Finally: my favourite movies for this year. I know I missed 2008, but that was because the movies I saw were rather middling; though Persepolis was beautiful if a little unevenly paced, and I really enjoyed the bubblegum-coloured Speed Racer, for all its flaws and the critical drubbing it received.

Just quickly, some Honourable Mentions for 2009: Where the Wild Things Are, Bright Star, Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (see review), I Love You, Man

These were good movies, enjoyable movies; and the first two are probably the most beautiful movies I saw this year in terms of set direction and artistry. I think what kept them from being in my top 5 was that I didn't *feel* as strongly about these, or I didn't have as much to mull over when I left the theatre.

So what made the top five?

5. Whip It! (d. Drew Barrymore)

Sure it's flawed: mostly I noticed how staidly it was filmed, even the exciting roller derby scenes. But I could care less when something is this warm and fun to watch; I just wanted to give this movie a big hug at the end. I loved that it put women front and centre and made them all kinds of people but you could like them all, even the supposed 'bad' ones. It's got this infectious, happy energy to it, and it deserved a lot more love than it got.


4. An Education (d. Lone Scherfig)

Such bittersweet but hopeful movie. I didn't so much identify with Jenny than I remembered wanting to be a girl like her; someone school-smart and well-read, who wants to be cultured and sophisticated, who starts to think that academia may not the only way in life. But the movie, based on Lynn Barber's memoir, also shows how Jenny is maybe not as smart as she thinks she is, and that sophistication and culture doesn't always lead to that perfect life she dreams of. It's a gorgeous movie, from the romantic sojourn in Paris to all the 60s costuming, and filled with some fantastic performances: Carey Mulligan, of course, as Jenny who starts off the movie so young and idealistic and finishes with a wise, sadder look in her eyes; but also Rosamund Pike as a beautiful but rather dim friend of Jenny's older boyfriend who lends the film a comic charm.


3. Star Trek (d. J.J. Abrams)

This was just rollicking fun. I heard so many times from friends this year that they loved it, when though they don't love Star Trek/science fiction; and also from people who were ardent ST/SF fans who also loved it to death. I didn't have so strong an opinion, except for wanting to yell "Science doesn't work like that!!" (though according to this, sometimes it can. Bits of it anyway. Bits that are not red matter). But the more I thought about the movie afterwards, the more I realised sometimes it's just enough to enjoy something without overthinking it to death, particularly if it's something upon which popular opinion and actual quality coincide happily for once.


2. The Class (d. Laurent Cantet)

Absorbing, naturalistic, almost documentary-like feature about a year in the class of a junior high school in the 20th in Paris. Based on the real life events documented in Francois Begaudeau's book on his own teaching experiences, the author plays Mr Marin, who teaches French to a class of 14/15 year olds, and tries to push them to be more engaged with learning and thinking in general, by challenging, and on occasions, mocking them, about their behaviours, attitudes and beliefs. In doing so, I couldn't help but be challenged the same way. I remember Amanda, Belinda and I having a rather heated discussion about race afterwards, feeling our ways toward understanding the society around us through the lens of this high school class.

But unlike many Hollywood movies about inspiring teachers, it's not some cut and dried heartwarming tale that ends in the salvation of a previously recalcitrant class. True to life, there are some children who blossom under this intense environment, and others who fall by the education wayside, the consequence of not one but many conflicting factors of class and race and societal pressures and personality.


1. Inglourious Basterds (d. Quentin Tarantino)

From the moment the last line was spoken I knew I agreed: this is Tarantino's masterpiece.

There's a lot of debate about IB out there on the internets, and even personally I had three email threads about it going on post-movie, in my eagerness to rehash and argue why I responded so positively to it. For starters, it's very funny, super thought provoking, and ridiculously film geeky in the very best of ways. There's just so much to mull about, from a moral angle, from a film history angle, from a history angle...it's amazing.

Each of the five parts is perfectly constructed, with the tension ratcheting slowly and terrifyingly and absorbingly until it's almost unberable, begging for a release, begging for the violence to give us relief, and then sicken ourselves all over again. I talked with some people who felt that IB goes too far in its ending, that it satisfies, and could be read as encouraging, an unacceptable bloodlust. I think IB is the ultimate revenge fantasy for a world that takes the holocaust to be the biggest moral infraction of the last century, but I also think that in the way Taratino does it, the film then questions us in return: now that we have an idea what that revenge would look like, do we still want it or feel the same way about it?

It still catches me in moments, after a few months; images still very clear in my head (like Shoshanna putting on her warpaint, reflected in the glass and in the poster and all around so beautifully) and thoughts still buzzing about its knotty ethical implications.

**

Well, I hope you've enjoyed this rambling little series on the movies that have made the most impact on me these last ten years! Here's to more fascinating, thought-provoking, beautiful, memorable films in the coming year...

Movies of the Decade: 2007
Movies of the Decade: 2006
Movies of the Decade: 2004-2005
Movies of the Decade: 2003
Movies of the Decade: 2002
Movies of the Decade: 2000-2001

Songs of 2009 part 6

Are you starting to see a pattern in my song choices yet? I feel like I've used the words 'driving beat' and 'fuzzy guitars' and 'makes me want to dance' about fifty gazillion times by now. At least now I know I have consistent taste! :)

## Panic Switch by Silversun Pickups
from Swoon

Fuzzy guitars like sirens in the background, that gravelly growly voice that goes so well with it. The album is good, not great; maybe I was expecting a few more stand-out tracks like this one.

Watch:



## Hell by Tegan and Sara
from Sainthood

I am so torn by their new album. The first time I listened to it I really didn't like it. I didn't enjoy the new direction they'd taken, all jagged edges; I missed the sweetness of their folkier, heartfelt songs. But I've given the album a few more spins and I think I'm getting it more now: they are no less heartfelt under the layers of guitars and driving beats. This song is fantastic: it's catchy, but the grittiness of the lyrical content is conveyed in, and suits, the rockier sound.

Watch: live performance vid, which means cute Canadian accents and banter and rambly stories about weird hair diseases guinea pigs get :D



## Sweet Disposition by The Temper Trap
from Conditions

I tried to resist, but they started playing this endlessly on the radio and it became a highlight of my work day, when they'd play this instead of the bland, mainstream junk. It's so pretty and lovely and joyful, as the insistent beat drives the whole thing on while that lovely falsetto vocal floats over the top.

Watch:



## You and I by Wilco
from Wilco (the album)

A duet, featuring Feist. Jeff Tweedy's voice works so so well with her voice; they meld in this lovely harmony, the textures complemeting each other. The song is lovely too, a slice of alt-country pop with a melody that just begs to be sung-along to.

Watch: in performance



Zero by Yeah Yeah Yeahs
from It’s Blitz!

From the synth-heavy opener to when Karen O's sublime voice slinks over it, this song always always makes me want to dance. And be as badass as Karen O in the video, ever dancing and performing so freely for an unseen audience. :)

Watch: Cutest moment: the whole band smushed onto one trolley!



Songs of 2009 part 5
Songs of 2009 part 4
Songs of 2009 part 3
Songs of 2009 part 2
Songs of 2009 part 1

Movies of the Decade: 2007

Last post before my top movies of this year! :)

Hot Fuzz (2007; d. Edgar Wright)

I was going to try and fit in a repeat viewing of this before writing it up, but alas it was not to be. This movie is hilarious; I saw it twice within the space of a week around Christmas two years ago, and it was as ridiculous and fresh and fantastic the second time around. I love that it's smart about the genres its parodies, but in a loving way.


Juno (2007; d. Jason Reitman)

In the years since it came out, this has been much maligned. Even when we went to see it, as the lights came back on I turned to the friends who saw it with me and said I liked it, only to have the other two make faces. But I've seen it again since then, and I still find it really lovely and charming. If you look past the rather obvious affectations ('honest to blog' is still a really irritating, nonsensical quip), it navigates an ethically tricky story with heart, not judging Juno for becoming pregnant, not judging her nor explaining in depth the choices she makes, just allowing her to be a confused but smart sixteen year old with some big decisions to make. Ellen Page is so good as Juno, letting her be prickly on the outside while always giving us glimpses of the softer girl inside. The rest of the supporting cast are great, particularly J.K. Simmons as Juno's dad, and Jennifer Garner as the uptight but desperately maternal Vanessa.


No Country for Old Men (2007; Joel and Ethan Coen)

Bleak and affecting, an old story told very well, and filmed beautifully. Llewellyn Moss (Josh Brolin) takes $2million out of a drug deal gone wrong, and a scarily focussed killer (Javier Bardem) tracks him down for a form of justice. There are some immensely suspenseful moments in this, the pacing just-so for them maximum heart-in-mouth moments, and the killings, even as they decrease in violence, increase in meaning and heartache. Excellent supporting cast - Tommy Lee Jones plays his straightforward sheriff with just the right amount of bewilderment and wisdom as he contemplates a world more violent than he can patrol, and Kelly Macdonald really surprises as Moss' southern wife.


The Simpsons movie (2007; d. David Silverman)

I must admit that my first feeling upon leaving the theatre was relief; relief that the movie hadn't sucked. So my expectations were not high, going in. That said, this is really funny. Sure, the story doesn't always hold together, but then, do we really expect it too? And it manages to feel more than several episodes strung together. The jokes are a great mix of visual and verbal, with the kind of wittiness and sense of fun that the earlier series had.


Zodiac (2007; d. David Fincher)

A very tense movie that somehow sustains the subtle horror of the unsolved serial killer mystery throughout the whole movie, allowing the story to conveying the weary reality of chasing the unknown criminal to no, typical, satisfyingly pat end. Good performances all round, though Robert Downey Jnr. is the best thing in this movie (as he often is).

Movies of the Decade: 2006
Movies of the Decade: 2004-2005
Movies of the Decade: 2003
Movies of the Decade: 2002
Movies of the Decade: 2000-2001

Songs of 2009 part 5

Had this open in the window all day, and forgot about it until now! It's all been a bit hectic...

eta: one late addition at top


## Moth's Wings by Passion Pit
from Manners

I was lucky to receive this CD for Christmas. This song is so pretty, all glintering noises as a backdrop and driving beat and airy voices.

Download:
Moth's Wings


## The Good News by Philadelphia Grand Jury
from Hope is For Hopers

Aussie pop-rock, immensely catchy with great fuzzy guitars and a rhythmic keyboard line that should drive me mad but really just makes me want to dance.

(If you missed it, here's the write-up of their show at the Factory a week ago.)

Download:
The Good News


## 1901 by Phoenix
from Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix

Shimmery electro-pop. I love the first half of the album more than the latter, but in the right mood it's a lot of fun, and again, totally makes me want to dance.

Download:
1901


## These Are My Twisted Words by Radiohead
online single

A new Radiohead song is always welcome. A free one even more so! This is a moody (hah - when is it not?) track that's a touch of Amnesiac (wait! come back!) and In Rainbows era sound.

Download:
These Are My Twisted Words


## Bodies by Robbie Williams
from Reality Killed the Radio Star

Ignore the faux-irreligious nonsensical lyrics; focus on the music. The genius of Robbie Williams' latest album sees a return of some ridiculous catchy pop songs like this, that marries a jagged electronic sound with a lush string section and manages to sound so grand and pretty.

Watch: This video is crap. But it has brooding Robbie, on a motorcycle.



Songs of 2009 part 4
Songs of 2009 part 3
Songs of 2009 part 2
Songs of 2009 part 1

Movies of the Decade: 2006

Happy Boxing Day aka yearly avoid-the-heat, watch-a-blockbuster movie day. :)

I went to see Sherlock Holmes, which I enjoyed in a brain-dead, in love with RDJ and Jude Law and Rachel McAdams kind of way.

And so we continue into movies I have also enjoyed, from 2006:

Little Miss Sunshine (2006; d. Jonathan Dayton, Valerie Faris)

I know it's manipulative, but aren't all movies? It's a funny, bittersweet and very human tale, with some great characters, and it mostly manages to steer clear of mawkishness. Steve Carell is particularly good as the depressed, second most pre-eminent scholar of Proust. I watched the beauty pageant scene again recently, for a class on the sexualisation of pre-teens, and was struck again by how funny and uncomfortable little Olive's routine is, and how well that whole scene is constructed to make the audience laugh and squirm.


Look Both Ways (2006; d. Sarah Watts)

A lovely Australian movie about the difficult reconciliation of coping with death and loss while being alive. Over a summer weekend, a motley group of loosely related people - particularly Meryl, whose father has just died; and Nick, who's just learned he has cancer - deal with the emotions of losing lovers and parents, their own fear of death and loss, finding new people to care for, and so on. It sounds like a heavy mix, but it's actually quite a hopeful film, grounded in reality and well-rounded characters, that asks for some thought in processing the various relationships that are formed, held and broken. Also, the mood is broken up with some really beautiful animation work by the director, who illustrates Meryl's wild imaginative scenarios of death and shows Nick's own mirroring thoughts in photo collages.


Pan’s Labyrinth (2006; d. Guillermo del Toro)

I don't normally cry at the movies, but I was sobbing by the end of this movie. It's so wonderfully made and terrifyingly beautiful; the storytelling is excellent, and from the tears, you can guess that it had a great emotional impact on me. I came home and I could not stop talking about it with my family. But it's certainly not a movie for the fainthearted.


Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story (2006; d. Michael Winterbottom)

I declared this movie the best of the year immediately after I watched it, and while the other three in this post are strong contenders I don't know if any of them match this in sheer ludicrous, free-wheeling enjoyment. It's meant to be a film adaptation of a rambling 18th century English novel that has been dubbed "unfilmable" but it is also a film about the film of an adaptation of a rambling 18th century novel and it is actually a film about the film of a... Whatever it actually ends up being, it is very very funny and clever and knows just how to send up its pretentious roots. At one point, Steve Coogan, playing an actor named Steve Coogan, pompously announces, though he hasn't read the novel the film is based on, "This is a postmodern novel before there was any modernism to be post about."

And he's kind of right. You don't have to have read the novel either, and that's one of the running jokes of the film, that no one on set has actually read the 600+ pages of novel. While the set up is completely confusing, it makes complete sense on camera, and unfolds wonderfully on-screen as actors, directors, and actors playing directors, and actors playing themselves break the fourth wall to talk to the camera, while moving between scenes and sets and "real life", all with a funny, hyper-realistic script that flows naturally between all the different modes. This is a film for people who love film; there's plenty of inside jokes, I'm told there are even inside jokes inside inside jokes for those who are really obsessive about movies.

The cast is amazing. A veritable list of great British actors cross the screen doing good work no matter how big or small their part. In particular, Steve Coogan is great - he's such an vain, insecure man as 'the actor', but he also shows a softer side playing a new father, and it makes him endearingly human and thus likeable - plus he also has to play Tristram the narrator and Walter Shandy his father. But apart from the clever ideas, the great acting and the tamed chaos, there's also a lovely sense of the visual joke. See the picture I've posted? That's one of my favourite scenes of the movie.

As Steve Coogan is lowered head first, complete with his 18th century costume, into a big pink uterus model, he has an argument with the production assistant about how he is positioned.

"[Mark, the director] wants it to be as realistic as possible."

"He wants realism. Yeah. I'm a grown man, talking to the camera, in a womb."

Original post-movie reaction and review.


Movies of the Decade: 2004-2005
Movies of the Decade: 2003
Movies of the Decade: 2002
Movies of the Decade: 2000-2001

Songs of 2009 part 4

## Merrimack River by Mandy Moore
from Amanda Leigh

Bet you didn't know that a) I'm a closet Mandy Moore fan, and b) she released an album this year. A world away from the teen pop princess she once aspired to be (but could never quite be, ala Britney and Christina), Moore has, after a bumpy few transition albums, matured nicely into a singer-songwriter of some very pretty folk influenced adult contemporary music. I really like this opening track, stripped back, gentle and waltz-like.

Watch: live @ Walmart Soundcheck



## Help I’m Alive by Metric
from Fantasies

Emily Haines' pretty voice floating over fuzzy guitars and a relentless drum beat "like a hammer". I'm in.

Watch:


Download:
Help I'm Alive (acoustic)


## Satellite Skin by Modest Mouse
from No One’s First and You’re Next EP

This one is rollicking and full of attitude, Isaac Brock's growly voice, jangly guitars and an unexpected lightness. I must admit that apart from this song the EP didn't really grab me, but MM haven't lost the ability to rock out from time to time.

Watch:



## I Belong To You/Mon Coeur S'ouvre A Toi by Muse
from The Resistance

I just did not get this album at first. Muse have always been OTT and grandoise in their music and ideas, and I love them for it, but The Resistance was just too much on first listen. But then Al linked me to this review at Strange Horizons by Adam Roberts and I was so taken by how he lovingly describes and embraces it all that I gave it another go, this time with the SF framework as a guide. And it made all the difference. The album is still a little cold and synth-heavy for general listening, but when I'm in the mood for some storytelling it's evocative and interesting.

This song is immense and lush and darkly romantic, with its thumping beat and crashing piano chords and Matt Bellamy's voice poured over like syrup; and THEN they add a power-ballad bridge in French and throw in a jazzy woodwind interlude for good measure.

Listen: the karaoke version, complete with lyrics and random art. :)



Songs of 2009 part 3
Songs of 2009 part 2
Songs of 2009 part 1