Unexpected Monday Afternoon Magic

Good times for Adele. Last week (or so) she cleans up at the Grammy's, and now this absolute fucking banger of a remix of Hometown Glory appears courtesy of Chewy Chocolate Cookies. So the track has been mixed up a bunch of times, but this one kills facists and like perennial BW jam Sleepyhead, this proves you can get in and make nights in under 3 minutes.

Adele - Hometown Glory (Chewy Chocolate Cookies remix) [soundcloud download]

Update: zshare link was killed so it's a soundcloud d/l now.

Neon Flames

Neon Gold's unbelievable track record for finding shithot bands continues. This time it's Giantess, whose jams are being produced by Passion Pit's Ayad Al-Adhamy. Which makes total sense when you hear the track. A saccharine -but not cloying- fun explosion. More please.

Giantess - You Were Young

Tracks of the Year (Alex)

Through sheer saturation and ubiquity, it’s hard not to declare 2008 the year of Sex On Fire and just be done with it. But too much good music came out this year that got lost in the fury that was the KoL, MGMT, etc explosion. What follows are my personal faves, to tessellate with the heat Nat dropped below. All are linked to individual zshares.

Bishop Lamont – Grow Up
Dre produces one of the hottest beats of the summer, in classic restrained Dre mode, and Bishop Lamont furthers his claim on being the new saviour of West Coast rap. So fresh.

Passion Pit – Sleepyhead
Hands-down banger of the year. The most exhilarating and life-affirming sub-three-minute experience since bungee jumping.

MGMT vs Notorious B.I.G vs Justice – Nasty Feel (DDPesh rework)
When someone gets a mash-up right, something like this happens and it’s so epic. Brooklyn's DDPesh come through with another rework that's so much greater than the sum of its parts.

Horse Feathers – Albina
It’s so mesmerizingly pretty, and then you listen to the lyrics and go “oh - woah. That is so bleak,” but the song is made all the more beautiful for its honesty and discordance.

Lykke Li – Little Bit (AutoErotique Bootleg Remix)
I posted a whole album worth of Lykke Li mash-ups in my Best Albums list, but this remix is so much fire it can’t be skipped for that reason. It takes a sparse, delicate song and turns it into a total banger, without losing the tenderness of the original track. (thanks to the good folk of creamteam)

Grouper – Heavy Water / I’d Rather Be Sleeping
Their album was super close to making my top five for the year. It would've made a top ten Although it’s only short, this is a song to get lost in.

Arthur Russell – I Couldn’t Say It To Your Face
I’m totally with P4K on this one. What is it with Arthur Russell? A track that should be mundane by any other standards is siphoned through Russell’s vulnerable sincerity and accomplished structuring, and so it talks to somewhere deep inside.

D. Gookin - Glad I Met You

Puts bop in your stride and gets your smile out. Catchiest song of the year?

Air France - Collapsing At Your Doorstep

My favourite song off one of my aforementioned favourite albums of the year.

Bon Iver - Skinny Love

The forceful passion of this song, and the damage in it, makes the idea of spending a period of alcoholism in the wilderness seem compelling. This would have been available from Nat Albums of the Year list, had it not been quietly assassinated by the fire Nazis.

Happy 2k9 all: may it be as fruitful as 2k8 was.

Albums Of The Year (Alex)

To be honest, we here at BW didn't really discuss the logistics of posting individual Best Of lists in a year that saw us agree firmly on the releases of a certain few bands. Which is rarer than you might think. To avoid redundancy, see Nat's post for two albums which will probably make a heap of Best Of lists worldwideweb-wide, with mine no exception:

Passion Pit - Chunk Of Change EP

Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago

There were albums this year that had moments of sheer individual brilliance, from people as diverse as T.I and Bob Dylan, but it only seems fair to include the albums which got the most overall burn. So, as dictated by my iTunes play count, I present you the other 3 best albums of 2008 :

Kanye West - 808s and Heartbreak

Kanye's decision to move beyond his comfortable, highly successful mould as a hip-hop producer is demonstration of a commendable ambition, and largely unsurprising for someone with an ego as healthy as his. Like him or hate him for his bold claims about being 'the voice of a generation', with 808's, Kanye has managed that rare feat that is sporadically achieved in pop music: the ability to craft an album that will influence the sound of pop music for the immediate, and perhaps lasting future.

(On a sidenote, anyone unconvinced by the new material should try to catch a live show, as some of the BW family did last night. Moments of earnest indulgence from Mr West did nothing to stymie a concert that at times reached obscene levels of fun.)

Kanye West feat. Kid Cudi - Welcome To Heartbreak

The Hood Internet - Lykke Li minimix

I thought Lykke Li's album was amazing in and of itself. But it seems to have been the most fertile ground for people wanting to do mash-ups or remixes since Paper Planes. The Hood Internet's signature approach pairs her transcendent vocals with a range of sweetly tessellated beats, from the beautiful ambience of The Field and Gui Boratto to dancefloor bangers with Hercules & Love Affair and Booka Shade. When quite often mash-ups can be merely "oh that's kinda clever," these six little gems leave you more "oh woah that's better."

The Hood Internet vs Lykke Li - minimix (via The Hood Internet)



Air France – No Way Down EP
This was my go-to ‘in transit’ choice. It works equally well as background music to a book on the train, or when I’m skating somewhere, or when I’m just walking. Which is not to say it’s a white noise thing: the songs all just have a way of being present and feeling so appropriate to being in motion. Sort of like when a song sounds right at the beach, and you zen out a little.

Air France – Collapsing At Your Doorstep

We say party - you say die!

As you know we here at BW are a big fan of the beats from the Blue Mountains. Cloud Control and Hermitude are two top acts to come from the region. Must be cause they don't have a mall or something.

Add to that list the psypop stylings of we say bamboulée who have recently come to attention of local Sydney station FBi and now myself. Peep their Klaxon's style lyrics and Passion Pit influenced beats below. Props to them for letting a little Aussie twang steal into the vocals. Refreshing.

we say bamboulée - Unwelcome Copacaban Holiday

Myspace

How To Spend Your Pocket Money

OK so it's heaps late news and whatever, but out of principle and because we're total bandits for their shit-hot gasflare pop, BW wants to make everyone aware of Passion Pit's EP "Chunk of Change" dropping. Nothing going around at the moment is as fun. Play them to anyone, and if they say "I don't really like them" you will know that person is boring and tonnes lame. Out now through Frenchkiss, it's $7 asking price might be the biggest bargain of the year - especially tasty given everyone has no money left and we're all going to lose our jobs.

Passion Pit - Cuddle Fuddle

Myspace

Update:

The video to Sleepyhead just got released over at Pitchfork.tv. Have a look below - no CGI is used, which is pretty incredible.

It's Summer Somewhere

So Sydney is mentally cold right now* which always succeeds in totally bumming me out and making me feel lonely. Always. So in between wishing I was on tour (for what I'm not sure: I'm not a musician), being a total Passion Pit booster and thinking about what it would be like to be married to Amanda Blank (superbabe wife, but would I get weird about her lyrics?), I discovered Noah And The Whale. English bands have an unmatched ability to make wistful pop, and these subjects** are no exception. So before you go "oh more nice-sounding folk-pop whatevs why don't you marry it," listen to the music, and then think about it playing while you're at a picnic on a beautiful summer's day and totally giggling out with your friends. A twee image maybe, but that shit is FUN. And I miss it. And I want winter to pack up and give me my sun back. NATW's album "5 Years Time" comes out August 4th, so it's in time for Spring if you're south of the equator, and timed just right to get all wistful during Fall if you're north of it.

Noah And The Whale - Shape Of My Heart

Myspace | Website

*Not, like, New York cold, but we live at the beach, so it's different.

**Apparently, if you come from the UK, you're a subject rather than a citizen.

The Peach Pit

So there is already a gushing post over at GWFAS, one of BW favourite blogs, about Passion Pit. How ever after living with a number of their tracks over the past week I just had to hype this band a little more.

Hailing from Massachusetts in the US of A, they spit a type of warped psychedelic pop that seems to all the rage in 08. While GWFAS chose to feature the brain-melting Sleepy Head, I have opted for the more expansive I've Got Your Number from their first EP Chunk of Change.

Passion Pit - I've Got Your Number

Myspace | Label