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Old 2012.12.09, 06:04 PM   #21
deadgrandma
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2. The Shins- Port of Morrow- released March 20


The Shins’ fourth album came with a mixed reception upon first release. Critically, it was a success, but many fans thought that it was a departure in sound and quality from the “old” Shins sound. James Mercer is the only original “Shin” in the group now, but he was also the brains/founder of the The Shins anyway. I certainly don’t think this album is too far off of the original sound, and I love the new elements that are brought into play here.

As soon as you press “play” on the album, you’re greeted with one of the catchiest songs of the year “The Rifle’s Spiral”, with its bouncing bass line surrounded by swirling, gorgeous guitars and keys. James sounds as good as ever, albeit a bit more restrained. Lyrically, its one of the most memorable albums I’ve heard all year, Mercer once again playing with words like only Mercer can. The second track and leading single “Simple Song” is just gorgeous, simple, sweet and delivered perfectly. See the subtle touches of piano and the delicious chorus. The video clip that supports it is still burned in my memory, and really sets the stage for the recurring themes of family, maturing and redemption that Mercer seems to know like the back of his hand.

Further tracks in the album are just as powerful. The ballad “It’s Only Life” is really quite beautiful. Some may say the lyrics are cliché, but I feel that’s only because we as people are so familiar with what is being sung, and the delivery of the chorus is classic Shins. My personal favorite song on the album “No Way Down” channels into power pop territory (the U2 vibe is very evident) but still manages to sound like “The Shins”. And it wouldn’t be a Shins record without the gorgeous acoustic ballad song “September”. Finally it ends with “Port of Morrow”, the most unique and different sounding song on the album, with amazing instrumentation and smart lyrics, it’s a satisfying end to a satisfying album.

Few albums this year have excited and moved me like this album. It is still on heavy rotation in my playlist even though it was such an early entry in the year. I think it has some of the strongest songs ever released under the Shins name, amazing production and a sense of comfort (or perhaps maturity) that wasn’t present in previous releases. Being a fan for a long time now (I was into them just before the second album came around) I am delighted with it and I feel good giving it the silver medal this year. Just listen to it.

No Way Down
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Old 2012.12.09, 06:26 PM   #22
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The Shins sound like my kind of band. I'm going to go check them out, DG.
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Old 2012.12.10, 03:17 PM   #23
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1. Sa Ding Ding- The Coming Ones- released June 3



Anyone who was around for this one landing will probably remember how much I went on about it at the time. I still stand by everything I said about this album, and feel that I like it even more since then. To my ears, this is definitely the best piece of music this year and still as amazing as ever.

Its an album that is immediately accessible, yet also needs repeated listening to reveal its intensity. I think the album I hear now is indeed a different album to what I heard the first time I heard it. Like the other Sa Dingding records, its an album of electronic intricacy mixed with traditional Chinese, Tibetan and Mongolian majesty. What’s different about this one however is how her vision is well and truly put into fruition for the very first time. It is in equal parts uplifting and heartbreaking, a truly deep, exhausting and ultimately rewarding album. I consider it a must own.

The structure of the album fascinates me, it is book-ended by two extremely powerful songs “Lai Zhe Mo Jie” and “Tian Lai Zhi Ai” which are emotionally grabbing in two distinct ways. The first leaves you absolutely shattered and exhausted and the last lifts you up and makes you feel uplifted. In between these two songs is where the magic really reveals itself on multiple listening. Listen how Sa Dingding’s voice just glides perfectly with the bouncy bassline on “Ru Ying Sui Xing” or get lost within the beauty of “Chen Ai Zai Ge Chang”, be flattened by the grace of the strings on “Qiu Xiang Yue”. The most crushing song on the album comes from its simplicity, the duet “Zhen Zhi Yan” featuring the most powerful vocals ever delivered by Sa Dingding in her entire career supported mainly by Chinese drums. First time I heard it I was thinking “The Dull Flame of Desire (Bjork Song)- eat your heart out.”

And the voice. Oh my the voice. Sa Dingding delivers easily the best vocal performance on any album I’ve heard all year. I feel like she is truly passionate about what she does, this is her swan song and the months of working on it (according to the making of) really shine through. A solid, soulful release that is damn near perfect. Sure, it’s overblown, pretentious and occasionally verges on new age, but it’s still honest and that’s what really matters.

For these reasons, and the fact that I plain just played the hell out of it ALL YEAR is why I’ve chosen it as Album of the Year. Hell, the best album of the past few years if you ask me. If you haven’t heard it, do yourself a favor and hunt it down. Just make sure you give it more than one spin for best results. Thankyou, Sa Dingding!

Best songs: all of it.

Lai Zhe Mo Jie

Ru Ying Sui Xing

Zhen Zhi Yan

Tian Lai Zhi Ai


So that's it, my top 10 of 2012 list. Hope you enjoyed reading it and I also hope it inspired you to check some of my recommendations out. Or at least inspired you to post your own top 10, I wanna see what everyone else dug this year!!!

So to recap my list:
10. Jane Zhang- Listen to Jane Z Live
9. Ichigo Ichie- Doku Ichigo
8. Deerhoof- Breakup Song
7. Oneida- A List of the Burning Mountains
6. Project UNDARK- Radium Girls 2011
5. Mariko Goto- 299792458
4. Meshuggah Koloss
3. Converge- All We Love We Leave Behind
2. The Shins- Port of Morrow
1. Sa Dingding- The Coming Ones


Yes I realize what a pretty weird list this has turned out to be :-p
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Old 2012.12.10, 03:41 PM   #24
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I thought Dingding would've been your no. 1 , it would've been my no.1 too but I hadn't heard enough new albums this year to make a list. I still slightly prefer Harmony over it though

EDIT: I only have to disagree on what you said about "Lai Zhe Mo Jie", are we listening to the same song? I don't feel shattered or exhausted at all after listening to it (maybe the lyrics are shattering, but I can't understand a word from the whole album), It makes me feel very uplifting and energetic, even more so than the last song. I still love it to death and it's her best song imo. it should become the next anthem of China after they'll (hopefully) get rid of the communist party

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Old 2012.12.11, 07:53 AM   #25
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Deadgrandma, good to see you talking about this album, since I have yet to see it appear on any publication/blog/website EOY lists. You are one of the few people talking about on the internet (at least in English). Of course, I found out about it through you. I have to agree with matan-san: I find the first track uplifting not at all shattering.
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Old 2012.12.11, 01:01 PM   #26
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I guess I shoulda used "blown away" or
"emotionally flattened. I guess shattered could mean a negative emotion, but its not what I meant.
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Old 2012.12.11, 01:38 PM   #27
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I'm not a huge fan of Tian Lai Zhi Ai, it sometimes borders on kitsch
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Old 2012.12.11, 04:19 PM   #28
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IMO, Sa Ding Ding's entire album borders on kitsch. It's all good though.

I think it's very New Age. Enya would be proud.
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Old 2012.12.12, 06:22 AM   #29
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I really feel like this is the time of year I spend the previous 11 months working for. I enjoy listening to music as a fan, but I writing and talking about the music opens up the doors to a higher appreciation. I would probably do all this writing even if I didn't have you all to read it (or at least scroll past it), however it is much more enjoyable to share with all of you. Before I get on with the show I want to thank you for perusing this scratch for putting up with me for another year.

This year I wrote a suite of articles, an expansion on things I had already done years previous, that I will post through (and hopefully finish by) the end of the week.

Part 1 - re:2011: Catching up with 2011 works I missed by being a total newb, what albums stood the test of time, and what foreshadowed 2012.
Part 2 -Honorable Mentions: Artists that deserve your attention
Part 3 - Top 50 Albums of 2012: Oh mama Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5
Part 4 - 2012 playlist: Great songs from the year that was
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Old 2012.12.12, 06:30 AM   #30
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re:2011
Following up with 2011

November 2010, I anticipated the coming end of year lists. Not only did I want to learn what records people thought were the best -- but increasingly, I just wanted to be exposed to new music. End of year lists can be great Zagats guides. While it’s easier than ever to find new music in the internet age, it is somehow more daunting. With quick access to everything from pop mega stars of India to bedroom-recordings of someone just blocks away from you, you are even less sure of what to listen to. End of year lists can be a shortcut in that decision, and that was increasingly how I used them.
As a list lover and a fancied fan of music, this was a situation I was not content with. I did not want to wait until December to be reminded that Deerhunter put out a new record. I wanted to construct my own end of year list and not on delay as I caught up.

2011 was the first time since the turn of the millennium I took action in keeping up with music. It was definitely a learning period. I had to learn not just where to look, but make time to listen and keep at it. That was the hard part. It's real easy to skim, not recognize any names or familiar sounds, and pass. I wouldn't say I exhibited remarkable effort in trying new things, but enough effort was there that I had formed opinions on enough records to finally assemble my own end of year list.

I wish I was a little more insightful with my accompanying comments (it was very much a list and little else), but I am still pretty happy with my list last year. My top 3 and top 5 are all stellar records and there's no record I regret placing. There are some records that I grew to like more than their placement may indicate. In January, February, I went through a big Bon Iver kick. Also Panda Bear's Tomboy grew on me a little more. My fiance discovered Andrew Jackson Jihad's Knife Man, of which we've since shared a few listen-alongs of “American Tune.”

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Laura Stevenson. Not pictured: Cans

This is not to say there are no records that I wish I regret omitting from my 2011 list. Around March I fell in love with Sit Resist, an album by Laura Stevenson and the Cans. This is the kind of album I would otherwise classify as "Lifetime music," meaning that its music that sounds like it belongs in a commercial for some uplifting made-for-TV movie on the Lifetime channel (which is a channel full of women's programming, for those outside the US.) This is to say it's happy, bouncy, cute acoustic indie pop. But what draws me in to this record, aside from very catchy hooks and harmonies are the uncommon influences Laura Stevenson juxtaposes. The Neutral Milk Hotel influences are very clear with the use of horns and also the often dark, sickly subject matter. The cute sound, dark subject motif is a trick I can't help but continuously fall for. Her sickening description on "The Wait" of the "alkaline taste" in her mouth spreading, saying she knows "it's going to kill me" and then that line morphs into a pop-trope hook of "It's killing me." Also the "Two Headed Boy part 1" nod of "The Healthy One" which describes a girl whose siblings all have some sort of illness, who needs to reassured she's healthy and cope with that she will one day have to bury her family -- set of course to one of the jangliest tunes on the record. So in love with this album, I was heart-broken when I learned this was actually a 2011 release. I then plotted to lump it in with the 2012 releases anyway, assuming it was a late release. But no, it was released back in the previous May. My dream of ranking Sit Resist dimmed. But it’s still an album I really love and had to wiggle in a review of somehow.

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La Dispute in happier times

I would have loved Laura Stevenson at any point in time in my life. But one album I would have missed out on without "upping my game" is La Dipute's Wildlife. In a past life, the screamed vocals, almost spoken word melodies, and general screamo sensibilities would have immediately put me off. I still had to work to get up to speed but like most things in music, and life, the things that are most foreign to you are where the treasures lie. Jordan Dreyer is a captivating frontman. He delivers his lyrics with the midpoint between a gasp, a bellow, and a sob that just makes me want to put my arm around the guy until he can collect himself. The storytelling swallows me every single time I put this record on; I have to stop whatever I'm doing, revited. "King Park" is the crown jewel on the record. When the song reaches its arresting climax, if my eyes don't well up, the hairs on my neck certainly stand on end. If you haven't been moved by music in a while, put this record on. Put any pretensions aside and enjoy one of 2011's greatest moments.

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Daniel Lopatin, aka Oneohtrix Point Never. Grooming also minimal.

One album I did get to mention (honorably) after my list that deserves a little more coverage of Oneohtrix Point Never's Replica. I bring it up because no other album colored how I listened to music, how I approached it, in 2012 like Replica. I first listened to the album while I was up one night with indigestion. Maybe it was my state of delirium but it blew my mind. The repetition of the samples and the minimalist synth being played ever so differently each time ensnares me. The atmosphere, the scenery painted by the sounds -- clicked. Suddenly the world of ambient music was opened to me, and I would go on quite a binge in the early months of 2012. The night I listened through Replica (thrice) I immediately wanted to make room for it in my top 30, but my list was already assembled and I didn't have time to make a full judgment, so I decided otherwise. I don't want to play the re-ranking game, but Replica is personally a very important album.

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Trend setters if I ever saw them - Be Forest

While Replica had the biggest influence on my year of music, no album set the stage for 2012 like Be Forest's Cold. Cold was the smallest, and most obscure, record that I put on my list last year, but it was unintentionally the most forward thinking. 2012 was big on dark, thick atmospheres, occasionally heavy instrumentation, and eerie and subversive emotions. I think Be Forest delivered all these sounds last year, just in a shoegaze package. This dark music that I will soon talk about as well as the neo-RnB movement started by last year's House of Balloons usurped the prevailing trends in the independent music scene, and I expect that to continue in 2013. (But I am historically, laughably wrong with these kind of projections.) Which is fine by me.

I think it’s important to keep in mind that none of these lists are exhaustive. These are snapshots of the landscape taken from the closest point possible. There will be artists and album that don’t get recognized, but should and cause listmakers to kick themselves later. Now, ready to tackle my second end of year, I feel much better equipped and well-studied. There is always a rush in November to circle back to things I either cut short or otherwise missed to make sure I make the most informed list I can. Hopefully I can help expose you to new music you might have otherwise passed on, as your lists and other "professional" lists that I will read will do for me.
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