Top 10 Songs of 2009 ... So Far

So, last week I know I teased with the fact that I had a put together a list of the 10 Best Songs of '09 so far and I just now realized because of all the BBQ and beers and such, I forgot to share it with the world. How terrible of me. So, anyway, here we are again in the fairest of orders which is alphabetical, here's the Top 10 Songs of 2009 .. so far?

"Brothersport" - Animal Collective
"And The Hazy Sea" - Cymbals Eat Guitars

"Stillness Is The Move" - Dirty Projectors


"Vacationing People" - Foreign Born
"Two Weeks" - Grizzly Bear

"Tunnelvision" - Here We Go Magic


"Lalita" - The Love Language
"Little Secrets" - Passion Pit
"Actor Out Of Work" - St. Vincent

"Awkward Kisser" - Telekinesis

SIS The Best of 2009 ... So Far, Part One

I'm going to go out there on the limb of bloggerdom and just say it: 2009 is so better than 2008. I don't remember ever in the history of me charting a course of the best albums of the year (started back in 1998) that by the halftime show already being stacked up with so many quality albums in where I might just have a three-way tie for first. OK, that's a lie - the classic line-up of Guided by Voices couldn't reunite and put out their best album ever in an attempt to top out what is #1 so far. No, I'm not going to give away the high order just yet. Instead, we let the alphabet take precedent as we look back at Part 1 of the Best Albums of 2009 .... so far.

Cymbals Eat Guitars / Why There Are Mountains / Sister's Den

It's pure coincidental that the first album mention was the first to make its impact on me this year. It was a record that 10 years from now I'll still be able to point my finger on the moment I first heard it. After frantically searching the internets, this Staten Island-based quartet's first album was blasting through my Macbook. For a month straight it was all I heard. And now it's everything else the indie world is listening to and more will soon be joining the pack. After a glowing Pitchfork review, the band is playing festivals and hitting the road with The Pains of Being Pure at Heart this fall. Their star is on the rise.

Dark Was The Night / 4AD

I know of at least one person, a former co-worker, who gave me shit for mentioning this one because it's a compilation, but damnit if it isn't a good one. You get Feist dueting with Grizzly Bear ("Service Bell,") you get Feist dueting with Ben Gibbard ("Train Song"). You get Yo La Tengo committing to tape one of their obscure covers ("Gentle Hour,") and you get new music from every other hot commodity on the indie scene (Spoon, The National, Arcade Fire, Bon Iver.) It's like some great Time Life comp or what have you that was advertised in the 70s for the indie generation, something like a Nuggets compilation except not because these aren't a bunch of one hit wonders, but rather an established sect of bands getting together for a cause. Hopefully the Red Hot organization has another good comp or three in them.

Eels / Hombre Lobo / Vagrant

E had a lot riding on this one for me - he had to follow up the winner of my Album of the Year 2005, the double-opus Blinking Lights & Other Revelations. Since then he occupied the time of myself and the other Eels fans with three grueling tours, penning his memoirs, and putting out a best-of and double-disc set of rarities. So when it came time to finally make a new studio record, he brought the beard back to reivisit the "Dog Faced Boy" of 2001's Souljacker. It's an album that sonically is a gritty sounding Shootenanny: bluesy 60s guitars covered in static and lo-fi aesthetics. Everything's cranked up to 10, there's next to no overdubs unless hums and hisses of feedback count. It a song-cycle based on longing and desire, things E has always written about, but not so much from the third person.

Foreign Born / Person To Person / Secretly Canadian

This album, the second from the California natives, gets almost a daily spin here at the SIS HQ. If you love the French Kicks, you'll love this, maybe even more then that Brooklyn trio. Person comes off as the album Swimming is not: it's bright and sunny and the guitars shimmer, all the instruments coalesce and co-exist in perfect symmetry. There's not a bunch of jangly guitars bogged down by an organic production and darkness, they beam like the sun. "Vacationing People" is a strong contender for one the year's finest tunes, while the album ties itself together with other songs like "Can't Keep Time," "Blood Oranges" and "Can't Keep Time" keeping it in check.

Grizzly Bear / Veckatimest / Warp

I remember writing the Can't Stop Spinning column/letter of love back in February and the second it was done, I was sad it was available for all to read. Months later when the album finally came out and we all helped it get to #8 on Billboard (I bought the CD and the LP and tickets to three shows,) I still was finding new things I loved in and out about this record. A year after debuting it to the world, "Two Weeks" holds up as one of the strongest songs of the year, but it's not just an album about songs it's about the building blocks that make the songs. The lush arrangements on the grand "Ready, Able" and the perfect harmonies of "All We Ask" and the epic angels and demons allusions of Daniel Rossen vs. the Brooklyn Youth Chorus in "I Live With You" are just a few of its perfections making it a strong contender for not just Album of the Year, but Album of the Decade, if not, my lifetime.

Thursday Video Round-Up

So the other week I did this on a Friday, but this week I decided to do it on a Thursday just because I can't contain my excitement anymore on these fun videos I have to share with you. In no order other than the logical whatever comes to my mind first as I write this post:

First we have that Cymbals Eat Guitars band whose star is surely on the rise. Since I first started spinning their phenomenal debut Why There Are Mountains back in January, Pitchfork has become their newest fans awarding both the album and the jam "Wind Phoenix" with the Best New Music stamp of approval. They're also opening up for The Walkmen AND Beach House at Webster Hall in NYC tonight. Looks like my blogger license will stay in tact. Here's some footage from them this past Easter weekend, opening up for Beep Beep at the Cake Shop.


Cymbals Eat Guitars | April 12th Cake Shop | nyc from intervuus on Vimeo.

Next up is the new video from St. Vincent. I love me some Annie Clark. She is so, so pretty. She is only two years older than me. Can anyone arrange a date? Either way, the lovely songstress has a new album called Actor coming out on May 5th, and the first single is "Actor Out Of Work". In the video for said song, it appears her cuteness be auditioning actors that are out of work I bet. And they are crying. And she thinks she loves me, she thinks she might? [Editor's Note - Apparently it's "mad" not "might." Either way!]



Finally, we have the latest video from The Breeders. They're getting up there in age, but I still find Kim and Kelley Deal attractive in the same way I do Kim Gordon. They are chicks who rock out in indie rock bands and they smile and are oh-so polite. Oh, and their new video takes place at a roller derby! The track is the titular song from their new self-released Fate to Fatal EP. It's a pretty catchy jam but you'll have to jump through a hoop to see this one. Rolling Stone has the exclusive so click here and watch it. No blood for the weak at heart, at least I don't think so.

Band of the Week: Cymbals Eat Guitars

It's highly probable at the beginning of the year you saw me go nuts for New York's Cymbals Eat Guitars. I was just minding my own business, checking in with the message boards I frequent and someone had started a thread about them, saying how they would be big in '09. I heard their album, Why There Are Mountains, and was immediately on the bandwagon. I've already said it: if they aren't big by year's end, take my blogging license away. But with Pitchfork now on board featuring the band in the On Repeat section of the Forkcast, going nuts over their Modest Pavement to Spill-ness, it's only a matter of time until they are the only band that matters.


Download: "And The Hazy Sea" [mp3]

The Rumble Hits NYC Next Week!

Stranded in Stereo celebrates our new partnership with Future Sounds with another night of New York’s monthly concert series The Rumble (originally dubbed SIS Club Nights), featuring the best up-and-coming indie rock artists. This is your chance to catch them before they become huge. January’s Rumble features The Depreciation Guild, Bodega Girls, and Black Diamond Bay, and the DJ talents of Dissensous from Raven Sings The Blues.

THE RUMBLE
Presented by Future Sounds and Stranded in Stereo
Wednesday, January 28th
Fontana’s
105 Eldridge Street, New York NY
(212) 334 – 6740
(B or D to Grand St; F, J, M, Z to Delancey)
Doors 9pm / $5 / 21+

Cymbals Eat Guitars
As a phrase, “cymbals eat guitars” gives off the idea that man and the kit he sits behind finally wins in the ultimate battle of man and recessive instrument versus man and dominant instrument. As the name of a band, Cymbals Eat Guitars gives off the idea that the band is to be as ferocious as the name dictates. This much is true: lead singer Joe Ferocious is not named that because he is tame. And like his last name, ferocity plays an integral piece of the CEG manifesto, dictated on to tape and put together in the form of expressionist art called Why There Are Mountains, their debut album.

The Depreciation Guild
The Depreciation Guild's influences are impressive in the form of being chronologically diverse. Their synth use is somewhat reminiscent of power-punkers Ozma, incorporating Nintendo-esque 16-bit synth lines with an array of resounding guitars, most of which can lend its shoegaze influences to a heavy amount of reverb being featured beside a variety of guitar pedals and effects. To be honest, The Depreciation Guild present one of the most singularly distinctive styles we’ve heard all year. You can download their new album “In Her Gentle” for free by clicking on the yellow strip on their web site.

Black Diamond Bay
It started as a Patrick Krief solo project while he was still in The Dears. Now a full-fledged band hailing from Montreal, Quebec, Black Diamond Bay are bringing back guitar rock but with their own unique additions. They combine an ominous sounding organ with tribal-like toms banging in the background that hits your body. Or other times, they create an epic blend of haunting strings, melodic bass lines, and wailing guitars so beautiful that you want it to go on forever. Black Diamond Bay is a diverse band that can go from a slow-paced emotional plea to a hard rock dance number instantly.

Future Sounds and Stranded in Stereo have a deep love and respect for the indie music community. Having produced successful events and promoted emerging indie artists, their collaboration promises to continue a tradition of supporting independent music, while at the same time providing locals with a place to party. Through the reach of an online music publication, indie rock internet radio station, indie retailers and online social networking sites, our connection to the music community is broad.

Can't Stop Spinning: Why There Are Mountains by Cymbals Eat Guitars

Snowy weekends like this past one were made for albums like this. Someday I'll be able to give myself the credit of discovering a band and making them big one year, but not for this one. As much as I would love to take the claim, it was not I who just happened on to them. I mean, I did stumble upon their awesomeness, it was just a message board I frequent that tons of other people do, too.

They're in the red on the blogdar meter, blogdar being that radar that us bloggers have, that sixth sense about bands that will explode. If these guys aren't the it band at CMJ this coming fall, I'll be in total shock and surprise. I will turn over my blogger license, cut it up in to several pieces.

Think Pavement. Think if Malkmus got the crew back together to make something of grand, epic proportions. Using strings at times and more exotic things like toy pianos and - was that glasses full of water - Cymbals Eat Gutiars even kind of channel Arcade Fire in some sick post-rock/post-hardcore kind of way. Like I mention Luna once did with "Math Wiz", grandiose opener "And The Hazy Sea" just starts already enveloped. Joseph Ferocious screams doo-wop styles over loud guitars, calaminous drums and an overall fracas that is equal parts catchy as it is dissonant. By the time you are in "Indiana", with its massive horn section and upright piano gallloping along, you'd think you've traded in dank club for wild west saloon, until the hemorraging guitars compete with the tickled ivories. "Wild Phoenix" shares this same sentiments, again utilizing the brass, while the centerpiece "Share" is all over the place for most of its seven minute duration. And lest we forget "Cold Spring", a song with a breakdown reminiscent of the best parts of The Lonesome Crowded West.

Did I mention these guys aren't even signed yet? At least not to my knowledge they aren't. But I know that if they catch on to others like they have already caught on to me and other blogs, 2009 will be the year all instruments are in a cannibalistic battle with one another.

Download: "And The Hazy Sea" [mp3]