Dancing About Architecture Indie Music News 12.21.10
Posted by Ian Wright on 12.21.2010
Beefheart RIP, Wilcofest, a new Iron And Wine song, a new Wye Oak album, Belle And Sebastian live, and more.
The bit at the start.
Hello all and welcome to the final Dancing About Architecture of 2010, I'm taking next week off. The file on my computer that I've got all my columns backed up on tells me that I've been doing this for too long, or six years to be precise. Wow, that's depressing.
Anyway here's a list of the 30 albums that I've enjoyed most in 2010:
30. Mountain Man – Made The Harbour
29. The Besnard Lakes – The Besnard Lakes Are The Roaring Night
28. Girl Talk – All day
27. Jogging - Minutes
26. Fang Island – Fang Island
25. Carolina Chocolate Drops – Genuine Negro Jig
24. Redneck Manifesto – Friendship
23. Gil Scott Heron – I'm new here
22. Retribution Gospel Choir - 2
21. No Age – Everything in between
20. The National – High Violet
19. Groom - Marriage
18. Jim O'Rourke – All Kinds Of people love Burt Bacherach
17. Woman – Public strain
16. Emeralds – Does it look like I'm here
15. The Morning Benders – Big Echo
14. Perfume Genius - Learning
13. Dum Dum Girls – I will be
12. LCD Soundsystem – This is happening
11. Four Tet - There is Love in You
10. At Last An Atlas – From Which We Were Raised
9. Pantha du Prince - Black Noise
8. Joanna Newsom – Have One On Me
7. Best Coast – Crazy For You
6. Owen Pallett – Heartland
5. Arcade Fire – The Suburbs
4. The Walkmen - Lisbon
3. Titus Andronicus – The Monitor
2. Gold Panda – Lucky Shiner
1. Future Islands – In Evening Air
Beg, borrow, buy, steal or download this album.
Future Islands – In Evening Air
Because it's the best fucking album of 2010.
You news, you lose
Aww no, sad news.
2010 has been pretty shitty for music, I really don't think I've heard a landmark classic new record this year (or in a couple of years to be honest). There's been lots of good stuff put out but nothing earth shatteringly great as far as I'm concerned. However more disappointing is the number of times this year that I've had to lead off the news portion of this column with news of somebody's passing. So it's both annoying and fitting that I'm leading off this week with another death notice.
On Saturday Dick Van Vliet passed away. He was 69 years old. Better known as Captain Beefheart Van Vliet was one of the most fearlessly innovative musicians of the 20th century and influenced virtually every musician with an avant garde string to their (rubbed against a saucepan lid or some fucking thing like that) bow. I suppose 69 is a good spell on earth but still, there's very few people of his ilk around.
Beefheart's best known work is probably 1969's Trout Mask Replica, famously beloved of critics and ignored by everyone else it has over the years become notorious for being utterly unlistenable but in fact given it's influence and the fact that it's now over 40 years old when I finally got around to listening to it I didn't think it was all that impenetrable or difficult. In fact I thought it was rather good. Bonkers in places but bonkers isn't really a bad thing. If you haven't heard it I do think it's worth checking out.
Wilcofest.
It was announced last week that for that in 2011 for the second successive year Wilco will curate the Solid Sound festival at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art in North Adams MA during the weekend of June 24-26.
That's about all there is to say about that but this year in addition to performing as a band and programming the event a large number of Wilco side projects got a work out so if you're a hardcore fan this might be for you.
New Iron And Wine music.
Okay, at this stage I think we all know the deal, you give away your e-mail address and you get a song. It's called "Tree By The River" and it's from the upcoming Iron and Wine album Kiss Each Other Clean which is out on January 25th on Warners in North America and 4AD internationally.
The one catch is that they're not providing a widget for me to embed on this page, instead you have to go here.
New album from Wye Oak.
Wye Oak's last record The Knot is a bit of an overlooked jem and the Baltimore outfit's third album Civilian will be out on March 7/8 on City Slang/Merge in Europe/North America.
Tracklist:
01 Two Small Deaths
02 The Alter
03 Holy Holy
04 Dogs Eyes
05 Civilian
06 Fish
07 Plains
08 Hot as Day
09 We Were Wealth
10 Doubt
The album was mixed by John Congelton who's previous credits include St. Vincent, Modest Mouse and Okkervil River.
Last story of 2010 isn't much of a story.
I hope you're reading this early in the day because if not you might be missing out. At 4PM today NPR will host a live video stream of Belle And Sebastian's gig at Glasgow's Barrowlands venue. According to the station the set will feature "a mix of old favorites and lost gems, along with a few festive surprises."
03-02 Miami, FL - The Fillmore
03-03 Lake Buena Vista, FL - House of Blues
03-04 Atlanta, GA - Tabernacle
03-05 Asheville, NC - Thomas Wolf Auditorium
03-06 Richmond, VA - The National
03-08-09 New York, NY - Radio City Music Hall *
03-10 Boston, MA - House of Blues
03-11 Portland, ME - State Theatre
03-13 Toronto, Ontario - Sound Academy
03-14 Royal Oak, MI - Royal Oak
03-15 Chicago, IL - Vic Theatre
03-17 Nashville, TN - Ryman Auditorium
06-23 London, England - Royal Albert Hall
* with Superchunk, Wild Flag
Writing under the influence
Without which this column would not have been possible:
Galaxie 500 – Today
Emeralds – What Happened
Elliott Smith – A boot from 2003
The bit at the end
Right, that's me dome for another year, take care folks, see you next year, maybe if we're lucky 2011 will give us a great record.
You can follow me on twitter, I'm endlessly fascinating.
