The Final Countdown

Da-na-na-naaaa, da-na-na-na-naaaa....

Yes yes indeed, with lesser competitions such as the X-Factor and Strictly Come Dancing and BBC3's Young Butcher of the Year already falling by the wayside, it's time for the most hotly talked about contest of the year to slam it's final axe stroke in to the craggy mountain of music that's been piling up this year, and haul ourselves over the apex to reflect upon the marvels on offer.

I'm already busy at work in the lab, conducting devious genetic experiments so that I can offer myself a shoulder to sob on as I begin to realise the gems that I've missed off the list. There are two that I'm thoroughly kicking myself over, which I missed off for various careless reasons but would have easily been bothering the top 10 - 1. Memories by Pangaea, a track that the wider population (or at least, the demographic of the population who listen to down-beat soulful dubstep) had been enjoying for the best part of half a year before Muggins McPhee here latched on to it, and 2. the hugely fun and danceable Why Don't You by Gramophonedzie, a song that I love greatly but for some reason thought was from several years ago.

And THEN there are the various tracks that Chris, Tom and Richard listed in response to my appeal for your own favourite songs lists (suggestions still warmly encouraged by the way!), so mad props to the aforementioned badmen, their lists can be found in the comments section of the previous post and are all well worth a listen.

Despite these exceptions, this top 10 is a good reflection of what I've been enjoying on a whole other level of enjoyment this year. Each one is the kind of song which lures me into putting it on again straight after it's finished, because I just can't get enough of its goodness. You may well take one listen/look at the list and emit a big fat WTF (c'mon guys, how could I NOT include Fight For This Love??), but I'd like to think that if you welcome these tunes on to your hearth and in to your hearts then we'll soon be reading from the same hymn sheet.

Unlike the YouTube links of ye olde sections of this countdown, all the ten songs have got download options, as a Christmas present from me to you. You can even download the whole lot in one fell swoop by clicking here, and choosing 'Select All' from the options at the top and then clicking 'Bulk-download Selected'. That should work. I think.

10. Florence & The Machine - Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up)

Although I'm not a wholly devoted F&tM fan, they've been really good whenever I've seen them live and there are a few tracks of theirs that I greatly enjoy. This, the second track off 'Lungs', is my favourite. A stirring, vocally wonderful song, full of mythical and mystical imagery, Rabbit Heart is a cryptic battle cry that will have you throwing your hands up in the air and saying "Lord I just don't care" much more emphatically than certain other Florence tracks that have just been released YET AGAIN.

9. Fever Ray - Seven

A voice that's instantly recognisable from her work as one half of The Knife, Karin Dreijer Andersson flew solo this year under the name Fever Ray with the release of her bloody excellent album, also entitled Fever Ray. Chock-a-block with great songs, Seven is the pick of the bunch in my eyes. The lyrical content is superbly simple and mundane - "we talk about love, we talk about dishwasher tablets", "I ride my bike up, I ride my bike down" - but there's an ever present sense of nostalgia and longing in the song, which could readily relate to romance, or death, or both. Seven has also been remixed well by Martyn, and less so by Crookers - or should I say, Crookers have cut up the vocals and plopped them on top of the same beat they use for every song.

8. Joker - Digidesign

The future's bright - the future's purple. Apparently Joker 'hears' purple when he makes his music, which means that his sound is now referred to as 'Purple Wow', he makes songs with purple in the title, he wears a lot of purple etc. So, dubstep's answer to Prince then? Well Digidesign is certainly sultry and sexy enough to tick at least some of *unpronounceable symbol*'s boxes, with a luuuurvely synth pattern that will have any dance floor 'bom-bomming' along when dropped. You'll know what I mean when you listen to it. Hopefully. Digidesign was released on a 12" with 2000F's You Don't Know What Love Is (#12 in this list), which surely makes it the sexiest EP of the year, possibly ever. If most dubstep doesn't convince you, GO AND FIND THAT EP, it's an absolute delight.


7. Few Nolder - Chika


This track from oddly named Lithuanian producer Few Nolder contains one of the cutest and most infectious tunes I've heard in a long time. The track is minimalistic techno, without actually being minimal techno -  it provokes a feeling much more euphoric than your bog standard minimal, and even has hints of dancehall throughout. When the quivering little tune finally drops after the build up, it never fails to leave me with a smile on my face.


6. Deadboy - U Cheated


In the year that saw UK urban music getting increasingly funkier, this is probably the finest example to date of the 2-step revival. A great R&B-esque vocal hook that injects a soulful mood in to the track, combined with tropical drum patterns and a funkier-than-thou bassline all make U Cheated one of the great songs to have emerged from the UK underground this year. Lovely stuff.


5. Dance Area - AA 24/7 (Diplo Remix)


I was pretty surprised when I was compiling this list to find that this song was only released this year (admittedly the original was released at the end of 2008, with the remix dropping in January), as it seems that Diplo's high-powered reworking of Dance Area's infectiously child-like AA 24/7 has been slaying dance floors for an eternity now. I believe the story behind the original goes thus: someone (quite likely to be Erol Alkan) recorded the bathroom attendant of London's The End club, Austin Boston, doing the 'rap' that features in this song on an iPhone, then Dance Area (also quite likely to be Erol Alkan) used it to form AA 24/7, a tune that was then widely played in clubs around the planet (largely by Erol Alkan). Diplo's remix crunks the track up in to a huge electro banger, even greater than the original. Never have the words 'DO IT' been such a trigger for mayhem.


4. Dusty Kid - Nemur (Wall of Guitars)


I probably shouldn't like this song as much as I do. Two things in particular should really point to it being utterly naff - the 'European singing emotionally in English' vocals, and, er, the pan pipes. Yep, that's right - pan pipes. An instrument which has sensibly been left out of the majority of songs since the likes of E-Rotic's Max Don't Have Sex With Your Ex walked the earth. But I feel that Nemur has managed to emerge triumphant, despite giving itself these two notable handicaps. The constantly pulsing beep throughout the track is what first attracted me towards it when I heard Dusty Kid use the song to close his set at Fabric in the summer, and when I went home and tracked down his album Nemur grew and grew on me. The lyrics are certainly a bit pants and don't make a whole lot of sense, but the singer (I'd guess Dusty Kid himself) sings them with a good level of feeling, and combined with the gentle guitar strumming it makes for a very sweet little track. Even the pan pipes are A-OK in my book, adding an earthy sound to the song. Could Europop vocals and pan pipes be THE sound of 2010? This excited blogger certainly hopes so.


3. Crystal Fighters - Xtatic Truth (Xtra Loud Mix)


Given the ever dwindling quality of the Kitsuné Maison CD series, this track was a real delight to find nestled on the seventh edition of the French label's compilations. This song is truly remarkable - it starts off with a kind of traditional folk guitar melody, before the ecstasy starts to kick in, hard. First with the hushed vocals reassuring us that "there's nothing left here to worry about", and then with the soaring rush of synths that come thundering in, inducing a genuine sense of rave love. If the government were to take a dab of MDMA and put this song on whilst coming up, they'd soon be on their BlackBerrys busy sending texts to Prof. David Nutt along the lines of: "David, man.... i love you. ur just such a fucking sound guy. soz about sacking u and all that, u were totally right all along man. i'm in fucking outerspace right now nutty, there's like totally nothing left to worry about. we should go to fabric sometime yeah? i fucking love you david, peace out xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"


2. Gui Boratto - No Turning Back


No sooner have we finished with one entrancingly euphoric beast of a song, but another one pops up. No Turning Back is somewhat like the 'Green Mile' of the music world - it's not the subtlest when it comes to piling on the emotion, but the end result is a thing of beauty nonetheless. The melody rises optimistically with synthetic distortion before mournfully sinking back down with a feeling of inevitable despondency, with this sense of melancholic futility reflected in lyrics such as "I can show you the way but I know that you'll never be there". However the track still maintains a euphoric atmosphere, in the kind of way that you can imagine it closing a set in a club and you'd leave feeling thoroughly contented and at peace.


1. Joe McElderry - The Climb
    Florence & The Machine - Drumming Song (Boy 8-Bit Remix)


So, here we are. This, ladies and gentlefolk, is my favourite song of 2009. And what better song to top the list than this outstanding reworking of an already excellent song - Joe's voice compliments the lyrics of Hannah Montana's original perfectly, and he really makes the song his own in - oh wait, I'm confusing myself again.


No, my favourite song of the year has actually been the superb Boy 8-Bit remix of Drumming Song, a track which showcases both Florence Welch's vocal prowess and David Morris' masterful production skills, both of which have been a regular fixture on my stereo throughout the year. Boy 8-Bit slices out the finest vocal cuts of the original - which although good in its own right will plod along painfully slowly when listened to in the aftermath of the remix - and forges them in to an exhilarating force that seizes and drags you in to the world of Florence's inner emotional conscience, with Boy 8-Bit's commanding drums holding you firmly fixed in place as the drumming noise inside her head gets louder and LOUDER. It's that bit, at the heart of the track, that really pushes this track from great to truly amazing - the loop of "it fills my head up and gets louder, and louder" steadily grows in volume and strength until it's one of the most gripping things you'll ever encounter in any song. With each repetition it builds in fortitude - if it had continued any longer then it'd probably have been classed as a realistic threat to the nation.


Boy 8-Bit's had a great year, with other highlights including the Baltic Pine EP and a remix of La Roux's Quicksand, but for me this his finest work, and the finest work of the year FULL STOP.




So there we are, that's the end of my Top 50 Favourite Songs of 09 list. All that's left to say is that I hope you agree with at least some of my choices, as well as WELL BLOODY DONE TO RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE AND MR AND MRS MORTER, definitely one of my favourite music-based days of all time.


And I've just realised I uploaded some songs the other day which haven't been used yet, so here's a quick Classic Track + Songs I'm Currently Loving...


Classic Track: J Dilla - Workinonit - this blog would have a lot less musical content on it if it wasn't for the influence that J Dilla has had on artists in the Flying Lotus mould, he was a true master of innovative hip-hop who tragically died of blood disease in 2006. Genuinely up there with the biggest in terms of losses to music, but his legacy looks set to be manifested long in to the future.


Songs I'm Currently Loving:

• Rustie - Inside Pikachu's Cunt - it's immediately obvious why it would be an abomination if I didn't post this song, fortunately it's also a very enjoyable listen.
• Inside Out Boy & Vogel - Cazzo! - what do catchy electro bleeps and the operatic stylings of Andrea Bocelli have in common? Answer: they both feature on this track by Inside Out Boy & Vogel, which is one of two tracks from their newest EP which, in keeping with the festive spirit, they are gift-wrapping for free download: Cazzo! / Adrenochrome EP. Adrenochrome is equally great, this time deploying a Fear and Loathing sample on top of a sinisterly creeping beat that could easily soundtrack one of Hunter S. Thompson's more spookier trips.
• Movado - Neva Believe You - soulful Caribbean vocals? Check. Downbeat dancehall riddim? Check. 90's-rave-sounding piano riff? Check. Lazy 'end of blog' unimaginative use of a check list to replace writing a proper summary of the song? Check.

An End of Year albums list has been compiled, but probably won't be along til the start of 2010. So if the magic of Christmas is waning for you, then that'll be something to keep your heart pumping and eyes eagerly wide open as you lie in bed at night. Merry Christmas one and all, I hope you all get what you want in your stockings. All I got last year was feet.

Quick Request

Howdy all, before I launch my top 10 songs and albums of the year I have a quick appeal to make. Although it's interesting to look back on the year and compile my own favourites lists, I'm also dead keen on reading other people's take on the year's music. In the past few days I've been flitting around the interweb soaking up various End Of Year lists, and in doing so have had my eyes opened to a few excellent songs and albums that had previously passed me by. That's why I think it would be rather dandy if you yourselves could have a pop at drawing up your own top 10 songs and/or albums lists and posting them on here, so that we can all pour our musical favourites in to one big tub, and splash about in it gayly like children in a paddling pool.


I'm already thinking of songs which really shudda been on my Top 50 list - Memories by Pangaea, Loader by Shadow Dancer, Olympians/Surf Solar by Fuck Buttons, something by Moderat, I'm sure several more will pop in to my head before too long - and hopefully by the time I've finished listening to your suggestions I'll be kicking myself even more!


So gwan, have a wee think back over the year and then chuck your thoughts at the comment box below. Every musical persuasion under the sun is more than welcome, in fact styles that might not be the normal stamping ground of this blog are eagerly encouraged. And if you fancy letting me know how rubbish/average/awesome my list has been, or if you care to hazard a guess at my own top 10, then go for it.


Tuck in, children, tuck in.

Countdown, 19 - 11

We're on the penultimate stretch of my countdown of my favourite songs of the year, and to reward each of these tracks for making it so far in the list, each one will be treated to a short description explaining why it ranks so highly. The twist is that each description will be written in the style of someone else, which I'm pretty sure is a terrible idea but will be done nonetheless.


19. La Roux - Bulletproof - (in the style of Caspa & Rusko) - 2009 was a great year for La Roux ("IT'S ME BELT, TURKISH"). Their début album spawned a string of hit singles ("CHILL WINSTON") and was a strong contender for this year's Mercury Prize ("ARSE TICKLER'S FAGGOT FAN CLUB").

18. Floating Points - Vacuum Boogie - (in the style of Noel Fielding) - Hey, yeah, I went to a vacuum boogie once, it was held underwater and there was a bouncy castle made of scampi. I brought a Henry vacuum cleaner as my date, I stuck some long hair made of a raccoon's fur on it and pretended it was called Henrietta, we had a WILD night. I accidentally spilled some syrup made of Spandau Ballet's back catalogue all over her towards the end though, she stormed off and hooked up with a hoover called Douglas.

17. Dorian Concept - The Fucking Formula - (in the style of Malcolm Tucker from 'The Thick Of It') - The fucking formula is one of the fucking best tunes of the whole fucking year, now listen to the fucking thing or FUCK THE FUCK OFF.

16. jj - Things Will Never Be The Same Again - (in the style of Kanye West's blog) - THIS SONG IS DA BOMB YO!!! JJ, MJ, OJ, S'ALL GOOD IN '09 YO! NONE AS GOOD AS YO BOY KANYE THOUGH, I'M JUST REAL YO!! NOW HERE'S A RANDOM PIC OF A PARISIAN WOMAN'S DRESS THAT I LIKE YO!

15. Floating Points - Love Me Like This (Nonsense Dub) - (in the style of Kanye West interrupting Taylor Swift at MTV VMA's) - YO LOVE ME LIKE THIS (ORIGINAL VERSION), I'M REAL HAPPY FOR YOU AND I'MMA LET YOU FINISH, BUT THE NONSENSE DUB WAS ONE OF THE GREATEST TRACKS OF '09.... OF '09!!

14. Vitalic - Second Lives - (in the style of Matthew Friedberger) - "Oh hi, I'm Vitalic, please listen to my song about Second Life" - FUCK YOU!! What is this, some kind of anthem for on-line virtual worlds? Are the beats made on a three-dimensional modelling tool? Vitalic's just trying to align himself with what people consider cool, and everybody knows there's nothing cooler than devoting your entire existence to an internet persona rather than your actual real life. Or being Matthew Friedberger. Vitalic is such a bogus arse.

13. Tempa T - Next Hype (also probably the best video of the year) - (in the style of Jan Moir) - Is it just me who finds the circumstances around this song very troubling? Here we have yet another young man who, because he is black, was always destined to record an angry and violent rap song, just like so many of his kind have done before him. Now, I'm a civil rights champion and often black up myself of an evening so I am well aware of the problems faced by young black adults these days, but even I am disturbed by the sheer amount of pars that occur throughout the course of this song. Why is it that this young man feels compelled to rap about violent acts, when his contemporaries such as Giddy Rascal can achieve success purely by singing about playing conkers? I find Tempz's lifestyle to be full of sleaze, and I think this song is a real blow to the myth that black people can create songs of equal worth as normal people. What an absolute par.

12. 2000F & J Kamata - You Don't Know What Love Is - (in the style of Joker's Twitter) - LOOOL I WOZ ON DIS EP 2!!!! DUTTY TOOOON!

11. Clark - Growls Garden - (in the style of Brian Collins) - This is a tune from..... Clark. From Clark's. From Clark's album Totems Flare. Oh yes. Clark, who comes from...................... It, umm, starts off slow and.....umm, slowbot, deadboat..... downbeat. Hmm. The vocals are in! It's building up to a hefty bass drop! Here comes the bass....... and boom goes the dynamite.


Classic Track


Continuing this series of classic tracks, we shuffle genres yet again and this time we've arrived at industrial goth metal. Ever the shy and uncontroversial one, Marilyn Manson likes to let his music do the talking and back in the day produced some real killer tunes. This one in particular is a bona fide rock classic, with everything oozing sinister menace - the rhythmic drumming, the crunching guitar riff, and the snarling vocals of MM (any fact fans? All the original members of his band created their stage names by taking the first name of a famous female sex symbol, and adding the surname of a serial killer, hence Twiggy Ramirez, Olivia Newton Bundy etc).


Marilyn Manson - The Beautiful People


Songs I'm Currently Loving

• Robyn - Be Mine - I might well be the world's biggest chump - WHY THE HELL HAVEN'T I HEARD THIS SONG BEFORE?!? It's so good that, having turned off my laptop and gone to bed, I've now got up and turned my comp on again just so that I can listen to it some more. But seriously, why did it take this long for me to hear this song? I presume it must've been played quite heavily on the radio a while ago when Robyn was all the rage? Maybe I was too busy pretending that pop music was below me for it to have registered on my radar, but now I'm making up for lost time and hereby declare this song as up with there with the finest pop tracks of at least the past decade.
• Gang Gang Dance - Princes - contrary to popular opinion, Tinchy Stryder has actually featured on at least one good record in his life, and this is it.
• King Midas Sound - One Ting (Dabrye Remix) - King Midas Sound released their début album within the past few weeks, so what better way to hail it's arrival than to post a song which isn't actually on it? This remix by Flying Lotus' buddy Dabrye spruces up the ethereal dub of the original with some hip-hop beats to create more of a toe-tapper, but both versions are great and the album is well worth a listen.
• Pangaea - Memories - some more moody bass stylings here, but this one has a bassline and drum pattern that will really keep your head bopping until you've completely run out of bop juice.
• Simian Mobile Disco - Hustler (from Spank Rock's Fabriclive Mix) - never really a fan of uploading/downloading tracks from mixes to be honest, but I've now reached the point of my musical menstrual cycle whereby I go through a phase of listening to Rick Ross' Hustlin' a lot, which always inevitably leads me to also visit this delightful bit of mashing up which features on Spank Rock's Fabriclive 33 CD. It combines Hustler by SMD and Hustlin', you see. Do you see? Do you see what they've done there?

End of Year Countdown: 29 - 20

Here's the next instalment of my Top 50 Favourite Songs of the Year. Listen to them, love them, but don't MAKE love to them. Or if you do, remember to wear a skin before going in.

29. Boys Noize & Erol Alkan - Waves

28. Nosaj Thing - Fog

27. The Field - Leave It

26. Darkstar - Need You

25. Dizzee Rascal & Armand Van Helden - Bonkers

24. Bibio - The Palm of Your Wave

23. La Roux - In For The Kill

22. Major Lazer - Pon De Floor

21. Birdy Nam Nam - The Parachute Ending

20. Bibio - Jealous of Roses

Classic Track(s)

To celebrate the start of December, this post will feature a spectacular triple bill of classic tracks, one for each of the major religious festivals that this final month of the year contains - Hanukkah, Al-Hijira (Islamic New Year), and, of course, Yule, the Pagan celebration of the Winter Solstice. Anyone who doesn't think these three are the most important religious dates in December is a skin-head racist and anti-multiculturalist, and is probably already balls deep in Nick Griffin's podgy anus.

Anyway, this ménage à trois of legendary songs isn't just a random group of tunes that drank a bit too much at Tiger Tiger last night, and having eyed each other up across the dance floor decided to all pile in to a taxi together and head back to a sordid Holiday Inn room to engage in an orgy of vintage musical fornication. No, these tracks are linked both stylistically and geographically, as they represent the work of The Belleville Three - Juan Atkins, Kevin Saunderson, and Derrick May, who, due to their productions that emerged from Belleville, Detroit since the early 1980's, are often labelled the founding fathers of techno. The three high school buddies drew on influences ranging from George Clinton to Prince to Kraftwerk, and set about establishing Detroit as the birthplace of modern-day techno, a legacy it has continued ever since with such techno giants as Carl Craig, Jeff Mills and Richie Hawtin (who clearly saw more potential in the American city's scene than in his own home town of Banbury, Oxfordshire) all establishing their reputations there.

• Cybotron (Juan Atkins) - Clear
• Derrick May - Strings of Life
• Inner City (Kevin Saunderson) - Good Life

Songs I'm Currently Loving: Female Tekover

So apparently women are making music these days. While your natural reaction is probably this, I've tried to make the most of a bad situation and have compiled a selection of some of the finest tracks around at the moment to have been crafted by dainty little hands that should have been doing the washing up instead. If you wish to read more of my educated opinions on the state of the nation then the News Of The World will be serializing my forthcoming book "Uh-Oh, Here Comes Trouble" over the festive period, in which I impatiently tut at everything that's even marginally changed since 1816. The full publication will be released on December 21st, with a RRP of 17 groats.

• Cooly G - Narst - a slightly sinister piece of dancehall/UK Funky/dubstep from the consistently excellent Brixton lass Cooly G, who's already establishing herself as one of the finest producers of the genre.
• Ikonika - Sahara Michael - Ikonika is rising fast in the dubstep world, easily surpassing many of the shaved-headed blokes who are still churning out unimaginative bass thuds. She's released a number of quality EPs, and whenever her album comes along it's sure to stake it's place amongst the ranks of Hyperdub classics.
• Dinky - Westoid - it's a little known fact that female producers at the moment don't JUST produce UK urban music, some of them come from Chile and make very lovely jazzy minimal techno too. Dinky's music sounds like the result of Ricardo Villalobos performing a sex change operation on Moodymann, and it will be a very sad world indeed if that ever stops being a good thing.
• Tokimonsta - So Sick - hailing from LA, Tokimonsta is Brainfeeder's most notable (possibly only) laydee creator of beats, and a fine creator she is at that. She's also pretty damn hot.
• Shuanise - Baggage For Sale - an artist on Floating Points and Alex Nut's excellent Eglo Records, Shuanise makes chilled out jazz-hop which is perfect for both a sunny summer's day in a paddock* with a glass of cool lemonade, or a cosy rainy day indoors with some boardgames and Hama beads.

*99% guaranteed that's the only time you'll read the word 'paddock' in any form of blog for a long while.

• Bjork - Big Time Sensuality - could easily crop up in the Classic Track section any day of the week, but seeing as the (wonderful wonderful wonderful) Icelandic songstress has appeared there already I thought I'd take advantage of this feminine Songs I'm Currently Loving to throw in the song which spawned the name of this very blog.

Listening to the songs in this post has left me in a very good mood, I hope they'll have a similarly uplifting effect on you. And as I stated in the previous post, I'd love to hear your thoughts on my countdown, the classic tracks, the Songs I'm Currently Loving, or any other unreserved praise you have for this blog, so why not imprint your mark upon the world wide web by leaving a comment below? It's a quick and painless process, and is a far better use of time than not leaving a comment.

The next post will either be the penultimate set of songs in the countdown (19 - 11), or my Top 10 Favourite Albums of the Year, so that's an exciting cliffhanger for you there isn't it.

Never Mind The Boris, Here's More Counting Down

After the songs listed as 50 - 40 in my Top 50 Favourite Songs of the Year were announced in the previous post and immediately saw sales of said songs rocket (Chris Moyles got so excited that he played Shackleton's Moon Over Joseph's Burial seven times back-to-back during his show on Friday), I felt that I'd try and press on with the rest of the list as quickly as possible, if only to snap Moylesy out of his atmospheric dub trance.

So here are 10 more aural masturbation aids for you to erotically rub against your eardrums, just remember to give them a wipe after you've had your way with them:

39. Sub Focus - Rock It

38. Mount Kimbie - Sketch On Glass

37. Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Zero (Erol Alkan Remix)

36. Dusty Kid - Here Comes The Techno

35. Slagsmalsklubben - Brutal Weapons

34. Mount Kimbie - 50 Mile View

33. Bullion - Young Heartache

32. Lazy Jay - Float My Boat

31. The Ian Carey Project - Get Shaky

30. Joy Orbison - Hyph Mngo

Seeing as this is just a titchy little post so far, I'll take this opportunity to encourage you to leave your thoughts - whether they be good, bad, or just plain ugly - on my choices of songs for the Top 50 Favourite Songs of the Year (or anything else in this blog for that matter), by using the comments section below. I think it's quite easy to do, and I don't believe you have to sign up for a Blogger account either. So, why not give it a go eh kids?! I think there's the option of posting anonymously, so you can spare yourself some blushes by not having to reveal that you're a reader of this blog, which I'm fully aware has been the cause of many marital splits and coup d'etats in the past.

Classic Track

The second in this new and already widely revered 'Classic Track' section takes us hurtling back to the mid-90's, and to one of hip-hop's all-time classic chilled out anthems. A gentle piano melody loops in the background while New York's finest lay down some tough truths about the dependence on and continual struggle for money in the city - Cash Rules Everything Around Me, it's:

Wu-Tang Clan - C.R.E.A.M.

Songs I'm Currently Loving

• Boris Dlugosch - Bangkok (Dub) - I'm thoroughly atheist when it comes to believing the hype about Boris Dlugosch's Bangkok (original version here). I've read people waxing lyrical about it, anointing it as THE track of 2009. My ears picked it up twice during the course of Annie Mac Presents at the Warehouse Project, and I can imagine pretty much every electro club the length and breadth of Britain/the World is rinsing a bit of Boris pretty heavily these days. Well, I THINK IT'S A BIT BORING. It's certainly a pretty catchy tune, but I just feel it lacks that extra bit of punch - when the hook drops, it drops a bit flat and limp, and the whole song sounds like it's the wind-down to itself, as if the real dance floor-smashing element of the track has actually occurred before the track's begun and now we're just left with the shadowy outro. It's basically a less emphatic version of Pon de Floor, from which it seems to steal both a similar sounding hook, and at one point an almost identical drum pattern. And I know it's primarily intended for dancing to in a club, but if you listen to the full original mix just through home speakers or headphones it gets bloody tedious after not too long at all. I'm still waiting to find a remix of it that really adds some oomph to the track, but for the time being this 'ere dub version from the EP is actually a superior cut to the original if you ask me.
• Four Tet - Love Cry (Joy Orbison Remix) - Four Tet's latest track Love Cry makes it's second appearance on the trot on The Hardcore and The Gentle, this time having been rubbed down with a hot towel by Joy Orbison, a producer who's really at the top of his game at the moment. This remix focuses attention on the lush vocals from the track, and makes for equally (if not more) pleasurable listening than FT's original.
• Ellie Goulding - Under The Sheets (Jakwob Remix) - a track in a similar mould to the likes of Emalkay's When I Look At You (but less overplayed) or the Joker remix of SMD's Cruel Intentions (but without the irritating lead-singer of The Gossip on vocal duties), Jakwob has here sliced up Ellie Goulding's vocals for his second top notch remix of one of her tracks, and given them some whomping bass for company.

That concludes this particular post, the next tracks in the Year's Best Songs countdown will appear soon enough, as will the list of my Top 10 Favourite Albums of 2009. Oooh I do spoil you something rotten, don't I?

B

Y

E

(remember, don't be afraid to leave a comment!)

County Down, part 1

When I was a child, I went on a family holiday to Switzerland. While we were there we took a wee day trip to the Large Hadron Collider, to see if we could spot the Higgs boson for ourselves. However, DISASTER STRUCK. I, convinced that I'd just spotted the Higgs boson bombing past, rushed to the edge of the machine to take a closer look, but in my excited haste I failed to notice a crate of low-fat Dairylea Dunkers that had been set down just beside the collider -I tripped, and was sent tumbling in to the collider.

I cannot recall much of what occurred once I was inside. All I'm aware of is that what I had perceived to be the Higgs boson was in fact Higgs' bassoon, which Higgs was carrying on his way to wind band practice just further down the collider. From then on, my memories are nothing more than blurry, incomplete shapes and whirls, until I suddenly snapped back in to full consciousness to see my family and Dr Fox anxiously peering down at me. Heaven knows how long I was in there until I was fished out, but I appeared to have emerged unscathed.

Or, at least, it appeared that way at first. After I'd been comforted and given a steaming hot mug of cocoa and a low-fat Dairylea Dunker, Dr Fox took me to one side, out of ear shot of the rest of the group. He explained to me that his experiments with the LHC were not quite what the public were being led to believe. Instead of trying to recreate the Big Bang, he whimpered, he had in fact been using the machine to try and recreate Big Brovaz, who at the time had been the height of musical innovation until their tragic volcano-based demise. He explained that if he could just unleash another R&B/hip-hop collective on the world with the talent and vision of Big Bro, then he might finally be able to convince Simon Cowell to revive Pop Idol and give him a slot as a judge again. The good doctor explained that he wasn't sure what, if any, side effects I would feel from my brush with the collider, but that he would personally ensure that I was looked after properly for the rest of my life, and given all the funding and resources I needed to ensure that this experience wouldn't hinder me, and I would be able to build a successful career in the future.

Of course, just like all the others who had received the same pledge from Dr Fox or any other talent show judge, my prospects were soon to implode. I was haunted by my ordeal in the collider: I couldn't sleep properly, I got jittery whenever I heard the sound of a bassoon, and I massively went off low-fat Dairylea Dunkers. Like, MASSIVELY. But the most significant effect of my experience was the most mind-blowing of all: I could now see in to the musical future. I knew as early as 2002 that Take That would reform and that Robbie Williams would fall from stardom, only to return years later with a comeback that everyone heralded as magnificent but in truth wasn't particularly impressive. I had a vision in 1997 that over-the-top europop synths would make passionate love with the scrag-end of the hip-hop world and their offspring would rule the planet, and lo and behold in 2009 the love-children of the affair, Taio Cruz and Tinchy Stryder, stormed the charts. At this very moment, I know that the winner of this year's X Factor (who I can't reveal on here due to legal restrictions) will go on to land the Christmas number one, do fuck all for the next 7-8 months then return to prominence briefly with a series of heavily American-influenced hits interspersed with weak cover versions.

Why am I telling you this? you might ask, probably about 70 lines ago. Well, I've used my superpower of being able to gaze in to the future of music and have decided that there won't be a sufficient amount of stingin' toons released between now and the end of the year to stop me from entering the initial stages of an End Of Year countdown. The top ten has actually already been drafted but will be left for a later date, partly due to the recent emergence of a tune that is making a strong argument to be catapulted to the top end of the list (said tune is to be found in Song's I'm Currently Loving).

So for now, let me present to you the songs that I have listed as 50 - 40 on the list of My Favourite Songs of the Year, and the rest will be portioned out in the coming days and weeks. There's a mixed bag there, so if you pick one out you don't like then just try and swap it with someone else, and for heaven's sake don't just put it back in the mix once your grubby fingers have been all over it. Learn some manners, you filthpot.

- - - I'm providing YouTube links for these as far as is possible, if you wish to own the track then either buy it as I can guarantee that it's propah good, use some form of YouTube song downloading tool, or it could already be on this blog so check tha side list of artists yeah? - - -

50. Jesse Rose - Well Now

49. Lady GaGa - Poker Face

48. Sticky K - Bandari Funk

47. Shitao - We

46. Shackleton - Moon Over Joseph's Burial

45. Zombie Nation - Worth It pt.1

44. Burial & Four Tet - Moth

43. Martyn - Elden St.

42. Luke Vibert - We Hear You

41. Rye Rye feat. M.I.A. - Bang

40. Joy Orbison - Wet Look

So there we go, I hope that's wet your appetite for the even more heavyweight tunes yet to come. Before we get to the customary Songs I'm Currently Loving, in my infinite wisdom I've decided to add even more length to this already lengthy-enough post through the introduction of a new little segment. From now on, the downloading section of each post will also include a 'Classic Track'; that's to say, an absolute gem of musical brilliance that you should own by law, so if you don't already have it then download it fast and avoid a 7 year jail term.

The début Classic Track is a stunning combination of one of the finest voices ever committed to record, enigmatic and beautifully romantic lyrics, and set against a driving yet hypnotically soothing techno backdrop. So please, stop what you're doing, lay yourself down somewhere, and immerse yourself in:

Bjork - Hyperballad

Songs I'm Currently Loving:

• Gemmy - BT Tower - Gemmy combines the best bits of both the past and future of dubstep, with a throbbing filth-fest of a bassline fused with the more atmospheric side of the genre that's becoming increasingly healthier
• DatsiK - Southpaw - more dutty thumps and squelches c/o Datsik, here sampling Wu Tang Clan to create a propah nawty banger of a tune
• Tricky - Slow - I recently discovered the 'Tricky Meets South Rakkas Crew' album and am currently enjoying it greatly, hunt it down if you haven't heard it already.
• Shinichi Osawa - Maximum Joy (Van She Remix) - Another bad-ass album that's recently wandered in to my life is Southern Fried & Tested vol. 2, a compilation released by Norman Cook aka Fatboy Slim's Southern Fried Records. Got some real treats on there, including the next song as well.
• Touché - Vampires - even if you don't think you've heard anything by DJ Touché (one half of The Black Ghosts) before, you have. Here you go: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iODdvJGpfIA&feature=related
• Pom Pom - Untitled - I am currently in love with Pom Pom, and this is currently my particular favourite of his hoards of untitled tracks.
• Slagsmalsklubben - Brutal Weapons - one of the few saving graces on the new Kitsuné Maison compilation. Band name is Swedish for 'Fight Club', FYI.
• Four Tet - Love Cry - a lovely bit of new Four Tet, which is a precursor to a new album which should be out early 2010 me believes.
• Ill Mana feat. P-Money - What Did He Say (Remix) - currently my favourite example of the newly crowned 'Greatest Genre In The World' - Bassline (of course)
• Deadboy - U Cheated - This is the song which has thrown my previously nicely settled 'Top 10 Favourite Songs of the Year' in to disarray, as it only got released a few days ago but is already infecting my brain at every given opportunity. Definitely one of the biggest tunes of the year, I only wish it could have revealed itself sooner and saved me the hassle of having to shoe-horn it in on the upper platforms of my End Of Year list.

Bye.

In a cupboard with The Field

Occasionally the rest of the world wide web gets jealous of the brilliance emanating from The Hardcore and The Gentle and starts to throw a bit of a wobbly. So, for the sake of keeping the internet balanced in a state of satisfied contentment and maintaining international cyber-security, every now and then I contribute my wise words to other outlets, particularly the fine electronic music site Sound Revolt, which you should all bookmark straight away.

To read an interview I conducted the other week with The Hardcore and The Gentle's permanent object of affection, The Field, which has now been posted on Sound Revolt, all you gotta do is:

CLICK HERE

Harry along now youngster

This is just a quick wee post because a) I haven't written anything in a little while, but mainly b) I read something muchos lol-ita the other day and feel obliged to spread the chuckles to those that haven't already chuckled at it already.

The Fiery Furnaces are an American band that primarily consist of siblings Eleanor and Matthew Friedberger, and who - now somewhat regrettably - I rather like. My regret is induced by Matthew Friedberger rather bizarrely mouthing off about Radiohead's touching and respectful tribute to Harry Patch, who had been Britain's last remaining World War 1 veteran until he passed away in July earlier this year. Thom Yorke, moved by a 2005 interview with Patch on Radio 4, recorded the song 'Harry Patch (In Memory Of)' and it's available to download on Radiohead's website, with all proceeds going to the The Royal British Legion.

Sounds like a thoroughly worthy cause, non? PAH, WORTHY AS FUCK! Let Matthew Friedberger cut through all the crap and tell it like it really is:

"'Oh, please listen to our new song about Harry Patch'. Fuck you! You brand yourself by brazenly and arbitrarily associating yourself with things that you know people consider cool. That is bogus. That's a put-on. That's a branding technique, and Radiohead have their brand that they're popular and intelligent, so they have a song about Harry Patch."

Yeah! Fuck you Radiohead, you DICKS. Thom Yorke's clearly spotted the fact that all the kids on the street were rocking Harry Patch ringtones and baseball caps, and Tweeting about how cool it would be to be the oldest man in the UK, and third oldest man in Europe, and he's only gone and exploited Harry Patch's status as a hipster's wet dream to release a bloody TRIBUTE SONG. And what's that? What's he done with all the profits? Only gone and DONATED THEM ALL TO THE BRITISH BLOODY LEGION! I know! What a blood-sucking opportunist!

But, err - hang on. Although Harry Patch will now forever be far, far cooler than Matthew Friedburgerandchips, I wouldn't have thought that anyone could be accused of bandwagoning or deploying self-promotive branding techniques by paying homage to a man who may easily be considered a hero, but less easily a figure of cool. So, Matthew Friedburgeranddietcola, what the bloomin' heck are you on about? Me thinks a follow-up but possibly even more confusing statement is needed!

"Like most creative musicians, Matt Friedberger is not a fan of Radiohead and most of their chart busters. Of course, Matt and all the Fiery Furnaces family are great fans of all Tommys living or dead, so much so that lots of the Fiery Furnaces' work is, because of the pun, dedicated to imitating the Who's Tommy.

"Back in the fall of 1996 or whenever that interview was conducted, the interviewer asked what Matt thought of the Radiohead song celebrating a WWI veteran. Matt naturally thought it would be interesting to pretend that they wrote a song about the celebrated American composer of a similar sounding name, hence his joking in the interview about Radiohead composing a song with something like 48 notes to an octave. It was easy and amusing to imagine Radiohead's attempt to colonize that relatively arcane bit of our musical lifeworld. This is what they used to call, in some bohemian and advertising circles, 'riffing' or fooling around.

"Matt has not heard the Radiohead song about Harry Patch, but if he did, he is sure he wouldn't like it. No doubt Radiohead and their fans can ignore his opinion of this matter and continue with their triumphant artistic interventions. Matt would have much preferred to insult Beck but he is too afraid of Scientologists."

The celebrated American composer of a similar sounding name is Harry Partch - click on that Wikipedia link and pretty much the first thing you'll read is "Not to be confused with Harry Patch". So it's now clear that Matthew Refriedbeans obviously doesn't like Radiohead, but made a fairly understandable mistake (especially as he's American, so the importance of the last British Tommy wouldn't be so pertinent) and confused Patch for Partch. And, to be fair, it would be a tad pretentious to out of the blue record a tribute to an experimental composer. But Matthew Kentuckyfriedchicken doesn't want us to think of him as a generally well-meaning bloke who, like all of us, is susceptible to mistakes. No - he wants us to think of him as a twat. He wants us to think of him as the kind of man who "naturally" finds it INTERESTING to pretend that other bands have written songs which they in fact haven't written. If someone told him that JLS had written a song about the pre-Industrial Revolution method of fabric production, he'd probably jump with glee and spend 4 days solid locked in his room acting out every possible consequence of such an action, Synecdoche New York-style.


Then, for no discernible reason whatsoever, he ends his head-scratching statement with a dig at Beck. Matthew Fridayschildisfullofgrace and Beck may have some deep-rooted blood feud which I'm not aware of, but to the casual observer it appears that the Fiery Furnaces man has decided to use the 'Random Target Generator' which once featured in an episode of Never Mind The Buzzcocks, whereby a button is pressed and a name of a celebrity is generated completely at random to be the subject of mockery and scorn.

As I don't actually like the Beck track and cannae be arsed to wait ages for my slow internet to upload the song on to Mediafire, BUT I feel like it's appropriate to try and rub Matthew Friedberger's face in it as much as possible, if you wish you can download 'Harry Partch' from this blog.

I'm now off to ridicule (*generating*) Paolo Nutini for recording a song about (*generating*) Ipswich Town midfielder Grant Leadbitter.

Bye.