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Underground > Radio & Music >

Top Songs of 2007

  
  

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Spaniel
12:23 / 10.12.07
With free Rapidshare I find that only some of the mirror downloaders work

Can't even get that far.
 
 
pony
01:59 / 11.12.07
as someone that's lurking the fuck out of this thread and reaping many benefits, i'd like to say that yousendit is way more useful than rapidshare for the receiving end of things for most people... plus, after you put up your first ysi file they tend to email you a trial membership that enables you to upload a slew more.
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
05:39 / 11.12.07
Rilo Kiley - Breakin' Up

Really I'm spoilt for choice in terms of songs from Under The Blacklight, which is fast becoming one of my favourite albums of the year, but I chose this one partly because it's so - okay, I need to find another word for "immediate" so I stop repeating myself - and partly because it's such a high quality capture of a great live performance.

I was gonna bang on about the album in general and their fan-alienating, Flyboy-pleasing shift in sound, but best to work that up into a whole other post, I think.

'Breakin' Up' is one of THOSE songs, in the tradition that runs back from 'Since You Been Gone' through McAlmont & Butlet's 'Yes' to staples so well-worn they're burned on the collective consciousness ("At first I was afraid..."). Some songs can just be encapsulated in their opening line, and this is one:

"It's not as if New York City burned down to the ground the day you drove away..."

Well, yeah. You said it, girl. Although of course it can feel like that. But this song is so upbeat right from the get-go that you just know it's a matter of time until she can't contain it any more and breaks into the "Feels good to be free!" climax.

I didn't have this song the last time I broke up with someone, and I hope never to need it in that way, but someone will. And now it's there for anyone who ever does.
 
 
illmatic
11:41 / 12.12.07
For me, this year has been the I started getting really excited about new music again, especially grime and dubstep. I'm still not an up to the minute hardened convert - in no small part because listening to grime sets makes me feel like I'm sprinted the 400 metres - but there's some amazing talent out there.

Top of the list for me is Durty Goodz. I've always loved fast relentless lyrics and no one does relentless like Doogz. He's amazing. The Jamaican/USA DNA of Daddy Freddy, The Ragga Twins and the London Posse must be floating around in the water somewhere because it's the distilled essence of all the above, brought up to date for 2007.

I was going to pick the unreleased (as far as I know) "They Back Me" for my tune of the year (see video link in this thread) but a better choice would probably be "Take Back the Scene" from the Axiom EP, where he fucking rips it over Coki's "Tortured" - dubstep and grime combined.

Will up the track later via yousendit if anyone wants to hear it.
 
 
Spaniel
11:49 / 12.12.07
Gwan
 
 
illmatic
13:20 / 12.12.07
I'll do it when I get in tonight. Was deafened by the silence when I did it in the previous Durty thread.
 
 
illmatic
15:27 / 12.12.07
Here 'tis: Durty Goodz: Take Back the Scene

Let me know what you think. If you like it, I've got a couple of links to some radio sets.

Also, Boboss, have you heard Partha Du Prince: This Bliss - I never thought I'd listen to a whole techno LP again but it is really excellent. It this might be up your alley.
 
 
Closed for Business Time
15:33 / 12.12.07
That's.... really fukin good! Cheers Feral!
 
 
illmatic
15:38 / 12.12.07
I love this tune so much, I have to rewind it every time I play it. Ideally, though you don't want it on a PC. Blast it through some proper speakers.

and we do it for dem man that move gully on the d-low
in the back of the club wid the weed smoke
and the girls in the club looking pretty wid da curves in the new Moschino...
RRREEWINDDDD!
 
 
illmatic
18:22 / 13.12.07
Well, now don't all rush to tell me how you enjoyed it.

I hate Barbelith. Shut it down, Tom!
 
 
Spaniel
20:01 / 13.12.07
Will download and listen to it at work tomorrow. Promise.
 
 
grant
20:02 / 13.12.07
I could dance to that.

I haven't been dancing in... y e a r s.
 
 
grant
20:03 / 13.12.07
(p.s. please don't shut down Barbelith, thank you)

This actually reminds me of the apocalypse speech in Brother From Another Planet.
 
 
Spaniel
12:13 / 14.12.07
Was good! I'm not that into Grime - probably because I've never actually listened to very much of it - but it seems tome that one of the forms strengths is the way that the lyrics are so well-suited to a relentless, machine-gun-like approach, and that's just what this tune does so well.

It. Never. Lets. Up. Until it's beaten it's way into your flailing limbs.
 
 
illmatic
06:31 / 15.12.07
True dat. I've been listening to a couple of old Rinse FM radio sets and it's like drinking a load of coffee, smoking 3 Malboro Reds and then sprinting 400 meters.

That's a compliment by the way.
 
 
rizla mission
21:43 / 15.12.07
I could dance to that.

I haven't been dancing in... y e a r s.

I'm sure you'd be a radical dancer, grant.

You should get back into it!
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
12:13 / 18.12.07
El-P - 'Tasmanian Pain Coaster'

Damn you, El-P, for a) making me want to quote lyrics at length like that, and b) making me love a track that features the Mars Volta. (Yeah, I know, everybody needs to get over their desire to remain pure.)

Anyway, 'TPC' is one of those thrilling, epic opening tracks, the kind you never get tired of hearing. It pulls off that admirable trick of perfectly capturing claustrophobic anxiety BUT also being, y'know, actually enjoyable to listen to even when you're in a good mood. El-P's very good at that at his best, I guess maybe because he's listened to the right records. Also like a lot of his best stuff, this track is totally of the city - specifically Brooklyn, New York, of course, but it could almost be anywhere that has that denseness, that darkness, that mass...

It's hard to know for sure, I have no statistical data, but the way the crowd at the show I saw in Camden in April seemed to know every word suggested to me that this song has already become something of a touchstone. It does seem to capture a mindstate: the personal and political united in an uneasy underlying sick feeling... It reminds me, I have to say, pompous as these analogies are, of Ginsberg's 'Howl', being as it is in part a eulogy for shell-shocked fucked-up minds of El-P's generation, destroyed by madness ("ooh yeah, anxiety is freedom").
 
 
Essential Dazzler
22:58 / 18.12.07
Gallows - Orchestra of Wolves

Far and away the most surprising bands to get Daytime Radio 1 airplay this year. It's hard to pick a favourite from this album but i'm going to go with the title track.

Gallows are a brutal little punk-rock band and their debut album is astonishingly fun for 40 minutes of noisy, raw guitars fueled by pure hate.

Every track drips with misanthropic bile and hatred, which is nothing new, but it all sounds so genuine, because the album sounds like it's primary motivating factor is love and a belief in all that's good and a total disgust at the awful things people do.

Orchestra of Wolves is a filthy, unpleasent blast of noise. They hate you because they care, they make you suffer because you deserve it. Love your Mum.
 
 
uncle retrospective
10:06 / 20.12.07
This year was far too good for music for me to just stick to ten songs. So here's another 12. I'm not sure I've sold these as well but here we go, everyone a gem.

Annuals
Having spent most of the year supporting the Flaming Lips around the world (well Europe at least) it was good to see them get some of the attention they deserve. Coming firmly in the art school side of rock you can hear bits of The Flaming Lips and Arcade Fire in the music and I have great hopes for their second album. This is the opening track off their debut and unfortunately is leagues better than everything else they’ve done. 3 minutes of a wistful build potters about and then the drums come in and suddenly you’re in Anthem World.
Brother

Daft Punk

I’ve never been a Daft Punk fan. I just never got the rush everyone else seemed to get off them. All their tracks are too long and boring on the albums.
Then I went to see them live and was converted. This is off Alive 2007 recorded in France. It’s a mash up of Primetime of your Life, Brainwasher and Rollin’ and Scratchin’ into one stomping acid techno masterpiece. So, so good.
Prime/Brain/Rollin Mash up

Malajube

More Montreal music. This time in French. I’m going to use the word stomping again, maybe even use the phrase “knees up” in a Bowie kinda way. This is upbeat and jaunty as hell. I will warn you though, listening to it while walking will result in strutting.
Montreal -40c

Shellac
Was never mad on Shellac, they have a few good songs on each album but I’ve always been a bit blah to them. This is one of their great songs. A claustrophobic song about the last DJ on earth looking for a listener. It reminds me of Prayer to God in the repetitive guitar riff but the breaks into full on shellac rock are amazing.
The End of Radio

The National
Boxer is my album of the year by a long shot, dark and romantic and, well, a bit silly. This is the first song on the CD and I have not stopped listening to it since I got it. Starting off with piano and a Tinderstick croon it builds until the almost military drums kick in leading us to the brass fanfare at the end of it. It’s simple and enough to melt the coldest heart.
Fake Empire

The Field

I’m not a man for minimal anything. I’m a big fan of “more is more” but the album From Here we go Sublime really got under my skin. While it is full of the usual dark clicks and beats that makes the genre so bloody dull but it has a lightness that makes it stand out as the year’s best dance album. This track starts off quite dark but 2 minutes the mood lifts and it sounds comparable to Orbital at their best.
Everday

Dry County

Another Irish band (Irish music is getting much better now that the tyranny of the Singer/Songwriter has ended). This is a group who make music like an indie band but instead of a wall of noise they go into a techno stomp. Delayed starts with an industrial sounding beat which leads into a toe tapper of a song that then destroys the place with techno. Gotta love it.
Delayed by 5

iLiKETRAiNS

This Leeds Post Rock band stand out because of their vocals (and almost Goth they’re so deep) and the fact that all their songs are about soundtracking the lives of obscure historical figures. It’s an odd choice but it seams to work very well for them. This one is about Donald Crowhurst a man who faked a round the world trip, came to believe that life was an evolutionary stage whereby a man who realised the Truth could ascend to the status of a cosmic being. Then upon completion of his thesis he’s thought to have thrown himself overboard the ship he was travelling on, his celebrity status in Heaven seemingly assured. Odd choice, but great song.
The Deception

Les Savy Fav

I only heard of these guys at ATP this year and was blown away. It’s the sort of American indie rock that I haven’t heard in years. High energy, aggressive and a whole boat load of fun. This is the choice cut from Let’s Stay Friends.
The Equestrian

Paul Hartnoll

The Orbital brothers launched their solo albums this year and while Long Range aren’t very good Phil’s album follows on nicely from Orbital. This is a b side to Patchwork Guilt and is more of a dance number than appeared on the album. Yup, it sounds like an Orbital floor filler. Nice.
Gloopy

Modest Mouse

I only got into MM this year when some one sent me 3rd Planet. I quickly ate up all their albums and fell in love with We Were Dead. (And they were great at ATP) This is the best track off WWD. It starts off with a jaunty acoustic part building up until the full band are playing in a lush wall of noise and the the trumpet blaring. Magic stuff.
Spitting Venom

Air Formation

Do you miss Slowdive too? Is there an empty place in your soul for warn shoegazing loveliness? Well Air Formation are hear to help you. This sounds like it could have come off Souvlaki and I can’t offer much higher praise.
Cold Morning
 
 
Pingle!Pop
18:24 / 21.12.07
Arcade Fire - Intervention
Working for the church! While your life falls apart!

I never really caught onto Arcade Fire the first time round; they made some fun danceable songs, but didn't really catch my imagination. I'm really liking them, though, in full goth-pomp mode, and Intervention is about the most brilliantly goth-pomp song you can get.

Muse should take note: the way to make utterly preposterous melodrama sound brilliant (particularly in a club) isn't a load of guitar wankery, but church organs. Played really, really loud. And over those church organs, not high-pitched teenage wails, but doom-laden intonations that sound as old as the gods themselves. It feels completely impersonal, but from the first declaration that "The king's! Taken back! The throne!" to the final weighty warnings and lamentations, it's incredibly gratifying.
 
 
petunia
21:10 / 21.12.07
I've been wanting to write about this track for ages, but it's hard...

So it starts off with a melancholy beat fluttered over with warm misty sorrow slowsynth. Give a couple of bars and:

"Maybe we could make it all right
We could make it better sometime
Maybe we could make it happen baby"

She sings with soft sadness that makes you believe in everything she says. It reminds me of being a tiny kid and falling in love with characters in cheap love films. The longing and yearning that knows it can't get there and is made stronger by this knowledge. I want to fall in love with the singer.

We get a two-note glimpse of the strings to come and then her singing tempo steps up for:

"We could keep trying
but things will never change
So I don’t look back
Still I’m dying with every step I take
But I don’t look back"

At the start of this block, the fast 'dunudunudunudunu' of the music machines starts. Adds to tempo. It's sad, but this is a dance song, a Pop song. It doesn't let up.

She steps into another verse and the drumbeat gets a little more insistent. Inbetween her words there are breaths. Breathing in, gasp and sigh, perfect timing adding to the act, to the belief in the role. Reminds me of 'Girl' by the Beatles - Lennon's heavy sighs. Her voice remains taught and I want to stop her from crying. Because she might, you know.

"Just a little, little bit better
Good enough to waste some time
Tell me would it make you happy baby"

All the lyrics so quick. Glimpses from a train of a city romance.

And again with the chorus and the strings break in with all the soaring substantiality they bring. They raise the emotion to a relisation of movement - a height to the sadness where it sees its dawn, the sorrow already changing. A flying peak, a flash of the evening sun through the walls and concrete. Reminder.

And the strings stop and we have a high fast scale run by the synth to remind us again that this is a pop song and a dance song. I'm reminded of scenes in 'Interstella 5555', reminded of that enthusiatic optimism shown in Daft Punk's Discovery. But this time it's simpler. Just a scale run up and down. Little pink stars.

And she drops in, repeating a line again and again. Perfect timing, beating heart. Every syllable given its own space, its own beat. Just again and again she repeats and you realise it's ending.

You want it to go on and on, but the four minutes are up and that's already too long for a pop song. You want to extend the whole thing, turn it into an epic, remix it to eternity, hold onto the feelings it holds secret within it, but you know you never could. To change any part of what happened would make it less. To extend it, impossible. The song leaves the perfect residue feeling of a break-up and of a broken heart. The longing for something you no longer want. Tears.

It's left repeating in your head, consuming your thought, making itself much more than just the passing moment it held in time. Again and again

"And it hurts with every heartbeat
And it hurts with every heartbeat
And it hurts with every heartbeat"

|

Andreas Kleerup with Robyn - With Every Heartbeat

I think it might have ended up released as by Robyn alone, but i'm not sure.

I'm also aware that it got a lot of radio play over the summer, so the track may not have the same cosy 'mineness' for those of you in the UK who listen to the radio or watch music tv. It's still very special for me. Really lovely song.
 
 
uncle retrospective
12:42 / 30.12.07
One last track and I'm only putting it in cause I only heard it this year, it's been around a long time.

The track is from the Eureka 7 soundtrack and it's by Denki Groove. Rainbow is an amazing song to warm the heart, it's the sound of a J pop/techno band stealing Belfast by Orbital and making a beautful pop song with boy/girl singing over it. Go on try it you'll fall in love to.
 
 
Seth
15:30 / 04.01.08
Leona Lewis - Bleeding Love

It makes my heart glad that the X-Factor can give a career to someone so monumentally gifted, showcased here on a song that hits you so hard that it hurts. Lyrically universal without being trite, vocally emotional without being overwrought, an arrangement so in touch with its own history (Whitney Houston at her best) and so gracefully attuned to its subtle dynamic that when it slides into half-time for the ending it hits an emotional climax where most producers would have opted for a cheap crescendo. I am very, very excited to hear her album on the strength of this.
 
 
Seth
15:40 / 04.01.08
Nice to see a mention of Rainbow from the Eureka Seven soundtrack too (unarguably the greatest soundtrack to a television show that I've ever heard, especially the orchestral score, first closing theme and third and fourth opening themes. The fourth is the best opening theme in history, period).

I played Rainbow to a friend who had never seen the series, and his comment summed up what a great song it is: he said it was like that moment in romantic stories when the woman is at the airport about to fly to somewhere unreachable, and the man is heading there at breakneck speeds in a taxi to declare his love for her and stop her before she leaves his life forever. And yes, it does soundtrack that moment... if you replace the taxi with a giant robot and the airport with the End of the World. That it can so perfectly evoke the moment it supports sets it up there with Cameron Crowe's finest soundtracking choices.

But let me mention again that Sakura by Nirgilis is the greatest opening theme in history, one that I won't link to here because you really need to see close to forty episodes to understand how much the show earns a moment so audacious, so transcendant, so sucker-punching, so triumphant.
 
  

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