We’ve had a recent influx of videos for some excellent new tunes and thought it was high time we shared some of them…
We’ve got TERRY’s line-dancing vid for Hot Heads, dancers from Ballet Austin in Adam Torres’ new video for Juniper Arms, Julie Ruin’s video for their excellent track I’m Done, the return of MM faves Loch Lomond and their video for Pens From Spain, and Metronomy’s new video for Night Owl.
Then there is Diane & The Gentle Men’s tongue-in-cheek video for Motorcycle, a classic tale of teenage rebellion, and finally Soft Fang’s excellent musical film for The Wilderness.
Download Girls – Honey Bunny mp3 (from Father, Son, Holy Ghost)Removed by order some uninformed halfwit – available everywhere else for free on the web
So, the penultimate entry before Mrs Mackerel finishes off this year’s set of Top Ten postings tomorrow is my very own.
Without further ado…
10. Milk Music – Beyond Living
Although it was released early in the year, I only discovered it recently. A full on, no holds barred, nihilistic 70s punk attitude and the very best of the heavyweight riffs of the grunge era is a mighty powerful combination. One that makes me wish my car stereo went all the way up to eleven.
Similarly, Yuck’s Holing Out effortlessly recalled the 90s with a crunchy distorted riff, reverb and a fuzz slathered hook. That it also had one of the best videos of the year was just another bonus.
If there is one mystery to me in the world of music, then it is how James Jackson Toth aka Wooden Wand can be so damn prolific across so many genres and yet suffer no discernible dip in quality – not that I’m complaining. Another great year and too many tracks to choose from, but in the end it was this, seemingly an afterthought on his forthcoming boxset that makes up Volume 3 of his archives – a simple folk ballad that still managed to be head and shoulders above most things released this year.
Top ten from the opening moments of this song; the hazy, shimmering guitar and the lazy drawled vocals intoning
“I don’t want to change, but I don’t want to stay the same I don’t want to go but I’m running I don’t want to work, but I don’t want to sit around all day frowning
I don’t want to give up, but I kinda want to lie down But not sleep just rest Give me a break how much does it really take? Get my head outta here”
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6. Henry’s Funeral Shoe – Dog Scratched Ear
It made a lot of other MM guest top tens so no need to add anything new. Anthemic, swaggering blues boogie at its fiery best.
I’ve mentioned this two or three times recently and posted it earlier today so not much more needs to be said about this either. Simply that it is pure, sugar-coated garage pop with just the right amount of surf inspired twang that in a parallel world would have been the woozy, feel-good hit of the summer.
Download The Royal Sea – This Summer mp3 (from The Royal Sea)
4. Deer Tick – Chevy Express
Deer Tick’sDivine Providence was, mostly, a rowdy, rambunctious good time rock’n’roll record that was meant for late nights of whiskey drinking and bar-room brawls. But tucked away in the middle of all the heady intoxication was this track: sombre, reflective, and undeniably sobering. It was the soundtrack to a heavy heart and lonely regret washed by the first light of an early morning dawn and may well be the best thing they’ve ever done.
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3. Felice Brothers – Fire At The Pageant
Voodoo, zombies, sinister nursery rhyme chants, classic Felice Brothers lyrics and a woozy, old-timey, back porch rhythm means this song should have been an utter mess. That it was the complete opposite stands tribute to this bunch of ramshackle mavericks of increasingly experimental Americana.
The most bitterly caustic song I heard all year meant it was a shoe-in for my top ten. I originally said “it drips venom over a heavy, single drumbeat, a vicious guitar strum, and spits lyrics like physical bullets”, and this still sounds a pretty fair summation to me.
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1. Middle Brother – Daydreaming
From the simple picked guitar line and weary, melancholy opening lyric, the scene is set for a raw, unflinching excursion courtesy of McCauley’s craggy vocals and beer-soaked romanticism. Loneliness never sounded so…well, lonely.
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Almost Made It
The Wooden Shjips pulverising Lazy Bones, Tom Williams & The Boat’s observationally wry and off kilter Wouldn’t Women Be Sweet, the blistering euphoria of Wye Oak’sCivilian, and LONG’s criminally ignored and under-rated Shoot Your Dog. If there was a better example of dark, claustrophobic psych-rock this year than the Ganglian’sJungle then I didn’t hear it, while A.A. Bondy’s dark-hearted The Twist and Twilight Hotel’s epic road trip Mahogany Veneer were both superb examples of modern Americana. Back home, Metronomy’s ultra catchy The Look, and Male Bonding’s fuzzed up, yet still sugary What’s That Scene? flew the flag for the UK – on another day, in another year, all could so easily have been in the final shake up.
Download The Ganglians – Jungle mp3 (from Still Living)
Download Metronomy – The Look mp3 (from The English Riviera)
Favourite Covers
Hurray for the Riff Raff’s mesmerising My Sweet Lord and Phosphorescent’s reverent take on Neil Young’sAre You Ready For The Country? were both outstanding, but just pipped by Siskiyou’s own Young cover, the skeletally menacing Revolution Blues. Titus Andronicus payed due homage to Nirvana’s classic Breed, but best of all was Middle Brother’s version of the Replacement’sPortland.
How on earth had Okkervil River escaped me for so long, particularly John Allyn Smith Sails and the superb For Real. Likewise with Wilco’sMisunderstood – I’d heard it, but this year I actually listened to it. Shellac’sPrayer To God is the most vicious song I’ve ever heard and one of the best, and so too Fugazi’sWaiting Room. Richard Buckner’s heartbreaking Emma was a revelation and James McMurty’s rollicking live version of Choctaw Bingo was eight minutes of pure, adrenalin fuelled Americana.
So, the penultimate entry before Mrs Mackerel finishes off this year’s set of Top Ten postings tomorrow is my very own.