Thursday, December 29, 2011

Twelve of 11


A list of my favorite tracks of 2011.  No specific order and no claims of completeness, just the tracks I loved over the last year for reasons various and mostly subjective.  
  1. Ghostpoet – Survive It (Quest’s Guidance mix)
  2. Clams Casino – Brainwash by London
  3. Holy Other – Touch
  4. Drake – Dreams Money Can buy
  5. Dj Rum – Mountains, Parts 2 & 3
  6. Floating Points – Myrtle Avenue
  7. Falty DL – Mean Streets, Part 1
  8. The Weeknd – Wicked Games.
  9. Schlomo – Just Us
  10. Rick Wilhite – Blame it on the Boogie (feat. Theo Parrish & Osunlade)
  11. Julio Bashmore – Battle for Middle You
  12. Jamie xx – Far Nearer
Ghostpoet – Survive It (Quest’s Guidance mix)
“I know, Times are hard, You're against the wall, and your head is down…”  The weary, yet determined, optimism of Ghostpoet’s lyrics perfectly captures the dire resilience that colored 2011.  And, Quest’s remix, haunted by both the dread weight of ’06 dubstep and the bittersweet swing of classic UKG amplifies that sense of struggle at the songs heart.

Clams Casino – Brainwash by London
Everything Clams Casino touched this year was gold.  However, this smoked-out sub-base work out was a personal favorite for soundtracking late night subway rides.  The shouty bit at 1:30 is a great reichian sing-along moment.

Holy Other – Touch
A long cold draft of liquid longing and desperation.  The comparison to Burial is unavoidable but here all that late night hum is devoid of skittering beats or nostalgia.  This is the best in a long list of excellent releases of dark electronics from Tri-Angle over the course of the year.

Drake – Dreams Money Can buy
The love/hate relationship with Drake continues.  Yeah, his constant whinging over the melancholy of cars, money, women and fame should be grating, insulting or by this point tired but somehow you find yourself relating to the emotions even if the specifics are absurd.  The touches of self-deprecation and the off-kilter, self-destructing beats certainly help.

Dj Rum – Mountains, Parts 2 & 3
Widescreen, moody, sub-laced atmospherics.  This track should be too noodley, overly melodramatic, disjointed.  Instead, it reclaims and repurposes the emphasis on bass and space that dubstep discarded on its way to mainstream dancefloors.

Floating Points – Myrtle Avenue
Brilliant in every way.   This track is in a constant state of subtle flux, slowly writhing and contorting, the beats growing and tightening until they peek intensity and then, when you expect a huge synth flourish or massive drop, Floating Points simply places you down in new aural surroundings, not entirely unfamiliar but fresh and airy.  Then the process begins again.  The fact that that gorgeous vocal flourish (Fatima?) doesn’t appear until over 7 minutes in, is testament alone to the masterful amount of restraint at work here.

Falty DL – Mean Streets, Part 1
A number of Falty DL tunes from the past year could have made the cut (Hip Love. Lucky Luciano, Here We Go Again remix…).  But this is perhaps the most unique and, pressed in a limited vinyl only run, the hardest to track down.  Lagos by way of Brooklyn and Croydon,  I do not understand how this wasn’t a huge anthem. 

The Weeknd – Wicked Games
No one had a bigger year than The Weeknd.  Doubling down on Drake’s emo-bling and taking the beats edgier and sparser, the result is an addictive brew of filthy late-night R&B from the edge of the abyss.   This track came with an amazing, supposedly unsolicited video (NSFW).

Schlomo – Just Us
I’m on a dawn plane, unslept and hungover, reality lurching and pitching around me like I am out at sea instead stuck on the LGA tarmac.  This song rises through a folder full of random odds and ends on my MP3 player, with no artist or track info, only the unhelpful cover art.  Its frayed, skittering beats and haunted underwater carnival synths are the perfect complement to my state of mind.   It takes more than a week before I track down the info.  

Rick Wilhite – Blame it on the Boogie (feat. Theo Parrish & Osunlade)
"slick rick was in the house, turning it out, the girls were all singing lad di da di, I guess we were having a party…" The official Den of Iniquities party jam.  More fun than a serious Detroit house track should be allowed to be.

Julio Bashmore – Battle for Middle You
The hands down dancefloor anthem of the year.  Classic house and garage (Doomsnight Revisted?) are encoded in its DNA, yet it sounds like nothing else out there.  The call to “stomp your feet and get down” is superfluous.  Like you have any choice.

Jamie xx – Far Nearer
Oh, the steel drums!!  I played this more times this year than all the other tracks on this list combined.  If you stepped in my house or anywhere I was allowed control of the selection you heard it.  In the winter it made you dream of beaches and sunshine.  In the Spring and Summer it compelled you to sip cocktails in the sun and dance under open skies.

The most grin-inducing, joyously filthy thing I've heard in ages.