Since it’s nearly the end of the year, and since I write for a weekly newspaper and an mp3 blog that is obsessed with new fave songs, I have naturally been revisiting the last 12 months and making various lists of what I liked/remember.
At least one proper year-end best of will be posted here after Christmas, but before I make my final judgments on that stuff, I am scouring the flood of lists already out there to see what favorite songs I might have missed.
Two from Said the Gramophone’s Favourite 50 Songs of 2007:
Parts & Labor - “Fractured Skies”
If this one from the Brooklyn trio’s Mapmaker (Jagjaguar/Brah) isn’t your new favorite song on first listen, you get your money back. These lines from a N.Y. Times review are nice: “Dan Friel and BJ Warshaw hoist sustained vocal lines that might almost be Celtic folk tunes if they weren’t taking place amid such a din. … songs roar through the mental landscape of a post-9/11 New York; the attack is compounded of fury, paranoia, confusion and portents of disaster.” Woah!
[ website ] [ Jagjaguwar Records ] [ Brah Records ] [ myspace ]
Unh! I said, “Unh! Give it to me!” I adore Amerie, and I am shocked that I didn’t come across this funky one-song party until now.
[ website ]
I am a little surprised that Pitchfork’s Top 100 Tracks of 2007 only had one song (that I didn’t already have on the Best of 2007 list) that I wanted to add as a new fave:
I’ve already visited Panda Bear this year and I let it pass without much consideration. But after seeing it on Pitchfork’s, and every other music blog’s list, I put on fresh ears and was lulled into submission by the fog, and jarred awake by visitors materializing and disappearing back into the shroud.
[ Paw Tracks Records ] [ myspace ]
And, to round out today’s catch-up post (total of SIX new faves, plus one Chico band of the week) here’s a few I’ve been holding onto…
Another little pebble I greedily picked up from STG. I put this one in my pocket months ago and passed it over somehow. I throw it out for you now to find, pick up, and fiddle with in your pocket as you follow along the lonely trail upon which NICO (Nicolas Jaar) has placed his crumbs.
[ website ]
Portland, Oregon’s Francofile bro/sis duo have followed up their nonpariel Hell is Eux Autres with another hand-clapping collection of dark pop songs disguised as sunny pop songs–Cold City. The last :27 seconds here will slay you! (Eux Autres played Chico last week and I did not go, which I really, really regret.)
[ website ] [ Happy Happy Birthday To Me Records ] [ myspace ]
Another treasure from Aurgasm. Australian model meets Parisian producer and makes clean electropop goodness (White T-Shirt, Tempest Recordings) … and one sweet and breezy ballad.
[ myspace ]
And, your belated Chico band of the week song…
Red Track Jacket - “ee does it comma write” [ listen here ]
RTJ is originally a Chico band, but is now officially a Chico/Merced, CA duo. [Full disclosure–RTJ contains two of YNFS’s bestest friends.]
This is pretty lo-fi demo, but I defy you not to be humming “doodoo doodoodoo / doodoo doodoo doo doo doo doo doo” for the rest of the week after listening to it.
Bonus, since RTJ is the first of the featured Chico bands of the week to still be an actual band, this song is also a proper New Fave Song. So, there’s that.
