visual madness

Over the course of this year a whole slew of great albums came out, providing brilliant soundscapes and audio experiences for those of us who were willing to hunt them down. Here are ten of my favorites.

10. Black Moth Super Rainbow – Eating Us

I’ve been a huge fan of Black Moth’s dreamy, psychedelic, Vocoder-ridden sound since I first picked up Sun Lips about a year ago. Admittedly, their music isn’t for everyone, so for a while I was kind of hesitant about recommending the band to people whose tastes I wasn’t completely sure of. However, with the advent of Eating Us the band has managed to create a sound that’s both otherworldy and surprisingly accessible at the same time, which will hopefully encourage more newcomers to check into the rest of their (amazing) back catalog.

To be completely honest, I didn’t really care for the last three tracks of the album, which is why this isn’t higher up (or in this case, down) in the list. Then again, when you have such an array of showstoppers like The Sticky, Twin of Myself, Dark Bubbles and Born On A Day The Sun Didn’t Rise, it’s only reasonable that you’re allowed a few ‘misses’ every now and again.

That being said, the first 9 tracks of this album are absolutely solid, and make for a perfect soundtrack to a lazy afternoon of chillin’ out, maxin’ and relaxin’ all cool. When you’re done listening to the album be sure to check out their interactive video for Dark Bubbles. Like the band, it’s a one-of-a-kind experience.

And lastly: if you think their current band name is a mouthful, just remember that they used to be called satanstompingcaterpillars. No joke.

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Black Moth Super Rainbow – “The Sticky“

9. Sykur – Frábært eða frábært

When I first wrote about Sykur earlier on in the year they only had a couple of tracks up on their MySpace. Flash forward to about 7 months later, and the Icelandic trio now has a full-fledged album under their belts, which, not unlike the band name, is really, really sweet.

Most of my thoughts on these guys’ work can be found in the aforementioned link above, but if there’s one major additional comment I had to give regarding Frábært eða frábært it would have to be the step up in professionalism, as far as the recording is concerned. Songs that used to be on their MySpace like Nakti apinn (formerly known by its English name, Naked Ape) sound so much richer in detail, Swedish Snowboard Girl has a whole new intro, and Rakel Mjöll’s vocals in Rocketship truly have to be heard to be believed.

Given their immense talent and energy, I’m sure these guys will be huge in a few years. And when they are, you know where you heard about them first… BUAHAHAHAHAHA

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Sykur – “Nakti apinn“

8. Passion Pit – Manners

Passion Pit sort of burst onto the scene this year, first with the quick-as-wildfire campus-wide spreading of Chunk of Change, then later on with their full-on debut LP Manners. The band’s been breaking big ever since, even landing an appearance on Jimmy Kimmel earlier this week.

Even if you don’t listen to much indie music you’ve probably heard them on a number of commercials, including that Canadian PSP ad and the recent spot for the Palm Pixi. There’s a real inspiring spark of life in all of their tracks, a visual manifestation of which you can see in the music video for Little Secrets that I posted a while back.

As of this time of writing I’ll be going to see them play in Pomona later today, so hopefully that gives you an inkling how much I enjoy these guys’ work.

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Passion Pit – “Sleepyhead“

7. Neon Indian – Psychic Chasms

Aaaaaand on that note, another band I got to see earlier this year was Neon Indian, whose hit Deadbeat Summer made me an instant convert to the chillwave genre, despite having some less-than-satisfactory encounters with other bands of that type before.

All in all the album runs at a surprisingly short 30 and a half minutes, but that’s not to say it’s less of an experience in any way—if anything, the sheer density of each track more than makes up for it.

Add that to the fact that, layered on top of the super lo-fi sound are a smattergasm of ridiculously catchy hooks and you’ve got yourself yet another fantastically fun debut LP on this list. In a row, even! Haha.

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Neon Indian – “Deadbeat Summer“

6. E-603 – Torn Up

Apologies for the c-c-c-c-c-c-cccombo-breaker! here, but Torn Up is by no means E-603’s debut effort—that would have to go to 2008’s Something For Everyone, which is also every bit as amazing in its own right.

As with Sykur, I have detailed a pretty lengthy description of my admiration for this guy’s work before, but for the lazy (or click-impaired) readers of this site, imagine every song you’ve ever heard from on the radio from high school to present day all blended together into something that’s not only listenable, but pants-wettingly fun at the same time. That’s Torn Up for ya.

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E-603 – “Push ‘Em Up“

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We all have our little guilty pleasures in life, be it Tater Tots, MTV Cribs, or watching Nicholas Cage in The Wicker Man. For me, there is no pleasure, no rapture, no exquisite sin greater… than the fine art of White Rap.

Now, when most people hear the words “White Rap”, images of Eminem, The Beastie Boys and perhaps even the venerable Mark Wahlberg usually come to mind. To me, these people aren’t white rappers – just rappers that happen to be white.

True White Rap is what you get when you take an art form and have it performed by people whom it was never, ever intended for. The resulting product is something so awesome it’ll make you want to rip the face off of a 5th-grader.

So without further ado, here are 10 of the most outrageously badass White Rap songs… EVER.

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Even though my first viewing of 12 Monkeys at age 12 was what opened the door for me as far as film-making went, it was only when I started making little flourish videos in ‘04 that I finally walked through it. In making my flourish montages, I always had one simple rule – I had to know what song I was using before I put the video together.

When I did HFFH four years ago, even before shooting it I knew I was going to use that particular track off of the WWE Anthology. Likewise, Void Deck was destined to have Emily Haine’s haunting voice in the background. And one of the reasons Portable Playground took so long to come out was because I had to find that one song that fit – eventually I did, and now I can’t imagine anything other than Sam Roberts’ track playing in its stead.

So I guess when it comes down to it, one could say I’m a music video maker with a very specific subject. And while I don’t consider myself as much of a music-video nut as I do a film geek (more on that next time), it’s a format that I’ve come to be very fascinated with. » Read the rest of this entry «