2009 RELEASED albums ranked
Submitted by Feif Umgotnn on Fri, 01/23/2009 - 12:52
Tags:
- I WOULD LOVE ANY RECOMMENDATIONS!!!!!!!!!!!!!
- and i will be reviewing my list at the end of the year so do not worry too much on EXACT order, but worry about which category each album goes into.
- SONGS
- this is not a good list of best songs, but they are some that i enjoyed – very poppy
- 1. Animal Collective: "Summertime Clothes" - Merriweather Post Pavilion - the 12” single they put out is shit, the electronic covers of the song suck, i clearly hate electronic music with few exceptions – it made what is a warm song lifeless; the guts of electronic music is to gut other types of music, it is all mind and no heart – stay away
- 2. Azita: "Away" - How Will You?
- 3. Dirty Projectors: "Cannibal Resource" - Bitte Orca
- 4. Animal Collective: "In The Flowers" - Merriweather Post Pavilion
- 5. The Crocodiles: "Refuse Angels" - Summer Of Hate
- Azita: "I’m Happy" - How Will You? - free listen from Drag City
- A Journey Down The Well: “Sugarman” - Sorry Monsters, I Have To Grow
- The Decemberists: “The Rake’s Song” - Hazards Of Love - this was all that i really got out of the entire album.
- Jackie-O Motherfucker: "Lord Of The Underpass" - Freedomland
- Heartless Bastards: "The Mountain" - The Mountain - you can listen to it for free by clicking on their name here or below.
- Blackout Beach: "The Whistle" - Skin Of Evil
- Animal Collective: "Brother Sport" - Merriweather Post Pavilion
- A Journey Down The Well: “New Abandoned Places On Earth” - Sorry Monsters, I Have To Grow
- Azita: "Come William" - How Will You?
favorites
exceptional
- Elegi: Varde - you can listen to tracks 2 & 3 for free on his myspace page, but that hardly says anything about the album.
good
- Ant-Bee: Electronic Church Muzik - sorry, the album is not yet released, and i got my copy from Ant-Bee and willn’t share it – i hope he gets the funding sooner rather than later. ECM is a mix of his first two albums diluted with maturity, and all that still makes for one of the best albums of the decade. some songs are available to listen to on his radio show that i have archived here
- A Journey Down The Well: Sorry Monsters, I Have To Grow - the “Bush Horror Movie Soundtrack” (samples of gunfire and death statistics from the Iraq War and in general any conflict of the last 8 years) was an annoying departure from the elegant, and quirky minimal classical music that played before and after – i do not think that kind of theory of music works, at least not for me. with that aside, there is not much other wasted space or wasted energy.
- Bat For Lashes: Two Suns - not sure, needs another listen at the end of the year
- Cloaks: Versus Grain
- Azita: How Will You?
- Alva Noto: Xerrox, Vol. 2 - sounds like a modern Irrlicht, sometimes literally.
- St. Vincent: Actor
- Andrew Bird: Noble Beast (2008) – “Effigy”, “Tenuousness”
- Hope Sandoval & the Warm Inventions: Through The Devil Softly - i am a fan of Hope Sandoval
- Dälek: Gutter Tactics
- Tim Hecker: An Imaginary Country
- Animal Collective: Merriweather Post Pavilion (2008) – “My Girls”, “Summertime Clothes”, “Brother Sport” – after another listen i found that i like tracks 1, 2, 4, and 11. everything else is just boring, not to say that every moment of the other songs are brilliant, they are just not boring. “My Girls” has the obvious wide spread appeal with a simple melody at a steady pace that recalls Panda Bear’s Person Pitch without the insanity. “Summertime Clothes” is my melodic bright spot; as the walking starts i forget about the other 7 songs i dislike. Animal Collective wore down the edges and made a really mainstream record, a record so baroque and lush it makes Phil Spector blush. and this WILL still probably be everyone’s #1 because of how much pop appeal there is with hints of obscure electronic manipulations – just the right recipe i suppose, but there is 10 months to go until anything is anywhere close to being finalized. - i am coming around to this album, though i doubt it will be anywhere close to the top by the end of the year.
- Dirty Projectors: Bitte Orca
- The Fiery Furnaces: I’m Going Away - more straight forward songs that do no stand-out, without the quirks of their previous albums nor as good.
- Blackout Beach: Skin Of Evil (2008) - “The Whistle”
- Akron/Family: Set ‘Em Wild, Set ‘Em Free - i need to revisit this album to put the new albums in perspective.
- Shit & Shine: 229 2299: Girls Against Shit
- Church of Misery: Houses of the Unholy
- Legion of Two: Riffs
- Jack With One Eye: The Bad Sleep Well - shoegaze revival
- Billy Bao: May 08
- James Blackshaw: The Glass Bead Game - pleasant to listen to, but nothing special
- Lisa Germano: Magic Neighbor - this is nothing special for the casual fan, but I love singer/songwriters, and Lisa Germano is probably 2nd only to Bob Dylan on my scale of personal importance for singer/songwriters, and Bob Dylan is de facto my favorite (of any sound artist - though he is not known for his sound composition, not even by me), so she ranks very high on my list: I am too partial to her.
decent
- Woods: Songs of Shame
- Bob Dylan: Together Through Life
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- Grizzly Bear: Veckatimest
- Yeah Yeah Yeahs: It’s Blitz!
- Bibio: Ambivalence Avenue
- The Crocodiles: Summer Of Hate
- Black Lips: 200 Million Thousand
- Cotton Jones: Paranoid Cocoon
- LSD March: Under Milk Wood
- Red Horse: Red Horse - experimental music with most of its composition rooted in aleatory, and This Heat’s (especially Side B) early experiments.
- Hot Chip: Hot Chip EP With Robert Wyatt And Geese
- Beirut: March Of The Zapotec EP/Holland EP
- Six Organs Of Admittance: RTZ (2008) – “Creation Aspect Earth”
- Cheer-Accident: Fear Draws Misfortune (2008) - “Your Weak Heart”
- Antlers: Hospice
- Sunn O))): Monoliths & Dimensions - this was pretty boring
- Les Claypool: Of Fungi And Foe
- Alessi’sArk: Notes From The Treehouse - this is a decent debut of an 18 year old english singer/songwriter whose vocal’s intonation have an uncany resemblance to Joanna Newsom’s, with similar interesting structures, but something seems to be missing here…i think she will get it in the next couple tries, and I cannot wait.
- Faust: C’est…Com…Com…Complique
- The Decemberists: The Hazards of Love - - wow, i cannot believe that “The Rake’s Song” would be THE highlight of the album.
- Mount Kimbie: Maybes EP
- Blank Dogs: Songs For Under And Under Dogs
- Wardruna: Runaljod – Gap Var Ginnunga
- The Hunches: Exit Dreams
- Heartless Bastards: The Mountain - “The Mountain”
- Jackie-O Motherfucker: Freedomland (2006) - these are better compositions than i am used to hearing from newer releases, but the recording is so dull and fuzzy that it may all be an illusion. i like the last 3 songs though, with moments of delicate insanity tickling my ears a bit. “Shukran” fails to capitalize on the ambience of the first 6 minutes when it tries to kick it into gear and instead it just sputters and putters along until the 9th minute where they turn on some effects on the guitars, and ends with the singer thanking inanimate objects with no zeal or much of anything worth revisiting. “Pull My Daisy” is a cuter, longer piece. and the finale with “Lord Of The Underpass”, the potential is probably reached, min for min the best piece as it continues the rhythms of the previous “Ghost Rider” but melts it down into a séance of a deranged girlie voice searching until the halfway mark the band begins its march home – this is the track that could have been SPECIAL, instead it is really really good. this low rating may be a product of a very shitty live recording – as i have read (and clearly not listened to) is a common theme for the band. i wish they would revise this protocol for the better of their own art – no more people are going to buy it than usual, but for those who do may have something worth holding onto.
- Handsome Furs: Face Control
- A.C. Newman: Get Guilty
- Fever Ray: Fever Ray (2008)
- Den Saakaldte: Øl, Mørke Og Depresjon - “Jag ar den fallna” - this is an odd album. some parts are pure death (i want to eat babies) metal, and other parts are extremely quaint, weird. “Øde” and “Gjenspeilingen av Knuste Minner” were goofy, and could have been on a Brian Eno album, whereas “Drikke ens Skal” & “Vandringen” were pure evil. and the finale: “Jag ar den fallna” starts with a saxophone driving along heavily distorted metal guitars before the band just disintegrates into the usual death persona, when halfway it becomes a waltz to the end (for metal that is). and the final bit song “Den Sorgløse Latterens Sang” is another weirdo for a death metal album. this is definitely an album i would not have listened to if it were not for my quest to hear everything that i possibly can from this year (hint: i will not come anywhere close).
- MV & EE With The Golden Road: Drone Trailer - “Anyway” - Drone Trailer is born from the cavernous hippie epoch with a strong Neil Young odor in rhythm and vernacular. the songs are mostly built from jam concepts (“Weatherhead Hollow”) and acoustic ballads (“The Hungry Stones”, “Drone Trailer” & “Twitchin’”) with the two bookends (“Anyway” & “Huna Cosm”) not only juxtaposing themselves but the rest of the album. “Anyway” is a cute distorted pop song with a mild driving guitar and “Huna Cosm” is a spacey ethereal guitar/effect swells song that sucks any life the record had before, but not horrible.
- Wavves: Wavvves
- The Pains of Being Pure At Heart: The Pains of Being Pure At Heart
- Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy: Beware
- Camera Obscura: My Maudlin Career
- The Appleseed Cast: Sagarmatha
- Inara George: An Invitation - one half of The Bird And The Bee, George employs Van Dyke Parks for arrangements that fall short of those found on Ys. her songs are forgettable, but nice to listen to – singer/songwriter type of album.
- Here We Go Magic: Here We Go Magic
- This Will Destroy You/Lymbyc System: Field Studies - barely decent soft post-rock instrumentals by both bands.
- Bon Iver: Blood Bank EP (2008)
- Atlas Sound: Logos
- Ane Brun: Changing of the Seasons
- Kalisia: Cybion - this is one very long song split up into 19 parts, and for those who are a fan of fancy death metal, or a death metal version of Dream Theater: EAT YOUR HEART OUT! as for me, i think the album is respectable, just not my taste.
everything else
- though some are better than others, order can be considered irrelevant
- Bruce Springsteen: Working On A Dream
- Arvo Pärt: In Principio
- Animal Collective: Animal Crack Box (2000 - 2003) - only get this if you are starved for some Animal Collective – there is nothing special here, ONLY FOR FANATICS OF ANIMAL COLLECTIVE like all the bootlegs of Dylan and other artists with similar releases.Fight Like Apes: Fight Like Apes And The Mystery Of The Golden Medallion
- Forgas Band Phenomena: L’axe du fou (Axis Of Evil) - really proggy jazz fusion with violin – very straight forward playing, nothing that stands out melodically or emotionally.
- Ben Folds: Stems And Seeds
- Clue To Kalo: Lily Perdida
- The Bird And The Bee: Ray Guns Are Not Just The Future
- Armia: Der Prozess
- Psychic Ills: Mirror Eye - “Fingernail Tea”
- Antony & The Johnsons: The Crying Light (2008) - Antony is no less of a singer this time around, but the heartbreak is gone from choice pieces on I Am A Bird.
- M. Ward: Hold Time
- Sir Richard Bishop: The Freak Of Araby - sucks – 4/10, maybe
- Air France: No Way Down
- ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead: The Century of Self
- Iran: Dissolver
- Charlie Winston: Hobo (2008)
- Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele: The Good Feeling Music Of Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele
- Franz Ferdinand: Tonight: Franz Ferdinand- just another Franz Ferdinand album. “Ulysses” will warm the charts and have the girls dancing, beyond that, not much at all.
- A Camp: Colonia
- Colossal Yes: Charlemagne’s Big Thaw
- Grave Digger: Ballad Of A Hangman (2008) - normal sounding metal album from a group of veterans that date back to the 80’s. if you were waiting for these guys to come out with another album then go for it. if not, move on.
- Apoptygma Berzerk: Rocket Science - “Butterfly Defect”
- Dakota Suite: The End Of Trying
- Lonely, Dear: Dear John
- Bricolage: Bricolage - a bad attempt at the Arctic Monkeys…that is really saying something – this is NOTHING like Amon Tobin’s Bricolage
- Morrissey: Years Of Refusal
- J. Tillman: Vacilando Territory Blues
- DJ Sprinkles: Midtown 120 Blues
- John Frusciante: The Empyrean - boring album with a stupid cover of Tim Buckley’s “Song To The Siren”.
- The Gourds: Haymaker! - average country rock album – great for ignoring in the car, and i do not mean that in a horrible way, but no track stood out
- Death: …For The Whole World To See
- Cut Off Your Hands: You & I - sounds a little like The Smiths, but mostly like The Killers
- Glasvegas: Glasvegas
- Late of Pier: Fantasy Black Channel (2008)
- Franz Nicolay: Major General
- Exile: Radio
- Napalm Death: Time Waits For No Slave
- Distance: Repercussions
- De Amsterdam Klezmer Band: Zaraza
- Gui Boratto: Take My Breath Away - “Besides” – very boring and flat electronic music.
- Mark Olson & Gary Louis: Ready For The Flood
- Kreator: Hordes Of Chaos - fierce drumming amid predictable and played out metal riffs, with uninspired lyrics (destroy, chaos…).
- Japandroids: Post-Nothing
- The View: Which Bitch?
- Too Pure To Die: Confess
- The Paddingtons: No Mundane Options (2008)
- Absu: Absu
- Reel Big Fish: Fame, Fortune And Fornication
- wishful releases:
- Joanna Newsom: - I hope she gets her new material out before the end of the year!
- My Bloody Valentine:
- Arcade Fire:
- Sufjan Stevens:
- Miss Violetta Beauregarde:
- The Books:
Author Comments:
sources:
i use these the most – random compilations of EVERYTHING being released:
Metacritic
amazon.com’s lists of new releases
Rate your music comprehensive lists: 1, 2 - and any other list of best/favorite albums from RYM users, and Listology users.
honestly, i do not depend on these much, they came up in a search for 2009 album releases a while back, and i thought it would be better to keep them around rather than delete them:
Pitchfork Media
Wears the trousers
Dusted Magazine
Rawkblog
Vague Space
Stereogum
Ultimate Guitar
Stranger Dance
Head Heritage - possibly this site by Julian Cope if it could come in handy, though he picks favorites of the month for albums that can either be compliations, or albums 20 years old.
piero scaruffi
and i use any label’s website that i know of (Drag City, Riot Season) and check their upcoming releases which do not always make it onto the radar of Metacritic, Pitchfork, scaruffi….
if anyone has any other sources that are good, feel free to let me know
Cool. Glad to see you will be ranking albums for this year.
yeah, i am getting tired of listening to 100 mediocre albums from the 60's, now it will be from 2009.
i see your recent listened list from time to time. feel free to inundate me with all the albums you find/hear about, good or bad, obvious or obscure.
hey
nice to see someone ranking 2009 albums
i was just about to check merriweather post pavilion out (no. 2 on metacritic for 2009) and i was wondering who is "everyone" when you talk about "this will be everyone's best album of the year"? does this include scaruffi too?
no, everyone is pitchfork...and people here and on RYM.... i hope he does not rate it #1. he will probably rate it a 6. but he also rated Cherry by Shit & Shine a 7 at one point, but has since moved it down to a 6.5, which is still very generous. it is not much better than a 5 - he just loves Shit & Shine.
metacritic so far has it #1 for this year - the Pavement album is a reissue that was released last year. metacritic is a decent place to find some new albums but you should also check out some lists from time to time on RYM and other random review sites (Dusted, Stereogum - let me know of any others). though i am going to try to be the ONE to check all these sites out and listen to all the albums i can - this will probably fizzle out every couple of weeks. and i know i have it in bold at the top, but if you come across any albums that you think should be heard let me know. i want to get it as close to correct as possible, for myself as well as any passer-by.
ahh i see yeah it does sound like some pitchfork-favourite
thanks for the tip, i'll go check out those other sites sometime if i have time
i just saw on metacritic that the ones i mentioned and other sites are listed for the rankings of the albums. i always ignored those publications thinking that they were strictly print for some reason. i will start to check out those as well. the other sites do not offer much in ratings like AMG, Pitchfork, scaruffi, but all i use is their listing of an artist i have never heard of or a new album from an artist i have that are not explicitly listed on any other site i frequent.
yeah i agree that Merriweather... has too many fillers.
wow.. this list looks.. absolutely astonishing
time to check out Varde and Xerrox
definitely, let me know what you think. i just skimmed Varde and it was not as good as i remembered...but i think it may be an album that needs to be listened to from start to finish to get the full effect.
btw what do you see in azita's how will you? although her voice is definitely special, the context isn't exactly very special (a typical piano ballad)
well, what i like about "I'm Happy" is her vocals, as for the rest of the album i will have to wait another day assuming that can buy it locally in the store tomorrow morning before school. as for piano ballads(singer/songwriter songs) - i like those. not that Azita is as good as Joni Mitchell, but i will probably be rating Blue directly behind Faust when i get to 1971.
haha i see
cool thanks
dude xerrox vol. 2 is some awesome stuff... definitely beats xerrox vol. 1 (the only other alva noto's work i've listened to)
historically awesome or just really good for a 2009 released album?
hmm... just for a 2009 released album. Better than the animal collective one.
Awesome list; what are your sources?
thanks, i will list out my sources in the next update - in the author notes. i have not listened to anything "new" in over a week....
i have them listed now, though they are not all that special, and the update is not all that significant. i will try to get in 30 or so albums this weekend.
An Imaginary Country is really an excellent album, reminds me a bit of Biosphere's Substrata (which is one of the masterpieces of the genre), but whereas Substrata is ice cold and sometimes quite spooky, AIC remains pretty warm even in its dark and moody aberrations (Her Black Horizon). Overall, one of my favourites of 2009 so far too...
agreed, it is a warmer album than the content suggests. i will need to check out Substrata again sometime.
I agree with you; Summertime Clothes is best of year.
oh yeah, it is not even close. i think it is better in its 4 minutes than any other album released this year that i have rated. it goes beyond simply the best song of a year, 2009, beyond the top 100 of the decade, but in the discussion for the top 100 songs of all time! it is a pop masterpiece, nay, a masterpiece. nuff'ssed! i think i will take another listen :-{#)
This looks promising.
NOW THIS IS WHAT I HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR - ANOTHER YS AND POSSIBLY SHE IS PUSHING ON THAT ALBUM TO GREATER HEIGHTS. IF SHE PUTS OUT A DOUBLE ALBUM, NO, A DOUBLE CD, THEN I MAY BE LOOKING AT ANOTHER gReAtEsT ALBUM OF ALL TIME...
THANKS FOR THIS POST, AND AT THE SAME TIME, DAMN THIS POST - NOW I AM GOIN GOING TO BE ANXIOUS AND IN CONSTANT ANTICIPATION FOR THIS "ALBUM" IF AND WHEN IT COMES OUT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! nevermind, thanks, this definitely looks promising.
I'm lost for words :)
How is Bob Dylan's new cd? I liked Love & Theft and Modern Times quite a bit. Not to mention Time Out of Mind. Does it stand up to those in the least?
Together Through Life is not nearly as good as Time Out Of Mind, but that has songs like "Cold Irons Bound", "Lovesick", "Highlands", and "Not Dark Yet" which could have gone on any of his famous albums (take your pick), thematically or qualitatively, though it would have been more lyrical if written a few decades ago. compared to the other two albums from this decade i would put it like this: "Love and Theft" is high energy and best, Modern Times has a similar feel but lower energy, and Together Through Life is even lower. if you are a Dylan fan, and liked the last two albums then you should not be disappointed with this effort, but it is closer to Modern Times than anything else. "Beyond Here Lies Nothin'" is the jewel from the album; so, if you heard that and liked it, do not expect it to be duplicated another 9 times. if none of this has you uneasy then go for it.