Albums
of the year
2010
I felt it appropriate this year to change the title of my annual best albums post by replacing the word KILL with LIVE. It has the same effect I think, but with a positive slant. At first I thought I wouldn’t be able to do this post at all since, as some of you know, my Mom passed away last month from a 15+ year battle with congestive heart failure. My original intention was for the first time to actually write my own reviews (who would have thought, right?), but the events of the past couple months have had the bulk of my free time. So instead of not abandoning my yearly tradition (when there are so many great albums which must be heard by all of you!), I figured I would do it as I have in years past. To compensate, however, I created a companion playlist you can stream at Grooveshark so that you can effortlessly listen to tracks from this year’s esteemed “winners”! I picked two tracks from each album, which was a tough call as there really aren’t any bad tracks on any of these albums. For the album from Janelle Monáe I picked 3 songs to be fair, as the album is so incredibly long and every track is fantastic. I believe in my heart of hearts these albums would be rewarding for each and every one of you to pick up and listen to, in full, and as loud as possible. These are also in no particular order, except for the first album by Radio Dept, which is without any doubt the best of the year. Enjoy, and drive with aloha …
2
Crystal Castles
Crystal Castles
“The battlefield of ’00s electro-tantrum spazz-ravers is littered with the corpses of those who burned too brightly at the outset and, in the process, burned out any interest in a sustained career of noisemaking. After all, once you’ve shocked and awed the glowstick crowd with synth-stabs and video-game glitches that fry synapses and short-circuit the minds of casual fans, where is there to go? For their second, homonymous album, the stuttery Canuck duo Crystal Castles have replaced most of the non-stop screeching high jinks that made them (in)famous with a predeliction for yearning synth-pop. Having put aside the gimmicky Atari-melting antics of yore, the Castles have created a dense-yet-airy thicket of pure pop transcendence.” – The Phoenix
“Electronic duo Crystal Castles generally operates in two distinct modes–its songs are either angry dancefloor scorchers built around videogame blips or expansive shoegaze numbers that sail off upon waves of synth lines. Although the group’s 2008 self-titled debut was furiously innovative in quick doses, its ideas tended to burn out during overlong songs or curious track sequences. Two years and an overabundance of hype later, producer Ethan Kath and singer Alice Glass return with another self-titled set that corrects all of their debut’s miscues and remains eye-popping from beginning to end.” – Billboard