Archive for January, 2011

Immediately upon settling the needle down on the imaginary vinyl of Eyelid Movies, the rookie album from the New York duo that record as Phantogram, the sound emerges in much the same manner... it seems to diffuse out from the speakers, a highly textured mixture of viscous sexuality and fearless mystery-pop that requires no special glasses to tickle your amygdala.
- Aaron Rogge

Astro Coast is the album that Weezer fans have been living 15 years without. Unabashed power-pop hooks meet sunny self-aware rhetoric in an album that knows just where to hang tambourines, hold pauses an extra beat, or take a scrumptious riff around the block for another spin. In a year that saw numerous 'beach'-themed albums slam 1960s Detroit blues-pop into Beach Boyish reverb-soaked lullabies for maximum indie cred, this album comes across as the most honest, hard-working, and promising of 2010's rock crop. And with Brasky being a Florida-based music/scene/art blog, it just feels right to include these South Florida youngsters in our top 10.
- Aaron Rogge

For much of the year this album defied measure for the Brasky reviewers, first described as yet another chin-stroking Caribou album when we reviewed it in April. Swim, Dan Snaith's 5th full-length album and 3rd under the Caribou moniker, was unmistakably inventive and beautiful, though the prevailing criticism was that some of the songs were simply too challenging. 2007's Andorra ("a mellow, psychedelic grab bag of masterfully conceived "bedroom music") marked the beginning of a psychedelic shift in his sound, a trend inherited and heavily accentuated by Swim. Snaith tests, new funky vocal styles alongside electro synths metered by house rhythms, sprinkled as usual with studio-sampled drum work. Our original review noted that the underlying music was, in some ways, a throwback to the more electronic sounds of Manitoba:

"Swim takes a turn to more experimental and earthy sounds, more closely resembling the sounds of Snaith's earlier work as Manitoba, with tracks building and decaying steadily and with more repetition, in general. But Swim is by no means a digression, as Snaith tests a variety of sounds and styles, including regular doses of scale-wandering vocals that call to mind fellow Canadians the Junior Boys."

That was after a week's contemplation in April. What we came to discover as the year went by was that the more we dissected any one aspect of the music, the more merit the songs gained. Most importantly, we realized the album grew in plain listenability throughout the year. While it's important to note that there is still some internal debate on this album, the prevailing zealousness of its endorsers earns it a spot in this year's top 10.
- Derek Clark

LCD Soundsystem have knocked it out of the ballpark. Whatever the creative process is for James Murphy, it works. As people expected a dance record, they were instead given a masterpeice of melodies and rhythm.
- Emanuel Moshouris

Before there was Haunted Graffiti, there was just Ariel. Since the early 2000's he has been secretly amassing a vast catalog of lo-fi, nostalgic pop music. Before Today hit at the perfect moment for a fast-growing undercurrent of listeners ready to embrace new(er) wave sounds and 80s nostalgia. The album seems effortlessly timeless, wandering carefully through stretches of psychedelic rock and new wave ennui. Accusations of mimicry should instead be described as support for Ariel's nimble translation of an emerging cultural yearning to rediscover the artistic honesty of 70's/80's pop music.
- Derek Clark

After an epic meltdown on his European tour, the troubled genius behind Wavves brings that trademark sense of sarcasm and aggression to another noise punk hit-list. Drawing heavily from the Pixies, Nirvana, and every jaded pill-popper that's ever thrashed on a Fender Jaguar, Wavves pushes the pace yet still finds time to groove.
- Aaron Rogge

Age of Adz feels like Sufjan Stevens had submitted to himself. It seems as if there had been this thing catalyzing inside of him, growing with each album released, larger and more substantial until he could bear it no more. In reality, months before development had started on Age of Adz, Sufjan had been victim of a bizarre nervous system infection, nearly rendering him immobile and in excruciating pain.

I won't pretend to know of the creative process, because I don't. I can however, imagine how frustrating it must feel to be unable to create when there is something inside of you needing to be let out. Evidenced by the dark and bellowing melodies with electronic undertones, by no mean is this a typical Sufjan album.
- Emanuel Moshouris

Lyrically this album seems more personal and more mature than his others. He has the same angelic chorus for his backup vocals. On this album he got his hands on a drum machine and experimented with textures.
- Cathy Hughes

Teen Dream lands somewhere between French X-rated movie soundtrack and midnight college radio long-play material. That being said, the restless winding of this album is a haunting and gratifying trip through afternoon memories and summer endlessness.
- Aaron Rogge

Last year Gold Panda arrived on the scene with the infectious sounds of "Quitter's Raga" - A 2-minute collage of diced-up Eastern sentiment. From this teaser we approached Gold panda's debut full-length release, Lucky Shiner, with optimism. The album immediately delivers with "You", a track that borrows from the formula that made "Quitter's Raga" so appealing - finely diced vocal samples laid over syncopating hip hop pattering. From here the album takes an intriguing shift toward minimalism, remaining rich with detail but steady and enchanting in rhythm. "Same Dream China" and "Snow & Taxis" are great examples of the patient accumulation of sounds and moods that come to shape the emotional experience of the music. As the song titles seem to support, Lucky Shiner oozes a vibe of reflection on past memories, places and relationships. Seems fitting enough coming from a reclusive Englishmen who's spent time in Japan and attended the School of Oriental and Asian Studies at the University of London.

From June's review:

"Sleigh Bells managed to first fuse together two massive, adrenaline pumping styles, hardcore and crunk hip hop, but then took it a step further by sprinkling it with soft, feminine synth pop vocals. Occasionally the sonic shitstorm stalls long enough to hear Alexis chirp something about "your boyfriend", immediately cut off when overdriven, heavily stacked chunks of "melody" resume the assault on your eardrums. The compression and overdriven distortion are usually so heavy that they nearly mute out the vocal tracks when the two coincide, this usually would constitute a production error, but this seems consistent with the spirit of Treats: Unrelenting, unpolished, provocative machine "pop".

- Derek Clark