I started writing on this site to share my thoughts on the cultural incidents that affect me in positive ways, in hopes that whoever regards these opinions might find themselves similarly affected. It is also a journal of my changing opinions as they are anchored to specific times in my life – or, it would have if I had been more consistent with my posts. Anyway, I hope that the following will act as a summation of these thoughts from the past year and in particular the things that I wanted to talk about, but couldn’t find the time to do so. On her blog for NPR, Carrie Brownstein writes about the disposability of current music and in particular, her personal shift from collecting to compiling in what amounts to the passive consumption of hardly noticeable music. I agree with her and would expand it to include all cultural production in this media-saturated climate. It is resources like this site that I hope can help preserve the value of specific works: as a jumping off point for a drop in the bucket.

Jumping Off Part I: The albums by smaller independent bands that had a major impact on me this year mostly because they were more surprising than their bigger indie and pop brothers and sisters.

Jumping Off Part II: The albums by bigger independent bands and pop groups that I felt deserved mention because in some cases they trump. These aren't comprehensive lists and I encourage people to comment on those that I missed.

Jumping Off Part III: Movies.

I. Best of the Smaller Bands:

30. Eric Copeland - Hermaphrodite

Eric Copeland (of Black Dice) put out this album of messy yet oddly cohesive songs that are equally challenging and hypnotic. Listening to "Hermaphrodite" is what I imagine having an out-of-body experience must be like.

Eric Copeland

29. Bowerbirds - Hymns For a Dark Horse

The first of two 'Dark Horse' titled nostalgic albums on this list, Bowerbirds contribute the stripped down, organic, homey of the two, and they do a great job of bringing modern romance into the backwards gazing folk that lives on this album.

Bowerbirds

28. The Besnard Lakes - The Besnard Lakes Are the Dark Horse

The Besnard Lakes put out two of the best 'singles' of the year ("Disaster" and "For Agent 13") and they happened to be the first two tracks on this album. Beach Boys harmonies wrap around meandering bass and lazy orchestral flourishes drenched in reverb that suck you into their musical equivalent of an oceanic pastoral.

The Besnard Lakes

27. Blitzen Trapper - Wild Mountain Nation

This album is fun, funky, and full of twang. It's like listening to a younger, scrappier, ADD The Band as fronted by Jeff Tweedy at his popiest performing a scrappy, post-modern 'Basement Tapes', or in it's louder moments early Beck.

Blitzen Trapper

26. Shapes & Sizes - Split Lips, Winning Hips, A Shiner

Like the title of the album, these songs invoke images of scrappy underdogs in a schoolyard brawl, all bones and spit, hair and strawberry burns.

Shapes & Sizes

25. Electrelane - No Shouts, No Calls

Electrelane is one of the coolest bands out there. It's too bad they're going on hiatus soon, because this is such a cool album. These are my scholarly opinions. I'd call this album the sloppier British cousin to Arcade Fire's "Funeral", but then Electrelane have been doing this for years.

Electrelane

24. Black Moth Super Rainbow - Dandelion Gum

I can't decide if Black Moth Super Rainbow are actually from the 1960's or from the 2060's, but either way they definitely got here in a time machine. These songs have the most infectious drum beats and the laziest hummable melodies. If you're in the mood for something psychedelic, Dandelion Gum is the goopiest, gauziest mess that you can treat your ears to this year.

Black Moth Super Rainbow

23. Menomena - Friend or Foe

It's easy to comment on how young the guys in Menomena are, especially for a band that has 3 albums under its belt already, but youth is the hallmark of their sound. It's fun music, and it's all over the place. But for a band so young, the experience comes through and the songs are tight and addictive.

Menomena

22. A Place to Bury Strangers - A Place to Bury Strangers

The music on this album is stroke inducing...in a good way. The audio equivalent of a strobe light, A Place to Bury Strangers is all about punctuation and there is so much static here that a more appropriate name for the album would be 'Gain'. In spite of the aural dynamite, it isn't really a loud album -- it's aggressively broken-hearted.

A Place to Bury Strangers

21. The Coathangers - The Coathangers

The Coathangers turn gender politics into obnoxious fun. This album is totally exciting and energetic, sloppy and frantic. They are one of three reasons on this list that the Atlanta indie music scene is the most relevant scene right now.

The Coathangers

20. Handsome Furs - Plague Park

You can check out my opinions on this album when it first came out back in the archives, but I just want to say that I saw them play this stuff live and it was heavy.

Handsome Furs

19. Beirut - The Flying Club Cup

In many ways "The Flying Club Cup" is an extension of and a broadening of last year's "Gulag Orkestar". Listening to the album is like going on vacation -- getting to see something first hand that you've heard so much about. In all of its hyperreality, it is nostalgic for the oral history traditions of the past.

Beirut

18. Frog Eyes - Tears of the Valedictorian

I talked about this album in an earlier post, describing it as Mt. Vesuvian in its grandeur, and it feels as big and important now as it did when it first came out.

Frog Eyes

17. Chromatics - IV

Chromatics know that their music would be perfect to play over the credits of an 80's thriller or an Italian horror film and they aren't self-conscious or ironic about it in the least, making a sexy, dark, highly danceable homage to the disco night parties that may or may not exist outside of the movie world.

16. Caribou - Andorra

The music on Andorra focuses on the fruition of melody, which is a departure for Caribou who tend to stifle the melodious undercurrents of their songs with noise. The result is a haunting, maximalist throwback to 60's psychedelic pop.

Caribou

15. St. Vincent - Marry Me

Annie Clark (a.k.a. St. Vincent) is my favorite guitarist of the year. And quite possibly my favorite singer. "Now Now" one of my favorite songs. Oh, and she's from Dallas! Finally, a great torch bearer for an underrepresented music scene. She is remarkably talented for someone who is only 21 years old. I can't wait to hear what she does next.

St. Vincent

14. Shocking Pinks - Shocking Pinks

This album really surprised me the most out of the albums on this list, mostly because it felt like the scrappy music I listened to in the late 90's. It took me a couple of listens to really get into it, but I was rewarded for sticking around with it. The beats are irresistible and the result of a singular creative force in Nick Harte.

Shocking Pinks

13. Magik Markers - BOSS

Riot Grrrl granddaughter Magik Markers manage to evolve sonically from album to album, pushing the avant-garde without losing their political efficacy or song craft. Amidst the anger and squalor that provide the backbone of BOSS are several exquisitely tender gems that subvert and supplement the musical and lyrical experiments contained here.

Magik Markers

12. Dirty Projectors - Rise Above

Dirty Projectors' recontextualization of the Black Flag classic "Damaged" brings the spirit and energy of the original album and takes it to a completely different world. Dave Longstreth is a fantastic composer/arranger and his abilities are at the forefront of this album. Rise Above amazingly brings the efficient beauty of Henry Rollins' lyrics to light and wraps them in complex orchestration and lush vocal harmonies.

Dirty Projectors

11. Jana Hunter - There Is No Home

Probably the simplest, most pared down album on this list, but all the more powerful for it. I listened to this album constantly during the summer and it has such a calming effect that it could easily be my favorite album for that specific mood. Jana is another great down to earth Texas songwriter (along with Annie Clark) keeping the home state alive.

Jana Hunter

10. Low - Drums & Guns

The second most cohesive album on this list presents a bleak, but not hopeless vision of current events in a minimal, but emotionally impacting musical cast. When I listen to this album, whether intended or not, I imagine the singer, the narrator, to be a soldier conflicted by his/her sense of duty and fears. The best piece of fiction to get inside that conflicted mindset so effectively across the media.

Low

9. No Age - Weirdo Rippers

The Los Angeles music scene has been slowly gaining steam over the past few years and this is the first year since maybe the hardcore scene that a definitive and cohesive musical community has emerged distinct from the rest of the nation and No Age could be the founding fathers. Weirdo Rippers is grounded in that punk scene, yet treads completely new terrain. It is noisy and sporadically melodic: the most promising album, band, and scene all year (for me).

No Age

8. Deerhunter - Cryptograms / Fluorescent Grey EP

Some of the most conflicted, personal, novelistic music of the year, these two albums (or one and a half) could be one. It's the sonic equivalent of Catcher In the Rye. Aural experimentation lends a haunted quality to some of the most poetic and diaristic lyrics out there. These albums, especially when experienced in the context of their tour blog, seem to me anthropological gems.

Deerhunter

7. Jens Lekman - Night Falls Over Kortedala

For me, Jens Lekman is synonymous with heartache. His Jonathan Richmanesque crooning is steeped in longing and failure and peppered with the insignificant, intimate details about relationships that most often go unnoticed. On Night Falls, his heartache is uplifting, hopeful, and gives you the sense that maybe he'll find true love in the end after all. Oh, yeah, and it has some of the funniest lyrics over some of the catchiest disco flourishes I heard all year.

Jens Lekman

6. Mika Miko - 666 EP + Mika Miko 7"

Though maybe not an album in the traditional sense, this is the most genuine, youthful, irreverent, punk music out there. It is music dosed in riot grrrl spirit and attitude and is as contagious as the common cold. Probably the best live act I saw all year, this album does a good job of capturing the energy and immediacy and I-don't-give-a-flying-fuck mind-set of the most exciting and addictive band of the year.

Mika Miko

5. Sunset Rubdown - Random Spirit Lover

Admittedly, I am a huge fan of Sunset Rubdown and the mythos of Spencer Krug in particular. Their 2006 album Shut Up I Am Dreaming was my favorite of the year, and though they don't top it this year, they come pretty close with another concept album of modern anguish with some of the best lyrics to date. This is a tormented album that has its foundations in ancient traditions, but it isn't pretentious; in fact I go as far to say as this album has a matter-of-fact quality that makes it contemporary beyond the scope of its musical touchstones.

Sunset Rubdown

4. Phosphorescent - Pride

On second thought, THIS was the most surprising album of the year for me. I didn't think I was going to like it even after it was recommended to be by a couple of people, but I quickly fell under its spell. It is both primitive and human and above all things spiritual. The aura around Pride is ghastly and undeniably reverent. This is one album I have yet to get tired of, but I make a point of listening to in certain settings because it creates a world in and of itself.

Phosphorescent

3. The Black Lips - Los Valientes Del Mundo Nuevo & Good, Bad, Not Evil

In the tradition of the best garage rock bands, The Black Lips make you want to start your own band. They make it sound easy too. Los Valientes is the best live album I've heard in a long long time and it captures the raw, rowdy, snotty attitude that these four punk kids embody. Good, Bad, Not Evil takes their sound to another world. Somehow they manage to stay true to themselves while reaping the rich musical heritage of garage, punk, and soul and offer a snapshot of contemporary Southern Youth better than anybody else out there except maybe T.I.

The Black Lips

2. Scout Niblett - This Fool Can Die Now

The four 'duets' contained on This Fool capture love, longing, heartbreak, nostalgia, and passion like no other songs on any other album I've heard this year and this why it deserves so much more attention than it gets. Scout Niblett's voice bites to the core and tears you apart. The 'non-duet' songs are a striking counter-point, often filled with anger, yet without losing sentiment. It may not be the most progressive album of the year, but it certainly fills the shoes of most widely emotional for me.

Scout Niblett

1. Panda Bear - Person Pitch + Strawberry Jam

My most anticipated album of the year and the one the exceeded my expectations and continues to surprise me to this day, Panda Bear's Person Pitch and his work with Animal Collective on Strawberry Jam (in many ways a lesser, more outrageous companion piece) are collectively my favorite 'album' of the year. Person Pitch is uncompromising and constantly rewarding. The lyrics and style embody both the personal and the universal and are spectacularly uplifting. Pushing into new sonic territories without losing touch with musical traditions seems to be a common thread with albums on this list and Person Pitch and Strawberry Jam epitomize these methods. Above all, though, both of these albums inspire creativity and that is a gift that Panda Bear should be most proud of imparting to young, hungry listeners.