Another year, another bunch of lists to finalize. I didn't see very many movies this year. The best of the bunch were: 1) Boyhood; 2) The Trip to Italy; 3) The Grand Budapest Hotel; 4) Gone Girl; 5) Guardians of the Galaxy. I've never felt more out of the conversation on current TV in my life. I kept up with Parks and Recreation, Parenthood, Girls, Game of Thrones, New Girl, The Mindy Project, Community, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Portlandia, and True Detective. Some of them were great, others middling, others well past their creative zenith. I guess a sea-change is on the horizon for my TV viewing, being that most of my favourite series have ended recently or will end soon. Hard to keep up with new stuff when you're working through Gilmore Girls though. Here's my favourite albums that came out this year. It was a pretty shallow year, but this stuff was all great: 1) Lust For Youth - International I never heard about this project until this year. I was totally blown away. Pristine, sparkling, gorgeous synth-pop on some songs ("Epoetin Alfa", "Armida", "New Boys", and "Illume", the best song I heard this year, easily); dark, atmospheric electronic on others ("Ultras", "Lungomare", the title track). Not a lot of new ground being tread, but these people really know what they're doing. Having instrumental tracks dispersed throughout really keeps it from becoming too similar from song to song, and as a result it's a New Order worship record that flows better than any of New Order's LPs. Four on the floor until infinity. 2) The Hotelier - Home, Like NoPlace Is There Dumb title, which really put me off. Glad I came around though. I guess this is some emo throwback stuff, but it's not really twinkly. Think more like, the SDRE end of the '90s spectrum. That said, there's also some real pop sensibility, which makes me think these folks never put away their '00s Long Island scene records. Thursday, Brand New, even Latterman can all be heard on here. It's not perfect: "Housebroken" is pretty weak, and "Life in Drag" feels out of place. This has some of my favourite lyrics of the year though - check the last chorus on "In Framing", second verse of "Your Deep Rest", and pretty much all of "Dendron". The hooks. 3) Wayfarer - Sleep Through to the Light These guys are my friends, whatever. There is some serious song craft on here. They've grown in a lot of ways from their previous material on the Decayfarer split. For example, the three-song suite that closes the record ("Lithuania", "Ewa", "Andrej") feels like the kind of thing they had wanted to do since Our Fathers came out, but never quite had the personnel for. Recorded live off the floor, the decision to have Kyle play drums and bringing in Mark from Teen Violence to play guitar, made out of necessity or not, really pays off. "Worn Out", "Translating", "Beta, the Disappointed Lover", and "Artificer" are all highlights. I'm really excited to see what these guys get up to in the new year. 4) Protomartyr - Under Color of Official Right Really dark stuff. This band mines a lot of material from late '70s post-punk, especially the second and third records by Wire. There is an omnipresent sense of dread in nearly every guitar part here. The rhythm section locks into each other in really interesting ways ("Ain't So Simple", a serious dance number). "Tarpeian Rock" has some of the most relatable lyrics of the year. "Come and See" is the darkest pop song I've ever heard. 5) Self Defense Family - Try Me I had been peripherally aware of this band's existence for a really long time, but for no reason at all I just never checked them out. I'm angry with everybody I know for not forcing me to listen sooner. This is another darker, post-punk inspired record. The "Angelique" interludes are really interesting a few times, but for the most part I treated this as a 9-song, 40 minute album. Most songs are repeated guitar lines and slogan-esque lyrics descending around one another for minutes at a time. It's a serious triumph that it doesn't get boring - the guitar parts are always careful and measured, while the lyrics feel a bit too personal at times. The songs that aren't in first person ("Turn the Fan On", a highlight) included. 6) Exalt - Pale Light Another band filled with my friends. The songs here that were re-recorded from last year's demo versions are improved greatly; in fact, this is by far the best these guys have ever sounded. There are punishingly heavy mosh grooves (the end of "Greying", "Old Vein"), blisteringly fast crusty hardcore songs ("Forsaken", "Worn as Earth"), and dark atmospherics (the title track, the back half of "Feed", "Palmcarver") in nearly equal measure here. The guitar work has gotten a lot better too, with songs like "Deafen" showing a real creativity with the instrument. An improvement over 2012's Breach False Minds in every way. 7) Literature - Chorus Maybe not the best example of the C86 sound I heard this year (I'm counting Alvvays' debut as a 2013, otherwise it would be here), but a great record nonetheless. Crisp, reverb drenched, '80s-esque indie guitar pop. Emphasis on guitar - it borders on mathy territory at times - but remains incredibly catchy (check out "The English Soft-hearts" - when the guitar follows the vocal melody it's just enormous - or the solo in "Jimmy"). The verse of "Chorus" would be a contender for melody of the year. This record is very cutesy, and there's a lot of fake British accents, but it's complex and surprising and a really enjoyable listen. 8) YG - My Krazy Life The best of the year in hip-hop for sure. A real throwback to 2001-era Dre/G-Funk production style. There's a lot of guest rappers appearing, which kind of waters down the product to be honest, but it's still a tight 40 minutes. The songs where YG appears alone are modern classics though, like "Bicken Back Bein Bool" and "BPT". There's a real sense of world-building here, and while he might not be the strongest lyricist, he delivers his lines with conviction. He also paints a personable portrait of himself, with a hip-hop album where the skits are actually funny and even the hardest songs have jokes. 9) Panopticon - Roads to the North This is another project I didn't start listening to until this year (regrettably, as 2012's Kentucky would definitely have appeared on that year's list). While this isn't quite as good as that album, the juxtaposition of atmospheric black metal and Appalachian folk continues here. Lunn is getting better at incorporating the two styles into cohesive songs (check the through-melodies on "Where Mountains Pierce the Sky"). "The Long Road" suite is impressively put together. Mostly a really pretty record. 10) Life in Vacuum - 5 Yeah, it was a great year for KW bands. These guys came back with their best record yet. There's no more keyboard, which opens the sound up quite a bit. Instead of the quasi-novelty vibe of Commander Clark, we get a much more serious batch of songs. The Drive Like Jehu influences end up coming out a lot more pronounced than on previous records. "Seven" and "1984" are the best songs. As usual, no write-ups for 11-15, but in order they were: Hard Girls - A Thousand Surfaces; Tigers Jaw - Charmer; Bob Mould - Beauty & Ruin; Young and in the Way - When Life Comes to Death; Give - Electric Flower Circus. And a list for everything that isn't an LP: 1. Brave Bird - T-Minus Grand Gesture 2. Voight-Kampff - "The Last House on the Right" b/w "Little Dyings" 3. Self Defense Family - "Indoor Wind Chimes" b/w "Cottaging" 4. RVIVR - Bicker and Breathe 5. The Weather Station - What Am I Going to Do With Everything I Know 6. Stüka - Live Your Words 7. Crazy Spirit - Demo 2014 8. Conundrum - Conundrum 9. Sundials - Kick 10. Stuck Out Here - Getting Used to Feeling Like Shit Good luck in 2015 everybody.
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