Anyway, this year I thought I’d whack the playlist up on this blog; all of my choices are below in the order that they appear on the CD (with the exception of ‘Funky Flex’ by Lil’ Silva which isn’t on YouTube). Enjoy (and feel free to post comments/criticisms or indeed your own end of year lists in the comments):

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ie5y3M5mgmA

Darkstar -- Aidy’s Girl’s A Computer
Hyperdub celebrated their fifth anniversary in 2009, marking the milestone with the (excellent) compilation 5. It’s hard to pick a standout from that 2xCD set but certainly one of the more unusual selections is this oddball 8-bit torch song from Darkstar. Fragments of vocodered speech drift over a delightfully naive mariba-led melody, while every so often the song itself seems to fall apart, seemingly overpowered by the ‘Loading’ sound from an old Commodore64 game. Lovely stuff altogether.

myspace | buy on itunes

www.youtube.com/watch?v=IcO4DUSUWcA

The Golden Filter -- Solid Gold

No one could accuse The Golden Filter of being overly adventurous with their sound: the chunky drums, the spiraling analogue arpeggios, the airy female vocals -- it’s all been done before, of course. It’s just this pair do it so very well. The chorus is catchy as hell and the (live sounding) drums inject a sense of urgency to a rhythm track that could have easily come over stiff and robotic. Gorgeous golden-hued video there as well.

myspace | buy on itunes

www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLoF7K2UWcQ

Starkey -- Miracles (Jamie Vex’D Remix)

‘Emotional’ is not a word one would usually associate with dubstep music, which is what makes Jamie Vex’D’s soulful reimagining of Starkey’s ‘Miracles’ all the more startling. Stripping the original down to just it’s pitchshifted vocal sample, Vex’d sets about filling the space with all manner of atmospheric whirs and growls, skeletal synth melodies and distorted bass. Epic stuff.

myspace | buy on itunes

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eje6rIn-sZ0

Lil’ Silva -- Funky Flex

Well, this track’s not on YouTube unfortunately, so I’ve posted the A-side of the release, ‘Seasons’. Not that ‘Seasons’ is a bad tune -- like ‘Funky Flex’ it walks a fine line between irresistably catchy and intensely annoying. Oddly reminiscent of Mr. Oizo’s ‘Flatbeat’, ‘Funky Flex’ sports a ringtone-like bleeping melody, booming sub bass, and a nice line in Latin percussion. Good luck trying to track it down though.

myspace | currently unavailable

www.youtube.com/watch?v=8I8_tyOPyf8

Hudson Mohawke -- Overnight

What to say about this track? I’ve been playing it more or less non-stop since it was (officially) released back in January 2009. The joyous brass stabs and tumbling drumline, topped off with a naggingly catchy wordless vocal hook -- the level of sonic detail in this (very short) song is simply breathtaking. Still, it’s a shame it sounds like he forgot to finish it!

myspace | buy on itunes

www.youtube.com/watch?v=0bIR_YmiuVw

Joker & Ginz -- Purple City

Arguably the producer of the year here, Joker has been credited with breathing new life into dubstep in 2009, introducing a welcome dash of neon-tinged George Clinton-esque synth-funk to what can sometimes be a depressingly grey sound palette. With so many outstanding productions to his name, it’s tough to choose just one but ‘Purple City’, a co-write with Ginz*, is probably my favourite. Heavy, yet melodic, slow, but danceable -- in many ways it’s the quintessential Joker track -- and not forgetting that lead synth melody. How could you? Once that’s burrowed it’s way into deep your brain it’s not going anywhere soon.

*Poor Ginz! Nobody ever mentions him. Check out his MySpace, he’s a funny chap.

myspace | buy on itunes

www.youtube.com/watch?v=05DZRQJFaug

Nosaj Thing -- Light 2

Something a bit moodier now -- Nosaj Thing’s dark, futuristic vision of hip hop. Metallic arpeggiatted synths swirl around an achingly beautiful central melody, while the lazer-heavy beat holds the whole thing together; easily the standout track from a very strong album.

myspace | buy on itunes

www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-uifJJcnCw

The Juan MacLean -- One Day

2009 has been a fairly low-key year for DFA: the next LCD Soundsystem album isn’t expected until mid 2010 and despite a mildly diverting record from YACHT, there hasn’t been much in the way of their trademark take on glitzy New York disco.  All the more opportunity then to focus on The Juan MacLean who delivered their sophomore album The Future Will Come in April. It’s an album that sees MacLean and singer Nancy Whang moving away from the expansive space disco epics (they’re still there, don’t worry -- ‘Happy House‘ is twelve and a half minutes of sheer bliss) and towards more concise, tightly structured bursts of Human League-alike synthpop. The best example of this is ‘One Day’, a track that, with it’s disco strings, piano stabs and call and response vocals already sounds like a classic. And how many songs can you name that feature the word ‘beleagured’?

myspace | buy on itunes

www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_ffPVq4aUU

2000F & J Kamata -- You Don’t Know What Love Is

Another track deserving of the tag of ‘instant classic’ (a phrase, incidentally, that I hate but for which I can’t think of a better alternative), ‘You Don’t Know What Love Is’ takes Joker’s brand of bass-heavy P-funk and runs with it, fashioning a smooth, stylish, and strangely sexy, digital slow jam. It’s a beautiful piece of work -- the talkbox vocals, though largely indecipherable, have a sense of yearning to them that’s as affecting as anything on, say, George Benson’s Erotic Moods or even Prince at his most sensual. Definitely music for… well… you know.

myspace | buy on itunes

www.youtube.com/watch?v=fidtM1Sflno

Ghost -- The Club

Cheating a bit here as this older track comes from the (excellent) Blackdown-curated retrospective of El-B’s work, The Roots Of El-B. I’ve always loved 2-step garage and El-B is the undisputed master of the form. This track is pure fun from start to finish.

myspace | currently unavailable

www.youtube.com/watch?v=7AnyCPvYg9s

Instra:Mental -- Watching You (Original Mix)

Traveling around Asia for six months I didn’t get to hear much in the way of new music but one release I stumbled across a few weeks ago was this one from Instra:Mental. As you may have gathered already I have a bit of a thing for robot love songs and ‘Watching You’ is definitely right up my street. The cold, clinical sounding beats contrast nicely with the warm, and oddly wounded, timbre of the vocals. One to watch for the coming year.

myspace | buy on itunes

www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxbyBz-342E

Marek Hemmann -- Gemini

Hemmann’s had a lot of nice tunes this year -- most on the excellent Freude Am Tanzen label -- but the standout for me is ‘Gemini’. Mixing acoustic elements with electronics is always a dicey proposition -- particularly something as resolutely earthy sounding as a flippin’ saxophone sample -- but Hemmann executes it beautifully. By the time the Todd Edwards-esque vocal cut-ups arrive in the final three minutes, I gaurantee you’ll already be dancing -- or at the very least engaged in some sort of toe-tapping, head-nodding, subvocal humming equivalent therof.  Plus it’s more than a little reminiscent of this -- one of the best tracks (and videos) of all time.

myspace | buy on itunes

www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCAs20c1e6M

DZ -- Right About Now Sounds

A straight-up, wobble-bottomed banger now. I featured DZ’S ‘Fireman‘ in my last podcast and was tempted to include it again here but the B-side ‘Right About Now Sounds’ just managed to nudge its way in at the last minute. Unsubtle it may be, but it’s catchier than swine flu and the rolling piano loop is a nice counterpoint to the juddering beats and basslines.

myspace | buy on itunes

www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsJVW5apRmY

Joy Orbison -- Hyph Mngo

For once the hype was justifed as Joy Orbison’s ‘Hyph Mngo’ really did mark the arrival of a major new talent. Blending a superattenuated Janet Jackson vocal sample and an unashamedly euphoric keyboard pad sounds like a recipe for disaster but the incessant, trance-like repetition and jerky rhythms are almost impossible to resist. The track never really ‘takes off’ in the way we might be conditioned to expect -- not even when the slippery synth lines fade into view -- but it’s ‘Hyph Mngo’s (still no clue how to actually pronouce that title, by the way) restraint that really set it out as something different.

myspace | buy on itunes

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mq5GdutCRo8

La Roux -- In For The Kill (Skream Remix)

Tune. Of. The. Year.

I mean, this is the one, isn’t it? Ellie Jackson’s wailing vocals may not be to everyone’s taste -- her first release on Kitsune back in 2008 sounded horribly tinny and treble-heavy to my ears -- but she’s matured into (after Lady GaGa) one of the most artistically promising pop stars of the new decade. (Sorry Little Boots. Things were looking good there for a while but I’m sure we can both agree it just hasn’t been working for a long time now. Frankly, I think we should see other people). La Roux’s album, though patchy in places, was an unusually strong debut and each of her brilliant singles heralded a boatload of remixes, from the likes of Nero, Midfield General, Foamo, TEPR, Jackbeats, and Slugabed to name but a few. Perhaps the tune most fiddled with however was ‘In For The Kill’, yielding this mix here -- arguably Skreams best work in years. Stripping everything down to an eerie, high-pitched E-Bow-like synth line and ominous slabs of rumbling bass, this remix is a daring exercise in minimalist atmospherics… until of course <spoiler alert!> you reach the (by now, notorious) twist in the tail. Genuinely, the first time I heard this track played out I squealed with joy at this unexpected (and thrilling) coda -- I distinctly remember on another occasion falling over dancing at this point. Yes, it fades all too soon but that’s simply all the more reason to go back and play it again. Simply put, if there was a better tune this year, then (somehow) I didn’t hear it.

myspace | buy on itunes

… aaaand that’s the lot. Honourable mentions go to Major Lazer, Simian Mobile Disco, Akira Kiteshi, Grizzly Bear and plenty of others but I’m simply too tired to type any more.

‘Til next year, kids!

And so the Little Boots album arrives at last. Is it all we (I) could have hoped for? Well, yes. And no. Yesandno.

Like pretty much every other album these days about half the tracks on here have been floating around in various forms for about a year now. Still, it’s remarkable how generally cohesive the whole thing sounds. It’s polished to within an inch of its life and while perhaps not sounding quite like the proverbial million dollars (these are troubled times after all) it’s clear a fairly sizable bit of cash has been thrown at this project. And that last word there is key -- it really does sound like a ‘project’. Multiple producers (including Greg Kurstin, Joe Goddard from Hot Chip, and Lady Gaga hitmaker RedOne) have lent their weight to the album, beefing up the sometimes weak songwriting with all manner of shiny synths and whooshy sound effects. Of the lot, the RedOne track, ‘Remedy’, is probably the standout -- though it’s by far the least Little Boots-sounding song on the record (it’s also already spawned a pretty excellent Rusko remix which you can here a bit of here).

Other highlights include the naggingly catchy ‘Earthquake’ and the campy Phil Oakey duet ‘Symmetry’; overall, though the album just feels a bit too calculated, transparently programmed to appeal to Top 40 fans and Hype Machine heads alike. Basically, it sounds like Little Boots wants to be Annie. No bad thing, that -- except we already have an Annie who’s doing a pretty good job of being, er, herself. What set Little Boots apart (at least initially) was the endearingly ramshackle, DIY approach to the music -- clearly influenced by Goddard; unfortunately most of that sound has been sidelined on this album, in favour of glitzy, sequined numbers like ‘New In Town’ and the aforementioned ‘Remedy’. It’s by no means a bad album, just a mildly disappointing one. There are glimmers of what made Little Boots so great to begin with on here but they are, alas, just glimmers.

Still, ‘Remedy’. What a tune, eh?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNZdiVFGWOM

great day. still beating the jetlag. went to Harajuku saw loads of crazy stuff. bought amazing GoGos tshirt. just had a swim on 47th floor.

Disappointingly, there were also about 486 million other people milling around Harajuku today so wherever Boots was I didn’t see her. To be continued…

Made it to Tokyo! Flight was fine, been dreading this trip a bit but now I’m here am super excited!! Blaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!

‘Blaaaaaaaaa’ indeed. And there’s this, from about an hour ago:

Staying at the hotel from Lost In Translation. Incredible. The view from my room literally took my breath away.

I’m off to Shinjuku so…

www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCw1zltT2A0

It is, regrettably, awful. Dancing homeless people, gang members prancing about like extras from West Side Story and a truly embarrassing denouement featuring… ack, I don’t know, some sort of choreographed prostitute orgy. I’m making it sound about a million percent better than it actually is -- watch it and I’m sure you’ll agree it’s a just a shallow, pretentious piece of toss. Victoria looks nice enough, I suppose, and the tune is OK, if somewhat generic. Personally I prefer the Fred Falke remix which really launches the track into the pop stratosphere -- after this, the chorus on the original sounds hopelessly anaemic.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJmpQptN6vU

Here, for no real reason, is a picture of Little Boots. She’s very pleasant to look at, I’m sure you’ll agree and she’s talented to, er, boot. Here’s her hype.

Good to see the tags are working too.

AudioPost

Tracklist
Little Boots – Meddle (Joker Remix)
Giant – Badness
Akira Kiteshi – Pinball
Santogold – Creator
Hudson Mohawke – Overnight
Hercules & Love Affair – Raise Me Up (Loop)/Lil’ Wayne – A Milli (Acapella)
Modeselektor – 2000007 (Siriusmo Remix) feat. TTC
Tweet – Oops (Oh My) (Extended Mix)
Ultramagnetic MC’s – Feelin’ It (Loop)/A-Ha – Take On Me (Loop)/Montel Jordan – This Is How We Do It (Acapella)

Info
runtime: 24m40s | filesize: 30mb | bitrate: 192kbps | download