2008 Albums List: 1-5

aaaaand the final bit:

1. Jacaszek - Treny

I practically got hit by a train on this no-name guy that i wandered into on a whim. Second album by the Polish composer titled after the nationally famous series of poems mourning the loss of a young daughter (look it up on Wikipedia, it's actually pretty interesting), Boomkat went completely nuts off the hype train (like they would) for this one, and i previewed a copy expecting its melancholy bent to be endless, repetitive, dragging, and far too advanced to appreciate on any level lower than post-everything. what i got was one of the most beautiful albums i've ever heard. violin, cello, static, and soft electronics in the burial vein make up his songs about lament and loss and i sat there alternately transfixed and involuntary mumbling amazement by it all. put out by Miasmah label, which i thought was too small for me to get a copy without paying stupid money, but it's still available through amazon. if you've had any interest in burial, polmo polpo, arvo part, or murcof, you need need need to hear this.

2. Bruno Pronsato - Why Cant We Be Like Us

Steven Ford (his real name and half of Half Hawaii) is primarily a percussionist and even used to drum for a heavy metal band, so when he took two years to make this, he wasnt making a regular minimal album of mute precision, but a sort of throttled techno with surprising blood and interplay between his beats, the live percussion, snatches of vocals, and piano. thats not to say he's completely unconventional, he does take his time to get to where he is, and it can miss, but he is talented in that the build is not the placeholder. his tracks maintain interest from the get go and only get more exciting as time goes on. despite the missteps, this album is number 2 because what works does so staggeringly well. precise, lethal, and tense in sound, it's surprisingly human and erratic in execution. clips and samples get cut off shorter... they misstep and stumble, and develop problems as they go on, or at least appear to. they rarely start as they end, and cant be predicted. one of the most exciting and visually inspirational techno albums i've heard.

3. Sigur Ros - Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust

An album that seems tired of the purposeful epic, the motif in their album title and ensuing artwork is of an endless buzzing, of sounds that by its nature and in involuntary ways simply need a release. Sure, there's the one-two of festival and ara batur, both familiar exercises in length and grandiosity, but the former comes from a whistled tune and the other (as evidenced by the special edition dvd or just by listening to it) is simply written to the extreme. This didn't need a sit down to write. They've always been mildly proud of working out of nothing to jam something into existence, and here, finally, it sounds the absolute opposite of forced. Secure enough in its soul, the appreciation of love in all things naturally flows out of them and into pop songs and quiet excursions alike. I wont say it's better than agaetis, but if it's not that then it's certainly their second best and probably the album I've listened to most this year.

4. Portishead - Third

Geoff Barrow likes throwing people for a loop, and he also hates trip hop, so when I heard of a new portishead album I didn't believe it. Then when I believed it I knew it would never sound like the previous albums. There's few constants I can pin down on portishead: the tangential love of noir that follows them everywhere, and the persistant desire to make everything uncomfortable. I couldn't tell what it'd sound like until I heard it, but when I did I was thrilled and extremely proud of how this bands incredible ear for music came through on what, to me, is undoubtedly their best album. The symbolism of the terseness in 'machine gun', the demented false optimism of 'deep water', the nervous breakdown of 'magic doors' the sudden silence of an unbearable weight that cuts out everything on 'silence', it all made perfect sense for a record not just critically amazing but one I could pout on repeat.

5. Starkey - Ephemeral Exhibits

Grime is the greatest thing to lament about. For a genre burgeoning in the public consciousness you have a league of "I was there's" telling everyone that grimes been dead for a few years now, and while they'll get into whats going to on today, even accepting it as a necessary evolution, they're quick to tell you that backpacking now is useless, for nothing is as it once was.
Of course, they're right. Take the speed and kaleidoscopic crunch of whats been lumped into he grime/2step/garage/dubstep mix-n-match scene and it doesn't sound nearly as rough and abrasive as the real stuff. Enter starkey, who no one should pretend is going to revive ghosts and make them real again, but he is turning heads and making a few people admit that a guy from Philadelphia has actually made a grime record despite also waving the dubstep flag. This album is raw, folks. It's got a sharp clean sound but the content is all business and its vibrancy is ridiculous. melodies everywhere. bends like melted plastic and full blasts of color on every track. Abrasive and true.
seriously, if you have even passing interest in electronic music, maybe just going to give it a chance again sometime soon... check this one out. it's beautiful in ways people wouldnt use yr regular ran-through phrases to describe it. the one-two of 'dark alleys' and 'escape' is so goddamn satisfying.