Cats Are Grey

1) Breeders – Mountain Battles

Pod is still my favorite Breeders record but Mountain Battles comes a close second. What’s amazing about Mountain Battles is how, even though it switches from pop songs to slow contemplative songs to country to Spanish love song to German rock, it feels more like a cohesive album (as opposed to a collection of isolated songs) than anything else I heard this year. Credit that to the anchor of Kim Deal’s still phenomenal voice and impeccable song writing. Also, Steve Albini’s production is a plus.

I saw The Breeders at Webster Hall in July and they played an incredible set incorporating songs from all four albums and the record Kim recorded as The Amps. One of these days I’ll get around to drawing that show. In the meantime, off the Divine Hammer single, here is Do You Love Me Now, Jr? featuring J. Mascis from Dinosaur Jr.

2) Crystal Stilts – Alight Of Night

A mesmerizing mix of garage rock and shimmery shoe gaze echoes with deep crooning vocals that sound like a mix between Ian Curtis/Morrissey/Stephin Merritt. Alight of Night is the perfect record for late night wanderings through quiet, suburban areas (maybe as you search for a record store, as I was doing).

I’ve been working on a drawing of The Crystal Stilts which I will hopefully have posted before the year ends. In the drawing they are playing in Superman’s fortress of solitude. While you wait for that, here is Prismatic Room off Alight Of Night.

3) Foals – Antidotes

Foals’ sound contains elements of some of my favorite bands: Sonic Youth, Gang Of Four, early Cure and Q and Not U to name a few. Foals is more than the sum of what I’ve made up their influences might be. They have a totally unique sound of fast paced, attacking, math rock-esque, droning, bleeping, rock music. I caught them twice this year, once at Bowery Ballroom (discussed here) and once at Maxwell’s (discussed here). Both shows were phenomenal with the band bouncing and leaping around the stage and sometimes into the audience. Hopefully they’ll make it back to the States in ‘09. Here is a live version of their song
Mathletics.

4) Mates of State – Re-Arrange Us

I am a huge fan of Mates of State’s drums/synthesizer/boy-girl vocal harmonies indie pop. So, I was a little disappointed when I wasn’t immediately knocked out by Re-Arrange Us. Listening to it now, I can’t figure out what I wasn’t liking. Their song writing is as strong as ever, with Now, My Only Offer and Great Dane being some of my favorite Mates songs yet. Their voices sound great. The addition of an actual piano is great. So, I guess what I’m saying is, if this one doesn’t grab you right away, give it time.

Mates of State played a surprisingly small number of NY shows in 2008. Sarah and I saw them at The Highline, which was fantastic. A belated post on that will emerge before the end of the year. And, for your enjoyment, Invitation Inn from the A House Full Of Friends compilation.

5) My Teenage Stride – Lesser Demons

Please find below a photo of My Teenage Stride mastermind Jed Smtih arriving to a party at my old apartment circa 2002. Jed seems to be dressed as the The Punisher even though it wasn’t a costume party. Also, I seem to be watching Back To School, the Rodney Dangerfield classic co-starring Robert Downey Jr. who can be seen wearing a football helmet with a nuclear missile through it.

My Teenage Stride are an excellent Brooklyn pop band led by the aforementioned Jed Smith. Have you seen the movie May where Angela Bettis plays a girl who kills people, steals the prettiest parts of their bodies and sews the cadavers together to create one perfect person? That is Jed’s style of songwriting, eviscerating pop songs for the best bits, combining and recombining until he’s created something both familiar and fresh.

My Teenage Stride is also a fantastic live band with Brett Whitmoyer on drums, Jenny Logan on bass, an Tris McCall on synthesizer. McCall’s animated, joyful attacks at his synthesizer remind me of jazz musician Cecil Taylor’s feeling that pianists should “try to imitate on the piano the leaps in space a dancer makes.”

The last time I saw My Teenage Stride was at the soon to be defunct Knitting Factory. The show ended as Jed fell to the floor while still playing, and then continued playing. Fantastic! 2008 saw the release of their digital ep Lesser Demons. Here is Red Nurse.
Also, you can see Jed in the audience in this drawing.

6) The New Fantastics – Peasant Peasant Peasant Serf
The New Fantastics are another band I hope to see more of in 2009. Singer/guitarist/songwriter Patrick Shea combines Morrissey-esque crooning with bizarro Robert Pollard-esque lyrics, and then, with drummer Jeff Rohe, wraps the whole thing up in fuzzy garage pop with a soupçon of Velvet Underground. Genius!

Their EP Peasant Peasant Peasant Surf is 7 short and sweet tracks (only 2 are over 2 minutes). You can purchase it on their MySpace page. From that EP, here is Your Prehensile You. My post on The New Fantastics can be found here.
Meanwhile, Patrick, not one to rest on his laurels, has set out to write a song for every chapter of Moby Dick. That can be witnessed at Call Me Ishmael. Recommended.

7) No Age – Nouns

I was told that No Age sounds like Sonic Youth and My Bloody Valeninte. So I listened to them. They sound nothing like Sonic Youth and My Bloody Valentine. But they’re still great. If I were to describe them I would say they sound like the soundtrack to a never made John Hughes movie bathed in layers of fuzzy guitar feedback and shattering drums. Take a listen to Things I Did When I Was Dead and decide what they sound like for yourself.

8 ) Portishead – Third

After 11 years of silence, Portishead released this phenomenal album which feels simultaneously like it could have come out a year after their self-titled last record or like it could have come from 10 years in the future. Geoff Barrow and Adrien Utley have outdone themselves musically, creating a richly layered aural environment for Beth Gibbons’ haunting vocals. However, the most jaw dropping track on Third has to be Deep Water featuring nothing but Gibbons and a ukulele. An incredible counterpoint to an incredible album.

Here is their cover of Serge Gainsbourg’s Requiem For Anna off Monsieur Gainsbourg Revisited.

9) Ribbons – Surprise Attacks

Ribbons singer/guitarist Jenny Logan and drummer Sam Roudman have crafted a hybrid of post-punk and metal. Surprise Attacks is a half hour of deep, shimmery guitar melodies, assaultive drum attacks and dark, echo-y vocals. While their intensity comes across on Surprise Attacks I heartily suggest seeing them live to fully get the Ribbons experience. In fact, their show at Galapagos in April was the first live show I drew a picture of. That can be seen here. The picture was inspired by the Ribbons song Spread Out Under The Trees. At least the trees were.

10) Vivian Girls – [Self Titled]

The Vivian Girls write super-short, super-catchy ’60’s style jangly garage pop covered in layers of fuzz with the echo-y vocals buried in the mix. They put on great live shows (a drawing of their Bowery Ballroom show in October is coming soon) and also have great stuff at their merch table. When I saw them open for Sonic Youth I picked a CASSETTE copy of their (at the time) out of print self titled release, complete with the B-Sides of their first two 7 inch singles. At the Bowery show I got a t-shirt sporting a drawing of a vomiting cartoon dog and a CD of live radio tracks. From that CD, please enjoy Second Date live on WFMU.