Dylan Peterson writesCHIRP Radio Best of 2011 (Dylan Peterson)

Throughout December CHIRP Radio presents its members’ top albums of 2011. The next list is from Dylan Peterson.

(Click here to get the complete list of CHIRP Radio members’ picks.)

1. Detroyer – Kaputt (Merge)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   I don’t think a great album can ever be neutral. The best records probably get an equal amount of love and hate (I’m thinking Trout Mask Replica, Velvet Underground, Another Green World, In Rainbows, Rumours, anything by ELO, etc.). Believe it or not, people still think Bob Dylan has a weird voice. And yeah, Kaputt should divide us. People should get upset when they hear this easy-listening, cheesy-sax-drenched, vocals-recorded-lying-on-a-couch, artsy shit.
   
   But what can I say. I haven’t listened to any other album this year more than Kaputt. I am infatuated with every track here. I guess artistic audacity just gets me every time. I want to hear someone giving a crazy idea his all, even if that could potentially mean utter failure. Dan Bejar could’ve made the worst decision of his life by releasing Kaputt, but as long as listeners like me are around, we’ll make sure this isn’t the last time an artist doesn’t play it safe. Kaputt is my favorite album of the year.

    

   
   Best Track: Kaputt

2. Real Estate – Days (Domino)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   I completely slept on Real Estate’s self-titled debut, but after seeing their show at the Subterranean this summer, along with a majority of new songs in their set, I woke up. You don’t have to look too deep beneath the haze to hear a band that cares deeply about music. Precision and harmony are of utmost importance to Real Estate, and the result is an arresting album of indie surf rock. And no, you shouldn’t just listen to this in summertime. I just listened to it again, and it sounds great on 40-degree Chicago evenings.

    

   
   Best Track: All the Same

3. Washed Out – Within and Without (Sub Pop)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   Chillwave came out of the bedroom in 2011. Washed Out is the frontrunner of the movement, and is taking pride in being so. Whether you’re getting high, having sex, dancing, reading, or sleeping, Within and Without should be the soundtrack. It’s a strange time for music like this though. Washed Out opened for Cut Copy on their last North American tour, and leaving the venue I overheard some awful girl call Washed Out “the hipster Enya.” First I wanted to turn around and tell her to check this out, but then I just shrugged it off and thought, “Enya is awesome.”

    

   
   Best Track: Soft

4. Kurt Vile – Smoke Ring for My Halo (Matador)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   Hey, guitars! Yeah, that’s an instrument for old dudes, but Kurt Vile doesn’t care. He knows how to write a great song with his guitar, and he should continue. Kurt has an aura that you can’t really fuck with. The timelessness of songwriting wins again here, whether you’re a fan of Bruce Springsteen, Sonic Youth, or Arcade Fire, Kurt Vile’s music somehow stretches across decades of rock and roll cool and comes back with a uniquely original style.

    

   
   Best Track: Jesus Fever

5. Korallreven – An Album by Korallreven (Acephale)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   It was a great year for quiet music. Actually, I don’t know. Does screamo exist anymore? Is punk still a thing? I have a feeling that loud shit doesn’t do as much for us anymore because of how easy it is to make a high-quality album in one’s bedroom with a laptop. Our ears are collectively refined, and emotional music can’t be achieved as easily or brutishly these days. Korallreven is like new-age, Native American, sacred music, ambient, Sigur Ros and chillwave delicately smooshed into one lovely as honey viiiiiibe.

    

   
   Best Track: The Truest Faith

6. M83 – Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming (Mute)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   It was 2011’s epic album. And hey, if I’m looking for something grandiose and overwhelming, this is the stuff. It sounds like the 80s, but no, it actually doesn’t. It sounds like 2011. This is music that people are connecting with right now. We’re not going back in time. We’re hearing synths clearer than ever, and they warm our hearts. Don’t forget about shoegaze either. M83 is a culmination of a couple decades worth of ideas, succeeding today and today only.

    

   
   Best track: Midnight City

7. Chad Valley – Equatorial Ultravox [EP]
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   If anything should be considered a “surprise” in my top 10, I guess this would be it. Equatorial Ultravox wasn’t even reviewed on Pitchfork, so y’know. But these seven tracks still get me up. He sounded great at Schubas, so I have really high hopes for a full length (or another EP, or whatever he decides to release). It’s the ideal chillwave, and I am still unapologetic about loving it. These guys are making fresh music, and it gives me the bliss.

    

   
   Best Track: Fast Challenges

8. G-Side – The One…Cohesive (Slow Motion Soundz, LLC)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   Rap album of the year. In a recent interview I did with ST 2 Lettaz and Yung Clova, they said that their music is not cloud rap, just Alabama music. But whatever we want to call it, G-Side has the most radical sound in hip-hop today. They sample Beach House, Enya, and Tame Impala like it’s nothing. Seriously, they’re not gimmicky at all. If the sound works for their song, that’s why they’re sampling it.

    

   
   Best Track: How Far

9. Bon Iver – Bon Iver (Jagjaguwar)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   I couldn’t stop listening to this when it came out. Replay value is what gets an album in my top 10. I would\ rather not even explain why this album works for me, it just does. If you also put these songs on repeat, you got it. If you turned it off seconds after hearing it, fine. I don’t think this an album that needs to be defended.

    

   
   Best Track: Beth/Rest

10. Active Child – You Are All I See (Vagrant)
    BUY: Insound / iTunes
    An ex-choirboy plays the harp over post-dubstep beats. I don’t really feel the need to say anything more. He gets a guest vocal from How To Dress Well, brought Chad Valley along as the opener of his North American tour, and is now the opening act for M83’s tour. He is running with the right crowd. We will hear a lot more Active Child in the years to come. You Are All I See is a beautiful haunt of an album, but it really feels like the beginning of something special.

     

    
    Best Track: Hanging On

CHIRP DJ writesCHIRP Radio Best of 2011 (Liz Smyth)

Throughout December CHIRP Radio presents its members’ top albums of 2011. The next list is from Liz Smyth.

(Click here to get the complete list of CHIRP Radio members’ picks.)

1. PJ Harvey – Let England Shake (Vagrant)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   This album is beautiful in its quiet grace, and the honesty of its lyrics. Even 9 months after its release these songs still get happily stuck in my head.
2. The Joy Formidable – The Big Roar (Atlantic/Canvasback)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   This group is very easy to listen to (beware of spontaneous sing-alongs). Their accessible rock/pop mixes lilting verses with grungy, crunchy choruses.
3. The Weeknd – House of Balloons (XL)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   The title track is great, and the rest of the album is filled with solid, lush night music.
4. Timber Timbre – Creep On Creepin’ On (Arts & Crafts)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   I love the inventiveness of this group, and especially on this album. It’s like the melancholy love-child of a crooner and a folk-rock band, with atonal influences.
5. Blind Pilot – 3 Rounds and a Sound (ATO)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   This album is perfect for quiet mornings. I appreciate the detail given to every song, from the lyrics to the subtlety of its chord and voicing changes.
6. Radiohead – The King of Limbs (Ticker Tape Ltd.)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   This is another album that contains a ton of musical detail. I’m probably in the minority, but I really enjoy the electronic and jazz influenced direction Radiohead has gone lately.
7. Likki Li – Wounded Rhymes (LL)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   Lykke Li portrays her vulnerability with such passion on this album. “I Know Places” is one of my favorites.
8. Adele – 21 (XL)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   I and every person in America love this album, but who can deny the pull of “Rolling In the Deep” or “Someone Like You”?
9. Beastie Boys – Hot Sauce Committee Part 2 (Capitol)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   This album makes me feel like a bad-ass, which is hilarious. I especially like the first half of the recording.
10. Fleet Foxes – Helplessness Blues (Sub Pop)
    BUY: Insound / iTunes
    Does anyone else feel like Fleet Foxes are our generation’s Simon and Garfunkel? The title track is one of the best on the album in my opinion.

Bobby Evers writesCHIRP Radio Best of 2011 (Bobby Evers)

Throughout December CHIRP Radio presents its members’ top albums of 2011. Our first list is from CHIRP DJ Bobby Evers.

(Click here to get the complete list of CHIRP Radio members’ picks.)

In making this list, I realized 2011 has been a year of “Don’t Miss” albums. Like, you should absolutely make it your business to listen to “The King is Dead” “21” “Watch the Throne” and “Bon Iver, Bon Iver.” The word “epic” gets thrown around a lot, but 2011 seems to have turned out to be a pretty important year albums-wise.

First, The Honorable Mentions: Artists whose Albums I regret not listening to more that likely would have made the list had I gotten around to it: Peter Bjorn and John, Bill Callahan, Fleet Foxes, Radiohead, Tapes N’
Tapes, The Joy Formidable, Feist, Death Cab For Cutie, Beyonce, Fruit Bats, Mister Heavenly, Saves the Day, Wilco, Bjork, St. Vincent, BOBBY, Eleanor Friedberger.

And now, the top 10…

1. The Decemberists – The King Is Dead (Capitol)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   The first #1 for Pacific Northwestern indie folk troupe The Decemberists saw them stripping away 100% of their theatrics to get back to their roots and do what they do best: simple, sweet folk songs with an alt country bent. Play to your strengths, Meloy.
   

    

   Recommended Tracks: Rise to Me, January Hymn, June Hymn, This is Why We Fight

2. Bon Iver – Bon Iver (Jagjaguwar)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   At first I was listening to it over and over again because I was trying to see what all the hype was about. It charted at #2 on the Billboard 200 and everyone was talking about it. I couldn’t quite figure it out, but eventually I was listening to it over and over again because I couldn’t stop. It had become the film-within-the-book in David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest that renders the audience incapacitated.
   

    

   Recommended Tracks: Holocene, Michicant

3. Wye Oak – Civilian (Merge)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   “I still keep my baby teeth, In the bedside table with my jewelry, You still sleep in the bed with me, My jewelry, and my baby teeth. I don’t need another friend, When most of them I can barely keep up with. I’m perfectly able to hold my own hand, but I still can’t kiss my own neck. I wanted to give you everything but I still stand in awe of superficial things I wanted to love you like my mother’s mother’s mothers did…Civilian…”
   
   No explanation needed.
   

    

   Recommended Tracks: Civilian, Holy Holy, Doubt

4. Thao & Mirah – Thao & Mirah (Kill Rock Stars)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   What started as a tour together between Kill Rock Stars darlings Thao Nguyen (of her assembled Get Down Stay Down) and Mirah Zeitlyn of Mirah quickly turned into collaborative songwriting and the world was made better for it. The album was produced by Merrill Garbus (see #5).
   
   Recommended tracks: Eleven, Teeth
5. tUnE yArDs – W H O K I L L (4AD)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   This is the year Merrill Garbus exploded with her musical project tUnE-yArDs, a collage of multi-instrumentation and sound effects. The album is bombastic, fun, and incredibly original. I seriously didn’t understand what I was listening to the first time I heard it streaming on NPR.
   

    

   Recommended Tracks: Gangsta, Powa, Bizness

6. Nicole Atkins – Mondo Amore (Razor & Tie Music)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   The follow-up to her debut Neptune City, singer-songwriter Nicole Atkins is moody and soulful and dark. Taking inspiration from Ennio Morricone, a lot of the songs give you the unsettling feeling you’re living a David Lynch movie. It was actually her poster hanging at Subterrenean the night after she performed there that made me listen to this record, making me immediately regret missing her there.
   

    

   Recommended Tracks: Cry, Cry, Cry, Hotel Plaster, This is For Love, War Is Hell

7. Adele – 21 (XL)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   Another #1 record, this is the sexy, soulful followup to her debut album 19 (I hope she titles all of her albums the age she was at the exact moment she wrote them, like a diary). It is all at once empowering and heartbreaking soul pop.
   

    

   Recommended Tracks: Rolling in the Deep, Rumor Has It, Someone Like You

8. Tennis – Cape Dory (Fat Possum)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   Ridiculous album cover aside, this is a record by a married couple who traveled the world and then made an album about it. It is dumb, fun twee pop and one that I listened to over and over again at work, alongside Bon Iver and Civilian. Unfortunately I missed them at Lollapalooza, but I could still hear them.
   

    

   Recommended tracks: Take Me Somewhere, South Carolina, Cape Dory

9. Mountain Goats – All Eternals Deck (Merge)
   BUY: Insound / iTunes
   2011 saw a return-to-form for John Darnielle’s songwriting project The Mountain Goats after a dissappointing response to 2009’s Life of the World to Come. It is driving, full, and dripping with the cleverness audiences come to expect from Darnielle.
   
   Recommended tracks: Damn These Vampires, High Hawk Season, For Charles Bronson
10. Jay-Z and Kanye West – Watch the Throne (Roc-A-Fella/Roc Nation/Def Jam)
    BUY: Insound / iTunes
    Another collaboration that once it came together seemed fairly obvious with fantastic results. An annoying ad campaign for a pretty brilliant hip-hop album that is dark and fun and has a cornicopia of special guest stars including Beyonce, Frank Ocean, Mr. Hudson and a polarizing use of an Otis Redding track. The songs that have “featuring” credits are the best ones on the album. This album is kind of a big deal. If you haven’t heard this, you’re basically out of the loop.
    

     

    Recommended Tracks: Otis, No Church in the Wild, Lift Off, Made in America, That’s My Bitch

P.S. I also made a Spotify playlist that is accessible to anyone with Spotify that has a lot of the aforementioned recommended tracks.