Good news, everyone: monthly playlists are back for 2016! Here are 10 of the tracks that most tickled my tympanic membrane in January...
1. Animal Life - Shearwater
(from Animal Joy)
Shearwater are a band I've been meaning to investigate for ages, and January 2016 was the month in which I finally got around to it. Animal Joy was the album I purchased (thanks to @dickiesview on Twitter for the recommendation), and it's a very strong set of songs - Animal Life could well be one of my all-time favourite opening tracks, and I've only owned its parent album for about two weeks.
We've (almost) reached the end of April, and it's been a month of freshness and newness and sunshine all around. Here are 10 of the tracks that have soundtracked the last 30 days or so for me.
We'll start, perversely enough, with the closing track from Cloud's new album (which I reviewed earlier this week). I don't know for sure that this song's title is a Mario Kart reference, but I fervently hope it is.
As you may have noticed, spring is here! The sun is out, the jumpers are off, and there's been a noticeable change in the kind of music I've been listening to lately. Here are three albums that never fail to make it feel like springtime:
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah by Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
If I associate an album with a particular time of year then, more often than not, it will be the time of year at which I originally bought that album. I picked up CYHSY's self-titled debut in March 2007, and since then, it's always reminded me of the clocks going forward and the sun coming out. Happily, it still sounds as fresh and as bonkers now as it did eight year (eight years!) ago.
Springiest Track: The Skin of My Yellow Country Teeth
"How can I keep me from moving? Now, I need a change of scenery"
I'm not sure where it started, or how long it's been going on for, but quite a few people have been tweeting their 'Top 50 Debut Albums' over the last few days.
I wanted to jump on the bandwagon, but I'm not sure I've even heardfifty debut albums, let alone fifty good ones. I decided that I could just about stretch to a Top 10, so here we are - The Album Wall's Official Top 10 Debut Albums:
10. Give Blood by Brakes
Recorded in one long take (or so I vaguely remember reading), this awesome album gave the world its first glimpse of the Brakes and their bonkers little world.
9. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah by Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
In which Alec Ounsworth finds beauty and brilliance in his own nasal passages, and deigns to share it with us. As every review mentioned at the time of its release, Davids Byrne and Bowie were both big fans.
Here is something that Clap Your Hands Say Yeah posted on Twitter last night:
This announcement made me very happy indeed. CYHSY have been one of my favourites since I first got my hands on their debut album - that was back in 2007, and many of that CD's songs now number among my most listened-to of all time. There's Details of the War, the bruised, beautiful torch song that introduced me to the band; there's Upon This Tidal Wave of Young Blood, the audacious album closer that ends with Alec Ounsworth repeating the phrase 'child stars' about fifty times, which always thrilled me when it probably should have really annoyed me; and then there's The Skin of My Yellow Country Teeth, the loose-limbed centrepiece of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah which, for a time, was a serious contender for my favourite song of all.
I think a lot of people consider the other two CYHSY albums to be somewhat disappointing, but I quite like them. Some Loud Thunder is certainly challenging - I can't imagine anyone who would enjoy listening to the muffled, distorted title track - but it's also the album with Satan Said Dance on it, which is more than enough to exonerate it. Songs like Yankee Go Home and Love Song No. 7 are pretty smashing as well, not to mention my personal favourite Mama, Won't You Keep Them Castles in the Air and Burning? It's like this album's Details of the War.
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Third album Hysterical is even better. It caught some criticism for sounding like The Killers, and while I can certainly understand that comparison, their jerky, nasal take on The Killers' brand of skyscraping American anthemica certainly works for me. The first three tracks (the soaring, skittering Same Mistake; the breakneck title track; and the lovely Wasted Youth, which is this album's Mama, Won't You Keep Them Castles in the Air and Burning?) form one of the best opening one-two-three punches I've ever heard.
It's hard to know what to expect from the new album. There hasn't really been any pattern to their releases so far - I suppose that Hysterical, a reasonably accessible album, could be construed as a reaction to the confusion that Some Loud Thunder elicited, in which case the new'un will probably be more experimental again. I'm vaguely aware that they released a new EP recently...does anyone know what that sounded like?
Actually, it doesn't matter. Regardless of what the new CYHSY album is like, I'll probably go to Spillers and buy it and listen to it and enjoy it. They're a special band, and if they're currently absent from your collection, I recommend righting that wrong ASAP.
I catch the train to and from work, and since my journey takes the best part of an hour, I usually have time to listen to one full album each way. This morning, however, I managed to squeeze in two: Tosta Mista by Hooded Fang, and This Many Boyfriends by, er, This Many Boyfriends. Both albums are pretty petite, and while some people might complain that a thirty-minute running time doesn't represent good value for money, I like a nice, concise LP that doesn't hang around any longer than it needs to.
Both of those albums are well worth a listen, by the way. I realise that it would be kind of ironic if I wrote reams and reams of text about the art of keeping it brief, so instead, here are five more short albums that I recommend checking out. Descriptions won't exceed the length of a Tweet (140 characters).
Reckoning by R.E.M.
Punk for sensitive people. Every track is a winner; some folk say that Camera or Time After Time let the side down, but they are wrong.
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah by Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
One of my most-played of all time. It unfolds beautifully, a glorious whole that's done and dusted within forty minutes.
The Pains of Being Pure at Heart by The Pains of Being Pure at Heart
It has all the rises and falls that a full-length album should have, but it doesn't outstay it's welcome. Compare Hey Paul with Stay Alive.
How to Ruin Your Life by The Murderburgers
Pop-punk from Scotland. Fifteen tracks in about half an hour. It's Over Already is perfect, and even the worst tracks are invigorating.
Hörse of the Dög by The Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster
Remember to pronounce the umlauts. At around 25 minutes, this is the shortest of all, delivering blow after blow without wasting a second.
Do you have any other short 'n' sweet favourites to add? Share them in the comment section below. In the meantime, here's a quick blast from that last one:
