These Are A Few Of My Favourite Things

It’s that time of year when popular (or in this case singular) demand dictates that a planned, indefinite hiatus may need to be suspended in order to enumerate the coolest, most yulest, recordings of 2011. In no particular order, this is the music that caused my jaw to drop this year.

1. Lanterns on the Lake – Gracious Tide Take Me Home (2011)
Utterly gorgeous offering from Geordieland. Not a sentence I’d ever anticipated writing, but this is a truly wonderful album. folk ambient? Jazz Folk? Never mind the category, just let it wash over you.

2. Olafur Arnalds – Living Room Songs (2011)
Neo classical wonderfulness from Icelandic bedroom genius. Written, recorded and mixed in ten days by all accounts, this album betters his best.

3. Chrysta Bell – This Train (2011)
The return of David Lynch – only slightly reminiscent of the wonderful Julee Cruise, this album’s highlight is the twisted blues of “Real Love” which delivers a timely reminder that rock music is still capable of being down and dirty. The guitars on this track are downright filthy.

4. Anna Calvi – Anna Calvi (2011)
A talent (and a sound) too large to ignore, this album fuses elements of Diamanda Galas with Jazz, Flamenco and Blues. There is still hope while talents like this get record deals.

5. King Creosote & John Hopkin – Diamond Mine (2011)
If I had to choose just one album from this list it would be this, eerie and beautiful by turn, this blend of found voices, electronica and folk is a fully immersive experience that makes me wonder why we bother with dreary technology like 3D TV. One day people will look back and remember when they had imaginations. A power for the hills.

6. PJ Harvey – Let England Shake (2011)
This is simply without peer, a set of songs that sets this wilful and extravagantly talented artist apart from everyone else of her generation. That rare thing, a concept album that works. The messages here are from the heart and that’s the difference.

7. Tom Waits – Bad As Me (2011)
If ever an album could be said to be inebriated it is surely this. A glorious, lurching, ramshackle beast of a talent this stands up with SwordFishTrombones as representing the essence of this singular man. Inevitably, it features Keith Richards.

8. The National – Think You Can Wait (Single – 2011)
No properly new product from the National this year, but this single will do – The Paul Thomas Anderson’s of rock music, another timeless vignette from an act who set such high expectations in 2010 that my worst fear is that they won’t match it. This single suggests that they will.

9. Ryan Adams – Ashes & Fire (2011)
Back on track with a much more focused effort. His concert in Brighton was simply astounding this year and here, this maverick talent settles down for an hour or so. As a balladeer, Ryan Adams is without equal. Ashes & Fire delivers a set of songs that stand up with the best of Heartbreaker and Love Is Hell. High praise.

10. Roy Harper – Songs of Love & Loss (2011)
Speaking of mavericks, Roy Harper is surely the block from which Ryan Adams is a chip. A compilation of varying interest, but the highs here are veritable peaks. Francesca, East of the Sun, Another Day, these are absolutely sublime recordings.

Honourable mentions to other artists constantly on the sound system – reissue of the year The Cramps – Smell of Female, an absolutely dastardly album and for me, the best of the Cramps. Sleazy, deranged and comical by turn. They truly were marvellous days. The Go Betweens – Before Hollywood for one song in particular, the amazing “Cattle & Cane”. The Guillemots – Walk the River, as deliriously over the top as ever, “I Don’t Feel Amazing Now” and “Sometimes I Remember Wrong” are two of the best love-gone-wrong songs ever. Wilco – The Whole Love, you simply can’t go wrong with Jeff Tweedy, like a good whisky, they just get better with age. Finally, David Lynch – Crazy Clown Time, the deranged surf guitar of “Pinky’s Dream” featuring Karen O. Spooky, psychotic and edgy this track has most of what makes rock music so special.

So that’s it from me – have a very merry Christmas and a happy new year!