Best of 2006 - John M. Cunningham of Canasta
Ok, so, this is why I suck.
Canasta is going to be one of my top picks for 2006 (When I finally get around to writing the list, hah!). One of the reasons I haven't written about them is that when I got their latest album We Were Set Up (which actually came out in 2005) I listened to it for like a month straight and then liked it so much that I gave it to this boy I liked to listen to one night and he never gave it back. And then he went on tour - and I totally couldn't find it on the internet to steal...so I was gonna patiently wait until he gave it back - but now I am in the midst of a huge project and have no time to do anything while all of these reviews gather dust in my inbox.
ANYWAY
Just check out John's "Best of 2006" list and then check out their Myspace (where, of course, you can totally download 4 songs). All I have time to say right now is that they are like, good, and stuff.
est of 2006 - John Cunningham
5. Joanna Newsom, Ys
Girl's getting a lot of guff and p-word drops for her long song-suites, but pretentious only makes sense within the insular realm of indie rock: no one would dare diss Philip Glass, say, for ten minutes of hypnotic harp figures. Plus, the expansiveness only enhances the thorny beauty of these fairy tales: amid the colorful swaths of orchestration, it lets them linger and breathe.
4. Junior Boys, So This is Goodbye
Two years ago I swooned for the tricky rhythms and gorgeously frozen sighs of the electro-pop duo's debut, Last Exit, and though this one's more streamlined, that may ultimately be to its advantage: the insistent beats and squelching synths on "In the Morning" prompt fantasies of dancing all night, eyes lifted to the darkened sky.
3. Final Fantasy, He Poos Clouds
Owen Pallett's palette consists of the polite tools of the trained composer: contrapuntal cello and ornate piano intricately darting past each other, for instance. But he's as likely to spiral into cries of anguish as he is to dwell on his own prettiness (just as the album title conflates the heavens with literal shit), and the appearance of the Charlie Brown children's chorus on "This Lamb Sells Condos" all but encapsulates the record's consuming melancholy.
2. Sonic Youth, Rather Ripped
Twenty-five years on, and these boho rock stars not only haven't lost the plot, they're making some of the best music of their career: here they condense the bright, dreamy jams of their last couple records into crisp, shimmering pop songs, albeit with plenty of detuned arpeggios and breathy art-school poetry that'll probably always serve as a signature, since it still sounds so good.
1. Girl Talk, Night Ripper
The gimmicky fun of the traditional mash-up gives way to a more transcendent pleasure: hearing dozens of my favorite radio hits stitched together, one snippet after another, for over 40 breathless minutes. Even when the name-that-tune factor lost its novelty, I was still left with a cavalcade of thrilling new contexts that unexpectedly stuck in my craw, and as the sort of dilettante who loves Ciara nearly as much as Sonic Youth, I couldn't help feeling like the mix was designed just for me.
Canasta is going to be one of my top picks for 2006 (When I finally get around to writing the list, hah!). One of the reasons I haven't written about them is that when I got their latest album We Were Set Up (which actually came out in 2005) I listened to it for like a month straight and then liked it so much that I gave it to this boy I liked to listen to one night and he never gave it back. And then he went on tour - and I totally couldn't find it on the internet to steal...so I was gonna patiently wait until he gave it back - but now I am in the midst of a huge project and have no time to do anything while all of these reviews gather dust in my inbox.
ANYWAY
Just check out John's "Best of 2006" list and then check out their Myspace (where, of course, you can totally download 4 songs). All I have time to say right now is that they are like, good, and stuff.
est of 2006 - John Cunningham
5. Joanna Newsom, Ys
Girl's getting a lot of guff and p-word drops for her long song-suites, but pretentious only makes sense within the insular realm of indie rock: no one would dare diss Philip Glass, say, for ten minutes of hypnotic harp figures. Plus, the expansiveness only enhances the thorny beauty of these fairy tales: amid the colorful swaths of orchestration, it lets them linger and breathe.
4. Junior Boys, So This is Goodbye
Two years ago I swooned for the tricky rhythms and gorgeously frozen sighs of the electro-pop duo's debut, Last Exit, and though this one's more streamlined, that may ultimately be to its advantage: the insistent beats and squelching synths on "In the Morning" prompt fantasies of dancing all night, eyes lifted to the darkened sky.
3. Final Fantasy, He Poos Clouds
Owen Pallett's palette consists of the polite tools of the trained composer: contrapuntal cello and ornate piano intricately darting past each other, for instance. But he's as likely to spiral into cries of anguish as he is to dwell on his own prettiness (just as the album title conflates the heavens with literal shit), and the appearance of the Charlie Brown children's chorus on "This Lamb Sells Condos" all but encapsulates the record's consuming melancholy.
2. Sonic Youth, Rather Ripped
Twenty-five years on, and these boho rock stars not only haven't lost the plot, they're making some of the best music of their career: here they condense the bright, dreamy jams of their last couple records into crisp, shimmering pop songs, albeit with plenty of detuned arpeggios and breathy art-school poetry that'll probably always serve as a signature, since it still sounds so good.
1. Girl Talk, Night Ripper
The gimmicky fun of the traditional mash-up gives way to a more transcendent pleasure: hearing dozens of my favorite radio hits stitched together, one snippet after another, for over 40 breathless minutes. Even when the name-that-tune factor lost its novelty, I was still left with a cavalcade of thrilling new contexts that unexpectedly stuck in my craw, and as the sort of dilettante who loves Ciara nearly as much as Sonic Youth, I couldn't help feeling like the mix was designed just for me.
Labels: canasta, final fantasy, girl talk, joanna newsom, junior boys, sonic youth
