November Playlist
This month’s playlist, without me intending it to, turned out to be heavy with heartbreak tunes. I promise to make next month’s a bit cheerier.
November Playlist (Spotify link)
This month’s playlist, without me intending it to, turned out to be heavy with heartbreak tunes. I promise to make next month’s a bit cheerier.
November Playlist (Spotify link)
Everyone’s at it, so I thought I’d pitch in. I make no claims for this list beyond the fact that it represents the albums I actually enjoyed the most this decade. No hipster posturing for me, oh no.
So, resisting the urge to put my album at number one, and in very particular order, here we go…
1. Daft Punk - Discovery
I played this every day for a year when it came out. This is a nostalgic choice for number one really - but I stand by it. No other album gave me as much joy this decade.
2. N.E.R.D. - In Search Of…
I refer specifically to the original version of this album, before Pharrell decided to delete the CD and rope in Spymob to make a rockier - and far inferior imo - version.
3. LCD Soundsystem - The Sound Of Silver
I don’t know how James Murphy does it. Really I don’t.
4. Lambchop - Nixon
I am baffled why this isn’t in everyone’s top 10. It is, quite clearly, one of the most beautiful albums ever made, in any decade.
5. Joanna Newsom - Ys
I heard nothing else like this in the ’00s. She deserves our undying love just for being so wilfully different.
6. The Streets - Original Pirate Material
When I was a teenager, I didn’t have a band, my band, like you’re supposed to - didn’t like Nirvana, didn’t care either way when it came to Oasis or Blur. Then I reached my 20s, and Mike Skinner came along. He is the ’00s to me, and even though he went downhill creatively after A Grand Don’t Come For Free, I still respect him like no other British artist of the last 10 years. He’s our Jay-Z.
7. Beck - Sea Change
Perfect songwriting, basically.
8. Midlake - The Trials Of Van Occupanther
Perfect songwriting, basically (part 2).
9. Aaliyah - Aaliyah
Yes, actually. The high watermark of those glorious few years when US r’n’b producers like Timbaland were creating futurehits practically every week, before they got crunked up and lazy.
10. Coldplay - A Rush Of Blood To The Head
I don’t care what you think. This is a fantastic album. Fuck off.
11. Phoenix - It’s Never Been Like That
What is it about the French and their ability to make music that makes me so happy?
13. Metro Area - Metro Area
I don’t think I listened to house again after this. It never got better (note: I know nothing about contemporary dance music anymore, so please take that with a pinch of salt).
14. Broadcast - The Noise Made By People
Perfect music from a perfect band who haven’t, as far as I’m concerned, made a duff record all decade.
15. Richard Hawley - Truelove’s Gutter
This year’s classic, and one that, I think, will last.
And the rest…
16. Kanye West - College Dropout
17. The Strokes - Is This It
18. Avalanches - Since I Left You
19. Outkast - Speakerboxxx/The Love Below
20. Peter, Bjorn and John - Writer’s Block
21. Clipse - Hell Hath No Fury
22. PJ Harvey - Stories From The City, Stories From The Sea
23. Fleet Foxes - Fleet Foxes
24. Spiritualized - Let It Come Down
25. Mumford & Sons - Sigh No More
26. Alicia Keys - Songs In A Minor
27. Bjork - Vespertine
28. Jill Scott - Who Is Jill Scott?
29. Burial - Untrue
30. Royksopp - Melody AM
31. Justin Timberlake - Justified
32. Feist - Let It Die
33. Zoot Woman - Living In A Magazine
34. Belle & Sebastian - The Life Pursuit
35. Air - Talkie Walkie
36. The Micronauts - Bleep To Bleep
37. Luke Slater - Alright On Top
38. Eminem - The Marshall Mathers LP
39. M83 - Dead Cities, Red Seas & Lost Ghosts
40. Destiny’s Child - Survivor
41. Amy Winehouse - Back To Black
42. The Rapture - Echoes
43. Von Südenfed - Tromatic Reflexxions
44. Turin Brakes - The Optimist LP
45. Jay-Z - The Black Album
46. MIA - Arular
47. Kanye West - Late Registration
48. The Streets - A Grand Don’t Come For Free
49. Franz Ferdinand - Franz Ferdinand
50. The Last Shadow Puppets - The Age Of The Understatement.
And finally…
Worst Album Of The Decade: Vampire Weekend - Vampire Weekend
Note: if this already exists please let me know!
The limitations of all drum machines/sequencers is that they rely on individual samples, or loops, or sliced loops. This means you spend forever auditioning samples before you can even start making a beat. Ableton make it easier than most by allowing you to import audio to midi (as does Logic 10 I believe), but still, you need to have the right sampled loop to begin with. And even worse, you’re generally relying on the same sample sets everyone else has got, unless you’re sampling and remixing your own sounds - and quite frankly who can be bothered to do that? (Lots of people, I realise, but as someone who wants to get beats down quickly to build songs around, I usually don’t have the motivation for this).
Imagine instead if you made a beat this way. Start with a kick sound. Now manipulate that one sound - and I’m imagining this on the iPhone, so think of using hand gestures, taps, or moving the iPhone itself - like a piece of putty. Squeeze it to make the kick more condensed and 909-like; stretch it out to make it fatter; press into it to make it bitcrushed; pull it in all all different directions to make crazy noises. When you’ve got the perfect sound, tap out the rhythm. Done. Now move on to the snare, hats, percussion etc, and work them the same way.
By the end you’ve manipulated maybe five or six individual starter sounds and created something ‘unique’ - much better than wading through tons of samples to get the same effect.
I’ve no idea if this is possible. It would, I assume (and I’m so far from an expert it’s laughable), require the software to be streaming a huge amount of samples all at once to make it work - like BFD but even more intensive. Because it wouldn’t be about taking one sound and just adding effects, it would be about manipulating a sound so that all possible sonic directions are at your disposal. You could shift from a realistic Ludwig-sounding snare to an 808 handclap to a Neptunes crunch to some crazy sci-fi thing just by gesturing with your hands.
Is this idiotic? People who know about this sort of thing, please let me know :)
Nick Garrie - Little Bird. From today’s lost ’60s psychfolkpop gem, The Nightmare Of J. B. Stanislas.
