Salutations!
Ok, so here it is, the first post of what we hope to be many of She&Him Do Music posts. I am Matt, and my counterpart Liz and I will be "blogging", as you kids call it these days, about our favourite music. We hope to talk about upcoming and favourite indie music without falling into the stereotype of the typical stuck up, arrogant indie kids.
First off, a roundup of our favourites of 2008, that seems like a good place to start. I hope you have heard of most of this music, unlike the Pitchfork tops albums of 2008, half of which I have never heard of. But I digress. Here is my list of the top 40 albums of 2008, edited only slightly from the one I posted on Facebook.
1. Bon Iver – For Emma, Forever Ago
2. Bloc Party – Intimacy
3. Cut Copy – In Ghost Colours
4. Mates Of State – Re-Arrange Us
5. Born Ruffians – Red Yellow & Blue
6. Crystal Castles – Crystal Castles
7. Chad VanGaalen – Soft Airplane
8. Los Campesinos! – Hold On Now, Youngster
9. Beck – Modern Guilt
10. Portishead – Third
11. The Stills – Oceans Will Rise
12. Los Campesinos! – We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed
13. Kanye West – 808s & Heartbreak
14. Wolf Parade – At Mount Zoomer
15. Stars – Sad Robots (EP)
16. Lykke Li – Youth Novels
17. Vampire Weekend – Vampire Weekend
18. Tokyo Police Club – Elephant Shell
19. The Submarines – Honeysuckle Weeks
20. TV On The Radio – Dear Science
21. Final Fantasy – Spectrum, 14th Century (EP)
22. Winter Gloves – About A Girl
23. Hayden – In Field & Town
24. Glasvegas – Glasvegas
25. Deerhunter – Microcastle
26. City And Colour – Bring Me Your Love
27. Black Kids – Partie Traumatic
28. Hot Chip – Made In The Dark
29. The Raveonettes – Beauty Dies (EP)
30. Animal Collective – Water Curses (EP)
31. Coldplay – Viva La Vida
32. Joshua Radin – Simple Times
33. Ben Folds – Way To Normal
34. The Killers – Day & Age
35. Hawksley Workman – Los Manlicious
36. Death Cab For Cutie – Narrow Stairs
37. Ladytron – Velocifero
38. The Faint – Fasciinatiion
39. MGMT – Oracular Spectacular
40. Girl Talk – Feed The Animals
All in all, not the best year for music, in my opinion. Bon Iver gets my #1 spot, but its not my overwhelming favourite like Handsome Furs was last year. What I like so much about this album is how it brings out so many emotions just from listening. It's a very low-key album - sad and fragile, but beautiful. It's good to listen to when you're feeling down. It's an album you can just lay back and absorb . My favourite track would have to be 'Skinny Love' with the single'Flume' (which was played on Conan O'Brian beautifully) a close second.
Cut Copy and Mates Of States grew on me alot from when I first listened. Mates of State always do a great job making enjoyable, extremely catchy indie pop, and even though I missed the usual electric organ sound, there were alot of great hooks and cathcy melodies. Standout songs included: Get Better, Help Help, and Lullabye Haze. Ptichfork called this album boring, saying that The husband/wife band made the songs for their family, but I say that Mates are still on top of their game, creating catchy pop songs that still have heart.
Cut Copy is a fantastic album, full of unique, catchy songs that just put you in a good mood. My favourite songs were: Feel the Love, Lights and Music, and Far Away.
Finally, I thought Intamacy by Bloc Party was great, no matter what the critics said. Ion Square was my song of the year, since it is probably the best love song ever. Courtship Dating by Crystal Castles was a close second, I just can't get sick of it.
So thats it, my picks of Best of 2008, Liz will be adding stuff that I missed, so between us, hopefully we covered your favourite album. Thanks for reading the ramblings that make up my first blog post ever, I hope you enjoyed it! Until next time,
-&Him
P.S. I don't really know what Salutations means.
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Some more goodies to add to the pile:
Kings of Leon-Only by the Night (saw them on this tour... top concert of the year)
Radiohead- In Rainbows (official release date jan 2008- not the leak date)
Santogold- Santogold
M83- Saturdays= Youth
Hercules & Love Affair-Hercules & Love Affair
T.I.- Paper Trail
Copeland- You Are My Sunshine (female who sings on the album, completes it)
Ting Tings- We Started Nothing
Q-Tip-The Renaissance
The Black Ghosts-The Black Ghosts
Lil Wayne- Tha Carter III (nuff said)
I'm sure there are more where that comes from but for the most part, those stand out
-She
The highly anticipated 9th(?) album by Animal Collective titled Merriweather Post Pavillion, (which is set to release January 20th 2009) has made its way onto the internet and into my itunes. Magical ain't it? Regardless of how I came across the album, a hard copy of the cd will be purchased by this girl. I hereby give it two thumbs pointing straight up. The group has taken their typical, all over the place "what instrument will they throw in next" sound, to the next level higher. From an immediate listen, it sounds like a much more electronic/ psychedelic sound for the group. It's not shocking that the group has decided to take this route but I am in favor of it.