The Factual Opinion

The Top 30 Albums of 2011: 10-1

10. Frank Ocean - Nostalgia/Ultra

In a year where R&B had an out-of-nowhere renaissance, between mainstream radio and weirdo online only releases (seriously, it may not be the best album but The Dream’s “Wedding Crasher” is probably my most-played track of the year), Frank Ocean managed to not have any competition in great songwriting (or in a few cases rewriting other people’s eh songs as great songs, fudging the “your favorite hip hop/r&b artist’s taste in rock is about the same as your mom’s” rule by making a Coldplay track pretty listenable). Subject matter, this is as much about sex and relationships as the Jodeci he takes a swipe at in one of the interstitials, but there is a breadth of language and approach to subject matter on this record that makes Nostalgia/Ultra different. “Novacane” draws a parallel between a need to be numb and the current studio-frankensteined style of his genre, but still manages to walk us through a pretty specific story in a way you only see in golden age rap and singer-songwriter deep cuts. “We All Try” positions Ocean’s relationship with his girl by laying out his entire belief system. “Songs For Women” playfully navigates the before and after of becoming a songwriter to get with girls, and what it feels like when the one girl isn’t interested. A pretty rote love song is bookended with a monologue from Eyes Wide Shut, seemingly tearing into the misogyny of the track itself. On “There Will Be Tears”, Ocean gives us the heartbreaking ballad, but instead of being lovesick for a girl he sings about growing up without a father and losing his grandfather. He sings his heart out, and it hurts, and not in the way that these kind of songs ever hurt to listen to. All of Nostalgia/Ultra takes what are essentially genre tropes that have been worn smooth and impersonal and make them personal to Ocean in ways that show how idiosyncratic an approach he can take without really changing up what an album like this should deliver. Everything here is a presentation of Ocean’s personality - from the videogame cartridge noise to the way he approaches sex, and how well it speaks to you has everything to do with how you respond to him.  -SW

9. Big K.R.I.T. - Return of 4Eva

The truth is, coke rap was always a metaphor for the music industry. Just like most rock bands’ second albums are secretly about the process of making a second album, raps about hustling on the corner are really raps about hustling to get into the studio. Hustler’s remorse is just self-doubt. Measuring weight = measuring sales. The good shit is the good shit. Keys open doors… to your new career! But these days every rapper is his own label, accountant, and marketing department. Rappers like Nicki Minaj and Kanye West use the music industry itself as a lyrical focus. So what’s the metaphor now?

On Return of 4Eva, 25-year-old Mississippi native Big K.R.I.T.’s industry talk seeps out between the UGK-indebted tributes to wood grain that define his album. He claims that rap labels aren’t interested in signing someone who’s just rapping about country shit. They’re not interested in someone aiming for a collection of songs rather than a monster single. That may be legit; it may be part of K.R.I.T.’s mythos. Either way, it’s K.R.I.T.’s relationship with his own career that gives Return of 4Eva its poignancy. When he’s not fetishizing his tires, K.R.I.T. is transparently working through the artist’s process—ambition, second thoughts, trying to be the person your family and friends see you as. Every time he contemplates writing a gangsta track or wonders if his deceased grandmother has been pulling strings for him from beyond the veil, K.R.I.T. taps into that larger metaphor—how you fight or buckle against the seemingly unmovable forces in your life, especially when it seems like you’re not built to succeed. That’s the difference between coke rap and industry rap: there’s no underdog in the crack game.

“Couldn’t pay the rent, but passed up on the deal because it wasn’t right,” K.R.I.T. raps on “Dreamin’,” “Sometimes you gotta wade the storm.” You’re not going to get better life coaching from the Clipse. -MB

8. WU LYF - Go Tell Fire to the Mountain

The cover I usually see attached to WU LYF’s Go Tell Fire to the Mountain is a simple collage. A shard of a picture of raging fire tearing through tall, dry grass sits on top of a picture of storm clouds burrowing through mountaintops, just below a crystalline sky. WU LYF’s music is similarly elemental, a torrent of swells and decrescendos, with singer Ellery Roberts’ anguished voice calling out through the flames.

Go Tell Fire to the Mountain’s vinyl album cover is even more intriguing. It primitively depicts a group of people embracing and celebrating at the edge of a body of water, itself in front of a pyramid-shaped hill. WU LYF’s full name is displayed—World Unite: Lucifer Youth Foundation—and at the top, against a white background, sits a modified cross with a W at the top. Because the cover’s not as immediately visually striking, the vinyl album could conceivably be lost and rediscovered in a record bin decades from now, mistaken for a relic from a tribe or cult. And that’s exactly what it sounds like, from the passionate sweep of the orchestration to the organ-led songs to the chanted choruses. When lyrics do creep out through Roberts’ garbled annunciation, they are often familial (as on the self-explanatory “We Bros”), adoring (he is as unafraid to say “I love you” as anyone since Billy Corgan), or primal (the most articulated lyric is the refrain “I’m spitting blood”). It’s as if Go Tell Fire to the Mountain has been unearthed from a colony, tucked away somewhere in the Western hemosphere, where the inhabitants worship at the church of Broken Social Scene, and even the discontents are occupying bro street. -MB

7. Wooden Shjips - West

While I have few music examples beyond Watch The Throne at hand, it certainly seems like 2011 was a year where our more reliable sluggers failed to get on base. David Fincher continued his post-Zodiac “i’m taking some time off from hard work”, Soderbergh remade Full Frontal with disease in place of the jokes, Thom Yorke accidentally labeled his new solo album as a Radiohead one, and then there’s that aforementioned West/Z team-up, which confirmed what we’ve all long suspected: Hova did actually retire, he just forget to take Shawn Carter with him. Enter: The Shjips. These San Francisco psych merchants have been steadily building better tracks for a solid six year bent, and West is one of their strongest and most accomplished collections to date. (The word album doesn’t really fit for West--the songs have a tendency to sound a bit better when presented side to side, and yet each of them is best experienced singularly; that way, the sea of conclusions they present remains navigable. It’s the same problem a short story collection creates. History tells us we read books cover to cover, and yet the pieces need you to give them their own private space.) There’s no denying that the Shjips will, for some, forever be relegated to the retail wallpapering category currently teeming with psycho heroes of past and present. That’s just the rules of the game, as much a subtitle as the old Parental Advisory used to be. But every once in a while, pull this one out and really give it a listen. Underneath the drone, distortion and shimmering chords, you’ll find a living center, pulsing with life, as hard as nails. Watching these guys get better is never going to get old. -TS

6. Destroyer - Kaputt

Dan Bejar sings on the final track of Kaputt, “Bay of Pigs (Detail)”, that he “was 20 years old in 1992”. Which places Kaputt in a different context than almost all of the past decade’s 80s nostalgia - or modified nostalgia where New Order and The Swans were as big as they are now remembered, instead of Phil Collins and Ultravox. Here, cultural memory is slammed back to jibe with actual history, and while the lyrics can poke at “Message In a Bottle”, the songs sound closer to Nothing Like The Sun, with all the weird issues of ego, race, pretension, pandering, nostalgia, and “lifestyle music” that can come with. All of it being dealt with by a guy who probably went to punk and indie shows to avoid ever listening to music like this at the time. Kaputt is an absolutely gorgeous record, one that finds the perfect way to present the lyricist side of Destroyer, because all the clusters of words and references don’t feel over-labored, instead they seem to slide along these songs. While Destroyer has been a motherfucker guitar band and a digital-only chamber pop orchestra, “ease” isn’t the kind of word you’d ever have associated with Bejar before now. There is a sense that in making an album like this, combined with the words he does “why’s everybody sing along when we built this city on ruins” - that Kaputt is a refutation of the kind of fake nostalgia records that are everywhere nowadays, the problem being that this essentially the same thing. So instead Kaputt feels like a call for a tempering of nostalgia with the kind of personal desolation every one of the records he’s referencing tried to cover up. This is where the rebellion came to die, and do cocaine and make some money. Those albums are all about the emptiness of being a rock star, but also the emptiness of singing about that. All the big statements, the gestures towards relevance, towards social conscience, and searches for love, all the stuff that dominates the record (even though in Bejar’s hands the words are wrong) were there because you’ve got to sing about something, right? It was music to listen to at dinner, before you broke out the coke, no one was listening anyway. But maybe now we are. -SW

5. White Hills - H-p1 

While Pitchfork (and Pitchfork’s readers, and those White Hills fans who preceded both) have made any number of excellent cases for why the best White Hills is the White Hills you go see live, the argument seems like one lacking in necessity--after all, who says that both can’t be great, even if it’s not in equal measure? (“Great” didn’t all of a sudden get worse than good, did it?) And yes, some of the complaints have merit: the parts during the twelve minute “Paradise” where the Hills start playing with what sounds like the hissing suction straw popularized by dentists does get old around the fourth time you hear the album, and sure, “A Need To Know” seems like little more than baby’s first remix of cool movie scores. But any quibbling is drained of its strength when cast against this album’s four front attack: “The Condition of Nothing”, opening the album with a hellish descent into psychedelic metal oblivion, courtesy of the heaviest guitar available. “No Other Way”, with it’s whirling repetition and unpredictable swell, adding up to the most dynamic interpretation of being drowned since childhood nightmare. And then there’s that Basinski sounding decay at the end of “Monument”, leading up the title track, “H-p1”, and the return of vocals, albeit vocals that lurk behind the savage sonic constructions that opened the album in the first place. Angry, loud, and surprisingly political--it’s okay to forget, but yes, this is a protest album, as strongly felt as they come--“H-p1” serves as the album’s crushing send-off. It’s exciting and rewarding, the most straight ahead “song” of any that the album contains, and it’s a great reminder of the ease with which music can capture emotion at its most blunt, at its most raw. A lot of people got pissed off in 2011. White Hills? They just remembered that anger isn’t supposed to be fucking boring. -TS

4. The Weeknd - House of Balloons

I spent most of 2011 trying to find something--absolutely anything--that could closely approximate the excitement found when “Power” gave way to “All of the Lights” leading up to “Monster”. Nothing. It felt unfair, actually. Kanye’s Twisted Fantasy showed up at the ass end of the year and basically annihilated 2011 for me, it became the thing everybody had to beat, and that trio of songs was the specific height that bar got set at. When the Weeknd came along--as it was for most of us, I found out because somebody else (we all have a Marty Brown, I just happen to have access to the original model) pointed me in that direction--it wasn’t an immediate, drop-to-the-knees revelation. It was mostly just joy that somebody (besides Lonely Island) had figured out that R&B gets way more interesting when it quits trying to appeal to the Steve Harvey’s of the world and starts singing about big asses and fucking somebody’s brains into a pile next to the laundry, which you also should probably have sex with. Fuck it: you're not going to out-seduce the classics in the field, so why not out-vocalize every rapper alive: steal that attitude, and make up a story. That’s what Weeknd did on Balloons, although it wasn’t until “House of Balloons/Glass Table Girls” worked its way into my subconsciousness that I finally caught on to what I was hearing go down. The song suite is one of the strongest cases for the album’s production, a steel rimmed mix of stripper extravaganza and bathroom sanity check reliant on the popularity of stripped down dubstep and naked hip-hop beats amongst film portrayals of insanity. It’s creepy shit, sure--this album failed the can-that-voice-fool-mom test, f.y.i.--but that’s just a byproduct of how well the premise got nailed. It wasn’t a full-on concept album, thankfully. Instead, it split the difference--story, with narrative attention split amongst subjects and audience, a ballsy mix that somehow managed to avoid the danger of turning into a musical or (considering its delivery device) performance art. A song like “Wicked Games” lulls one in to connivance, rolling itself around like infatuation while, in reality, pleading for (and then condemning) attention, including us in the obsessive asides “Tell me you love me/I know you don’t love me”, never pretending that the playing field is an even one. (It’s not for nothing that the perspective is so one-sided--when there is a response, it’s a tinny, child-like one. A strong woman would make this whole thing way too weird to stomach.) “Keep it up” would be the mantra, if, you know, the guy hadn’t already proven himself pretty capable of doing so. -TS

3. EMA – Past Life Martyred Saints

Past Life Martyred Saints is a series of journal entries, indulgent and raw, comprised of rambles and sentences repeated ad nauseum so as to find a hidden meaning between the letters, teasing out ideas through admonishments, fragments of stories, shout-outs to spurned friends, thoughts of self-mutilation, twisted idealization of her grandparents—you know, all the teenage stuff you’re still going through in your early twenties. But, even though she repurposes Bo Diddly’s humblebrag, “I am just 22; I don’t mind dying,” Erika M. Anderson is 29 years old. It’s to her credit, then, that her first solo album in the wake of a break-up with her boyfriend and Gowns collaborator, Ezra Buchla, sounds less like a fragmented emotional exercise, and more like a tightly-coiled emotional assault. Eight out of nine songs are downtempo, and they’re all propelled by a stately death march, punctuated by peals of industrial noise. At one point, EMA lets out a long groan that’s somewhere between a growl, a howl, and a burp—like much of the album, it might be embarrassing if it weren’t so visceral. Even the a capella round, “Coda,” is pretty in spite of itself. On it, droning voices sing, “These drugs are making me so sad”—an observation usually made after time and distance. So maybe Past Life Martyred Saints is Erika M. Anderson allowing her 22-year-old teenage self to whirl and spit within her while externally keeping a rigid front. You know, like an adult. Like an adult who knows that teenage feelings never really go away. -MB

2. Clams Casino - Instrumentals

Clams Casino, a 23 year old producer who works with his collaborators by email, is mostly known as a producer for Lil B. Sonically, his music is hip hop production. The beats are minimal, they build and recede the way a good backing track is supposed to. But Clams Casino is taking that structure and the immediate instinctual understanding that goes with listening to it, and does it with sounds and styles that are alien to hip hop production - the go to comparisons here are Warp records, M83 at their most digitally fuzzy, 70s Tangerine Dream, the late night comedown weirdness of Burial and Photek, Capcom games for the Super Nintendo. All of which it might be assumed Clams Casino probably wasn’t listening to for inspiration. So the sense of haze, the patient approach to bass, the manipulation of voices, the languid keyboards, they’re all decisions that have been come to because he thinks they sound good. While this could be a resume record, as a lot of producer-instrumental comps can be, the final result is a cohesive whole. Which is strange considering how these tracks could have been selected at random from the 200+ on Casino’s hard drive, but the final result is a journey which builds on the track which comes before it, whether it be a wide vista full production or a raw loop of an obvious sample, each of these tracks fare better on their own than in their original intended state as showcases for rappers. Unlike a lot of music that you can apply “haze” to as a descriptor, there is a sense that you can never call Instrumentals a stoner record. It’s too propulsive, too minutely detailed in it’s attempt to shudder off the rails that Casino has laid out for each track. It never does, but it’s the trying that makes it compelling. -SW

1. Shabazz Palaces - Black Up 

One of the only hip-hop albums released on Sub Pop records, quietly promoted with a series of eclectic videos (one a Burnett/Heron mash-up featuring a mass grave and bleeding pigs, the other a whimsical interview featuring the loveliest--and yet most incongruous--pairing imaginable), including songs bearing titles like “A treatease dedicated to The Avian Airess from North East Nubis (1000 questions, 1 answer)" it was no surprise when Black Up turned out weird. Coming at it without knowledge of pedigree--that it was Digable Planet’s Butterfly, grown-up and partnering with a multi-instrumentalist whose father is essentially African music royalty--the album’s initial bite was even fiercer, only eclipsed in audaciousness by Death Grips decision to open their 2011 album with a statement of purpose culled from an extended Charles Manson sample. But whereas Exmilitary ran itself headlong into exhaustion when the actual tracks began, Shabazz Palaces made good on theory: hip-hop’s great frontier might remain in its sound, and in the willingness of its participants to explore. On the image and statement front, you can file Shabazz's avant-garde artiste next to Twisted Dark Fantasy's real time celebrity psychopathy and Big K.R.I.T.'s termite work on today's carpenter--it's been a year of Platonic ideals. The trick to Black Up's success is in its confidence--this is a zealous album, consumed by the creativity of its creators, track after track after track of noise and unpredictability, the only constants those muffled explosions that crowd the ear and decide the tempo, while lyrics laced in double meaning and split second point of view changes swarm through wherever allowed in tight bursts of fire. Nothing sounded like this, and yet the hypnotic quality often worked to overpower the stink of newness, working--as Sasha Frere Jones so aptly put it, Black Up is the “loveliest fog”--to keel its listener over, exhausting and educating. And it accomplished it all--the intellectual satisfaction, the tromp through newness, the challenge, the weird--without lecturing, while still being compelling, still grinding out the necessary rhythm. This was the high wire act every year deserves. -TS

-Marty Brown, Sean Witzke & Tucker Stone, 2012

The Top 30 Albums of 2011: 30-11

30. A$AP Rocky – LIVELOVEA$AP

If you’re listening to LIVELOVEA$AP for quality of rapping, you’re doing it wrong. He may have gotten the three-million dollar label advance, but A$AP Rocky’s rudimentary MC skills are mostly window-dressing for the post-apocalyptic genre-mashing on display. A$AP Rocky is simply a very good poster boy for what, in some ways, is hip-hop’s punk rock moment—what with the A$AP Crew, Main Attrakionz and Lil B collectively imagining rap rebuilt from the basics up, set to soundtracks of slow-motion YouTube videos of the Twin Towers falling (and if this makes Odd Future this era’s Ramones, that’s just the price we have to pay.)  A$AP Rocky’s true gift lies in his Tim Tebow-like ability to rally everyone around him toward a central cause. He utilizes bombastic production from new jack Clams Casino; resurrects and reinvents Screw music ; and makes ugly-ass practitioner Spaceghostpurrp seem respectable. Then, every once in a while, he makes a stunning play himself—most often in the form of a concise, forceful line like his mantra, “I’m a pretty motherfucker.” Pretty being the exact quality needed for a figurehead. -MB 

29. Moon Duo - Mazes

Heavily saturated with noise, striding across abandoned landscapes, Mazes saw the latest phase in Moon Duo’s attempt to figure out how far they want to go with the what they’re able to create. The basics haven't changed: Sanae Yamada sets the tempo with her keyboards and some electric what nots, and then Erik Johnson (of Wooden Shjips fame) rips around alongside on guitar. Vocals are a mix of the back and forth regulars--imperative statements and mumbled nature references--and the songs all tap out around five minutes. As with their previous releases, the album works as both sludgy background palliative (think Brian Eno’s Music For Slow-Motion Stumblings Through Dark, Druggy Basements) as well as old fashioned headphone friendly immersion trip. Months later, this chamber seems inexhaustible. -TS

28. SBTRKT - SBTRKT

The inherent contradiction in dubstep-derived pop is that it pits an inherently insular genre against an extroverted one.  The obvious compromise involves dialing up dubstep’s flashier qualities—enormous bass, toy-box melodies, and metal-machine squall—to meet pop’s exuberance. It’s something that producers Joker and Benga successfully pull off on “The Vision (Breathe In)” and Katy B’s “Katy on a Mission,” respectively, without veering anywhere near Skrillex’s bombast-overload. But, across his first full-length album, SBTRKT’s Aaron Jerome takes a less-traveled route, retaining the subtle pleasures of dubstep (and UK garage, and UK funky) while turning in an unrestrained pop album. Jerome creates a cohesive sound using a wide array of vocalists, including UK funky stalwarts Sampha, Jesse Ware, and Roses Gabor, as well as Little Dragon’s Yukimi Nagano. Their performances revel in a sort of reawakened hope—diva moves from a small party in a dingy basement.  Rather than blowing songs out of the water, each vocalist ducks in and out of SBTRKT’s delicate, intricate framework—gentle encouragement for subtle dancing. -MB

27. Nicolas Jaar - Space Is Only Noise

Nicolas Jaar’s debut album is full of voices: Jaar’s own singing voice, but dialog taken from films in french and english, children playing - sometimes crying - in the distance, diced up breathing and muttering, Ray Charles. There is a physicality as well - running water, shoreline sounds, pingpong balls, hands moving across a piano. Ostensibly, this is a collection downtempo electronic music. There is enough evidence here of that for it to be classified as it and nothing else. But there is a surprising amount of found sound and manipulation of sound here. Things like fake cd skips deleting instruments and replacing them with new ones, playing the same rhythm. The final result is something that resembles nothing else but memory, messy and deliberate, fragmented and cohesive at the same time - reconstructing songs (if you want to call them songs) out of whatever is left after the passage of time. Jaar states “space is only noise if you can see”, elsewhere someone else states “the monuments have been brought down to earth, and made part of the land”. By the end of the album, it seems like memory destroys the divides between things - space/ noise/ land/ sea/ sound/ music/ self/ others. -SW

26. Iceage - New Brigade

Besides mixing up about fourteen kinds of genres, as long as all of those genres involve loud drums and hyphenated words like “post-punk”, New Brigade also made use of its scant runtime to champion the strongest case since Kanye for relying on a band’s preferred listening order. Following the requisite 45 second noise intro, “White Rune” gets down to the business of laying out everything you’re about to experience. One: you’re not going to understand most of the lyrics, and won’t need to. Two: all of these songs are going to end about a minute before you want them to. Three: there is still plenty of room left in your life for a quartet of loud teenagers, especially Danish ones who tell the New York Times they heard New Jersey has good sandwiches, and maybe the next album will be longer? Somebody take a note: the hype is there for a good reason, and this is one of those times. -TS

25. Wild Flag - Wild Flag

Carrie Brownstein is, in many ways, the last guitar god standing. Any and all candidates you want to throw out just seem like shadows of other better players, or are too busy doing other thing to still be in the running. Wild Flag’s songs are written by Brownstein or Mary Timony, and while this isn’t a “guitar album”, what is most enervating about listening to it is to hear their two guitars ricochet off one another, how exciting that can be even in 2011. The songs - Timony’s feel more tuneful, Brownstein’s feel more savage - both are frequently about music in a way most bands haven’t been writing songs since... well rappers rapped about DJs and metal bands sung about metal. It feels like a very organic growth from a band that clearly derives all of its power from playing together - this isn’t a conceptual decision, it’s a byproduct. On “Future Crimes” Carrie Brownstein belts out “If you’re gonna be a restless soul/ then you’re gonna be so so tired/ if you’re gonna give up on the fight/ then I’m gonna call you a liar”, updating her previous “Entertain” for the moment, where the problem is no longer “who’s side are you on” but are you committed? To anything at all? This is organic too. -SW

24. Battles - Gloss Drop

Hey, Battles, what makes you think you’re so funky? Here’s an album made out of the stuff of prog-jazz-funk, by the kind of dudes who understand how to play in 17/39 time, but the end result is something you want to dance to. This is as confounding and exciting as the last time they did it, only without a breakout single to distract from the nature of the thing. This is an entirely physical album, one that’s effect is not aimed towards the musically trained listener’s mind but the body of anyone in earshot. On paper, Battles sounds like a mathletics league, but in execution it’s music that shuts your brain off and has you doing stupid dances to augmented 9ths or some other thing I’ll never understand even after it’s explained to me. Gloss Drop sidesteps any and all conversation about their musical acumen and asks us to dance with somebody, and like Whitney Huston before them, they’ve succeeded. -SW

23. M83 - Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming

I recently had a conversation with a friend of mine that Anthony Gonzalez would never get away with any of the shit he does without being french, and it is something you’ve got to wonder about - if culturally you’re allowing for extravagances and gestures you’d scoff at if they were on an album made by some kid from Portland, if you’d really be as into it if it weren’t coming from the place where Air, Daft Punk, and Phoenix defined our parameters of taste. It’s something I’ve thought more and more about M83 because I never used to care - here was the all-digital Kevin Shields, but album-by-album in distorted noise vistas have been replaced by plaintive voices and obliteration has been replaced by naked emotionality. Which isn’t to say that all of that wasn’t present in the M83 to begin with, but it has since taken the forefront. There is a lot more bombast evident in everything, and there are certainly times where you wonder if you’re giving this record a pass because it’s french or if you really like what’s being done as much as you did “Unrecorded”. In execution, though, this is an album that earns every one of its excesses. Even at it’s most ridiculous, there is no artifice here. Or maybe, there is, but it is a particularly gorgeous artifice, one that moves past the pan and scan John Hughes worship of the previous album and goes somewhere a lot more anamorphic. -SW

22. Unknown Mortal Orchestra – Unknown Mortal Orchestra

Despite this year’s R&B-to-indie/indie-to-R&B mass transmigration, few artists have made more palpable arguments in favor of white funk’s continued existence than Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s debut album. The media-shy Portland band finds groove within the whitest of white inspirations—Grateful Dead guitar jangle, 2nd generation garage rock, Peter Frampton—and implants it into indie-rock tropes. “Little Blue House” and album opener “Ffunny Ffrends,” for instance, roll certified break-beats through Vetiver-trademarked freak-folk territory. But it’s the pivotal track, “How Can U Luv Me” that makes a serious case for Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s soul. I imagine it as a corollary to Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings’ “How Long Do I Have to Wait for You?,” with horns subbed out for fuzzy guitar, and in-the-red production in the place of R&B sheen. -MB

21. Gnod - In Gnod We Trust

One of (at least) three Gnod releases this year, In Gnod We Trust is a little over a half hour long, comprised of two songs--”Tony’s First Communion” and “Vatican”--and yet it happens to be one of the heaviest albums on this list. Both tracks are built around repetitive, incredibly loud core sounds--"Tony’s" is some kind of swelling bass, like a gigantic alien heart arytyhmia, whereas “Vatican” is a mix of various howls and some kind of never-ending organ noise--that a variety of other sounds approach and interact with. The core never really merges with those bits, but considering the conceit of the album (the press release that accompanys the music is a fantastic piece of faux-sermon), maybe those core noises are meant to serve as some approximation of monotheistic metal deity. Who can keep up with religion these days? -TS

20. Washed Out - Within and Without

When they start giving out prizes for album-art-that-best-describes-one’s-sound (they probably already do this), one hopes the committee will retroactively give a statue to Ernest Greene for Within and Without. Clambering bodies, eyes closed, sun baked flesh-to-flesh cast against bright white sheets, with private vocals whispered by a tongue that’s pressed directly against your warm earlobe, this is the chillwave album that snuck past people’s visceral standoffishness with that goddamned “chillwave” moniker. (Or “dreampop”. Never has there been a term more suited as a defense for homicide than the word “dreampop”.) Fuck that thinking, though. This is a great electro suite, a languid sonic bath that takes old ESG tones and turns them into the grown up version of a bubble pit. Sure, there’s going to be moments where your ear says “you realize you’re dancing to the sound of somebody dragging a sharpie across a piece of copier paper”, but power through that shit. Nobody ever kissed a negative nelly, and in the future, we’re going to be stabbing all the wallflowers anyway. -TS

19. Eleanor Friedberger - Last Summer

The paradox of making anything is that it either has to be “timeless”, implying that it could exist at any time, at least any time where mass produced electronically recorded music was easily available. It means that it could have been released at any point between now and whatever point we currently don’t feel alienated from (so right now 70s/80s whereas the 50s/60s are starting to be periods we set tv shows. Look they wear ties and drink!). The other approach is to make music of its time - especially rap and dance music, which kind of have right NOW built into their dna simply by the way their music is released and listened to, as opposed to like, indie rock or country or whatever. The problems with both - timeless can mean who gives a shit and current can mean disposable and empty. So Friedberger manages to avoid the pitfalls of both, crafting an album full of songs that could have come out any time in the past 40 years but are still explicitly tied to a place and time. Specifically: last summer, Brooklyn, 2010. It’s hallmark is songs about being lovesick and scrolling through your inbox in bed. A very current experience, one that might be too fleeting to write a great song about. The details here - from the movies that were playing that summer to the giggle of the drug dealer she runs into - are what make Friedberger’s songs have some real emotional weight to them. The other thing is that... well there isn’t a bad song on here, and there isn’t one that doesn’t quietly get better with each listen, that’ll have you singing along with the phrasing you squirmed at on first play. Last Summer feels so alive without really being one of those “snapshot” records that always seem like someone singing their diary entries. Maybe the only one of those that ever actually felt this alive was Illmatic, which is a ridiculous comparison, especially considering what mid-30s Friedberger and 20 year old Nas have in common, but it feels like that vibrant a depiction of someones life, and how often does that happen? -SW

18. Belong - Common Era

Common Era sounds like it was recorded miles away in some sort of cavernous industrial space, the sonic provenance of A Place To Bury Strangers even as the songs have the feel of a better-than-you-remember Slowdive single. This isn’t really shoegaze or shitgaze or even really noise music at all. It’s just a series of delicate pop songs recorded in a way to disguise how that is all they are. Belong’s second album is one that lives and dies on how well the melodies grab you, from under layers and layers of white noise and reverb - and largely the album sticks. Tthe production has a very specific effect, forcing the listener to take each piece as a whole. There are no discernible lyrics, no real dissectable aspects of each song other than drums. Each song is its own fiber optics image, no aspect of it not containing its entire corpus. What makes this different from your average pop album is that deliberate presentation, demanding that it be taken on its terms rather than anyone who listens. Common Era makes what could be a gimmick or a style into intent. -SW

17. Grails - Deep Politics

While Grails has always seemed like the band you think Earth is warming up to become (until you listen to Earth and realize that no, that’s pretty much it), Deep Politics might be the album that puts their name at the forefront when it comes time to talk Western post-rock. It’s merited. “Future Primitive” opens Deep Politics with the latest bastard hybrid of Morricone and death metal, but by the end, the song has splintered open, ejaculating the sorts of LA cosmic guitar riffs that are stock & trade samples for M83 wannabes. After that, the game is on: it’s just a question of which bricks are going into the stew. There’s some fucked up New Age in “Corridors of Power”, stuff that wouldn’t be out of place if you go to a massage parlor where all sessions are concluded by cutting the electricity and abandoning you to your shame. There’s the weird cinematic work of the title track, where the guitar work chases around the idea of public displays of sorrow and revenge--"Deep Politics" indeed--all of which wrap up with the same sort of orchestral cornballing that our brains have been taught to seek true love amongst. Fuck the agrarian transition: this is what we’re talking about when we talk about the Great Leap Forward. -TS

16. Cults - Cults

According to the July 2007 FBI Law Enforcement bulletin, Stockholm syndrome usually involves the following conditions: “captors who do not abuse the victim, a long duration before resolution, continued contact between the perpetrator and hostage, and a high level of emotion.” That sound like a great metaphor for relationships for you? Cults thought so too. Across ten songs that echo 60’s girl groups like The Shangri-La’s, the East-Coast-by-way-of-West-Coast duo’s debut album seizes on the idea of kindness as emotional manipulation. Often the songs sound romantic, but actually live in the grey area between codependency and abuse. They’re accentuated with samples of speeches by Jim Jones and his ilk, all reminiscent of the legions of self-help platitudes that we presently use to define ourselves and our relationships. “I can never heal myself enough for you,” Madeline Follin sings at one point, revealing some hippy-speak unattainable ideal that her man expects of her. Most important, though, is that sound, steeped in the tradition of songs like The Crystals’ “He Hit Me (And It Felt Like a Kiss).” Cults’ melodies are as seductive as the promise of a new, better life. They hook you. Then they abduct you. Then they indict you. -MB

15. Main Attrakionz - 808s & Dark Grapes II

"I’m a diamond of God,” chants MondreM.A.N., “but a neighbor of Satan.” Like their buddy A$AP Rocky, Main Attrakionz trade in rap that hinges on plainspoken but intricately constructed statements. The Bay Area twosome’s 808s & Dark Grapes II digs into the central theme of post-Biggie gangster rap: the desire to be good, buoyed by the urge to do bad. It’s well-worn material, but statements like Mondre’s nail the angel/devil polarity precisely—it’s the kind of street poetry doesn’t need poetics; it just fucks around with big themes and taps into meaning. Producers like Friendzone, Giorgio MoMurda (have I mentioned how much I love that dude’s name?), and Main Attrakionz’ Squadda B use Clams Casino’s Instrumentals the way that The Grind Date’s producers used The Blueprint as a search engine for ideas. New Age piano, swaths of ambient noise, and castrati choral voices accentuate Squadda and Mondre’s songs, always reaching toward the sublime and sometimes grasping it. -MB

14. Zola Jesus - Conatus

As a cultural genre, goth deserves every sling and arrow thrown at it, if for no other reason than because it’s so gosh darn fun to throw them. (Even the most tolerant would agree: people in vampire clubs are the most humorless of pits.) And by rights, level the criticisms at Conatus all you want, but don’t be deceived into mistaking its gentile qualities--air gulped vocals, synthesized homemade bass lines--for fragility. It’s a classically structured sleight of hand, songs that move past the edge of comprehension; more passion songs about love than love songs passionately sung. The same things that make that aforementioned subculture so trite--its lack of purpose, its hasty retreat into the safe, the make-believe--is what’s entirey absent from the Conatus project. That opening blend of Aphex Twin style gargled electro isn’t ill-thought, not a scam, it’s a promise; this is what we’ll put inside you, what we’ll feed you now. The jagged stripped down, delivered with a history vocal you might not have accepted otherwise. It’s a worthwhile deception. -TS

13. Yuck – Yuck

A lot has been made of how closely Yuck hews to the sound of 90s bands like Dinosaur Jr, Teenage Fanclub, and Yo La Tengo. Thing is, the London-based group is less a tribute band than it is the Platonic ideal of two decades of indie rock. On their self-titled album, Yuck refine the shortcomings and rough edges of their forebears. If that brings to mind a homogenized version of a decades-old sound, well, that may be hard to dispute; but it’s also hardly the point. Yuck seem less interested in sound than they are in songs—that is, they use the components of 90s bands’ sound to craft timeless songs. And, since Yuck doesn’t aim for the emotionally disaffected audience that 90s indie rock targeted, their songs possess the sort of brazen emotional scope and impact that Pavement never attempted. The result is an album that splits between anthems (“Get Away,” “The Wall,” “Georgia,” “Operation”) and ballads (“Suicide Policeman,” “Shook Down,” “Stutter,” “Sunday”), each of which are both familiar and elusive (two of the best qualities music can have, in my opinion). Yuck may not have invented its own sound, but its songs belong to no one else. -MB

12. Katy B - On A Mission

Two of On a Mission’s primary producers, Zinc and Geeneus, are survivors of the UK garage boom of the late 90s and early 00s. Two others, Skream and Benga (who collaborate with Artwork as Magnetic Men), helped define dubstep as a genre. As dubstep and its offshoot UK funky transition into pop forces, and UK garage builds upon the comeback it mounted in 2010, it’s fitting that these four collaborated on Katy B’s debut. On a Mission all but establishes the blueprint for a successful, dubstep-based pop album. The flashpoint is the title track, “Katy on a Mission,” which churns with gnarly synths and muffled vocal clips before dropping a monstrous bass pulse. Benga’s production provides a British parallel to US pop’s current house obsession—the way it establishes momentum with just a few chords and a propulsive bass line has echoes in Rihanna’s “We Found Love,” for example. Of course, this is Katy B’s album. While she’s not the flashiest vocalist, Katy B excels in the exact area that dubstep requires: rhythm. She utilizes syncopation and vocal changes at a level hinted at on, say, SBTRKT, but mostly absent on dubstep’s crossover tracks—most of whom feature house-indebted divas. The result is a resolutely British album, rooted in tradition, with a firm idea of the near-future. -MB

11. Das Racist - Relax

Recurring themes on Relax, including guest verses - laughter, myriad Terror Squad references, not taking shit too seriously, taking shit seriously, money, how people in rap make money, how people around rap make money, 90s pop culture references, 00s pop culture references, literature, twitter, women, honesty, honestly relating to women (who may or may not have a pool), race, real life vs what rappers talk about, cultural relativism, crypto-Kanye references (what did you think “Michael Jackson” was about?), food, white castle, language (“half internet, half high school cafeteria shit”), meta-commentary by song title and sequence placement despite lyrical content or tone (“Booty In the Air” “Happy Rappy”, “Brand New Dance”), how rapping gets boring, even when you’re only a couple years in, the internet, recently dead musicians, being the best rappers alive. The last one is only implied. The criticisms of Relax have largely been that it feels more mainstream than the two previous free releases and that it’s weird that “Rainbow in the Dark” is being reused without any alteration. And yeah, both of those criticisms are valid and in some way true. The other big one, indicated by the first two examples, is that it felt like Das Racist didn’t seem to have the worldbeating urge that seemed to drive them to drop Shut Up, Dude and Sit Down, Man back to back. Which is bullshit, and exactly the reactions you hear on everybody’s major label debut, or whatever - the first album they’ve charged money for. Relax isn’t the album that people wanted/expected, it’s where Das Racist is right now. And thank god they’re not at all interested in giving a fuck about who’s listening, or what they want, even as they talk about who’s listening. -SW

-Marty Brown, Sean Witzke & Tucker Stone, 2012

The Top Music of 2011: The Also Rans

Before we dive into a proper Top 30, we thought we'd pull back the curtain a bit for a look at the albums that didn't quite make it in. Personal favorites that didn't make the cut, albums that lurked right outside the lists purview, or pieces that just didn't land specifically enough to make a fight worthwhile--a whole bunch of them follow, courtesy of Marty Brown and Tucker Stone.

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Marty Brown

Action Bronson – Dr. Lecter
Cities Aviv – Digital Lows
Kendrick Lamar – Section.80
Lil B the Based God – I’m Gay (I’m Happy)
Spaceghostpurrp – Blvcklvnd Rvdix 66.6 (1991)


Here’s five albums by dudes I’d consider foreriders in the current rap vanguard. Action Bronson pulls off the year’s second-best Ghostface impersonation on a Primo- and Pete Rock-indebted concept album about New York cuisine. Memphis resident Cities Aviv squeezes hard-bodied introspective joints out of high-garbage-content samples from “Float On,” “People Are People,” and, most impressively, the Alessi Brothers’ “Oh Lori,” which, yes, is about riding a bicycle in Springtime with the person you love perched on the handlebars. Kendrick Lamar, who is reportedly taking pole position on Dr. Dre’s mythical Detox, raps dexterously enough to establish himself as the post-Drake Snoop Dogg. Lil B unexpectedly steps his game up for the most anticipated album of his short, prolific career by toning down the self-help verbiage and learning how to get out of the way of his producers. And, finally, Miami-based beat-maker Spaceghostpurrp is responsible for the most intentionally ugly rap album of 2011, mastering sounds at different levels within the same song and inserting horrific/orgasmic screams with the same velocity that AarabMUZIK inserts DJ drops. From Bronson’s immaculate East-coast traditionalism to Spaceghostpurrp’s engrossingly terrible production, each of these guys has a conscientious stake in what hip-hop wants to sound like over the next decade.

The Rapture – In the Grace of Your Love

In the five years since Pieces of the People You Love, dance-punk impresarios The Rapture lost half of their rhythm section but rediscovered disco and, oh yeah, Christianity. For this years’ “comeback,” they toned down the more abrasive aspects of their sound—the primacy and jaggedness that got them so much attention a decade ago as part of the first wave of DFA artists—and came up with an album jam-packed with arena-rock dance-pop. Proving that if old punks never die, they can at least age gracefully, In the Grace of Your Love is The Rapture’s best, most cohesive record to date. It’s about Jesus, but fuck it.

Tiger & Woods – Through the Green

Throughout its 75-minute run time, Tiger & Woods’ full-length debut recalls bits of nearly every hit from the electro-disco era—“Heartbeat” to “Mercedes Boy”—but it plays more like a 12-hour fever dream with Melvin Riley’s exact intonation of the words “oh” and “Sheila” stuck on repeat inside your head. Credit the reclusive duo with taking Theo Parrish-style experiments in tedium and repetition; subbing out the component parts for diva-house vocals and Salsoul orchestral stabs; and ultimately churning out ten lengthy exercises in sustained joy.

Kurt Vile – Smoke Ring for My Halo

You don’t often think of singer-songwriters as bitchin’ guitar players—part of the draw for “musicians” is that being one usually doesn’t involve much more than strumming and feeling your feelings; it’s not a profession for strivers. So it makes a certain sort of sense that, on an ostensibly “singer-songwriter” album, Kurt Vile plays guitar like he could shred if he really wanted to, but is content sounding like a 90’s teenager sprawled out on a couch in a cement basement, sleepily reconstructing his hazy 80’s memories of 70’s rock radio. He sings as laconically as imaginable, as if he’s barely trying to hit any note, to say nothing of the right one. It’s what you’d call effortless if effortless weren’t a compliment. Yet, in spite—or because—of Vile’s apparent laziness, Smoke Ring for My Halo is one of the most compelling singer-songwriter records of 2011. I guess it’s like Kanye says: When you try hard, that’s when you die hard.

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Tucker Stone

Japanther - Beets, Limes and Rice

The track record seems to be one solid twenty minutes of material every other year with these guys. This is one of the good ones, even with the terrible album title.

Kriedler - Tank

This is what Goblin would sound like if Goblin were a bunch of fans of Goblin, and it was 2011.

Mark McGuire - Get Lost

He gets better with every release, but he’s got a way to go before people start throwing their Tim Hecker albums out the window. There's a really unusual, hard to get past noise effect on almost all of these tracks--it's sort of like a electronic rake being quickly scraped across an electronic plate--and while it's too infrequent to get used to, there is a feeling of satisfaction to be found the first time you proactively suppress the all-too-natural wince.

PJ Harvey - Let England Shake

You have to be careful when you’re on the way back from experimenting with noise, because it’s really easy to end up stuck in a Starbucks indefinitely. In the same way that you don't really wish the people you dislike any actual real world harm, nobody wants PJ Harvey to get her heart broken. And yet?

You know what I'm talking about.

Spank Rock - Everything is Boring and Everyone is a Fucking Liar

The best album of the last twenty years?

Ty Segall - Goodbye Bread
Ty Segall - Ty Rex
Ty Segall - Live In Aisle Five

Finally, a Ryan Adams for those of us who want to appear cool with those girls who complement their oversized aviator glasses with oversized novelty t-shirts.

Big Black Delta - BBDLP1

You gotta give it up for a group that could totally make it big on the nerdcore scene, but chose not to.

Big K.R.I.T. - Last King 2 (God’s Machine)

While 21 of the 22 tracks on Last King 2 (God’s Machine) aren’t “Yoko (Remix)”, one of the 22 tracks on Last King 2 (God’s Machine) actually is “Yoko (Remix)”.

Cold Cave - Cherish The Light Years

My only problem with sincerity is the part where you want me to listen to you talk about The Cure.

Gauntlet Hair - Gauntlet Hair

If all the Vampire Weekend fan bands are going to sound like this, maybe the next forty years won’t be an ever-worsening series of moments. (Well, the music part at least.)

Gui Boratto - III

In the same way I would give up on food for a series of life sustaining pills, I would give up on headphones to have Gui Boratto injected directly into the base of my spine.

The Top 50 Songs of 2011: #25-1

(Catch up with #50-26 here)

25. 151 Feva Gang – “Kush Groove"

If we’re being honest, Stardust’s deathless “Music Sounds Better with You,” which cornered the market on uptempo house jams for about three years at the turn of the millennium, would be a suspect choice as the basis for any rap song. But for a weed anthem, something that all but requires a loping, dusty beat? That’s just absurd! On “Kush Groove,” 151 Feva Gang knock a couple of BPMs off of the club warhorse. Beyond that, they keep the party hyped up. 151’s Dapper Don hosts the revelry with the enthusiasm of a young Lil Jon, incessantly screaming out “Ya Dig!?!” and veering off into digressions (like a moratorium for going H.A.M., where he suggests that instead of going Hating Ass Motherfucker, we just go Gibson). The looseness of Don’s rhymes and the gregariousness of his personality play nicely against the source material’s rigid beats, giving the song a magical, near-endless replayability, much like Stardust’s classic—the feeling that “Kush Groove” could go on forever and that’d be okay. In the end, that may be the song’s greatest gift to stoners.

24. The Weeknd – “High For This”

The Weeknd’s Abel Tesfaye writes a lot about what Craig Finn might call “the way that whispers bite like fangs in the last hour of the parties.” There’s a sense of drug-induced claustrophobia and impending doom present in Tesfaye’s songs, and, most of the time, he’s content to play the creepy guy in the corner, waiting for the girl’s eyes to start to roll into the back of her head. On “High For This,” the opening to The Weeknd’s out-of-nowhere free album, House of Balloons, he convinces someone to get trashed and fuck without a condom. Tones and beats stream through the song like tracers in your peripheral vision. Tesfaye tells the girl, “You don’t know what’s in store, but you know what you came for.” It’s creepy. More than that, it’s an extreme point-of-view to write an album around. But that’s exactly what the Weeknd does, and “High For This” is its most harrowing, compelling moment.

23. Fleet Foxes – “Helplessness Blues”

For the follow-up to their acclaimed debut, Fleet Foxes made a slight adjustment in their sound, as the band’s primary inspiration shifted from Americana to British Folk. Or from, say, Crosby, Stills & Nash to Fairport Convention. That might not seem like much, but the austerity of the British influence produced a parody of Fleet Foxes’ first album, rather than an evolution from it. Their self-seriousness seemed to get seriouser. Their melodies became drier. Though there was some grandeur (most notably in closer “Grown Ocean”), it was surrounded by tedium.

Which is not to say the band didn’t exhibit growth, the most exciting bit of which appeared in songwriter Robin Pecknold’s lyrics, which turned from vague excuses for harmonizing into thorny rambles (most of which also gave way to harmonizing). “Helplessness Blues” centers on one of the most interesting lyrical conceits I can think of, maybe because it’s antithetical to the principles of rocknroll itself. Pecknold opens explaining that he grew up believing he was “special”—he compares himself to a snowflake in what might be Fleet Foxes funniest moment by default. As he grows up, he discovers he’d “rather be a functioning cog in some great machinery,” emphasizing the power of community over the individual. As the song explodes from acoustic guitar into orchestration, Fleet Foxes ultimately wring deep pleasure out of mundane sentiment.

22. Mr. Muthafuckin’ eXquire – “Huzzah! (Remix Feat. Despot, Das Racist, Danny Brown & El-P)”

Favorite moments, in chronological order: Underground veteran Necro’s droning, UFO-landing soundtrack of a beat; Despot’s Irish pride; Victor Vazquez calling out Immortal Technique for being obnoxious (shots fired!), exactly the kind of intellectual beef underground rap needs right now; Das Racist hypeman Dap’s performance on Heems verse (I mean, I assume it’s Dap; I’ve been wrong before), especially when he reveals that two, not three of Heems’ shirts look expensive; Heems proclaiming himself “the worst rapper on this track, third coolest”; Danny Brown, who put out an album about getting older this year, actually telling stories about walking to school in the snow; the precision of El-P’s counting-themed verse; and Mr. Muthafuckin’ eXquire, like, blown away that someone could be “still hungry” after a thousand views on YouTube. A thousand.

21. Win Win – “ReleaseRPM (Feat. Lizzie Bougatsos)”

With Gang Gang Dance, the power of singer Lizzie Bougatsos’ voice frequently gets obscured by all of the “experimental” shit she does with it. She’s renowned for her vocal flexibility, and is equally comfortable obscuring her voice with effects or singing in an Indian pop style. When she plays it straight, as on 2008’s “House Jam,” she’s a force. So, on Win Win’s “ReleaseRPM,” it’s thrilling to hear her take on the role of diva/muse. Former Spank Rock producer XXXchange and friends draw upon UK Garage to create a slippery rhythmic framework, slowly adding peals of noise to build toward a climax. Bourgatsos, miles away from the inscrutable presence she is with gang, dives head on into the role of sultry pop star, even adding a little pout to her intonation as she sings, “All I need is some sort of release.”

20. Joker – “The Vision (Let Me Breathe) (Feat. Jesse Ware)”

Jesse Ware’s performance on the B-Side to Joker’s “The Vision” is my favorite vocal of the year, edging out Adele and Beyoncé and a couple of others we’ll discuss further down the list. Though she shows a similar range, Ware has fewer vocal ticks and tricks than Beyoncé on “1+1.” She’s more direct, aiming for the sternum—just like the bass that underpins her. She flaunts a bit more melisma than Adele, but—strange as it may seem—her voice comes from a deeper place. She out belts the beltiest belter of the year. Ware’s voice is unrestrained, while Adele’s—as profound as it is—still retains a professional sheen. Adele keeps her feet planted while she sings; Jesse Ware throws her entire body into the song.

Given Ware’s vocals, “The Vision (Breathe In)” has all the trappings of an attempt at pop crossover. In actuality, Joker is still digging in the same holes that he has been, following the same blueprint as “Tron,” “City Hopper,” or “Psychedelic Runway.” Eruptions of scuzzy bass pierce through Ware’s performance. Chirping melodies weave in and out. For Joker, the song’s structure is airtight so that the actual sound can be unhinged. The two of them are technicians who allow themselves to get out of control. Between them, they create the type of dystopian encroachment the repeated lyric, “Just let me breathe,” hints at.

19. Junior Boys – “Banana Ripple”

It’s All True may have been riddled with inward-looking slow-jams and meditations, but it closes with the most ecstatic track of Junior Boys’ career. For years, Jeremy Greenspan and Matt Didemus have been building toward the kind of slippery funk they exhibit on “Banana Ripple.” Fitting, then, that they decide to spend nine full minutes with it. Fitting, also, that they take the long route toward ecstasy. “Comfort is in your past,” Greenspan admonishes, bullying you with ultimatums like, “If you don’t really want it, don’t come,” and backing you into a corner where the only way out is dance.

18. Azealia Banks – “212”

Azealia Banks and Nicki Minaj both attended LaGuardia High School in New York—AKA The Fame School. They both studied theater, which should tell us something. That something is this: Drama geeks are great battle rappers. Of course drama geeks are great battle rappers. Acting camp school is less about learning how to feel your feelings, and more a training ground for exploiting others’ self-loathing for your own personal gain. Additional acting school lessons Banks employs on “212” include flipping voices at will, dropping the word “cunt” for dramatic effect (works every time), and consistently ratcheting up the tension without ever letting it break. And, if “212” instantly eclipses any single Nicki Minaj song, well, it’s only a matter of time until these two start feeding off of each other’s intensity.

17. Tyga – “Really Raw (Feat. Pharrell, Snoop Dogg & Game)”

Tyga knows enough get his two rudimentary verses out of the way quickly. He’s making way for the real show: Pharrell’s two best performances in forever. First, there’s the Neptunes’ production, all shuffling high-hats and errant horns—an acoustic version of their era-defining early work. Then, there’s Skateboard P’s work on the hooks. He’s just listing things that are “really raw” (a catchphrase that still has a chance to take off… right?), but every line is a pearl. It never occurred to me before just how raw KFC by the bucket it, but, yeah, I’d say “really” would be a pretty apt description of how raw that is. Same goes for jackets that smell like jet fuel, or gargling with champagne. Tyga’s best line even comes from repeating one of Pharrell’s and pairing it with an impression of Timmy from South Park. Elsewhere, Snoop Dogg does his daffy Uncle Snoopy thing, going so far as to call Tyga “Nephew” because he knows who he’s hired to be now. And, finally, Game (sorry, but he’ll always be The Game to me) compares himself to Nas before… wait, did The Game just compare himself to Nas?

16. Future Islands – “Balance”

Throughout Future Islands’ On the Water, singer Samuel T. Herring fluctuates between a pronounced theatricality and a guttural snarl. It’s as if the affectation of his pleasant, “professional” voice is attempting to restrain the rawness of his real one. When the growl breaks through, a gush of emotion attends it. On “Balance,” over band-name-invoking tropical rhythms, Herring is direct about his intentions. “You can change your life,” he repeats again and again, “It just takes time.” And it’s the growl, rumbling through a measured tenor, that turns that advice from platitudes into hard-earned wisdom.

15. Phantogram – “Don’t Move”

Phantogram’s “Don’t Move” is a work of cut-and-paste beat-smithery that lets you hear the seams. It opens with a full-throated voice, clipped, repeated, and patched onto a differently-intoned “oooh.” The horn line and guttural voice that round out the musical phrase nod to Portishead. But, instead of trip-hop’s atmospheric drag, Phantogram aim for a hard-hitting pulse to brace Sarah Barthel’s vocals against. “All you do is shake, shake, shake,” she sings, mercurially, before demanding, “Keep your body still. Keep your body still.” The song’s title is “Don’t Move,” but, ultimately, Phantogram is daring you not to.

14. Wiz Khalifa – “The Race”

Wiz Khalifa released his major-label return, Rolling Papers, shortly after scoring a huge surprise hit with “Black and Yellow”—a song that timed perfectly with the Pittsburgh Steelers’ ascent to the Super Bowl. But Rolling Papers hedged its attempts to continue Khalifa’s pop crossover, providing Splenda beats and keeping the hooks closer to 50 Cent’s lazy singing than, say, Hayley Williams’ “Airplanes” chorus. That approach culminates in “The Race,” a breezy, joyous ode to the precise moment of his career when he envisions success without quite having it, completely. Yet. The result is something along the lines of DJ Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince’s “Summertime”—uplift without a touch of cynicism.

13. MNDR – “Cut Me Out”

After the second chorus, MNDR’s “Cut Me Out” launches into her version of the bassline from Robyn’s “Dancing on my Own.” Synths throb incessantly, like a drum roll performed by hammers on a keyboard. “Cut Me Out” (which vastly outclasses its origins as a free Mountain Dew label single) may be the most unintelligible British pop song of the year—for example, MNDR begins by gathering sparks in a velvet bag. It might also be the most tightly constructed, creating an insane amount of pressure with not much more than those synths and MNDR’s mechanically expressive voice.

12. Clams Casino – “Motivation”

Lil B put out “Motivation” about a month before the enthusiasm for Clams Casino as a solo artist really got going. Once @clammyclams put up the free mixtape Instrumentals for download, the reaction to the bare “Motivation” track was instantaneous: Get That Kid Offa There. Lil B’s granola rhymes—self-indulgence (which, hey, is generally welcome in rap tracks) masquerading as inspiration—so completely miss the point of the beat that they nearly tank the whole song. Clams Casino’s work is all breath and anticipation, squealing synths and clattering drums, bombast and ambience. It manages to be both calm and loud; if it were an athlete, it would be in The Zone. So maybe Lil B isn’t entirely to blame for not being able to keep up with this monster. This thing was built to stand alone.

11. Big K.R.I.T. – “The Vent”

Big K.R.I.T. has travelled a huge distance on the strength of his Everyman persona—his perpetual mix of astonishment and shrewdness toward the music industry; his (perhaps unhealthy) obsession with wood grain; his continual thanks to his grandmother. “The Vent,” his most accomplished song to date, holds his Organized Noize-indebted production chops to a few extended chords and a barely-there beat, while he unloads a complex web of familiar insecurities, ranging from mundane to profound. Should I write another song about cars, or go deeper? What do I do about this girl I’m interested in? How do I shake this depression? “I put my problems in a box beside my tightest rhymes,” he raps, “And when it gets too full and I can’t close the lid, I spaz on my family and my closest friends.” Then, 60% of the way of the through the song, K.R.I.T. begins to sing, and things come into focus. He’s commiserating, sharing every tremulous thought, in the hopes that you (or “you) get some sort of comfort out of it. It’s an act that’s rarer than you’d think, but there’s no better way to cement his Everyman reputation than becoming your friend.

10. Lana Del Rey – “Video Games”

Lyrically, “Video Games” is little more than a list of male fantasies. Lana Del Rey is literally in the backyard on a swing when her man comes home and whistles for her. She wears his favorite dress and takes it off to get his attention. She wants him to tell her what to do. “I heard that you like the bad girls, honey,” she sings, and if there’s even a hint that “Video Games” ironic, it’s in the follow-up line, when her voice lilts into a slight Betty Boop: “Is that true?” Mostly, though, Lana Del Rey doesn’t have to telegraph the desperation at the heart of her actions; the hypnotic march of the song accentuates it. After every line there’s a pause as she awaits his response, his command. “Video Games” uses many of the same components of Chris Isaac’s “Wicked Game”—the steamy drawl, the arid strings, the sultry female lead—to create its exact inversion. These male fantasies are meant to be sexy, but they’re sad. Sad for her and him both.

9. Charles Bradley – “The World (Is Going Up In Flames)”

Charles Bradley may sound like a soul-revivalist, but he’s really more of a vitalist. “The World (Is Going Up In Flames)” may feel like classic R&B, dredged up from the annals of Stax, but it is as resonant as any other song this year. Part of that is, of course, the subject matter, spelled out plainly in the title. Most of it, though, is due to 63-year-old Bradley’s performance. He gives everything he has. Backed by the Menahan Street Band—a super-group of Daptone musicians best known for “Take the Road By Walking,” the basis for Jay-Z’s “And the Winner Is…”—Bradley absolutely wails the words, “The WooooooRRRLD/ Is going up in flames,” as if he’s already mourning, pleading for it to come back. Nicknamed “The Screaming Eagle of Soul,” Bradley practically anticipates all of the victory, fear, and ridiculousness of the year—the overthrown governments, Republican debates, and #Occupy movements—and weighs them all in his voice. It’s a lesson in how to make the political personal.

8. Yuck – “Georgia”

Yuck doesn’t retread 90’s indie rock tropes, as much as it provides a collective memory of them. The band distills the positive aspects of Yo La Tengo, Sparklehorse, Unrest, and plenty of other bands, while conveniently forgetting their rough spots. They are a band as Platonic ideal. Band as universal consciousness. And that is how they arrive at “Georgia,” one of the most perfectly composed songs of this, or any, year. A grungy guitar riff aims for the red, but gets clipped by the mixing board, so it doubles back on itself. A man and woman sing together, their voices shrill, obscured and unsure. “Georgia, I’m still in love with you,” she sings, tapping into the one sentiment that grows stronger with longer distance and fuzzier recollection. To that effect, “Georgia” might also be Yuck’s perfect mission statement. They make the heart grow fonder.

7. Tyler, the Creator –“Yonkers (Single Version)”

Here’s the easy cut you can use to untangle the Gordian knot of ethics presented by Odd Future’s rape lyrics (or anyone’s, really): If the rape jokes are funny, then fine. If they’re not funny, then they’re not jokes; they’re “jokes,” and you’re left with a bunch of angry kids actually talking about raping people. Simple. Is that something you’re into? Probably not.

When Tyler, the Creator released “Yonkers” in anticipation of his XL debut, he seemed to inherently understand this principle. Without losing any of the vitriol of his 2010 releases and appearances, “Yonkers” is far and away Tyler’s funniest song. “Jesus called he said he’s sick of the disses/ I told him to quit bitchin’/ This isn’t a fucking hotline”; “I’m a fucking walking paradox/ No I’m not”; “Here’s the number to my therapist/ You can tell him all your problems/ He’s fucking awesome with listening”—all deeply hilarious lines that could only be a product of that particular mind. Ignore for a second that Tyler tacked another verse on for the album that upended the whole song (dissing music publications instantly reduces you to an internet commenter). Ignore that he copped out on his whole serial-killer persona on Goblin, choosing instead to go the 10-years-stale “Am I?”/”Am I not?” Eminem route. Ignore the fact that Odd Future hasn’t made a decent rap record in ten months, but they’re still showing up on the covers of magazines. Concentrate instead on those lines and the Psycho shower scene beat, as abrasive as anything since the Bomb Squad. Concentrate on that. That’s what we were all excited about.

6. Charli XCX – “Nuclear Seasons”

The Cold War lasted 45 years, which makes it the rough equivalent to the length of teenage infatuation. On Charli XCX’s second enormous single of 2011 (the first being the Gothic-industrial “Stay Away”), she dives full on into the well-worn territory of the late 80s. Taylor Dayne and Martika, like anything else, get distorted by time. The heroic voices from Martika’s “Toy Soldiers” become brief cries from the dark. Dayne’s pristine dance-pop becomes an overblown, feedback-laden mess. Charli XCX’s hair isn’t crimped; it’s fried. The sound of “Nuclear Seasons” reflects what it would be like if we were in a standoff with the Russians now. We wouldn’t try to gloss over the situation. We’d just toss it in with all the other shittiness and add some billowing drums. Of course, “Nuclear Seasons” is actually about a teenage romantic dispute, not the Reagan Doctrine. It’s an interesting choice for a metaphor though. Love is war, baby. But it’s a boring one, so let’s get crazy.

5. Killer Mike – “Ric Flair”

The promos Killer Mike uses on “Ric Flair” come from roughly ten years into the wrestler’s four-decade run, but already Flair’s confidence has meshed with wrestling’s artifice, each illuminating the other. He’s talking shit, but his words have the effect of a Zen koan—a truth you never knew you knew. Producers Sweatbox Productions accentuate Flair’s showmanship with music that has the slight ring of a Vegas act—drumrolls, variety-show horns, and a schmaltzy soul sample. Mike lets Flair do the bragging for him, because he knows it’s part of the act. For his part, Killer Mike dispenses rote street wisdom and encourages kids to become better basketball players. Question mark? He is supposed to be the voice of authority here, and he definitely sounds it, lending gravity between Flair’s rants. But whose truths are more authentic? Does Ric Flair really have more cars than most of you have friends? Probably. Most of you don’t have that many friends.

4. Purity Ring – “Ungirthed”

Plenty of forward-thinking artists spend lots of time piling tons of shit into their songs—key changes, funky time signatures, exotic instruments, weird vocals, samples, studio trickery, kids’ choirs, rap verses, Timbaland. Sometimes those things even work. But you know what usually tends to sound like The Future? Simplicity. On “Ungirthed,” Purity Ring assembles an array of unassuming elements—synth strobes, tick-tocking electronics, zeitgeisty vocal chirps—and arranges them into a deceptively complex structure. The rhythm is the melody; the bass follows it. Nearly every chord sounds like an expression starting to escape from some robot’s mouth. Megan James sings about body parts—hands, eyes, skin, knuckles, ears ringing, teeth clicking—while her partner Corin Roddick manipulates her voice to sound like aluminum. As a whole, “Ungirthed” pulls off the rare trick of being experimental and accessible. They’re giving you a chance to acclimate to What’s Next.

3. Lil Wayne – “6’ 7’ (Feat. Cory Gunz)”

Rap—the actual act of stringing words together into compelling and clever phrases—deteriorated this year. The most interesting rappers were often the least skilled or most derivative. They are lacking in one or more of the critical areas on Kool Moe Dee’s infamous report card: Vocabulary, articulation, creativity, originality, versatility, voice, records, stage presence, sticking to themes, innovating rhythms. Rap is done, and I’m pretty sure “Six Foot Seven Foot” is most of the reason why. Lil Wayne won rap. Game over. The lyrics are so dense, so clever, so twisted that there’s nowhere to go from here. Wayne has reached maximum capacity for triple-entendres, punchlines, and phrases that take hours to unpack. Just rapping your head around the magnanimity of “Real G’s move in silence like lasagna” is a PhD waiting to happen. Six months ago, I was ready to call this the best Weezy track ever. Now, I’m almost convinced it’s the greatest rap of all time.

2. EMA – “California”

Erika M. Anderson’s ramble through “California” veers wildly from seething anger to nauseous regret. From schizophrenia to violence to folk songs. From getting punched in the mouth on Christmas morning to envying someone who’s never seen the ocean. From selling menstruation-soaked pants to sensing the taste of dirt in her mouth and mistaking it for failure. From watching Mary and Joseph, marching away from the manger with guns in hand, to watching her grandparents, to watching herself carrying the gun. The gun the gun the gun. She is exhuming everything from herself she can, and that includes blood, sex, and mess. It’s a journal entry, plain and simple. That might convey intimacy, sure, but I always wrote in my journals expecting someone else to read them someday. Private thoughts that ache for sharing. “Fuck California” means nothing if no one hears you say it; neither does an apology. “I’m just 22. I don’t mind dying,” Anderson sings, echoing the words of Bo Diddley. She is 28. When you’re 22, you do the worst shit, things you intend to atone for someday but maybe never do. And, yeah, you don’t mind dying, but it would definitely bother you if you died and no one had known you didn’t mind.

1. Gil Scott-Heron & Jamie xx – “I’ll Take Care of U”

Here are some running themes I keep coming back to in what I like about my favorite songs of this year: How a persona can be just as articulate about Who You Are as your “real” personality; how relying on a community can enrich an individual; and how the human voice can be expressive of things beyond the scope of language. Obviously, not all of the songs I picked for this list reflect those themes, but they’re what I kept writing and thinking about as I put this together. Now, as I settle in to write about my favorite song of 2011, I realize that it embodies all of those things.

Gil Scott-Heron may or may not have known that he was nearing the end of his life when he recorded last year’s I’m New Here. Either way, the album brought with it a certain sense of closure—of taking stock of the run that he’d had and singing about it wryly, but honestly. His version of Brook Benton’s “I’ll Take Care of You” was a little bit different. Gil Scott didn’t focus so much on himself; he focused on “you.”

Jamie xx released his remix of “I’ll Take Care of You” a couple months before Gil Scott-Heron passed away, his body ravaged by drugs, and possibly A.I.D.S. With elegiac piano and steel drum accentuating his voice, “I’ll Take Care of U” would be a great tribute to Gil Scott—if it weren’t a great tribute from him. Instead, he reaches outward, with all his suffering in the last two decades channeled through his creaking voice. With Brook Benton’s lyrics he uses clichés and plain-spoken words to communicate precisely what his poetry would never allow him to say: “I’ve loved and I’ve lost.” “Dry your weary eyes.” “I’ll take care of you.”

-Marty Brown, 2011

(If you're interested, here's a 100-song mp3 mix of my favorite 2011 music, featuring most of the songs on this list.)

The Top 50 Songs of 2011: #50-26

Over the next few days, The Factual Opinion is counting down its favorite music of 2011, beginning today with some of my personal favorite songs of the year. These are tracks that have either stuck with me throughout the past twelve months, or that I expect to stick with me well into the future, or both. Instead of trying to include representative tracks from genres that aren’t really my thing, I decided to stick to what I know and consistently enjoy. So you’re not going to see Fucked Up or Tim Hecker on here, because, although I generally enjoy those dudes, I really have no point of reference as to what makes their hardcore punk or ambient music better than anyone else’s. Maybe the rap, synth-pop, and indie rock that I enjoy aren’t your thing. Hey, I’m sorry about that. But maybe they are! And maybe you haven’t heard some stuff on here that you might dig. That’d be cool.

50. Reks – “Cigarettes (Feat. Lil Fame & Attica Barz)”

Introspective songs on rap albums require threading the needle—getting a little misty without losing your manhood. On “Cigarettes,” Boston MC Reks navigates the problem by unraveling his biography through his history with smoking. As a kid, he wished his mother would quit smoking; as an adult, he buys Newports to help him deal with stress. An immensely gifted storyteller, he knows exactly which details to linger on and which ones to let speak for themselves (from the opening verse: “I used to ask my ma when my daddy died/ what he died of/ AIDS was the new craze I didn’t quite get/ what she meant”). And, just in case anyone should question Reks’ ruffneck credentials, he’s got a guest verse from M.O.P.’s Lil Fame, who reminisces about beating kids with bricks.

49. Destroyer – “Blue Eyes”

The second track on Destroyer’s Kaputt has every hallmark of a love song: mellow saxophone, cooing background vocals, mildly orgasmic breathy sounds. But check out the first lines: “You terrorize the land/ You are pistol and mortar/ Your first love’s New Order.” To a barely-listening indie rock fan, maybe he’s describing a badass chick with a synth-pop fetish. More likely, though, he’s talking about, like, Hitler Youth. It is, after all, called “Blue Eyes.” Right there’s the paradox of Destroyer’s 2011 album. The trappings of 80s soft rock (plucked from an era we associate with obscene wealth and greed) get used to obscure the palpable anger and anxiety underneath, whether in coke heads or poets or Nazi sympathizers.

48. Ill Blu – “Meltdown”

Before Michael Viner’s “Apache” became the greatest breakbeat of all time, it was just a straight-up bongo-tastic funk song. On “Meltdown,” London duo Ill Blu do for UK funky what Viner’s Incredible Bongo Band did for funk—strip it down to pure rhythm. Sure, “Meltdown” features synth- and bass-licks luscious enough to place them in direct lineage with Girl Unit’s gargantuan “Wut.” Yet the focus remains squarely on rhythm, beginning with a skittering, vaguely-tribal beat that underpins the whole track, and escalating toward monstrous, gunshot snare hits. Ill Blu’s greatest accomplishment is that they’ve produced something that feels more live than programmed. Released in February, “Meltdown” doesn’t seem to have had any instant reverberations on the UK funky scene, but, then, “Apache” took a while to get warmed up too.

47. Grimes – “Vanessa”

Like plenty of other musicians who’ve come up in the last couple years, Grimes’ Claire Boucher learned how to make music by fucking around on Garage Band. The sounds she’s pulled for “Vanessa,” though, are primarily acoustic—high hats, hand-claps, and a trellis of voices. The effect is a little like hearing a hand-built machine (or an automaton for the Martin Scorsese fans) whir and click while Boucher’s eerie falsetto guides the whole thing. So, the unearthly feel of “Vanessa” can be chalked up to something we don’t get a lot of these days: delicate—almost human—technology.

46. Kito & Reija Lee – “Broken Hearts (Dillon Francis Remix)”

Dave Nada had a cousin in high school that was throwing a skipping party in the middle of a school day. He invited Nada to DJ and hyped him to his friends. When Nada got there, he noticed the kids were vibing hard to reggaetón, and got anxious that they wouldn’t be into his Dutch records. Improvising, he put on his remix of Afrojack’s “Moomba,” but slowed it down to match reggaetón’s tempo of 108bpm. The crowd went nuts, so he played another screwed down house track. At that point, he realized he had fucked around and created a genre, which he called Moombahton. Plucked from Nada’s Moombahton compilation on Diplo’s Mad Decent label, Dillon Francis’s remix of Kito & Reija Lee’s “Broken Hearts” is a high point for the start-up genre. Francis mashes the bombast of American dubstep, slowed-down tropical beats, and the Lees’ bratty scream-singing to create a track that could very well point toward the future.

45. A$AP Rocky – “Trilla (Feat. A$AP Nast & A$AP Twelvy)”

A$AP Rocky garnered a lot of attention this year for being a rap polyglot. On his two mixtapes, he utilizes the hypnotic drag of Houston’s screw music, rides Clams Casino’s ambient beats, and even mimics New Orleans’ C-Murder on one track. Plus, he does it all while having the gall to be from New York City, one of the most rigidly traditionalist meccas for rap music. “Trilla” is the point where all of those influences congeal into a signature sound. A$AP seems to know it, too, because he makes a point to include his personal catch phrase, which also happens to be as bravely non-traditionalist as his sound: “I’m a pretty motherfucker.”

44. Iron & Wine – “Walking Far From Home”

On Iron & Wine’s first three records, Sam Beam’s take on folk music had clear restrictions. Everything was very neat and self-contained, but the precision and structure of Beam’s songs allowed him to wring drama out of the slightest changes—a new chord, say, or a shift in inflection. Live, though, Beam erases and redraws the boundaries of his music, unleashing it into psych-rock freakouts and jazz dénouements. So it’s heartening to hear Beam loosening the reins on “Walking Far From Home.” As Beam’s voice escalates, the music churns underneath it. Swaths of noise evaporate into acoustic piano, droning voices, and unfinished drum rattles. Then, the noise returns for a finale with enough emotional heft to match any one of Beam’s quieter performances.

43. Night Plane – “Parallel Lines”

“Parallel Lines” is off-kilter from the beginning. Right off the bat, it’s hard to tell whether the song is revving up or settling down; just when a particular melody starts to get going, it quickly dissipates. When the female vocals come in, they give you something to grasp on to—at least, until they start to overlap, jutting in and out of one another. A male voice climbs into the mix. Elements of the beat drop out and resurface. And someone’s cell phone keeps telling them they got an email. Over the course of nine-and-a-half minutes, Night Plane unravel the most slippery, maddening dance song of the year. It could all be some sort of hardcore raver fuckery: A song clearly made for the late hours, but with a built in sense of unease.

42. MondreM.A.N. – “Mondre Mo Murda”

Typically the quiet half of Main Attrakionz, MondreM.A.N. usually seems content to let his more loquacious partner, Squadda B, dominate the conversation. On “Mondre Mo Murda,” from the duo’s epic 808s & Dark Grapes II, MondreM.A.N. takes lead and nearly steals the show. Introducing himself with a “Hey mon,” and riding a galloping, reggae-lite beat, Mondre sets up the track as a slightly-amped weed track—for, like, stoners who enjoy jogging. Things really take off when producer Giorgio MoMurda (who has the best producer handle I’ve seen in a minute) drops a key change and introduces a smooth saxophone sample. Easily the lushest rap song of the year, the best part comes toward the end, when Mondre says of his group, “We ain’t nowhere yet. We ain’t shit right now.” I take that to mean Main Attrakionz is just getting started.

41. Cults – “You Know What I Mean”

“You Know What I Mean” may sound like a ballad, but it’s actually a waltz, which may hint at the complexity at the root of Cults’ seemingly simple songs. Real life couple Madelin Follin and Brian Oblivion (not his real name) specialize in songs that sound like 60s pop confections (the opening seconds reference the Righteous Brothers’ “Unchained Melody.”) Underneath the saccharine sound, though, are songs about co-dependency, depression, and anxiety. Here, Follin sings from the point-of-view of a girl most dudes would refer to as crazy. But, instead of juicing up the stalker-eque aspects of co-dependence, Follin takes the opportunity to dig around in the fear underneath, desperately punching the words when she sings the refrain, “I can’t sleep alone at night/ Yeah, you know what I mean.”

40. Eleanor Friedberger – “Roosevelt Island”

Rambling over a propulsive funk riff, Eleanor Friedberger remembers fragments from a hazy day, maybe more than one: how riding the train to Roosevelt Island is like riding the train to Coney Island; how people drop in and out of your days/life, like the girl with the same hair as her, or the guy who died in Philadelphia, or the guy she hated until she heard him giggle; how hard it used to be to cop drugs without a cell phone; how things (maybe drugs, maybe friends, maybe the Cyclone) can turn a dark day on dirty sand into a memorable one; how a subway ride can feel so comforting that you never want to get out; how sometimes you get back above-ground and realize you’ve forgotten how beautiful the sunlight is, and then you get to rediscover it.

39. Nicki Minaj – “Super Bass (Feat. Esther Dean)”

Interesting thing about “Super Bass”: You can’t dance to it. At least, not easily. It’s bridge-walking music—driving just enough to get you across the distance; uplifting enough that you notice the water and the horizon. Nicki Minaj’s debut album may have gotten a tepid reception from critics, because of its reliance on R&B and pop tropes over Nicki’s rap chops, but “Super Bass” gives her an opportunity to make a case that the two aren’t mutually exclusive. Flipping back and forth between airy choruses and raw verses, Nicki proves that even ferocious chicks can make boldly romantic gestures.

38. Patrick Wolf – “The City”

Patrick Wolf assembled “The City” from finger-snaps, rousing horn-riffs, cascading piano, power-vocals, and garish sentiments like, “Don’t let the city destroy our love.” Treading perilously close to musical theater, this guy. Wolf’s Glee-ful boldness results in a legitimate show-stopper, but it’s one that’s grounded in prosaic detail: “It’s not about those debts you made/ The car you never had/ The house we never owned.” So, “The City” echoes the English-Irish Wolf’s fellow countrymen Thin Lizzy and Dexy’s Midnight Runners, to become a genuine, working-class anthem—as opposed to one for a haughty Broadway audience. Fist-pumping is generally discouraged in our day-and-age, but here it’s appropriate.

37. M83 – “Midnight City”

When I think of Mellon Collie & the Infinite Sadness, I think of rinky-tinky electronics, snarling guitars and angst, lots of angst. But when M83’s Anthony Gonzalez chose the Smashing Pumpkins’ double-album as the inspiration for his own, he zeroed in on quite different aspects: oscillating between huge songs and tiny ones; relentless crescendos; a baldly emotional sweep. The success of “Midnight City,” the lead single and spirit animal for M83’s Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming, comes mostly thanks to its hook—a pogoing yelp of synths. Gonzalez knows he has a good thing going with that riff. He knows precisely how to back off of it just long enough for you to miss it, and lets it do most of the heavy-lifting until the very end, when he embellishes it with an epic saxophone solo.  

36. Tiger & Woods – “Curb My Heart”

The opening to Tiger & Woods’ “Curb My Heart” promises a drum-machine-R&B monster along the lines of Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam’s ”I Wonder If I Take You Home.” It doesn’t disappoint of that front, with vocalist ‘Em turning in an 80s-worthy performance complete with vocal ticks copped from New Edition and Janet Jackson. The production duo, however, have a larger agenda, spinning the lightweight electro-disco into a relentlessly hard-hitting club tack. They turn ‘Em’s performance into an auditory hallucination, and display a Daft Punk-like knack for honing in on an exquisite groove and throttling it half to death (see also: “Gin Nation”).

35. Drake – “Dreams Money Can Buy”
34. Jai Paul – “BTSTU”

The voice at the beginning of “Dreams Money Can Buy” sings, “Don’t fuck with me,” in a wispy falsetto. That right there could be the perfect analogy for Drake’s entire persona: talking tough but sounding fragile. On the self-released track, Drake takes an approach like 50 Cent on “I Get Money,” flaunting his wealth, taking advantage of women, and admitting he’s a “top five” rapper mostly by default. Despite all the machismo, he never comes off as less than weepy, which must be by design. Don’t ever say the guy doesn’t have a sense of humor.

The sample source for “Dreams Money Can Buy” is Jai Paul’s “BTSTU.” In Paul’s hands, the falsetto “Don’t fuck with me” becomes like a “You won’t like me when I’m angry” tactic to set up for the hulking bass. Once the low-end kicks in, “BTSTU” primarily plays bait-and-switch, using Paul’s castrati vocals to lull you into a loping R&B stride before waylaying you with thunderous sub-woofer action. It’s a one trick song, but that one trick is delightful.

33. The Strokes – “Taken For a Fool”

When the Strokes heroically appeared during the waning hours of nü-metal, a large part of their charm came from the retro sheen and emotional distance of their music. The media focused on their leather jackets, skinny jean and thrift store t-shirts—fashions that only served to reinforce their aesthetic sensibilities. For the first time since, what, the 70’s, here was a band effectively marketing Cool. In 2011, after a five year absence and middling solo albums by most of the members, the worst thing the Strokes could have done for their “comeback” was put out an album completely off-brand. Oops. Angles’ sound is rooted in 80s classic rock like the Cars and ZZ Top—bands that are cool, but will never be Cool—that might have been too much for an audience with ten years of distance on Is This It. Thing is, half of the songs on Angles could stand alongside the Strokes’ best, especially “Taken For a Fool,” which affixes their taut guitar work to a snarky infatuation with a dense girl.  

32. Kendrick Lamar – “Rigamortis”

“Rigamortis” is practically the very definition of a rapper showcase, with supremely talented spitter Kendrick Lamar speeding up his rhymes over the course of the song. His technical skill is impressive, so much so that it almost sounds like producer Willie B built the track around his voice. At least three clattering drum tracks flit in and out of his words, while a jaunty horn loop either screams through the lines or unexpectedly drops out altogether. It’s a virtuosic song, but aside from Lamar’s high-speed performance, it doesn’t call attention to itself in a way that reminds me of Q-Tip’s no-frills productions for A Tribe Called Quest. Artists who can marry that kind of classicism with forward-thinking and legit skills? Those are the ones you have to watch out for. They’re dangerous.

31. Adele – “Rolling in the Deep”

It’s not that there aren’t great songs born out of pop’s recent dependence upon house music (like Rihanna’s “We Found Love” for example), but it is heartening that the most ubiquitous song of 2011 contains a good old fashioned stomping and clapping breakdown. On “Rolling in the Deep,” Adele reaches through the annals of pop music and pulls from blues, gospel, country, soul, and jazz. She rounds all of it up and puts it to work in the most rocknroll way possible: As a vessel for her bilious anger.

30. Dum Dum Girls – “Wrong Feels Right”

I get a little jolt every time I hear the beginning of the Dum Dum Girls’ “Wrong Feels Right.” Dee Dee’s vocals come in crisply and immediately, a low drum roll ramping up underneath her. She sings demandingly, “Tell me what you dream!” The clarity is part of the reason it’s such a shock. The groups’ debut, last year’s <i>I Will Be</i>, used lo-fi recording to obscure their songs. With the massive and precise sound of “Wrong Feels Right,” and the rest of the <i>He Gets Me High</i> EP, it’s clear that the Dum Dum Girls were merely underplaying their hand. Here, their influences—The Pretenders, The Shangri-La’s, The Byrds, The Smiths—coalesce, and they turn into a promising force of their own. Even beyond the opening jolt, “Wrong Feels Right” is one of the most visceral and complete rock songs I’ve heard in a while.

29. The Rapture – “It Takes Time to Be a Man”

House music usually succeeds on the basis of simplicity and repetition. So, The Rapture’s experience with house means that their ballads are going to sound a little different from everyone else.  At first “It Takes Time to Be a Man,” the closing track on <i>In the Grace of Your Love</i>, is skeletal in its construction. Over a drum pattern that does little more than hold the beat, an elusive piano phrase and a guitar melody play call-and-response. Luke Jenner sings about brotherly love with the spirit of a gospel-tinged house vocalist. But, when the back-up vocals come in with a chorus of Hallelujahs, and the song explodes into a (what else?) closing saxophone solo, it’s clear that the cues The Rapture have taken from house are more than just musical.  They’ve captured the feeling of shambling into ecstasy.

28. Beyoncé – “1+1”

Up close, Beyoncé’s “1+1” doesn’t make a whole lot of lyrical sense. Her proclamations of love, courtesy of songwriter The-Dream, are usually confounding. “I don’t know much about guns,” she sings at one point, “But I’ve been shot by you.” Because… you’re… a gun? Because, then, if you’re her lover, wouldn’t she actually know a decent amount about guns. Even the opening lines are a labyrinth of nonsensical jabber: “If I ain’t got nothin’/ then I’ve got you/ If I ain’t got something/ I don’t give a damn/ ‘Cause I’ve got it with you.”

But one thing makes absolute sense: Beyoncé’s conviction. The way her voice skirts off uncontrollably whenever she says “with you.”  The way that sometimes she can barely keep herself from growling. The way she completely earns the biggest power-ballad electric guitar solo in at least two decades. Her refrain, “Make love to me,” is neither pleading nor bullying, but rather a simple and profound direction, as if it were the more important and true thing in the world. Beyoncé owns “1+1,” she owns her relationship, and her conviction toward love is astounding, even if she can’t quite express it with logic.

27. XXXY – “You Always Start It”

The further we get from it, the more variations we hear on Joy Orbison’s “HYPH MNGO.” Mancunian producer XXXY’s version is rooted in UK Garage (experiencing a small revival amidst all the dubstep-pop crossover). The vocal sample on “You Always Start It” follows a similar pattern as “HYPH MNGO”—a couple of jumbled vocal chirps, followed by a more accentuated one, all seeming to say something vaguely like “you.” Where XXXY veers off is simple. He sets up the lush, garage-tinged track, and then, about two minutes in and for the rest of the six minute run, he proceeds to arpeggiate the shit out of it.

26. Frank Ocean – “Novacane”

Frank Ocean meets a dental student at Coachella who introduces him to pot laced with anesthetic. They hole up together for a while and end up like Jason Patric and Jennifer Jason Leigh in <i>Rush</i>, except with 100% more porn shoots. Yes, “Novacane” is a druggy R&B love song. Ocean aspires to more than that, however. He’s interested in how drugs can numb you to the joy and fear inherent in sex, and, more interestingly, how Autotune has caused a similar emotional distance in modern R&B. Odds are that the character Ocean takes on in “Novacane,” who admits, “Even when I’m fuckin’, Viagra poppin’,” is listening to <i>808s & Heartbreak</i> while he does it.

30. Dum Dum Girls – “Wrong Feels Right”

I get a little jolt every time I hear the beginning of the Dum Dum Girls’ “Wrong Feels Right.” Dee Dee’s vocals come in crisply and immediately, a low drum roll ramping up underneath her. She sings demandingly, “Tell me what you dream!” The clarity is part of the reason it’s such a shock. The groups’ debut, last year’s I Will Be, used lo-fi recording to obscure their songs. With the massive and precise sound of “Wrong Feels Right,” and the rest of the He Gets Me High EP, it’s clear that the Dum Dum Girls were merely underplaying their hand. Here, their influences—The Pretenders, The Shangri-La’s, The Byrds, The Smiths—coalesce, and they turn into a promising force of their own. Even beyond the opening jolt, “Wrong Feels Right” is one of the most visceral and complete rock songs I’ve heard in a while.

29. The Rapture – “It Takes Time to Be a Man”

House music usually succeeds on the basis of simplicity and repetition. So, The Rapture’s experience with house means that their ballads are going to sound a little different from everyone else. At first “It Takes Time to Be a Man,” the closing track on In the Grace of Your Love, is skeletal in its construction. Over a drum pattern that does little more than hold the beat, an elusive piano phrase and a guitar melody play call-and-response. Luke Jenner sings about brotherly love with the spirit of a gospel-tinged house vocalist. But, when the back-up vocals come in with a chorus of Hallelujahs, and the song explodes into a (what else?) closing saxophone solo, it’s clear that the cues The Rapture have taken from house are more than just musical. They’ve captured the feeling of shambling into ecstasy.

28. Beyoncé – “1+1”

Up close, Beyoncé’s “1+1” doesn’t make a whole lot of lyrical sense. Her proclamations of love, courtesy of songwriter The-Dream, are usually confounding. “I don’t know much about guns,” she sings at one point, “But I’ve been shot by you.” Because… you’re… a gun? Because, then, if you’re her lover, wouldn’t she actually know a decent amount about guns. Even the opening lines are a labyrinth of nonsensical jabber: “If I ain’t got nothin’/ then I’ve got you/ If I ain’t got something/ I don’t give a damn/ ‘Cause I’ve got it with you.”

But one thing makes absolute sense: Beyoncé’s conviction. The way her voice skirts off uncontrollably whenever she says “with you.” The way that sometimes she can barely keep herself from growling. The way she completely earns the biggest power-ballad electric guitar solo in at least two decades. Her refrain, “Make love to me,” is neither pleading nor bullying, but rather a simple and profound direction, as if it were the more important and true thing in the world. Beyoncé owns “1+1,” she owns her relationship, and her conviction toward love is astounding, even if she can’t quite express it with logic.

27. XXXY – “You Always Start It”

The further we get from it, the more variations we hear on Joy Orbison’s “HYPH MNGO.” Mancunian producer XXXY’s version is rooted in UK Garage (experiencing a small revival amidst all the dubstep-pop crossover). The vocal sample on “You Always Start It” follows a similar pattern as “HYPH MNGO”—a couple of jumbled vocal chirps, followed by a more accentuated one, all seeming to say something vaguely like “you.” Where XXXY veers off is simple. He sets up the lush, garage-tinged track, and then, about two minutes in and for the rest of the six minute run, he proceeds to arpeggiate the shit out of it.

26. Frank Ocean – “Novacane”

Frank Ocean meets a dental student at Coachella who introduces him to pot laced with anesthetic. They hole up together for a while and end up like Jason Patric and Jennifer Jason Leigh in Rush, except with 100% more porn shoots. Yes, “Novacane” is a druggy R&B love song. Ocean aspires to more than that, however. He’s interested in how drugs can numb you to the joy and fear inherent in sex, and, more interestingly, how Autotune has caused a similar emotional distance in modern R&B. Odds are that the character Ocean takes on in “Novacane,” who admits, “Even when I’m fuckin’, Viagra poppin’,” is listening to 808s & Heartbreak while he does it.

-Marty Brown, 2011

(Hit up #25-1 here.)