The Fly's Top 50 LPs of 2012 (I haven't heard any of them. Gonna listen. I don't know what The Fly is...)

50 Trailer Trash Tracys - Ester

just gonna pick the first or 2nd video i see. kudos for the New Order riff. this is nu-triphoptronica. like that duo with the icy blonde and the skinny dude. a little J&MC and a little Portishead. don't know why it takes 4 people to make this but they look stylish. pretty singer. 90's mania. terrible band name.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zztx7FBMr04

Good luck Scott!

49 Lucy Rose - Like I Used To

its a little crazy that this voice is its own genre now? like the old man hat voice genre. cat power + beth orton + other people i never listen to. i highly recommend the last jesca hoop album, for what it's worth. the guitar breakouts here are really unconvincing for some reason. they don't really belong. the jazzy section toward the end is also somehow unconvincing. i don't even know what i mean by unconvincing. there isn't much of a song here so i guess they had to fill it out with something.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjLLkeYxnZc

thanks!

That no. 50 one is on some ad that's on UK TV all the time, at least that's how i recognised it. now depressed about thought of all those XX influenced bands that are surely out there.

Lotus Plaza - Spooky Action At A Distance

i really like the word spooky. so, there's that. the voice is terrible. the tune is barely there. i hear where they are going with the guitars and its a good approximation of ultra vivid scene or a hundred other ancient guitar pop bands. the drum corps drums would have been way up front in the mix though back in the day. this is just limp but i would check out one more song just based on my love for that kind of guitar sound.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbwo-KUXe0k

(okay i sampled a track called "monoliths" and it made me want to hear kitchens of distinction AND the field mice so i guess that's nice. still limp though.)

47 2:54 - 2:54

very bland. and just anonymous. i like the distorted guitar sound at the beginning. all downhill after that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWbL8uXonQ8

now depressed about thought of all those XX influenced bands that are surely out there.

There maybe are some somewhere, but I think the only comparison I'd make between The xx and Trailer Trash Tracys would be the song's tempo. There's way more turn of the 90s guitar/atmosphere in this track than in anything The xx has ever been responsible for.

46 Egyptian Hip Hop - Good Don't Sleep

hey, i kinda like this one! again, dumb band name, but what the hell this ain't bad. nice intro. suitably swelling new wave guitar stuff. voice not too annoying. and it sounds like NEW new wave, you know? they look like they are 12 years old. go, kids!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xn_0Zudk4ys

2:54 do have a couple of decent songs, Creeping isn't really one of them though and that album was a bit flat and boring. You're Early and especially Scarlet are worth hearing if you like things like Warpaint...

45 Errors - Have Some Faith In Magic'

see, if i were being snarky i would say this was the soundtrack for driving to whole foods in your prius and it wouldn't really matter if it were accurate because i would have mentioned whole foods and prius and someone would roll their eyes and say "totally". but i don't feel snarky. its fine. faux-80's stuff that doesn't annoy. would sound good on a car stereo. its minor. but being minor is no crime. this also sounds like it could be one person in a home studio and not four actual people who look to be at least 14 years old.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wx0hfEr5uoc

44 Stealing Sheep - Into The Diamond Sun

this actually sounds like it was ...produced! like, in a recording studio. i like the vibe. its not overly cluttered/busy but there's a lot going on. they obviously have "ideas" but they don't overshoot the moon or anything. i enjoy the harmonies. it makes you want to hear more. so, there you go.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MP-SbwXJU44

i like the Lotus Plaza! but i'm a Deerhunter stan so there's that. i don't mind his voice, and i don't think any of his songs are really "catchy" or anything. his first album was half ambient stuff and even his more song-like songs are still more about texture than anything else.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APmkliiXIXQ

^ my favourite song off the stealing sheep record

43 Pulled Apart by Horses - Tough Love

hate this. mostly cuz anything that even remotely reminds me of jack white makes me hate the planet earth.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJyT-u_jS8Y

42 Trash Talk - 119

i couldn't listen to this whole song. i have my limits.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJQx84sjw4Y

41 Two Door Cinema Club - Beacon

terrible band name. terrible album cover. this song isn't good either. manages to mix nu-Pitchfork indie with nu-Coldplay and i guess they are hoping for Cadbury advert money or something? who the hell knows.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZNt1v103Ik

40 Allah-Las - Allah-Las

this is actually a genuinely clever band name! say it fast a few times. intro reminds me of Felt and that is always a good thing. i thoroughly enjoyed this song. great understated twang. i like that kind of australian-inflected 80's cowpunk vocal style too. i would totally listen to this whole album. kudos!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNU9NPhX90M

That's one of my favorites this year. Glad you dig it.

I'm really enjoying this thread. Thanks for doing this, scott

39 Mystery Jets - Radlands

everyone here can probably name all the current bands this sounds like and its a thing and its not my thing. those cold vocal openings have to be really compelling for me to like - your vocals have to hook me in immediately if you are gonna be out there all naked like that - and lyrically too you gotta bring the goods if you want to be up front for the world to see. washing my sins away in a creek ain't hooking me anytime soon. these guys have never washed anything in a creek. i'm pretty sure about that. you can be trite, fellas, but you gotta sell that shit. coldplay dude knows that in his bones.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPBJPCaeda0

that Lotus Plaza album is a real grower, imo. the things you describe here - "limp" is probably a somewhat fair criticism - come together quite nicely when you listen to whole album and go back to it.

i entered this thread expecting to be annoyed by it, but am enjoying it so far. kudos, scott!

38 Best Coast - The Only Place

i love that Best Coast who i confuse with Beach House has a Grizzly Bear on their cover. Oy! this is an enjoyable little ditty if you've never heard the previous 50 years of recorded pop music. so, if you are a child, maybe. my suggestion: pick up the first Betty Serveert album and prepare to have your mind like totally blown.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoPoRuNTo9U

37 The Invisible - Rispah

i anticipate great things cuz i think the album cover is great. i like the steady beat. so far so good. digging the witch house vocals...sorta fucked up percussive qualities pair nicely with the guitar and the guitar hangs back there in a nice stoner goth way. are these guys actual goths? this is kinda screaming for an ebm remix. definitely want to hear more. thumbs up!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20t-HmzvSJ4

36 Liars - WIXIW

this straddles the border between lazytown and statelyville. like they want to achieve grandeur of a sort but don't really want to get out of bed to achieve it. the electronics are really amateurish, but if you are a modern indie rock fan you probably won't care.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGHJJKSQ7NQ

Echoing the appreciation for your effort here, Scott. Not only helping a Tuesday morning go by, but hopefully will add a few to my own 2012 list.

(just buy the two lansing-dreiden albums if you want to see what DIY electro grandeur looks like)

35 Howler - America Give Up

oh my god you would totally fall in love if these guys played at your local uni dining hall during a...uh...boxing day celebration...or something. kind of adorable. totally for kids in the best possible way. make sure to brush your teeth twice a day and listen to your howler cd.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swg9X1LcXm8

34 David Byrne & St. Vincent - Love This Giant

i just can't. more power to them. and if you like it god bless you. i can't even listen to an entire vintage talking heads album anymore. i basically want to hear "burning down the house" and i'm good for another year.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpPYKJAnwUo

I like rhat Invisible record.

I love you, Scott.

33 Animal Collective - Centipede Hz

i'm going to try REALLY really hard to hear this with an open mind and ear. REALLY hard. here goes nothing...*sigh* this is already rough...it's so long too...two minutes left!...oh man ritalin rock will never be my thing. oof.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ln_Ag7vk5X4

32 Beach House - Bloom

this is NOT Best Coast. Okay? Man, these bands REALLY want me to pull out some old Sarah Records CDs. Where is my double-disc Field Mice set anyway? and I already played the first Slowdive album a ton a couple weeks back so i already have visions of sugarplums dancing in my head. I dig the faux-Liz Fraser part in this song. very funny. and it will probably drive me crazy all day trying to figure out what cocteau song this sounds like.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuvWc3ToDHg

Ritalin rock! Yes!

31 Here We Go Magic - A Different Ship

finally, a brief durutti column intro! kinda. vini was feeling left out with all these backward glances going on. if my dentist gave me gas and put this on i might never leave his office. total painkiller groove. and slow in a good way. thought this was gonna be more annoying lite-coldplay but i dig this. horrible band name though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvXLONlKTgY

The Fly is a Camden freesheet w/ gig listings, appallingly rockist views etc. Seems to me this list is basically what you would hear were you to listen to BBC 6Music of an evening, with all the good and bad that implies.

30 Graham Coxon - A+E

calling all blur fans! you know who you are. the people who own blur albums. this is for you! i'm sure the whole album is "varied" and shows the many sides of graham. i'll take it on faith. it bears repeating with all this 80's worship around, i still think blur got the 80's the rightest out of anyone with "girls and boys" and they did it in 1994.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2PIZGtE9aA

it will probably drive me crazy all day trying to figure out what cocteau song this sounds like.

Reminds me of "Crushed".

its a little crazy that this voice is its own genre now?

otm

Poliça - Give You The Ghost

they totally should have called this album Fantasma en el Machine. although i think polica might actually be eastern european so maybe that would have been dumb. the singer is model-pretty. her stagename should be Enya Autotune. this song is definitely the part of the movie where kirsten dunst runs through the rain only to find that ryan reynolds went through the time machine back to 1832 in order to preserve the integrity of the future but wait! there is nothing left for her here in the present maybe she'll go back in time as well and join him...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rl03afAqeFQ

28 TOY - TOY

who knew ultra vivid scene were so revered! and, hey, the hoodoo gurus want their shirts back! totally mean but i can't help think this was one of those "hey, dudes, think it would be cool if my girlfriend played keyboards?" kinda things. okay, that is mean. maybe she is the genius of the band. i shouldn't be so sexist. just not really a keyboard-driven song and i see her in the corner..and she looks cool so that's cool. you can hear her keys every now and again. unless hal blaine is actually playing them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VDYMjvdCWpc

27 Chairlift - Something

might be the worst band name/album name combo yet. here's that voice again. watch your back, Lucy Rose! electro backing is sub-amateurish. its like someone just hit the presets in the casio showroom and recorded that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HS9XuAR0DDI

26 Bat For Lashes - The Haunted Man

sounds like Lana! a good singer might be able to save this song. maybe. or an interesting singer. not the most compelling song and they are very much going for compelling. big time compelling. its like the old joke: you know, if you were more talented you'd be really good at this!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UznHTBZIa8E

lex called polica "gentrified r&b" the other day

ouch

embeds making things sticky:

The Fly's Top 50 LPs of 2012 (I haven't heard any of them. Gonna listen. I don't know what The Fly is...) PART TWO!

Polica are actually from Minneapolis, not Eastern Europe, and press fawning here is at overkill saturation levels. That said, I kinda like them, or at least more than most of the other clips on this thread (thanks, Scott!) and I don't hear them as gentrified R&B.

New Chairlift lp > new School of Seven Bells lp, fwiw

I made that statement early in the year after they both arrived, and I still believe it to be true.

(New SVIIB ep is rather smashing, though.)

sounds like Lana! a good singer might be able to save this song. maybe. or an interesting singer. not the most compelling song and they are very much going for compelling. big time compelling. its like the old joke: you know, if you were more talented you'd be really good at this!

This sounds like LDR because it was written with her songwriter.