Top 10 Tracks of 2010 (Midway)

from thesecretstereo.com

This is a bit hastily thrown together, but here it is, 8/23, and I haven’t done it yet, so here goes. No comments, no order, only criteria is that it was released between 1/1/2010 & 6/31/2010. Links provided for samples:

Follow the Train – “Movin”
New Pornographers – “Crash Years”
Memoryhouse – “Sleep Patterns”
Stars – “Fixed”
Cerebellum – “Crawl Out of the Water”
Wye Oak – “I Hope You Die”
Beach House – “Walk in the Park”
Broken Social Scene – “World Sick”
Venice is Sinking – “Tugboat”
Strand of Oaks – “Bonfire”

So there.

Yours?

Top 10 Tracks: Death Cab For Cutie (part 1)

Here’s part 1 of my top 10 Death Cab for Cutie tracks, in no particular order…

Grapevine Fires: This is the strongest track on their last album. It’s a serious stylistic change-up for the band, and a total success at that.

Photobooth: It displays all that is great about the “classic” Death Cab sound, and the band gets style points for the clever and catchy use of the click track.

405: The band opened with this when I saw their “welcome home, world conquerors” show in Seattle in 2006. The 405 is the Seattle interstate bypass, but to me this one drives straight into the heart of that city.

The Employment Pages: Close your eyes and put on your headphones for this one. When you begin to float away on clouds of mopey, ethereal bliss, you’ll understand why people go nuts about Death Cab for Cutie. Classic lyric: “We spread out/And occupied the cracks in the urban streets.”

Title & Registration: This hyper catchy tune features a classic Death Cab riff, but it’s the lyrics that ultimately steal the show. The fact that Gibbard can take something as common place as a glove compartment and stretch it into a mournful meditation on love lost as prison cell shows just what kind of talent we are dealing with. Simply put, this is masterful songwriting.