2011 has been a great year for albums. Whether it be the eclectic US hip-hop sounds of Danny Brown, Das Racist, Shabazz Palaces, Beans, Beastie Boys and Pharoahe Monch’s long players or the alt-rock sounds of Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks, White Denim, Real Estate, Boston Spaceships and Chad Vangaalen – it’s been varied and special.
There’s been some beautiful oddities too, like Unknown Mortal Orchestra‘s eponymous debut, the Mister Heavenly ‘supergroup’ and their debut ‘doom-wop’ album, Out of Love. Plus the delightly peculiar, tUnE-YaRdS LP, W H O K I L L and it’s take on avant-afro-beat-indie (or whatever the cool new way of describing the charming madness of Merrill Garbus is currently).
Even the mellow stuff had an odd streak. Bill Callahan‘s Apocalypse ushered in seven tracks filled with rich storytelling and beautifully-off-kilter Americana from one of the US’s best living songwriters. Bon Iver followed up their amazing debut, with an eponymous second, that widened their sonic template but lost none of their charm. The Youth Lagoon debut, The Year of Hibernation also offered a hush take on sepia-tinged fragility and gentle bedroom indie brilliance.
So, in no particular order, here are Slacker Slack‘s top twenty albums of the year – along with five downloadable tracks that you may or may not wish to consider as a ‘sampler’:
01 Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks – Mirror Traffic
02 Danny Brown – XXX
03 Das Racist – Relax
04 Bill Callahan – Apocalypse
05 Boston Spaceships – Let It Beard
06 Bon Iver – Bon Iver
07 tUnE-YaRdS – W H O K I L L
08 Mister Heavenly – Out Of Love
09 Chad VanGaalen – Diaper Island
10 Youth Lagoon – The Year of Hibernation
11 White Denim – D
12 Shabazz Palaces – Black Up
13 Ghostpoet – Peanut Butter Blues and Melancholy Jam
14 Pharaohe Monch – W.A.R. (We Are Renegades)
15 Unknown Mortal Orchestra – Unknown Mortal Orchestra
16 Beastie Boys – Hot Sauce Committee Part Two
17 Beans – End It All
18 Flash Bang Grenada – 10 Haters
19 13 & God – Own Your Ghost
20 Real Estate – Days
(MP3) Unknown Mortal Orchestra – Ffunny Ffriends
(MP3) Danny Brown – Scrap Or Die
(MP3) Youth Lagoon – Cannons
(MP3) Real Estate – It’s Real
(MP3) Mister Heavenly – Bronx Sniper
And if you want to push us to pick an album of the year – we’d have to plump for, Stephen Malkmus and the Jick‘s awesome, Mirror Traffic…
Slacker Shack 