Best Records of 2011: January, February and March - Part 1

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From James Blake to Cloud Nothings, The Popscener provides a handy round-up of the records released so far in 2011 that you should have heard...

James Blake - James Blake

James Blake - James Blake
Atlas/A&M (7 February)

Those who dismissed this much-anticipated debut as the death of a dubstep producer and the birth of a genuine – read: boring – singer-songwriter missed the mark. The looped samples and freeform structures may be mostly gone but, the deep bass-groove rework of ‘Limit of Your Love’ aside, Blake still deals in ideas over songs. The upshot is minimalist, throbbing wee hours murk, decorated with the treated soul of Blake’s voice, and lyrics-as-mantras, repeated to project the emotion lost in the laptop. 
Choice Cuts: The Willhelm Scream, Limit To Your Love

Drive-By Truckers - Go-Go Boots

Drive-By Truckers - Go-Go Boots
PIAS Recording (14 February)

More rustic, leisurely – and frankly, ‘country’ – than the careering alt-rock of its predecessor, Go Go Boots finds the the homely Southern idyll conjured by its music populated with a cast of titillating characters. In a world of small-town hoodlum treachery, Patterson Hood plays empathetic judge and jury, Shonna Tucker the spurned wife – while Mike Cooley maps out the escape route for those wanting more.  
Choice Cuts: The Fireplace Poker, Cartoon Gold

Kurt Vile - Smoke Ring For My Halo

Kurt Vile - Smoke Ring For My Halo
Matador (7 March)

Philadelphia troubadour Kurt Vile’s fourth album, his second on US indie stalwart Matador, sees him build on the lo-fi promise of his previous output, firming up sound and structure to deliver a coherent body of brooding alt-folk and tumbling Americana numbers. Song of the year to-date ‘Jesus Fever’ is an instant classic which borrows the chiming dynamism of Wilco’s flightier moments and underpins it with Vile’s world-weary baritone and lyrics which reads like a flippant requiem. “When I’m a ghost I see no reason to run, when I’m already gone” he groans. But there’s life in him yet.
Choice Cuts: Jesus Fever, Ghost Town

Cloud Nothings - Cloud Nothings

Cloud Nothings - Cloud Nothings
Wichita (24 January)

Pop-punk or lo-fi? Always too detached and undersold to be the former, and now too carefully produced – and played – to be the latter, 18-year old Cleveland prodigy Dylan Baldi’s debut excites with speed as much as songcraft. Consequently, I prefer to brand him ‘new-thrash’, as for every galloping rhythm and unnervingly indelible melody I often wonder if Husker Du don’t lament a lighter touch.
Choice Cuts: Not Important, Nothing's Wrong



Part 2 of the Best Records of 2011: January, February and March coming up tomorrow...

Listen Up! No. 99: Architects of Grace - Reflection

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The brainchild of 30-something media professional Duncan Robert Illing - an admirably ill-hidden truth revealed by a simple Google search - and shrouded in the kind of gloomy, brooding promotional aesthetic one might associate with a Donnie Darko soundtrack, Architects of Grace should be a study in synth-pop miserablism. Me? I hear more Psychedelic Furs than Depeche Mode in the four bright, pulsating minutes of forthcoming single 'Reflection' (released 4 April). Illing's words and intonation avoid both goth-mawkishness and bitter romantic platitudes, forging through the murky flail of ringing guitars to suggest something hopeful, if not necessarily contented. Meanwhile, the industrial groove rumbles on and on. And on. Where it emerges, we'll see when debut record Moments in Time drops in mid-April.

Listen Up! No. 98: The Strokes - Gratisfaction

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The Strokes' new album, Angles, has been given variously short shrift - "tired", "lazy", "lacking ideas" - by critics who seem at least partly pre-disposed to twist the knife. Sure, the band haven't helped themselves with a series of wretched interviews veering from disinterested to repulsed. And sure, it's no masterpiece. But then neither was Is This It?, and 'lacking ideas' - beyond the metronomic garage-rock insouciance which drives their entire debut - never bothered anyone then.

Of course, when 'ideas' means Bahamas business-trip disco-reggae ('Machu Picchu') we could do without them. What The Strokes have always been best at is recognising the heart-in-mouth vibrancy of a moment in musical history, and plonking it squarely in the 21st century, often with finer hooks to boot. Aside from the twitching rapture of lead single 'Under Cover of Darkness', this trick can be heard in earnest on 'Gratisfaction', which marries chugging glam and twiddly power-pop with a wink and a smile. But probably not with a tongue in the cheek. It's a bit like the musical equivalent of going to an Alex Chilton memorial party at Tom Petty's mansion with The New York Dolls in tow. That said: I'm still undecided as to whether the house band is T-Rex or Status Quo. And Julian Casablancas is probably serving the drinks.

Listen Up! No. 97: Dum Dum Girls - He Gets Me High

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When LA female noise-pop quartet Dum Dum Girls' debut LP I Will Be surfaced last year, it felt like a missed opportunity. The had a look, built around the gutter-goth style sexual aura of frontwoman Dee Dee, which screamed alt-icons. They were well connected - East Coast pal Nick Zinner from the Yeah Yeah Yeahs contributed guitar in the studio. Meanwhile, songs like 'Jail La La' proved a band able to deliver the bubblegum melodies required to stand out from a pre-eminent (and saturated) lo-fi scene. However, where LA contemporaries Best Coast succeeded in pinning Bethany Cosentino's simple melodies to graceful, unfussy production,  Dum Dum Girls hid behind walls of guitars and a rhythm section so jarring as to be positively painful in headphones.

Did this betray a crisis of confidence in the material, or a bungled attempt to breakthrough with super-compressed radio fare, courtesy of former Go-Gos producer Richard Gottehrer? Regardless, swallowed up in the thud of the mix, many of the songs fell flat. Which brings us seamlessly to 'He Gets Me High', from the band's new EP of the same name (released late last month). The thundering snare is held back a touch, while guitars are allowed to sway woozily in and out of the void left behind. Most importantly, however, is we get more Dee Dee, with harmonies we can hum and words we can hear. And take note fellas - and Bethany Cosentino - she's not singing about weed.



He Gets Me High EP is out now on Sub Pop.

Listen Up! No. 96: Bing Ji Ling - Move On

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Bing Ji Ling is the pseudonym of New York producer/writer/multi-instrumentalist Quinn Luke. When not pursuing his day job as one sixth (at last count) of marauding post-hippie troupe the Phenomenal Handclap Band, Luke apparently likes to indulge himself in a spot of breezy, feel-good '70s soul. On latest single 'Move On' (released earlier this month), he duly treads a fine line between a forgotten cut from Hair: The Musical and the kind of music used to backdrop frolicking youths in Boots suntan lotion adverts. Thankfully, this one is more 'Aquarius' than Joss Stone. Just. The album, Shadow to Shine, drops on 21 March.