Now that 2010 has arrived, most of the major music publications have finished putting out their picks for the top albums of 2009. Each newspaper, magazine, and blog uses their own criteria to determine their rankings, leading to an infinite amount of subjectivity. In the words of my boy Alex, these lists are more or less “an exercise in futility.” 2009 did have its share of great, universally acclaimed albums (you’d be hard-pressed to find an indie outfit that didn’t list Grizzly Bear, Animal Collective, Phoenix, or Dirty Projectors in their top ten), but there were more than a handful of albums that flew below the radar. Here are the top ten LPs that fell through the cracks in ‘09:
The 24 Best Songs of 2009...According to Courtney
I’m no expert here. I’m simply and honestly telling you the songs that I loved this past year - polls, charts, blogs, magazines aside. I avoided adding/removing songs just to reach some practical number, so there are only 24.
Here we go with the very subjective and biased Top 24 Songs of 2009!
Animal Collective's Fall Be Kind EP Leaks, and I'm a Happy Person
I’ve been hearing a wide range of opinions about Animal Collective’s Fall Be Kind EP, which leaked last week before its December 15th debut.
For me, I give it an instant thumbs up.
It’s like a little treat, getting a five-song bundle from a these three crazies less than a year before their release of Merriweather Post Pavilion.
The opening track ‘Graze’ really does it for me - it contains one of the most beautifully strange transitions I’ve ever heard. It’s a body high of a dream sequence lullaby that turns into a somewhat ridiculous use of pan flutes reminiscent of an African safari.
My favorite by far is ‘What Would I want? Sky,’ which is characterized by their usual repetitive nature and witty uses of hallow, echoing voices both elevated and grounded by crashing and banging. I feel like whirling around or falling asleep… I can’t decide which, but both are good options.
Animal Collective - "In the Flowers" Music Video
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Our favorite indie freak-folk band Animal Collective just released a new video for their song “In the Flowers.” Not surprisingly, the video is a bit on the weird side. (This could possibly be the understatement of the century.) The video itself is a trippy montage of sorts, complete with vintage footage that looks as if it was filmed by Abraham Zapruder himself.
Since the “In the Flowers” is such a good song though, it really doesn’t matter what the video looks like. The video could have been in claymation for all I care.
Blurtt Brings Postcard Artwork to the Masses: An Interview with Co-founder/CEO Nikhil Sethi
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There once was a time when people sent postcards to friends, family members, and significant others in order to share their thoughts, experiences, ideas, and emotions. Now fast forward to today — when was the last time you sent out a postcard in the mail? It’s been a while, hasn’t it? Well, one man is on a mission to try and change all of that. Recently, Jetcomx was lucky enough to chat with Nikhil Sethi, co-founder/CEO of blurtt.
Andrew Boni: Thanks for taking the time to talk to us today. Why don’t you go ahead and tell us a little bit about yourself. Where do you call home? What school do you do to? What are you studying?
Nikhil Sethi: My names Nikhil Sethi, I grew up around the Bay Area, a little bit from San Francisco, in a small town called Saratoga. Currently I’m going to school at Northwestern University in Evanston, IL studying Electrical Engineering and Law.
AB: Alright, so give us the low-down on blurtt. Maybe some people have heard of it, while others haven’t. What exactly is blurtt? What does blurtt do? What makes it special?
NS: So blurtt.com__ is tackling the problem of creating emotion in day to day communication. You may go online and send a few emails to your friends, or send a couple of text messages, but its not easy to quickly get across real emotion. We’ve created a simple, easy to use online interface that lets you send real, printed postcards with YOUR handwriting to your friends anywhere in the world. The best part is you don’t even need to know your friend’s addresses to send a postcard to them. As long as they are on Facebook or Twitter, or even have an email address, it’s easy to send them a message on a real postcard that has real emotional impact, as its something that arrives to them in a physical form.