LPs of 2005

Mark’s LP’s of 2005

(OK, it’s a bit egotistical of me to expect any of you to read this, but I’ve had fun compiling it anyway!  Wait a second, me egotistical!?!)

Well what an amazing year (for music anyway!).  Live highlights Primal Scream at Glasto, Arcade Fire at Reading, Saint Etienne & Annie at Koko, Magic Numbers at Truck  and the Zodiac also Brakes, Alfie and Artic Monkeys at the Zodiac. But this year has belonged to one band; gig of the year at Hammersmith Apollo, my favourite main stage festival headline performance in the world…….ever at Glasto (yes, better than the roses Reading ’96) the sexiest women in rock and the coolest goatee and cape combo ever…..

1. White Stripes – Get Behind Me Satan.  In which Jack White decides to add piano and marimba to the mix and produces another Stripes classic.  Not as ROCK as Elephant, but the structure of these songs are truly awesome.  Take, Take, Take, is the bedroom sing-a-long tune of the year too!

2. Alfie – Crying at Teatime.  Britain’s most underrated band?  How can a band this amazing be ignored for so long?  (It’s too late now anyway, alfie split in October) An LP about heartbreak, devotion and redemption on the other side.  So many ideas bursting from the speakers.  Truly an album to love.

3. British Sea Power – Open Season.  A classic album about subjects no other band has surely covered.  “Oh Larsen B won’t you fall on me”  Larsen B is an iceberg, of course!  This LP has probably been my most played this year.

4. St. Etienne – Tales from Turnpike House.  The idea of a concept album always brings horror to these ears.  If one band could pull it off so well then Pete, Bob and Sarah were always going to be the ones.  This is an emotional, stunning journey through a London tower block.  Guest vocals from David Essex; Contender for song of the year in ‘Teenage Winter’; and yes Chris in Sarah’s eyes you will always be Gary Stead.  A bonus CD contains a preview of a children’s LP, Sarah helps your children to learn to count, and builds a zoo with a hairy hippo.  For the parents amongst you this makes this the most essential release of the year. 

5. Black Mountain – Black Mountain.  This is awesome.  The debut release from a Canadian 5 piece of mental care workers (no seriously).  Any self respecting rock fan needs this now.  Bluesy, mellow and heavy, with nods to the Stones, Velvets and Zepplin but coming out with something fresh as the fruit & veg at the market!!  ‘Everybody likes to claim things!’ I’m totally in love with this LP. 

6. Soulwax –  Nite Versions. What ‘Any Minute Now’ should have been?  A Soulwax LP to dance to and love in equal measures.

7. The Spinto Band – Nice and Nicely Done.  This American band has come out of nowhere.  The classic indie pop LP of the year.  Like a winning combination of The Shins, Arcade Fire and The Flaming Lips, yes really that good. 

8. Magic Numbers – Magic Numbers. How can a break up album sound so damn uplifting?  Gloriously crafted pop if a little long.  ‘When I see you I see me’, the best love tune since ‘only love can break your heart’? 

9. Maximo Park – A Certain Trigger.  Talking of break up albums!  If the Numbers are moving on in a slightly lovey way then Paul Smith may be dealing with it in a slightly different way.  ‘What happens when you loose everything? You start over again’.  ‘I’m going missing for a while I’ve got nothing left to loose’.  Great loud indie pop.  A real ‘getting ready for a big night out’ album!

10. Ryan Adams & The Cardinals – Cold Roses.  Simply beautiful.  Ryan has had a very productive year but this double LP is the pick.  Formed a band in the Cardinals that actually back up and improve his talents.  Best from Adams since Gold.  Still waiting to see the bastard live though!

11. LCD Soundsytem – LCD Soundsytem.  An album that lives up to the hype, been waiting ages for this, and it has just got better and better with more listens.  How James Murphy manages to be so cool and sing so perfectly for the music when he is evidently not cool and can’t sing really bugs me!

12. My Morning Jacket – Z.  Basically this is a 1 man band.  This year Jim James sacked his whole band and formed a new one.  Not as heavy as the last 3 albums and a lot more psychedelic and majestic.  Slowy compiling one of the best collections of work of any band in the world.  Genius.

13. Death From Above 1979 – You’re a Women, I’m a Machine.  ‘Turn it Out’ is such definition of intent for the rest of this highly charged album.  An amazing sound, which was awesomely replicated at Reading. 

14. Bright Eyes – Digital Ash in a Digital Urn.  Conor Oberst is slowly turning into a true Dylanesque spokesman for a generation.  But behind him he so has the music to back it up.  This is the pick (just) over his other more traditional release this year (although I’m ‘Wide Awake it’s Morning’ does have Emmylou finally singing with Conor).  

15. Beck – Guero.  Another great Beck album.  This one returns to a more funky/dancey feel, with a proper mash-up of sounds.  Makes you smile and dance in equal measure!  Although this year I have discovered ‘Sea Change’ and it has become etched in my heart as one of the most tenderly brilliant albums I have ever heard.

16. Brakes – Give Blood.  16 tracks, 29 minutes.  From the country tingend ‘Jackson’ to punk perfection of the 10 second ‘Cheney’.  ‘Cheney, Cheney, Cheney, Cheney, stop being such a dick’.  Couldn’t have put it better myself.

16. The Rakes – Capture/Release.  The true sound of London calling.  Forget the turgid mess Hard-Fi produce, this really is the sound of the kids in the suburbs.  ‘Work, Work, Work (Pub, Club, Sleep)’  Sounds about right!

18. Shout Out Louds – Howl Howl Gaff Gaff.  Joyous indie pop from this Swedish group.  The kind of stuff you find yourself singing every word after only a few listens.  Shouting it out loud in fact! (I thank you!) 

19. Madonna – Confessions on a Dancefloor Les Rythmes Digitales, Thin White Duke, Jaques Lu Cont, Stuart Price,  I salute you.  A dancefloor monster.

20. Babyshambles – Down in Albion.  I’m going to get hammered by some parties for including this!  It just gets better and better with repeated listens.  Albion is stunning.  Pete’s voice is brilliant.  There are 5 or 6 hard arsed classics in here.  OK there are some dodgy minute gaps of feedback and tuning, a bizarre reggae by numbers tune with ‘The General’.  Oh and did I mention that Kate Moss is in the booklet in just a QPR shirt?

2006?

Clap your hands say yeh! Should justifiably become pretty big. 

Guillemots, will become the new Keane; fade into obscurity; or become my new favourite band (check it Made Up Love Song online if you get a chance, stunning). 

Arctic Monkeys, to become the biggest band in the UK?  Maybe putting Oasis down on the way!

Primal Scream, to release the greatest Rock ‘n’ Roll album in the world ……ever.  Only to find it criminally ignored by the press and bought by 20 people!

The Mystery Jets, to be the least successful NME hyped band ever.  Hello Campag Velocet & Terris!

That’s it have a Wicked Christmas and I hope 2006 can begin to match 2005 for music.  Send me your lists (although I guess none of you have this much spare time.  Saddo!)

Mark, xxx