Best of 2009

I had all of these great plans for a big year end best of as well as a decade best of wrap up, which just has not come to fruition yet. The holidays proved to be much more taxing than I had predicted. However, it would be a shame to have been keeping these lists piled up all year/decade and not at least drop them some where.

So without much fanfare, here are my picks for the best of 2009 followed soon by my best of the 2000’s.

Instead of giving a lot of verbiage to these discs, I will just include some tracks and you can decide for yourself what you think:

1.) Bill Callahan – Sometimes I Wish We Were an Eagle

Too Many Birds

Rococo Zephyr





2.) The Postmarks – Memoirs at the End of the World

No One Said It Would Be Easy

Thorn In Your Side






3.) Tortoise – Beacons of Ancestorship

Charteroak Foundation
Monument Six One Thousand






4.) The Avett Brothers – I and Love and You

Slight Figure of Speech
Incomplete and Insecure





5.) The xx - XX

VCR

Crystalised

6.) Fuck Buttons - Tarot Sport

Surf Solar

Space Mountain

7.) Justin Townes Earle – Midnight at the Movies

Midnight at the Movies

Mama's Eyes




8.) BLK JKS - After Robots

Molalatladi

Cusror

9.) The Duke and The King - Nothing Gold Can Stay

If You Ever Get Famous

The Morning That I Get to Hell

10.) Pink Mountaintops - Outside Love

Axis: Thrones of Love

Vampire

11.) Atlas Sound - Logos

Walkabout

Sheila





12.) Lucero - 1372 Overton Park

Can't Feel a Thing
Darken My Door

13.) Pelican - What We All Come to Need

Glimmer
Strung Up From the Sky





14.) Yoko Ono & Plastic Band - Between My Head & the Sky

Waitin' On the D Train
Watching the Rain

Tie:


15.) Discovery - LP

Orange Shirt
So Insane





15.) Passion Pit - Manners

Sleepyhead
Little Secrets

Happy Holidays!!

Is there anything that the world needs more right now than a holiday mixtape? Sure world peace, a cure for cancer and a muzzle for Lane Kiffin would be nice, but what about some holiday love from The Raveonettes, Yoko and Animal Collective? Either way, here is my littering of the interwebs with some choice tunes for the holiday season.

One thing to note as you dig into the mix: as a rule I hate Christmas music. That being said (nice Curb reference), I feel pretty good about the tunes here. They are not all actual Christmas tunes, some are just winter themed - and by winter themed I mean that they could easily end up on Alexa Ray Joel's iPod (too soon? - probably).

A couple of highlights to make sure you catch: Both of the Dylan tracks from his new Christmas disc are great. If you have ever wondered what the holidays would sound like channeled through tinsel, phlegm and a child's cowboy hat you are in luck. The unreleased Bob Marley take on White Christmas is also a nice touch, and asks the age old question,"can I make a bong from a snow globe?". I will have to put on my engineering hat and check that out for next year. Lastly, I included a track by The Duke and The Gent that is not festive in the least, but probably my favorite song of 2009. Consider that my present to you.

Enjoy!!

link to mix:
http://countryclubofthezeroseven.blogspot.com/

Waiting for the D Train

First let me start by saying that I am shocked by how much I have been enjoying the Jimmy Fallon show. He was always the weakest link on SNL, the movies I have seen him in (thanks airlines)are mostly unwatchable, and the first few airings of his show were painful. However he seems to have turned the corner and the show has gotten much better. His skits are still lame, but his uneasiness interviewing his guests is entertaining and he is top notch on bringing in great musical guests.

Before we get carried away and think this was a post to praise Fallon, I better get to the point. On the 11/5, he hosted Yoko Ono and in the process aired one of the musical highlights of what has already served to be a pretty great year for music.

I started writing a review of her new disc "Between My Head and the Sky" when it first came out, but had to stop after I could not fully wrap my head around how amazing the disc is. Plus it came out at the same time as the Beatles remasters, and I knew that anything that I wrote about her would draw some form of backlash from Beatles purists.

Whatever the case, here is a clip of her performance last week and simply put, it was fucking amazing!! At 76, Ono still remains one of the most important voices in avant garde new music.

Enjoy!!

link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VR6P3mBlkHY

Kicked It in the Sun

Apologies for the delay in getting a new mix up, but it seems like lately finding time to post has been a bigger struggle than douchebag Congressman Joe Wilson trying to get into Mensa. Anyway, here is the mix in a nutshell. I think it is pretty solid, and flows well considering the fact it has everything from Italian disco, to French ambient to Porter Wagoner and an Eagles cover in the mix. I will say you might have to give it a few minutes to get going, it starts out slow and builds to a nice clip in the middle before winding back down and wrapping up with a Smiths cover from Zooey Deschanel (how can you go wrong with that combo?) and then one of my easy top 5 best tracks of the year by the Raveonettes ("Last Dance"), and then a haunting acapella auto-tune max out from Bon Iver. Also in the mix are stellar new tracks from Juilan Casablancas, Girls, jj and the must hear electro sleaze freak out "Rollerskate".

Artwork from an Emek poster for a Melvins in Israel show.

Enjoy, and as always comments are welcomed!!

http://countryclubfothezeroseven.blogspot.com/

Eternal Summers

With Summer winding down and fall around the corner, I thought I would put together a little mix to help ease the transition. From the chilly, cogs slowly winding down sounds of Kim Hiorthøy to the warm campfire vocals of the appropriately named Eternal Summers and ultimately down to the throes of Antony burning out and Yoko fading away, this whole set should help ease the inflamed melanomas of summer with the soft cashmere sweaters of fall.


Enjoy!

http://countryclubofthezeroseven.blogspot.com/

Vishnu and the Magic Elixir

Since everything I have posted lately seeems to have been a mashup of more recent stuff, and a fair amount of it has skirted towards electronic music, I thought I would use this mix to get back to some of my old favorites.

With Harvest Records presenting Brightblack Morning Light, Espers and Bonnie "Prince" Billy at the Diana Wortham Theatre this Friday, and Dungen and Woods playing at The Grey Eagle next week, this seemed like the perfect time to scrape the bong resin out of the old cranium and fire up a psychedelic stew.

This mix does feature a handful of tracks from Dungen and Woods, both old and new, but also some all time favorites like Bardo Pond, Acid Mothers Temple, a vintage classic by Silver Apples and a newly remastered track by 60's Irish psych-folk band Andwellas Dream There are a couple of newish tracks like the ones from The Dutchess and the Duke, Floorian and Flight and some very new tracks by the not so psychedelic (but mind bending nonetheless) Destroyer and Yo La Tengo.

And of course no psychedelic mix would be comlete with out at least one track by the Lemmy helmed, pre-Motorhead, brain melting amalgam that was Hawkwind.

Note: this site not responsible if the colors do not taste like you think they should.

Enjoy!

http://www.countryclubofthezeroseven.blogspot.com

Party out of Bouds - The B-52's Live (1978)

It has been awhile since I posted, and I recently stumbled across this B-52's live set from 1978, and was pretty blown away by it, so figured I might as well share.

Back before they became a campy parody of themselves (before they thought it was a good idea to appear on the CMA awards, before "Love Shack"), the B-52's were a solid standout from the post new wave crash. Any of their first handful of discs are still solid (especially the David Byrne produced Mesopotamia) all the way up through Whammy. With the death of original guitarsit Ricky Wilson, the band largely took a lengthy hiatus before returning bigger than ever with Cosmic Thing (I am not a huge Cosmic Thing fan. I do love "Follow Your Bliss" and "Deadbeat Club", but rarely on the disc do you hear the leaner, meaner bouffainted B-52's featured on this bootleg).

I would have to say I put Whammy in my list of most formative albums of young Scott's taste. I remember lying in my bed in 7th grade watching videos on a tiny black and white TV (Channel 46 for anyone that remembers that grainy UHF station from Atlanta) and seeing the "Legal Tender" video and immediately heading out to Record Bar to pick that album up the next day. I can also credit that album for turning me on to Yoko Ono as well as it features a great duet with her ("Don't Worry"), which was for some reason removed after the first couple of pressings.

Anyway, if all you know of the B-52's is hearing "Love Shack" or "Rock Lobster" from weddings, sorority crush parties or VH1 specials this live show might blow your mind.

Recorded at a club in Athens in 1978 (months before their first album release), this short set shows the band at the height of their frenetic, post-punk, Patsy Cline meets Dick Dale and Stiv Bators on the far side of the moon best.

Enjoy!!

http://countryclubofthezeroseven.blogspot.com

From South Africa to South Carolina

First up, this mixes' title is sort of false advertising as I don't think any of these artists are from South Africa. There is a remote chance that Malcom McLaren used some backup singers from Soweto on Buffalo Gals, but I am not vouching for it. It gets difficult to title these things sometimes, and there is at least a track by Gil Scott-Heron from an album of the same name, so in my book that counts.

This mix came from me having to head to Detroit this week for work, and wanting something to listen to on the plane and in the rental car. My experience with the local radio stations up there has not been very favorable so far, minus a feed from a public radio station in Toronto that you can sometimes pick up.

Anyway, there are a few tracks on here that I cannot offer much commentary on other than I dig them. I don't know much about Beatfanatic who opens and closes this set. Of what I have heard, his discs drag in the middle (as do most electronic and rap discs), but definitely has nailed entrances and exits. There are a handful of tracks from Stones Throw artists, like the one from the late Jaylib, who might rival 2pac for posthumous releases, the Miles Davis cover from Otis Jackson Jr, is off of a Yesterdays New Quintet compilation, as is the Madlib track and the just released new single from Dudley Perkins.

Erykah Badu is easily one of my favorite female vocalists, rivaled only by Gillian Welch. There probably couldn't be a wider contrast of artists, but the heart wants what the heart wants... I know Bady has performed a few times with My Morning Jacket, so maybe a meeting with Welch and Rawlings is in her future someday, right after a duet with Falco and Brigitte Nielsen (oh wait, that actually happened - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xH8Wqdb4U0 ). I put a couple of tracks off of her very underrated Worldwide Underground disc.

Also in the mix are a couple of old school hip-hop tracks. Nothing too obscure, but nothing too obvious either.

The only really new tracks would be the above mentioned Dudley Perkins track, and the track "Ecstasy" by the Swedish band jj. Without a doubt this song is the best of 2009 in the category of "Songs about drugs, that sample Lil' Wayne and hail from Sweden".

The artwork is a photo of funk queen and oft rumored subject of the Stone's "Brown Sugar", Marsha Hunt.

Outside of that, I got nothin'.

Enjoy!

http://countryclubofthezeroseven.blogspot.com

Stuck in Greenville with the chemo blues '09

With the 4th just around the corner, I thought it might be a good idea to put a mix together for any cookouts or parties that might pop up. Also, I thought it might make sense to put together a mix that is insanely fun and full of energy in an effort to make sure everyone around the Hall house is in party mode for the weekend. The irony is that even though I stand by this mix as an absolute uplifter, Katherine hates anything with beats in it, so this will likely get shelved in favor of the new Wilco disc (not a bad substitute but still).

That being said, what's on the plate in the mix? We start off with a track I left off of my funk playlist from a couple weeks back, a smoking cover of Bill WIthers', "Who Is He?" by Me'Shell N'Degeocello. Yeah, I get it, it's a gender fuck mashup, but once you hear that greasy bassline, you can take all of your politics and hangups and toss them in a pot of fatback. This track rawks. Next we have a track from DJ Kaos that is turning out to be one of my favorite tracks of the summer "Love the Night Away". Usually a summer track filled with kettle drums, bongos and xylophones would slide toward the Jimmy Buffet vomitorium, but thanks to some slinky beats and keyboards this thing brings visions of Haircut 100 bouncing around the jungle to mind as opposed to frat boys playing pee pee touch games behind the urinals during "A Pirate Looks at Forty".

In addition to the DJ Kaos track being one of my favorite tracks of the summer, also in that line up is a track by Free Energy called "Dream City". I am not sure where this DFA track came from but it absolutely scorches, and when teamed in a mix with the new Modest Mouse track "Satellite Skin", you have my top three picks of Summer 09. Did you ever think Modest Mouse would be the feel good band of any season, other than that of the witch?

There are two tracks in here from the band Discovery, that I would easily cast as a favorite for any best of 2009 list. The first track jumps all over the place with Art of Noise backbeats, swirling synths and Hot Chip vocals, and the second track features a freaked out Auto Tune take on the Jackson 5 (timely, huh?).

The two blacksheep of the lot are a duet with Scarlett Johannson and Pete Yorn that brings to mind the best duets of Lee Hazelwood and Nancy Sinatra, and makes you think about reconsidering Johannson's unfairly maligned disc of Tom Waits covers. The second is The Lemonheads covering GG Allin's "Layin' with Linda". Sure the song is about murdering your lover, but Evan Dando makes it sound much more sweet and playful than the turd covered suicidal burnouts original.

In the middle we have a little bit of a soul breakdown with a throwaway classic from Maurice & Mac, a sticky sweet nugget from Allen Toussaint that apparently has been co-opted by Axe body spray, and a keyboard shredding beaut from Booker T & the MG's.

Lastly, there is a track by Brakes on here that I swear reminds me of the Pixies, yet I still like it.

Outside of that, just enjoy!!!

http://countryclubofthezeroseven.blogspot.com/2009/06/stuck-in-greenville-with-chemo-blues-09.html

Furious Fists of Funk!!

It has been awhile since I have had the motivation, energy or time to put together a mix, so I am hoping that this one is received with hungry ears. Over the past month I have had a couple of sleepless nights where I do nothing but lie in bed scrolling through my iPod and adding songs to playlists. The one thing I noticed is that in all of the playlists or mixes I have made, none of them are geared toward helping me unwind. Plenty of them are for entertaining, driving or flat out all night drinking. I decided to put something together that would come in handy for just hitting the relax button, taking some deep breaths and slipping outside of my mind. With that said, after scrolling through 14,000 songs, here is what I have come up with. Trust me, this was not an easy task. I wanted to find the perfect seamless balance and keep it at under 2 hours.
Commentary on the tracks will be slim, as a lot of them come from some of the recent Lagos, Nigeria and Jamaica compilations from various labels but here goes...

Leading off is one of my favorite Funkadelic tracks. I never got into the party vibe of Parliament that much, but when it comes to down and dirty, red-eyed funk there is none better. I had a hard time choosing between this or Maggot Brain, but there is a Cymande disc later in the mix that is similar enough in structure to the Eddie Hazel masterpiece to skip it. Along the way is a great Talking Heads track that definitely sets up the groundwork for all of David Byrne's Luaka Bop work; a version of "Whole Lotta Love" by Ike & Tina Turner that makes Adam Lambert's version look like a Lucky Pierre between Clay Aiken and Scott Stapp. Probably the oddest addition is the krautrock "Vitamin C" by the German band Can. Maybe it is just me but I think their improv merges right in. Also there is a second great track by Ike and Tina Turner called "Young and Dumb", that smokes on its own, but is included because I really like to hear Tina growl about being "young, dumb & full of cum". Call me juvenile. I can't help it.

Just about every mix I have made seems to have a Clash track on it somewhere. Usually, they lead off; but in this case I love the tribal drum pattern of "Car Jamming" and like to think as the music fades that somewhere that drum line keeps playing forever in the background.

As always, enjoy and if I can remark without sounding desperate please leave comments. I track my hits, and know that I get a fair amount of listeners, but it makes putting mixes together a lot more fun and interesting when I know what people are thinking about the tunes I am dropping.