My Year-End Lists Of 2014

Posted on | December 29, 2014 | No Comments

If 2013 was the year I found the beat, 2014 was back to basic Rock N’ Roll.

I knew The Lees Of Memory‘s debut album would be #1 on my list.

Even from way back in January and definitely when it dropped back in September. There’s not one thing frontman/singer-songwriter John Davis as ever put out that I do not enjoy the hell out of.

The man’s a musical genius.

DFA 1979: the return on record no one expected but damn if they did deliver wall to wall bangers on their sophomore album.

Owen Pallett recorded the prettiest album of the year.

The other Sisyphus in my top 5 with Sufjan Stevens in the lead with rapper Serengeti and beatmaker Son Lux at his side, made my favorite electro/rap/sad bastard album of the year.

Foo Fighers: I’ll never quit you. While not your best album, you still cranked out awesome melodies and Arena Rock fist pumpers that made me listen to your “Sonic Highways” over and over again.

January 1st is when y’all come back to download my massive, gargantuous 2014 songs compilation.

Most if not all the picks you see below will be included so y’all come back now, ya hear?

Top 20 Albums Of 2014

01. The Lees Of Memory Sisyphus Says
02. Death From Above 1979 The Physical World
03. Owen Pallett In Conflict
04. Sisyphus Sisyphus
05. Foo Fighters Sonic Highways

06. Tweens Tweens
07. Self Super Fake Nice [EP]
08. Caddywhompus Feathering A Nest
09. Young Widows Easy Pain
10. Weezer Everything Will Be Alright In The End

11. Sounds Like Sunset We Could Leave Tonight
12. Bob Mould Beauty & Ruin
13. Run The Jewels Run The Jewels 2
14. My Brightest Diamond This Is My Hand
15. Lion Babe Lion Babe [EP]

16. Cloud Nothings Here and Nowhere Else
17. Beck Morning Phase
18. Caribou Our Love
19. Katie The Pest Other Cities, Other Girls
20. Perfect Pussy Say Yes To Love

Honorable Mention:

Alvvays Alvvays
Azealia Banks Broke With Expensive Taste
Braid No Coast
D’Angelo And The Vanguard Black Messiah
Elbow The Take Off And Landing Of Everything
Field Mouse Hold Still Life
Honeyblood Honeyblood
Manchester Orchestra Cope
Thurston Moore The Best Day
Popstrangers Fortuna
Saintseneca Dark Arc
September Girls Cursing The Sea
Sunbears! Future Sounds
Timber Timbre Hot Dreams
Thom Yorke Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes

Shoegaze /Dream Pop:

Bleeding Rainbow Interrupt
Cheatahs Cheatahs
Nothing & Whirr Whirr / Nothing [EP]
Paws Youth Culture Forever
Stagnant Pools Geist
Thought Forms / Esben And The Witch Split [EP]

Hip Hop:

Common Nobody’s Smiling
Eman X Vlooper XXL
L’Orange The Orchid Days
PRhyme PRhyme
Shabazz Palaces Lese Majesty
Shad & DJ T.LO Boarding Pass [EP]

EPs And Singles:

Failure Come Crashing [Single]
Julianna Barwick Rosabi [EP]

Disappointments / Pure Suckage:

Better Than Ezra All Together Now
I Break Horses Chiaroscuro
Ume Monuments
We Were Promised Jetpacks Unravelling

2013 Releases Discovered This Year And Enjoyed:

Thought Forms Ghost Mountain
Kelela Cut 4 Me [mixtape]
SZA S [EP]

Top 3 Shows Of 2014:

Failure @ Irving Plaza ( May 29th )
Death From Above 1979 @ Metropolis ( December 4th )
Tween @ Baby’s All Right ( October 23rd )

May 29th in New York City may have been my favorite day this year.

Seeing Failure live for the first time, A band who were number #1 on my bucket list to see before the big dirt nap just filled me with utter joy.

Ken Andrews, Greg Edwards and Kellii Scott were just so damn amazing. The sound was crystal clear. I could hear every note, every lyric sung.

The icing on this beautiful cake were the 2 new songs we got in
conjuncture with this reunion tour and the possible new LP that’s
being worked on.

My Fav Films Of 2014:

Boyhood
Birdman (Or The Unexpected Virtue Of Ignorance)
The Guest
Nightcrawler
Whiplash

Honorable Mention:

Dead Snow: Red Vs. Dead
Enemy
The Grand Budapest Hotel
Interstellar
John Wick
Obvious Child
Predestination
The Raid 2: Berandal
Top Five
Under The Skin

Documentaries:

Jodorowsky’s Dune
Life After Death From Above 1979
Nas: Time Is Illmatic
Our Vinyl Weighs A Ton

Such an amazing year for movies.

Richard Linklater doing it again with Boyhood and this time,
he may actually be recognised by The Oscars for the truly amazing
director that he is.

Birdman: Michael Keaton. Holy shit bro. Do more of that.

The Guest: Homage to 80’s and early 90’s crazy psycho movies. Think The Terminator meets The Hand That Rocks The Cradle combined with a killer “Drive” like soundtrack with the blonde guy from Downton Abbey. This should have sucked hard but it does not.

Quite the opposite.

Nightcrawler: The Gyllenhaal as never been better. Holy crap is he ever creepy in this. Also serves as a great mirror to the state of our crazy media culture today and it’s thirst for blood.

Whiplash: A Jazz movie about a drummer who wants to be the best and will do anything to get there. The most unlikely psychological thriller I’ve seen in year.

Miles teller is on his way to great things.

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MVs Collection #171 ( Best Of 2014 )

Posted on | December 28, 2014 | No Comments

Over the last few years, I’ve kept my blogging to my podcasts and my love
of music videos.

Back in the day, on Muchmusic, I would watch on a weekly basis “The Wedge”
which was our “120 Minutes” here in Canada.

Sadly, the show met it’s end earlier this year after an on and off run
of 22 years.

Now, if you want to watch any and all music videos, YouTube is where it’s at
and clearly, it’s the best thing that could’ve happened to the format.

Directors can now be as free as they want to be when it comes to their
visions, not having to bow down to TV network regulations, they can be
as creative and fucked up as their twisted minds allows.

So many good directors in the game right now: Hiro Murai, Eric Wareheim,
Kahlil Joseph, Nabil … to name just a few.

2014 was an exceptionally good year and I wanted to share my 15 favorites
in no particular order.

Through the magic of YouTube, I’ve created a playlist so that you can watch them
on your beautiful HD TVs in all their stupendous glory.

The Bug – “Function / Void”
Directed by Factory Fifteen.

Mr. Oizo – “Ham” (NSFW)
Directed by Eric Wareheim.

Röyksopp & Robyn – “Sayit”
Directed by Sandberg & Timonen, Kacper Kasprzyk.

St. Vincent – “Digital Witness”
Directed by Chino Moya.

Alt-J – Left Hand Free” (Version 2)
Directed by Scott Cudmore & Michael Leblanc.

Girl Talk & Freeway Feat. Waka Flocka Flame – “Tolerated”
Directed by Allen Cordell.

Self – “Runaway”
Directed by Ballard C. Boyd.

Caddywhompus – “Company”
Directed by Derek Beck & Jono Foley.

Jagwar Ma – “Let Her Go” (Pop Up Chorus Version)
Directed by Michael Lucas.

“Weird Al” Yankovic – “Word Crimes”
Directed by Jarrett Heather.

Thundercat & Eric Andre – “Tron Song”
Directed by Eric Andre.

Spoon – “Do You”
Directed by Hiro Murai.

Chad VanGaalen – “Monster”
Directed by Chad VanGaalen.

Shabazz Palaces – “#CAKE”
Directed by Hiro Murai.

Movement – “Ivory” (NSFW)
Directed by Fleur&Manu.

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MVs Collection #170

Posted on | December 21, 2014 | No Comments

Panda Bear – “Boys Latin”
Directed by Isaiah Saxon & Sean Hellfritsch.

Pusha T – “Lunch Money”
Directed by Emil Nava.

Ali Shaheed Muhammad Feat. Merna, JaPoet & David Luke – “CPR”
Directed by Merna & @bloowoods.

Cheatahs – “Controller”
Directed by Federico Urdaneta.

September Girls – “Black Oil”
Directed by Jessie Ward O’Sullivan.

Sky Ferreira – “Omanko”
Directed by DIIV.

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AGDFA’s 2014 Xmas Mix

Posted on | December 20, 2014 | No Comments

Here be my second annual AGDFA’s Xmas Mix.

14 songs in all.

Mostly new, some old.

Want more? SO MUCH MORE?

I have for you last year’s mix right HERE and check out all my previous Christmas podcasts: # 21, 48, 70, 90, 108, 123, 134 and 143.

Hours of Yuletide fun to put in the background of your Christmas gatherings, hootenannies, rigoddon and hoedowns.

Joyeux holidaze to us all.

— > ( ( ( DOWNLOAD ) ) ) <—

Tracklist

Los Campesinos! – “Kindle A Flame In Her Heart”
Dum Dum Girls – “On Christmas”
September Girls Feat.The #1’s – “I Want You Back (For Christmas)”
A Sunny Day In Glasgow – Shut Your Mouth, It’s Christmas”
Lola Dutronic – “The Christmas Disco”
Sunbears! – “Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree”
Elephant Stone – “Christmas Time (Is Here Again)”
Landlady Feat. Amelia Meath – “Please Come Home For Christmas”
Otis Redding – “Merry Christmas Baby”
Kanye West Feat. Jim Jones, CyHi da Prince, Pusha T, Big Sean, Cam’ron, Teyana Taylor & Musiq Soulchild – “Christmas In Harlem”
Molto Groovy Productions – “Silver Bells”
Bentcousin – “Fuck You, It’s Christmas”
Grandaddy & Band Of Horses – “Hang An Ornament”
The Punch Brothers – “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel”

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Listen: CJLO’s Dirty Work / Hooked On Sonics ( December 11th 2014 )

Posted on | December 16, 2014 | No Comments

Last Thursday, I skedaddled to Concordia’s Loyola Campus for a hang with
the CJLO 1690AM Thursday afternoon crew Denis of Dirty Work (@denisdirtywork) and Omar Goodness of Hooked On Sonics (@omarsonics).

On air that afternoon were the very hyper “Carlos” and the cool as a cucumber
“Sparky”, new producers of both shows, Nana of “Nana Knows Best” with her own picks and yours truly.

4 hours of non stop radio fun. Mostly new songs played and us shooting the shit.

I’ll be back January 8th (TBD) four our annual Hooked On Dirty Airplay
Year-End Spectacular, where each of our top 10 albums of 2014 lists will
be revealed.

This CJLO appearance will sub for my podcast this month (cuz why not) which
will be back in early January with new songs and picks unused for previous
episodes from the year that was.

Come back for that but also, come back for my annual Christmas compilation,
my best of year-end lists and the MEGA SUPER DUPER 2014 songs compilation
posted on New Year’s Day.

Woot.

Dirty Work

— >>> Download MP3 / STREAM <<< —

Last Ex – “Hotel Blues”
Medicine – “Cold Life”
Cold Specks – “Let Loose The Dogs”
vibragun – “Supernova Comedown” (Paul Pick)
Cousins – “What’s Your Name”
Speedy Ortiz – “Cutco”
Lion Babe Feat. Childish Gambino – “Jump Hi” (Paul Pick)
Flying Lotus – “Coronus The Terminator”
Mozart’s Sister – “Don’t Leave It To Me”
Homeshake – “Cash Is Money”
Wu-Tang Clan – “Keep Watch” (Paul Pick)
Dan-E-O – “Locked”
Earl Sweatshirt Feat. Tyler The Creator – “Whoa”
yU – “Never Burning Out” (Paul Pick)
Bear In Heaven – “Time Is One Day Old”
Hookworms – “The Retreat”
Taperecorder – “Hot Bartender” (Paul Pick)
Absolutely Free – “Earth 2”
Aphex Twin – “4 bit 9d api + e + 6”
WTCHS – “Chinese Hand Cream”
Nothing – “Chloroform”
Stagnant Pools – “Ever So”

Hooked On Sonics

— >>> Download MP3 / STREAM <<< —

Mogwai – “Teenage Exorcists”
Gigantic – “Pity Sex” (Pixies Cover)
No Joy – “Last Boss”
Drug Church – “But Does It Work?”
Smashing Pumpkins – “One And All (We Are)” (Paul Pick)
Nothing – “July The Fourth”
Texas Is The Reason – “Back And To The Left”
Weekend – “Oubliette”
Sunbears! – “He’s A Lie! He’s Not Real” (Paul Pick)
Limblifter – “Ariel Vs. Lotus”
Sleater Kinney – “Surface Envy”
Beliefs – “Tidal Wave”
Bleeding Rainbow – “So You Know”
Lauriate – “Northern Dialects”
Petite Noir – “Chess” (Nana Pick)
The Bots – “5:17” (Nana Pick)
Generationals – “Black Lemon” (Nana Pick)
Caribou – “Our Love” (Nana Pick)
Shad & DJ T.Lo – “Always Winnin'” (Paul Pick)
Disappears – “Halcyon Days”

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