THE FIFTY BEST RECORDS OF 2009: Part #1

50. Kitchen’s Floor – Loneliness is a Dirty Mattress (R.I.P Society)

If I had a cynical, sardonic companion to whom I played all my new musical findings for approval, s/he would probably have knocked this one down with something like “god, you’ll listen to any horrible crap made by teenagers hitting guitars won’t you?” And s/he would have been right. But regardless, this album by a thoroughly unschooled song/noise making trio from down under is strangely compelling, despite frequently sounding like an internal mic recording of some fourteen year old Fall fans having a tantrum in the basement. Despite? Perhaps I mean “because”. Anyway, for those who are still reading, Kitchen’s Floor are fantastic, sounding like a really bummed out Beat Happening if they’d been raised on The Dead C and the really early Clean stuff. There’s a certain strain of Jandek-esque miserablism running through proceedings (see: both band name and album title), but once you get over that, the infectious joy of hearing some kids who’ve clearly never had two music lessons to rub together picking up the cheapest equipment possible and just fucking banging it out with complete self-belief wins through, turning songs that consist of little more than two alternating notes and one yelped expression of total boredom (“I AM IN A ROOM!”, that sort of thing) into furious, multi-faceted creations that’ll stay in your head for days. And, almost inevitably, there are at least a couple of *amazing* pop songs buried in here too, patiently awaiting your attention. Punk rock indeed.

Mp3> Lander

49. The Strange Boys - The Strange Boys & Girls Club (In The Red)

Sloppy, shit-kicking Texans who want nothing more out of life than to jam on ‘The Kink Kontroversy’ and ‘Bringing It All Back Home’ pretty much endlessly? Sounds like hell for a lot of you out there I realise, but bring it on I say! Usually when people start throwing around phrases like “good old fashioned rock n’ roll”, they’re inevitably applying them to load of old bullshit music that probably sounds like it was recorded by studio musos in the mid 80s. They SHOULD be applying it to bands like The Strange Boys, doing a pretty much *perfect* recreation of that magic window circa ’65 when our assorted white boy heroes were at the peak of their punk-ass, flickknife r-n-b swagger n’ jangle, but before they all got distracted by fancy production, taking drugs, being called geniuses and writing rambling, smart-ass songs about things other than sex. No book learnin’ or multitrackin’ to get in the way here – just a timeless good time, pretty much. Not exactly a great songwriting record, but the playing and the sound hits the sweet spot every time. If I ran a drinking establishment, I’d put this on repeat in the background throughout weekday evenings, and life would be good.

Mp3> This Girl's Taught Me a Dance

48. Our Love Will Destroy The World – Stillborn Plague Angels (Dekorder)

To say “it’s been a quiet year for Campbell Kneale” would be kinda funny, seeing as how he’s blessed us with this LP’s worth of impossibly dense, mind-crushing, soul-wrenching sonic destruction, a record that would stand as an unprecedented statement of maximalist terror in anyone else’s catalogue. But this is Campbell Kneale we’re talking about, so the reaction is more like “what, only one?” Having apparently retired his Birchville Cat Motel moniker for the time being, this first outing as Our Love Will Destroy The World veers closer to blanket bleakness of Kneale’s Black Metal inspired Blackboned Angel project, but with a bit more treble, concentrating on merciless arcs of toothache feedback and violent industrial skree. As ever with Kneale’s harsher work, there is beauty to be found within the details of the assault, from the aching string textures of “Chinese Emperors and the Army of Eternity” to the wasp swarm raga of “Over Prehistoric Texas”. In this case though, it quickly becomes an uncomfortable sort of beauty, carrying with it the feeling of holocaust and mass extinction/transmutation hinted at in the album’s title, rather than the prettier concerns of the track titles. A dark, dark, overpowering, inhuman sound like nothing I’ve wilfully subjected myself to since hearing Tony Conrad scrape out the shape of his own insect-machine apocalypse in St Giles church way back when; like a soundtrack to things the human mind and body can neither endure nor imagine. I guess anyone who buys this probably knows what they’re in for, but still, handle with care.

No Mp3 because the tracks are very long, and I only have them on vinyl.

47. Wino – Punctuated Equilibrium (Southern Lord)

Ah, Wino. It’s good to have him around. Like a stoner metal Billy Childish, you can be confident that anything Mr. Weinrich puts out will revel in its ‘more of the same’ totality, mixing up a few absolutely killer new concoctions with equal proportions of filler, rehashes of old material and general timewasting – but it’s all Wino, so it’s all good, and I think this first ‘solo’ disc carries a better hit-rate than the Hidden Hand ones I picked up, even if it rarely soars to the heights of his career-best period in Spirit Caravan. So we get a few unconvincing stabs at punk tempo, a few songs dedicated to espousing his conspiracy-based political beliefs, and an instrumental called “The Women in Orange Pants”. But we’re still here, cos Wino is a mighty dude whose very being overflows with the holy spirit of rock n’ roll, and whose every ringing note conveys complete belief in the righteousness of his amplified path to enlightenment. So when he announces “last night I dreamed, I was makin’ love in the sky!” on ‘Release Me’, you don’t feel inclined to doubt him, and when he launches into a typically breathtaking harmomelodic wah-wah solo a few minutes later, you feel like you’re about to join him. Sweet holy head-banging from here to eternity…. yeah, it’s good to have him around.

Mp3> Release Me

46. Hollows – s/t (Addenda)

A rather mixed bag of an outta-nowhere debut from these Chicagoan Girls In The Garage devotees, but whatever, it still packs a punch. Personally, I reckon some of their songs are rather too (I hate to say it) twee for my tastes, with sing-song organ lines and chirpy vocals taking a garish, pastiche-y approach to girl group tradition that sits poorly with my current belief that such things should be deadly serious. But all is forgiven when they hit the fuzz pedals and launch into furious Halloween dance party burners like “Skeleton Woman” and “Do the Scarecrow” with gregarious abandon, sounding like the greatest freakin’ high energy trash band you ever heard (or alternatively, like my Finnish garage-punk heroines The Micragirls). I don’t think Hollows are supposed to be, like, a horror-themed band as such, but this spook-show vibe gradually seems to pervade the whole album. The intro to “Shadows In The Dark” sounds like the theme from The Munsters for christssake, and hey, is it just me or are the lyrics to otherwise sappy-sounding ballad “Muncie, IN” all about a baby getting mutilated in a car crash and reassembled as some Frankenstein creature..? Good grief, I’m almost shocked! Meanwhile, cuts like “Johnny Appleseed” and “Mary Goes To Law School” see the band’s kooky doo-wop side meeting their ghoulish Back From The Grave mojo halfway, and emerge untarnished as just plain great, funny, raucous pop songs. So yes folks, step this way, hold your breath through a few rinky-dink organ n’ drum machine moments, and a whole barrel of fun times awaits with Hollows!

Mp3> Skeleton Woman

Labels: best of 2009, Hollows, Kitchens Floor, Our Love Will Destroy The World, The Strange Boys, Wino