Yuck, “Georgia”
Sure, Yuck has a terrible band name and cook their sound with too many ingredients from the mid 90s (4 parts Pavement, 3 parts Teenage Fanclub, 1 part My Bloody Valentine), but they have the songwriting chops to make it easy to forgive, especially on “Georgia”, a chorus that’s inspired in spite of it’s sound.
find it on Yuck
Phantogram, “Don’t Move”
Phantogram jettisoned most of their trip-hopisms and gave us this gem: a dreamy pop song with a brilliant stuttering bass drum and enough touchstones of 90s electronic music to sound slightly nostalgic while not sounding anything other than modern.
find it on Nightlife
Woods, “Who Do I Think I Am”
Woods aren’t the easiest band to love, but if you can get past the shambling reediness, you can find some fantastic songs. The melody of this song unfolds over the course of the chorus, leaving a musical memory even greater than the parts played.
find it on Sun & Shade
Moonface, “Whale Song (Song Instead Of A Kiss)”
One of the few truly original sounds came from Moonface’s self-explanatorily-titled Organ Music Not Vibraphone Like I’d Hoped. “Whale Song” is a percolating organ that takes in a bunch of melodic ideas over its eight minutes, its yearning vocals building to a beautiful peak.
find it on Organ Music Not Vibraphone Like I’d Hoped
The Dodos, “Going Under”
“Going Under” has all the great things about the rest of No Color–great songwriting, brilliant drumming and Neko Case’s background vocals–but trumps everything else on the record with the addition of That One Part Where They Totally Rock Out.
find it on No Color
Washed Out, “Amor Fati”
I heard this song once in a room on turntable.fm and one of the DJs commented “This sounds like it should be playing over the closing credits of any John Hughes movie.” And that’s about the size of it. Obviously, I think that’s a very good thing.
find it on Within & Without
Tennis, “Seafarer”
It was easy to sour on Tennis a little bit when it got clear that they were basically rewriting the same song (including some of the exact same lyrics) on their debut, but even that fact didn’t dampen the spirit of “Seafarer”, a song that always revived my hopes that Tennis will find other subject matter to include with their brilliant songs and amazing energy.
find it on Cape Dory
Raphael Saadiq, “Heart Attack”
The soul burn of this track is obvious and immediate, but it’s the incessant, almost droning rhythm of the guitar and vocals that take it from neo-soul to something excitingly different.
find it on Stone Rollin’
Cass McCombs, “County Line”
Cass McCombs’ molasses-paced music finally gets its perfect partner of a song. The languid falsetto chorus drips with summer humidity, and the slowness speaks of peace rather than laziness. Beautiful.
find it on Wit’s End
M83, “Midnight City”
Mr. M83 (aka Anthony Gonzalez) revisits this riff on several songs on his new record, but never as effectively as he does here, where it fits perfectly in with the drums and drum fills.
find it on Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming
Acid House Kings, “Under Water”
Leave it to the Swedes to offer some pure musical sunshine. They just appreciate it more. The whole record was sunny, but the joyous speed of “Under Water” makes it a standout.
find it on Music Sounds Better With You
Veronica Falls, “Wedding Day”
By far the sunniest song on their self-titled record, “Wedding Day” is the best example of what makes this band so great: not just the melodies, harmonies and songwriting, but the absolute joy of playing music that jumps from the speakers. Hard to imagine that the band doesn’t get excited about playing this even at practice.
get it on Veronica Falls
Iron & Wine, “Tree By The River”
There were two high-profile records that took 70s and 80s adult contemporary music as a stylistic touchpoint, but Bon Iver’s was universally lauded, and Iron & Wine’s was practically ignored in year-end lists. “Tree By The River” recalls Christine McVie and does an amazing job (much better than Bon Iver) at recalling the smooth sounds and pleasant vibe of cheesy music past and updating it into something great.
find it on Kiss Each Other Clean
Youth Lagoon, “July”
The problem with a lot of bedroom pop is that it sounds like a bedroom is exactly where it was recorded, which is a problem not because of the lesser production quality, but because it sounds like they’re trying not to wake anyone. “July” starts out that way, but about halfway through the sound, it’s all ‘waking be damned’ and the emotion pours out, unstoppable by technique or courtesy.
find it on The Year of Hibernation
The Ladybug Transistor, “Breaking Up On The Beat”
The harmonies and resolution melody of the title make it exactly what it’s supposed to be: a good, satisfying song that you find singing along to yourself when it’s done, and nothing more.
find it on Clutching Stems
Gruff Rhys, “If We Were Words (We Would Rhyme)”
“If we were words, we would rhyme” is such a perfect metaphor of romantic compatibility that it’s hard to imagine that it hadn’t been coined until 2011, but even if it isn’t originally from the mind of Gruff Rhys, he was the one that put the perfect waltz to it.
find it on Hotel Shampoo
James Blake, “The Wilhelm Scream”
Blurring the lines between cover, original and remix, this song’s emotionally broken vocals and dripping, desolate array of backing sounds creates a sound so sad and desperate that it would be tough to listen to if it wasn’t so beautiful.
find it on James Blake
Fleet Foxes, “Helplessness Blues”
Fleet Foxes took a little bit of a step backward into a swamp of reverb, meadering and lesser lyrics, and this title track is no exception. But the melody of the first part is irresistible and so are the chiming acoustic guitars, and with Robin Pecknold’s impossibly powerful voice, it’s not only a great listen, but ultimately unforgettable.
find it on Helplessness Blues
Eleanor Friedberger, “I Won’t Fall Apart On You Tonight”
This track more than any others on Last Summer proves that it’s Eleanor’s brother who’s the one in Fiery Furnaces with the musical ADD. It’s almost shocking what a simple song this is: a verse that starts without wasting a second, a chorus melody that barely strays from one note. A refreshingly immediate song from a voice that so often challenged and often frustrated when she was with her brother.
find it on Last Summer
PJ Harvey, “On Battleship Hill”
There’s no shortage of songs that conjure up images of a chilly, windswept England, but this is Regeneration
find it on Let England Shake
Slow Club, “Two Cousins”
If it seems as though there’s been a shortage on exuberance lately, it may be because “Two Cousins” took more than it’s fair share. The lovely lilt of the verses breaks wide open into a chorus that’s the sound of joy in noise: singing as smiling, yelling as singing, and beating the ever-loving crap out of a snare drum.
find it on Paradise
Liturgy, “Generation”
With vocals, Liturgy is ridiculous and unlistenable, but without vocals, it’s exactly the thrill ride that metal is supposed to be. “Generation” has the precision drum-and-riff excitement, but what makes it brilliant is how the band is playing around with the groove, backing off and trying again until it feels exactly right. And at the 5:11 mark, it feels exactly right.
get it on Aesthethica
Little Dragon, “Nightlight”
2011 had a pretty short supply of great dance songs, but “Nightlight” gave us what no one else could: a fantastic, slinky dance song that took an unfamiliar path but was an immediate, obvious track for the floor.
find it on Ritual Union
Pete and the Pirates, “Half Moon Street”
Pete (and you too, Pirates) sound like they may have lost a little bit of the youthful kicks that made their debut record such a blast of a listen, but “Half Moon Street” make jadedness and bitterness sound almost like it’s a fair trade.
find it on One Thousand Pictures
Cults, “Bumper”
The appeal of the debut album by Cults in a single song: chirping piano, charming duet vocals, a heightened outro and some of the best, freshest indiepop to grace us in a long time.
get it on Cults
Telekinesis, “You Turn Clear In The Sun”
Remember turntable.fm? That was great. Apparently, it’s still around, but it’ll mostly just be the summer of ’11 for me, when I suddenly heard a ton of music for the first time in the rooms that were all like Wii DJ. This was the cream of the crop I found, a perfect song with curving melody lines, a woozy synth and as much as you could ever ask from indierock.
find it on 12 Desperate Straight Lines
Beirut, “East Harlem”
A simple song with a hook that hangs off only the words “uptown downtown”, only horn swells separate the repetitions of the identical verses and an outro at the end. Simplicity has never sounded so great.
find it on The Rip Tide
Veronica Falls, “Veronica Falls”
Indie wistfulness at its best. “Crest of a wave, death of a day, they will never know the truth” is sung in heartbreaking, perfect harmony, the two-note guitar lines chiming along behind it. There are a ton of songs that seek to create the sound of poetry and romance without being about love or being poetry, but this is one of the few that nails it.
get it on Veronica Falls
Eleanor Friedberger, “My Mistakes”
It’s easy to be reminded of Supergrass’s 1994 classic “Alright” by “My Mistakes”. But while they have the eighth-note piano chords in common, “Alright” is about being young and carefree and “My Mistakes” is about fixation on regrets and pivotal moments of the past that pile up with age. Whatever take on life they have at whatever age, though, they’re both immediate, perfect pop songs. And “My Mistakes” trumps “Alright” with the sax solo.
find it on Last Summer
The Decemberists, “June Hymn”
A few weeks ago, a friend mentioned that he’d read my 2010 list and found himself wondering how I could have made the decision for one song to be ranked over another. It’s a fair question of all lists, of course. My first, rational answer is that it’s simply a filter: “here’s the one song of this year you should listen to, and if you can listen to two songs…”
But really, it’s feel. Whether talking about the best song of the decade or year or week, there’s just always been one song or year to me that stands out clearly as the one that speaks truly of that year.
I could probably scrape together some words that justify it’s musical right to my song of the year, but the real reason is much less tangible: “June Hymn” sounds like my 2011. It sounds difficult and weary, but it stops to look around and finds beauty and peace in spite of it: “standing on the landing with the war you shouldered all the night before”. It’s Colin Meloy’s charming pretentiousness at it’s best and bravest. It’s fun to play on guitar. It sounds like REM but it’s better than anything they’ve done in years and it came out in a year where I turned 40 and REM, a band that changed my life when I was in high school, broke up. It’s simple, beautiful, and I just want to hear it over and over. Which, all analysis aside, is really all I ever look for in a single song.
get it on The King Is Dead
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