Unbelievably good new album by the Australian band Drones has all ingredients of a classic album. Gareth Liddiard, the leader of the band, leaves here a very strong mark as the main author, with a series of excellent song that appear abstract on their surface. But when you dig deeper, the songs are very concrete and in a strange way even storytelling. Only those stories appear to be from some really deep and dark place. But what’s best about this band, there’s absolutely nothing “droney” in their music. In fact, it’s very angular, dynamic and drenched in the rock’n’roll history as much as it’s original.
9. Thee Oh Sees – The Master’s Bedroom is Worth Spending a Night In
This San Francisco band sounds as if they were from the Memphis garage scene, if there was no a bit of their Californian irony in the whole mix. Guitar experimentation and inspired songwriting puts them very high on our list this year.
10. All The Saints – Fire on Corridor X
One of most exciting new bands in the past year comes from the South. But this is not a typical southern deal. Noisy, precise and serious arrangements, with a dose of gothic mystery but also a touch of shoegaze and grange, sounds more British than Southern. But it also doesn’t sound out of place on legendary label Touch And Go which helped the band rise from obscurity.
11. Service Industry – Limited Coverage
In the year of the most disastrous global economic collapse in the past 50 years, proletariat has found themselves completely lost and disorganized to turn things around. But if they ever figure themselves out, they have a perfect set of songs to sing along as they carry through their revolution. Texas band Service Industry could provide that soundtrack.
12. Fleshtones – Take A Good Look
History of Fleshtones came out recently as a book entitled Sweat. And it was a rough 30+ years ride. What else to expect for the only 80s legends that don’t need a reunion, since their never really broke up!? With the explosive Take A Good Look, Fleshtones reach new heights, composing an album that rivals some of the best records they put out in their entire career.
13. Evangelista – Hello Voyager
This is Carla Bozulich’s new band, named after Carla’s previous solo record. Layers of noisy songs are expertly interleaved with passages of abstractness. There is plenty of suspense here. Very ambitious, but sometimes that’s the way it should be.
14. Lucinda Williams – Little Honey
Lucinda’s new album has been in making for several years now, since I remember some of the songs on Little Honey being played live as early as 2005. On this great new album Lucinda rocks the house from the beginning to the end making her most entertaining album since Car Wheels.
15. Willy DeVille – Pistola
The 2008 saw Willy DeVille with a return album Pistola. Available in USA only as an import, Pistola is an amazing record of a man who’s fighting his own demons and who can tell city street stories with a great authority. This is likely Willy’s most rounded album since the Mink DeVille days.
16. Pierced Arrows – Straight to the Heart
Fred and Toody from Dead Moon returned this year as Pierced Arrows. The rawest album of the year that sounds as if it was recorded live.
17. Eddy Current Suppression Ring – Primary Colours
Fantastic Australian rock’n’roll scene gave us some of the most exciting new bands this year. Eddy Current Suppression Ring achieved a great international success when legendary Memphis label Goner picked them out of nowhere, pulled them up from down-under, and released their 2008 masterpiece Primary Colours.