Perhaps we'll remember 2011 as the year we returned to "the song." Yes, I know, music is almost always based around songs, but those elusive mysteries with actual choruses, verses, bridges (remember those?) and emotions seemed kind of rare for awhile. Whether in the loose slacker forms of Kurt Vile, the Petty-meets-experimental vibe of The War On Drugs, Drake making the club sound like some hellish, inescapable monster, Cass McCombs turning even further into stark emotional honesty or PJ Harvey reminding us that she is incredible and singular, it seems like songcraft has finally beat back the slew of by-the-numbers bedroom recordings.
While this happened, cheap yet easy-to-use software also made it easy for the masses to make maximalist songs with a million tracks that sounded more like sonic sludge than anything resembling music. Maybe that's why I'm drawn to atmospheric efforts like Burial's "Street Halo" or the fine instrumental clouds of Clams Casino that put a premium on space and texture rather than blowing up my speakers with the deepest bass possible.
Sorting my favorite tracks into one condensed pile at the end of each year is always a struggle, but the 2011 wrap-up was a bit easier than usual. The beautiful thing about hip-hop music over the past 12 months was the wealth of options available for fans looking for some variety. There was The Throne hype and the Odd Future craze, but in between there was also Danny Brown’s deranged bars, G-Side’s chilled-out tracks and my runaway favorite: A$AP Rocky’s east coast trill rap.
It’d be impossible for any two people to agree on the top ten songs of any particular year, but at the very least we can agree on some of the best artists of the year. My picks are ranked in no particular order. They simply represent the tracks I could actually vibe out to at any given point in the day.
Dance this year was all about getting low, getting high, freaking out, hooking up and sweating into delirium. Oh, wait. That's what every year in dance is. Oh well. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. House, club, R&B-laden vibrations, garage, drum'n'bass, bangers, dubstep and a smattering of cruelly-labeled microgenres that we can't even wrap our feeble minds around (dubstream, ravetune, etc.) dominate this list, as do floor-slayers CREEP, L-Vis 1990, Girl Unit, Dillon Francis, Kingdom, Bibio, Katy B, Gigamesh, Benga, Moby and The Rapture. No room for middling – these are our picks for the best of 2011's dance: dark, light and nothing in between.
My year, much like last year, was dominated by songs made by lonely guys on computers that made me want to go out, and songs played by a gang of people on guitars that made me want to stay in. You could say I'm contrarian, but I'd just say you can't. Here are the ten things I dug most about RCRD LBL in 2011. Don't enjoy Christmas and New Year's so much you start hating real life, it's all about keeping a balance.
Noting the “best” tracks of a given year can be tricky, so consider this list a collection that represents some of rock’s finest efforts in 2011 (in no specific order). Whether it was the genre-bending Mexican flair of Mariachi El Bronx’s second album or the pop-laced fervor of Sleeper Agent’s debut, this year embraced rock as anything with a beat and some guitar. On the heavier end, Junius and Black Tusk are particularly successful examples how rock can be aggressive and guttural without alienating listeners. And as The Joy Formidable and Ume remind us, girls rock just as hard as dudes. Maybe more.
2011 brought a lot of lessons, musically. I learned that I like chillwave (see: Washed Out, Active Child), despite the genre’s name, and that Kanye West doesn’t seem like such a douchebag with Jay-Z there to balance him out. I discovered that while everyone (literally, everyone) agrees that Mastodon’s mainstream metal aggression is amazing, not everyone knows to look deeper into the genre for similarly heavy accessibility (see: Black Tusk, Russian Circles). And for every ear-biting Katy Perry track there is a pop song that deserves merit and repeated listens (see: Rihanna, Florence And The Machine).
But mostly 2011 was the year that marked the return of the Muppets – both on The Green Album and in movie theaters. I’d never normally recommend you listen to The Fray, but their version of the Muppets’ classic “Mahna Mahna” is a solid way to top off this year.
Diversity was the key concept in 2011 rap music. While new MCs bubbled-up from all corners of the country and used blogs to gain equal footing with rappers from major media centers, a diversity of sound gave us everything from the spacey minimalism of Drake and The Weeknd to The Throne's maximalist stunting to Maybach Music Group's by-the-numbers street bangers.
Craftsmen like Curren$y and Big K.R.I.T. built their unique underground movements to new heights, while newcomers like Tyler, The Creator and A$AP Rocky wowed fans with their youthful energy, exploratory production and overall gall.
Musically, 2011 was the best of times, period. Big bassy pop, sci-fi electro earbleeds, welping indie rock ballads and freak-nasty hip-hop all had equal time in the sun. So how to choose what to focus on? I kept it simple. Really, the heart of my relationship with tunes this year was what it meant to be in transit, and how music telecasted my moods and ultimately made me feel and change, for better or worse. Most of what I listen to, smile to, hold back tears to happens as I walk alone with my earbuds from grey building to bright basement.
I get lost in what lets me contemplate. What me allows me to imagine. That's why I chose not the biggest, but the brightest, for my year-end wrap. The beautiful and supple massages of How to Dress Well, jj, Ladytron, Mr. Little Jeans, Little Dragon and made me do more than sway – they made me think. They moved me forward. I hope they will for you, too. Because that's really what the closing of one year into the opening of another is really all about.
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