December 14, 2008
With everything else that’s been going on this year (the new job, the new house, the new wife) I’ve hardly been to the cinema at all this year so this will have to be a top five rather than a top ten. There’s only one other film we saw at the cinema this year that I can think of (Indiana Jones and the Ridiculously Improbable Third Act (which wasn’t as bad as many people made out but still far from great)). Three of the five were animations, one was British and two were from the Middle East. Wouldn’t have guessed that one.
1. Waltz with Bashir
When I first saw the trailers for this, I figured it was just a Persepolis derivitive but, although I loved Persepolis, this one is easily the better film. One of the best war films I’ve ever seen. Jawdropping, rotoscoped animation and a Max Richter soundtrack tell the directors true story of his invovlment as a young man in the Lebanon war in 1982 and why his brain has blanked out any details of it.
2. Wall-E
3. The Dark Knight
4. Persepolis
5. Happy Go Lucky
We went to see this the day we were originally supposed to move house. That was the day it fell through at the last minute. We, understandably went a bit crazy that weekend and decided to get married on the spur of the moment on the way back home from the GFT. (Three weeks later, we were married and breaking the news to the relatives).
EDIT: and I completely forgot that Son Of Rambow (which I loved on levels normally reserved for Michel Gondry) was this year. So call it a top 6 and stick Son Of Rambow in at 2
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December 7, 2008
1.
Bon Iver – For Emma, Forever Ago
He played Edinburgh on my birthday but me being me, left it too late and it had sold out by the time I tried to book. What sounds like nothing more than a nice wee album on first listen, given time and repeated listens, blossoms into a complete gem. Hands down my favourite of the year.
2. Remember Remember – Remember Remember
First discovered him when he opened for Aidan Moffat in the Arches back at the start of the year (and started with a Daniel Johnston cover). Saw him again a few weeks later at the Mogwai Tryptich gig and have been waiting eagerly ever since for the album to finally drop in November. Musically, he fits in well with Mogwai’s gentler side but he’s really worth seeing live. Like Andrew Bird, he plays most of the instruments himself and builds up layers using samplers. He utilises everything from scissors snipping to sellotape ripping to create sound effects which he loops to make percussion and builds up on top of his washing layers of guitar. For reasons I cant quite put my finger on, there are bits of the album that remind me of Penguin Cafe Orchestra.
3.
Glasvegas – GlasvegasChuffed as I am that I was hyping the band on this blog a full year before they hit the big time, it would serve to be pretty embarrassing if the debut had turned out to be rubbish. Fortunately, there was nothing to worry about. The Mary Chain guitars and Oasis swagger are present and correct throughout the album and the hooks are a mile wide.
4. Max Richter – 24 Postcards in Full Colour
I had never heard of Max before this album but my interest was piqued by a review on Pitchfork of a German born, Edinburgh based, classically trained but electronic music inclined, musician making an album of short instrumental pieces designed to be used as mobile ring tones. Having gone back a bit further, some of his earlier albums are much better but since this was the first one I discovered and the only one out this year, its on the list.
5.
Mogwai – The Hawk is HowlingIf you look at my last.fm charts, I would guess you’ll find that I’ve listened to Mogwai more than anyone else this year. I hadn’t really listened to them in a long time until this album came out and I got back into them big-style. I still don’t think they’ll ever top New Paths to Helicon but this is a fine album.
6. Ron
Sexsmith – Exit Strategy of the Soul
Sounding quite different to the last album, going more for a horn drenched soulful sound, I found myself listening to this album more than I expected.
7. Vampire Weekend – Vampire Weekend
Had heard the name bandied about a few times but finally heard some music on the Rough Trade Counter Culture annual. They’ve gone huge since then but it’s about 3/4s of a great album (with the bits that sound like Sting not being so good, obviously).
8.
MGMT – Oracular Spectacular
Fated to pretend was one of the best pop songs of the year with its trademark Dave Fridman production but it didn’t really prepare me for the eclecticism of the album which ranged from 80’s synth to Air style ambient ballads.
9. Elbow – Seldom Seen Kid
Another band I had always heard good things about and never quite got round to checking out. A few corking singles off this album finally prompted me to give it a listen. a well deserved Mercury Award winner.
10. Frightened Rabbit – The Midnight Organ Fight
Basically just a big, balls out, rock album with HUGE chorus’. First heard them at Mogwai’s Triptych all-dayer shortly after the album came out. Was struck by their resemblance to Idlewild at their most visceral.
Special mention goes to:
Animal Collective – Strawberry Jam
Would have been number two in this years top ten since I first heard it around April this year, except for the fact it was released May 2007. Bugger. Have intended to get into this band for years due to the early Flaming Lips/Mercury Rev comparisons but didn’t give the bits and pieces I downloaded enough of a chance so couldn’t get my head around them. Finally found an entry point with Strawberry Jam and have realised that the early stuff I dismissed as noise before are subtly nuanced works of musical genius. If you imagine taking newborn babies and then shutting them off from all music except Priest Driven Ambulance and
Yrself is Steam right through until adolescence then asking them to write an album, it would sound like this. Will be seeing them live in January around the time their new album comes out and I cant wait for both.
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November 6, 2008
Have been nervous for a while about how my Nano would cope with being off for a few days. I deliberately squeezed in more than the minimum words on Saturday and Sunday last week to allow for the fact that yesterday was my wifes birthday so Tuesday night I had to bake a cake then last night I wanted to spend time with her rather than neglecting her, tapping away all on my lonesome up in the computer room. After a marathon session this evening, I feel inspired again.
On Saturday, when I started the novel, words werent coming very quickly at all but my prose was witty. Since then, I’ve realised I just didnt have the time to imbibe each scene with the humour and pathos that they deserved. I’ve really resigned myself now that this story is nothing more than a rough draft. and a very rough one at that. it serves no other purpose than to get the story out of my head and allow me to spot plot holes and bash things into shape.
There’s still a few surprises of course. Characters do things you hadn’t planned and a few new ideas have materialised out of the ether. I’m hoping to get a good blitz at it this weekend and, after churning out 3500 words with no problem this evening, it would be nice to see another 10k by Sunday night…
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October 20, 2008
So now a flash version of the site is up but I haven’t yet figured out how to embed RSS into flash. Once I figure that one out, its about an hours work to finish version 1.0 of the site off.
That’ll have to wait until December though since I’ve got a busy few weeks followed by NaNoWriMo in November. 4 more gigs before the end of the year as well…
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