Top Albums of 2010 - #19-15

This week, the BZNZmen will be bringing you their list of the best albums of 2010.

#19

Harlem - Hippies

JESSE: It's a warm may evening in Philadelphia, after a long day of walking the town with Jeremy and Gina, we see Banksy's Exit Through The Gift Shop, and waltz around discussing whether or not Banksy is Mr. Brainwash, or what. Then I see a record shop, and we walk in. the dude at the counter throws on what sounds like some 70s garage rock, so simple and so catchy. I don't do this often, but I had to ask him who it was. "Harlem" he says, apparently they've recently released an album on Matador! Great! From what I can gather, it's a 3-piece band that has just the essential skills on their respective instruments to put together some catchy songs that work hard to pass the 3-minute mark. Someday Soon starts off the album, and you just have yourself great vintage-sounding song after song. While certainly not an extremely original sound, it's just fun fun fun. The dude asks me "Yeah, it's a sweet album dude, want to buy a copy?" and I decline, opting for spending $2 on used copies of the Superfly soundtrack and Ian & Sylvia's Four Strong Winds on vinyl. But I got it eventually, and oh yes, it's good. Also, it's really easy to play the guitar along with, because it's just nice simple chord progressions. Great job, Harlem.

TK: I've been on the Harlem bandwagon for quite some time now. Their debut album was like a humble homage to early Kinks/Stones garage-rock. Like Jesse states, not original but fun fun fun. There was one song in particular that was phenomenal, "South of France". A fury of psychedelic, drug-induced, freak-out of garage rock power that would fit perfectly in some compilation of lost 60's nuggets. Unfortunately you're not going to hear a track as good as that on their sophomore effort but the album on a whole is way better. "Someday Soon", which sounds like it could be a 60's girl group cover, really sets the pace for the whole album. From odes to Casper (yeah, the friendly ghost) to sleazy domestic disputes, it's all over the place but what great garage-rock album isn't?

Harlem - Someday Soon


Harlem - Gay Human Bones

#18
Shinichi Osawa - SO2

#17
Oneohtrix Point Never- Returnal

TK: Holy Synths! And now we tune in to the imaginary station that is Oneohtrix Point Never, emitting deliciously strange frequencies. Daniel Lopatin's album, Returnal, finds him using synthesizers to explore the cyclical nature of time. The opener "Nihil Admirari" (a latin phrase that means, surprised by nothing) is the ultimate palette cleanser. Imagine a volcanic eruption. From then on out things quickly mellow out. A lot of people compare the title track to something The Knife would produce, which isn't that farfetched. "Ouroboros" (see a snake eating its tail) is a stand out track that you wish was longer, barely going over 2 minutes. But to me the best is "Pelham Island Road". A mind-blowing track that invokes traveling, not through space but through time. For fans of Bladerunner or someone who may have played to much Sega Genesis as a kid, I guess...

Oneohtrix Point Never "‡PREYOUANDI∆" from Megazord on Vimeo.

#16
The Chemical Brothers- Further

#15
Sun City Girls- Funeral Mariachi

JESSE: So I haven't really scratched the surface of Sun City Girls' discography. According to their Wikipedia page, they have over 80 releases. This is their final recording under the name, as the drummer of the band sadly passed away this past year. 31 years of recording, I see them as somewhat Zappa-ish, but really I don't know much about the band. This album is largely instrumental, and the vocals present are not in any lyrical form, but rather additions to the songs made. Opening track Ben's Radio comes across as a bit of a sound collage, with the guys saying either gibberish, making trumpet noises, saying "Jakarta" at some point, then it breaks into this nice bass line with a surf guitar riff for a bit. This is a horrible description, but as a song it works so well. The album is overall pretty chill, but I can't explain how many types of music it sounds like, while sounding like none. Much of it sounds like it would fit will in a Kill Bill soundtrack. Not sure what else to say, but it's good. Now it's time for me to work through their music retrospectively.

Sun City Girls - Funeral Mariachi


Sun City Girls - Blue West