1.
Aereogramme-
Seclusion. This album kicks ass in more ways than Mr. T and Chuck Norris could come up with combined. Lynsey Joss's vocals deftly handle the alternation between breezy, heartfelt synthy ballads and peeling the shellac on the ten-minute powerhouse "The Unravelling," while the rest of the band creates soundscapes and melodies that are puzzlingly delicate for a hard rock album. There isn't a dull moment on this record, and you have to give props to a band who covers the Flaming Lips' "Lightning Strikes the Postman" and improve it. The only downside to this album is that listening to it dwarfs anything you've ever done.
2.
People in Planes-
As Far As the Eye Can See. A brit-rock band at the core, People in Planes distinguishes itself simply by incorporating a more diverse palate of genres than any of its stylistic peers or predecessors. Part 90's alternative rock, part acid-jazz, part post-rock,
As Far As the Eye Can See does for 2000's guitar rock what Radiohead's The Bends achieved a decade ago.
3.
Parov Stelar-
Seven and Storm. Stelar's vision of what you can only call "psychedelic jazz" is utterly singular. Combining upright bass sounds with turntables, electronic house beats, 1950s lounge/soul vocals and samples from the
Batman television series, each song on Seven and Storm is an intricate web of sounds that is just as interesting to dissect upon the 100th listen as it is on the first. A contemporary, genre-bending tour-de-force.
4.
Rocco DeLuca & the Burden-
I Trust You to Kill Me. Aside from having the coolest band name and album title this side of the tropic of Cancer, DeLuca and the boys should be touted as the early 21st century's foremost blues-rock heroes. The first band to be signed onto Kiefer Sutherland's back-to-basics Ironworks records, the Burden's debut is what you'd expect Zeppelin's Physical Graffiti to sound like if Jeff Buckley had played it. DeLuca's register is phenomenal and his dobro-hollow-body guitar with a steel top, also among the hardest instruments on Earth to play properly-slithers and slides through the album like a rattlesnake with a bad case of the Delta blues. Beyond which, in the wake of James Blunt's shenanigans, DeLuca has the stones to feature the phrase "You're beautiful..." rather prominently in the chorus of his sublime album closer "Favor," and makes the line feel more earnest than you've ever heard it before. A genuine masterwork.
5.
Dumas-
Fixer le Temps. With 2004's Le Cours des Jours, Quebec heartthrob Steve Dumas proved beyond the shadow of a doubt that he was the best songwriter this province-probably even this country-has to offer. His follow-up,
Fixer le Temps holds its own and shows Dumas, as ever, exploring new musical and lyrical terrain when most people figured he would probably just elect to slack off with this one. Here's to showing Ron Sexsmith who's boss.
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