Fever Chills

One of chillwave's brightest stars led us to the music of Mat Cothran aka Coma Cinema, a 21-year-old from South Carolina who's debut album Baby Prayers is available to download for our favorite price. "Flower Pills" and its trance inducing companion video demonstrate perfectly the short but oh-so-sweet sadness that envelopes Cothran's entire catalog. Listen, watch, and if you figure out how being bummed can sound so blissful, let us know.

"Flower Pills" - Coma Cinema

In Our Minds

Underwater Peoples records is home to a slew of 2010's most promising acts including Mountain Man, Fluffy Lumbers, and Rainbow Bridge. The label generously put a free compilation under all our Christmas trees this year, and while each of the artists made solid contributions, one track from Brooklyn's Air Waves shines through the lo-fi haze and has been intoxicating us for almost a month now. "Sweetness" is like tripping on acid for 3 minutes inside a temperature controlled bubble while a blizzard and sub-zero temperatures ravage the world around you - the upbeat simplicity of it all is sure to slap a shit-eating grin on your face even if everything you love is frozen.

"Sweetness" - Air Waves

Dream World

We first caught wind of Jack Tatum's bedroom pop project Wild Nothing when the Virginia native put out a shoegazing cover of Kate Bush's "Cloudbusting" earlier this year. He employs the same introspective melancholy on "Live in Dreams" - a hauntingly hazy love song that has Tatum sounding like a sedated Morrissey singing about cigarettes and suicide. "Pretty face, could you make the jump with me? I'm dying just to let things go," he begs with such a poignant sentimentality that after listening you'll be left dazed and dreaming of forgotten first kisses and warm summer rain. Wild Nothing's debut LP is due out on Brooklyn's Captured Tracks sometime next year.

"Live in Dreams" - Wild Nothing

BW's Best of 2K9

Looks like Grizzly Bear is taking home Backwash gold for crafting one of the most beautiful, artistic albums EVER, and the clear defining record of the year. Breakouts Small Black nabbed track of the year for their hypnagogic '09 anthem "Despicable Dogs" (official video below). Scan the rest of the round-up and tell us what ya'll like and what we might of left out. Also, be sure to check out any of these albums/EPs/songs that you might have missed this year while you were too busy worrying about Balloon Boy.

ALBUMS:

15. White Lies - To Lose My Life
14. Rural Alberta Advantage - Hometowns
13. Memory Tapes - Seek Magic
12. Dirty Projectors - Bitte Orca
11. Girls - Album
10. Cymbals Eat Guitars - Why There Are Mountains
9. Au Revoir Simone - Still Night, Still Light
8. The Pains of Being Pure at Heart - The Pains of Being Pure at Heart
7. Neon Indian - Psychic Chasms
6. Woods - Songs of Shame
5. Real Estate - Real Estate
4. Phoenix - Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix
3. Passion Pit - Manners
2. Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavilion
1. Grizzly Bear - Veckatimest

EPs:

5. Caddywhompus - Caddywhompus
4. The Drums - Summertime
3. Surf City - Surf City
2. Animal Collective - Fall be Kind
1. Delorean - Ayrton Senna


SINGLES/STANDOUTS:

10. "Velvet" - The Big Pink
9. "Something in the Way" - Best Coast
8. "You Are The Blood" - Sufjan Stevens
7. "Anna" (feat. Noah Lennox) - Taken by Trees
6. "Vacation" - Beach Fossils
5. "Psychic City" - YACHT
4. "Belong" - Washed Out
3. "Never Have Fun" - That Ghost
2. "Walkabout" (feat. Noah Lennox) - Atlas Sound

1. "Despicable Dogs" - Small Black

Thirst For Blood

Surfer Blood is a 5 piece power-pop act out of West Palm Beach, Florida that reaped a bit of buzz after playing 12 well-received gigs at this years CMJ showcase. Casual Fridays took a break from shooting stunning skate videos to bring us this stripped down version of Surfer Blood's playful, catchy-as-fuck guitar jam "Floating Vibes". Watch the vid with headphones and plunge into the bouncy, surf harmonies - then compare it to the washed out echos on the electrified mp3 below. The group's debut LP, "Astro Turf", is set to drop Jan 19 on Kanine Records.

"Floating Vibes" - Surfer Blood