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.
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
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.
We don't know much about Ryan Trott aka Family Trees apart from his friendship with Backwash Whiskey favorites Eternal Summers and his affinity for making some irresistibly simple surf-pop. "Nature Girl" is a minimalist love letter, raw and straightforward - a few acoustic chords enhanced only by hand-claps and a dreamy recorder melody. "I want to see everything/can you show me all the gifts the city never gives?" Trott sings sadly, either stricken with the Brooklyn blues or just head-over-heals for some beautiful beach bum hippy with feathers in her hair, you decide.
Tiny Microphone is the pseudonym for the solo project of Kristine - a Chicago indie pop princess better known as the front-woman of the band Very Truly Yours. Her first track under this alias - "You Dissapear" - takes listeners on a heartbreaking journey through time by evoking the post-punk sensibility of groups like The Jesus and Mary Chain, The Telescopes, and more recent Brooklyn contemporaries The Pains of Being Pure at Heart. The fuzzy guitars are paired with Kristine's timeless voice and tragically visual lyrics ("If my heart explodes in the sky/will it give you piece of mind?") creating a sad, dreamy song that could seamlessly soundtrack the climax of Sofia Coppola's next film.
send new music, photos, or cold beer to: patrick_mcdermott@emerson.edu
All mp3s are for sampling, and are posted with the intention of promoting the bands/artists. If you own one of these tracks and would like it to be removed from Backwash Whiskey, contact me and it'll be gone faster than a thirty of Red Dog on a Thursday night.
