The Obligatory Best of 2010 List - Part One

Another year has past and so bloggers and the music press the world over feel the need to try and convince you of the best albums of the past twelve months. And so as much in an attempt to fill our pages in a quite spell as convince you of anything here are not so much the best, but our most enjoyed albums of 2010.

Not a top ten, or a top 50 even, but a good old honest top 18. Because that's how many albums we really liked this year.  Part one will cover the bottom nine - come back for the rest soon.

18. There Is Love In You - Four Tet

On which Keiran Hebden stopped trying to revolutionise with every record and instead brought everything together to create something which feels a bit like a best-of approach to Four Tet. It lacked the standout moments of the classic Rounds but besides that it is his most focused work.

17. Wave and Cloud - The Whiskey Priest

Unnoticed by the press but don't let that put you off, Wave and Cloud's obscurity only serves to make it even more deserving of your time. A frail and honest record that relies on songs and little more. The coupling of the weatherworn 'A Seafarer's Lament' and the heartfelt and beautiful 'If a Train Was a Doctor Was a Song' remains on of this year's best album openings.

16. Latin - Holy Fuck

Another album that appears to have been forgotten... Latin may not have garnered the praise heaped on previous album LP, but it demonstrates Holy Fuck's ability to continue to innovate. 'P.I.G.S.' remains one of the ill-est sounding joints we heard all year.

15. Swim - Caribou

The first Caribou release to really capture BlackPlastic's attention, Swim, along with Matthew Dear's Black City, was 2010's most danceable record for people that like to think. Simultaneously organic sounding and strangely electronic this is an album that felt more like a collaboration than an album by one artist ever normally could - one moment subtle and understated and the next needy and epic.

14. Real Life Is No Cool - Lindstrøm & Christabelle

Almost not on the list because we heard it in 2009 it makes it here on a technicality - it wasn't officially released until 2010. It's sun-drenched cosmic disco sound is also staggering - this is the sound of taking a dip in the 40 degree heat. By adding in Christabelle, Lindstrøm went and made his best album.

13. The Age of Adz - Sufjan Stevens

Prolific and at times frankly unfocused, Stevens only seems to release two types of record - challenging and flawed or challenging and fantastic. The Age of Adz is undoubtedly the latter, from the delicate opening of 'Futile Devices' through to the 25-minute-plus 'Impossible Soul' this is the sound of Stevens tearing up the few rules he had previously adhered to. At its best, on the furious and rapid 'I Want To Be Well', complete with it's repeated "I'm not fucking around" chorus, Sufjan sounds more vital than ever.

12. Contra - Vampire Weekend

It seems that everyone but BlackPlastic loved Vampire Weekend's debut. By rights, this - the follow up to a smash record we passed up on - should have been of little interest. And yet something in Contra really captures the listener. Whether on the tight upbeat pop of 'Run' or 'Giving Up The Gun' or the slow and considered numbers that just sparkle as on 'I Think Ur A Contra' this was pretty much the perfect pop record.

11. Subiza - Delorean

In a year when BlackPlastic returned to the White Isle nothing encapsulated the feeling of basking in the Balearic sunshine quite like Delorean's debut... If one band lead the Chill Wave movement for us then it's Delorean. A bit like Animal Collective mixed with a beach, some house vibes and quite a lot of ecstasy Subiza is just too hot and sunny to resist, particularly with songs as beautiful as 'Real Love'.

10. Causers of This - Toro y Moi

Causers of This is one of 2010's sleepers for BlackPlastic - so much so that we haven't mentioned it before now. The problem is that it is flawed, if only mildly so, in that a number of it's charms are hidden away in the latter half. 'Blessa' starts things off in a pleasant but slightly uninspiring manner but there are some of 2010's best moments here - just check the snappy, funky closing couplet in the form of 'Low Shoulders' and the title track. One of this year's most promising debuts, Causers of This is the heart broken record you can dance to.

BP x

Album Review: DJ-Kicks - Various mixed by Apparat

The DJ-Kicks series appears to be hitting something of a stride... With several notable releases this year already in the bag, The Juan Maclean's being a particular highlight, here comes one more from IDM innovator Apparat.

And Apparat's entry certainly doesn't drop the ball. To a certain extent it does what you would expect... It's intelligent, electronic music that is built more for home listening than the dance floor, but the quality of the music and timing is good enough to make listening (repeatedly) a pleasure.

Things start off fairly heavily with Apparat's own 'Circles' - what feels almost like a trance track with a cinematic world-music guitar motif - before getting dubby on fellow IDM-ers Telefon Tel Aviv's 'Lengthening Shadows'. From there things spin out in multiple directions. This is a mix that is one moment cold, hard and clinical and the next warm and embracing.

The latter is best demonstrated by Four Tet's stunning remix of 'I Need A Life' by Born Ruffians... A track that manages to simultaneously feel like the heat of summer and joy of Christmas. It creates a neat centre for the album before things turn darker on Vincent Markowski's classic 'The Madness Of Moths' and Four Tet and Burial's 'Moth'. As Thom Yorke's haunting 'Harrowdown Hill' emerges from Ramadanman's 'Tempest' there is a stark urban feel to this album that shows the influence of Apparat's recent collaborations with Modeselektor.

The album closes on Tim Hecker's ambient melancholy drenched 'Borderlands'. Apparat's DJ-Kicks album is a serious business and that may alienate some, but it is a testament to how a good mix album can be much more than the reconstruction of a live DJ set. This is a mix album with more emotional punch and ambition than most electronic artists manage on their own studio albums, and for that BlackPlastic salutes it.

BP x

DJ-Kicks by Apparat is out now, available from Amazon.co.uk on CD, LP and MP3.

Album Review: Christmas Gift - Various

Rainboot's Christmas Gift is a compilation truly in the spirit of the times... A set of fourteen understated, folky, Christmas influenced tracks where all of the takings go straight to a good cause - Save The Children.

For any label to do such a thing takes balls. For it to be a boutique such as Rain Boot is really rather generous (and brave) - they came to BlackPlastic's attention earlier this year when they put out the Whiskey Priest's superb Wave and Cloud. And that surprisingly blunt yet beautiful record is a good demonstration of what to expect.

This truly is the anti-X Factor. Whilst many in the UK alternative scene get behind John Cage's (rather excellent) '4:33' for Christmas number one most of the tracks on this album would make a much more fitting replacement. These are warts-and-all Christmas songs - the second act blues of A Charlie Brown Christmas, prior to the realisation of the true meaning of Christmas. It is the aural equivalent of turning your back on Argos, pulling your collar up and walking off into the cold, present-less, because all that really matters is who you spend it with (not what you spend it on).

There are certainly stronger and weaker moments here. Tyler Butler is battered and bruised on 'Waxwing' whilst The Animal Beat feel cautiously optimistic on 'Love Again'. Unsurprisingly, given the quality of Wave and Cloud, The Whiskey Priest delivers the gut-wrenching 'It Came Upon A Midnight Clear' and this contrasts with the beautifully coquettish 'Waiting To Find Me', from Sara Lewis. Where things stray into full on ballad territory is where BlackPlastic struggles a little - Travis Tucker's 'O Holy Night' is an epic Christmas song, it just feels a little over-delivered in contrast to the rest of the album.

Overall though you can't fault the package, and you certainly can't fault the sentiment. With all of the cover price going to a good cause we whole heartedly recommend you check out Christmas Gift.

BP x

Christmas Gift is out now on Rainboot, visit the Rainboot site for details on where to buy (including a pay what you want option at Bandcamp).

Video: My Heart is a Drummer - Allo Darlin'

BlackPlastic has been feeling this video since it dropped into the inbox a few weeks ago and now that it is getting airplay on 6music there seems to be no escaping it's greatness.  It's a slightly kooky number, reminiscent of She & Him's take on Alt-Country but in this case it's more alt-folk... Anyway, enjoy - it's a nice straight forward pop song.

BP x 

Single Review: I Can't Wait / Rock Me - Russ Yallop

Russ Yallop's 'I Can't Wait' is a bit of a master of deception. From the first minute you would be forgiven for thinking this is some sort of funky-house jam. The elements are all there: four-four, filters, female vocal.

Yet almost as soon as that minute is up Yallop treats us to a bass line heavy enough to dispel any illusions. Sure - it's house. And it's certainly funky. But this is a long way from anything described by the two labels together. Packed with snap, crackle and pop 'I Can't Wait' practically fizzes out of the sound system, melting the electronics on its way out. It boasts a lovely organic and analogue feel which, combined with some serious low-end, sounds like Chicken Lips at their best.

B-side 'Rock Me' is similar but with less compromise. There is even less vocal, instead just a moan, yet a lovely disco stab is worked into things to give the track it's hook before finally opening up and blossoming in the song's final quarter into a full on soul sample... And then back to the dark techno drums i goes, a brief flirt in the sunlight brought to an end all too soon.

So this is what minimal sounds like when you aren't afraid to fuck with it: awesome.

Check out a preview below:

I Can't Wait-Crossroads-Rock Me by Russ Yallop

BP x