SMRTS

smRts Have Friends And Visit Them At Night
Heartless Robot

If the old adage “everyone in rock just rips each other off” is to be believed then the true test of artistry is moving past simply “ripping off” those influences and recombining what you’ve learned into such an idiosyncratic package that it becomes distinctively yours. With smRts Have Friends And Visit Them At Night, supremely talented local outfit smRts come very close to doing just this.

Moving past the most obvious of their garage-rock influences, Predrag Delibasic leads his band into bold new territory, mixing those very influences into a nearly unrecognisable pastiche of hypnotically pop-centric songwriting.

PASSENGER

All the Little Lights
Black Crow Records / Inertia

UK-based Mike Rosenberg, known on-stage as Passenger, has been adopted as an honorary Aussie: he recorded his latest release All The Little Lights in Sydney, spends more time here than in his home country, and you may have just seen him busking in Freo over the weekend.

BAND OF SKULLS

Sweet Sour
PIAS Recordings / Liberation

When English rockers Band Of Skulls released their 2009 debut record Baby Darling Doll Face Honey, they “had no idea that anyone would come to our shows” according to vocalist and guitarist Russell Marsden but, the Southampton three-piece’s tune I Know What I Am made Single Of The Week on iTunes, Friends made the cut on the Twilight: New Moon soundtrack and they went on to tour extensively and support Muse in 2010.

GOLDFRAPP

The Singles
Mute / EMI

In what seems like no time at all electronic English duo Goldrapp have five albums under their belt and are well worthy of a singles collection even if it has come about as a way to fulfil a contractual obligation. Alison Goldfrapp offers her name and her voice to the group, and although she often finds the recording process somewhat confronting and difficult, the results speak for themselves.

The Singles kicks off with the outfit’s biggest hit Ooh La La, a song that captures Goldfrapp’s subtle hooks and warm beats during their period where Alison Goldfrapp’s outfits were as enchanting as the songs. Strict Machine has been a staple for late night Rage viewers and is as danceable here even without the film clip in tow.

POND

Beard, Wives, Denim
Spinning Top Music / Modular

Over the course of 12 absorbing tracks, local psych-funksters Pond pummel with the poise of a late-night funk infomercial—journeying through Motown soul and trippy texture in equal portions.

The ghosts of Sly and Curtis Mayfield are heard in the slinky grooves, and Electric Ladyland and Maggot Brain sound to have played a part in shaping Pond’s stoney decadence. It’s just that ability to emulate the sound of its heroes that makes Beard, Wives, Denim a fun, diverting trip through the pleasures of a wildly excessive genre.

AIR

Le Voyage Dans La Lune
Astralwerks / EMI

Le Voyage Dans La Lune, which translates to A Trip To The Moon, is the seventh studio album by French duo Air.  While the talented two-some have always drawn inspiration from famous film scores, Le Voyage Dans La Lune truly feels like an Air film soundtrack, albeit to a film that doesn’t exist.

Inspired by the famous French silent film from 1902 by the same name, Le Voyage Dans La Lune has a much more sinister tone than previous work by Air, foregoing a poppy single that previous releases have had at least one of.

FRANCOIS & THE ATLAS MOUNTAINS

E Volo Love
Domino

There is a playfulness and a naivety on E Volo Love, the most recent release from Bristol-via-France quartet, Francois & The Atlas Mountains. It is nostalgic guitar pop from a band not taking itself too seriously. The drums are laden with ramshackle energy, the guitars with jangly reverb and the whole thing is teeming with handclaps, percussion and vocal harmonies.

What separates E Volo Love from the scores of other retro-leaning indiepop albums of the moment is the album’s sophisticated arrangements.

DIE ANTWOORD

Ten$Ion
ZEF Recordz

Listening to Zef rave-rappers Ninja, Yolandi fucking Vi$$er and DJ Hi-Tek without any visual accompaniments just doesn’t do these wayward, aberrant Cape Town entertainers justice. “Fuck the system, we have our own system, we make our own rules, we don’t answer to no-one” is Ninja’s declaration in his guttural Afrikaans accent on Never Le Nkemise 2, the electro-dubstep rap raver which concludes this brilliant collection of insane, raw and deliciously original tunes.

BEN KWELLER

Go Fly A Kite
The Noise Company/Shock Records

2009’s Changing Horses found puppy faced singer Ben Kweller returning to his hometown of Texas and making his most unashamedly country sounding record to date.

Three years on and Kweller is clearly settled and feeling comfortable in his own skin, with his latest album sounding like a retrospective look at his years as a solo artist.

TRENT REZNOR &

ATTICUS ROSS

The Girl With The
Dragon Tattoo
Soundtrack
Mute/EMI

With Nine Inch Nails being on a hiatus, Trent Reznor has found himself to be on everybody’s shortlist when it comes to doing soundtrack work. He has already collected an Oscar for his audio accompaniment to The Social Network and the accompanying 3 disc set to David Fincher’s remake of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is an even more ambitious effort.

LEONARD COHEN

Old Ideas
Columbia

Music legend Leonard Cohen last studio offering was 2004’s Dear Heather and since then he has re-ignited old fans and made new ones with a series of sell-out world tours. Long-time fans of Leonard have had the pleasure of hearing him grow old, with every release showing him grow more and more in to his deep, trademark voice.

LANA DEL REY
Born To Die
Interscope/Universal Music

Rarely does any new artist cop as much flack as Lana Del Rey. Appearing from seemingly out of nowhere, her single Video Games was a leftfield hit and now she’s declared she can live up to at least some of hype with Born To Die.

NERVES JUNIOR

As Bright

As Your Night Light
sanoBLAST! Records

As Bright As Your Night Light is the debut album from Kentucky based band Nerves Junior and it comes with some pretty serious hype. Comparisons to juggernaut acts like Radiohead do nothing but raise expectations very high. Thankfully Night Light mostly lives up to its lofty praises.
Opener Champagne & Peaches is sonically soothing with vocals and a lead guitar that fulfil its reputation and comparisons. Building up with the rising sound of an effects laden guitar, it’s a sound familiar yet at the same time completely original. The lead guitarist is the most obvious Radiohead influence with a sound laden with effects and a harsh attack, like Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood.
The eponymous track on the album is a brilliantly catchy tune that nicely sums up the sound of the band, with a looping, crashing drum beat and a seriously infectious chorus. Lo-fi electronic keys buzz out as simple a melody as you can get while a sleazy bass line pushes the whole thing forward.

TRAILER TRASH TRACYS

Ester

Domino/EMI

With a band name like Trailer Trash Tracys you would likely be expecting a band that sounds like a hard rocking posse of bourbon swilling badass chicks, or a toothless brand of ladies with a penchant for the front step and a collection of out of tune banjos, but neither comes anywhere near touching on the sound from this London four piece.

BENJAMIN GOLBY

A Progress

Independent

As an integral member of indie pop outfit Split Seconds, who are undoubtedly one of Perth’s busiest and most promising new acts, you have to wonder how Benjamin Golby has found the time to complete second solo outing, A Progress.
The secret may be in Golby being older than his years would suggest, as portions of A Progress are simply Victorian in nature. When I Lapse is baroque pop from a time that should be long past, and is a classy pondering. The pedal steel laced Gone! is the type of pop tune that considering his credentials, you would expect Golby could write during a visit to the can.

KATE BUSH

50 Words For Snow
EMI/Fish Music

Kate Bush burst onto the scene as the somewhat bookish, yet quirky dancing and seductively clad siren with left of centre tunes that somehow struck a chord with the masses. Success was relatively rapid, but it would be unfair to say that it came ‘easy’ for Bush. For some time she has been the perfectionist, which has lead to her releases becoming rarer than rocking-horse shit and bordering on the more obtuse and nutty.

Early in 2011 Bush reinterpreted some of her own tunes on Directors Cut, but it is her latest work 50 Words For Snow that has kept the full lipped, auburn haired singer locked in the studio for years on end.

CHILDISH GAMBINO

Camp
Island

Donald Glover’s day job is as an actor and comedian, starring in US sitcom Community and working as a staff writer for cult comedy series 30 Rock. By night he’s both the rapper Childish Gambino and, as it seems from this album, a part-time Kanye West impersonator.

However, a fascinating public persona is not synonymous with fascinating musical output, and while Glover’s attention-seeking behaviour may be grotesquely compelling, the 20-something rapper himself is not. He fancies himself a tortured artist, but his mixture of ego and self-loathing could not be more cliché. He thinks he’s an aesthete, but his taste (college girls, white society, getting crunk) is tired.

AMY WINEHOUSE

Lioness: Hidden Treasures
Island / Universal

Last year, 2011, at the age of 27, Amy Winehouse  famously died from ‘acute alcohol poisoning’. It was the terrible loss of a supremely talented singer, one whose life will be remembered for music, fame, drugs, booze, love, loss, drugs, booze, rehab and a retro style. Sadly, the world would never see another of her beehive hairstyles, or Amy strolling belligerently, fag in hand, from court to waiting taxi. We would expect and have though, soon enough, to find a new Amy Winehouse record on the (hypothetical) shelves.

KORN

The Path of Totality
Roadrunner Records

Metal and dubstep. It just fits together, you know? Like pop and rock, or blues and roots. I don’t know why we didn’t think of it before. For those of you who have been under a rock for the past few months, nu-metal rockers Korn have gone all lost and confused in their old age and released a dubstep-metal album called The Path Of Totality. And man, it’s a doozy.

GORILLAZ

The Singles Collection
2001-2011
Parlophone

It’s hard to believe it has already been 10 years since Blur front-man and all-round musical bad ass Damon Albarn unleashed his animated concept band, Gorillaz. With three major albums, and one minor release this year, Gorillaz have given radio stations plenty of catchy tunes to spin. To mark the 10 year occasion Parlophone has put together an album that neatly compiles all the band’s best hits.