bloodsweatandsemen:

Poveglia, Venice.

nervousacid:

DOWNLOAD | The Nervous Acid 2011 Year In Music

Just because I quit writing about music for money doesn’t mean I quit loving music. In fact, just the opposite! This year I get to make a year-end mixtape that is zero percent critical consideration and 100 percent this-is-what-I-actually-love.

Here’s my list by the numbers:

• Number of British Artists: 13
• Number of Non-British Artists: 2 (1 from America, 1 from Denmark)
• Number of Unsigned Artists: 1 (Whoever signs Owen Duff first is a guaranteed future millionaire member of the 1%!)
• Number of Artists Without Full-Length Albums Out: 5
• Number of Out Gay Artists (That I Know Of): 3
• Number of Times I’ve Listened to “Stay Away” in 2011: Approximately 7,652
• Number of Artists Featured on SPIN’s Top 50 of 2011: 0 
• Number of Artists Featured on Stereogum’s Top 50 of 2011: 0
• Number of Artists Featured on Rolling Stone’s Top 50 of 2011: 0
• Number of Artists Featured on New York Magazine’s Top 10 of 2011: 0
• Number of Artists Featured on NME’s Top 50 of 2011: 1

So basically, we’ve learned that I still love the import section at the record store, that I still love discovering new artists, and that — except for that dude at NME who added the Bombay Bicycle Club record to their Best-Of list — pretty much no one else writing about music shares my taste. But that’s cool. Because these, my friends, are the songs and artists that made me excited to be alive in 2011.

COMPLETE TRACKLISTING:

1. Bombay Bicycle Club — “How Can You Swallow So Much Sleep”
2. The Joy Formidable — “Whirring”
3. Charli XCX — “Stay Away”
4. Will Young — “Come On”
5. Death Cab for Cutie — “Doors Unlocked and Open”
6. Emeli Sandé — “Heaven”
7. Clock Opera — “Belongings”
8. Bright Light Bright Light — “Disco Moment”
9. Cher Lloyd — “With Ur Love” (feat. Mike Posner)
10. The Wombats — “Anti-D”
11. Owen Duff — “Realitycide”
12. When Saints Go Machine — “Parix”
13. Butcher the Bar — “Bobby”
14. CocknBullKid — “Asthma Attack”
15. Mr Fogg — “Answerphone”

New music from me http://owenduff.bandcamp.com/album/realityicide.

I was walking down Goswell street, late at night after a drink after work. I was walking and suddenly my attention was captured by the presence of a large black Mercedes coupe, which had drawn up at the lights of the junction with Old street. The Mercedes’ engine was revving loudly, and its sound machine was grinding out solid monstrous bass, and before I was really cognisant of what this noise was, or in fact what the car was, or in fact of anything really except what was in my own head at that moment, which was blankness, at the first instant of my becoming aware of the Mercedes and the noise coming from it I for a second thought it was some huge black ancient animal, roaring near me. After recognising what it was in actuality I became aware also of the fact that I had really been thinking of nothing prior to that point for a few minutes at least, and I had the image of blank whiteness, in fact of a piece of paper, the letter A and the number 4 came into my mind because although this piece of paper was without dimension its blankness seemed commensurate with A4 as that is the most blank type of paper there is, its commonplaceness makes it disappear, there is nothing of the exotic or unusual about it, unlike A6, or A0. I work a lot with A4 paper at my office. After this realisation I looked directly at the Mercedes, and took the detail of it into my conscious mind. Inside the car were three large men, probably in their 30s, possibly middle eastern, wearing suits and sunglasses. The music and the neon that surrounded them and the reflectivity of the car made it all seem so threateningly and glamorously futuristic or at least redolent of some recent but fading idea or ideal or dystopic vision of what the future is or will be. And yet I thought again of the ancient animal. And I thought again of the blank A4 paper with no dimensions. And as I looked ahead of me to my home I realised that while lost in the blankness I had found my way from the drinks after work towards my home. And yet I had also been in the blankness. And I started to imagine something else. A future which was not like this blankness, or like my walk home, or like my office or A4 paper or work drinks.

I veered into the road towards the Mercedes, and leant into its open window, my hands on its cold shining skin, and I looked at the three men and they turned to look at me, and I said “okay, let’s do it”, and they opened the door and I got into the Mercedes.

I read my friend Emily’s newly published poem The Old Fuel (http://www.granta.com/Online-Only/new-poets-emily-berry) a few mornings ago while sat at the piano. I improvised and sang the poem, recording it on my phone. Excuse the morning voice.

I cannot afford

O Landlord, to pay

U, more than I do

O Constellation

There’s no consolation for life

Like that star-spangled blackness

Above us

Something must love us!

It fit that reeling ceiling

Each feeling is wired to a stellar bulb

And out sprouts bright recall

To make your heart full

So when forest green

Comes to mean

So much more than just trees you’ll see

It’s part of the firmament of memories

Leaves on a solar breeze

Memories like stars

What fun we had.