Top 5 Records of 2013 (So Far)

So I don't just like rap music. Along with Wu-Tang Clan, Cities Aviv and Odd Future, Japandroids, Sonic Youth and Bloc Party are also some of my favorite musical artists of all time. So at the moment, I feel inclined to write about something outside of rap music.

2012 was a great year for indie rock. With excellent records by Japandroids, Metz, The Men, DIIV, Wild Nothing, Grimes, Frankie Rose, Royal Headache, Titus Andronicus and Cloud Nothings (whew!), I became increasingly nervous for the albums that would come out in 2013. But the five records listed below have proved that 2013 may be able to top the amazing 2012.

The Men - New Moon

New Moon, is the third record in as many years from Brooklyn punk rockers cum Neil Young shoegazers, The Men and it may be their best yet. Like every other album by The Men, it goes in a different direction than the last and displays even more musical maturity. This time, The Men leave the grimy basements of New York and go out to the Catskills to record, and New Moon reflects this change.

The Men work their way through twelve songs of punk energy ("The Brass", "Supermoon"), country twang ("Bird Song", "The Seeds", "Open the Door") steel lap and harmonica ("Half Angel Half Light", "Without a Face") and Neil Young meets Dinosaur Jr. fuzz ("I Saw Her Face", "Electric"). New Moon is another evolution for The Men, and they've already confirmed that they have another album recorded, so I'm excited to see where they go next.


Foxygen - We Are the 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace & Magic

Foxygen may be influenced by bands of the past like The Stones, The Velvets and The Beatles. But through the duration of their excellent We Are The 21st Century... they make it clear that they're making music of their own. When listening to anything by Foxygen, you don't think of who the song sounds like until it's over. 

Front man Sam France may seem like the driving force of We Are the 21st Century... especially when he stretches his voice out across songs such as "Oh Yeah" and the title track, but Jonathan Rado and the rest of the band provides stellar instrumentation on songs like the driving "On Blue Mountain" and the trippy "Oh No 2". Foxygen have confessed to not listening to any new bands, and where some may say this is a pretentious statement, it makes sense. They don't let the surrounding bands influence them, allowing them to make excellent, and original music of their own.



Iceage - You're Nothing
Danish punks Iceage are similar to Foxygen, because both bands synthesize decades of music into their own. Though, whereas Foxygen draw from classic rock, Iceage draws from early 70s NYC punk, British post punk and dark Californian punk and wrap them in shoegazey, no-wave guitar hooks, and loud and messy bass lines and drum fills.

You're Nothing is definitely a step up from New Brigade in lyricism and musicality. Frontman Elias Rønnenfelt's lyrics are displayed more at the forefront on this album, and he recalls the late Joy Division singer Ian Curtis, in both subject matter and delivery. The rest of the band has also improved considerably, providing melodic hooks on songs such as "Wounded Hearts" and "In Haze" and adding piano to the album highlight "Morals". You're Nothing is definitely a catchier affair than it's predecessor, and by listening to "Ecstasy" the second time through, you'll be screaming "PRESSURE! PRESSURE! oh God no" along with Rønnenfelt.


Youth Lagoon - Wondrous Bughouse
From the opening instrumental "Through Mind and Back" and the follow up "Mute", with all of it's electronics and delayed guitars, you can tell Trevor Powers is not interested in making The Year of Hibernation II. The Year of Hibernation reveled in intimacy, with Powers singing in a near whisper at times about childhood stories and nostalgia, but Wondrous Bughouse is notably more expansive in instrumentation and lyricism than its predecessor.

Powers employs much more electronics and effects, making the music almost sound like Animal Collective, especially on the song "Dropla" where strange noises pop up all over the place and beautiful piano on "Raspberry Cane". Powers is also looking more out than in on this record, wondering about death, God and the metaphysical world as a whole. These heavy subjects seem like they may be hard to pull off from the guy who sang about finding snakes in his backyard, but Powers pulls it off quite well. The Year of Hibernation was a record that could only be made at a certain place in time for Powers, so I think it's safe to say he won't repeat on other albums. So I feel that we should be content with what he's pulled off considerably well on Wondrous Bughouse.



My Bloody Valentine - m b v
Even though this event (yes, this release is classified as an event) happened at the beginning of February, this will probably be remembered for years to come. That on the night of February 2nd, a new album from My Bloody Valentine, who hadn't released anything for 22 years, suddenly appeared on the internet and it was available for purchase. So naturally I bought it.

My Bloody Valentine are the god fathers of shoegaze, and they've been silent since they're perfect album Loveless, released in the early 90's. m b v isn't better than Loveless but it's still nothing short of amazing. It also shows some musical growth, with the organ led "Is This and Yes" and the insanely layered closing track, "Wonder 2". 

I've let this record set in for the past couple months, to make sure that it didn't sound as good as it did because of the hype surrounding it. And it's survived the test. With the countless shoegaze bands that have come and gone after My Bloody Valentine, Loveless still felt like a timeless peace of work and no doubt m b v will be the same. I can't wait for their next album.


Records to Look for in 2013
Milk Music - Cruise Your Illusion, Release Date: April 2nd
Wavves - Afraid of Heights, Release Date: March 26th
Merchandise - Total Nite, Release Date: Sometime this Spring
The National - Title TBA, Release Date: Sometime this May
Cloud Nothings - Title TBA,  Release Date: Sometime this Fall
Deerhunter - Title and release date TBA

'Twon the Illest Out: A Review of Antwon's "In Dark Denim"

I've probably rewritten the intro for this review about ten times now. Because, how do you start a review about an Antwon album? Sure, he's from the Bay and he'll make a cloud rap song, but than the next song will be an industrial, hardcore, punk influenced song. He's impossible to pigeonhole. People like to compare Antwon to Biggie and Rick Ross, but that seems just because of his voice. Antwon is more like Ghostface Killah circa Fishscale (had Ghostface been an internet rapper and released free mixtapes), a rapper who just goes balls out and will rap about anything or everything.

Across all of Antwon's projects (apart from My Westside Horizon) Antwon raps about sex, death, love, food, depression, thrift stores, drugs and even more. And what's so interesting about Antwon, is that he's able to pull off rapping about all of these things so successfully.

And now we have In Dark Denim. Is it Antwon's best release? Probably not, but that's because it's impossible to compare them. But In Dark Denim is a damn good mixtape.


The first thing that strikes you about In Dark Denim is the production. It's louder, noisier and more cluttered than it has been on past releases. But these beats suit his deep voice perfectly. The loud and chaotic "Dark Denim" produced by Froskees, the strange piano loops and soul samples of "Still Gaurded" produced by Cities Aviv and the grimy pulse of "Boomerang (3 Deep)" produced by Teams. With beats this good, you have to rap pretty well to not get lost in the mix with them. Which is exactly what Antwon does.

What's great about In Dark Denim is how fun of a mixtape it can be. "3rd World Grrl", produced by Froskees is a prime example of this. It's as close to a love song that Antwon gets on this tape, and has some hilarious lines like "two mexican pizzas / charge it to the game, girl / no visas." The sex jam "Werk 4 Me" finds the MC half of Shadowrunners, Himself The Majestic, dominating the track with an intensity. "It'll All Make Sense" is a nice breather from the rest of the noisy album, with it being a nice back in the day song. And on "Downtwon", Big Baby Gandhi shows up in the last 30 seconds to spit a rapid fire verse and disappear until who knows when.

But like Danny Brown's XXX, a mixtape that can be a lot of fun as well, In Dark Denim has a dark side to it. Once Antwon wakes up after all the sex, drugs and partying, he realizes what's wrong with himself and the world around him. To Antwon, the world is ending, as told by the lyrics on "Dark Denim", "in remembrance / all times are ending / I lay awake / inside of dark denim".

Sometimes, Antwon sounds like he's on the verge of madness, such as the B L A C K I E produced "Burn Away". This dark, noisy track has lines such as "childhood friends all hooked on meth" and "I wanna die / and I hate my life / I'll take any chance I get." By halfway through the song, Antwon reaches the end of his rope and just yells "ugh, fuck!".

On the closing track, "Still Gaurded" Antwon has lyrics similar to all his other songs about sex, but there's a much darker subtlety making it one of his most interesting songs yet. There are lines like "she got my pleasure zone so hard / I can't speak." But there's lines like "my thoughts so typical / they only distress me" and "rose petals touch my lips / feel like glass shards". "Still Gaurded" is a darker take on a friends with benefits song, where the woman he loves just has sex with him and moves onto his other friends "next week" so Antwon feels like "a throw away nigga".

It's great that we now have rappers like Antwon, Cities Aviv, B L A C K I E and Death Grips who make noisy, experimental hip hop. They're exciting figures of internet rap, just like Odd Future and Das Racist used to be. Antwon's layered songs about sex, love and depression are a pleasure to listen to and the internet needs more rappers like him.

In Dark Denim 
9/10
Recommended Tracks: Dark Denim, 3rd World Grrl, Rare 2000s, Burn Away, Still Gaurded
Download here.