Spin Cycle: Best of 2004

Another year, another list. We know you’re probably oversaturated with year-end roundups by now, but who doesn’t love dissecting the highs and lows of pop culture? And what a ride it’s been for the Canadian music scene this year-we’ve been touting homegrown sounds in these pages for as long as we can remember, so forgive us for having felt a bit smug as our favourite acts surfed a wave of unprecedented international hype. The local scene finally exploded as we’d predicted, though some had to decamp elsewhere (Feist, Stars, Howie Beck) before our notoriously fickle audiences showed them some love. But in the end, 2004 was all about the love-from Feist’s siren seduction to Junior Boys’ sad synths, this year’s soundtrack to our lives went straight for the heart while getting stuck in our heads.

  1. Feist – Let It Die (Arts & Crafts)

Six years ago, I hosted a benefit show with several local singer-songwriters on the bill. My favourite singer at the time was a slip of a girl named Leslie Feist. A charming, unassuming guitar whiz with a drop-dead voice, she was slated to play last. By the time she and her band went on well after midnight, practically the entire room had cleared out. Fast forward to four weeks ago, when this hometown gal-made-good brought a 1500-strong crowd to its knees at the ridiculously packed Phoenix. Memo to those kids at C’est What (and every other microscopic, empty ramshackle room Feist ever played back then): Fuck you. While it’s a shame she had to move to Paris in order to find success, Feist deserves every last bit of it for Let It Die. Pouring her cabarnet voice over a collection of velvet-upholstered cover tunes and tiny, perfect originals, she reminds us that the saddest part of a broken heart isn’t the ending, but rather the start.

  1. Stars – Set Yourself on Fire (Arts & Crafts)

If you’re a hopeless romantic, Stars is the band for you. Wallowing in their pretty synth-pop sound is just the ticket for nursing a bad crush or epic break-up. But if it’s lace and flowers you want, look elsewhere-there’s always been a razor-sharp focus to Stars’ songwriting that’s brought nicely to the fore on Set Yourself on Fire. Matters of the Heart (our #1 album on last year’s list) give way to matters of the head, as principal songwriters Torquil Campbell and Amy Millan suggest a “Soft Revolution” in which the personal is political. What sets Stars apart from every other swank Brit-influenced group out there is their perfect balance of boy/girl vocals-Campbell’s sneer plays off Millan’s cherubic tones-like a pair of angels who fell to earth, got the shit kicked outta them, and lived to tell the tale. “We will always be a light,” sings Millan, and as long as Stars are around, bringing a glimmer of beauty into your world is as easy as pressing play on your stereo.

  1. The Arcade Fire – Funeral (Merge)

Bury all your bad CDs in your backyard, because you’re never going to want to listen to any of them ever again after hearing the Arcade Fire. Led by charmingly eccentric husband-wife duo Win Butler and Régine Chassagne, the Montreal art-rock crew tells tall tales of lovers digging tunnels, runaway brothers, and sleeping in the back seat, over swirls of strings, wheezy junkyard accordian, and slapdash keyboards. Butler’s creaky croon and Chassagne’s Bjork-esque warble are acquired tastes, but damn if you don’t believe each and every impassioned word that comes out of their mouths. While it’s true that the record doesn’t begin to hold a candle to their incendiary live show, and the relentless hype (New York Times! SPIN! They’re Bowie’s favourite new band!) is getting a bit tiresome, this magical mystery tour of sound was unequivocally the debut of the year.

  1. K-OS – Joyful Rebellion (EMI)

To simply call K-OS (a.k.a. Kevin Brereton) a rapper is to miss the point entirely, and he proved as much by throwing down a record that didn’t so much avoid the sophomore slump as completely obliterate it. Dude can rap (“Emcee Murdah”), sing (“Hallelujah”), play almost any instrument around, and roll out the hits like there’s no tomorrow. Effortlessly leapfrogging between the addictive jazzy strut of “Crabbuckit” and laying it out old-skool style with “B-Boy Stance,” K-OS became as much of a fixture on the charts as in the clubs around town supporting his peers. Trading in bling for brains, Joyful Rebellion is a clarion call for a return to the roots of hip-hop. Cool, interesting, conscious Canadian hip-hop straight outta Whitby? Now that’s rebellious.

  1. controller.controller – History (Paper Bag)

“Did you tell them about me?” demands singer Nirmala Basnayake on the final track of local post-punk outfit controller.controller’s compact-yet-packed 6-song EP. You can bet your life we did: when music is this ridiculously catchy, you’re compelled-nay, required-to let everyone in on it. Forget all those tedious P.I.L. and Joy Division comparisons-controller’s sound may hinge on darkly danceable retro rhythms, but their take on ‘death disco’ is new, exciting, and fresh-in short, it’s all about moving forward, not looking back. Every element here stands out, from the duelling guitars to the devastating rhythm section to Basnayake (how fucking awesome to see a brown girl fronting an indie-rock band in today’s multicultural T.O., by the way)’s coolly detached vocals. Can’t wait to see what they can do with a full-length (due this spring).

  1. Sarah Harmer – All of Our Names (Universal)

Sarah Harmer has this very specific way of singing-very crisp, clean, precise-she even completes the consonants at the end of every lyric. She applies the same careful approach to her songwriting-every image is stark, each word deliberate. These are short stories as songs, full of emotion, time, and place. On the album’s delicate centrepiece, “Dandelions in Bullet Holes,” Harmer finally wears her political convictions on her sleeve, the song inspired by seeing her name and activist Naomi Klein’s listed together on the same marquee during a tour in the U.K. While we’d like to see her rock out a bit more like she used to, Names’ timeless songs full of smarts and melody suggest that Harmer, even at her quietest, can capture our ears like no other.

  1. Howie Beck – Howie Beck (Independent)

Howie Beck deserves more respect. The local singer/songwriter knows and has worked with practically every local artist and band you can think of, and yet seems to be the perpetual bridesmaid of the scene. That would surely change if more people heard his latest self-titled release, a hushed collection of bittersweet tunes he wrote, sang, played, and produced himself. Some of his more famous friends lend a hand-Feist pops up on a silvery duet (“I Need Light”), Sarah Slean offers up some string arrangements-but it’s Beck’s intimate voice (fans of Damien Rice and Josh Rouse take note) and beautifully crafted songs that draw you further into the headphones. “Don’t be afraid if you’re all fucked up,” Beck sings, “everybody knows you’ll get through somehow.” The tune is classic Beck-all handclaps and honey, but with a lyrical dagger buried between its shoulder blades just so. This is the stuff of heartbreak-the people and things that drive you mad, even as you love them fiercely for it.

  1. The Go!Team – Thunder, Lightning, Strike (Memphis Industries)

Oh, those Brits. Leave it to the U.K. massive to come up with something as bizarre, unwieldy, and utterly addictive as this. The multiculti Brighton brigade offers up the album as mash-up: throw anything and everything into the musical blender and purée. Luckily for them, spaghetti Western licks stirred together with double-dutch shout-outs is pretty darn tasty-the effervescent result is like eating pop rocks candy and washing it down with cola. Spiky bursts of percussion propel the mostly instrumental disc along like a wildly erratic heartbeat, there’s a piano-driven number (“Feelgood By Numbers”) that sounds like something Schroeder from Charlie Brown would play, and you’ll want to adopt nearly every track as your own personal theme song. Exuberant, giddy fun-if this doesn’t make you feel like a kid again, you’ve got no soul. [A gold star to Malcolm and Josh for the tip.]

  1. Kanye West – The College Dropout (Roc-A-Fella)

Yeah, he’s a bit of an egomaniac, and sure, we could do without that stupid “Workout Plan” song, and don’t even get us started on all those filler skits on the record… But enough of that cavilling-when most superstar hip-hop producers get behind the mic, it’s a joke (P. Diddy’s ‘rapping,’ anyone?)-well, with Kanye West, the joke’s on us, as the shrewd producer/MC churned out hit after hit all year long. Turns out West didn’t even need the big-name guests crammed onto Dropout-from the social studies of “All Falls Down” (“Couldn’t afford a car/So she named her daughter Alexis”) to invoking a higher power on the inescapable “Jesus Walks,” West delivered the crossover smash of the year, proving decisively that hip-hop is the new pop music. For a college dropout, dude sure taught us a thing or two about the school of life.

  1. Junior Boys – Last Exit (Domino/Kin)

Sad boys are just so adorable. When Junior Boys’ Jeremy Greenspan sighs, “You’ve gone and missed my birthday/You’ve gone and left me on my own,” you just want to give the poor guy a hug. Not that he really needs one-the Junior Boys (Matt Didemus is the other half of this electro duo) are doing just fine, thank you very much. Darlings of the nascent blogosphere even before their album was released, these Hamiltonians left a trail of orgasmic reviews in their wake before the CD was even available here at home. Living up to that kind of hype can be next to impossible, but Last Exit comes pretty close with its icy-cool New Order-meets-Timbaland synth sheen. Despite its obvious ’80s influences (the keys are chilly, the beats tinny), the JB’s sound is thankfully more metro than retro-after all, using computers as a tool of seduction is so very new-millennium, n’est-ce pas?