The Avalanches – Frontier Psychologist
The Avalanches, an electronic music group from Australia, used over 3,500 music samples on their 2001 album Since I Left You. The most intriguing part of this video is that every single visual oddity is based on the amazing audio track.
Top 10 Viral Videos of 2009 from Earshot Presents
Welcome to the Top 10 YouTubes of 2009 from Earshot Presents, as compiled on one Saturday afternoon late in December. The following videos are in no particular order.
LSD No NO
Robbie Maddison’s Incredible Arc Jump
36 Skaters Make Downhill Neon Video Game w/ Freeboards
Senator Al Franken draws map of USA
Stop Motion with Wolf and Pig
Phish play Exile on Maine Street’s Loving Cup in Indio
Eclectic Method Goes Phish
CULTURAL FUNKIN OVERLOAD
David After Dentist
Web Site Story
You can share this Top 10 Viral Videos post by clicking the Share This button below. Are there some videos EP overlooked? Share links to your favorites or share your thoughts via the comments area below.
If you have some more time to kill, you may also be interested in checking out the Top 10 Songs of 2009 from Earshot Presents.
UPDATED
There were bound to be some oversights. Here are a few:
We Don’t Pump Our Gas, We Pump Our Fists
Inspired Bicycles
DEADLINE
Top 10 Songs of 2009 from Earshot Presents
2009 was a really great year for music. There was an outstanding release every week, it seemed. Maybe it was the glut of tasty new stuff, our shitty economy, or just the way things are working these days, but 2009 was also a year that saw a crazy proliferation of illegal downloading & file sharing and the continued demise of the recording industry. It will be very interesting to see where things go from here. While EP and its editors don’t claim to be 100% piracy free, we encourage the legit purchase of music as much as possible.
The tracks below are not downloadable from this page, but they are hyperlinked either to the iTunes Music Store or to their source. You can listen to the Top 10 Songs below or heer the ten songs (and a few extra tracks) from a streaming feed here: http://bit.ly/8IKQd6. Hopefully you’ll hear something you like or a new sound to check out when one of these acts is passing through your area.
While EP’s Best Songs of 2009 might at first appear to be just another year-end hit parade of indie rock, we’d like to make one point that clearly differentiates Earshot Presents from all those hipster magazine Top 10 lists dotting the blogosphere. EP’s Top 10 includes absolutely no Monsters of Folk songs. So if you’re looking for that kinda thing, well…
Slow Down Jo – M. Ward
Slow Down Jo is M. Ward at his finest. Reminiscent of the waltzish Fuel for Fire from 2005′s Transistor Radio, the noticeable difference here is that M. Ward has found a few friends to back him up instead of overdubbing his own vocals. Good for M.
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Chirstmas Island – LAKE
In November, EP called LAKE’s Chirstmas Island “the perfect golden oldie circa 2009″. This encahnting, timeless track is from the Olympia, WA band’s 12th album called Let’s Build a Roof, which is all pretty solid. Purchase it at the K Records website.
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Backwards Down the Number Line – Phish
Backwards Down the Number Line appears on Joy, the 14th studio album from the gotta-see-’em-live rock band Phish. John of EP is proud to have rediscovered his love and respect for the band over a very special festival weekend in Indio, CA earlier this year. Chances are good that you’ve heard all about it…and still don’t give a shit. But I’m telling ya
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The Giant of Illinois – Andrew Bird
The Giant of Illinois is part of Dark Was the Night, the twentieth compilation release benefiting the Red Hot Organization, an international charity dedicated to raising funds and awareness for HIV and AIDS. This song, written by the Handsome Family, was inspired by the life and death of Robert Waldow, aka The Giant of Illinois.
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There May Be Ten or Twelve – A.C. Newman
Another brilliant tune on the Dark Was the Night comp was one by the New Portnographers called Hey, Snow White. It would have been included here on this list as well, but A.C. Newman (lead man of the NPs) also had a solo release this year and we wouldn’t want to double up on a list of ten. We’ll go with There May Be Ten or Twelve, the lead track from A.C.’s Get Guilty. Kickin big ass from its first notes.
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I and Love and You – Avett Brothers
Another great lead track from 2009 is the Avett Brothers’ I and Love and You. The tune captures the beauty of the Avettt’s acoustic songwriting and serious attention to close harmony. It was great to see this deserving act get a ton of attention in 2009. I and Love and You comes from the Avett’s album of the same name.
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The Commute – I Come to Shanghai
The Commute is from the self-titled debut of Oakland-based duo I Come to Shanghai. The album is available for pay-what-you-can from the band’s website. It’s outstanding, so don’t be a cheapass.
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Don’t Wanna Talk – Brendan Benson
Brendan Benson is writing some of the best powerpop tunes of contemporary rock. They have the same energy and spirit as The Cars, but kick a lot more ass. The Raconteur’s solo release from 2009 was called My Old, Familiar Friend. Don’t Wanna Talk has Brendan Benson written all over it.
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Armistice – Phoenix
The French rock band Phoenix dropped a rock bomb called Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix in May. There was a ton of buzz, which wasn’t 100% deserved. Their Grammy-nomination was probably deserved, however.
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Rolling Sea – Vetiver
Several 2009 albums were less impressive than would be expected. They included Wilco’s Wilco the Album, Deer Tick’s Born on Flag Day, Yo La Tengo’s Popular Songs, and Vetiver’s Tight Knit. Vetiver’s fourth release had a few noteworth exceptions, and Rolling Sea is one.
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2008 songs that skipped EP’s radar until 2009:
Old Enough by The Raconteurs
Make You Crazy by Brett Dennen
Sometimes the Wheels from Neil Halstead’s Oh! Mighty Engine
Great songs from albums EP wouldn’t recommend:
I Just Can’t Take it Anymore (G. Parsons) from the Lemonhead’s cover album called Varshons
Please share this top 10 with others via the Share This button below and remember to also link to the live stream from http://bit.ly/8IKQd6. Here’s some twitter-friendly text to share the stream in yer tweets and fb updates:
Hey @earshot posted the Earshot Presents Top 10 Songs of 2009. At http://earshotpresents.com and streaming from http://bit.ly/8IKQd6. (120 characters).
If you have some more time to kill, you may also be interested in checking out the Top 10 Videos of 2008 from Earshot Presents .
The Raconteurs’ Old Enough (fea. Ricky Skaggs & Ashley Monroe)
The Raconteurs Old Enough Featuring Ricky Skaggs & Ashley Monroe. Directed by Autumn DeWilde
Phish plays Stones’ Loving Cup
Phish plays the Rolling Stones Loving Cup during the Exile on Main Street musical costume on Halloween 2009. The beginning-to-end cover set featured guests include Sharon Jones and Saundra Williams on vocals, and David Guy, Tony Jarvis, and David Smith on horns. The band’s been covering Loving Cup for years and this version from the 3-day Phish 8 festival in Indio, CA is said by many to be the pinnacle of the band’s 20+ year history.
Let It Snow: a Christmas memory from NYC
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The images of New York’s recent snow storm make me miss the City at this time of year. Thinking about my Christmastime-in-New York memories, one night from 2006 stands out. I had the privilege of seeing one of my favorite songwriters, Alejandro Escovedo, play with a string quartet at Carnegie Hall. I recorded the show with my new recorder and that audio is featured in the podcast portion of this post. The short podcast intro recounts the December night when, after seeing one of the top 5 concerts of my life, my date and I walked up to the majestic bar of the Pierre Hotel, just off the park. A song from Alejandro’s performance called Slow Down precedes the audio you’ll here from the Pierre, which is in the last minute of the podcast. My recordings of cabaret singer Kathleen Maddox playing and singing Christmas carols that night in her perfectly loungey style make for some of my favorite personal recordings. Absolutely holiday time in New York. Merry Christmas from EP.
The Transgames
I’ve been avoiding the sports posts because I know there is a strong anti-sports contingent on EP (sorry, it’s an anti watching sports contingent), and the Internet is plenty full of sports opinion/no one cares about the woes of my fantasy teams. But if we put aside these very reasonable objections, then I’d like to purpose a framework for deciding what is the best sport to watch. Say for a second that we agree that the joy of sports watching comes from the purity of power, skill, and competition, and that watching athletics on the world’s highest levels evokes something so essential about the human animal that it allows us to transcend out animal nature. Animals know struggle, but not glory. Nor, as far as I know, can animals gamble.
That said, then the best sports must be the sports that have the most skillful and powerful athletes. You could find the most powerful athletes by making them run little races and lift weights, but how would you know who was the most skillful? A soccer player can’t be expected to compete against a baseball player in baseball, but does that mean baseball players are better athletes than soccer players? I think, that after a team distinguishes itself as the best, then that team should compete against other elite teams from different games in third neutral sports.
Imagine if after the Dream Team or even the Redeem Team won the basketball gold metal, they just started entering themselves in other Olympic competitions. Imagine Shaq, Kobe, LeBron, and Melow playing volleyball. Bill Simmons (in another context) said you could explain the rules of volleyball to the Redeem Team on the way to the game, and they’d clean the volleyballers clocks. But what if the Brazilian soccer team emerged to play the Redeem Team in volleyball, then that would be a game. Maybe it’s just my Patriotism showing through, but I’d put my money on the basketball players against the soccer player in volleyball. When the Redeem team has to change courts they should all just jump over the net a la Andre the Giant entering the ring.
What about an NFL Probowl team against an NBA Allstar team in soccer? I think back in the day, it goes to the NFL, but now the NBAers win. Steve Nash and Kobe are supposedly pretty good soccer players. Baseball players would have cricket, but could also do surprisingly well in things like handball. What about soccer players against basketball players in American football? Again, I have to give the edge to the NBA. If you disagree examine this picture of Dwight Howard. Soccer would have the edge against the NBA in polo–let’s be honest you could convince most of the NBA that horses have a conical bone coming out of their foreheads. Soccer players probably would dominate most of the winter Olympic sports, but Kobe and Shaq would make a charming bobsled team.
We could call the trounment the Transgames, and the cheerleaders could be drawn from the hottest trannies in each country (again, advantage Brazilian soccer team–don’t ask how I know that).
Damien Dempsey’s Kilburn Stroll
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Damien Dempsey’s Kilburn Stroll is taken from the Irish singer/songwriter’s 2007 release, To Hell or Barbados.
Ken Lee tulibu dibu douchoo
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Ken Lee (“Can’t Live”) is a phonetic interpretation of Mariah Carey’s 1993 cover single and Badfinger’s classic love song “Without You” performed by Valentina Hasan, a contestant who auditioned for the Bulgarian TV show Music Idol in February 2008. Watch the famous video at KnowYourMeme.
Al Kooper re: Like a Rolling Stone
Al Kooper recounts the Like a Rolling Stone studio recording session. An excerpt from Martin Scorsese’s documentary No Direction Home
Gettin’ Ready For Christmas Day
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In February 1999 a college radio disc jockey named Lance Ledbetter set out on a mission to compile rare and essential recordings of vintage religious music. Four and a half years later the result of this journey was released as a box set called Goodbye, Babylon.
Backwards Down the Number Line
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It’s come to our attention that some people still have no respect for the rock band Phish. Pray for those haters and do your best to convince them to come to Indio, CA next year. They’ll see the light yet.
Get Behind This:
