Greetings friends and comrades. Though many will say 2009 was a piss poor year, and though I may be inclined to agree with them, it’s hard to feel that way given the plethora of amazing music released. Below are 5 albums that meant the most to me and/or were played the most. Please enjoy my opinions and declarations of love!

Dirty Projectors – Bitte Ocre

This band KILLS it live. I saw them twice this year in Austin; both times I left infatuated with Dave Longstreth’s taut strings and those ladies’ beautiful voices. Solid compositions grace every corner of the album, with their signature alarming yelps and the jagged guitar swipes, this was the AC to the sweltering summer. Linked, an OUTSTANDING rendition of the song below that accentuates the complexities of their vocal arrangements. By far my most enjoyed band of 2009.

Dirty Projectors – No Intention

Beirut – March of the Zapotec/Holland

Zach Condon’s half Mexican horngy, half lullaby was a perfect delivery at the beginning of this year. Zapotec grips me with tangy brass arrangements, channeling the Balkan/gypsy sound that garnered Beirut so much attention in the first place. And Holland recalls Condon’s project The Real People, which specialized in lo-fi loops and saturated samples under slurred crooning.

Beirut – Venice

The Flaming Lips – Embryonic

The Flaming Lips are a shoe-in on any of my lists. One of my all-time favorite bands, this album offered a contrast to their recent, I would say, pinkish records. Putting down the lush string arrangements for guitar freakouts and piercing screams, this album offered me enough Holy Shits to last through the holidays. Though enjoyed best in its entirety, here is my favorite track, though its efficacy may be lost plucked from the album, without context.

Flaming Lips – Gemini Syringes

Ducktails – Landscapes

Matt Mondanille makes music as Ducktails when he’s not otherwise blissed out with Real Estate. As many will reminisce (and have, I’m sure), these hissy guitar swipes and cloudy samples did complement how HOT it was. A soundtrack to summer indeed, even if you spent 40 hours a week at computer. This album deserves all the adjectives as well, woozy, hazy, beachy…?…and its slowness and wobbles mimic the oppressive consecutive 100-degree days.

Ducktails – Parasailing

Bibio – Ambivalence Avenue

I discovered Bibio by ways of a Boards of Canada comparison. With gentle acoustic guitar samples and loops trickling over and over each other, early 2009’s “Vignetting the Compost” was made for strolls through the English countryside. And where Compost was melodious and sentimental and pretty, Ambivalence Avenue was just straight funky. Girthy bass insulates his samples and voice, mixed with some hefty turntablism, combine in a weird hip-hop kumbaya circle.

Bibio – Fire Ant

Shout outs to other albums I obsessed over: Junior Boys – Begone Dull Care, Andrew Bird – Useless Creatures, Real Estate – Real Estate, Wild Beasts – Two Dancers, Yura Yura Teikoku – Beautiful, The XX (duh), Sally Shapiro – My Guilty Pleasure, ad infinitum.

WOW! What an incredible decade it has been. From the Y2K scare and the horrors of 9/11, to the Britney-Madonna kiss and the Janet Jackson titty incident, and of course the recent revivial of dance music and the death of commercial rap. MTV is now a bitchy teenage girl channel and doesn’t even play music, while the internet (which was still useless in the year 2000) is now the most important thing in the known universe!

As this year and decade come to a close I began to think of the what records were the most important TO ME and really shaped my life and what I was into at that time. It was really fun to go back and remember some of these, and some I am sure will crack you up but I cannot change now what I was listening to ten years ago, so I must be honest with you and stay true. Although it was extremely difficult to choose between the many fantastic records that hit my CD book (old term for i-pod), here is my list of the top records in my life for each of the last ten years.

2000: Three 6 Mafia – When The Smoke Clears

M.E.M.P.H.I.S.

2001: Daft Punk – Discovery

Voyager

2002: Interpol – Turn On The Bright Lights

Leif Erikson

2003: Outkast – Speakerboxx/The Love Below

Unhappy

Prototype

2004: Modest Mouse – Good News for People Who Love Bad News

The View

2005: My Morning Jacket – Z

It Beats 4 U

2006: Band of Horses – Everything All the Time

The First Song

2007: LCD Soundsystem – Sound of Silver

Someone Great

2008: Fleet Foxes – s/t

Blue Ridge Mountains

2009: Edwarde Sharp and The Magnetic Zeros – Up From Below

40 Day Dream

Well thar tis. If you do not own them already, go out and purchase these records for they have each touched me in a special way…in a special place, and I want them to touch you and your friends too…

Watch out for these! They also come in Mini-Vans.

Happy Holidays from all of us at Rhythm Sektion!!! I hope that everyone is enjoying their friends/families and reflecting on how wonderful their lives are. I personally had tons of time, while making my holiday commute, to evaluate how truly blessed I am to have these amazing people in my life that motivate me to carry on my daily routines. My deepest sympathies go out to all those stranded in airports, war zones, roadsides,  and separated from their loved ones. For the traveler making their trek by car, I have some tunes to help the drive go by.

First off, here is some wonderful music from my beloved Animal Collective. Congratulations for the impressive performance in the many “Best of 2009″ polls that they have had with Merriweather Post Pavilion. If you haven’t purchased their new EP, Fall Be Kind, then I would have to say that you are doing yourself an injustice.

Animal Collective- Guys Eyes (Live from Royal Oak Music Theatre 5/18/2009)

Animal Collective- Daily Routine (PhaseOne Remix)

Animal Collective- I Think I Can

Animal Collective- Banshee Beat

Here is your dose of Bradford Cox (Deerhunter and Atlas Sound) for the season….. If you ask me, I will tell you that he is the most incredible musical prodigy of our generation.  Lockett Pundt, also of Deerhunter, has his own side project called Lotus Plaza. If you like Deerhunter, then give it a listen.  Need I say more?

Atlas Sound- Another Bedroom

Atlas Sound- Recent Bedroom

Atlas Sound- Quarantined

Deerhunter- Vox Humana

Deerhunter- Hazel St.

Deerhunter- VHS Dream

Deerhunter- Like New

Lotus Plaza- Red Oak Way

Lotus Plaza- A Threaded Needle

Now for some electronic tunezzzzzz….. I was first introduced to Pictureplane by my close friend Mike. I initially appreciated their musical effort, but it wasn’t until I was doing some X-mas shopping at the local American Apparel and heard the “Found Too Low Rmx” on Viva Radio, that I was really too excited about them (P. S. Viva Radio is one bad ass internet radio site.). As an added bonus, I have included a tasty remix from DFA’s own Juan Maclean. Bon appetit!

Pictureplane- Found Too Low Rmx (feat. Zach Condon from Beirut)

Pictureplane- Goth Star

The Tough Alliance- A New Chance (The Juan MacLean Remix)

Finally, I am posting some of my favorite mixtapes. The eclectic mixes range from delicious disco from the future to funky beats from down under. If you are in need of additional soundtracks for your journey back home, please scroll down and check out some of the music and mixes posted by Rhythm Sektion’s own Bennet Leader, James Jones, Derek Brown and Samantha Garrett. Enjoy and travel safe!

Cut Copy- So Cosmic Mixtape

Holy Ghost and Jacques Renault- Infatuation Podcast 5

Hercules & Love Affair- Sidetracked Mixtape

Much Love,

Rolo Toni Browntown AKA Downtown Ryan Brown