The Best Of 2009 [Part Two]

Favorite Comics:

Interesting year for comic nerds in that this was the year that Watchmen (the landmark DC comic from the late '80s that Time declared as one of the best 100 novels of the past century) was finally released as a Hollywood blockbuster, after years and years of saliva-soaked waiting.

And while it wasn't a complete stinker, it just served to illustrate that comics are a unique storytelling medium that eludes most attempts at film adaptation. For every sublime success like The Dark Knight, there's The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen or The Punisher to make you run screaming back to the comics to remind yourself just how great something like those titles can be.
Thankfully, great mainstream comics are still being released, and here are some of my most enjoyable reads:

The Walking Dead by Robert Kirkman and Charlie Adlard
The Goon by Eric Powell
Special Forces by Kyle Baker
Ex Machina by Brian K. Vaughan and Tony Harris
Fables by Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham, and others
The Boys by Garth Ennis, Darick Robertson, and others

Not an exhaustive list, mind you, but a nice start on a cold night by a hot fire.

Favorite Albums:

Again, if I had to really say "this year's favorites," I'd include some aforementioned older albums from The Beatles and Kraftwerk as well as that sweet anthology from Sweet. And let's not get started on my 2009 obsession with Sparks, with a catalog twenty-two albums deep from the early '70s until just a few months ago, with some of their best work (Lil' Beethoven, Exotic Creatures Of The Deep) released in the '00s. But as far as non-old-shit releases go, I got some enjoyable spins from the following platters that matter:

Metric – Fantasies

Self-released and self-produced, self-confident and self-assured, it's their consistently best effort, a natural progression of introspective synth-pop colliding with stadium rock moves and grooves. It’s how bands used to gradually grow and change when left to their own devices, so of course, it’s underwritten by Canada. And my fantasies? Finding American bands that can sound this sexy and adult.

Zombi – Spirit Animal & Sapphire / Long Mirrored Corridor 12"

No one would ever look at the ‘70s soundtrack work of John Carpenter and think “career move,” but the duo known as Zombi clearly aren’t looking to crash the charts anytime soon. Instead, it’s progressive rock with an edge of dire dread, keeping you looking over your shoulder while you’re banging your head. Or at least, that's one side of them; while the Sapphire 12" had an early-'80s Goblin-meets-Giorgio Moroder nightcruising vibe, Spirit Animal was all '80s Rush and King Crimson circa Red, but with enough electronics to keep things modern. And the cover for Spirit Animal, all electrical storms and elephants, would look sweet as a black light poster in some stoner’s bedroom.

Röyksopp – Junior

No junior effort here; Röyksopp has fused the European art-pop of their early work with the cinematic sweep of their middle period to pen a career statement. And despite the presence of some ace vocalists (Lykke Li, Robyn), it’s their instrumentals that allow their light yet insidious hooks to swirl about like refreshing ocean currents. The Parliament sample doesn't hurt, either.

Wild Beasts – Two Dancers

Boy, if you can get past the arching sparks of the main vocalist – who recalls Billy McKenzie of ‘80s UK act The Associates – you’ll find some sublime joys here: chiming guitars from the Johnny Marr playbook, densely poetic and sexualized lyrics, and oh yes the voices, scraping the upper registers of belief and the scrotal sac. Too gay for Glee, too twee for thee, but all right for me.

Phoenix – Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix

If you replace “Canada” with “France,” you can sub in my Metric synopsis. Although Phoenix has more of an impact on the mainstream than Metric, with songs in commercials and weddings with filmmakers. And they’re French. Did I mention that? When Phoenix released their debut United in 2000, I thought they'd never be able to better the light pop breeze of songs like "Too Young," but I'm happy to say that I now stand corrected. I just don't know how they're going to top this one.

Other wonderful albums included:

Sparklehorse – Dark Night Of The Soul (as it was unreleased, you'll have to search the interweb for it, but search you should)
Florence + The Machine – Lungs (my favorite debut of the year)
Bat For Lashes – Two Suns
Manic Street Preachers – Journal For Plague Lovers
Annie – Don’t Stop
Memory Tapes – Seek Magic
The xx – xx
Maxwell – BLACKsummers’night
Rammstein – Liebe Ist Fur Alle Da
Beak> - Beak>
Music Go Music – Expressions
Jay Reatard – Watch Me Fall
The Horrors – Primary Colours
Depeche Mode – Sounds Of The Universe
Morrissey – Years Of Refusal
Dinosaur Jr. – Farm
Placebo – Battle For The Sun

My biggest disappointment won't come out in the U.S. until '10, but In This Light And On This Evening by Editors will take the cake possibly for both '09 and '10. The reason why I was a bottom-tier reviewer for Alternative Press and Bust (magazines that people don’t read) is that I rarely come up with something as pithy and revealing as what I read about the new Editors. My favorite line, which neatly encapsulated my feelings, was something along the lines of the following:

"At least you have to give them credit for evolving: while they used to imitate Joy Division circa Unknown Pleasures, now they’re imitating Joy Division circa Closer."

But I wish they would have imitated Closer (a stone-cold-depressing glacial post-punk classic) rather than imitating an imitation of Closer. It’s like a professor, ossified and intractable, making copies of old copies of old handouts. After all that replication, there are bound to be smudges and imperfections that detract from the power of the original. And so it goes with In This Light And On This Evening, an album as unwieldy as the title would indicate. Bloated and boring, they’ve set their synthesizers to “simulacra” without adding much new to the formula. Now, strict adherence to formula is what got Editors their sharp debut, a blend of Interpol and Coldplay with the fat largely boiled away, a debut that I played over and over despite my awareness of their influences. It’s only natural that Editors try something new, but they must have depleted their reservoir of hooks in the process of maturation. But there's always hope for tomorrow, right?