Happy Christmas all.  For any confused Americans out there, yes I am an atheist, and yes I love Christmas.  It’s a Pagan holiday, appropriated by the Christians so they could convert subject peoples without having to force them to give up the traditions which bound their communities together, so the idea of an atheist celebrating Christmas is no more hypocritical than a Christian doing so.  I just like the feasting and the tree and the lying in bed watching stupid movies part too much to give it up over the trifling matter of a mish-mash of sellotaped-on religious nonsense.

For any non-Americans out there who have no idea what that paragraph was all in aid of, they get awfully excited about that sort of thing over there, as far as I can tell, and try and make Christmas all non-religious by saying stupid things like Happy Holidays, when it’s not even a Christian fucking celebration to begin with.  Celebration of the Winter Solstice pre-dates Christianity by many thousands of years anyway.

Anyhow, that rather splendid cover version up there comes from the excellent LY and SO on YouTube.  They only have a couple of covers up there, but that one really is nice.  It’s funny when that sort of thing starts happening.  I can only imagine that more popular bands who get covered all the time find the experience generates a weird combination of fascination, pride, embarrassment and all sorts.

And… just to completely change the subject again, I am not going to list all the end of year’s that our bands have turned up in, because there have been too many.  I try and get them up on Facebook and Twitter as and when they turn up, so follow/friend/stalk/whatever me on there if you are really that interested.  Thanks though, of course, to everyone who has included any of our lot, because I do genuinely find and appreciate them all.

One little bit of boasting I have to do though is this: The Recommender recently asked music bloggers to nominate their favourite music blogs in the world and, somewhat surprisingly I have to confess, I finished joint fourth with Gorilla vs Bear.  That’s joint fourth favourite blog in the universe as voted by fellow bloggers.  This, I think I can say without seeming too vain, is extremely nice.

And so finally we come to our penultimate Friday Five of the year, and the official announcement of the album of the year vote last week.  As you can probably tell from this week’s posts I disagree with all but about one of you about what the best album of the year is, but no matter.  You wouldn’t need me constantly lecturing you about Acceptable Music Fun if you had all the answers already, now would you.  Anyhow, drum roll please…

5. Broken Records – Let Me Come Home I picked this one myself so I am not at all surprised and extremely pleased to see so many readers vote for it.  The excellence of this record doesn’t seem to have entirely stopped the hipster sneering from a few quarters, but I do get the impression that once folk have started doing a band down it can become rather contagious.  Fuck these people, I say.  And so do you from the looks of it.  Good on you.

Broken Records – Dia dos Namorados!

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4. Kid Canaveral – Shouting at Wildlife I don’t honestly know why this album isn’t in my top albums of the year, because I love it, but I think it might be down to how and when I listen to Kid Canaveral’s music, which is mostly live.  In fact, had I not spent a sizeable chunk of the festival season driving Meursault about the bloody country I would say that I have probably seen them live more than any other band this year. Also, this is generally music to encourage the having of Fun, which is not what I listen to in the house all that much. It’s not just that they write some killer pop tunes, but the album itself is really well assembled and perfectly paced.  They and the Scottish Enlightenment would probably be my Scottish bands of the year for 2010, I reckon.

Kid Canaveral – Cursing Your Apples

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3. Arcade Fire – The Suburbs Personally I find this album pretty dull, I have to confess.  But if you look at the results of both this vote, the Readers’ Song of the Year vote and pretty much every tight-trousered list out there then I suppose I have to grudgingly admit that the majority of the internets seem to disagree with me.  A very late spurt of voting carried this into third place ahead of Kid Canaveral, who seemed to have that spot completely sewn up.  I have to confess this is something I rather resent.

Arcade Fire – City With No Children

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=1. The National – High Violet As Big Fez said in the comment thread where the vote took place, it’s not so much the album of the year as the year of this album.  Even my mum loves it.  Enough said.

The National – Anyone’s Ghost

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=1. Meursault – All Creatures Will Make Merry When Meursault did so well in the song of the year voting I kept saying to myself that of course they were going to get a lot of votes on this site of all places – it’s like the ultimate home court advantage.  And that’s true.  But if the home court advantage counted for all that much, you’d expect to see the vote full of Toad Records bands, which it just wasn’t – not even close.  So I think it’s time to stop making excuses and accept that basically this is a fucking great record, bollocks to false modesty.

Also, of all the bands we have worked with Meursault have worked the hardest, for the longest, played the most gigs, recorded the most songs, and have never ever let me down on any count.  So instead of making excuses for why they might have got more votes here than in other places, especially when that didn’t seem to count in anyone else’s favour at all, I think I should really just be saying well done and thank you.  It’s been some year lads, well fucking done indeed.

Meursault – Crank Resolutions

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So, after possibly the longest post in Friday Five history, I can’t be arsed making up five stupid questions, so just list five things you are either very much looking forward to or very much dreading over the next couple of days.  I am guessing that this will be a quiet one anyway, given it’s Christmas Eve and all.  So happy Christmas everyone, and remember to drink massively, massively irresponsibly.

1. Micah P. Hinson – Micah P. Hinson & the Pioneer Saboteurs

There’s not much which really distinguishes this records from the two preceding, but when I sat down to give it some consideration, I came up with one simple reason: emotional range.  Micah P. Hinson goes from the sentimental to the heartbreaking to the furious to the playful and back at the drop of a hat, whereas Perfume Genius and The National pretty much find their level and stay there.  Having interviewed the man, he is someone I am not at all surprised to see has the ability to sustain that burning desire to make music which deserts so many musicians as they reach a level of personal comfort after a few well-received albums.

Micah P. Hinson – The Striking Before the Storm

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2. Perfume Genius – Learning

This album is in some ways a one-trick pony, but I find it completely captivating nevertheless.  The lyrics are personal and poignant, something the drowsy, woozy production only serves to emphasise.  It’s the kind of album I tend to stick on and listen to in its entirety as well – in fact I don’t think I’ve ever done anything else.  I struggle to really articulate what it is I like about this album, for some reason, and I can easily imagine people not liking it, but it’s just one of those which grabbed me from the very start for some reason and in the six or seven months since I first heard it rarely has a week gone by when I haven’t played it at least once.

Perfume Genius – Write to Your Brother

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3. The National – High Violet

I am, as you probably know by now, something of a contrarian.  The fact that this fucking album is in every bloody end of year list imaginable means it irks the living shit out of me to put it on this one as well.  Honestly, though, there is no escaping the fact that after a very, very slow start indeed I have completely fallen for this album.  What turned the slow build of an album I was initially indifferent to into a complete about-face was probably seeing the band at Glastonbury.  They mixed the new songs in with the old, and despite a fairly low-key performance, it was still obvious that I had come to love pretty much everything on High Violet.   I now have it on two slabs of gorgeous purple vinyl (alright, alright ‘violet’ vinyl) and even my bloody mum loves it.  Alright you National bastards, you win.

The National – Anyone’s Ghost

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4. Broken Records – Let Me Come Home

I knew virtually every song on Broken Records’ first album, and that robbed me of a little bit of excitement on hearing it, but this one was (almost) all new, which was brilliant.  In terms of the music itself, this record harnesses Broken Records’ instincts to wind themselves into a frenzy and gives it a real sense of purpose. It’s also very much a whole album, with fantastic dynamics from start to finish.  In fact, there have been a lot of these this year, which somewhat contradicts the popular assertion that digital music has killed the album.  Maybe for people who were never that fussed about albums in the first place it has, but not for most of the rest of us.

Broken Records – Dia dos Namorados!

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5. Sam Amidon – I See the Sign

I still feel this album tails off a little, and I still can’t stand that bloody R Kelly cover, but neither of those gripes stop this being a fucking amazing record.  The lush orchestration is never intrusive, and complements the more traditional elements with rare beauty.  Sam’s voice is truly an amazing thing, which gives him something of a head start, but almost every element of this record is lush and captivating.  Every time I hear Sam Amidon’s music I find it baffling that I actually had to listen to his previous album for about six months before I realised that I loved it. It really, really should have been obvious.

Sam Amidon – How Come That Blood

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This week there will be fuck all happening in Edinburgh, or at least there better be, because I will be participating in none of it.  Apparently there’s some pagan bollocks going on at the end of the week related to a fat man and some reindeer, but I wouldn’t bother paying that too much attention if I were you.

Actually, there is the Christmas Songwriters’ Club down in Leith on Thursday which looks rather excellent.  I have been trying to buy tickets, but am finding WeGotTickets to be an unspeakable shitfest of password requirements and expired logins and all this other shite.  If you can manage that though, tickets are to be found here and I’d recommend it, because the lineup looks splendid.

Last week, however, was fucking spectacular.

The Song, by Toad Christmas Party was fucking excellent, if a little bit hectic (for us anyway, there was no evidence the audience really noticed).  Everyone came round straight after work, so we had no more than an hour and a half to set up two PAs and soundcheck six bands.  This, as many of you will know, is simply not possible.  Nevertheless, we seemed to get away with it entirely.

The Queen Charlotte Rooms was decked out to the nines in tinsel and fairy lights, and the whole affair was a ludicrous, brilliant shambles.  I was working a bit too much to properly let my hair down (one pint all night, one fucking pint!) but everyone seemed to have a lot of fun, and in general I can’t imagine a better way to close out what has been a rather dizzyingly dramatic year for all of us.

A massive thank you to everyone who came, and everyone who played. The Scotsman wrote us a five star review the very next day, and the Herald tried to, but apparently there was a mistake somewhere and we were robbed of two stars, dammit.  They are sorting this as we speak, I believe. Thanks to David Pollock and Nicola Meighan for the writeups.

Eagleowl’s Stars in Your Eyes was the following night at Pilrig St. Paul’s and, although I wasn’t there myself due to parental commitments, apparently I (and any of you who also rather foolishly neglected to attend) missed Neil from Meursault as Tranny Lennox, Jesus H. Foxx as Johnathan Richman, eagleowl as Talking Heads, and Broken Records as REM.  I dearly wish I had been able to go, but I am going to have to content myself with watching Milo’s video above, stolen from this post here, and sighing wistfully to myself.

By Saturday, Kid Canaveral’s Christmas Baubles was the final nail in my liver’s coffin.  I was DJing inbetween bands and, for all my combination of naff eighties hits, indie obscurata, and the odd inclusion of I Feel Pretty from West Side Story and Nothing Like a Dame from South Pacific, I have to confess I rather doubt that my contribution was at all significant.  I did, however, save everyone from a constant repeat of Now That’s What I Call Christmas 64 or whatever else they had on the stereo when I got there, so let’s not underplay it either.

In any case, it was a bloody brilliant night, and by the time I staggered home I think it is fair to say that the weekend had been officially seized.

I am not personally going to bother doing a ‘Best of 2010′ podcast based around my own choices.  Over the next couple of weeks you’re going to get more than enough of that in text form anyway, so I think we can all live without a podcast as well.

What I thought I might do, though, was just do a quick rundown of the Song, by Toad Readers’ song and album of the year voting because… well, why the fuck not, I suppose.  As much as anything I felt like doing it because there were a couple of surprises in there, a couple of omissions and a couple of disagreements, so I guess  it gives me something to whinge about when introducing the songs, eh.

Direct download: Toadcast #153 – The Mobcast

01.The Japanese War Effort – Summer Sun Skateboard (00.21)
02. The National – England (06.05)
03. Foals – Spanish Sahara (11.17)
04. Broken Records – The Motorcycle Boy (24.31)
05. Kid Canaveral – Her Hair Hangs Down (29.06)
06. Arcade Fire – Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains) (33.51)
07. Micah P. Hinson – My God, My God (41.13)
08. David Tattersall – The Typewriter Ribbon (43.44)
09. Meursault – What You Don’t Have (52.46)
10. eagleowl – No Conjunction (60.54)

The results of the only real award that matters this Winter season (apart from the oracular annunciations of my own opinion, of course) can now finally be announced!  AWESOME! I hear you cry in unison.  Maybe.

Last year we had these votes as well, but I rather neglectfully failed to actually add up the final scores.  In all honesty, it’s the making of the lists which is often the best bit, so picking a winner at the very end is probably not entirely necessary for fun to take place, but given you all did me the honour of voting it seems a little rude not to fulfil my side of the bargain.

So yes, my enormous and profoundly complex algorithm (also known as a tally chart) has finally processed all the entries, and we can announce the winner of the Song, by Toad Readers’ Top Five Songs of the Year.  On Friday we will vote for our top five albums, so you might want to start thinking about that one in advance.

Anyone who actually followed the votes will know two things about this particular vote: firstly, that the winner was completely obvious from the very start; and secondly, that there are dozens and dozens of songs with no more than a single vote each, which is kind of inevitable in this kind of thing, but at least suggests that for all Song, by Toad probably represents something of a musical monoculture, there is at least a fair bit of diversity within that narrow vista.  So congratulations to the likes of CTel for coming on here and posting five entirely different songs from a notably different genre to the norm around these parts, and balls to the indie kids who don’t like it!

So, in reverse order, we had many songs tied for sixth place.  They’re not really part of a top five, of course, but I thought you would be interested to see them:
Arcade Fire – Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains)
Arcade Fire – We Used to Wait
Meursault – One Day This’ll All Be Fields
Meursault – Weather
The National – England
The Scottish Enlightenment – Little Sleep
The Walkmen – Angela Surf City

Getting into the top five, we ended up with a three-way tie for third place (in alphabetical order):

=3. Broken Records – You Know You’re Not Dead (Buy here)

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=3. Foals – Spanish Sahara (Buy here)

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=3. Meursault – What You Don’t Have (Buy here)

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There was a really close-run race for second throughout the voting, with Meursault, Foals and Broken Records all in there at various times, but in the end a little burst of enthusiasm carried the following tranche of epic gorgeousness over the line ahead of the others:

2. eagleowl – No Conjunction (Buy here)

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Which leaves the winner, obvious from the very start of the voting, and a song which, from the moment it was first released, generated so much excitement for the album from which it comes that High Violet was almost guaranteed to do well weeks before anyone heard more than a single song.  Bloodbuzz Ohio may not even be my personal favourite from that record (that would be England) but it does embody the rich, luxuriant sombreness of the album beautifully.

1. The National – Bloodbuzz Ohio (Buy here)

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And so there we go, your favourite five songs from 2010, a year which I thought was brilliant for new albums, far better than the extremely disappointing 2009.  A few things stood out to me from the voting, which are sort of worth mentioning, just by way of follow up.

1. No Sparrow & the Workshop?  Come on, people. I know the Sparrows have been quiet for a while, working on their new album, but I reckon they deserved a little more love than they ended up getting in this particular vote.

2. Ha ha ha, no Joanna fucking Newsom or Laura Marling. Well done.  They’re fucking shit.  I am proud of you.

3. Meursault and The National got a lot of votes. The National scored marginally more total votes than Meursault, but they were mostly for Bloodbuzz Ohio.  Meursault had about five or six songs, all of which could easily have been nudged into the top five by a couple of stray votes here or there.  In the end, I think it’s fair to say (with some pride) that the consistent excellence of their album, and their general schizophrenia as a band, cannibalised their own vote.  No matter though, because these two bands both scored almost double as many total votes as anyone else on the whole list, which is accolade enough in itself.

4. How do I know nothing at all about Foals? I assume that you all read this site because you more or less agree with my taste in music.  Otherwise, I can’t entirely see the point.  So how come, given we all listen to broadly the same kind of music, do you all love Foals so much while I have never once made the time to sit down and listen to their stuff.  Shame on me.  Homework for Christmas!

5. We got a lot of votes. This fact gives the results a sheen of respectability which I could never hope to generate on my own. Thank you.

So, a day late with this, sorry.  I blame a combination of Virgin Media and vast amounts of drinking.  I woke up yesterday, still slightly hungover, and found that Virgin have managed to break our internet.  Here I am today a day and a half later and it is still fucking broken.  They offered us a fiver refund without me even asking for it, so I assume they must have fucked up something pretty significant, but I felt too shitey to venture out to find an internet cafe to write this, sorry.

All of this meant that I missed the chance to plug the Withered Hand gig at the Wee Red Bar last night, sorry.  He is playing tonight at the Captain’s Rest in Glasgow though, with the excellent Japanese War Effort, so I recommend getting along to that if you accidentally find yourself on the wrong side of Scotland this evening.

It’s funny, I remember a couple of years ago the mere fact that there was one music based Christmas party was enough to pique my interest.  This year it seems that every cunt in fucking Scotland is having on, ourselves included.  After the awesome Gerry Loves Records one a couple of weeks ago, this week is the week it all kicks off proper like:

Thursday 16th December 2010: Song, by Toad Records Christmas Party at the Queen Charlotte Rooms, Leith.

We’ll have six bands, and two stages, with Jesus H. Foxx, Inspector Tapehead and Meursault on the noisy stage, and Yusuf Azak, Rob St. John and The Savings and Loan on the quiet stage.  We’ll stagger the bands, but whilst we can sell 180 tickets, only eighty or so people can fit in to the upstairs acoustic room at any one time, so please be understanding if you can’t get in – and prepared if there’s something you really want to see.  Tickets are shifting rather quickly, so I’d recommend getting them in advance (or turning up rather early – but we’ll be starting promptly to get all six bands on, so that might be wise anyway) from either Brown Paper Tickets, or the new Avalanche Records shop down on the Grassmarket.

Friday 17th December 2010: Stars in Their Eyes Christmas at Pilrig St. Paul’s.

This is going to be magic.  Broken Records, eagleowl and Toad Records superstars Jesus H. Foxx and Meursault will be performing as their favourite bands.  Tickets are very, very nearly sold out for this though, so act very sharpish if you want to go along – available here and from Avalanche.  There will be a couple left on the door, but this is not something I recommend you count on.

Saturday 18th December 2010: Tentracks at the Forest Cafe.

As part of the ongoing efforts to save the Forest Cafe from closure, Tentracks are hosting a night there, featuring Not Squares, Foxgang, Logikparty and Fueldiva.  Given that Kid Canaveral has already sold out Saturday’s Christmas party this looks like the perfect place for all you lost and wandering souls in search of a gig this weekend.

Sort of?  Yeah, only sort of.  Back in March last year, having just been signed to 4AD, Broken Records put on a small gig in the Bedlam Theatre in Edinburgh.  The place only holds about ninety people or so, and they barely advertised it, so it really did just end up being a chance for them to celebrate their record deal and the imminent release of their debut album with a small group of their friends, family and local fans.

The band invited us to film the show, and we edited together a load of live videos and Kas, their sound guy, mixed the audio and the whole lot went up around the release of Until the Earth Begins to Part last year.

One song which didn’t, however, was this one: an early version of A Darkness Rises Up. This song had only just been written back then and the encore at the Bedlam Theatre is the first time they ever performed it, so it was far from finished and had very different lyrics to the version which finally made it onto their second album Let Me Come Home.

Now that album’s been out for a while, however, I asked the band about this video and they agreed that there was no harm in letting people see it – provided it was clear that this version of the song was an early, unfinished version of what people will recognise from Let Me Come Home.  So there, I think I’ve made it clear.

It’s a tricky thing, awaiting albums by bands who are personal friends.  I don’t know what I fret about more, whether it gets a good reception in the wider press or whether I myself can honestly look the band in the eye and say that I like it.

Their first album was on the receiving end of some of the most negative 3/5 reviews I think I have ever read.  Because of tricky record label negotiations, not helped by the credit crunch, it took them almost a year longer to get their debut album out than it perhaps should have, leaving the band to face a backlash before, to re-use a phrase from a recent review, there had ever been much of a front-lash.

Even from my own perspective, as much as I liked the album, much of the excitement in hearing a new release was dissipated by the fact that I already knew all the songs so well from their live shows that there were few actual surprises left in the record itself.

Whereas Ian Caple, who produced Until the Earth Begins to Part, gave the band pretty much free reign in terms of how the record ended up sounding, this time they have been working with Tony Doogan in Glasgow, who has by all accounts been a lot less indulgent.  This, it turns out, is a very good thing.

Between the negative reactions in some quarters to their first record, and the uncertain period the band themselves endured when two of their number decided to call it quits earlier in the year, there is a fair bit of emotional tension in the air when you listen to Let Me Come Home, and it has served the music very, very well indeed.  There is real bite to most of this, and it is darker and in some ways heavier than its predecessor, whilst at the same time being a lot cleaner.

People have looked at me askance a few times when I’ve said that.  Heavier than its predecessor?  When most people seemed to think that was the big problem with that album, that it was too heavy, too overbearing?  Well The National have a real weight to their music, without being sonically cluttered in the slightest.  A Leaving Song might sound a little like ‘Oh, Broken Records with more guitars’, but Modern Worksong builds up to one of their fraught crescendoes, and then breaks into a skittering piano and drum refrain.  To me this shows that for all they have retained their penchant for Big Sound, there is a newfound clarity of arrangement and ability to use certain tools in their armoury more sparingly, in order to give them more impact.

Dia dos Namorados, which follows, never attempts the highs for which the band frequently reach, and this restraint is something they use well on this album.  It punctuates the mood perfectly, retaining the heavy, foreboding atmosphere, but creating an important break in the prevalent aural textures.  The Motorycle Boy picks the drama back up, but keeps the tempo slow, so by the time pop gem A Darkness Rises Up hits, you are entirely ready for the release of giddy foot-tapping once more.

All in all, this is fucking great record.  It addresses a lot of the criticisms of the first one, without ever feeling like the band have allowed themselves to be deflected by other people’s opinions of what they should be doing.  It shifts from the rattling pace of Modern Worksong, to the ominous march of Dia dos Namorados, to the air-punching Springsteenisms of the Cracks in the Wall and finally to the gorgeous closer Home in under forty minutes.  Disciplined, full of ideas, and while there are a couple of mainstream radio sounds in there – most obviously for me A Motorcycle Boy I guess – you have to remember that that is what the band are actually aiming for: something which is interesting enough for snobs like me to like, which it is, and yet populist enough to cross over to mainstream interest.  If this album doesn’t achieve a fair bit of that, then it won’t be by much.

The simple music fan in me just loves Let Me Come Home.  It tugs at all the emotions, from schmaltz to grief to joy to aggression.  And then a part of me remembers the reception their previous album ‘enjoyed’ and thinks ‘See!  See!  This is why I wouldn’t stop telling you how fucking good these guys are.’

Broken Records – Modern Worksong

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Broken Records – Home

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Website | More mp3s | Buy from Rough Trade

I seemed to forget why this was called the Fallcast until the very end, so it clearly isn’t a very central concept to the podcast itself.  Basically, I just rattle on about some new music for a bit, which means there’s hardly an excuse to call this bloody podcast anything, really.

Still, next week we have the Inspector Tapehead Toad Session, which is nearly finished, and then after that I was thinking about doing podcasts from vinyl.  I reckon I can probably just run a lead into to the microphone jack of the computer, straight from the Tape Out RCA connection on the back of the amp, although that may well not work I guess.  I could just get myself an mp3 turntable, but that’s expensive.  Still, doing the podcasts straight from vinyl seems like a good idea to me for the future.

For now, though, it’s just me sitting and talking shit to my computer, sorry.

Direct download: Toadcast #145 – The Fallcast

01. Broken Records – Modern Worksong (00.17)
02. Kurt Vile – In My Time (09.09)
03. Twin Shadow – When We’re Dancing (12.28)
04. Husband – Feelings (20.39)
05. Houses – Endless Spring (27.00)
06. Laku Noc – Sleep (29.53)
07. Brown Brogues – Treet U Beta (37.22)
08. Shapers – Virginia Reel (41.29)
09. FOUND – String Theory (44.33)
10. Ravens & Chimes – Division Street (54.31)

Despite the title (and the first song) there is very little ranting about the fucking Pope on this podcast, I promise.  He may be a vicious, decaying old scorpion in charge of one of the most corrupt and evil institutions on Earth, but after a little bit of gentle joshing at the beginning I promise I do let it drop and carry on with the music.

We have a fair bit of new stuff this week, such as Belle & Sebastian, Broken Records, Li’l Daggers and various other bits, and then a brief detour into Mrs. Toad and my drunken late night vinyl escapades last night.

Enjoy!

Direct Download: Toadcast #140 – The Romecast

01. Tom Lehrer – The Vatican Rag (00.17)
02. Li’l Daggers – King Corpse (06.26)
03. Bastardgeist – Flee to the Hills (11.26)
04. Belle and Sebastian – Write About Love (20.23)
05. Broken Records – Ailene (23.10)
06. The Walkmen – Blue as Your Blood (31.31)
07. Common Grackle – At the Grindcore Show (36.07)
08. The Meteors – Out of Time (40.42)
09. The Housemartins – Five Get Over Excited (43.46)
10. The Delfields – Claire (50.03)