Arbitrarily Decided List

As the title suggests, I made a list based solely on how many tracks by that artist I have on my Macbook. I kept it pretty simple - if their name is in the Artist field, or if they did the remix, they're in. Anything else I'll explain on the way.
10) Björk (36 tracks)
I have blogged about her before so I won't say too much more. I've loved her music since a friend gave me her Debut album, and my collection has grown erratically from there. I used to have more of her music, but I lost it in The Great MacBook Breakdown of '08 :(
9) The Dresden Dolls (39 tracks)
Again, I've blogged about these guys before. If I'd added Who Killed Amanda Palmer, the lead singer's solo album (produced by Ben Folds) they would have placed higher in this list. But I didn't.
8) Tom Milsom (39 tracks)
Tom places higher than the Dresden Dolls because I listen to his music more (Last.fm has a frightening 1223 scrobbles at time of writing). His first album, Awkward Ballads For The Easily-Pleased is a delightful collection of ballads and antifolk music, and his website has many of his unreleased antifolk and electronic tracks available for free download. A second album is also on the distant horizon, and I'm very curious to see what it involves, because with Tom you really can't quite tell. :)
7) Justice (42 tracks)
Credited as the guys who single-handedly revived the electro scene, Justice's most interesting recent activity has been in the form of, oddly, the Dior Homme 2009 Summer collection music they made, re-released as Planisphére Parts 1, 2, 3 and Final. Stereogum called it "dark, crunchy, ominous, at times triumphant" and it is all of these things, so altogether not what one would expect from catwalk-music :) They have also recently released A Cross The Universe CD/DVD, which is available through their MySpace and through iTunes.
6) Belle & Sebastian (42 tracks)
Somewhere along the line I collected a lot of Belle & Sebastian. I was first introduced to them through the soundtrack to the film Juno which featured Piazza, New York Catcher (from Dear Catastrophe Waitress) and Expectations (from Tigermilk), still two of my favourite songs by them. So kudos and thanks to the film that brought antifolk and McSweeney's into the mainstream and Belle & Sebastian to me. Their most recent release is The BBC Sessions, available through their website.
5) Johannes Kerkorrel (46 tracks)
Blogged about him before too. Kerkorrel definitely peaked with Eet Kreef! so while the double-disc Best Of album pêrelsvoordieswyne (trans. pearlsbeforetheswine) has some truly mediocre tracks on it, it also has some very lovely ones as well. While not entirely devoid of political satire (Wat 'n Vriend Het Ons In PW, for example), his music also turns to other things in this album.
4) Cloud Cult (48 tracks)
If asked, I'd be hard-pressed to tell you of any artist I definitely like better than Cloud Cult. The music has a strange charm to it I find very hard to pin down to any particular element. After all, the lead singer's vocal talents aren't the greatest and the band as a whole has only received underground regard and success. It might have to do with the integrity of the albums, particularly Advice From The Happy Hippopotamus, but also The Meaning Of 8 and their most recent album Feel Good Ghosts (Tea-Partying Through Tornadoes). I can't decide, so all I can do is ask you to decide for yourself.
3) Rilo Kiley (51 tracks)
I'd be better pleased with this very good band if their last album wasn't so very bad. Whatever musical magic this band conjured through four albums was very catastrophically undone in Under The Blacklight, which has few redeeming features. Only slightly better is the lead singer Jenny Lewis' latest solo album Acid Tongue, though her first solo outing Rabbit Fur Coat (what little I've heard from it) has better content. However I can find little to criticise about their earlier albums, so if you like if you like folky pop-rock I would highly recommend them.
2) Regina Spektor (59 tracks)
What's not to like about Regina Spektor? A singer whose appeal is quirky but universal because of the sheer diversity of her music which, while generally referred to as antifolk, can swing from balladic to jazz to country to blues and even punk or rap. Her lyrics and complex and deep or fun and bemusing and have garnered her much attention - her song Fidelity was used in the trailer for the romantic comedy 27 Dresses and she was asked to write a song for the most recent Narnia film, Prince Caspian, the end-product being The Call. Her music has also been used in several episodes in TV shows. Also: where else can you find an artist who writes an entire song about a pickle or peddling butterflies?
1) The Decemberists (67 tracks)
And finally, The Decemberists, the band who dominate my music library. Late 2007 was a good time for music for me, because I got hold of Björk's Debut, Cloud Cult's Advice and The Meaning Of Eight and The Decemberists' The Crane Wife at the same time, as well as being introduced to Tom Milsom, Rilo Kiley, The Arcade Fire, Deerhoof, and electro music in general. The Crane Wife is still one of my favourite albums of all time and I adore The Decemberists' brand of intellectual ballad-driven indie-rock. In their early days often compared to Neutral Milk Hotel, The Decemberists specialise in an almost steampunk air to their tales told through music, evoking something of William Blake's Songs Of Innocence and Experience in their subject matter and time period. They are at turns whimsical, epic, political, gentle and baroque, and their influences range from traditional Eastern stories to historical events to little picaresques of roguish figures.

Rave over. Here's the music:

Björk - There's More To Life Than This (From Debut)
The Dresden Dolls - Mandy Goes To Med School (From Yes Virginia...)
Tom Milsom - Watching The Paint Dry (From Awkward Ballads For The Easily-Pleased)
Justice - Planisphére (Final) (From Planisphére)
Belle & Sebastian - Expectations (From Tigermilk)
Johannes Kerkorrel - Hoe Ek Voel (From pêrelsvoordieswyne)
Cloud Cult - Transistor Radio (From Advice From The Happy Hippopotamus)
Rilo Kiley - Portions For Foxes (From More Adventurous)
Regina Spektor - Apres Moi (From Begin To Hope)
The Decemberists - My Mother Was A Chinese Trapeze Artist (From 5 Songs EP)

The Dark Side Of The Lawn

Okay, so taking the blog in an abruptly different musical direction, I'm going to rave for a while about The Dresden Dolls.

I justify this by being excited about their new album, which was released last week. It's essentially an album of stuff that was left off of their 2006 album, Yes, Virginia..., along with some B-sides and other material, named, almost predictably if you know the backstory, No, Virginia... I first heard about it when I subscribed to Stereogum's newsletter, The 'Gum Drop. Along with the weekly prize giveaway Stereogum also give you a free downloadable mp3 of a band they're promoting. Pretty sweet, and the stuff is diverse so you never know what they'll send your way next. And on the 23rd April 2008 that mp3 was Night Reconnaissance.

It's a very quirky cabaret-verging-on-showtune number and therefore solidly in the style of Missed Me and Coin-Operated Boy. As in The Jeep Song after you listen to the lyrics they make you smile for the references to other famous songs misquoted in the lyrics (hence the title of this post. If you don't get it shame on you and go stick your head in a bucket of Pink Floyd til you are safe to walk society once more). I can't yet review the entire album because I haven't managed to obtain it at the time of writing, but if it is as good as that track is, I have high hopes, particularly given some of the reviews available on the internet.

The mp3s with this are particular favourites of mine. Missed Me was how I got into their music and was the only thing I played on my iPod for a solid week, and with which I can freak out a friend by halfway through (I'm grinning as I write this). Coin-Operated Boy is just fantastic in its own right and Delilah is a slower song which shows the angry, hurt side of their music in a very different way to Missed Me.

Let the Epic Cabaret continue!

Night Reconnaissance - The Dresden Dolls

Missed Me - The Dresden Dolls

Coin-Operated Boy - The Dresden Dolls

Delilah - The Dresden Dolls

Oh, and as a side note and because it's interesting, here is the letter that sparked the names of the Yes, Virginia... and No, Virginia... albums (and explains the Christmas theme of the CD cover of the latter album).

Dear Editor-
I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, “If you see it in The Sun, it's so.” Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?
-Virginia O'Hanlon

Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men's or children's, are little. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The external light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if you did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus? Thank God! He lives and lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay 10 times 10,000 years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.
(Printed as is, from the New York Sun, 1897)

Kinda sweet, don't you think? Wish it were Christmastime so I could wish you guys a Merry Christmas. Ah well :)