Top 10 Films 2009

Here we go!!!

1) Che (Steven Soderbergh, US)
2) Watchmen (Zack Snyder, US)
3) Moon (Duncan Jones, UK)
4) Let The Right One In (Tomas Alfredson, SE)
5) Gran Torino (Clint Eastwood, US)
6) District 9 (Neil Blomkamp, ZA)
7) Milk (Gus Van Sant, US)
8) The Limits of Control (Jim Jarmusch, US)
9) All Tomorrow's Parties (All Tomorrow's People/Jonathan Caouette, UK)
10) In The Loop (Armando Ianucci, UK)

Top 20 2000 - 2009 Number 20

20 - Crippled Black Phoenix: The Resurrectionists/Night Raider (Invada, 2009)
This is it then, the last one. This is my favourite record of this year, and what a record! 2 records as well! CBP cover so many styles here, from 'post-rock', ballads, Waitsian-inspired drinking songs... I had the chance to see them live back in November and it was a great gig, up there with Thee Silver Mt. Zion. Get the double record, the edited version '200 Tons of Bad Luck', is a compromised version of these two, so buy now! Roll on 2010!
http://www.myspace.com/crippledblackphoenix
James
Plus Rage Against the Machine, Christmas number 1 in uk?! Hell yeah! Did you join in?
I did.

Top 20 2000 - 2009 Number 19

19 - Neurosis: A Sun That Never Sets (Relapse Records, 2001)
What's there to say? Neurosis. If you haven't listened to them you haven't listened to post-metal/heavy metal/folk. Here Neurosis really explored their quieter side for the first time and to great effect. The anger is still there, though they keep it held in for a great deal and instead let out more angst! Really, this is a record where the originators of a sound that has been vastly imitated stepped up their game and kept themselves more than one step ahead of the pack!
http://www.neurosis.com/
james

Best of 2009 - Music

1) Crippled Black Phoenix - Night Raider/The Resurrectionists
2) Converge - Axe To Fall
3) Shrinebuilder
4) Isis - Wavering Radiant
5) Frank Turner - Poetry of the Deed
6) Om - God is Good
7) Mastodon - Crack the Skye
8) Jesu - Opiate Sun/Infinity
9) Gallows - Grey Britain
10) Kylesa - Static Tensions

Honourable Mentions: Black Cobra - Chronomega, Baroness - Blue Album, Callisto - Providence, Dead Weather - Horehound, Them Crooked Vultures, Grey Machine - Disconnected, Sunn 0))) - Monoliths and Dimensions, Pelican - What We All Come To Need, Boris - Japanese Heavy Rock Hits Vol. 1-3.

Still to come movies and gigs, plus the end of the best of the last decade!

James

Top 20 2000 - 2009 Number 18

18 - Cult of Luna: Somewhere Along The Highway (Earache Records, 2006)
I couldn't stop listening to this record when I got it. I'd always liked COL but they'd always played second tier to bands like Neurosis and Isis but then the released SATH and they stepped away from the path they'd created with albums such as Salvation and The Beyond into a much rawer sound.
Apparently recorded in a cottage in the middle of Sweden somewhere it retains COL's amazing ability to build a track up from nothing to a mass of sound whilst making it somehow more gentle and personal than their previous works.
Stand out tracks here are 'Finland' and 'Dim', but really the whole album is their watershed moment!
www.cultofluna.com
James

Top 20 2000 - 2009 Number 17

17 - Battles: Mirrored (Warp, 2006)
Damn, this was some arty shit. I was drawn to this cos the drummer is John Stanier, he of Helmet and Tomahawk fame! But what great, crazy music this is, no comparisons to either 2 bands, apart from the fact that there are drums and guitars used! The stand-out track is definitely 'Atlas', which has been used in the new ATP movie to PS3's Little Big Planet, and is awesome, the first time the band have used 'vocals'. Fantastic!
http://bttls.com/
Jms