2004

John Frusciante - Shadows Collide With People
TV on the Radio - Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes
Sufjan Stevens - Seven Swans
Rufus Wainwright - Want One (2003 US)
The Stills - Logic Will Break Your Heart (2003 US)
(honorary mention: Kylie Minogue - Ultimate Kylie)

I haven't heard the new Red Hot Chili Peppers album yet, but based on the hideously dull, syrupy singles I'm not sure I want to. Ignore any chili-based preconceptions, John Frusciante's albums are never anything less than interesting and this is a stonker. He has a stronger voice than I would have expected and it's perfectly complimented by that of his collaborator, Josh Klinghoffer. The groups of vocal tracks are punctuated by strange, yet compelling electronic warblings, sending the listener into a hypnotising trance of both relaxation and unease.

I may not have given this bunch of odd noise makers a try if TV On The Radio weren't signed to the love of my life, 4AD. Which would have been a shame, but I did, so it's not an issue. Shut up. It takes quite a while to get used to the awkward, off-kilter sounds of this album. In fact, scratch that, you don't get used to it and you shouldn't. Maybe that's the point.

I was making a chilled-out birthday compilation CD for a mate and was a couple of tracks short. I followed up some internet recommendations and found the Sufjan Stevens CD. I'd never heard of him before and this was a bloody good find. Though he's now gaining a lot more recognition for his American states series of releases this one is a lot sparser in its arrangements. Just guitar, banjo and voice, mostly. Very pretty, but not too sugary sweet. A great Sunday morning record, if you can be arsed to get up that early and here's the perfect excuse.

I came quite late to this flamboyant Canadian-New Yorker's party, missing Rufus Wainwright's first couple of albums. I didn't even get this one until the end of the year, more than twelve months after it was released in America. I naughtily bought it on a whim, after the buying-for-oneself deadline had passed in December, lying to myself that I'd give it away to someone else for Christmas. Partly bombastic & operatic, partly quiet & circumspect, this is a monster of an album, producing sessions prolific enough for a sequel. Part two had already been released in the US by this time and I managed to score an import copy on a trip to Barcelona early the next year, but although Want Two is just as wide in scope, Want One is the original and best. Catch him in concert next year, singing the hits of Judy Garland. I'm not lying.

It was a toss up between this Stills album and Green Day. To make the decision easier I asked myself which choice would make me look cooler, so I plumped for the less well known one. Yes, I know I don't need anything to make me look cooler, I am, of course, as cool as it is possible to be, but that's as maybe. See look, I've gone all this way without actually mentioning anything about this lovely Canadian band or their album. That's how cool I am, I don't need to say anything about it and you will still trust my judgement implicitly. It's good, trust me. Peace. Word. No Doubt. etc.

And just to shoot all my ideas of coolness out of the water, here comes this years guest star, Kylie. I haven't been including compilations in my lists, but this is here for Jenny, so she will shut up about my glaring omission of this sexy, Antipodean dwarf. Disc one covers the same period as her previous couple of Greatest Hits, but with significantly fewer tracks. Some may say that this is a good thing. I would not be one of them, to my eternal shame.