40: ZAMBRI
‘FROM THE STARTS’
(FREE DOWNLOAD)

Brilliant in its reduction – verses here are instrumental, with cut up echoes of the chorus floating through them – Brooklyn band Zambri’s ‘From the Starts’ could be compared to Telepathe in its bottom-heavy production and Suicide-esque electronic swirls, but whereas Telepathe prefer to stay emotionally detached – there’s feeling in their music, but you usually have to dig deep in the nonsensical choruses and commitment-shy quasi-raps to find it – ‘From the Starts’ is, bizarrely pluralized title aside, upfront and direct in a way that little modern underground pop is.

That’s what makes this track great: for all the subtle effectiveness of an Ariel Pink hiding bold statements deep in lo-fi fuzz, Zambri not only let their tribute to commitment ride the top of the mix, but they endlessly repeat it and elevate it with the sort of crashing waves and mountaintop drums you’d associate with Kate Bush’s Hounds of Love. Let’s hope the rest of the lo-fi brigade take note: it’s possible to sound both feverishly hypnagogic and unashamedly direct.

39: GUIDO feat. AARYA
‘BEAUTIFUL COMPLICATION’
(PUNCH DRUNK)

Bristol’s Guido announced his arrival earlier this year with ‘Orchestral Lab’, a magnificent, synth-string-driven record that brought to mind grime dreamers Ruff Sqwad at their most fanciful and romantic. ‘Beautiful Complication’ built on that track’s promise, employing auto-tuned female vocals to create a glossily futuristic R&B track anchored by rough bass and accordion-style compression.

Guido, for all his pop finesse, knows how to tool up his tracks for soundsystem use, and so the poppy melody of ‘Beautiful Complication’ is supported by heavy subs and rhythms that thump and snap with all the simple efficacy of a Rodney Jerkins beat. For all its fatness and colour and foregrounding of melody, it remains minimal and spaced-out. Not since the heyday of girly garage has UK R&B sounded so distinctive, vivid and viable.

38. THE HORRORS
‘DO YOU REMEMBER’
(from PRIMARY COLOURS, XL)

The Horrors’ second album really divided opinion, in both the FACT office and the world at large. One thing that warring partisans could agree on though, was the brilliance of MBV-go-glam scuzz-fest ‘Do You Remember’. While the kraut-inspired and generally more talked-about ‘Sea Within A Sea’ felt a bit tokenistic and tacked-on, the more representative ‘Do You Remember’ was dumb, derivative and proud of it, with a riff to die for.

37: GUCCI MANE
‘ROUND ONE’ (SALEM REMIX)
(FREE DOWNLOAD)

“Ay man, check this shit out man, this just for the Rucker…”

“…SALEM”

If there’s a more ominous intro to a track this year…well, it doesn’t matter. Michigan’s Salem have always been juke fans, and here they remix 2009′s best rapper to incredible effect, turning Gucci’s Atlanta drawl into something resembling the last rites, bouncing off walls of solid bass in some deep purple dream state. Chopped ‘n’ screw-icide? You betcha.

36: UNTOLD
‘STOP WHAT YOU’RE DOING’ (JAMES BLAKE REMIX)
(HEMLOCK)

James Blake spoke to FACT recently about becoming “obsessed with the incessant melody” of ‘Stop What You’re Doing’, the self-confessed “black sheep” of Untold‘s Gonna Work Out Fine.

It tells in his remix: the staccato hook is pretty much all that’s left of the original, Blake using it as a foundation to project a wild, nightmarish fantasy of pitch-bent synths and cyborg vocals. Difficult to listen to, this takes the stop-the-dance aesthetic of many of Untold’s tracks (think the drop on ‘Anaconda’) and magnifies it, resulting in one of the year’s bravest and best singles.

35: LAWRENCE
‘FOREVER ANNA’
(from DIVIDED EP, SPECTRAL SOUND)

Preceding this year’s full length album, Divided‘s B-side featured one of the best house tracks that Dial Records boss Lawrence has recorded – ever. Starting off with heavy pads and a subtle bassline that runs through the track like a train in a tunnel deep underground, ‘Forever Anna’ is quickly taken over by one of the year’s most beautiful melodies; shimmering and starbound, it morphs the track’s entire complexion. All of a sudden those pads feel like snow crunching underfoot; that shimmer the glow of distant lights.

34: ANDY STOTT
‘BRIEF ENCOUNTER’
(MODERN LOVE)

Sublimely confident and characterful deep techno from the dark horse of Manchester’s Modern Love stable, with a tragic/romantic melody that really earns the track its title.

33: EXCEPTER
‘CASTLE MORRO’
(from BLACK BEACH EP, PAW TRACKS)

The centrepiece of Excepter’s Black Beach was the magnificent ‘Castle Morro’, an epic techno-style cut that captivates for its whole 6-minute duration. Rhythmic field recordings of indeterminate crunches and scrapes build into a fierce but distant, dubbed-out 4/4 thud – it reminds us of Porter Ricks releases and that sense that you’re outside a thick-walled fortress listening to a rave taking place within. After four minutes, the bass-drum emerges from the fog, now wreathed in hi-hats and 303-style acid house squiggles.

32: THE-DREAM
‘SWEAT IT OUT’
(DEF JAM)

That Terius Nash had a thing for messing up a girl’s hair first became apparent on 2007′s ‘Playing In Her Hair’, from his Love/Hate debut; but that piece of swing-snap-bounce smoothness merely skirted the issue in comparison to ‘Sweat It Out’s obsessive fixation.

It’s perhaps unsurprising from the man who has described his approach to production as “so I can destroy this perfect picture I painted…that’s what I do with everything.” In the context of his Love vs Money concept album, it’s the carnal interlude between glitzy guest star singles and the sturm und drang of the emotional and sonic upheaval to come; in isolation, it’s a fine, R Kelly-indebted slow jam which finds The-Dream sailing as close to the wind as he dares while still carrying off his seduction. Never has a facial sounded so sweet.

31: KODE 9
‘BLACK SUN’
(HYPERDUB)

Hyperdub’s first record at house tempo, and one that opened up the label to release 130bpm singles like Cooly G’s ‘Narst’ and Martyn’s ‘Mega Drive Generation’, not to mention future single ‘Natty’ by Scratcha DVA. Kode 9 had already expressed his interest in the UK’s rapidly changing Funky House scene: here his curiosity was realised as a completely fucked, oxidized nightmare of a single with jagged analog synths and cutting snares.

This entry was posted on Monday, December 14th, 2009 at 1:30 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.