2009 According to Rachel

What does my Best of 2009 say? I feel it reflects my poor taste in music. And possibly an identity crisis. And it seems to be full of epic and monumentally moving songs which kinda masks the fact that I spend a lot of time in a club listening to bangers and I’m not an epic and monumentally melancholy person but it’s about the songs that stick with you right?

And while I do agree that it was the year for dubstep (ew), dream pop, nu-wave and whatever else I was also happy to see it was the year for folk and folktronica and excessive portmanteaus to describe genres. 2009 for life x

The Juan Maclean - Happy House

In 2009, the people I most wanted to be were: Nancy Wang, Lady Gaga, Natasha Khan, the winner of the lottery, Tao Lin and Michelle Obama. There were a few other 90s sounding bangers around that took my fancy too, Shit Robot’s Work It Out, Siriusmo’s High Together and this 11 minute track but it wasn’t a standout year for club music. Dizzee Rascal seriously go fuck yourself.

Antony and the Johnsons - Aeon

No music “affected” me more than Antony and the Johnsons in 2009. It’s so overwhelming I often have to turn it off. Sometimes people get so wanky when they start talking about the impact of music but I couldn’t help it with The Crying Light. A beautiful album and a beautiful song that eschewed the zeitgeist.

The xx - Crystalised and Stars (pre-album version)

The xx were probably my favourite discovery for 2009. I like the delicate and almost childlike simplicity. It's kinda magnetic and just quite unusual music and not like much I've heard before which is all I really hope for.

Casiotone for the Painfully Alone - Streets of Philadelphia

I just love anything that comes out of Owen Ashworth so it’s kinda irrelevant to the year but it was one of the best gigs I saw in 2009. Is lo-fi nu-wave indietronica trendy? I’m not sure.

Fuck Buttons – The Lisbon Maru

Really, all my list of honorable mentions should be in this spot, I can't decide. But it was the year for Fuck Buttons and beautiful hardened electronic soundscapes and experimental synth orgies. I love rude levels of grandeur in music. When I ranked my itunes according to “number of plays” yesterday Camera Obscura was the first song but I was secretly wishing it would be The Lonely Island.

And an Australian top 5 because it was a super good year for music. I am so obsessed with the music that comes out this country, and Sydney in particular.
Crayon Fields – All the Pleasures of the World
Tame Impala – Remember Me
Paul Dempsey – Ramona Was A Waitress (Faux Pas Remix)
Bag Raiders – Shooting Star
Philadelphia Grand Jury – Going to the Casino

DOWNLOAD RACHEL'S 2009 (zip file)

DOWNLOAD ENTIRE BLOUSE BEST OF 2009 (zip file - 187mb)

Honorable mentions
Air – Sing Sang Song
The Big Pink - Dominos
Boy and Bear - Mexican Mavis
Camera Obscura – French Navy
Washed Out – Feel It All Around
Hot Chip – One Night Stand
Memory Tapes - Bicycles
The Lonely Island – I'm On A Boat
Temper Trap – Sweet Dispositions
The Middle East – Blood
Phantogram – Mouthful of Diamonds
Jay Z and Alicia Keys – Empire State of Mind

read on, readers

Hello Faux Pas... is that you? Had not heard much from you since your hypnotic remix on Gotye's Mixed Blood album (also Gotye - where are you??) and was starting to wonder. But I have evidently been under rocks since 2007, the year of the dolphin, because you have been doing a shitload of producing, blogging and radio jockeying as well as working on a second album... super.


I am in love with these two remixes Faux Pas has done of Australian bands. So creative and so interesting and actually added something to an original rather than just churning it through a banger factory.

Faux Pas says of the first track: Team Dempster asked me to get all remix on this - and initially i wasn't sure how it was going to go. But once I figured out that it was a song about a robot waitress I kinda had a feeling I'd work something out. This song is, apparently (according to a friend), "vocoder reggaeton".

Paul Dempsey - Ramona Was A Waitress (Faux Pas Remix)

Faux Pas says of the second track: I took the reconstituted sunshine pop of The Rectifiers (my friends from Melbourne) and re-reconstituted it into a remix in two parts. First part: troptronica, kind of pushing their original parts just the little bit they needed to be pushed in order to be enjoyed with a cocktail and a coconut. Then, about half way, i take my shirt off and start yelling "RECTIFIERS", some ravey synths start up, and i start hammering away on the shiel family piano. So, yeah, thats that. I'm not sure quite what happens but i like it.

The Rectifiers - Blackbird (Faux Pas Remix)

Also, his blog is freaking hilarious.

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