Pitchfork Tracks Of 2007: I’m in this, a bit (capsule reviews of T2, Groove Armada, Spoon) and voted in it and anyway it’s always intriguing to see what the P4K list turns up. What I thort of the Top 10, under the cut:
1. LCD Soundsystem – “All My Friends”: Was pretty much always going to win, I think. I liked it but only really got into it when I heard the John Cale version (after reading Mark Richardson’s excellent column about same), where the creak and weather in Cale’s voice brings more out of a (pretty nebulous rly) lyric. On the original it’s the New Order style synth line that gets me.
2. Battles – “Atlas”: Hurray for math rock schtroumpf! This has really grown on me though I don’t usually make it past 3 minutes in – has anyone done a pop re-edit of it, do you know?
3. Panda Bear – “Bros”: NEVER made it past 3/4 minutes into this, and I have tried – I’ve skipped ahead a few times to get to the other “movements”. To my unschooled ears pulls the same sort of back-to-childhood trick Boards of Canada used to, a band I also never clicked with. (Battles’ killer munchkins sound a lot more authentically kiddish actually). It is pretty, yes, but for me it doesn’t go beyond pretty, just wistfully rings the changes on it.
4. MIA – “Paper Planes (Remix)”: Love this, though prefer the original – Bun B and Rich Boy’s verses are great and OK respectively but they don’t improve on “Paper Planes”‘ perfect melancholy hit. Nate Patrin, by the way, is a VERY BAD MAN for the “electro’s Clash” gag in the write-up.
5. Rihanna – “Umbrella”: Excellent write-up on this, an unenviable one seeing as the song’s been so ubiquitous. I don’t think I’ve listened to it since summer but I certainly voted for it and, what can you say, it’s a monolith.
6. UGK – “Int’l Players Anthem”: Triumphant track given inevitably sad tinge, I was half-expecting this to be higher even though the poll was put together before Pimp C’s death. I had got so behind on hip-hop that I hadn’t even heard this until voting on the Pitchfork ballot started – and I don’t really know if I can contribute anything to discussion on it, other than to say a small ‘sorry’ to Andre 3000 for all the times I’ve lazily bad-mouthed him (tho his lovely opening verse reminds you what irritated about him as well as what enthralled).
7. LCD Soundsystem – “Someone Great”: Sank its hooks in me more slowly than “All My Friends” but also rather beautiful. Here’s the possible problem with the high placings Sound Of Silver‘s been getting on end-of-year charts, though (I have no idea where Pitchfork will put it) – the impact of the full-length seems so bound up in these two “YOU’LL BELIEVE A HIPSTER CAN CRY!” tracks that if you’ve voted for those, why would you also vote for that? Maybe it’s just me who hardly ever listens to the rest of it, decent though it is.
8. Justice – “D.A.N.C.E.” – aaaaaah, the great divider. Even the Poptimists DJs are split on this one – I can’t stand it, don’t think it ever coheres and that it wastes its hooks being cutesy, like a slightly sleeker Go! Team. Other people adore it and think the remixes are a waste of time.
9. Animal Collective – “Fireworks”: After repeated bad Panda Bear experiences I’m not sure I ever gave this a listen.
10. Jay-Z – “Ignorant Shit”: Leaked very close to polling time and I think its freshness – plus a general sense of relief that Jay-Z was making good music – accounts for the high placing. Certainly not bad.