10. The Dodos – Time to Die

Though sadly still, not a patch on the staggering Visiter, The Dodos headed for clean cut Shins/Fleet Foxes producer Phil Ek to make their third record Time to Die as a three piece. I thought (and still do a little) that the album suffers  slightly without the rough edges that made their previous efforts so alive and human.

But in saying that it was only after repeted goes at it that I realised just how good songs like Fables and Troll Nacht really are. Meric Long’s song writing is maturing at a staggering rate and finally after getting over my production beef with the record I settled on this aspect and realised that this was still my beloved Dodos after all.

An album I’m sorry I doubted and one that I can see taking the band on to a more honed and tighter sound.

9. Fanfarlo -  Reservoir

Little known UK fokies Fanfarlo slipped out their first record earlier in the year for £1 through their own website and after being linked to it by a very good friend I bought the album and thought it was interesting… but nothing spectacular. It was only after checking out it’s rising position on my most played list that I realised it totally, secretly and completely had me.

A real grower for me this year but one I feel rightly deserves place on this list and it’s multiple spins on my battered ipod; Mixing old time trad structures with Arcade Fire like drive, Fanfarlo and producer Peter Katis (Interpol, The National) have made an album of beautifully recorded sweet and serious music which may not hit you at first but with which you’ll be suffering with glee later on down the track.

8. Bat For Lashes – Two Suns

Coming out of the percussive darkness that surrounded 2007’s Fur and Gold, Two Suns is a far more laserbeamed and controlled. Natasha Khan could have made a more sonically directly linked follow up but the young Brit shifted her sounds and her focus enough to make something that sounds like Bat For Lashes evolving instead of just carrying on.

The shakers, xylophones and loose deep drumming that punctuated 80% of Fur and Gold are turned down and this time a focus on vocal dexterity and crunchy synths sit at the forefront, Khan’s deep, sexy voice rooting all of this great conceptual album in place. A bold move for a second record but one which I think works.

7. The Mountain Goats – The Life of the World to Come

John Darnielle’s band have been making off colour, highly personal and often hilariously dark records for 2 decades now (See Tallahassee’s No Children for one of the finest, bile ridden, angry and affecting songs of all time) and they seem pretty comfortable in doing so. The Life of the World to Come is kind of a departure from that… though kind of not.

It’s got a mean (yet a little harder to find) sense of humor and, though most of the tracks put Darnielle at the piano, quite often alone and somber, it has a crazy wisdom to it that shines through. Don’t be fooled by the albums religious titles either. Darnielle’s relationship with god (among other things) has been well documented in his songs and in the press and his stance on the record’s themes has been as purposefully contradictory as ever.

I was skeptical at first but there really is something in each track on this heartfelt and moving album for everyone whether you believe in ‘him up stairs’ or not. Exactly the way Darnille wanted it, I’m guessing.

6. Colourmusic – F, Monday, Orange, February, Venus, Lunatic, 1 or 13

The Oklahoma/UK quartet combine their Red and Yellow EP’s on this gloriously cheery on the surface/creepy underneath hit machine of an album. Simple, tried and tested song craft and crunchy production are at the center of an LP on which any track could be a single.

With quaint English Kink’s like melodies squashed in behind meathook riffs Colourmusic used the rules of pop music to make a different beast all together and one which holds up to many many many many repeat listens. Orange is a rock /pop oddity in the extreme and one so catchy you wont be getting it out of your head in a hurry.

5. Dan Deacon – Bromst

When I saw Deacon earlier in the year the electro-mad-scientist held such power over the crowd that he parted them like the red sea and conducted  a dance off in the middle of the venue. A genius or just plain annoying? Deacon’s megalomania on stage somehow makes sense when you  when you hear the hyper programed pianos and chipmunk pitched gang vocals on Bromst.

Obviously it’s not for everyone. Deacon makes obsessive music, arranged with a classically trained ear by the hands of an electronics nut; Part Aphex Twin part Phillip Glass. Glitchy without being boring in any way and melodic enough to have you humming away on the bus while the chaos of a 180bpm glockenspiel is thrown at you down tinny headphones; Bromst, if you can take it,  is worth your time.

4. Volcano Choir – Un Map

When Bon Iver dropped this years Blood Bank EP complete with its looping pianos and vocoder/autotune, some fans of the folkish cabin in the woods mini masterpiece For Emma, Forever Ago, recoiled in horror. Here was a more playful and out-there Justin Vernon going purposefully against the sounds that made him one of the must see acts of the year.

His Volcano Choir project is that side magnified in the extreme. Un Map is a wash of loop and delay and reverb,  both it’s deafening smashing drums and epic ambient warmth are both surprising and beautiful in equal measure.

So hypnotic and wonderful you’ll forget that its been on loop all day long.

3. Animal Collective – Merriweather Post Pavillion / Fall Be Kind EP

I’m cheating a little bit on this one but The Animal Collective’s LP/EP one-two’s are legendary and 2009 big brother/little cousin pair is no exception. Merriweather Post Pavilion see’s the band at is skewed poppy peak, somehow another mutation above 2007’s screaming Strawberry Jam.

The more floaty but equally as catchy Fall Be Kind EP, with its ruminations on season and change is a perfect soundtrack to these cold winter mornings as you can almost feel the warmth coming off speakers. If you’re not grinning like an idiot when the pan pipes kick halfway through the opener Graze, there is seriously something wrong with you.

Although these are perhaps the most commercially accessible sounding albums in The Animal Collective’s stunning cannon, they have somehow managed to sacrifice none of their experimental side in attaining, finally, their well deserved success.

2. Japandroids – Post Nothing

Don’t let the two skinny aloof figures on the cover fool you. Japandroids make a hell of a big noise. On this, their debut record, the amount of chainsaw like distortion and deep driving toms should, by all rights, cover over any trace of  hook or melody. The astounding thing about Post-Nothing is that they don’t. In fact somehow they work in it’s favour.

Apart from being sonically smashing, Japandroids have made a record that for once encapsulates everything about being once young, dumb and recklessly optimistic without a hint of the maudlin, self loathing, “look at me but don’t look at me” eyeliner scared tripe running in the sewers of the streets built by Muse and My Chemical Romance et al.

A record for those of you who remember getting caught steeling liquor from your parents kitchen, crashing your car, not quite getting the girl and yet still having the guts to laugh about it while you waited for something cool to actually happen instead of cutting yourself just to feel something.

Sorry Muse fans.

1. Grizzly Bear – Veckatimest

Grizzly Bear took a little while to follow up the sublime Yellow House but, for me, at least it sure was worth the wait. Veckatimest is a painstakingly gorgeous selection of tunes, subtly layered, obviously labored over and perfectly put together without at all being over produced or too shiny.

Each instrument is allowed a staggering amount of space to move and breathe yet every song comes together in one pulsing, magical, ringing rush. The arrangements are put together with such care and lie on top of each other in the  same sought after way that the vocals, bass lines and organs do on The Band’s mystically genius Music from Big Pink ; Powerful and huge, yet somehow never ever getting in each others way.

Although most of what there is to be said about this little opus has already been said it really is true that with Vecktimest Ed Droste and his harmonizing machine of a band have most certainly made the album of their career… so far.