Here is our New Year's Listening Resolutions, we pledge allegiance to these sound grafters. Let's hope they go big places, they already have a big place in our new year hearts.
5) Egyptian Hip Hop
These musically advanced individuals already caused a stir in 2010 with their good looks, strange choice of clothing and even stranger choice of song structures. 2011 will see them move on to bigger and brighter things. On their own terms though, these guys play gigs if they want to, and they make the music they want to as well. By the end of January they will probably already have changed their musical direction. They are like a modern day sped up version of The Beatles in terms of cracking out new ideas. They are a very interesting musical proposition, make no mistake on that one! They are hard to pin down in many ways, journalists claim that they are hard to interview, music reviewers claim that they become bored of their own songs and even get bored of playing gigs. Then music fans struggle to pin down their style, what is it? That doesn't matter for now, what matters is that it sounds like the future!
4) Wildlife
Wildlife are a great new bunch of guitar wielders from the United Kingdom. They started working their way up last year supporting the likes of The Vaccines in small but good venues. They are pumping out the gloomy guitar ghoulishness that has been made popular once more by the gloomy minds of Chapel Club among others. So what if they aren't groundbreaking? It's hard to do something really new these days, so why not bring life to old styles? Wildlife do exactly that, like Editors and Interpol before them, Wildlife bring the darkness in appealing bucket fulls. Their guitars clatter and whir, their bass rumbles, their drums shake it up and the vocals add a healthy dose of menace. Wildlife are making the gloom wildly appealing in 2011.
3) The Vaccines
A band hasn't caused such a stir among musical people for a very long time. The level of excitement for the arrival of The Vaccines was phenomenal. It was on the level of The Strokes, Arctic Monkeys and Kings Of Leon when they burst onto their scenes back in the day. Rock'n'roll bands seem to be the bands that have the greatest impact on the musical landscape, rock'n'roll is supposed to excite and cause commotion. Few can pull it off, but The Vaccines have done exactly that. Their own brand of rock kicks up dust with modern twists. They have taken modern trends and stuck them together with the essential elements of a stone cold classic rock band. The looks, the stage presence, the sounds, the attitude, they all add up to be the perfect vaccination that combats the lack of exciting music in the mainstream.
2) Still Corners
Youths are often stereotyped into either liking fast, meaningless music or slow, over-emotional music. I think the trendy youth of today should be listening to Still Corners. It suites the feeling of being young, being imaginative and having an almost never ending freedom. The Still Corners sound is dreamy, uplifting, imaginative. Atmosphere and emotion is conjured through sound and pace. And yes, they may be making a sound that is popular at the moment, but what sound isn't popular at the moment? Some bands do it, and some bands do it best, Still Corners being the latter. In 2011, it feels as though while the world sprints by, it'll be nice to step back and lie on the grass with the sun, friends and Still Corners.
1) Weird Dreams
A great scene exploded like bubbles being blown forth into the wind in London. It was D.I.Y, it was fresh and it was rough around the edges. It was also varied in it's sound, but it never veered too far away from the punk aesthetic and the glorious lo-fi recording technique. Some roped in influence from 60s girl groups with lots of oohs and aahs doing the melodic work and others echoed the slacker vibes from 90s alt-rock. The list of influences was lengthy as it was varied, but the overall sound was very exciting. Weird Dreams echo this scene in their songs. The mash-up of pop, punk and guitars is all present and correct. It feels as though it shouldn't work for a second time around, but it does with Weird Dreams. They take some of the best borrowed bits from the great London D.I.Y scene and they are going to kick start our love for that home-grown style once more in 2011. Bring it ON!
LET THE SOUNDS OF THE WORLD GUIDE US INTO NEW REALMS OF COMPLETE AND UTTER JOY IN 2011!
Written by Jack Parker for Power Chord Music Blog. Photographs were taken from google images.
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