Listen: Nobukazu Takemura – “Tiddler” [1998]

Somehow stumbled across this cool glitch/experimental electronic record from 1998, Nobukazu Takemura’s Scope. There are some tracks that are just way over my head, but songs like “Icefall”, “Kepler” and the song here “Tiddler” are pretty great. “Tiddler” sounds like it could be a lost town theme to a Super Nintendo or PS1 game, thanks to some similar sound fonts being present in those game soundtracks. This song is definitely an exception to the rest of the record, which is pretty high energy and glitch-heavy. I highly recommend the other two songs I listed, though!

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The 200 Best Songs of the 2010s

It’s been a minute, but I’m back with more Best of the Decade content. This time it’s breaking down my 200 favorite songs of the decade, which was obviously no easy task. In my opinion, picking 200 albums was so much easier, since you have so many fewer choices to make. Picking 200 songs out of 200 albums, plus other albums from the decade… now that’s intense.

Here’s a stat breakdown for ya before we get into the meat of everything. Think back to my list of 200 albums. According to my iTunes, that’s 2,266 different songs. To listen to it all, it would take me roughly 6.4 days, which translates to about 9,216 minutes. And that’s just the 200 albums I narrowed down from the 500 albums I picked throughout the decade of making Top 50 Albums of the Year lists. Elsewhere, I made a playlist of all my favorite songs of the decade, spanning over 1,500 song selections. That’s roughly 190 hours, aka 6,540 minutes. There is obviously overlap between the two lists, but that’s definitely over 10,000 minutes of music I have to get through to pick my favorites. Now I’ve narrowed it down to 930 minutes, a cool 15.5-hour playlist. Easy peasy!

But enough of Mr. Professor up there, onto some arbitrary song ranking decisions. Below you’ll find 150 of my top favorite songs of the decade ordered in an alphabetical fashion, followed by a loose ranking of my 50 favorite songs of the decade. Things were moving around even on the day I put this out, so clearly just listen to everything listed here, or at least in the top 50.

Conveniently a Spotify playlist for all the songs listed here. The songs marked with a ** are not on Spotify and I’ve linked in the song name using elsewhere sources.

You better read more – I didn’t type all these words just for them to sit there!

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Listen: Jockstrap – “Acid” [2020]

Here’s something exciting. Bubbling newcomer duo Jockstrap just got picked up by Warp and put out this bomb new single “Acid”. My roommate (shout out to Dylan if you’re reading) has been telling me about this band for ages, so I’m glad they found a spot at a legendary label. According to Dylan, they’ve earned it. Shout out to Jockstrap!

Onto the music – it’s some dark, alternate universe pop music with chintzy sound effects but masterfully executed. I can potentially see them opening for a band like Guerilla Toss right now, but potentially overtaking them down the line if they put out a bomb single or two. Otherwise, get to know this band before the rest of the world does!

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Listen: Destroyer – “It Just Doesn’t Happen” [2020]

It’s here. The new Destroyer album Have We Met is OUT NOW via Merge and it’s splendid. I’ve been lucky enough to sit with the album for a while and early single “It Just Doesn’t Happen” has been my favorite song on the project since I heard it. What a brilliant melody and hook, plus the delivery of “you throw yourself down on the playground / skid to a halt on the runway / you cast a poisonous look to the sun / you know it doesn’t just happen to anyone” is a great chorus.

Bless this band.

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Recommended Albums: December 2019

Oops! This is very late. I still wanted to continue my streak and wouldn’t you know it, there were some pretty hot albums that came out in the cold of December. While most of the output seemed like it was major labels shuttling out pop star records to make it in time for the next GRAMMY cycle, others felt like they were sneakily squeaking out as the year ended. I wish I could find more to feature here, but even my usual wellsprings of discovery seemed to be dried up when it came to December. Either way, I’m happy with the selection I have here. Some relatively well-known (indie) artists, plus a newcomer to the blog Pedro Kastelijns. Radical stuff. No Warm Visions descriptions, just a quick blurb about the sound. As one does with December!

Burial – Tunes 2011-2019 [Hyperdub]
A collection of every Hyperdub-released Burial project from the 10s. Absolutely essential electronic music that every fan should have in their collection. Already featured in my favorite albums of the 10s.

Daniel Lopatin – Uncut Gems Original Motion Picture Soundtrack [Warp]
Oneohtrix Point Never-led journey through a glittering, shiny, anxious climb through altered states of reality. A vision that’s entranced by jewels and nothing more.

Duster – Duster [Muddguts]
Slowcore legends return for an unexpected new album and it’s great. Brutal distortion, hissing effects, disaffected vocal deliveries. Like they never even left.

Free Nationals – Free Nationals [OBE/Empire]
Criminally overlooked record tacked on at the end of last year. Total retro late 70s fonk throwback with a good selection of guest vocalists & emcees.

Julianna Barwick – Circumstance Synthesis [RVNG Intl.]
More delicate synthesis of new age keys + electronics with Barwick’s amazing, weightless vocals on top. What else could you need?

Kaytranada – BUBBA [RCA]
Another clinic in how to produce a record and mold songs around your guest stars. Not as summery as 99.9%, sounds a bit more club-focused. Lots of ultra-jams I can’t wait to bump this summer.

Pedro Kastelijns – Som das Luzis [Overseas Artists Recordings]
Warped, fisheye-lens Brazilian bedroom folk + rock tunes. Songs seem to degrade and reform as they progress. Packed with experimental gusto and bold psychedelic production.

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The 200 Best Albums of the 2010s

To celebrate 10 years of Warm Visions / Combo Breaker Kid, I’ve compiled my 200 favorite albums of the 2010s. Not only that, but I’ve concocted “Warm Visions” descriptions and wrote blurbs about each record. I’m sure you can infer from that that this is a long post, so get your popcorn, get your cookie dough bites, get a cuppa tea in a nice insulated mug – you’re gonna be scrolling quite a bit.

This is a ranked list of 200 albums that’s chock full of personal gems, obvious premium indie biggos, landmark generational achievements and dark horses that most have forgotten about. I initially had a list of 100, but thought why not expand to 200? It’s my own damn blog and I have a lot of records I want to write about. Collectively all the preparation and execution adds up to nearly a year’s worth of work. Yes, that’s far too much time to be working on a Best Albums of the Decade post. I know this. But I had a lot of fun doing it, so that’s what matters.

The ranking is pretty fluid and shouldn’t mean much to you until you get to the Top 20 or so. Those are the true lifetime favorites. I was moving records around position-wise the day before this was released, so clearly the numbers don’t mean a whole lot. It’s just a snapshot of where I’m at right now. Who knows what my AOTD will be in five years. You should just listen everything I’ve listed here, regardless of ranking. I tried including streaming links for each record, but it turns out having 200 embedded YouTube videos in one post slows it down a bit. Instead, you can sample most of these in my massive Best Songs of 2010-2019 Spotify playlist! Sorry to those who don’t have Spotify, I’ll try and branch out this decade!

Thanks for reading and following along with this goofy blog for 10 years. Hope you enjoy.

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Listen: Georgia – “24 Hours” [2020]

Baby’s first 2020 post! We’ve been teased with singles from the upcoming Georgia full-length Seeking Thrills for what seems like the longest, and now on Jan 10th we’re finally getting our release. Every song out from it so far has been a HIT, including this most recent one, “24 Hours”. After seeing Georgia’s electric performance in NYC a few months ago, all I can think of is the jubilant, dancing crowd I was a part of and Georgia’s astonishment that it was all happening while listening to this new song. The song makes me feel good apart from those memories, but the combination really warms my heart and pumps me up to attack the rest of the day.

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2019 Retrospective – 100 Songs + Listening Stats

Since 2014, I’ve tried to keep track of songs that have impacted or defined my year. See 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018. Songs that will make me think back to that time when I listened to it a lot and think “huh, that’s what my life was like back then, huh?” Maybe that’s a good or a bad thing. Maybe it’s neither, because more than likely it’s just a song that came out that year. Or maybe it’s a song that reflects a phase I went through at the time (early 2019 was dominated by Prefab Sprout – check their three songs in the first 10). I spend nearly my entire day listening to music. Mostly in headphones, soundtracking my time on the computer, cooking, walking around the city or in basic leisure time.

These are the songs that soundtracked my ups, downs and turn-arounds in 2019 in chronological order along with listening stats, other media consumption and a list of every album from 2019 I listened to this year ::

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Best of 2019 :: Live Experiences

I saw a lot of shows this year. The most out of any year period. There were multiple weeks where I went to a concert every night. Was it healthy? Maybe. I probably didn’t eat very well those weeks. I definitely stopped going to the gym once my schedule got loaded up with shows every night. That’s my fault. But was it fun? Oh hell yeah. I had a ton of fun this year going to shows. SO many artists seen for the first time (128 in fact) thanks to the advent of SXSW and Merge 30. NYC is a beautiful place and allows me to see this many shows. I should really start doing show coverage, but I’m lazy it turns out. Check out what my top 10 favorite shows I saw this year were below, along with seeing all the artists I saw throughout 2019 + stats.

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Best of 2019 :: 100 Songs

Gonna keep it quick since I’m publishing this so late in the year and I have a good amount of words below. Once again, I’ve picked my 100 favorite songs of the year and ranked my top 10. It’s a pretty fluid ranking with a definite #1 and #2. Like I mentioned in my albums post, I felt like music this year was swallowed whole by my decade list prep, which is a darn shame. Looking back at a lot of these songs from throughout the year, it turns out I actually did have a good time listening to things. Either way, I hope you do as well.

LISTEN ALONG WITH MY BEST OF 2019 SPOTIFY PLAYLIST!

90 GR8 SONGS of 2019 ::

  • 100 GECS – “800db Cloud”
  • ALASKALASKA – “Moon”
  • ALDOUS HARDING – “The Barrel”
  • ALTIN GÜN – “Kolbasti”
  • ANAMANAGUCHI – “Air On Line”
  • ANA ROXANNE – “I’m Every Sparkly Woman”
  • ANGEL OLSEN – “Spring”
  • ANNA MEREDITH – “Inhale Exhale”
  • BENNY SINGS – “Dreamin'”
  • BIBIO – “Curls”
    ~~
  • BIG BRAVE – “Muted Shifting of Space”
  • BIG THIEF – “UFOF”
  • BLACK BELT EAGLE SCOUT – “My Heart Dreams”
  • BLACK MIDI – “bmbmbm”
  • BLANCK MASS – “House vs. House”
  • BODY MEAT – “Nairobi Flex”
  • BODYWASH – “With Heat”
  • BONOBO – “Linked”
  • BOY HARSHER – “Lost”
  • BRUTUS – “War”
    ~~
  • CARLY RAE JEPSEN – “No Drug Like Me”
  • CAROLINE POLACHEK – “Door”
  • CLAIRO – “Bags”
  • COMMON HOLLY – “Uuu”
  • CROSS RECORD – “Face Smashed, Drooling”
  • DANNY BROWN – “Savage Nomad”
  • DEATON CHRIS ANTHONY – “1999 She”
  • DEERHUNTER – “What Happens To People?”
  • DENZEL CURRY – “RICKY”
  • DESTROYER – “Crimson Tide”
    ~~
  • DRUGDEALER – “Fools”
  • ELSA HEWITT – “Rolling In Your Wall”
  • ERIKA DE CASIER – “Little Bit”
  • ESTHER ROSE – “Always Changing”
  • FACS – “Anti-Body”
  • FAYE WEBSTER – “Kingston”
  • FEATER – “Time Million (feat. Vilja Larjosto)”
  • FLOATING POINTS – “Anasickmodular”
  • FLORA – “Crush _ Melt”
  • FONTAINES D.C. – “Too Real”
    ~~
  • FRANCES QUINLAN – “Rare Thing”
  • FRIENDLY FIRES – “Almost Midnight”
  • THE GALLERIA – “Stop & Go”
  • GEORGIA – “About Work the Dancefloor”
  • GREAT GRANDPA – “Digger”
  • HAND HABITS – “Can’t Calm Down”
  • HELADO NEGRO – “Running”
  • INFINITY SHRED – “Forever, A Fast Life”
  • JAI PAUL – “He”
  • JAMILA WOODS – “ZORA”
    ~~
  • JENNY HVAL – “Accident (feat. Laura Jean)”
  • JESSICA PRATT – “Aeroplane”
  • JULIA JACKLIN – “Pressure to Party”
  • KÁRYYN – “Ever”
  • KINDNESS – “Lost Without (feat. Seinabo Sey)”
  • KONRADSEN – “Roasted”
  • KORNÉL KOVÁCS – “Rocks”
  • LANA DEL REY – “Venice Bitch”
  • LAPALUX – “Limb to Limb (feat. Lilia)”
  • LINGUA IGNOTA – “BUTCHER OF THE WORLD”
    ~~
  • LITTLE SIMZ – “101 FM”
  • LOVING – “Only She Knows”
  • MANNEQUIN PUSSY – “Drunk II”
  • MARBLE ARCH – “Gold”
  • MARIA SOMERVILLE – “All My People”
  • MEGA BOG – “Diary of a Rose”
  • MEGAN THEE STALLION – “Cash Shit (feat. DaBaby)”
  • MOLLY SARLÉ – “Human”
  • MOUNT EERIE & JULIE DOIRON – “Love Without Possession”
  • NATE MERCEREAU – “Joy Techniques (feat. Terrace Martin)”
    ~~
  • NILÜFER YANYA – “Tears”
  • NONLOCAL FORECAST – “Planck Lengths”
  • POWDER – “New Tribe”
  • PURPLE MOUNTAINS – “Margaritas At The Mall”
  • RICO NASTY & KENNY BEATS – “Cheat Code (feat. Baauer)”
  • SACRED PAWS – “Almost It”
  • SALAMI ROSE JOE LOUIS – “Earth Creature”
  • SANDRO PERRI – “Time (You Got Me)”
  • SHARON VAN ETTEN – “Seventeen”
  • SNOH AALEGRA – “Whoa”
    ~~
  • SOLANGE – “Stay Flo”
  • SPELLLING – “Haunted Water”
  • STEVE GUNN – “Vagabond”
  • SUDAN ARCHIVES – “Confessions”
  • TINY RUINS – “How Much”
  • TORO Y MOI – “Who I Am”
  • TYLER, THE CREATOR – “EARFQUAKE”
  • WEYES BLOOD – “Andromeda”
  • YEULE – “Poison Arrow”
  • Y LA BAMBA – “Boca Llena”

Keep reading for my Top 10 favorite songs of 2019! –>

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