Evaluating this decade from a cultural standpoint feels, to paraphrase a report card comment from my 11th grade English teacher regarding my ability to focus, a little like nailing Jello to the wall. Unlike the eighties which brought us Back to the Future and hip hop and crack cocaine, this decade was rather short on original iconography, defining itself more by the manner in which past trends were recycled than the rate at which new ones were created. Even Bin Laden’s iconic attack of the World Trade Centre was so obviously lifted from the 1992 Steven Segal action blockbuster, Under Siege.
If forced to find a label, this decade this could perhaps be regarded as the age of irony, a generational fetishizing of bad taste that allowed brashness to trade as talent and cynicism as charm. While certainly a cultural masterstroke on the part of reality television hopefuls and sallow hipsters with no fashion sense who could pass themselves off as hip by hiding under fluorescent sweatshirts and trucker hats, what should have been a summer fad has all but consumed an entire decade, leaving some of us feeling how one does after eating dessert in lieu of dinner.
In summing up this decade’s output, I refrained from doing the standard list of the hundred or so greatest albums and songs, assuming I’d wind up with something as arbitrary as those greatest films lists which attempt to put titles as diverse as Star Wars, Annie Hall, and Casablanca in a definitive order of quality. Instead, I assembled a couple of super-sized mixes of some highlights from a decade when we used to listen to music on CDs, talk about how the Iraq war was really over oil, and about how we still had time to save the environment. It seems like only yesterday.
Part One – A Decade in Computers
Dapayk & Padburg – Black Beauty
Matthew Dear – Don and Sherri
Mandy vs. Booka Shade – Body Language (Konrad Black Remix)
Roxy Music – The Thrill of it All (Mandy & Booka Shade Mix)
Alex Smoke – Make My Day (Luisine Mix)
Matias Aguayo – New Life
Dave Aju – Crazy Place
!!! – Shit Scheisse Merde, Pt. 2
Chromeo – Needy Girl
Junior Boys – In the Morning
Metro Area – Miura
Miss Kitten & the Hacker – Madame Hollywood
Fischerspooner – Horizon
Radiohead – Idioteque
Ricardo Villalobos – What You Say (Edit)
Stephen Beaupre – Fish Fry
(a)pendics Shuffle – Looking for Me (Mossa Remix)
SCSI 9 – Mini
Enliven Dop Acoustics – The Dust (Enliven Deep Acoustics Mix)
Moodymann – Freeki Mutha F cker
Soulphiction – Get It Right
Elektrochemie – Don’t Go
Invisible Conga People – Cable Dazed
The Knife – One Hit
The Postal Service – Such Great Heights
Amadou & Mariam – Sabali
Woofly vs. Projections – Starlight
Jurgen Paape – So Weit Wie Noch Nie
Kraftwerk – Elektro Kardiogramm
Air – Run
Boards of Canada – In a Beautiful Place Out in the Country
Fever Ray – If I Had a Heart (Familijen Remix)
Clipse – Grindin’
Aaliyah – Try Again
Farah – Law of Life
Cassie – Me & U (Chopped & Screwed Version)
Theophilus London – Aquamilitia
Kid Cudi – Day and Night
Tessio – Luomo
Mount Kimbie – 50 Mile View
Damian Lazarus – Moment
Daft Punk – Something About Us
Playgroup – Hideaway
The Chromatics – Night Drive
The Orb – Before Because
Dntel – Anywhere, Anyone
Burial – Archangel
Ratatat – Cherry
Cassius – Nothing
Schneider TM vs. Kpt Michi Gan – The Light
Part One – A Decade in Computers (right click to download) 120 mins/ 256 kbps/ 162MB
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Part Two – A Decade in Bands and Singer/ Songwriters
Andrew Bird – A Nervous Tic Motion of the Head
Fujiya & Miyagi – Collarbone
Of Montreal – Gronlandic Edit
Takka Takka – Everybody Say
These United States – First Sight
Angus & Julia Stone – Paper Aeroplane
Stars – This Charming Man
American Analog Set – Aaron and Maria
The XX – Basic Space
Phoenix – If I Ever Feel Better
Yeasayer – 2080
The Polyphonic Spree – Solider Girl
The Duke Spirit – Masca
The Strokes – Last Night
The Concretes – You Can’t Hurry Love
You Say Party! We Say Die! – Downtown Mayors Goodnight, Alley Kids Rule
Serena Maneesh – Her Name is Suicide
Sonic Youth – Peace Attack
American Watercolor Movement – Sweet Thursday
Panda Bear – Take Pills
Electralane – The Valleys
Amnion – Praise God For the Light Within Me
Wilco – Radio Cure
Yo La Tengo – Don’t Have to Be So Sad
Gregor Samsa – Jeroen Van Aken
The Owls – Isaac Beshevis Singer
The Wooden Birds – Seven Seventeen
Wildbirds & Peacedrums – I Can’t Tell in His Eyes
Taken Too Young – Too Young
Brightblack Morning Light – Everybody Delight
Sam Baker – Odessa
Alela Diane – The Rifle
Gravenhurst – The Diver
Goran Gora – Slow Down
Kings of Convenience – I Don’t Know What I Can Save You From
Iron and Wine – Lions Mane
The Rosemont Family Reunion – Ho Ho Ho
Sebadoh – Beautiful Friend
Antony & the Johnsons – Hope There’s Someone
Papa M – So Warped
Sigur Ros – Staralfur
Alaska In Winter – Horsey Horse
D’Angelo – One More Gin
Part Two – A Decade in Bands and Singer/ Songwriters (right click to download) 120 mins/ 256 kbps/ 165MB
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[...] In aid of getting the locals hyped about his appearance in Vancouver tonight, here’s the titular track from Dave Aju’s lovely 2007 Ep. Dedicated readers will fondly remember the inclusion of Aju’s “Crazy Place” in our best of the decade mix. [...]