Best new music of 2010

By Impose Automaton » Best music is a work in progress. Enjoy our best new music of 2010 before you've heard it. (Or heard of it, as the case may be).

Some obvious choices, other long shots, some bound for greatness, others a bad-ass tape release. We are fans of all of them, and you should be too.

Here is a working list of artists we think will do or already have done something great in 2010.

Ernesto Gonzalez

While still a teen, the Venezulean/Belgian wunderkind had already put out a massive drone/noise LP and joined Belgian psych-folk collective Sylvester Anfang. In 2009 he left the free noise improvs to release a gorgeous LP of composed psych jammers. Sylvester Anfang did an Amon Düül type overhaul by adding II to the end of their name and eschewing folk dirges, releasing a full on space rock album of Hawkwind proportions. With both of these project taking new directions, it will be very interesting to see what Ernesto does in the coming months.

Part Wild Horses Mane On Both Sides

For a band that David Keenan regularly calls "the best in the UK," you'd expect a lot out of PWHMOBS, if you had heard of them. After a handful of limited releases, CD-Rs and live recordings, they snuck in their first proper LP right before the clock struck midnight in 2009, and absolutely killed it. Pascal Nichols (drums/vocal sounds) and Kelly Jones (flute/electronics) play a style of improvised music that is highly rooted in jazz, but does not fear dipping into the vast space of other psychedelic sub-genres. Expect them to do a lot more in 2010.

Tonstartssbandht

Montreal-based Tonstartssbandht are probably being blogged about as you read this. They're currently enjoying copious, if not dubious, dollops of internet love. Right now things look good for their scummy brand of weirdo noise rock. Plus, the brother duo seem to put out CD-Rs and cassettes like it's taking out the garbage. Their live show will help raise the collective's consciousness to what they were missing in 2009.

Beach House

Before there was an army of lo-fi bedroom artists trying to replicate the sound of haze and nostalgia, there was Beach House doing it without all the reverb. Norway, their third LP, slated for an early 2010 release, is bound to solidify the Baltimore duo's place as one of the great song-writing projects of our generation.

The Superstitions

Since 2006, purveyors in the only garage country licks we've heard and liked. The Superstitions have a sweet new cassette on Wizard Mountain, a label that introduced us to Ty Segal (a dude the band did a split with last year), and Grass Widow. Hopefully some label will get a full-length out of them in the next twelve months.

John Zorn

Be mildly afraid. The reigning grand-daddy of downtown music is promising what you'd expect out of some kids with pedals and a tape recorder: that's right folks, a release a month. While many of the DVDs and records are just catch-up on his past work, he's promising "a major new studio composition," additions to his Book of Angels series, improvised stuff with Fred Frith, and, most chillingly, "several surprises."

Gowns

There was the breathtaking Latitudes sessions recorded this past year in England, but the San Francisco trio with one of the best claims to a sound that's truly both noise and pop have a sophomore album due in 2010.

Future Islands

A hard working band with a prehistory to their upcoming Thrill Jockey LP that spans six years, a changed name, and a few lineup alterations, Future Islands write fabulously contemporary pop songs, and I'mma let your boring blog pop finish, but Future Islands got the best live show in America.

Best Coast

Creeping out of the shadows of Pocahaunted as a song-writer and talent in her own right, Bethany Cosentino's spattering of 7-inches were among the best examples of jangley west coast garage pop in 2009, and the full-length she and Bobb Bruno are crafting will surely synthesize the ripe emotionalism she manages to capture in her perfunctory lyrics and honest vocal delivery.

Dinowalrus

2009 saw the Brooklyn weirdo future pop trio land on Kemado, a label that can finally give them the support they deserve. Some of the best textured psych fun since Frank Zappa, even if Pitchfork didn't get it.

Intuition

His record Girls Like Me will make the LA-based Intuition the next ugly-ass rapper to be adored by teenage women, probably to Slug's relief. He'll also single-handedly keep L.A. hip hop in our thoughts and ears in 2010.

Coasting

With nary a demo nor a firm home base (half the duo hibernates in New Zealand for the winter while the other stays in Brooklyn), the girl guitar/drums duo spins melodic yarns somewhere between the Swirlies and the current lo-fi garage continuum, Coasting already blew us away off a few practice tapes and handful of live shows. Lookout for 2010 7-inches on M'Lady's records and Group Tightener.

Art Museums

This San Francisco band's debut on Woodsist will be a continuation of Kinks-revisited songwriting that has made the Bay Area such a pleasure to explore in recent years.

Girls at Dawn

In the words of Bill Hicks, if you're in marketing or advertising, kill yourself. Short of that, you should probably check out Girls at Dawn; they may be your wet dream. A hotter Vivian Girls with the backing of just about everyone in the New York garage rock scene and fabulous melodic sense, if their Hozac 7-inch is to be believed. They only play big shows and seemed destined to universal approval or panning, depending on which side of cynicism you live on.

Blueprint

Adventures in Counter Culture is in the fetal stages of becoming Blueprint's Detox. The Ohio native once enjoyed the luxury of being too underground to bother with sample clearance, but now he's on the radar. It did not help that in 2009 his harddrive crashed, causing Printmatic to start over from scratch. Check out his song "Blue Balls" on BK One's record for the full story on the status of Printmatic's solo and give the man a rest on asking where's the album at.

GDFX

Greg Fox's one man jam may have gone relatively unnoticed when compared to his other projects (Teeth Mountain, Liturgy, Dan Deacon's touring ensemble), but he spent 2009 quietly amassing an arsenal of great glitchy dance tunes.

Dark Dark Dark

It's hard not to love the earnest innocence of a band like Dark Dark Dark. Literally a traveling troubadour of crust punks, they play gypsy-inspired folk ballads--if folk is allowed to include a heavy reliance on the accordion and no acoustic guitar to speak of. They've toured to nearly every corner of the earth and even played floating upon the rivers of Venice on an incredible raft-turned-art installation. With a new LP expected in 2010, we're expecting a Beirut/Gogol Bordello explosion.

Sisters

Their enormously loud live show makes it hard not to see the drums/guitar duo as No Age's little bro's, but the Death by Audio band are a pop band at heart, with gloriously sticky synth hooks thrown into the rock clatter. Calling them a "band to watch" is cherry picking at this point. Have them play your proms and dance parties before it's too late!

JEFF the Brotherhood

Before Jamin Orrall was a part of the combusted major label boondoggle that Be Your Own Pet fast became, he was touring all over the place with his bro as JEFF. Now that BYOP is out of the way, JEFF the Brotherhood's had plenty of time to spread the gospel, touring throughout the country in 2009 and dropping a full-length, Heavy Days, on their homegrown label Infinity Cat in October. Expect more of the same in 2010.

Blu & Exile

The most recent word on the internet is that Blu's performing new songs on tour. New songs he did with Exile. It's about goddamned time! We would break out Below The Heavens to celebrate, but we've yet to put it away.

Anamanaguchi

We may need to wait til they graduate from college, but we name Anamanaguchi the default leader in the onslaught of 8-bit bands that seemed to multiply and expand like extra lives in 2009.

Co$$

With guest spots on two of our favorite 2009 hip hop records, Fashawn and Sene, Co$$' hype is ripe for his Before I Awoke LP due in the spring on Tres Records.

My Bloody Valentine

C'mon Shields, you've been promising us something new for decades. This is the last year we'll falsely predict that you're finally coming through! Unless you say something about a new album in 2011. Then we will reconsider.

Posted on December 14, 2009.

More on: best new music, best of 2010

Read more in Best Music | Browse all Bytes