With our Ones To Watch for 2010 complete, Breaking More Waves is about to take a Christmas break. We just have one more feature to roll, a look back at our top ten albums of the year, with one album published each day as we count down to our absolute favourite and number one. The concept of producing an albums of the year list and grading them in order of brilliance is somewhat ludicrous. After all how can one subjectively order ten great albums in a linear comparative ranking? The fact is we could have easily have chosen any of our Top 4 albums as our number 1, but to satisfy those who possess almost autistic tendencies, an ordered list is what we present. Unlike our ones to watch list which was simply a group of ten, this is a group of ten with a winner. Expect some obvious choices and a couple that you probably haven't seen on any other best albums of 2010 list.
Then after that expect just the odd blog until you see us back in January for more of the same. It’s been a good year musically and we’ve been energised by the nice comments we’ve had about the blog, the way our readership and subscription has grown, how we have been asked to guest write for other blogs, make the odd local radio appearance and were chosen to be one of the 'music tastemakers' voting in the BBC Sound of 2010 poll. Thank you for everyone who has taken the time out to read Breaking More Waves. There’s no point in writing it if nobody is reading.
This year we feel we’ve really firmed up our vision for what the blog is about, and to a greater extent what it isn't about. If you want free MP3’s then we suggest you look elsewhere, there are plenty of blogs that cater for you. If you want just one style of music then this also isn’t the blog for you. If you want a blog to name check and be one of the hip indie kids then this certainly isn’t the blog to check. If you like a blog that looks cool and isn’t just a standard Blogspot template this isn’t the blog for you. If you want a blog that simply posts up all the press releases, news ad reviews of freebies it receives with no real vision about what it stands for, then this isn't the blog for you. If you want artfully clever literate journalism then this isn’t the blog for you.
But if like us, you like reading all types of blogs and think that the variety of such internet publications is what makes the music blogosphere an exciting place - a place free from editorial and commercial demands - and just love music music music, then Breaking More Waves may be one of the blogs for you. To use a cliche, it really is all about the music.
Next year we’ll be bringing more live reviews, debating music related issues, writing about new acts that we believe are worth you giving some time to, reviewing albums and singles and expanding our new guilty pleasures series. We hope you visit often. Right, we will stop blowing our own trumpet now, and start giving the fanfare to those who in our opinion really deserve it.
It’s time to ready our albums of the year list. In reverse order, our favourite works of 2009. There's a fair deal of variation in this list, but what binds each of these recordings together is that they are all complete bodies of work created by artists that have excited us immensely in 2009. Get ready. Here from tomorrow come our albums of the year. Let us know what yours are.
5 comments:
This blog has been one of the nicest discoveries I've made on the internet all year and I look forward to another year of interesting articles and coverage of new bands that I might not have otherwise heard of. There's no other feeling that's quite like the discovery of a new music artist :) Ever considered making a print version? ;)
Aww thanks James. Much appreciated. Do keep visiting !
No plans for a printed version at all. A few years back I used to run a fanzine called Breaking Waves (hence the rather obvious name of this blog) and struggled to sell a hundred copies of the damn thing, and it was a lot of hard work to put together.
Like many things these days the internet has changed everything, and writing a blog is much easier, quicker and I can have hundreds of readers in just a few hours. So that's why I'm sticking with this.
Yep, good job (as the yanks say) look forward to seeing more in thee new year.
And a happy Christmas to you. Keep up the good work - I enjoy it too.
My top 10 albums of the year are
Marissa Nadler, Temper Trap, Grizzly Bear, The Horrors, Pains Of Being Pure At Heart, The XX, White Lies, Wild Beasts, A Camp and my No.1 album is Animal Collective
Cheers Troy. A neat list of albums there and at least one of those that you have named that hasn't appeared on our list yet will be appearing. Not so sure about White Lies, that felt a little too contrived for us to become emotionally attached to and the lyrics were in our opinion a bit 6th form. Marissa Nadler is one that has been cropping up on a number of lists. We love some of it, but not all. We love the songs River of Dirt and Heartpaper Lover with a passion. A Camp is an unusual choice. We will always love Nina's voice, but for us it was a little too mature for its own good, but obviously an album that was made free of commercial restrictions, always a good thing.
Oh and hello Mistress Wanda. Are you doing an end of year list on your blog ? We'd be interested....
Post a Comment