The Sky Report - Albums of the Year

1. Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavilion

2. Grizzly Bear - Veckatimest

3. The Antlers - Hospice

4. Fever Ray - s/t

5. The Horrors - Primary Colours

6. Atlas Sound - Logos

7. Natureboy - s/t

8. The Fiery Furnaces - I'm Going Away

9. The Flaming Lips - Embryonic

10. PJ Harvey & John Parish - A Woman A Man Walked By

11. Fuck Buttons - Tarot Sport

12. Bat For Lashes - Two Suns

13. The XX - XX

14. Sharon Van Etten - Because I Was In Love

15. Phoenix - Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix

16. The Raveonettes - In and Out of Control

17. Yeah Yeah Yeahs - It's Blitz!

18. Nite Jewel - Good Evening

19. The Pains of Being Pure At Heart - s/t

20. Real Estate - s/t

21. JJ - n° 2
22. Memory Tapes - Seek Magic
23. Bear In Heaven - Beast Rest Forth Mouth
24. Antony & the Johnsons - The Crying Light
25. Girls - Album
26. Woods - Songs of Shame
27. White Denim - Fits
28. Ganglians - Monster Head Room
29. Yo La Tengo - Popular Songs
30. Lotus Plaza - The Floodlight Collective
31. Neon Indian - Psychic Chasms
32. Dark Was the Night (compilation) - various artists
33. Bibio - Ambivalence Avenue
34. Sunset Rubdown - Dragonslayer
35. St. Vincent - Actor
36. Royksopp - Junior
37. Masterface - Freedom Tower
38. DâM-FunK - Toeachizown
39. Cold Cave - Love Comes Close
40. Telepathe - Dance Mother
41. Wavves - Wavvves
42. Gossip - Music For Men
43. The Sandwitches - How To Make Ambient Sadcake
44. Neko Case - Middle Cyclone
45. Jeremy Jay - Slow Dance
46. Discovery - LP
47. Here We Go Magic - s/t
48. Micachu - Jewellery
49. Kurt Vile - Childish Prodigy
50. Night Control - Death Control

FULL YEAR-END COVERAGE HERE

Best of 2009 - Guest List - NATUREBOY

As a precursor to our impending year-end list, we've asked some of our favorite artists to select their five favorite releases of 2009. Natureboy blew my mind this year. I don't think I've spent more personal, alone time with any other record this year. So, I am humbled and gracious that Sara Kermanshahi, the brainchild, songwriter and vocalist behind the band, would share her favorite recordings of the year with us.

1. Masterface Freedom Tower
Seamless, new, innovative and irie. "Excuse Me Girl" is one of my favorite songs of all time.

2. Animal Collective Merriweather Post Pavillion
Seemingly effortless yet brilliant vocal melodies.

3. Discovery LP
Trippy, really catchy electro/pop. Lots of arpeggios.

4. Sharon Van Etten Because I Was In Love
Strong and moving songwriting, very full and realized record. Gorgeous voice.

5. Werewolves Dance Raincoat Glass
Garage/punk/psychedelic converge to create impassioned, muse-driven songs.

FULL YEAR-END COVERAGE HERE

Best of 2009 - Guest List - SHARON VAN ETTEN

As a precursor to our impending year-end list, we've asked some of our favorite artists to select their five favorite releases of 2009. Next we have Sharon Van Etten, who has had an absolutely amazing year. When I first hung out with her at SXSW last March, she seemed confident, yet altogether unsure of what the outcome of her new LP would be. Weeks later, the staggering Because I Was In Love was released and the blog world was stunned. What a shockingly sparse, honest, and cohesive album she had up her sleeve! All the major players cited her with positive remarks - Pitchfork, Gorilla vs. Bear, Spinner - and if that weren't enough, she popped up on The Antlers' Hospice LP, an album that is in serious contention for record of the year. And now she's laying her own claim on best of lists, just yesterday topping Said the Gramophone's Best Songs of 2009 list. Yes, she came in at #1! And just to add more fuel to the fire, she shows up on Earfarm's Top Ten Bands To Watch in 2010. I think I've said enough. Here are Sharon's top 5 selections for 2009...

#1 - The Antlers - Hospice - They've worked really hard. They are genuine, sweet, honest people and every time I put the record on, I am reminded of that.

#2 - She Keeps Bees - Nests - Jess and Andy are amazing together. They have the best rock show hands down I have ever seen - and her voice SLAYS. Be on the look out for a light coming your way through blues methods.

#3 - Natureboy - Natureboy - Her arrangements are STUNNING and her songwriting is classic. Gets stuck in my head every time. And Sarah's voice reminds me of Betty Serveert which was one of my favorite bands in high school - so I get SUPER reminiscent.

#4 - Glass Ghost - Idol Omen - Another really hard working ny band. I got to play with them a few times and it is so exciting to see them go further and further. I have been looking forward to this one for over a year now. Crazy mix of hip hop, indie, jazz, spoken word. David Byrne reincarnation - no doubt.

#5 - Rain Machine - Rain Machine - Kyp Malone is the most balls out, risk taking, honest, blunt writers I have ever met and have been lucky enough to know and to play with. I played with him when he was still playing these songs solo. To see them grow (organically) with his friends - to see his ideas brought to a whole new level is so exciting to me. It's rare to get this kind of honesty in music these days... and to hear and understand his incites has always been inspiring to me.

FULL YEAR-END COVERAGE HERE

SHARON VAN ETTEN, NATUREBOY, REY VILLALOBOS This Saturday in Brooklyn

Kevchino.com Presents . . . .
Sharon Van Etten, Natureboy, Rey Villalobos
Saturday, November 7th Union Pool
DJ Scot Bowman of The Sky Report will be spinning between sets
Reindeer Art show by Brad Nack in the lobby
$10 Advance online and $12 at the door. 21+
TICKETS

KEVCHINO.COM presentsSharon Van Etten, Natureboy,Rey Villalobos

The Sky Report will be providing music in between sets by Sharon Van Etten, Natureboy, and Rey Villalobos at Union Pool in Brooklyn on Saturday, November 7th. This is kevchino.com's first showcase and it's sure to be an amazing night of live music. Tickets are $10 and available now at brownpapertickets.com.

Review - NATUREBOY - s/t - 82%

Review by Scot Bowman

When I was a teenager, my first true love made me a mixtape. In between songs from The Pretenders, Gene Loves Jezebel and Siouxsie & the Banshees was this amazing, obscure track taken from the soundtrack to the Michael Hutchence movie Dogs in Space. It was a song called “Shivers” by Marie Hoy & Friends. What captured my attention most about the track was the singer’s utterly unique and somber voice. This brings me to the new self-released LP by Natureboy, who isn’t actually a boy, but in fact the name of the new project from former House on a Hill vocalist Sara Kermanshahi.

Upon my initial listen to Natureboy, I was immediately transported back to that mixtape-discovering that heartbreaking voice for the first time. Kermanshahi’s voice left me with that same feeling, which might have something to do with the fact that her voice has a remarkable similarity to Marie Hoy’s. But let the comparisons end there.

This wonderful album is a superbly produced, cohesive collection of deeply personal and beautifully crafted songs, with lyrics that conjure a romantic, noir-like motion picture in your imagination. Anyone with half a soul could get swept up in Kermanshahi’s abstract world. She compels the listener to draw closer.

The sparse opener “Curses Fired” tells a story of breaking away from a life weighted-down and packing metaphorical bags to move on, be it by a train or within the self. The chorus repeats like a bittersweet lullaby:

“I’m going to leave your mind”

It seems to me that traveling, as a means to set oneself free, is a common thread throughout the album. Not to say Kermanshahi is running from her life, as confrontation is also a prevalent factor in these songs, but rather she is dealing with her shit and walking away from what’s not working. Others may have a completely different interpretation of the thematic elements at work here, but the best albums allow the listener to get swept up in their own psyche and create their own visualization of the music.

“Dither” is the album’s turning point. The delicate guitar instrumental at once serves as an interlude, but by the same hand highlights another dimension to Natureboy’s sound. Layered ambient vocal harmonies that swirl around the repetitive arrangement create a dramatic transition into the second half of the album. On “Heart to Fool” it’s as if she were composing the movie of my young adulthood. The part in act II where things hit a snag and I have to reevaluate my direction in a complicated journey. Anyway you look at it, these songs speak to the listener in an intimate way.

In a time when music is so over-produced and candy coated for the attention challenged new generation of youths, it’s nice to hear someone with a real point of view getting to the core of things.

Originally published at kevchino.com.