Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival
13-15 & 20-22 April 2012
Empire Polo Club, California, USA
coachella.com

In a sentence
With two identical line ups on consecutive weeks, Coachella boasts what is probably the strongest overall line up in the world.

Headliners
The Black Keys
Radiohead
Dr Dre & Snoop Dogg

If you only see one band
This could have been anybody of dozens, but ignoring the headliners, I wouldn’t want to miss The Shins.

Hidden down the order
It shows the strength of the line up that Gaslamp Killer looks like he’ll be on very early on the final day.

Other sockformation favourites
Pulp, Arctic Monkeys, M83, GIRLS, The Horrors, Frank Ocean, SebastiAn, Yuck, Neon Indian, WU LYF, The Dear Hunter, Miike Snow, Jeff Mangum, Feist, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, SBTRKT, Flying Lotus, Azealia Banks, A$AP Rocky, Buzzcocks, tUnE, yArDs, Black Lips, The Big Pink, Justice, Beirut, The Weeknd, Girl Talk, The Hives, DJ Shadow, Wild Flag, Modeselektor, Real Estate, First Aid Kit, Metronomy, Wild Beasts

how was your christmas? mine has been fun. present wise, i finally own a record player meaning that i can now play the piles of vinyl i’ve built up due to my complete lack of self restraint when faced with a pretty looking 12″. no longer will i have to shift uneasily or change the subject when somebody when i get home from flashback records and emma asks me why i’ve bought another record. having said that, 2011 has once again been dominated by digital music of course. your spotify account now links to your facebook, everybody has their top three played artists of the week feed through from their last.fm to twitter and you can’t move on the tube for people with a pair of beats headphones plugged into their iphone. some artists are fighting back though. it is not unusual to see a band release lovely vinyl versions of their albums with limited edition t-shirts, posters or chocolate brownies. but they still have to include that code for the digital download of course.

enough of all that though. let’s get on with the list. once again, i’ve nominated a top ten, with a single winner and then an extra addition which i simply couldn’t ignore. the 2011 apologies for just missing out go to battles, emmy the great, the kills, pj harvey, the pains of being pure at heart and last year’s winner cloud nothings.

bon iver. bon iver

he’s still a miserable fucker, but compared to for emma, forever ago this is positively rainbows & puppies. let mr iver take you on tour of his favourite places while he sits alone in a vets. (buy here)

girls. father, son, holy ghost

their ep was one of my favourites of 2010 and this full length is a worthy successor. in a year when the beach boys announced they’re reforming for 2012, girls released an album that any californian worth their salt would be proud off. (buy here)

the horrors. skying

i’m still at a loss as to how a band can improve so immeasurably (actually, you can measure it. only in terms of back to the future though). still debating whether it’s as good as primary colours, but who would i have thought they’d be anywhere near this list four years ago? (buy here)

lykke li. wounded rhymes

oh lykke. we all love lykke. her second album ticked all the boxes about growing up and while not as instantly pickupable (real word) as her first is far more accomplished overall. (buy here)

m+a. things.yes

this was the album that i could just put on this year and drift away. what a a truly beautiful album. (buy here)

metronomy. the english riviera

what isn’t to love about this album? nothing. the perfect advert for tourism of the english coast. (buy here)

times new viking. dancer enquired

there are lots of bands producing that lo-fi sound that i love so at the moment. the greatest example of the year though came not from a teenage genius in his bedroom, but a five-album veteran three piece. (buy here)

tom vek. leisure seizure

so excited i was about the release of this album that i dedicated a day to tom vek day. any other year he would have probably walked off with the winner’s badge. tom vek is back in a big way. (buy here)

yuck. yuck

the first new album i listened to of the year. a great start it was too. especially for a sonic youth and cajun dance party fan like myself. (buy here)

so, who wins? if you’ve been an avid reader of this blog over the year i’m sure you already know. a couple of years ago nobody knew whether they were a swedish collective or an east london teen. it transpired that they were in fact a guy who was already established as solo artist in his own right, and a girl who was a music journalist – and had in fact been asked to cover the band before people knew their true make up. i’ve seen them over a dozen times live and i hoped the album would live up to the high standards they’d set. it more than did.

summer camp. welcome to condale

summer camp introduced us to the fictional american town of condale. with teen crushes, a burgeoning rock band and ultimately death, welcome to condale and the accompanying fanzine takes us through an americana dream. it isn’t just the story that makes this album so good though. elizabeth has the sort of voice that is recognisable and easy to listen to. jeremy knows more about electronic instruments and how to use them than i know about cheese. the songs have more variety than early releases did and straight away remove the risk of becoming bored of the sound. this is a worthy winner. as an aside, if i was writing a list of my live performances of the year, i fancy summer camp’s gig at efes would top that too. (buy here)

alex turner. submarine original songs

i couldn’t complete the list without giving a shout out to alex turner’s soundtrack to submarine as well. my favourite film of the year was also my favourite soundtrack. just six tracks long, but it was pretty much all i listened to for a period earlier in the year. superb songs, brilliantly performed. (buy here)

in case you’ve ignored all of my subtle hints to buy the albums mentioned, you can listen to them all on this handy spotify playlist.

it is 3am in the morning and i can’t sleep. fuck knows why but for whatever reason i can’t. therefore i’ve decided to write something about the mercury music prize nominations. as i’m still a week away from having internet access at home you will notice that the little time at the bottom of this post probably says about half eight or something. glad we’ve got that cleared up.

i can’t be bothered to list them all as every other site on the web has already done that so if you’d like the list please click here. i’ll wait a moment while you read it. done? good. what did you think? i know what you’re thinking. where are wild beasts? where is tom vek? where are yuck? all three of those (especially wild beasts) will have to go down as 2011′s gorillaz for their glaring omission.

let’s talk about who is in then. ghostpoet. happy day. the quite wonderful ghostpoet is there. i’ve written about him so many times i’ve lost count. not only does he hold the distinction of being the first ever post on the relaunched sockformation, but i also confirmed that i didn’t lick him during a very drunken gig and he was my only tip for 2011 in amongst all of josh’s (none of which are in. take that short stuff). i hope he wins. i really do.

strangely i didn’t review the ghostpoet album. i can’t remember why. in fact, i only reviewed two. or to be more exact, i reviewed pj harvey and helen parton reviewed metronomy for me. both were very positive and i predict that it will be pj harvey who walks off with the prize. she may well be more established than a lot of winners tend to be, but let england shake is a brave and unusual album. mercury love that shit.

others to keep an eye on would be king creosote & jon hopkins or katy b. i’m not the biggest fan of the latter but i think she’s probably come out at the right sort of time for the awards. anna calvi was another hotly tipped artist for this year and her nomination confirms that her self-titled album lived up to expectations. adele has done alright for herself this year and you’ll have trouble discounting her from the running. i’m unsure whether she’s a label mate of last year’s winners, the xx, will affect her negatively though. shame because out of all the nominees i’m sure she could probably do with the £20k prize money the most after selling more records worldwide than there are people.

i’ve put together a playlist on spotify of all the nominees. there are a couple of tracks from each album. you can find it here.

finally. who the fuck is gwilym simcock?

it’s been a quiet month here on sockformation thanks to me moving and finding out that virgin media can’t service my flat. the shits. that means that the playlist for june doesn’t fit in with the posts quite as simply. that’s nice in a way though as you can hear what i’ve been listening to on the bus every morning instead.

one of the mains things is monsieur serge gainsbourg. i watched the biopic and my obsession with all things to do with cool french people smoking just increased. what a man. anybody who has ever looked at the header here will know that i’m a bardot fan of course, but funnily enough after watching the film i’ve decided that serge and jane birkin are my new couple crush. what a pair they were. having said that it’s a bardot duet that i’ve gone and included on here so that makes little sense.

you can get your playlist here and i’ll be back with more frequent posts soon.

look at how nice it looks there. the harbour. the sun. the women suggestively licking things. where is it? monte carlo? the bahamas? the amalfi coast? no. it’s torquay. fucking torquay! more distressing though is the playing of drums on a golf course. i hope they repaired their divots.

album review: metronomy. the english riviera. 11 april 2011. because music
(buy here)

enjoy metronomy while you can. for chances are, through no fault of their own, by the end of the year, i predict they’ll have gone all xx on us. by that i mean, you won’t be able to move for tracks from the english riviera soundtracking everything from goal of the month to springwatch to brian cox’s speaking in a soft mancunian voice about complicated physics things. seeing as some of the tracks towards the end sound like something you’d find on a 70s science programme, anyway, cox’d do well to drop the sweeping sigur ros in favour of a bit of metronomy.

oh, this sounds a bit like i don’t like it, doesn’t it? let me put you straight, i love this album. i love the dark, brooding bass on she wants. i love the contrasting uplifting springiness of latest single the look. but most of all, i love the obvious care that’s been taken in putting it together, right down to the cover artwork – originally produced for a devon tourist information poster. without coming across all x factor, there is a proper “journey” to be had here. you’ve got the first, title track with seagulls’ calling and the closer ‘love underlined’, which fills a much lcd-shaped hole in terms of a full on electro assault. in between, metronomy founder joseph mount and co take in xtc, elo, a bit of seaside wurlitzer and the odd hint of giorgio moroder. mount says he was inspired by daft punk – which i totally get on tracks like ‘the bay’ – and the eagles – which i don’t know enough to comment on, but don’t worry there’s nothing that sounds hotel blasted california.

metronomy are in a great position, having gained critical acclaim for their last efforts and a strong live following that’s probably set to go into overdrive come 2011 festival season. listen, enjoy and savour the english riviera now, because i think we’ve got them as a reasonably well kept secret for a few months at best.

9

words by helen parton (twitter)

sheeeeit. i mentioned the fun and little bit awesome new metronomy track the other day. well, ghostpoet has only gone and bloody remixed it hasn’t. as we already know ghostpoet is all sorts of brilliant. a quick bit of maths here. i make fun + little bit of awesome + all sorts of brilliant = this has made my day so much i’m almost tempted to use a capital letter. almost.

that’s not all though. oh no. it is here for you to download and play to your heart’s (or hearts’ if i decide to address all readers rather than just you) content. if i had to stick this in a box, i suppose it is a dubstep ish remix. i’ll stick to that for now.

metronomy. the look (ghostpoet remix) (mp3)

you want more? how about a remix from the genius that is tv on the radio’s dave sitek of the brilliant (and past ghostpoet collaborator) dels? good enough? it better be, because it is another great track that makes me want to do maths.

dels. gob (featuring jack davey) (dave sitek remix) (rcrd lbl mp3)

i know i get excited easily, but i think i am fully justified in my excitement for the forthcoming metronomy album. the english riviera is out on 11th april on cd, download and limited edition vinyl. ‘the look’ is the second track to precede it and sounds great. joseph’s patented vocal drawl is there in abundance with the simple electronic accompaniment for which they have become known. the video is perfect for the track. basic but beautifully arranged. it also has a inquisitive pigeon (i think it’s a pigeon) in a dodgem. obviously.