Oxygen Ashtray's Albums Of The Year

1. Toro Y Moi - Causers of This

  2. Beach House - Teen Dream

3. Wild Nothing - Gemini 

 4. Local Natives - Gorilla Manor

 5. Cloud Nothings - Turning On

6. Beach Fossils - Beach Fossils

7. LCD Soundsystem - This is Happening

 8. The National - High Violet

 9. The Arcade Fire - Suburbs

 10. Magic Man - Real Life Color

11. Girls - Broken Dreams Club Ep

12. Morning Benders - Big Echo

13. Wavves - King of the Beach

14. Beast Coast - Crazy For You

15. Janelle Monae - The ArchAndroid

16. Happy Birthday - Happy Birthday

17. DOM - Sun Bronzed Greek Gods

18. Teen Daze - Four More Years/Everything

19. Childish Gambino - Culdesac

20. Tame Impala - Innerspeaker

21. Dum Dum Girls - I Will Be
22. Twin Shadow - Forget
23. Tennis - All their music
24. The Drums - The Drums
25. Sufjan Stevens - Age of Adz
26. Surfer Blood - Astro Cast
27. Sleigh Bells - Treats
28. Freelance Whales - Weathervanes
29. Vampire Weekend - Contra
30. Tallest Man on Earth - Wild Hunt
31. Gayngs - Relayted
32. MGMT - Congratulations
33. Avi Buffalo - Avi Buffalo
34. Ariel Pink - Before Today
35. Harlem - Hippies
36. The Soft Pack - The Soft Pack
37. Marcus Eaton - As If You Had Wings
38. Delorean - Subiza
39. Broken Bells - Broken Bells
40. Jonsi - Go
41. Matt and Kim - Sidewalks
42. Gorillaz - Plastic Beach
43. Woods - At Echo Lake
44. Frightened Rabbit - Winter of Mixed Drinks
45. Crocodiles - Sleep Forever
46. Bonobo - Black Sands
47. Emanicpator - Safe in the Steep Cliffs
48. Mumford and Sons - Sigh No More
49. Owen Pallett - Heartland
50. Yeasayer - Oddblood
51. Deer Hunter - Halcyon Digest
52. How to Dress Well - Both Albums
53. The Walkmen - Lisbon
54. Joanna Newsom - Have One on Me
55. Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings - I Learned the Hard Way
56. Free Energy- Stuck on Nothing
57. Salem - King Knight
58. Four Tet - Love in You.

Well there it is! My favorite albums from the year 2010! It has been a decent year, with the early stuff having some real staying power. Toro Y Moi takes the #1 spot. I love everything Chazz does and that album is literally perfect. Every song on the album has had its moment at the #1 spot. Beach House is #2. Victoria Legrand is a goddess with the most beautiful voice ever. Teen Dream is another perfect album from start to finish. I find their music to be so visual. Wild Nothing, they are real talent. I saw them live this year, great guys and amazing performers. Their album is 80's fuzzy guitar dream pop. My favorite! These songs are so catchy to me. These three albums were by far my favorite from this year.

I gave Local Natives #4 because I love that album so much and it was re-released this year. Cloud Nothings are one of my favorites. Super reverby, you can hardly hear any vocals or actual guitar chords, but it's so raw. This band knows how to rock the fuck out, cheers guys! Beach Fossils are Lofi indie gods that have catchy guitar riffs that I love to try and re-create, you guys are true inspiration. LCD Soundsystem put out one of their best efforts yet. This album is so much fun, love throwing this on at a party and just having fun to it. The National and The Arcade Fire put forth extremely solid albums this year. They are both well established and are continuing to grow in different directions with their music. Magic Man rounds out the top 10 with some local talent. These guys built an album with depth and textures I was really impressed with. This album was in my top ten the moment I heard it.

I would like to mention that all of the albums on this list were good. If you made the list, I enjoyed your album this year. Morning Benders has some of my favorite songs this year, Wavves and Best Coast ruled our summer, the perfect soundtrack. Happy Birthday, you guys rock...keep being weird. Teen Daze, I don't want to just include Four More Years...I love everything you have put out so far. Each track gets better and better. Donald Glover, thank you for being my role model, you are the fucking man.

PS. Kanye's album didnt make the list...it was good but he's just not going on my list

Black Swan

 

Movie of the year! Black swan was so captivating...purely brilliant! This blows The Social Network and Inception out of the water. Get to the theaters for this one, preview below.

http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/fox_searchlight/blackswan/

DMB - The Last Stops - Cville

FREE DVD DOWNLOAD OF N1---> http://www.sendspace.com/file/dplzkb

The trek down to Cville is a journey. 9 hours for me, but I was lucky enough to have Amanda with me for the ride. She decided last minute due to a free night one ticket that she could make the trip. We were staying with our good friends Jules and Jessie at a baller suite in Cville. Everything was lined up for a perfect trip for the last stop in the bands hometown. We got into town just in time to smoke up before heading downtown to Millers. Millers for those who don't know is where it all started. Tim and Leroi would play there all the time where Dave tended bar. It was cool to go back there, I made the trip in '09 too. There were tons of fans there pregaming to go see TR3 right across the street at the Jefferson Theater. Joe Lawlor was opening for TR3, and he later guested with Tim and Jeff Coffin even came out for a couple songs during Tim's set. We were two feet away from Jeff and Tim, two of the most talented men at their instruments and they were doing work! It was so cool to watch Jeff think of sax lines and then step up to the mic and just blow us all away. The show was a lot of fun, and I would have killed to see Dave and Tim play there back in the day. We headed back after to rest up for the real reason for going to Cville!

N1 started out with us going to the Cavalier Inn to hang out with the Ants Marching crew. We had to move to the main lots due to no tailgating at the Cav, but we had a great time with everyone and ate a ton of great food. We wanted to get in for the opener for the first night. The plans for N1 were to sneak onto the floor, which was no problem, per usual. We had a great spot about 15 rows back, right in front of Dave. The little red guitar was out again, Squirm opened. I was thinking it would be something much bigger. The show started off pretty slow and was I slightly sad that Bartender didn't follow BEF, I was really in the mood for it. Grey St. was great, but it was the only one that wowed me in the first few songs. Spaceman and Everyday followed, I was worried. Thankfully #41 was after and things were smooth sailing after that. The rest of the show was excellent! Joe Lawlor guested which was great. The entire band loved sharing the stage with him. When Joe went over to duel with Tim for the first #41 of the tour over 10 minutes long, it immediately made me forget the first portion of the set. Joe gave Tim props by basically bowing down to him before they both shredded at the same time. It was one of the many highlights from the weekend. The crowd was really buzzing after #41 and the band kept the high going with Shake Me. Then they busted out Spoon for the 3rd time since 2003. I have been trying to see Spoon for a long time, it is one of their most beautiful studio efforts and I was completely floored by the performance the band put on during this song. It will go down as one of the best best single song performances ever. Jeff and Carter and Tim all kill this song to the 10th degree. The video will be posted at the bottom along with a few others, just mind blowing.

The crowd was going insane. Then the band called out long time friend John D'Earth for Warehouse. There was a special quality to the way the band played these songs, they knew it was their last shows for a while and they played like it. Warehouse was intense, everyone was into it and the Sala Jam was great! Keep it going boys!...and they did! Trombone Shorty then joined for Jimi Thing. Quite possibly my favorite Jimi Thing ever. There were 5 horn players on stage, everyone soloed and Dave played the 'For What It's Worth' outro which is 10x better then Sexy Motherfucker. Blackjack is just a weird song, I don't like it very much and Amanda was super de-hydrated so we headed to our real seats. Dave played the Can't Buy Me Love outro to Christmas Song and then went right into Lie In Our Graves. Now that is a fucking good run of songs. Boyd went crazy during his solo on LIOG gettin' all up in Dave Stefan and even Carters face! I love this song more and more every time I listen to it. No reprise again, just like MSG, I was hoping for it to pop up the next night. I don't know why Dave likes to play Timebomb into You and Me, especially so late in the set...it's so lame! Stay also closed the main set, which it tends to do in Cville. Whateva! at least it wasn't the encore closer, and I was still riding the high of the last few songs.

The encore started out with Sister, which is given a pardon due to Jane actually being in attendance. Then Fonz started a nice 2 minute intro that led into All Along The Watchtower. Again I was hoping the encore would have one more song in it...I was praying for Halloween at this point. The band usually finishes AATW right after Dave says 'No reason to get excited'. But Carter kept jamming and Dave started playing the Halloween riff and the crowd started seriously freaking out. It was a really cool moment to see everyone in the pit flipping out, I even saw my friend Rachel jumping...she has been seeking out Halloween for years. It was a real treat for all the hardcore fans that made the trek down there for the last shows. I had zero expectations for seeing Halloween that weekend. Thank you to whoever brought the sign. Overall this show was a lot of fun, a few questionable songs but how can you bitch about a show with Spoon and Halloween!

Here it was, it all boiled down to this...the last show the Dave Matthews Band would play until further notice. The day started with beer and pizza downtown, then Ricky's tailgate. Again, we ate like kings. It was a lot of fun to hang out with the Ants crew before both shows, great to meet some of the faces behind the avatars. Being surrounded by real fans that I could have actual discussions with about the band was a real treat. The show started with You Might Die Trying. I was hoping for something older, but YMDT has been great this year and the crowd was loud! They played Proudest Monkey Satellite next which was classic DMB, but it was again a little too slow paced for this 'epic' last show. Say Goodbye changed my feelings. I finally got to see this song this year and it is such a beauty. I love Jeff on the flute and Carter on the drums. This version killed the MSG one, Dave finally had his voice back and hit all the high notes. Rhyme and Reason with Joe was a lot of fun. This time he headed over to the horns and challenged them. I think this is one of Joe's favorites. Eh hee Cant Stop and Cornbread is garbage...NO reason for them to play these songs at the last show. That's all I have to say about that. However once Digging a Ditch started, the rest of the show was smooth sailing and was very high energy. Lying in The Hands is a out of the world now. 17 minutes long and Jeff goes crazy with Carter, a super heavy groove. Fonz bounces all around on this one.

I gotta little sister named Jane... my third of the tour! Such an upbeat happy song, I love it. Write Song went into Why I am, the best version ever. Cville has the loudest cheers on the GrooGrux King line...I got shivers. Dancing Nancies featured Boyd Tinsley going Boyd on the violin. He was jumping and screeching like a mad man! This lead into Long Black Veil, easily the biggest surprise of the weekend. I wish there was more of a jam at the end of it, but I was just shocked that this one got busted out. I have a feeling it was one of Roi's favorites to play and that's why Dave decided to play it. What You Are had the sweet blues intro that they have been doing lately. I was hoping it wouldn't close the set, and then Boyd started strumming Two Step. What You Are -->Two Step was such a energetic way to close the main set. Carter handed out about 30 sticks, the crowd was erupting. It was the end of the main set to what would be their longest show ever and the fans were showing the love.

Dave came out for the encore and told us a little story about how he wasn't sure if he wanted to do this break and that he was crazy for doing it, but that it would be good and that we would see them all very soon. He played Some Devil, my favorite E1 song. I get the chills every time. Sure enough the band decided to play Granny for the second song in the encore. As I've said before...that's the perfect spot for Granny. The crowd shouting Love! Baby! One of my favorite old school jams. The 12 string came out and it was time for The Last Stop at the last stop. He teased #40 before which was a nice surprise because of the 12 string, and because of the 12 string it was just a short tease. Then the band played The Last Stop. If you caught a show this fall, you most likely saw it, and you know how special it is. This one was even more special, Carter and Tim's build up was perfect the outro with Dave saying goodbye to everyone... not a dry eye in the building. Even a Three Little Bird's interpolation by Dave at the end, it was the perfect touch. The song ended and Dave thanked us. The band was hugging and waving to us as they left the stage...Dave Stefan and Carter were left on stage talking.

The crowd was shouting for ONE MORE SONG! Carter tapped his cymbals and the band made its way back out for another tune. This was one of the most special moments in my DMB going career. The band started Too Much and then I think they were planning on going directly into Ants but Stefan busted right into Anyone Seen The Bridge. He was jumping all over stage for one last time. You could tell he was going to enjoy this moment to the fullest. The band went back into the Too Much intro that lead right into their anthem, Ants Marching. This song is epitomizes DMB and this version was epic. Boyd Tinsley tore the roof off, hopping and jumping around all over the stage...it was a super extended jam with the entire band circled around Carter. They lead into the outro, the best 45 seconds in the history of music. Everyone's hands in the air, it was one of those moments where you feel so connected with everyone around you. The crowd was soooo loud! Then that was it...Carter handed out a few more sticks, band members hugged, fans hugged...I couldn't believe it was over.

This month was the best month of my life in terms of going to DMB shows. 7 shows in less then 3 weeks. The time of my life. I saw some amazing performances, and met lots of great people. Thank you all for the memories...hope to see you for a few shows next year!

Beach House - Conan

Beach House played Conan the other night and performed 10 Mile Stereo. Spoiler alert.... Teen Dream is super high on my album of the year list.

Merry Christmas!

Happy Holidaze yall, it's a busy time of year and I'm still working on my Cville write up...and my albums of the year list..plus trying to shop for everyone! But the write ups are almost done. Now you will have something to read once you're done reading everyone's best of list's that are already posted! However I have some music that I need to get in your hands NOW! Some holiday tunes for you...Kanye, Beach House, and Dent May all posted really great Christmas songs in the past few days. I also have the new Toro Y Moi and Beach Fossils tracks from their new albums coming out next year! So enjoy the your break and your Holiday...be sure to check back for my list soon!

FREE DOWNLOAD------->>>>  Get Drunk on Christmas Playlist

MOM IT'S MY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!

Oxygen Ashtray is a year old today. WOooooooooooooooooo!!!! That's like 27 in blog years. Since I started the blog, I have met a lot of great people that work hard to bring quality music to CT. My initial goal was to get the music I enjoyed more available to my friends. So much more has come from starting the blog and it's really cool! I know that I have not been posting too much of late but I promise that is all changing. See...already 3 posts in the past couple of days. I've got my Cville write up being posted soon and my album of the year list will be up shortly. I wanted to have the album list ready for today because I had my best of '09 list ready for my first post. But alas I'm a lazy blogger. I blame work and my girlfriend. My new job doesn't allow me to get on the computer so there goes a good 4 hours a day of finding music. Plus I have a girlfriend now, which is way better then dating my blog. Here are some of my favorite songs from 2010, my favorite albums should be posted next week. Cheers!

DMB - The Last Stops - MSG

MSG is a special place to see DMB. They play killer shows and the crowd is electric! Walking around the city before the show started really got me excited. I love being in NYC... I think I belong there. I saw the little red guitar which signals a Squirm opener which did happen. Whenever that song opens I find that things get off to a slow start and the crowd is not very into it. That's exactly what happened. The show picked up after they jammed the hell out of LITHOG, I don't think I've ever seen Jeff and Carter push that song like that, I needed to catch my breath during Eh Hee. Once that song ended and I heard the opening chords to LIOG I literally jumped out of my seat for joy. No reprise and it went right into YMDT which is at it's peak right now, I used to hate this song but currently am loving it. The next song totally shocked me. Lover Lay Down is the song that made me fall in love with this band. I bought RR95 because it was the only CD that had LLD on it. Finally after 25 shows I got to hear this song. I got a little emotional...in fact I could hardly sing the song. I'll never forget finally being able to hear it. I did ask Fonz in Boston for Lover Lay Down, and I told him that I would be at MSG and Cville in case they needed to practice it. He said I'll see what I can do...' Well thanks Fonz! even if I had nothing to do with it. The rest of the show was what I excpected from MSG! Warehouse followed and this song is always spot on. I love what the horns have added to this one and the salsa jam was out in full force. I felt like it was my first show again, I was enthralled by the band and how they were playing. The crowd was nice and loud on Jimi Thing which Dave let us sing the first two versus of. What you are was a treat to hear, it was the first time in a while for me, and it was the first time it closed a main set since 2005. It had a really slow bluesy intro that went into the normal start of the song. I loved how they did it. The encore was really nothing special, I guess Dive In solo is cool because it has never happened before, but i was expecting another full band song before they went into AATW, like sayyyy Granny! Granny is the perfect encore song. But little did we know what we had in store for us N2...

There was a really big buzz in the building as everyone got to their seats. At first we tried to fit five people in one seat because we all wanted to sit together but that didn't work out. We did get to chat with Danny before the show. Finally! We had been trying to meet up with him for a while now. After chatting for a few minutes our group had to split up. Jamie and Sally sat together and I sat with Amanda and Brittany. It was Brittany's first show! The show started with the band building up, I thought it would lead into DDTW for sure...it was something far better. The #41 opener is tooooo good! It's the perfect way to start a show. You could tell it was going to be a special night. Then it went right into Say Goodbye...ala the Crash album. I thought I was going to faint. It was the first time since '96 they opened a show that way. MSG was on fire after these two songs. Funny was a decent BW tune to follow, but Dave's voice was shot...he couldn't even finish the song, we had to. Pig was cut the night before, so there was a feeling from the fans it would show its head on N2. I'm glad it did so early in the set because it kept the crowd pumped. That's one thing I noticed from that night, the crowd was so passionate. It was the most connected and loud crowd I have ever been apart of. Even more then Cville N2. Nancies was the perfect song to play after Write A Song because it let Dave rest his voice. He asked us to yet again help him sing along. We sang most of Nancies ourselves. This show was a lot of fun but I was a little disappointed at this point that Dave's voice was shot. Then out of nowhere, his voice came to life during DDTW and was fine the rest of the night.

The next part of the set was hilarious. Dave messed the the lyrics to Christmas Song giving Jesus two mothers. He started laughing and stopped the song. Carter started a beat, Tim joined in and Dave scatted a little improv. I thought they were going into Cornbread with the way Carter was playing, but thankfully they went back into Christmas song after the jam and the crowd went crazy! The first midset Christmas Song since 1995! Check it out HERE. 'I gotta little sister named Jane'...those words are like gold, it's the best when Dave introduces the song that way. Classic DMB, Jane should be played all the time! Crush is another classic that tends to follow me around. It's one of my favorites though, and one that Amanda and I love to see together. Boyd and Jeff are so tight on this song! Everyone was feeling the groove on that one. Once BOWA started my night was made. Jeff Coffin makes the outro his bitch! What a killer set so far. Pig and BOWA sum up my philosophy on life, so thankful that I got them in the same night. During BOWA I mentioned how badly I wanted to hear Rhyme and Reason and Brittany said she did too, it was one of her favorites. Sure enough, next tune was Rhyme and Reason, it's first play in over a year. All we could do was laugh. Then the band brought out Vusi Mahlasela for Everyday. I am not a huge Everyday fan at all, in fact after the intro I ran to the bathroom. Good thing I was only gone for a minute because this jam was the highlight of the night. I never thought it could be, but Everyday was unreal at MSG. In fact it ruined all future performances of it because this was too perfect. I can't even describe the pure feeling of joy in the room. Vusi has the most positive presence and you can't help but smile. Watch it HERE, when the house lights go up on the crowd around 7min...goooooosebumps! What an unreal moment. Then they wasted two spots with Time Bomb and You and Me. Two Step was a great closer. It was the best one I have ever heard. Carter pushed his solo longer and further (TWSS) than I've ever seen! My mind was fully blown after this main set. I'm glad to see this version getting the respect it deserves because it should be released. This is what keeps me going to shows, this is DMB at it's best!

The encore was not as jam packed as I expected. I thought there was a shot of #40 or IBYU. Instead he played Sister for his sister Jane. I was thinking there would be one more song before the closer, maybe So Right, but I saw the 12-string coming out and everyone knew that Last Stop would close out MSG. The band explodes right into this song. The crowd goes crazy, Carter goes crazy. The build up right before the reprise is so intense between Carter and Tim. The slow outro to close the show out and Dave thanked us all and that was the end. It was a quiet ending to the show, I loved it. Its a tough call between this and SPAC N2 '09 for the best show of my life. I want to call it a tie, both shows were basically perfect. I'm really happy that I got a poster from because this show is one that I want to remember forever. Everyone there will agree that this was one of the best shows the band has ever played and by far the best of 2010. I wouldn't trade this one for anything.

Tis The Season

My god, I love Zooey...

DMB - The Last Stops - Boston

Phew, I have finally re-cooped from the most amazing November of my life. 7 DMB shows in a little over two weeks, including the final two shows until further notice. A dream come true! A lot of memorable moments happened during the fall tour and I want to thank everyone that I came in contact with on my trip. So, Thank You! Lets get right into it...in my previous post I summed up the Albany show in detail...I want to touch on the other six shows but I will not be talking about every song. I know some of you were not huge fans of me writing about every single song and how many times I've seen them...so I won't do that, as much.

 The story of Boston starts the night before. I was working...my cell phone rings and its a random number, it's Cali from 104.1 Boston...he had some good new for me. I won the opportunity to meet Stefan Lessard and watch the Cali interview with Stefan, which you can listen to right here! This was a once in a lifetime opportunity and I can't believe I was one of the few winners chosen. Pete and I got up to Boston nice and early hit the Volcano and then headed to Ben and Jerrys. The interview as you can hear, is very well done. Cali is a real DMB fan that asks questions that the true hardcore fans want to ask. Not to mention being 3 feet away from Stefan the entire time was unreal.

After the meeting Fonz and asking for Lover Lay Down there was about two hours before we wanted to head into the venue. We had floor seats and wanted to get close to Fonz and see if he would remember us. We settled at around 10th row. Great views of everyone all night long. The people around us were really cool too. There was this crazy bitch that made her way in and we all got her the boot and the whole crowd was singing good bye, it was priceless. The show started with Proudest Monkey into Satellite which is not the most energetic combo to open with...but they are two familiar songs that everyone in attendance knew and the crowd was into it right off the bat. After some Big Whiskey, they played DDTW, Last Stop, then Seek Up. That was one of my favorite runs of the tour. What a powerful three songs to play in a row. I was thinking Grey St. when I saw the 12-string, but a mid-set Last Stop is always a treat. Then I was floored after I heard the start to Seek Up. When Boyd is going crazy and Dave is wailing, I get goosebumps just thinking about it. The downfall in this part of the set was when two people right next to us passed out on the floor. It was way too hot and people were so dehydrated. Pete missed most of Gravedigger because he ran to get help for the people that fell.

The next four songs were a bit slow, I figured Big Whiskey was going to get played and here it was. I really do love Stay or Leave..it was just in the wrong spot. LITHOG is a real monster now...it's the best song from Big Whiskey by far. I really enjoyed the next four song run of #41, Grey St, Il Back You Up, and Crush. That's the kind of stuff I like to see. Crush was a good one! It was one of the highlights in the set in my opinion. However the ending run was just pathetic!!! Ants Marching was the only saving grace...but I was a little disapointed. It was just such a boring finnish. You and Me in the second to last slot is awful...and don't get me started on Can't Stop. The encore was okay. I love Some Devil, it's my favorite Dave E1 solo song. It's just so emotional. Everyday was meh, it did have a nice little #36 reprise which was a cool change of pace. PNP Rapunzel is a great closer. I prefer it to open but it works in the closing roll too. They always push it on that song every time. Too bad Boston was the only time they brought it out all tour. All in all it was a decent set and I had a great time on the floor. I was expecting a lot for N2. 

Night two started off with meeting up with my friend Ryan and his friend Jessie who we got floor tickets with us for N2! We had drinks at Boston Beer Works, which was a stones throw away from the venue. It was great to catch up with Ants and chat before n2. We left early again to get in for decent floor spots. John Butler Trio were the openers again, they are very impressive. I enjoyed watching their set for all four opening acts they played. The show started out perfectly with The Stone. There is no better opener in my opinion...The Stone is my favorite song. However the crowd could not sing the outro to save their lives! Squirm works out much better in the two slot but imo doesn't translate well live. After a killer What Would You Say, I looked at Pete and said this was going to be a fun show. Sadly I was escorted out of the building during Crash because someone else handed me a J and a cop saw...I missed the rest of the show. Highlights were Cry Freedom into Granny and then Lie In Our Graves. I was really bummed to miss that run. But shake it off, still got 4 more shows to get to and they were killer! MSG review will be posted tomorrow!

Tennis Rulez

This blog is on its way back! I am finishing up my fall tour write up for DMB and crafting my albums of the year list that I will have posted in time for the 1 yr anniversary of this here blog. In the meantime here is a video of Tennis playing their new song that I am obsessed with 'Pigeon'. Cheers! Talk soon.

Yours Truly Presents: Tennis "Pigeon" from Yours Truly on Vimeo.