The Sauced Bulletin

All right people, we’re nearing the end of our struggle.  “What struggle?” you might ask.  Why, the one we’ve been engaged in since early December:  systematically categorizing and ranking an entire year’s worth of music until we arrive at the music that was THE BEST.  And this week we will find out just which 10 albums were better than all the other ones, at least according to The Sauced Bulletin (which, you know, is pretty definitive).  Are you as excited as I am!?!?  Because I’m so excited I can barely type straight!

BUT, that’s not what we’re doing today.  Before we give you our Top 10 Albums of 2011 list, we need to talk about a few records that just barely didn’t make the cut.  These ones were so close, oh soooooooo very close to being in there.  In fact, all of them were in our top 10 at different points in the year, but were then pushed out as we approached the end and the decisions became tougher and tougher.  They’re not in any specific order, o don’t view them as numbers 15-11, but they probably would have been in some capacity!

So just enjoy this short list, check out some songs, and come back TOMORROW for The List of All Lists:  The Sauced Bulletin’s Top 10 Albums of 2011, which will be accompanied by a 2-hour televised list-revealing EVENT, to be simulcast on all major TV networks!

Ceremonials by Florence + the Machine

For the follow-up to her arena-ready, batshit crazy debut, Lungs, Florence Welch made the logical choice:  to go BIGGER.  Ceremonials is probably the year’s most unabashedly huge album, each song coming at you with guns blazing.  And by guns I pretty much just mean Florence’s incredible voice.  But that’s not to say the band doesn’t do some heavy lifting of it’s own, just check out how hard they rock on the epic “What the Water Gave Me”.  Infinitely more interesting than Adele in terms of songwriting and presentation, Florence + the Machine showed the world that they mean business with this one.

Slave Ambient by The War On Drugs

 Prior to this record I had kind of forgotten about The War On Drugs.  But, the “Barrel of Batteries” EP had earned them enough goodwill in my book to warrant a listen to their new release, and Slave Ambient  ended up surprising me like few other albums this year.  Each song moves forward with such momentum that the beats seem unstoppable, the riffs seem inevitable, and the lyrics seem to blend into each other as Adam Granduciel lets loose a slew of mental images, truly earning all those Dylan comparisons.  With everything awash in a pleasant lo-fi haze, it makes sense that Kurt Vile once called this band his home.  One of the truly underrated albums of 2011.  Check out standout track “Come to the City” here.

Zonoscope by Cut Copy

The third effort from Australia’s premier electro-dance act doesn’t carry quite the same amount of OH MY GOD THIS IS THE BEST THING EVER sugar-rush excitement that In Ghost Colours did, but it remains head and shoulders above just about every other album of its kind this year.   With tracks like the stellar opener “Need You Now”, and glam stomper “Where I’m Going” nobody gets a party going quite like Cut Copy.  And hey, since LCD Soundsystem called it quits, somebody’s gotta step up to claim James Murphy’s disco ball-encrusted rave throne.  Cut Copy seem like just the band for the job.

Past Life Martyred Saints by EMA

 I have to admit that, for most of the year, I was afraid of this album.  Every review I read described it with words like “intense”, “harrowing”, “lacerating”, or “emotionally devastating”.  Let’s just say that I wasn’t quite in the mood for all of that this year.  But my curiosity had been piqued, and somewhere during the fall it became too much.  I manned up and decided to give EMA’s debut a listen.  I will forever be glad that I did.  Erika M. Anderson crates haunting, confounding music; simultaneously abrasive and beautiful.  Whether she’s speak-singing stream of consciousness bile on “California”, or whispering in your ear on the 7-minute opener “The Grey Ship”, she’s nothing less than captivating.  There are moments on this album when you’ll want to rock out, moments when you’ll want to punch someone in the face, and moments when you’ll just want to break down.  But by the time the cathartic stomp of “Red Star” fades out, there’s no denying that you’ve had an experience.

Smoke Ring For My Halo by Kurt Vile

The man with the best name in rock decided to follow up the strangely alluring Childish Prodigy with the even stranger, densely atmospheric Smoke Ring For My Halo, which turns out to be his best record yet.  Vile shows off his formidable chops on songs like the gorgeous, finger-picked opener “Baby’s Arms”, as well as his pop craftsmanship on the immediately catchy “Jesus Fever”.  He manages to do all of this while still sounding like he either just woke up, or he’s extraordinarily bored with the whole enterprise.  But the care taken in crafting the album as a whole, arranging the songs into an affecting, sumptuous whole, shows that Kurt Vile isn’t bored at all.  He’s just so good he can act like he’s not trying.

So there they are, your 2011 Honorable Mentions.  Great job everybody!  But now let’s all get ready for the big show.  Tomorrow.  The Top 10 Albums of 2011.  See you there!