Jeff Mangum came out of hiding to officially release some brilliant old tracks from the archives, Keaton Henson put out an achingly powerful single from 2010′s self-released Dear…, and a lot of deaf music reviewers shit on The Strokes latest collection of songs (except for us, of course). 2011 welcomed back our all-time favorite artists and introduced us to new favorites. Narrowing down the year’s best was especially difficult this time around, but here is our very biased list of 25 favorite tracks from 2011 (give the page a minute to load the embedded clips):
1. Neutral Milk Hotel – “Ferris Wheel on Fire”
2. Keaton Henson – “You Don’t Know How Lucky You Are”
3. The Strokes – “Machu Picchu”
4. Feersum Ennjin – “Hate The Sun”
5. Modeselektor – “Pretentious Friends”
6. HEALTH – “Goth Star (Pictureplane cover)”
7. Tapes ‘n Tapes – “Nightfall”
8. M83 – “Midnight City”
9. SONOIO – “Enough”
10. Radiohead – “Codex”
11. Panda Bear – “Alsatian Darn”
12. Keaton Henson – “Strawbear”
13. The Antlers – “Every Night My Teeth Are Falling Out”
14. The Strokes – “Taken For A Fool”
15. M+A – “Liko Lene Lisa”
16. Tapes ‘n Tapes – “Badaboom”
17. Modeselektor – “Grillwalker”
18. The Horrors – “Still Life”
19. Saul Williams – “Triumph”
20. Amanda Palmer – “Map Of Tasmania”
21. Atlas Sound – “Mona Lisa”
22. Adebisi Shank – “Century City”
23. Puscifer – “Monsoons”
24. Battles – “Ice Cream”
25. Givers – “Noche Nada”
Over the last two months, Amanda Palmer (Dresden Dolls) has been rehearsing with her old high school’s drama department and theater director. The production is called With The Needle That Sings In Her Heart and is inspired by the Neutral Milk Hotel masterpiece “In The Aeroplane Over The Sea.” It’s not completely certain what Palmer’s role is, but from the information gathered it looks like she will be both playing music for and appearing in the play.