Altered Zones

As 2010 draws to an close, Altered Zones brings you its collective year-end recap. Today, we list our favorite tracks of the year, with favorite albums due tomorrow. You can also check our list of the year's favorite music videos here, and don't forget to stay tuned through the holiday break for daily year-end mixtapes from our favorite artists.

Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti: "Round and Round" [4AD]

MP3: Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti: "Round and Round"

Balam Acab: "See Birds" [Tri Angle]

MP3: Balam Acab: "See Birds (Moon)"

In a year when many artists explored the meaning of image and identity in an age of faceless, over-abundant information, Balam Acab was initially lumped in with a wave of internet-dwelling producers who put more weight on artifice and presentation than substance. "See Birds" (and the ensuing EP) quickly dusted off any scene associations, and distinguished itself by actually owning a deep-rooted, intoxicating groove. From the triplet sway and watery reverb of the beat, to the the ghostly keyboard stabs, to the feedbacking, echoing sample that drives it, "See Birds" stood out by employing dub for it's sonic palette. Its use of vocal samples as an independent instrument rather than a reference, besides resulting in one of the years most bizarrely memorable "hooks," also strips it of any sense of irony, coming off rather like a heartfelt transmission from someone who, at the moment, would really rather be left in the shadows. --Noam Klar

Baby Jazz: "Michael Jordan" [self-released]

MP3: Baby Jazz: "Michael Jordan"

Baby Jazz's very first track, "Michael Jordan" is a 12-minute megamix collaboration between Golden Chow (Samuel Cooper of Sunglasses) and Teen Wolfe (Elgin Braden of Aux Arc). The track starts with a cacophony of angular, glitchy samples and reversed female harmonies. But after 80 seconds of rising and waning sonic patterns-- usually lost the moment they are grasped-- a beat finally organizes the chaos. From there on in, Baby Jazz skips from genre to genre and sample to sample like a mini pop culture role call of feel-good cues. We hear Chris Tucker screaming on the phone in Rush Hour, some rando screaming "NOBODY TURNS DOWN DRUGS", orgasms, and the intro to Dolly Parton's "Don't Drop Out". A hilarious and joyful musical rendition of my YouTube history. --Ric Leichtung

Blondes: "You Mean So Much to Me" [Merok]

MP3: Blondes: "You Mean So Much To Me"

Along with Teengirl Fantasy, Brooklyn electronic duo Blondes pretty much led the pack this year in re-envisioning the electronic music pioneers of the 20th century as music the rock kids could get down to. “You Mean So Much To Me,” the  9-minute opener of the duo's Touched EP, sounds like something Juan Atkins, E2-E4-era Manuel Göttsching, and Cluster might come up with if they convened for a late-night bump-and-grind on an autobahn ride to nowhere. Sam Haar and Zachary whisper synth ribbons and ethereal vocal samples into a delicate cymbal patter until they unleash the eternal techno 4/4. You can read it as an invitation to dance or permission to sink deeper into your beanbag; either way, it's proof that the millennial generation is making headway on a new, glitch-free strain of intelligent dance music. --Emilie Friedlander

Dead Gaze: "Take Me Home or I Die Alone" [Fire Talk]

MP3: Dead Gaze: "Take Me Home Or I Die Alone"

Cole Furlow, aka Dead Gaze, has been churning out one fantastic jam after another this year, but few tracks anywhere have struck me the way this one does. Through the first half, Furlow sounds like he's pleading with someone. More importantly, it sounds like he really means it. As the track progresses, the song gets brighter, leaving us to believe that someone must have finally taken him home. --Jheri Evans

Games: "Planet Party" [Hippos in Tanks]

MP3: Games: "Planet Party"

It's been nine months since Games first arrived via "Planet Party." Needless to say, a lot has happened since, but the original genus for the duo's work still holds true. "Planet Party" is a diabolical excursion into midi-funk through the backdoors of our collective computer love, culling our internal memory for sampled bits and progenerated synth scapes. If there was ever a definitive sound of the past year, and counterpoint to "proto-chillwave," this was it. --Michael McGregor

Girl Unit: "Wut" [Night Slugs]

MP3: Girl Unit: "Wut"

Counting local club producers such as Mosca, Kingdom, and label founders L-Vis 1990 and Bok Bok among its ranks, the artist collective and upstart UK label Night Slugs had one of the most influential and consistent runs of releases this year, presenting an assimilated and innovative take on UK bass music. Girl Unit's "Wut" was easily its defining moment, in which the disparate elements of Southern rap, electro, grime and Baltimore club crystallized into one bold, forceful statement of intent. With its 7-minute sprawl and cyclical structure, the track oozes confident craft, coming in with a deceptively innocuous melody, before dropping a down-tempo bombshell of sub bass, air horns and pitch-shifted cries over a backing of buzzy, minor synth chords. --Noam Klar

Greatest Hits: "Danse Pop" [Olde English Spelling Bee]

MP3: Greatest Hits: "Danse Pop"

Greatest Hits lives up to their name. "Danse Pop" is a brief two minutes of sheer danceable ecstasy. The song wastes no time kicking into place and immediately has you sliding every which way across the hardwood floor. Just don't slip when it's all greased with the sweat of everyone else unable to contain this groove. --Jheri Evans

Hotel Mexico: "Its Twinkle" [Second Royal]

You can't not love the "Love Gun"-inspired riff that opens "Its Twinkle" by Japan's Hotel Mexico. But there's more to this song than that killer, 4-second, descending shredder of a hook. Layer upon layer of guitar, bass, samples, and tambourines build on that riff, as other melodic parts come in and out of focus like the phase of two droning tones. A soft falsetto emerges from the busy instrumental tapestry, changing the sonic climate with an added sense of fragility. The initial reason-- the "hot riff"-- that made you fall in love with "It's Twinkle" fades into the background. --Ric Leichtung

James Blake: "CMYK" [R&S]

MP3: James Blake: "CMYK"

A close relative of the cut-and-paste R&B hook Deadboy worked into his devastating "U Cheated," James Blake’s ubiquitous "CMYK" begins in a far more delicate fashion, before overwhelming with a 2-step wave at the drop. Starting with the notes on a synth falling like water in a fiendish Morse pattern of drops, you can’t help but be lulled into a moment of stillness before the fuzzy wall of sound hits. "CMYK" is so restless that its vocal snippets slip in and out of time, rushing around the track like echoes of its own past and future pitched forward and back before the energy of the whole collapses in on itself. --d

Nice Face: "I Want Your Damage" [Sacred Bones]

MP3: Nice Face: "I Want Your Damage"

Nice Face, the madcap bedroom project of Brooklyn’s Ian Magee, has been channeling some serious hyperactivity since he started self-releasing his first cassettes and singles back in 2008. “I Want Your Damage,” our favorite of the pint-sized psych-rock stompers that made it onto his Immer Etwas LP this year, combines the fuzzed assault of Wooden Shjips, Purrling Hiss, et al. with the off-color zaniness of the B-52s. We're psyched to hear someone actually rock out over a drum machine, and can thank Nice Face for the kind reminder that precision and lo-fi values are by no means mutually exclusive. --Emilie Friedlander

oOoOO: "NoSummr4U" [Disaro]

MP3: oOoOO: "NoSummr4U"

Though this year saw music's darker retreats illuminated by the likes of Salem, Nike7UP and Stalker, San Franciscan producer oOoOO conjured the most poignant image of C21st cultural pollution. His self-titled EP, released in autumn by Tri Angle Records, is a beguiling, obsessive collection of possessed pop poltergeists that may be veiled in an unsettling gothic sparseness, but still burn effervescent at the core with pure melodic feeling. Non-EP track "Nosummr4U" is the best gateway into the sensual shadow-world of oOoOo, though. Its disembodied lullaby hooks and super-sleazy soft-metal guitar shredding is simultaneously alienating and enrapturing. --Jack Shankly

Pure Ecstasy: "Voices" [Acephale]

MP3: Pure Ecstasy: "Voices"

In the past year I've gone from seeing Pure Ecstasy in the back parking lot of an Ethiopian restaurant on a dismal, cold night in Austin to the background music on an advertisement with a pale, stumbling Kate Moss-type. Both fit them perfectly. The understated-ness of this band must not be, well, understated. "Voices" is rife with blown-out blue notes and phantasmic guitar tones, backed by softened vocals which sometimes stretch out in love-lost angst. With its simple but steadfast lyrics, Pure Ecstasy's "Voices" reminds us that you dont have to be a TS Eliot to be affective. --Ryan Ellis

Salem: "King Night" [IAMSOUND]

MP3: Salem: "King Night"

When it hit the blogosphere last June, Salem’s “King Night” felt BIG. Huge, even. In fact, it sounded like these Chicago enfant terribles were trying to pull us out of the muddy highway ditch that their Water EP had dumped us into just a few months earlier. Setting aside the half-hearted white-boy rhymes and syrup-slow siren calls for a minute, Salem shocked us with a sample that seemed to be the electronic trio's antithesis: a heavenly, full-choir rendition of the Christmas carol “O Holy Night”, which speaks of a coming savior, and is bound to evoke the starry-eyed rapture of your elementary school Christmas pageant. Six months ahead of season, “King Night” set its source material to paper-thin beats and a bassline so blown-out it made you check to see if your speakers were broken. It was hyperbolic, a bit tacky, and almost tragically optimistic. --Emilie Friedlander

Teengirl Fantasy: "Cheaters" [True Panther]

MP3: Teengirl Fantasy: "Cheaters"

On "Cheaters", Ohio duo Teengirl Fantasy explore the more interesting peripheries of house and dance music, rather than these genres' more central, crowd-pleasing elements. As a result, the track feels like a careful distillation of all those subtle pulsations, innate rhythmic shifts, and density of sound that make the club such a good place to be. The vocal source material, culled from Love Committee's 70s R&B cut "Cheaters Never Win", appropriately swirls like some pained smoke-machine spirit through all of this anti-banger's small gaps. --Shea Bermingham

Teen Inc.: "Fountains" [self-released]

MP3: Teen Inc.: "Fountains"

Teen Inc. found something special this Spring in the super-smooth sound of fusion and funk. "Fountains" comes off super epic and endlessly groovy, a supreme trip through wobbly synthesizer, slapbass, and plaintive falsetto. Perhaps part of the reason this song has bounced around so much in my head (and in my iTunes) is because of the unfortunately small sample size of Teen Inc.'s catalog: two songs, one solitary, self-released 7" record. However, give me an LP full of this sound on a long drive any day and I guarantee you'll see a satisfied dude. Fingers crossed for something similar to this fantasy in 2011. --Ian Nelson

Tjutjuna: "Mosquito Hawk" [Fire Talk]

Ty Segall: "My Sunshine" [Goner]

MP3: Ty Segall: "My Sunshine"

I don’t think there’s a single other track that I’ve listened to more than “My Sunshine” this year. Ty takes his signature garage-pop and toughens it with a dose of classic 90’s grunge brilliance. The song tears itself apart, screams till it's hoarse, and then snaps back into place; always on the edge of self-destruction but never ceding to the crush of its own noise. It's songs like this that make me wish that the spirit of '91 was still alive on the radio waves. Were it only a few decades earlier, this one would have every kid in the country howling along in their bedrooms. --Andy French

Vacant Lots: "Confusion" [Ancient Hills Music]

MP3: The Vacant Lots: "Confusion"

The "psych" tag has been getting thrown around pretty arbitrarily recently (day-glo hypnogogia?), but in the classic sense, it could hardly apply more than it does to the Vacant Lots. "Confusion", one a handful of absolute burners from this Burlington duo, doesn't aim for any vast imaginary worlds (though it does nod to some monolithic/prog-temple vibes), instead preferring a dopesmoking hypnosis and half-disquieting/half-cozy drug-rug nostalgia borne of teenage garage jam thrills and more acquired tastes for drone and minimal guitar mesmerics. --Richard MacFarlane

WU LYF: "Heavy Pop" [self-released]

MP3: WU LYF: "Heavy Pop"

It's refreshing to hear such genuine, visceral soul on this out-of-nowhere hit from mysterious Mancunian outfit WU LYF. Such rawness and emotion tends to be absent from a lot of contemporary leftfield pop, but "Heavy Pop" stays true to its namesake, trudging through continual set-backs and triumphs, drum-rolls, guitar chimes, and gravel-throated howls. The climax comes in the form of a rambunctious, exhausted collapse; fitting of a track so emotionally invested, and as a result, so gloriously draining. --Shea Bermingham

In the last several years, there's been an explosion of small-scale DIY music. Altered Zones is a team of 14 music blogs dedicated to exploring these emerging musical worlds, traversing genres from psych and drone to electronic and underground pop. Our mission is to highlight the most notable and adventurous new artists, and to serve as a focal point for the flood of creativity coming from deep within the music underground.

To launch the site, we've each chosen one favorite track, cassette, and album. from the first half of this year. Over the past two days, we've covered tracks and cassettes, and today, we feature albums. Our regular posting schedule begins Monday. We hope you enjoy reading and listening.

Welcome to Altered Zones.

Memoryhouse: The Years EP

Delicious Scopitone says:
In all our internet meandering, endlessly seeking those rare extra-terrestrial sounds born of hearts and minds weighed down by unique talent, one band in particular confirmed this year that all the effort is worthwhile. Whenever we're ready to throw in the towel and convince ourselves that all our time spent trawling is utterly pointless, we remind ourselves of the sumptuous beauty of Memoryhouse. First hearing Deniese Nouvion's bewitching voice on the Guelph, Ontario band's transversal, heavenly dream-pop demos felt like reason for marvellous new hope. Receiving the fully-realised Years EP was more a case of consecration.

MP3: Memoryhouse: Lately (Deuxieme)

The Years EP is available for free download at Arcade Sounds Ltd.

Teen Daze - Four More Years EP

The Road Goes Ever On says:
The eight songs featured on Teen Daze’s debut album, Four More Years, are a neon wash of samples and synths. In "Shine On You Crazy White Cap," the line "let's drive to the coastline tonight" glistens against heavy bass, beckoning to the tide and warmer places. The entire album exudes this warmth, making it an ideal collection of songs for today and the rest of the summer. With a delicate mixture of hazy synthetic effects and more traditional instruments, Four More Years is a debut that proves Teen Daze's ear for balance and positions him as an artist whose creations leave you wanting to hear more and more.

MP3: Teen Daze: Shine On, You Crazy White Cap

Four More Years is out soon on vinyl on Arcade Sound Ltd.

Skeletal System: Skeletal System EP

20 Jazz Funk Greats says:
It's strange to think of something arriving, without warning, quite as perfectly formed as this. No label involvement, no svengali. A 5-track EP sitting there, for the world to download, perfectly judged artwork and all.

"Dialogue" is the hook, sounding like Galaxie 500 reformed and signed to Hyperdub. The other delights on the self-titled EP reveal themselves more slowly, like a cold fog engulfing the wharfs of the band's San Francisco home. Primitive cold-wave tendrils arch their way through the mournful post-punk guitar and dream-pop vocals, giving them an electronic base from which to launch evocations of post-millennial dub and echoing house.

MP3: Skeletal System: Dialogue

Skeletal Systems is available for

free download on Bandcamp

The Samps: The Samps EP

Transparent says:
We've been lost deep in the grid-locked, sweltering partyscapes of The Samps' eponymous debut EP for a good moment now, and escape does not seem imminent, so densely packed are its six tracks of warped porno-funk and red-light retro-futurist boogie. Promoting the same white suit, top-down, purple haze AM fantasy as buddy Ariel Pink, Cole Neill and co. have put a magnet to the circuits of main-room house, techno, and disco and come up with a fried, haywire hijacking of modern dance music full of sleazy promise, woozy groove and, most vitally, illicitly good fun.

MP3: The Samps: FXNC

The Samps is out now on Mexican Summer

Big K.R.I.T.: K.R.I.T. Wuz Here

Yours Truly says:
What sets Big K.R.I.T. apart from every other emcee breathing on a beat? Maybe it’s those home-cooked canvases-- born in his bedroom in Meridian, Mississippi-- brimming with soulful samples, live instrumentation, and patience beyond his 23 years. Maybe it’s his voice, slow and low, drenched in drawl, refreshing as a glass of sweet tea. Maybe it’s his honesty; the kind that comes from feeling completely at home in one’s skin; the kind that lets him write about his grandma, his contradictions, faith, relationships and fears without a filter. This unfiltered integrity-- the courage to be truly transparent-- is actually wildly experimental for a genre that expects masks. K.R.I.T. Wuz Here succeeds at setting a new precedent for southern rappers to do something truly innovative: be themselves.

MP3: Big K.R.I.T.: Country Shit

K.R.I.T. Wuz Here is available for free download on DJBooth.net

Lindstrom & Christabelle: Real Life Is No Cool

Friendship Bracelet says:
I didn't really get into Lindstrom until last year, when, after constant recommendations from a friend, it finally clicked for me. His recent work with Prins Thomas is fantastic, but it’s the sugary disco of Real Life Is No Cool that I find myself revisiting time and time again, hanging on every sultry vocal that spills from Christabelle's lips. As the title suggests, this album is made for escape from grim day-to-day sexualised hyper-reality to a place where fashion is luxurious and the drinks are straight.

MP3: Lindstrom & Christabelle: Lovesick

Real Life Is No Cool is out now on Smalltown Supersound

Pocahaunted: Make It Real

Get Off the Coast says:
Over the last year I've become a huge fan of Pocahaunted's music. Their weirdo vibes, woven into beautiful tribal-sounding journeys, never fail to entrance me, and Make It Real is no exception. The addition of several new members on the album results in countless warped dimensions, with the band at times slipping into fractured planes of existence. The entire album is a desert space odyssey, fueled by hallucinogens and filled with dark magics that stir your spirits into a frenzied beat.

MP3: Pocahaunted: Make It Real

Make It Real is out now on Not Not Fun

Nice Face: Immer Etwas

Raven Sings the Blues says:
It’s hard not to love a band bestowed with one of life’s greatest insults as a name. I’ve been following Nice Face since some early Sacred Bones singles piqued my interest with their decomposed garage covers and tar-lunged originals. Then Immer Etwas came along and shredded everything Ian Magee had previously laid to tape. From slow-crawl, motorik-beat-laden creepers to explosive fuzz-punk, Nice Face cover a lot of territory on Immer Etwas, avoiding the sound rut that can sometimes plague lo-fi’s current crop. The addition of seasick keys and spiraling guitar effects, paired with some true hooks buried under the evil veneer, lift the album to classic status.

MP3: Nice Face: I Want Your Damage

Immer Etwas is out now on Sacred Bones

White Fence: White Fence

Weekly Tape Deck says:
While best recognized for his work as the frontman for Darker My Love (and as the background singer for The Strange Boys), it’s Tim Presley’s solo exploits that have been keeping our phono needles busy. His debut under the moniker White Fence is absolute ramshackle-scatterbrain-chaos, revealing an equal affinity for the acid-soaked psychedelia of Syd-era Floyd and the noise-caked post-punk of The Fall (see Reformation Post TLC). Even while traversing a wide variety of moods and personalities, this kaleidoscopic LP is masterfully complete, and an understated portrait of the savvy genius behind it.

MP3: White Fence: I'll Follow You

White Fence is out now on Make a Mess

Herbcraft: Herbcraft Discovers the Biter Water of Agartha

Chocolate Bobka says:
The vibration of life, a quiet rumination buried deep beneath tectonic plates, is 7.8 beats per second. It's inaudible to most, though some sense it in the knees. Much like this vibration, the fractal textures of Herbcraft Discovers the Bitter Water of Agartha are not easily heard by all. But those willing to drift in and explore Herbcraft’s glowing world are rewarded with rustic ragas and melodic noise dirges, proving him to be a real being in nature. They cull the Earth’s roots, creating a dense spectrum more akin to the ancient landscapes of Arcadia than the pointless architecture of the 21st century.

MP3: Herbcraft: Road to Agartha

Herbcraft Discovers the Bitter Water of Agartha is out now on Hello Sunshine, and available at Woodsist (limited to 500)

Rangers: Suburban Tours

Gorilla vs. Bear says:
Suburban Tours, the stellar debut LP from former TX resident Joe Knight (aka Rangers), immediately struck a chord for me, given that the record essentially plays out like a hazy sonic projection of youth spent in the endless DFW suburban sprawl that Knight and I both called home as kids in the '80s. Knight's "elevator psyche" evokes an affecting, very real nostalgia for childhood moments, all faded grade-school film-strips and late night bike excursions through cookie-cutter 'hoods, at once comforting and kind of sad.

MP3: Rangers: Bel Air

Suburban Tours is out now on Olde English Spelling Bee

Sun Araw: On Patrol

Visitation Rites says:
According to Sun Araw’s website, On Patrol is an “application of the philosophies of Heavy Deeds,” a process of moving from thought into action. And as hard it is to ascribe thought to sound-- let alone practical advice on how to live the good life-- Sun Araw’s latest full-length will add a swagger to the step of anyone who has ever wandered our concrete jungles without a destination. Each beat is a new step forward, each scorched guitar line and flyaway word a reminder that that you have to see the street lamps and sign posts in double and triple before you can understand why they’re there. On Patrol elevates the aesthetics of dub to a creed, and delay is the new Hallelujah.

MP3: Sun Araw: Ma Holo

On Patrol is out now on Not Not Fun (limited to 500)

James Ferraro: Feed Me

Rose Quartz says:
Since we caught Ferraro's homemade VHS camcorder movies of Hollywood Boulevard in May-- featuring gross TV dinners, stop-motion skulls, and MTV punks-- he's been ripping it with muzak way more schizoid than even before, riding new transient and alien frequencies. These shorter pop experiments are distinct and nightmarish (but also super fun) responses to our mainstream culture, mirroring its repetitions in delightfully gunk-filled FM absurdism. There are plenty of SNES and cartoon memories slotted in trebly loops, but those weird nostalgias flash by faster than ever here, as though there were never time to remember them properly in the first place.

MP3: James Ferraro: Feed Me (Excerpt)

Feed Me is out now on CD-R via MuscleWorks, and available at Olde English Spelling Bee