whiskeysherpa:

Whiskey Sherpa - 2011 by whiskeysherpa

Who said anything about “best”? These are the songs we liked most from 2011. They’re the songs we played twice before leaving the house, the hooks we sang while biking, the requests we shouted out too loudly at the end of a show, even though you know they were gonna play it as the encore anyway. If we were a couple minutes late meeting you out, it was because we were just listening to one more song — and it was one of these.

So here’s to 2011, the first year of Whiskey Sherpa. Thanks for the laughs, dudes.

photo by Cassandra Nguyen

~Andy, Orr, and Drew

The Weeknd - House of Balloons/Glass Table Girls (snippet)
Elite Gymnastics - Omamori
Grimes - Vanessa
M83 - Midnight City
Youth Lagoon - Cannons
Gardens & Villa - Orange Blossom
Erik Gundel - You Brought Joy
tUnE-yArDs - Bizness
Ford & Lopatin - Joey Rogers
Balam Acab - Oh, Why
Holy Other - Touch
Yellow Ostrich - Libraries
Sonny and the Sunsets - Girls Beware
Girls - Honey Bunny
Bobby Chiz - Brooklyn Mouth
Pure X - Easy
Cass McCombs - County Line

And, since we can never agree about anything, here’s our top records of the year, by your individual sherpas.

Andy:
Personally, I thought 2011 was great. I can think of at least 20 more albums i could have easily included in this list. It seemed to be all about cut-and-paste, genre-busting, collage pop this year. The music was weird, but that seems to be what we were looking for. There were plenty of nods to musical styles of the past. Though, what seemed to grab everyone’s attention were the nods to the future.

Destroyer - Kaputt
John Maus - We Must Become the Pitiless Censors of Ourselves
Clams Casino - Instrumental Mixtape
Real Estate - Days
Pure X - Pleasure
Ford & Lopatin - Channel Pressure
Elite Gymnastics - Ruin
Gang Gang Dance - Eye Contact
The Weeknd - House of Balloons
Kurt Vile - Smoke Ring For My Halo

Orr:
I hate forcing my favorite records into a strict order, as if the #4 album of the year somehow won more points than #7, but goddamn if EMA’s “Past Life Martyred Saints” didn’t jump out of every list I scribbled and threw out. Not only is it a bunch of good songs (and a collection of distortion-as-art that scratches every weird itch), but it’s a near-perfect album album, draped over three movements — three long, slow-building songs that are composed of dramatic elements themselves. It also just rocks, with guitars. Take it how you want it, there’s enough life packed into this record to last a year.

1. EMA - Past Life Martyred Saints

The Antlers - Burst Apart
Balam Acab - See Birds EP
Blackout Beach - Fuck Death
Deleted Scenes - Young People’s Church of the Air
Destroyer - Kaputt
Gang Gang Dance - Eye Contact
Mutual Benefit / Holy Spirits - Mutual Spirits (split 12”)
Peaking Lights - 936
tUnE-yArDs - w h o k i l l
Woods - Sun and Shade
Wye Oak - Civilian

Drew:
2011 was a great year for sophomore albums. Tune Yards, Sonny and the Sunnsets, Guadalupe Plata, Yellow Ostrich and Mayer Hawthorne all released stellar second albums to build on great debuts. Some great new releases from a few reliable sources, and funky debuts from new arrivals like Gardens & Villa and Delicate Steve rounded out a 2011 that sounded great and bodes well for the future.

Sonny and the Sunsets - Hit After Hit
tUnE-yArDs - w h o k i l l
White Denim - D
Blitzen Trapper - American Goldwing
Gardens & Villa - Gardens & Villa
Guadalupe Plata - Guadalupe Plata
Destroyer - Kaputt
Mayer Hawthorne - How Do You Do
Yellow Ostrich - The Mistress
Delicate Steve - Wondervisions