Like the best homeland-inspired albums, there was an uneasy sense of patriotism about PJ Harvey's 8th studio album, even as it recounted in gory detail our horrible history ("I've seen and done things I want to forget/I've seen soldiers fall like lumps of meat"). Complemented perfectly by spine-tingling musical arrangements (just how disarming is that bugle on The Glorious Land?) and Harvey's pleading vocals, it was the pick of the crop from what's been a fine year for British music, and the most deserved Mercury Music prize winner since, oh, yeah, 2000's Stories From The City, Stories From The Sea.
Anthony Gonzalez hasn't exactly shied away from sounding "epic" in recent times, but on his latest, maybe greatest work, he made the most unashamedly huge album of the year. Doffing its cap to like-minded works of bloated majesty such as Mellon Collie & The Infinite Sadness, this was an album where no Phil Collins-sized drum fill was too much, no synth too stadium-sized, no child's choir (or child's ode to a frog) too cringe-inducing. That he pulled it off so effortlessly is testament to the heart and soul embodied in his work, and perhaps in part to a clutch of quite astonishing songs like Midnight City, Claudia Lewis and Ok Pal.
On the fringes of the Canadian indie scene for so long, despite his involvement with the New Pornographers, Dan Bejar finally hit the (relative) big-time with this soft-rock monolith. As self-referential as ever, but tuning down his usual verbosity, Bejar played the lounge lizard, whispering sweet-nothings in your ear whilst indulging in a mixture of cocaine and champagne, all to luxuriant layers of sax and suave new-wave synth. Brilliant and, just in case you missed it first time around, the phenomenal 11-minute suite Bay Of Pigs was thrown in for good measure too.
In some parallel, better adjusted universe, House Jam from 2008's Saint Dymphna scored GGD a huge hit. In that same universe, Eye Contact is their ascent to mega-stardom. Vocalist Liz Bougatsos was pitched front-and-centre on Eye Contact, and she embraced the role, cooing over the sensual likes of Romance Layers and Adult Goth, whilst the madcap rave of Mindkilla and sticky sweetness of Chinese High demonstrated how the Brooklyn experimentalists had sharpened their pop talons. But it was over the 12 achingly constructed minutes of Glass Jar that GGD joined the likes of Animal Collective as one of those rare bands whose increasing accessibility goes hand in hand with an ever-expanding sound.
1. Fucked Up - David Comes To LifeFor a band who started out with a heady stream of 7" releases, a concept-heavy double album (further fleshed out by a limited edition album, David's Town, a compilation of singles by made-up British 60's bands, all actually variations of Fucked Up) would appear to be the very anithesis of their original MO. But the reason this album rings so true is that it simply refuses to get bogged down in its (admittedly absurd) story, and instead concentrates on stuffing every last one of its 18 songs with an embarassment of big guitar hooks and gooey backing vocals, making them all major ear-worms despite (sometimes even because of) David "Pink Eyes" Abraham's call-to-arms screams. With Abraham casting doubts over his future role in FU, the Toronto-based band's future looks uncertain, but by casting the multi-layered guitar sound of 2008's The Chemistry of Common Life to the immediacy of their earlier work, they couldn't have possibly come up with a better career summary than this.
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