Year in Music, 2012 edition.

I’ll keep this short. My notable albums of the year (in alphabetical order) were:

• `Alleluia! Don’t Bend! Ascend! by Godspeed You! Black Emperor
• Bloom by Beach House
• Channel Orange by Frank Ocean
• The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do by Fiona Apple
• Lonerism by Tame Impala
• Old Ideas by Leonard Cohen
• Shields by Grizzly Bear
• Swing Lo Magellan by Dirty Projectors

It was a bit of a strange year in that no album felt earth-shakingly landmark, though who can really say how these albums will fare over time. If I had to pick a favourite one, it would probably be Swing Lo Magellan, because I can envision listening to that one for a long, long time, though most of these albums have been really quite fantastic.

Also don’t miss:

• Attack on Memory by Cloud Nothings
• Bish Bosch by Scott Walker
• Clear Moon by Mount Eerie
• Confess by Twin Shadow
• Ekstasis by Julia Holter
• Gossamer by Passion Pit
• The Haunted Man by Bat For Lashes
• Mature Themes by Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti
• Shrines by Purity Ring
• Until the Quiet Comes by Flying Lotus

And a special imaginary award goes to Atoms For Peace’s “Default”, which probably got the most playtime on my computer this year despite its relatively young age.

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Dirty Projectors announce About to Die EP.

Dirty Projectors have announced a new EP, titled About to Die. The title is, of course, taken from the track in their latest album Swing Lo Magellan. It will feature said track and three new songs. [via Consequence of Sound]

There’s also a new video for “About to Die”, featuring footage from the short film Hi Custodian. [via YouTube]

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Hi Custodian.

Watch the Dirty Projectors short film Hi Custodian (with music from Swing Lo Magellan) right now. [via YouTube] It is directed by David Longstreth and is extremely pretty.

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Rojak: Bumper edition.

Rojak is a regular collection of assorted links as well as a bulletin summarising the week (or thereabouts) on this blog.

Hello, good morning, and welcome to an especially big edition of Rojak, since we took the weekend off last week.

Before we get started, here’s some music from Cloud Nothings as you read. [via YouTube]

Assorted

On Anne Carson’s Antigonick. [via Time’s Flow Stemmed]

Interview with Dirty Projectors, whose latest album Swing Lo Magellan is quite magnificent. [via Pitchfork]

On that topic, Alex Ross listens to Dirty Projectors too. [via Alex Ross: The Rest Is Noise]

A Stephen Collins comic. [via The Guardian]

“I believe in them and the music that they will make. I love Girls and I always will. That faith overshadows the pain of saying goodbye with the eagerness to say hello, to whatever future is to come.” Saying goodbye to Girls. [via True Panther]

You can read the whole of G.K. Chesterton’s The Man Who Was Thursday online. [via Conversational Reading]

Kafka’s torture machine from In the Penal Colony. [via A Piece of Monologue]

This is the first I’ve heard of new editions of Julio Cortázar’s Blow-Up and Hopscotch comingfrom Pantheon. [via JACKET MECHANICAL]

Photographs of Lucian Freud go on sale. [via The Telegraph]

tUnE-yArDs’ African Music Mix. [via Pitchfork]

The upcoming Flying Lotus LP, Until the Quiet Comes, features Thom Yorke on a track. [via Consequence of Sound] I remember reading that Jonny Greenwood would feature on another track as well, but I’ve lost the link.

John Gray vs. Slavoj Žižek. [via A Piece of Monologue]

Bulletin

The main feature was last week’s quick impression piece on The Dark Knight Rises.

Also on WKLC this past fortnight:

• Ernst Lubitsch.
• Edouard Levé.
• Clarice Lispector.
• Anne Carson.
• The Man Booker longlist.
• Ultraísta.
• Flea.
• Bob Dylan.

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Rojak: “Last time it was a melancholy hillock.”

Rojak is a regular collection of assorted links as well as a bulletin summarising the week (or thereabouts) on this blog.

Assorted

Presumably Borges’ last recorded words in English. [via The American Scholar]

Pitchfork’s review of Fiona Apple’s The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do. [via Pitchfork]

David Lynch and painting. [YouTube, via A Piece of Monologue]

Text messages from drunk authors. [via The Paris Review]

Dirty Projectors on Fallon. [via Stereogum]

What a lovely photo. [via daily dose of imagery]

Bulletin

This week on WKLC:

• Heather Cleary and Sergio Chejfec.
• Chris Andrews.
• Quim Monzó.
• Sigur Rós.
• Prometheus.
• Fiona Apple.

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