Hail Hail Rock'n'Roll

Seeing as it’s that time of year, here’s the list of top 2009 albums I submitted to a monthly music magazine that’ll have to remain nameless.

1. Yeah Yeahs Yeahs, It’s Blitz
2. Micachu & The Shapes, Jewellery
3. Florence & The Machine, Lungs
4. The Horrors, Primary Colours
5. Regina Spektor, Far
6. Alasdair Roberts, Spoils
7.  Bat For Lashes, 2 Suns
8. Doves, Kingdom Of Rust

There was no showing in the final list for Micachu, which suggests I was the only one who voted for her. So, some kind of explanation may be in order. Her real name is Mica Levi: she’s 22, signed to Rough Trade, and she and her band make an artsy-fartsy, somewhat discordant row that’s borderline unlistenable, but somehow addictive – the musical equivalent of that thing where you touch an electric fence for a laugh, and then do it again and again, despite yourself (kind of thing). There are tinges of The Slits – and maybe Elastica – in there somewhere, but have a listen yourself: the bizarrely-titled Turn Me Weller is perhaps best avoided, but the single Lips is great.

Oh, and she’s at the opposite end of any imaginable musical spectrum from Doves, but I like all kinds of stuff, me. By way of further enlightenment, there’s a Spotify playlist of some of the best tracks from seven of them, minus Alasdair Roberts. So, in honour of the bostin re-re-reissue of The Who Sell Out, there’s also the BRILLIANT out-take Early Morning Cold Taxi.