Metal 2011: The Year of TraditionBetween revivals of classic heavy metal genres and iconic bands' reunion tours, it's clear that a love of tradition still runs deep in aggressive music culture. Metalheads are infamous for their Klingon-like loyalty to the bands and styles they love; many metal heads don't just let their musical...
Metal 2011: The Year of InnovationMore than ever, in 2011 established acts broke free of their genre conventions, reinventing themselves with new and more complex musical identities. Previously unknown groups exploded onto the scene with releases that were as dynamic and exciting as they were strange and unidentifiable. Aggressive...
Folk & Country 2011: Where Are the Protest Singers?On July 13, Vancouver-based Adbusters Magazine, inspired by the Arab Spring, posted on their blog that people could similarly amass on Wall Street in New York City on September 17 to protest against the ever-growing disparity between the rich and poor. Thus was born the now-global Occupy...
Dance & Electronic 2011: A Benchmark Year for CanadiansSince the mid-2000s or so, the consensus about Canada's electronic music has been more dispirited than encouraging. Canada could've been a hotbed of industry and creativity had the rave explosion of the '90s been allowed to mature on its own terms without crackdowns on its legality and legitimacy...
Hip-Hop 2011: How to Be a Hip-Hop Superstar in the Internet AgeFind something fun to shout Ever found yourself wanting to shout "Wolf Gang!" (or its even more irreverent bizarro cousin "Golf Wang!") in the verbal equivalent of all caps, for no apparent reason? You have if you're Odd Future honcho Tyler the Creator's Twitter account, or one of his...
Hip-Hop 2011: That Canadian SoundThe amount of talent in Canada's hip-hop production scene is ridiculously deep with talent and hip-hop heads around the world are beginning to notice. Here are just a few of the many Canadian producers who made a lot of noise in 2011. T-MINUS Producing "I'm On One," the inescapable summer...
Improv & Avant-Garde 2011: Unstandards - Reinventing JazzOne of my favourite quotes in Exclaim! this year comes courtesy of Badbadnotgood (pictured): "A young person doesn't give a fuck how you play 'Stella By Starlight.'" Such youthful insouciance! Badbadnotgood are 2011's gateway drug into deeper states of consciousness. By sticking largely to...
Pop & Rock 2011: Canada - The Next GenerationBeing a Canadian was once a dirty word for bands trying to break internationally. But over the last decade an increasing number of eclectic groups proved that old adage wrong. This year saw two of the groups primarily responsible for this shift move onto new phases of their careers; the Arcade...
Pop & Rock 2011: Sax-y Times"Saxophones are becoming this thing. I began to see a pattern forming. That's why we did it early. Next year everyone's gonna have a saxophone on their record because saxophones are just cool." Those were the words of Deerhunter's Bradford Cox when he spoke to Exclaim! in the fall of 2010. At...
Punk 2011: A Fucked Up YearIn November of 2010, Fucked Up detailed their forthcoming full-length album to Exclaim!, a "completely relatable rock opera rife with meta-plot, meta-parts, meta-leads and self-referential quirks." Just over a year later, that record, David Comes to Life, has topped our list of the year's...
Soul and World 2011: Everyone's In tUnEFor the last several years, the big winners (for critics looking at soul, funk and world albums), have found a sweet spot that works well in a variety of DJ sets. With WhoKill, Merrill Garbus (aka tUnE-yArDs) constructed a meeting place between dub, Afrobeat, punk, funk, hip-hop and folk....
Metal 2011: 18 Best AlbumsListen to our Best of 2011: Metal playlist on Rdio by clicking here. 1. KEN Mode 2. Mastodon 3. Fuck the Facts 4. Wolves In The Throne Room 5. Today is the Day 6. Liturgy 7. Hammers of Misfortune 8. Opeth 9. Imbroglio 10. Brutal Truth 11. Graf Orlock 12. Black Tusk...
Hip-Hop 2011: 16 Best AlbumsListen to our Best of 2011: Hip-Hop playlist on Rdio by clicking here. 1. Kanye West 2. Jay-Z and Kanye West 3. Shabazz Palaces 4. D-Sisive 5. Big K.R.I.T. 6. Kendrick Lamar 7. Danny Brown 8. Tyler, the Creator 9. Talib Kweli 10. Phonte 11. Lil B 12. Childish Gambino...
Improv & Avant-Garde 2011: 10 FavouritesListen to our Best of 2011: Improv & Avant-Garde playlist on Rdio by clicking here. Given the diversity and depth of the improv and avant-garde scene, instead of ranking and rating releases, we've asked regular contributors to discuss their favourite 2011 albums from the far corners of the...
Dance & Electronic 2011: 20 Best AlbumsListen to our Best of 2011: Dance & Electronic playlist on Rdio by clicking here. 1. James Blake 2. Nicolas Jaar 3. SBTRKT 4. Oneohtrix Point Never 5. Rustie 6. Amon Tobin 7. The Field 8. Little Dragon 9. Gang Gang Dance 10. Africa Hitech 11. Katy B 12. Hudson Mohawke...
Pop & Rock 2011: 30 Best AlbumsListen to our Best of 2011: Pop & Rock playlist on Rdio by clicking here. 1. Bon Iver 2. St. Vincent 3. Feist 4. M83 5. Destroyer 6. Braids 7. Austra 8. PJ Harvey 9. Timber Timbre 10. Sandro Perri 11. Wild Flag 12. Shotgun Jimmie 13. The Pains of Being Pure at Heart...
Soul and World 2011: 16 Best AlbumsListen to our Best of 2011: Soul and R&B playlist on Rdio by clicking here. 1. The Weeknd 2. tUnE-yArDs 3. Raphael Saadiq 4. Frank Ocean 5. Charles Bradley 6. Toro Y Moi 7. The Stepkids 8. Mayer Hawthorne 9. Cee Lo Green 10. Aline Morales 11. Beyonce 12. Seun Kuti...
Folk & Country 2011: 16 Best AlbumsListen to our Best of 2011: Folk & Country playlist on Rdio by clicking here. 1. The Decemberists 2. Dan Mangan 3. Laura Marling 4. One Hundred Dollars 5. Snailhouse 6. Gillian Welch 7. Richard Buckner 8. The Deep Dark Woods 9. Daniel Romano 10. The Barr Brothers...
Punk 2011: 14 Best AlbumsListen to our Best of 2011: Punk playlist on Rdio by clicking here. 1. Fucked Up 2. OFF! 3. Iceage 4. Bomb The Music Industry! 5. Junior Battles 6. B-Lines 7. Obits 8. The Wonder Years 9. Cloud Nothings 10. Polar Bear Club 11. Lemuria 12. The Brains 13. Crusades...
Pop & Rock: Year in Review 20101. Arcade Fire 2. Deerhunter 3. Beach House 4. PS I Love You 5. Owen Pallett 6. Best Coast 7. The National 8. Sufjan Stevens 9. Spoon 10. Women 11. Diamond Rings 12. Joanna Newsom 13. The Walkmen 14. Broken Social Scene 15. Ariel Pink's Haunted Grafitti 16. Sleigh...
POP & ROCK: Beach House - Bloom
Between revivals of classic heavy metal genres and iconic bands' reunion tours, it's clear that a love of tradition still runs deep in aggressive music culture. Metalheads are infamous for their Klingon-like loyalty to the bands and styles they love; many metal heads don't just let their musical...
More than ever, in 2011 established acts broke free of their genre conventions, reinventing themselves with new and more complex musical identities. Previously unknown groups exploded onto the scene with releases that were as dynamic and exciting as they were strange and unidentifiable. Aggressive...
On July 13, Vancouver-based Adbusters Magazine, inspired by the Arab Spring, posted on their blog that people could similarly amass on Wall Street in New York City on September 17 to protest against the ever-growing disparity between the rich and poor. Thus was born the now-global Occupy...
Since the mid-2000s or so, the consensus about Canada's electronic music has been more dispirited than encouraging. Canada could've been a hotbed of industry and creativity had the rave explosion of the '90s been allowed to mature on its own terms without crackdowns on its legality and legitimacy...
Find something fun to shout Ever found yourself wanting to shout "Wolf Gang!" (or its even more irreverent bizarro cousin "Golf Wang!") in the verbal equivalent of all caps, for no apparent reason? You have if you're Odd Future honcho Tyler the Creator's Twitter account, or one of his...
The amount of talent in Canada's hip-hop production scene is ridiculously deep with talent and hip-hop heads around the world are beginning to notice. Here are just a few of the many Canadian producers who made a lot of noise in 2011. T-MINUS Producing "I'm On One," the inescapable summer...
One of my favourite quotes in Exclaim! this year comes courtesy of Badbadnotgood (pictured): "A young person doesn't give a fuck how you play 'Stella By Starlight.'" Such youthful insouciance! Badbadnotgood are 2011's gateway drug into deeper states of consciousness. By sticking largely to...
Being a Canadian was once a dirty word for bands trying to break internationally. But over the last decade an increasing number of eclectic groups proved that old adage wrong. This year saw two of the groups primarily responsible for this shift move onto new phases of their careers; the Arcade...
"Saxophones are becoming this thing. I began to see a pattern forming. That's why we did it early. Next year everyone's gonna have a saxophone on their record because saxophones are just cool." Those were the words of Deerhunter's Bradford Cox when he spoke to Exclaim! in the fall of 2010. At...
In November of 2010, Fucked Up detailed their forthcoming full-length album to Exclaim!, a "completely relatable rock opera rife with meta-plot, meta-parts, meta-leads and self-referential quirks." Just over a year later, that record, David Comes to Life, has topped our list of the year's...
For the last several years, the big winners (for critics looking at soul, funk and world albums), have found a sweet spot that works well in a variety of DJ sets. With WhoKill, Merrill Garbus (aka tUnE-yArDs) constructed a meeting place between dub, Afrobeat, punk, funk, hip-hop and folk....
Listen to our Best of 2011: Metal playlist on Rdio by clicking here. 1. KEN Mode 2. Mastodon 3. Fuck the Facts 4. Wolves In The Throne Room 5. Today is the Day 6. Liturgy 7. Hammers of Misfortune 8. Opeth 9. Imbroglio 10. Brutal Truth 11. Graf Orlock 12. Black Tusk...
Listen to our Best of 2011: Hip-Hop playlist on Rdio by clicking here. 1. Kanye West 2. Jay-Z and Kanye West 3. Shabazz Palaces 4. D-Sisive 5. Big K.R.I.T. 6. Kendrick Lamar 7. Danny Brown 8. Tyler, the Creator 9. Talib Kweli 10. Phonte 11. Lil B 12. Childish Gambino...
Listen to our Best of 2011: Improv & Avant-Garde playlist on Rdio by clicking here. Given the diversity and depth of the improv and avant-garde scene, instead of ranking and rating releases, we've asked regular contributors to discuss their favourite 2011 albums from the far corners of the...
Listen to our Best of 2011: Dance & Electronic playlist on Rdio by clicking here. 1. James Blake 2. Nicolas Jaar 3. SBTRKT 4. Oneohtrix Point Never 5. Rustie 6. Amon Tobin 7. The Field 8. Little Dragon 9. Gang Gang Dance 10. Africa Hitech 11. Katy B 12. Hudson Mohawke...
Listen to our Best of 2011: Pop & Rock playlist on Rdio by clicking here. 1. Bon Iver 2. St. Vincent 3. Feist 4. M83 5. Destroyer 6. Braids 7. Austra 8. PJ Harvey 9. Timber Timbre 10. Sandro Perri 11. Wild Flag 12. Shotgun Jimmie 13. The Pains of Being Pure at Heart...
Listen to our Best of 2011: Soul and R&B playlist on Rdio by clicking here. 1. The Weeknd 2. tUnE-yArDs 3. Raphael Saadiq 4. Frank Ocean 5. Charles Bradley 6. Toro Y Moi 7. The Stepkids 8. Mayer Hawthorne 9. Cee Lo Green 10. Aline Morales 11. Beyonce 12. Seun Kuti...
Listen to our Best of 2011: Folk & Country playlist on Rdio by clicking here. 1. The Decemberists 2. Dan Mangan 3. Laura Marling 4. One Hundred Dollars 5. Snailhouse 6. Gillian Welch 7. Richard Buckner 8. The Deep Dark Woods 9. Daniel Romano 10. The Barr Brothers...
Listen to our Best of 2011: Punk playlist on Rdio by clicking here. 1. Fucked Up 2. OFF! 3. Iceage 4. Bomb The Music Industry! 5. Junior Battles 6. B-Lines 7. Obits 8. The Wonder Years 9. Cloud Nothings 10. Polar Bear Club 11. Lemuria 12. The Brains 13. Crusades...
1. Arcade Fire 2. Deerhunter 3. Beach House 4. PS I Love You 5. Owen Pallett 6. Best Coast 7. The National 8. Sufjan Stevens 9. Spoon 10. Women 11. Diamond Rings 12. Joanna Newsom 13. The Walkmen 14. Broken Social Scene 15. Ariel Pink's Haunted Grafitti 16. Sleigh...
