The Underground of Happiness

Happy New Year. Just a quick hello to land you with a list of 46* (edit - make it 48) albums that did the rounds many times in here in the past year. Another great year for pop music, I think you'll agree. A couple of other miscellaneous highlights underneath. I'm not bothering with lots of links and pictures and videos in this post - that's what the rest of the blog is for, go digging and you'll find. Most, if not all, of the list have been represented in these pages over the last year. And I might also mention that interviews with Crystal Stilts, Efterklang, (The) Caseworker, Hotels, Josh T. Pearson and Neville Skelly from the year gone by are also over there on the right hand side of the page. I may well have left a few people out, and there were a few borderline cases - if anyone has any particular beef with me on what's below, give me a shout. I'm all on for, like, engagement. Say no more. (I'm making one exception, I can't get enough of this) ...

One of my favourite record labels is celebrating 5 years in 2011, the Perth-based Hidden Shoal Recordings . They've released some wonderful music in that time. I think it was 2009 I first became aware of them - some of my top albums of that year were from this release list - 2009: A Million Square Miles I might also direct your attention to a couple of Hidden Shoal artists who have been interviewed on the show, German ambient artist Markus Mehr in 2010 and Blake Madden from Seattle band Hotels just a few months ago (links here, or jump straight to the interview below that - you could also follow a search for "Hidden Shoal" at the top of the page). http://theundergroundofhappiness.blogspot.com/2011/01/markus-mehr-interview.html Markus Mehr Interview Podcast by underground of happiness http://theundergroundofhappiness.blogspot.com/2011/04/hotels-interview.html And even more recently, the glorious and uplifting pop music keeps flowing from Western Austral...

The interview (phone) with Blake Madden from Seattle band Hotels is available to download now in full ( 23m45s, 70MB approx ) - we had played a short extract on this week's show. The conversation ranged over film music, casinos, manipulating mood in pop music, John Barry, being based in Seattle, playing bass while singing, surf guitar, and of course the excellent new Hotels album On the casino floor . These were my thoughts on that album, from a few weeks ago. Hotels - On the casino floor (Hidden Shoal) A concept album of sorts from the Seattle band with a madly ambitious premise, too good not to quote from the press blurb. The plot concerns a " secret agent, his former mentor and current arch-nemesis, and a nefarious prince's plan to destroy Earth during the grand opening of the universe's only outer space casino complex " (!). This would be good enough in itself but happily the musical chops match the scale of the ambition, with elements of surf-rock and po...

A fresh and hopeful New Year to all. Apparently it's spring already (and there's revolution in the air) - in Ireland usually marked by the return of Wind. Some tunes following, which have been doing a great job of making us forget about the dodgy central heating at UOH HQ. They should keep the most reptilean among you warm, and the most revolutionary cool. All albums, unless otherwise noted. The Phoenix Foundation - Buffalo (Memphis Industries) Cracking opening single from album of same name by the Wellington, New Zealand band. The tune is equal parts giddy, joyous and amiably psychedelic (let's face it, the plot concerns a seafaring buffalo), with an irresistible "woo-hoo" middle eight. The jangly guitars, high-fretted bass and spot-on arrangement make me think of fellow kiwis The Chills (something everyone should be made to do, daily). The whole thing is as fresh as a daisy and tends to remind you why you fell in love with pop music. Practice singing along w...