Top 10 Tracks of the Week 03/31/12

In this weekly feature we’ll compile our top 10 most viewed pieces of new music from the week preceding. These can be anything from completely new songs to live versions of new songs to new remixes of slightly older songs to covers that have just surfaced. Stay up to date wit the week’s most talked about music and vote in our “Best of the Best” vote after our rundown.

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Spencer Krug has released many many albums over the last decade or so – too many for me to care to count. But, the quality has been uniformly high, so people are happy to stick with him despite his level of output approaching serious overkill. And they will be rewarded for their loyalty when he follows up last August’s Organ Music with his second Moonface album, Heartbreaking Bravery in April. The album is cavernous, exhilirating and quite astounding. “Headed For The Door” is the second taste of Heartbreaking Bravery and enforces the fact that Krug’s idea to get Finnish band Siinai to do the majority of the music on this album has given him just the platform he needs to create his next great album.

– Rob Hakimian

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Port of Morrow may have been mildly disappointing, but, this song along with #1 on last week’s Top 10 Tracks of the Week “Pariah King,” prove that its bonus tracks are further evidence that James Mercer isn’t actually capable of writing a bad song. Combining thoughtful lyrics, smooth production and a catchy melody, “The Waltz Is Over” is really just business as usual in the best way possible.

– Brendan Frank

The Shins – “The Waltz Is Over”

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Grrl got chops. “212” was an installment of artistic dexterity; “Fuck Up The Fun” boldly takes that model and ignores it. There’s so much to admire of Azealia’s lyricism and flow that it’s easy to ignore how much fun she’s obviously having, and by extension how much fun we’re having bearing witness. Appropriately backed by Diplo and DJ Master-D’s drumline-gone-MDMA beat, Azealia doesn’t NEED a hook, and in a lot of ways the absence of such a frame benefits the track. This is a song driven by balls and balls alone (proverbially speaking). Banks is so comfortable in the pocket that she doesn’t feel out of place next to Outkast at their spitfire best, and the meta-moments are blips of awareness tastefully applied. For an artist so early in her contribution to hip-hop, Azealia has sure done a great fucking service to upping the ante.

– FM Stringer

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“You and me, we’re both so fucked up.” So starts this unlikely collaboration of celestial proportions. “Ashes in the Air,” is robotic and magnetic, and while its atmosphere screams Flaming Lips, it’s more Justin Vernon by way of Volcano Choir than Bon Iver. Just another reason to look forward to Record Store Day, when this will be released along with a collection of other Flaming Lips collaborations on multi-colored vinyl.

– Brendan Frank

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The premiere of upcoming Australian musician Jack Ladder’s video for “Short Memory” was something that we were delight to have the opportunity to do this week, and the fact that it’s made it onto this list means that readers must have enjoyed it too. The dark, brooding song is perfectly matched by a haunting grayscale video of two people running – from what or where to we don’t know. This partners up perfectly with the motorik-like beats and the equally mysterious vocals that charge the song full of power. And then there’s the ending, which I won’t ruin, but make sure you see it.

– Rob Hakimian

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[10-06][05-01][Best of the Best]