Band Wars--Conclusion

[If you haven't seen the earlier matchup (that I posted about an hour ago), go here first.]

There are three matchups today: two semifinals and the finals.  In the first,

Youth Lagoon, Year of Hibernation

will upset Spiritualized, Sweet Heart Sweet Light

Why Youth Lagoon?  The short answer is that it is growing on me.  And the music seems to change with every listen.  This time through, Year of Hibernation had an overwhelming fairy-tale sound, as if it were the soundtrack to a sad children's story.  This description sure doesn't sound like much of an endorsement, but it is . . . for me.  Many of the sounds from his synthesizer--whistles, repeated three-note charms, high-pitched catchy earworms--sound childish in the best possible description of childish: simple and sad but uplifting at the same time.  One listen of "Afternoon," and I hope you'll see what I mean:

* * * 

In the other semifinal, we pit Chromatics, Kill for Love

against M83, Hurry Up, We're Dreaming

I choose the winning album in this case because the losing album, despite its quality and variety, doesn't strike an emotional chord with me.  I listen to it.  I think, Really good music!  But I don't feel much aside from that.  The winning album, just as good an album as the loser, has the added quality of being to tap into my mood.  So, M83 advances.

And the final matchup between M83 and Youth Lagoon isn't even close.  M83 wins.  Youth Lagoon is a surprisingly great album (and not the sort of music that I normally listen to).  M83's Hurry Up, We're Dreaming is their best album--and considering their tremendous output, that's saying something.

I suspected M83 would win.  But I also suspected that Atlas Sound or Girls would win as well.  Neither of those made it out of the first round.

Well, here's the final update.  I hope you enjoyed this as much as I did.  Of these bands, I'm going to add M83, John Talabot, Youth Lagoon, Chromatics, Lotus Plaza and Atlas Sound to my regular rotation.  A pretty good variety of excellent new music.

Next up for me, I guess, will be going to pitchfork, allmusic, and metacritic to find 16 new albums for Band Wars 2.