Album of the Year: Charles Spearin - Happiness Project

It is perhaps a disservice to the merit of my chosen album that I should begin extolling it's virtues with a disclaimer, but there's something about 'end of year' lists that doesn't sit particularly easy with me. Subjective responses delivered with the assumption of authority- such declarations of conclusion can seemingly never please everyone, and accusations of bias, clique-ism, or narrow-mindedness usually follow such posts. Arguably, the format serves to inspire debate as much as to cement an album's place in the 'canon of whatever year'. So, it is with these concerns in mind that my choice for Album of 2009 doesn't aim to be the last word on the year's music, nor to allude to the objective 'best'. I've settled on a record which has not garnered mainstream press and is in itself the smallest of statements.

Having cut his teeth in some of Canada's finest (Do Make Say Think, Broken Social Scene, Valley of the Giants) Charles Spearin's solo debut album of sorts is a perfectly formed album of revelatory moments and life-affirming sentiment. Furthermore, you are unlikely to hear an album composed in this style ever again. It started as an experiment: to record audio interviews with the neighbours on his street regarding their perceptions of happiness. Having acheived this, Spearin listened to the recordings over and over- identifying interesting moments of cadence, turns of phrase, incidents where meaning of sentence and musicality of voice uplifted each other. Instrumentation was inspired directly from the inflections in voice that gave it 'a sing song quality'. And so came about eight pieces of music that wove interview and songcraft together with staggering success.

Spearin presses a small cross-section of society on the subject. Schoolchildren, the elderly, a women who has only recently had surgery to correct her deafness, a lady who works with the mentally ill- all give fascinating and articulate accounts, entirely subjective and borne of experience- that each provide small revelatory meditations on one of life's most involving philosophical questions. What is happiness? How does one attain or hold onto it?

The recording was pure chance, and must have been a deeply humbling and engaging process for Spearin and his neighbours. This record was the very antithesis of superstardom, it's composer merely facilitating the creative process. Furthermore, the album pertained to write itself or play out by serendipity. Spearin was a party to the album's compositional unfurling, and had no way of foreseeing how successful, if at all, the project would be. What struck me about this record more than any other released this year is that it sought, perhaps without knowing it, to rearticulate the creative process. What does it mean to be a recording artist in 2009? Whereas certain aspects of culture have only grown more gargantuan, allowing artists to speak to us from pedestals of spectacle and multi-media, the democratisation of recording technology has also allowed for an unprecedented return to music's more community-based roots, music as social glue, as 'event'. What's most lacking in our societies these days is community, and Spearin's album has reflected both the merits of brave experimentation and of talking to your neighbours.

Best track on album: Mrs Morris (reprise).

Opening and closing the record, Mrs Morris wonderful summation of love, happiness and gratitude is here set against dreamy guitars awash with reverb, an underlying beat and a playful Saxophone solo. Simplicity in itself and an utter joy.

Any improvements that could have been made:

Arguably, the album's most succesful moments are those in which the relationship between spoken word and musical turn of phrase are most evident. And certainly, the album is a real curio- released on a small independant and in no way seeking the mainstream approval. As with the artist's recording history- it will reward those who take time to discover it.

Best of the rest:

The XX:

A masterclass in simplicity and 'mood' - something far too many albums seem to have forgotten these days. And it's an excellent album, lyrically beautiful, addictive and unique.

Raekwon - Only Built for Cuban Linx II:

Proper 1995-sounding hip-hop like they don't make anymore. A truly refreshing reminder of class in a genre dominated by Floridas and Lil Waynes.

Lady Gaga - The Fame Monster

Having spent half the year criticising her out of hand, I had something of a Damascus moment. We're now agreed: Alluring, shameless, dirty, self-aware, ironic, disgusting, indulgent, a disgrace and reflection of part of society, art in it's truest sense and truly postmodern pop.

First published in the Sound Screen end of year review.