The gauntlet has been thrown down. South by South West is upon us once again. Over a year, the impact of this massive music festival in Austin, Texas can diminish since your last visit, but oh lordy, make no mistake, Austin is the music town. Amongst 2000 bands, 12,000 official attendees and the many more who lined the streets of Austin yesterday for Paddy’s Day, it was the kickoff for 96 hours of non-stop gig madness. Here’s a taster of highlights for day one:
The Morning Benders
The swooning San Franciscan classical indie-popsters thrilled a capacity crowd at Emo’s (really a big low-ceiling shed) at BrooklynVegan’s day party. Think Grizzly Bear jamming with Vampire Weekend. ‘Excuses’ was phenomenal and an extended a cappella middle lifted the song above all else in their set.
Frightened Rabbit
After falling in love with their new album The Winter Of Mixed Drinks album, I was really keen to see the Scots live. Unfortunately, due to gear problems at the Paste Magazine show, the big-sounding dynamics of the new album was forfeited for a quieter, more-acoustic show. It didn’t thump as much as it should have but the emotion was still there, with ‘Living in Colour’ and ‘Swim Until You Can’t See Land’.
This weekly chart consists of ten of my favourite tunes right now including a some fine instrumental electronica from Monk Fly and The Boog-A-Loo Crew, the new MGMT-esque single from Baby Monster on BigStereo records, remixes of Massive Attack and UGK, new Reverse Engineering (remember 
After some conversations with friends about dubstep recently, I thought I’d put up some tunes from last year to serve as a catchup/beginners guide to the genre and its surrounds. I’m by no means an expert but over the next two pages you’ll find my favourites from Burial, Zomby, Joker, Peverelist, Benga, Skream, Samiyam, Darkstar, 2000F, Joy Orbison, King Midas Sound, Kode 9, Guido and more. 
Below is a list of my favourite records of the last ten years. Ranking these albums was led by a) what the album means to me and b) how often I’d listen to it. Each and every one of these albums blew me away repeatedly at some time between the ages of 18 and 27. Each one has something special going for it, something magical that brings me back to it. For that I can only thank the creators of each. Without further ado, here are my favourite 50 albums from the decade. And remember, you can’t be wrong if they are your favourites.
The third and final 
Neither a Jazz mix or a Monday is this but here’s a sweet mix of sunny dreamy beats I’ve been playing this morning. 
