I should make it clear from the outset – tonight’s show was not a ‘best of 2011’ show.  If it was, I would have included ‘Try to Sleep‘ by Low, the song which had my favourite video of 2011:

Low + Film Noir.  It was always going to impress me with that formula.

If tonight’s show was a proper 2011 review show I would also have had to play something from PJ Harvey’s Let England Shake album.  I’ve not really given much thought to what my favourite album of 2011 was, but if I did give it much brain time, this album would never have been far from those thoughts.

Each of the 11 songs on Let England Shake has a video.  You’ll find them all on the Let England Shake Youtube channel.

So, to what tonight’s show was, rather than what it wasn’t.  It was kind of a summing up of what’s changed in Eclectic Mainline over the past 12 months or so.  There are a number of factors.  One factor is what actually lands in my post pile.  I have to admit that I don’t have a great deal of spare time to seek out new music; often it’s a case that I play the music that finds me.  The music I have received has changed over the past year or so, and tonight’s show reflected that.  Or to be more specific, the music that arrives in the post has changed.  There are an ever-increasing number of promos that arrive digitally, and I don’t have time to listen to them.  This fact is to the benefit of those CDs and records that arrive the old fashioned way: in the post.

Another factor in the change of focus of Eclectic Mainline is the recommendations I receive from Jumbo Records in Leeds.   There were numerous amazing things recommended to me on my visits to the shop in 2011, two of which (Roll The Dice and Mink Freud) featured in tonight’s show.

If you wish to listen back to tonight’s show, you can do so for approximately 4 weeks, and you’ll find the link on today’s page of the BCB Listen Again service.  Here’s a full list of what I played:

Mark Fell – “Multistability 1-A” (LP – “Multistability”) (Raster Noton)
M. Ostermeier – “Ngth” (LP – “The Rules Of Another Small World”) (Tench)
Tokimonsta – “Day Job” (“Creature Dreams EP”) (Brainfeeder)
Sven Kacirek – “Arsenal Aluny Village” (LP – “The Kenya Sessions”) (Pingipung)
Monoblock B – “Teatime In Medellin” (LP – “Teatime In Medellin”) (Spezialmaterial)
Roll The Dice – “Way Out” (LP – “In Dust”) (Leaf)
Martyn – “Love And Machines (ft Spaceape” (LP – “Ghost People”) (Brainfeeder)
Container – “Dissolve” (LP – “LP”) (Spectrum Spools)
Mark McGuire – “Sun Shining Through The Open Barn Door” (LP – “A Young Person’s Guide To…” (Editions Mego)
Floating Points – “Danger” (7″ single) (Eglo)
Dels – “Capsize feat. Roots Manuva & Joe Goddard” (single and LP – “Gob”) (Big Dada)
The Advisory Circle – “Logotone I – Decision” (LP – “As The Crow Flies”) (Ghost Box)
Gil Scott-Heron and Jamie XX – “I’ve Been Me [Interlude]” (LP – “We’re New Here”) (Young Turks / XL)
Matt Sweeney – “Tallinn (Excerpt)” (LP – “16:9”) (Oomff)
Mink Freud – “Winter Sunrise” (CD – “Gelatinous”) (Domestic)