As I mentioned when reviewing the Live in Seattle album by Moufang / Czamanski at #30, I don’t listen to a ton of “electronic music” these days. That’s not to say there aren’t a few bands with fully-synthesized music on this year’s countdown, but I wouldn’t call those other bands “dance music.” Dan Deacon, coming in at #25 with his third album, Gliss Riffer, is 100% dance music.

I posted about Deacon earlier this year, when my son pointed me to Deacon’s awesome video for his song “When I Was Done Dying,” and while I had heard the song prior to my son mentioning it to me, I hadn’t given the album its due. Since then, I haven’t really stopped listening to it. I’ve gone back to it at least once a week (partly due to my son requesting that I play “his song” anytime he gets in the car).

“When I Was Done Dying” is the highlight of the album, but there’s some great variety of music, vocals and beats across the album, making it super fun. Speaking of vocals — I really enjoy how Deacon handles them on this album, using them as just another instrument, breaking them up electronically, rendering them unintelligible and otherworldly, or running them through enough distortion to sound robotic. Without that distortion, the vocals on these songs would be indistinguishable from most other electronic music. Deacon makes them his own.

Overall, this album is light and fun. Put it on, and I dare you to sit without moving. Try it; it’s impossible.

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26. Dark Bird is Home by The Tallest Man on Earth
27. Gunnera by Pfarmers
28. Swimmer to a Liquid Armchair by Ricked Wickey
29. To Pimp a Butterfly by Kendrick Lamar
30. Live in Seattle by Moufang / Czamanski
31. High by Royal Headache

What is the Bacon Top 31?
Past years’ Top 31s

Live in Seattle by Moufang / Czamanski

Time was, I would listen to “techno” music all the time. Underworld, the Orb, Aphex Twin, Orbital, Chemical Bros. — this was the world I lived in. And I’d find myself at a club, every weekend, gyrating and flailing (I’m not sure I should call it “dancing”) to whatever the DJ was spinning. But that was the 90s, and things are quite a bit different for me now.

Musical tastes change, priorities shift, and the prospect of doing something akin to exercise past 11pm on any given night no longer brings the appeal it used to. But every so often I come across something that brings that drive, that desire to move, back. Enter Germany’s David Moufang (aka Move D) and the Netherlands’ Jordan Czamanski (aka Jordan GCZ, also of Juju & Jordash), collectively known as Moufang / Czamanski.¹

Performed back in May 2013 but not released until October of this year, this set is the definition of background music. Put it on, and watch yourself become more effective at your behind-the-screen desk job. But be careful, because you may hit a point (probably around the 78-minute mark) where you find yourself bouncing in your seat, taken out of whatever it is you were typing, fully immersed in this digital landscape.

^{1. Add in a second Nederlander, Gal Aner, also of Juju & Jordash, and you get yet another group: Magic Mountain High. Check them all out.↩}

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31. High by Royal Headache

What is the Bacon Top 31?
Past years’ Top 31s

#25 on the 2015 Bacon Top 31

#30 on the 2015 Bacon Top 31