The 11 Best Songs By The Joy Formidable

I had a meeting in a coffee shop today.  When I walked in, I was a little startled to notice that every single table was occupied.  That wasn't the unusual part.  Hip coffee shops in LA are always unrealistically busy, like showing up to one is the only way to keep your hipster cred intact.  What was strange was that there was only one person at each table.  Each person was staring aimlessly at their laptops.  I was the only person in place that was meeting with another physical person (well, besides the person I was meeting with, obviously).  I found this disturbing.  Why did all these people come here just to sit on their computers?  Doesn't that defeat the purpose of getting out of the house?  How can you be social with your nose glued to an artificially lit computer screen?  How are you taking full advantage of having a laptop if your only using it to do something you could pretty much do at your house?  Don't these people have coffee at their houses?  I was perplexed at the point of all this...because honestly, there was no point.  One guy was reading his Facebook.  A girl was watching YouTube videos.  It was like they were using this coffee shop as an offsite room to their house.  As cool as every single one of them thought they were being...I don't think any of them realized how stupid they all looked.

Here are the 11 Best Songs By The Joy Formidable:

1. Magnifying Glass (The Big Roar)
2. Whirring (The Big Roar)
3. Cradle (A Balloon Called Morning)
4. Austere (The Big Roar)
5. Greyhounds in the Slip (It's Just A World Apart)
6. The Last Drop (A Balloon Called Morning)
7. Endtapes (Breaking Dawn Part 1)
8. A Heavy Abacus (The Big Roar)
9. Popinjay (It's Just A World Apart)
10. 9669 (A Balloon Called Morning)
11. The Everchanging Spectrum of a Lie (The Big Roar)

Buy Joy Formidable's new album, Wolf's Law...now!!!

The 11 Best Debut Albums of 2011 (so far)

All these albums are solid and every one of these artists is someone you should keep your eye on.  But there's one artist in particular I want to point attention to and that's The Weeknd.  An unknown artist who came from nowhere that has taken the blog world by storm with his first mix-tape/album.  Here's the kicker...he's giving it away for free.  What is original about the debut isn't just the music itself but the method in which he's distributing it.  The Weeknd has all but abandoned the traditional style of distributing music and fully embraced the 21st century.  Without a publicist or marketing department, he's managed to become well-known all on his own.  While the major labels are fighting tooth and nail for the fraction of floor space left on retail floors, the new emerging artists are passing them by...by embracing the future.

The 11 Best Debut Albums of 2011 (so far):


1.  Yuck - Yuck
2.  James Blake - James Blake
3.  The Head and the Heart - The Head and the Heart
4.  The Weeknd - House of Balloons
5.  Foster the People - Torches
6.  The Joy Formidable - The Big Roar
7.  The Naked and Famous - Young Blood
8.  The Vaccines - What Did You Expect From The Vaccines?
9.  Cults - Cults 
10.  Ringo Deathstar - Colour Trip 
11.  EMA - Past Life Martyred Saints

Get The Weeknd's album, House of the Balloons for free!