My Top 10 Albums of 2009:

1. Phoenix - Wolfgang Amadeux Phoenix
2. Drake - So Far Gone (mixtape, album, whatever… this belongs here)
3. The xx - xx
4. Maxwell - BLACKsummers’night
5. Yeah Yeah Yeahs - It’s Blitz
6. Gucci Mane - The State Vs. Radric Davis
7. Rick Ross - Deeper Than Rap
8. Zombie Nation - Zombielicious
9. Mos Def - The Ecstatic
10. Kid Sister - Ultraviolet

Biggest Disappointment of 2009:
Julian Casablancas - Phrazes for the Young

Notable Mixtapes of 2009:
Cool Kids & Don Cannon - Gone Fishin’
Pill - 4180: The Prescription
Theophilus London - This Charming Mixtape
Chromeo - DJ-Kicks
Donnis - Diary of an ATL Brave
DJ Mehdi - Red Black & Blue

My Top 15 Tracks of 2009 becauseican’tpickten…
1. Siriusmo - High Together
2. La Roux - In For the Kill (Skream’s Let’s Get Ravey Mix)
3. Drake - Best I Ever Had
4. Duck Sauce - aNYway
5. Major Lazer - Pon De Floor
6. Jay Electronica - Exhibit C
7. Chromeo - Night By Night
8. Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Heads Will Roll (A-Trak Remix)
9. Tiga - Mind Dimension
10. Fake Blood - I Think I Like It
11. Boys Noize - Jeffer
12. Soulja Boy - Turn My Swag On
13. Florence & the Machine - You Got The Love (the xx remix)
14. Kid Cudi - Pursuit of Happiness
15. Joakim - Spiders

Rhyme of the year: Kanye in “Run This Town”

Best horse:
Mustard (pictured above the day I acquired him)

Now let’s discuss!

I’ll be posting my year-end lists tomorrow… but in the meantime here’s a link to Sneaker Freaker’s feature on 2009’s best sneakers, including my pick.

Brand new disco-house track from Portugal’s own Rockets (previously known as Discorockets) from the Discotexas collective. If you’re not familiar with him, look up his song “Running”, it’s dope too!

DOWNLOAD: The Kid with the Goofy Skateboard (right-click, save-as)

Can’t wait to hear the new album. These guys really sound like nobody else. So proggy! Makes me think of atoms dividing. The single is out now on Phantasy.

I’ll be ringing in the new year (I never really understood this expression) in LA this week, and frankly you can’t really beat this line-up. Sometimes I dread NYE because I feel like too much to juggle, too many people to please, but not this year! I’m gonna be DJing my arse off with a big smile on my face. If you’re in the LA area I hope to see you there. I think there’s just a few tickets left, they’re going fast. Grab them over at Hard’s website.

Set times:

9pm: Destructo
10pm: DJ Mehdi
Midnight: A-Trak (new decade, hooooooo)
2am: Boys Noize

The only way you can be excused from coming to this show if you’re in town is if you’re checking out Chromeo at Club Nokia. Either way, Los Angeles, spend NYE with a Macklovitch. If you don’t you’re a bum.

The Fool’s Gold European Vacation tour was the first official FG tour outside of American shores. The line-up was various combinations of: myself, Jokers of the Scene, Congorock and Greenmoney. For two weeks we traveled across the Old Continent, spreading the gospel of Mr Goldbar, leaving a trail of stickers and sweaty club kids. We slalomed between language barriers and customs officers, all in the name of the logo as Lyor would say. Even when we hit cities that I’ve played by myself, it was a completely different experience to show up with a posse and make that statement, throwing merch into the crowd and playing snippets of upcoming 2010 releases. Representation in the European parliament shouldn’t be very far off.

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Final pics for my good friend Fafi’s collabo collection with Adidas. More pics after the jump, and full set over at Fafi’s blog.

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La nouvelle collaboration entre Fool’s Gold et l’équipe Cool Cats chez nos cousins français: ce t-shirt splendide “Fool Cats” signé Dust La Rock. Disponible sur le Cool Cats store. Miaou.

**translation:

Here’s the new collaboration between Fool’s Gold and our French cousins over at Cool Cats: this gorgeous t-shirt designed by our own Dust La Rock. Available now at the Cool Cats online store. Meow.

It takes a lot for me to post a t-shirt on my blog but this one is definitely worthy.

Erol Alkan collaborated with David Rudnick on this one: only 100 made, all hand numbered, and all packaged with a very special E.R.O.L. marker. What does the maze reveal? You’ll have to do it to find out.

Shirts are available from Erol’s webstore, and a handful might make their way to Colette (Paris) and Dover Street Market (London) in the new year.

I would bring this on the plane and do the maze on my tray table… Who needs sudoku?

Need some present ideas? Here’s one.

Hedi Slimane, who you probably know for his work as Artist Director for both Dior and YSL as well as a respected photographer, brings us this selection of “eleven of the best movies about adolescence”. He is famously fixated with teenager culture in the United States; it was the theme of his exhibition (”Sweet Bird of Youth”). He has chosen eleven movies, the foundation stones of American culture, gathered in a box in an ultra-limited edition, numbered to 2500 copies.

- REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE by Nicholas Ray

- WHO’S THAT KNOCKING AT MY DOOR by Martin Scorsese

- WOODSTOCK by Michael Wadleigh

- ZABRISKIE POINT by Michelangelo Antonioni

- PERMANENT VACATION by Jim Jarmusch

- RUMBLE FISH by Francis Ford Coppola

- BOYS DON’T CRY by Kimberly Pierce

- MYSTERIOUS SKIN by Gregg Araki

- WASSUP ROCKERS by Larry Clark

Available at Colette.