It shouldn’t be of any surprise that the man who has covered songs by the likes of R. Kelly, Danzig, Mariah Carey and Tim McGraw has eclectic tastes, but Will Oldham has still caught me off guard a bit by the vast range of artists he’s chosen to highlight on his “Best of ‘09” list.
In a feature for Artforum (via the Daily Swarm, via Teenage Kicks), Oldham, going by his latest moniker Bonny Billy, prefaces the list by saying that he “will try” not to be “too esoteric,” at the request of the editors, but he’s been turned off by the hype surrounding some artists in the music news media. “[W]e as individuals are finding greater connections to smaller things; things smaller in scope and more specific to our tangible and imagined communities,” he writes. “I find that the music that transports me often has a community of admirers bound together only by the love of that music.”
What follows is a “Best of” list that ranges from Kanye West and the Killers to a marching band from New Orleans and the gospel house band of a Louisville, KY church. Check it out here (scroll down after the link).