Another music update.

I’ll be filing reaction pieces all day as we learn about trades (but only when we know all the parts). Keep an eye on my twitter feed for links to articles as they go up.

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I’m not sure if my tastes are narrowing as I get older, or if there really just isn’t as much great new music coming out now as there was five to ten years ago, but I’m definitely not spending as much on music as I did early in the last decade. Here are ten songs I’ve heard this year – not all are new releases, and one is from 2006 – that are in heavy rotation for me at the moment.

Manchester Orchestra – “I’ve Got Friends”

At the Team USA trials in July and the Tournament of Stars before that, both held at the USA Baseball complex in Cary, the music played during BP and between innings was mostly atrocious, including crap like the Veronicas’ “Untouched” and OneRepublic’s “All the Right Moves,” which includes the line “All the right friends in all the wrong places.” Of course, that just put me in mind to hear Manchester Orchestra’s similarly-worded song, which has the chorus “I’ve got friends in all the right places/I know what they want, and I know they don’t want me to stay.” There’s a tension in the music and vocal style that matches the desperation of the lyrics, and it’s the best new (to me, that is – it’s from 2009) song I’ve heard all year.

Tame Impala – “Solitude is Bliss”

Only available on iTunes right now, as far as I can tell. It’s an Australian trio with a psychedelic edge to most of their songs, but of what I’ve heard from them, this is the one track with a real hook that made me want to hear it again. The layered production hides a minimal instrumental approach, and the idiotically-simple guitar riff in the chorus gains a new currency from effects that make it sound like it’s enveloping your head. The video is by turns comical and disturbing – and doesn’t the lead singer remind you of Dave Grohl?

Features – “Lions”

Reminds me of a cross between the Arctic Monkeys (first album) and the Black Keys, combining the shout-along chorus of the former with slower, sly verses where the singer is apologizing for something … without really apologizing.

Neon Trees – “Animal”

I have a feeling I’m going to be sick of this song in about six months, as it’s already crossing over, and I’m generally not a fan of this slightly nasal style of vocals, but it’s a pretty strong pop-alternative track if you can get past the cheesy lyrics.

Broken Bells – “The High Road”

I’m pretty sure that for my debut album I’m going to have to work with Danger Mouse. I do love the lines “The dawn to end all nights/That’s all we hoped it was,” with the unspoken fear that it’s something a lot worse, and the way James Mercer sings in two different voices that seem like they couldn’t have come from the same person.

Pinback – “From Nothing to Nowhere” (right-click to download the song free from their official site)

From 2007, but I first heard it the weekend I went to see Stephen Strasburg pitch in Altoona in early April. Pinback’s music is mostly understated emo, not exactly my style, but “From Nothing to Nowhere” has some velocity to it that’s missing from other songs I’ve heard by the group, making it a great driving song. I’m still skeptical of the lyrics I found online for this song – it sounds like he’s saying “who sung my lyric?” rather than the bizarre “co-sign my letter” listed on all the lyrics sites. The visual effects behind the band in the official video elevate it beyond the usual mailed-in band-playing-song clip. I have no idea why Rob Crow wanted to look like the Unabomber without his hoodie, though.

Alkaline Trio – “Help Me”

Power-pop is kind of a lost art right now, and this wouldn’t stand up to the 1990s stars of the genre like Sugar, Jellyfish, or Sloan, but there’s something about Matt Skiba’s singing on this track that got stuck in my head, even though the lyrics are nothing special. I did like it better when I thought I caught the word “jejune” in the line right before the chorus, even though I knew that was about as likely as a Jason Tyner shot to the upper deck.

Muse – “Supermassive Black Hole”

This song should have been on my top songs of the 2000s – a list I’m going to have to revise at some point – but it came out right three weeks after I quit the Blue Jays to join ESPN … and four weeks after I became a father. I was oblivious to just about anything that happened that summer, whether news or popular culture or non-baseball sport, so this song, an obvious homage to vintage Prince, escaped my notice, and I didn’t hear it until this spring. I’m sure Muse fans would disagree, but this is the best song I’ve heard from them since their debut album, with the incomparable “Sunburn” and “Muscle Museum,” purposefully over-the-top without the derivative feel that’s ruined a lot of their recent work for me, featuring a slithering guitar riff behind a falsetto vocal that will call to mind the Purple One at his peak.

Arctic Monkeys – “From The Ritz To The Rubble”

The second-best song off their 2006 debut album, when they were still ultimately a punk band with intellectual stylings and the appropriate sneer the critics wanted to see. The brief up-to-11 guitar lick leading into what you might call the chorus – the song defies conventional structures – grabs you up front, but the way Alex Turner turns shouted lyrics into another instrument is what hooked me, and how could you not like a song that rhymes “this one’s a scary’un” with “totalitarian?”

Cold Cave – “Love Comes Close”

This is so close to early ’80s new wave that it almost feels like parody – is it Joy Division? Camouflage? Early Ministry? I’m not in love with the vocal style – it reminds me of the guy from The National – but Cold Cave just nailed that new wave/synth-pop sound in a way that would fit perfectly on a compilation CD from that era.