Yes In My Backyard is a semiweekly column showcasing MP3s from new and emerging local talent. This is a compilation of 2010's best local music, lovingly curated by YIMBY columnist Christopher R. Weingarten. See last year's tape here.

R.I.P. Chris Weingarten's old blue trucker hat. Photo by Rebecca Smeyne.

Have you heard the one about how the recession is over? Uh, don't tell it to New York City's musical community. While our center-of-the-universe assembly line of hype puttered on unabated, 2010's biggest up-and-comer success stories were actually beamed from the outer limits of the five boroughs--Titus Andronicus (Glen Rock, NJ), Screaming Females (New Brunswick, NJ), Phantogram (Saratoga Springs, NY), Real Estate (Ridgewood, NJ)--places where money can go to tour vans instead of landlords, where musicians aren't paying $400 a month for the luxury of sharing a practice space with three other bands. The remaining New York City indie-crossovers all benefited from frugal one-man home-recording set-ups (Oneohtrix Point Never, Matthew Dear), stripped down line-ups (the Drums, Sleigh Bells, Matt & Kim) or simply embracing the idea that sounding mushy is smarter than buying new gear (Small Black).

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Yes In My Backyard is a semiweekly column showcasing MP3s from new and emerging local talent.

New York's Child Abuse is a gloriously confrontational band, mixing the incoherent glugs of death metal, the dissonant meander of 12-tone composition, the atonal squonk of free-jazz, blasts of ucky noise, and a wet gob of old-fashioned punk rock. Second album Cut And Run (due on Lovepump Records, April 13) continues to blur the lines between metal, avant-garde, and simple nihilistic abrasion, blasting out six arty and ugly songs that sound like if Dirty Projectors got eaten by Cannibal Corpse. "Even though we all love Stockhausen and Morbid Angel, our sound and writing process has never been preconceived or self-conscious," says bassist Tim Dahl. "Twentieth century composition and metal has influenced us, but I wouldn't consider us 'serious' composers nor a metal band. Until metalheads consider us a metal band, we are not a metal band." "Bebe" is some searing, mildly funky non-metal metal, working like zombie Stravinsky and zombie Battles clawing each other's eyes out over some galloping 9/8 double kicks.

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