Jay Arner – Broken Glass
Hermetic – Portlandish (Jay Arner Remix)

Today, we’re lucky to have Vancouver’s Jay Arner sharing five favourite unknown tracks of the past year. If you’re unfamiliar with him, he’s one of the best new indie pop songwriters in the country, and a very talented producer as well. It’s clear that the future is bright for this one, with Exclaim, Herohill, Weird Canada, and FFWD all singing his praises. Even his demos are great. Here’s Jay’s selections:

Aaron Read is probably best-known in Vancouver as a member of comedy group The Sunday Service (makers of my favourite youtube video), but he’s also great at music. He is a double threat. He’s also in the How To Dress Well power trio alongside Cameron Reed of Babe Rainbow.

No Gold is my favourite Vancouver band ever. They’re on hiatus now, but the members continue to make music with the Mood Hut group of awesome dance music producers.

I helped my friend Chris make this 7″ of crazy piano punk (I guess??) rock. He’s been a cornerstone of the Vancouver music community for years but he only has a few recordings. I was really happy to be a part of this one.

My favourite Mount Eerie song of the many released this year. I’ve never heard Phil’s music sound so mechanical, which is neat considering it’s all (apparently) acoustic instruments recorded to tape.

NOT FROM AROUND HERE. FROM TORONTO I THINK. You can’t google this band. >:/

Jay Arner is on Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr. Follow that man.