Post by Trumpy's Magic Snout on Dec 30, 2007 18:34:51 GMT -5
So after seeing Mighty Jack's and Mr. Atari's Greatest album threads I thought I'd do one just for the now departing year. Here's my fifty. Feel free to post your own favourite albums of the year or the ones I missed or the ones I included that you hate.
The thinking I put into this took a while, I don't really know why, just thought I'd do it. Who knows maybe it'll help someone find something new, or they'll ebd up cursing my name for ever more because they liked how The Residents or Pole sounded!
(Included as it's the only musical smiley!)
The thinking I put into this took a while, I don't really know why, just thought I'd do it. Who knows maybe it'll help someone find something new, or they'll ebd up cursing my name for ever more because they liked how The Residents or Pole sounded!
(Included as it's the only musical smiley!)
On first impressions it appeared that Bjork may have made her finest album. Indeed it’s much more accessible than Medulla’s almost entirely vocal sound. It plays like an amalgamation of Vespertine’s icy landscapes, Homogenic’s harsher electronic production and the tunes of Post and Debut, on other words it’s a bit like a Greatest Hits made entirely of new stuff. Earth Invaders is fun, while Wanderlust comes closest to Homogenic’s sound, mainly thanks to that album’s producer Mark Bell (LFO) popping up to do the music on it. Songs like The Dull Flame Of Desire with Anthony (of And The Johnsons fame) are beautiful ballads. There’s even collaborations with Timbaland on here.
Scottish group The Beta Band are much missed. Their particular brand of experimentation is much needed in these bland days, and former front man Steve Mason’s King Biscuit Time doesn’t quite do the job, as good as last year’s Black Gold was. The Aliens consist of two of Mason’s band mates and are led by Gordon Anderson, who was once in The Beta Band before a mental breakdown forced him out before they released anything. Thankfully he recovered and recorded under The Lone Pigeon guise before hooking up with his former Betas.
Super Furry Animals front man’s second solo album. This one’s mainly in English this time after the Welsh deluge of Yr Atal Genhedlaeth. The sounds still very lo-fi though but the ambition has been ramped up, especially on fifteen minute closer Skylon. Many Super Furries fans have commented that Rhys appears to be saving his best tunes for his solo albums, and that may be the case, but I personally prefer the Super Furries’ latest. There’s still something very special about that band playing together that the solo efforts of any of them lacks, even if the actual tunes are in fact stronger.
Bizaare album to judge this. It’s musically and lyrically strange with most tracks bleeding into one another so it becomes quite confusing as to where you actually are in its proceedings. There’s a lot of interesting stuff here but my appreciation of this varies with each listen. It sits lower on the list at this point but at times it’s been up about twenty places or out of the top fifty all together. Worth a try if you like to take risks musically.
Bluesy, ballsy rock. Vietnam sound a lot older than they are but thanks to their youth the music has a swagger that renders it pretty impressive. At times it can sound a bit samey, but there are some fantastic tunes on here, with Priest, Poet and the Pig and the hidden track at the end being particularly excellent.
Five Roses may be the definition of the word lovely. Some beautiful songs with lots of gorgeous synths and vocals that sound like they should be blasting out of your radio on a sunny day as you drive down the coast. Probably in the 70’s.
A two-disc set of unreleased stuff and stripped down versions of older songs. It’s basically the same old thing that Sigur Ros always do, which is a good thing.
A very interesting experiment from an Australian based in Iceland that lives up to its name. Lot’s of layered sound interplaying and repeating while occasional bursts of fractured drumming appear somewhere in the background. Frost’s ability to play with sound is phenomenal and he can paint some pretty impressive aural landscapes, at times speaker shredding in their epic nature, at others incredibly subtle. Half the time you don’t even realise what a certain sound is or that it has changed key or instrument because of how easy it is to become lost in the forefront noise. The chances are that Frost will eventually do something Earth-shattering, not just in the volume stakes, but as of now he is more an interesting listen than a pioneering force. Theory Of Machines suggests that there is an incredible talent present here, one that could well be looked at by others in relation toproduction techniques. 
Not the Super Furries best album but that still means it’s better than most. Moving away from the lush Love Kraft sound the band have continued their pattern of expensive, sleek album followed by stripped down raw album. Hey Venus! Mainly sounds like Fuzzy Logic and Phantom Power which is definitely a good thing but the material just isn’t up there with the great stuff of the past. Still songs like Suckers! are fantastic and if any other band had turned out this album it would be hailed as their best, but as the Super Furries have such an illustrious past it’s shamefully one of their lesser efforts.
A great summer album of Petula Clark and Gladys Knight style soul. Great album for when you’re feeling down.
Music’s favourite loony cult bounce back after the shockingly bad Together We’re Heavy with an album that combines the tunes of their debut with the musical tightness gained by playing together for a while now, even if there are 800 members of the group (they’ve almost caught up with The Fall!). Nothing on here elevates them to the levels hit by the likes of The Flaming Lips, Mercury Rev or any of the other psychedelic American groups (Grandaddy, Sparklehorse) who appeared on the cover of NME before The Strokes ruined that magazine but at times they come close. Thankfully the mood is also not quite as forced happy or sad as previous efforts have been, rather the emotion finally seems to be natural. They could yet come up with something incredible.
Angular indie music that harks back to XTC and early Talking Heads is de rigueur in Britain right now with any band that has that sound becoming NME’s “best band you’ll ever here”. It’s now a meaningless platitude as it appears to be crowned weekly and all of the bands have been terrible. Field Music have the sound but haven’t been given that title. The reason is because they are too clever, and are now in one hell of a quandary. The kids who listen to the sort of stuff they make don’t listen to them thanks to a lack of clear cut iPod cuts while everyone else dismisses them as an NME type band. Field Music deserve a lot better. A power trio that are fantastically tight, clever musicians who aren’t out to sound like the zeitgeist, they just happened to be influenced by the same bands. 
One for the fans of The Flaming Lips’ Transmissions of the Satellite Heart and Clouds Taste Metallic. It has that same creative edge, while at the same time possessing a raw, garage rock feel, mainly thanks to the muscular drumming (some of the best you’ll hear this year). There’s so much going on here on a creative level, but thankfully like those Lips releases everything is grounded by the great tunes.
Prog, math-rock, post-rock, whatever you want to label it it’s just fantastically clever music. Propelled by John Stanier‘s mighty drumming the rest of the band create a bizarre soundtrack with the simple tools of guitar, bass, electronics and strange vocals. Very much stroky chin arty farty stuff, but lots of great fun too.
Who knows what to make of the Japanese group Boris. Like many a band from that country (Boredoms, The Acid Mothers Temple, Melt Banana, Mad Capsule Markets) experimentation comes as second nature to them resulting in a lot of different styles of music, all sounding vaguely familiar yet unlike the standard examples of the genre. Throw in Ghost’s Michio Kurihara and you also get some of the best, balls out guitar solos of the year. The stuff he plays on Sweet No.1 is simply phenomenal. It’s a very hard album to pigeonhole and is all the better for it.
With a singer that sounds like Neil Diamond did in the 70’s and a sound that evokes the spirit of the early Coral and Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci records without ever sounding as ramshackle as that suggests Tiny Dancers may have provided the best pop album of the year. Some of the songs are clearly designed to work better live with audience participation (Bonfire Of The Night). Also there’s definitely that feel that they threw in everything they had no matter quality or style so amongst the fun pop of Hannah We Know there is plodding indie like 20 to 9. If you’ve enjoyed any British indie over the past twenty odd years there may be something here for you. Hopefully unlike The Coral they continue to play and experiment and do something really special in the years to come.
!!! (pronounced Chk Chk Chk) were pretty much written off as a great live party band who couldn’t make a record of any substance. Myth Takes might not be the deepest album of the year but it is great fun and, thanks to a tour supporting Red Hot Chilli Peppers, there are actually well written tunes and everything. The band are still best on extended jams like Bend Over Beethoven and dancey funk numbers like Heart Of Hearts than the Chilli Pepper-like stuff but the former now benefit from a greater focus and a band who have become incredibly tight, three drummers and all. An unexpected treat.
A live recording, probably in the studio, of this Australian three piece improvisational group. Each Necks album usually involves one long track, this one clocks in at 53 minutes, and can feature a variety of musical styles from Jazz to Electronica. Townsville is the perfect example of the slow build, being as that’s all it is. The explosion that it seems to be building up to never actually happens as piano, upright bass and drums repeat the same patterns over and over. The fact that the drummer never moves off of his cymbals no matter how much he suggests he will sums up the album. The fact that it doesn’t change is its strength. 
Swift is a rotund singer songwriter that has a nice vein in self deprecation. He’s in the Tom Waits propping up the end of the bar mould of artist, although musically he’s much more into the cracking pop hook. Some heart breaking songs, and some very funny, especially when Swift is detailing how his look doesn’t fit in to the music industry.
Walls touches so many genres it’s hard to really describe it. There are touches of M83-style epic electronica, old-style broken down machinery dance, hip-hop, trip-hop and so many more. Very talented bloke.
Low go electronic. After The Great Destroyer sounding a bit more upbeat, Drums And Guns goes back to the downbeat earlier Low material, but musically it’s another huge leap forward for this great band. By incorporating synths and drum machines the musical soundscape suits the desolate lyrics, a lazy description would be that this is Low’s Kid A. Radiohead are definitely a touching point, as are Tortoise and Low’s old favourite Galaxy 500. It’s difficult, but ultimately very rewarding.
In which Nick Cave took a few of his Bad Seeds and resurrected the harsh early Seeds and even earlier Birthday Party and Boys Next Door sound. The best way to describe the Grinderman record was what the guy in my local record shop said; “Aye it sounds like the Birthday Party, if they were in their forties, hadn’t split up and had quit the heroin”. I can’t put it better myself. Another essential Cave record.
As one guy on an electronic music forum put it, Bogdan’s like the electronic AC/DC. While the music may seem dumb, it’s actually very clever and can’t help but put a smile on your face. On Alright! the Polish artist explores Happy Hardcore rave music, but like every sub-genre that he explores he contributes so many fresh ideas as to instantly show it up for how limited everyone working in it is. 
An impressive album from a band I hadn’t heard of before. I was recommended them through my like of Wilco and Son Volt and although they don’t really sound like either they have made a better album than both this year. It’s pretty straight forward musically but fantastic lyrically, and the slide of final song John Allyn Smith Sails into The Beach Boys Sloop John B. is one of the finest moments on any record this year.
Punk, funk, indie. Whatever style Les Savy Fav are playing they rule at it. Those with their digits planted firmly on that pulsing vein called the zeitgeist will tell you that Les Savy Fav are the true front runners to both The Strokes and The Rapture, putting them at the forefront of two of the coolest recent genres in the indie world. Now this was actually something that left me a little cautious checking them out as I haven’t been impressed by most of what’s being claimed as their doing. Turns out that like all those great overlooked bands at the forefront of cool movements Les Savy Fav are far better than the copyists.
It’s good to see ex-Orange Juice lead guy Collins back as he nearly died of a brain problem then as he was recovering he caught a serious bug. Including his comeback album could be seen as a sentimental vote but the simple fact of the matter is that Home Again is a fantastic album and one that proves Collins is still a major talent after all this time.
A funky CD thing that only plays in a DVD player or computer and lets you download MP3s of the album (it’ll never catch on) is how The Lips first live concert film of the confetti and balloons era of shows is packaged. The band are as brilliant live as ever, proving that underneath all the spectacle they are one hell of a musical unit, Wayne Coyne’s voice apart of course. As per usual the songs are culled from the last couple of albums only but as this is a homecoming show they dig out Love Yer Brain from the Oh My Gawd…It’s The Flaming Lips album as an encore, much to the vast majority of the crowd’s bemusement. Plus as it’s a Lips film there’s other fun stuff, this time involving animals thanks to the zoo setting for the gig. Plus there’s a big U.F.O. that the band come out of which may fall and kill the front few rows thanks to it being held together by gaffer tape. The closest you’ll get to seeing their madness in person.
Mice Parade specialise in non-electronic electronic music. The stuff is played entirely using live instruments but in a way that sounds like it should be made by synths and drum machines. It’s an intriguing listen and the actual tunes are pretty damn good too.
Blonde Redhead have been around for ages but I have to plead ignorance beyond knowing of them. 23 was a very pleasant surprise. The reason I decided to check this out was because many on Amazon had described this as their “Cocteau Twins Album” that any band with a clever guitarist and a female singer inevitably end up making. It sounds like them in places but this is way more. The opening title track is one of the best songs of this year, and with its multi-layered guitars and confusing vocals it sets up the rest of the album perfectly. Nothing else on the album quite lives up to it, but then very little else on any album did. A fantastic album and one that leads me to want to check out the rest of their work. 
Or the kids that gave Daft Punk a kick up the arse. Thanks Justice for that, but also thanks for a great album in its own right. Funky house that would sound like the most cutting edge thing ever if this was 1997. As it stands ten years on its just a window back to that era of fun French music, of course not a bad thing at all. If you don’t know what Justice sound like dig out any Daft Punk album. It’s uncanny.
The most overrated band on the planet? Maybe but Neon Bible’s a great album, even if it isn’t the greatest thing since someone attacked a loaf with a knife. Don’t let the overreactions of people put you off this one, if you go into it with an open mind you’ll find a collection of, mainly, brilliant songs. Sure some of it’s overwrought and the darkness a bit forced, plus the band sound like a group of dispirit buskers pulling their incompatible styles together and hoping it sticks, but the results are indeed interesting. 
They are a dark horse indeed. I had never heard of them but this is a wonderful album of cluttered, ramshackle rock that sometimes has three drummers and some big guitar licks.
Pop Levi is an ex-member of electronic group Ladytron. His solo debut is a surprisingly joyous Glam album a la T.Rex. The tunes are great and in any other time this might have been a huge album, but Glam just ain’t cool right now. Of course that won’t spoil your enjoyment of one of the most fun albums you’ll hear not just of this year but the decade, maybe beyond.
The National specialise in albums that initially underwhelm before creeping up on you and smacking you across the back of the head with their brilliance. The best way to describe their music is classy. The connoisseur’s album choice of 2007. 
This is one of those love it/hate it albums, I’d imagine. Animal Collective have a similar approach to The Residents in the sense that their approach to sound has the same Dadaist collage feel, but whereas The Residents are happy to embrace that way of thinking fully and alienate the listener Animal Collective actually do have some catchy little numbers. Obviously nothing on here is immediate but given time there is much to love if you can tune into what they are doing. Of course it’ll be just as easy to be really turned off by this straight away, but my advice is to stick with it and you should grow to enjoy this.
DJ mix that appeared right at the death of 2007 on Warp. Excellent and not just your typical 4/4 Euro Dance crap that you get on all of those Ibiza CDs. There seems to be an emphasis on mixing up styles, more for the sheer hell of showing off than anything, and most of the thing is (complex) beat driven. In the end it’s just a brilliant hour long mash-up that proves to be great fun.
Not much to say about this glorious release from Smith’s estate. It’s a 2 CD set compiling stuff he rejected for his second self-titled album and brilliant third Either/Or. Turns out his offcuts are amazing too. A much missed talent and this is a fitting tribute to his genius. Hopefully there will be more to follow.
Steingarten marks a return to form for Germany’s Pole as he again explores the darkest recesses of glitchy dub. Thankfully he’s a master of this kind of thing so the album never overwhelms the listener with it’s heavy dark sound, and in fact contains a number of great, catchy dance tunes, just not the sort you’d hear in a club.
Although classified as ambient electronica Eluvium’s music is more like classical music. Copia shifts between pieces played entirely on piano, like some of Helios’ work, to little orchestral pieces. Sometimes it is huge in scope, sometimes minute and close to the ambient tag. The most impressive piece is the closing ten minutes of Repose In Blue as layers of strings drone a repeated musical pattern for about four minutes before a slight musical shift that heralds the recording of a fireworks display. This is nothing new in this type of music but the size of the explosions means that they sound like a timpani drum being hit randomly as the strings continue to swell. A perfect end to a beautiful album.
Imagine Our Love is a beautiful album, kind of like if The Cocteau Twins were influenced by country instead of Siouxsie And The Banshees. At times Lavender Diamond use repetition to great effect (Oh No, Like An Arrow) which see the same lyrical lines over and over cyclical tunes. These are mesmerising as are the gorgeous ballads, especially Dance Until Tomorrow. The album for the most part is aurally rich, which is a shock as it is pretty much entirely played with acoustic guitar, piano, bass and very sparse drumming. Sometimes this setup does lead to a lack of variety, and things can become a bit Belle & Sebastien twee at times, the name’s a dead giveaway, but for the most part this is a wonderful little album.
Lekman is a singer songwriter that constructs his music entirely from samples. This gives the music a bizarre over-the-top feel, kind of like The Avalanches on brighter moments, Scott Walker on the darker. On top of this Lekman sings in his syrupy voice love songs that come from the smallest of everyday minutia, such as your lover sneaking up behind you to give you a cuddle. One song is even based on Lekman thinking about his lover’s lips because he sees their asthma inhaler on a table. Obviously this means the album can be sickly sweet and twee at times so not one for the Death Metal crowd but for anyone who likes their music lovely this is one of the sweetest albums in ages.
The rumours before release were that Do Make Say Think had gone the way of just about every instrumental act and started singing. Turns out it’s not much and the songs are great, as is the rest of the album. This lot are very clever musicians and aren’t content with the supposed rules of post-rock, unlike, say, Explosions In The Sky, so they set about bending, stretching and breaking them in a way that goes beyond mere singing. The Universe! Is as mighty and fantabulous as the title suggests, while songs like Bound To Be That Way and Executioner’s Blues lull you into the post-rock sense of security before going off on other tangents. A Tender History In Rust sounds like the band met up in a cabin somewhere and just started improvising some country folk number, and is a wonderful midpoint to the album. Thanks to Do Make Say Think the concept of post rock isn’t dead just yet.
It’s been a bit of a strange year in electronic music. People have tried things and there have been successes and failures, and a ridiculous amount of build up for The Tuss release based on who may have been behind the record, and yet most of the best releases ended up looking back. Eksel could have been released any time in the last fifteen years and yet doesn’t sound like some retread of old ideas. The D’arcangelo brothers are basically too talented for that ever to happen and so the album is an enjoyable trip through all of those styles and sounds. It may not be the most clever of electronic album ever made but it is a damn great listen, and sometimes that’s enough.
What’s left to be said about the “pay your own amount to download and we’ll release it on New Year’s Eve on normal CD anyway” scheme? Of course in all the PR it became easy to miss the fact that one of the finest, most creative bands in operation today had just went and made their best album since OK Computer. It’s similar to The Flaming Lips At War With The Mystics, not in sound, but in the sense that it’s a stripped back, band orientated record that only could be made by going to the extremities that preceded it.
The funkiest release of the year. There’s always something very appealing about a bunch of relatively old white guys shaking the dance floor to its foundations and dictating to the little kids what’s cool.
Scottish bloke who used to be the musical half of Arab Strap. This is his third solo album, the first after the Strap’s break-up. The music is at its most bombastic yet with loads of electric guitars, synths and horns, a real move from the mainly acoustic first album. Of course lyrically we still get songs like We’re All Going To Die (brilliantly released in an attempt to be British Xmas No. 1, it failed) and F**k It I Love You, all delivered in Middleton’s droll Falkirk mumble. It adds a comedic angle to proceedings as he gets that he’s a miserabilist even though his life’s actually going quite well, a song on his last album proclaimed that he’d rather be dumped by his girlfriend so he could write songs about it, as the happy ones were a bit rubbish. Oh and We’re All Going To Die is actually a positive song!
The Voice of Midnight is an aural play based on Kaufmann’s Der Sandman. As such it’s exceptionally uncomfortable to listen to, but then it is The Residents, but ultimately brilliant. 
At a time when Daft Punk’s sound couldn’t be cooler you’d think that the veteran dance innovators would have nothing to prove. The problem is their sound is cool because a bunch of young ‘uns have nicked it. Of the three main Daft Punkian (?) releases only Justice truly succeeded , sounding so much like their peers that it has to be considered that Justice may actually be Daft Punk pretending to be a couple of whippersnappers beating them at their own game. Thankfully the old guys decided to come out fighting, and even more thankfully after the lacklustre Human After All they stayed away from the studio, instead taking to the road with a giant pyramid covered in the sort of Xmas lights you wish you could afford. The shows are considered by anyone who saw them to be up there as some of the absolute best and Alive 2007 is a document of one of those shows.
Panda Bear’s a member of Animal Collective and Person Pitch was thought to act as a taster for Strawberry Jam. Instead it stole the whole damn show. Taking the Beach Boys are a starting point, and in particular their vocal harmonies, before applying the ideas of Spector’s wall of sound and electronic music’s use of repetition to create a swirling, psychedelic masterpiece. The songs are essentially acoustic folk numbers that are then looped and found sounds and vocals are layered, and layered, on top of it before they become soaked in reverb to crank up that hazy sunshine feel. It’s all done by one guy, a home studio, an ageing computer and an understanding for many different aspects of psychedelic music. It’s probably the best thing made by anyone involved with the Animal Collective. Not bad for the drummer, eh?
It’s been a while since the last Stars album, there were actually two this year thanks to a tour CD as well, but the only ambient act fit to lick Eno’s boots are back and And The Refinement Of The Decline may be their finest yet. Two hours worth of drones may sound like hell, but it’s some of the most beautiful droning you’ll ever hear. It sounds like a dreamlike state. The album’s really all about layers of sound as many different strands intertwine and drift in and out of each other. Descriptions don’t do Stars Of The Lid’s music justice, it has to be experienced, preferably in a darkened room, maybe under a duvet. Quite simply phenomenal.
Seefeel are one of the great forgotten bands of the 90’s. Coming at the tail-end of the British shoegaze era (currently hip again thanks to M83, Maps, Ulrich Schnauss, A Place To Bury Strangers and A Sunny Day In Glasgow) Seefeel were easily the smartest of the lot. They combined a love for The Cocteau Twins with a fascination for the developments in British electronica at the time, meaning Seefeel sound as much like Autechre as they do Curve. Obviously this meant they were all but ignored by everyone except muso types.
Chris Clark may be the premier Electronic performer in the World right now. Shamefully no album (Turning Dragon’s out at the end of January 2008) but two E.P.s. Ted is the offcuts of 2006’s Body Riddle while Throttle Promoter popped up at the absolute death to show off how Turning Dragon will sound. Both very different releases showing this young man’s talents.
Who is The Tuss? The online consensus is that it’s Aphex Twin, and not some new wonder kid called Brian Tregaskin and his female alter ego/sister/wife Karen. The thing is listening to Rushup Edge points to many performers, Cylob, U-Ziq, Squarepusher, Ceephax, Like Vibert or even Rephlex label co-owner with Aphex Grant Wilson Claridge. The hype leading up to its release was ridiculous thanks to the thought that it was a new Aphex release but the sad truth is that no matter who did it it’s a below par release with only two truly great moments. It probably is Aphex doing a mySpace take on the early 90’s Bradley Strider identity crisis (he probably is Strider too but the speculation came later thanks to a limited pre-internet release) and if it is it’s one of his lesser works.
I don’t really need to say anything about this great slice of pop joy!
A new Wilco album is cause for joy, unless it’s as lacklustre as this. Hopefully they get their act together for the next one.
