The
Preamble
As
always, I’m not deluding myself that anyone actually reads this stuff and, even
if they do come across it thanks to a typo in a Google search, that they will
take any notice of it but I find it good year end therapy and an opportunity to
remind myself how good (or bad) a year its been for ‘proper’ music.
Again,
as always, the rules are that no re-issues, no best-of’s and no live albums can
make it in the list which, this year, stops The Jesus & Mary Chain taking
the top 4 or 5 slots!!!
Its
fair to say that this could have been a top 30, 40 or 50 list this year and
there is some great stuff missing mainly because you have to draw the line
somewhere!
Final
consideration … I am in no way saying these are the best albums of the
year, but that they are my favourite albums for many reasons.
Feel
free to scoff and comment at the stuff you have heard but keep you’re opinions
in check on the stuff that you haven’t until you get the time to go find it and
listen.
The
List
20. Bombay
Bicycle Club: “A Different Kind of Fix”
The Crouch End collective’s third
album continues the theme of sounding completely different from the last one
and delivers a superb collection of polished alt / indie tunes that often start
in one place and then head off somewhere completely different just because …
Check out: “Beggars”
19 Lou
Reed & Metallica: “Lulu”
A classic example of when having
access to albums before the music press reviews hit the web / shelves can
afford you time to make up your own mind long before the sop called experts try
to make it up for you.
I would class myself a fan of Lou
Reed and more of a distant appreciator of Metallica and had been looking
forward to this since it was announced.
It surprised me how complex and challenging this album was but I’d
encourage anyone who might like the combination to invest some quiet time to
listen to this properly and ignore the populist reviews that appear to have
buried this.
Now all we need is a Mark E Smith
and Black Sabbath album in 2012!
Check out: “The View”
18 Radiohead
: “The King of Limbs”
Another example of Radiohead
catching everybody by surprise by announcing the fact that the album existed on
the same day they offered it for download.
Initially disappointing, repeated
listens were encouraged by the brilliance of “Lotus Flower” and “Codex” … these
repeated listens continue to draw you into a collection of tracks that grow
into one of the band’s most cohesive, if not best, collections.
Check out: “Codex”
17 R.E.M:
“Collapse into Now”
Anyone who discovered R.E.M. as a
result of (or after) ‘Everybody Hurts’ may have failed to recognise the history
of ground breaking indie-Americana they had served up previously via brilliant
albums such as “Life’s Rich Pageant”, “Document”, “Green” and “Out of Time” …
despite a fast decent into mediocrity since the departure of drummer Bill Berry
in 1997, their last (ever?) albums of “Accelerate” and this offered some
glimpses of the genius that had gone before.
Should history find the possibility
of pretending that “Up”, “Reveal” and
“Around the Sun” never happened then R.E.M. should be considered one of the
worlds most important bands, ever.
Check
out: “UBerlin”
16 Iceage:
“New Brigade”
Danish youth punks deliver debut
album of raw structured noise that reminds you what it was like to listen to
The Pixies for the first time … nuff
said !
Check out: “New Brigade”
15 dEUS
: “Keep You Close”
The Belgian outfit have been around
(on and off) since 1994 when they released the edgy art-punk album “Worst Case
Scenario” that caught the attention of many including me. I’ve been a fan since and watched them
develop in many directions, often varied, often unsuccessful.
He band have taken several breaks in
their 6-album career and while “Keep You Close” doesn’t have the edge of the
debut, it retains the essence of creativity that made me like them in the first
place.
Check out: “Keep You Close”
14 Explosions
in the Sky: “Take Care, Take Care, Take
Care”
Ah, the ubiquitous instrumental
post-rock fascination continues … and not for the last time on this year’s
list!
The Post-Rock genre is often accused
of being ‘samey’ with many claiming ‘ it all sounds like Mogwai’ but closer
inspection reveals many different facets of the quiet-quiet-loud-LOUD-quiet
genre that takes so much time to appreciate but delivers so much in
return. Texans Explosions in the Sky deliver
their sixth album which is less accessible than many of its predecessors but
retains the effortless sonic layering that we have become accustomed to.
Oh,
and based on this years offerings by both bands … its sounds nothing
like Mogwai !!!
Check out: “Last Known Surroundings”
13 Girls:
“Father, Son, Holy Ghost”
Second album from the San Francisco
duo that made the top of many of the music press reviews of the year for good
reason. A varied album that includes
influences from many musical eras but delivers a fresh, angst-ridden and
contemporary indie-Americana feel.
Check out: “Vomit”
12 Wild
Beasts: “Smother”
I have to admit that I wasn’t a fan
of Wild beasts up until the release of this album … I gave previous album “Two
Dancers” a fair chance but just couldn’t tune into the falsetto vocal style
that saturated the sound.
Early reviews of “Smother” suggested
that this had been toned down and, while its still there, there is much more
space to appreciate the song structures and textures.
I’ve seen them live twice now and
encourage anyone who hasn’t to do so when they can … rarely can a band with
such a complex sound deliver so well on stage.
Check out: “Reach a Bit Further”
11 British
Sea Power: “Valhalla Dancehall”
Brighton’s post-punk collective
cough up their fifth album of pseudo-topical, arcane-ironic that your either
gonna love, hate or never listen to … up to you.
Check out: “Who’s in Control”
10 Peter
Murphy: “Ninth”
The undisputed godfather of goth’s
ninth (albeit only eighth studio) album while being uncreatively named includes
some of the best post-Bauhaus stuff we have heard from the great man.
On first listen, it’s important to
either grin and bear the first couple of tracks or just skip them (don’t worry,
they eventually work) and delve deeper into the darker moments that commence
around “I Spit Roses”.
Repeated listens are required to do
this collection justice … then go and dig out your Bauhaus collection, we’ve
all got one … don’t we?
Check out: “The Prince and Old Lady Shade”
9 Blueneck: “Repetitions”
The Bristol ambient post-rockers
follow up 2010’s “The Fallen Host” with an astounding album of mostly ghostly
chill out sounds but where the volume knob is sometimes cranked up slowly and
deliberately.
Haunting vocals and often
unstructured arrangements require the right frame of mind to appreciate but
well worth the effort.
Check out: “Pneumothorax”
8 The
Strokes: “Angles”
Since the release of the 2001’s “Is
This It”, the muso press constantly called for The Strokes to re-invent their
sound to avoid them becoming too one-dimensional. When the band tried to do this on subsequent
albums they were panned for losing their identity … they couldn’t win!
So, 10 years on and after a lengthy
hiatus that saw many solo albums from band members, The Strokes return with a
sound that is exactly what people where calling for … clearly still The Strokes
but with some spot and polish.
Unfortunately, the band appear to be
tainted in the eyes of many of the populist press these days but for those with
open ears, they sound (almost) as good as they did 10 years ago.
Check out: “Under Cover of
Darkness”
7 Arctic
Monkeys: “Suck it and See”
After the mixed reviews of 2009’s
“Humbug” where the band re-invented their sound, they play a blinder by coming
back with an album that had influences from all over the place.
Preview tracks like “Brick by Brick”
and “Don’t Sit Down …” led us to believe the sound would be similar to the
murky rock-blues of the previous offering but when the album was unveiled we
heard bits of Stone Roses, some Echo & the Bunnymen and not a shortage of
David Gedge’s Cinerama (one for the purists the last one!)
Again, many made their mind up based
on the early reviews and more fool you, this is a wonderful and varied album
and was certainly the soundtrack of my summer!
Check out: “That’s Where Your Wrong”
6 The
Fall: “Erstatz GB”
The great John Peel once said of The
Fall that they were “always different, always the same” and this remains true
to this day.
One of the most consistent Fall
albums in years, it has been given some stick by the so called purist Fall fans
who don’t rate it … I think they worry that it might just be listed to by
people who are not worthy!!
If you’re a Fall fan you will have
your opinions on this but I rate it very, very highly … If your not a Fall fan,
this might just be the very place (and time) to start … enjoy!
Check out: “Taking Off”
5 Blanck
Mass: “Blanck Mass”
The solo guise of Benjamin Power who
is one half on electronic noisemeisters Fuck Buttons … this is one of those
indescribable pieces of work that you will find either hugely affecting or
completely disposable.
Genre busting electro-drone that is effectively
a collection of ambient soundscapes that on first listen don’t add up to much
of anything but given the right collection of circumstances can be the perfect
accompaniment to those times of reflection and concentration.
Check out: “Chernobyl”
4 We
Were Promised Jetpacks: “In the Pit of
the Stomach”
The Edinburgh indie-collective
follow up 2009’s “These Four Walls” with a way more mature collection that
sounds great first time round but continues to grow on repeated listens.
Another example of brilliant Scots
indie rock that builds on the success of The Twilight Sad, Frightened Rabbit
etc.
Must be played loud!!!
Check out: “Human Error”
3 Mogwai: “Hardcore Will Never Die But You Will”
So, all instrumental guitar based
post-rock sounds like Mogwai then eh?
Well, I reckon this changes the game slightly as Glasgow’s finest decide
to back off the noise a tad and focus on adding even more layers to the sound
structure that has stood them in good stead since 1997’s “Mogwai Young Team”.
The essence of the Mogwai sound is
all here and many of the arrangement styles have been heard on previous albums
(‘White Noise’, ‘Rano Pano’, ‘You’re Lionel Ritchie’ etc) but these are
accompanied by some radical departures like ‘Mexican Grand Prix’, ‘How to be a
Werewolf’ and the stunningly beautiful
‘Letters to the Metro’.
John Peel’s Fall quote of “always
different, always the same” could equally apply to Mogwai, another band that
Peel loved.
I managed to see Mogwai live twice
in 2011 and they continue to deliver the best live experience around.
Check out: “Letters to the Metro”
2 This
Will Destroy You: “Tunnel Blanket”
I discovered TWDY thanks to the
wonders of last.fm where they were presented as a band that I may like based on
my previous listening, given that their first album was pretty much a post-rock
by numbers offering (albeit a brilliant one), last.fm were not wrong.
“Tunnel Blanket” departs from their
initial offerings in many ways … its still instrumental, its still guitar based
rock but it takes on a much more drone structure in many ways that takes some
serious effort to tune in to.
This is an important album for me in
several ways, firstly because its brilliant … its takes many listens to
appreciate but it is utterly brilliant.
Secondly, this is the album that was a constant for me around the death
of my father earlier this year and seemed to fit perfectly with that ‘I don’t
know what I should be listening to here … Am I sad? Am I angry?’ mode.
Given this, I appreciate that this
won’t be everyone’s cup of tea but I always say that personal music taste is
all about reference points and they don’t come much bigger than this for me.
Check out: “Black Dunes”
1
Wu
Lyf: “Go Tell Fire to the Mountain”
I’m
sure I mentioned on my Facebook page very early in 2011 that these guys would
be on many peoples best of list come the end of the year … well, after repeated
listens and revisits, they certainly deserve to be on top of mine.
The
most under-promoted and under-hyped band in a long time, this reminds me of
listening to Happy Monday’s ‘Bummed’ for the first time (after a colleague
gifted it to me as he thought it was shit, thanks Graham!!!) it also reminds me
of what a fusion of Foals, Arcade Fire and the Clash would sound like.
I
don’t care that the lyrics are largely undistinguishable … I don’t care that
the sound is raw and unpolished … despite the influences its fresh and that
will do for me !!!
