Despite
compiling a list of my favourite albums of the year every year, it’s been a
while since I published here for absolutely no one to see …
So, in ‘broken’
traditional style, here lies my offering for 2015 with minimal descriptive copy
as it’s been a busy week and my motivation is low … for the writing you
understand, for music listening there is no letup!
20 Human Don’t Be Angry - “Electric Blue”
19 Belle & Sebastian - “Girls in
Peacetime Want to Dance”
18 Idlewild - “Everything Ever Written”
17 Beach House - “Depression Cherry”
16 Floating Points - “Elaenia”
15 Kathryn Joseph - “Bones You Have Thrown
Me and Blood I Have Spilt”
14 Low - “Ones and Sixes”
13 Kagoule
- “Urth”
12 The Fall - “Sub Lingual Tablet”
11 New Order - “Music Complete”
10 Caspian
- “Dust & Disquiet”
Fourth album by American post-rockers that culminates in a final
title track that has no place being that good!
9 Desperate journalist - “Desperate
Journalist”
Think Echobelly meets Gene and the retro flashbacks kick in …
thanks to consistency of delivery, this comes off as more that a pseudo tribute
though … superb stuff!
8 Georg Holm (Sigur Ros) - “Circe”
No Sigur Ross album in 2015 so we just had to make do with this
score for upcoming BBC documentary “The Show of Shows” by ¾ of the Icelandic
band’s touring members. An eclectic
collection of instrumentals than can feel disjointed at times but ultimately superb!
7 EZTV - “Calling Out”
Brooklyn collective deliver retro guitar based indie that brings
back Teenage Fanclub memories … what’s not to like!
6 Aero Flynn - “Aero Flynn”
Close friend of Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon, Josh Scott finally
breaks cover to release his first proper album.
This was my Majorca holiday pool side staple earlier this year and
deserves way more attention and acclaim than it got.
5 Desaparecidos - “Payola”
Conor Oberst (temporarily hopefully) ditches the Bright Eyes
moniker and reforms the American politic punk combo for only their second album
since forming in 2001. Non-stop 100mph
delivery of challenging content that harks back to a more politically aware
musical generation of yesteryear.
4 Blanck Mass - “Dumb Flesh”
As big a shift from his eponymous debut as you can imagine,
Benjamin John Power returns with a mind bending noise monster!
3 A Mote of Dust - “A Mote of
Dust"
Craig Beaton of Aereogramme and The Unwinding Hours reinvents
himself yet again in a stripped down guise that delivers one of the most
introspective & beautiful albums in a long time... Really looking forward
to seeing Craig execute this live in an intimate Aberdeen venue in January
2016.
2 Stephan Bodzin - “Powers of Ten”
A tweet from the account of Scottish electronic collective Very
Very Small Inclusions about the great sounds on the new Stephan Bodzin album
encouraged me to check this out... Incredibly consistent electronica!
1 Godspeed You! Black Emperor -
“Asunder, Sweet and Other Dreams”
Like watching an episode of The Leftovers, pressing ‘play’ or
dropping the needle on any Godspeed album signals an investment in time that is
never comfortable but always rewarding.
Digitally, this comes across as two behemoth tracks sandwiching two
drone / noise instalments … on vinyl, it all just makes sense.
Final ‘track’ “Piss Crowns Are Trebled” has to be one of the most
perfectly conceived & executed instrumental rock tracks in history …
perfect!
