Swiftly on to the top albums of the year! First the bridesmaids...
Daft Punk - Random Access Memories. The first dozen or so plays through
this album were such a joy! Just misses out on my top 10 due to the
fact that it's not as edgy or eccentric as moments on Homework or
Discovery.
Fuck Buttons - Slow Focus. No let up from this duo. Textures a-plenty. Again not quite in the top 10 as it didn't move me as much as Tarot Sport (and other albums in my top 10).
Julia Holter - Loud City Song. If 'Ekstasis' was a wonderful eccentricity, part Laurel Halo part Joni Mitchell. Then 'Loud City Song' is part Fiona Apple part PJ Harvey. Beautifully fragmented but set to the heartbeat of the world outside. Love it.
Run The Jewels - Run The Jewels. El-P and Killer Mike released pretty awesome LPs back in 2012. Their collaborative nous came through on both of those albums, however 'Run The Jewels' wears the crown. Limitless energy and fantastically interesting flows makes this one of the hip hop records of the year.
Forest Swords - Engravings/ The Haxan Cloak - Excavation. I've put these together because it's difficult to leave either out. Indulgence. I came across Excavation several months before I actually lisetened to it, managing to pick up a German copy eventually. It was a great decision (pat on back). A very intimate dubstep/electronic listen and mememorable in it's audacity. If I had listened to it a few more times definitely a top 10 shoe in. With 'Engravings' I recall picking it up and being lost in this one man world. Then 'Loud City Song' and Janelle Monae' 'Electric Lady' were released and my attention was diverted. Coming back to it over the last few weeks reminds me what an electronic delight it is. Forest Swords and The Haxan Cloak released opposing electronic pieces but together they form a reminder of how much depth this genre continues to show.
There's something fundamentally wrong with me writing this on Christmas Day whilst everyone else is taking Chaucer to heart. The show must go on;
10. Justin Timberlake - Mirrors
There were a few candidates for best JT song of the year. But this is the one that does it for me. It's the quintessential Timberlake/Timbaland production really. Starting at a pressing pace and then a change up into something a little more comfortable. It's just the hookiest of his songs in 2013 and with the prettiest syrup laden falsettos
9. The National - I Need My Girl
It's difficult to pick out a particular favourite from 'Trouble Will Find Me'. Unlike 'High Violet', which had Bloodbuzz Ohio and Conversation 16 amongst others, TWFM finds the band at it's most at ease. Without the weightiness and themes of the familiarial, a diversion has been made from dealing with life as thirty-somethings. It hasn't completely evaporated however. I Need My Girl reminds me of the wordplay of much of 'Boxer'. Tight, personal and yet universally appreciable
8. Disclosure - Latch
LOVED what these boys did this year. What's particularly great is that they straddled both critical raves and mainstream success. Why? Confidence for one. Two, an album filled with wall to wall golden bangers. Yeah i'm picking Latch but could just as well picked 3-4 others.
7. Arcade Fire - Reflektor
The songs that really connect (with me) are those that deal with alienation and loneliness, from society, from ourselves, without dwelling in some mawkish sludge under the sewers. Here we have our disco setting (see Afterlife), and on top of that a vigor that hasn't disappeared after 10 years.
6. HAIM - The Wire
Este is back. Can't keep a good face down. Seriously though how awesome is the bass line here? The pop charts should be grateful.
5. Deafheaven - Dream House
This year, Sunbather, was my unexpected unearthed gem. Dream House kicks thing off in a wistfully romantic mood. Romantic? Well yes, this is the heaviest of rock metal (not black metal, mind) and yet the melodies are as gorgeous as anything released this year. The lyrics blend in and out of the mix and work well as an additional rhythmic element to what is happening in the background (although when read in isolation also stand up to scrutiny). Many will simply press play and switch off after 15 seconds. It's a shame because Dream House is just the start of the most loving odyssey created in 2013.
4. Burial - Come Down To Us
The latest release of my top 20, Come Down To Us frustrated and downright angered Burialites. But what Mr Bevan did here feels like the most IMPORTANT track of 2013. It's two halves contain the most saccharine uplifiting samples he's ever put out. Gone is the isolation and underbelly of a gluttonous city swapped for hope and glorious resurrection. Burial announced tracks 2 and 3 were a riposte to bullying, a candle to those who feel like they have nowhere to turn. It succeeds magically (director Lana Wachowski's speech a fitting ending).
3. Vampire Weekend - Step
I love everything these guys have done this year. It's so exciting to see a band mature the way they have. I enjoyed Contra but it held my attention in spurts. What a wonderful representation of Koenig and co 'Step' proves to be. The stage is set with a nostalgic reverb piano riff but what makes this so GREAT? The lyrics. Essentially a balance sheet on age vs youth, it acheives a sweet spot with balance and poetic beauty.
2. The Knife - Full Of Fire
The first time I saw the
short video for this track it was difficult to comprehend in one
sitting. What is this song even about? Class struggles? The internet
age? Gender inequalities and the 21st century fight for sexual equality?
The ever diluting of valuable ideals and truths? Even if this is a
tickle on social change what matters to listener A is the verve and
tenacity of what the Dreijer' acheive here. It's a song that makes you
stand up, shock, shake you to your core, makes you dance and ends up
leaving you wondering why more acts aren't so daring and provocative.
1. Phosphorescent - Song For Zula
A voice that sounds like stepping on shattered crystals (in the most respectful way), a transition chord template which has been heard a million times (U2 for one in almost all their tracks). Song for Zula hit home as soon as I first heard it. Being grabbed straight away with a line that not only references a great Johnny Cash track but calls it out as folly. It's bitter but also heartbreaking just as the rest of the song, which adds swelling orchestration to its armoury but ends with a graceful denouement which exits at the back of the stage but leaves the lasting impression as the crowd leave the hall.
Days off, rarer than fool's gold. A delay a mosey on the beak of a songbird etc etc.
Let's hit the road!
20. Sigur Ros - Isjaki
It's been something of a comeback year for the Ros, which is a strange thing to say considering the volume of their output hasn't exactly waned. The issue i've had with the last few LPs is that many of the band's songs have been a sole idea stretched out to some hollow end point. While there have been positives, momentum has often been curtailed due to a certain insouciant meandering. So a return to form. Check out the transition from Chorus 1 to 2 for evidence. Reminds me of the 'Gong' days.
19. Kanye West - Blood On The Leaves
This shouldn't work. A relationship tale on a political backdrop? It's bracingly honest which helps no end but that it fits between the lyrically smash-mouth 'I'm In It' and half-sister 'Guilt Trip' allows 'BOTL' to rise to the podium as the emotive fulcrum of 'Yeezus'. No mean feat for such an abrasive, confrontational merry-go-round.
18. Youth Lagoon - Mute
There's an almost agnostic sparkle to this ambitious tune by Youth Lagoon. It's an interesting turn of musical trends that the best songs on the search for some sort of spiritual synchronization have avoided the altruistic sermons of yesteryear and now aim for a middle ground, the no man's land we dwell in for joyless swathes of time. Not many of us are able to portray such a reverential juxtaposition.
17. M.I.A - Bring The Noise
M.I.A (Mark III) has covered a lot of bases in her relatively short spanned career (LP wise). Since Galang, I've always found her most enjoyable when she brings a pop sensibility to her songwriting toolbox. She brings it here, just as with last year's bumper single 'Bad Girls'. Fab video to boot.
16. Arcade Fire - Afterlife
The African shuffle is undeniable after a few listens here. Really the patented Arcade Fire trick now. Take an upbeat build up ahead of steam rhythm section layer with synths/syncopated percussive elements and then layer with Win/Regine narratives on something heartbreaking. A triumph.
15. Haim - Falling
Can't wait to see this threesome live in March. Those Fleetwood Mac/ Stevie Nicks comparisons were a little distracting when 'Don't Save Me' was released. But the energy and vivality of everything these girls do is undeniable, and this is just one of many pop pearls on their debut album 'Days Are Gone'. I'll take Este's bass face over 100's of listless NME indie types any day of the week.
14. My Bloody Valentine - wonder 2
The best song of the year with '2' on the end of it. (editor note: stop with the tongue in cheek comments). It's seems we've had this new album 'mbv' for years and thats a testament to its quality. When it came out though, fresh download and all, 'wonder 2' was the polemic track which went against the comfort of what came before it. Part cacophony, part 21st century shoegaze. It's the song that still jolts as much as any else released this year.
13. James Blake - Retrograde
I wouldn't say I was indifferent to the new James Blake album but this was so clearly the highest of highs, all other tracks seem subservient to this small wonder. It's not as mysterious or offsetting as anything on 'James Blake' but it rivals 'Limit to Your Love' in that it holds its soul sensibility very much on its sleeve as wild flowers bloom amongst and beyond its hymnal motifs.
12. Daft Punk - Giorgio by Moroder
9 minutes and 5 seconds of showing off, pyrotechnics, autiobiography and uncontrollable release. Dance!
11. Janelle Monae - Primetime
Absolutely love Janelle. She's one of those narratively speaking innovative artists out there hand in hand with Erykah Badu who rather neatly appears on Monae's new LP in the jammin' 'Q.U.E.E.N.'. This is my favourite of her singles though. One of the ballads of the year and my pick simply because while before she had the songs and the words she now has the emotion also. Hopefully B.I.G. sales will follow soon enough.
