TOP 100 Albums, compilations, reissues and books from a year united in adversity.
Welcome to Deluxe Issue 21, our annual assessment of the last 12 months of - mostly - new music. Whereas we normally focus on the bricks, the mortar, the walls, the racks, the diligent and sonically enlightened folks that tend the till and all of the weird and wonderful creatures that shop there - this issue of Deluxe is all about the music, man. I don’t think that anyone would argue that 2020 has so far been a real sonofabitch, but you know what, reading through this top 100 albums list, it has at the very least sounded fantastic. So for your consideration, one hundred albums (plus choice reissues, books and compilations) released between January and late October of this year that we have loved playing. Hope you do too.
www.deluxenewspaper.com Written and compiled by The Drift Record Shop Designed by Jenny Frances Cover illustration by Ailsa Johnson Sub edited by Lu Overy Printed by Newspaper Club Distributed by Forte Music Distribution Š 2020 Deluxe Newspaper Whilst every care has been taken in the preparation of this newspaper, the publishers cannot be held responsible for the accuracy of information or any consequence arising from it.
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LANTERNS ON THE LAKE Spook The Herd
JONATHAN WILSON Dixie Blur
EMMY THE GREAT April
BC CAMPLIGHT Shortly After Takeoff
TIM BURGESS I Love The New Sky
THE FLAMING LIPS American Head
I BREAK HORSES Warnings
DRAB CITY Good Songs For Bad People
MODERN NATURE Annual
a selection of 2020 releases from
BELLA UNION shop all this years releases | www.bellaunion.com
B E G G ARS ARC HI V E 2020 RE LEAS ES
PALE SAINTS Comforts of Madness
SOUTHERN FREEZ + JOHN ROCCA
111111
Variations on a Theem
THE CHARLATANS
PJ HARVEY
Between 1Oth and 11th
Dry
BUFFALO TOM
THE FALL
Birdbrain
The Frenz Experiment
FIELDS OF THE NEPHILIM Elizium
2020
Top 100...
Picked, voted, ranked and counting down from 100. This is a good guide to what 2020 has sounded like over here.
100. Melt Yourself Down
99. Rival Consoles Articulation
Don’t Let Get You Down
Decca / 3 July
Erased Tapes / 14 August
Brainfeeder / 28 February
Explosive third LP from London 6-piece Melt Yourself Down. They’ve retained a strong sense of the wonderfully free spirit improvisers they are on stage, but with Youth and Ben Hillier on production duties there is a refined focus on record. Politically charged, but playing out like a party album at breakneck speed.
Beautifully crafted, with meticulously made beats that ebb and flow. Perhaps more so than ever before, there is a looseness that leans more towards a post-rock band set-up; beats to lock into and drift away to. Plenty of changes of pace and lush timbres to bring you back into the room.
The virtuoso beatboxer and comedian Reggie Watts joins forces with techno legend John Tejada for a collaborative album of hugely gratifying house anthems. It’s a real trip, pure escapism through loose and punchy beats, Watts’ impressive vocal range and plenty of weirder experimental production to keep you locked in.
97. Muzz Muzz
96. Mark Lanegan
Straight Songs of Sorrow
95. Sink Ya Teeth
Matador / 8 June
Heavenly Recordings / 8 May
Hey Buffalo / 28 February
Self-titled debut album from Paul Banks (Interpol), Josh Kaufman (Bonny Light Horseman) and Matt Barrick (Jonathan Fire*Eater/The Walkmen). They have captured such a vibe on this one, dark and soulful with impressionistic imagery. Even the slower moments are full of a quiet and brooding euphoria.
Although unflinching in tone and shrouded in darkness, it doesn’t feel like a superficial dressing, it’s just plain dark. Production is really captivating, lots of guests (Warren Ellis, Adrian Utley, Ed Harcourt), and the little electronic gestures and muted instrumentation really draw you in. Another gripping collection from an original voice.
Excellent second album from duo Maria Uzor and Gemma Cullingford. Production wise, it has a nice progression from their first outing, sonically placed somewhere in the late 70s with the last shakes of disco’s euphorica against DIY funk and brittle post-New Order bleakness. Diverse with plenty of carefully-led builds.
100% YES
Records of the Year 2020.
98. Wajatta
Two
Nos. 100 - 30
94. Colorama
93. Bananagun
92. JARV IS…
Chaos Wonderland
The True Story of Bananagun
Beyond The Pale
Banana & Louie / 4 September
Full Time Hobby / 26 June
Rough Trade Records / 17 July
New LP as Colorama from Carwyn Ellis in utterly grooving form. It’s an homage to the music that he loves and is inspired by, and in less-skilled hands recreating those tones could fall flat as tribute. Chaos Wonderland is warmly nostalgic, and frames his versatile and addictive voice.
Vibrant debut from Melbourne’s Bananagun, with restless energy that positively erupts from each and every song. Sonically it stretches between hypnotic afrobeat, post Os Mutantes grooves and acid-dipped exotica, it would not surprise to find that any of these songs were lovingly recorded decades ago. A genuinely psychedelic trip.
Idiosyncratic, restlessly finding new influences to consume and reimagine in his own image. You can all imagine post-disco-pop-music with Leonard Cohen chewing the microphone right? Well that is the styling, but there is so much more going on here, it’s meticulously layered. Droll, funny, honest and pretty much beatperfect throughout.
91. IDLES
90. Brigid Dawson & The Mothers Network
89. EOB
Ultra Mono Partisan Records / 25 September
The complete arc of IDLES’ ferocious rise from the much-hyped viral live band to full-fledged social commentators and chart toppers. Fortunately they remain pretty firm to their punk guns here with reassuringly uncommercial production, it’s relentless in its bluntness. Not every message hits home, but they remain thrilling and poignant.
Nos. 100 - 30
Ballet Of Apes
Castle Face / 24 July
You may well know Brigid and her glorious tones as part of Thee Oh Sees or in OCS. The songs on Ballet Of Apes testify to a brilliantly seasoned writer and an album of sonic collages. A journey through Dawson’s musical obsessions, it has such a ghostly haze to it.
Records of the Year 2020.
Earth
Capitol / 17 April
Debut album from Radiohead’s Ed O’Brien as EOB. The main narrative here is the beautiful harmony between the album’s intricate and delicate pieces and the full chug and drive of the big moments. Vocally he sounds fantastic, and it is beautifully produced, too. Full of excellent songs with loads of hooks.
88. U.S. Girls
87. Daniel Blumberg On&On
Out of My Province
4AD / 6 March
Mute / 31 July
Spacebomb Records / 6 March
Technicolour seventh album by U.S. Girls, the protean musical enterprise of multi-disciplinary artist Meg Remy. It’s so rare that you find someone who can balance big themes from this year’s unique climate with vibrant and addictive pop songs. She’s both a brilliant writer and performer, and this is pretty essential stuff throughout.
A really fascinating set here, fiercely experimental in its flow and instrumentation, and at the same time full of sweet and utterly heartfelt moments. Blumberg is in stunning voice, and his band use repetition and subtle improvisation across the nine-track song cycle like ghostly premonitions and echoes. Some of the year’s creatively boldest moments.
New Zealander Nadia Reid’s third album, and her first with Spacebomb, produced by Matthew E. White and the Spacebomb House Band. She sounds utterly amazing and although the production is her fullest support to date, they all know exactly when to fade away and leave just Nadia’s commanding voice in the mix.
85. bdrmm
84. LA Priest GENE
83. Tim Burgess
I Love The New Sky
Sonic Cathedral / 3 July
Domino Recording Co / 5 June
Bella Union / 22 May
Sort of self-titled debut from the Hull/Leeds based five-piece. Loads and loads of musical reference points, with clattering guitars and waves of swaying reverb. This fine debut is a case of substance over style, and bdrmm really do have their own vibe, set out clearly amongst the fuzzy shapes.
Lots of people can take the styles and garnishes of Prince’s maximalist pop and deliver something perfectly catchy. Working with producer Erol Alkan, LA Priest (Sam Eastgate of Late of the Pier) has delivered an album that genuinely expands that sonic palette with flare. Utterly brilliant pop music, and an instant classic.
Tim Burgess’s fifth solo album is an absolute joy. He is a wry and very personable writer; these are all autobiographical pieces but surreal enough to bring in smart observations between the heartbreak and anthemic bangers. Direct, honest and spiritually uplifting, his charm really shines through the warm nostalgic production.
Heavy Light
Bedroom
Records of the Year 2020.
86. Nadia Reid
Nos. 100 - 30
82. Nap Eyes
Snapshot of a Beginner Jagjaguwar / 27 March
Focused around frontman Nigel Chapman’s idiosyncratic drawl, thematically the album is more mellow than its predecessors. It’s world weary, but funny, smart and able to find glorious moments of melancholic sunshine between the riffs. They have captured such a vibe, albums that are able to do that are really rare.
81. Tony Allen & Hugh Masekela Rejoice
World Circuit / 20 March
Released two years after South African trumpeter Hugh Masekela’s death, this 2010 session with the legendary Nigerian drummer Tony Allen documents their unique fusion of Afrobeat and jazz. Sadly, Tony Allen died a month after this joyous album was released. A fitting tribute to two immaculate talents.
80. Juniore
Un Deux Trois Outré / 28 February
Impeccably cool new LP from the Paris outfit Juniore. If you’re a radio listener, you’ll no doubt have kept hearing hugely evocative 1960s French pop with hazy psychedelia and surf grooves... it’s these guys! Don’t mistake the yé-yé for style over substance, they have some killer songs in the smokey haze.
79. Andy Bell
78. Jason Molina
77. Jaga Jazzist
Sonic Cathedral / 9 October
Secretly Canadian / 7 August
Brainfeeder / 7 August
Debut solo album from Ride guitarist and singer Andy Bell. Finger-picked folk, through psych pop, to some brilliantly off-kilter electronic burrs, it feels like a very personal collection from someone who has been hoarding ideas for decades. There is of course also plenty of shoegazing too… a really beautifully crafted set.
Final collection of songs that Jason Molina recorded before his death. Stripped back to the barest bones, it’s somehow louder and more crushing than the biggest moments of Magnolia Electric Co. Without a doubt, one of the finest and most important songwriters of our lifetime. A very powerful last set to savour.
The iconic Norwegian eight-piece Jaga Jazzist partner with the Brainfeeder label for the first time on a four track album that deep dives into jazz, post-rock and psychedelic influences. Although wildly eclectic and free flowing, there is such cohesion that it never fails to drive on to rousing effect.
The View From Halfway Down
Nos. 100 - 30
Eight Gates
Pyramid
76. Pottery
Welcome To Bobby’s Motel Partisan Records / 26 June
Debut LP from Montreal’s Pottery. It takes all the overlapping nervous energy of their brilliant No.1 EP and presents a fuller, broader and bigger collection of songs. Never afraid to change pace, they move between grooves and rattling riffs adeptly, whilst always sounding to be having a lot of fun.
73. Daniel Avery & Alessandro Cortini Illusion Of Time
Phantasy Sound / 27 March
Debut collaboration from renowned UK producer Daniel Avery and acclaimed experimental musician and Nine Inch Nails synth artist Alessandro Cortini. It feels a little like a soundtrack to a day: hazy sunshine wake-ups, big blue skies, swirling sunsets and starry nights. A real trip, and a very beautiful one.
75. Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever Sideways to New Italy Sub Pop / 5 June
74. The Soft Pink Truth Shall We Go On Sinning So That Grace May Increase? Thrill Jockey / 19 June
You know we always rave about these guys, but this new set really feels like a big step up in production. They successfully bring quite maudlin moments into the fold too, albeit through their sun-kissed lens. Some superb jangle going on here across the interwoven lines of guitar and vocals.
New LP from Drew Daniel of Matmos. A stunning headspace, masterfully fusing jazz, house, ambience and minimalism into a mood that feels nurturing in its sustained haze. Created as a reaction to the worldwide resurgence of fascism, it’s a collection of phenomenal power through soft touch.
72. Sorry
71. Hailu Mergia
Domino Recording Co. / 27 March
Awesome Tapes From Africa / 27 March
Debut LP from the North Londoners. It really is marvellous this, taking cues from a ton of stuff and sounding wildly like nothing very much at all. Pop music that veers from half-sedated to totally jacked up, it’s a thrilling ride and the production is just brilliant. Reminiscent of the unparalleled wonk of early Metronomy.
Totally mesmerising new LP from Ethiopia-born multi-instrumentalist Hailu Mergia. Bubbling with the Ethio jazz sound that he was so seminal in bringing to the wider world. It’s audacious in style, his hypnotic jazz is increasingly shaped with little gestures towards funk, reggae and R&B across these beautiful sonic headspaces.
925
Yene Mircha
70. Anna von Hausswolff
69. Douglas Dare Milkteeth
All Or Nothing
Southern Lord / 25 September
Bella Union / 21 February
FatCat Records / 7 February
An album of extraordinary intensity and emotion from Anna von Hausswolff on the mighty Southern Lord imprint. The Swedish composer sidelines the gothic pop of her previous releases in favour of sorrowful, wordless soundscapes, performed entirely on a church’s pipe organ. Both calm and dramatic, fluidly progressing between the two.
Produced by Mike Lindsay (of Tunng and one half of LUMP), everything is stripped right back to wrap around Douglas’s voice. We’d go so far as to say that he has one of the most beautifully controlled and hugely emotive voices around. It is pretty, sad, simple and really addictive.
Immediate fourth album from postpunk trio Shopping. Pounding rhythms and full of the intoxicating guitar riffs and hooks that Rachel Aggs (also of Trashkit/Sacred Paws) has become so celebrated for. The production is vivid and punchy, it’s as close as they have gotten to pop and it’s totally vibrant.
67. Squirrel Flower
66. Field Music
65. Georgia
All Thoughts Fly
68. Shopping
I Was Born Swimming
Making a New World
Seeking Thrills
Full Time Hobby / 31 January
Memphis Industries / 10 January
Domino Recording Co. / 10 January
Debut album from Ella O’Connor Williams. It’s intimate and really close, but there is quite a lot of brashness to the reverby production. Lyrically it is poetic without being impenetrable, and she does a fine job of conveying some of the bigger moments with moods rather than words.
A nineteen track song cycle about the after-effects of the First World War. Musically smart, thematically bold, the only let-down (which is entirely not their fault) being the grim reality of what they present here: a modern world that’s been crippling itself incrementally for a century. Some of their finest production, hugely engaging.
Inspired by Chicago house and Detroit techno, Seeking Thrills is about analogue club beats (her drumming is brilliant) and is full of euphoric pop and melancholic synths. An ode to being “consumed by night”, this is a passion project from someone who not only “gets” club music, but clearly loves it too.
Nos. 100 - 30
Records of the Year 2020.
Room For The Moon
63. Angel Olsen
Whole New Mess
62. Nubya Garcia
RVNG Intl. / 25 September
Jagjaguwar / 28 August
Concord / 21 August
Hugely ambitious and grandiose pop from Moscow-based electronic producer Kate NV. Alongside a cast of guest musicians, it’s a fascinating combination of honking traditional instruments and bubbling synths. Although quite metronomic or mathematical at its core, it is so inventive and absolutely full of life.
A companion piece and early chrysalis of the songs that formed 2019’s All Mirrors. Thrilling to hear the journey in full. It’s the most stripped back she has sounded in a decade, but her presence has grown such that it’s as powerful as the epic production of its remarkable predecessor.
The exceptional full debut album from saxophonist Nubya Garcia. Source is all about Nubya as the leader, taking her band and collaborators on a vivid and diverse sonic journey. Hot calypso and dancehall influences in the mix, it coherently pulls in a lot of tones and goes somewhere with them.
61. Phoebe Bridgers
60. Khruangbin
Dead Oceans / 19 June
Dead Oceans / 26 June
59. Tom Misch & Yussef Dayes
Even in her most lo-fi roots, she proved herself to be a devastatingly funny and devastatingly-devastating songwriter: wry, knowing, sad and able to move between all modes with such fluidity. Punisher is a huge sonic step forward, the same maudlin and bitter-sweet sentiments but delivered with a wonderfully controlled euphoria.
Sun-scorched funk, soul and psychedelia from the Houston, Texas trio. Dubby grooves and stylish production are a beautiful counterbalance to Laura’s vocals, which are a positive revelation on their debut appearance here. A meditative and hazy escape from reality in a year that sure has needed it.
64. Kate NV
Punisher
Mordechai
Records of the Year 2020.
Source
What Kinda Music Blue Note / 24 April
The combined efforts of producer Tom Misch and drummer Yussef Dayes, a quite striking collaboration between two artists of very different disciplines. Misch’s tight pop production colliding with Dayes’ jazz experimentalism is quite the thing, sonically seamless whilst full of surprises, and way more than a sum of their parts.
Nos. 100 - 30
A L B U M S
O F
T H E
Y E A R
2 0 2 0
A GREAT ALBUM ISN’T JUST FOR CHRISTMAS MARY LATTIMORE
KELLY LEE OWENS
WIDOWSPEAK
CARIBOU
‘SILVER LADDERS’
‘INNER SONG’
‘PLUM’
‘SUDDENLY’
(Ghostly International)
(Smalltown Supersound)
(Captured Tracks)
(City Slang)
KATE NV
TIM KOH
SMOKE FAIRIES
SUN RA ARKESTRA
‘ROOM FOR THE MOON’
‘IN YOUR DREAMS’
‘SWIRLING’
(RVNG Intl)
(O Genesis)
‘DARKNESS BRINGS THE WONDERS HOME’ (Year Seven Records)
(Strut)
THE WYTCHES
WILLIE J HEALEY
V/A - KHRUANGBIN
V/A - HOT CHIP
‘THREE MILE DITCH’
‘TWIN HEAVY’
‘LATE NIGHT TALES’
‘LATE NIGHT TALES’
(Cable Code Records)
(Yala!)
(Late Night Tales)
(Late Night Tales)
MASSIVE THANKS TO DRIFT RECORDS FOR SUPPORTING INDEPENDENT MUSIC SUPPORT YOUR INDEPENDENT RECORD STORE - SHOP LOCAL! WWW.REPUBLICOFMUSIC.NET o N s. 100 - 30
Records of the Year 2020.
58. BC Camplight
57. Delmer Darion
56. Porridge Radio
Bella Union / 24 April
Practise Music / 16 October
Secretly Canadian / 13 March
In the spirit of Harry Nilsson or Brian Wilson, Shortly After Takeoff is a melancholic pop masterpiece. Brian Christinzio has always shown a deft touch at writing a hook, but placing himself right at the centre of these fine songs was a masterstroke. Funny, euphoric and shrouded in neurosis. A rare talent.
Far from easy going, this sprawling and impressive debut is inspired by a line (“The death of Satan was a tragedy for the imagination”) in the Wallace Stevens poem Esthétique du Mal. It’s all about contrasts, with really lush experimentation, pretty flourishes and industrial clunks making for good bedfellows.
Centred around the songwriting and incredible presence of Dana Margolin, Every Bad is an album of emotionally tense and brutally raw music. They have kept all the energy that made them such a DIY phenomenon and have really taken the sound somewhere else; big, brash and totally arresting.
55. Islet
54. Caribou Suddenly
53. Laura Marling
Song For Our Daughter
Fire Records / 6 March
City Slang / 28 February
Partisan Records / 10 July
The first new full-length release in seven years for the Welsh experimental pop trio of Alex Williams, Emma and Mark Daman Thomas. Eyelet is positively kaleidoscopic, more of a musical world than a musical landscape, with ambitious and brilliantly wonky pop songs. Charming, smart and accessible.
Dan Snaith returned after a five year absence with his seventh album as Caribou, and doubtless his most perfectly crafted. It is full of the technicolour glimmers and halcyon moments he is known for, whilst introducing high production pop for an altogether more glossy spectacle against the old charms.
It was ready - and the world had gone to shit - so she just released it online back in April, some moments of tranquility during the neurosis of lockdown. Quite simple in its instrumentation and production (with the odd orchestral flourish aside), leaving much space for her wonderful voice and quite thrilling phrasing.
Shortly After Takeoff
Eyelet
Morning Pageants
Records of the Year 2020.
Every Bad
Nos. 100 - 30
Roped In
51. Craven Faults
Erratics & Unconformities
50. Sarah Davachi
Third Man / 9 October
The Leaf Label / 10 January
Late Music / 18 September
Led by duo Patrick McDermott and pedal steelist Barry Walker, the Los Angeles-based musician collective North Americans feature a rotating cast that includes Mary Lattimore and William Tyler. Sunlight twinkles ambiently throughout this transcendental joy. Delicious, instrumental, psychedelic folk music.
The double debut LP after three quite exceptional EPs of bleeps and postindustrial beats. Synths and antiquated machines pulse in sync with one another as the moods swell and suites form and equally dissolve. It feels both beautifully controlled and also entirely random, long form loops and experiments.
A set of drones and long haunting organ compositions recorded across multiple cities. Regardless of the organ being so synonymous with churches, there is a strong spiritual aspect to the album and its sustained, thoughtful tones. It features her vocals for the first time on two tracks that are absolute beauties.
49. The Orielles
48. Daniel Avery
47. Run The Jewels
Heavenly Recordings / 28 February
Phantasy Sound / 27 November
Jewel Runners/BMG / 18 September
The Orielles have already proved themselves to be smart and sharp songwriters, but their hugely assured second studio LP is nothing short of a sonic trip. Experimentations in samba, disco, funk, acid house and anything else that grooves. Varied in tone yet focused in their joyous and inimitable style.
The second of two appearances this year from producer Daniel Avery. His third solo LP is an exploration of club culture, full of meticulous details, slow builds and epic gratifications. In a year where none of us can congregate and feel the same thing together, this is a heartbreaking reminder of why it’s so good.
Four albums in, it’s hardly surprising that Run The Jewels again create a driving and hugely gratifying hybrid of funk and rock and rap; it’s just inspiring that they manage to use that as the delivery mechanism for one of 2020’s most culturally important messages: “everything needs looking at”. Essential stuff.
52. North Americans
Disco Volador
Nos. 100 - 30
Love + Light
Records of the Year 2020.
Cantus, Descant
RTJ4
A Hero’s Death
45. Bibio
Sleep On The Wing
44. Kamaal Williams
Partisan Records / 31 July
Warp / 12 June
Black Focus / 24 July
The vital and pounding second LP from the Dublin post-punks. As a whole it’s tense, loud and brash, but track to track there is a lot of intricacy in what they are doing, the builds are slow and careful, everything has a mood and the hazy spells never get broken.
Stephen Wilkinson returns as Bibio with one of this year’s most beautifully bucolic headspaces. Exploring the same sonic territory and influences as last year’s equally beautiful Ribbons LP, he skillfuly weaves folk tones, plucked strings and field recordings to quite wonderfully atmospheric effect. Quietly stirring in its natural tranquility.
Second album from Peckham visionary Kamaal Williams. A self-styled fusion of celestial jazz, funk, rap and r&b that Kamaal describes as “Wu Funk”. Full of grooves, the album exists somewhere between spiritual and smooth jazz, with the strings and beats of his collaborators skillfully woven into the multi-layered mix.
43. Shabaka And The Ancestors
42. Crack Cloud
41. Trees Speak
Meat Machine / 17 July
Soul Jazz / 6 March
If you want to talk about musical forces of nature, Vancouver art collective Crack Cloud are their own audio eco-system. Seven or so core members and a rolling cast of contributors use their collective strengths to deliver sweeping and swooning euphoria, without ever sounding muddled. Thrilling in its joy, camaraderie and compassion.
The first of two albums in 2020 from the mysterious Tucson, Arizonabased group. Hypnotic loops taking sonic cues from krautrock, psych, no-wave and post punk with the drive of Neu! or early Kraftwerk, and the the wild experimentalism of Can or Tangerine Dream. One of 2020’s most played, best kept secrets.
46. Fontaines D.C.
We Were Sent Here By History
Impulse! Records / 27 March
Saxophonist Shabaka Hutchings returns with his ensemble of South African musicians for a foreboding and thrillingly dark affair. Although stylistically calmer than the other projects he leads, there is an ominous undertone that underpins the album, echoing the past and warning of the future.
Pain Olympics
Records of the Year 2020.
Wu Hen
Ohms
Nos. 100 - 30
LATE NIGHT FINAL A WONDERFUL HOPE Play It Again Sam
DANIEL AVERY LOVE + LIGHT Phantasy Sound
CIRCA WAVES SAD HAPPY Prolifica
KATIE GATELY LOOM Houndstooth
KNXWLEDGE 1988 Stones Throw
ROSE CITY BAND SUMMERLONG Thrill Jockey
MR BUNGLE THE RAGING WRATH OF THE EASTER BUNNY DEMO Ipecac
BEN CHATWIN THE HUM Village Green
CHASE & STATUS FABRIC PRESENTS CHASE & STATUS: RTRN II Fabric
MATT BERRY PHANTOM BIRDS Acid Jazz
ED HARCOURT MONOCHROME TO COLOUR Point of Departure
ALL THEM WITCHES NOTHING AS THE IDEAL New West
www.loverecordstores.com
THE LEAF LABEL 2020
CRAVEN FAULTS ERRATICS & UNCONFORMITIES Double LP w/ 20-page booklet / CD
KEELEY FORSYTH DEBRIS Limited oxblood vinyl LP / LP / CD
LAURENCE PIKE PROPHECY Limited yellow vinyl LP / CD
NIGHTPORTS w/ BETAMAX NIGHTPORTS w/ BETAMAX Limited diecut vinyl LP / CD
SNAPPED ANKLES 21 METRES TO HEBDEN BRIDGE Limited green vinyl LP
SARATHY KORWAR OTHERLAND Limited green vinyl EP
WARMDUSCHER EUROPEAN COWBOY Limited vinyl remix EP
DOMENIQUE DUMONT PEOPLE ON SUNDAY Limited white vinyl LP / LP / CD
CRAVEN FAULTS ENCLOSURES Limited grey vinyl mini-LP / mini-LP
The Leaf Label. Evidence-based since 1995
theleaflabel.com
40. Keeley Forsyth
39. Widowspeak
38. Bent Arcana
The Leaf Label / 17 January
Captured Tracks / 28 August
Castle Face Records / 21 August
Debris is a remarkable debut, as bleak as it is beautiful. Debris charts Forsyth’s climb out of paralysing depression, and few releases this year are as bold, candid, haunting and captivating as this strikingly brave and compulsive album. Her delivery is beguiling, staying with you long after the record has stopped.
Fifth studio LP from the Brooklyn duo of Molly Hamilton and Robert Earl Thomas. With feet in 90s dream pop and 60s psych rock, it sounds both aetherial and full of dark rumblings, whilst often breezy in tone. Timelessly melodic with plenty of glimmering hooks and lush vocals.
The self-titled debut from a large ensemble of players, led by John Dwyer of Oh Sees and featuring members of Sunwatchers, TV On The Radio, Flying Lotus, Feels, Prettiest Eyes and many others. Improvised jams in the spirit of 70s fusion, but with the hypnotic bite of kraut-rock rhythms.
37. Shit and Shine
36. Moses Sumney
35. Adrianne Lenker
Rocket Recordings / 9 October
Jagjaguwar / 15 May
4AD / 23 October
2020 will boast many albums created in lockdown, none of them will be as full blown weird and addictive as this. Little point trying to pin on any genres, it reinvents itself before you can fix a label on it. Broken beats to rigid beats, a delicious Kool-aid for our mashed minds.
Moses Sumney has an incredible voice. Absolutely awe-inspiring. Græ is a big, double album of complex moods, narrated and guided by the crystalline light of his vocals. Stylistically it is bubbling and dense, unflinching in content, remaining strangely intimate in spite of its grandness. A rare wonder, this.
A double collection that forms together as one pensive, thoughtful and quite stunning collection from Big Thief’s Adrianne Lenker. Her songwriting is vivid and her voice is quite extraordinary, the way she conveys emotions with every aspect of her breath is overwhelming. There are no wasted gestures, this is beautifully personal music.
Debris
Malibu Liquor Store
Nos. 100 - 30
Plum
Græ
Records of the Year 2020.
Bent Arcana
songs / instrumentals
ARCA KiCk i
KING KRULE Man Alive!
EVERYTHING IS RECORDED Friday Forever
YAEJI What We Drew
GIL SCOTT-HERON We’re New Again - A Reimagining by Makaya McCraven
LÅPSLEY Through Water
Hether Blether
33. OSEES
Protean Threat
32. Bing & Ruth
Phases Recordings / 29 May
Castle Face Records / 18 September
4AD / 17 July
Hether Blether is Erland Cooper’s third and final album in a trilogy of releases shaped by the Orkney islands where he grew up. Beautiful and graceful songs that ebb and flow with a smartness that is masked by simplistic and humbling charm. Big feelings and inspiring headspaces.
Album 23 from California’s OSEES/ Thee/Oh Sees is a jacked-up treat. At 40 minutes it’s one of the most focused outings in a good while, whilst meandering brilliantly between wild and complicated jams and tense and tight riffs. There is not a moment wasted, nobody does it better.
Composer David Moore always creates important and epic feeling music. His fourth LP as Bing & Ruth is perhaps his most simple in approach - centred chiefly around the tones of the Farfisa organ - but the mood is as impressive as ever, with long meditative compositions that slowly unfold. Spiritual stuff indeed.
31. Waxahatchee
30. Protomartyr
34. Erland Cooper
Saint Cloud
Ultimate Success Today
Merge Records / 27 March
Domino Recording Company / 17 July
Katie Crutchfield’s fifth studio album is her most personal yet, and perhaps this year’s most personal, honest and totally arresting album. These fine country songs are crafted by experience; through writing, performing and also living. Focused around love and sobriety, her directness is positively overwhelming. A remarkable voice in full flight.
Very few bands get anywhere near as abrasive or as utterly life affirming as Detroit’s Protomartyr (their 2017 LP Relatives in Descent was our album of the year). Again they tackle difficult and uncomfortable truths with the blackest humour and nothing short of pounding sincerity. Startling and stirring.
Nos. 100 - 30
Records of the Year 2020.
Species
2020 PINEGROVE
SLEAFORD MODS
- MARIGOLD -
- ALL THAT GLUE -
Rough Trade PINEGROVE
CAROLINE
- MARIGOLD -
- DARK BLUE -
JARV IS...
HELLO FOREVER
- BEYOND THE PALE -
- WHATEVER IT IS -
SLEAFORD MODS
JARV IS...
- ALL THAT GLUE -
- BEYOND THE PALE -
2020
THIS IS THE KIT
BRITISH SEA POWER
- OFF OFF ON -
- OPEN SEASON -
ROUGHTRADERECORDS.COM
29. Holy Fuck Deleter
Holy F / 17 January
A very welcome return from the sweary Canadians, and a bold change in direction finds them coming through a creative metamorphosis. Featuring guest appearances from Hot Chip’s Alexis Taylor, Angus Andrew of Liars and Nick Allbrook from Pond, Deleter really does have a hell of a lot in the mix across its nine tracks. Krautrock drives, plenty of electronic wooze, and really primal beats that sonically fall more into deep house than the experimental clunks you might have been expecting. Same playful and searching energy that they’ve always had, but with a bold new focus that takes them somewhere completely new.
28. Machinedrum
27. Mildlife
Ninja Tune / 9 October
Heavenly Recordings / 25 September
LA-based producer Travis Stewart’s ninth solo as Machinedrum, and it’s an absolute tour-de-force through styles and genres. Chopped-up beats and breakneck turns of pace taking tones from house, rave, jungle and pretty much all bass music. The guests are impressive too, from Jesse Boykins III and Freddie Gibbs to Armenian jazz pianist Tigran Hamasyan, all adding a distinct stylistic influence that contributes to the project rather than directing it elsewhere. Everything from the pulsing beats to the impressive foil-stamped front cover shimmers, this is immaculately produced, hugely varied music, united in its ambition.
Second LP from the Australian multi-instrumentalist fourpiece Mildlife, and their first with Heavenly. It’s an album of quite incredible grooves, immaculate production values that echo the Californian soul of Ned Doheny or Steely Dan without ever sounding bloated or rigid. Somewhere between propulsive jazz, funk, soul and electronic music, it will come as no surprise that the band are avid crate diggers and pull in a world of influence, without losing their own distinct compositions and voice. Although full of looping, rhythmic patterns, it has a strong sense of journey, and is one of this year’s most propulsive and unique trips.
A View of U
Automatic
26. Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs
25. Thundercat
Rocket Recordings / 3 April
Brainfeeder / 3 April
With vinyl editions pressed on “Drained Of Blood” and “Blood and Guts” vinyl, it is quickly evident that Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs were returning in ferocious form with Viscerals. The Newcastle-based metal band make heavy music: full-throated vocals, pounding drums with aurally assaulting riffs that resonate with full-body power. Whereas their previous releases have focused on mammoth jams, the tracks on this outing are relatively succinct, tense and muscular in their focus and venom. It is a menacing record, everything about it is quite literally visceral, and few albums this year have gotten anywhere near as thrilling.
Co-produced with Flying Lotus and stacked with guest appearances, the nonchalantly titled It Is What It Is marks the return of jazz-virtuoso and living bass-god Thundercat. Slow grooves through to full-on funk thrillers, it is nothing short of a joy this one. The jazz polymath is funny and sweetly humble in his musings, but that’s not to suggest that the still waters don’t run deep, there are moments of crystalline introspection on the biggest of all themes. It’s also exciting to try and count the number of times you lose your breath at how damn fast his fingers are. No mere mortal.
24. Fiona Apple
23. Ben Lukas Boysen
Epic / 24 July
Erased Tapes / 1 May
First album in eight years, released inconspicuously online back in April. Her lack of fanfare only accentuated the mass critical acclaim, it remains the highest-rated album of all time on reviews aggregator Metacritic. Both her delivery and production are equally fascinating and enthralling, her voice and instrumentation change and morph throughout. It’s like a stream of consciousness, dense and honest and almost dreamlike. The intimacy is so intense it’s like you’re actually in her head, or maybe she’s in yours? Believe the hype, here is one of the finest songwriters around in extraordinarily experimental form. Nothing short of an instant classic.
As with many of those magic moments on Erased Tapes, Mirage finds itself in the beautiful spaces between contemporary classical, electronic and sonic textures. It is a remarkably structured album, the production is meticulous, and not one of the fluid beats or pulses feels anything other than beautifully considered. As an album, Mirage is just that, a hazy vision of tones and sonics that sound neither human nor robotic, and not something that you can ever truly get a hold of. The guest appearances of Anne Müller and Daniel Thorne are particularly thrilling, beautiful other-worldly compositions and searching headspaces.
Viscerals
Fetch The Bolt Cutters
It Is What It Is
Mirage
22. Rose City Band
21. Hania Rani
Thrill Jockey / 24 July
Gondwana Records / 3 July
Summerlong is the second LP (following last year’s lush self-titled release) from Rose City Band, sprawling sunshine Americana from Wooden Shjips and Moon Duo psych lord Ripley Johnson. We’re massive fans of everything he does, but there is something about this record that we just couldn’t put down this year, it’s just so unashamedly sunny. The breezy guitar lines are hypnotic, in many ways the same complex and interwoven patterns he’s always made, just with the Country music vibes. “Doing a country record” could well have fallen foul to vacuous posturing, but here, these are just beautifully evocative songs.
Quietly breathtaking album from pianist and ambient composer Hania Rani. She was born in Gdansk (Poland) and splits her life between Warsaw - where she makes her home - and Berlin where she studied and often works. It is an album centred around the concept of “home”, a notion that has become ever more complex in 2020. The slow builds are masterful, the majority of the album is instrumental and her compositional skill in guiding the emotional themes and narratives as they stir and settle is really quite stunning. She has a beautiful voice, and using it so sparingly adds to its allure.
20. Stephen Malkmus
19. Modern Nature
Domino Recording Co. / 6 March
Bella Union / 5 June
Third solo LP without either the Jicks or Pavement; that said, Matt Sweeney appears almost throughout and offers up some truly delicious solos. Ten songs of modern folklore centred around acoustic guitars (there is quite a lot of the 12-string that made such a fine debut on 2018’s Sparkle Hard LP) and hypnotic ragas. It would seem highly unlikely that Malkmus would ever make a straightforward acousticleaning album, but what really is striking here is that although his idiosyncrasies and unmistakable delivery remain at the forefront, it’s a beautifully subtle and deftly delivered folk set. Quietly one of his best.
Although billed as a mini-album, Annual creates such an irresistibly spooky vibe across its 20 minute running time that it will remain with you for a great deal longer. The compositions are exquisitely measured, drawing the songs down to their centre point with really bold use of silence and space. They use their instruments in a way that makes them feel like extensions of human gestures. Often sung at no more than a whisper, this is sad music, drenched in the same soft energy as late period Talk Talk. Beautifully considered, it is a wonderful haze.
Summerlong
Traditional Techniques
Home
Annual
18. Sunwatchers
17. Four Tet
Oh Yeah?
Sixteen Oceans
Trouble In Mind / 22 May
Text Records / 13 March
Absolutely blistering fourth album from the New York psych-jazz-rock quartet… and we mean like, the heat of the sun. Oh Yeah? finds them in full flight, ever-building euphoria with honks, drones and drums that skip in and out of the mix whilst subtly leading the way. It is frenetic from the very first seconds, complex guitar riffs and triumphant saxophone lines like a hive of bees before the drums swell to action, locking the subsequent six minutes into a motorik statement of intent. You will lose control, one listen and they’ll have you hooked. A thrilling cacophony.
Announced in Kieran Hebden’s typically understated style, his tenth album as Four Tet arrived simply with the track listing set forth on a postit note. Sixteen Oceans is as masterful as any of his previous albums, with subtle echoes to any number of its predecessors in turn making this feel like a companion piece. It broadly has two modes, clubready bangers (Ellie Goulding’s guest vocal on Baby in particular being a real standout moment) and downbeat daydreams built from field recordings and natural tones. Either direction is sonically blissful, and the fluidity between the two affirms him as a singular talent.
16. Surprise Chef
15. Kevin Morby
Mr. Bongo / 16 October
Dead Oceans / 16 October
Stylishly crafted, Daylight Savings is the second album from Melbourne’s jazz, funk and cinematic soul journeymen Surprise Chef. Their impressive 2019 debut All News Is Good News showed off their ability to create a chill mood, but there is distinctly more bite to its excellent follow-up. They have channelled the charm of David Axelrod’s Californian sound, but still using their own dusty homegrown jazz shapes as the primary drive. Although it sounds distinctly like a long-lost soul-funk soundtrack to 1970s cinematics, they avoid a hackneyed sonic tribute and deliver an album that is fresh, searching and optimistic throughout.
Sundowner continues Morby’s trajectory as one of the finest songwriters around. These are dense, thoughtful and wistful songs, tributes to his Kansas City home with a contemporary vision of the Midwest that is enthralling and at times mythical. The delivery is just immaculate, his understanding of his voice is quite the thing as he experiments again with repetition; his phrasing is really captivating. His perceptions of even the most mundane can form into powerful songs and feelings. This late arriving Autumn gem is only going to get better and better, the more time you can spend with all its glory.
Daylight Savings
Sundowner
CARGO RECORDS BEST OF 2020
MODERN STUDIES
PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS
FIRE RECORDS LP / CD
ROCKET RECORDINGS LP / CD
THE WEIGHT OF THE SUN
THE LOVELY EGGS I AM MORON
VISCERALS
BDRMM
BEDROOM
EGG RECORDS LP / CD
SONIC CATHEDRAL LP / CD
SUNWATCHERS
BRIGID MAE POWER
TROUBLE IN MIND LP / CD
FIRE RECORDS LP / CD
OH YEAH?
HEAD ABOVE THE WATER
TREES
WAXAHATCHEE
(50TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION) EARTH RECORDS LP / CD
MERGE RECORDS LP / CD
TREES
SAINT CLOUD
THURSTON MOORE BY THE FIRE
ISLET
EYELET
DAYDREAM LIBRARY LP / CD
FIRE RECORDS LP / CD
ANDY BELL
BOB MOULD
THE VIEWFROM HALFWAY DOWN SONIC CATHEDRAL LP / CD
MIKE POLIZZE
LONG LOST SOLACE FIND PARADISE OF BACHELORS LP / CD
PEEL DREAM MAGAZINE
AGITPROP ALTERNA TOUGH LOVE LP / CD
WWW.CARGORECORDS.CO.UK
BLUE HEARTS
MERGE RECORDS LP / CD
BLACK LIPS
SING IN A WORLD THAT’S FALLING APART FIRE RECORDS LP / CD
THROWING MUSES SUN RACKET FIRE RECORDS LP / CD
14. Bill Callahan
13. Yves Tumor
Gold Record
Heaven To A Tortured Mind
Drag City / 4 September
Warp / 3 April
One of our very most favourites. Across the last 30 years as Smog, and latterly under his own name, Bill Callahan hasn’t really ever put a foot wrong. His early albums were written as an outsider looking in on the peculiarities of how “we” all tick. As an elder statesman, he has become a great social commentator; across the ten tracks here, he is funny, sweet, bruised, quietly euphoric and as insightful into how we all live and interact as perhaps anyone writing these days. The impressionistic oneliners should be studied, his empathy and humour are quite a marvel. Gold Record is solid gold.
A regular question this year has been - where in the shop do we file this quite remarkable release? Yves Tumor’s fourth album trades on wildly inventive lo-fi R&B-pop jams, spiralling psychedelic rock riffs and broken scratchy beats throughout - and that’s within any of these hypnotic and gratifying tracks. Its entirely organic approach to genre, style and tone paints a picture of its creator, able to move between propulsive and downbeat so naturally. Such a visceral and thrilling listen. The impressive production creates a sound unlike anyone else, that lingers long in the memory.
12. Tiña
11. Working Men’s Club
Speedy Wunderground / 6 November
Heavenly Recordings / 2 October
It is genuinely psychedelic, it could easily have appeared from a dusty 1960s sleeve, pulled from the vast record collection of some outsider rock and roll aficionado. It’s not just the utterly delicious analogue production - these songs and these performances paint vividly. It is unflinching in tone, wistfully crooned conversations about mental health. The technicolours fill the speakers and there is menace too, the sense of a bad trip trying to muscle in is palpable. Truly worthy of being the debut album release on the esteemed Speedy Wunderground imprint.
The absolutely pounding self-titled album from Working Men’s Club, and legitimately one of the most exciting debuts in yonks. Whilst sounding so fresh, a huge part of their charm is the element of the slightly familiar about them. The visual identity is showered in late 80s rave culture, the drum machines pound with the dark, fullbodied euphoria of Movement era New Order, and as a front man and centrepoint, Sydney Minsky-Sargeant has wit and humour well beyond his years. From Detroit techno to acid house squiggles, this is fully-formed dancefloor music and a remarkably self-assured album.
Positive Mental Health Music
Working Men’s Club
‘Frankly it's an incredible song' - Stereogum ‘A remarkable reinvention, evolution, self-reevaluation' - NPR ‘Superbly ambitious' - Clash ‘Best New Track' - Pitchfork
The Weather Station
'This is their most convincing and compelling work to date' - NME
Includes single ‘The Robber' Album Out February 5th - Pre-order now.
Courtney Marie Andrews “there simply isn’t anything to dislike about Old Flowers” MOJO “bracingly and courageously “a potent collection of unfiltered” emotionally raw songs” Album Of The Week NPR MUSIC UNCUT “quiet and still and unbearably sad, but somehow leaves the listener feeling better” Album Of The Week THE EVENING STANDARD “devastatingly intimate and open-hearted” NME “this really is a beautiful album: crafted, moving and sophisticated” THE TIMES “these are high quality songs written by someone who knows her craft” Album Of The Week FINANCIAL TIMES
‘A stunning, intricate, debut album' - Pitchfork ‘An utterly unforgettable record' Album of the Week - The Line of Best Fit
HELENA DELAND SOMEONE NEW
A Certain Ratio
Cabaret Voltaire
ACR Loco
Shadow Of Fear
CD Spearmint Green Vinyl
CD Cassette Purple Vinyl
Lee Ranaldo & Raül Refree
Erasure The Neon
Names Of The North End Women CD White Vinyl
CD Orange Vinyl
Daniel Blumberg
Nicolas Bougaïeff
On&On
The Upward Spiral
CD Clear Vinyl
Double Blue Vinyl
POLE
Simon Fisher Turner & Edmund de Waal
Fading A Quiet Corner In Time CD Double Aztec Gold vinyl
mute.com
CD White Vinyl
Home
Albums
Singles
Latest
My List
Top Albums in the UK
CORNERSHOP
‘England Is A Garden’ Ample Play CD / 2LP
5
4
3
2
1
BRIGID DAWSON & MAGICK MOUNTAIN THE MOTHERS NETWORK ‘Magick Mountain’ ‘Ballet Of Apes’
7
8
FUZZ
RIVAL CONSOLES
CARLTON MELTON
In The Red LP / CD
Erased Tapes LP / CD
Agitated CD / 2LP
‘III’
9
‘Articulation’
10
11
Castle Face LP / CD
12
KELLEY STOLTZ
RICHARD NORRIS
Woodsist LP / CD
Agitated LP / CD
Group Mind LP / CD
‘Ah! (etc)’
OSEES
‘Protean Threat’
‘Where This Leads’
WOODS
‘Strange To Explain’
‘Mirage’
Erased Tapes LP / CD
Magic Mountain Records LP / CD
Castle Face LP / CD
6
BEN LUKAS BOYSEN
‘Elements’
THEE MVPS
‘Science Fiction’
Eeasy Records LP / CD
Coming Soon
OSEES
‘Panther Rotate’ Castle Face LP / CD
VARIOUS
HERE LIES MAN
Castles In Space 2LP / CD
RidingEasy LP / CD
‘Scarred For Life Vol: 2’
‘Ritual Divination’
ALL AVAILABLE FROM DRIFT RECORDS info@fortedistribution.co.uk
Plays Live | Live In Athens 1987 | Secret World Live | Growing Up Live
Four Classic Concert Performances | Half Speed Remaster 180g Vinyl
OUT NOW petergabriel.com
An album focused on instruments that sound like they’re breathing, curated by Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith’s immaculate touch and featuring new songs from Emily A. Sprague, Julianna Barwick, Mary Lattimore and others, including Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith herself. Fascinating in its concept, it really is a beautiful and inspiring collection of work.
Touchtheplants / 4 August
Various Artists
Breathing Instruments
We knew these cats had good record collections, but damn! Khruangbin in expert curatorial form for the Late Night Tales series. A mind-blowing selection of tracks that cross borders and cultures. Asian pop to Nigerian reggae, Japanese mellow groove to Latina flavas, united by Khruangbin’s deep love of global grooves.
/ 4 December
Various Artists
Late Night Tales
Late Night Tales: Khruangbin
In the spirit of the iconic label, a new and reworked collection of classic Blue Note tracks brought together for the first time by some of the jazz scene’s most exciting talents, including: Shabaka Hutchings, Ezra Collective, Nubya Garcia, Steam Down, Emma-Jean Thackray, Jordan Rakei, Yazmin Lacey, Alfa Mist, and Jorja Smith.
Blue Note / 16 October
Various Artists
Blue Note Re:imagined
Various Artists
To celebrate the 50th anniversary of both the self-titled Black Sabbath album and Paranoid, Sacred Bones has curated a compilation of Sabbath covers recorded by artists from across their roster to include Zola Jesus, The Soft Moon, Marissa Nadler and Thou. Bow down in thanks to thy master!
Sacred Bones Records / 11 September
What Is This That Stands Before Me?
Another choice year for curated listens, with exciting new avenues in jazz, minimalism, funk, soul and the devil’s best rock and roll.
Compilations
Soul Jazz turn their attention to heavyweight ragga-influenced hardcore jungle from the early 1990s. Super heavy basslines, equally heavy twisted drum loops, even heavier ragga vocals. Featuring classic and seminal tracks from the likes of Leviticus and DJ Dubplate, alongside a host of rare and little-known ragga and junglist hardcore tunes.
Soul Jazz Records / 22 May
Soul Jazz Records Presents
BLACK RIOT: Early Jungle, Rave and Hardcore Various Artists
A superb collection of funk, soul and Sega (protest songs, descendant from times of slavery, sung against injustices in Mauritian society) from 1970s Mauritius. The island musicians uniquely fused Western and Indian cultures, pop, soul and funk arrangements, syncopated polyrhythms, saturated guitars, psychedelic organs and Creole vocals.
Born Bad Records / 1 May
Moris Zekler - Fuzz & Soul Sega from 70’s Mauritius A collection of hot and dusty rare funk cuts, party rhythms, and inexplicably an absolutely essential cover version of Pop Corn right in the middle. Running through the 70s and 80s, it’s an exploration of the meeting of funk and world music. An absolute joy, not to be missed.
Wagram / 25 September
Various Artists
Oriental Rare Groove – Rare Funky Songs From The Arabic World
Various Artists
The first volume of Captured Tracks’ new excavations, dedicated to compiling forgotten music from the 1970s – 1990s that has a connection to Captured Tracks’ sound and aesthetic. We loved this, some of the best jangly indie rock from the 1980s that would go on to inspire future generations.
Captured Tracks / 22 November
Strum & Thrum: The American Jangle Underground 1983
Following last year’s absolutely glorious deep dive into the Japanese city pop genre, the heads at Light In The Attic have wasted no time at all in going back to the affluent late 70s and early 80s for another glitzed-out “city pop” amalgam of r’n’b, jazz fusion, funk, boogie and disco, all a touch dizzy with tropical euphoria. The overarching theme of this fine compilation is the sense of optimism, mirroring the rise of a country emerging from ruin to become an economic powerhouse, allowing people fun in their lives. Whereas the contrasting yacht rock genre felt egocentric, Pacific Breeze is laid-back joyous.
Light In The Attic / 15 May
Various Artists
Pacific Breeze 2
The Deutsche Elektronische Musik series has been one of our favourite Soul Jazz series over the last decade, digging through relatively well-known and fantastically obscure tracks from German electronic and krautrock groups of the 1970s and 80s. This fourth edition includes big hitters like Harmonia, Can, Amon Düül and Roedelius, but it is the wealth of lesser known artists that really opened our ears and blew our minds this time out. Synthesiser goodness from Klauss Weiss, Deutsche Wertarbeit and E.M.A.K. are great, and the spiritual psychedelics of Kalacakra’s Nearby Shiras are a proper trip.
Soul Jazz Records / 5 November
Soul Jazz Records Presents
Deutsche Elektronische Musik 4 Various Artists
A major double-album exploration of Tokyo’s cutting edge 80s sound, through the music of cult Japanese label Nippon Columbia and its Better Days imprint. Record label We Want Sounds have teamed up with journalist, British radio presenter and Japanese music expert Nick Luscombe - who was granted rare access to the much-guarded Nippon Columbia’s vaults - for a masterful selection encapsulating the fascinating sound of Tokyo in the late 70s and 80s. Newly remastered, the collection includes sought-after rarities which have scarcely been released outside Japan. Synth-pop, funk and ambient works from Ryuichi Sakamoto, Shigeo Sekito, Juicy Fruits, Hitomi “Penny” Tohyama and Yumi Murata.
We Want Sounds / 27 November
Tokyo Dreaming
Various Artists
Just in case the title didn’t already grab your full, undivided attention! Our good mates at the Stranger Than Paradise shop launched their own imprint this year, and reissued the legendary compilation taken from the infamous Kings Road SEX shop jukebox; it’s glorious. Curated by SEX shop regular Marco Pirroni (of Siouxsie and the Banshees, Adam and the Ants), it’s a hand-selected treasure trove of underground and outsider classics - including Alice Cooper, Vince Taylor and Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, to name but a few - all of which were on heavy rotation throughout the mid 70s on Malcolm and Vivienne’s SEX boutique jukebox.
Stranger Than Paradise Records / 27 November
SEX: Too Fast To Live Too Young To Die
We nearly covered this without saying “kaleidoscopic”, but we can’t, as that is what it is. Thrilling and ground-breaking music that fizzes with energy.
Our Compilation Album of the Year for 2020 is Kaleidoscope: New Spirits Known & Unknown, a thoughtful and explorative collection from 25 contemporary jazz artists. The UK jazz resurgence has been increasingly well documented over the last five years, but this timely collection not only cements London as its hotbed of riches, it also focuses on the breadth of the current scene and how the movement is spread across the whole of Britain (and indeed beyond). Featuring amongst others: SEED Ensemble, Mackaya McCraven, Tenderlonious & the 22archestra, Joe Armon-Jones, Nubya Garcia, Maxwell Owin, Emma-Jean Thackray, Theon Cross, and Yazmin Lacey, another of Kaleidoscope’s features is the scene’s modern iteration and intersection with electronic music. New Spirits Known & Unknown indeed, the majority of these artists are either self-published or released on independent labels, this is a gateway into a scene that remains vibrant with pioneering spirits crossing musical boundaries. As Soul Jazz explain in the release’s excellent liner notes, Kaleidoscope covers “deep spiritual jazz, electronic experimentation, punk-edged funk, uplifting modal righteousness, deep soulful vocals and much more.”
Soul Jazz Records / 24 July
Soul Jazz Records Presents
Kaleidoscope: New Spirits Known & Unknown
Compilation of the Year
Impulse! / 9 October
Two iconic and utterly seminal albums reissued as part of the Acoustic Sounds series. Utilising the skills of the top mastering engineers and the unsurpassed production craft of Quality Record Pressings, they are both mastered from the original analogue tapes. It’s impossible to explain just how amazing these sound.
Never-before-released jam session, recorded live in Copenhagen in October 1965. The Danes on the session are a fine rhythm section able to implement Cherry’s blend of avant-garde, free jazz and hard bop across three Cherry originals and a cover of Richard Rodgers’ show tune You Took Advantage of Me.
A Love Supreme / Ballads
Gearbox Records / 26 September
Cherry Jam
John Coltrane
Don Cherry
Electr-O-Pura
Matador continue their everexpanding Revisionist History series, with a 25th anniversary reissue of Yo La Tengo’s absolutely superb 1995 album. The switches between wigout, melancholia and the poptacular are just unrivalled. We know you know this, but they really are one of the finest bands ever to do it in our ever-so-humble opinion.
Matador / 4 September
Yo La Tengo
Open Season
We had a real “Has it already been 15 years?” moment with this one. British Sea Power still sound utterly irresistible the second time around, on one of their finest collections to date. Includes additional live sessions, B-sides and rarities from the period, and extensive new sleeve notes.
Rough Trade / 6 November
British Sea Power
With some big anniversary edition reappraisals and a few cases of musical archaeology, it’s been a great year for looking backwards.
Reissues
Pale Saints
On the eve of a post-Thatcherite Britain, the Pale Saints - alongside the likes of Lush, Ride and Slowdive ushered in a hazy and dark new wave of British indie. Hugely explorative, in 4AD they found a perfect home for their sound, a thrilling meld of noise and dream-pop.
4AD / 17 January
The Comforts of Madness: 30th Anniversary Deluxe Edition
A thoughtful and beautifully paced career retrospective of the iconic singer, composer and transgender activist who has lived most of his professional life in obscurity. The late-blooming renaissance continues with a tour through new age experimentalism, folk and roots. A really fantastic body of work from a fascinating artist.
Transgressive / 16 October
Transmissions: The Music Of Beverly Glenn–Copeland
Beverly Glenn– Copeland
Trees
Earth Recordings / 13 November
An absolutely beautiful 50th Anniversary appraisal (aren’t they always on Earth Recordings!) of the self-titled Trees album. The early 70s outsider folk album was distinctly weirder than its contemporaries, and listening to it 50 years on, it sounds eerily modern. Includes demos, sessions and notes from Stewart Lee and founder member David Costa.
Island / July/August/September
Man did we punch the air back in May when news broke that FINALLY PJ Harvey’s immaculate discography would be reissued. 2020 saw the return of Dry (July 24), Rid Of Me (August 21) and To Bring You My Love (September 11), each accompanied by a standalone set of demos.
Trees
Studio Albums and Demos
PJ Harvey
One of the late Japanese ambient legend’s most sought-after albums. Sadly Hiroshi Yoshimura’s music barely made it out of his native Japan in his lifetime, but following the reissue a few years back of his breathtaking Music For Nine Postcards and his key inclusion on the amazing Kankyo Ongaku compilation, there looks to be ever more of his groundbreaking work on the horizon. Somewhere between Erik Satie’s piano meditations and the stirring atmospherics of Brian Eno’s ambient works, it sounds like the soundtrack to another time; not old, not new, but somewhere entirely else.
Albert Ayler’s commercially “remarkably unsuccessful” New Grass LP from 1969. People were not ready for this: a dense, complex and really mindbending album that incorporates soul, free jazz and funk. The sleeve’s hype sticker proclaims “FREE-SOUL-JAZZFUNK-MASTERPIECE”, which you might well doubt until you relent and drop the needle for the first time; what plays out is a remarkable journey, starting out with wild squealing and honking sax before taking a trip through spiritual levels of funk and soul. The sticker is right, this is visceral and positively evangelical stuff. We honestly can’t rave about this one enough, a proper gem back in press.
Nothing short of musical archaeology. An unheard recording of a 1968 high school performance by the jazz great, recorded by a janitor and shelved for decades. Racial tensions across the country were at an all-time high. Danny Scher, a rising junior at Palo Alto High School, had a dream to bring Thelonious Monk to Palo Alto to perform and help bring about racial unity in his community as well as raise funds for his school’s International Committee. The session captures some of the fiercest, most spirited versions of his quartet’s core repertoire, and it remains amazing that it happened at all.
GREEN
Light In The Attic / 24 July
New Grass
Third Man / 26 June
Palo Alto
Impulse! Records / 18 September
Hiroshi Yoshimura
Albert Ayler
Thelonious Monk
Vernal Equinox
Available again on vinyl for the first time in 42 years, and CD for the first time in 30 years, Jon Hassell’s hugely evocative Vernal Equinox has been fully remastered from the original tapes and sounds utterly incredible. Although using traditional instruments and folk stylings from South Africa, South America, and the Middle East, the way they build against the muted saxophone is just extraordinary and still sounds quite unlike anything else we’ve ever heard. Also as we do ever so like neatness, it was reissued on Friday 20th March 2020, and that was the?... Vernal Equinox! Well done.
Ndeya Records / 20 March
Jon Hassell
“After 46 years, Neil Young unearths a lost but highly consequential album, a collection of humble, stripped-back love songs he began writing at what was arguably the artistic zenith of his career.” - Pitchfork 8.8
- The Guardian
“His great lost album, finally unearthed”
Finally rescued from the vaults, a genuinely long-lost gem of an album that found Neil Young at arguably his most purple of any purple patches. Young has said this album is “the unheard bridge between Harvest and Comes a Time”, which perfectly describes the warm, semi-acoustic feel of the 12 songs. Accompanied by a stellar group of musicians (including Levon Helm, Ben Keith, Karl T Himmel, Tim Drummond, Emmylou Harris and Robbie Robertson), it was originally intended for release in 1975. It had remained unreleased since then, with varying accounts why, and only growing in legendary status amongst fans. Recorded during a protracted break-up with the late actress Carrie Snodgress, Young has since reflected that it was too painful. “It was a little too personal - it scared me,” he told Cameron Crowe in an interview for Rolling Stone the following year. Much of the album has appeared in one form or another over the years (save the utterly mind-blowing Vacancy), but it’s the cohesion of these sessions and the dark webs he weaves that make this such magic. As huge Neil Young fans, this is such a gift: something old, something new, and perhaps one of his best albums.
Warner / 23 October
Homegrown
Neil Young
Reissue of the Year
The most brutally honest and unsparing grunge memoir ever committed to the page by one of the greatest alternative rock stars of the past 30 years. From the first pages, his sincerity is gripping. It’s the unflinching story of a hard fought life and inspiring artistic victories. A rare talent.
White Rabbit / 24 April
Mark Lanegan
Sing Backwards and Weep
Real life through times good, bad and the shades in between. The poetry collective bring their radical performance style to a series of poems that resonate with their collaborative force. Four pamphlets enclosed in a custom sleeve, a fine addition to the inspiring Rough Trade Books vaults.
Rough Trade Books / 1 October
Roshni Goyate, Sharan Hunjan, Sheena Patel & Sunnah Khan
4 BROWN GIRLS WHO WRITE
Nick Cave
An intimate journey in images and words into the creative world of musician and cultural icon Nick Cave. It features full colour reproductions of original artwork, handwritten lyrics, photographs and collected personal artefacts, along with commentary and meditations. A fascinating and very privileged insight into his creative process.
Canongate / 18 June
Stranger Than Kindness
Kim Gordon
No Icon
One of the most singular and influential figures of the modern era. This personally curated scrapbook is an edgy and evocative portrait of her life and art. Spanning from her childhood on Californian surf beaches in the 60s and 70s, to New York’s downtown art and music scene in the 80s and 90s.
Rizzoli New York / 13 October
In a year where we’ve been reading more than ever, here are a handful of the fine printed editions that really kept us page turning.
Books
- Irvine Welsh
“Heavenly is more than a record label, it’s the absolute nectar of all that’s brilliant in the culture of these islands. I love the shit out of them and everything they stand for.”
It was 30 years ago today - or thereabouts - that Heavenly came to be. In celebration of this big ol’ birthday comes Believe in Magic - a chronicle not only of Foxbase Alpha, Working Men’s Club and 28 of the releases in between that got the label to where it is today, but also of the haircuts, nights down the pub, pencil-eraser-carvings, cheese toasties, acid houses, Sunday Socials and lost Weekenders - Yorkshire and otherwise - that are as much a part of its story. Good friends of ours and lifelong supporters of everything we’ve done, it was never in doubt just how much we’d enjoy this beautifully written and designed tour through the last 30 years, but what really hit home was just how many lives they have affected in the last three decades with energy, time, thought, support and the sort of unrivalled passion that changes lives.
30 years of Heavenly Recordings celebrated in a book. It’s enough to make you believe in magic.
White Rabbit / 12 November
Believe in Magic
Robin Turner
Book of the Year
www.transgressiverecords.com
2020
BONIFACE BONIFACE
MICHELLE HEATWAVE
TRANSMISSIONS: THE MUSIC OF BEVERLY GLENN-COPELAND
MOONCHILD SANELLY NÜDES
SONGHOY BLUES OPTIMISME
LUPIN LUPIN
MARIKA HACKMAN COVERS
COMING SOON…. ARLO PARKS COLLAPSED IN SUNBEAMS OUT 29TH JANUARY 2021
Ultraísta Sister
Laura Marling Song For Our Daughter
Pottery Welcome to Bobby’s Motel
Fontaines D.C. A Hero’s Death
Chubby and the Gang Speed Kills
IDLES Ultra Mono
Emel The Tunis Diaries
Craig Finn All These Perfect Crosses RSD
Bombino Live in Amsterdam RSD Black Friday
Top 10...
Coming right up, the ten albums we’ve most enjoyed this year. Follow the codes for tailored recommendations of other things that we think might well make you tick.
10. Peel Dream Magazine Agitprop Alterna Tough Love / 3 April
Agitprop Alterna is one of our most favourite albums of 2020, but it could easily have been one of our most favourite albums of 1991, or earlier, or later, or of soon?! New York City composer and multi-instrumentalist Joe Stevens founded his DIY outfit Peel Dream Magazine back in 2017, and this is the second album of huge atmospherics and beat-perfect indie rock. The album springs to life with Pill, a song that we had been waiting with baited breath for My Bloody Valentine to write for the last few decades. The spirit of MBV rings heavy in this thrilling album’s heavier moments, but Agitprop Alterna really is about slow builds and compositions with euphoric layers. Although indebted to its influences and wearing them on its sleeve, there is no doubt that this is jubilant, gratifying music that breathes originality. You can hear Stereolab’s droning organs, Ride’s waves of guitar tones and the brooding energy of early Yo La Tengo, but taking those elements and crafting a patchwork of tones and feelings that flows together so seamlessly is what makes this album such an adrenaline rush. Bookishly smart, this is no borrowing of ideas, this is an album of incendiary brilliance.
Records of the Year 2020.
Nos. 10 - 2
9. Aoife Nessa Frances Land of No Junction Basin Rock / 10 January
Released all the way back in January (in the first new release week of the year), Aoife Nessa Frances’ utterly gorgeous Land of No Junction is absolutely the album we have played most this year. She has been a constant companion through all of the seasons, all of the lockdowns and all of the good times too. Produced with Cian Nugent, the Dublin native (pronounced “Ee-fa”) delivered a hugely assured debut here, drawing from a wide-reaching array of sonic references - 1960s West Coast breeze, 1970s art rock, avant garde orchestrations and even tropicália - but picks them like threads and weaves something altogether her own. She has a beautiful, whispery voice that casts an enchanting spell. She is a thoughtful and gifted songwriter; the way she blurs and moves between personal themes and “The Irish songwriter’s voice shines imagined or dreamlike elements is both discombobulating and totally like a headlight in fog. Her debut alluring. These are excellent songs, immaculately delivered. abounds with deceptively serene
serenades and surprising lyrical shifts.” - Pitchfork
Nos. 10 - 2
8. Kelly Lee Owens Inner Song
Smalltown Supersound / 28 August
The beautifully paced, rich and vivid “this album is a leap in artistry second album from Kelly Lee Owens. She is hugely successful in taking her that sees Kelly Lee Owens return influences, stepping into completely new fully-formed, hopefully more creative pastures, and remaining totally herself. She is still clearly influenced by fulfilled, and damn near flawless.� dream pop and beat music, but while her - Loud And Quiet debut LP established her as a fine voice and an exciting producer, this next step cements her as a rare talent indeed. The underlying theme is euphoria through emotions; her voice is somewhere between ethereal and ghostly, washing in, out and in between the mix. The album builds and falls gracefully, beautifully controlled. She allows the songs to breathe, leaving space for contemplation. For all its meditations, she can also pound speakers with the very best of them; oscillating rhythms with mesmeric techno and progressive house. Although the album also features a superbly memorable collaboration with her compatriot John Cale, Owens has revealed herself as a truly singular talent.
Records of the Year 2020.
T H E P H O E N I X F O U N D AT I O N
POLIÇA
WHEN WE STAY ALIVE
MUSH 3D routine
FIELD MUSIC MAKING A NEW WORLD
mp h mdeu s t r iies
in
2 0 2 0 vision
www.memphis-industries.com
s
available at your local record shop
ONE LITTLE INDEPENDENT RECORDS
Henrik Lindstrand – Nordhem
Liar, Flower – Geiger Counter
Galya Bisengalieva – Aralkum
Manu Delago – Circadian Live
Penny Rimbaud – Reality Asylum
Sarah Walk – Another Me
7. Gil Scott-Heron
We’re New Again: A Reimagining by Makaya McCraven XL Recordings / 7 February
To celebrate the 10th anniversary of Gil Scott-Heron’s final album, I’m New Here, XL Recordings chose to commission the Chicago-based drummer and producer Makaya McCraven to create a reimagining of the album, and it is nothing short of revelatory. McCraven’s sound is truly vivid, sampled sounds that “The Chicago drummer and are looped, repeated and improvised producer transforms Gil-Scott to create hypnotic and mesmerising Heron’s final album into a soundbeds. He is very much an artist in the searching spirit of Gil Scott-Heron, masterpiece of dirty blues, a sonic explorer (during the creation spiritual jazz, and deep yearning.” process, McCraven decided not to listen to the original album, nor Jamie - Pitchfork xx’s excellent 2011 remix album, instead focusing on just the mastery of the original vocal takes creating through improvisation. The way that he breathes new life into Scott-Heron’s recordings is hugely impressive, the vocals somehow strain and growl more than ever as the fire-like production positively licks around him. Ten years after I’m New Here’s glorious arrival, this wonderful and psychedelic reimagining is testament not only to its creator’s innovative and boldly imaginative abilities, but also to just how good Gil Scott-Heron’s final work really was. Roll on 2030.
Nos. 10 - 2
6. Green-House
Six Songs for Invisible Gardens Leaving Records / 1 May
In a year that has certainly made a tranquil headspace something that needs to be called up on demand, you will not find a more untroubled 28 minutes than this. It is absolutely beautiful. Green-House is Los Angelesbased artist Olive Ardizoni, and this six-song set is a stirring and hugely evocative collection that incorporates field recordings and spiritual tones. The harmony of the electronic synths and nature recordings is breathtaking stuff; the organic tones sound huge and strangely alien in isolation, and as a counterweight the electronic hums are peaceful and hard to place. Combined they become muddled, and it’s fascinating how they become almost indeterminable from one another. Named after the plants that inspired them, the six tracks - Peperomia Seedling, Sansevieria, Parlor Palm, Perennial Bloom, Soft Meadow and Xylem - also flow into one another in a dreamlike and cohesive way; if possible you should absorb this wonderful collection as a whole. Created to be intentionally naive, these calm and ambient songs flow with the simplicity of light, a transcendental listening experience that we highly recommend to anyone.
Nos. 10 - 2
• THE ORIELLES • Disco Volador
• CHERRY GHOST • Live at the Trades Club
• KING GIZZARD & THE LIZARD WIZARD • Eco-Friendly Vinyl Reissues
Nos. 10 - 2
• BAXTER DURY • The Night Chancers
• ANNA BURCH • If You’re Dreaming
• MARK LANEGAN • Straight Songs of Sorrow
• MILDLIFE • Automatic
• WORKING MEN’S CLUB • Working Men’s Club
• KATY J PEARSON • Return
• THE MAGIC NUMBERS • The Magic Numbers
• CHERRY GHOST • Beneath this Burning Shoreline
• TERRY HALL • Home
Records of the Year 2020.
5. Moses Boyd Dark Matter
Exodus Records. / 14 February
Dark Matter is an album we have had the distinct pleasure of sitting with and enjoying over and over all year. We were thrilled to work with the young drummer and arranger (who will be known to you already as half of Binker and Moses or perhaps for producing Zara McFarlane’s Arise LP, or numerous other “He’s known as a jazz stalwart but live and studio collaborations actually) this album brings Boyd’s nuanced to create a limited Dinked Edition on this album on release. It then came as no production skills to the fore in artsurprise to us or anyone else that Boyd was fully spliced, stylish tracks” nominated for the Mercury Prize, watching the critical reaction and his presence grow - The Guardian through this often tumultuous year has been a high point. Dark Matter is a hugely ambitious piece and a leap in his esteemed, young career. Although he remains very much one of the leading lights in the hotbed of London jazz, the extent and range of his influences on this explorative debut LP result in a creative tour de force. He is a skilled producer, creatively interweaving warm acoustic tones with tempestuous electronic samples, and he coherently brings in grime, Afrobeat and garage to explore the point where electronic music and jazz converge. Bold, dance floor-friendly and ever-forward propulsive, it’s an irresistible album.
Records of the Year 2020.
Nos. 10 - 2
4. Richard Norris Elements
Group Mind Records / 4 September
Richard Norris (The Grid / Beyond The Wizards Sleeve) is a rare and skilled producer. Although much of his work has been beat driven, he has always shown a talent for dense and textured music, specifically focusing on how music can heal. Elements is divided into five parts - Earth, Water, Fire, Air and Space - with plenty of meditative space to explore how these elements sound. The five long tracks use warm, pulsing electronics and washes of synthesiser to create a widescreen soundscape, and the character that he brings to each section is impressive. Earth unfolds out of tight loops - like a planet spinning - rotating rhythms that slowly transform. Water is one of the more expansive sections, a palpable sense of scale, and Bishi’s vocal is dramatic against the fast-running motifs. Fire retains the strongest rhythm throughout, like embers glowing and flickering. The stillness of Air is imposing, with long drawn out drones, and the final piece - Space - is suitably remote, with long bubbling sounds that are unlike anything else on the album. Elements is transcendental music, an extraordinary deftness of touch to convey such emotion. It is not so much about escapism, this is more about exploration of the mind, and that’s pretty thrilling.
No.3 Sault
Untitled (Black Is) Forever Living Originals / 28 August
An astounding work ethic and a quality of output that is quite extraordinary - savour this and wonder what might appear next.
Nos. 10 - 2
Between now and the end of the year, you will read a lot about the pseudonymous Sault, and rightfully so. In the last 18 months they have released three albums (with fourth Untitled (Rise) scheduled to drop shortly), each one brilliantly formed, sonically diverse, driven, tense, cool, politically charged, socially conscious and really rather faultless. 2019 saw the release of 5, then 7 and the 18-track Untitled (Black Is) quite sensationally was announced and premiered this summer with a full album playback on Gilles Peterson’s BBC 6 Music show. In the digital age (especially a year where so many of us have dwelled online), they have done a remarkable job of keeping their identities low key. The words are voiced by Laurette Josiah, who along with producer Inflo and singer Michael Kiwanuka, are the only contributors credited by name. We know that Cleo Sol also sings (do make sure to check out her utterly superb Rose in the Dark when we can track down more copies), and Chicago rapper Kid Sister features too, with the esteemed Cover linking in on production and writing. Poignant, urgent and musically magnificent.
“We present our first ‘Untitled’ album to mark a moment in time where we as Black People, and of Black Origin are fighting for our lives. RIP George Floyd and all those who have suffered from police brutality and systemic racism. Change is happening…We are focused.” - Sault
Records of the Year 2020.
Nos. 10 - 2
No.2
Mary Lattimore Silver Ladders
Ghostly International / 9 October
Drenched in otherworldly calm, Mary Lattimore’s harp resonates tones and atmospherics that are positively therapeutic.
Nos. 10 - 2
An album of quite overwhelming beauty from Los Angeles-based harpist Mary Lattimore. She is quite unlike any other harpist we have heard. Although classically trained, she does not play or compose classically. She is a very modern experimental music-maker, her arrangements are free flowing and hugely organic. With just a harp and loop pedals she creates dreamscapes that are hugely moving, ethereal and intricate with minute, abiding details. Further establishing her style in the contemporary, Silver Ladders was produced by Slowdive’s Neil Halstead at his Cornish studio in the dark winter months as lockdown “the Los Angeles harpist swells approached, unbeknownst. The production is revelatory, the occasional synthesiser or her gentle ambience with a more guitar flourish mirrors the thoughtful plucks. strident sound but remains as As an album it is so transformative, taking transporting as ever.” - Pitchfork her listeners to places both imagined and real. Although a technical virtuosity, it’s the humanness that makes her music so special, with just a pluck of a string and allowing the reverb to ring, she’ll take you to long-forgotten corners of your mind and the smell of summer nights or to love lost and found. This is exquisite ambient music, a wonderful album.
Records of the Year 2020.
Nos. 10 - 2
bombay bicycle club everything else has gone wrong
nathaniel rateliff and it’s still alright
denzel curry x kenny beats unlocked
tom misch & yussef dayes what kinda music
christine and the queens la vita nuova
jehnny beth to love is to live
mystery jets a billion heartbeats
margo price that’s how rumors get started
oscar jerome breathe deep
nadia reid out of my province
matt berninger serpentine prison
sylvan esso free love
m huncho x nafe smallz dna
action bronson only for dolphins
Caroline +Fiction king gizzard & the lizard wizard k.g.
another sky i slept on the floor
the big moon walking like we do
soccer mommy color theory
best of 2020
nas king’s disease
tame impala the slow rush
frazey ford u kin b the sun
Record of the Year
No.1 FUZZ |||
In The Red Records / 23 October
Our 2020 Record of the Year is III, the third album from the collaborative limbs of Ty Segall, Charles Moothart and Chad Ubovich as Fuzz. Strap in.
No. 1
It is a huge return from the proto-metal trio - their first release in five years - and one that in many ways sees the band returning to the very core of their collective powers. Whereas their second album (2015’s II) stretched the band’s sound in different directions through extended jams, space-rock odysseys, psychedelic flourishes and swapping of roles, this third record is the band distilled down to pure raw-power, and utilising their strengths to glorious effect. They all have a role - on this occasion Charles Moothart does the riff heavy-lifting with layers of gnarled guitar, bassist Chad Ubovich drives the rhythm ever forward, and “Fuzz are best when they Ty Segall pounds the drums, whilst embrace ridiculousness” - Uncut yelping and screaming down the microphone - and it is startlingly clear that this is recorded live and that they “On their first record in five years, are having a lot of fun. The album Ty Segall’s proto-metal power trio was taped live-off-the-floor by Steve dig into the fundamentals of their Albini, and his overdub-resistant style brings a rawness to proceedings. sound, captured in crisp audio-verité As Moothart holds back, stamping style by Steve Albini.” - Pitchfork pedals and lining up the next epic solo, you can hear how muscular and tense the rhythm section is as it rumbles away underneath. Albini’s cantankerous presence keeps things focused, bringing punch to the songs whilst keeping them tight and propulsive (with half of the album’s eight tracks clocking in at little over three minutes). Although fuzzy, fast-paced and ferocious, across the album there are plenty of changes of pace, certainly enough to keep you locked in as they rip through svelte riffs and extravagant solos, and settle into blackmetal glam-stompers. This is a fantastic collection of songs, with hooks and riffs that you won’t shake out of your head for days. The recording is spontaneous and full of life as they rip through the set with visceral live power. Gripping and above all else, a lot of fun.
20
20
GRIMES
Miss Anthropocene -
21st Feb
TKAY MAIDZA
Last Year Was Weird, Vol. 2 -
7th Aug
U.S. GIRLS
Heavy Light -
6th Mar
THE LEMON TWIGS
Songs For The General Public -
21st Aug
PURITY RING Womb -
3rd Apr
FUTURE ISLANDS As Long As You Are -
9th Oct
BING & RUTH Species -
17th Jul
ADRIANNE LENKER
Songs And Instrumentals -
BECKY AND THE BIRDS Trasslig -
24th Jul
w w w. 4 a d . c o m
23rd Oct
Record of the Year
To celebrate this ferocious release, we have a produced a very limited special edition with Drift Records that is pressed on transparent green vinyl and includes a numbered A3 Risograph poster, a custom petrol eggshell Fuzz sticker and guitar pick.