Urban75 Album of the Year 2013 revisited

[flypanam]

I'm still listening to Yamataka//Sonic Titan's YT//ST



I think it made my list.

 

[hitmouse]

The last Camera Obscura album (to date), Desire Lines, is not remotely as good as Let's Get Out of This Country, and imo isn't up there with Maudlin Career either, but it's pretty enough in its way. You could do worse if you want something to yearn to.

 

[marty21]

Always look to see whether there was a Low album as if there was you can pretty much guarantee it was the best thing out that year - but the 2013 album The Invisible Way isn't up there with their best work so I'll not be voting for that.

Deafheaven mentioned upthread - yes please, remember going to see them in a little basement club in Stoke Newington that year - they tore the roof off - fucking brilliant gig. Just re-listened to Sunbather - been a while, it's as good as I remember.... an absolute stonker. I've checked out many a black-gaze album since but nothing has ever hit home like this... Could be my no. 1...

In the same venue that year I also remember going to see The Haxan Cloak - eerie dark ambient / drone / dungen step - that was a great show too - lashings and lashings of bass.



I wonder what that venue was.... I think it was fairly short-lived but I'm sure I went to some other great shows there that year too. I was at peak-gig at the time, I miss those days!

I liked that album, but I think I heard of Low way after that, so haven't included it on my list. Have seen Low several times they were never disappointing, saw them do one of their Christmas shows too which was aces.

 

[braindancer]

I liked that album, but I think I heard of Low way after that, so haven't included it on my list. Have seen Low several times they were never disappointing, saw them do one of their Christmas shows too which was aces.

Don't get me wrong it's a decent album for sure - but there's some magnificent Low albums and this one doesn't quite deliver to the same level in my very humble opinion

 

[Knotted]

I haven't had much of a chance to catch up with this thread but I've found two albums that I think are amazing.

Ichiko Aoba's O



Minimal, intimate Japanese singer songwriter guitar + voice. Just wow at this. Minimal chord structures leave a certain openess that allows the voice to explore and blimey does she. Now one of my favourite albums of all time even if I missed it at the time. Can't stop listening to it. Owes something to Satie I think.

A little less interesting (but then so is everything!), this Turkish hip hop outfit, Farazi V Kayra, are really storming. Hayalet Islığı



Also worthy releases from Nisennenmondai, Guitar Wolf, Tricot and Tim Hecker.

 

[Knotted]

This moment. You've got to hear this moment.

 

[Knotted]

Melt Banana's Fetch was 2013 as well. Can't believe it's been 10 years etc. Awesome album. Probably their best.

 

[Knotted]

Anyway, we need to be thinking about wrapping it up. December approaches.

hitmouse
Spandex
braindancer
stavros
nogojones
DaveCinzano
zahir
Fozzie Bear
chilango
The39thStep
starfish
flypanam
belboid
AverageJoe
Fez909
Mattym

I've actually got a bit of time in the evenings at present. It's all coming together.

 

[Knotted]

Concha Buika - La noche más larga

This is extraordinary.

 

[hitmouse]

Hmmm, I was thinking that 2013 was maybe a bit harder to find really good stuff than 2012, but now I'm drawing up my list it's got about 30 names on it.
Here's something from 2013 you can't vote for, cos the whole project's a compilation:



I thought maybe they gave up after that but apparently they did do the full 420 in the end, this video's got links to all of them in the description:

 

[hitmouse]

In the spirit of mentioning Darkthrone albums that no-one else ever votes for, 20 years after releasing 1993's classic Under the Funeral Moon which no-one else voted for, and 10 years after 2003's Hate Them, an album I've never listened to and so didn't vote for, in 2013 they released The Underground Resistance. It's... probably not quite as good as the previous four imo, the singer does a silly high-pitched metal voice that I don't enjoy as much as the silly metal voices they do on all their other stuff, but Leave No Cross Unturned is quite a fun pun:

 

[chilango]

There's also Superchunk's "I hate music" and "Run Faster" by The Julie Ruin.

 

[hitmouse]

Might as well throw in a last-minute plug for Rakta's self-titled debut, possibly the best Brazilian postpunk album of 2013? I don't actually know Siouxsie and the Banshees that well but some people say Rakta sound a bit like them?

 

[hitmouse]

holo pleasures is definitely an EP, not an album, so you can't vote for it, but I like it anyway:

 

[AverageJoe]

I think the Atoms For Peace album (Thom Yorke, Flea, Nigel Godrich and Joey Waronker) has actually held up pretty well. Might even go up my list this time round.

 

[braindancer]

In the spirit of mentioning Darkthrone albums that no-one else ever votes for, 20 years after releasing 1993's classic Under the Funeral Moon which no-one else voted for, and 10 years after 2003's Hate Them, an album I've never listened to and so didn't vote for, in 2013 they released The Underground Resistance. It's... probably not quite as good as the previous four imo, the singer does a silly high-pitched metal voice that I don't enjoy as much as the silly metal voices they do on all their other stuff, but Leave No Cross Unturned is quite a fun pun:

I pressed like but I don't actually like it - those vocals are just no....

 

[The39thStep]

Elephant Stone - Elephant Stone . Canadian tinged retro psychedelia. One of the few bands to have a sitar player.

 

[The39thStep]

A Tribe Called Red – Nation II Nation. Native Canadian dance music - "pow-wow step"

 

[Spandex]

Looking at 2013 I'm much more excited by the compilations that came out than the albums, so here's a top 15 comps that you (probably) can't vote for:

William Onyeabor – Who Is William Onyeabor

William Onyeabor was little remembered, even in Nigeria other than as a one-hit-wonder from the 70s, until this comp came out that highlighted to the world that he is indeed a Fantastic Man.

Kenya Special: Selected East African Recordings From The 1970s & '80s

'Hipster' reissue labels had dug through and compiled much west African music from the 70s by this point, then along comes this absolutely incredible all-killer-no-filler comp focusing on Kenya, showing how much music from Africa there still was for westerners to discover.

20 Jahre Kompakt / Kollektion 1 & 2

Probably the best mnml label, who always did things their own way, celebrated 20 years since they started as a record shop in Köln by releasing 2 double CD comps. I played these to death and love them with my soul.

TSOB - The Sound Of Belgium

Rave music originated as much in Belgium as in Chicago or Detroit, as this 4 CD set amply demonstrates.

Italians Do It Better - After Dark 2

IDIB create a cool electropop world of their own on this second volume of the After Dark series. Since it's all new and all produced by the same person I'm gonna put this on my list and see if it gets disqualified.

Tres Chic! (More French Girl Singers Of The 1960s)

Wall to wall Ye Ye girls from the 60s showing that French is the true language of pop music.

Musik For Autobahns

Motorik flavoured not-quite-house, not-really ambient electronica.

Saâda Bonaire – Saâda Bonaire

Two model-esque non-singers backed by immigrant musicians from a Turkish Communist community center produced by Dennis Bovell in Kraftwerk’s Cologne studios, most of whose music never got released by their label in the 80s.

Patrick Cowley – School Daze

A collection of Cowley's instrumental synth workouts recorded between 1973 and 1981 found in the Fox Studio vaults.

Afrobeat Airways 2 - Return Flight To Ghana 1974-1983

More afro-beat/funk/disco from Ghana.

Change The Beat (The Celluloid Records Story 1979 - 1987)

NY no-wave electro hip-hop synth-pop disco rock from the 80s.

In The Dark: Detroit Is Back

Techno. From Detroit. You know what to expect.

Drexciya – Journey Of The Deep Sea Dweller III & IV

Continuing to trawl the vaults of Detroit electro pioneers

 

[The39thStep]

Agnes Obel - Aventine

"exquisite arrangements: sculpting strings and piano into beautifully melancholy ripples"

 

[hitmouse]

I pressed like but I don't actually like it - those vocals are just no....

Haha, fair enough. It did grow on me a bit, but I can certainly see why they'd be offputting as well. This one's quite fun though, imo.

Looking at 2013 I'm much more excited by the compilations that came out than the albums, so here's a top 15 comps that you (probably) can't vote for:

There's also Scared to Get Happy, a huge boxset Cherry Red did as a kind of Nuggets of 1980s indie, but tbf even as someone with a very high tolerance for all things twee and shambling I think there's a lot on there that's best left forgotten. Anyway, it doesn't feel super 2013-y to me. 420 Love Songs is great in its way, though.

Anyway, stop the thread, no-one put any lists in, I've just realised that we've got this far into the thread without anyone mentioning that the Fall did Re-Mit in 2013. I've never listened to it and I've got no idea if it's any good or not, so we should probably all vote for it as #1 to be on the safe side.

 

[Knotted]

Deadline Thursday 5pm please so we can start on 2023. Need more lists.

 

[Knotted]

This may be just my superficial impression but 2013 seems to have been a much better year than 2012.

 

[Knotted]

I have time to do it this time, but if anybody wants to host this year they can. As long as I get to do the adding up I'm happy.

 

[hitmouse]

Thrown my list in now. Tricky to say how 2013 compares to 2012, my first thought was that it doesn't live up to 2012 on account of how if you ask literally any person alive to name the two most important records of the last 100 years, every single one of them will immediately say "Born to Die by Lana Del Rey and The Money Store by Death Grips" so it's hard to top that, but when I got around to actually drawing up a list I feel like they were fairly similar in quality - about 8 or 9 really great albums that I love, a load more very very good ones, and then some other pretty decent ones. Definitely a great year for hiphop, or at least for hiphop that I listen to.

 

[braindancer]

17 on my list now. Just need to order them somehow... I know what no. 1 is. After that I'm clueless....

 

[braindancer]

Special Request- Soul Music

On my list fo sho.

 

[braindancer]

Have we had this 'weightless' classic?

Absolute blinder - atmospheric instrumental grime.

 

[The39thStep]

Nils Frahm - Spaces

Live recording pieced together in the studio.

'This is an absorbing work, full of pensive moments cut together by music that thrives on dovetailing melodies that can be simultaneously mesmerizing and beautiful. '

'the overriding feel is one of joy at listening to a performer demonstrating the infinite elasticity of sound.'

 

[hitmouse]

I definitely won't have time to host the results tomorrow evening, but might well be able to on Friday evening, and definitely will be able to at some point on Saturday daytime, so depends how keen people are to find out quickly?