20: Lol Tolhurst x Budgie x Jacknife Lee – Los Angeles
Los Angeles is an immersive, dystopian fever dream of an album. Obviously the percussion is great, but the trio have pooled together their contacts for a fearsome supporting cast of collaborators and singers. Some are better known than others, but no less effective on record.
19: Hak Baker – Worlds End FM
While the outstanding Streets tale of a ‘nuther night to scratch of the tally that is DOOLALLY has proved to be something of an outlier, the much more dominant lean on gospel reggae and brotherly love makes Worlds End FM an essential commodity in its own right.
18: The Japanese House – In The End It Always Does
The record ends with a contemplative acoustic segment, with closer One For Sorrow, Two For Joni Jones’ – rooted in the nursery rhyme ‘One for Sorrow’ in sentiment – signing off an authentic, accomplished body of work from an artist that continues to go from strength-to-strength.
17: Steve Mason – Brothers & Sisters
Fundamentally a record meant to unify, on it Steve Mason’s declaration is that things must work for everybody or they work for none. In making it he’s also reminded us protest music needn’t be angry by definition – and that Parliament wouldn’t be good enough for him.
16: Daughter – Stereo Mind Game
Swim Back is the album’s apex, its rumbling bass, flowing synths and the work of a 12-piece orchestra skying their work into a place the horizon is always close enough to touch. It’s a song that’s a promise of continued spiritual fulfillment between old friends.
15: bdrmm – I Don’t Know
For a band who first climbed onto people’s radar under the cloak of an ostensibly long dead movement, on I Don’t Know bdrmm have made listeners come with them, recasting themselves as no slaves to what they’re supposed to be.
14: Sampha – Lahai
Lahai is testament to those with patience, both in the making and in the hearing. Sampha was nobody’s overnight sensation, but he’s now in beyond promise fulfilling mode, striding into a future that promises much more than anyone could’ve foreseen in the distant past.
13: Hamish Hawk – Angel Numbers
A man who waited for the perfect time that never came until it did, a chance gained simply because he realized he had the gift to decide when it was. Angel Numbers will leave you pleased you don’t know its end, only that there’s an everyday chance that a hawk can turn those who listen into doves.
12: PJ Harvey – I Inside The Old Year Dying
Will Polly Jean Harvey be your role model? Only if you commit to never wanting one, or vow not to repeat any of her actions. I Inside The Old Year Dying is a record made by someone uninterested in comparisons, and there will be few like it this or any year.
11: King Creosote – I DES
Change comes in Dove Street in these beginnings and endings, memories that lap like waves in the harbour, growing and receding and eventually lost to time’s permanence. In places like this, where King Creosote is just Kenny, I DES is just another chapter.
10: Corinne Bailey Rae – Black Rainbows
The enormous scope and variety on show in Stony Islands’ collection has clearly instilled in Corinne Bailey Rae a sense of limitless possibility in her own art which absolutely translates onto record, as well as a newfound desire to explore Blackness — her own experiences and the histories of others.
9: The Lemon Twigs – Everything Harmony
All that’s missing from the final production is the swish of a curtain coming down. It may have its roots in the simpler times preferred by many, but Everything Harmony presents The Lemon Twigs as more than just keen history students. Pristine and hugely listenable, the now is calling.
8: Jayda G – Guy
Whatever mode Jayda G’s in the signs tell you she’s an artist it would be wise not to take for granted. Guy is Jayda G turning her father’s life into a sonic collage, one that opens up a highly personal space but without ever making the listener feel like they’re spying.
7: Protomartyr – Formal Growth In The Desert
Of course, Michigan’s best kept secret could’ve made everything sound a bit more old and recycled, but instead Formal Growth In The Desert marks a leap of faith that’s handsomely rewarded, Protomartyr’s best album of what’s been a uniquely idiosyncratic journey to date.
6: Young Fathers – Heavy Heavy
Like paint dripped on an abstract canvas, Heavy Heavy leaves a lot of meaning to the beholder. Made by people who believe giving their audience what they know they want before even it does, this is an unfettered headrush that’s ready to be played on anybody’s radio station.
5: Julie Byrne – The Greater Wings
In the wrong hands its unfiltered study on grief could feel almost voyeuristic, like rifling through a diary found in a long forgotten bed-side cabinet. The Greater Wings is inviting and cathartic however, calmly welcoming any stranger to find solace in its universal themes.
4: Sleaford Mods – UK Grim
Defiance has now made them revolutionaries: the duo were slating the state of the UK long before the Brexit vote. So while turning their back on the world would be an act of self-sabotaging pretentiousness, making their twelfth album their masterpiece shouldn’t be a surprise.
3: CMAT – Crazymad, For Me
Lamenting those moments in life that bolt you upright in the middle of the night is nothing unusual; CMAT’s knowing wit, dry humour, self-deprecation and hope for the future certainly is. The consistency of the grand old pop songs on show here is something to truly behold.
2: slowdive – everything is alive
The perfect album for this time of year as the summer transitions to autumn and the melancholy of what went before and what is to come pervades. ‘everything is alive’ is a stunning piece of work that showcases both slowdive’s sonic dexterity and that they’re (hopefully) just getting started.
1: The Murder Capital – Gigi’s Recovery
The Murder Capital didn’t used to sound like someone else, not if you actually listened to them. And now on Gigi’s Recovery they don’t even sound like they used to sound like, untethered from their own past. Change is permanent, but this is a record you may not want to leave behind for a very long time.