In an era when it’s taken for granted that albums are a thing of the past, musicians themselves are still using the format to articulate their musical directions.
2013 saw the album in rude health as it offered up a plethora of quality releases across every genre; here I outline my picks of the year.
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – Push the Sky Away
This is accessible Nick Cave. Far removed from some of the depths of his Birthday Party and Grinderman days he seems to be comfortable allowing his non-devotees access to one of the great musical minds of our generation. The lyrics aren’t the usual fear inducing murder ballads, instead he engages with modern society in an amusing and sarcastic way but the results still carry his rough panache. Gems on this record include Jubilee Street, Higgs Boson Blues and “We No Who U R”. A dynamic performer as evidenced by his headline slot at the Body & Soul festival.
Mano Le Tough – Changing Days
Mano Le Tough was responsible for two of the best Irish house gigs this year: a 4 hour set in the Button Factory and a tented Electric Picnic offering which were nuanced house at its most visceral. However, his monthly Passion Beat night in Berlin meant his gigging skills were already more than established worldwide, this album was his first full length release so it was his chance to confirm his reputation on wax. On the record his vocals coalesce with a captivating and layered sound to produce tracks that envelop the listener with a cumulative build: brick by brick, listen by listen, track by track this 12″ etches itself onto the listeners mind. Recently I drove from Galway to Clifden in stormy conditions close to midnight, the road twisted, turned and dipped in front of us and there were few cars for company. Mano’s Primative People played as we chased the cats eyes through the rain, it was eerily perfect: eponymous in the primitive landscape.
Niall Mannion, hailing from Greystones in Wicklow, has gone to Berlin and established himself as one of the pioneers of house music, this release is unequivocal proof that he will enrich the 4×4 beat legacy. The album finishes with the water lapping in the melodic Sea Inside, let this one wash over you regularly.
Also seek out the remixes of this album as others have twisted this canvas with interesting results, peer interest is the best accolade for Mano Le Tough,
Jon Hopkins – Immunity
One complete night out in one hour. Jon Hopkins has created a record that charts the euphoria and comedown that one night of clubbing can offer and does so in a perfectly condensed one hour, not a minute more or less. It’s that symmetry that underlies the potential kinetic chaos of this, and every, proper night out. In the opening track you hear a key turn in a lock and feet drag in a corridor as Hopkins opens the door to the hour that oscillates from harsh techno to ambient electro. After heading out that door the album builds to an 11 minute techno dance-floor peak called Collider before beginning the introspective journey home that slows and slows and slows until sleep can be welcomed. This is musical euphoria without the comedown.
Arcade Fire – Reflektor
The magical collaboration of Arcade Fire and James Murphy delivered the best pop record of 2013. While Daft Punk and Arcade Fire took musical hype & marketing in new and exciting directions in how they promoted their releases, the latter also managed to push on musically while the former simply paid homage to a disco past. Many have rubbished Arcade Fire’s fourth album saying it’s too long but this is one that’ll be played for longer than Daft Punk’s release that delivered the best pop song of the year but little beyond that.
King Krule – 6 Feet Beneath
King Krule and Gilles Peterson
Gilles Peterson introduced me to the sounds of King Krule. I heard him before I saw him; that’s relevant because it’s a shock. King Krule sounds like London grunge, a hardened drawl that matches the alienation that the unforgiving metropolis creates and fosters in its teenagers. His real name is Archy Marshall and he looks undeniably like innocence, a doppelgänger for Harry Potter’s flaming sidekick Ronald Weasley in fact. The two, Krule and Marshall, voice and looks, are one and the same and he manages to channel his teenage angst through a musical mind that belies his years. He’s 19 years old, but musically he’s decades of Thames influence older: London’s jazz, garage, rap, R’n’b and soul scenes flow through him. His is
the most interesting voice on 2013’s eclectic music landscape: he is the pipe piper – follow him into 2014 and beyond.
Gregory Porter – Liquid Spirit
Once again Gilles Peterson turned me onto this man, if you don’t already listen to GP’s worldwide show then make it your New Year’s resolution: it’s the eclectic musical gym that you’ll willingly revisit every Saturday afternoon from 3 to 6 on BBC radio 6. Grammy nominated singer-songwriter Gregory Porter’s first Blue Note release is perfectly in tune with the rest of that label’s staple, which is class brass. The single Liquid Spirit is all the evidence one needs:
Maya Jane Coles – Comfort
Maya Jane Coles was laughably christened the “diva of the underground” by Rolling Stone, who are usually miles behind the underground dance scene. If she’s on their radar she’s no longer subterranean but her sound has unquestionable defined the deeper side of house and dance music in 2013. Many tracks here are dark, dirty and compelling none more so than “Easier to Hide”, after this album Maya will have nowhere to hide in 2014.
Darkside – Pyschic
In 2011 Nicholas Jarr gave us Space Is Only Noise, it topped Resident Advisor’s album of the year chart, we’re still gripped by that record. Jarr has moved on while we remain fascinated by his minimalist electro canvas. In 2013 he teamed up with guitarist, and fellow New York resident, Dave Harrington to provide us with more fodder for our fascination mill. They pair back the noise and leave us following their musical trails, Paper Trails, that invariable leave us hanging off of their guitar strings, gripped by their sparse melodic hooks wondering what it all means: enraptured. Jarr is only 23 and runs the subscription label Other People, unique is far too common a word to describe him and his work.
Bob Dylan – Another Self Portrait Bootleg Vol. 10 (1969-1971)
Might the release of 43 year old outtakes/alternatives/previously unreleased songs and a live concert from the early 1970s
possibly be the album of 2013 – especially as the original 1970s Self Portrait was considered critically a dud for its cover versions?
Well, like time being the difference between a terrorist and a freedom fighter, perhaps time has made Another Self Portrait, Bob Dylan’s volume 10 of The Bootleg Series, the surprise sleeper of the past year.
Two songs stand out from the New Morning album, the title song itself and If Not For You together with a cover of an Eighteenth century folk song Pretty Saro released as a single earlier in the year. Who knows how Dylan arrives at the final cut of his original albums but fans are infinitely better off that the Bootleg master has given us access to another cache.
Weekly Music Choice 