Favorite Albums 2023

2023 was a year of discovery, broadening horizons, and maybe a bit too much harsh vocalization. While I listened to quite a bit of music, I found most of albums just don't have consistent quality throughout, or a je-ne-said-quoi long-term listenability that would make them enjoyable front-to-back; fun individual songs, yes, but not an overall winning experience. There were few albums though that had my attention all the way through, or at the very least made for fun background noise while working. Without further ado, the select misfit gang that got me through my Master's thesis:

Savage Sinusois and Spirituality and Disorder - Igorrr (2017 and 2020)

First, Savage Sinusois. The first five or six listens, I had to stop myself from giggling like an idiot on the bus. A chaotic yet cohesive blend of wub wubs, incoherent screaming, beautiful opera singing, squawking like a chicken, an actual chicken, classic instruments, double pedal, fonky bass, and more. It is violence and beauty. Elegance and brutality. Patience and recklessness. My favorite review from Bandcamp, from Wisdoms End:

This music is the product of some skilled musicians, the surreal voice of Laure, a chicken called Patrick, sometimes a vacuum cleaner, some sick mastering/mixing and 250 grams of madness all mixed together and served in a pot with only one handle at the side. A waiter merely clothed with a bow tie suggests a molotov cocktail as aperitive. No desert.

Favorite songs: Viande, ieuD, Spaghetti Forever, Problème d'émotion, Robert

I also discovered their more recent album Spirituality and Disortion this year. It's definitely more thematically consistent then Savage Sinusois, which is both a strength and a weakness, making it perhaps more approachable, but less batty insane.

Favorite songs: Paranoid Bulldozer Italiano, Polyphonic Rust, Kung Fu Chèvre

The Forever Story - JID (2022)

The name of the game here is balance: lyrically, The Forever Story is a mixture of bravado and bragging, heart-opening and story-telling, humour and poignancy. Instrumentally, there's soft bass and choir choruses contrasted with bouncy beats, switch-ups, aggressive vocals, and frenetic high-energy passages. The Forever Story does it all, and does so in a cohesive manner, making for a front-to-back album experience that's thoroughly entertaining and thoughtful. Music tends to have a fairly short shelf-life for me (Savage Sinusoid, for example, having already fell by the wayside). I've also struggled to get into rap as a genre in general, so the fact that I'm still listening to this consistently is the highest honour I can bestow.

Also, sampling Mort from Madagascar has to be the greatest creative decision ever made.

Favorite songs: Rayder, Crack Sandwich, Kody Blu 31, Lauder Too

Oni - Darko US (2022)

As Meghan Trainor once said:

I'm all about that bass

Darko US is clearly a big fan of hers, because Oni is indeed 'all about that bass'. Baby J raided Bridon's offices and got away with the Big Hydra rope. He then strung this across the grand canyon and used it as an impromptu guitar, loosing bowel-watering, earth-shattering tectonic rumblings to challenge earth's own. Tom Barber and friends have surgically replaced their vocal cords with portals directly to hell and serenade you with throatfuls of phlem, gravel, and luciferian vociferations. It has weird alien noises, funky drumming, bouncy beats, single-note guitar playing, and inhuman vocals, all tucked into a neat little package that blows up in your face; what more could you ask for?

Favorite songs: Hyper Kill, Ana, Acid Inject

Bronco - Orville Peck (2022)

Country (Americana?), like rap, is another genre I've struggled to get into. Orville Peck, like JID, has kindly opened a door and invited me in. He has a swoony, lovely deep voice, the songs alternate between tear-jerking soulful and horse-riding energetic, and I think blue jeans are only mentioned once in the entire album. Like the Forever Story, Bronco has me wondering just how much excellent music I've been missing out on.

Favorite songs: The Curse of the Blackened Eye, Kalahari Down, Let Me Drown

Bleed The Future - Archspire (2021)

Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Favorite songs: brrrr (Drone Corpse Aviator), brrrrr (Bleed the Future), brrrrr (Drain of Incantation)