2023 end of year lists

30. Lorraine James – Gentle Confrontation





A super interesting patchwork of electronic noodles, beats, occasional drum and bass sounding tempos and some vaguely folky sounding stuff too, a lot of the vocals have really personal lyrics and that ties it all in nicely and makes it feel like a proper album.



29. Forest Swords – Bolted





Forest swords have been on my radar for a while, yet i’ve somehow never took the plunge and listened to them. Shame as this is right up my street, ethereal Burial style vocals and dark atmospheric electronic music with a really nice crunchy distorded drum sounds.



28. Baxter Dury – I Thought I Was Better Than You





Just an emminently listenable album. I could listen to Baxter read pretty much anything out loud in his expressive cockney drawl. He sounds fantastic on this album where light but rhythemic productions give him the space to work his magic.



27. Emma Anderson – Pearlies





Apparantly it’s the singer from Lush’s first solo album. I liked Lush and I like this. Dreamy guitar / synth sounds and lovely spooky sounding vocals. This ting is impecabbly produced.



26. Slowthai – UGLY





He’s an objectionable character but he keeps banging out decent albums. On UGLY he’s gone a bit rocky, lots of the tunes are quite Jamie T’ish and I quite like it. His raps are generally quite dark and very british sounding, he always sounds on the verge of a breakdown and it gives his music a certain tension which makes it interesting to listen to.



25. Woods – Perenial





Gourgeous sounding album which to me just sounds like pure west coast california sunshine. Some great instrumental tunes on here and others with lovely blissful vocals. Very loose relaxed feel to it in general.



24. The Umlauts – Slags





Technically a compilation of two older EP’s and a few new songs. Who cares though, i’m sticking it in my list. It’s a fucked up big dirty hit of industrial sounding old school filthy European electro. Apparantly they are a 9 piece band, would surely be quite something to see live. Their song Boiler Boots and Combat Boots might be the most enjoyable piece of dance music i’ve heard this year.



23. Danny Brown / JPEG Maffia – Scaring the Hoes





Super high octane rap from Danny Brown recorded when he was still hitting shit hard bur released after he gave up drugs earlier this year. JPEG Mafia provides a perfectly hectic and dischordant sound collage for him to shine on. Absolutely bonkers sounding album.



22. The Goa Express – The Goa Express





There’s a real dearth of really straight up indie rock these days. Thankfully The Goa Express are here to remind us of the golden era of indie pop-rock in the mid 00’s. They do regretfully sound a bit like the Wombats at times but frankly there’s so little of this type of music around these days it’s just nice to see some kids pick up the mantle and go with it.



21. Willie J.Healey – Bunny





A rich and varied album, his most varied to date. Has a 70’s rock / funk vibe to it with some really lush production going on. The guy has had a tough time getting an audience but it feels like he’s starting to pick up some steam now.



20. Shame – Food For Worms





Really impressive set of songs from a band that I perhaps unfairly just expected top be a bit of a flash in the pan. There’s just a bit more going on in the compositions than the fantastic but fairly simplistic vision of their debut from 2018.



19. King Krule – Space Heavy





Something of a return to form after the bland Man Alive! this strikes a nice balance between the Jazzy elements, the dischordant noise and the chilled out singer songwriter that lies deep within and is buried in all these dark layers. Think Space Heavy actually has quite a nice warmth to it with his deep resonating voice and the light reverb drenched chords combining to excellent effect.



18. Slowdive – everything is alive





Think this has gone relatively under the radar, largely because of their comeback album from 2017 was such a massive and unexpected success. This is another belter though, perhaps a touch less engaging than the predesessor but if this was the comeback album it would too have got the plaudits. An incredible ageless band who i’m delighted have come back and found an audience thirsty for them.



17. Killer Mike – Michael





Some nice gospelly sounding hip hop on this album. It’s definately got southern American homely feel to it. In keeping with the Atlanta feeling he’s got his fellow Atlantans EL-P, Andre 3000 and CeeLo Green to contribute as well. A much less confrontational sound than when he does his Run The Jewells stuff. Whilst the sound may be more relaxed the raps still have a fair amount of anger and gereivances displayed.



16. Nourished by Time – Erotic Probiotic 2





A really interesting style of music that i’ve not heard much of – maybe it’s just because I haven’t really heard much 80’s synth pop. Whilst the keyboards are incredibly retro sounding it’s put together in a way that makes it sound really cool and interesting and unlike anything else on this list. His vocals style is very R & B / soul but with a independent minded bedroom style production. It really is a fascinating listen.



15. The Blaze – JUNGLE





Just an incredibly anthemic set of vocal dance tunes. It’s a really evocative album of pleasant sounding slightly washy vocals, simple rising synths and deep stabs of bass. Would challenge anyone to listen to this warm fuzz of good times and not feel anything.



14. Blur – The Ballad of Darren





Wasn’t really expecting much from this album. It’s been 8 years since their last album (Magic Whip) and whilst that was a solid enough effort, it wasn’t something you’d ever really go back to. I thought this one would be more of the same – it’s a worthy addition to their cannon and it’s quite surpising how Blur like it actually sounds. Narcissist is a magnificent song and Barbaric tootles along nicely with it’s she’s lost control style percussion and pleasing Graham Coxon jangles. Could do with a little more Graham Coxon influence on it but Damon’s Damon and he’s the real work horse so it’s no surprise there’s more of him in it.



13. Mandy Indiana – I’ve Seen a way





A glorious cacophony of industrial dacey sounds from round my ends. Somehow i’ve never seen these live even though they’ve played plenty of times on various local festivals and supporting other bands I like. The vocals sung in french are very un-mancunium but the sparse cold factory style driving rythem is distinctively mancunium. As well as the disturbing noise there are also some more blissful moments on this album, the distorted almost Hendrix like squal of iron maiden is lovely.



12. Clark – Sus Dog





Stunningly produced by Thom Yorke, it’s got his touch all over this. Clark’s falsetto vocal which runs through it is very Thom-like anyway. Beautifully layered electronics which veer between classical piano tinkles, dirty bassy electro noise and huge ambient swells of sound. It’s a magnificent collage.



11. Girl Ray – Prestige





Disco-tastic. A bit of a progression / turn around from their indie begginings, although probablly not as much as I first thought given their tunes always had a bit of a rythemic shuffle to them. The Disco vibe is fully in flow here, it’s basically like listening to Chic but with a posh sounding home counties accent as the voice. There’s some great melodies on this album, it absolutely flies by and just when you’re thinking ‘ok that’s ebough disco’ the Joe Goddard produced single Give Me Your Love from last year closes the album with it’s down tempo Balaeric magnificence.



10. Gretel Hanlyn – Head of The Love Club





Technically this an EP but it’s 8 songs long and clocks in at 26 minutes so it’ll do for me. It’s singer spongwritery stuff but fleshed out in the studio with a band. Quite a bit of variation in moods and styles accross the space of this 26 minutes, Little Vampire is a dark brooding ballad, Dry Me is pure PJ Harvey, Wiggy is a mid 90’s sounding brit pop anthem about her cat, Drive is a catchy little Cardigans-esque rocker and the closer Today (I Can’t help but cry) is anthemic and almost 80’s sounding. It’s a great little taster of hopefully plenty more to come from her and i’m surpised it hasn’t garnered more attention



9. James Holden – Imagine This Is High Dimensional Space Of All Possibilities





Probablly the most ‘out there’ album on this list. Space cadet approved psychedelic electronic music in the mould of the Field or a less unrestrained Orbital. No vocals on this one, just layers of oscilating rythems and warped but beautiful sounding synths. The most creative original piece of electronic music i’ven heard in years (or at least since that Clark album at #12 lol).



8. Grian Chatten – Chaos For The Fly





What a hot steak this guy is on. Three Fontaines albums getting progressively more interesting and now an excellent solo album. Mad that he’s still in his 20’s yet he’s already reached the ‘taking a break from the band to do solo stuff’ stage. His vocals, lyrics and ability to tell stories are just fantastic and it’s nice to hear that they work away from the band too with a much softer sound here to sing over. Has a lovely almost american feel to it at times this one. All The People is the devastating high point of the album.



7. Beach Fossils – Bunny





Fantastic comeback album of sorts after a 6 year break. Actually think this bests their aledged early teenies pomp when they were scene setters on captured tracks . Bunny has a glossier and more hi-fidelity recording sound than their early recordings and as a band this type of recording suits them more. There’s not a bad moment on this record, it’s just wall to wall really well recorded guitars and a really rich sonic soundscape that in no way betrays their unmistakably indie begginings.



6. Bar Italia – Tracey Denim





Only just seen today that this is actually the first of two albums they released this year – so bloody hard to keep track of music these days. No idea what album #2 is like but this one released back in May is an absolute belter. I’ve always loved it when a male and female vocalist trade vocals back and forth and these guys do it realltwell. These guys have quite an art school kind of vibe in their asthetic and semi shambling lofi pavement-esque guitars, it’s not overly pretentious though and there’s plenty of melodies to soak up. The brilliantly titled yes I have eaten so many lemons yes I am so bitter is a particular highlight.



5. Barry Can’t Swim – When Will We Land





Every bit as colourful and playful as the cover art suggests. Much like Fred Again, Barry Can’t Swim gets a bit of shit from what can be a quite eliteist Dance music community. You would have to soulless to listen to this album and actively dislike it. It’s just so fun and accessible, taking all the super catchy parts of dance music from the last few years (afro beat sounds, Bicep style ravey bits, Fred again conversational vocal snippets and general 90’s housey piano loops) and mixing them together into 41 minutes of floor filling goodness.



4. The Chemical Brothers – For That Beautiful Feeling





The chems never really fell off, they’ve released numerous albums through the noughties and teenies which have been good additions to their three absolute stonker albums they released in the 90’s. This however is a truly fantastic album that’s the best they’ve put out since 1999’s Surrender. The guest vocalists Halo Maud and Beck are subtle rather than show stealing, which isn’t always the case with big electronic artists who rope in well known vocalists. This has full throttle big beat anthems, emotional weight and interesting changes of gear throughout, it’s an impeccably paced proper dance music album that takes you on a journey with a big pay off.



3. JW Francis – Dream House





Asbolutely smashed this album earlier in the year (it was released in January). Wondered whether I would still like it when I came back to it to write this. No problem there, it’s just so catchy and perfect sounding. Just really simple summery indie rock that I could never tire of listening to. This kind of ‘slacker’ indie is just absoluterly slap bang in my wheelhouse – the guy sings like he hasn’t a care in the world. When you see him live as well he’s every bit as smiley and lovely as he sounds on this record, telling jokes on stage and generally being hilarious. Highly recomend. The calypso sounding Casino probablly the best tune on here.



2. Young Fathers – Heavy Heavy





Was super surprised to see that these came from Edinburgh of all places. Joyous affrobeat-gospel-soul-rock hybrids aren’t something you really associate with Scotland. A fucking astonishing album that kind of defies words if truth be told, it’s one of those that have come from seemingly nowhere and inhabits a space that’s all of it’s own making. Just a remarkable piece of work. Listen to it.



1. Geese – 3D Country





Ardent fans of my yearly list will know that Geese previously picked up the album of the year gong back in 2021. That was their debut and this is their second album, a bit fanboyish going two out of two? probablly, th3ese guys are great but it’s hardly definately maybe and what’s the story morning glory. I’ve been known to fanboy a lot over my years andf this maybe a bit more fanboyism. However tis just a great piece of work and very different to their debut album which was a lot tighter and strokesier sounding. This is loose jammy and groovey as all heck! It’s got country in the title, has a country themed front cover but I wouldn’t say this a country album at all, it has slight elements but it’s more weird southern fried funky rock. I’ve just thoroughly enjoyed every single play of this album, just can’t get enough of it. Truth be told the top 10 this year are all fairly interchangeable (probably say that every single year) but given how much i’ve listened to this one it just pips it over the chasing pack.