The upside to that though is that I've found a lot of good albums that I believe that people haven't heard and an even bigger amount of stand out tracks that even fewer have heard. Since I didn't want the time I spent to be complete in vain I decided to write about a couple of my favorite albums and tracks that seem to have flown under the radar during the year, starting with a piece on a couple of albums.
Black Cilice - Mysteries [Black Metal]
Black Cilice is a Portugese black metal band who's music reminds a lot of early black metal demo's. It's incredibly lo-fi and very harsh at the same time, bordering on noise in a similar fashion to a band like Gorguts but in a different fashion.
I spent ages looking for a stream of this album and it took me almost two months from hearing a single and reading a review to finally hearing the album in its entirety leading me to believe I would ultimately be disappointed because of the amount of expectations I had for this record. I did however not find myself disappointed and instead came to cherish this record as one of the best metal records I've heard so far this year.
Mysteries is not for the faint of heart and not for someone who can't stand the chaos and darkness of black metal, if this sounds like you then you're better of listening to Sunbather yet another time. Mysteries is raw and ferocious which is something I want more of in my black metal. Portugal might not be the country from where one would expect this kind of black metal but any fan of the genre owes it to themself to hear this phenomenal record.
Damien Dubrovnik - Vegas Fountain [Noise]
As someone who usually isn't a big fan of noise, Damien Dubrovnik's latest release Vegas Fountain was right up my alley. It isn't as harsh as many Japanese acts that often become the face of the genre to newcomers for the absurd nature and instead acts as a low-key, almost minimalistic record that focuses on textures and dissonance at an almost ambient level. Opener On Its Double revolves around a sharp piercing tone that gets increasingly louder as the track goes on, drenched in field recordings and a repeated knocking sound. It's something that captures the essence of noise without having to sound like Kazumoto Endo's While You Were Out or anything by The Gerogerigegege.
Vegas Fountain combines beauty with noise, ambience with distortion and it's not only a very good album but also a fantastic starting point for someone curious about noise with little to no idea of how to approach a genre so impenetrable. My biggest regret of this year was not taking the chance to see Dubrovnik perform here in Stockholm when I could.
Dawn Richard - Blackheart [RnB]
Blackheart might be the most well known and the most "mainstream" of the albums on this chart. This is an album that continues a planned trilogy that Dawn Richard has been working on where Blackheart sits as the second installment, the followup to Goldenheart.
Why this hasn't blown up completely confounds me. Richard makes contemporary RnB in a similar fashion to her peers such as Janelle Monae. She has the mainstream appeal in tracks like Phoenix which could be a radio banger on any RnB-station I know of while combining it with more eventful and unique tracks which with production signed Noise Castle really elevates her music to something unique and original. This album clocks in at over an hour and is one of the most diverse RnB records I've ever come across. The instrumentals shapeshift between breakbeat-influenced bangers into accessible radio hits and turns into deep introspective tracks on drug abuse and prostitution. If there were checklists of how to make a successful album, Blackheart would have been able to tick every single box.
Despite that, noone seems to have paid it any attention. Pitchfork gave it an 8 despite this seeming like it would be right up their alley as a product they would promote and sell to fans of Monae and similar artists, and I haven't seen any buzz for it anywhere else.
Do yourself a favor and listen to this record if you're any kind of fan of RnB and doesn't loathe the genre. Your bound to find atleast something enjoyable on this record.
Nicolas Jaar - Pomegranates [Electronic, OST]
Next up is one of my personal favorite artists that are still active today and the one I'm always the most eager to hear new works from. Earlier this year Nicolas Jaar released his own OST to the Armenian art-house film The Color Of Pomegranates with the context of the film in mind for the music. However the music stands tall on its own two feet and isn't too far from Nicolas Jaar's previous solo debut, Space Is Only Noise, only more ambient and a bit more abstract.
This release, just as many of Jaar's other releases, has a heavy focus on textures and the clash of sounds against eachother. The tracks are varied, ranging between drawn out drone segments with a couple of piano chords hiding in the mix like on Construction and more active electronic-heavy songs like the heavily side chained Three Windows.
The songs are simple ideas that aren't supposed to be fleshed out into something that's easily picked up and listened to and the songs may very well fit even better into the context of the film (I have unfortunately not had the pleasure of vieweing The Color Of Pomegranates myself so I can't speak of its value when compared to the already existing sounds of the film), but I do believe that they still stand strong on their own even if this release probably won't appeal to as big of a crowd as Jaar's previous works have done (Darkside's Psychich and Jaar's Space Is Only Noise). I do believe that many of the tracks on here show incredibly interesting directions and I hope we see Jaar evolve even more. The only thing I've come to expect from the man is the unexpected.
Graham Lambkin & Michael Pisaro - Schwarze Riesenfalter [Electro Acoustic]
I first came across Graham Lambkin's music when I began my first venture into avant-garde music. Someone suggested I try The Salmon Run and I found it appalling. I did however found my way back into electro acoustic music and to my surprise it was actually Lambkin's collaboration with Michael Pisaro that made me curious about the genre.
The two released a collaborative LP earlier this year titled Schwarze Riesenfalter and it's one that's often times closer to field recordings and ambient than it is to the depths of musique concrete that one may delve deeper into if one would so be inclined. It's an album that focuses heavily on the sounds and music created by the clash and dissonance between different kinds of recorded sounds and what truly makes this album shine is how incredibly tight it sounds. You've got a track like Auflattern Die Fledermäuse which starts with the vibrations and bleeps from a ringing phone sounding exquisite and intricate in a good pair of headphones, only to move into a more haunting second half which sounds like the night swallowing the lone piano player of the world.
It's an album that should be enjoyed with a good pair of headphones, because the amount of detail and how finely tuned every element on this record is, is an experience that one should see at its very best. One of the, to me, biggest surprises of the year.
Anton Öberg Sysojev
No comments:
Post a Comment