2022 AOTY So Far

black midi - Hellfire
Garcia Peoples - Dodging Dues
Hazy Sour Cherry - Strange World
Imperial Triumphant - Spirit of Ecstasy
Satan - Earth Infernal
The Garden - Horseshit on Route 66
Upchuck - Sense Yourself

Both new Ka albums have hit streaming now

This is incredibly slamming. I mean check out the last track
https://nyegenyegetapes.bandcamp.com/album/ndjila-wa-mudujimu

otm

otm🕸

Paging new Junior Boys album to thread

i did a rummage and am putting this here for future reference

1. Charlotte Adigéry and Bolis Pupul - Topical Dancer
2. Somi - Zenzile: The Reimagination of Miriam Makes
3. Koffee - Gifted
4. Syd - Broken Hearts Club
5. SAULT - Air
6. Immanuel Wilkins - The 7th Hand
7. Germán López - Alma
8. Nduduzo Makhathini - In the Spirit of Nut
9. Viagra Boys - Cave World
10. Hollie Cook - Happy Hour
11. Johnny Gandelsman - Complete Bach Cello Suites for Violin
12. Julius Rodriguez - Let Sound Tell All
13. Burna Boy - Love, Damini
14. Mu-ziq - Magic Pony Ride
15. Kendrick Lamar - Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers
16. Miranda Lambert - Palomino
17. Sam Gendel - Superstore (et al)
18. PUBLIQuartet - WHAT IS AMERICAN
19. Cécile McLorin Salvant - Ghost Song
20. Orbital - 30 Something
21. Mr Fingers - Around the Sun pt 1
22. Saba - Few Good Things
23. Kylie Minogue - Infinite Disco
24. Soccer96 - Inner Worlds
25. Kadhja Bonet - JGS EP
26. Real Lies - Lad Ash
27. DOMi and JD BECK - NOT TiGHT
28. Amythyst Kiah - Pensive Pop EP
29. Dawn Richard and Spencer Zahn - Pigments Movement 1
30. Beyoncé - RENAISSANCE
31. Megan Thee Stallion - Traumazine
32. Mr Mitch - WORK!
33. Roomful of Teeth - Catherine Called Birdy OST
34. Vicky Chow - Philip Glass Solo Piano Etudes v1
35. Theo Parrish - DJ Kicks
36. Dry Cleaning - Stumpwork
37. Mach Tommy - Duck Czn: Tiger Style
38. Cam’ron - U Wasn’t There
39. Protoje - Third Time’s the Charm
40. Alhaji Waziri Oshomah - World Spirituality Classics 3
41. Vieux Farka Toute and Khruangbin - Ali
42. Makaya McCraven - In These Times
43. The Comet Is Coming - Hyper Dimensional Expansion Beam
44. Terri Lyne Carrington - New Standards v1
45. Jazmin Sullivan - Heaux Tales, Mo Tales Deluxe
46. Julian Lage - View With a Room
47. Alabaster DePlume - GOLD
48. Amanda Shires - Take It Like a Man
49. Nicola Cruz - Self Oscillation EP
50. Samora Pinderhughes - Grief
51. Danish String Quartet - Prism IV
52. Prince and the Revolution: Live, March 30 1985

(if we do a poll this year, i am increasingly thinking lad ash may win best album)

is this where we talk about the new shabason & krgovich album?

Some discussion of their previous album in the sophistipop thread. New one is not AOTY material for me, but I do love "I Am So Happy With My Little Dog", like Bernard

i am increasingly thinking lad ash may win best album

as it should

real lies detected

Six Sault albums to vote for now.

What's the record for most albums in the 77 in a single year?

:(

Real Lies winning would be excellent even if it's not really my bag, but it would be a unique ilm pick in a year with so many huge & obvious contenders in it

doubt all 6 sault albums will make it *famous last word*

Just a suggestion to give the Rachel Podger Bach-cello-suites-on-violin a shot. Gut strings, recorded in a big room, and a superior (in my opinion) performance to the Gandelsman

interesting! Is the -on-violin approach something people have done before with the suites (I am a classical naif)?

follow-up q: did this come out in 2019?

my money's on renaissance tbh

Yeah, would love Real Lies to win but can't see past Renaissance claiming the prize

i will spin that podger album

oh, also the babyface album of duets is real good for the most part

renaissance over big thief? 2022 has been long tbf

I'm not personally aware of too many violin recordings of the Bach cello suites. Podger's was the first I heard, and I think it's divine. Gut strings really seal the deal for me, steel E-strings are just too strident for my taste for this kind of adaptation.

Podger cheats in the 6th suite; she overdubs viola notes for the missing lower C-string stuff. Gandelsman, in contrast, performs the "4-string viola adaptation", but up a fifth (in D-major, i.e. the original key).

Rather than type forever about it, I'd just recommend to also check out Lillian Fuchs's wonderful performance of the cello suites on the viola. Her 6th suite in particular is miraculous; Pablo Casals is said to have remarked that it was, at the time of its recording, the best rendition of it, and superior to his own. Her performance is Romantic in technique but unsentimental, sits nicely next to the Milstein recording of the violin sonatas and partitas imo

thanks for that, fgti!

i think big thief still surely have to be the favourites?

i think their flirtation with radical zionism may have hurt them a bit, i know my read on a lot of their lyrics/vibe went from "hmm, gnomic" to "oh these guys are actually dumb."

alright kanye

I'm not sure scheduling, then canceling amidst the inevitable backlash, a couple of ill-advised shows in Israel (where, incidentally, one of the band members actually lives) is the same as a "flirtation with radical zionism" but go off.

Still leaning towards Cloakroom for my personal album of the year.

I refuse to start making lists until both my current favourite songwriters have dropped albums on the 18th

But I'm constantly discovering a lot of incredible things vying for upper placement in any hypothetical list. It has been a very, very great year - last year was a relative lull imo, probably Covid-relatedly

if I were to summarize my Big Five so far:
Mr. Money, Boy Alone & King Of Amapiano II With The Rave, Roses & Renaissance Vibe, Part 1

My top 4

Battlelore - The Return of the Shadow
Brymir - Voices in the Sky
Rina Sawayama - Hold the Girl
Archers of Loaf - Reason in Decline

bc: I'm curious to see if/how you'll work in Love & Ego on friday :)

I'm disconnected from most new music as usual but I really liked:

Animal Collection - Time Skiffs
death's dynamic shroud - Darklife
Junior Boys - Waiting Game
Magma - Kartehl

‘more love, less ego’ would be a perfect description of said Rave, Roses & Renaissance Vibe, methinks

xp

My top 5 AT THE MOMENT, in chronological order of release, definitely subject to change (newest addition to the list is Ariel Zetina):

Big Thief
Nova Twins
Nina Nastasia
Shygirl
Ariel Zetina

Kangding Ray - ULTRACHROMA (my favorite of his by a wide margin)
Sofie Birch - Holotropica
Kuedo - Infinite Window
Brian Eno - FOREVERANDEVERNOMORE

yes that's two all-caps album titles

I keep hearing about how economically unfeasible it is to be a musician these days (which it is), yet there's already too many good albums to keep up with. I don't know what I'd do if the world started caring about the treatment of artists again.

Yeah, the sheer number of releases I've been curious about this year has been exhausting. I think it's pretty much all an after-effect of the pandemic, for various reasons:

1. bands/artists that held on to finished albums until they could tour again
2. bands/artists that had to wait for pressing plant delays to clear up to release their new stuff
3. bands/artists that had a lot of extra time to write new material that sped up their usual cycle

list of records that have stuck with me for the year, sort of in order, obv i have so much to catch up on and i never will:

junior boys waiting game
lambchop the bible
beth orton weather alive
rosalía motomami
perfume plasma
real lies lad ash
the 1975 being funny in a foreign language
soccer mommy sometimes, forever
caracara new preoccupations
mr fingers around the sun pt 1
carly rae jepsen the loneliest time
arctic monkeys the car
brent faiyaz wasteland
sharon van etten we've been going about this all wrong
ari lennox age/sex/location
willow <copingmechanism>
circa survive two dreams
underoath voyeurist
cloud rat threshold
panic at the disco viva las vengeance
maren morris humble quest
dawn richard and spencer zahn pigments
sam prekop & john mcentire sons of
autopsy morbidity triumphant
tegan and sara crybaby
tears for fears the tipping point
wilco cruel country
björk fossora
no devotion no oblivion

13 albums from this year that I will ride or die for

Real Lies - Lad Ash
Mr Fingers - Around The Sun pt. 1
Cass McCombs - Heartmind
Billy Woods - Aethiopes
Destroyer - Labyrinthitis
Cloakroom - Dissolution Wave
Arctic Monkeys - The Car
Scarcity - Aveliut
Black midi - Hellfire
Danger Mouse/Black Thought - Cheat Codes
Double Virgo - Foolish Narratives
Sophie Royer - Harlequin
Fontaines DC - Skinty Fia

I think the Naima Bock album might end up my AOTY. Somewhat out of character for me, but it's so beautiful and intricate. I took me a while to hear the Brazilian influence all the reviews mentioned, but I hear it in the way she arranges and combines instruments

One that needs to be mentioned is Lorraine James’ Whatever The Weather album. Superb ambience broken up by crispy breakage

Oh yeah, that Lorraine James is really good.

At the moment (in roughly descending order):

Oren Ambarchi - Shebang
Lucrecia Dalt - ¡Ay!
Beth Orton - Weather Alive
Real Lies - Lad Ash
Lady Aicha and Pismo Crane's Original Fulu Miziki of Kinshasa - N'Djila Wa Mudujimu
The 1975 - Being Funny in a Foreign Language
Puscha - Etterath
Dawn Richard & Spencer Zahn - Pigments
Junior Boys - Waiting Game
Rema - Rave and Roses
Rosalía - MOTOMAMI
Au Suisse - Au Suisse
Brent Faiyaz - Wasteland
Taylor Swift - Midnights
Arctic Monkeys - The Car
Perfume - Plasma
Soccer Mommy - Sometimes, Forever
Kendrick Lamar - Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers
Carly Rae Jepsen - The Loneliest Time
Jenny Hval - Classic Objects
Ethel Cain - Preacher's Daughter
Makaya McCraven - In These Times
Shackleton - The Majestic Yes
Omay Lay - Boy Alone
Ari Lennox - Age/Sex/Location
Maren Morris - Humble Quest
Sam Prekop & John McEntire - Sons Of
Emeka Ogboh - 6°30′33.372″N 3°22′0.66″E
Miranda Lambert - Palomino
Sudan Archives - Natural Brown Prom Queen
Obongjayar - Sometimes I Dream of Doors
Somi - Zenzile: The Reimagination of Miriam Makeba
The Soft Pink Truth - Is It Going To Get Any Deeper Than This?
Beyonce - Renaissance

But there's so much I still need to hear or need to spend more time with.

I was having a typically depressing conversation with my dad about politics and he asked, "Does anything seem good now?" I said, "Well, there's a ton of great music ..."

This is practically my only resource for finding new music at the moment, so I think my list'll be pretty hive-mindey this year:

Real Lies - Lad Ash
Croatian Amor - Remember Rainbow Bridge
Time Wharp - Spiro World
Junior Boys - Waiting Game
Big Thief
Beth Orton
Modern Nature - Island of Noise
Florist - s/t
Sam Prekop & John McEntire - Sons of
Ashenspire - Hostile Architecture
Duncan Marquiss - Wires Turned Sideways in Time
Makaya McCraven - In These Times
Kali Malone - Living Torch
Jake Xerxes Fussell - Good and Green Again
Lambchop - The Bible
Bennie Maupin & Adam Rudolph - Symphonic Tone Poem for Brother Yusef
Etran de L'Aïr - Agadez

And aye, xp, good year IMO.

Realizing from Brad & Tim's lists that I somehow still haven't listened to the Maren Morris album. Thanks both.