Year-End Critics' Polls 2014

rs songs list is not nearly as terrible as their albums list ("drunk in love" at #1 is cool) but i swear they have like 5 songs that were released as singles last year and had long since peaked

Shabazz Palaces album is awesome. not sure I've heard anything better than it this year

The Skinny (UK) have released their top 10. Runnerups 11-50 forthcoming.

1 - Warpaint: Warpaint
2 - The Twilight Sad: Nobody Wants To Be Here & Nobody Wants To Leave
3 - The War On Drugs: Lost in the Dream
4 - St. Vincent: St. Vincent
5 - Angel Olsen: Burn Your Fire for No Witness
6 - Mogwai: Rave Tapes
7 - FKA Twigs: LP1
8 - The Afghan Whigs: Do to the Beast
9 - The Phantom Band: Strange Friend
10 - Young Fathers: Dead

Angel Olson is great

I'm tight with the Juno Plus list of best reissues. Also agreeing with their comment re Gigi Masin's Talk To The Sea

wasn’t just the best reissue project of the year – it was better than most albums of new music released in 2014
― doug watson, Wednesday, December 3, 2014 11:17 AM (8 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yes. i posted on the balearic revival thread that it might be my favorite album of the year, at this point there's no doubt. i feel like it's gonna become an all-time favorite album for me.

From AV Club's Least Essential Albums list:

Least essential Christmas album, Internet-famous cat-egory:
Grumpy Cat’s Worst Christmas Ever: Official Soundtrack

The idea of adult-contemporary singers and cutesy indie duos recording well-trodden Christmas standards is already an inessential addition to the world’s library of music. Doing that for the album accompaniment to a Lifetime movie that’s based on an Internet meme makes Grumpy Cat’s Worst Christmas Ever: Official Soundtrack so ephemeral, physical copies may as well be shoved directly into the ground as a giant “fuck you” to the Earth.

I do kinda feel like once all of the music stores that exist mainly to sell CDs are gone, these will be among the only CDs that are mass produced, just to sell on the impulse rack at Wal Mart or whereever.

yeah there will always be a carousel for them at the drug store next to the one holding 30 $5 copies of Ecks vs. Sever and Sum of All Fears on dvd

http://www.magnetmagazine.com/2014/12/03/best-of-2014-world-music/

world music top 10

wannabe boomer confession: i like the jackson browne album. won't be on my EOY list though.

Rolling Stone - Best songs of 2014
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/50-best-songs-of-2014-20141203

1. Beyonce feat. Jay -Z - Drunk In Love
2. DJ Snake feat. Lil Jon - Turn Down for What
3. U2 - Every Breaking Wave
4. Future feat. Pusha T, Pharrell, Casino - Move that Dope
5. Jenny Lewis - Just One of the Guys
6. Taylor Swift - Blank Space
7. Bruce Springsteen - Frankie Fell In Love
8. Sharon Van Etten - Every Time the Sun Comes Up
9. Future Islands - Seasons (Waiting On You)
10. Kendrick Lamar - i
11. Alvvays - Archie, Marry Me
12. Sam Smith - Stay With Me
13. Foo Fighters - Outside
14. Grimes - Go
15. Sia - Chandelier
16. Beck - Blue Moon
17. Rae Sremmurd - No Flex Zone
18. Bleachers - I Wanna Get Better
19. Iggy Azealia feat. Charli XCX - Fancy
20. Old Crow Medicine Show - Sweet Amarillo
21. Weezer - Back to the Shack
22. Lana Del Rey - Brooklyn Baby
23. Tove Lo - Habits (Stay High)
24. The Black Keys - Gotta Get Away
25. Caribou - Can't Do Without You
26. Drake - 0 to 100/The Catch Up
27. Thurston Moore - Grace Lake
28. Prince - This Could Be Us
29. Miranda Lambert - Smokin' and Drinkin'
30. Coldplay - Magic
31. EMA - So Blonde
32. Maroon 5 - Animals
33. Jackson Browne - The Birds of St. Marks
34. Sylvan Esso - Coffee
35. First Aid Kit - Master Pretender
36. Beverly - Honey Do
37. Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers - Faultlines
38. YG feat. Jeezy, Rich Homie Quan - My Hitta
39. Priests - Doctor
40. Sleater-Kinney - Bury Our Friends
41. Ought - Habit
42. FKA Twigs - Two Weeks
43. The New Pornographers - Brill Bruisers
44. St. Vincent - Prince Johnny
45. Hospitality - I Need Your Bones
46. Katy B - 5 AM
47. Real Estate - Talking Backwards
48. Alex G. - Harvey
49. Old 97s - Longer Than You've Been Alive
50. Counting Crows - Dislocation

Treble zine - Top 10 Metal Albums
http://www.treblezine.com/20342-top-10-metal-albums-of-2014/

1. Pallbearer – Foundations of Burden
2. Tombs – Savage Gold
3. Yob – Clearing the Path to Ascend
4. Mutilation Rites – Harbinger
5. Triptykon – Melana Chasmata
6. Atriarch – An Unending Pathway
7. Primordial – Where Greater Men Have Fallen
8. Thou – Heathen
9. Godflesh – A World Lit Only By Fire
10. Nux Vomica – Nux Vomica

glad to see somebody rep for Grimes -Go, thought that song was generally hated, but it's the first time a track of hers has genuinely thrilled me.

I don't think I've actually heard 'Chandelier' but I'm assuming the chorus is just Sia hollering 'CHANDELIER! CHANDELIER!' while playing four straight piano chords really loudly.

I don't think I've actually heard 'Chandelier' but I'm assuming the chorus is just Sia hollering 'CHANDELIER! CHANDELIER!' while playing four straight piano chords really loudly.
--Matt DC

no, the production sounds like rihanna bc it was written for rihanna, but the lyrics are v sad sia stuff about alcoholism

it's good tho!!

sia being considered a songwriter of quality completely mystifies me

never cared for her much until this latest record, based on her matching assumptions like Matt DCs above. however, thought putting her against actual current pop production worked. really like "elastic heart," "big girls cry" & "fire meet gasoline," as well as chandelier

her lyrics often leave something to be desired, although I did like how raw they are on 1,000 forms of fear.

btw lex I tried some of those k michelle songs (you were championing her here I believe, correct me if wrong), and really enjoyed them. will check the whole album soon. thanks!

awesome, the k michelle album is incredible

The Music Exchange (Nottingham vinyl shop):

1. St. Vincent - s/t
2. Angel Olsen - Burn Your Fire For No Witness
3. Swans - To Be Kind
4. Goat - Commune
5. Bremen - Second Launch
6. Hookworms - The Hum
7. Sleaford Mods - Divide & Exit
8. Alvvays - s/t
9. Grumbling Fur - Preternaturals
10. Todd Terje - It's Album Time

Reissues, Soundtracks & Compilations:

1. Lee Hazlewood - Love And Other Crimes
2. Patrick Cowley - School Daze
3. Laraaji - Celestial Music 1978-2011
4. V/A - Warfaring Strangers: Darkscorch Canticles
5. Arthur Russell - World Of Echo
6. The Fates - Furia
7. William Onyeabor - Vinyl Boxset 1 & 2
8. Craig Leon - Anthology Of Interplanetary Folk Music Vol. 1: Nommos/Visiting
9. Glenn Branca - Lesson No. 1
10. Sinoia Caves - Beyond The Black Rainbow OST

Cannot get into St. Vincent at all.

It's pretty sad to see any even remotely classic roch-ish album get props over Intensity Ghost by Chris Forsyth & the Solar Motel band which is so godlike in imagining some amazing hybrid of Crazy Horse, Physical Graffiti, and Television, while feeling wholly fresh

And I like War on Drugs fine but see Solar Motel live and they would eat their fucking lunch

They're instrumental though so it's a different enough category, no?

Either way still got to pick that one up.

What I heard of that record was amazing and I liked the last record just fine. Their live album kills, too.

evan - you mean st. vincent on a whole or this album? bc it stripped away some of the stuff that i didnt love about previous albums of hers (less twee/chamber-pop touches)

looking at this thread is like looking at pictures of that garbage island in the north pacific

sloth- yeah her albums have always been a bit too busy but I'm still not feeling any of her melodies. All a bit too stiff for me too.

Evan yeah obv instrumental but I think the core of the appeal is a certain post punk/indie update on classic rock jamminess

Either way I thought maybe the record had gotten a little more notice outside of the ilx brigade crowd

Hopefully! They're a great band.

is zis solar motel album on ze spotify

i didn't even know there was another forsyth record

brigade thread way too big to load, way too many youtubes, you're doing yourselves in

looking at this thread is like looking at pictures of that garbage island in the north pacific

ya. but gigi masin tho!

garbage island is endlessly fascinating tbh

OK, I've loaded up the NME, Paste, Rolling Stone, PopMatters, and TIME song/track lists onto a single Spotify playlist (deleting duplicates):
http://open.spotify.com/user/seaworthyset/playlist/6gv4ng5XkJQQrTSkr7OzEH

Will add others as they come out.

Sloth there are 2 songs from the album, one is really long, they are both standouts and give you a good idea of what Intensity Ghost is like

x-post

MAGNET’s j. poet picks the best world-music releases of the year.

1 Seun Kuti & Egypt 80 A Long Way To The Beginning (Knitting Factory)
2 Toumani & Sidiki Diabate Toumani & Sidiki (World Circuit)
3 Jamie Dubberly & Orquesta Dharma La Clave Del Gumbo (Dubberly)
4 Zongo Junction No Discount (Electric Cowbell)
5 Anansy Cissé Mali Overdrive (Riverboat)
6 Lo’Jo 310 Lunes (World Village)
7 Boris Kovač & La Campanella Eastern Moon Rising (Riverboat)
8 Da Cruz Disco E Progresso (Boom Jah)
9 Banda Magda Yerakina (Ground UP)
10 Ricardo Lemvo & Makina Loca La Rumba SoYo (Cumbancha

Oh, forgot Ricardo Lemvo had a new release out. Have liked his Congolese meets Cuban grooves in the past.

Alvvays at 11 on the RS tracks list makes me happy

xxp they are "the ballad of freer hollow" and "i aint waiting" correct?

Yep

33. Jackson Browne - The Birds of St. Marks

lol

And I like War on Drugs fine but see Solar Motel live and they would eat their fucking lunch

― you say tomato/i say imago (upper mississippi sh@kedown),

WOD lunch = moldy kale + sprouts iirc

bc of brooklyn and beer commercial rock amirite???????? TRUTH 2 POWER

btw evan & shakedown i very much like these chris forsyth/solar motel songs

Nice! Yeah it's goof stuff sloth

good...

goof stuff also sounds interesting imo but forsyth is def not goofy

toumani & sidiki is probably my #1 album from this year

i'm a sucker for the stereo thing

Sidmani & Tanooki

Don't say it three times or he'll appear.