1)Complete Mountain Almanac - Complete Mountain Almanac
Fell in love with this release from early 2023 and it remained my favourite all year
2)PJ Harvey - I Inside The Old Year Dying
Further exploration of English heraldry and weirdness. Polly Jean can do no wrong
3)Anohni And The Johnsons - My Back Was A Bridge For You To Cross
Painfully confessional as ever, but never not beautiful
Blonde Redhead - Sit Down For Dinner
The Waeve - The Waeve
Lana Del Rey - Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd
Fever Ray - Radical Romantics
Feist - Multitudes
Esben And The Witch - Hold Sacred
Christine And The Queens - PARANOIA, ANGELS, TRUE LOVE
Lanterns Of The Lake - Versions Of Us
Bonnie “Prince” Billy - Keeping Secrets Will Destroy
The Coral - Sea Of Mirrors
Forest Swords - Bolted
Beirut - Hadsel
Harp - Albion
Lankum - False Lankum
Lisa O’Neill - All Of This Is Chance
The Polyphonic Spree - Salvage Enterprise
Laura Veirs - Phone Orphans
Missed quite a few more off here. An unusually strong year. I couldn’t narrow down a top 10.
Last few years I’ve been looking backwards a lot, getting acquainted with stuff I abjured for years in favour of edgier fare… This year’s similar, but with more new releases slipping-in, of which the standouts released this year are:
As far as re issues go, this one’s a peach (Non-Jazzers look away). The vinyl is pressed and ready to go now - available at https://samrecords.fr. Of all the original records I’ve sold this is the one I’ve regretted most. I’m 99% certain I won’t see another. (Or afford one!)
Heaven -Cleo Sol, The vinyl hasn’t dropped yet but you get the download on pre order - In several respects it struck me as wall paper / background sound which is neither inspiring or interesting but my wife likes the work she did / does with Sault so it’s been playing a fair bit and seems to have gone deeper with me now.
Really not bought a huge amount of music this year, really just been background music to other activities but stand out has been this, big fan of HMR anyway but really really enjoyed this!
from Hidden Britain Tapes - The Stone Tape - Analysing A Ghost By Electronic Means
