nostalgia_ultra

A relative unknown at the time, Jon Hopkins emerged as an artist in his own right on his fourth full-length release with an album that broke down the significant wall dividing electronic/techno music from a mainstream audience. It feels difficult to comprehend the impression that Immunity left upon me when I first heard it back in the summer of 2013. That impact exists now as a collection of thoughts and emotions, linked to experiences from a personally tumultuous year. It became my long player of the year; not only my favourite release but the one that got the most consistent play as the months went on and winter approached. Despite dozens of other albums competing for my attention, Immunity continued to linger in the mind. I know I’m not alone in regard to that impact. Immunity is an album whose reputation precedes it, now even more so than it did during that long summer. At the time, you might’ve checked it out because a friend of a friend was singing its praises, or you’d glance over someone’s shoulder on the tube in morning rush hour to see them listening to it (my wandering eye spotted this on several occasions). Or better yet, how its slow-burner status was confirmed once it bagged a Mercury Music Prize nomination and the predictable spike in sales solidified a burgeoning love for an album that already had the formations of a stone cold contemporary classic. Immunity bulldozed virtually every other album released in 2013 in its ability to straddle that revered space where artistic vision and commercial success amalgamate without even so much as a whiff of compromise. That it resonated as much as it did was mostly a surprise, not least of all to Hopkins; it appeared seemingly out of nowhere and only built on its success as time went on. I can think of perhaps no other electronic release this decade that has achieved the same success without intentionally playing to the kind of audience the label might market it to. (Grimes’ Visions has arguably a more enduring legacy than Immunity, but not even the most hardcore Claire Boucher fan can say the superb Art Angels wasn’t conceived as more accessible in response to Visions’ breakthrough success.) Compare some of the other releases of 2013 with Immunity and it’s easy to see how it stands alone as a sort of outlier, hallmarked within strict perimeters of Hopkins’ fascination with sound design, a technique he employs throughout every track that can only be described as a ‘sensory overload.’ There are most likely two caveats when it comes to finding a worthy 2013 release to compare to Immunity’s reputation. In my experience (cross-referencing to jog my memory of a specific time, place and even an album’s cultural clout in 2013), all came up short. Firstly, there are those that no doubt matched the artistry of Hopkins’ larger than life ambitions, yet quite understandably, were too obtuse to make ripples beyond the pool of those within esoteric earshot (Amygdala, R Plus Seven, Tomorrow’s Harvest). Secondly, there are those albums that felt borne of the weight of commercial expectation and succeeded, managing to deliver healthy sales, news features and, by 2018, reverence as cult albums amongst a select group of devout diehards (The Bones Of What You Believe, Random Access Memories and, most notably, Settle). All of these releases were big news in some way in 2013, the final three managing to achieve particular acclaim for crossing over genres and blurring the distinction between indie, rock, dance and synth-pop. What can we learn from Immunity by comparing it with these other albums and Hopkins’ ability to communicate beyond the usual artist/audience relationship? Was it all pure luck? Usually a couple of the hits from Settle or Random Access Memories will find their way onto most people’s Spotify playlists; a Latch here or a Get Lucky there. It might be less common for those listeners to know the albums back to front, and almost certainly not in the case of R Plus Seven. Even Immunity falls into that trap, yet there are a number of clues as to its enduring appeal and why such a relatively large audience connected with an hour-long electronic album almost devoid of vocals. Hopkins is a classically-trained pianist and his piano playing comes to the fore on numerous tracks on Immunity, the most arresting of which is Abandon Window. Technically the album’s showstopper, it takes a heartbreaking piano motif to its core and fuses it with the sound of distant erupting fireworks in its second half. It’s difficult to know what kind of emotional reaction we’re meant to take from Abandon Window, but maybe that’s the whole point? We can take what we want from an album that is more concerned with pushing the boundaries on sound content, leaving us to focus purely on our emotional response. The lack of vocals throughout the majority of the album feel in part responsible for creating this strong reaction in a large number of listeners. Devoid of that most instantaneous and human of responses to popular music, the listener is forced to have an internal reaction over an external one. We cannot sing along to Immunity; we may nod and hum or tap our feet, but its cerebral and hypnotic rhythms reflect a desire to solve one of its most common themes; the harmony that arises from the discord of its rhythmic melodies and archaic stop-start programming. Within it evolves a kind of beauty out of madness. It’s like solving a mathematical problem in our heads and slowly making sense of its garbled information overload, problems that become more familiar as we learn how to trapeze through Hopkins’ den of mystery and intrigue. Hopkins is fascinated with the pure essence of sound and how it can be manipulated. Immunity was recorded over a nine month period in his east London studio and the confident, jagged instrumentation of most of the album’s ‘upbeat’ tracks reflect not only a remarkable tactility but pure joy in the power of creation. Second track Open Eye Signal is arguably Hopkins’ most popular and enduring song. It captures perfectly the album’s technique of sustained delay and release, accruing tension ever so slowly with each passing wave of noise until it become so strong that everything building up behind it cascades forward, tumbling down in a glorious, shimmering mess of glitchy, fragmented distortion. Its melodies are distinct and minuscule, yet our brains are wired to group them together into larger blocks that click together like a Jenga tower. Working better as a motif, they function like small shards of glass reflecting light at an infinite number of angles, repeating and recurring with emphasis placed at key points to drive forth a particular mood or feeling. Hopkins manages to sew them together so intricately and so beautifully that they work just as well as modern pop music. It’s impossible to listen to Open Eye Signal (or its sister track Collider) without thinking about Hopkins’ intentions in the same way one might feel Kubrick or Scorsese lurking in their mind whilst watching Barry Lyndon or Taxi Driver; the director’s vision is so apparent that it affects every frame, even more so at intervals where a pinnacle thought or idea begins to crest. Immunity’s position as a landmark album this decade is thrown into even starker contrast when we consider its successor, Singularity. Released a few weeks ago, the weight of expectation surrounding Singularity was intense, so much so that it landed within the top ten of the official UK album charts (Immunity peaked at 63). Reaction has been strong with critical accolades aplenty (no doubt a Mercury Prize nomination will follow), yet Singularity feels like more of a shuffle than a stride forward. It’s a product of the reactionary effect of Immunity’s surprise word-of-mouth success. To be fair to Hopkins, Singularity contains many moments of awe, it’s just that they feel indebted to Immunity’s jackpot-hitting formula. As with Grimes, how could it not be? Immunity felt like it had the power to change your life, but no one’s life was changed more so by its success than Hopkins’. Even the titles have an uncanny similar...ity, along with the artwork, and the fact that the first half contains the heavier techno numbers before giving way to more ambient soundscapes. Over time we must come to view both albums as separate works and allow Singularity the distinction of its own merit. Would we be satisfied with anything less than what Hopkins has bestowed upon us? Would we be happier if Hopkins had taken an entirely left turn? Most of us have been waiting patiently for a follow-up to Immunity that captures that same lightning in a bottle, so it feels particularly unfair to criticise him for continuing its sound. His style is one that is hard to pick faults with and Hopkins has stated that Singularity actually contains many studio advancements. Whether you can spot them or even care doesn’t matter. We know that lightning never strikes twice in the same spot and if Singularity feels mildly underwhelming, it stems from the relationship I’ve built with Immunity over the years. Had Immunity never existed, Singularity could be taken of its own accord and we would be freer to make up our own minds about all the same things we did five years ago, but since it is indebted to its predecessor in style and content, we can never know what that might feel like. It will be interesting to see how time continues to shape Immunity and its reputation as a landmark electronic release. Singularity has thrown that into sharp relief this year. If we can deduce anything at this early stage, it’s that the sound Hopkins has carved out across these two albums hints at a bigger picture, something that could be blown wide apart on his next release, and that is definitely an exciting idea to mull over whilst we wait for the next chapter of his journey.

THE XX I SEE YOU It’s easy to forget January-released albums in end of year lists, and, if my scouring of them in the past few weeks are anything to go by, The xx’s I See You was no exception. It’s also easy to forget just how much impact the band’s third album made when it was doing the rounds twelve months ago. Part of the dialogue surrounding I See You upon its release centred around whether it did or did not avoid the pitfalls that their sophomore album Coexist fell prey to; that, simply put, the London-based trio were yet again rehashing former past glories to ever-diminishing results. Part of the allure of their 2009 self-titled debut was that you really had to pay attention to the words and music. The hushed vocal melodies of Romy Madley Croft and the long pauses (at least for pop’s terms) between the music wouldn’t allow for anything less than a reaction; you either got it or you didn’t. xx became a sleeper hit and Coexist mined a lot of that same gold, but by 2012 the quickly-shifting musical landscape was filling with many of the same sounds that xx had ushered in; by 2016 and on the cusp of the release of I See You, it felt overwhelmingly saturated. If anything, I See You is a detour, the most radical leap for this still young band thus far for one primary reason; the four-and-a-half year gap between albums  gave the band’s producer (and crucial third member) Jamie Smith chance to release his debut album In Colour. For me personally, as someone who never quite ‘got’ The xx is the way everyone else seemingly did, In Colour was a complete revelation, the kind of music I wish the band had been making from the off. In Colour rendered electronica, house and UK garage in such acute, vivid detail, with such sophisticated and immersive production that it sparked something of a summer-long obsession in me; albums rarely take hold of me for such a long time, and In Colour was second to none throughout June to August of 2015. I See You very wisely adopts In Colour’s beating heart and gives the band’s music a much needed jolt; you can hear the reverberating echoes of Hold Tight in the Hall & Oates-sampling On Hold and the searing melancholy of Loud Places in rich ballads Replica and I Dare You. The long pauses on many of Coexist’s songs felt like empty chasms, purposefully drawing attention to the emotional voids left by the lyrical narratives unfolding. Yet I See You somehow sidesteps the barren skeleton of many of Co-exist’s tracks, fleshing out both instrumentally and vocally. One of the most striking aspects of its willingness to embrace the listener more than any other xx album is Romy Madley Croft’s vocals. Even after many listens, I still find myself impatiently preempting her verses because they feel so good to sing along to; hitting all the right notes and with such soulful gusto, Croft is the unlikely star of the record and, married with Smith’s bristling production, they create an unbeatable combination that has resulted in the band’s most endearing album to date.

Bejar leaves a breadcrumb trail of riddles and challenges throughout Poison Season with vocals sung to evoke mystery and intrigue, the audio equivalent of peering into dark tunnels and trying to make sense of the blackness all around. On Forces From Above he sings "I tried to follow the lines to the letter" with a mystique that has carried him for two decades. Poison Season is something of a return to the glorious mess of earlier Destroyer albums, almost certainly a conscious reaction to Kaputt’s unbridled critical and commercial success. Bejar seems confident in shirking his so-called responsibilities to unlikely indie stardom and more than willing to discard the newest Destroyer fans in favour of protecting the band’s impressive legacy. Still, there is something in the way of thematic cogency in the album’s arc. It’s still clearly a very carefully curated work and the running order of songs feels particularly honed when songs like Solace’s Bride, Bangkok and Sun In The Sky flesh out the album’s latter half. They just feel like closers, as though a sun were slowly setting on Bejar’s latest opus in order to wipe the slate clean for whatever incantation he might take on his eleventh record. Poison Season is a remarkable follow-up to Kaputt, one which will be widely hailed as one of the many peaks in a career that shows no signs of letting up.

If Sufjan Stevens were a mainstream artist on a major label concerned with hits then Carrie & Lowell would've been marketed as a “return to form,” an album designed to regain the fickle lost fans who would've abandoned him in the five years since his attempt to try something radically out of step with the status quo. As it stands, Stevens is as about as mainstream as you can get for an artist on an independent label. Now more than fifteen years into his career, his music has progressed in leaps and bounds, confirming a position as a unique artist not merely universally acclaimed but universally loved. Until 2010's The Age of Adz, Stevens managed (rather uncannily) to resonate on a personal level despite little of the subject matter relating to his personal life. Both 2003′s Michigan and its now-classic successor Illinois (2005) are sprawling epics brimming with orchestral arrangements rooted in indie folk and baroque pop. Chaotic and magnificent in the only way constructed narratives concerning the history of the two States could be, they are informative and educational, merging historical fact with an innovative patchwork of musical styles bolstered by Stevens' talent for catchy melody and witty storytelling. Alongside scrupulous cover art and lengthy song titles that bordered on the parodic, it was easy to see Stevens as a musician who had constructed a character with which to present himself to the listener. Yet behind the mask were confessional tales which alluded to his childhood and personal life. Rumours pertaining to his sexuality and faith never got in the way of an almost unparalleled level of communication with his fans; we respected his right to privacy and in turn he bestowed us with gifts both on and off stage. Carrie & Lowell is thin-skinned emotional nakedness on a scale rarely witnessed in popular music. There is nowhere for Stevens to hide, no historical figures he might stand behind, no personal truths cloaked in myth and subterfuge. Stevens knew this all too well, that if he were to release an album about his relationship with his mother it could only ever be a no-holds-barred account of his devastation and loss. Virtually all of the promotional material and interviews in the run up to its release centre on the facts: that Stevens' mother left him and his siblings when he was one year old, that she re-emerged for a few summers when he was still very young, that she battled with alcoholism, depression and schizophrenia for decades. Her death in 2012 affected him profoundly as, in his own words, he was "trying to gather as much as I could of her, in my mind, my memory, my recollections, but I have nothing." Stevens poured this sorrow into his work and the result is one of unending questions, uneasy answers and, ultimately, an attempt to reconcile the confusion into something more understandable than he could at the time. Ultimately, Carrie & Lowell is a document of pain, a chronicle of the suffering that occurs through the unalterable transition into death and the spaces which cannot be easily filled by the loss incurred. That also makes it a precious tool, a device necessary for catharsis and healing, not just for Stevens but his fans also. Many have expressed their surprise at just how useful this album has been for them in dealing with their own personal losses. Stevens understands the necessity for communicable honesty with his audience, that it must be uncompromising in its transparency. Indeed, Carrie & Lowell is all the more beautiful for its sacredness. The mood that Stevens imbues these eleven songs with is a combination of sadness and bittersweet happiness, the fleeting childhood memories of Carrie and otherwise minor anecdotes that spark a series of thoughts that come to define entire songs. On Eugene, Stevens recalls summers spent in Oregon by recounting location-specific details only to conclude that the best is behind him. The title track flickers by like a film roll of childhood memories, joy and wonder soon to be replaced by the disappearance of Carrie once more ("Erebus on my back / Ephemera on my back, she breaks my arm"). On Should Have Known Better (arguably the best song here), he admonishes himself for never truly being able to confront the complex emotions thrown up whilst his mother was still alive, a “black shroud” getting in the way of his feelings. The vocals stop and start across a simple banjo motif, traversing emotional peaks and troughs to extract the most effective response from the listener before concluding with optimism; in the final two minutes Stevens shrugs off the shroud and gathers the clarity to see the sacredness of his brother’s daughter’s innocence as something to cherish, that the beauty of a newborn brings “illumination” to all those around her. Carrie & Lowell is musically sparse, yet there's never the feeling that it needs anything more to counter the emotional weight of the lyrics. That's partly because the subject matter is so wholly encompassing and the music which encircles Stevens' solitary figure can easily play the supporting role. Lyrics and vocals are most crucial here (they are defined by the subject first and the emotional response second) so any attempt to embellish the music would feel massively erroneous. Yet of course the music is vital in conveying those feelings. The lush ambience that loops in the final minute of Blue Bucket Of Gold envelops like a hug, as though the music were arms wrapping lovingly around Stevens' hymnal chanting. The trance-like John My Beloved is soundtracked by plodding percussion and a barely-formed piano motif. It comes to shadow the vocals as Stevens slow-waltzes through gorgeous lines like, "I love you more than the world can contain in its lonely and ramshackle head." As it draws to a close the music rises ever so slightly in anticipation of a climax that may never arrive. Instead, Stevens draws a gentle breath, as though he were overwhelmed by the struggle to deliver such lines that may have felt much easier to write down. Sequentially, Carrie & Lowell plays some tricks that only become apparent after dozens of listens. Drawn To The Blood is relatively sparse for two thirds, a simple guitar riff and vocals struggling to reconcile the pain of a life lived and loved in faith ("What did I do to deserve this?"). The final third expands as the guitar and vocals drop off in wounded resignation, replaced by ambient noise flooding in, as though it were attempting to reveal the empty void left in the wake of loss. The previously-mentioned Eugene follows, but take this song out of the equation and the album would continue with Fourth Of July where Drawn To The Blood left off. The washes of ambience that introduce Fourth Of July are almost identical to the ones that conclude Drawn To The Blood. Both songs are very present in that they deal directly with Carrie's passing; in this context Eugene is merely a flashback, perhaps an attempt to deflect the pain by reverting to memories in order to alleviate the pain brought on through Drawn To The Blood and its elusive truths. Yet we seem to be now aware that the wound must be opened in order to truly heal and Fourth Of July burrows itself deeper than any other song here. Stevens' vocals are up front and centre, as though he were whispering directly into your ear, the music almost muted beneath. With each passing verse we get closer to Carrie until the lyrics become a sort of dance between mother and son, a melange of words and thoughts that carry a conversation across shattering lines like, "Such a funny thought to wrap you up in cloth." Stevens' lyrics feel almost allegorical in nature, but they reach a peak where he cries, "Make the most of your life, while it is rife, while it is light." We're not sure if the words are coming from Stevens in the here and now, or if they were uttered by Carrie on her deathbed. It’s inconsequential; the advice transcends all logic and hits right between the eyes like the most singular and terrifying message you’re ever likely to receive. The real strength of Carrie & Lowell lies in Stevens’ willingness to make amends and forgive. Opening song Death With Dignity is a simple banjo and piano number in which Stevens reveals a sort of mantra for the album ahead: "I forgive you mother, I can hear you and I long to be near you." It signals that this isn't music invested in anger at his mother, nor despair. Rather, Stevens documents, investigating his pain in an almost relentless and scientific fashion, holding a magnifying glass to his memories and assessing the evidence to arrive at answers that have eluded him. For Stevens, the making of Carrie & Lowell was hopefully enough to provide closure. That he was able to transmute his situation into the beautiful sounds that formed the record means that he's achieved an almost impossible feat for an artist making music in the millennial age. It is by no means a musically innovative record, nor is it complex and intricate in the way many of his other studio albums are. For that reason alone I found it easy to digest upon first listen. Each subsequent listen only anchored my appreciation for it further and in its own way it emerges as a completely innovative record. Works like Carrie & Lowell simply don’t come along very often, certainly not ones which collectively stop everyone in their tracks. It will be interesting to see just how much more significance it accumulates over the coming decade with its status as a modern classic already secure. After releasing such a profound musical statement like this, what else is there to say? Right now the real question seems to be: where will Sufjan Stevens go from here? 

In arguably the most in-depth interview she's ever given, Joni Mitchell talks frankly about her audience and their tendency to see only the celebrity through the music. She argues earnestly that a real communication is formed at the point in which they see themselves through her music and lyrics, that the music has no value until they see beyond the figure they're worshipping. Later on she makes a cutting statement about what inspires the majority of artists by saying '99.9% of musicians sat in their rooms, picked a hero and emulated it." Not only does this raises some really interesting questions surrounding authenticity in music but there's a clear link between her earlier comment on seeing only the artist through the music. If one simply hero-worships musicians, essentially putting them on pedestals for their celebrity rather than their music chops, that person will be subconsciously influenced by their sounds whether they believe so or not. That's all fair and well, but it doesn't invest much hope in a future of truly original artists. Mitchell's points stuck with me. Naturally I made a connection a year or so later when the lead single from Courtney Barnett's debut album hit the airwaves. Pedestrian At Best bestows a ballsy chorus with Barnett exclaiming "Put me on a pedestal and I'll only disappoint you!" Whilst it's true Barnett has invented a character to deliver these songs (one no doubt influenced by the flannel shirt slacker-rock of the halcyon days of nineties rock and grunge), it would be selfish for the listener to assume she's not being at least partly autobiographical. Indeed, one of the biggest achievements of this stunning debut album is how Barnett introduces herself as someone so much more than just the aforementioned 'character'; Barnett has cultivated a persona so strong that it's almost as though her words become wholly fused with the instrumentation, as though you couldn't imagine any other artist making music like this in 2015. As a result, Sometimes I Sit And Think, And Sometimes I Just Sit is almost too good to be true, the kind of fully realised debut that many artists would struggle to follow up but one which right now showcases a remarkable talent who is quite clearly commanding the attention of the masses. The music on Sometimes I Sit... is clean, precise, cutting. Barnett has a tendency to flatline, but what she lacks in vocal melody she makes up for through dynamite interplay between her musicians, colouring such songs as Dead Fox and Nobody Cares If You Don't Go To The Party with a sophistication that belies the often rudimentary traditions of the music. The former combines automobile melodrama (”just swerved into a passing truck”) with physical wellbeing (”sometimes I think a single sneeze could be the end of us!”) into something of a tragicomedy as Barnett sings of taxidermy kangaroos, a possum Jackson Pollock and ‘big business overtaking’. Apathetic, she mantras a chorus and paraphrases from a sticker we’ve all seen slapped on the back of large vehicles: “If you can’t see me, I can’t see you.” The aforementioned Pedestrian At Best is built from tight, crunching guitar lines peppered with tightly-cloistered observations that build with all the fervour of someone unscrewing a champagne bottle, only for the cork to pop the second the smashing chorus hits. Both vocally and lyrically it's a knockout, one of the strongest singles of the past five years, at once knottily complex, painlessly straightforward and, combined with opener Elevator Operator, forms one of the strongest two-punches of any debut album I can think of. Barnett is already proving herself a master of the short song form by presenting compositions that begin logically and follow through patiently to a satisfying conclusion, yet she also showcases variety in other areas on more complicated arrangements. The seven-minute Small Poppies opens with lounge-style guitar chords that develop into an aggressive bluesy number bordering on the virtuosic; the music shadows the lyrical content, which in this instance transforms from a meditative take on whether or not to cut the grass to dreaming of stabbing her lover with a wire coat hanger out of sheer frustration. Likewise, on Kim's Caravan, questions of identity and environmental issues are entwined, opening with a particularly brilliant anecdote concerning a seal that died even after it had been repeatedly rescued. Rather than just reel off the facts, Barnett takes time (nevertheless succinctly) to consider the seal's point of view: "Guess it just wants to die / I would wanna die too / With people putting oil into my air but to be fair I've done my share / Guess everybody's got there different point of view." Barnett's vocals may be frequently deadpan but she expresses a wide range of emotions and scrutinising observations through her storytelling. Hers is a casual conversational style that speaks often of disappointment or disillusionment undercut by humour and acerbic wit; Aqua Profunda! sees our protagonist trying desperately to impress a fellow swimmer in the next lane only to almost drown because, quite frankly, she's not that great a swimmer. On An Illustration Of Loneliness (Sleepless In New York), Barnett lies awake at 4:00am, counts cracks in a wall and is reminded of a book she once read in a surgery about palm reading. All of this is outlined in exacting detail in the opening verse. The genius is in the minute details and how deftly they're woven into the fabric of the overall song; the conclusion seems to be that her "love life seems entwined with death." In the second verse she reels off a line about how the kitchen in the temporary apartment is "art-deco necromantic chic, all the dinner plates are kitsch with...," almost vaulting like a gymnast between the two breaks either side of the comma from one description to the next. Barnett has spoken in interviews about how she likes to play with alliteration and cram as many syllables into a single line. This stream-of-consciousness style reflects a busy head, as though she were singing for every uncertain young adult just trying to navigate their way through the transition from the cocksure, selfish teen they used to be. By throwing out dozens of memorable lines (often in a single song), it's hard not to think of Barnett as one of modern music's pre-eminent wordsmiths. The less-initiated might find little here to mull over, yet it's usually slower-paced records that fail to hold the attention of those who demand instantaneous hit music. Bartnett's music has commercial appeal in the strictest alternative sense yet will never appeal to mainstream radio due to its densely-worded lyricism. There's almost too much going on throughout the album's twelve tracks as Barnett's group knock each track out in a way that feels more like a cut-and-paste collage of textures than anything like a wholly cohesive statement. Tracks like Debbie Downer and Aqua Profunda! build around incessant riffs that hammer home a melody for good effect. Barnett not only writes great lyrics that communicate to the listener on a equal footing, she composes them in a way that reveals an intelligent, quick-witted, perhaps even competitive characteristic that is clearly much more sophisticated than the unworldly, anxiety-ridden character contained within them. As such Barnett becomes something more than just the author; her songs are the equivalent of audio books, real literary page-turners in which each verse is craftily cultivated to spark interest in just exactly what she's going to say next. Rather tellingly, the opening Elevator Operator is the only song on the album not to be sung from the first person. Barnett introduces us to her world by way of astute external observations of a man wrongly assumed to be suicidal, but once the song’s over we’re even more in the thick of it; she turns wry observations from the outside world inward, each passing track documenting her own life in exacting detail. The famous dictum ‘The unexamined life is not worth living’ is worth bearing in mind when listening to Barnett’s soon-to-be-classic debut album. For Barnett herself, the examined life seems like the only option.

One year later it'd be tempting to think that Goon can stand on its own without the comparisons to '70s singer/songwriters that accompanied its initial release. Whilst it's true that Tobias Jesso Jr.'s debut owes a lot to the golden era pop melodies of Elton John, Carole King and Randy Newman, the idea that it’s unable to carve out a place amongst classics by those artists is unfounded. Early reviews tended to centre around an appropriation of dad rock, making it nearly impossible to approach without a suspicious mindset that Jesso Jr. was playing an all too familiar role. Indeed, my first run through with Jesso Jr. left an odd indifference, his vocals akin to what I could only initially describe as saccharine posturing. It's with repeated listens that, through solid songwriting and pop format sensibilities, Goon reveals itself to be the most singular of albums released in 2015 and certainly one of the strongest debuts in recent memory. There's an innocence that unfolds throughout where, once nestled safely in the album’s fragile embrace, Jesso Jr. comes to feel more like an old friend than just another artist on a mission to reinvent the love song. Goon, by way of endearing vocals and instrumentation, never feels like a chore. It is patient, considered and wholly self-aware by design. If patience is a virtue in 2016, then it stands to reason that with so much music available at our fingertips it can be difficult to stick the course with artists that don't instantly hook us. In some sense it's almost amazing that Goon has attracted a sort of cultish following in the twelve months since its release, accruing a sizeable army of supporters who recognise the significance of utter simplicity in Jesso Jr.'s lyrics and arrangements. Vocally, there are imperfections amongst the comforting piano chords, yet irresistible hooks dominate each and every song here, from the patient post-breakup admissions of opener Can't Stop Thinking About You to the brittle string arrangements on For You, effortlessly mimicking the song's brave little melody and sunny disposition. The latter feels like a companion piece to The Wait, a song that appears slightly earlier on. Both tracks form a nuanced dual counterpoint to the album's overall theme of emotional nakedness, a sort of symbiotic relationship in which the two contrasting moods are bolstered by the other's necessity to express human truths seldom exposed this honestly in contemporary pop songs. Jesso Jr. has allowed the music on his debut the space to breath, a wise move given the homogeneity of the subject matter. Hollywood is an incredibly dour chronicle of helplessness that, for the most part, is a simple vocal and piano number. The long pauses between verses feel essential in the telling of a sad tale unfolding, someone shattered by the trappings and failures of stardom in a cut-throat town. An exercise in control, Jesso Jr. gives his vocals the space to fully explore the deeper aspects of pain and fear with a melancholic, jarring horn section that supersedes the piano for the final two minutes. Meanwhile, Without You possesses the strongest chorus on the album precisely because it feels like a perfectly executed pop song in the traditional sense; there's not a single part that feels misplaced, down to the way the piano chords shift subtly from verse to chorus and back again or the way that the drums tumble forth between these two sections. Effortlessly restrained, it's Jesso. Jr's old-fashioned vocal dexterity that struck me from the first time I heard it and after dozens of listens I still find it irresistible, a stellar example of a song that progresses without a single stagnant second. Part of Goon's appeal is Jesso Jr.'s ability to make you care. His pains and fears are universal, his voice the one inside our own heads. Yet his future as an artist seems uncertain; the possibility to be cast aside as a one-album wonder is much higher than artists who bare their soul a lot less in their careers than he already has on his debut. Much like the artists who inspire his sound, Jesso Jr. will have to prove his worth by having something to say in order to not only survive but thrive. Therefore, at least at this stage, Goon feels almost as permanent as it does transitory.

Matthew E. White is a man on a mission. Maybe what I actually mean is ‘a man of many talents,’ but both statements seem to hold equal weight now that a year has passed since Fresh Blood was released. The Richmond-based visionary is the founder of Spacebomb records, a label which boasts an array of in-house musicians all working towards the common goal of nurturing 'local' talent and pushing forward towards something bigger. Sudden success came as a surprise to Spacebomb when White's debut, Big Inner, was released in 2012. It also pushed him into expanding the label, developing a broad community of visual artists utilising Spacebomb as a base to nurture their creativity and talent. That's partly why Fresh Blood feels more like a collaborative work than anything White has done before. A vast array of musicians are enlisted to imbue its sound with strong, widescreen arrangements that hold their sparkle after many listens. This is rich and lush music, exquisitely rendered by White's beautiful vocals, a seductive croon that's as fragile as it is unfettered. The silky, languid approach to both vocal style and instrumentation are both signs that the album is frequently in danger of dribbling to a smoochy halt. Nevertheless, things are kept moving due to the careful sequencing of key-players such as Holy Moly and Take Care My Baby, songs which begin humbly but build to dramatic crescendos, dripping in horns and strings. Rock & Roll Is Cold and Fruit Trees are some of the most insistent tracks here and their side-by-side placement feels like a deliberate attempt to showcase another side to White's aesthetic, that of multi-layered harmonies and equally complex song structures that belie the album's general '70s easy-listening sheen. Fresh Blood delivers an emotional depth that couldn't have been conveyed on Big Inner, one of lessons learnt through experience. The aforementioned Holy Moly confronts sexual abuse, Tranquility is a paean to the life and work of Philip Seymour Hoffman, Circle 'Round The Sun is about the suicide of a friend's mother. One could hardly consider White a 'present' artist in the sense of dominating or dictating the narrative of his songs (the music itself takes a much stronger lead in carving out a path from start to finish), but at least lyrically White touches on themes and ideas that were absent on earlier works. In light of Natalie Prass' self-titled debut, which White produced to universal acclaim, it's easier to see a pattern emerging in the production techniques that give White a thematic template. These smooth grooves provide various audio safety zones where the listener might seek refuge. For me, Circle 'Round The Sun sounded exemplary through headphones on the sleepy early morning train ride to work through London on a wintery morning, a revelation that patiently unfolded, frame by frame. Fresh Blood is whatever you want it to be, proving itself to be quite malleable and self-sustaining after a year of friendly familiarity.

The most interesting piece I've read about Levon Vincent's self-titled debut was written by Patrick Masterson. In it, he rather pointedly confronts the politics of a statement on Vincent's Facebook page announcing the release of the album, taking particular heed to the statement of "this is music for the ugly ducklings of the world...If you are a member of the rat race, climbing around a dumpster with the other rats vying for power, you may of course listen, but know - this is not music for you. This is action against you." Masterson refers to Vincent's "earnest stance" surrounding the release of the music as "full of contradictions." In my own attempt to avoid getting into the political aspect of this statement, I'll simply say that the discussion should always be primarily centred around the music. It's why I feel statements such as this unfairly affect the listener's appreciation of the work in what should be an otherwise pure experience. Vincent's earliest recordings date back to 2002 but it wasn't until roughly 2008 when the New Yorker began moving into Berlin techno and deep house that multiple ears pricked. Every 12-inch from thereon built towards something and it's with his 2015 self-titled debut that he could finally go in for the kill. Levon Vincent has staying power because it doesn't attempt a grand re-invention of his formula, perhaps wise for this first outing which by all accounts should serve as an uninterrupted experience for the uninitiated. Spread across eight sides of vinyl and clocking in at well over seventy minutes, one of the initial questions thrown up is whether Vincent can sustain a listener’s interest for this long. At times the collection of eleven songs can feel like an exercise in patience. I find it helpful to split the album in half via the track Confetti - a sleepy early hours number with ambiguous cut-up vocal fragments - and the final three tracks, all of which round out the album on a muscular note and showcase a tremendous balancing act between melody and emotionality. Anti-Corporate Music is a detailed deconstruction formed of a deep dub-bass looping rhythm section that keeps falling back on itself, interjected by sudden eruptions of jarring noise that disturb the smooth flow of the propulsive machine working away beneath. A high-register countermelody appears rather brilliantly around 5:10, one that had been coming but you didn't know it until the second it hit. Similarly, Small Whole-Numbered Ratios is a masterwork in nuanced variation, a repetitious riot that, to the initiated, is anything but repetitious. Levon Vincent is constantly toying with the unexpected as a means to further the dramatic tension in the music. The marimba-led grooves of Launch Ramp To Tha Sky are spacious, yes, but tethered by an incessant reverb that serves to increase the possibility of the unknown. The payoff appears seven minutes in after an almost uninterrupted run as the well-worn groove begins to slide away with the introduction of jagged organ strokes and a barely audible choir harmony that feel more akin to Daniel Lopatin's work. Opening track The Beginning commences with a sprightly melody that soon finds itself having to catch up to the immense synths that creep in at the lower end. Vincent applies these as large brushstrokes, similarly too on Junkies On Hermann Strasse, whereas Phantom Power all but does away with any low end, instead placing emphasis on skeletal synths that feel ominous and unsatisfying upon first listen. I mentioned earlier that the album is always seeking to heighten the dramatic tension. I’ve found that even after one year I’m still struck by this tension, one which must be taken on board as a crucial element in understanding what it means to listen to as a tactile experience. Levon Vincent is a holistic body of work, it functions in part because of the whole and conceived with the idea of sprawl no doubt partly in mind. Black Arm w/Wolf is the album’s black sheep, the one cut that ticks away unnoticed on first listen but comes to represent something much more intrinsic on later listens. It’s the most abstract piece here by far and simply tumbles forth cutting out its own path through the album’s otherwise rigid, polyrhythmic serpentine structures. Political notions aside, Levon Vincent translates most effectively across a good sound system in the early hours, often at lower levels than you’d be comfortable with. It feels equally designed for this as much as the dance floor yet never comfortable occupying just one of these modes. Insular or extrovert, Levon Vincent will prove to be a classic within its field many years down the line.

You could describe Josh Tillman's scattered musical past as a lengthy gestation period where an uncertain career path finally comes into sharp focus. Tillman moved to Seattle in 2002, eventually releasing a string of under-appreciated solo albums before joining fellow Seattleites Fleet Foxes in 2008 and touring the world in support of their second album Helplessness Blues, an opportunity that, at the time, came like a "magic bullet." By early 2012 he had parted ways with Robin Pecknold's super-group and reinvented himself following a mushroom-fuelled road trip down the coast on a self-described "search for enlightenment." The birth of Father John Misty appeared the same year with the release of Fear Fun, an album through which Tillman could channel his outlandish and peculiar ideas through the construction of an alter-ego. Fear Fun made waves, but still not the kind to turn Tillman into a Big Deal. That all changed in early 2015. I Love You, Honeybear is one of the greatest albums about love to be released in the past ten years, but not for the reason that might first spring to mind. When musicians sing and write about love, it's usually designed in a way to stir emotions in the listener, to communicate and hopefully awaken thoughts about their own experiences with love. Commercial pop gets wedged rather crudely somewhere in this description, thereby creating a grey area surrounding artistic credibility and opening up an ongoing debate about authenticity and ownership. Father John Misty is by all accounts selfish and brash, endearing and flawed. "Mascara, blood, ash and cum on the Rorschach sheets where we make love" go some of the opening lines to the album, declaring early on that this is not an artist concerned with pandering to the listener by editing his love life into the audio equivalent of a Hallmark Valentine's Day card. Tillman is now married to Emma and the album scans as a DIY handbook on how to accept and welcome love into your life, a warts-and-all account of one man's difficult attempt to shed the self-involved world views we develop as teenagers (and ultimately find hard to shake) and find the capacity to commit to another human being. In some sense Honeybear is the album Tillman has been destined to make for more than a decade, it's just taken this long for himself to become comfortable enough within himself to put it out in the world. That also makes it both a personal and professional breakthrough. Honeybear displays a complex matrix of emotions running down the album's backbone, made manifest in its sardonic lyrical observations of the emotional complexity of the narrator's relationship. Additionally, the album is brought to life through memorable lines that often reference the mundane issues that most people in similar situations would cast aside in an attempt to tackle the entire problem head-on. Ultimately, Emma is the only one who can understand him and agree with him on so many things. On Chateau Lobby #4 (In C For Two Virgins) he proudly declares "I haven't hated the same things as somebody else since I remember," relieved to have found a kinship with someone else who gets riled by the same day-to-day headaches. On True Affection he asks his new love interest if they can talk face to face without the need for electronic devices. Technology now authorises and controls such large parts of our relationships and Tillman figures he "can give you true affection" in place of "using all these strange devices." Even in its more sincere moments, Honeybear remains honest and open. Another impressive feather to the album’s bow is how it documents the relationship in fairly chronological order. As the songs progress there's a notable increase in the complexity of the instrumentation, as if their very position at the centre of the album stand as an indicator of the relationship's burgeoning intensity. On songs like When You're Smiling And Astride Me and Nothing Good Ever Happens At The Goddamn Thirsty Crow, the range of emotions experienced begin to obfuscate, thereby leading to the appearance of doubt, suspicion and malaise. The former marches in with backing vocals that hit like a freight train, forming a sort of chorus that repeats like a mantra until Tillman is ready to join in on the final minute by improvising on the established vocal arrangement beneath. It's a true highlight on an album of many, not least because it manages to convey some of the desperation and terrifying nature of falling love, of giving yourself over completely to that one other person. Tillman's vocals are astounding, delivering already-classic lines such as "You see me as I am, it's true, aimless fake drifter and the horny manchild momma's boy to boot!" and "I'll never try to change you, as if I could and if I were to, what's the part that I'd miss most?" Honeybear builds on the production of Fear Fun by introducing lush orchestral arrangements and familiar American traditions in the vein of gospel and R&B. This in turn complements the dramatic vocal arrangements, which would otherwise fall flat without the right kind of musical flourishes to support their sudden peaks and troughs. The Night Josh Tillman Came To Our Apartment is the most successful example of this and potentially the strongest song on the entire record. Practically every line is perfectly executed, both lyrically and vocally, as Tillman displays the kind of dynamic ability to transform complex arrangements into the most melodic way possible. Tillman looks outward as the album draws to a close. Holy Shit and Bored In The U.S.A. criticise modern-day living and the desperate need to attribute meaning to those aspects of our lives that we know will ultimately define us; friends, relationships, careers, wellbeing. As he withdraws, we’re never given a resolute answer on those topics. Everything is left down to chance, but it would be pointless to go through life without questioning. The guise of Father John Misty has allowed Tillman to explore deep-rooted truths in an offbeat, comical way that he might have conveyed less effectively without the ability to gain this distance. One can only wonder how he might further this charade on subsequent releases, especially when this one feels almost finite in what it can teach us. Honeybear feels like a complete work and any attempt to embellish the dramatic nature of the topics contained within on future releases would be like flogging a dead horse. That truth would make Honeybear all the more special to the legions of admirers it’s picked up in the past year and to the many more who will encounter it in the years ahead.

Nashville-based Natalie Prass had to wait patiently after being signed to Matthew E. White's Spacebomb label. She completed her self-titled debut in 2012 but had to shelve it for a few years due to the unprecedented and sudden reaction to White's own debut album, Big Inner, forcing the entire camp into promoting it around the world. Prass and White's collaborative works extends beyond that initial label signing; the two played together in high school bands and it’s likely that this back history resulted in White co-producing Prass’ debut. This should come as no surprise if you’re at all familiar with White’s two brilliant albums; evidence of the hushed calm and studio 'closeness' heard throughout his own music can be heard across Prass’ beautifully coherent debut. As it stands, after a three year wait, there was a fair bit of commotion generated in January 2015 when it was released and I, like many, were intrigued. I must admit that initial listens proved slightly underwhelming and I found myself wondering what all the fuss was about, yet there's nothing quite like falling in love with an album that creeps up on you. Indeed, the feeling that I'd missed something the first time around prompted me into giving it a few more spins before becoming utterly hooked much later on in the year. The nine songs on Natalie Prass are delivered with a clarity and confidence that is overwhelmingly precise. She sings primarily about heartbreak and loss with a steadfast conviction that is rare in pop music, as though the final destination to her vision is one of personal recovery. Her vocals are delivered with a grace that befits the lyrics, unusually emotive both as a process of catharsis for herself and for the listener. The restraint she exercises as both a lyricist and vocalist is one of the defining strong points on what went on to become one of 2015's most important debut releases, not least because the record is immaculately produced and expertly arranged. All of the elements that coalesce on truly great, memorable pop records come together here with he utmost  sophistication. Prass makes a breathtaking first impression on the opening track My Baby Don't Understand Me as a concoction of woodwind and brass instruments dance around the line "Our love is a long goodbye!" It's repeated almost incessantly as the song comes to a close and, as a taster of things to come, it manages to perfectly capture the tumultuousness below the glossy sheen on the surface. Bird of Prey follows, upping the ante with a galloping piano melody that showcases the versatility of not only Prass' vocal range but of White's production skills. That vocal range may be versatile, but the initial impression is one of a childlike wonder and innocence intrinsically linked to the polished sheen of the production and the virtuosity of the instrumentation. Lyrically, however, Prass is not one to be underestimated. Christy is a chamber-pop melodrama replete with claustrophobic string arrangements whilst Your Fool practically waltzes to the tale of a lover's infidelity. Empowering though it may be, there's still the feeling that Prass is working her way through heartbreak one song at a time. One of the most interesting aspects to Prass' sound is how it sits alongside White's as a wider, more considered approach to sumptuous songs where instrumentation is key. White shares production duties on this record with Trey Pollard and it's easy to make the parallels between his sound and Prass', but there's a maturity and level of confidence experienced on the album that mere production alone can't create. Natalie Prass is also a true collaborative effort with more than thirty musicians contributing throughout and Prass herself doubling as a sort of ringleader for the band behind her. Truthfully, she appears most confident behind songs which are driven by persistent drums and piano, such as the groovy Why Don't You Believe In Me, yet I can't help but wonder how some of the more meandering tracks here would fare with more insistent music behind them. It will be interesting to see where she takes this already fleshed-out aesthetic, but for now Natalie Prass remains one of the most impressive debut albums to come around in many years.

Anyone who thought that No Cities To Love would be unable to hit the sweet spot in quite the same way that earlier Sleater-Kinney albums had can be forgiven. Carrie Brownstein, Corin Tucker and Janet Weiss returned in January 2015 after a ten-year absence, one which ran for almost the entire length of the period between 1994 and 2005 and produced seven powerful, distinct albums. That blisteringly productive run would be enough to exhaust any band and it's perhaps wise, looking back, that the trio took an extended hiatus to focus on other projects. If that hiatus is the very reason why No Cities To Love is so sharp and on-point, consider for a moment if it's not. The break-neck pace at which these women deliver their songs leaves me thinking that this album could've been released as early as 2006 or 2007 and still sounded as urgent and potent as it does now. Yet that decade-long absence has made Sleater-Kinney more vital than ever before. In his premature evaluation of No Cities To Love a week before its release, Stereogum's Tom Breihan confidently named Sleater-Kinney the best rock band of the past two decades. It's a claim that makes total sense once you eventually process it. Although not the most obvious band you think of, who else would it really ever be? If No Cities To Love is a logical progression to its predecessor, The Woods, it doesn't feel like it. That album showcased Sleater-Kinner at their most experimental, indeed, the logical progression up until that point for a band who had released back-to-back, stone-cold hit albums every couple of years for more than a decade. No Cities To Love goes back to basics, but that's not to say it's a retread. Rather, the decade apart has allowed for all that accumulated noise to solidify and signify a fresh start, a clean slate on which to rebuild the band. Intentionally short, No Cities To Love gets straight to work with Price Tag bringing a dream-team vocal assault from Tucker and Brownstein. Not to be outdone, Weiss' rollicking beats set the tone instantly, and for the accelerating tension of each and every song here. Ten tracks and a little over thirty minutes is all they need to get in, make the return to form you always knew was coming, and get out. Fade is the perfect closer, grinding to a close and ever so slightly applying the brakes after the marathon that preceded it. Virtually every song has the power to hold you hostage for its run time and the vocal melodies on songs like Bury Our Friends and the glorious title track are some of the strongest they've ever put out. Midway through the album on A New Wave, Brownstein sings "It's not a new wave, it's just you and me." It serves as a polite reminder that Sleater-Kinney are not suddenly back because of any of the usual factors that bring bands out of the woodwork: contractual obligations, complacency or dwindling bank balances. They exist in the here and now because it feels right. The music you hear on No Cities To Love simply came into existence because it needed to be made, and there is very little evidence of nervousness or trepidation on their part regarding their return. In many ways it soundtracked the year to come, almost certainly setting a benchmark for other acts to reach. There were certainly more complex albums that were released in the eleven months that followed, but none achieved such a fine balance between glorious simplicity and red-hot urgency. It's been one year since Sleater-Kinney re-ignited musical urges that many of us didn't know they were craving and it's not even a question as to whether it holds up. Things may have quietened down in the twelve months since Sleater-Kinney bounced back, but don't be too surprised if another announcement is on the horizon soon...

These three tracks form the backbone of Vulnicura. It's where the stinging disease of the heartache lies, deep in the wound. The three that precede it and the three that follow it are the lead-up and the aftermath, yet it's important to consider Vulnicura as a unique whole with Björk's message most succinctly captured in a line from Notget: "Don't remove my pain, it is my chance to heal." The very title itself is a merging of two words taken from the Latin 'vulnero' and 'cura' (the wound and the cure). Björk is keenly aware of the healing power of music and it seems that the very power of exercising her demons through this remarkable album has set her on the path to recovery that she always knew she would reach. A year since its (unexpected) release, we may not know Björk's personal level of contentment with the subject matter that inspired these songs, but the power that came from this expression of grief still feels relevant.

The Grim Reaper meets Noah Lennox's musical stage name and in its contested title, the listener is confronted with questions concerning the ongoing relevance and validity of the artist's work. By this point - primarily due to his work with his main band, but bolstered also by formidable contributions as a solo artist - Lennox has managed to embed himself so comfortably in the upper echelons of 21st Century alternative music that his influence has not only gestated and flourished but diminished in equal measure. This trajectory can be usefully ear-marked by three Animal Collective albums - Strawberry Jam stirs, Merriweather Post Pavilion explodes, Centipede Hz wanes - yet I can't help but feel the relative buzz at any given moment surrounding new solo material by any of the band’s members is inextricably tied to just how successfully they offer up a reinvention or interpretation of the current zeitgeist. Panda Bear Meets The Grim Reaper marks the culmination of Lennox's signature sound, one which has been honed and refined through the years on albums such as his 2007 break-out hit Person Pitch and its drone-influenced successor Tomboy. It feels like the satisfying accumulation of a life's work from a fully-realised artist whilst also being open-ended enough to suggest that perhaps now is the time to move into newer, more unexplored territory. That’s in part because the electronic experimentation and psychedelic flirtations that have marked most of Lennox's previous work coalesce here into something altogether more straightforward and sublime. From the point of view of a listener with a patient ear, tackling those previous albums sometimes felt like hard work in spite of the obvious treasures they bestowed, and it's true that ...Grim Reaper is not nearly as innovative or daring as it perhaps could've been. Crucially, the question seems to be: Does this matter? The result is an album that feels entirely cohesive and solid whilst recalling some of Animal Collective's strongest golden pop moments. Lennox's guest turn on Daft Punk's Doin' It Right may have been the catalyst for much of ...Grim Reaper's poppier moments, the likes of which dominate the album's first half on rhythmic belters such as Mr Noah, Butcher Baker Candlestick Maker and Boys Latin. Vocal repetition has continually played a loose, almost improvisational part in the way Lennox constructs his music, but on ...Grim Reaper he buckles down and gets to work by separating distinct repetitious sections before stitching them back together like a multi-coloured patchwork. Come To Your Senses is the album’s longest cut precisely because of the hypnotic looping of the phrase “Are you mad?” The loop is repeated, yes, but never feels repetitious, offered up in a format that repeats the question before answering it with one final admittance: “Yeah, I’m mad.” These vocal loops are mixed into the thick sonic soup of the album’s maximalist production until the two are entwined, two halves of the same unit shuffling forth toward a logical end. Elsewhere, Tropic of Cancer and Lonely Wanderer flip the bright lights of the aforementioned tracks in favour of a bereft and hushed minimalism. Both are beautiful in their simplicity, their feathery lightness made all the more incandescent as a result of Lennox's personal lyrics. In keeping with the title, the album explores darker themes and the subject matter is concerned with mortality on various levels, but the musicality of Lennox's vision for how this work should be digested and appreciated for years to come has allowed for some sprightly, unnerving arrangements to formulate. ...Grim Reaper is both hypnotic and haunting in equal measure and a very fine addition to an already impressive canon of work. One year later and its seeds feel firmly planted, the first truly great album of 2015 in a year that would go on to yield more truly great albums than seemed logically possible.

D’ANGELO BLACK MESSIAH Even though rumours of a follow-up surfaced almost periodically since Voodoo's release in 2000, by the end of the decade it was becoming all too easy to believe that D'Angelo's presence as one of the music industry's brightest stars really was a lost cause. Black Messiah finally arrived in the final weeks of 2014 like the most polished and refined work of art, just as music critics and fans were looking back on the year's greatest releases, some of whom had already published their lists. A result of this timing means that Black Messiah is not technically a 2015 release either (although it was meant to be) and as such exists - at least from a point of recognition - in a sort of limbo. One year to the day after it was released to an unsuspecting public, Black Messiah feels, on one hand, somehow absent from the musical landscape, as though the wait for its release is still on-going. On the other, it's evident that this is a record that remains an utter pleasure to listen to and will continue to yield results many years from now. D'Angelo managed to create his own world in which Black Messiah exists. Indeed, it's a world that existed only for him and the close circle of friends, musicians and engineers over the many years spent in the studio working on it. Outside of listening to the record, it's difficult to recall definite structures and sounds due to the richness and density of the music and words. This is the clear result of many years work, a true labour of love for all those involved in its evolution. One which, by all accounts, was 'surprise-released' due to a push. It took the US race relations protests around police brutality to really galvanise D'Angelo into getting this work out there. Emblazoned with its striking, fists-in-the-air cover art, it would be all too easy to mistake Black Messiah as a politically-awakened record, yet it's important to clarify that this is not the case. It's a collection of mostly joyful, uplifting jams, the kind of which flow together so seamlessly that they sound cooked up over one productive weekend instead of over many painful years of self-doubt and physical illness. Recorded completely on analogue equipment (the album liner notes make clear that no 'digital plug-ins' were utilised), the vintage approach to production gives Black Messiah a real warmth, inviting new listeners in who may be unfamiliar to D'Angelo's music, those who were only children when Voodoo was released (a year before the world became a much more complicated place in almost every aspect). It seems futile to talk about this marvellous record with only one year's hindsight. People will turn over and dissect Black Messiah for many years to come by looking for hidden meanings in its lyrics. Part of that reason will be because it took so long to see the light of day, but mostly people will recognise just how well it will have aged, maturing to a level of greatness and sophistication reserved only for truly great musicians. I've tried to resist mentioning particular songs, instead choosing to focus on the record as a single piece. There is, however, an introduction on one particular song which keeps playing over and over again in my head. It's the first sound I think of whenever someone mentions this record. The first minute of the fifth track feels like a sudden realisation. The words are only whispered, only sweet noise.

ANDY STOTT FAITH IN STRANGERS I first experienced the murk of Andy Stott's dub-techno in the winter of 2012. Luxury Problems had just been released to universal acclaim, causing somewhat major shockwaves on the underground club scene. The walk home from work was particularly bitter (the kind where hands out of pockets for more than ten seconds result in a numbness that takes twice as long to recover from), allowing the blustery chill of Stott's mechanical, industrial production to resonate with me in a way that no record that year had. There was, and remains, a distinct curiosity to the mood Stott managed to so successfully evoke throughout the record's nine meaty slabs. For example, the idea that you were privy to something evolving in a room at the end of some long corridor, or a late-night sound experiment taking place at the hands of some alchemist. The pieces (one hesitates to refer to what Stott produces as 'songs') frequently built from a muddied puddle into something more coherent, like on Sleepless or Up The Box, achieving a remarkable clarity at their mid-points only to fade into the same fog that had inspired their slow gestations, as if intentionally bisected to prevent something too heavy from developing. Stott tackles these juggernaut, steamrolling ideas head-on with his latest release, Faith In Strangers. With an enthusiastic public now anticipating his next move, Stott approaches the recording and production with an expanded and altogether more emblematic approach. Passed Me By and We Stay Together - two EPs both released in 2011 which brought his music to an unprecedented audience - provided the springboard for Luxury Problems, and it's in this triptych of releases that Stott developed his most distinct signature to date. Former piano teacher Alison Skidmore provided vocals on the latter's stunning opening number Numb, emerging as the beating heart of the signature that Stott has so meticulously crafted with each successive release. She returns here on Violence, gently teasing the inevitable beat that arrives achingly late as razor sharp synths cut across a bruised bass. The 'drop', as it were, arrives only a few seconds later than the one on Numb, yet somehow feels long overdue; opening track Time Away precedes Violence, purposefully undercutting a minute of opening silence by introducing a horn, formless and devoid of beat or repetition. Its place as opener feels like a clear indicator of Stott's desire to establish a sudden shift in what his audience may have come to expect from him at this crucial point in his career. Skidmore returns for On Oath, the longest track on the record, one which seems designed to test the limits of even the most ardent listener. The production is as sublime as ever with monolithic synths rising like steam as Stott scatters her vocal arrangement across the floor. The track gradually begins to coalesce and by the halfway point it's riding a fragmented wave that proves difficult to shake. Vocally, Skidmore is even more essential to Faith In Strangers' ability to connect on a basic reactionary human level than she was on its predecessor. For all its dank and dismal, Faith In Strangers radiates a real warmth even though it's surrounded by the steeliest of production. It's a binary notion, a testament to one element unable to survive without the other: on How It Was her vocals are chopped up, tossed in a heap and given the freedom to ricochet across an elastic bass. The title track introduces the catchiest vocal hook of the entire album as Skidmore intones, "He wakes up in the morning, lights pressing on his eyes, mouth wide open in the mirror, face he doesn't recognise." Taken as a pop song, it's the most cohesive thing Stott's ever done and suggests that the formalities of popular music are not all that alien to him. It's difficult to locate a particular favourite on any album as fully-realised as this, yet Science And Industry might be mine. Even after one year and dozens of plays, the opening two minutes still capture my imagination like no other piece here. It opens with the same skittering that permeates the title track, only this time it's partially smothered by the most dramatic low-end string section, arriving after forty seconds in a swell like an ominous tidal surge. Stott has mentioned how this track utilises field recordings more than any other. Most notable is a brutal clanging from the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester, which is masterfully cut up into a punctured staccato around Skidmore's clarion vocal calls. Stott's sound is textural first and foremost, which is why adjectives such as 'blurry', 'murky' or 'grimy' are usually tacked on to descriptions of his aesthetic, but it's the feelings these textures conjure within the listener that allow Stott to stand outside the circle of what would otherwise be termed electronic/techno. Feelings of claustrophobia, abrasiveness, violence and stress are intrinsic to how we're meant to experience this music and yet, if you find yourself able to enter the spaces he creates, it can become difficult to want to leave them. There's comfort in melancholy, someone once said. Faith In Strangers is a bold and very successful jump forward for Stott. Given his breakthrough with Luxury Problems, it will be interesting to watch where he takes this already impressive sound.

CLARK CLARK Being in the right time at the right place seems to be a saying that rings especially true for certain artists operating in and around the margins of electronic music over the past two decades. Warp label mainstay Chris Clark has release seven studio albums since first being signed up fifteen years ago, each one expanding on bold, irrepressible synths and brutish beats designed to evoke an atmosphere altogether more tactile than many of his contemporaries. Nevertheless, true stardom seems to have evaded Clark with celebrated label mates such as Aphex Twin, Autechre and Boards of Canada acquiring legendary status for their pioneering ways. No one's doubting the importance of the aforementioned acts' contribution to the evolution of electronic music and indeed, all three have played important roles in shaping its landscape, yet it feels as though Clark has almost being unfairly misaligned. Even relative newcomers to Warp's roster (I'm thinking Oneohtrix Point Never, Flying Lotus) have benefitted from developing styles which stimulate the underground and translate well to an impressive, albeit niche, mainstream. One year later, it might seem pressing to take stock and question just why Chris Clark decided to make his seventh album eponymous. If it's not a way of introducing yourself to your listening public by releasing a self-titled debut then it seems like more of a reason to question his motives several albums and EPs into an already prolific career. Is the end near? If not (and I very much hope not) then Clark feels like the soundtrack to an impending dystopia with chilling techno and rave soundscapes carving out a decidedly harsh atmosphere. Things get off to a wobbly start with both Ship Is Flooding and Winter Linn serving to merely set the tone. Unfurla is where things really take off, five minutes of hard-hitting techno carried along underneath a buoyant mixture of synths. Just when you think the track is coming to a gradual close, Clark ramps up the propulsion as the final minute takes an extreme left turn. Sodium Trimmers, meanwhile, feels like a distant cousin with its rumbling bass providing a piercing stab in the dark before taking a similar left turn into even more white-knuckle territory. The brief piano-led murk of Strength Through Fragility provides an emotional counterweight to its bookends, and its these brief respites (Snowbird treads similar evocative territory) that make Clark such a fascinating, unpredictable experience. Whilst I'm of the opinion that the majority of gold to be found here resides somewhere in the middle, there are gems to be found around the margins. The Grit In The Pearl is wholly textural, simultaneously abrasive and refined like sandpaper caught between printer rolls. Silvered Iris is similar, with both tracks utilising synth stabs to wondrous effect while Petroleum Tinged reminds me of some of the quieter moments on Boards of Canada's Tomorrow's Harvest. Nuclear holocaust may not be the theme Clark’s going for, but it's unsettling either way. The unusual level of press attention levelled at this self-titled album in the year since its release seems to hint at a shift in Chris Clark's public image. It may very well be his masterwork thus far and in the case of all he's put out so far, it appears, at least this time, he's in the right place at the right time.

GROUPER RUINS Liz Harris, who is better known under the stage name Grouper, has just released her debut album as one fourth of dream-pop band Helen. The Original Faces was built out of a slow gestation period, having been recorded over the course of several years in Harris' hometown of Portland. It's interesting to contrast this upbeat affair with Grouper's evolved sense of downbeat ambience, the kind which perfectly soundtracks rainy days. Helen essentially scans as a dream pop project, but it's not the kind of pop you'll be used to. In fact, it's about as far removed from the notion of commercial pop as you could imagine, which seems to make sense if you know that the group's original intent was to make Helen a thrash band. Not only does this news highlight Harris and her troupe's versatility as performers, it puts forth the idea that Helen was born out of a reaction to the kind of music she had been making as Grouper for the past decade. Ruins is the tenth and most recent studio album from that project, one which I find comforting to listen to after the hazy thrill of The Original Faces. It's the kind of album you don't know you needed until roughly ninety seconds in, that's the point at which distant drums and the occasional sound of croaking frogs of opening track Made Of Metal give way to the piano-led Clearing. Half-spoken and bringing to mind some sort of invocation, Harris' vocals are devastating from the start. Her sense of melody is so well placed that you're drawn into the scene within seconds. Led by piano and vocals with only the faintest static in the background, Clearing feels both desperately sad and slightly optimistic, as though the two instruments were somehow caught in a slow dance. The intimacy with which the majority of these songs are executed is almost unbearably awkward. Even when the vocals are stripped back, such as on the instrumental piano gloom of Labyrinth, there's a sense that something ominous has taken place and what we’re left with is the aftermath. The way the piano climbs, falls, and folds back into itself on Labyrinth is so captivating that the sudden beep of a microwave - allowed to remain in the final product instead of being re-recorded, as would be the case in most scenarios - feels like a sudden jolt back to reality. As Ruins progresses it becomes ever so slightly more involved, the track lengths increase and the compositions don't feel quite as concise, almost like they were gradually falling apart or fraying at the seams. Holding, for example, is drawn out for eight minutes as tumbling piano chords remain faithful for almost seven minutes, like breaking waves on a shore. The vocals across tracks such as this and Lighthouse are as coherent as anything we've ever heard from Harris. Even still, there's a fragmentation to her delivery that contrasts her brave, romantic piano playing. It's a duality that Harris makes the most of and remains one of the key reasons why I keep returning to this album every couple of months. Everything dissolves a minute before Holding ends. We're left with the sound of gently falling rain giving way to the closer, Made Of Air, a straight-up ambient number that acts as a companion piece to Ruins' opening track. It's more along the lines of the ambient loops and drones with which we've come to know Harris for and its inclusion is a reminder that the evolution of the Grouper sound is subtle yet undeniable.  When taken this way the two instrumental bookends inspire the feeling that the entire album is caught up in some place of extreme isolation. Whatever intangible truth is hinted at here, the sense that Ruins is caught in time and left to crumble feels more human. That gradual decline into disorder, where once stentorian structures crumble into ruins, somehow feels particularly apt. Taken a little more literally, the fact that Ruins was recorded three years prior to its release in the remoteness of Aljezur, Portugal means that Ruins can, if we choose to see it as such, be viewed as a relic of the past. The more time passes and the more distant Ruins becomes, the more special it might feel.