I'm gonna be honest, 2012 did not pop out to me as much of a year in the way of
new music, at least not like 2011 did. However, I'm a year older and more cynical and less impressed by the nostalgic musical textures making the rounds these days. Cold wave is totally bored and dead, 70s revival has been done to death by now, post-80s 808s now make me gag, witch house was always shit and indie rock needs embalming, its rigor mortise is rampant. That being said, I managed to scrape together 10 records that made their way to my earholes in the last 370 days, which is my standard for whether something should have been heard at all - I heard it. Mind you I heard some other things, this list isn't purely lazy, but what you see hear are the things I made it all the way through more than once without being strapped into a dentist's chair.
Zeus blew up on the Toronto bar scene nearly half a decade ago when they ditched Jason Collett to pursue their brand of uber-catchy, Abbey Road revival album rock. Having been to a handful of their truly scintillating live shows I eagerly awaited a recorded debut. Their Sounds Like Zeus EP and Say Us full length presented a tame, analog rendered version of their energy. It is on Busting Visions that they have perfectly captured what was so great about the '70s harkening sounds of Sloan's Navy Blues, with even more clarity in their sonic vision of the past. Are You Gonna Waste My Time? Anything You Want Dear and Proud and Beautiful are the most recent songs to adequately re-imagine the studio-rock legacy of 10cc in the modern day. A great listen the whole way through. 8/10
This one had to go up here as it is a) the best album title of the year and b) a welcome return to form for PE pioneer weirdo Boyd Rice. While I missed the NON project on their first time round at the end of the last century I will surely be looking into them having heard this immense tour-de-force of post-apocalyptic, grating mid-range abuse. If you like anger and sadism, nothing else released this year rivals this newest gospel from the master. Extra points for an old-school Warm Leatherette rendition.
My introduction to this female singer-songwriter powerhouse came in the form of this seminal release. Tramp is a total breath of fresh air in the world indie-folk lady songstresses as its themes of love, possession, heartbreak and infatuation range from candidly intimate to icy cold in performance. While the textures on this album could have been more varied, the songs themselves are perfect. The stoned haze which the songs sound like they were written in conveys a character on record who is refreshingly as paranoid and guarded as she is subdued and seductive. Looking forward to more from Ms. Van Etten.
Sludge and doom are not easy. These sub-genres are predicated on very basic cliches and thus, like with any music that's been happening for more than 20 years, a surplus of generic and unoriginal bands is continually mounting. This makes seeking out the innovators or even just the talented acts can be exhausting. Luckily I have friends and band mates to do that for me. Monarch are undoubtedly part of that select few. With Omens they demonstrate their monolithic ability to effortlessly create plodding riffs that keep you interested and in the dark while generating an atmosphere that pulls the listener deeper into a darkened pit of depravity.
A Thing Called Divine Fits is 2012s answer to
Kill The Moonlight. This record recognizes Britt Daniel as the true champion of the claustrophobic pop he first perfected with Spoon on the aforementioned 2002 opus. After a decade, Daniel shows that, having wandered down that 70s glam garden path with his old outfit, he can reinvent himself in the idiosyncratic idiom that suits him best. Bonus points for stealing my preferred high school cover of Nick Cave band the Boys Next Door's
Shivers.
Baby Get Worse
***
I heard this one early on this year and genuinely forgot/did not
realize it was a 2012 release, it seemed too good, too instantly
nostalgic. Sleigh Bells have come out the gate firing on all cylinders
in a
Reign of Terror I hope continues for years to come.
Impressively tackling textures as disparate as hair metal shred guitar
revival, shoegaze soprano vocalise and grind drum machine programming.
The result is a dizzying display of sugary sweet pop melody atop
throbbing mechanical heavy metal dance beats. Boom.
Never Say Die
There's not much people won't have said about this one. Frank Ocean completes his ingenious one-two punch of releasing a largely plagiarized mix-tape of improved-upon hits with sonic interludes that made reference to the influential medium within which he was working by creating a near flawless original album that tackled another medium of popular media consumption: television. As we're guided, flicker in hand, through a series of episodes in the young, talented and recognized artist's mind, we experience an emotional roller coaster boiled down to snapshots of unwitting patrons seconds before they drop. Along the way are odysseys of the heart, addiction, commitment and frivolity that grip the listener at every turn, keeping them glued through advertisements.
Aldebaran have long been in the above mentioned distinguished league of funeral doom hordes. Their newest and sophomore effort took a surprising turn for the melodic after the bleak and brooding sludge of 2007's Dwellers In Twilight. Boasting one of the most Thergothon comparison worthy tracks of the past decade (clocking in at a couple under half an hour), Aldebaran's newly donned depressive harmony is a welcome change that does all but eclipse their debut stronghold.
Cloud Nothings managed to spur a great Albini rant on reddit this year as well as deliver a biting full-length of moody 90s post meets pop punk that brings as much new melody and songwriting as it does familiar textures with King Dick behind the boards. From gloomy mid-tempos to infectious hooky rockers, Attack On Memory carries more excitement than an online scrabble match.
By far the most exciting and innovating record this year and shockingly put out by Sub Pop! Spoek Mathambo is equal parts eccentric, hip, South African dance, hip-hop hooliganism and post-rock angst. Father Creeper is an unsettling and idiosyncratic afro-futurist vision of a generation who outlive the end of morality and the world as they know it. With the accompaniment of an extraordinarily versatile band, drum programming and minimal sampling, Spoek manages to realize an apocalypse that's profound nature comes in that it is social and not environmental. And most of this happens over an irresistibly complex dance beat.
SWANS second reactivated effort trumps all with its impeccable conceptual fortitude and all-encompassing range of material. Gira has managed a piece that is retrospective and inventive at the same time, which fits well into the album's theme of endings as new beginnings and vice verse. Culling unfinished compositions from throughout his 30 year career and up to the present day, Gira demonstrates his unchallenged diversity in musical texture. The 30 minute title track alone weaves through avant garde tonal walls, tense marital swells and into the SWANS own brand of bludgeoning proto-sludge droning incorporating, along the way bagpipes, tubular bells, dulcimers, gongs, harmonica and what sounds like a power drill. Through The Seer the SWANS/Angels of Light catalog has been given new meaning and continuity. That's no easy feat.
