Sampha - (No One Know Me) Like The Piano

New solo album from this serial collaborator out February 3.

Best of 2014 Part 6

A slight spoiler: for me there was no runaway winner this year, so at this point I feel like the order of the last few albums could be jumbled up and justified in any fashion. They're all really good, and basically I just picked albums I liked a little more to come up with the final order. Anyway let's get down to business, here is the beginning of the very best albums of 2014.

#6

Run The Jewels

Run The Jewels 2

Killer Mike! El-P! Run The Jewels! Yaaaa sucka! This record is just hype personified. I liked the first album, I loved this one. The production, as expected, is fuggin awezum. Kind of sounds like Death Grips, only less manic. This is the new wave gangsta shit.

I should of course mention that the lyrics are seriously PG-13, or maybe more appropriately rated R for some less-than-savoury tracks, which is most of them. Ha. Don't look for radio hits, there are none. It's just badass hip hop ground up with dirty electro grime and fried in a dope step pancake. So far ahead of the curve. Keep runnin' fellas.

Oh My Darling (Don't Cry)

Blockbuster Night Part 1

Early

#5

FKA Twigs

LP1

What good is an album title anyway? I guess when you're busy writing tunes you can't be bothered about with unimportant things like that. So this is the new R&B. Or so I've been told. I have no idea where this fits in the traditional genre spectrum, and to be honest I don't care. Downtempo, a bit glitchy, trippy and intense. Tahliah's voice just kind of floats around in the background, far far away from the over-the-top self indulgence of today's bloated pop divas.

FKA stands for 'formerly known as'. Good to know. I saw the video for "Two Weeks" and did my best impression of Keanu Reeves. Totally awesome. Thankfully it wasn't a one-off, the whole album is great. Just the right mix of weird and catchy. Very excited to see where she takes this in the future. Let's hope that means sooner rather than later.

Hide

Video Girl

Lights On

#4

The War On Drugs

Lost In The Dream

I have to admit I really didn't want to bother with this album. I hate the band name, and just about everything about them exudes hipster in the worst possible ways. After some prodding I gave in and donated an hour of my time to give it a shot. I tried not to like it. I tried, and failed. I couldn't help it, it's actually really good. That's just the worst, when you want something to be terrible and fit exactly in the stereotype of mediocrity that you have it pegged for, and then it turns out to be something genuinely enjoyable, so much you have to write about it. Damnit.

So there are certainly arguments to be made that's it's not particularly original. Repackaged oldies, a mix of Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, a little Neil Young. Yup, it certainly sounds like it, but somehow it still sounds fresh. It doesn't seem to be heavily burdened with the knowledge that it's a continuation, not a beginning, and the songs just kind of flow together. Don't worry, I'm not prepared to give up the ghost just yet, but I'll concede this one. For now...

Under The Pressure

Red Eyes

An Ocean In Between The Waves

EP #2

Vancouver Sleep Clinic

Winter

Now this must be the easiest comparison I've ever heard. It's basically Justin Vernon over some drum tracks. Considering the last Bon Iver album was a masterpiece, it's not a bad formula. In actuality this is the work of Tim Bettinson, an Australian, which is somewhat upsetting considering the name of the city he's chosen to use in his alias. Couldn't he have been the Brisbane Sleep Clinic? Melbourne? Toowoomba? Anyway, lousy name, good music. The most chilled out EP of the year. 

Collapse

Flaws

Vapour

Almost there...

Best of 2014 Part 4

Slept in today. Still tired. Soldiering on. 

#12

Brock Berrigan

Four Walls And An Amplifier

36 minutes of the dopest beats you've heard all year, no doubt. This guy is arguably the most prolific basement dweller of the modern age. He describes himself as "beat maker, music enthusiast, multi instrumentalist, sample hunter, town drunk". He forgot inspirational guru. 

Old school soul samples and old blaxploitation clips sliced over the phattest hip hop grooves on the east coast. Apparently he's got hordes of unreleased material he doesn't want to release, occasionally dropping one on his SoundCloud page. Put this guy in the ring with any of the world's best lyricists and you've got yourself a chune. I wonder if he wears that chicken mask at home?

Reading Rambo

Clockwork

Why The Funk Not

#11

Beck

Morning Phase

Is the old Beck gone? The funky dude who thought he was a loser? If he is, we'll understand, but hopefully he's just on hiatus. In the meantime, we have a return to the "Sea Change" sound, only this time it's more ethereal and, frankly, much better.

He's definitely not breaking any new ground on this one, but it doesn't seem like he's pretending to. It just sounds like he wanted to chill out for a while, and we've been let in on a few minutes of his thoughts. It's an easy listen, one you'll likely repeat several times once you give it a shot. I'm not really sure it gets better with time, because it's good on the first go. Thumbs up from me.

Say Goodbye

Heart Is A Drum

Blue Moon

#10

Wild Beasts

Present Tense

As soon as I heard the opening track on this one I knew it would be a winner. I haven't really given them much time before, but they got plenty of it this year. It's kind of hard to put a finger on why it's such an engrossing album. It's largely a synth-heavy melancholy sound, but the production is really well done, it's nice and crisp but at the same time buttery smooth.

They all seem to be talented multi-instrumentalists, with Hayden Thorpe and Tom Fleming adding the lyrics in an interesting, kind of semi-falsetto muddy-tenor mix that has a nice contrast. The songwriting is pretty good, a step up from their older stuff, and it sounds like they have higher places to reach for in the future. I'm looking forward to the next one.

Daughters

Sweet Spot

Mecca

EP #4

Wigbert

This And That

Minimal tech house leaning more towards techno than house, this is the best of that genre I've heard all year. It's not overly complicated, pretty straight forward stuff, but subtle and really, really tight. This isn't big-room blast your ears off, it's late night vampire keep that brain moving and those toes tapping. The lost art of simplicity done right. 

Okapi

This And That

Head Machine

Into the best of the best, starting tomorrow!

Jimmy Fallon & The Roots - Desire

Might as well post the song that inspired this whole shindig. Great job Jimmy.