ILM's Top 77 Albums of 2015

As blizzard thaws to meltwater, so too must ILM's TOP 77 TRACKS of 2015 give way to ILM's Top 77 Albums of 2015.

Thanks for taking the time to nominate and vote for your favorite albums; my understanding is that we had 137 votes cast. Other cohorts in crime on the creation of this countdown include johnny fever, seanandalai and gr8080 (who will be completing the countdown on Wednesday and Thursday).

You can listen along at home on Spotify if you're inclined using this playlist link:
ILM's Top 77 Albums of 2015 Spotify Playlist
More than 90% of the placing albums will be on this playlist; we'll provide links for sampling the rest.

We'll start tomorrow but it's likely to be a somewhat erratic schedule on Monday (77 to 61) and a later start on Tuesday (60 to 41) due to my busy life. Consider yourself forewarned and forearmed.

Enough preamble! Let the speculation begin!

all these albums suck!

albums are bad

http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/l/178664-klax-genesis-screenshot-it-is-the-nineties-and-there-is-time.png

https://www.allgigs.co.uk/images/object/artist/73168/Gaz_Coombes-1-200-200-100-crop.jpg

albums are rockist

my DN was between this and Sufjan Sund4r

If you were a gurl (or willing to challenge the gender binary), you could use "Susanne Sund4r".

http://cdn1.umg3.net/95/files/2015/01/site-banner-album-more.gif

press blurbs otm

"CLICK HERE TO BUY" otm

thk u press blurbs

Nature abhors a vacuum but spoilers still suck. Gaz Coombes speculation excepted natch.

too low!

Excited for the joke #2

saw a poster today promoting a gig by GAZZ COOMBES

I heard from somewhere that the guy's "[a] bastion of British songwriting"

who the fuck is gaz coombes?

the drummer from superchunk

While we're killing time, here's the all-time list for the albums poll:

2014 D'Angelo and the Vanguard - Black Messiah (2105 points, 58 votes, 8 #1 votes)
2012 Miguel - Kaleidoscope Dream (1909 points, 51 votes, 7 #1 votes)
2013 Haim - Days Are Gone (1792 points, 56 votes, 3 #1 votes)
2014 Taylor Swift - 1989 (1624 points, 40 votes, 8 #1 votes)
2013 Daft Punk - Random Access Memories (1532 points, 44 votes, 5 #1 votes)
2013 My Bloody Valentine - MBV (1520 points, 47 votes, 2 #1 votes)
2014 FKA twigs - LP1 (1509 points, 43 votes, 2 #1 votes)
2013 Beyoncé - Beyoncé (1450 points, 39 votes, 9 #1 votes)
2013 Sky Ferreira - Night Time, My Time (1426 points, 45 votes, 2 #1 votes)
2013 Vampire Weekend - Modern Vampires Of The City (1397 points, 39 votes, 8 #1 votes)

2013 was a big year for points

What is it with you people and Gaz Fucking Coombes

^board description

Prediction: 2/25

lol i was all "no results yet, must be the preemptive AFL thread"

oh please don't say you fuckers have comedy-voted g*z c*****s into this -_-

expecting 7/25, hoping for 10

can't wait to see what crazy shit the rogue voters have gotten into 77-61 eh folks

I didnt vote for any albums but maybe I will like one of these.

For the purposes of this, do mixes count as albums? There are 3 or 4 mixes i would have voted for

they do and iirc a few mixes have placed in the past

mostly commercially available mixes right? only online freebie i recall was nguzunguzu's perfect lullaby, which went out of its way to look like an auteurish work rather than RA podcast 8493 or fact mix 94938 (i am surprised we don't see more of the latter sort nominated, but then i don't engage with them the same way i engage with albums)

I'd assumed commercially available mixes would, though the mixes I would have voted for were soundcloud podcasts, it didnt occur to me until just now that they might. There weren't so many, but....there were some!

4/25 at best, hopefully at least 3, but you never know

Dunno what I'll win, but I expect 7/25, maybe 8 if we still love Colin Stetson.

http://in1.ccio.co/Z3/G4/J8/3181071365207931502831646676354nlarge.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/92SB039.jpg

77 KURT VILE "B'lieve I'm Goin Down" (225 points, 8 votes)
Pitchfork - 23 / P&J - 27

this is an outrage!

that's right, get the crap out the way.

that all-time albums list upthread is pretty dreary imo.

TOO HIGH lol

On Matador records I believe ~it's a sign~ #gazwatch

8-vote threshold huh :/

if it turns out joanna wang was 78'd by this record then there will be hatred

8 votes though, think that means goodbye to 98% of my ballot oops xp

I think #77 on the tracks poll was 8 votes as well, but I think something with as few as 5 votes made it in iirc.

this is the most annoying apostrophe in rock, maybe? discuss

xp

yeah fkn Radiohead

Several things with 5 votes, actually. That seems to be the threshold this year.

http://i.imgur.com/d7coN7X.jpg

76 PROJECT PABLO "I Want to Believe" (226 points, 6 votes, 2 first place votes)
Pitchfork - DNP / P&J - DNP

idk even what this is...off to the internet!

huh, would've expected that to get more than 6 votes (nb: it did not make my ballot)

Never heard of it, fuck cassettes though.

quite good techno/bobbins of the Todd Terje school imo
try "Follow It Up"

There's like a 50% chance lex will love it.

For me it's the singing, with special shouts to the production on those spooky chain-gang harmonies, plus the strange juxtaposition of soul/gospel vocals and industrial(ish) backing music.

Whining about rolling genre threads another thing I thought we'd avoided. You got your bloody spotify playlists that mean you don't need to make an effort to engage with them, you guys already won

I like the implication in this post that clicking on Youtube links somehow represents "effort". TBH I don't really think there's anything wrong with not making an effort, it's not a syllabus. Or at least it's more important to make the effort to meet the music halfway when you're actually listening to it, however you come across it. But not making the effort while simultaneously bemoaning how much you miss out on is the worst of both worlds and particularly clownish to boot.

Doing the 70s albums redux poll a few years ago was a fun exercise, where we took the results of the original poll off the table and the outcome was really wonderful (even if familiar names/albums still dominated, they weren't the releases you always see in lists of the best albums of the decade).

― Ⓓⓡ. (Johnny Fever), Saturday, January 30, 2016 10:41 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this really was such a great poll!

never forget

2010 GOON POLL results: The Top 30 Hip-Hop/Rap Albums of 2010

loooooool I had not seen that before

I wonder if the Jlin album is going to switch more people onto footwork or if it's being included more as an example of avant-electronica and being thought of in similar terms to things like Holly Herndon? Obviously it can be treated as either / or.

― canoon fooder (dog latin), Saturday, January 30, 2016 2:20 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

idk I've probably listened to more avant-electronic stuff than ever before this year, whereas I was already into footwork.

but I don't know if I'd posit her as a gateway into that

for all my 'waaah it's only metal for people who don't like metal itp', I listened to the Ghost album all the way through yesterday and my god is it glorious. definitely my favourite discovery from the poll so far.

every track is catchy and structurally poppy but coated in metal-camp. whoever said scooby-doo up thread wasn't wrong, bit that's obviously a strength. looking forward to playing this all next Halloween

My favorite non-musical discovery of this year's poll is the Papaganda videos Ghost made in 2013: The Olde One, What Happens in Vegas. High camp indeed.

i wish i liked ghost more. guy's voice is a dealbreaker

If you don't like the current Papa Emeritus, just wait till the next album.

Devin Townsend? :D

well that'd probably kill me

still think Addicted was cruelly denied the acclaim Ghost got

Townsend is a Canadian progressive metal shredder? Iyo, he made a better hard rock pop album than Meliora? Queuing this up.

I like "The Way Home!".

This today, Ginger Wildheart tomorrow

Oh ha, I did like that one but "Awake!!" was the one I was enjoying at that moment. Got titles mixed up.

Louis, you need to listen to Rwake's Xenoglossalgia like right now..."Calibis/So Fucking Tired" probably ahould've topped your tracks ballot

*Calibos

just wanted to give a little thanks for that levon vincent album in this list, it is such a fucking TREAT

Yes, it's excellent.

The Helena Hauff album, which didn't place but got a lot of love, is superb too.

I'm surprised the Emily King album didn't place. that was 2015 right?

I've been bingeing on Domenique Dumont, Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith, and Neon Indian. Would love to know if there were threads on ILM for them that sparked more interest.

kaitlyn aurelia smith was talked about on the noise dude ambient thread and last year's rolling time travel

can a noise dude recommend some AMBIENT
time travel 2015 -> 2012 <-> 2102 <-5102 levart emit

maybe it's even time for her own thread tbh, cos she's got a new album coming out ~next month(?)

Nice, thanks!

what is the time travel thread anyway? I've never figured it out.

time travel is a feeling

it's a place to post music that you think might contain clues as to what the time travel thread is

its not what it will be

re: what is the time travel thread anyway?

arty / avant / experimental music for timelords that doesn't fit easily into other rolling threads.

to get the most from the thread: you need to match at least one of these requirements

a: be a timelord or dr who fan and appreciate the work of delia derbyshire
b: be a fan of imago
c: have a philosophical interest in temporality (and how it relates to music) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temporality
d: read The Wire magazine

ha I am an imago fan and have occasionally read The Wire but I'm still lost

Just open yr skull, pour in the music, and let it ferment yr mind grapes

experimental music
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_music

see the meta box at the footer of this wikipedia entry

"Experimental popular music genres"

Art pop Art punk Art rock Avant-garde jazz Ambient Drone metal Electronic Experimental metal Experimental pop Experimental rock Glitch Free jazz Intelligent dance music (IDM) Industrial Krautrock Math rock New-age No-fi No wave Noise rock Rock in Opposition (RIO) Post-rock Progressive rock Punk jazz Vaporwave Witch house

i.e the thread should be: Rolling Experimental & Avant Music Multi-Genres

As confirmed by your sweeping list of genres, "experimental music" can mean a lot of different things to different people. I don't think it works as any sort of genre marker.

or I could have read your last sentence idk

TT is the best rolling music thread name since rolling rap threads stopped having good names (thanks to edward, iirc Louis originally named something characteristically horrifying like Post Psych Non Avant Zero Math Chunk Wave). thread also has some of the best contemp music on the board. if the vagueness of the name alienates nebbish bedwetters that can't click on a bandcamp link without knowing what rigidly defined category of music to expect then that's a feature not a bug. imo there is a p obvious sensibility running thru the thread that i would describe as non-pretentious outsider music, often outgrowths of broadly defined 'rock' scenes. you could also just think of it as the thread where Edwars III, emil.y and lj post weird stuff they are freaking out about.

^the soft sell ;)

ty flopson tho that is v accurate

This is pretty much my entire argument against rolling genre threads in a nutshell:

That Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith album was easily in my top 5 albums of the year.

Yet it seems the only discussion of it happened in a thread where literally every criteria for participation (except "likes Delia Derbyshire") is a massive turn-off to the point of being exclusionary.

But TBH I didn't discover that record through ILX - that was one of the rare suggestions that Spotify Hipster Boyfriend got really really right (and why I persist with him). I guess if that says algorithms (as bad as they are) have a better hit rate than "genre" for me that really speaks to me of the uselessness of genre.

iirc time travel developed from a sequel to LJ's "rolling dilettante convocation" & the idea was supposed to be a free-for-all of stuff that wasn't being discussed elsewhere, ie there are no criteria for participation (martian's were obviously jokes). Obv the stuff that gets posted there has ended up being shaped by the sensibilities of the ppl who do participate, because that is what happens in communities. so time travel has become a vague "I know it when I see it" aesthetic.

Would relentlessly troll that thread by posting about Merzbox on it except I don't have the time.

there are no rules to time travel, only paradoxes

kaitlyn aurelia smith has a new album out in april, i haven't got round to listening to the whole of the one that placed in here but the new one is lovely

my argument for rolling threads is that until an artist achieves a certain critical/commercial mass OR is somehow an outsider to their home genre, starting a thread for them is usually just asking for tumbleweed. i feel like there are lots of general threads around where you can bring them up in a non-genre context.

Yet it seems the only discussion of it happened in a thread where literally every criteria for participation (except "likes Delia Derbyshire") is a massive turn-off to the point of being exclusionary.

It was also discussed (though briefly) in the rolling ambient thread.

http://cdn.yamibuy.com/images/201510/source_img/10417_G_1445033936368.jpg

(Oops I started reading this, forgot what thread I was on, and decided it was the time travel thread when I read all the time travel discussion. Still an amazing cracker box.)