Year-End Critics' Polls 2012

Oh good! No consensus then

comparing "I Don't Like" to "The Message" was a little over the top, i thought

― some dude, Tuesday, 18 December 2012 13:20 (1 hour ago) Bookmark

maybe, but after a year of endless surrounding grumbling and murmuring and whatnot about the track it was effective just this once to bang a fist on the table with a historical juxtaposition and clear the fug for a sec. besides it wasnt "this is as good as" or "the 2012 version of", he used the comparison (and well i thought)

did anyone mention the jacob korn record yet? have come back to it a few times over the course of the year. #faintpraise.

meant that for the dance thread actually, but it's here forever now. i'll let history judge me.

I spoke to Tony Blair and he said he preferred the Petar Dundov album.

the ruth saxelby bit for alunageorge is quite good just for placing them in about the right critical spot ("1980s UK electro pop duos, from Yazoo to Eurythmics") where it's been so easy to tip too far either side of the dance/r&b question. felt like a sensible clarification for me anyway.

"this isn't the time for soundbytes. but today i truly feel the hand of house on my shoulder." xpost sorry carry on

I've heard of Jacob Korn without ever having bothered to look into him but having realised he had a hand in Philipp Dolphia I'm going to check him out immediately.

the ruth saxelby bit for alunageorge is quite good just for placing them in about the right critical spot ("1980s UK electro pop duos, from Yazoo to Eurythmics") where it's been so easy to tip too far either side of the dance/r&b question. felt like a sensible clarification for me anyway.

the "hook so pop it hurts" is a bit "uhhhh really?" though

liked katherine st asaph on angel haze a lot

in general the p4k lists crystallises this sense across most EOY lists i've seen that it's even more about ring-fencing and aesthetic branding than ever this year. on a related note, i was really happy to see rich juzwiak pick keyshia cole for this:

http://www.thefader.com/2012/12/17/20-musicians-tastemakers-and-other-weirdos-pick-their-favorite-music-of-2012/

If I had to listen to only one song from 2012 for the rest of my life, it would be the second single from Keyshia Cole’s Woman to Woman album, “Trust and Believe.” No commercial track I’ve heard this year understands where R&B is and was quite as well. Seething with sound, its snapped beats reverberate into hisses, its snare fills throw tantrums while Cole sings furiously, balancing heartbreak and righteous indignation. This should be the ballad that defines the 31-year-old’s career.

Four tracks in, “Trust and Believe” is Woman’s showstopper. It’s almost bizarre, then, how consistently entertaining the album goes on to be. Its backbone is old-school hip-hop soul, the kind of minimal, breakbeat-based R&B that Mary J. Blige (without whom Keyshia would not be possible) used to sing over. Cole’s endless supply of hooks keep midtempo from sounding mundane, but it is the album’s eventual sense of adventure that makes its 15 tracks fly by. Darkchild’s “Stubborn,” (which Cole pronounces “stub-bron,” lest you think she’s become entirely refined by Album No. 5) bridges the gap from trap to house more convincingly than even “Mercy.” “Hey Sexy” is to Mtume’s “Juicy Fruit” what Miguel’s “Adorn” is to Gregory Abbott’s “Shake You Down” (Cole previously sampled “Fruit” in “Let It Go,” here she just invokes its spirit in a more sophisticated tribute). She samples “Theme from Shaft,” duets with Ashanti on the title track (not a remake of the Shirley Brown Stax classic) and enters the canon of great R&B first lines on the airily modern “Forever”: I’m not easily impressed, but you got me fucked up.

The story of R&B’s phenomenal year centers on the heady, atmospheric turn it has taken and the men who have popularized it. Woman to Woman acknowledges the sound of Frank Ocean, The Weeknd and Miguel, but it offers a much wider palate—there’s a sense of grounded soul tradition here guided by Cole’s still-feral pipes. Woman to Woman is the alternative to the alternative, a commercial R&B record delivered with so little hype, it was easy to miss. It’s destined to be an underrated gem, just like they used to make.

Fuckin Rich will send me scurrying back to the Cole.

i like that grimes's "oblivion" is getting a lot of praise now, not only b/c it is the only track on the album that i ever felt compelled to revisit much but also b/c it seemed like hardly anyone ever mentioned it in reviews of the album (even tho the music video was out and everything)

if hearing keyshia cole as anything more than passable/tedious and schlocky is to be the real r&b rubicon then ima hand in my gun & badge right now

the ruth saxelby bit for alunageorge is quite good just for placing them in about the right critical spot ("1980s UK electro pop duos, from Yazoo to Eurythmics") where it's been so easy to tip too far either side of the dance/r&b question. felt like a sensible clarification for me anyway.

Or 1990s UK electro pop groups like Sneaker Pimps.

well, i liked them too

Sneaker Pimps implies a level of dead-eyed monitor lizardity that I'd be loath to apply to AlunaGeorge. Morcheeba, maybe.

I thought "Nightmusic" was gonna be the runaway song from Visions, but I don't think the album version (or video) storms the keep the way it does in a live setting

XLR8R's Best of 2012: Tracks #25-#1
http://www.xlr8r.com/features/2012/12/xlr8rs-best-2012-tracks-part-two

The RA #1 track by Andres reminds me of Roule/Cryadamoure output circa 1998. So, I quite like it.

(Crydamoure, even)

if hearing keyshia cole as anything more than passable/tedious and schlocky is to be the real r&b rubicon then ima hand in my gun & badge right now

― r|t|c, Tuesday, December 18, 2012 7:17 AM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

word. and I realize she's not as bad about it as she used to be, but I can't take the way she sings.

i would probably have been with you before i heard her latest - when i listened it was so refreshing both because she'd unexpectedly improved and because only hearing that emo MJB style done so sincerely and unashamedly did you realise just how far out of the critical discourse it's got

I've got Elle Varner for that (although not really emo).

yeah elle varner is more...theatre kid? there's something kinda cutesy about her even on the heartbreakers, you don't feel like she's ever on the edge of a meltdown, which is where keyshia kinda lives.

there's melanie fiona, though i think her album is actually better when she's playful rather than overwrought, apart from "4am" obv. keyshia's entire thing is to be overwrought and it's whether she can sweep you along or not. she rarely did, until this album.

I couldn't really get into the Melanie Fiona album too much faux-Motown retread I'm too bored to even finish this sen-

"4AM" is dope and "6AM" is cute on some I see what you did there tho.

this is such a "c'mon son" moment smh

Tiny Mix Tapes albums list for all your vaporwave needs:
http://www.tinymixtapes.com/features/2012-favorite-50-albums-of-2012

1. Scott Walker - Bish Bosch
2. Dean Blunt & Inga Copeland - Black is Beautiful
3. Swans - The Seer
4. Mount Eerie - Clear Moon / Ocean Roar
5. Laurel Halo - Quarantine
6. Macintosh Plus - Floral Shoppe
7. Actress - R.I.P.
8. Andy Stott - Luxury Problems
9. YYU - TIMETIMETIME&TIME
10. Dean Blunt - The Narcissist II
11. Grimes - Visions
12. Frank Ocean - Channel Orange
13. Holly Herndon - Movement
14. BEBETUNE$ - inhale c-4 $$$$$
15. DJ Rashad - TEKLIFE Vol. 1: Welcome to the Chi
16. Death Grips - The Money Store
17. Daughn Gibson - All Hell
18. The Caretaker - Patience (after Sebald)
19. Traxman - Da Mind of Traxman
20. Kendrick Lamar - good kid, m.A.A.D. city
21. Aaron Dilloway - Modern Jester
22. Demdike Stare - Elemental
23. Angel Olsen - Half Way Home
24. Graham Lambkin - Amateur Doubles
25. Mediafired - The Pathway Through Whatever
26. Sun Araw/M. Geddes Gengras/The Congos - FRKWYS Vol. 9: Icon Give Thank
27. White Suns - Sinews
28. Tim Hecker / Daniel Lopatin - Instrumental Tourist
29. 情報デスクVIRTUAL - 札幌コンテンポラリー
30. Dolphins Into The Future - Canto Arquipélago
31. Jason Lescalleet - Songs About Nothing
32. Motion Sickness of Time Travel - Motion Sickness of Time Travel
33. Farrah Abraham - My Teenage Dream Ended
34. Thee Oh Sees - Putrifiers II
35. Burial - Kindred EP
36. The Men - Open Your Heart
37. Tame Impala - Lonerism
38. Ian Martin - Mechanical Rain
39. Ahnnu - Pro Habitat
40. Lil B - White Flame
41. Heat Wave - Fukd In Tha Game
42. Death Grapes - No Love Deep Web
43. Killer Mike - R.A.P. Music
44. Apple, Fiona - The Idler Wheel is Wiser...
45. Arca - Stretch 2
46. Converge - All We Love We Leave Behind
47. Internet Club - Vanishing Vision
48. Belbury Poly - The Belbury Tales
49. Raime - Quarter Turns Over a Living Line
50. Mykki Blanco - Cosmic Angel: The Illuminati Prince/ss

Glad to see Mount Eerie that high.

"Grimes" next to "Frank Ocean" on all these lists never fails to make me think of Frank Grimes

DEATH GRAPES

I couldn't really get into the Melanie Fiona album too much faux-Motown retread I'm too bored to even finish this sen-

― The Reverend, Tuesday, 18 December 2012 16:31 (40 minutes ago) Bookmark

haha

i can't disagree

[...] a rear-guard action, a fight to preserve a space for R&B rather than demand or even anticipate anything of it. [...]

― Tim F, Sunday, 26 December 2010 03:50 (1 year ago) Bookmark

my most-delayed eoy chore is giving The MF Life one more front-to-back listen to honestly assess whether i'm being too kind to it

I really like both the Lando Kal and Tom Demac tracks from the XLR8R poll, but in whose warped mind are they topped by that George Fitzgerald schlock? The RA poll this year seemed significantly more conservative than previous years. Pretty much strictly house for the top 10 and otherwise just safe bets for a few token non-house genres.

tbh i am kinda glad that RA didn't feel the need to make token non-dance gestures in their eoy lists this year, and i'm not seeing pachanga boys or anthony naples on any other lists so it's weird to call it conservative. maybe i just like more focused genre lists though?

the juno list is also really good and pretty stylistically similar to the ra list

non-house /= non-dance!

Thanks for the tip on the Juno list.

one of the best UK techno records in a generation

Wow, really? I don't listen to that much UK techno specifically, but I'd think that would apply more to Getting Me Down. Maybe that's not technically techno?

pachanga boys

And yeah by "conservative" I meant leaning heavily towards dad techno.

non-house /= non-dance!

well yeah, but in the past ra hasn't exactly included much outside of the techno/house/post-dubstep world, but they would throw in a few more token indie picks than they did this year

idk half of the ra list hasn't really shown up elsewhere, dad techno or no

Christianity Today - Top Albums of 2012
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2012/december-web-only/2012-ct-music-awards.html?

1. Phil Madeira (et al.), Mercyland: Hymns for the Rest of Us (Tone Tree Music)
2. Bonnie Raitt, Slipstream (Redwing Records)
3. Punch Brothers, Who's Feeling Young Now?(Nonesuch)
4. Bruce Springsteen, Wrecking Ball(Columbia)
5. Andrew Peterson, Light for the Lost Boy (Centricity Music)
6. Anais Mitchell, Young Man in America (Thirty Tigers)
7. Carolina Chocolate Drops, Leaving Eden(Nonesuch)
8. Bob Dylan, Tempest (Columbia)
9. Andrew Osenga, Leonard the Lonely Astronaut(101 Distribution)
10. Julie Lee, Julie Lee & the Baby-Daddies (Still House Road Music)
11. Rosie Thomas, With Love (101 Distribution)
12. Lecrae, Gravity (Reach Records)

So,they're broad-minded about some/most of those Tempest lyrics?

or Tempestlyrics even?

mercy on the near-sighted typists

I'm glad TRAXMAN and Rashad are appearing on these lists, but Young Smoke isn't getting a lot of love and that was my favourite footwork LP of the year, certainly better than Traxman's effort.

Speaking of which:

http://www.spin.com/articles/best-dance-electronic-EDM-albums-2012

fairly sure only someone who believes they know what "dad-techno" is would use the term "dad-techno"

adult contechnorary

It's true, I'm actually a big fan of dad techno. But still.