ILM's Top 77 Albums of 2013

TNP also too low

Good news guys, I'm not leaving ILX.

What's the matter, ain't ya happy for me?

Don't think I've ever heard These New Puritans. What's a good place to start?

i respect this record more than enjoy it

Although Disclosure, FFS!

really enjoyed field or reeds, musta placed it in my top 10
think 'organ eternal' is a personal standout but i really see the album as a collective rather than the songs individually

Okay let's give this Puritans thing a whirl.

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

i haven't been a fan of her work before, but this new janelle monae album is good.

fuck yes TNP!
so good!

Yeah this is stunning. Glad it placed so high, pretty sure it's a ridiculous thing to say but kinda feels like the instrumental to Late Nite Tip stretched out over 50 minutes.

pretty sure it's a ridiculous thing to say but kinda feels like the instrumental to Late Nite Tip stretched out over 50 minutes

the tnp record is not nearly this amazing but now i know if i ever make a record what i want it to sound like

best place to start for TNS is probably chronologically!
numbers, colours, elvis off the debut (beat pyramid)
we want war, white chords, attack music off hidden...

me on Facebook talking Field of Reeds:

I'm not sure where to begin when describing These New Puritans or their third album Field of Reeds.

This is a band that started out as a better-than-average British indie rock outfit with some hints of hip-hop (lead vocalist and primary songwriter Jack Barnett cited Wu-Tang Clan as an inspiration) and morphed over the course of three albums into... this. A largely atmospheric ensemble, interested in pieces that introduce several meandering, disconnected musical ideas that indulge their own internal themes before converging into a more coherent groove. It's a trick that could get old really quickly, or be alienating, particularly when paired with Barnett's adenoidal, untrained vocals, but the underpinning musical ideas carry through every single time. The result is largely ambient and contemplative; only on "Fragment Two" and the second half of "V (The Island Song)" do you find something that one could reasonably call a rock/pop song, and those are heavily informed by the orchestral scoring leading into them. This album is a soundtrack to a nonexistent film, scored for rock band, string ensemble, wind ensemble, jazz singer, indie vocalist and a dude who was hired to come in and intone C#2 on the title track. There are a ton of fantastic ideas swirling around on this album, from the musical convergence point about one and half minutes into "V (The Island Song)" to the slow creeping crescendo into the drum fills on "The Light in Your Name" to the droning title track. This is one of the most musically ambitious albums I listened to last year and I invite you all to dive into its placidly unsettling world.

So a few people were acting like the world would end if this didn't place yet it only has one first place vote... interesting.

it was my #2 (my #1 was Savages)

xp Too late, I've started with track 1 of Field of Reeds. Literally the only thing I know about this band is that I always confuse them with Thee Oh Sees.

hahaha i put tns
was thinking of total network solutions

This is a band that started out as a better-than-average British indie rock outfit with some hints of hip-hop

Feel like this directly contradicts nathey's advice

I'd recommend Hidden to a newbie. This is good but might seem vaporous and opaque on first listen.

One of the things that makes TNP so staggering to me is the musical journey, both in terms in how much the music has changed/evolved and in how much signposting there was in the eventual evolution of the band in their earlier, more conventional material.

so does this band sound like talk talk or what

lol was about to post that

Took me a while to get into this album but it is a really great album. Didn't like Hidden at all but this is almost like a different band. Obviously if you ever enjoyed Bark Psychosis you will love this album.

TNP = my slowest grower of the year.

i like the really low voice in the final song

TNP left me cold last time i tried them (last time they placed in an ilm poll) but i put on "organ eternal" and...was really enjoying it! and then

It's a trick that could get old really quickly, or be alienating, particularly when paired with Barnett's adenoidal, untrained vocals

that happened

(it didn't intrude too much on this particular track but i find the sound of his voice unenjoyable on a v fundamental level, and i suspect it's more prominent on the album)

this band should ditch him and make instrumentals imo

it's a shame LJ finally fell asleep just as it was about to be revealed

I love all of Field of Reeds but Organ Eternal is so amazing in particular.

i do really like the music though, that hypnotic melody and those washes and drones going on, like it IS ambient and vaporous but there's something to actually hook you in as well

will not investigate further til he shuts up for good tho

Long DJP post otm. What a brilliant and baffling record, took me ages to get into it and I still feel like I'm trying to really understand it properly. If you've not heard it I guess the closest thing to compare it to is late period Talk Talk, but with more of a nervy modern classical feel to it than a serene In A Silent Way jazz one - it's somewhat less at ease with itself, it wriggles like an frigging eel when you try and grasp it. Maybe reminiscent of Scott Walker too, but his later albums, I do not mean that they sound a bit like the Divine fucking Comedy. They're willing to take risks with form, structure and orchestration and introducing odd sonic elements into mix. Has been so good to watch this band develop and at lightspeed too.

Hidden is better overall, I think, but this is still a beautiful and strange record, any of the songs with the swelling horns just do it for me. The problem that won't go away is the singer's voice but the rest of the music is often so gorgeous I'm prepared to overlook that. It's probably the one element that holds them back from being a genuinely incredible band though.

Should just let the fado singer do everything next time round.

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

14 M.I.A. Matangi (724 points, 24 votes, 2 first place votes)

Spotify

hey NickB thanks for the Holter recommendation, will investigate further

oh hey look it's MIA

At his best he sounds like 3D on latter Massive Attack records but that is a really low ceiling.

holy shit I am genuinely surprised re: M.I.A.

her best record

A few bangers on Matangi but a complete mess and so so patchy compared to the first two. She's into her Return To Form phase by now, sadly.

does every song on the MIA album have cuss words?

xp Barnett's a musical visionary imo but if he could sing as well as, say, Mark Hollis I'd like this a lot more. Less of an issue on Hidden because that was a more abrasive record. Still grateful that someone this talented and ambitious is around.

Hey MIA

i really enjoyed matangi on the first three listens but i haven't had the urge to listen to it since

her best album since MAYA

That record is phenomenal

what happened to mýa

Facebook babble re: Matangi:

I tried very hard to lower my expectations for M.I.A.'s fourth album Matangi. While I eventually grew to embrace most of MAYA, the middle section is really, really dull and the second half is not packed with immediacy. I had really been digging the singles released in the run-up to the album, particularly "Bad Girls" and "Bring the Noise", but my lingering disappointment in MAYA compared to the previous two albums and the protracted delay in the album's release, combined with the domestic drama surrounding her ex and her child, made me concerned that time would blunt her edge and the external distractions would push her in the wrong, sleepier direction.

I really shouldn't have worried.

As soon as the title track kicked in, I began to swoon. Explosions, filtered vocals and slamming triplet rhythms build into a jump-up frenzy reminiscent of "Boys" only much, much tougher. Every time M.I.A. spells her name in Tamil then spits a list of countries, I feel a gigantic grin spread across my face and my entire body wants to leap out of whatever chair I'm sitting in and dance like a fiend. This is what the best M.I.A. songs do to me and it happens with practically every single song on this album. When she counts down in orders of magnitude on "Only 1 U", I lose my mind. When the slowed-down sample from "Así Me Gusta A Mí (X-Ta Sí, X-Ta No)" by Chimo Bayo kicks in on "Warriors", I lose my mind. When the accelerando kicks in with those weird synth squeals on "Come Walk With Me", I lose my mind. When the octave drops and leaps happen on "atTENTion", I lose my mind. Basically, every time I play this album, by the time I get to the end I am a gibbering crazy person who only wants to dance, set things on fire and change the world.

I don't really like much of anything TNP did before Field of Reeds but by god do I like Field of Reeds. The TAlk Talk comparisons are entirely justified, including the career trajectory.

this band should ditch him and make instrumentals imo

He's totally the creative force of the band though, does all the arrangements, learned to read music solely to do that, it's weird how hyper-obsessive he is about every other element of the music and then sings like that. FWIW I think he hates his voice.

i voted for matangi!

i'd been so put off by the last album, the rhetoric around her and her persona that i pretty much considered myself off the m.i.a. wagon. gave this a listen out of duty and it was actually good! bit sad that it got ignored, just goes to show how hype and musical quality don't correlate. i enjoyed reviewing it: http://thequietus.com/articles/13952-m-i-a-matangi-review

"bring the noize" - my nan was a stan for imported liquor brands
"y.a.l.a." - BANKING OFFSHORE / TAKE A TRIP TO SINGAPORE / I NEED TO EARN LIKE / I'M JULIANNE MOORE

happy this made it!

Beats, rhymes, and life. That's what this album is.

Main thing for me about Field of Reeds is that it feels very evocative of certain landscapes, and Jack's voice is very important in both anchoring it to this place and giving it uh local colour.