ILM's Top 77 Albums of 2019

Therein lies the rub…

32 feels pretty high for Little Simz given the tumbleweed rolling across the thread for that album.

I mean I could elaborate

OK I'll elaborate a bit. The distorted screams in 'Boss' are the most metal thing I've heard all year, 101FM is a bop, Venom feels like it is actually rising up to strike at your throat and Therapy, for all that it eloquently disses the therapeutic process (which I reckon still has a lot to offer young Simz), has this sort of gripping catatonic don't...need...therapy self-knowingness that turns it into a really, REALLY compelling confession. The rest of the album is great too and there's no filler. Might be my AOTYSF

― PPL+AI=NS (imago), Thursday, 21 March 2019 13:09 (ten months ago) link

Yes to Highwomen! In a year where my listening became almost exclusively streaming and my experience of music ever more flattened out, several tracks on here sounded like standards. Love Little Simz too (not seen much Top Boy chat in here - she's great in that too).

VENOM.

I completely missed out on hiphop last year, for some reason. Liking the Danny Brown one so far.

Little Simz veers into spoken word delivery too often for my taste

Voted for 'Boss' on the tracks poll, but came late in the year to Little Simz so didn't have much of a chance to get to know the whole album, but might not have voted for it anyway, as the other tracks I heard didn't stick out so much as that one.

It's my favourite and one hell of a launchpad but the whole thing is very strong I think

I'm going to need to do a deep dive on Arthur Russell's discography soon. I loved that 'Eli' track that came up during the short songs poll, but forgot to follow it up, and this album is sounding beautiful. He seems difficult to pin to one sound but I'm hearing bits of Grateful Dead and early Brian Eno and sometimes mixed with these strange angular chord progressions that mess with the pretty folkiness of it.

that is very otm

The World Of Arthur Russell comp on Soul Jazz is a great starting point

It is. I'd also recommend 'World of Echo' and the brilliant 'Calling Out of Context'; both offer a variety of his many flavours.

Thanks both, will check out very soon!

I wasn’t nuts about uknowwhatimsayin but I LOVE “Combat”

i was the "Weirdo hip hop" comment and, in truth, that's more about his career and public persona than that album. Which I enjoyed!

Anyways, why is there no jazz on this countdown?

https://i.imgur.com/NHgJP5N.jpg
#31 – Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah – Ancestral Recall (344 points, 10 votes, 1 #1 vote)

Rolling Jazz Thread 2019

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/20/arts/music/christian-scott-atunde-adjuah-ancestral-recall-review.html

Too low!

Very pleasantly surprised to see Men I Trust on here. Only heard it at the very end of the year and it took over my listening for a good few weeks. I was actually drawn to the album title and artwork combination, so I'm not really sure what that says about me. For an album that's 70 minutes long, it doesn't drag one bit. I love getting lost in their strange world.

Little Simz was very low on my list. I dismissed her earlier in the year, but the album grew on me recently when I revisted it. I didn't expect her to be this high.

Loving how unique this list is overall even though it's making me realise I was wrong to think I'd done a really good job of keeping up to date with new music in the last 12 months.

Extremely great image.

Too much talking on this one, I just couldn't take it.

Im glad Men I Trust made it too, agree that it’s remarkably consistent over 70+ mins

For an album that's 70 minutes long, it doesn't drag one bit

yeah otm for me too, i'm always surprised at how easily i get through it

It's an extremely impressive album that I'm never in the headspace to want to put on.

Album of the year

ancestral recall was no. 6 on my list, i've been following scott for... more than a decade now (ugh) but this is his best record. i've always liked his work but felt it sometimes got a little suffocated by its influences cf. radiohead, post-rock, deep studies of the second great quintet (not that i minded that he drew heavily from these sources). here his extremely hybridized vision of jazz becomes—and i'm consciously using this word despite its other associations in the genre—free

So so happy Caligula placed. Had I known about the record and given it a good listen before compiling my ballot it would have been top 5. It's insanely good.

Title track from Highwoman was really good! Excellent play on words from the original song and the subject matter fits the mood. Listening to the rest of the album and while it's not quite my thing, it's not bad.

Rest of the rollout today was aces. Not familiar with Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah, but damn it was nice to see Saul Williams is still fire. Love that dude.

one more and then a pause

Oh hell yeah there's more

Yay Ancestral Recall. Also pleasantly surprised, thought it might squeeze into the seventies, but ten votes is great. Wonderful album.

in advance of the TOO LOW hullaballoo: this is not a false flag; #30 is actually #30

https://i.imgur.com/D29cqSv.jpg
#30 – Richard Dawson - 2020 (352 points, 14 votes)

Richard Dawson (raucous experimental UK folk racket w/ intense picaresque realness vox)

https://thequietus.com/articles/27259-richard-dawson-2020-review

there he is

probably going at about one every ten minutes up to 21 now.

take us there forks

every time I play Dawson on the radio the program we use to log tracks insists that the record is actually three different records called "0", "1", and "2"

Let's talk about 'Jogging'.

Not too low! This album came on the heels of two of the best albums I have ever heard and will ever hear, in a row, and in that context it can't measure up. It's obviously a fantastic piece of work in its own right, and apart from Jogging, Civil Servant and Black Triangle (a heartbreaking tale of a conspiracy theory nut who loses his family) are top-tier Dawson songwriting as well. A bold and often surprising leap into his own peculiar sort of indie-rock, and my #14

Let's talk about Black Triangle and how it serves imperialism by rattling about UFOs and loneliness

Never got this dude. Oh well

I will admit the Jogging deep dive in that side thread was amusing

not low enough

will say that i absolutely love 'the vile stuff'

Serving SPQR imperialism is fine tho.

no more shiters please

is this an actual thimg amongst you ukpol nonces

Not his best album but still really good.

https://i.imgur.com/TWeMmFN.jpg
#29 – The Comet Is Coming – Trust in the Lifeforce of the Deep Mystery (354 points, 17 votes)

London jazz wizard Shabaka Hutchings: Sons of Kemet / The Comet Is Coming / Shabaka & the Ancestors

https://www.npr.org/2019/03/07/700510300/first-listen-the-comet-is-coming-trust-in-the-lifeforce-of-the-deep-mystery

the comet came

Eh, the comet isn't all it's cracked up to be. Like I said in the tracks thread, more improv (not necessarily of the 'free' variety) would've been welcome.

Not as good as their previous album but happy it is here!