Best album from the 2018 ILM EOY album poll that received only ONE top 3 weighted vote

I would've stanned for Dream Wife, but couldn't be bothered with the boring reaction "it's too retro and not retro enough / I hate this century"

Meg Bowles' album of ambient atmospheric space music is on Spotify:

Meg Bowles – Evensong: Canticles for the Earth

(On Bandcamp it just has the first 4 tracks)

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/ru/thumb/8/85/%D0%A0%D0%B0%D1%81%D0%BA%D1%80%D0%B0%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B8_%D0%B4%D0%BB%D1%8F_%D0%B2%D0%B7%D1%80%D0%BE%D1%81%D0%BB%D1%8B%D1%85.jpg/200px-%D0%A0%D0%B0%D1%81%D0%BA%D1%80%D0%B0%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B8_%D0%B4%D0%BB%D1%8F_%D0%B2%D0%B7%D1%80%D0%BE%D1%81%D0%BB%D1%8B%D1%85.jpg

We've got a short thread for Monetochka / монеточка

Her album is a charming pop.. thing, and there's an academic article on how it reflects Russia under Putin's fourth term, but that website is mysteriously down atm so you'll have to settle for this headline:

- https://meduza.io/en/feature/2018/05/31/a-19-year-old-musician-just-released-the-best-russian-pop-album-of-the-year-seriously

“Coloring for Adults” rightly starts with the song “Russkii Kovcheg” (Russian Ark) — an aphoristic composition about Russia’s special path:
"Where’s their Slavic mass, oil, and gas?
They’ve got unisex, but we’ve got kvas,
Iconostasis and Mikhaylov, Stas. [...]
Pussy Riot took off their masks — a pity.
But they look good without them — they’re pretty."
Another key track is “90” — a satire on the myth of the “troubled” 1990s, and something like the opposite of a song with the same name by the band “Barto”:
"It’s fun to sit around and divvy up the shops,
But carving up a country is where playtime stops. [...]
It’s only thanks to tapes and to Krovostok’s song
That I learned with horror what had gone wrong.
That in the 90s people turned up dead,
And they ran the streets buck naked."
What’s important here isn’t just what is being sung, but how: Monetochka’s music has neither patriotism nor contempt. She brings only a keen interest in the land of her people, and a genuine love for its paradoxical nature. In the song “Russian Ark,” when a chorus of voices starts chanting “Rossiya!” it’s authentic, but it isn’t some pro-Kremlin cheer. Listen carefully and the sound might as well be people Gyrdymova’s age shouting the same word at some unpermitted protest.

The Riccardo podcast mix is great! There's an old interview about the label here - http://www.meoko.net/interviews/imprints-records-an-exclusive-interview-podcast-with-domenico-rosa-riccardo

didn't vote in this, but the Goat Girl record was my fav of the year. Such a great re-think of The Fall and Butthole Surfer's art-twang, but with a completely different take on the loathing.

The Riccardo podcast mix is great! There's an old interview about the label here - http://www.meoko.net/interviews/imprints-records-an-exclusive-interview-podcast-with-domenico-rosa-riccardo

― sbahnhof, Monday, 18 February 2019

The tracks in this are all unreleased, with exception of one which just came out. I presume some of the others are scheduled to come out this year!

I was the Yu Su voter - melancholy Vancouver house, probably my most listened to record last year.

Quite enjoying the A Forest Of Stars's combination of black metal and Celtic folk. Maybe they really are one of those "admittedly awesome bands that would fare better with less unhinged thespianesque vocals". Or maybe they'll all be doing it next year.

Earthling Society just placed in the ILX metal poll:

ILM METAL POLL 2018 RESULTS THREAD!

That's not metal, it's space rock, it's got a multicoloured album cover

(I know, I know, that poll is metal + heavy rock... Have any voters ever tried to move the needle far away from 'metal' for spurious reasons?)

This could be metal, it's got guitars and swearing!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eeONrInKnGE

Dream Wife's my fav on the list, but I'll give 1 vote to The Adults because it's too sad to see that unloved band name get zero. It's a wonderful album. (And the record company actually forced the name on them!)

I really like Park Jiha but I think Philos, which came out last year (Communion is a reissue), is quite a bit better

Have any voters ever tried to move the needle far away from 'metal' for spurious reasons?

Many times a year, yes. Koenji Hyakkei and Machine Girl made the rollout this year alongside the usual psych-rock and emo that gets a pass (i'm not really complaining)

Metal poll tends to be less like Decibel or Terrorizer & more like the late, great Rockarolla (a point I'm about to make in the actual poll thread)

I might end up checking out that Goat Girl album next

I don't really see post-hardcore emo and psych rock as being any more distant from the tradition of Sabbath, Purple, Priest, etc than extreme black metal artists are.

Goat Girl live: one of those bands where the drummer puts it over the top.

I <3 A Forest of Stars

Senyawa just placed too in the top 20

and Yamantaka//Sonic Titan

firstly, this sunwatchers is killer !! just wow.

also was happy to discover dream wife and carla dal forno. thanks to whoever voted for those.

i had written up a list of 2-3 sentence responses to everything here (except the compilations) but lost it somehow. oh well.

the corsano et al. was my vote -- just an amazing free record. you can buy the digital album for £6 at café oto:

https://www.cafeoto.co.uk/shop/chris-corsano-bill-nace-steve-baczkowski-mystic-be/

thee open sex record also mine. very impressive krautrock workout, very focused, very groovy in spite of being almost puritanical in its devotion to repetition.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Kaku P-Model - Times = Times (Kai=Kai) - by Susumu Hirasawa - Individual tracks are online

There's a playlist of the album on YouTube atm:

- http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwlET339SalrCl_xi8mGJ2bC-3lJdYibD / (Discogs tracklisting)

https://img.discogs.com/jdjdBBcqm3vyEc7GynCROax5mEg=/fit-in/300x300/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(40)/discogs-images/R-12463681-1535801084-6743.jpeg.jpg

Heard a few more today - I can only add to the praise for the Roy Kinsey album. Tenderlonious/22archestra and the chill beats on Junes' A View sounded good too.

Hard to choose between the Job Sifre and Meg Bowles. The brief mention of Lando Chill upthread got me listening to it and I love it. Probably would have made my albums ballot.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Why'd you vote for them? They can't even play in tune.. nah, just kidding

I still need to listen to all the 3rd-placers. Mystic Beings sounded astonishing from the previews.

man, i missed this thread, the niche records are very much my thing, looking forward to exploring!