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james blake

Year End List: Best albums of 2013

by Rio Toro

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Excuse me for the misleading title, but these are not the best albums of 2013 — saying something as extensive as that would be beyond my reason for making this list. Keep in mind, this is not necessarily because this year didn’t produce albums that could be called “the best”, but because of my predicament of being only 1 person, I clearly could not have listened to, as well as properly digested every single one of them. With that being said, these 10 picks are the albums I have deemed to be the most special; the ones which have impacted me as an individual and are perfect despite any minor or major flaws they may have. Through my travels, I have come to the conclusion that best-of lists aren’t about being “correct”, but about an expression of one’s individuality, and most importantly, a representation of our freedom to love any piece of crap we choose to.

So yes, I have decided to limit this year-end list to but 10 albums. I had originally planned for it to be 20, but then I thought it might as well be 25, and if it was going to be 25, it might as well be 30, or any other random number. So I decided to do away with attempting to commemorate every album I enjoyed this year (I only had about 5 negative reviews, so there were quite a lot) and instead focus on the ones that were always in the back of my head; the ones that happened to latch on to memories and grab hold of something real that was going on in my life through these past 12 months.

What writing album reviews has really taught me though, is that there is no album no matter how horrendously bad or typical, that I can’t derive some sort of pleasure from. Maybe this means that I shouldn’t be a critic, as when I think about it, there wasn’t one album I listened to this year that some part of me doesn’t love and admire. Even the ones I wrote negative things about I find myself returning to time and time again, and it really makes me feel bad for critics who are known for writing excessively negative and scathing reviews. I mean, music is supposed to be enjoyable right? Saying something like “we need bad albums to make the good ones be good” is just ridiculous, and can be equated to a religious conservative saying that gay marriage ruins marriage for everyone else. Anyhow, I sure am happy that I enjoy music as much as I do, and I continue to pray every night that I don’t wake up deaf. I hope you’ve enjoyed reading my reviews throughout this year and can see why I’ve chosen these as my top 10.

P.S. — I cheated on this list, a lot… (There is a particularly ugly tie, I’ve included EPs, mixtapes, as well as lumped together releases from artists who had more than one release over the past 12 months)

Runner Ups: Kelela: CUT 4 ME, Neko Case: The Worse Things Get…, Baths: Obsidian, Julia Holter: Loud City Song, Forest Swords: Engravings, Wolf Eyes: No Answer Lower Floors, RP Boo: Legacy

 

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10.) James Holden: The Inheritors

I still have yet to make up my mind between whether The Inheritors is a noise record, a chill out record, or one disguised as the other. I do know, though, that it’s the reason Boards of Canada’s Tomorrow’s Harvest didn’t come anywhere close to making this list. Built out of long, single take analog keyboard improvisations, these 15 tracks are all about balancing the unfolding chaos that ensues when an artist has access to such a massive horde of equipment. James Holden fully harnesses the ability to create stirring, raw, and off balanced compositions with his virtuosic talent. No matter whether he was chronicling free jazz, hauntology, krautrock, trance or techno, The Inheritors never once lost its drive/

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9.) James Blake: Overgrown

This release doesn’t quite fit in with the others in my top 10. Unlike my other choices, Overgrown isn’t what one would call experimental. It’s not boundary pushing, and the sound it offers ventures closer to the mainstream than I’m usually accustomed to. But being the Blake fanatic that I am, I really forced myself to listen to Overgrown a lot, and its transformative secrets were soon revealed to me. Truly though, what we have here is actually a rather straightforward soul record that draws as much from Joni Mitchell as it does from the UK bass scene. If until now Blake has been in a state of constant flux, this is by far his most reserved and contemplative release yet. It’s no misstep for a producer as immaculate as Mr. blake though, as this is a record that proved to provide a draw unlike any other this year. With a chilly, isolated vibe that feels as though it was carved out of ice, to the deeply passionate and often profound lyricism, to Blake’s newfound vocal prowess that matches the oft used sub aquatic bass pulses with ease, Overgrown can stand right up with James’ greatest accomplishments.

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8.) Arcade Fire:Reflektor/Kanye West: Yeezus (tie)

I find it funny that what were arguably the two most anticipated albums of the year also turned out to be the two most polarizing. Even a mention of one of these two albums on Facebook or Youtube will get you spammed by two varying sides to the unsolvable equation. You may feel like you’ve already heard enough about them, but the way I see it, whenever the line of approval is cut in a way like it is with these two albums you know something genius must be at work. Polarization isn’t the only thing these two masterpieces have in common though. In fact, besides Yeezus being brief and Reflektor being extensive, they pretty much offer identical listening experiences. Both are obsessed with pushing boundaries, draw heavily from the influence of their producers, have thematic elements about the warped state of humanity, and proudly declare themselves to be a work of art. When it comes down to it though, whether you liked these albums or not, these were the absolute essential albums you couldn’t not listen to if you were part of 2013. I’d personally argue that this also makes them two of the most important. If this is the sound of cockiness and overindulgence and pretentiousness, these words have never sounded better and meant more.

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7.) Arca: &&&&&

This year saw some truly extraordinary and adventurous mixtapes — most notably from the likes of 18+, Le1f, and Kelela — but the most jaw dropping one for me was by far Arca’s &&&&&, whose alien tendencies have yet to diminish from my mindset throughout the extensive time I have spent with it. With this release, his production work on Yeezus and FkA Twigs’ EP2, the enigmatic producer dominated on all fronts this year and made a pretty undeniable case that he is one of the true forces to be reckoned with in electronic music. His music represents the current extreme of where beat making can go, and how far samples can be mutilated to the point of taking on entirely new forms. If you had half an hour to kill in 2013 , there were very few ways to do it that were better than this.

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6.) These New Puritans: Field of Reeds

This spot was a fight between this album and Julia Holter’s Loud City Song for the year’s best orchestrally based indie record. To be honest, Julia Holter crafted an equally compelling statement, but for some reason, I’ve listened to Field of Reeds countless more times and feel an compulsive attraction towards it. The album has a certain elusiveness to it that I still to this date am unable to shake – and I’m happy continuing this undying trend until my listens reach the triple digits. Maybe it’s just my obsessive personality, but no matter how many times I listen to Field of Reeds I’ll still be dying to listen to it again in a week no matter how many other great albums I seem to find elsewhere. The orchestrations are the perfect mix of grand and minimal, the cast of characters is varied and cohesive, and I haven’t heard the type of rare beauty present here since Sigur Ros’ finest achievement, ( ).

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5.) Oneohtrix Point Never: R Plus Seven

There were a whole lot of artist transformations that occured this year, but i’d say none were as fluent and as gapless as R Plus Seven. Daniel Lopatin’s new world was so fluent, in fact, that is was hard to see exactly how much had changed since the artist’s previous release, Replica, without comparing the two side by side. R Plus Seven brought all the abstract noises, found sounds, and vintage synthesizers of Replica hurdling into the 3rd dimension. These were some of the most labored over and sublimely intricate electronic manifestations of the year, as well as some of the most stripped down and otherworldly atmospherics — like a dystopian epic and a lazy Sunday wrapped into one. It’s the kind of music that makes my brain amazed it can even comprehend such a thing. It wasn’t necessarily the compositions that made this release so great though. For every time I listened to R Plus Seven, I found myself lost in existential thought, dreaming about some absurd idea that would never make sense within our world. This is music about escaping reality and concentrating on the components of life that aren’t really there. It’s the year’s best thinking man’s (or woman’s) record, in a sense.

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4.) Dean Blunt: The Redeemer + Stone Island

Now this guy is a real screw up, isn’t he? Everything he puts out is sorely crafted, crumbling at the edges, only warranting a spin or two for a laugh. Only somehow, through our mocking, this music manages to grab a hold of something internal, and when it hits you it might just make you realize why you love music in the first place. All joking aside though, I always “liked” The Redeemer. Truly, I did. But I didn’t think it would be an album I would enjoy coming back to time and time again as the months went on. I thought of it as being too damaged to truly love. Admittedly, its impact didn’t entirely sink in until Stone Island: a secretly released sequel which furthered the majestic orchestrated sounds of its predecessor. These two releases together continue to stand as a grand expedition of heartache, lost souls, and the power of music in overcoming life’s greatest torment: the relationship.

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3.) Burial: Truant/Rough Sleeper + Rival Dealer

The bookends of 2013 were over taken by surprise releases from London’s finest, AKA Burial. With Truant/Rough Sleeper in January and Rival Dealer in December, the producer took on a wealth of new ideas and crafted what I consider to be quite inarguably his two best releases to date. In fact, if this whole reviewing process were entirely up to me (god damn you editors!) this would have been at #1, as half of these other albums wouldn’t have even existed without Burial in the first place. Ok, maybe that’s a blanket statement, and I wouldn’t say it’s true for the next artist down the list who may have in fact…oops, I’ve already said too much! Anyway, read my reviews if you want to learn more about these stunning releases. Off to number…

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2.) The Knife: Shaking The Habitual

No other album to come out this year feels as permanent as Shaking The Habitual. Contrary to popular belief, this is a complete, unmovable statement that is 100% worthy of its sky high ambitions. Not one sound or electronic ripple could be taken away or replaced to make this release any better than it already is. And although at its surface — the schizophrenic patterns, 20 minute ambient stretches, themes about gender/identity crisis —  it may seem like a hard left turn for a supposed “pop” group, Shaking The Habitual is really just a continuation of what The Knife have always done best: atmosphere and sounds. Through their 12 year career they’ve continuously pushed and twisted and scrambled their formula until they’ve arrived at a new, ultimately meaningful destination to make an album (or opera) about. With its cinematic worthy running time and emphasis on extremely mutilated found sounds, Olaf and Karen have undoubtedly put out their most challenging and mystifying work yet, but unlike most double albums, it’s devoid of what one would call “filler”, and continues to be rewarding through innumerable amounts of playthroughs.

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1.) Autre Ne Veut: Anxiety

This was an easy pick for me. Even if “Play By Play” was the only great song on this album — which it’s absolutely not — it still would have been album of the year for being the most groundbreaking and inspiring pop song of the last several years. Autre Ne Veut speaks towards the apex of human creativity and imagination just as Grimes and Death Grips did last year. But there’s something I find even more special about Autre though. The way he channels all his energy into belting out one awkwardly sung phrase after another; the way he grabs hold of the listener’s attention through abrasiveness, only to come off like Whitney Houston a moment later; and how he does all of this with a desperate, bleeding intensity that lays his innards scattered across the floor for us to inspect. As one would expect, the effect this sort of music has is beyond polarizing, but luckily, in my case, this demented form of pop music gives me insurmountable pleasure. These are the songs stuck in my head all day, the ones I (try to) sing in the shower, as well as the ones that inspire me to try my hand at creating my own “pop” music. Autre Ne Veut may not be the future of where pop music is headed, but with Anxiety, Arthur Ashin has made a perfect and masterful album of what pop music is truly about, as well as the heights that this tainted genre can still take us in 2013.

Filed Under: BREAKING NEWS, ENTERTAINMENT, MUSIC, OPINION, REVIEWS Tagged With: 2013, arca, arcade fire, Autre Ne Veut, best albums, burial, dean blunt, james blake, james holden, kanye, music, oneohtrix point never, the knife, these new puritans

Album Review: Airhead – For Years

by Rio Toro

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Airhead: For Years

Similar Artists: James Blake, Mount Kimbie, Nicolas Jaar, Boards of Canada

Genre: Downtempo, (Dubstep?), Organic Electronica

Label: R&S

 

There’s no real recipe for creating great music — things that work well for some artists don’t work at all for others, and that extra oomph that makes music tick tends to just come from something within the artist’s blood. However, in 2013, if there is some kind of trick to get an artists’ career rolling, it’s through the use of restraint. Of course, it isn’t as easy as it sounds, because knowing when to hold back and when to release is where the true talent lies. Probably the best example (within recent memory) that proved the powers of well harnessed restraint would be Nicolas Jaar’s 5 hour interdisciplinary performance at MoMa PS1. Through the holy-fuck-this-is-long running time, he only reached a handful of climactic phases, but due to his skill at building tension, the music never failed to entice — surprisingly, my worn legs never managed to fail out on me either. Using this “restraint” has become especially important for virtuosic musicians such as Nicolas Jaar or James Blake, because when they aren’t showing off, we have time to focus on other facets of their music, like their brilliant use of sound design and production techniques — when they finally do let loose as the climax arrives, the likelihood that we will be blown away is magnified tenfold.

Rob Mcandrews, AKA Airhead, is the long time collaborator and touring guitarist of James Blake, and the two have worked together for years now, starting with the “Pembroke” single released in early 2010. Before now, Mcandrews had only released a handful of singles, most notably the Karen O sampling “Wait” and the more beat driven “Pyramid Lake”, both of which are featured here. Due to his steady relationship with Blake, and his undeniably similar musical style (excepting vocals), you would imagine that his debut full length would mine similar territory: albeit of a more guitar inclined variation. While that is true in some respects, For Years is far from being 10 repeats of “Lindisfarne” (one of the two artists’ most notable collaborations). The ten tracks here are actually rather diverse, as we hear lovely acoustic guitar, off kilter vocals, big beat breakdowns, robot symphonies, and an array of ambient wash. Mcandrews manages to sound similar to his peers without quite being a rehash of them, and it is why For Years is an almost instantly likable collection of tunes.

The first thing you’ll notice about the album is how well made the tracks are. Each one almost feels like a distinct single; which in fact turns out to be both a positive and negative when you look at the album as a whole. While the beats are often big and luxurious, and the effects crackle and fizz with the necessary depth, there isn’t much holding this album together as a unified piece (possibly the idiosyncrasies of the sampling?). Secondly, while several of the tracks do contain the aspect of controlled restraint that I lauded earlier in this review, the concept doesn’t reach across tracks to build any kind of album climax. While “Fault Line” and the previously released “Pyramid Lake” do attempt to heighten our sense of ecstacy by being bolder and more quickly paced than the rest of the bunch, overall they fail because they don’t sound like a continuation off of the previous tracks. This lack of a proper beginning, middle or end left me occasionally feeling lost while listening to the album, and I often had to reassert myself into the music rather than be whisked away by it. Some albums can work by simply being a track for track compilation of an artists’ work, but with this kind of organic sounding electronic music something feels missing from the complete package.

A lot of what makes music successful is the point it is released in time. This year we have seen releases from both James Blake and Mount Kimbie — the two acts most closely related to Airhead in terms of sound. Although this music isn’t dull, it doesn’t stand out like it would have if it was released a few years back, and Infuriatingly enough, some of these tracks, such as “Wait”, have supposedly been entirely finished since 2009, so it really is unfortunate that it took so damn long for this album to come out. One can imagine that hearing this music even a year ago (a year that was quite devoid of downtempo electronic music) would have left a more ingrained impression. Airhead doesn’t seem to care about his pacing issues though; he seems quite content being indefinitely compared to James Blake as long as he gets to release his own material every once in a while. On For Years he proves that he is an intelligent producer capable of tackling various moods and styles, it’s just too bad his contemporaries have proved that twice over already.

 

Track Listing:

1.) Wait*

2.) Milkola Bottle

3.) Callow*

4.) Masami

5.) Pyramid Lake*

6.) Azure Race

7.) Autumn*

8.) Fault Line*

9.) Lightmeters

10.) Knives

 

Album Highlight – *

Filed Under: ENTERTAINMENT, MUSIC, REVIEWS Tagged With: airhead, Album Review, downtempo, electronic, for years, james blake

Album Review: James Blake – Overgrown

by Rio Toro

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James Blake: Overgrown

Similar Artists: Joni Mitchell

Genre: Singer-Songwriter, R&B

Label: Polydor

 

Over the past two years, there is no album in my library that I have played as many times as James Blake’s eponymous debut album. For the record, I have listened to it upwards of 200 times, yet I have still been unable to release myself from its grasp. The sounds seem to always be in the back of my mind, haunting me to take one more listen. And how could I refuse such an offer? After all, each listen was sure to reveal yet another layer of Blake’s virtuosic keyboard playing and brilliantly designed chord patterns. Although upon its release, many referred to it as a singer-songwriter/dubstep hybrid, it actually exists outside both of those genres. After my long term examination, it is quite clear to me that James Blake was the best album of 2011. *Hands over award*

Unfortunately, many others do not share my opinion. As critically acclaimed as the album was, it also received a resounding amount of backlash. As a means of therapy I will release my anger at the tyrants who hated on James Blake now: Shame on you fools! How dare you say that the album is overly spacious and full of half-finished songs? Seriously…who do you people think you are? I should come over there and beat your whiny asses right now! And don’t even say that his EPs were better, because they don’t hold a candle to the beauty and originality of this full length! And so what if I’m an addict who needs psychological help? At least I can tell a good album when I hear it. Grrrrr……………..

Ahem, so anyway, you could understand my intense anticipation for his 2nd full length. In hindsight, based on how rapidly this producer changes his artistic direction, I should have known that Overgrown wouldn’t consist of the same pleasures of his debut. Although this will be seen as a more subtle departure for him compared to his genre shifting string of 2010 EPs, this is without a doubt an entirely different beast than its predecessor.

Although we haven’t heard James Blake go full on dubstep since the very early days of his career, his music has always made it easy to identify him as one of the most talented bass producers in the world. This is not the case with Overgrown, as Mr. Blake is much more concerned with embracing his inner Joni Mitchell than repeating his previous successes. This relates to his newfound vocal prowess and song-writing ability. On the “Enough Thunder” EP, he released a wondrous cover of Joni’s “A Case of You”, and on this album it seems she has made her mark as one of his primary influences. In the relatively short time since James Blake, he has learned an astounding amount of vocal tricks; each one perfectly complementing his electronic palette. As nice as his voice was on James Blake, the real surprise there was that he knew how to sing at all. Here, he delivers a much more commanding and difficult performance that even overshadows his production.

Don’t get me wrong, the production is still stellar, but more often than not, the keyboards are used as leverage for the vocals rather than taking the lead. A large portion of the album represents shimmering minimalism evocative of cold desolate landscapes. As atmospheric as it is, Blake never truly shows off with his keyboard skills, instead, he has crafted a record that is much more moving and intimate than his previous work. Since many songs seem to relate to aspects of his own life, it will also most likely go down as his most personal.

Aside from the vocals, the album’s defining feature is the lyricism. Well over half the tracks have analysis worthy lyrics. I certainly don’t remember using the word provocative to describe a James Blake track before. Through “I am Sold”, Blake repeats the line /and we lay nocturnal, speculate what we feel/, later in the song, he brings up that we need a /constellation that shows us where we are/. The album’s main theme seems to be the inability to convey emotions. The album references this in regards to how we talk to other people as well as how we see ourselves. On the piano led “DLM”, Blake pleads /Don’t let me hurt you more, it’s at your stare and at your core/. On the album’s astronomical centerpiece “Retrograde”, Blake sings about finding ourselves by separating from the physical world /Suddenly I’m hit! It’s the Starkness of the Dawn, you’re friends are gone, and your friends won’t come, show me where you fit in/. It’s the album’s defining and most contemplative moment – it’s also the most profound thing Blake has written to date.

Oh yeah, and there’s also a RZA track that kinda, sorta ruins the mood, (although not as badly as you might expect) – but in the end, it’s not really worth dwelling over. James Blake has pulled off the  impossible. Once again, he has made an album that exceeds our expectations –  but not because we didn’t think he could do it, it’s because we didn’t know he could in the first place. Now we are left to ponder what other skills this mutant must have hidden up his sleeves. Here’s to finding out in 2015!  *cheers*

Track Listing:

1.) Overgrown*

2.) I Am Sold*

3.) Life Round Here

4.) Take a Fall for Me (Feat. RZA.)

5.) Retrograde*

6.) DLM

7.) Digital Lion*

8.) Voyeur*

9.) To the Last

10.) Our Love Comes Back

* – Album Highlight

Filed Under: BREAKING NEWS, ENTERTAINMENT, MUSIC, REVIEWS Tagged With: Album Review, james blake, music, overgrown

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