2023-12-31 11:39:10
| HM | EPs | 50 – 41 | 40 – 31 | 30 – 21 | 20 – 11 | 10 – 01 | The Playlist |
10.
Sprain
–
The Lamb as Effigy
Review | Spotify |
Irony of fate? Justament, when Master Gira takes on a tired “When the other has come/ Then Michael is done/ Is done, is done…“, and they said “the other“ inevitably in Alex Kent and his (take a breath!) The Lamb As Effigy, or Three Hundred And Fifty XOXOXOS For A Spark Union With My Darling Divine in so furiously veritable in many ways Swans-Just grown up band Sprain had to believe to recognize, the chief eccentric (even for [Ex-]Colleague April”I was kicked out of sprain three weeks ago and i have no idea what’s up with today’s announcement.“ Gerloff surprises) with a (irritatingly pluralistically articulated) final line: “We have decided that there is no longer a logical path forward for the band Sprain. Thank you all very much for the constant support over the years. We will cherish those memories forever!“
An impulsiveness that at the same time cannot be reconciled at all and yet also absolutely with the improvised-constructed eclecticism Sprain on The Lamb As Effigy as a theatrical, talk-singing overdose of everything that an art school can attend in the field of tension between experimental noise rock, pretentious post punk and avant-garde no wave. As a consistently coherent paradox, the Californians’ second studio album not only feels like a magnum opus that is overwhelming in its volume, following which everything has actually been said, but also leaves room for improvement with enough loose adjusting screws to make it seem almost certain that that Kent will probably follow on from this with his next project.
09.
Soastasphrenas
–
Moirae
Review | Spotify |
349 Take long konnten Soastasphrenas fuel the assumption that began on January 6th Moirae would have to do with probably the best album that will be released into the wilderness of screamo and emoviolence in 2023.
And that despite the fact that no weak competing works were published over the next few months. About bands whose names were easier to pronounce and whose albums you might actually put on your record shelf instead of mourning limited edition cassette recordings.
But so mangy Moirae A truly unbridled passion and energy is ignited in its impulsive moments, and almost horrified into melancholy hysteria by a melancholy-inducing beauty in its quiet moments, the Berliners juggle here with a force that dwarfs everything else, which has been caused by the excessive confrontation since its appearance with these 22 minutes something in the perception of Soastasphrenas-Debuts has changed: with each passage you think you can see more clearly that you might be dealing with a modern classic of the genre.
08.
Kali Malone
–
Does Spring Hide Its Joy
Review | Spotify |
Does Spring Hide Its Joy is not an album to be surrendered to lightly: 3 tracks over more than as many hours capture a maximum effect of minimalist drone majesty along microscopically shifted frequencies and never-tangible classical and soundtrack expertise.
A consuming meditation in which form and content go hand in hand: Where in music (no, this term actually hardly fits here – more like: beguiling soundscape!), apart from following the eternal vibrations of a single note, not much seems to happen, But what happens to you is even more so – a variation of the observer effect!
Malone („tuned sine wave oscillators“) fills with Healthy O)))-Couple Stephen O’Malley (Electric Guitar) and cellist Lucy Railton as accompanists the thoughts and physically envelops, says “The music is a study in harmonics and non-linear composition with a heightened focus on just intonation and beating interference patterns“ and turns the monotony into a hypnotic mantra in such a matter-of-fact uneventfulness that Does Spring Hide Its Joy like few albums function on a meditative level.
The first glimpses show that the now married couple Malone and O’Malley are becoming a true power couple All Life Long close: the work of the Swede by choice seems to have been raised to a new level by her 2023 magnum opus.
07.
Soldier
–
Eat me
Review | Spotify |
The 23-year-old Chinese linguist and Greece fan Liu Zhenyang has his two playgrounds Vitriolic Sage (for that with dream road but there was still time) and soldier change positions in terms of the role as the previous main and side project and which is now commonly referred to as Hoplites (which, according to Wikipedia, means heavily armed members of the main body of the Greek armies of the Archaic and Classical periods) sent the well-known one-man band on an eclectic journey for an album trilogy.
This starts on Fake und findet über T ni, beschreitet dabei einen Spannungsbogen, der assoziativ aus (einen Schatten auf Theophonos throwing your own restart) Serpent Column-Worshipping mit Vector‘esque sophistication and Deathspell Omega-Toxicity to psychedelic from Orange Pazuzu grows, and celebrates tech-disso-death-thrash as a great spectacle with a compact move to the goal.
In order not to let a third of the top ten be taken over by this formative Triumphirat run, the middle part of the triptych, in its status as a zenith of work to date, acts as a deserved placeholder for this year’s output soldier.
06.
King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard
–
PetroDragonic Apocalypse
Review | Spotify |
Fun fact: at the end of 2023 King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard almost as many studio albums as the rest of the top 10 on this list combined.
The fact that practically every single one of these 25 records, in addition to the always convincing quality that speaks for itself, also provides the necessary new impulses so that things never get boring when looking at the big picture is a point that also records record number 26 of the Australians are eagerly awaiting.
Between the two best live albums of the year (perhaps more correct: at least this decade?) in the form of the mega recordings from Red Rocks 22 Amphitheater as well as Chicago 23and a techno trip into rapping electronics that doesn’t require an ironic break (The Silver Cord as Yang to the previous Yin) Stu & Co. have (watch out, take a breath once more!) PetroDragonic Apocalypse; or, Dawn of Eternal Night: An Annihilation of Planet Earth and the Beginning of Merciless Damnation more than just optimizing the promises of Infest the Rats‘ Nest recorded: things are raging down under as if they had to High on Fire-Thrash-with proggy Tool-Quotes go sledding and simply have uninhibited fun with coherence, enthusiasm and intensity along uninhibited guitar descents instead of underlining the aggressiveness in metal. The pit becomes a party!
05.
Blur
–
The Ballad of Darren
Review | Spotify |
Surrounded by the satellites Cracker Island, Radio Songs and The Waeve also predominates with a gap of around a year to the release date The Ballad of Darren not the anger regarding that Blur the fabulous trio The Rabbi, The Swan and Sticks and Stones were quickly wasted as bonus tracks instead of integrating it into the shortest album in the band’s history and thus also made the half-baked sequencing (which thwarts a higher positioning here, where the record would be at number 2 in the charts in the tracklist readjusted for personal use) more rounded to design.
But the joy that the Brits are on their second long player since the comeback The Magic Whip (20175) flanked by the single that introduces the summer and never wants to disappear from heavy rotation The Narcissist show such a natural relaxedness in dealing with their iconic status: the instant fan favorites give each other the handle (on the most listened to album of the year) without Blur the same criticisms that Damon Albarn recently made regarding the Rolling Stones before he adds succinctly regarding his own core group before a new break: “It’s time to wrap up this campaign. It’s too much for me.“
If this is actually the end of it for good Blur should be, only the memory will remain that it was a beautiful ending. Prepare with this outlook The Heights more goosebumps than ever.
04.
Closet Witch
–
Chiaroscuro
Grindcore continues to experience a euphoric renaissance, and the stream of outstanding genre releases has simply not stopped, at least for more than a year.
That Coronet Juniper was expected with the most euphoria in advance, it was only obvious given the history of the band coming together for one last hurrah. But flanked by attacks like The Weight of Being or 1.8.7. Myself However, you always had to reckon with insider tips from the background.
And yet they (also) caught on the Screamo Experts label Zegema Beach native Closet Witch got off on the wrong foot with their second album. With guitars that mop up the dirtiest floor of filthy mosh pits with noise morass. A voice like a madly barking fury ride. A rhythm section that blasts with such intense energy that even old scene veterans with bumblebees in their asses explode and turn their own four walls into hits like You, Me & Venus in Decay want to disassemble, no – have to: it can hardly be more compelling than this second work!
Closet Witch As scene stealers of the current grindcore show, they are out of the shadow of the real ones Cloud Rat-Heirs pressed on par with the spearhead of the genre. That Dylan Walker (despite invariably showing adrenaline injections). No Love Lost, Failure Will Follow and The Sin of Human Frailty) delivers its best feature this year here, is a good symbol of the immense level at which Chiaroscuro operates – that the record found its ideal title together with the wonderful artwork in the late Renaissance, possibly also: what should come following this?
03.
Panopticon
–
The Rime of Memory
Review | Spotify |
Austin Lunn takes his time almost until the last moment to (probably only as a logical result) almost achieve a start-to-finish victory with his December release (ideally timed to the mood of the music) in review of the year: Something better than The Rime of Memory, This showpiece of modern, American black metal, interspersed with elements of post-rock, folk and Americana, has not happened to the genre in particular for a long time, and has hardly happened in 2023 in general – which also shows that creating lists before the final month of the year is bad manners .
Especially as a complete work, as an epic and a veritable blockbuster, this album deserves so much respect now, and not only retroactively, as a reminder of its advantages, even if it is the best The Rime of Memory Perhaps the fact is that, at least in the medium term, there is no detrimental expiry date on these almost 76, the previous history of Panopticon culminating minutes.
02.
Slowdive
–
Everything is Alive
Review | Spotify |
According to current findings, shoegaze is more popular than ever before (and thanks to younger groups like Flyying Colours or even younger epigones a la Rippedd There is no generational conflict to contend with either), but Slowdive Therefore, do not choose the security option in the comfort zone: Everything is Alive expands the band’s style-defining signature sound even further than the self-titled comeback from 2017 into the spheres of kraut and post rock, ambient and synth pop, and is aesthetically lighter The Cure, Notwist or Beach House in the sea of stars, before the second biggest shoegaze band of all time, alongside Slowdive, comes to mind as a reference.
At first glance, it doesn’t seem like such an instant evergreen Sugar for the Pill in the structure, each of the eight numbers claims the seal of approval as an “exceptional song”, but overall there is a nevertheless familiar collection of secret catchy tunes and clear hits (Kisses) and pure goosebumps magic (Prayer Remembered) under the album’s not completely round arc from great songwriting art to ethereal perfection of form.
The question of whether Rachel Goswell, Neil Halstead and Christian Savill, Nick Chaplin and Simon Scott are anachronistically ahead of the times and their trends with this development still only arises to a limited extent, because more than anything else they feel Everything is Alivewhich has become a reliable companion since its release, feels like a familiar reunion with a friend you grew fond of long ago.
01.
Khanate
–
To Be Cruel
Review | Spotify |
After 17 long years (leaving aside any on-off appearances over a decade ago), you really didn’t have to expect anything from once more Khanate listen. How good the chances are To Be Cruel However, to be back at the top of the podium in the ranking in the personal final accounts of the past twelve music months was not that unlikely, at the latest following the first round, which these 61 minutes that appeared out of nowhere were given on the (initially only digital) turntable .
Fan glasses or not, (and the previous masterpieces by Alan Dubin, James Plotkin, Stephen O’Malley and Tim Wyskids, re-released via Sacred Bones, may have earned an irrefutable place of honor in the disturbing abyss of the heart through their active participation in musical socialization actually demand the best album from an iconic band and hardly deserve anything less.
Khanate Strictly speaking, they don’t play more than three pieces that at first glance only serve the group’s traditional trademarks (which would be absolutely clear because no other formation out there sounds, can sound!, like Khanate), but on the other hand, with a more mature and complex approach to the work, the nihilistic character of this exorcism in sound is distilled in a way that is more impressive than ever in terms of sound technology.
Yes, it’s just so damn good to have this band back, because it hurts maybe even more today than it did around two decades ago.
| HM | EPs | 50 – 41 | 40 – 31 | 30 – 21 | 20 – 11 | 10 – 01 | The Playlist |
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